Podcast
Even Tacos Fall Apart
Hosted by MommaFoxFire · EN
The "Even Tacos Fall Apart" talk show includes interviews with actual mental health professionals and conversations where real people talk about the messy side of mental illness, disabilities, wellness and life in general. My goal is to normalize mental health conversations and reduce the stigma around illnesses. We all struggle at different times in our lives, but that doesn't mean we're unlovable - after all, Tacos Fall Apart and WE STILL LOVE THOSE!
mommafoxfire is a MH advocate and variety gaming streamer on Twitch: twitch.tv/mommafoxfire
tacosfallapart.com
32episodes
Episodes
Newest firstAll episodes
Anxiety Disorder & Treatment with Tyler Coates
1w ago01:17:22Tap to summarizeIf you've ever lain awake at midnight rehearsing a conversation that hasn't happened yet, planned out every possible response before a difficult talk with your boss, or felt your heart pound before a presentation for days in advance... you're not broken. You might just be really good at anxiety.More info, resources & ways to connect - https://www.tacosfallapart.com/podcast-live-show/podcast-guests/tyler-coatesIn this episode of Even Tacos Fall Apart, we sat down with Tyler Coates of The Composed Mind, a mindset coach based in Melbourne, Australia who spent years struggling with anxiety before he even recognized what it was. His story will sound familiar: he wasn't spiraling in an obvious way. He was just playing out conversations on a loop, needing certainty before he could feel safe, and quietly running on stress he didn't have a name for.Tyler breaks down what anxiety actually is... a strategy. The brain's attempt to manufacture certainty and control when things feel unpredictable. And once you understand that, the whole experience starts to look different.We talked about the difference between feeling anxious and having an anxiety disorder, and why that distinction matters more than most people realize. We got into the physical symptoms (the racing heart, the sweaty palms, the full-body heat) and why Tyler compares them to a brutal workout without the endorphins. We also talked about the stuff that tends to fly under the radar: over-rehearsing conversations, avoiding social situations, sticking to the same restaurant order every single time because at least you know it's going to be good.One of the most interesting threads in this conversation is the idea that anxiety lives almost entirely in the future. It's built on worst-case possibilities, not probabilities. Tyler makes the point that even someone who experiences anxiety constantly can't conjure genuine panic about being on Mars in two hours... because the brain won't buy what it can't conceptualize as real. That same principle, turned around, is actually the beginning of how anxiety gets treated.We covered treatment options honestly and without pushing any single approach... medication, CBT, journaling, exercise, nutrition and the deeper belief-level work that Tyler specializes in, which involves identifying the core story someone is running underneath the anxiety. For Tyler, that story was "I'm not good enough." Once that belief dissolved, the anxiety stopped having anything to attach to.We also talked about why anxiety is likely underreported in men, the role judgment plays in keeping people stuck, why having one person in your life you can say the quiet part out loud to is genuinely one of the most powerful things available to anyone, and how the stigma around mental health quietly costs people years they didn't have to lose.This is a real, honest, funny conversation between two people who have both been in the thick of it. No fluff, no toxic positivity. Just a clearer picture of what anxiety is, where it comes from and what it looks like when it stops running your life.
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Ghosts, Spirituality & Adrenaline's Impact on the Body with Tina Erwin
2w ago01:13:35Tap to summarizeAnyone curious about the science behind trauma, the truth about what happens after we die, or why the hell they still can't seem to calm down no matter what they try will find something in this conversation worth holding onto.More info, resources & ways to connect - https://www.tacosfallapart.com/podcast-live-show/podcast-guests/tina-erwinWhat happens when a retired Navy commander who spent 20 years working with the US submarine force also happens to help ghosts cross over? You get one of the most unexpected and genuinely fascinating conversations we have had on Even Tacos Fall Apart.Tina Erwin joined us for Mental Health Monday, and she did not disappoint. Tina has written nine books on metaphysics, developed the Crossing Over Prayer, and spent decades helping trauma survivors understand something most doctors never look at: what adrenaline actually does to the body after trauma, and how to get it out.Adrenaline doesn't just flush out of your system after a traumatic event. It can stay in the body for years, quietly poisoning everything. Tina calls it adrenaline poisoning, and she explains how it connects to a condition called pyroluria, a deficiency in vitamin B6 and other key nutrients that can trigger rage, anxiety and in some cases murderous ideation in people who have no idea why they feel the way they do. She has worked with veterans, abuse survivors and teenagers who had been failed by every conventional approach, and she has seen people transform once the nutritional and biological piece gets addressed alongside everything else.Then there is the ghost work, and yes, it is exactly what it sounds like. Tina helps earthbound spirits cross over, and she teaches regular people to do it themselves through the Crossing Over Prayer, which is free on her website. She walks through why some spirits do not cross, what it feels like to live in a haunted space without knowing it, and why she believes you should not have to hire a psychic to help your own loved ones move on. She also shares a true crime story involving remote viewing, a storage unit in Virginia and a missing woman who had been trafficked for over a year. It is the kind of story that is hard to shake.What ties all of it together is Tina's core belief that science and spirituality are not in conflict. They are, as she puts it, the same thing. Whether she is talking about quantum entanglement, nutritional deficiencies or helping a guilt-ridden ghost finally accept that they are loved, she is always pointing toward the same goal: helping people stop surviving and start actually living.
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Turning Pain Into Perseverance & His Journey with Depression & Anxiety with Noah May
3w ago01:11:17Tap to summarizeIf you've ever felt like you were drowning while everyone around you seemed just fine, this one's for you.More info, resources & ways to connect - https://www.tacosfallapart.com/podcast-live-show/podcast-guests/noah-mayNoah May has lived with depression since he was 13 years old. He was bullied relentlessly, watched his grandmother disappear into Alzheimer's, grew up without a father, and by the time anxiety hit at 18, the physical toll was so severe he lost 20 pounds, could barely open a bottle and his legs shook walking down stairs. This is his story, and he's not holding anything back.In this episode of Even Tacos Fall Apart, Noah opens up about what those early years actually looked like, not the cleaned-up version, but the real one. The suicidal thoughts at 13. The porn addiction he developed as a coping mechanism. The friends who looked right through him. The teachers who didn't do much better. And the moment his mom caught him, sat him down and instead of just punishing him, asked what was really going on. That one conversation changed everything.Noah talks about being diagnosed with clinical depression at 14 and anxiety at 18, what it felt like to finally have names for what his body had been doing, and why he waited years to try therapy because he genuinely believed it was only for people who were "crazy." He also gets into the physical reality of an anxiety disorder that most people don't talk about, the kind that doesn't show up as a panic attack but as months of unexplained nausea, dramatic weight loss and a doctor who had no idea what was wrong.The conversation also goes into what his healing looks like in practice. For Noah, it's been podcasting, writing poetry, finding the right medication and building a support system from scratch after leaving behind a high school class that never really saw him. He's candid about the fact that most of those people still haven't reached out, and that he's made peace with it.Noah is a journalism graduate from Auburn University and the host of the Lethal Venom podcast. He's turned his own pain into a platform for other people who are still in the thick of it, and his whole thing is simple: you shouldn't have to feel alone in this.If you've ever felt invisible, been told to just get over it or wondered whether things actually get better, this episode is for you.Keywords: depression, anxiety, mental health, depression and anxiety, overcoming depression, mental health podcast, living with depression, teen depression, clinical depression, mental health awareness, depression recovery, anxiety symptoms, mental health journey, Even Tacos Fall Apart, Noah May
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Resilience, Healing & Self-compassion with Malisa Hepner
4w ago01:26:10Tap to summarizeIf you've ever been called resilient when what you really needed was a hand, this episode is for you.More info, resources & ways to connect - https://www.tacosfallapart.com/podcast-live-show/podcast-guests/malisa-hepnerMalisa Hepner has lived a lot of life. Foster care, addiction in her family, incarceration, profound loss... and she went beyond surviving to build a career helping others navigate the same kind of pain. As a therapist, speaker and podcast host, Malisa brings both clinical expertise and raw personal honesty to everything she does, including this conversation on Even Tacos Fall Apart.We dig into what resilience actually means, because it's not about bouncing back fast or being "God's strongest soldier." Malisa talks candidly about how she used to resent that word, how it felt like people watching her drown while cheering her on. Her reframe of the word is powerful: resilience is the ability to show up authentically, find meaning in the mess and know that nothing outside of you changes your worth as a person.Self-compassion gets a real, practical look here too. Malisa walks through how it started for her as a single decision... a decree, really... to stop tearing herself apart and start treating herself like someone worth caring for. She talks about the body-based tools she uses when grief or anxiety gets loud, how to get out of your head and into your heart in about 90 seconds, and why your brain is genuinely lying to you most of the time it feels like catastrophe.One of the most powerful threads in this episode is vulnerability. Malisa was told by a trusted friend that she was emotionally unavailable, and she was furious! ...until she realized the friend was right. She had been retelling her trauma like it happened to someone else, using humor as armor, and calling it healing. That moment became the foundation of her podcast, Emotionally Unavailable, and a whole new chapter in her own growth.This episode was recorded just one month after Malisa lost her son to an accidental overdose. She shows up anyway, in real time, and shares what grief is teaching her about trust, connection and asking for help. It is one of the most honest conversations we have had on this show.If you are navigating trauma recovery, complex PTSD, perfectionism or just trying to figure out how to be a little kinder to yourself, this conversation could help.
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Trauma Reactions & Gaming with Joy AKA Compassion & Consoles
Apr 2801:26:48Tap to summarizeWhen Joy, known online as Compassion & Consoles, joined MommaFoxFire on Even Tacos Fall Apart, the conversation went deep fast. Joy is a licensed professional counselor, a doctoral candidate focusing on anxiety and trauma, and someone who uses her own lived experience with mental health to inform the work she does. This episode covers trauma reactions, gaming as a coping tool, how schools fail kids with unrecognized trauma, and why the DSM does not have all the answers.More info, resources & ways to connect - https://www.tacosfallapart.com/podcast-live-show/podcast-guests/joy-compassion-consolesJoy pushes back on the narrow definition in the DSM, which limits trauma to things like threats to life or sexual assault. Her take is more practical: if an experience overwhelms your ability to cope, not just in the moment but over time, that counts. Chronic, ongoing situations where you have no escape and no control can be just as damaging as a single acute event, even if a textbook does not say so. Invalidating someone's trauma because it does not fit a checklist is its own kind of harm.Social support is the single biggest protective factor after trauma. Studies consistently show that having even one safe, supportive adult can make an enormous difference, especially for kids. Other risk factors include pre-existing anxiety, avoidant coping patterns, genetics and family history. The less control someone feels they have in the aftermath, the harder recovery tends to be.This is where Joy gets fired up, and rightfully so. Children who have experienced trauma often cannot put what they are feeling into words, so it comes out as behavior instead: running out of classrooms, ripping up work, shutting down completely. That behavior gets labeled as defiance, ADHD or ODD, and the actual cause never gets addressed. Joy is direct about it: she has never worked with a kid diagnosed with conduct disorder whose behavior was not better explained by trauma or anxiety. Slapping a behavioral diagnosis on top of a trauma reaction does not help the child, it just gives adults someone to blame.Joy is a single-player, narrative-driven gamer. She talks about how games like Detroit: Become Human and the Uncharted series offer something genuinely valuable: story, agency and a chance to emotionally invest in characters in a low-stakes environment. She also gets honest about anxiety spiking during combat sequences and having to walk away from games entirely, which opens up a real conversation about how gaming intersects with stress responses.Drawing from both research and personal experience with an eating disorder in her late teens, Joy explains why thought suppression backfires. The more you try to block a thought, the louder it gets. Mindfulness-based approaches, which focus on noticing and accepting thoughts rather than fighting them, are a better fit for trauma recovery.The episode closes with a look at mental health needs in the workplace. Reasonable accommodations are legally required, but many people do not feel safe enough to ask for them, and many employers do not know how to respond when they do. A pool table in the break room is not employee support.Find Joy on Twitter at Compassion & Consoles and follow Even Tacos Fall Apart for more conversations about mental health, gaming and the messy, real stuff in between.
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Unmasking Without Spontaneously Combusting with Angie Dixon
Apr 2101:12:23Tap to summarizeIf you've spent most of your life feeling like you're performing a version of yourself that's just slightly off from who you actually are, this episode is for you.More info, resources & ways to connect - https://www.tacosfallapart.com/podcast-live-show/podcast-guests/angie-dixonAngie Dixon is an author, artist and creator of the Leonardo Trait, a framework for understanding the kind of brain that runs on curiosity, cycles through a hundred projects at once and absolutely refuses to pick a lane. She's also late diagnosed autistic, and she spent decades masking before a severe back injury seven years ago forced everything to stop, and forced her to finally start living as herself.We talked about what unmasking actually looks like, and it's not the dramatic transformation the word might suggest. For Angie, it started with novelty t-shirts. She began wearing them to physical therapy because those were the ones without paint on them. That small comfort became her whole wardrobe. Unmasking, she says, tends to be gradual, personal and a lot less cinematic than people expect.One of the most clarifying things Angie said in this conversation is that neurodivergent people are not broken neurotypicals. We're not a defective version of something else. We're just different, and that difference is worth protecting rather than hiding.We also got into the Leonardo Trait itself, which Angie describes as profound creativity in a chaotic world. If you think in spirals instead of straight lines, have 37 browser tabs open in your brain at any given moment and feel like the self-help books everyone else loves were written for someone who is simply not you, you might be a Leonardo.Angie was diagnosed with autism at 55 after nearly 20 years of writing a book she thought was about creativity, only to realize it was actually about neurodivergence the whole time. That realization sent her back to the drawing board, and the result is a manifesto about being who you actually are rather than the acceptable version of yourself you've been performing.We talked about burnout warning signs, what to do when rest isn't enough, how to stop treating unfinished projects like personal failures and how to figure out the difference between professional adaptation and genuine self-erasure. We also talked about her AI assistant Ziggy, who once told her that a plain t-shirt would make her look like she was about to hold a hostage.If you're questioning whether you've been masking your whole life, Angie's take is simple: if you're asking, you probably already know the answer.Find Angie and her Unmasked summit at her website, and check out the summit itself, which was designed specifically to be the least overwhelming format possible: email only, no endless video calls.Even Tacos Fall Apart is a Mental Health Monday podcast. New episodes weekly.
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Getting to Good Riddance - Breakup Survival Without the Bullshit with Dr. Jodie Eckleberry-Hunt
Apr 1400:49:14Tap to summarizeIf you've ever missed someone you knew was wrong for you, waited for closure that never came, or just needed someone to tell you the truth about healing... this one's for you.More info, resources & ways to connect - https://www.tacosfallapart.com/podcast-live-show/podcast-guests/jodie-eckleberry-hunt-2Breakups are messy. The grief hits you in waves, the anger blindsides you at random moments, and somewhere in the middle of it all, you find yourself missing someone you know was completely wrong for you. If any of that sounds familiar, this episode is for you.Dr. Jodie Eckleberry-Hunt is a board-certified health psychologist, author and no-bullshit self-help expert who joined us on Even Tacos Fall Apart to talk about her book Getting to Good Riddance: A No-Bullshit Breakup Survival Guide. She wrote it during COVID lockdown, at least partly because so many of her clients were coming in saying they were done... all that togetherness pushed a lot of people right to the edge.So what's the biggest piece of bullshit people tell themselves after a breakup? According to Dr. Jodie, it's the self-blame spiral. Replaying everything you did wrong, convinced it was all your fault. The truth is, most relationships fail because of two people. And while accountability matters, flogging yourself endlessly is less accountability and more pain with no payoff.We also get into why "good riddance" is more useful than chasing closure. Closure sounds great, but the reality is you might never get it. Good riddance reframes the whole thing: this relationship wasn't right for you, and you deserve better... or at least different. Dr. Jodie recommends giving yourself six to eight months to heal before dating again... and that clock doesn't start until you go no contact. Still texting every day? You haven't actually broken up yet. The no-contact rule is extremely practical. You can't clear your head when you're constantly stirring the pot!We also talk about the role anger plays in healing (spoiler: Dr. Jodie actually loves the anger phase, it's energizing!), why following your ex on social media is actively working against you, and how to rebuild your identity when a long-term relationship has quietly swallowed it whole. One of the most powerful tools she recommends is expressive writing... there's real neuroscience behind it, and it helps you reconnect with who you were before the relationship defined you.And if you're wondering when to bail on a relationship that isn't working yet, Dr. Jodie gets into that too, including a thoughtful, honest conversation about abusive relationships and why "just leave" is advice that completely misses the reality of what people are dealing with.Her top piece of advice, straight from the episode: Why the hell do you want to be with someone who doesn't want to be with you?It's a good question. This episode helps you sit with it... and eventually, answer it.
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Psychedelic-assisted Therapy with Diana Colleen
Apr 701:07:26Tap to summarizePsychedelic-Assisted Therapy Saved Her Life. Now She's Writing About It!More info, resources & ways to connect - https://www.tacosfallapart.com/podcast-live-show/podcast-guests/diana-colleenThis one is for anyone who has ever hit a wall that talk therapy couldn't break through, or who is just curious about what it actually looks like when someone decides to stop surviving and start healing.Diana Colleen did not have an easy start. Born into poverty, sexually abused as a child, abandoned by her father at 11, sexually assaulted as a young adult and then blamed for it by the RCMP when she reported it. She packed her cats and whatever fit in her car and drove from Canada to Seattle to start over. For decades, she did what a lot of survivors do: stuffed it all down and kept moving.By 2018, there was nothing left to stuff. She became suicidal. What saved her was an underground psychedelic therapist and a single MDMA session that, as Diana puts it, wrapped her in a blanket of love she had never felt for herself. "I didn't know that I am love until that day," she says. "And that changes everything."Diana joins Even Tacos Fall Apart to talk about her healing journey, her training as a psychedelic facilitator and her debut novel They Could Be Saviors, which imagines a world where billionaire hoarding disorder gets treated the same way any other mental illness would.So what actually is psychedelic-assisted therapy?It is not the same as taking mushrooms at a festival. The difference is set, setting and most importantly, integration. You go in with intention. You have a trained facilitator holding the space. And after the session, you sit with a therapist and work through what surfaced. The medicine, as Diana explains, has its own ideas about what you need to heal. Your plan and the medicine's plan are often two very different things.She also makes clear: it is not a magic bullet. "You still have to do the work," she says. Think of it less as a cure and more like ripping off a bandage that talk therapy might peel back millimeter by millimeter for years.Why isn't this mainstream yet?! Blame Nixon. Diana walks through the political history of how psychedelic research got shut down for decades, why veterans and people experiencing homelessness stand to benefit most from legalization and why her biggest fear is Big Pharma swooping in and pricing out the very people this therapy could help most.Countries like Australia and Poland are already moving toward legalized psilocybin therapy. Diana believes full legalization is coming in her lifetime, and she is ready for it.The big idea behind the novel is that billionaires are hoarders operating at a planetary scale. Her book flips the cultural script from celebrating extreme wealth to recognizing it as a symptom of unmet psychological need. Psychedelics, she believes, could reconnect people to each other and to nature in ways that no amount of money can replicate. "Once you've seen that you're connected to everybody, you can't unsee it."This is a conversation about trauma, healing, plant medicine, wealth inequality and what it actually takes to change your life from the inside out.Keywords: psychedelic-assisted therapy, MDMA therapy, psilocybin therapy, mental health, trauma healing, psychedelic facilitator, plant medicine, ankylosing spondylitis, chronic pain and mental health, psychedelic legalization, Even Tacos Fall Apart podcast
Transcribe →Even Tacos Fall Apart - Welcome to Season 5!
Mar 3100:11:15Tap to summarizeSeason 5 of Even Tacos Fall Apart is officially here!!!! And we're starting it the right way: by honoring where we've been before we talk about where we're going.Check out all of Seasons 1-4, find out what guests are coming to the Live Show next, look for mental health resources, become a part of the community & more - https://www.tacosfallapart.com/In this season premiere, MommaFoxFire takes a look back at an extraordinary Season 4... a year packed with raw, honest and deeply human conversations about mental health. From trauma and PTSD to grief and loss, depression and recovery, anxiety, suicidal ideation, and everything in between, Season 4 covered the full spectrum of the mental health experience.We heard from therapists, researchers, advocates, survivors, and everyday people brave enough to sit down and say "here's what I went through, and here's how I got through it." Standout conversations included episodes on religion and mental health, family trauma and PTSD, the entertainment industry's toll on mental wellness, ADHD and neurodiversity, grief, binge eating, chronic pain, ibogaine therapy, narcissistic abuse recovery, and mental health care for marginalized communities... just to name a few!This episode also revisits the heart of what Even Tacos Fall Apart is all about: the idea that falling apart isn't failure. Life is messy. Healing is messy. And somewhere in the chaos of being a human being trying to hold it all together, there's community, humor and hope... even when the taco hits the floor.Season 5 is bringing more of everything that makes this show what it is: honest mental health conversations, diverse guest perspectives and topics that don't get talked about enough. No shame. No filters. Just real talk for real people.If you're new to the show... welcome. Start here, then dig into the archives. There's something for whatever you're going through!If you're a returning listener... thank you for being here again!Now... Let's do this!!Even Tacos Fall Apart is a mental health podcast covering trauma, depression, anxiety, grief, healing, neurodiversity, relationships, and everything in between. New episodes drop regularly. Subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts.
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Unleashing Your Bad-assery with Sheri Arcuria
Mar 2401:16:37Tap to summarizeIf you've ever talked yourself out of your own potential, dismissed your progress because it didn't look impressive enough, or just needed someone to remind you that hard days don't have to become hard lives, this episode is for you.More info, resources & ways to connect - https://www.tacosfallapart.com/podcast-live-show/podcast-guests/sheri-arcuriaSheri Arcuria didn't set out to build a movement. She started with a blog, a body she was trying to save and a whole lot of stubbornness. On this episode of Even Tacos Fall Apart, she sat down to talk about what badassery actually looks like in real life... and it's not what most people think.Sheri is the author of two books, Unzipped and Blindsided, and the creator of MOBA (Master of Badassery), an apparel and community brand that has grown into something way bigger than t-shirts. But before any of that, she was a 32-year-old woman sitting in a doctor's office being told she would have diabetes for the rest of her life. The doctor handed her a stack of prescriptions. Sheri handed them back.What followed was six months of walking every day, cleaning up her diet and tracking everything. When she went back for her follow-up and every single marker had normalized, she was, in her words, "smug as shit." That moment cracked something open in her. It stopped being about a number on a scale and started being about what she was actually capable of.The first book came out of spite too, if we're being honest. Her husband finally called her out after years of her saying she should write about her bariatric surgery journey. She stormed into the office, sat down at a blank screen and didn't stop typing for five days straight. Wrist guards and all.But this conversation goes well beyond weight loss. Sheri talks about what it means to be a badass when you're dealing with chronic pain, anxiety or a life that looks nothing like you planned. Her take is straightforward: badassery is an attitude, not a destination. It's doing whatever is in front of you with purpose, even on the days when that thing is just getting out of bed and taking a shower. The goal posts move. The journey doesn't end. That's the whole point.She also gets into the emotional roots underneath physical struggles, the way we mow over our problems instead of pulling the weeds, the damage that comes from holding everything in until your body stages a full revolt and the very specific kind of freedom that comes from finally finding your voice in a relationship or a doctor's office or anywhere else you've been quietly swallowing things down.The MOBA community grew out of a TikTok live where people just wanted to plank together every morning. Now it's a Discord full of people cheering each other on through workouts, hard days and everything in between.Sheri is also a certified mindset coach and is finishing up certifications in personal training and nutrition. She takes DMs. She writes handwritten cards with every single order. She has not forgotten where she started.This one is worth your time.
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