Latest / Just Heal with Dr Jay / Healing Is a Lifestyle: Menopause, Mental Wellness & the Power of Community with Dr. Jessica Sheperd

Transcript

Healing Is a Lifestyle: Menopause, Mental Wellness & the Power of Community with Dr. Jessica Sheperd · Just Heal with Dr Jay

0:00
Speaker 1: Welcome to Jesshill with Doctor j a production of The
0:03
Speaker 1: Black Effect Podcast Network and iHeartRadio. So I have the
0:06
Speaker 1: great honor and pleasure to sit with my friend. She's
0:11
Speaker 1: all over television, She's all over every magazine, doctor Jessica Sheppard.
0:16
Speaker 1: How you doing.
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Speaker 2: I am so good. We are here, like live together. Yes,
0:21
Speaker 2: we heard so many times we're like commenting on our
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Speaker 2: posts and being like, how did you get to that
0:26
Speaker 2: conference that I missed you? And yes, it's good, we're here.
0:30
Speaker 1: Yes, I listen. This is a conversation that I've been
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Speaker 1: looking forward to because I just love what you represent,
0:38
Speaker 1: not just what you do in the medical field, but
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Speaker 1: I think also what you represent for the achieved woman,
0:44
Speaker 1: and I want to unpack that today.
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Speaker 2: So have a bit of a packing to do about
0:48
Speaker 2: that one.
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Speaker 1: Right, the achieved woman and so and that just came
0:52
Speaker 1: to me, you know, And I have my questions and
0:55
Speaker 1: all those different things. But as I always start off
0:58
Speaker 1: every episode when I'm welcoming someone to the healing community,
1:02
Speaker 1: I don't ask them how they're doing. I like to
1:04
Speaker 1: ask them how are they feeling? How are you feeling today?
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Speaker 2: Dot Ooh, I love that. I'm thinking of my emotion
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Speaker 2: wheel in my head. Today I feel reassured. I think
1:15
Speaker 2: today is a day where I feel reassured because we'll
1:18
Speaker 2: get into that of the work that I've done on
1:21
Speaker 2: myself as an individual. So today I feel reassured.
1:24
Speaker 1: Good. I love that reassured. Let's see if I can
1:27
Speaker 1: ask myself how I feel today today. I feel encouraged.
1:31
Speaker 1: H Yeah, I feel encouraged today, and not that I
1:35
Speaker 1: was discouraged, but I feel encouraged to continue the work
1:39
Speaker 1: that I'm doing in this space. Whenever you and you
1:42
Speaker 1: know this, when you are helping people heal, whether it's
1:45
Speaker 1: from a psychological or from a medical perspective, I think
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Speaker 1: there is the notion that there's this joy that we
1:53
Speaker 1: always have, yeah, because we're like, oh, we have been people,
1:56
Speaker 1: and so I think for me, I'm often battling sometimes
2:00
Speaker 1: back and forth because sometimes there's joy with it, yeah,
2:03
Speaker 1: and then there's a little bit of pain and it's
2:05
Speaker 1: not deep pain. It's almost like man, people are really hurting.
2:10
Speaker 2: That's what I would definitely agree with you on because
2:14
Speaker 2: you know, even though we're approaching it from different perspectives
2:17
Speaker 2: of you know, psychological mental approach. For me, mostly physical
2:21
Speaker 2: is there is a lot of mind body connection. But
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Speaker 2: either way that you're helping people, is that a lot
2:27
Speaker 2: of times that can maybe pull away from you because
2:33
Speaker 2: you're so like into the giving and the healing and
2:35
Speaker 2: how it and I help you that often if you
2:38
Speaker 2: don't take time for yourself or take time to figure
2:41
Speaker 2: out how that is impacting you, then you do feel
2:44
Speaker 2: sometimes a little bit down. And being encouraged I think
2:47
Speaker 2: is a good term. And yeah, I feel that some days.
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Speaker 2: She was like, huh, I feel encouraged to continue the
2:54
Speaker 2: work that I'm doing.
2:55
Speaker 1: Yeah, because I think if we're on as the ebbs
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Speaker 1: of flows of our work, it's really attached to the
3:04
Speaker 1: energy that we're giving out. Because if it's a day
3:08
Speaker 1: where you're pouring and you're not only talking about the diagnosis,
3:12
Speaker 1: you're also asking about the support system, you're also asking about,
3:15
Speaker 1: you know, how are they going to move forward? And
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Speaker 1: do they have people in their tribe? Those things can
3:21
Speaker 1: kind of take from us. And I'm reminded because I
3:24
Speaker 1: was recently sitting with the client and they said to me, man,
3:27
Speaker 1: I don't have a great community, And that thing has
3:30
Speaker 1: just been just really just digging at me to know
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Speaker 1: that they're on this path to healing, but they also
3:37
Speaker 1: feel very long though they have me to guide them
3:40
Speaker 1: on this journey. And that's one of the things that
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Speaker 1: I often feel challenged with because I wish that everyone
3:48
Speaker 1: can feel yes that edwin and I.
3:50
Speaker 2: Think that that probably will come up later as we're speaking.
3:52
Speaker 2: Is one how do you build community? Because many times
3:56
Speaker 2: the community that you may have been in as you're healing,
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Speaker 2: you may need to actually change a little bit of
4:02
Speaker 2: that community, and so finding that new community sometimes can
4:05
Speaker 2: be challenging. But also is that inner work that you
4:09
Speaker 2: do with yourself. A lot of self love and self
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Speaker 2: trust has to be established in order for the days
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Speaker 2: when you may feel alone or lonely, or the community
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Speaker 2: is not all the way there, maybe you can't reach
4:19
Speaker 2: your therapist, right, Yeah, Is that you have to actually
4:22
Speaker 2: go into yourself to being like, what are my tools
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Speaker 2: and how are you going to kind of bring back
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Speaker 2: that self love and self trust Because it's not always
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Speaker 2: a well honed skill. So it's the work that you're
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Speaker 2: doing to get to that level of being self worthy
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Speaker 2: and building that self trust.
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Speaker 1: So I want to go back to there, Doc and
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Speaker 1: ask you that question when you were talking about you
4:44
Speaker 1: may have to get a new community. Talk about that
4:48
Speaker 1: because that yeah, as a black woman, yes, who is achieved.
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Speaker 1: Did some of your circles change as you begin to
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Speaker 1: grow and expand?
5:00
Speaker 2: Absolutely it has, and there's there's good reason for that.
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Speaker 2: I think, you know, as we grow, I think we
5:05
Speaker 2: live in stages and phases. And just because growth might
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Speaker 2: build a new community, or you may have to offset
5:13
Speaker 2: some of the community that you have, it doesn't mean
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Speaker 2: that it's always out of loss of love or loss
5:20
Speaker 2: of respect. It means that for this moment in my life,
5:24
Speaker 2: I need to focus on who are the community that's
5:28
Speaker 2: going to help stabilize me if it's a stabilization issue,
5:33
Speaker 2: or if it's I'm in a growth phase, who's going
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Speaker 2: to help me in that growth phase? And not everyone
5:38
Speaker 2: is going to be best for that community at that time.
5:41
Speaker 2: So I often think that people feel that if they're
5:46
Speaker 2: in that kind of movement, both a person who's removing
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Speaker 2: the community and the person who may be in that community.
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Speaker 2: It can be tricky. But I do think that if
5:55
Speaker 2: we do it in a way that's loving and it
5:57
Speaker 2: doesn't have to be a negative experience, that you should
6:00
Speaker 2: actually be changing your community. I mean, we would say
6:02
Speaker 2: the same thing. For think of the people who are
6:06
Speaker 2: at the top of their game, like what Jeff Bezos
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Speaker 2: and those people from the time that they were in
6:12
Speaker 2: college building this thing or oh Facebook was a thing
6:16
Speaker 2: that I built in my dorm room. The people that
6:18
Speaker 2: were there at that time to now where they are
6:20
Speaker 2: have changed. That is what is expected of that. So
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Speaker 2: why shouldn't we expect that of ourselves as we start
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Speaker 2: to grow, whether it's spiritually, physically, mentally, that ourn't community
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Speaker 2: should have to change.
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Speaker 1: Yes, Oh, this is so good because what I'm thinking
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Speaker 1: about is when I begin my healing journ as a man,
6:41
Speaker 1: it was difficult. It's tough, and I've talked about this
6:44
Speaker 1: in previous episodes because it's who you have to leave behind,
6:49
Speaker 1: and there wasn't there wasn't conversations, you know, most of
6:54
Speaker 1: the time. I think my growth just kind of did
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Speaker 1: the talking for me.
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Speaker 2: It was kind of a natural phase.
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Speaker 1: It was this kind of natural phase. So as a woman,
7:05
Speaker 1: how does it look because it looks different for men
7:07
Speaker 1: and women? Because yeah, because yeah, because men, because when
7:13
Speaker 1: there's a separation with brothers, brothers, I don't think that
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Speaker 1: they think personally, Bruggies just think, oh man, my man,
7:20
Speaker 1: got a lot going on and we'll catch up.
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Speaker 2: You know, I get to like pose that question back
7:25
Speaker 2: to you because you just said something that like I
7:27
Speaker 2: thought of a question, but no. I think that is
7:29
Speaker 2: very tricky because women, we are so giving and we
7:32
Speaker 2: are emotional and when something's going on, even if it
7:35
Speaker 2: isn't something. So for example, I've had times where I'm
7:39
Speaker 2: really focusing in on a particular project I'm doing, and
7:42
Speaker 2: so I may not talk to as many people as
7:45
Speaker 2: I have in my friend group or community as much.
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Speaker 2: And I won't guarantee you there will be someone who
7:50
Speaker 2: will be like, reach out and say did I do something?
7:53
Speaker 2: Was there something? And then you're like, wait, no, but
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Speaker 2: should I have said something like then you're like caught
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Speaker 2: in this likespire of there wasn't anything, but did you
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Speaker 2: think something? Why do you think?
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Speaker 1: So?
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Speaker 2: You know, girl, we will go down a rabbit hole
8:06
Speaker 2: and then the person's like, well, you didn't call me
8:08
Speaker 2: at nine o'clock on Tuesday like you usually do, and
8:10
Speaker 2: so it creates this thing. And I think that's where
8:12
Speaker 2: we have to be okay with saying the hard thing
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Speaker 2: with Hey, I'm doing a project and I'm so sorry.
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Speaker 2: You can honor the person in their feelings, but also
8:21
Speaker 2: you have to come back and say, well, this is
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Speaker 2: why this happened. And even if it was I felt
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Speaker 2: this happened and this is how I felt about it,
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Speaker 2: you still have to own up to that because there
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Speaker 2: are a lot of women who will shy away from
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Speaker 2: that conversation and then it becomes toxic.
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Speaker 1: Yeah.
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Speaker 2: Oh, learning how to communicate is one of the biggest
8:40
Speaker 2: things that I've learned from myself personally in a career
8:45
Speaker 2: in how to manage friends. But once you navigate through
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Speaker 2: it and you get more comfortable with it, it isn't
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Speaker 2: a bad thing. It's actually necessary. I'm going to pose
8:55
Speaker 2: that question back to you before I forget is you said?
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Speaker 2: And I think this is so true. Obviously, men and
9:00
Speaker 2: women are different in how they communicate. If a man
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Speaker 2: is like, oh, man, he's just going through a hard thing,
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Speaker 2: but really they may be going through a difficult time
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Speaker 2: or not. Do you think that men should approach it
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Speaker 2: in a way where they're like, I was just checking
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Speaker 2: on you, is this going on or not?
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Speaker 1: Absolutely? I think I think for us as men, because
9:24
Speaker 1: we don't have the muscle or the development of that muscle,
9:30
Speaker 1: we kind of refrain from trying to use it. Like
9:34
Speaker 1: you'll see this with brothers who are not very good
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Speaker 1: at something. They fear trying to do something new. They
9:40
Speaker 1: fear trying to do something that they feel like they
9:43
Speaker 1: may be a novice at. So if they don't really
9:46
Speaker 1: have the development in that area, they kind of shy away.
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Speaker 1: And then if they are interested, they are very kind
9:56
Speaker 1: of sensitive to kind of like, well, how do I
9:58
Speaker 1: approach that? And one of the things that has helped
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Speaker 1: me is that question. I always ask a brother how
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Speaker 1: they're feeling, and then I'll ask them, hey, brother, how's
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Speaker 1: your heart? Man? And that question right there, Man.
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Speaker 2: It's aulds like an easy question, but many times to.
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Speaker 1: Answer that question stops so many of my brothers in
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Speaker 1: their tracks. And I love that it does. And what
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Speaker 1: I did is in my group, I created a emotional
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Speaker 1: chart for the brothers, so each color represents a feeling
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Speaker 1: and a statement like green says man, brother, I'm feeling great,
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Speaker 1: I'm feeling couraged, I'm feeling inspired. We have blue with
10:39
Speaker 1: brother I'm kind of a space where I really don't know. Red,
10:43
Speaker 1: of course is an emergency, and then we have yellow.
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Speaker 1: It's just like, man, bro it's not bad, it's not good.
10:51
Speaker 1: I'm just kind of like in a zone where I'm
10:53
Speaker 1: just kind of going through the motion and believe it
10:56
Speaker 1: or not. Got that color chart for them, man has
11:01
Speaker 1: been liberating game change right, because it also gave brothers
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Speaker 1: a language to speak that they hadn't learned.
11:09
Speaker 2: I think it's like bringing it down to a level
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Speaker 2: of you don't need to be you know, philosophical with it.
11:15
Speaker 2: Oh and like have this whole dissertation in the answer.
11:18
Speaker 2: It's just like very simple and that actually can open
11:21
Speaker 2: up the waves to being like as they admit it,
11:25
Speaker 2: being like, oh my, I didn't even realize it, but
11:28
Speaker 2: as you say it, you're like honoring and knowledging. It's
11:31
Speaker 2: similar to when you're in the hospital, right when you're
11:34
Speaker 2: after a procedure whatever, they have the chart that has
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Speaker 2: all the faces. Once we're ten on your pain, it's
11:38
Speaker 2: pretty much the same thing, is that I just like
11:40
Speaker 2: asking what is the description of the pain? How does
11:42
Speaker 2: it feel?
11:43
Speaker 1: Like?
11:43
Speaker 2: What number are you? And the face will tell you
11:45
Speaker 2: like how bad it is. That was such a helpful
11:48
Speaker 2: thing that we developed in medicine.
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Speaker 1: Yes, because most of us don't really want to talk
11:53
Speaker 1: about our pain. Let alone talk about what our pain
11:57
Speaker 1: is making us feel. That's the challenge for men that
12:00
Speaker 1: I think that we really just really struggle with, because
12:04
Speaker 1: it's like, if I tell you how I'm really feeling,
12:07
Speaker 1: there's this fear like, man, are you gonna look at
12:10
Speaker 1: me different? And what I've been able to do with
12:13
Speaker 1: the brothers in my circle is allow them to see
12:16
Speaker 1: how I'm feeling and allow them to see and allow
12:21
Speaker 1: them to see how I model it where they have
12:24
Speaker 1: literally sawt I mean they've literally seen in real time
12:29
Speaker 1: me be at a bad place. About a couple of
12:34
Speaker 1: years ago, I'm on this prayer call what about eight
12:38
Speaker 1: brothers every Monday, every Monday, fifty two weeks out of
12:41
Speaker 1: the year, I mean, which is which is a year
12:43
Speaker 1: fifty two weeks and every Monday, you know, we get
12:46
Speaker 1: on the call. And I had missed several weeks, just
12:50
Speaker 1: wasn't feeling up to it. I didn't want to pray.
12:52
Speaker 1: I feel like I was just just not feeling it.
12:58
Speaker 1: And one day I got on the call and I
13:01
Speaker 1: said to the brothers, I said, man, I want to
13:03
Speaker 1: apologize man that I haven't been here and I've been missing,
13:07
Speaker 1: and not because I've been busy. I said, Man, I'm
13:10
Speaker 1: really overwhelmed. And I said, I'm so overwhelmed that it's
13:17
Speaker 1: scaring me and I don't know what's happening, and I
13:24
Speaker 1: fear what my history is with depression, that it could
13:29
Speaker 1: be pushing me into a dark place. And immediately you
13:34
Speaker 1: can just hear the phone go silent. And brothers sat
13:37
Speaker 1: with it. And after they sat with it, one brother
13:41
Speaker 1: started chiming in and speaking life and the other brother
13:44
Speaker 1: beg dropping scripture, and then the other brother began sharing.
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Speaker 1: He said, Bro, it's funny that you said that because
13:50
Speaker 1: I've been in the same place.
13:52
Speaker 2: See, that's the vulnerability, and we need.
13:56
Speaker 1: To know that we're not the only one. And this
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Speaker 1: is the thing that I I love that women have
14:02
Speaker 1: is you guys have such community that there's never if
14:07
Speaker 1: any and I made because I'm the only bored and
14:09
Speaker 1: may but I can't tell with my mom and sisters
14:12
Speaker 1: because they talk about everything. I never since any trepidation
14:16
Speaker 1: around you guys is sharing.
14:18
Speaker 2: You know, we do have some a few we're more open.
14:21
Speaker 2: I think we communicate more. What I have found in
14:24
Speaker 2: both my patients and just women that I've started to
14:28
Speaker 2: meet as i've been more of I guess you can
14:31
Speaker 2: say a public figure is there is also a lot
14:34
Speaker 2: of numbing that goes on. Right, So even though we're
14:36
Speaker 2: communicating and we're saying this is how I feel, or,
14:40
Speaker 2: there still is on the extreme I would say, actually,
14:42
Speaker 2: on the extreme of what you're explaining is now I
14:45
Speaker 2: have to present as everything's good, everything's fine, we're doing great,
14:52
Speaker 2: and I'm doing great too. Meanwhile, that's not the situation, right,
14:56
Speaker 2: So it's again the other side of it, where there
14:58
Speaker 2: is over communication. I wouldn't really call it over communication,
15:01
Speaker 2: but in the sense of, you know, when we're comparing
15:04
Speaker 2: to men, but also there becomes this projection of that
15:08
Speaker 2: everything is okay. So again I think at both stages
15:11
Speaker 2: there still needs to be this muscle of vulnerability that
15:14
Speaker 2: needs to be explored and transparency in being okay with
15:19
Speaker 2: this is really how I feel. Yes, But the community
15:23
Speaker 2: always matters, right, So as you're growing that skill set
15:26
Speaker 2: of me being able to explain really how I am
15:30
Speaker 2: or may require another community and that's okay too, because
15:34
Speaker 2: you want to grow that part of you emotionally, and
15:37
Speaker 2: I think in that growth phase you may need to
15:40
Speaker 2: I call it the cocoon phase, right, the cocune phase
15:43
Speaker 2: of like, let me kind of be a little bit
15:45
Speaker 2: more focal with intention to figure out where I am
15:48
Speaker 2: so I can see what needs to be around me
15:51
Speaker 2: in order for growth.
15:53
Speaker 1: As you were speaking, I was thinking that you're in
15:58
Speaker 1: a place where some will look at you and said, man,
16:01
Speaker 1: you achieve everything. How important is it for you to
16:06
Speaker 1: have achieved everything? But also to find spaces where you're
16:11
Speaker 1: not doctorshipper you can just be just how important is
16:15
Speaker 1: that for you?
16:16
Speaker 2: That definitely was a growth phase for me when you
16:20
Speaker 2: think of in the path when you know, I can
16:22
Speaker 2: remember myself when I first started to do say TV,
16:25
Speaker 2: which is way back, and like I think that was
16:27
Speaker 2: like twenty eleven is where I really started to hone
16:30
Speaker 2: that skill. And in that path of that required really
16:36
Speaker 2: focus into learning how to be on TV, how to present,
16:40
Speaker 2: how to make sure that you were giving a really
16:43
Speaker 2: broad scope of information a very short amount of time
16:45
Speaker 2: that people could walk away with. That was like a
16:47
Speaker 2: lot of training all while being a doctor. Right, so
16:51
Speaker 2: if you can imagine that already has to be there,
16:55
Speaker 2: so doctors already when we work way too many hours
16:58
Speaker 2: and then on top of the I'm like, oh, let
16:59
Speaker 2: me try this other skill set that I have to
17:02
Speaker 2: learn so as a learning curve, and then at that
17:05
Speaker 2: time I think, well maybe a few years after that,
17:07
Speaker 2: like around twenty fourteen, I had kids back to back,
17:10
Speaker 2: mind you, which is funny because I'm an obgyn, and
17:13
Speaker 2: I was like, ah, how does one not do that?
17:15
Speaker 2: And then you do it anyway? So that comes and
17:18
Speaker 2: I do think that you know, you hear this often
17:21
Speaker 2: when you hear of accomplished women. I was recently at
17:25
Speaker 2: a at a conference in Indra who was a previous
17:29
Speaker 2: CEO of PEPSI was talking and one of the things
17:31
Speaker 2: that she talks about a lot is people will say
17:33
Speaker 2: the same thing, how did you accomplish so much? And
17:35
Speaker 2: can you have it all at once? I believe you
17:38
Speaker 2: can have it all at once, but they're not going
17:40
Speaker 2: to grow in the same globe stages and phases. And
17:45
Speaker 2: that was something for me to learn because inherently I'm
17:49
Speaker 2: a very like motivated, determined person. And I would say,
17:52
Speaker 2: even now I have a name for it is like
17:55
Speaker 2: kind of like a steamroll or effect. I'm like, we're
17:57
Speaker 2: coming through, whether you're we're coming through. But always remember
18:03
Speaker 2: your strongest attributes can also have a weak spot. And
18:07
Speaker 2: I think early on for me, oh that's steamroller.
18:11
Speaker 1: Man, you gotta go No, no, we gotta park back there. No, no,
18:15
Speaker 1: we're not right there. That's that's the moment too. Oh
18:20
Speaker 1: my gosh. Our strongest attributes also has weak points, also
18:25
Speaker 1: has weak points. What were some of the weak points?
18:28
Speaker 2: The week point the steam roller was like, I'm out
18:32
Speaker 2: of my way, I've got like this path to do.
18:34
Speaker 2: I know what the next step is. Yeah, I mean,
18:36
Speaker 2: like you really had to be like that in med
18:38
Speaker 2: school or you ain't never going to get through. So
18:40
Speaker 2: you had to be so like, I'm determined, I'm here
18:42
Speaker 2: to accomplish this goal. This is what I'm doing. And
18:46
Speaker 2: so I was already like that, and then going into
18:49
Speaker 2: a profession where that was really what got you to
18:52
Speaker 2: the highest levels. And now I'm at another four forefront
18:56
Speaker 2: of I'm going to do this other thing and so
18:58
Speaker 2: steamrolling again. And I think, looking back, yes, it was
19:01
Speaker 2: a strength, and yes it got me to a lot
19:04
Speaker 2: of the reasons why I am the way I am
19:07
Speaker 2: today or where I am. But in that is taking
19:11
Speaker 2: pause and saying, are there moments of this steamroller path
19:15
Speaker 2: that I need to be aware of my surroundings? And
19:19
Speaker 2: what's going on and that has been one of my
19:21
Speaker 2: biggest growth phases over the last few years.
19:24
Speaker 1: And when you and when you discover that and you
19:27
Speaker 1: have that awakening like this works over here, yeah, but
19:32
Speaker 1: it doesn't work over there. And I think that's important
19:35
Speaker 1: for the women that are watching and even for the
19:37
Speaker 1: men that are watching. How important is it to quickly
19:41
Speaker 1: recognize what works and where it works?
19:45
Speaker 2: I love that question. So I would say the quickness
19:48
Speaker 2: of it doesn't always happen because you may not realize
19:51
Speaker 2: it's going on, or that it's not giving you the
19:54
Speaker 2: best outcome that you were expecting. Right. What I would
19:57
Speaker 2: say is in those phases is learning the capacity to saying,
20:04
Speaker 2: how are people experiencing me?
20:07
Speaker 1: There? It is?
20:08
Speaker 2: Right there?
20:09
Speaker 1: It is?
20:09
Speaker 2: What is that weakness? And now what are the things
20:13
Speaker 2: that I'm maybe willing to decrease in the strength of it.
20:16
Speaker 2: You're not decreasing your strength, You're decreasing possibly the momentum
20:20
Speaker 2: or the aptitude or the speed and velocity of which
20:24
Speaker 2: the strength is going to. Now focus on the weakness
20:27
Speaker 2: to accommodate it so that you are you're creating it
20:31
Speaker 2: in a way where you're always aware self awareness that
20:34
Speaker 2: is my like term for twenty twenty five. Yeah, self
20:38
Speaker 2: awareness ability to say, ooh this is this doesn't feel good?
20:43
Speaker 2: Maybe that's an internal thing for yourself. Or if someone
20:47
Speaker 2: comes to me with something, where can I hold that
20:50
Speaker 2: and be vulnerable enough to say, this may be something
20:53
Speaker 2: that I have to pay attention to. How am I
20:55
Speaker 2: going to do that in a way where I have
20:57
Speaker 2: compassion for myself.
21:03
Speaker 1: Which is hard for susciety people and driven very hard
21:06
Speaker 1: because they often see compassion as weakness.
21:09
Speaker 2: Yes. Absolutely, And that was probably in the last year
21:14
Speaker 2: as I realized I did not have a lot of
21:15
Speaker 2: self compassion.
21:17
Speaker 1: Wow. Yeah, when you discovered that, Yeah, how did you
21:23
Speaker 1: receive it? Like for yourself?
21:25
Speaker 2: Oh? I think it's still a daily thing because it's
21:28
Speaker 2: a tool, right, It's something that you actually have to
21:30
Speaker 2: start to learn how to do. So if you think
21:33
Speaker 2: this is where I get into the brain philosophy of
21:38
Speaker 2: who we are and how we present and what are
21:40
Speaker 2: our childhood traumas that we have to address. Is our
21:44
Speaker 2: brains are magnificent complex organs, yes, which is why they're
21:49
Speaker 2: so smart. But inherently what they do is they will
21:53
Speaker 2: figure something out that you may have acquired when you
21:56
Speaker 2: were six, seven, eight years old. Yeah, and it will
21:58
Speaker 2: stay in that pattern unless you choose to recognize that
22:02
Speaker 2: the pattern that was built, which may not be serving you,
22:05
Speaker 2: has to be changed. That's where the difficult part is
22:08
Speaker 2: because you have to acknowledge it and then work to
22:10
Speaker 2: change it. And the work, the hard work. No one
22:13
Speaker 2: wants to do that hard work.
22:15
Speaker 1: It's you know, and this is the doctor in me
22:20
Speaker 1: in the healthcare that we don't discuss often for individuals
22:27
Speaker 1: that neuroplasticity.
22:28
Speaker 2: Neuroplasticity is so amazing when you're able to understand it
22:34
Speaker 2: and work with it, but it will be the thing
22:36
Speaker 2: that hinders you. Right, it's a strength. But the weakness
22:39
Speaker 2: is if you don't understand how wired your brain is
22:43
Speaker 2: and the things that may not be your fault at
22:46
Speaker 2: all that may have accumulated over years. Being self aware
22:49
Speaker 2: of that and saying, oh my, this may be something
22:53
Speaker 2: that I need to address, and then focusing that cocoon
22:56
Speaker 2: phase on it so that you can come out with
23:00
Speaker 2: the skill set that you focused on and the neuroplasticity
23:03
Speaker 2: that allows all of us to acquire that growth is fascinating,
23:09
Speaker 2: It is so fascinating.
23:11
Speaker 1: How is it important for people to identify with how
23:14
Speaker 1: they are experiencing them themselves and how is tied to
23:19
Speaker 1: the trauma that is also tethered. Yeah, so they're.
23:26
Speaker 2: Man, you ask like a you asked like a punch quest.
23:30
Speaker 1: Let's go to work.
23:32
Speaker 2: So I would definitely say going back to self awareness. Right.
23:35
Speaker 2: So for women, typically we call it the the airplane
23:39
Speaker 2: approach where they tell you in an emergency, you're supposed
23:41
Speaker 2: to put the oxygen on yourself first before you put
23:45
Speaker 2: it on the child. What do women typically do? The opposite?
23:49
Speaker 2: They will take care of everyone else except themselves. And
23:53
Speaker 2: for years, what we have seen, and this is where
23:56
Speaker 2: I go a little bit into patriarchy of society, religion, culture,
24:00
Speaker 2: or family has taught them is to you take care
24:03
Speaker 2: of everybody else before yourself. And so with that comes
24:06
Speaker 2: this trauma from a very young stage. Whether you saw
24:09
Speaker 2: it is exemplified and you took that on, is I
24:12
Speaker 2: take care of everyone else and now I don't even
24:14
Speaker 2: know that skill of knowing what's going on with me
24:16
Speaker 2: or I'm going to ignore it or it's not I'm
24:17
Speaker 2: too busy, I'm not going to pay attention to it.
24:20
Speaker 2: Self awareness is key, and that also means for your
24:23
Speaker 2: physical health and when you don't feel yourself, and that's
24:26
Speaker 2: why you know I do midlife medicine is typically what
24:29
Speaker 2: I focus on in my practice, So for women who
24:31
Speaker 2: are in between the ages of like forty to fifty five,
24:34
Speaker 2: because inherently what happens during that phase as they start
24:37
Speaker 2: to have changes and fluctuations in their reproductive hormone. So
24:40
Speaker 2: that's like your estrogen, your testosterone, and your progesterone. What
24:45
Speaker 2: we have seen now in evidence and research, you know,
24:49
Speaker 2: and it's very new. We know women go through menopause.
24:52
Speaker 2: It's fine, it's physiologic, it's biologic, it happens. But what
24:56
Speaker 2: was happening leading up to that point is this kind
24:59
Speaker 2: of fluctuation of hormones which inherently impacted how we felt
25:03
Speaker 2: about ourselves because of mood. When we think about depression,
25:07
Speaker 2: the most common age of women being diagnosed with that
25:11
Speaker 2: with the mood disorder is forty five to fifty five. Wow,
25:14
Speaker 2: why do you think that is? Because there's all these
25:17
Speaker 2: changes happening with hormones, which is not their fault. It's
25:19
Speaker 2: part of the biological process, but no one was talking
25:22
Speaker 2: about it. We don't talk about our health. We don't
25:25
Speaker 2: talk about when I just don't feel myself because what
25:27
Speaker 2: are people going to label us? Right, and then we're
25:31
Speaker 2: not going to our doctor to talk about it either.
25:33
Speaker 2: And I will say, you know, from a medical standpoint,
25:35
Speaker 2: we weren't well equipped with understanding the mental and mood
25:40
Speaker 2: changes that happens in perimenopause and menopause. Yeah, and so
25:43
Speaker 2: we always attribute it to a physical symptom, not a
25:47
Speaker 2: mental emotional We.
25:48
Speaker 1: Always talking about the because I was at home with
25:51
Speaker 1: my mom when she was going to the mintopause, and
25:54
Speaker 1: I just remember it being fifty five degrees in the
25:56
Speaker 1: house and I'm like, it's decent, like, but she but
26:01
Speaker 1: she's having she's having hot flashes and nice and all
26:07
Speaker 1: the things. And I remember being home and my mom
26:10
Speaker 1: coming in she was like, what aren't you cold? And
26:13
Speaker 1: I'm just like, no, I'm not like I'm freezing. I'm
26:15
Speaker 1: like And I was in school at the time, and
26:19
Speaker 1: my bachelor's in science and I was in anatomy and
26:21
Speaker 1: physiology and brothers. This is this is why I'm so
26:25
Speaker 1: glad that you hear, doc, because I want you to
26:27
Speaker 1: talk to these brothers as well. And I'm the only son.
26:30
Speaker 1: I'm so glad that I educated myself about women's reproductive
26:35
Speaker 1: system and understanding that this mental pause changed that my
26:39
Speaker 1: mom was going through was the end of a reproductive journey.
26:43
Speaker 1: And then also my mom had a hysterectomy, so I
26:46
Speaker 1: was locked in and tapped because when she was in
26:50
Speaker 1: one of those moves, I didn't take it personal. And
26:54
Speaker 1: I want you to speak to that because I hear
26:57
Speaker 1: and work with a lot of men that are married
27:01
Speaker 1: to women who are either pre menopause or it's full blown,
27:07
Speaker 1: and just how important is it for men to understand
27:11
Speaker 1: what that woman journey is so they can in some
27:14
Speaker 1: way be supportive and not take it personal and feel
27:19
Speaker 1: attacked Because there is a mood.
27:20
Speaker 2: Change, There is absolutely, I mean, even me being perimenopausal,
27:24
Speaker 2: I can definitely note the changes in how I feel
27:28
Speaker 2: from day to day. But again, because I have this
27:30
Speaker 2: education and the resource, I mean to go to work
27:33
Speaker 2: and get that taken care of. As far as from
27:34
Speaker 2: a hormonal standpoint was, I would say it's a two
27:38
Speaker 2: prong approach in the sense that for men who have
27:41
Speaker 2: a spouse partner who are going through that is exactly
27:44
Speaker 2: to understand it's not personal and to understand that it
27:48
Speaker 2: is a hormonal shift, but they shouldn't be shamed, right,
27:51
Speaker 2: So women shouldn't be shamed for having that happen. So
27:54
Speaker 2: the best approach a man could take is, yes, being
27:58
Speaker 2: brought up to speed on what it is, but to
28:00
Speaker 2: being a safe space for that woman to be in
28:05
Speaker 2: that you know, kind of transition and being like, at
28:09
Speaker 2: least I have someone here who makes me feel safe
28:12
Speaker 2: August right, So kind of creating a safe space. But
28:15
Speaker 2: from the women's side of that is, you don't have
28:18
Speaker 2: to live that way. There are ways that you should
28:22
Speaker 2: be addressing because that ultimately is your quality of life.
28:25
Speaker 2: Whether it's your relationship, whether it's the symptom that you're
28:28
Speaker 2: going through of hot flashes, night sweats, irritability, whatever it is.
28:31
Speaker 2: You don't have to live that way. And so that's
28:34
Speaker 2: why I encourage women to in like that advocacy for themselves.
28:39
Speaker 2: Is it literally is the airplane. You know how many
28:41
Speaker 2: women I have come into my office and they'll talk
28:44
Speaker 2: about these literally extreme It doesn't have to be extreme
28:47
Speaker 2: the symptoms all the time, but the ones who come
28:48
Speaker 2: in my office and I remember them is because they
28:50
Speaker 2: have these extreme symptoms. I'll be like, how long have
28:52
Speaker 2: you been going through this, No, like three four years,
28:54
Speaker 2: I'm like, why are you living like this? Or like
28:57
Speaker 2: I thought it it would pass. I thought, you know,
28:59
Speaker 2: maybe if I just like ignore it, it would go away.
29:02
Speaker 2: And I'm like, no, no, we're taking care of that
29:04
Speaker 2: to date. But it's advocating for yourself in a way
29:07
Speaker 2: where you're like, I can do better than this, and
29:09
Speaker 2: I don't want to live like this. So I think
29:11
Speaker 2: that's a too prong approach. And I would also say
29:14
Speaker 2: as a community, and I would definitely say in the
29:17
Speaker 2: Black community. And this is where I love statistics. There
29:20
Speaker 2: is a study that was done and they looked at
29:21
Speaker 2: all ethnicities or at least five of women going through
29:25
Speaker 2: that transition. Black women typically start menopause earlier. Black women
29:32
Speaker 2: typically have more severe hot flashes and night sweats. Black
29:36
Speaker 2: women typically have more heart disease that is associated with
29:39
Speaker 2: that change in estrogen. And when we look at the
29:44
Speaker 2: long term outcomes of decline and estrogen, which would be
29:47
Speaker 2: heart disease still number one killer of women when we
29:50
Speaker 2: think of dementia, still something that impacts Black women more
29:53
Speaker 2: because their hot flashes are more severe. So it's not
29:56
Speaker 2: only in that moment that they're going through the symptom,
30:00
Speaker 2: and like, what are you going to show up as
30:01
Speaker 2: as a seventy eighty and ninety year old. Now, now
30:03
Speaker 2: you're increasing your risk for dementia. Now you're increasing your
30:05
Speaker 2: risk for heart disease. Why are we doing this? Why
30:08
Speaker 2: are we doing this?
30:09
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm just gonna let us sit in this because
30:14
Speaker 1: she just dropped the wealth of knowledge and information. A
30:22
Speaker 1: lot of Black women don't have access to good health care.
30:26
Speaker 2: That is probably the thing that infuriates me the most
30:29
Speaker 2: is the access and resources that our community has. And
30:32
Speaker 2: you could take that across the board. You could take that,
30:35
Speaker 2: we could get into maternal mortality at the point of pregnancy,
30:38
Speaker 2: because that still is something that impacts us more when
30:41
Speaker 2: you think about depression. You know this when it comes
30:43
Speaker 2: to the community breast cancer, we don't even have more
30:46
Speaker 2: rates of breast cancer. We just die more. So it
30:49
Speaker 2: is across the board that clearly we see that there's
30:52
Speaker 2: health disparities and health inequities. Yes, and so when it
30:56
Speaker 2: comes to menopause, I'm like, it is not even something
30:59
Speaker 2: that you know, if you wanted to put it a
31:01
Speaker 2: range of how hard it is to manage, it's not.
31:04
Speaker 2: So why are we still at a paucity of having
31:07
Speaker 2: the same resources that are available. But we're suffering more.
31:11
Speaker 2: If you think about what we just said about age
31:13
Speaker 2: and severity of symptoms infuriates me, you.
31:16
Speaker 1: Know, doc for you, you know, being a black woman
31:19
Speaker 1: and knowing that we have less black doctors today than
31:25
Speaker 1: we did. I want to say back in nineteen seventy eight,
31:28
Speaker 1: if my stats are right.
31:29
Speaker 2: They just haven't increased. They have not and they were
31:32
Speaker 2: low already.
31:33
Speaker 1: With exactly So listen.
31:36
Speaker 2: Do you know, like, let me not get on that soapbox.
31:39
Speaker 1: I'm a hobble on this soad box. Really quick. Listen.
31:41
Speaker 1: We don't need no more rappers.
31:43
Speaker 2: We need more doctors. I'm scientists. Its listen.
31:48
Speaker 1: We'll need no more ig models. We don't need no
31:50
Speaker 1: more scammers there. We don't need no more real estate agents.
31:54
Speaker 1: Please listen. We need more doctors. And I say this
31:58
Speaker 1: because I sit on the advisory committee for the APA,
32:01
Speaker 1: the American Psychiatric Association, So I'm part of the advisory
32:06
Speaker 1: council committee for their MFS for their Minority Fellowship program.
32:10
Speaker 2: So I want to hear about this. What are you
32:11
Speaker 2: seeing from that lens?
32:13
Speaker 1: So what I'm seeing from this lens is we need
32:15
Speaker 1: more black psychiatrists and more black psychologists, We need more research.
32:21
Speaker 1: We were just in a meeting in DC. We have
32:24
Speaker 1: about forty six fellows that is getting ready to go
32:27
Speaker 1: through this fellowship program, which was a two year program
32:31
Speaker 1: that has now been cut down to one year program.
32:34
Speaker 1: And I'm not going to get into this from a
32:35
Speaker 1: political standpoint, but this is why we have to do
32:39
Speaker 1: something because all of these cuts not just affect us now,
32:44
Speaker 1: but if you have fellows that are not able to
32:49
Speaker 1: go through these processes in these programs, and so my
32:52
Speaker 1: job is to help mitigate some of that, and then
32:55
Speaker 1: also to create clearer pathways so they're able to talk
32:58
Speaker 1: to a doctorship, so they're able to have other mentors
33:03
Speaker 1: and other fellows that look like them that can mirror
33:07
Speaker 1: them to have an understanding of their journey while they're
33:09
Speaker 1: in residency. And I just I just sat there as
33:13
Speaker 1: being a black man sitting in his room and being
33:15
Speaker 1: able to lend my voice. I felt so proud. But
33:19
Speaker 1: when I look at the pictures, I'm like, God, we
33:21
Speaker 1: need some more black and brown people.
33:23
Speaker 2: Like so many more, so many more, right, Because here's where,
33:26
Speaker 2: here's the thing that really kind of makes it put
33:30
Speaker 2: it put it all together for me is that we
33:32
Speaker 2: are already at a lack of So the fact that
33:35
Speaker 2: we have more community, we're trying with more programs, but
33:38
Speaker 2: then you have budget cuts or then you have you know,
33:41
Speaker 2: because of what party is in and they want to
33:42
Speaker 2: cut funds. So now it's that what two steps forward,
33:47
Speaker 2: you know, seven steps back? Is like you're already at
33:50
Speaker 2: a limitation. Yes, So the long term implication, I agree
33:54
Speaker 2: with you, like looking five ten years out from now.
33:57
Speaker 1: Oh and and we're and we're even looking at it
34:00
Speaker 1: from the perspective that if you think about the access
34:04
Speaker 1: to care, that if this big beautiful bill and all,
34:08
Speaker 1: I'm not like we were having this discussion around these
34:11
Speaker 1: rural areas that will have hospitals shut down there's no
34:14
Speaker 1: access to Medicare, Medicaid. And we're also looking at the
34:20
Speaker 1: influx is going to happen with clinicians because when people
34:24
Speaker 1: can't get medication, when people can't receive care, that's going
34:28
Speaker 1: to drive mental health issues, that's going to drive individual psychosis,
34:32
Speaker 1: is going to create a mired of different issues. And
34:35
Speaker 1: this is why we are necessary in this time. And
34:38
Speaker 1: this is what I love about what you've been able
34:41
Speaker 1: to do with your platform, is be a representation as
34:44
Speaker 1: a black woman, because I'm pointing young black girls to you,
34:48
Speaker 1: I'm pointing young Yeah. Absolutely, I've worked with black girls
34:52
Speaker 1: who code and working with them, we're talking about all
34:57
Speaker 1: of these different pathways to not just only creating girls
35:00
Speaker 1: who can code and understand technology, but also girls who
35:03
Speaker 1: can understand medicine and technology and how those two things
35:07
Speaker 1: come together. So we need more representation in this space
35:11
Speaker 1: to provide better care. When I was going through my
35:14
Speaker 1: doctoral program and master's program, it was heartbreaking to know
35:18
Speaker 1: that there wasn't any research on most of the issues
35:25
Speaker 1: that we're plagued with as blacks, and to think about
35:30
Speaker 1: most of our research is not even accepted.
35:33
Speaker 2: Not accepted. And then from if you think again, going
35:36
Speaker 2: back to trauma, the trauma that was endured by the
35:39
Speaker 2: black community when it came to research talk about it.
35:42
Speaker 2: So now there is a complete mistrust of the system.
35:45
Speaker 2: And so even I remember, you know, working in Chicago,
35:48
Speaker 2: as there University of Illinois so very high research, and
35:51
Speaker 2: then here at Baylor, and then there was that also
35:53
Speaker 2: University of Louisville, which are research academic centers to be
35:58
Speaker 2: able to recruit patients to come into a study. Every
36:01
Speaker 2: time I had a black patient, I was like, oh,
36:04
Speaker 2: let's get you into a study because I know what
36:06
Speaker 2: research does and how it helps us formulate medications and
36:10
Speaker 2: treatment programs. The amount that would deny versus accept it
36:15
Speaker 2: was much more denial than being like, yeah, I'll be
36:17
Speaker 2: part of this project because there's mistrust and how do
36:20
Speaker 2: we carry down information? Usually through family stories or but
36:24
Speaker 2: that's all they hear. And now even with changes in
36:27
Speaker 2: being able to say no, we have we have much
36:31
Speaker 2: more protocol or we have ethical portions or committees that
36:35
Speaker 2: you know, look over research, they were still like, nah.
36:37
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I can understand it. And I could exactly
36:40
Speaker 1: because when you look at the healthcare system when it
36:43
Speaker 1: comes to us, yeah.
36:44
Speaker 2: I can't trust why would you? Why would you?
36:48
Speaker 1: And if I can't trust your system, I don't know,
36:53
Speaker 1: don't I don't know if I have the capacity to
36:56
Speaker 1: embrace what you would prescribe it. It may be something
37:01
Speaker 1: that could possibly help me. But how many times have
37:04
Speaker 1: we seen black says I'll die with.
37:06
Speaker 2: It yes, or doctors ain't trying to help.
37:09
Speaker 1: Us, aans trying to help us, And.
37:11
Speaker 2: It's like this loaded statement which if you're to maybe
37:14
Speaker 2: take this back to like nineteen twenties thirty four, very true,
37:17
Speaker 2: and now that we have more block not more block doctors,
37:20
Speaker 2: but more visibility to inequities, they still are like I
37:25
Speaker 2: still don't trust you, Like, what what have you done
37:27
Speaker 2: to build trust in order for me to have surefooting
37:31
Speaker 2: to step into it? I don't think we've done enough.
37:34
Speaker 1: Wow with your journey, doctor Shepherd, how has your journey
37:40
Speaker 1: inspired you even more to do more?
37:43
Speaker 2: I think that comes through the stories, right, So that
37:46
Speaker 2: comes through stories of every patient, which is why I
37:49
Speaker 2: still choose to practice. Like there's so many other things
37:52
Speaker 2: that I'm involved in where I really could step away
37:54
Speaker 2: from practicing, but I have found you would love this analogy.
37:58
Speaker 2: One of my favorite favorite IT shows and series is
38:01
Speaker 2: The Wire.
38:02
Speaker 1: Oh heck yeah, the greatest show of all time. It is.
38:07
Speaker 2: I mean the writing was brilliant. I mean every season
38:10
Speaker 2: was brilliant. So it's kind of like, what was at
38:14
Speaker 2: the end of it? What was Avon? Who did Idris play?
38:17
Speaker 2: What was he?
38:17
Speaker 1: Stringer bells?
38:18
Speaker 2: Stringer bell the differences between them at their level of
38:22
Speaker 2: like where they were and string was like, nah, we
38:25
Speaker 2: got to do all businesses. Am, I'm like, no, we
38:26
Speaker 2: got to be like keep our feet in the in
38:28
Speaker 2: the community and like seeing what's going on in the corners.
38:32
Speaker 2: And in the end, he still needed that, he still
38:34
Speaker 2: needed to be relevant, he still needed to see what
38:36
Speaker 2: was going on. And so that's what that's that's what
38:40
Speaker 2: really helped me being like, what's really going on is
38:43
Speaker 2: for me to hear stories to people, for women to
38:45
Speaker 2: come in and share what's going on in their lives
38:47
Speaker 2: so I can be like, ah, that's where we need
38:49
Speaker 2: the help or that's how we're going to reach them,
38:50
Speaker 2: because this is the overlying or the overwhelming message that
38:53
Speaker 2: they're telling me.
38:55
Speaker 1: Yeah, Because for me, what I've always loved about research
38:59
Speaker 1: is a love of the you know, the qualitative and
39:02
Speaker 1: all those different things, but I love the oral research
39:05
Speaker 1: where you get to hear stories, and I think those
39:08
Speaker 1: stories are our maps to understanding so much about our
39:15
Speaker 1: culture and then so much about our family history and
39:18
Speaker 1: about the DNA of the family, and I think we
39:20
Speaker 1: need more of that. What scares me where we are
39:24
Speaker 1: today is I don't know whether I don't know where
39:28
Speaker 1: to connect anything when it comes to us as blacks.
39:31
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I think it's quite honestly trying to
39:35
Speaker 2: be written over. And so that's why we have to
39:38
Speaker 2: be more vocal and vocal, not just and loud. That
39:43
Speaker 2: you have to be strategically loud with what you're saying
39:47
Speaker 2: because you still again trying to communicate. What comes back
39:50
Speaker 2: down to communication. You're trying to communicate with a group
39:53
Speaker 2: that may not have the best interest or any interest,
39:56
Speaker 2: but you still have to align yourselves in a way
40:00
Speaker 2: or the communication is not either going over their head
40:02
Speaker 2: or they refusing not to listen to it because it
40:05
Speaker 2: isn't coming in a way that now there can be
40:07
Speaker 2: actual dialogue.
40:09
Speaker 1: Yes, so dog, this this conversation is so good, like
40:13
Speaker 1: we can oh, I.
40:13
Speaker 2: Love I'm learning today.
40:16
Speaker 1: So we've talked about you know, the pathways MENI palls
40:23
Speaker 1: with women, and we've kind of talked about your journey.
40:27
Speaker 1: What do you what do you see now for yourself
40:31
Speaker 1: as you're in this stage where you've been a voice,
40:35
Speaker 1: you've been a face, you've been an advocate of, you've
40:39
Speaker 1: been a conduit at this journey of your life now right,
40:44
Speaker 1: we was talking about healing and talking about your self awareness.
40:48
Speaker 1: What matters to you now?
40:50
Speaker 2: What matters to me now? So that can be through
40:53
Speaker 2: my experience and what I've navigated through personally in my life,
40:58
Speaker 2: and then also hearing the kind of the similarities in
41:02
Speaker 2: other women who have come into my office in space
41:04
Speaker 2: is we have neglected I could say this for all women,
41:08
Speaker 2: doesn't matter. You know what ethnicity is that we have
41:12
Speaker 2: neglected a large part of how the emotional status of
41:17
Speaker 2: our lives connects with our physical health. Just like that book,
41:22
Speaker 2: the body holds score right. So whatever trauma you've gone
41:25
Speaker 2: through in the past, whatever bad experiences, relationships, motherhood, you know, career,
41:31
Speaker 2: all of that has created something within us. But that
41:35
Speaker 2: emotional space for us to understand it will a lot
41:39
Speaker 2: of times limit our ability to be our best selves
41:42
Speaker 2: because we have not connected mind and body. And so
41:45
Speaker 2: that's where I have devoted a lot of my time
41:48
Speaker 2: when they come in. So women will come in for
41:49
Speaker 2: obviously a disease state or a condition, or I need
41:52
Speaker 2: help physically. But when I tell you, when I dig down,
41:57
Speaker 2: just ask a few more questions about the emotional capacity
42:00
Speaker 2: in space that they're in and why they're there and
42:03
Speaker 2: trauma and the complexity of that. So many women will
42:07
Speaker 2: literally sit there and just start crying because I've never
42:11
Speaker 2: had from the MD perspective, my emotional health and well
42:16
Speaker 2: being discussed in the same visit, and then suddenly I'm
42:20
Speaker 2: able to say, well, then this is why it should
42:23
Speaker 2: be because that ability for you to now put them together,
42:26
Speaker 2: to feel emotional within your physical health visit means that
42:31
Speaker 2: we have to pay more attention both that patient and myself,
42:34
Speaker 2: and getting them to someone who can get them help
42:37
Speaker 2: is so important because then they can see how much
42:40
Speaker 2: work needed to be done up here in order to
42:44
Speaker 2: address what their physical symptom is. And that's why I
42:47
Speaker 2: have therapists in my practice. Then it's like this pathway
42:50
Speaker 2: where I'm just like pathway, you don't even have to
42:52
Speaker 2: look for one.
42:53
Speaker 1: You'r too.
42:55
Speaker 2: Trauma recovery. We have those who look at health anxiety.
42:59
Speaker 2: We have those who will even be like, let's get
43:01
Speaker 2: you into somatic work trauma recovery, so it all is integrated,
43:06
Speaker 2: but we've never approached it that way. So I think
43:09
Speaker 2: that has been my own personal journey and being able
43:12
Speaker 2: to share that with my patience, it's been it helps
43:15
Speaker 2: me in my healing.
43:16
Speaker 1: Yeah, so as you were talking, you hear a lot
43:20
Speaker 1: of men say women are never happy, like you can't
43:23
Speaker 1: make a woman happy. And as I was listening to you,
43:27
Speaker 1: it made me even have more compassion for the journey
43:32
Speaker 1: of a woman because I'm the only boy, and I
43:35
Speaker 1: have sisters and I have a mom. And what I'm
43:38
Speaker 1: hearing from you is, though though men have this misconception
43:43
Speaker 1: that women have all of this liberation and freedom and all,
43:49
Speaker 1: it is just kind of like, you know, she gets
43:51
Speaker 1: to say things that I can't. What I'm hearing from
43:53
Speaker 1: you is that women don't feel that they even have
43:57
Speaker 1: the permission to be totally connect to their emotions in
44:02
Speaker 1: the way that they should feel them.
44:04
Speaker 2: Is that I would say that in addition to thinking
44:08
Speaker 2: of that statement that you just said, that women feel
44:11
Speaker 2: that they can never make them happier, they're never happy either.
44:14
Speaker 2: One of those is that there is some truth to
44:17
Speaker 2: that because it boils down to communication again, right, So
44:21
Speaker 2: the way that it's being approached and the response may
44:25
Speaker 2: feel as if, oh, she's not happy. On the flip side,
44:28
Speaker 2: I always will bring it back because there's always everyone
44:31
Speaker 2: has a responsibility in this and what we call beautiful
44:34
Speaker 2: partnership of men and women. And again we're speaking to
44:38
Speaker 2: when we think of male and female relationships. And obviously
44:41
Speaker 2: there's other dynamics of that is that women also too
44:45
Speaker 2: because the whole airplane thing of putting on oxygen first,
44:49
Speaker 2: we don't do that, And what happens is we fear
44:53
Speaker 2: or fail to form boundaries for ourselves.
44:57
Speaker 1: Wow.
44:57
Speaker 2: And many times when women do form boundaries, they usually
45:01
Speaker 2: are looked at as the one that's difficult. Right, But
45:04
Speaker 2: a boundary is being set. But we're not taught to
45:06
Speaker 2: do that. And we're also not taught from men to
45:10
Speaker 2: really learn how to emote and to share the feeling
45:14
Speaker 2: and being vulnerable. So there's do you see, It's kind
45:18
Speaker 2: of this like seesaw where women also maybe they aren't
45:23
Speaker 2: happy because they haven't learned to set boundaries and they
45:27
Speaker 2: haven't learned to saying what is the safety of what
45:30
Speaker 2: I'm feeling now? And when I'm out of that, that's
45:32
Speaker 2: usually when you have emotional dysregulation. So many women are
45:35
Speaker 2: actually functioning in emotional dysregulation. I believe it's because they
45:39
Speaker 2: don't form boundaries. We're not allowed. We always have to
45:42
Speaker 2: be nice and smile. What they say to Hillary when
45:44
Speaker 2: she was running, she doesn't smile enough. Have they ever
45:47
Speaker 2: said that to a man?
45:48
Speaker 1: Yeah? They said that to me, I don't smile like.
45:51
Speaker 2: You need to smile.
45:52
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's like you need to smile more. Are you mad?
45:54
Speaker 1: I'm like, no, I'm good. And as you said, I'm
45:57
Speaker 1: thinking we both need to come to the table and.
46:01
Speaker 2: Have a very long table, very long time, a.
46:04
Speaker 1: Very long conversation to extend grace, particularly for us as
46:09
Speaker 1: black people, because of the trauma, because of the pain
46:15
Speaker 1: that is unresolved. I think there needs to be some
46:19
Speaker 1: morning there because what didn't have. There's a lot of
46:22
Speaker 1: grief because when we come to each other, we don't
46:27
Speaker 1: come to each other with open arms. We come to
46:29
Speaker 1: each other with boxing gloves on.
46:31
Speaker 2: We don't go to listen to be heard, and so
46:35
Speaker 2: I don't see a partner.
46:37
Speaker 1: I see a sparring partner. So I'm not coming to
46:40
Speaker 1: see how I can support and understand you. I'm coming
46:44
Speaker 1: to defend. And I got my hands up because in
46:48
Speaker 1: my mind I'm thinking that you're going to swing on me.
46:52
Speaker 2: One of the most profound I would say psychiatrists. He's
46:56
Speaker 2: an MD. He's Canadian like me.
46:58
Speaker 1: I mean, you know Canadian Jamaican, Yeah.
47:01
Speaker 2: Canadian and Jamaican. We're going to stop and do like
47:05
Speaker 2: a whole house party now. But his name is Gobormante,
47:08
Speaker 2: and he is fundamental in looking at trauma, like how
47:12
Speaker 2: we store things from so long ago that we're unaware of.
47:16
Speaker 2: But they were survival skills, survival skills of whatever situation
47:20
Speaker 2: you were in. They didn't have to be bad, but
47:23
Speaker 2: you were exposed to them in a way. How people
47:25
Speaker 2: dealt with things, how they avoided conflict, how they learned,
47:28
Speaker 2: how to blame people, how they communicated, And that's survival.
47:33
Speaker 2: Whether you were abandoned, whether you have anxiety because you're perfection,
47:38
Speaker 2: you're always you know, built up in a perfection mode.
47:40
Speaker 2: Those are forms of trauma, but we build them so
47:42
Speaker 2: far back, so now we enter into relationship or partnership
47:46
Speaker 2: with people with those skills, so we are only like
47:50
Speaker 2: our seven, eight, nine year old versions of ourselves. The
47:53
Speaker 2: self awareness part of that of kind of like unveiling
47:55
Speaker 2: that is like the ekey work. No one wants to
47:58
Speaker 2: do it, but once you like and veil at your
48:01
Speaker 2: I literally in this last year have been like, oh,
48:04
Speaker 2: I'm doing that thing again, whatever that is that whole list.
48:08
Speaker 2: I have a whole list of these limitations that once
48:12
Speaker 2: you're self aware of it you're like, oh, but now
48:14
Speaker 2: I have the tool to know how to avoid that,
48:16
Speaker 2: because that's not serving me in the best way, and
48:17
Speaker 2: someone can experience me in a bad way. If I
48:19
Speaker 2: continue to do that, it becomes easier to have that
48:21
Speaker 2: conversation with yourself feel like, oh, well, I probably shouldn't
48:24
Speaker 2: do that. How am I going to pause with it,
48:26
Speaker 2: step away and deal with that in a better way?
48:28
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's good. So I ask every guest same question,
48:33
Speaker 1: because this is just heal all things healing. What is
48:37
Speaker 1: healing for you, doctor Shepherd?
48:40
Speaker 2: Healing for me is a lifelong journey. Healing requires the
48:47
Speaker 2: space to be compassionate, which I'm still working on, but
48:53
Speaker 2: it also requires the vulnerability of saying this has to
48:59
Speaker 2: become different, this has to become better. I have to
49:03
Speaker 2: release that thing or that person in order to create growth,
49:09
Speaker 2: and growth doesn't always feel good. Releasing ego doesn't always
49:12
Speaker 2: feel good. But that healing is really a lifelong journey
49:17
Speaker 2: because we always should be students, Yeah, every day, and
49:21
Speaker 2: students and healing require looking at it at the marathon,
49:26
Speaker 2: not the sprint.
49:27
Speaker 1: Yeah. So a lifelong.
49:30
Speaker 2: Journey, lifelong journey.
49:32
Speaker 1: Yeah, for the woman that is out there today, that
49:35
Speaker 1: is watching, they see the doctor Shepherd. I hope they
49:39
Speaker 1: got to see the woman behind the title, because you
49:43
Speaker 1: share such a wealth of knowledge. I never forget sitting
49:46
Speaker 1: with a client who was a mother who had had
49:49
Speaker 1: a mental breakdown, and we had been working. We were
49:52
Speaker 1: on our third session, and I'm connecting the pathways to
49:57
Speaker 1: her performance because for her, motherhood was performative and not
50:02
Speaker 1: performative because she was trying to be but she felt
50:06
Speaker 1: that she had to because as you were speaking earlier,
50:09
Speaker 1: that most women are going to put the mask on
50:12
Speaker 1: the child rather than themselves. And I never forget doctor
50:16
Speaker 1: she said. She says, Jay, I don't know how not
50:23
Speaker 1: to be a mom. And I said to her, I said,
50:28
Speaker 1: you were a woman before you became a mother. You
50:33
Speaker 1: were a woman before you became a wife. I said,
50:37
Speaker 1: what I want you to do is to reconnect to
50:40
Speaker 1: that woman. And immediately she like, I don't know, it's
50:46
Speaker 1: just instantly she felt this like this liberation or something.
50:50
Speaker 1: She felt this freedom. And she said, I said, what
50:54
Speaker 1: is this that you're feeling. She said, for the first time,
50:57
Speaker 1: I feel like I have permission to be the woman
51:01
Speaker 1: rather than trying to focus on being this best mom.
51:05
Speaker 1: So can you talk to the woman in the camera
51:07
Speaker 1: that is, and just speak to them from you as
51:11
Speaker 1: a woman, because I see that a lot with a
51:13
Speaker 1: lot of the women that I still see as clients
51:16
Speaker 1: are usually c suites, usually women that they are doing
51:22
Speaker 1: the therapy and the counsel and all the things, but
51:26
Speaker 1: sometime they have a difficult time taking care of the
51:29
Speaker 1: women because they're so focused on the title.
51:31
Speaker 2: Absolutely, I would say for anyone who's listening today, especially
51:35
Speaker 2: for women in midlife, is one you are not alone.
51:39
Speaker 2: Many times we feel like we're going through this journey
51:41
Speaker 2: in this path alone, You are not alone. And also
51:44
Speaker 2: to take compassion for yourself, to take the pause in
51:49
Speaker 2: truly understanding what is this journey about, and what are
51:52
Speaker 2: the tenets of this journey that I may have missed
51:55
Speaker 2: and I want to recapture and falling back in love
51:59
Speaker 2: with the individual and not the title. We are all
52:03
Speaker 2: individuals who come into throughout our life different job titles
52:08
Speaker 2: or I guess responsibilities, but ultimately your responsibility to yourself
52:16
Speaker 2: is to build that self trust and that self love.
52:20
Speaker 1: You are not alone, Doctor Shepard, thank you. Today's episode
52:25
Speaker 1: was phenomenal. Like I just because normally we usually on
52:29
Speaker 1: a panel and so it's like we got to tee
52:31
Speaker 1: it off. And I love that you and doctor Jill
52:34
Speaker 1: have have come to the Just Heal podcast and to
52:38
Speaker 1: give y'all an hour to just cook. Listen. Please follow
52:42
Speaker 1: doctor Jessica Shephard on Instagram all of our social handles.
52:47
Speaker 1: She is phenomenal. And for those women that are forty
52:51
Speaker 1: five plus, I would even say forty plus yeah, because
52:54
Speaker 1: one of the things that have helped me to understand
52:56
Speaker 1: my body. Because here's the other thing, Brothers, we didn't
52:58
Speaker 1: get into this today. You go through a former menopause too,
53:02
Speaker 1: called Andrew Paul's. So we didn't get into that today
53:04
Speaker 1: because it's not all just the women, but definitely brothers,
53:08
Speaker 1: take care of yourself, go to the doctor. And as
53:10
Speaker 1: I'm an advocate for black men in particular, to make
53:14
Speaker 1: sure that we are aging well, we need each other. Brothers.
53:18
Speaker 1: Listen again. October is one of the greatest wellness months
53:22
Speaker 1: for women. It is a breast cancer awareness month. Find
53:26
Speaker 1: something to connect to an initiative is menopause awareness. Listen,
53:31
Speaker 1: go out and become an advocate for something that speaks
53:33
Speaker 1: to you and to all of the women that are
53:36
Speaker 1: watching the podcasts, all of the women that are supporting
53:39
Speaker 1: the movement that we do here at the just Here community.
53:42
Speaker 1: I Doctor j Am giving you permission to put the
53:46
Speaker 1: mask on yourself and remember healing is a journey and
53:51
Speaker 1: wholeness is the destination. Until next time, take care. Just
53:55
Speaker 1: Here with Doctor j a production of the Black Effect
53:58
Speaker 1: Podcast Network. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
54:03
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows,
54:07
Speaker 1: and you can follow me at King J. Barnett on
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Speaker 1: Instagram and x and follow us on YouTube. Just Here,
54:14
Speaker 1: Doctor j