Latest / The Trauma Therapist / Episode 830: What Would Dr. Meyers Do with Amy Meyers, PhD, LCSW

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Episode 830: What Would Dr. Meyers Do with Amy Meyers, PhD, LCSW · The Trauma Therapist

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Trauma Therapist Podcast. Plus listeners can listen to episodes early and ad free right
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now. Become a Plus listener by going to Apple Podcasts searching for the Trauma
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Therapist Podcast and signing up today or welcome back to the Trauma Thepist podcast.
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My name is Gamiferson. My mission is to help trauma therapist be their incredible
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selves, to be human, to be real, not just a clinician.
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I'm a big believer in who we are is more important than what we know,
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and this requires cultivating authenticity, genuineness, and vulnerability, and that requires
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intention. Can learn more about my courses and workshops by going to the Trauma
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Therapist Project dot com. That's the Trauma Therapist Project dot com. Let's get
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started, all right, Amy, Here we go five four, three,
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two and one. Our folks, welcome back to the podcast. Very excited
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to have as my guest doctor Amy Myers. Amy, Welcome, Thanks,
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great to be here. Awesome So. Amy is a social work professor at
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Malloya University and a clinician in New York City, where she's maintained a private
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practice for thirty years. She's an advisory board member to the Sibling Abuse and
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Aggression Research Advocacy Institute at the University of New Hampshire. She's published and presented
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nationally about sibling abuse. Amy has also conducted numerous trainings and workshops on diversity
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locally and nationally, and transformed the Long Island School District's approach to culturally responsive
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and inclusive teaching. Doctor Myers is also the host of the podcast titled what
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would Doctor Myers Do? And we're going to talk about that today. Amy.
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Welcome, Thanks, awesome, I'm excited to be here. Cool.
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So, before we go in, share with our listeners where you're from originally
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and then where you are currently originally. So, I am from Long Island,
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New York City and I currently remain there. I've been a New Yorker
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for pretty much all of my life, and I am a psychotherapist, as
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you introduced, and became a professor kind of as my second profession, and
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I'm really really interested in focusing on counter transference. Cool. Cool. So
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I'm also originally from New York. I used to live in Long Island too.
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Oh really, yeah, I love talking about it and miss it and
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kind of I'm envious you stayed there. I haven't fantasize about going back,
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but we'll talk about talk about that later. All right, So we got
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your podcast with counter transference. We'll talk about but let's before we get there.
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How the heck did you get into this field? How the heck did
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I get into this field? So it seems like an easy question, but
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I don't know how complicated it is. I'll try and make it simple.
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First of all, my mother was a social worker and a psychotherapist, but
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I always say I don't think that that had much of an influence on me
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professionally, in the sense that she really never shared her work whatsoever. I
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just knew as she kind of developed a private practice very part time and brought
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it into the home. I had to be damn quiet while she saw clients,
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But I, you know, she wasn't somebody who talked about her cases.
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So I just don't make that direct connection. What I make the connection,
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too, is a dysfunctional home environment where I became very curious about why
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people do the things they do, act the way they do, feel the
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way they do. And I think, you know, I was always kind
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of a sensitive kid who was very empathic and felt the plight of others.
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So having that kind of natural intuition into other people's emotions, combined with my
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own struggles and challenges, I think that probably was the perfect formula for becoming
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a psychotherapist. Yeah, I mean, well said and makes me really understand
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what you're talking about out here. I mean, on this without getting into
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specifics, and I'm not you share whatever you want, but on the scale
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of the continuum of dysfunction, on the scale of zero to one hundred,
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one hundred being you know, off the charts, what are we talking about?
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That's very interesting. So I hate categorizations, so I appreciate your request
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for me to quantify my experience, but that's very, very difficult, right
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because people say everybody's, you know, got trauma, I think on some
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level, and who's to judge whose trauma is worse than others. I just
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know that I felt like I had a lot of hardships. So as you
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setting your introduction, I have become an expert on sibling abuse because I've conducted
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research on it. I work with clients who have experienced it, and that
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was my experience growing up as well, so you know, it was a
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traumatic upbringing in sorts. Yeah, simbling abuse is something very interesting. I
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don't haven't talked too much about it on here. What is it? I
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mean, I think we can we hear that, and we could, you
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know, come up with our own definitions and ideas. But how do you
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define it? How do you how do you talk about it? So it's
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interesting because when I was embarking on my research and I was telling friends and
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colleagues that I'm doing a study on sibling abuse, they said, basically,
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give me a break. Isn't that a dramatization of sibling rivalry? And basically
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sibling abuse is really probably defined the same as parent child abuse, only it
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occurs between or amongst siblings. But I think what is undermined in our society
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and culture is how impactful siblings are on our development. And so what one
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experience is this in the household? Not only is one being kind of betrayed
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or targeted by one's most prolific peer, but also it's kind of a double
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whammy because the parents, just by the nature of it occurring, are neglectful,
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right, So it's kind of a double whammy of impact, and just
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to kind of define it. So, but by the way, on my
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podcast, what would doctor Myers do. There is a series on sibling abuse,
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so every like five episodes or so, I do you know informational or
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have a survivor tell their story so one can learn much more about that.
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But I just want to kind of hone in on your copal question so that
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people do have an understanding of its seriousness. Sibling rivalry is a normative aspect
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of development. It helps people develop the ability to negotiate, to manage conflict,
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to communicate, to cooperate, and usually there is an equal opportunity for
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advantage or disadvantage between the siblings. Like within one argument it may go back
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and forth with name calling or pushing or something of that level. Or if
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one sibling has the power, the next there's an argument the other siblings has
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the power. And sibling abuse, one child is always in, you know,
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the always holds the power and the advantage. And so excuse me,
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So we're not just talking about sexual abuse, no emotional, physical okay,
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okay, psychological yes, And it's sexual abuse that gets the most attention.
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But actually my study was on physical or emotional abuse, and so there's intent
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to harm and that's the difference between the key key element between sibling abuse and
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sibling rivalry, right, Like you can cause some harm or injury during rivalry,
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but that the intention to really kind of harm your sibling is not there.
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When I was reading a bio and mentioned this that you're an advisory board
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member to the Sibling Abuse and Aggression Research Advocacy Institute, and I was looking
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over the website which says that sibling aggression is the most common form of family
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violence. It remains hidden and confused with sibling right. For me, I
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mean, it just sounds so so intense. What did you learn, perhaps
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maybe when you were doing your research, what surprised you that a lot of
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us maybe might be surprised to hear about this topic. What surprised me is
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that what you're asking, well, you know, I guess it's interesting.
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Not a whole lot surprised me because I had my own lived experience. So
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if anything, it was validating, right that other people had very similar experiences,
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and that it's so powerful to me that it still remains under the radar.
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And when I conducted the research, it was even more under the radar,
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more underrecognized, And so that was quite shocking. And maybe the extent
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of the speriences that some people had that were quite different than mine at the
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same time, because right, there's a range of how abuse can be imparted,
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so some of the stories were quite upsetting. Well, like you said,
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it oftentimes goes unnoticed by the parents or by default they become neglectful.
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It would seem to me that it could easily just go unnoticed and come under
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the heading of oh, you know, kids are or having rivalry, or
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they're arguing and whatnot. I think it's kind of interesting because these days,
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you know, there's this thing called helicopter parenting right where the parents are hovering
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and so overly involved in their children's lives to some extent. And yet on
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the other side, right, how could somebody be so oblivious to what's happening.
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I don't think that necessarily there is oblivion. I think that at times
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there's either physical or emotional absence of parents due to their own stressors. Sometimes
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they parents are abusive as well, so the child is learning from modeling that
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you know, this is acceptable behavior or it's displaced behavior. If a child
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is being abused by a parent, obviously they can't abuse the parent back,
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so they displace it onto you know, a more readily available target. Let's
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I want to move on to a different topic here, but before we do,
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and will direct people to your podcast to learn more about this. But
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for the therapist out there we're listening, how might they detect this or begin
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to talk about this that they're curious that this is going on. I think
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that's a great question. I think we are conditioned to really kind of think
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about and wonder about the impact of the parent relationship to the child on that
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child's development, but we really don't get into the sibling relationship. And so
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I would just say, just as a beginning assessment, start to ask about
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the quality and nature of the sibling relationship growing up. Because if you are
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treating a child, you may be the one to uncover this, right,
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But if you're treating a survivor who might not even have the language to call
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this abuse, they need your help in identifying and validating their experience because of
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the societal lack of recognition. So I think it's incumbent on therapists to know
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the questions to ask, which I also go into much more detail on that
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in one of my episodes. Not to sound fully self promotional, but just
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I know, we don't want to spend a whole time talking about this,
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and I think that, you know, there's many ways that we have to
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learn to kind of use language to uncover it, because again, the abuse
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terminology isn't there. And it's like, when I was conducting this study,
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I never said, you know, has anyone out there been abused by a
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sibling? Because I don't think people would identify themselves as that. So you
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have to lose use, you know, where you ever tease, pushed,
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you know, overwhelmed by your sibling. So you got to know what questions
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to start to ask about how this is impacting one self esteem, self perception,
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and interpersonal relationships. Okay, so right out of the gate, and
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when you started getting into this field, was that your focus? No,
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No, not at all. No. I majored in sociology and college because
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I didn't go to school with an undergraduate program in social work. I think,
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you know, you just start to kind of do well with what you're
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interested in, and you know, you start to lean towards where you excel.
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So I mean, I can't say, like, oh, you know,
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when I was ten, I wanted to be a therapist. Right,
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It just kind of started to come together and I think part of my focus
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on counter transference, which is about why we feel the way we do and
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act and receive act the way we do receive people, the way we do
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respond to people the way we do, comes from our early relationships. So
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I think I was not only curious about others, but about myself. Right,
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Why am I either struggling or just kind of have these responses? And
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I think that that was the foray, foray into right, wanting to go
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into this field. Well, let's let's talk a little bit more about that.
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So your interesting counter transference, How did that come about? And how
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did you how did that manifest in the work you were doing. I think
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when I was going for my training post well, I guess it's I learned
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about it in graduate school social work school, they teach you about transfers and
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counter transfers and the projections that clients make on you and that you potentially will
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have towards your clients, and how important it is to be aware of that
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and not lead by that, but understand that and where that's coming from.
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And I just thought that that was fascinating. And then when I went for
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postgraduates raining in psychoanalysis, I mean, that was you know, fifty percent
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of the equation. And I always tell my students now, you know,
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if you going into this field to think that you're just helping others, you're
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mistaken, right, And not only just help others, because you get the
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privilege of helping yourself through this process as well as well, but also focusing
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on others, you have to you know, be okay with learning more about
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yourself, even though some of what you see initially might not feel very good.
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You know, you got to understand it right, right, that was
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How was that for you? That invitation almost demand for that self exploration and
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self examination? What was that like for you? It was complicated? It
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was well, give me more Amy, we will get a little more specific
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here getting in there. I think, you know, I don't know why.
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Somehow it stuck in my head that it took me at least five years
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to feel a little less anxious and slightly more comfortable with doing the work because
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it brought up so much stuff all the time that it's very overwhelming, right
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emotionally psychically. So not only are we holding as therapist, are clients stuff
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right, are their emotions and their challenges, But we're managing our own at
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the same time. That's a lot. And that's why I always say that
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the work is draining. It's not because it's really kind of, as we
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know, a hard science and your brain is being racked with numbers or you
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know, difficult material. It's emotional. It is one hundred percent emotional.
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And so now, of course I enjoy it. And now in my countertransference
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comes up, it's kind of thrilling, right, because my self esteem is
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not where it was, you know, many moons ago, and it's made
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the work a hell of a lot more enjoyable. But so, yeah,
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initially it's not fun. Give us an example as you can of like when
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you started out and the counter transference came up for you, how might you
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have dealt with it? Well, you're asking me to tap into my memory
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of like thirty years ago. That's really difficult. So I'll try, But
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I mean I can certainly talk about how it still comes up right all the
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time. Yeah, let's do that too. Let's assume we assuming your audience
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knows what kind of transference is. Uh, well, oh you want to
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want to step aside and define it? Yeah, let me step us out.
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Okay, Okay, so transference again is our projections that our clients have
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towards us. Counter transference is the therapist projections onto the client. And what
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does that mean. It basically means that we've had certain experiences growing up that
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make us into who we are now, and we have had people respond to
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us in our lives that have shaped the way that we perceive ourselves and potentially
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perceive other people. So I like to say that we take in those experiences,
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we internalize them, right, and then we make them our own.
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So for example, if you had a really critical mother who you know,
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negated a lot of things that you or negating your physical appearance or your intellect
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or whatever it might be, you take that in right and you say,
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ooh, I am how my mother perceives me. That is who I am.
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And then we externalize that. We move through life projecting that onto other
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people and expecting that they're going to respond to us in the same way.
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So how that might manifest is I mean so many different ways interpersonally, right
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with friendships, with romantic partners, feeling less than wanting to please, so
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that you know, people don't sorry, just lost my thought if people don't
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kind of hurt you. If you protect yourself and know that you're already kind
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of a piece of shit, or you know, don't think of yourself very
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highly, then hopefully I won't be as sensitized to your words because I already
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know that. So that's one way that it can play out. It can
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play out, you know, if I'm a professor writ in the classroom somebody
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who's never going to raise their hand or share their opinions or viewpoints because they're
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already assuming that I am going to think that they are stupid, that was
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a silly question, or how can you think like that? Right? Because
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I am replicating the voice that's already been constructed into their ego. Right,
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And then you can just think about or imagine what that looks like when you're
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working as a therapist with a client. My god, right, So imagine
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a client kind of disapproves of something you said, and you get caught in
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your head about oh see, I shouldn't be doing this work or I'm not
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enough or whatever, right, and then you're kind of off and running with
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that, and then you're not present for the client, or you might overcompensate
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by responding in a way that you hope that they'll like you or that they'll
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think better of you, which isn't necessarily a therapeutic intervention for them. It's
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a thetrapeutic intervention for yourself. Right. So a lot of that goes on
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at the beginning, or at least it goes it went on for me.
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And so that's the whole point of being able to decipher what's real, right,
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what's real in this moment with the client. What is something that I'm
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bringing to the situation, what is something they're bringing to the situation. So
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if I if a client accuses me of not listening properly or not getting what
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they're saying, was I distracted in my own thoughts and they're absolutely right,
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and I have to acknowledge that. Or are they projecting onto me of never
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feeling listened to, never feeling valued? And this is a microcosm of what
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goes on for them outside of the therapeutic room, right, Or did I
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really mess up and was an attune to them and I need to kind of
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bring myself back and make sure that I'm present. So it's so important to
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distinguish that right, right, And that comes in part from a lot of
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self awareness a lot of self exploration, doing all that quote unquote work before
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you get in the room. Remember, someone told me, I think it
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was Lisa Farentz who said, you know, if you're working with a client
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and you find yourself thinking about your working on your own stuff in that moment,
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you're in the wrong room, right, you should be in your own
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therapeutic room. So what's the uh the takeaway here when you find yourself in
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that moment, you know, kind of doing that work. Uh, what's
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what's the what the teaching moment? Would you say? There? Yeah,
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so I think you know, as I said, it's about being aware of
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what's happening, and that's kind of a refined art that takes time. It's
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a lifelong process. It requires as you said, therapy is very helpful.
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Supervision is very helpful. Peer supervision is very helpful. You're not going to
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be perfect in the room all the time, and so you have to be
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kind of forgiving of yourself as well. And just as long as you're reflective
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and you use whatever happens to improve the next encounter or the next time that
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your counter transference comes up, that's what's most important. So I mean counter
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transference comes from personal experience, and it comes from bias. Right. We
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all have biases, whether we want to acknowledge it or not, whether it's
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about race, religion, ability, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation,
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et cetera. Right, and so we all, I mean, we're not
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perfect people. We all struggle, we all have our own challenges. It's
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a matter of keeping that in check and knowing. I think the more experience
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you have, the quicker you are to pick up on when you're having that
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counter transference. And if I can, I mean, I can give you
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an example of how that goes on. And still for me, now,
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yes, I mean counter transference. I think you know, it's mostly unconscious,
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and so the goal is to make it conscious that this is occurring.
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Otherwise we do just act on it and we don't right observe it. So
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it's not something to get rid of, it's not it's something to understand and
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to manage. And I think that that's really really important, because we have
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counter transference every single day, in every single interaction that we have. I
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believe that, right, I mean the moment I saw you, right,
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do you remind me of somebody something as simple as that you have either facial
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recognition that feels familiar or matterism, right, or maybe the more then I
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talk to you the way that you relate to me, and I just respond
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back. I just respond back. That's what most of us do. We
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don't realize, Oh you know what you remind me of? You know this
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friend I used to have who used to do this thing and drive me crazy.
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And if I'm not aware of that, I'm just going to be short
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with you, short tempered as opposed to saying, this is me and my
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stuff and you know, guy has nothing to do with this person. So
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what does this look like now? I mean I could tell you about three
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or four clients that you know touch my stuff all the time. So one
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example is I had a client recently who she's older than me, living with
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her ninety year old mother. Her mother's living with her, because that's what's
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happening in this generation, right, She's got to take care of her mother
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who's sliding into dementia. And the client is constantly trying to get her mother
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to understand why she has her shortcomings. So you know, don't do that.
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Stop that. Don't you remember I told you that all the things that
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you're not supposed to do with somebody who has dementia. Right, My father
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is cognitively declining, and I have the same patience at times with him,
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and it's and it's a terrible cycle. Because I go to visit him and
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I say I'm going to be more patient, I'm not. I get angry
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at myself. I say next time, I'm going to do better, And
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it's the same cycle. Right, So part of me empathizes with her.
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I get the struggle right, and part of me I find myself kind of
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being corrective of her because when I hear it outside of myself, it sounds
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so terrible how you're treating your mother, right, So that's something I have
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to manage. My being impunitive is a strong word, but you know coming
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from that is not going to be helpful to her. She already feels bad,
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right, So what is that going to do? That's one example,
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And that may or may not be something that you might share, right,
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a little bit of it whatever. Well, that's very interesting too. That's
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a whole nother discussion about self disclosure, something that I wasn't really trained to
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do, and I'm seeing more where it has potential purpose. I think with
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self disclosure. Again, we just have to know who are we really serving.
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Is it you and you know, don't worry, I get it and
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you want to share that to show you get it? Or is it a
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way to validate and normalize somebody else's experience. All right, let's talk about
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the podcast. What would Dr Myers do? When did you start this?
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And why did you start it? So I started this over a year ago,
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in November of twenty twenty two, and why did I start it?
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So it's really interesting, at least to me, because again, if we
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think about Kelter transfer into my life experience, I'm not one who always felt
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I had a voice, right and that I had things to say and a
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value, And so I never dreamed to be a podcaster. I never dreamed
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to be a professor. Right, I'll just kind of kind of happen and
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along the way. But I was in class with my students, and it
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was in a practicum course where they were also in internships at the time,
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and so we did a lot of processing. And so one of the students
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said, well, I wish I had you in my back pocket and I
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could just pull you out and be like, what would doctor Myers do?
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And I even struggled with that because the title of the podcast, because I
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thought, who's doctor Myers and who cares what she would do? And it
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sounds so grandiose right in a way, but it was just catchy. I
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liked it after a while and I leaned into it. So the podcast started
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off a lot to be about me talking with my students about what they were
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experiencing in the field, and it led to conversations about self disclosure, boundaries,
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counter transference, and I realized that there was a niche here to be
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able to talk about what we experience as therapists as we moved through working with
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others and what comes up for us and the challenges that we have. And
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it allows people to kind of be that fly on the wall, like,
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wow, what do therapist really think? Right, because we're not these perfect
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people. So you mentioned a conversation with your students. Is do you actually
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record conversation with your students? Well, yes, but I'm not recording a
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conversation. I mean we are having a conversation purposeful for the podcast, Okay,
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okay, but I'm also I talk with seasoned professionals. Interesting as long
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as we're looking at and you know, some person has to be willing to
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look at the counter transference. Yeah, what comes up for them as we're
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talking about what we're talking about. Yeah, it's such an interesting promise for
27:33
a podcast. And I think, you know, it's interesting to hear you
27:40
say that you struggled with thinking or feeling that you had a voice, because
27:45
as I'm talking to you now, you have such a strong voice, you
27:52
know you have, and it just feels like you have so much to share
27:55
and so much to offer. And now I'm guessing this your podcasts on Apple,
28:02
on Spotify, everywhere that podcast can be had and heard people, Yes,
28:07
people in access Yeah, definitely. Well we'll link that up here at
28:11
the show notes page at the Traumatist podcast dot com. So, you know,
28:15
this whole thing, this whole topic is very interesting to me because of
28:22
counter transference and transference, because a lot of people get into this field of
28:27
psychotherapy because they want to quote unquote help right, the which is which is
28:34
understandable and on the surface, it's a it's a good, good reason to
28:38
we want to help people. But a lot of people, not everyone,
28:44
of course, but a lot of people don't realize the degree to which you've
28:48
got to look at yourself and be willing to wait. I want to help
28:52
that person, wouldn't it You're asking me to look at myself. WHOA,
28:56
that's different. That's hard. Mm hmmm mm hmm. I think people should
29:00
certainly know that before they go into this field. And maybe that's not emphasized
29:06
enough. And and to me, that's along the lines of mandating anybody who
29:11
goes for a bachelor in social work or a master's in social work to have
29:15
therapy. You got to know what it's like to be on the other side
29:17
of the couch. But but we don't. We don't mandate that, but
29:22
I highly recommend it. Oh all right, doctor Amy, awesome having you
29:27
on here. We'll link again your podcast up. Aside from that, what's
29:33
the best way for people to get in contact with you? You can email
29:37
me at doctor myerspod at gmail dot com. I'm on Facebook and Instagram if
29:44
you want im me there, Yeah, send me an email goo to hear
29:48
from you. Awesome. Well look great meeting, You're great talking to you
29:52
and welcome back here anytime, and I appreciate it. Thank you so much.
29:56
All right, take care. Noting perdition a temple and temperator in tday
30:11
At often be roding