Do You Have Neuroplastic Symptoms? Here’s How to Know – with Dr. Howard Schubiner

[00:00:00] Hello, hello, and welcome back to the Heal with Grace podcast.
[00:00:04] Today I have Dr. Howard Schubiner.
[00:00:08] And if you have ever heard me talk about pain reprocessing therapy or
[00:00:13] emotional awareness and expression therapy, two therapies I am trained in,
[00:00:17] and that have made profound healing opportunities for people in the mind
[00:00:22] body healing space, then you've probably heard me talk about Dr.
[00:00:26] Howard Schubiner because he is one of the creators of these modalities and has
[00:00:31] been in this work for a very long time, really changing the name of chronic
[00:00:37] pain. He is a board certified internist and pediatrician and a leading voice
[00:00:44] in the field of mind body medicine.
[00:00:46] He serves as the director of the mind body medicine center at Ascension
[00:00:51] Providence Hospital in Southern Michigan and is a clinical professor at
[00:00:55] Michigan State University College of Human Medicine with over a hundred
[00:00:59] scientific publications to his name.
[00:01:01] Dr. Schubiner has been at the forefront of developing innovative treatments
[00:01:06] for chronic pain. He co-developed emotional awareness and expression
[00:01:09] therapy, a modality shown to be more effective than cognitive behavioral
[00:01:13] therapy in some trials and pain reprocessing therapy, which achieved a
[00:01:19] 66% recovery rate in the landmark NIH funded study.
[00:01:25] Published in JAMA Psychiatry, Dr. Schubiner is the author of several
[00:01:30] influential books, including Unlearn Your Pain, Unlearn Your Anxiety and
[00:01:34] Depression and Hidden From View. His work has been featured in the
[00:01:38] documentary This Might Hurt and he continues to educate both patients
[00:01:42] and practitioners on the transformative power of neuroplastic
[00:01:46] healing. If you are someone who is still doubting their symptoms,
[00:01:50] whether they're mind body neuroplastic and you need to hear from
[00:01:53] a professional medical doctor that your symptoms are mind body and not
[00:02:00] coming from something wrong to fix in your body, then this is 100% the
[00:02:04] episode for you to listen. I've been really excited about this because
[00:02:08] it's so important. I get it. Like I can talk about this all day long, but
[00:02:12] it's really helpful to hear from a medical professional, right?
[00:02:15] All right. Well, that's this episode. And so I will just let you
[00:02:20] listen and let's get into it.
[00:02:22] Hey there and welcome to Heal with Grace. I'm your host, Grace Secker,
[00:02:26] and I'm a holistic licensed therapist and nervous system coach who
[00:02:29] believes that the chronic and often unseen symptoms you're living
[00:02:33] with are a sign of something deeper going on. A sign that your
[00:02:36] nervous system needs attention. In each episode, I'll share the
[00:02:40] science behind the most common chronic health disorders plus
[00:02:43] holistic health tips using mental, physical and spiritual practices.
[00:02:47] You'll hear what I've learned in my journey and the true
[00:02:50] stories from our trusted guests so you can feel less alone in
[00:02:53] your experience and give yourself grace no matter what you're
[00:02:56] going through. So without further ado, settle in and get cozy.
[00:03:00] It's time to Heal with Grace.
[00:03:03] Hello and welcome back to the Heal with Grace podcast. I have
[00:03:07] Howard Schuberner here. And I'm really excited to have you.
[00:03:11] Thank you so much for joining. This is going to be a
[00:03:12] really special episode.
[00:03:14] Thank you, special. We shall see.
[00:03:17] So why don't you give us just a little bit of an introduction as
[00:03:21] to your background and how did you come into understanding or
[00:03:24] really working in the mind and body field for chronic symptoms?
[00:03:28] Yeah, you know, it's hard to know, you know, Kierkegaard said
[00:03:31] life is only live forward, but you can only understand it
[00:03:35] backwards. I think about that a lot because I think about my
[00:03:40] history going back to my college days when I was interested
[00:03:44] in mind, body medicine back then and starting to work in a
[00:03:49] free people's clinic in college and starting to question like
[00:03:53] what medicine was was about and what it was doing. I mean,
[00:03:57] back then we had a pamphlet called Billions for Band-Aids.
[00:04:01] It was a critique of the medical system. And now of
[00:04:03] course, it's trillions for Band-Aids. But I've learned
[00:04:06] over the years that modern medicine is good for some
[00:04:10] things.
[00:04:11] Actually, yes. And we have made actually we in the sense of
[00:04:18] medicine has made strides in in helping people with heart
[00:04:22] disease and cancers and diabetes and HIV AIDS and
[00:04:26] infections. There's a lot of treatments over the past 50
[00:04:30] years that have revolutionized treatment. And a lot of those
[00:04:36] diseases that kill people are getting better in a lot of
[00:04:40] ways, actually. On the other hand, the diseases that don't
[00:04:44] kill people are getting worse. And it's really striking when
[00:04:49] you look at it that way. So the diseases that don't kill
[00:04:52] people are chronic pain. And so there's 1.5 billion people
[00:04:56] worldwide with chronic pain. You know, we're talking about,
[00:05:00] you know, just in the US 50 to 75 million, you know, we're
[00:05:04] talking about in the US 25 million with migraine, 30
[00:05:08] million with irritable bowel syndrome, other headache
[00:05:11] pains, you know, a pelvic pain syndrome. Modern medicine is
[00:05:15] not doing very well for those. They're increasing treatments
[00:05:21] are becoming more invasive and less effective. And the same
[00:05:26] is true for anxiety and depression, which are
[00:05:29] increasing in society over the last couple of decades.
[00:05:33] Treatments are not getting better. Chronic fatigue,
[00:05:36] all the syndromes associated with chronic fatigue and
[00:05:39] dizziness and tinnitus, increasing in society. And
[00:05:43] modern medicine has no real answers for that. So it's a
[00:05:47] huge divide. And I got into it 20 22 years ago, by reading a
[00:05:53] book about that Dr. Sarno wrote the mind body
[00:05:56] prescription. And someone just said, Hey, Howard, you
[00:05:59] should read that book, you know, I was a mindfulness
[00:06:01] meditation teacher at the time. And I read the book and I
[00:06:04] said that is interesting. You know, I used to think about
[00:06:07] these things a lot back when I was in college. But my
[00:06:11] medical career had taken a lot of detours and done a lot of
[00:06:14] different things. But I done a lot of research, and I'd done a
[00:06:18] lot of teaching, and I'd done a lot of practice. And I
[00:06:21] prepared myself in a lot of ways for this work unbeknownst
[00:06:25] to me. And I called up Dr. Sarno, I worked with
[00:06:28] him for a while, came back to my hospital. And I said, I
[00:06:31] want to open a little clinic and see people with these chronic
[00:06:36] nonspecific functional type disorders and see if Dr. Sarno's
[00:06:40] methods actually work for me. And they said, fine, go ahead.
[00:06:44] And I did. And they did. And it's been a journey. You know,
[00:06:49] and since then it's been doing research, writing, teaching,
[00:06:54] organizing, you know, it's been it's been quite a journey.
[00:07:00] Incredible. Looking back at it.
[00:07:02] Yeah, it sounds like it. It's not right. You've taken lots of
[00:07:05] turns, but it sounds like there was always something about the
[00:07:08] way that you looked at people and medicine and disease or like
[00:07:13] chronic and non chronic disease that always made you
[00:07:15] question.
[00:07:17] Yeah. Yeah, I think to some degree. And I think, I think
[00:07:20] what's really changed. I mean, I was brought up in the
[00:07:25] biopsychosocial model as a young doctor. And we were on the
[00:07:29] forefront. I was I worked with great people who taught really
[00:07:34] importance of patient doctor communication, and caring for
[00:07:39] the patient and all that. I learned that from when I was
[00:07:42] starting in medicine. But I got to say, Grace, that this
[00:07:46] work requires doing that at a higher level. It's really
[00:07:51] been interesting to me to see to really because when you do
[00:07:55] this work, you're not doing 15 minutes, you're not doing half
[00:07:59] an hour visits. You know, I was doing an hour and a half visits
[00:08:02] two hour visits. I was learning about people's whole lives. And
[00:08:07] when you look at people's whole lives, I mean, you see
[00:08:11] amazing things that I was like, What? How can this
[00:08:15] possibly be so amazing that the journeys that the people that
[00:08:21] I was seeing had, when you look at the childhood issues that
[00:08:26] they had, the ways they learned to treat themselves or not
[00:08:29] treat themselves, the trauma they had from the medical
[00:08:33] profession, the trauma they had from all the symptoms that
[00:08:38] they had, which kept piling up more and more. And, you
[00:08:42] know, I needed to up my game as a doctor to really
[00:08:48] understand that and listen to that and hear that. And really,
[00:08:52] and I don't know, there's no better other way to say it
[00:08:56] other than to say, I had to be way more compassionate and
[00:08:59] caring and understanding of people than I had been in the
[00:09:02] past. And that was a big shift.
[00:09:07] I know firsthand, and I know many people listening to
[00:09:10] this. No, that's not normally the case when people go and
[00:09:15] see doctors for their symptoms. And like you mentioned,
[00:09:19] there's trauma that comes from just having chronic pain and
[00:09:22] illness and trying to figure it out and going years without
[00:09:25] understanding it. And so for you to say that, that, yeah,
[00:09:29] there does need to be an immense amount of compassion and
[00:09:33] care and education around what's actually happening,
[00:09:35] right? Coming from a doctor that says a lot. It's really
[00:09:38] important.
[00:09:38] And, you know, having the skills of a doctor was
[00:09:41] really helpful, actually, because I could cut through some
[00:09:47] of the crap and some of the inaccuracies that people were
[00:09:51] getting from traditional doctors about their back MRIs
[00:09:55] about their genetics of what they supposedly had about
[00:10:00] inflammation they supposedly had, I could cut through again
[00:10:04] some of the inaccuracies that they were getting from some
[00:10:07] alternative medicine practitioners that were inaccurate
[00:10:11] medically speaking. And so that that was really helpful to be
[00:10:16] able to to have those skills. Because I can't tell you how
[00:10:21] many times I saw a lady. It's kind of a funny story. We're
[00:10:23] talking about EAT a little bit ago. But I saw a woman who
[00:10:28] was like, you know what, you know, you're the back MRI you
[00:10:31] have is really normal. It's it's the doctors telling you
[00:10:36] that there's these abnormal findings. But those are normal
[00:10:40] abnormal findings. They're not actually the cause of your pain.
[00:10:43] And we've proved that based on how your pain shifts moves,
[00:10:47] turns on and off all these things, right? So she said, I know,
[00:10:50] but I can't get that image out of my mind that doctor telling
[00:10:53] me how, you know, how messed up my spine is. And he's showing
[00:10:57] me here it is right here. See this see all these things. I
[00:11:00] can't get that out of my mind. I can't feel safe in my
[00:11:03] body. I can't. I can't separate from my pain. I can't do that
[00:11:07] kind of work because I've got that thing. And I said to her, I
[00:11:11] said, you know, what if we were back if you were back in that
[00:11:15] doctor's office right now, and he was telling you all this
[00:11:18] stuff. But you knew it was lies. You knew it was inaccurate.
[00:11:22] What would you say to him? This is like amazing, right? And
[00:11:26] she's like, Oh, yeah, what would I say to him? Like, what
[00:11:30] are you telling me? She starts yelling at him, right? In her
[00:11:34] mind, you know, she's yelling and don't say this to me. This is
[00:11:36] ridiculous. Get out. You should lose your license. You know,
[00:11:41] you know, like she's just pushes him away and walks out of
[00:11:43] there. And I go, How does that feel? She goes, that feels
[00:11:46] great. And I go, Well, what do you think about the MRI now?
[00:11:49] She goes, Yeah, it doesn't bother me anymore. This is
[00:11:54] amazing. But yeah, it's like medical trauma. I can't tell
[00:11:58] you how many times I've had to apologize for my brethren, you
[00:12:03] know, in the medical profession for not knowing and how many
[00:12:08] times have you had a client or a patient say to you, how come
[00:12:12] no one ever told me about this before?
[00:12:14] All the time. All the time.
[00:12:16] Right? I mean, how come no one told me?
[00:12:20] Can we back up for a minute? Yeah, can you back up for a
[00:12:25] minute to talk about what do you mean by abnormal norm
[00:12:28] abnormalities? Wait, normal abnormalities. And to help our
[00:12:32] listeners understand exactly what you mean when someone does
[00:12:34] come in with certain findings, whether it's in their spine,
[00:12:36] whether it's inflammation, whatever it is.
[00:12:39] Yeah. Yeah, no, I mean, I mean, you know, if you go if
[00:12:42] you have chronic pain in your head, your scalp and your
[00:12:44] neck and you go to a doctor and they say, Well, your
[00:12:46] hair's turning gray. They say you've got wrinkles. They
[00:12:49] say your skin's a little saggy. You go, Yeah, but I'm
[00:12:53] only 25 or I'm only 40 or whatever. How can, you know,
[00:12:57] and other people have these findings. I know that other
[00:13:00] people have gray hair and don't have headaches. I know other
[00:13:02] people have wrinkles and don't have face pain. I know other
[00:13:04] people have saggy skin and don't have neck pain or back
[00:13:07] pain, right? But that's exactly what doctors are
[00:13:11] telling people. They're, they're telling people, well, your
[00:13:14] MRI shows degenerative disc disease. But what they
[00:13:17] don't tell you is that healthy people with no
[00:13:20] pain also have degenerative disc disease. You have bulging
[00:13:23] disc, they're not telling you that healthy people with no
[00:13:27] pain also bulging disc, right? And so, and it's the same
[00:13:31] thing with gut biome or inflammation in the
[00:13:37] fascia. It's like, you know, these are things that are,
[00:13:42] I don't know, you know, the problem is, is that there's
[00:13:46] a stigma against a mind body condition. There's a stigma
[00:13:51] against people telling people that it's all in your head.
[00:13:55] Well, of course there is because if you tell people it's
[00:13:57] all in your head, you're diminishing them, you're
[00:14:00] belittling them, you're demeaning them, you know,
[00:14:03] you're gaslighting them, right? It's horrible. So we would
[00:14:06] never do that. And we have to be honest about what is
[00:14:11] happening, that the symptoms are real. That's what I was
[00:14:13] talking about, validating people, loving people. You know, if
[00:14:17] you, my, the people I see, don't think I love them, why would
[00:14:21] they even listen to me? If they don't think I care, why would
[00:14:23] they listen to me? So that's got to come first. And we have
[00:14:28] to be accurate in saying that real symptoms can occur
[00:14:32] because of the brain. And we can talk about how the brain
[00:14:34] works a little bit, maybe, because I think it's really
[00:14:37] important for people to understand that. So the normal
[00:14:41] abnormalities basically mean that two things. One, correlation
[00:14:45] is not causation. This is a cornerstone of medical
[00:14:49] practice, just because something occurs. Someone, they say,
[00:14:53] well, your, your inflammatory markers are high. And you
[00:14:56] have pain. But that doesn't mean that you have pain
[00:14:58] because of the inflammatory markers. You may have high
[00:15:02] inflammatory markers because of virus, because of
[00:15:05] stress, because of trauma. And when the pain goes away,
[00:15:11] the inflammatory markers don't change. So then we know
[00:15:13] that it's not actually the inflammatory markers causing
[00:15:16] the pain. So its correlation does not equal causation. And
[00:15:20] when a doctor tells you that something is, is responsible
[00:15:24] for your pain or anxiety or depression or fatigue, or
[00:15:28] dizziness or whatever, if those findings are also seen
[00:15:32] in normal people without symptoms, then that should
[00:15:36] make one pause. So that's what I mean by, by these
[00:15:40] normal abnormalities. Dr. Sarno talking about that back
[00:15:43] in the 1970s and 80s. It's not a new concept.
[00:15:47] It's not. But actually, as you were talking about that,
[00:15:50] I'm wondering, since you've been in this field for so long
[00:15:54] since, you know, talking with Dr. Sarno around it, that
[00:15:57] book is by the way, the first book I read to the
[00:15:58] mind body prescription about 10 years ago. And I grasped
[00:16:03] it, but it still was, you know, struggling a little
[00:16:07] bit to understand it. I was also 23 or something like
[00:16:10] that. And grad school actually for therapy. And no one
[00:16:14] talks about this in my program or anywhere, right? So I
[00:16:17] had no idea it was going on. And so there's, there's more
[00:16:22] therapies like pain reprocessing therapy, EAT coming
[00:16:26] out more recently. What was going on between 20 years
[00:16:30] ago and I don't know, 10, 15, maybe years ago, or
[00:16:34] sorry, five to 10 years ago, I guess, but what was
[00:16:36] going on in that gap?
[00:16:38] I think that from what the way I understand it, I mean, many
[00:16:42] people are working in different ways at the same time, and
[00:16:46] coming to the same conclusions. And this has been this has
[00:16:48] happened for decades, you know, centuries. Yeah, science. I
[00:16:51] mean, Darwin came up with the theory of evolution, but
[00:16:55] another person across the world came up with the same
[00:16:58] theory at the same time. So these things happen all the
[00:17:01] time. But I think Dr. Sarno really kind of dominated
[00:17:04] the field for quite a while. And most of the people
[00:17:06] doing the work had learned from him. We're using his
[00:17:08] model, which was very specific model that he laid out in
[00:17:12] his books, which was great, and it helped a ton of
[00:17:15] people. And over the last 10, 20 years, you know, a bunch
[00:17:21] of second wave, third wave people, whatever, started
[00:17:27] trying to, you know, improve started trying to look at
[00:17:30] some of the mechanisms. Why does this work? What is
[00:17:33] how does this work? What should we do it this way or
[00:17:35] that way? And we started to do research. And so Dr. Sarno
[00:17:39] didn't have the opportunity to do a lot of research. So when
[00:17:44] you start to do research, you have to kind of manualize
[00:17:47] your programs. You know, because when you write up a
[00:17:51] scientific article, you say, Well, what did you do? Well,
[00:17:54] we did x, y and z. And so through that kind of those
[00:17:59] processes, we developed these, and I think of it as
[00:18:04] three things, basically, one is the pain reprocessing
[00:18:07] therapy group that I call the symptom reappraisal
[00:18:11] therapies. And I put all these under what we're now
[00:18:14] calling neuroplastic recovery therapies. So the
[00:18:17] umbrella term we're using is neuroplastic recovery
[00:18:20] therapies, because neuroplastic seems to be one of
[00:18:23] the best descriptors of what these these symptoms
[00:18:26] are or these conditions are, because they come from
[00:18:29] the brain and the brain is neuroplastic, the brain
[00:18:31] can create them, the brain can turn them on, brain
[00:18:34] can turn them off. They're real, they're not imaginary,
[00:18:37] they're not fake, they're not people's fault. And they're
[00:18:40] not caused by tissue damage in the body. So you put
[00:18:43] all that together, you get a neuroplastic
[00:18:45] symptom. So neuroplastic recovery therapies, I
[00:18:47] think are pain reprocessing therapies, symptom
[00:18:50] reappraisal, lowering fear around the symptom and
[00:18:55] rewiring the neural circuits from that point of
[00:18:57] view. And I think about emotional processing type
[00:19:00] therapies. EAET is the one Mark Lemley and I
[00:19:03] developed, emotional awareness and expression
[00:19:05] therapy, but there are others is not the only one.
[00:19:08] EMDR, expressive writing and journaling are other
[00:19:12] ways of getting at emotional processing. There's
[00:19:14] a lot of other therapies in that experiencing
[00:19:17] internal family systems, et cetera, lightning
[00:19:19] process. So there's a lot of other ways of getting
[00:19:23] at that. And then there's that other category
[00:19:26] that I like to think about which has to do
[00:19:28] with how people treat themselves. Who are you?
[00:19:32] What do you need to change in your life? If
[00:19:34] anything, you have to change who you are, where
[00:19:38] you work, who you live with, how you treat people,
[00:19:41] how you treat yourself, how you care for yourself,
[00:19:44] et cetera. That area can be really critical. So
[00:19:48] those are the three kind of categories of
[00:19:52] therapy that I think about that we've, I think
[00:19:55] we've been relatively successful in formalizing
[00:20:00] those, naming those, manualizing those and
[00:20:04] helping people use those. I don't know. What do
[00:20:07] you think? I agree. I like the distinction of
[00:20:10] those three ways and types of therapies because
[00:20:13] you're right. We very much so need all of them.
[00:20:16] I think that at least how I work with clients
[00:20:20] is they try to see where they are and meet
[00:20:21] them where they are, right? How much
[00:20:22] information do they have? Where are they
[00:20:24] in their journey and also just, you know,
[00:20:27] what's present in their life? But I do find
[00:20:30] that the work starting with understanding
[00:20:34] and with the brain sometimes can be a little
[00:20:37] bit, maybe more of an in an open door.
[00:20:40] Yeah. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Well, the first, I
[00:20:43] mean, before doing the therapies, the first
[00:20:45] two steps are explaining, explaining how
[00:20:48] the brain works, explaining neuroplasticity,
[00:20:50] explaining predictive processing, which we
[00:20:52] talked about. And the assessment, making
[00:20:55] sure that there's not a structural problem
[00:20:57] that needs specific medical treatment or
[00:20:59] there's some combination of neuroplastic
[00:21:02] condition plus structural. But, you know, we've
[00:21:06] I've worked in this field for a long time
[00:21:08] and the vast majority of people with chronic
[00:21:12] painful symptoms do not have tissue damage in
[00:21:15] the mind. The vast majority of people with
[00:21:17] chronic anxiety and depression and chronic
[00:21:19] fatigue symptoms and dizziness and
[00:21:22] and tinnitus and all the other kind of
[00:21:25] chronic ones. If they were, if they had a
[00:21:27] structural problem to cause it, it usually
[00:21:29] is going to be found within a few weeks, a
[00:21:33] few months, a few years. I mean, you know,
[00:21:35] people have had lots of medical attention
[00:21:37] for the most part. It's rare to find a
[00:21:41] significant structural problem that's been
[00:21:43] missed. So these neuroplastic conditions
[00:21:45] are incredibly common. But the assessment
[00:21:49] needs to be there. People can't have
[00:21:51] confidence that they don't have a structural
[00:21:53] problem unless they've had a decent
[00:21:55] assessment, obviously.
[00:21:57] Yeah. How would you explain to someone
[00:21:59] what's going on when they let me back up?
[00:22:03] There's many times where I have people come
[00:22:05] to me and they're like, I've done therapy
[00:22:08] for years, never worked, never changed
[00:22:10] anything. And I didn't even know I, you
[00:22:13] know, I've had chronic pain forever. I've
[00:22:14] had these symptoms forever and I've been
[00:22:15] to therapy. It didn't work. What's the
[00:22:18] difference between doing other types of
[00:22:19] emotional therapies and then coming to
[00:22:22] this work?
[00:22:23] The main reasons that the psychotherapy,
[00:22:26] the standard psychotherapies for chronic
[00:22:29] pain and anxiety question, it's not that
[00:22:32] they never work. I mean, obviously, they
[00:22:34] have been found to be effective. It's
[00:22:37] just that in general, the effectiveness
[00:22:39] is relatively small and tends to
[00:22:41] wane over time. And it's not because
[00:22:44] those therapies are bad. And the
[00:22:47] therapies I'm talking about and by and
[00:22:48] large are cognitive behavioral
[00:22:49] therapies, acceptance and commitment
[00:22:52] therapies, mindfulness based therapies.
[00:22:55] And as I said before, I've been a
[00:22:56] mindfulness teacher for over 25 years
[00:22:59] now. Everyone should learn mindfulness.
[00:23:01] However, the three things that are
[00:23:03] missing from those number one is the
[00:23:05] assessment. If you don't have an
[00:23:07] assessment of what the problem is,
[00:23:11] then the treat the psychotherapy is
[00:23:13] actually more of a coping model.
[00:23:16] It's helping people to cope with the
[00:23:18] illness that they have rather than
[00:23:21] helping them to reverse it. And so if
[00:23:24] you don't have the assessment, you
[00:23:26] can be mindful. If you're mindful
[00:23:28] about your back pain and you presume
[00:23:31] as everybody would that their back
[00:23:32] pain is due to structural damage in
[00:23:34] the body, it may vary over time. You
[00:23:36] may cope with it better, but it's
[00:23:38] unlikely to go away just by being
[00:23:40] mindful of it. If you're mindful of
[00:23:42] your thoughts, that's a different
[00:23:45] thing, because you know your thoughts
[00:23:47] are coming from your brain and you
[00:23:48] know your brain is neuroplastic. You
[00:23:50] know your brain has all sorts of
[00:23:52] thoughts. I mean, when I learned
[00:23:53] mindfulness from John Kabat-Zinn and
[00:23:55] Saki Santorelli back in 1999, the
[00:23:58] most liberating thing was like
[00:23:59] thoughts are just thoughts. That was
[00:24:01] a liberating statement. What if the
[00:24:04] back pain is a thought? If the
[00:24:06] back pain or the headache or the
[00:24:08] irritable bowel or the anxiety or
[00:24:10] the depression or the fatigue is
[00:24:11] actually a thought. In other words,
[00:24:14] something generated by the brain
[00:24:17] that is changeable, that's a whole
[00:24:20] different ballgame. So if there's no
[00:24:22] assessment that those therapies are
[00:24:23] limited, if and therefore the
[00:24:25] treatment is geared toward coping
[00:24:27] with them better as opposed to
[00:24:28] reversing them. And the third thing
[00:24:30] is those therapies often, not always
[00:24:32] but often are less geared toward
[00:24:37] addressing emotional conflicts, less
[00:24:40] geared toward addressing anger,
[00:24:43] guilt, shame, grief and moving into
[00:24:47] those and through those to get to
[00:24:50] compassion basically. So those are
[00:24:53] the reasons that I would come up
[00:24:57] with.
[00:24:58] And when you're talking about this
[00:24:59] assessment, can you describe what it
[00:25:01] would mean when someone goes through
[00:25:03] an assessment and you would find
[00:25:05] out that you would find that they
[00:25:07] are neuroplastic symptoms or they
[00:25:08] have neuroplastic symptoms? Yeah,
[00:25:10] there's three steps to the
[00:25:11] assessment. The first step is ruling
[00:25:14] out a structural problem. That's
[00:25:15] usually been done through going to
[00:25:17] regular doctors, routine visits. If
[00:25:20] the diagnosis they come up with is
[00:25:22] degenerative disc disease, if the
[00:25:23] diagnosis is fibromyalgia, if the
[00:25:25] diagnosis is irritable bowel,
[00:25:26] migraine headache, tension headache,
[00:25:28] Pudendol neuralgia, if the
[00:25:30] diagnosis is vulvodynia, coxodynia,
[00:25:33] those diagnoses are implying that
[00:25:36] they actually haven't found a
[00:25:38] significant structural problem. And
[00:25:40] most of the time that's not
[00:25:41] difficult to do. That's the first
[00:25:43] step, rule out the structural
[00:25:45] problem. Step two, rule in
[00:25:47] neuroplastic symptom or
[00:25:49] condition. How do you do that? Well,
[00:25:51] there's two parts to that. I think
[00:25:53] of it and I've written about this
[00:25:55] a lot. One is the
[00:25:56] circumstantial evidence. So, you
[00:25:59] know, if you if somebody comes in
[00:26:00] your house in their wet, you can
[00:26:01] assume it's raining outside, but
[00:26:03] maybe they ran through a
[00:26:04] sprinkler. So that's
[00:26:06] circumstantial evidence. So
[00:26:07] circumstantial evidence is like,
[00:26:09] well, they had childhood trauma.
[00:26:12] Well, people with childhood
[00:26:13] trauma have higher rates of
[00:26:14] having these conditions. But
[00:26:17] not all people with childhood
[00:26:18] trauma have these conditions. In
[00:26:20] fact, it's a minority. A lot of
[00:26:22] people have childhood trauma,
[00:26:23] but also have childhood
[00:26:25] protective events. Another
[00:26:28] thing that's circumstantial
[00:26:30] evidence is linkage. Well, the
[00:26:31] symptoms started at a time of
[00:26:33] stress. It started at a time of
[00:26:35] major issues going on in my
[00:26:38] life. Well, that could be
[00:26:40] coincidental, but it suggests
[00:26:42] that it might be related. Third
[00:26:44] thing is that you the person
[00:26:46] who's presenting now with, you
[00:26:48] know, say stomach pain had a
[00:26:50] history of migraine when they
[00:26:51] were a kid and then they had
[00:26:52] history of pelvic pain before
[00:26:54] they had history of anxiety,
[00:26:55] had a history of depression. So
[00:26:57] the other conditions make it
[00:27:00] more likely. And then people
[00:27:02] who have pain in lots of
[00:27:03] different areas. So those are
[00:27:05] circumstantial things which
[00:27:07] add up. Oh, and the
[00:27:07] personality traits like people
[00:27:09] who are hard on themselves,
[00:27:10] people who were overly
[00:27:12] perfectionistic, put
[00:27:13] themselves last, have a
[00:27:15] hard time being kind and
[00:27:17] caring to themselves, those
[00:27:18] kinds of things really can
[00:27:20] are really important, but
[00:27:22] they're not confirmatory that
[00:27:24] it is a neuroplastic
[00:27:26] condition. So the final step
[00:27:28] is confirm a neuroplastic
[00:27:29] condition. And again, I've
[00:27:31] written about this a lot
[00:27:32] and what I call the fit
[00:27:33] criteria, things that are
[00:27:35] functional, inconsistent
[00:27:36] and triggering. So if the
[00:27:38] symptoms are functional, that
[00:27:40] means that there's no
[00:27:41] structural thing to account
[00:27:43] for them. If it's pain, it's
[00:27:44] in a wide area. It occurred
[00:27:46] without any injury. It's
[00:27:48] lasting much longer than an
[00:27:50] injury would have healed.
[00:27:52] It's also so it's
[00:27:53] functional inconsistent means
[00:27:55] the pain is varying. It can
[00:27:56] be bad, bad in the morning,
[00:27:58] better at night, place versa
[00:28:00] goes away when you're on
[00:28:01] vacation, shifts in
[00:28:02] different places in the
[00:28:03] body. That's inconsistent
[00:28:07] and then triggered triggered by
[00:28:08] innocuous stimuli triggered by
[00:28:10] the wind triggered by stress
[00:28:11] triggered by cold triggered by
[00:28:13] heat triggered by the
[00:28:14] weather triggered by a
[00:28:16] computer screen. And so when
[00:28:18] you put all those together,
[00:28:19] you almost always get a very
[00:28:22] clear evidence to get to
[00:28:26] what I like to call a
[00:28:27] click moment. Like, you
[00:28:29] know, I was one of my
[00:28:30] favorite stories is a guy
[00:28:32] horrible 25 years of
[00:28:34] horrible pain can't sit down
[00:28:36] and he got foot pain can't
[00:28:37] stand up can't sit down 25
[00:28:40] years going to major medical
[00:28:42] centers, super great medical
[00:28:44] centers, injections,
[00:28:45] medications, surgery, nothing
[00:28:47] is out. And he's basically
[00:28:49] becoming not wheelchair
[00:28:52] bound recliner bound and
[00:28:54] suicidal 25 years. And
[00:28:57] somebody says, Hey, watch a
[00:28:58] podcast, watch a video about
[00:29:00] mind body work. So he watches
[00:29:02] it. He goes, That's
[00:29:03] interesting. I wonder if that
[00:29:04] applies to me. So a week
[00:29:06] later, he's walking into a
[00:29:07] pharmacy. And his pain is
[00:29:10] like a five level. He walks
[00:29:12] into the door and he sees a
[00:29:13] long line to wait in. And
[00:29:16] within 10 seconds, his pain is
[00:29:17] in nine. And he goes, Okay,
[00:29:22] I got it. I see it. That
[00:29:26] was his click moment. And
[00:29:28] it just took that one, that
[00:29:30] one moment. He had an idea,
[00:29:32] understood it, but he now knew
[00:29:34] it applied to him 100%. And
[00:29:37] within a month or six weeks,
[00:29:39] his pain was gone. 25 years
[00:29:42] because he changed his
[00:29:43] understanding of it. He
[00:29:45] changed how he treated
[00:29:46] himself. He changed how much
[00:29:48] he walked. And he started
[00:29:49] walking, but he was in
[00:29:50] pain, but he didn't know
[00:29:52] that he didn't care. But he
[00:29:53] was able to keep going
[00:29:55] because he knew it was
[00:29:57] reversible. And that so that
[00:30:00] assessment, that click
[00:30:02] moment, and I've got 100
[00:30:03] stories about different
[00:30:04] click moments. But I think
[00:30:07] people do better when they
[00:30:10] look for those when they
[00:30:11] find those. And it's worth
[00:30:13] the time. So somebody said,
[00:30:15] I want to know now, well,
[00:30:16] let's just keep waiting. Just
[00:30:18] keep watching, see what
[00:30:19] happens. Let's see, let's
[00:30:21] understand this. So we really
[00:30:23] know when you really know,
[00:30:24] it can make a huge
[00:30:26] difference. I like that
[00:30:29] term click moment. I usually
[00:30:31] say aha moments, therapy
[00:30:33] term, I think too. But yeah,
[00:30:35] when that happens, then you
[00:30:38] can start to understand that
[00:30:40] when not only how I treat
[00:30:41] myself, but also how my body
[00:30:43] feels really is direct, not
[00:30:47] necessarily just a correlation,
[00:30:48] but it's actually happening
[00:30:49] from maybe how I'm treating
[00:30:51] myself, what's around me,
[00:30:52] what's happening, right? It's
[00:30:53] that doesn't make sense for
[00:30:55] it to be a structural issue.
[00:30:56] That doesn't make sense to just
[00:30:57] all of a sudden be in a line
[00:30:58] and be afraid of the fact
[00:30:59] that it's nine people long
[00:31:00] and then all of a sudden
[00:31:01] your body feels pain.
[00:31:03] So yeah, yeah, I got
[00:31:05] an email yesterday from a
[00:31:07] woman, a patient of mine who
[00:31:09] something came up in a
[00:31:10] situation in her life. And
[00:31:13] it was annoying or
[00:31:15] difficult in some way. And
[00:31:17] she started to get these
[00:31:18] symptoms in her body, you
[00:31:20] know, started to get
[00:31:20] tightness, started to get
[00:31:21] heaviness, started to get
[00:31:23] these weird sensations in
[00:31:24] her body. And she stopped
[00:31:26] and she said, you know, I
[00:31:28] wonder what's underneath that?
[00:31:30] And she said, what is
[00:31:32] underneath that? Because
[00:31:35] this just happened. I mean,
[00:31:37] my body didn't change,
[00:31:38] something happened. And
[00:31:40] she said, Oh, well, this
[00:31:41] situation happened. Oh, well,
[00:31:43] how do I feel about this
[00:31:45] situation? Actually, I'm
[00:31:48] annoyed. I have resentment.
[00:31:51] Actually, I'm angry about it.
[00:31:53] And so instead of saying
[00:31:54] is what you had done for
[00:31:57] decades was just push all
[00:31:59] the anger down, push your
[00:32:00] feelings down, put up with
[00:32:03] everything to be good, to be
[00:32:06] nice to everybody, except
[00:32:08] herself. She said, No, I'm
[00:32:09] really angry about this. And
[00:32:12] that's why I'm having these
[00:32:13] sensations. Oh, click
[00:32:15] moments. Get it. And then
[00:32:19] she can do something about
[00:32:21] it. And she chose to have a
[00:32:23] conversation about
[00:32:25] well, stand up to yourself,
[00:32:27] say something, be civil, be
[00:32:30] be kind, but be honest, be
[00:32:32] authentic. Symptoms went away.
[00:32:35] She said, I have a super
[00:32:36] problem. That was amazing.
[00:32:39] Yeah. So how does emotional
[00:32:43] trauma, childhood trauma, or
[00:32:46] even if some people don't
[00:32:47] understand exactly the trauma,
[00:32:50] how do you how does that
[00:32:51] increase pain inflammation?
[00:32:53] Like what's actually
[00:32:54] happening there in the brain
[00:32:55] in the body? Yeah. So the
[00:32:59] brain is an amazing device.
[00:33:03] It has memory and remembers
[00:33:05] everything, but it doesn't
[00:33:07] remember everything in the
[00:33:09] videotape. And it remembers
[00:33:10] emotional content. And it's
[00:33:13] trying to keep us safe to
[00:33:14] protect us. So if you learn
[00:33:18] that people in your life
[00:33:21] don't pay attention to you or
[00:33:22] neglect you or don't hear
[00:33:23] you, you start to start to
[00:33:25] learn not to say anything or
[00:33:27] not to rock the boat or to
[00:33:29] try super hard to win praise.
[00:33:32] If you learn that people
[00:33:33] will betray you, maybe you
[00:33:35] learn not to get close to
[00:33:36] people. So the emotional
[00:33:40] learning that happens in and
[00:33:42] all children have emotional
[00:33:44] hurts. All people have
[00:33:47] emotional hurts. And if they
[00:33:50] have protective people around
[00:33:52] them or caring and loving,
[00:33:54] they can learn you can get
[00:33:55] emotionally hurt and you can
[00:33:56] be okay. So that's resilience
[00:33:58] that is built in people. On
[00:34:00] the other hand, if you if the
[00:34:02] protective factors aren't
[00:34:03] there quite as much, people
[00:34:05] learn that things are going
[00:34:08] to go bad for them. And their
[00:34:10] brain starts to act to send
[00:34:13] them messages. So the brain
[00:34:15] is a predictive processing
[00:34:16] machine, which means it
[00:34:18] creates what we experience. We
[00:34:22] see with our brain, light comes
[00:34:24] in our eyes, but the images
[00:34:25] that are that are created are
[00:34:27] formed in our brain, you can
[00:34:28] see in your sleep, you don't
[00:34:30] need your eyes to sleep, you
[00:34:31] can see in your sleep dreaming.
[00:34:33] What we hear is developed by
[00:34:35] is created by our brain and
[00:34:36] what we feel is created by
[00:34:37] our brain. When you touch a
[00:34:38] hot stove, it's not your
[00:34:40] finger causing pain. It's
[00:34:41] actually your brain, which is
[00:34:43] weird. And the reason we
[00:34:44] know that simply is because
[00:34:45] people can have an injury and
[00:34:47] have no pain at all. If that
[00:34:49] can happen, it shows your
[00:34:50] brain is in control of the
[00:34:51] sensations we feel. And it
[00:34:54] turns out that so you can
[00:34:55] have an injury and have no
[00:34:57] pain, you can have pain in
[00:34:59] the complete absence of an
[00:35:00] injury and everyone knows
[00:35:02] that. When you put those
[00:35:03] two together, and then you
[00:35:05] take the third fact is that
[00:35:06] trauma is that emotional
[00:35:08] upset causes the same parts
[00:35:10] of the brain to activate as
[00:35:12] does a physical injury. This
[00:35:14] is amazing. And this has
[00:35:16] been shown in several
[00:35:17] studies. When people are
[00:35:19] given emotional content,
[00:35:20] their brain creates an
[00:35:23] activity pattern, which is
[00:35:25] similar to behaving a
[00:35:26] physical injury. And so what
[00:35:28] we know now is that when
[00:35:31] pain occurs, it's generated
[00:35:33] by the brain when anxiety,
[00:35:35] fatigue, depression occurs,
[00:35:36] it's generated by the
[00:35:37] brain. And it can be
[00:35:39] generated by the brain in
[00:35:40] the presence of physical
[00:35:41] injury. Certain things can
[00:35:42] cause those conditions, but
[00:35:45] most of the time, as I said,
[00:35:46] it's generated in the absence
[00:35:48] of physical injury is
[00:35:49] generated by stress and
[00:35:51] emotions. So the danger
[00:35:53] and mechanism, the alarm
[00:35:54] mechanism that people have
[00:35:57] in people who have childhood
[00:35:59] trauma, it's more likely
[00:36:03] that they have a sensitized
[00:36:04] danger alarm signal, which
[00:36:06] then is more likely to be
[00:36:08] activated by later life
[00:36:10] stressful situation. Even
[00:36:12] that statement, when you
[00:36:13] say emotional pain lights
[00:36:15] up the same parts of the
[00:36:16] brain as a structural
[00:36:18] pain, right? In the body
[00:36:20] that I remember that to me
[00:36:21] was an aha moment of, oh,
[00:36:24] it clicks. It makes sense.
[00:36:25] Okay. Yeah, I can grasp
[00:36:27] onto that. I can understand
[00:36:28] that. And so childhood
[00:36:29] trauma and everyone has
[00:36:31] some, of course, as I said,
[00:36:33] causes the brain to remember
[00:36:35] those kinds of traumatic
[00:36:37] events. And the brain
[00:36:38] learns and remembers that.
[00:36:40] And then when later life
[00:36:41] situations occur that are
[00:36:42] similar to that. So one
[00:36:45] of my first patients, I
[00:36:46] saw headaches for 17 years,
[00:36:48] horrible pain, many headache
[00:36:50] clinics, nobody could help
[00:36:51] her every day headache pain
[00:36:53] every day 17 years. And her
[00:36:56] pain started at a time
[00:36:58] when she got a new boss and
[00:37:00] her new boss was
[00:37:01] unpredictable, would go
[00:37:02] into fits of rage and
[00:37:03] yelling. And it turned
[00:37:05] out her father was exactly
[00:37:07] the same way. And that
[00:37:08] was mind blowing to me.
[00:37:10] I'm like, wait, your
[00:37:12] father treated you that way.
[00:37:14] And now your boss is
[00:37:14] treating you that way. And
[00:37:15] that's when your headache
[00:37:16] started right then. How
[00:37:18] simple is that? How
[00:37:20] straightforward is that? What
[00:37:22] am I fried? I mean, it's
[00:37:24] not that hard. Nobody had
[00:37:26] ever asked her those
[00:37:28] questions. Nobody had ever
[00:37:29] asked her about that. And
[00:37:32] it was right there to see
[00:37:33] if you just ask. And that
[00:37:35] was the key for
[00:37:36] understanding. Oh, that's
[00:37:37] why these headaches started.
[00:37:39] And that was the key to
[00:37:40] getting her on the path to
[00:37:42] getting better. So this
[00:37:44] idea that the brain creates
[00:37:45] what we experience is
[00:37:47] really powerful. And the
[00:37:48] brain is sending us a
[00:37:50] message. It just doesn't
[00:37:51] speak English. You know, it
[00:37:53] might be in the form of
[00:37:54] neck pain or stomach pain
[00:37:55] or dizziness or anxiety or
[00:37:58] fatigue. That's the
[00:38:00] messenger. But what's the
[00:38:01] message? Is it have to do
[00:38:03] with what's going on in
[00:38:04] your life? You have to
[00:38:05] do with what's happened
[00:38:07] earlier in your life?
[00:38:08] It's coming back to
[00:38:10] haunt you. Is it because of
[00:38:12] how you're treating yourself?
[00:38:14] I mean, there's so many
[00:38:15] things to learn from. But I
[00:38:17] mean, the beauty of this
[00:38:18] work is that you can
[00:38:20] grow from it, right? You
[00:38:22] can learn something
[00:38:24] really important about
[00:38:25] your life and yourself. And
[00:38:28] I was saying about that
[00:38:29] woman who for the first
[00:38:30] time in her life said,
[00:38:30] wait a minute, I'm not
[00:38:32] honoring myself. I can
[00:38:34] choose a different path. And
[00:38:36] that is a growth
[00:38:37] experience, not just to
[00:38:39] get rid of her pain, but
[00:38:42] to grow as a person
[00:38:44] and to prevent future
[00:38:46] episodes of neuroplastic
[00:38:49] symptoms, by the way.
[00:38:51] Yeah, it really is an
[00:38:53] amazing growth opportunity.
[00:38:54] It makes you it when you
[00:38:56] come to this work, your
[00:38:58] body's forcing you to look
[00:38:59] at what's going on in your
[00:39:01] life and your past. Some
[00:39:03] people come to this work
[00:39:04] in different ways or
[00:39:05] self development work in
[00:39:07] different ways. But this
[00:39:08] is really it kind of makes
[00:39:10] us look there and you can
[00:39:11] grow from it. And it's an
[00:39:13] incredible journey can be
[00:39:14] hard and difficult, but it's
[00:39:16] also can be really amazing
[00:39:17] to to see that and be
[00:39:20] with the growth that can
[00:39:21] happen from then come
[00:39:22] from it. Yeah, I mean, we
[00:39:23] rarely lead with, Oh, you
[00:39:26] know what, your pain is
[00:39:27] really a gift. It's like,
[00:39:28] no, I don't want to
[00:39:29] hear that. No, no, it's
[00:39:31] not a gift. But if the
[00:39:35] brain is a danger
[00:39:36] signal, if the brain
[00:39:38] is there to protect you,
[00:39:41] guide you help you in a way
[00:39:43] warn you alert you, it's
[00:39:45] alerting you about
[00:39:46] something. And if you can
[00:39:48] figure out what it's
[00:39:49] alerting you about, that
[00:39:52] can be a key.
[00:39:54] This has been an amazing
[00:39:55] conversation, because I
[00:39:56] think this is going to be
[00:39:57] super, super helpful to
[00:39:58] break down what's
[00:39:59] happening, how it's
[00:40:01] treated, and really give
[00:40:03] people a clear idea of
[00:40:05] what's going on. And if
[00:40:07] if you're listening and
[00:40:08] you've been questioning it,
[00:40:09] I hope this gives you
[00:40:10] maybe a little clarity at
[00:40:11] least to just move forward.
[00:40:12] So I guess I'll ask you
[00:40:14] this. Someone listening
[00:40:15] who is starting to grasp
[00:40:17] onto this or they're
[00:40:18] questioning and maybe
[00:40:19] they're like, maybe this
[00:40:20] is for me. What would
[00:40:21] that? What would their
[00:40:23] next step or their first
[00:40:23] step look like? What would
[00:40:25] you suggest?
[00:40:26] Well, there's so many
[00:40:27] great resources to educate
[00:40:30] yourself by there's so
[00:40:31] many great podcasts, so
[00:40:34] many great interviews out
[00:40:35] there's, you know, videos,
[00:40:38] movies. I mean, once you
[00:40:40] get into the space, you
[00:40:42] know, drink it up. Just
[00:40:43] just learn. And then once
[00:40:46] you've once you've learned
[00:40:48] that you're opening your
[00:40:49] mind to a possibility.
[00:40:52] And that's the first step.
[00:40:53] Just open your mind to a
[00:40:54] possibility. And then the
[00:40:55] next step is to well, now
[00:40:57] let's see, does it apply
[00:40:59] to me? How might this
[00:41:00] apply to me? Start taking
[00:41:03] stock of your life,
[00:41:06] putting, you know, putting
[00:41:08] it down in order, in
[00:41:09] chronological order, what
[00:41:10] happened? How might these
[00:41:12] pieces fit together? Are the
[00:41:14] symptoms coming and going
[00:41:16] turning on and off, looking
[00:41:17] at the fit criteria, looking
[00:41:19] at these, looking at the
[00:41:20] evidence, putting the
[00:41:21] doctor's reports together
[00:41:22] and just kind of taking a
[00:41:23] whole viewpoint and getting
[00:41:25] help if you need it to
[00:41:27] to figure it out. But the
[00:41:29] most important thing is
[00:41:32] to just keep, keep an open
[00:41:34] mind and then look and
[00:41:35] evaluate the evidence. And
[00:41:37] when you do that, 95% of
[00:41:41] the time, it's, it's right
[00:41:42] there. It's right there.
[00:41:48] Where can people learn more
[00:41:49] about what you're doing
[00:41:50] right now? Do you want to
[00:41:51] share a little couple
[00:41:52] announcements?
[00:41:53] Well, I work for Commendi
[00:41:54] Health, John Strax, my
[00:41:55] good buddy. I see patients
[00:41:57] there virtually. I work for
[00:42:00] the AT&S, the Association
[00:42:02] for the Treatment of
[00:42:03] Neuroplastic Symptoms, our
[00:42:04] non-profit. We have a big
[00:42:08] exciting conference coming
[00:42:09] up in Boulder, Colorado,
[00:42:10] somewhere you're near and
[00:42:12] dear to your heart. At the
[00:42:13] end of September, that's
[00:42:15] Symptomatic.me. My website is
[00:42:18] UnlearnYourPain.com. And I'm
[00:42:20] writing a new book for
[00:42:21] Random House that's
[00:42:22] coming out next year, which
[00:42:23] I'm excited about. And
[00:42:25] there's an opportunity for
[00:42:26] people, if they've
[00:42:27] benefited from this work
[00:42:28] and want to put their name
[00:42:29] on a list that's going
[00:42:30] to be in the next book, they
[00:42:32] can go to my website and put
[00:42:34] their name in, or a fictional
[00:42:35] name if they prefer.
[00:42:37] Amazing. Thank you. And I'll
[00:42:39] have all the links
[00:42:40] below. So if you want to
[00:42:41] learn more, you can do so
[00:42:44] through those links. And is
[00:42:47] there anything else that's
[00:42:48] come to mind? I'm sure
[00:42:49] there's a lot because we
[00:42:50] could talk for a very long
[00:42:51] time about this. But I
[00:42:53] always like to ask, is there
[00:42:54] anything that's come up
[00:42:55] for you that we have not
[00:42:56] talked about that you feel
[00:42:57] like is really important for
[00:42:58] our listeners to know?
[00:43:01] I think that it's useful to
[00:43:04] understand that these
[00:43:06] conditions are really human
[00:43:07] conditions. We're human
[00:43:09] beings. Everybody has
[00:43:10] mind body conditions in
[00:43:12] some way, shape, or form. They
[00:43:14] mean I recognize it, but
[00:43:16] everybody does. Because
[00:43:18] we're human beings, we're
[00:43:19] social beings, we're in
[00:43:22] connection to each other. And
[00:43:24] these connections often
[00:43:26] fray or get broken.
[00:43:28] Young people are seeing
[00:43:31] these connections fray and
[00:43:32] get broken at much higher
[00:43:34] levels in the last decade
[00:43:35] or so. And it's important
[00:43:39] to remember that we're
[00:43:40] emotional beings. And our
[00:43:42] emotional needs are
[00:43:43] really important. We have
[00:43:45] emotional needs to connect
[00:43:46] other people. We have
[00:43:47] emotional needs to be
[00:43:49] assertive and be our own
[00:43:50] person. We have emotional
[00:43:52] needs to be honest and
[00:43:53] have integrity with
[00:43:54] ourselves. And those
[00:43:57] things are just part of
[00:43:59] being human. Everybody has
[00:44:01] those. And we can't do
[00:44:05] this alone. You can't be a
[00:44:07] human being alone. Loneliness
[00:44:10] is really bad for people
[00:44:12] that turn down. So I think
[00:44:15] the thing that's really
[00:44:17] important to understand is
[00:44:18] how can how can we find
[00:44:20] connections with ourselves
[00:44:23] and find connections with
[00:44:24] others that are fulfilling
[00:44:26] and caring and not so
[00:44:30] much of the world is
[00:44:31] polarizing and it makes it
[00:44:33] hard. So I think that that
[00:44:36] human connection issue is
[00:44:38] something that it's just
[00:44:41] really important. I'll
[00:44:42] highlight that too,
[00:44:43] especially for, you know, if
[00:44:46] you've been dealing with
[00:44:46] chronic pain, illness,
[00:44:48] symptoms for at any time,
[00:44:51] but especially for a long
[00:44:52] time, most people I know
[00:44:54] I have and my journey with
[00:44:55] it have felt really alone
[00:44:57] and isolated because no
[00:44:58] one understood me. No one
[00:44:59] grasped it. Doctors couldn't
[00:45:01] help me. My family
[00:45:03] didn't understand that
[00:45:03] people around me didn't get
[00:45:04] it right. And so that can
[00:45:05] even just feel even more
[00:45:07] isolating. It's really
[00:45:08] hard to go through. And so
[00:45:09] when coming to this
[00:45:11] work, like you said, this
[00:45:12] is a whole new world. There's
[00:45:14] a there's a lot of
[00:45:15] community here. And it's
[00:45:16] really wonderful. It's why
[00:45:17] I created a group for
[00:45:18] this for people to help
[00:45:19] people so we can connect in
[00:45:20] a group way. And I think that
[00:45:23] yeah, thank you for saying
[00:45:23] that because it's a really
[00:45:24] important part of this
[00:45:25] process.
[00:45:26] Great. Well, thank you for
[00:45:27] doing what you're doing,
[00:45:28] Grace. I appreciate it.
[00:45:30] Yeah, appreciate you and
[00:45:31] all and all of your work
[00:45:32] and all the trainings I've
[00:45:33] done through you. So thank
[00:45:34] you. Cool. Yeah. All right.
[00:45:37] We will talk to you all
[00:45:38] soon. Okay, take care,
[00:45:39] everyone. If this podcast
[00:45:42] means something to you, it
[00:45:43] would mean so much to me
[00:45:44] if you could do these
[00:45:44] couple things. One, go to
[00:45:46] the heal with grace show
[00:45:47] page wherever you listen and
[00:45:49] tap the plus sign or click
[00:45:51] on the follow button so you
[00:45:52] don't miss an episode. It
[00:45:53] helps both of us out.
[00:45:55] While you're there, if you
[00:45:56] could give a five star
[00:45:57] review so that this
[00:45:58] podcast can reach more
[00:46:00] people, it would mean so
[00:46:01] much to me so I can
[00:46:03] continue sharing episodes
[00:46:04] that help you as well as
[00:46:05] others. Thanks for
[00:46:07] listening and I hope this
[00:46:08] brings you hope on your
[00:46:09] journey.