Latest / QUESTION EVERYTHING / Release Stress and Trauma From Your Body (Get Out of Functional Freeze) Using Somatic Healing with Liz Tenuto (The Workout Witch)

Transcript

Release Stress and Trauma From Your Body (Get Out of Functional Freeze) Using Somatic Healing with Liz Tenuto (The Workout Witch) · QUESTION EVERYTHING

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Big things happen when you're pretty, pretty bold, pretty clever,
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: pretty strong. I'm Danielle Robe and each week my guests
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: and I have conversations that put a new spin on pretty.
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: This is pretty smart. Hello, Hello to all my pretty
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: smart people. I am recording this in New York. I'm
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: in a hotel room right now. I have a sheet
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: over my head so that the audio quality is good.
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: And I'm really excited about this episode. I don't know
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: if you've noticed, but I've started putting out episodes every
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: other week lately, and I'm going to be doing that
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: through the summer. Because your girl needed a break. I'm
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: gonna be honest. I have been putting out episodes every
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: single week for almost three years, and with this new
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: podcast that I'm doing with though Sunshine, on top of
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: all my other work, I just was starting to feel
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: over the edge and something happened that I want to
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: share with you. I initially was pushing through. I felt
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: like I had a lack of time and no life
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: because all I was doing was working. Like I would
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: be up at night in bed just working, waking up
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: feeling like it was Groundhog's Day, and felt like I
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: was missing out on family time and facetiming my mom
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: and dad and going out with my friends, and you know,
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: things that do matter that we push to the wayside
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: when we're busy. And I had a thought, what if
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: I don't power through this time? My whole life for
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: thirty three years, I have always powered through and quote
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: unquote done the right thing or the hard thing, And
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: I thought, what if I do the gentle thing for
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: the first time ever? How would that play out? So
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: I don't know TBD, I'm not sure how it'll play out,
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: but my hope is that one I don't let you
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: down when we come together each week.
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: It just it really is.
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: This is my favorite thing that I do. It's the
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: most special community in place, and so I just really
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: hope you'll stick with me through sort of the every
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: other week until we ramp up again. And secondly, this
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: cadence helps me keep the quality of the show at
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: its very best, including all the social clips that you know,
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: go viral on TikTok and Instagram, And I just I
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: like to put a lot of thought into the interviews
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: and the questions and the research, and I don't want
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: to start slacking on that because of a lack of time.
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: So I really do hope that the episodes stay special
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: to all of us and that you stick with me
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: through this moment because a lot of you have been
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: here since the beginning. Now jumping into today's episode, it's
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: a useful one. It's the kind of episode I feel
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: like you're gonna want to take notes in your notepad
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: or send to a friend that it makes you think
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: of because it's full of useful information. Today we're making
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: space for a conversation about trauma, and it's a word
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: and a topic that has been everywhere lately. It really
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: burst into the zeitgeist in twenty twenty, when mental health
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: conversations and therapy speak were suddenly everywhere. TikTok definitely helped
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: with specific hashtags like trauma dumping and big T versus
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: Little T trauma. And it was also around that time
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: that the book The Body Keeps the Score, which was
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: initially released in twenty fourteen, landed at the number one
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: spot on the New York Times nonfiction paper Back bestsellerless.
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: Written by doctor Besil vander Kolk, it's a cutting edge
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: examination in how trauma leaves an imprint on the mind, body,
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: and brain. Because We may think that we're processing things
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: even through therapy, but at the end of the day,
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: the body keeps the score. Our bodies know things, and
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: sometimes our bodies know things that our minds aren't even
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: aware of. Our guest today is taking that research a
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: step further. Liz toanudo aka the Workout, which specializes in
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: healing the physical effects of trauma and stress. Liz says
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: twenty twenty shook us all awake. She practices a mode
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: of healing known as somatic exercises, which she says can
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: introduce you to the way your body is supposed to
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: feel today. Liz hopes to change the way that we
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: deal with stress, yes, and with trauma. She explains why
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: emotions are stored in different parts of our body, like
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: what does it mean if we have tight hips, bloating
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: neck pain? Or what does it mean if you stay
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: up at night for an hour scrolling on your phone?
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: Is your body in a freeze response. We talk through
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: chronic pain, unexplained health issues, and ultimately how we can
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: hack our primitive minds to better conquer our modern world.
• 5:39
  Speaker 2: I'm working with magic mind.
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: If you want to try one, ooh, you are on
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: my third of the day and I need a little
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: focus and energy.
• 5:45
  Speaker 2: Amazing cheers, cheers.
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: I try and chug it. It tastes really good. Liz Tanudo,
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Pretty Smart. I am so excited to have
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: you here because I have been following you for over
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: a year and your work has been so impactful for me.
• 6:07
  Speaker 2: Thank you so much. I'm so glad to be here. Liz.
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: Where did the name workout? Which come from?
• 6:13
  Speaker 2: I used to teach one on one lessons in person
• 6:16
  Speaker 2: and I did it for about fourteen years. And when
• 6:20
  Speaker 2: my clients came to me, often they had some sort
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: of injury frozen shoulder, lower back pain that wasn't going away.
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: They were coming out of a surgery, and I was
• 6:29
  Speaker 2: helping them with injury recovery. Normally, they had already been
• 6:32
  Speaker 2: to a physical therapist, they had already done kind of
• 6:35
  Speaker 2: traditional methods of healing, but nothing really worked for them.
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: And they came to me and we would do pilates
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: and a bunch of other types of somatic exercises together,
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: and they laughed and would call me a witch all
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: the time. They're like, you're like this witch that like
• 6:55
  Speaker 2: we had to find through the depths of the healing world,
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: and we came in and, you know, finally feel better
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: and our injury is finally healing in a long term,
• 7:07
  Speaker 2: sustainable way. And so people used to joke with me
• 7:11
  Speaker 2: that I was a witch, and one client specifically called
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: me the Workout, which and I just loved the name
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: so much that it stuck, and I decided to name
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: my business that.
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: I love that you said long term stress, because that's
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: one of the things that really stuck out to me
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: about your work. But I was surprised to learn that
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: your work started because you were dealing with chronic pain
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: and healing yourself.
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: So I was. I grew up around a lot of
• 7:39
  Speaker 2: rage and within my extended family my therapist calls it,
• 7:45
  Speaker 2: I was surrounded with next level violence and I started
• 7:50
  Speaker 2: experiencing chronic pain really young. I was about fourteen when
• 7:54
  Speaker 2: it began flaring up, and I also had really bad
• 7:56
  Speaker 2: insomnia at that age. I was a dancer at the time,
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: so I had a place to kind of channel my
• 8:04
  Speaker 2: emotions and express myself, which was really helpful. And I
• 8:08
  Speaker 2: also kind of thought that my chronic pain was from dance,
• 8:11
  Speaker 2: because it just makes sense. So I stopped dancing for
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: a little while and my chronic pain in my insomnia
• 8:18
  Speaker 2: got worse. By the time I was in my twenties,
• 8:21
  Speaker 2: I got hyper thyroid, which is really young to get that.
• 8:25
  Speaker 2: And I started going on this big healing quest and
• 8:29
  Speaker 2: I tried a lot of different things, doctors, specialists, chiropractors,
• 8:34
  Speaker 2: holistic healing modalities, and nothing was really sticking for me. Finally,
• 8:40
  Speaker 2: my ballet teacher at the time mentioned she was like,
• 8:44
  Speaker 2: something's up with you, Like, something's wrong, because she saw
• 8:48
  Speaker 2: that I was having difficulty orienting in space and she
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: saw that I was dissociating all the time. And I
• 8:55
  Speaker 2: was a pretty good dancer, so those things, those characteristics
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: for a dancer to not know where you are in
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: space or kind of rare you're so aware of your body. Yeah,
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: And she was like, something's wrong. I want you to
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: come to my somatics class. And I was really skeptical
• 9:12
  Speaker 2: at first, honestly because I had seen her class before.
• 9:15
  Speaker 2: It was just a bunch of people in pajamas laying
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: on the floor doing these tiny movements, and I was like,
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: how is this going to help me? You know, like
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: it didn't make logical sense to me. But I was
• 9:29
  Speaker 2: also open and slightly desperate to find something that would work,
• 9:35
  Speaker 2: and after four lessons, my chronic pain was almost gone
• 9:39
  Speaker 2: and I was sleeping really well for the first time
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: in ten years.
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: What exactly is somatics.
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: Soma is the Greek word for body, and somatic exercises
• 9:52
  Speaker 2: are literally really gentle movements that you can do on
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: your bed or on the floor that released the years
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: or decades of pent up stress, stored trauma out of
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: your body. They also regulate your nervous system. They build
• 10:10
  Speaker 2: new neural pathways so that you can get out of
• 10:13
  Speaker 2: living in survival mode and get back into your homeostasis.
• 10:17
  Speaker 2: There are different schools of somatics, and the work that
• 10:21
  Speaker 2: my teacher did is called Feldon Christ.
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: Okay, and I read that you were a narcissistic abuse survivor.
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: Was that early on in your family or was that
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: later in life.
• 10:33
  Speaker 2: I had two major phases of experiencing that in my life.
• 10:37
  Speaker 2: I grew up around a parent that is narcissistic, and
• 10:42
  Speaker 2: then I also, unfortunately married, without my knowledge, married a
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: narcissist and didn't really discover that until about a year
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: into the marriage. Because initially, when you're dating a narcissist,
• 10:57
  Speaker 2: they love vombu and they treat you really, really well well,
• 11:01
  Speaker 2: and that was my experience. He was like a dream
• 11:03
  Speaker 2: for me at first. And then shortly after getting married
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: things started to change. And about a year into the marriage,
• 11:11
  Speaker 2: I felt like something was deeply wrong, and I felt
• 11:14
  Speaker 2: like it was very similar to what I had experienced
• 11:17
  Speaker 2: as a child.
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: It's interesting that you put those two together. Most people
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: never make that link.
• 11:24
  Speaker 2: Yeah, the patterns of behavior were really similar, and it
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: felt really familiar. And I was also noticing that I
• 11:31
  Speaker 2: was having chronic pain flare ups and I was having
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: the insomnia come back again, and so my body kind
• 11:38
  Speaker 2: of gave me all of these warning signs, and because
• 11:41
  Speaker 2: I had already been trained in somatics, I was very
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: tuned into that. Yeah, was very good at listening to that.
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: So I have had two major healing phases in my
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: own life, one from childhood and then the second one
• 11:55
  Speaker 2: from my marriage in my mid thirties.
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: So, I had like a back issue several years ago,
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: and it lasted for about eight months, and I was
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: trying so many different things and I love to work out,
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: and so I felt just really stunted by it. And
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: then I went to lunch with a friend who's a
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: very thoughtful, smart guy. And he was like, how are you.
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: I said, you know, I'm great, but my back is
• 12:23
  Speaker 1: killing me. And he's like, how long has it been?
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: And I said it's about eight months. And he was like,
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: that's not back pain. He said, what do you mean?
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: M M?
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: And he was like, if you hurt your back, it
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: heals in three months. Usually that's emotional pain. And I
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: was going through a really hard time and I did
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: not put the two together. What I know it shows
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: up for everybody so differently, But what are some of
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: the signs that stress is showing up in your body?
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: And it's not something like you pushed a moving box
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: or stretched the wrong way.
• 12:56
  Speaker 2: Your friend was exactly right in the timeline for pain.
• 13:00
  Speaker 2: If it's over three months, that's in an indication of
• 13:04
  Speaker 2: long term pain. And that's normally not from a fall,
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: from sleeping incorrectly, from you know, picking up a box.
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: It's normally emotional. Other signs that you have a lot
• 13:17
  Speaker 2: of stress stored in your body are waking up with
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: a puffy face, feeling constantly bloated, feeling exhausted all the time,
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: anxiety that keeps getting worse and worse, startling really easily
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: having issues with sleep, so maybe you can't fall asleep,
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: or you wake up multiple times in the middle of
• 13:39
  Speaker 2: the night, or you're kind of staying up really late
• 13:43
  Speaker 2: and like scrolling because it's your only time to really
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: be unstressed. That's quite common for people, especially recently since
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: the pandemic. Chest pains, muscle tension, like if you're clenching
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: your jaw right now, clenching the sphincter right now. Raised
• 14:02
  Speaker 2: shoulders are also a sign of so you can almost
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: even look at someone and kind of see if they're
• 14:10
  Speaker 2: feeling stressed right now or not.
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: How do you think that we differentiate between pain injury
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: and trauma because all the signs and all the symptoms
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: that you just shared are also just things that we
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: dabble in. What like I sometimes stay up late scrolling,
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: and it's right, like, how do we know? And that's
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: probably the question you get the most.
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah, if you're doing it once in a while, every
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: here and there, it's really not anything to be concerned about. Yeah,
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: it's when you start doing it as a routine and
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: it becomes a pattern for you, or it becomes like
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: staying up late scrolling becomes like you're like a little
• 14:50
  Speaker 2: safe place and you can't wait to do it, and
• 14:52
  Speaker 2: you've been doing it for months. Three months is really
• 14:55
  Speaker 2: kind of the amount of time with it and somatics
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: within physical therapy, even within some schools of psychology that
• 15:05
  Speaker 2: you start to think like, okay, this is maybe a problem. Interesting. Yeah,
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: So it's really about that long term pattern that you're doing,
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: not just once in a while.
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: I originally found your work because I was at Canyon
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: Ranch and I did a stretch class for my hips
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: MM and the teacher said, you may cry later, like
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: a it's a place that holds a lot of emotion.
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: And I was like, I'm good, I'm actually in a
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: place where I'm kind of happy right now.
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: I've been through lows. I'm not there.
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: And like five hours later, I was crying.
• 15:41
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, And.
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: I was looking online like what is this about? And
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: that's how I found your work. What do our hips hold?
• 15:49
  Speaker 2: Yes, there are different emotions that are stored in different
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: parts of your body. The hips specifically hold old trauma,
• 15:58
  Speaker 2: unresolved trauma, emotions, betrayal, and a lot of like for
• 16:05
  Speaker 2: a lot of women, it's relationship trauma too. And specifically,
• 16:11
  Speaker 2: you have a muscle called the soas muscle. It's called psoas, yeah,
• 16:15
  Speaker 2: and it connects your upper body to your lower body.
• 16:18
  Speaker 2: It's a very deep muscle. And that muscle is the
• 16:23
  Speaker 2: first muscle that contracts in your fight flight response. It's
• 16:26
  Speaker 2: like your first responder. And primitively it was intended to
• 16:31
  Speaker 2: contract to get us out of the situation. Right. So
• 16:35
  Speaker 2: a bear is attacking us, that muscle kicks in and
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: you're able to get out or you're able to fight.
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: It's a very powerful muscle. Now in modern society, that
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: muscle contracts from not a bear, but just like from
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: your boss yelling at you, or having a really bad
• 16:52
  Speaker 2: fight with your partner. And the interesting thing about that
• 16:56
  Speaker 2: muscle specifically is it stays contracted until you manually release it.
• 17:03
  Speaker 2: So a lot and that is often the cause for
• 17:05
  Speaker 2: long term lower back pain. So a lot of people
• 17:08
  Speaker 2: have this contracted so as and they'll start to notice like, oh,
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: my hips hurt, my back hurts, I'm sitting like this,
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: I'm not breathing the same as I used to, And
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: they'll start to notice these symptoms, but they don't understand
• 17:21
  Speaker 2: why or what's happening. And that's really my mission is
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: to help people know what those symptoms mean so that
• 17:28
  Speaker 2: they can actually address what's going on for them.
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah, can you talk more about flight, fight or freeze
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: specifically freeze, because I think that's where we're living mostly
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: as women.
• 17:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah, in twenty twenty four. Yeah, Yeah, So there's freeze
• 17:46
  Speaker 2: has a spectrum, there's functional freeze, freeze, and then shut down.
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: Functional freeze, I think is where a lot of women
• 17:54
  Speaker 2: are living right now. Functional freeze is a response to
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: long term stress or unresolved trauma. Essentially within the nervous system,
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: you have fight flight and freeze. Freeze is a little
• 18:08
  Speaker 2: bit more on a little bit further down on the
• 18:10
  Speaker 2: severity scale than fight or flight. So if you've been
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: in fight or flight for a long time, what happens
• 18:19
  Speaker 2: is you start to get exhausted, you can't really live
• 18:22
  Speaker 2: like that long term, and then you start to go
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: into freeze. Freeze can also happen suddenly in a really
• 18:31
  Speaker 2: traumatic event. So if you're in a really violent event
• 18:36
  Speaker 2: or you're experiencing essay, that often happens and you just
• 18:41
  Speaker 2: freeze because you don't feel like you have any other
• 18:43
  Speaker 2: option and you can't really escape or do anything. Functional
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: freeze specifically is when you can get through your day,
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: you can even be like great at your career, you
• 18:56
  Speaker 2: can be great at managing your family. You look really together,
• 19:01
  Speaker 2: but then you get home and you just absolutely crash,
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: like on the couch for five hours, too exhausted to
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: make or even order food, maybe too exhausted to even
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: brush your teeth at night, just so tired. And then
• 19:16
  Speaker 2: you get up the next day and you do it
• 19:18
  Speaker 2: over again, and so it's almost like you're living these
• 19:20
  Speaker 2: two lives and functional freeze, where publicly you seem one way,
• 19:24
  Speaker 2: but then personally at home you're overwhelmed, stuck, exhausted, and
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: you don't really know what to do about it. And
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: most people don't know what it is. Most people think
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: they're depressed when they're in functional freeze. But it's physiological.
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: It's a nervous system thing. It's not your fault. You
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: didn't do anything wrong. It's actually your nervous system trying
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: to protect you from experiencing more trauma or more stress.
• 19:50
  Speaker 2: It's conserving your energy.
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: So when you go to treat somebody, what does that
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: process look like? Like, say, I come to you and
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: I'm in functional freeze.
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah, first I just take an assessment of their movement actually,
• 20:06
  Speaker 2: because it gives me a lot of information that maybe
• 20:09
  Speaker 2: they're not going to be willing to share with me
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: verbally yet. So I look at how someone's standing, I
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: look at how someone is sitting, and I have them
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: stand and sit for me. I talk about what brought
• 20:23
  Speaker 2: them in, and then I ask a few questions, like
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: you know, what did you do over the weekend? Is
• 20:32
  Speaker 2: often really a good indicator, you know. And if someone's like, oh,
• 20:35
  Speaker 2: I was so exhausted and I canceled my plans with
• 20:38
  Speaker 2: my friends and I just stayed in pajamas and I rested,
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: then for me, I'm like, okay, let's keep asking more questions.
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: Let's keep asking It's okay, it's okay. And we all
• 20:50
  Speaker 2: know the producers, you're, well, we all do it sometimes, right, Yeah.
• 20:55
  Speaker 2: But it's when it becomes you know, I lived in
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: functional freeze for a years during my marriage, and it's
• 21:01
  Speaker 2: like it becomes a problem when you've been doing it
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: for four months, six months, two years, Like you're actually
• 21:09
  Speaker 2: not really living your life anymore. You're just in survival
• 21:12
  Speaker 2: mode getting by and your body is really taxed. Yeah,
• 21:17
  Speaker 2: So a lot of people think that they just need
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: to rest, which is a great first step to healing,
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: but you actually need to also regulate your nervous system
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: and go through a recovery process to get better.
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: So what release will somebody feel when something's been laying
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: dormant for a while.
• 21:34
  Speaker 2: Yeah, Initially, as you're doing somatic exercises, you'll start to
• 21:40
  Speaker 2: yawn a lot. As you're doing the exercises, your stomach
• 21:43
  Speaker 2: will start to rumble a lot. And those are actually
• 21:45
  Speaker 2: great signs that your nervous system is starting to come
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: back to its homeostasis, so you're not in fight flight
• 21:52
  Speaker 2: or freeze anymore. Those are physiological indicators. Really. If your
• 21:57
  Speaker 2: stomach is crumbling yeah, while you're doing the exercise. Interesting, yeah, yeah,
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: and then so what you really don't want to just
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: jump into a trauma release without preparing your body at all.
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: You can, but it's a little bit overwhelming, it's a
• 22:13
  Speaker 2: little bit intense, especially if someone's in freeze, it can
• 22:16
  Speaker 2: be like too much for them. So I really guide
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: people through a process. That's why I do it over
• 22:21
  Speaker 2: thirty days to get their body prepared and get them
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: their body back to homeostasis first before we release. So
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: you're already feeling safe in your body. You're already feeling
• 22:33
  Speaker 2: connected to yourself. Your nervous system is already regulating. You're
• 22:36
  Speaker 2: getting out of fight flight freeze first, and then we
• 22:40
  Speaker 2: do the release after that. The release itself is generally
• 22:45
  Speaker 2: one minute to five minutes. Some of my students have
• 22:48
  Speaker 2: told me that they've cried for fifteen minutes for thirty
• 22:51
  Speaker 2: minutes before. It's a really good, deep cleansing cry. Sometimes
• 22:56
  Speaker 2: you don't know why you're crying, but just let it out,
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: and after that release you'll feel You might also experience
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: some shaking in your body as you're doing the exercise.
• 23:10
  Speaker 2: The release exercises a little shaking. Some people laugh and
• 23:14
  Speaker 2: cry at the same time, which can be a little
• 23:16
  Speaker 2: disorienting for them too. After you experience the release, you'll
• 23:21
  Speaker 2: feel much lighter physically and emotionally. You'll literally feel like
• 23:25
  Speaker 2: you've just let a huge weight off of your chest,
• 23:30
  Speaker 2: off of your shoulders, out of your stomach. It feels great,
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: and you'll feel much more energized as well.
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: Wow. I read The Body Keeps the Score and that
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: was obviously like a groundbreaking book on this topic. Yeah,
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: and it says trauma results in a fundamental reorganization of
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: the way the mind and brain manage perceptions. It changes
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: not only how we think and what we think, but
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: also our very capacity to think. How do you think
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: the mind and the body work together when it comes
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: to trauma.
• 24:01
  Speaker 2: Your nervous system is the communication between your mind and
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: your body. So it's literally like the communication highway. So
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: your nervous system actually touches like every part of your body,
• 24:18
  Speaker 2: including your brain. So traditionally we've really looked at trauma
• 24:23
  Speaker 2: as mental and it's even been controversial, you know, to
• 24:27
  Speaker 2: say that it impacts your body, and people think of
• 24:30
  Speaker 2: it as wu wu and I did too when I
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: first when I first started, I didn't really understand that
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: it also impacts your body.
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: So when you say trauma, because I think people think
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: essay or something really intense. But trauma can be like
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: a bad breakup, Yes, right, absolutely.
• 24:47
  Speaker 2: Doctor Gabarmatte has this really beautiful way of defining trauma
• 24:52
  Speaker 2: which I'll paraphrase, and its trauma isn't what happened to you.
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: It's like the injury of what happened to you. So
• 25:01
  Speaker 2: if you go through a really bad breakup and it
• 25:04
  Speaker 2: rocks your world and it devastates you, and you can't
• 25:08
  Speaker 2: get out of bed for multiple months that and you
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: feel like it's trauma. It's trauma, you know, like maybe
• 25:16
  Speaker 2: there was betrayal in that relationship, maybe you had a
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: whole future built about that relationship. You're the person that
• 25:24
  Speaker 2: gets to decide what trauma is and what it isn't
• 25:27
  Speaker 2: for you, not anyone else.
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: Yeah, what parts of the brain are involved in trauma.
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: The amygdala, which is the fear response center, often gets
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: much For folks with PTSD and CPTSD, the amygdala gets
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: much larger. Your prefrontal cortex as well, which is this
• 25:49
  Speaker 2: part just like right at your forehead. That's the decision
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: making decision making. It's kind of like if you were
• 25:55
  Speaker 2: to think about your brain, it would be like the
• 25:58
  Speaker 2: c suite of your brain where all of your decision
• 26:02
  Speaker 2: making logic. So as your fear gets larger, this ability
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: to have rational thinking, to make decisions, to plan for
• 26:10
  Speaker 2: your life gets impacted and it becomes much harder and
• 26:15
  Speaker 2: it's harder to pay attention. You have brain fog. So
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: many people now think they have ADHD, and ADHD is
• 26:23
  Speaker 2: very valid, but there's a huge overlap between ADHD symptoms
• 26:30
  Speaker 2: and nervous system dysregulation from trauma and also CPTSD. There's like, yeah,
• 26:36
  Speaker 2: so many symptoms that overlap. So if you're experiencing brain
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: fog difficulty with decision making, but it hasn't always been
• 26:44
  Speaker 2: a thing for you, like as a kid, you didn't
• 26:46
  Speaker 2: experience that, it's probably from nervous system dysregulation or trauma.
• 26:54
  Speaker 2: You definitely want to get checked out and just see
• 26:57
  Speaker 2: and really assess what the situation is.
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: What are the key areas of the body where trauma
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: gets stored.
• 27:06
  Speaker 2: Yeah, hips is so key because that's where your so
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: as muscle is and that is one of the first
• 27:15
  Speaker 2: places to respond to any fight flight instinct. Your jaw
• 27:20
  Speaker 2: is also a place that responds to fight flight. So
• 27:24
  Speaker 2: these two are the first responders. If you have a
• 27:27
  Speaker 2: tense jaw, and if your teeth are clenched even right now,
• 27:32
  Speaker 2: you probably also have a tight so as muscle. Folks
• 27:36
  Speaker 2: will experience if they have a tight jaw, they'll experience headaches,
• 27:40
  Speaker 2: they'll experience neck tension, they'll experience shoulder tension. Jaw has
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: a lot to do with anger and resentment. Hips are
• 27:50
  Speaker 2: more betrayal, childhood trauma, and these those are patterns. They're
• 27:55
  Speaker 2: not absolutes. Folks can also store trauma in their shoulders,
• 28:00
  Speaker 2: and this is often connected to anxiety or long term stress.
• 28:04
  Speaker 2: You literally feel like you have so much burden on
• 28:09
  Speaker 2: your shoulders. And the neck is also a big place
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: for people, and the neck is really connected to oppression,
• 28:16
  Speaker 2: losing your voice, not feeling like you can speak up
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: for yourself. So folks with people pleasing patterns often have
• 28:24
  Speaker 2: neck pain as well.
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: Interesting, Yeah, I think there's a significant amount of people
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: that have buried trauma and don't remember it. Yeah, how
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: can people access it in their bodies if they don't remember.
• 28:41
  Speaker 2: The amazing thing about somatic therapy somatic exercises is that
• 28:47
  Speaker 2: it's bottom up, meaning that you start with the body
• 28:50
  Speaker 2: rather than starting with the mind, so you don't actually
• 28:53
  Speaker 2: have to remember what happened to you. You can just
• 28:58
  Speaker 2: notice that you have this symptom of trauma. So maybe
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: you have issues with sleep, you have chest pains, you
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: have frequent stomach aches like more than three times per month,
• 29:09
  Speaker 2: frequent headaches, muscle tension, all of these are indications that
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: you may be storing trauma in your body, and you
• 29:16
  Speaker 2: can start to do somatic therapy or somatic exercises to heal.
• 29:23
  Speaker 2: And the amazing thing about these exercises or this type
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: of therapy is that you're really moving your body and
• 29:30
  Speaker 2: releasing this tension, and as you do, you're building new
• 29:34
  Speaker 2: neural pathways in your nervous system out of the habitual
• 29:38
  Speaker 2: stress response, the habitual fight flight response, which can those
• 29:43
  Speaker 2: neural pathways can get really strong for people and back
• 29:46
  Speaker 2: into your homeostasis. So people will say like, oh my gosh,
• 29:51
  Speaker 2: I feel like myself again, or I can see myself
• 29:54
  Speaker 2: again in the mirror. I met myself again for the
• 29:57
  Speaker 2: first time after I feel like I've been hiding for years.
• 30:00
  Speaker 2: After they do somatics. Sometimes when you do somatics or
• 30:05
  Speaker 2: somatic therapy, you can have dreams, memories, or even nightmares
• 30:12
  Speaker 2: about some trauma that's happened to you, which I'm really
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: clear with people in the course, like there's a whole
• 30:19
  Speaker 2: thing about that that can happen. And sometimes that can
• 30:24
  Speaker 2: be scary for people, right because it's something that they've
• 30:27
  Speaker 2: buried for a long time. And when you bury it,
• 30:29
  Speaker 2: it's not because you don't want to see it's because
• 30:31
  Speaker 2: it's too overwhelming for you in that moment to process it.
• 30:36
  Speaker 2: So as the good thing about that stuff coming up.
• 30:39
  Speaker 2: Is it's an indication that you're starting to feel safe again,
• 30:43
  Speaker 2: because as you start to feel safer, that stuff can
• 30:46
  Speaker 2: come up and you can actually address it. And addressing
• 30:49
  Speaker 2: it is what heals it, and it is what ultimately
• 30:52
  Speaker 2: liberates you and sets you free. Keeping it buried won't.
• 30:56
  Speaker 2: So even if you are having nightmares because you started
• 31:00
  Speaker 2: working with a somatic therapist, like, it's totally scary in
• 31:04
  Speaker 2: that moment, it's good to acknowledge that, and that's why
• 31:07
  Speaker 2: it's good to work with someone like a somatic therapist.
• 31:11
  Speaker 2: Or we do a ton of support for all of
• 31:15
  Speaker 2: our students. We're like, we have a whole team of
• 31:17
  Speaker 2: people that have a somatic background that are trained and
• 31:21
  Speaker 2: can help people through these things. We make sure to
• 31:24
  Speaker 2: provide resources and personal support for all of our students.
• 31:28
  Speaker 2: But you do want to make sure that you're doing
• 31:30
  Speaker 2: it with some level of support so you're not just
• 31:34
  Speaker 2: like on an island trying to process this by yourself
• 31:37
  Speaker 2: from like a YouTube video.
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: What do you think the worst habits are that come
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: along with stress and trauma that make the experience even worse.
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: I've heard you talk about revenge, sleep, procrastinations, and I've
• 31:54
  Speaker 1: never heard of that. Yeah.
• 31:56
  Speaker 2: Revenge sleep procrastination is when you stay up really late
• 32:00
  Speaker 2: at night, okay, kind of mindlessly scrolling on your phone
• 32:04
  Speaker 2: and you're exhausted, but it's like one am, and you're
• 32:08
  Speaker 2: also having a great time scrolling on your phone, so
• 32:11
  Speaker 2: you just stay up for another hour or two. And
• 32:14
  Speaker 2: this often happens for people when they've been masking all
• 32:17
  Speaker 2: day or they're not able to be their authentic self
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: all day. And at a certain point, you need to
• 32:23
  Speaker 2: be authentic, right, you need to like look at what
• 32:27
  Speaker 2: you love to look at and go down different rabbit
• 32:29
  Speaker 2: holes and enjoy yourself. And so a lot of people
• 32:33
  Speaker 2: will do that really late at night. Very common for
• 32:36
  Speaker 2: new moms actually, because they have so much responsibility and
• 32:42
  Speaker 2: they're so busy and they're taking care of everyone and
• 32:45
  Speaker 2: they don't really get any time to themselves. So these
• 32:48
  Speaker 2: like really late hours for them or are sacred.
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: Wow.
• 32:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah, But ultimately, if you're doing it long term, it's
• 32:56
  Speaker 2: going to cause a bunch of other problems. Yeah.
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: Do you feel there are simple movements that we can
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: all do to deal with sadness and fear?
• 33:05
  Speaker 2: Absolutely? You want me to describe one. Yeah, Yeah, My
• 33:09
  Speaker 2: favorite movement to start with is you lay on your
• 33:13
  Speaker 2: bed on your stomach. You bring your hands up and
• 33:18
  Speaker 2: stack your hands on top of each other, place your
• 33:22
  Speaker 2: forehead on top of your hands, and you just gently
• 33:25
  Speaker 2: rock your hips side to side in the laziest, least
• 33:30
  Speaker 2: ambitious way possible, just like you're on day four of
• 33:34
  Speaker 2: a vacation.
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: So many of the women that listen are just very ambitious.
• 33:40
  Speaker 2: So I think this is a good call out, Yes, like,
• 33:43
  Speaker 2: how unmotivated can you be as we do this movement?
• 33:46
  Speaker 2: And it's just you're just gonna rock back and forth
• 33:49
  Speaker 2: for about a minute. You want to keep the movement small, relaxed, heavy,
• 33:55
  Speaker 2: not trying at all. Yeah, and you don't need to
• 33:59
  Speaker 2: set a timer because it's going to like whatever you
• 34:02
  Speaker 2: think am in it is is great. And then you'll
• 34:05
  Speaker 2: notice the rocking has this really beautiful even rhythm that
• 34:10
  Speaker 2: starts to regulate your nervous system. And this exercise also
• 34:14
  Speaker 2: utilizes bilateral stimulation, which regulates your nervous system too, So
• 34:19
  Speaker 2: it's a great exercise if you're feeling really stressed, if
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: you're feeling too stressed to sleep, or if you're feeling
• 34:26
  Speaker 2: really anxious. It's a really nice movement to do. That's
• 34:29
  Speaker 2: really simple. Yeah, yeah, thank you for that. Yeah.
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: You talk a lot about lowering your cortisol naturally. This
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: is going to sound really silly, but can we go
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: back to the basics, like what is our cortisol?
• 34:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah? What are our cortisol levels? Absolutely so, when you
• 34:45
  Speaker 2: experience fear, your amygdalok gets larger. That goes down into
• 34:52
  Speaker 2: your pituitary gland, which connects to your adrenals. Your adrenals
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: are what create cortisols, what creates your stress hormone. This
• 35:00
  Speaker 2: happens in like seventy four milliseconds. It's super fast, so
• 35:05
  Speaker 2: you experience fear boom cortisol spike. The cortisol spike is
• 35:11
  Speaker 2: really happening to help you get out of whatever situation
• 35:16
  Speaker 2: is causing this stress. So it's in that moment, it's
• 35:20
  Speaker 2: trying to help you flee or fight.
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: And can this be as small as social anxiety or absolutely?
• 35:28
  Speaker 2: Okay, absolutely so. I think what's what's really interesting about
• 35:32
  Speaker 2: our nervous system is like this ancient, primitive system that
• 35:35
  Speaker 2: hasn't yet caught up with modern society. So people will
• 35:39
  Speaker 2: experience a cortisol spike when they're sending an email, they'll
• 35:43
  Speaker 2: experience a cortisol spike, Like, you know, I experience cortisol
• 35:47
  Speaker 2: spikes when I am in large crowds because that's part
• 35:52
  Speaker 2: of my history that makes me really scared. So it's
• 35:56
  Speaker 2: also about kind of honoring historically what has your story
• 36:01
  Speaker 2: and kind of what still triggers you and knowing that
• 36:05
  Speaker 2: and it's okay, you know, but just knowing that, like whoo,
• 36:10
  Speaker 2: I feel my heart racing right now, or I feel
• 36:13
  Speaker 2: I'm suddenly sweating, or you're breathing really fast, those are
• 36:17
  Speaker 2: pretty clear indications of a cortisol spike, And yeah, your
• 36:24
  Speaker 2: cortisol will spike and then you'll feel all these physiological
• 36:27
  Speaker 2: sensations like I just mentioned. Totally fine if it happens
• 36:31
  Speaker 2: once in a while, but a lot of people are
• 36:34
  Speaker 2: experiencing cortisol spikes multiple times a day, every day, or
• 36:38
  Speaker 2: multiple times a week every week. They experience a corsol
• 36:41
  Speaker 2: spike every time they see their boss or they you know,
• 36:45
  Speaker 2: like or they experience a cortisol spike for a long
• 36:49
  Speaker 2: time because they're in a fight with their partner. So
• 36:51
  Speaker 2: like every interaction that they have is this really stressful thing.
• 36:58
  Speaker 2: And that's okay, we just need the tools to manage
• 37:03
  Speaker 2: that and the awareness to know what's going on. Because
• 37:06
  Speaker 2: we're not taught any of this. We don't know any
• 37:09
  Speaker 2: of this. This took me like ten years of trying
• 37:13
  Speaker 2: to figure out what was going on until I discovered somatics.
• 37:17
  Speaker 2: I had no idea what was going on. I was like,
• 37:19
  Speaker 2: why am I so scared getting onto the subway?
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: You know?
• 37:24
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I felt like it was like a life or
• 37:26
  Speaker 2: death situation.
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: Well, I think it's so interesting too, because you're such
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: a brave person, So it must have been really hard
• 37:32
  Speaker 1: to think, like, why can't I do this seemingly simple task?
• 37:36
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and also why is this bothering me? But it's
• 37:40
  Speaker 2: not bothering any of my friends, it's not bothering anyone
• 37:43
  Speaker 2: else on the train. Yeah, I would like break out
• 37:46
  Speaker 2: and sweat when I would get on the subway. And
• 37:49
  Speaker 2: I didn't understand what the reason for that was.
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: You were four sessions away from healing.
• 37:55
  Speaker 2: Yes, you didn't know at the time, I had no idea.
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: Well, I think one of the reasons I was really
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: excited to have you here is I had just learned
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: about somatics in the last year, and I'm into the
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: world of healing.
• 38:10
  Speaker 2: I'm curious about it.
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: I'm interested, and I think people are just now talking
• 38:15
  Speaker 1: about it in a more mainstream way.
• 38:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah, what do you think that is?
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: Why is it having its moment?
• 38:22
  Speaker 2: Yes? I think when the pandemic hit, a lot of
• 38:27
  Speaker 2: us came online more and we started to learn a
• 38:32
  Speaker 2: lot of new information, specifically about trauma because we collectively
• 38:36
  Speaker 2: went through a trauma, right, So we're specifically learning a
• 38:40
  Speaker 2: lot more about trauma. We're specifically learning a lot more
• 38:42
  Speaker 2: about healing, and a lot of people started therapy during
• 38:47
  Speaker 2: the pandemic too, And I really think that that influx
• 38:53
  Speaker 2: of information is why somatics is having its moment. It's
• 38:58
  Speaker 2: been around since like nineteen seventy two. That was the
• 39:03
  Speaker 2: first time Thomas Hannah used the words somatics, and it
• 39:08
  Speaker 2: has had several schools, have had development, and you know,
• 39:13
  Speaker 2: there's somatic Experiencing with doctor Peter Levine that's quite popular,
• 39:17
  Speaker 2: and it has been around for I believe about twenty years.
• 39:21
  Speaker 2: But now it's having this huge moment because we're all
• 39:26
  Speaker 2: so much more aware of trauma, of that maybe we're
• 39:31
  Speaker 2: all living in chronic stress in the United States or
• 39:35
  Speaker 2: so many of us are, like you, go to Europe
• 39:37
  Speaker 2: and you're like, why do I feel so different? Are
• 39:40
  Speaker 2: because we're on vacation, partly because we're on vacation, but
• 39:43
  Speaker 2: our culture also has a different pace.
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: I do a little rapid fire at the end of
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: any interview. What is a song that's currently on repeat.
• 39:52
  Speaker 2: In your life? Oh? Do a LIPA dance the night away.
• 39:55
  Speaker 1: A wellness trend that you think is worth the hype
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: in for red saunas, wellness trend that's completely skippable.
• 40:03
  Speaker 2: Cold plunges.
• 40:05
  Speaker 1: I agree, Oh my god, And can you say more
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: about that because related, yeah, absolutely, a cold plunge isn't
• 40:15
  Speaker 1: ideal or even beneficial for you if you're living with
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: long term stress.
• 40:21
  Speaker 2: It's because your body is already in its fight flight response,
• 40:26
  Speaker 2: and so when you submerge into an icy bath of
• 40:31
  Speaker 2: cold water, your body thinks that you're like falling. It
• 40:36
  Speaker 2: thinks that you're in a life or death situation. The
• 40:39
  Speaker 2: reason why you feel really good when you get out
• 40:42
  Speaker 2: is because your body thinks that you just survived falling
• 40:45
  Speaker 2: into a frozen lake. You escape death, You escaped death,
• 40:50
  Speaker 2: and that's why you feel so good. But if you're
• 40:55
  Speaker 2: already stressed and you're cold plunging. You're just keeping yourself
• 40:59
  Speaker 2: in that state of fight or flight. You're actually exacerbating it,
• 41:03
  Speaker 2: and you're just continuously living in this physiological survival mode.
• 41:09
  Speaker 1: What is a book that has changed your life? Something
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: you think everybody should read?
• 41:13
  Speaker 2: Glennon Doyle Untamed. Why if you've read the book, you'll know,
• 41:20
  Speaker 2: you'll know this. You're a goddamn cheetah.
• 41:25
  Speaker 1: Do you have a hidden talent?
• 41:28
  Speaker 2: I love wine dancing? What?
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that is amazing.
• 41:33
  Speaker 2: Where are you from? I'm from San Diego originally?
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: So how in the hell did you learn how to
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: line dance?
• 41:40
  Speaker 2: When I moved to La I started going to queer
• 41:42
  Speaker 2: line dancing and it's super fun. It's on Monday and
• 41:46
  Speaker 2: Thursday nights.
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: Are they playing Beyonce? Now?
• 41:49
  Speaker 2: They are playing Beyonce?
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: Now? I feel like that's the new line dance.
• 41:52
  Speaker 2: It's I mean, now, it's like super cool to wine
• 41:56
  Speaker 2: dance fabulous because of Beyonce. You are ahead of the trend. Yeah,
• 42:00
  Speaker 2: only slightly, but yeah.
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: Will you grab the question everything card game? Yeah, and
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: then pick whichever card calls you?
• 42:07
  Speaker 2: Okay, what's something you wish people could see about you
• 42:11
  Speaker 2: that they don't see at first glance? I think for me,
• 42:20
  Speaker 2: it's that I've been through a lot and have been
• 42:27
  Speaker 2: at a really deep rock bottom place when I got
• 42:32
  Speaker 2: out of my marriage. It was an abusive marriage and
• 42:34
  Speaker 2: I had to leave like really quickly, and you know,
• 42:40
  Speaker 2: there was also financial abuse that he had done to
• 42:43
  Speaker 2: me involved, and I didn't have a home to go
• 42:47
  Speaker 2: to because I left and was just so deeply struggling.
• 42:52
  Speaker 2: It was the worst time of my life. And I
• 42:55
  Speaker 2: really understand what rock bottom is from a personal level.
• 43:01
  Speaker 2: And I don't think that people think that when they
• 43:05
  Speaker 2: first meet me or first see my videos, because I've
• 43:08
  Speaker 2: done a lot of work to heal from it.
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: I think one of the things that's really inspiring is
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: if somebody's at rock bottom, they can see you.
• 43:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, Yeah, it's really tough. Yeah, it's really hard.
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: When you were in it, did you think you would
• 43:24
  Speaker 1: get out of it?
• 43:26
  Speaker 2: It was like I didn't even have the mental bandwidth
• 43:29
  Speaker 2: to think about whether I was going to get out
• 43:32
  Speaker 2: of it or not. I just knew I needed to
• 43:34
  Speaker 2: leave that situation like I had I needed to leave it.
• 43:38
  Speaker 2: Like yesterday, there was an incident that happened that was
• 43:41
  Speaker 2: just so far past my boundaries and that that night
• 43:46
  Speaker 2: I left and I hadn't. I felt just the whole
• 43:51
  Speaker 2: world was spinning. I had no idea where I was
• 43:53
  Speaker 2: going to go. I had enough money for like two meals,
• 43:57
  Speaker 2: is for real? Yeah, what'd you do? I called my
• 44:02
  Speaker 2: brother and he unfortunately was on a trip like a
• 44:09
  Speaker 2: in nature with no cell service. Yea, Luckily he called
• 44:14
  Speaker 2: me the next day, but I slept in my car
• 44:17
  Speaker 2: for a night, and then he called me and I
• 44:21
  Speaker 2: got a restraining order and did some legal setup and
• 44:28
  Speaker 2: he had my back every step of the way. And
• 44:32
  Speaker 2: that is why I ended up moving to the Bay
• 44:33
  Speaker 2: Area for a little while, is because that's where he
• 44:36
  Speaker 2: lives in San Francisco. So he helped me get through
• 44:41
  Speaker 2: that phase a lot, and I'm really grateful. And my
• 44:44
  Speaker 2: aunt and my uncle and my cousins helped me through
• 44:47
  Speaker 2: that phase too, So I'm really glad I had that
• 44:51
  Speaker 2: family support. But some people, some people don't. Yeah.
• 44:56
  Speaker 1: Yeah, what's the smartest decision You've ever made?
• 45:00
  Speaker 2: Trusting my gut over and over and over again, even
• 45:04
  Speaker 2: when people were telling me that what I was feeling
• 45:08
  Speaker 2: was wrong. Thank you so much, Thank you so much.
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: Okay, you know what time it is. Today's a good day.
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: To have a good day. I'll see you next week.