Latest / The Trauma Therapist / The Guest Host Series Christina P. Kantzavelos, LCSW interviews Lauren Auer

Transcript

The Guest Host Series Christina P. Kantzavelos, LCSW interviews Lauren Auer · The Trauma Therapist

0:00
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Trauma Therapist Podcast. My name is Gaming Person.
0:04
Speaker 1: I interview incredible people who've dedicated their lives to helping
0:07
Speaker 1: those who've been impacted by trauma. A big thank you
0:11
Speaker 1: to our sponsors and our guests who are supporting this show.
0:16
Speaker 2: Hey Lauren, Hi, I am so excited to have you
0:20
Speaker 2: on because I've been a big fan for a long time.
0:24
Speaker 2: I think you have so much wisdom that you get
0:29
Speaker 2: to share with us, I know, like via via Instagram,
0:31
Speaker 2: and I'd love for people to get to know you better.
0:34
Speaker 3: You are the trauma you are the Trauma Therapist. Welcome,
0:38
Speaker 3: Welcome on, Thanks for having me. I'm always happy to
0:41
Speaker 3: talk about this stuff. Man.
0:44
Speaker 2: We kind of discussed earlier, like the way I found
0:46
Speaker 2: you was through this one. I think it was a
0:49
Speaker 2: real of you throwing the DSM in the trash and
0:53
Speaker 2: and you're like, well, it's back up there. It was
0:55
Speaker 2: just for the video, yeah, but I was like, yes, yes, yes,
1:01
Speaker 2: because it isn't everything right. The DSM doesn't doesn't have
1:06
Speaker 2: it all figured out. That's why we have we constantly
1:10
Speaker 2: have new additions coming out and and we also talked
1:13
Speaker 2: about the fact that you know, we have clients that
1:16
Speaker 2: go on to you know, we call it, I call
1:18
Speaker 2: it TikTok University, Instagram university, and they, you know, they'll
1:22
Speaker 2: come to me and say, I diagnose themselves. Like you
1:25
Speaker 2: mentioned borderline earlier, I mean, what are your what are
1:28
Speaker 2: your thoughts actually on that of folks using using these
1:34
Speaker 2: platforms for educational purposes.
1:36
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's really interesting. I'm actually I'm working on an
1:41
Speaker 3: article this week for my substack about this. So it's
1:44
Speaker 3: like definitely forefront of my mind because I feel like
1:47
Speaker 3: I wrestle with this a lot myself as somebody who's
1:50
Speaker 3: kind of ended up in the you know, social media
1:53
Speaker 3: creator space in the mental health world, and because it's
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Speaker 3: so important to me personally to not only give accurate information,
2:07
Speaker 3: but make sure that it's current in research backed. And
2:13
Speaker 3: you know, I usually draw inspiration from things I'm actually
2:16
Speaker 3: seeing in sessions with clients and the work that I do.
2:20
Speaker 3: And I think that in one way, people seeing more
2:26
Speaker 3: of that kind of content come up on their feeds,
2:30
Speaker 3: it helps them to kind of normalize Oh wow, I
2:32
Speaker 3: do that too, or oh, like you know the real
2:36
Speaker 3: you talked about in me tossing the DSM five in
2:39
Speaker 3: the trash, you know, it was like a funny video,
2:43
Speaker 3: but it really does reflect a lot of my own
2:47
Speaker 3: personal feelings as a therapist and how I practice to
2:53
Speaker 3: you know, there was so much emphasis put on diagnosis
2:57
Speaker 3: in grad school and then you know licenser testing, which
3:01
Speaker 3: I do think obviously there is a role.
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Speaker 2: For that, but.
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Speaker 3: You know, now that I'm really working deeply in trauma,
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Speaker 3: I really take that stuff with a grain of salt.
3:13
Speaker 3: And I think sometimes people seeing a video like that,
3:16
Speaker 3: they might think, oh, wow, like therapy can look like that.
3:19
Speaker 3: Or my last therapist or five therapists all were very
3:24
Speaker 3: focused on my diagnosis and stuff, and I didn't really
3:27
Speaker 3: feel like we were getting the root of it, you know,
3:29
Speaker 3: So being able to put stuff out there like that
3:30
Speaker 3: where hopefully people can maybe see, you know, if they
3:35
Speaker 3: have become kind of jaded on therapy, that maybe there's
3:38
Speaker 3: people out there who do things differently and have a
3:40
Speaker 3: different philosophy on things to hopefully renew hope. And I
3:42
Speaker 3: do think I see that a lot. But with short
3:46
Speaker 3: form content, I think it's easy to number one, you know,
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Speaker 3: I can't obviously cite every resource and put all the
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Speaker 3: disclaimers up there and all the stuff, you know, so
4:01
Speaker 3: it's helpful, but I think sometimes you know, people can
4:05
Speaker 3: get in that echo chamber where if they start liking
4:09
Speaker 3: certain videos on certain topics and they're getting fed more
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Speaker 3: and more and more, and assuming that it's all accurate,
4:16
Speaker 3: which you know, anybody can put any video they want
4:19
Speaker 3: to on the Internet, and sometimes I think it's just
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Speaker 3: more nuanced than what TikTok tells them they're diagnosis is.
4:30
Speaker 3: And so it's it's a it's a tricky thing. It's
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Speaker 3: a slippery slope, a little bit of trying to figure out. Okay,
4:37
Speaker 3: it is helpful in some senses, but I don't want
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Speaker 3: to like add to the noise that can become kind
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Speaker 3: of problematic.
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Speaker 2: Mm hmmmmmm totally. I mean I've I have found things
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Speaker 2: out via TikTok real real and sorry what are they called.
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Speaker 3: I'm like, I don't know whatever, TikTok videos, videos, yeah,
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Speaker 3: Instagram reels.
5:02
Speaker 2: I'm like, I never, I've never heard of this before,
5:05
Speaker 2: you know. And then I'll go to my research and
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Speaker 2: I'm like, so interesting because that's not something we were taught.
5:09
Speaker 2: And we were talking about this also earlier in grad school.
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Speaker 2: You know, it's very I feel like our education even
5:15
Speaker 2: was someemi limited because, like you said, there was a
5:18
Speaker 2: focus on diagnostics and the DSM more so than there
5:24
Speaker 2: was on on trauma and you know, attachment and how
5:28
Speaker 2: that all can affect us in life. And you know
5:33
Speaker 2: so often too, you know, even in my own sessions,
5:35
Speaker 2: it's like is this is this the diagnosis or is
5:38
Speaker 2: this is this the trauma? Like symptoms from the trauma.
5:41
Speaker 2: And I also have seen with my own eyes and
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Speaker 2: you can let me know if this has been in
5:46
Speaker 2: your case as well. When you know, we've been doing
5:48
Speaker 2: a lot of trauma somatic informed work for a long time,
5:52
Speaker 2: those symptoms seem to calm down where they don't even
5:55
Speaker 2: meet criteria for said diagnoses. So was it, again the
5:59
Speaker 2: diagnoses or was it the unhealed trauma?
6:02
Speaker 3: Mm hmm. Yeah, it's a little bit of like which
6:05
Speaker 3: came first, the chicken or the egg. And also I
6:09
Speaker 3: have to like remain open minded to the fact that
6:11
Speaker 3: sometimes it is legitimately both right, Like like somebody could
6:17
Speaker 3: you know, be on the like autism spectrum just have
6:21
Speaker 3: autism and also trauma or adh sheet and trauma, you know,
6:25
Speaker 3: like these things can coexist and it's not always one
6:28
Speaker 3: or the other. But you're right, Like, I see that
6:32
Speaker 3: what you just described in my practice all the time,
6:35
Speaker 3: where you know, maybe we're not even focusing on let's say,
6:41
Speaker 3: like ADHD type symptoms, but doing trauma work sometimes like
6:47
Speaker 3: actually reduces some of those symptoms that show up as
6:51
Speaker 3: ADHD symptoms. So I kind of I have the philosophy.
6:57
Speaker 3: I heard it somewhere. I don't know who said it,
6:59
Speaker 3: but like you do need to know why it is
7:01
Speaker 3: to know that it is. So like I try not
7:05
Speaker 3: to focus too much on the well, what do we
7:07
Speaker 3: label this? Is this trauma? Is this a personality disorder?
7:13
Speaker 3: Is this, you know, a health condition, traumatic brain injury?
7:18
Speaker 3: It kind of like, at the end of the day,
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Speaker 3: for me, it doesn't matter as much because I know
7:24
Speaker 3: that they have the symptoms that they have and it
7:28
Speaker 3: doesn't change a lot for me to put a label
7:30
Speaker 3: on it. So I'm just kind of meeting them where
7:33
Speaker 3: they're at with that. And I realize different people, you know,
7:38
Speaker 3: that is a little bit more complicated or sometimes people
7:40
Speaker 3: are very interested in having that label put on it,
7:45
Speaker 3: but that's just they're not going to get that from
7:47
Speaker 3: me because that's not what my focus is.
7:49
Speaker 2: Mm hmmm h And yeah, And I think you mentioned
7:52
Speaker 2: like the intersection of it all. Could it could be
7:55
Speaker 2: something medical, It could be something truly diagnostic, It could
7:58
Speaker 2: be something you know, that was induced by via trauma,
8:01
Speaker 2: different types of traumas, be it physical, emotional, psychological, et cetera.
8:06
Speaker 2: So yeah, it's and that's that's that holistic approach that
8:10
Speaker 2: I think you also kind of offer of looking at everything,
8:13
Speaker 2: not just not just one one thing. And yeah, I
8:18
Speaker 2: have to ask like, what what got you to this point? Right?
8:21
Speaker 2: Like what led you onto this path into where you
8:24
Speaker 2: are today?
8:26
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was honestly a little bit unintentional. In graduate school,
8:33
Speaker 3: you know, we have to have internships, and I thought
8:38
Speaker 3: I didn't want to work with kids. I thought I
8:39
Speaker 3: didn't want to work with couples. I didn't want to
8:41
Speaker 3: do any really complex stuff. I was kind of picky
8:44
Speaker 3: going into it. But you know, joke was on me
8:47
Speaker 3: because you can't really be picky in that process because
8:49
Speaker 3: whatever internships are available in your areas, whatever internships are
8:53
Speaker 3: available in your area. And so I ended up getting
8:55
Speaker 3: an internship at an agency specifically that worked with kids
9:00
Speaker 3: and juvenile sex offenders in their families. And I thought
9:05
Speaker 3: that was going to be awful and I'm just going
9:08
Speaker 3: to like kind of grin and Barrett, get my internship
9:10
Speaker 3: hours and get through it. And I ended up kind
9:13
Speaker 3: of falling in love with it. I really thought it
9:17
Speaker 3: was so fascinating to be able to see trauma from
9:20
Speaker 3: those different angles, working with the offender as well as
9:23
Speaker 3: the victims and their families, so these kind of different
9:26
Speaker 3: angles to the same thing. And then from there I
9:30
Speaker 3: worked at a domestic violence shelter and a rape crisis
9:34
Speaker 3: agency doing therapy, and that also gave me a really
9:39
Speaker 3: interesting look at trauma because we offered free services for
9:44
Speaker 3: all ages. So I mean we had clients as young
9:46
Speaker 3: as three and as old as like in their eighties,
9:49
Speaker 3: you know, So sometimes it was super acute, this just happened.
9:53
Speaker 3: Sometimes it was this stuff that had happened earlier in
9:56
Speaker 3: life that people were just now addressing. And then we
10:00
Speaker 3: did you know, crisis work, like we'd show up in
10:02
Speaker 3: the emergency room for evidence collection, so some of those
10:05
Speaker 3: things of like being like right there as it's happening.
10:10
Speaker 3: And then I became the director of that agency, where
10:12
Speaker 3: I was working a lot with community members like police
10:15
Speaker 3: officers and hospital staff and teachers on training them in
10:20
Speaker 3: what trauma is and so kind of seeing that other
10:24
Speaker 3: layer of the vicarious trauma of these people working in
10:27
Speaker 3: this space. So I kind of got this like unintentional
10:30
Speaker 3: crash course in all the different ways that trauma can
10:33
Speaker 3: look and yeah, it was just really fascinating to me.
10:37
Speaker 3: So from there I just opened my own practice and
10:40
Speaker 3: here we are.
10:41
Speaker 2: And here we are. But in terms of what you offer, right,
10:44
Speaker 2: it's it's a mixture, it's brain spotting, it's cap tell us,
10:48
Speaker 2: tell us about your practice.
10:50
Speaker 3: Yeah.
10:51
Speaker 2: Yeah, I got trained in EMDR.
10:54
Speaker 3: Back when I was at that agency, and part of
10:56
Speaker 3: it at the time was like it was such a
10:59
Speaker 3: buzz were you know, it was everyone was kind of
11:02
Speaker 3: excited about it. It felt a little bit newer, at
11:05
Speaker 3: least I think it had reached main street and main
11:10
Speaker 3: street enough at that point to where like our funding
11:12
Speaker 3: agencies were allowing us to like fund that training for
11:16
Speaker 3: the therapist to do it, and so of course I
11:18
Speaker 3: did it. It was you know, free, free through the agency,
11:22
Speaker 3: and it was just really fascinating in a totally different
11:25
Speaker 3: way to look at trauma because it is pretty much
11:29
Speaker 3: the opposite of talk therapy. And so that was interesting.
11:34
Speaker 3: And then my mom's best friend is a therapist and
11:37
Speaker 3: was really interested in brain spotting, was really fascinated with it,
11:41
Speaker 3: and she was really trying to convince me to take
11:44
Speaker 3: the training, and I was like, it kind of sounds
11:46
Speaker 3: a lot like EMDR. I don't know if I really
11:47
Speaker 3: need that, but she was like so insistent about it.
11:50
Speaker 3: She was like, no, seriously, I will pay for you
11:52
Speaker 3: to do it. And I was like, okay, I mean
11:56
Speaker 3: I need the CEUs. So I did that, and she
12:00
Speaker 3: was right. I fell in love with it right away.
12:04
Speaker 3: And yeah, I think just even doing those two trainings
12:08
Speaker 3: just completely changed my mindset and understanding the brain and
12:13
Speaker 3: its function a lot deeper, and why talk therapy has
12:18
Speaker 3: so many limitations around it, and that kind of, you know,
12:22
Speaker 3: snowballed into looking at CAP kindomine assistant psychotherapy because it
12:26
Speaker 3: felt very similar in that way of kind of getting
12:30
Speaker 3: out of the logical thinking part of the brain and
12:33
Speaker 3: allowing you know, the rest of your brain to do
12:36
Speaker 3: what it's designed to do. And so really I kind
12:40
Speaker 3: of put those things in the same category and I
12:44
Speaker 3: use them interchangeably. It kind of is like whatever the
12:47
Speaker 3: client might gravitate more towards.
12:53
Speaker 2: Yeah, and and I know we also mentioned this earlier,
12:57
Speaker 2: like I say, like, we can't quite talk ourselves out
13:00
Speaker 2: of our traumas, right, which is like a cognitive behavioral
13:03
Speaker 2: therapy approach, which is why I find it to be
13:06
Speaker 2: quite limiting. It's why you know, people come to me
13:08
Speaker 2: and they're like, I did CBT for so many years
13:11
Speaker 2: and I'm still suffering. You know, with these with these symptoms,
13:16
Speaker 2: could you explain I know you use them interchangeably, but
13:19
Speaker 2: can you explain why they are effective? And like who right?
13:25
Speaker 2: For example, kennemine assisted therapy might not be the right
13:29
Speaker 2: fit for everyone, Like how do you decide who it
13:32
Speaker 2: is a right fit for or not?
13:34
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I mean I think I definitely give people
13:39
Speaker 3: like an overview of education of what the similarities and
13:42
Speaker 3: differences are. I've found that in my practice a lot
13:45
Speaker 3: of clients are coming to me at the place where
13:50
Speaker 3: maybe they've done a lot of talk therapy and they're
13:52
Speaker 3: still feeling stuck. And I think, you know, those types
13:59
Speaker 3: of modalities are so good for that because it gets
14:05
Speaker 3: beyond the stuckness, like there's a reason that they're stuck there.
14:09
Speaker 3: And so you know, with with EMDR, with brainspotting, with
14:12
Speaker 3: kedemine assisted psychotherapy, for all the therapy I do, I'm
14:18
Speaker 3: always watching people's nervous system state, so I can just
14:23
Speaker 3: tell like are they anxious, are they buzzing? Are they
14:26
Speaker 3: shut down? Are they oscillating? Back and forth? Like That's
14:30
Speaker 3: just something that I'm very tuned in on. EMDR in
14:35
Speaker 3: particular works really good. I think when someone has a
14:37
Speaker 3: specific stuck memory, like every time they think of a
14:42
Speaker 3: certain event, they just get you know, activated and overwhelmed,
14:47
Speaker 3: and it kind of helps to bring down that activation there.
14:54
Speaker 3: EMDR is a lot more structured, it's a lot more steps.
14:58
Speaker 3: It's definitely the therapist is a little bit more in
15:03
Speaker 3: the driver's seat, and I think some clients prefer that,
15:08
Speaker 3: Like they just want to be able to be told, Okay,
15:10
Speaker 3: this is what you do next, is what's happening. They
15:12
Speaker 3: don't want to be in the driver's seat necessarily, and
15:16
Speaker 3: so that might be a better fit for a client
15:18
Speaker 3: like that. There's also things to keep in mind with
15:23
Speaker 3: bilateral stimulation. I have different types of the buzzers and
15:26
Speaker 3: the light bar and you know, tapping and stuff. But
15:29
Speaker 3: for some people that can feel like a lot that
15:32
Speaker 3: can feel a little bit too overwhelming or too triggering.
15:36
Speaker 3: So I keep those things in mind. Brain spotting was
15:39
Speaker 3: kind of developed out of EMDR, and it does a
15:42
Speaker 3: lot of the same thing. It's using the same like neuroscience.
15:46
Speaker 3: What's going on is the same, But the biggest difference
15:49
Speaker 3: I find is that the client is a lot more
15:51
Speaker 3: in the driver's seat, like they're kind of leading things.
15:54
Speaker 3: It's not as step one, step two, step three. It's
15:58
Speaker 3: very open. You literally like kind of can't do it wrong.
16:02
Speaker 3: There's no wrong way to do it. And so I think,
16:05
Speaker 3: you know, that style for some people is going to
16:08
Speaker 3: be more effective because maybe just the dynamic of them
16:12
Speaker 3: feeling like there's a power differential or that they're confused
16:16
Speaker 3: or they don't know what the next step is and
16:18
Speaker 3: EMDR might be activating in it of itself, so some
16:22
Speaker 3: of it is like their own personality, what their own
16:24
Speaker 3: comfort level is. And then ketamine, I feel like it's
16:28
Speaker 3: almost like the manual version of that in a way.
16:32
Speaker 3: Of course, you know, I work with a medical provider
16:35
Speaker 3: that has to go through all the medical checks and
16:36
Speaker 3: all of that, so that's kind of outside of my hands.
16:39
Speaker 3: But you know, when it comes to EMDR to brain spotting,
16:45
Speaker 3: what you're really doing is targeting the areas of the
16:50
Speaker 3: brain that are actually activated during a traumatic event, because
16:54
Speaker 3: when something traumatic is happening, are logical thinking prefrontal cortex
16:59
Speaker 3: part our brain is just kind of offline, that's not
17:02
Speaker 3: really important. And when you're doing talk therapy, that's the
17:05
Speaker 3: part of your brain that you're using. You're recalling events,
17:08
Speaker 3: you're making sense of things. And that's why I think
17:10
Speaker 3: people find themselves stuck because they might be able to say, oh,
17:14
Speaker 3: it makes sense that I get anxious, and it makes
17:16
Speaker 3: sense that I feel really shaky when they have that trigger,
17:20
Speaker 3: and logically, you know, I know I'm safe now, and
17:23
Speaker 3: you know, they can come up with hoping tools and stuff.
17:26
Speaker 3: But at the end of the day, if they're not
17:29
Speaker 3: actually like having their logical part of their brain, like
17:33
Speaker 3: talk in the same language as the rest of their brain,
17:36
Speaker 3: it's going to continue to keep getting activated. And so
17:39
Speaker 3: it really targets those deeper parts of the brain that
17:42
Speaker 3: are actually online when people have trauma, and ketamine kind
17:45
Speaker 3: of does the same thing. It's more about shutting down
17:48
Speaker 3: the logical thinking part of the brain and just letting
17:52
Speaker 3: like their full nervous system kind of process through. So
17:56
Speaker 3: super nutshell on all of those but that's kind of
17:59
Speaker 3: how I decide.
18:01
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I think all three are powerful and different
18:04
Speaker 2: in different ways in getting folks out of feeling stuck
18:08
Speaker 2: in a rut you were saying. And the thing with
18:13
Speaker 2: you know, talk therapy is often will well, you know,
18:18
Speaker 2: overthinking is underfeeling. We're not really feeling, we're not really
18:21
Speaker 2: getting into the body. And that could also be because
18:24
Speaker 2: we don't feel safe too, right, no one's guiding us
18:27
Speaker 2: and how to do that. And you know, I work
18:28
Speaker 2: with folks with chronic illness, and it can feel really
18:31
Speaker 2: scary to even be in your body when it feels
18:34
Speaker 2: when it feels so unwell. But the goal is that
18:38
Speaker 2: we take those small steps towards towards that. And I
18:44
Speaker 2: was going to ask, how do you prepare a person's
18:47
Speaker 2: nervous system for any of this, for any of this work, right,
18:50
Speaker 2: because things can come up, things can arise, and it
18:52
Speaker 2: can feel like a lot. Yeah.
18:55
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, I definitely think it's super important. You know,
19:02
Speaker 3: Like I said, I'm always tracking nervous system states, and
19:05
Speaker 3: that really starts in the room, in the therapeutic relationship.
19:08
Speaker 3: I don't think it's you know, safe or good to
19:12
Speaker 3: just like be like hello, I'm Lauren, I'm your therapist.
19:16
Speaker 3: Let's start doing EMDR or let's start doing brainspotting. Because
19:19
Speaker 3: I'm a stranger, Like there's going to be I would hope,
19:23
Speaker 3: you know, an innate sense of guardedness to somebody, and
19:29
Speaker 3: I want to be able to like build that foundation first.
19:32
Speaker 3: I think some of that comes through education of like, hey,
19:34
Speaker 3: this is what we're doing and why and why this works.
19:38
Speaker 3: I think again, different people really value that. Other people
19:42
Speaker 3: are like, I don't want to know. That's too overwhelming.
19:44
Speaker 3: I just want to do it. And you know, so
19:46
Speaker 3: following that, but you know, you can't just tell somebody
19:50
Speaker 3: get back into your body, you know, like you it
19:53
Speaker 3: doesn't work that way, especially if it's ever been dangerous
19:57
Speaker 3: or it doesn't feel safe to be in your body,
19:59
Speaker 3: or that doesn't come natural to you. So starting really
20:03
Speaker 3: like with micro small maybe like noticing like their feet
20:10
Speaker 3: on the floor, the temperature, these small things of really
20:13
Speaker 3: experiencing getting into their body, because that pendulation, that back
20:19
Speaker 3: and forth is really key about you know, I think
20:24
Speaker 3: it's about like feel your feet on the floor a
20:26
Speaker 3: little bit, feel that and then okay, like let's talk
20:29
Speaker 3: about that. And you're you're pendulating between I'm in my
20:32
Speaker 3: body versus like I'm now in my head. I'm explaining
20:36
Speaker 3: so kind of dipping a toe in before diving deep,
20:39
Speaker 3: and that's really teaching the nervous system. It's possible to
20:43
Speaker 3: feel something without becoming totally overwhelmed. And that's definitely foundational.
20:49
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I agree with that. I call it changing,
20:52
Speaker 2: changing the channel. Yeah, Like we don't have to stay
20:55
Speaker 2: on this channel. We get to we get to come out,
20:57
Speaker 2: we get to focus on something that you like in
21:00
Speaker 2: a room or something you're hoholding right like on Yeah,
21:03
Speaker 2: just focusing on the other senses. I think it's a
21:06
Speaker 2: beautiful approach. And I mean I was one of those,
21:10
Speaker 2: you know, clients who had a therapist who was like,
21:12
Speaker 2: let's start em DR today. And I had never I
21:16
Speaker 2: had never experienced EMDR, nor was I trained in it. It
21:18
Speaker 2: was post it was like right after grad school, and
21:21
Speaker 2: it was rough. It was rough, like she essentially opened
21:25
Speaker 2: up Pandora's box without resourcing me, and I went into
21:28
Speaker 2: a pretty bad health flare because of it. You brought
21:31
Speaker 2: up a very important point and I think anyone any
21:35
Speaker 2: practitioners listening to this or watching this right now, please
21:39
Speaker 2: keep that in mind, like really really focusing on the
21:42
Speaker 2: person you're working with and their their nervous system where
21:45
Speaker 2: they are and starting low and slow is what I
21:49
Speaker 2: recommend and what I call it. So thank you for
21:52
Speaker 2: mentioning that. So I was gonna ask for like in
22:00
Speaker 2: your opinion, like you know, because right now, the trauma
22:03
Speaker 2: informed therapy is sort of like this buzzword, right, we're
22:06
Speaker 2: all we're all hearing like, how would you define it
22:09
Speaker 2: at this point? Like if someone was looking for a
22:10
Speaker 2: trauma informed therapist, somatic informed, like what would they what
22:16
Speaker 2: would those I guess green flags or what would those
22:19
Speaker 2: things look like for them in their search?
22:22
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I definitely think that that trauma informed this
22:28
Speaker 3: becomes such a buzzword, and you know, it's true if
22:32
Speaker 3: you think about it. I would imagine anybody who's been
22:36
Speaker 3: through a counseling psychology program, they've learned about trauma. Therefore
22:41
Speaker 3: they are informed on trauma and they can say they're
22:43
Speaker 3: trauma informed. Right, that kind of counts for everybody, but
22:47
Speaker 3: that doesn't mean that they know how to actually like
22:52
Speaker 3: work with the trauma that's coming up. At that level,
22:56
Speaker 3: I think it really also takes it foundation of understanding
23:01
Speaker 3: like the therapists themselves understands that everyone in some way,
23:05
Speaker 3: shape or form has been shaped by experiences of safety
23:09
Speaker 3: and threat. That's just innate to being a human. And
23:15
Speaker 3: again like that, being able to track what's happening in
23:17
Speaker 3: the nervous system is so key to that, you know,
23:23
Speaker 3: I think practically trauma like truly being trauma informed is
23:29
Speaker 3: like giving people any sort of options that create their
23:32
Speaker 3: own safety, letting them choose, like things like where to sit,
23:35
Speaker 3: or explaining what you're doing to that with them, you know,
23:39
Speaker 3: checking in about the pace. You know you talked about
23:44
Speaker 3: going to therapy, and kind of jumping right into AMDR.
23:47
Speaker 3: Like AMDR is a trauma specific modality. I'd say most
23:54
Speaker 3: people that offer AMDR probably know a lot about trauma.
23:58
Speaker 3: But going into a session with a new client offering
24:01
Speaker 3: trauma or AMDR right away is not trauma informed right.
24:07
Speaker 3: In fact, it's kind of dangerous. You have to understand pacing,
24:09
Speaker 3: you have to understand, you know, what is that person's
24:15
Speaker 3: nervous system cues, Like you can't know that straight off
24:18
Speaker 3: the bat. And I think you know, if a therapist,
24:23
Speaker 3: you know, in that instance, right, if they were to
24:25
Speaker 3: be like let's start AMDR right away, and you were
24:28
Speaker 3: to say, as the client, actually like I'm not sure,
24:31
Speaker 3: like I don't.
24:31
Speaker 2: Know a lot about that. Could we maybe wait a little.
24:36
Speaker 3: Bit on that or I want to them know more
24:38
Speaker 3: like if you feel safe and that therapist is making
24:41
Speaker 3: you safe to be like wait a second, I don't
24:43
Speaker 3: know that is trauma informed, right, Like that should be
24:47
Speaker 3: more of a dialogue than a just this is what
24:50
Speaker 3: we're doing, because that creates safety too, So it's more
24:54
Speaker 3: of like a way of being, I would say, than
24:56
Speaker 3: it is a like knowledge set.
25:00
Speaker 2: Mmmmm. I love that. It's so true. It's so true because,
25:03
Speaker 2: like you said, you can be trained in e m
25:05
Speaker 2: DR in brain spotting, et cetera, et cetera, but offering
25:09
Speaker 2: it in the first session without creating that therapeutic you know, uh,
25:15
Speaker 2: relationship with your client can can be like, not to
25:19
Speaker 2: sound dramatic, like a little dangerous. It's true. I went
25:22
Speaker 2: I went through, and I've heard of quite a few
25:24
Speaker 2: others who have so knowing how to pace really being
25:28
Speaker 2: able to feel into someone's nervous system. Yeah, you know,
25:33
Speaker 2: and I think that also requires you as a therapist
25:36
Speaker 2: doing your own work.
25:38
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, absolutely, Yeah, you.
25:41
Speaker 2: Know where's your nervous system at? How are you how
25:44
Speaker 2: are you presenting in each session? That's I think something
25:49
Speaker 2: we all we all need to be ethically required, you know,
25:53
Speaker 2: required to do so. Yes, part's really important. And I
26:00
Speaker 2: was gonna ask, like for yourself, as someone who does
26:03
Speaker 2: a lot of deep work with clients, like how do
26:05
Speaker 2: you yourself take take care of yourself? What kind of yeah,
26:10
Speaker 2: what kind of practice?
26:12
Speaker 3: Yeah? I mean I definitely, especially since starting my own practice,
26:19
Speaker 3: I definitely make sure that I'm in a good regulated space.
26:25
Speaker 3: I do things regularly throughout my day in my week
26:28
Speaker 3: to try to you know, enhance that like get good
26:32
Speaker 3: sleep and stuff, not overwhelm my schedule, you know, not
26:36
Speaker 3: put too much on my plate. But also I'm a
26:40
Speaker 3: human just like anybody else, and there's sometimes that like
26:42
Speaker 3: something comes up or whatever, and I have to like
26:47
Speaker 3: very much be intentional about Okay, like maybe I logically
26:52
Speaker 3: could show up for my clients today and we could
26:55
Speaker 3: get through our sessions, But can I show up in
26:59
Speaker 3: like a regulated calm space that they actually need for healing.
27:02
Speaker 3: I have to honestly ask myself those questions. And it
27:06
Speaker 3: doesn't happen often, but you know, there have been times
27:09
Speaker 3: that I've just had to you know, take a day
27:10
Speaker 3: or cancel clients or whatever, depending on what's going on,
27:14
Speaker 3: And I think that that is a good thing. I mean,
27:17
Speaker 3: when I was a director and had a staff of twelve,
27:22
Speaker 3: I was pretty open about that kind of stuff of
27:26
Speaker 3: like I like, take a day, cancel, like if you
27:28
Speaker 3: need to, Like that is number one. Obviously I had
27:32
Speaker 3: to kind of like work with like policies and you
27:36
Speaker 3: know things that sometimes I think that companies are structured
27:41
Speaker 3: in the way that that isn't naturally a possibility and
27:46
Speaker 3: that can be really hard. But I also, I don't know,
27:51
Speaker 3: I think that that definitely needs to be prioritized because
27:55
Speaker 3: that attunement in the relational piece is so key to
28:03
Speaker 3: any of the therapy that you're doing, and people can
28:05
Speaker 3: pick up on that if you're distracted, if you're not there,
28:08
Speaker 3: if you're going through your own stuff, and so yeah,
28:12
Speaker 3: protecting that because that's how you do your work.
28:16
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, amen, amen, because we and we can only
28:19
Speaker 2: take the person we're working with as far as we've
28:22
Speaker 2: taken ourselves right and meet them at our own capacities.
28:27
Speaker 2: So it's our own you know, per our own due
28:29
Speaker 2: diligence to really do those check ins. And it's a
28:34
Speaker 2: lot easier if you have your own practice and so forth.
28:36
Speaker 2: But you know, you might be surprised if you work
28:40
Speaker 2: for a company and organization, if you're real to talk
28:42
Speaker 2: to the director and mention this and find that middle ground.
28:46
Speaker 2: How can I take care of myself whilst taking care
28:49
Speaker 2: of this organization's clients?
28:52
Speaker 3: Right, Yeah, they can be a slippery slope. And I
28:55
Speaker 3: think too, like what you just said about doing the
28:57
Speaker 3: work yourself. I all of the trainings I've ever seen
29:01
Speaker 3: for things like EMDR or brain spotting is it's very
29:05
Speaker 3: much a part of the training to do your own stuff.
29:09
Speaker 3: And like when I got trained in ketamine assisted psychotherapy,
29:13
Speaker 3: like I did the whole process myself, because I'm never
29:16
Speaker 3: going to offer something that I myself am not willing
29:18
Speaker 3: to do partially because how my brain works, Like I
29:22
Speaker 3: could read about it, but like unless I tangibly like
29:26
Speaker 3: doing it, it doesn't like fully click. So that is
29:29
Speaker 3: something that is very important to me, and I think
29:32
Speaker 3: any therapist that's offering any type of modality they should
29:37
Speaker 3: definitely have experienced that themselves, are currently going through that themselves.
29:43
Speaker 2: A thousand one thousand percent, and because you know, the
29:46
Speaker 2: ketamine hasn't been super spoken about on this podcast, and
29:50
Speaker 2: we don't have a ton of time, but I just
29:51
Speaker 2: I want to ask, like where what have you seen
29:54
Speaker 2: it be most effective for in your in your practice?
30:00
Speaker 3: Yeah, I you know, I think there are some misconceptions
30:03
Speaker 3: out there about it being like a like a magic
30:08
Speaker 3: cure all or people will think that like one session
30:11
Speaker 3: of ketamine can fix like years of trauma, but that's
30:14
Speaker 3: really not how it works. I think, you know, there's
30:20
Speaker 3: it's becoming more and more talked about as laws are
30:23
Speaker 3: allowing it more and more, but it's been more like
30:26
Speaker 3: taboo for so long that I do think there's a
30:29
Speaker 3: lot of misconceptions about that. And it's not always this
30:33
Speaker 3: like dramatic like mystical experience or whatever, because honestly, I
30:40
Speaker 3: think a lot of the most profound sessions I've had
30:43
Speaker 3: and that I've seen with other people is like I
30:47
Speaker 3: don't know, like finally being able to break through some barrier,
30:50
Speaker 3: Like maybe they're just they have a hard time getting
30:53
Speaker 3: in touch with their feelings and like ketamine allowed them
30:57
Speaker 3: to kind of put down that wall enough to wry
30:59
Speaker 3: or to have that sort of release or get rid
31:02
Speaker 3: of those defenses that are up. That is kind of
31:05
Speaker 3: not allowing them to release or feel whatever they need to.
31:10
Speaker 3: You know, like the medicine isn't really about creating healing
31:15
Speaker 3: as much as it's about creating conditions where healing can happen.
31:21
Speaker 3: And with that, like the integration piece of it. So
31:23
Speaker 3: what you talk about before, what your intentions are, what
31:26
Speaker 3: you talk about after. You know, it's usually a series
31:31
Speaker 3: of kind of Maine treatments about a week apart. And
31:34
Speaker 3: there's a reason for that is because it kind of
31:36
Speaker 3: opens these pathways in your brain. So even between those sessions,
31:40
Speaker 3: you know, there are things that might be coming and
31:42
Speaker 3: flowing more easily to you. So having a therapist there
31:47
Speaker 3: with you through that process that can really help focus
31:52
Speaker 3: that and process through that stuff as it comes up
31:55
Speaker 3: more can be really beneficial, especially for somebody who has
32:02
Speaker 3: a hard time like breaking through those barriers.
32:05
Speaker 1: Yeah.
32:06
Speaker 2: Yeah, And for the sustainability of what comes up right
32:11
Speaker 2: and how it's integrated. It's why and like all the
32:14
Speaker 2: you know, I go to I go to a lot
32:15
Speaker 2: of conferences for for psychedelic sciences, and it's like what
32:20
Speaker 2: makes it so powerful is that assisted therapy component time
32:24
Speaker 2: and time and time again. You know, it's having someone
32:30
Speaker 2: to bear witness to your to your experience and help
32:34
Speaker 2: make sense of it and apply it as needed. A beautiful,
32:39
Speaker 2: beautiful explanation and something that's not quite related, but I
32:44
Speaker 2: think a lot of therapists probably would be curious about,
32:47
Speaker 2: is you know, you have a pretty big following and
32:50
Speaker 2: you have this practice, Like how do you find balance
32:53
Speaker 2: in being an educator and a therapist at the same time?
32:57
Speaker 2: Do you do you time block? Like how how do
33:00
Speaker 2: you manage it? And of course having a family and
33:02
Speaker 2: everything else.
33:03
Speaker 3: Right, Yeah, I don't know. I mean, I think it
33:08
Speaker 3: started as just a way to kind of get my
33:09
Speaker 3: name out there locally, to get some clients drummed up
33:11
Speaker 3: from my private practice, and kind of unintentionally grew into
33:14
Speaker 3: this thing that I was never intending it to and honestly,
33:21
Speaker 3: I enjoy it. I really love kind of like the
33:26
Speaker 3: teaching and writing aspects of things, and so I feel
33:30
Speaker 3: like most of the time it just does kind of
33:33
Speaker 3: come up naturally, like something will happen in a session
33:35
Speaker 3: or a couple sessions where I'm like, oh wow, that's
33:37
Speaker 3: like a thing that's common for people and I try
33:41
Speaker 3: to just kind of jump on that inspiration as it
33:43
Speaker 3: comes and keep a lot of things in drafts and
33:47
Speaker 3: just put them out there when I'm not feeling as
33:49
Speaker 3: inspired to do that. But yeah, the boundaries can get
33:52
Speaker 3: a little bit tricky. I think sometimes, you know, people
33:55
Speaker 3: sometimes will share really incredibly personal things, like in the
33:59
Speaker 3: DA which I'm honored to you know, be somebody that
34:06
Speaker 3: they feel like they can say those things too, but
34:08
Speaker 3: I can't be their therapist, you know through Instagram, so
34:13
Speaker 3: kind of being able to hold that tension. I feel
34:15
Speaker 3: like I do a lot of pointing people in the
34:19
Speaker 3: direction of you know, oh, you're in another state that
34:21
Speaker 3: I'm not licensed in. But if this is the stuff
34:24
Speaker 3: that's resonating with you, try searching, you know, somatic therapy,
34:29
Speaker 3: try searching you know, polyvagel theory or AMDR brain spoting ketamine,
34:35
Speaker 3: because then you're going to get people that probably are
34:37
Speaker 3: more like minded with some of the stuff that's resonating
34:40
Speaker 3: to you. So I do a lot of a lot
34:41
Speaker 3: of that. But yeah, I mean it's just it's I
34:48
Speaker 3: I do it because I enjoy it. It's definitely not
34:51
Speaker 3: this like major money maker or anything. And I feel
34:55
Speaker 3: like if I ever stop enjoying it, I'll just stop
34:57
Speaker 3: doing it, and I try to be pretty healthy about
35:01
Speaker 3: my way of approaching.
35:02
Speaker 2: That beautiful, beautiful. Thank you for that. And do you
35:10
Speaker 2: have anything coming coming out? Well? First, how do people
35:13
Speaker 2: find you?
35:14
Speaker 3: Yeah? On Instagram, I'm your trauma therapist underscore, and then
35:21
Speaker 3: TikTok is just your trauma therapist, and on my substack
35:25
Speaker 3: it's also your trauma therapist, so kind of across the board,
35:30
Speaker 3: those are the main places that I, you know.
35:33
Speaker 2: Publish stuff.
35:35
Speaker 3: I've been liking substack a lot lately because I think
35:38
Speaker 3: I get to go beyond that short form content and
35:41
Speaker 3: like get my like nerdy side out of like here's
35:43
Speaker 3: all of these resources and here's all this research. You know,
35:47
Speaker 3: so people are interested in that, definitely check that out.
35:51
Speaker 3: Otherwise I try to keep things hopefully easy to understand
35:56
Speaker 3: and also backed by research and stuff on my page
36:02
Speaker 3: through social media. So those are my main spots.
36:06
Speaker 2: Great, And are there are there any projects or anything
36:09
Speaker 2: on the horizon for you.
36:11
Speaker 3: I've got a bajillion ideas, it's just about focusing them in. Honestly,
36:16
Speaker 3: right now, I'm kind of trying to slow down a
36:18
Speaker 3: little bit and not speed up so I can honor
36:22
Speaker 3: my own nervous system. And so, you know, I've I've
36:26
Speaker 3: had a couple people reach out about like book related things,
36:30
Speaker 3: and I think eventually I'll put something out there, but
36:33
Speaker 3: I don't want to do it because here's this opportunity.
36:36
Speaker 3: I want it to be something that you know, I
36:39
Speaker 3: can do in my own time and my own pace,
36:41
Speaker 3: and that I'm really passionate about. So I don't know.
36:43
Speaker 3: I stay tuned. We'll see otherwise, you know, been enjoying
36:47
Speaker 3: just doing a lot of writing on my sub stack
36:50
Speaker 3: in my social media lately.
36:53
Speaker 2: Beautiful Beautiful is there if there's one thing someone listening
36:58
Speaker 2: or watching could leave with today from you, what would
37:01
Speaker 2: that What would that message be?
37:03
Speaker 3: Mhm? I have so many messages?
37:06
Speaker 2: Yeah. Probably.
37:09
Speaker 3: I think it kind of boils down to like seeing
37:13
Speaker 3: your body as an ally and not an enemy, because
37:18
Speaker 3: I know it can easily feel like your body is
37:21
Speaker 3: your enemy the way that it holds on to trauma
37:25
Speaker 3: or reacts to things that you might logically know are safe,
37:29
Speaker 3: or you know, memories that you want to forget, that
37:31
Speaker 3: sort of thing. It can be very easy to start
37:34
Speaker 3: battling with your body. But your body is wired to
37:38
Speaker 3: protect you, and that's all it's been doing the whole time,
37:43
Speaker 3: so really trying to learn to like trust that and
37:46
Speaker 3: get curious about it, whatever those things are that are
37:49
Speaker 3: coming up for you. It's a really simple yet complicated
37:55
Speaker 3: starting point.
37:56
Speaker 2: I think, h gorgeous, gorgeous message. Even I needed to
38:00
Speaker 2: hear that today. So thank you and thanks, I mean,
38:04
Speaker 2: thank you so much for being here with us today,
38:07
Speaker 2: and thank you to all who have listened and watched us.
38:11
Speaker 2: I hope you have a beautiful day ahead.
38:15
Speaker 3: Thank you.