Danielle Ireland (0:00)

Just a helpful hint for any listeners that may have kiddos around. These are conversations between adults, intended for adults. There is the potential for some adult subject matter or adult language. Hello. Hello, this is Danielle Ireland and you are listening to Don't Cut your Own, a solo cast and just a quick introduction. My name is Danielle. I work as a clinical therapist and while this podcast is not podcast therapy, think of it as therapy light. It is the twist of lemon and a glass of water, and the twist of lemon is the therapy. So we talk about some mental health related topics, but I'm not diagnosing anybody. I'm not pulling out the DSM and like cracking the therapy whip. I'm talking about life through the lens of someone who is in therapy and talks to clients all day long about their feelings and emotions. It blows me away and humbles me in a way that's hard to describe sometimes. How like the gift of sitting and listening to people open up and unlock some of their, I'll say, challenges, insecurities. When you hear the voice of pain essentially every day, I think that sounds like. And I think sometimes people who maybe find out what I do or maybe don't know who I am and then find out what I do, there's a very common response, which is either a joke about, oh, don't diagnose me, or, or the other common response is, oh my gosh, how do you do that? How do you, how do you listen to people talking about blank, diddy blank, diddy blank all day long? How do you, how do you cut it off and not take it home with you? And I'll be honest, sometimes the joke is true and I'm like, well, don't worry, I'm already diagnosing you and I can already tell you exactly what your problems are. Kidding slash not kidding. And the other is sometimes it is hard to turn it off. Sometimes it is tricky to not take it home with me or to not kind of replay something that someone has been processing in a session, a session after, you know, the session's over, like I'm human. Sometimes that stuff get. Does get stuck. What I've learned though, is that a lot of times the things that get stuck, basically every time something gets stuck that a client has experienced, it's reflecting something in me, an unacknowledged emotion. It's a growth edge for me in my life and that's why it's stuck in me more so than a reflection of just sitting and listening to people. And also the thing I love about the people I work with is that. And this might be my bias to the type of therapy that I do, therefore, the type of clients that I attract. But no one is really sitting and wallowing and whining. Like, I rarely is there a session where someone just doesn't want anything more than just to complain that doesn't ever feel like what that is. It's. It is. It's empowering and it's inspiring to see someone be vulnerable, look within, take accountability and responsibility for their own life, and then try to start enacting change. More often than not. I'm so grateful and honored. Like, most of the day, it can be tiring at times, but so many times it's energizing. So what I want to do today is something I don't think I've. I don't think I've done before, but I do. Even in my intro, I'm like, I'm not really going to be talking about therapy. It's therapy light. Actually, today is going to be about therapy. So psych. Little bait and switch action. Like, yeah, welcome. We're not going to talk about therapy. Psych. Door closed, sit down, let's have a conversation. Now, what I want to talk about are actually three myths about starting therapy. Because I think there is what I wish for people. I'll say this like, my wish for people is that they wouldn't wait until their life is crumbling around them before they're willing to ask for help. There is an unfortunate, I think, cultural, sociological, very capitalistic sense that you got to pull yourself up by your bootstraps. You got to swallow your pain. You got to leave your feelings at the door, check your emotions there. Leave your story, cut it off, Compartmentalized, get your shit done. Grind, hustle. Work, work, work, work, work, work, work, work, work. That energy that is slowly killing people. And I don't mean that in a pandering way, and I don't mean that in a dramatic way. Rates of suicide are higher than ever before. Rates of anxiety and depression are higher than ever before. And as we are moving closer and closer and finding ourselves in the holiday season, in a time where togetherness and singing songs of holiday cheer, people experience loneliness more than anything else like it. That painful emotion is felt most acutely this time of year for so many people, like gym memberships after the first of the year. I think the other thing that people put on hold through the holidays is their feelings, their unprocessed trauma, because they are kind of going back into the lion's den. A lot of People are going home, where the source and like the ground zero of most of our shit lives. And even if you love your family, even if you have great parents, I think acknowledging the truth of your pain in childhood, we're so protective and afraid to acknowledge because we love, we love our people. And what I want to say is both can be true. Both can be true. Things can be hard, shit may not have been handled well. And you can still love your people. Do you like the idea of journaling? But think, gosh, I think I just need a little bit of help. This blank page is freaking me out. What do I write about? What I did that day, What I ate for a snack. You're not alone. I get it. And that's why I made a journal just for you. It's called the Treasure Journal. It covers seven key areas of your life. There's lots of beautiful stories and sentence stems and prompts and ways to help you get those creative juices flowing to really unlock some powerful processing. Click the link in the show notes and grab your copy. Today, I want to talk about the three big myths about starting therapy. Hopefully bust some of these myths. Just like, I don't know why I'm thinking about Ghostbusters. Like, I just want to bust a ghost. I want to bust these three ghosts about starting therapy. And if it resonates with you at all, maybe therapy was a part of your life and you kind of dropped it for a while. Maybe you need to pick it back up, or maybe therapy isn't your jam. But I want to say that if you think therapy is not your jam or you're already like, I don't know, I don't think that's for me. I just want you to shh and just. You can obviously turn this podcast off if you're already annoyed by this. But if you're still listening, bear with me before you jump too quickly to say to telling yourself or explaining away why therapy isn't for you. Because there is, I think, emotional language being used in a way that is detrimental because if we don't, if we aren't clear on what we're actually talking about, if we don't have a working definition on what something really is and what it's not, then we can't talk about it truthfully and that's potentially dangerous, particularly when our mental health is on the line and our emotional well being is on the line. So here, here is something I've seen. So maybe you're like, oh, like, I don't need a therapist. I'VE got my girlfriends. My girlfriends are my therapy. Or shopping is my therap. Or wine is my therapy. Or exercise is my therapy. Oh, I fucking hear this all the time, and it drives me crazy. Ah. Running is my therapy. Travel is my therapy. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. You want to know why? Because therapy is therapy. Now, I've said this in other episodes. If you've been listening to me for a while, you may hear this because you're like, wait, but Danielle. But you've also said, and I'm about to say it again, therapy is not the only modality for emotional healing. I believe that to be true with every fiber of my being. There are so many experience experiences in my life that have been healing and transformational outside of a therapist's office, largely because I didn't start therapy until I was 35. So I'll be 38 this December, right? So I didn't start therapy until I became a therapist. And, oh, gosh, maybe I was 34. Well, time is weird and confusing, but the point is, I started late and I had had beautiful healing moments through journaling, through friendships and family and relationships and incredible conversation. And yes, I've seen beautiful parts of the world that have unlocked and opened parts of my mind and body and soul that I hadn't been in touch with before. Yes, yes, yes to all that poetic, beautiful stuff and word vomit. Vomit, vomit. So many people avoid therapy for these three reasons. And this. This. This is. I. This is killing people sile silently in their loneliness. It means something's wrong with me. It means I have failed or I have to know why. I want it to start it. I'm going to say those myths again. Myth number one, it means something's wrong with me. Myth number two, I failed. I have to know why. I want it to start it. Now, let's bust these ghosts. Are you ready? It means something's wrong with you. Yeah, no fucking shit. Because everyone has something. So I'm not even gonna say, no, nothing's wrong with you, boo boo kitty. Like, everything is fine. Like, me, me, me. No, if you're starting therapy, it means something's wrong. Not, something is wrong with you. Something is wrong. Something is wrong. That's like saying you're standing in a house that's slowly catching on fire and you smell smoke. Right? Your smoke is painful. Emotions losing your temper, losing control. Drinking too much, needing to shop to feel worthy. Endlessly scrolling on your phone without breaks or grabbing your phone anytime you're sitting in a quiet moment because you don't know how to sit with yourself. Whatever. That's the smoke. Saying that smelling smoke and acknowledging, I think my house might be on fire, your response would be, oh, that's a problem. That is a problem. We need to work. We need to figure that out. Where's the fire extinguisher? Where's the fire department? Right. We call in resources and. And we take steps to address the problem with the house. What we don't say is that house is fucked up. That house is crazy. Oh, why is it so hot all the time? Gross. Like, ew. Like, keep that shit at home. Your house is burning down, right? Your emotions, when you lose control of yourself or you feel out of control or you're in a crowd and you feel utterly and completely alone. Friends, that is smoke. That is smoke. And so it would make no more sense than judging a house that's on fire to say that there's something wrong with you, my friend. No, no, there's nothing wrong with you. And let me just say, after hundreds of hours of my butt in a seat listening to people, there is something wrong with everyone. Ugh. If I were Linwell, Miranda, I would have bust out into song. That felt like a moment that just needed to lift with song. But everyone is managing or dealing with some thing. It's true. But there's nothing wrong with you. All it means is that if you're smelling smoke, there's fire. There's something wrong. There's something wrong. And acknowledging that there is something wrong, that just is the starting place. It's literally the entry point to finding what's right for you. Okay, I needed to get that out. Thank you, my friends, for listening. Okay, myth number two. We're going to bust this ghost. I failed. I've failed. That is a product of our culture, and it seeps into family systems and family generations and gets traced down. That vulnerability is weakness. And that vulnerability will kill you. And acknowledging your mistakes is a threat to your life. And I know that sounds dramatic, but that is how vulnerability and shame have been interpreted and misinterpreted for generation after generation. Because at one point in time, to be very generous to everyone who's come before us, and before that and before that and before that, in a hierarchy of needs, right? Food, safety, shelter that are necessary or survival when those are threatened, through a depression, through war, through poverty, through, through, through, through. Through. Through. Through. Through trauma. Trauma when food, shelter, and safety are threatened. There's no. We're not talking about emotional vulnerability anymore. There's not bandwidth in the human mind to even experience depression or anxiety, because it's. When we're in survival mode, that's it. It's tunnel vision. And so that level of vulnerability is a threat. It is literally a threat. Because if you don't find food, shelter, safety, you could die. Now, as each generation that's come before us, right, we move into a new level of comfort. We move into a new level of stability. We move into a new. We're not in the original environment where the trauma or the stress or the trauma was imprinted. That internal hard wiring is passed through family systems, behavior, and it's actually passed through our genes. Our genetics, not denim, is passed through our genes genetically. And unlearning that and even recognizing and identifying that that's present in you is hard to do. Hard. Capital H, hard. And having someone that is not your friend, who is not your spouse, who is not trying to get you to buy something, who does not want you to numb it and stuff it away with alcohol and food and other substances, someone who allows you, through training, to actually hold space for that and first identify its presence and where it creeps up. And then ask yourself the oh so important question. Is it working for you now? Because everything that we do, everything that we do at one point was a coping strategy that we needed to survive at some point in our life. And so with that compassion and understanding, you then get an opportunity to choose consciously what is working for me. Now, no matter how honest you think you are with your friends, ultimately the threat of losing your friendship by being too honest is ever present for most of us. Not all of us. Some people. Some people may not be that, exactly. But what I believe to be true, we all want to belong. We all want to be seen. We all want to be accepted. And apart from the deep, painful sting of utter loneliness, right. The slight stair step before we get to loneliness is rejection. Because rejection represents the threat of loneliness. And we don't want to be alone, and so we don't want to feel rejected. And sometimes that means we betray ourselves and we're not honest with ourselves. And therapy can be a tool to help you bust that ghost. And then we move into the last one. I have to know why I want it. I'll be shorter with busting this third and final ghost. Almost every single client that has started therapy with me starts the session one of these. I'm here because. Well, I don't really know. My friend sees you and they say that they feel better, and I. I just. I. I don't know and the words get stuck in their throat. And that. That is probably response number one. I'm here, and I don't really know why. Now, of course, what I know to be true is under that confusion and doubt, there is a reason. But our lives. Our lives don't inherently allow space for us to be silent and still enough to feel our feelings, which is what therapy can be. It's 50 minutes, maybe 90, you know, if you decide to do, like a session and a half or a double. But it is time and space that you have invested because you're paying for it. You've invested to sit with yourself and your feelings. You can't busy it away with chores and laundry and tasks. You can't busy it away on a computer or distract it away with a TV or phone. You can't explain it away like you can to friends and family. It's just you and you. Well, and the therapist. But so often the magic in therapy is once we feel settled and safe enough to actually hear ourselves talk, that's when we start making powerful connections. And so you don't have to know. And I would venture to say that most people don't have a clear end goal. Most. The most clarity is like, well, I just don't like how I feel now. And I want to feel better than this. Good. Great. The other most common response is someone comes in because, well, they want to talk about a relationship. And what you quickly learn. And I, as someone, and I'm raising my own hand, I'm including myself in this, please know this is not from a place of judgment or even being better than. It's simply just true. We. Sometimes we think we're going into therapy to talk about how messed up the other people in our life are. And once you run out of things to say about other people, then you kind of sit in that awkward silence. And then you realize, oh, the conversation's about to redirect to me. I don't want to talk about me. Yeah. So either we don't exactly know why. We just think it sounded like something we should do. And then the other is, I want to complain about, like, crazy dramatic friend or my relationship partner who's so annoying for X, Y, and Z, or I want to talk about this relative, or I want to talk about blank, Diddy, blank. And then again, there's always that tipping point. And I. I can, like, smell it when I'm in my own session, and I'm like. And let me tell you another thing this person did. And then it's like, there's this long pause and silence. I'm like, oh, no. Oh, no, it's happening, it's happening. We're about to talk about me and my responsibility in this situation. It's hard. It's gross, but it's the right kind of hard. It's like the kind of hard that can make you very sleepy, but then also, like, can feel very satisfying at the end. Deep breath. Deep breath. That was a lot. It's all as true as I know it to be. It's the truthiest truth I have on the topic. My hope isn't that busting any of these myths, if you have thought about entertain the idea, put it on your to do list, and then crossed it off and said, I'll get to it another time. Just don't wait till your house is burned down to ask for help if you feel like you need it, if you even feel like it just sounds like a good idea, but you don't know why, or if you're worried what it says about you or you're worried it's going to mean there's a problem, just know that that's what every single person feels that tries it, that tries therapy. You can try it and not like it. You may try it and think this might be good, but maybe this person isn't the right fit. You can be in it for a while. You can be in it, you know, pretty intensely for a couple of months, three, four months. You get some good insight and then you need to take a break because you're like, ugh. I. I just. I don't know, I just lived through a. In home renovation while I lived there. And it was exhausting to have my kitchen gutted and my, I don't know, dishwasher in my office and my refrigerator in the front door. And now that life is kind of put back together in a manageable way, I just want to live in my house and rest. And you just take a break. You can take a break, you can start, you can stop, you can change therapists, you can change your mind because you know why it's your therapy. And that way it's actually. It goes from feeling potentially scary and disempowering to a really empowered choice that you can make. And you can change and you can remake and you can reevaluate, and you can let it be whatever you want it to be. But all that to say if any of those three reasons that I listed in the beginning are preventing you from getting the help you need. If they're keeping you stuck and feeling alone. I hope. I sincerely hope this may have shifted your mind just a teensy weensy, itsy bitsy bit. Thank you friends. Your time, your care, your attention and your presence here mean more to me than you know. It's such an honor to get to do this. It's makes me feel so good. Not just to record and figure out the content, but to be able to share. It's like the best things in life are shared. And I appreciate you. Thank you for being here and I look forward to connecting with you next time. Sam.