Latest / Giving Pain Purpose with Lyndsay Soprano / Get Savage With Your Health

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Get Savage With Your Health · Giving Pain Purpose with Lyndsay Soprano

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This is Your Pain Game podcast where we talk about the game of living in
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and with chronic pain and trauma, getting to the heart of how to heal.
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I am your host, Lindsay Soprano. On the show, I plan
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on discussing with doctors, chronic pain patients, ballistic practitioners, loved ones,
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and anybody that is interested in having their voice heard in the chronic pain and
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trauma world that we live in. I used to be a stuper athletic,
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active little chick that was thrilled with my body. I wasn't ever like this
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buff like workout person, but I was always happy with my body, even
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though I ended up being a little curvy and a little heavy down the road
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in my life kind of in between what's happened to me and diagnosis obviously,
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because I'm not I'm not curve and chubby anymore, and I want that body
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back to a certain extent. But until trauma, after trauma after trauma just
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kept stacking up on me, and then I was diagnosed with CRPS. I
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kind of like lost my compass and that's really hard for me because I always
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felt vary in control and varying control of my life and varying control of the
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places that I was going to go and the relationships I was in and my
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money in my life and my business, and and then I'm diagnosed with this
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and then went through that nasty divorce that I've talked about, and I'm just
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like this twenty four hour a day stress ball, you know, And I
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am trying to figure out how to find my compass again. And it's kind
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of a strange thing because my Sweedie and I have this thing. We just
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started to collect compasses, is like, I don't know, like two years
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ago, because we have this saying between the two of us that we are
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each other's true north. And so I've kind of leaned on like these really
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old compasses that I've bought for him, and I get him engraved. And
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I'm that kind of a gifter, you know. And it's a reminder to
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me to have those compasses in places throughout our home as the fact that I
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do have them, and I have people in my life that can help guide
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me as well, especially when it comes to trauma. And so it's kind
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of like finding this new compass as a trauma informed compass. And we're going
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to talk a little bit about that today a long of stress and some pain
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care aware language and holding space and something called the body brand nation and get
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in the hell away from it. So we're going to talk with that with
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my guest, and so anyways, I can blab and blab about compasses in
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ue North and all of that, but without further ado, I would like
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to introduce you today to my guest, Erica Thomas Hyi. Erica, Hey,
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Lindsay, good to see you. It's good to see you again.
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Thank you for being here with us today. She is self stated a highly
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caffeinated coat of savage Grace coaching. It's her own coaching firm. She's a
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course creator, a yoga teacher, a trauma released exercise. She also has
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a podcast she's the host of called The work In Podcast, which she's going
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to talk about it as well. Her podcast is devoted to mentorship and professional
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perspectives to help fitness professionals and wellness educators who want to set themselves apart using
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a trauma sensitive approach to getting lasting results for their clients and avoid burnout,
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which seems to be a word we are using a lot of these days,
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is burnout. And also this trauma informed approach to care and this trauma release.
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I love this about her and I love that this is really supports a
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lot of what we talk about here on this show. So I want to
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get the trauma out of our nervous systems and I want to get started today
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here with Ericas. So I'm rolling out the red carpet for your babe.
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Well, let's get started. Yeah, let's do it. I'd like to
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start by talking with you about the trauma and the nervous system part of what
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you do and your role that plays in fitness from your perspective, and what
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you mean when you talk about it's time to stop working out and to start
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working in And I love that because we all have these different viewpoints on like
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exercising and working out and what our fitness levels are all about. And all
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these crazy classes that are out there and all these things that are out there
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and that kind of scare you about working out, and so let let's get
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started with that. Yeah. So, most people when they go to start
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working out or go to the gym or start you know, thinking about becoming
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healthy. Like the idea there is that you are going to go and exercise,
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You're going to go move you go get a co to show up in
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classes. And for many people, their motivation for that, yes, is
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some sort of physical adaptation. They want to change something about their physical body
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on the outside, right, right. But another piece that people really look
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for out of their exercise that they do on a regular basis. Part of
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that is stress relief too, more and more so now with this kind of
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mental health epidemic that we are experiencing. If it's not number one on the
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list, it's a close second. So for me, in my history working
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in the fitness industry, I came from a place of a lot of like
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no pain, no gain. When you step into the gym, it's all
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out, balls to the wall, like you know, if it doesn't hurt,
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then it's not doing what it's supposed to do for you, and things
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like that. I never saw it as something that would relieve stress, actually,
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and there's a reason for that, because it wasn't actually relieving stress.
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When you exercise like that, you're adding another stressor to your nervous system.
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And I got to the point where I had some physiological dysfunction that was coming
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up in my body that was seemed to be completely out of the blue.
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Unrelated to anything else, and it was all centered in my gut. And
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at the time, I didn't understand the connection between your gut and the nervous
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system and all of the other systems in the body. And how if you
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approach movement in a dangerous way, the body reads it as a dangerous thing.
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So right, exactly so. But that's how I was taught, you
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know, That's how all fitness was really taught. It was like go hard
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or go home. And what it came down to for me is that I
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was looking for. I became interested in this whole world of PTSD and healing
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trauma because my family comes out of a military background. And it was through
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that teacher training that came through a yoga background that I realized that, huh,
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you know, soldiers aren't the only ones that are experiencing trauma. And
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maybe I'm actually traumatizing myself by behaving in this way, and maybe I'm trauma
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tizing my students by treating them this way. And is there a way that
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we can get the kind of fitness and wellness results that we're looking for without
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traumatizing or re traumatizing or triggering that sympathetic nervous system response that's taking people up
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over the edge when they leave the room. So that's where this whole thing
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started for me, and I really wanted to give people, my students a
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way to really kickstart recovery in that understanding of how the nervous system works.
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The magic there in looking for resilience is more about how you can pull back
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away from that challenge and then come back into the challenge that change in state,
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and I wanted to give my students a way to do that in all
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different kinds of formats because I taught a lot of things I still do.
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I teach a lot of different formats from yoga to martial arts, base to
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boot camp style, metabolic training and spin classes, so everything like across the
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intensity level. But all of those things come through the nervous system into the
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body. And if you look at your format of how you're moving and approach
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it from a place of changing the nervous system state, like I want to
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change the state of the nervous system. I want to be able to activate
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my nervous system and I want to be able to comb the nervous system.
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I don't want to just stay up in this activated state all the time because
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outside of the room, outside of that class, outside of that workout,
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I'm already activated all the time. So if you want relief there, you
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have to find a way to get it within those exercise parameters that we think
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of. And so that's where all of this has, you know, kind
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of how it got started for me. Yeah, And that's interesting because I
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was never like a gym rap kind of a gal. I was always in
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dance, and I was in THEATA, and I was into yoga, and
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I mean I did like skiing, hiking, biking stuff, But I was
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never a gym person. Like I tried. I tried the personal trainer,
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I tried all that stuff. It just was not for me. You everybody
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knows, because everybody's been in a damn gym. I mean, I don't
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care who you are, even if it's once. You always see the angry
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guy like running on the treadmill, some dumb some dumb chick like throwing a
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kettlebell and it hits the mirror behind them. Like we've seen these people that
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are just like almost like they're they're fighting for their lives and we don't know
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what's going on in everybody's goals while they're doing these things, and sometimes you
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can see like, man, like what happened to you? Right? What
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happened to you that is making this like vicious hardcore, like unbelievably difficult way
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to exercise and actually harm your body to your point, where is that coming
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from? Right? And some of it is a different understanding of what it
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takes to get the results they're looking for. Right. Some of it also
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comes from this body brand nation idea that you have to look a certain way
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in order to be healthy. And part of it comes from kind of this
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internalized adversarial relationship that we have with our own body. A lot of people
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really are not comfortable in their own skin with or without some kind of chronic
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pain issue going on, Like we're just not comfortable being in our own body.
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And so what that does is it sets you up in this fight,
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this fight or flight, but fight or flight within yourself. And so when
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you're going into an exercise, you can be in a state where you're you
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can't you're not really feeling, you're not really sensing what the body is telling
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you, and so it requires more in order to feel something, so you
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know you're you're either fighting yourself. You're fighting what you think your body can
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or should be able to do, Like I should be able to do this,
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so I'm going to make myself do this, or it is you're at
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a place where you've lost the connection to that area of your body, whether
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it's hips, whether it's you know, neck, shoulders, back, whatever
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it is, and you cannot feel it the way it wants you to be
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able to feel it. I mean, we can blow past the sensations that
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our body sends us so quick and if we do that too often, the
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body stops talking to us. So it's just like your best friend, right
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if you're just like if you're in a relationship with another their person and you
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and you're constantly talking over them and you never listen and you never let them
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speak and you and you can't hear what they say. Eventually they're going to
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stop calling you, you know, so they're going to turn away. It's
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the same, the same thing. It's it's this inner relationship with the body.
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And that's where you know the idea of stopping the work out or you're
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pushing to change the outside of yourself or how you look in the gym,
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or how you look to the world and turn into that inner relationship when you
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are moving so that you can build some awareness. Right, So we build
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up this friendly relationship within the body so that when you go for a walk,
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whether you go for a walk or whether you go to the gym for
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your exercise, if you're going for a walk, you can feel the soles
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of your feet, and you can feel how that breath comes in and out
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of the body, and you can be present with it. And even if
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something is a little bit or you can still be sore and feel safety.
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Maybe there might be something that's painful, Like I don't know, I mean
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I I have something hurts all the time in my body. So it's just
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just changed the day and it's something new, right, So something hurts,
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So pain doesn't necessarily mean that there's damage. It is a message your body
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is talking to you. But maybe we need to just pull back a little
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bit and look at that and ask the question to be curious, like,
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what are you really trying to tell me feet? You know? Well,
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yeah, I mean I definitely identify because when it comes to like not feeling
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inside of your body or not feeling a part of your body or a part
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of your body, doesn't feel like you are feeling uncomfortable in your skin.
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I never felt that in my life, like I had mentioned in the beginning
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of the episode. Now I don't know who my body is from my hips
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down. I'm like, huh, But it's really hard when I feel very
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disassociated and I feel like my legs just want to run away from my body,
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or like I've gnarly nightmares about my legs being chopped off, and like
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it's horrible because i have just this disassociation from my body. But I'm feeling
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them, I feel the pain that are in them. But I know wholeheartedly,
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and I say this on pretty much every episode. I know wholeheartedly that
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this is so much trauma that's orient that's caused all of this. And then
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you add stress components in our life and eating and you know, all these
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other things that are supposed to be working for us, and it kind of
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stinks because my body's talking at me and screaming at me, and I'm like,
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I'm trying to do everything that I can and I just can't make it
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all fit in in the day totally. It's challenging. Yeah, and when
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you know that there is some trauma story that story changes the physical sensations.
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Also, what we know now about pain science is it's really different than what
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we thought we used to think as instructors and health and wellness that like,
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especially in the yoga space, like if somebody was feeling, if you felt
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pain, that you should stop, you should pull back, you should you
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know, listen quote unquote listen to your body. And pain means don't go
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there. And I used to say back at the beginning of yoga classes,
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like you know, everywhere else you can go no pain, no gain,
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but in yoga it's no pain. Ever, that is false too, Like
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that's a lie. That's a lie because everyone everyone, if you are human,
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you're going to experience some kind of pain at some point in your life.
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We all do. Like that's the nature of the body. Pain is
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a message that originates in the brain from some area of the body that tells
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you that something dangerous is happening. So it makes sense that if you have
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experienced trauma in some way that is unresolved and has gotten frozen in time in
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your body somewhere, that maybe those messages are on a loop. Right Oh
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yeah, yeah, I believe that wholeheartedly. Ye yeah, And and and
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they can be made worse. That pain sensation is often and my good friend
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and mentor, Colleen Jorgensen, she is my teacher as far as paincare aware
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language goes. She talks about how that pain sensations are attached to some kind
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of emotion, right, They're always they always go hand in hand. So
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yeah, I know, I just looked at my face. I'm like,
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oh no, right, we kind of know this, right, Like if
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we're more like, the more scared you are, the worse the pain feels
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totally right, So that is an important piece of understanding. And when we
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tie in things like trauma release, what in my experience is like we think
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we know the story because we know our history. We think we know our
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history of our body and what it's been like from the moment we first started
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making memories that we can, you know, consciously remember. So we think
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we have our history down and so we think we know where that trauma might
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be coming from. But the body also has its own story that may not
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match your conscious story, and so it's really important to be able to work
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through the body, to give the body ways, pathways to let it go
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in some way, which is where movement can be helpful and that whole health
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and wellness industry can help people to relieve that stress if they understand, but
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that they need to give people an opportunity to let some of that stress intention
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come out instead of just powering through. Yes, I always say I'm a
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bid on a stick chick. I mean I have to, you know,
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like I wake up and I make my cognitive decision about how my day is
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gonna go, and then it's gonna go that way. You know, typically
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I am a high performing chronic pain human being. Like I don't know how
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I do it. I really don't. So can you give us an example
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of like when you're teaching and you're doing your classes and you're working with people
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from this trauma inform this trauma release, how can you how do you help
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people within chronic pain or PTSD or that have all of these structures that have
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come into life, how do you help them to release? Because I find
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that the best piece for me for release is meditation and yoga. I don't
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get it from very many other places. Like I never understood runners high,
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Like you guys are high. You guys are high, and I don't think
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it's from running. Come on, everybody, all you runners, come out
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of a closet about this. There is no runner side once in at all.
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Please tell us now, you know what I mean. It's like these
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just these crazy, these crazy people that do crazy sports and all these crazy
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things that they do. And I know that there's a lot of people that
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there's no pain. There's you know, you know from some of the stuff.
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But I mean, everybody's got an injury. Everybody has some kind of
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shit that they're pulling from their path that comes into So what do you do
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in your practice and in your coaching, because I know that you help coach
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other coaches and other wellness health professionals as well. What are some examples of
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some ways to release trauma through exercise and through movement because people that are in
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chronic pain tend to be a little scared of moving. I'm scared of it,
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but I still do it because I always say, if if I don't
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use them, I'm going to lose them. And that's my legs so and
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my crps. It can lead to amputations. So that's in the back of
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my mind every moment of my day. That's part of the reason why I
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have nightmares about somebody coming into my bedroom and cutting my legs off the chainsaw.
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It's super healthy to see your face in her eyes right now. No,
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no, lindsay, that is frightening. It is frightening. And then
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part of the reason why I don't sleep because I'm like, I don't want
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to fall asleep right right, and and all of those thoughts. This is
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something for everyone to understand. So thoughts like that and nightmares, whether they're
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you know, nightmares, nightmares or just insomnia issues like that, all of
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those things just start the big pile on for for the nervous system. Right.
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So now you're all ramped up and you're looking for a way out and
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you show up to some fitness class because you don't want to name your trauma
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or anything like that. You just want it to go away. You just
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want the tension to go away. And we get confused about between exhaustion and
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release. So you know, for for exercisers, a lot of it is
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a confusion like if I run, I'll feel better. Really you're just exhausted
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and too tired to do anything later. Because we don't understand the key piece
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to the nervous system. When you're talking about trauma informed work or trauma release
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in general. The secret sauce to all of that is the stop and rest.
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And so within any format of exercise, if you include permission number one
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language of permission to allow yourself to stop what it is that you're doing and
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rest and then come back in to the movement when you are ready, you
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begin the process of rewiring and retraining the nervous system in a more resilient way.
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So we are in any kind of exercise, you can play with your
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edge, your edge of effort, whether that's physical effort or the edge of
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some kind of emotional effort, or mental effort, spiritual effort, any of
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those things. That's one of the lovely things that is baked into yoga.
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Right, So when we are practicing yoga, it's not that you never feel
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anything like. There's often discomfort in a yoga practice, And you can find
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your physical edge in pretty much any asana that you are doing. Right,
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and then and then what do you do with that? Right? Do you
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just push harder into it? Well? You could, right, you could
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that there's plenty of yogi's out there that do that, or you could come
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up to that discomfort and then you could just say hello, to it and
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then back away a little bit, and then we can come back up to
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it. And that's the same kind of approach that we take in any other
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format, Right, and then that key piece right there, that permission piece,
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and then from the instructor or the coach, there is a level of
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curiosity where we're building awareness for clients, for each other and our clients to
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be curious about what it is you're feeling. Okay, because where the hell
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is that coming from? Like paying attention to be curious. That's a sensation.
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And there was somebody that I spoke with on another episode and she talked
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about instead of calling it pain, call it a sensation. Yeah, so
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it doesn't have this like negative connotation that comes with it, right, And
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then you get the opportunity actually, when we work in this paincre aware language,
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then once you have that, when you're building this curiosity about that,
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rather than pulling back immediately, maybe you stay right there, right there on
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that edge, and you're like, Okay, there's that sensation again. I'm
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not sure what that is is or where that's coming from. But there might
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be some things I can do to change that, to shift that. Maybe
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I can soften some muscles away. Is there a story that came up in
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my head about that sensation? Is there an emotion that pops? Is it
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an accurate thought that came into my head right there? Maybe it is?
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Maybe it isn't. Can I change my breath without moving away from that pain
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and just watch and see what happens to it? You know, sometimes we're
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so we're so we hate being uncomfortable in the society, right, we just
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like just instantly make yourself comfortable, take the pill, like, get sit
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on the couch, whatever it is, make it go away. But the
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body can do a lot for you if you give it a second, like
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just give it a second, to give it a second and ye, and
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take your time. Yeah right, yeah, So then so then what do
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you learn? You learn? Okay, well, if I take a nice
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soft, deep breath, oh that sensation just it softened, that sensation and
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now I can't I don't even know if I could call it pain. Now,
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so hm, that's interesting, and yeah, let's be curious about that.
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And I think that's really interesting because you know, like even just now
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while she was talking to us, Darling's um like, I like closed my
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eyes for a second and I was like deep breathing, and I was kind
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of like tense on my shoulders, my shoulders like up by my ears.
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And I recognize it because I moved my little outline for us to make sure
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I was talking about things, and I saw my shoulders by my ears,
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and I'm like, what the hell am I doing? And so I was
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listening to you, and then I and my producers probably gonna listen. I
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have like all these deep breasts that are coming into my life because I was
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kind of like doing it without thinking. It is really one of the reasons
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why I do love yoga and why I do love the practice of breathing and
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being curious and all of that. And I, you know, I stray.
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There are times, there are weeks or I'm so damn busy, and
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I blame it on busyness, you know, And then I'm all pissed off
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at myself that I didn't do the things that I needed to do for self
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care, which I need to do at the top of the list. And
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I talked about this all the time, that I'm much better than I used
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to, but I'm not perfect, and I still have a lot to learn
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and a lot of things that I need to change and shift. One of
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them is that is going huh okay, like okay, that was weird.
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What's going on right now? You know? And why might that be happening.
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I have to do that with anxiety, because I have pretty debilitated and
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anxiety. If I am able to look when I feel that like that,
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I get clammy, and I get sweaty, and my chest feels gross or
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my heart starts racing or whatever, this panicky anxiety feeling. Most of the
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time, when I take a deep breath and I look at myself and I
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am curious, and I absolutely ask myself, what is it, Wendy,
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that is causing this anxiety or this stress or this breathing or this or this
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whatever it is. Most of the time, when I sit and I stop
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for a second and I rest, which you know is a new word in
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my vocabulary, when I rest and take some inventory and breathe for a second.
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Most of the time, it's probably something pretty stupid that just it's like
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all of this information that's coming at us all the time that we're trying to
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process, and who knows where there's like this weird something that came in that
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stressed me out, that I had no idea that that was a stressor to
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me. And then when I figure out what that was, I would say
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ninety percent of the time, I'm like, why the hell did that stress
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me out? Like that was not that big of a deal. But if
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I don't do that, then it just topples on top of each other and
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it all ends up and then the next thing you know, it's the biggest
27:38
stress ball on the planet. You know, Yeah she's Louise, Yeah totally.
27:42
And sometimes there sometimes you just can't figure out what the stresser was because
27:48
it's just like you you just feel like this is your life, like this
27:53
is the normal. This is becomes your normal. And then when those anxiety
28:00
and panic attacks you know, come into the body, it's a body memory.
28:06
It's not a conscious mind memory. Like the body remembers either an emotion
28:15
or a physical sensation that is the same as something that happened before. And
28:23
here you are feeling that sensation again and the body reacts in instantaneously to protect
28:30
you. It's gonna make you feel those feelings. It's it's trying to save
28:37
your life. And this is the perspective. This is a perspective that maybe
28:41
needs to be a shift in general for people, is that everything your body
28:47
does is for you. It's for you. It's trying to adapt to save
28:52
you and protect you. We don't see it that way because sometimes it's so
28:56
uncomfortable, so painful sometimes, but even pain it's elf is a message from
29:00
the body to get you to stop or change or do something different. And
29:06
that pain sensation or that anxiety sensation, it happens way in advance, way
29:11
ahead of any tissue, where before any tissue damage would happen, before anything
29:17
could happen, because it once you just stop before you get there. Once
29:19
you just stop, it's it's steff right. One of the things that I
29:23
have I personally had a hard time with is is coming to this point where
29:29
I could love my body for what it did for me. And it took
29:33
a long time. It's I work on that all the time because I'm coming
29:37
from a place where I, you know, always want to make my body
29:41
do the thing, you know, make it be a certain way. But
29:45
I don't have to. It's going to do everything I need it to do
29:48
for me. And that does take time to rebuild that trust. And that's
29:55
really where trauma informed work comes in because that's what we're doing. We are
29:59
re building trust with our own body systems, and it takes a lot.
30:06
It really, it takes some time. I like that you use the word
30:08
trust in that because I think in places where we are dealing with people that
30:15
have PTSD, I mean I probably have, if I was to be honest
30:18
with myself, a little bit of it from who knows where and who knows
30:22
what, because I, unfortunately have been faced with too much that anybody.
30:26
You know, a lot of people shouldn't. I know there's people that have
30:27
been through far more than me. But you know what I mean, I
30:30
think trust is a really important word, and it's something that's going to kind
30:33
of strike me hard over the next couple hours when we're done here, because
30:38
that's so crazy, because they I this is where I lost my compass,
30:45
right where my body started kind of failing me and I started feeling like really
30:48
bad and got really really sick and lost all of this way and my whole
30:52
life was turned upside down and I had no path in no way, and
30:57
no guidance and no compass. And now here I am starting to work on
31:02
trusting my body and trusting the people that are coming into my life, not
31:06
unlike you. Where this true north, this trusting compass of mine that I
31:12
have to use to navigate through some of this junk that is like here that
31:18
I have not truly like that. I'm working on it, man, I'm
31:22
like it's a day to day thing. I have not broke some of the
31:26
some of the issues, some of the things that happened to me because I
31:29
never talked about him, didn't talk about him until I started this show.
31:33
Look what, I'm forty five years old. I just started talking about trauma
31:37
that started when I was nine, ten months ago. And so I'm like
31:42
unpeeling all of these different layers and having to trust the messages that are coming
31:48
from these like open wounds that I thought I had bandage ducked well enough and
31:53
stuffed them down far enough, you know. And now it's like there's an
31:57
episode I did with this girl named Amanda Kaye and she's awesome from Australian.
32:00
She did a good example of when you push a like a beach ball down
32:06
under the water and you keep pushing it, and you keep pushing it and
32:07
keep pushing it. As soon as you let it go, it flies up
32:12
higher than it would have if it was just right below the surface and it
32:14
splashes everybody around you. I was like, I totally have a beach ball
32:20
down there. I got like twenty well, and you're doing you're doing the
32:24
work, and there's no you know. I think we feel like we should
32:29
have all our shit together by the time you're forty five. Definitely by the
32:32
time you're fifty two, which is my age, you know, I should
32:36
definitely have it together. Figure it out. And I and I for myself,
32:40
I'm like, I feel like every single day, every week, every
32:44
month, I'm learning something new. I can I can dig new things out.
32:49
And then you think, oh, I'm okay, I fixed it.
32:51
I'm good, Like how good? And then and then the next thing like
32:57
oh that's what that's from. Okay, that's great, you know, and
33:00
then there's all this stuff like we, like I mentioned before, all the
33:02
stuff that the body is holding onto that you don't think is important, you
33:07
know. I mean, we we've we're throwing the word trauma around a lot,
33:12
and a lot of people think they have certain connotations about what that means.
33:16
And for many people they're like, oh, but that's not me.
33:20
I don't have trauma, Like yeah, just because you weren't. You weren't
33:23
raped, or you weren't beat up, or you don't you weren't in the
33:25
military, just right, and you don't have trauma, Yes, exactly exactly,
33:30
And so you know, like I have, I have. I have
33:32
examples of that, like things that I've that have happened that I forget,
33:37
forgotten all about. Like U, I had oral surgery when I was in
33:40
sixth grade, and so when I do trauma release, a lot of that
33:45
is all in here. Like I had nine teeth pulled. So like when
33:49
I when I start my tremor, a lot of times it's like teeth chattering,
33:53
um, you know, headshaking, my face changes, like all the
33:57
muscles and the fascia let go of that tension. It's almost like it's re
34:01
enacting that event. I was not even awake for that, Like my nuts,
34:07
my body remembered that. And after that session, that trauma release session,
34:13
I you know, I was like, huh, that must be from
34:16
that. I didn't think that was traumatic, but heck, you know,
34:20
the my jaw sure felt traumatized. You know, someone is drilling teeth out
34:25
of your head as a child. That's um, that's not fun. Um.
34:30
Even if you're not conscious, right, So, like and and that
34:35
goes into like a fear based kind of thing too as a child where you're
34:37
scared and nobody likes to go to the dentist. I mean, let's be
34:40
real, But so, can can I circle back really quick before because I
34:46
know that we're getting close on time, But can you circle back to like
34:50
the some some of the modalities that you use to help with some trauma release.
34:55
Maybe like a couple simple tips that you could give um that would work
35:00
for you know, a couple of us that like even with your jaw,
35:01
Like I know, I clenched my jaw and I'm always like popping my ears
35:06
like I'm in a plane. I've always had that. I've had six concussions
35:08
and a lot of that is part of it. Yeah, I know I've
35:10
been hit on every side of my head. Like I said in the beginning,
35:14
trauma after trauma after trauma. So can you give us a couple of
35:17
examples of some of those released techniques, because I think that that's something that
35:22
we all need. Yeah, So a couple of things we have actually talked
35:25
about the breath already, like using that breath, right, So that is
35:30
something that can be done anywhere, anywhere you are right, the breath is
35:35
the fastest way to tap into the parasympathetic side of your nervous system. Absolutely,
35:38
so what you need to remember, all you need to remember about it
35:43
is that we want it to focus on the exhale for calming. Right,
35:46
So if we're calming the system, we can inhale through the nose. You
35:51
can exhale out the mouth or the nose. And if you want to get
35:55
really specific with techniques about the breath, I to I like to offer two.
36:01
I offer box breathing, which is accounted breath. Like you you inhale
36:07
for a four, account hold your breath for four, exhale for hold for
36:13
four. That's a box breath. And then the other one is a physiologic
36:15
sigh or in yoga sometimes we call it like breath of joy is. So
36:21
you're going to take a big inhale and then a quick extra inhale the really
36:25
filled belongs and then sigh out the mouth, just completely sigh out the mouth,
36:31
and you can do a couple a few rounds of that. That interrupts
36:37
that anxiety sympathetic nervous system activation, just like that. I love that.
36:43
So those are two really easy anywhere kind of things. The second one I
36:46
would recommend would be actual trauma release. So there's a lot of trauma release
36:52
providers around the world. It is a global thing, and you can go
36:57
to their website, which I believe is Trauma Prevention dot org and find a
37:04
list of trauma release providers in your area. I like to use trauma release
37:09
itself, the actual tremor exercise as part of final relaxation at the end of
37:15
yoga and sometimes at the end of other types of classes as well. And
37:22
so what that what that type of exercise does is it just gives the body
37:25
a release valve into the natural tremor response, so you let the body shape.
37:31
This is something that most of the time we don't want to do as
37:35
adults, like we're like, okay, my body's shaking them. Must be
37:37
something wrong with me. Yeah, like, am I having a seizure?
37:39
What's happening here? Exactly exactly? But really that's a very natural response to
37:45
stress, and it helps to reset the parasympathetic side of the nervous system.
37:52
It only happens in animals after they are safe, you know, Like,
37:57
so I'm sure you've seen like the gazelle running from the cheetah, right,
38:04
yeah, and they escape and they do not run straight to their therapist.
38:09
They just shake it off and go about their happy gazelle life. They're not
38:16
gazelle therapist. I mean, that's what happened. But people, people don't
38:23
respond that way, right. I see like two gazelles sitting on the couch.
38:29
One legs are crossed, the other ones got glasses on a little notepad
38:32
on her lap. Gazelle therapy with Erica Thomas. That's right, that's right,
38:39
that's right. But human beings would do the same thing. We would.
38:43
We would shake if we were being chased by a literally a wild animal
38:47
and escaped, we would shake it off. We would let ourselves shake it
38:51
off. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that. But our stress now is
38:54
not life or death for the most part, and so we just tighten it
39:00
down. We just lock it down and freeze it in the body. So
39:04
um, So that is another way to kind of give yourself an out,
39:09
and practice like that can again kind of rewire the brain to say, hey,
39:16
oh yeah, okay, we're good. Now, we're good. Now
39:20
there's a shake, and then stop the shake, and then I'm in control
39:23
and we're good to go. Who would have guessed that Taylor Swift Shake It
39:27
Off was really what we needed to hear, that's true. Don't tell anybody
39:31
that I listened to that song. I'll kill you all Okay, I'm in
39:37
the closet. I'm in the closet about my love for Taylor Swift. All
39:40
right, Okay, love hate relationship with that little skinny thing. Your secret
39:50
is safe. Yeah, that into all my listeners because I'm not I don't
39:52
edit, you know, I mean unless there's a big snoff fil um.
39:57
Maybe Taylor Swift is a big snuff will have to say. So, when
40:02
it comes to what you do in your coaching, can you quickly chit chat
40:07
about that, because I think that's kind of a little bit of an important
40:08
thing that you do in life. Yes, yes, So what I am
40:13
doing is taking all of this stuff we've been talking about today and integrating it
40:20
into a framework. And you've mentioned multiple times this idea of navigation, right
40:25
using a compass a navigation, and so I've designed it that way because often
40:30
people feel lost, like they're not quite sure what direction to go themselves.
40:36
And so you know, that's why we hire coaches, but sometimes coaches our
40:39
human beings too, and coaches themselves are also lost, and so we've we
40:45
So what I've done is put this together in a framework designed around that compass
40:51
to help people understand a trauma informed framework that you can apply to any kind
40:58
of movement, any kind of form, at pretty much any movement that you're
41:02
doing, and with the intention to recover some resilience from stress, tension,
41:09
and trauma. So I in order to help people get started on that,
41:15
they can find my free guide to holding space. That's one of the things
41:20
that you know it's designed for fitness professionals, but honestly, holding space is
41:24
something that we do for each other all the time, and it's a really
41:28
important piece of coregulation, and I feel like every individual should know how to
41:34
do it because we need to be in connection with each other. So you
41:37
can find that free guide on my website at Savage Gracecoaching dot com, and
41:45
you'll hear all about it on my podcast because we're going through piece by piece
41:50
and bringing in some special guests to explain in depth what we're talking about when
41:57
we're talking about being trauma informed, and I think that's wonderful way to close,
42:01
because I know that this trauma informed approach to care has kind of turned
42:05
into a little bit of a bumper sticker, and I'm the first one to
42:08
use it, because I mean, do you use the bumper sticker on the
42:10
show, Because I use it all of the time because it's something that I
42:15
was never introduced to in my pain care and in chronic pain management, and
42:20
in trauma and in things you know that I've dealt with with psychologist, because
42:23
I've done CBT forever and I've been you know, I've done all of the
42:25
things, but that trauma. You know, we all think that it has
42:30
to be this like you know, massacre that you watched on some crazy true
42:32
crime. It does not, guys, it does not. Don't don't belittle
42:37
anything that's happened to you that you may or may not even know to support
42:40
what you were saying, Erica, like you had trauma from what you had
42:44
your teeth, you know, messed around when you were a kid, like
42:46
and that that things that happen to us. We don't realize that it's all
42:52
being implanted in our brain and it's all slowly being put into our bodies.
42:55
And I've mentioned the book many times on the show The Body Keeps the Score.
43:00
It definitely supports a lot of what Erica was talking about today. But
43:02
thank you so much for this because it's nice to hear all of the things
43:06
that I still need to work on. But it's good because it's it's a
43:12
healthy way of working on it instead of a shameful way of working on things.
43:15
Because I think a lot of what we're faced with, especially as women
43:20
in the chronic pain community or in trauma communities and what have you, is
43:22
that there's so much shame and so much guilt that comes with some of the
43:27
things that we've been through, so we decide to not deal with them and
43:30
not talk about them. Yeah, it is really important to remember you're not
43:34
You're not broken. Nobody is broken. Yeah, you and your body are
43:38
doing the best that you can with what you have, with where you are,
43:43
and that's that is It's brilliant, really, I mean, the human
43:46
body is a beautiful machine and a miracle maker. Really, So I really
43:53
want to thank you for having me on, Lindsay. It's it's truly an
43:58
honor to talk to you. Well, thank you and did obey because you
44:01
know it's I'm bringing people like you to listeners because you know what, one
44:07
of the things that we do here is try to bring amazing people that think
44:10
in this way, that approach their bodies and their care and their brain and
44:15
their loved ones and their relationships and their work and all of that in this
44:19
intentional, loving way where it's okay, guys, like it's okay. We've
44:24
all been through it. We all have so like we're not two people that
44:29
are sitting here like men. You know, we've been through this and what
44:31
have you. Everybody's been through something, and everybody's affected by stuff, and
44:36
it can end up in physical pain, it can't end up in all kinds
44:40
of different things in stressors and the way we respond to things that happened to
44:44
in our lives, the way that we're disorganized or overly organized. I'm in
44:47
that but wider category. You know, all of these different responses that we
44:52
do in our coping mechanisms that we do to get through instead of really focusing
44:57
on the magic and the miracle that is our body. And I think that
45:00
you really nailed that today for us. So I really appreciate you being here.
45:05
Thank you, Lindsay, thank you you are exclusively invited to share this
45:09
magical and miraculous VIP pain journey Together, Let's get to the heart of how
45:15
to heal with you by my side. Please follow the Pain Game Podcast wherever
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45:28
my little VIPs. Catch you on the other side.