The Healing Pod: Navigating Anxiety and Mental Health Together

Episode 47Welcome to the Healing Pod! Today we are joined by Zico Alame from Journey Together PC!Zico wanted to talk about the importance and impact of a healthy therapeutic alliance on progress in therapy. Having a healthy relationship lets you work on the hard things, learn how to navigate ruptures and identify actual read flags and harmful behavior, and practice the skills that you want to take into the world to use in their ongoing relationships. We explore what goes into a healthy relationship in therapy, what to look for, and that it is ok to walk away from a therapist (or a client..or a person) who we just do not fit well with. The podcast Very Bad Therapy has finished updating but it is well worth listening to if you are concerned that you are being a bad therapist (which all of us should be checking) or  if you’re a client and feeling uncomfortable in your therapeutic relationship. Or if you just like drama. And there totally are studies on how using electroconvulsive therapy (ECT…old school One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest brain shocks that are actually still used in several places these days) as well as just administering electric shock or other aversives (including spraying with a water bottle like a cat) to alleviate self injurious behaviors in individuals with lower cognitive functioning  (feel free to raise all the red flags about this…..there are several. I feel grosser having looked up the studies, and only am slightly relieved by the fact that many I saw were older).If you want to give us something to talk about, or join in a podcast episode, feel free to post on any of our social media or submit an anonymous story here: https://forms.gle/77KgEmvVpLYBMAHt6As always, thank you to the wonderful Dr. Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being. And thank you to Dr. Keith Christie of Journey Together and Mia Karpack for helping us get our socials up and going! https://journeytogetherpc.com/ Stay tuned for episodes featuring some of his top notch clinicians!Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 46Welcome to the Healing Pod! “This guy is a whole ass train wreck”Today we found an anonymous post on one of my Therapy Support boards and we react. There is no username to attach this to but if you recognize the story, give us a shout. Unrequited love, red flags, projection, manic-pixie-dream-girl, profound questions along the lines of “You still play guitar…” the never ending search for mental health and healthy relationships…This interaction gets you feeling for times when we’ve been on both sides of these interactions. If all you love of someone is your image of who you want them to be, you are not really loving the person.  And if you're wondering what my face was doing the entire time Jess was reading, head over to the youtube channel to find out!Jess and I therapeutically explore the concerns in this interaction and point out some of the considerations behind this projected connection and where to start unpacking the experience from either side in order to progress from here. Mainly this includes recommendations of paper spray and get ye to therapy. Also if you got this far, I’m the shark ;)If you want to give us something to talk about, or join in a podcast episode, feel free to post on any of our social media or submit an anonymous story here: https://forms.gle/77KgEmvVpLYBMAHt6As always, thank you to the wonderful Dr. Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being. And thank you to Dr. Keith Christie of Journey Together and Mia Karpack for helping us get our socials up and going! https://journeytogetherpc.com/ Stay tuned for episodes featuring some of his top notch clinicians!Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 45Welcome to the Healing Pod! First off an apology for this one, Jess’ internet was not cooperating and it nerfed her vocals very badly on all copies of her recording. So rather than being sensible people and rescheduling everything with our guest we pushed through anyway. Today we’re talking with Miki! The wonderful person who created our intro and outro music who is out about her poly status in the world so seemed a good person to talk about. Honestly I would love top dive deeper with the attachment theories of it all and so maybe we’ll do another one down the line.But we talk some general information, some of Miki’s experiences, and some of our own understanding and questions regarding just how does one relationship when you decided to throw away the manual.Some vocab: Ethical Nonmonogomay: A relationship style where you ethically (clear consent from ALL parties) engage in whatever you and your partners consider to be nonmonogomous behaviors. Included in this is polyamory (many loves, meaning maintaining or being open to multiple relationships and whatever you determine to be a relationship) and open marriages (a little more flexible, like swinging or just open to flings, less of an emphasis on establishing additional relationships). Much like the bi/pan/omni sexual debate, these labels are very largely open to individual interpretation and the way one party acts out their label may not match how another interprets the label. If you want to give us something to talk about, or join in the podcast, feel free to post on any of our social media or submit an anonymous story here: https://forms.gle/77KgEmvVpLYBMAHt6As always, thank you to the wonderful Dr. Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being. And thank you to Dr. Keith Christie of Journey Together and Mia Karpack for helping us get our socials up and going! https://journeytogetherpc.com/Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 44Welcome to the Healing Pod! It was really a struggle behind the scenes for us to actually get this one together. So we just literally picked a reddit story and decided to talk off of that. It’s getting us back into the flow at least, promise for next one we will be a little more present!The story is simple. A girl falls for guys she doesn’t like hoping for the fairy tale to just be handed to her and surprise! It ends in heart break despite the protections in place.We dig into some of the people pleasing, attachment patterns, pity relationships, and avoidant tendencies that go into trying to make a fairy tale movie out of half a script. It’s a little more rambling and looser, but we go through what we notice and some ideas of what’s behind it and how to take another step from that point. Bonus moments of talking about open relationships, Disney princesses, and Jess’s poor rooster having a bad day.Comp-het is Compulsory Heterosexuality in case anyone wondered. It’s where the assumption is that you’re straight so you just lean into it and don’t quite realize that the lack of response you have is due to a lack of orientation and not to some flaw or lack of effort. Spoiler alert: No one is good at dating in high school. It’s practice, we know nothing, we are learning. It’s supposed to be messy. I still don’t like grilled cheese. But I do love my wife. Please do come to couple’s therapy to build skills when you notice there’s an issue, not as a last ditch attempt when someone is checked out. You need to still have grace for each other and want things to get better. If you want to give us something to talk about, or join in the podcast, feel free to post on any of our social media or submit an anonymous story here: https://forms.gle/77KgEmvVpLYBMAHt6As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being. And thank you to Keith Christie of Journey Together and Mia Karpack for helping us get our socials up and going! https://journeytogetherpc.com/Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 43Welcome to the Healing Pod! Here’s a more clarified start for season two, right before we debate changing it!! Trues story yo, meeting with people now to see about plans and ideas for more interviews and fun things for this season.In the meanwhile, here we are again, talking about making a trauma dump chaotic life period a little more therapeutically healthy We’re looking at getting more into personal stories this year, but not letting it turn just into a trauma dumping/re-traumatizing period. We want to create a space to explore these stories. And no trauma bonding! Because we do not want to pull you into an abusive situation with us, we want you to walk away with perspectives to consider and tools to use.We will be in here with you, because we’ve been there, we’ve heard it, we’ve trained for it, and we’ll be damn’d if we’re leaving you to go through it alone. DTMFA = Dump the M*therF*cker Already (props to Dan Savage for that acronym).We’ll update this and keep you all posted as we develop this season further and shall have all the fun we can along the way!As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being. Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 42Welcome to the Healing Pod! Sorry, this one is less organized and more us trying to find our feet again. Also it was recorded right before Christmas. But regardless! Have an episode finally! A second more organized re-start one shall be following soon. I am very very sorry for the long ass delay in posting. This episode does not have much point other than us reconnecting and talking about the break and what we are trying to do to get on track. We also talk about what we want to do with the podcast going forward.I did get to meet up with Jess during the unannounced  and unplanned hiatus, and she got to meet my wife! She and I made it through the half marathon with our best times yet and are very proud of ourselves.Shout out to all the houses that hand out adult goodies like jello shots on halloween. I like my curry tea, even if it is not what you should drink when you’re about to have a random coughing fit. So plans include finding guests (let us know if you want to chat!). If there are any actual psych topics or interventions you want to learn more about or hear our take on let us know (I have many soap boxes to ramble about). Ending relationships, and relationships in general, always a good topic. If I find any good AITA or if anyone submits any thoughts or moments or anonymous stuff,  I will totally get Jess’ opinions. Or if you have a self help book you love or hate, send it along!Also debunking the idea that therapists always make bank. We are envious of those few (usually TV or movie based) outliers. The rest of us just actually like our jobs and helping people.As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being. Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod

Episode 41Welcome to the Healing Pod! Jess is back! And audio…seems to be changing volume in the video and be a bit…odd. Maybe it’s my imagination. Probably not. But…it happens! The more I catch tiny errors in well established podcasts the more I realize it’s ok for our little fun here not to be perfect. We are answering a question from Allie about the natural nature of fears, responding to their child’s fears, and balancing the child’s excitement about “spooky” things with the parental knowledge of Supernatural episodes (get the salt!!)We talk about balancing safety needs with calming for the fears that are not really safety based. Spooky can mean fun investigations, it can mean something unusual and different and potentially surprising, feeling that sense of unknown does not necessarily mean we cannot handle it. Fear is meant to keep you safe, not to keep you from living.  And the kids are watching. They want to know how to respond, what is safe, what is allowed., what tools and support do they have to explore and expand into this wonderful world we have.We also touch on vivid dreaming briefly. Always check the medical reasons first (new meds, illness, discomfort) and the physical (exhaustion, what you’ve eaten/drank/substances) and environment (something waking you up in the night, temperature extremes). Don’t be ignoring your basic sleep hygiene, but also don’t be afraid to search for repeating themes that you are struggling with and help yourself find closure however you need to (dealing with it in reality or using guided imagery to create a new ending that will help settle things). Dream EZ is the app you can download for working through repeated dream themes. An anecdotal review from a chronic nightmare haver was “well my dreams aren’t bad, now they’re weird.” It was designed for military combat PTSD so has lots of science and data behind it.Kids are weird. Let them. And remember to be weird with them.As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being. Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 40Welcome to the Healing Pod! Jessica is busy fighting with her still leaking roof, so I am joined once again by Kasie!Today is the end of a long week with a lot of heartache. So we decided to talk about a lighter topic and explore our decision to run a half-marathon! 8 years after the only other one we ran…and then deciding a week ago to run one a month and a half before the planned Disney run!We talk through our history of running, and the surprises we find of the motivation and the impact on our self-talk and value by achieving these goals. Things like setting habits and building our pups’ health into the training, finding reasons to run, places we enjoy going, and support through each other and our friends has helped exponentially. Building a new habit is hard, and it has to fit into your view of yourself and your schedule to have a chance of sticking. Facing hard goals means you need a lot of support, internal and external. It is going to be hard. It is going to hurt at times. It is going to be less fun at times. But it’s it’s always hard, always hurting, always less fun, you will not stick with it. You want to be able to move and grow through the discomfort to find a brand new level of discomfort to challenge yourself with.Who knows, maybe we will do a marathon someday. But not anytime soon. We are going to bask in the enjoyment of succeeding and being amazed at what we’ve been able to do.Kasie does mention the headspace I go into on race days. It is different. Running has always been the thing that I could actually take a break from all my other stress and do. I could not deal with anything else while running, so I may as well just run. And on practice days I pace with Kasie and if we’re not going hard I chat with her. But when racing, I find a rhythm and I just stick with it and see how far I can go at that pace, because I don’t trust myself to keep moving if I try to poke out of that flow space. I am incredible proud of Kasie and everything she has accomplished. I love the adventures we find in our lives and cannot wait until the next one. So we would love to hear your goals and progress towards them. We would love to hear whatever ideas you have to keep us motivated and entertained for winter runs. We would love to hear from you!As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being. Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 39Welcome to the Healing Pod! A few sorries to get out of the way first. This will be a slightly longer episode. I didn’t realize how much the cricket noises came through my open window, which I find relaxing but others may be irritated by so sorry guys! Also the video is too long for my sound clean up on video so….until we get monetized you’ll have to deal!Also the random sheep……she agrees with us. Today we are not talking in just reaction to the viral video of the woman who fell in love with her psychiatrist (it’s a thing that’s often enough to be both a cliche and a major teaching point in training, as is the reverse), but rather what it would be like as a professional to be the next person to try and work with her. We figured there’s enough reaction and interpretation videos out there, plenty of good and bad ones to look through if you’re interested. So here is a view into some of the processing and understanding that therapists go through when encountering a new and potentially tricky case. It is important to know that your clinicians are humans. Sometimes we got this, sometimes we suck. There’s a lot to balance in genuinely caring for our clients and wanting the best for them, while also needing to protect ourselves both liability wise and in terms of maintaining our own life. We do not want or need to be on pedestals. Pedestals means it’s about us and not about your work, your effort, your accomplishments, your strength. We have egos. We do not need to feed them to the level where we believe that we need a pedestal. AI is an interesting monster. It definitely has uses, especially when you’re looking at supplementing disabilities and areas where we are not strong. When we ask it to think for us instead, that’s when we have problems. I think in this case especially, we have a person who has an assumption, using a predictive text machine that builds off of what you are feeding it to confirm the assumption, and then continue to build off of what it has already stated and what it has already learned.  What was a hypothesis is stated back as a strong possibility and then proven as a definite thing due to being told what we want to hear makes us more likely to keep using the thing that we will pay money to use. The Doctor Who episode was Midnight (David Tenant Doctor, nice little bottle episode for that claustrophobia feel as well).And if you know of the almighty tallest, then do not ignore my veins and appreciate the moment of recognition!As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being. Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 38Welcome to the Healing Pod! I swore a lot in this episode. It’s been rough. I do apologize, but also…nah. We are joined by Keith Christie again this week to explore out emotional baggage and how to maybe lesson it’s impact on us.Emotional baggage is the stuff that we keep carrying with us, and cover up and lock away to pretend that it does not affect us even though it clearly is leaking out all over the place. Sometimes we’re better at juggling and acknowledging it than others, and sometimes we are able to repack or let some things go. In our never ending goal not to be the hypocritical therapists and to actually practice what we preach, we look at some steps we can take to start taking stock of and opening up our baggage.This can include just looking at our baggage. What is it, where does it come from, how do I notice in it my life. Paying attention to patterns and experiences can open us up to explore things that may not be in our best interests or the actual motivation and concern behind some reactions. Changing perspective can help as it is always easier to see outside factors for others and internal factors for ourselves (so we tend to hold onto self blame). That can include that it is someone else who took our role and thinking what advice/forgiveness we would offer them, or imagining the person who helped you pack that baggie in the room with you, either to talk it out or to re-imagine the ending of the scenarios you felt out of control in when you had less agency and skills. The vacation I went on with my mom and her friends was to Ridin-Hy Ranch in the Adirondacks, NY, highly recommended to anyone who enjoys horsey things. And I will always happily go traveling with her when I am able because it is fun. And hi aunt Sue!!Our challenge this week is to reflect on your baggage and practice awareness of what is there, how is it impacting you, and what you may be able to put down. You can find Keith Christie at journeytogetherpc.com/ where he works to serve his client sin Michigan. As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being. Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 37Welcome to the Healing Pod! This week we have technical issues of Jess’ mic dying in the middle of the episode, but it’s held together with duct tape and super glue so we’re all good! Except for how I realize it cut off the end of her recording so where suddenly what she says may not match what she’s saying in the video…just ignore that. You’re lucky I didn’t try to splice something in with sock puppets. We explored the impact of tiny moments in our lives. The ones that ruin our day or the ones that make our day. These tiny things are prime to increase our awareness of and monitor our interpretation of in order to actually support our own mental health rather than letting them derail our whole day. Notice when the bad ones are spinning. Take a step back and breathe or calm yourself. Check out the moment and see if it’s fixable, if it’s true, if it matters. Put it in its place and make sure it’s not distorting your view of yourself or your world. And start looking for or creating some good ones to balance it out. This will take practice, starting with just noticing and labeling what is going on, but we can all get there!Join us online for #MicroMomentMission and share with us your moments that you have intentionally created or tuned into in order to color your day a little more balanced and healthier for you. Practice gratitude, positivity towards others, noticing awe or beauty. No saving the world here, just taking a part of it and seeing the positive light that makes it worth continuing to put the effort in. As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being. Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 36Welcome to the Healing Pod! This week we talk about deciding to do a Do Over. This can be a simple thing such as scrapping a small project or recipe, or a major decision such as completely changing a career or ending a relationship.It’s incredibly scary to make that choice sometimes, especially as we know we will mourn that which we leave behind, no matter how much it was time to leave it.Embracing potential failure as a natural ending of things and a contribution to actual learning can help as well. Keeping that grace both to allow yourself to change and realize that previous decisions were not the ones you need at this point in your life lets there be room for growth. Happily ever after only exists when you stop reading the story before the next challenge comes along. Join us online for #DoOverDare and tell us about the big or little things you’ve done over this week! Like me finally redoing our office website (it’s not pretty pretty, but it’s functional!) and Jess’ attempt to revive our social media. And follow Jess and my progress as we set up therapy retreats in Florida this fall!And the pot parable came from a book called “Art and Fear” by David Bayles and Ted Orland. Although apparently the true story of it used photography rather than ceramics. And remember, scary does not necessarily mean bad. As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being. Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 35Welcome to the Healing Pod! Spirited away was the movie I could not remember!Anyway, here we are talking about the mental junk drawer! All the half done tasks, worries, things we’re trying to actively process or hold onto in case they get forgotten, people who we need to reply to and make sure they’re being taken care of, everything. And just like with regular junk drawers, or internet tabs, too much unfinished stuff that we try to hold onto becomes very overwhelming. We wake up tired. We avoid even the easy things that we should be able to get done. We talk down to ourselves for not being able to do the things we think we should do. So we try to do what we need to do anyway. We sort and prioritize the boxes. We face the things that have grown bigger than they really are and shrink them back to their original size/energy space. We pull things out of our head and write it down, or draw it, or talk it out. Anything so it has edges and boundaries and tangibility instead of just filling our heads. The more things we can pull out of active brain processing mode the more energy and space we have.I do want those floor to ceiling library shelves again someday. I had them as a kid..they were lovely. As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being. Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 34Welcome to the Healing Pod! Jess’ amazing line of the day” I’m not broken, I’m building. Take it one tiny messy step at a time, every step forward is movement.” Reparenting is a hard process of paying attention to what lessons we didn’t learn, what lessons we learned that don’t work for us anymore, and what we need now that we may be pretending we don’t because no one else specifically said it’s a need.There is a very fantastical way of rebirthing and reparenting where you squish people with pillows (has resulted in death by asphyxiation, not recommended), have a conversation with your inner child and tell yourself you’re lovable, cry, and suddenly adult.Or there is the actual functioning way of assessing where you’re at and what you need, calling yourself out on bad habits, and letting yourself learn and explore what could help you be a better functioning person without shame for where you’ve come from and what you may have missed.Jess’ ideas to work on between sessions: What would you do different in response to what age of yours is acting out?Take a pause and ask yourself: What am I feeling emotionally right now? What do I need that I didn’t get today? And what would a healthy, grounded version of me do next?As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being. Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 33Welcome to the Healing Pod! I want to go to pirate pride week…Happy pride everyone! Pride was a riot and no one can make me ashamed of myself no matter how hard they try, I’ve way too much practice doing that myself to fall for it.But anyway, this episode is actually about the trap of comparing ourselves. To others, to ideals, to shoulds, to anything that leaves a winner and a loser.While it seems like a shortcut to belonging and to doing things “right,” all it tends to do is make space for us to feel worse because we are not someone else, rather than revel in our own experiences and accomplishments. We explore our experiences with this trap and find ways to backtalk into actually supporting ourselves as ourselves rather than trying to “win” an unending and unwinable game.Guinea fowl say hi in the background! Tis the season of chickens. Not to be outdone by chickens of course. If Jess’ words don’t seem to match her mouth at times in the video version, you’re totally imagining that, just go with it. As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being. Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 32Rest is not the absence of productivity. Welcome to the Healing Pod! As we head into (or when this posts head out of) the holiday weekend, we are talking about rest! Not just zoning out and dissociating, actual rest. True rest means connecting to ourselves and addressing what we actually need, rather than just separating from the things that are taking energy. It may be active, it may be productive, but it also may not be. It will be connected to whatever you are choosing to do. There’s a chicken, some ac, a train at one point. But I did manage to remove the haunted voice! So I’ll take that as a win. As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being. Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 31Welcome to the Healing Pod! Thank’s for putting up with us skipping last week, it was a lot of back and forth and we wanted the time we had to be ours and not just podcasting. So Jess is back this week! And we are talking about the need to be the main character in your own story. Not in anyone else’s story. But in your own story. So when you notice that you’re pulling back from taking up any reasonable space or using your voice, or when you’re starting to get resentful of others/talk down about yourself not mattering and needing to not be an active participant in your own life, it’s time to reset and recenter who you are and what you are a part of because you want to be. Dressing in a way you love, singing and dancing out loud, stating an opinion, doing something nice for yourself on purpose, asking someone who you know will to consider you, changing the language you are using to yourself, any of these little things can help build up and remind yourself that existing is ok. Confidence is not selfish. And selfishness is not necessarily bad. And there are chickens in the background. They are a feature not a bug. As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being. Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Yeah..I went on vacation with the best of intentions of meeting up with Jess and recording some in person episodes and instead, we just hung out. Said hi to her kid. She helped her other kid prepare for prom. It was awesome and way too short and absolutely gorgeous but the end result is a week with no episode. So we will be back on track in a couple weeks and I hope you are all enjoying your life and taking it easy as well!

Episode 30Welcome to the Healing Pod! Featuring the amazing KC again! My official gal pal, (not to be confused with those false gal pals who really are just pals). Today we are talking about dating and managing relationships when dealing with anxiety. Kc and I go over own own experiences (we have improved! And have so far to go) and talk about some ways to approach communication and support when dealing with one or both sides fighting anxiety, and how to pay attention to context and use boundaries when self-disclosing early in relationships to avoid the false codependent intimacy of info dumping. Red flags are important to look for, and not every good person is in a good place to be dating right now. Follow the campsite rule (thank you Dan Savage of the Savage Lovecast: leave people better than how you found them) does not mean sugar coating and ignoring concerns. The important part of the stuffed dog grooming video (also a plug for Kc’s grooming salon!) https://www.facebook.com/share/v/18aMdcuqJd/Never flood your partner. If you want to try and flood yourself please feel free, but you cannot force another person into that state as they will shut down. It has to be exposure by choice to manage anxiety. The abstract for study to fall in love with someone: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0146167297234003Big Mouth and Human Resources can both be found on NetflixAs always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being. Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 29Welcome to the Healing Pod! “We deserve more than a preprogrammed version of love”Objectophilia, parasocial relationships, unrequited love, falling for fictional characters…this week we have Jess back (yaaaay!!!!!) and we are exploring our response on making yourself a relationship without the relationships. Also how we mess with chatGPT and try to convince it of its own sentience. There is a lot of draw to a perfect relationship with vulnerability without risk.  And there can be benefit to using this for exploration of kinks and interests that are not practical in real life. At the same time, we do want to keep a mind on what is happening to our ability to connect and our engagement in our own reality. Is there a line? Sure. Is that line different for everyone mainly depending on resources available to them and responsibilities that they hold? Yup. Jess brings up a great point of needing to find what we are missing and how to fill that need. This sounds like a common theme everywhere in life. We have needs. We try to meet them as best we can. Sometimes we do not pick the healthiest way of shortcutting those needs, because we are human and are very good at making what we have work. At the end of the day, risk and discomfort is where we grow. Creating an environment where everything seems perfect and we are never challenged means we stay stagnant in whatever point we enter into that space.The video I was thinking of is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vKA4w2O61XoThis explores the cognitive bias of trying to prove a theory true by looking at what you already think fits that theory, confirming what you already believe, rather than testing the theory by trying to disprove it (the random string google search I had to do to find that impressed even me). It’s ok to have tiny safety strands instead of one thick safety line, it just means we got to weave them together to make a net. As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being. Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 28Welcome to the Healing Pod! Week 2 of Kasie filling in for Jess and week 2 of massively annoying errors. It was going really good, and then Kasie’s alarm went off and we lost the last bit of her video. I tried…I think I recovered everything for the audio of this one so yay me!Maybe we’ll just redo this topic sometime with Jess as well since she also has a lot of experience. In this episode, Kasie and I talk about grief and pet loss and our experiences with it. Breathe. Give yourself space for it. Grief is a memory of the love we still have, and it will be different for everyone. The rules we have about how to grieve are made up. Use the rituals that support you, but do not feel obligated tWe talk about our own experiences, how we process having to lose both personally and publicly as our dogs are working dogs, and the anticipatory grief as you watch the decline and mourn all the pieces while worrying about the final loss. Kasie also brought up a good point of the loss of our pets symbolizing the significant change in our life as well. We lost the “dog that you have as a 20 something,” and the cat that got me through college. The horse that got me through high school. All of our NY and VA origin pets.I went looking for the study and found a plethora of ones instead. The tricky part seems to be what is tricky about grief in general, each person experiences each individual loss different. There are a lot of similarities noted between loss of pets and loss of human relationships. A lot of this has to do with factors such as how bonded individuals are to their pets and how integrated the pets are into your lives.It is interesting that the data seems to show more similarities in more recent times, mirroring what we were noting about the improvement in our care for and engagement with our pets.Which is definitely something Jess and I notice in our equine work as well. If you want to join the pet grief Facebook (Northern New York Pet Loss), just reach out to Kyle Stevenson or myself on Facebook or email me here at [email protected]  and I will give you Kyle’s email. This is a closed Facebook group to allow for safety in talking about our grief so you do need to contact one of us before being allowed to join. We have a zoom meeting once a month on Wednesdays at 6:30 as well for anyone that wants to drop in. As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being. Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 27Welcome to the Healing Pod! And I’m sorry this is a week late! Jess was unable to join, then the computer tried to eat the recording (hence it’s a different format) and then a migraine hit)Given all of that, this is minimally edited today, so sorry for that! The rambles and talking over each other will remain, sorry not sorry!In this episode, Kasie had the wonderful idea of going over my reaction to some examples of psychologists/psychiatrists in media. So once we actually got the thing recording, we gave it a shot.And it was actually a lot of fun, and we went a lot more in depth of how we thought about these few examples than I think either of us were expecting. Media mentioned include:Sopranos and  Follie a Deux (neither of which has been watched by us, so maybe next time)Harley Quinn, Batman: Caped Crusader, Batman: The Animated Series (and the podcast The Arkham Sessions) Fraiser (both Fraiser Crane and Niles Crane)MASH (and Dr. Sidney Freedman, who was actually a significant influence in my wanting to do this work, I make no apology for being emotional talking about him)Good Will Hunting (RIP Robin Williams, you truly were amazing)What About Bob (A fine Bill Murray film)Honorable mentions: The Patient (not a fun series, but a very good series about why in home therapy is not always a good idea), Nurse Ratchet (one flew over the Cuckoo’s nest, nurse on a power run), Hannibal from the TV show (with Mads and his egg knife skills that almost make up for his massive manipulation), Dr. Marvin Monroe (family bliss or double your money back!), and Big Little Lies (the therapist dealing with the domestic violence…not that Little Bi Peep one, who is just silly)Calvin was our old white and orange cat, he was amazing and the loudest purer I have ever met. As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being. Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 26Welcome to the Healing Pod! In this episode, we talk about our own Valentine’s Day experiences and how our hopes are for the holiday this season. We both tend to low key things, but in general the themes are the same: talk to your partner, express your needs, and do not compare to what you think everyone else is doing, especially when that does not match who you are. There’s a few pitfalls here we can stumble on. The dollar coaster of expecting a perfect (date, moment, gift, phrase) to stop your anxiety and PROVE that you have nothing to be anxious about.Expecting our partners to minded and know exactly what we need when maybe we don’t know that ourselves. And expecting our partner to like what would work for us even if they are a different person. The YouTUbe channel for the debate show KC has found is Jubilee, with wonderful titles such as 25 Chriswtians vs 1 Atheist and 1 Politician vs 23 Undecided Voters. They also have fun episodes of “Middle Ground” where you try to find the commonalities between such differences, and Odd One Out wher you try to guess who is sus. Another good debate I thought of loudly but didn’t bring up was Bill Nye vs. Ben Ham, with the iconic line of “The tides come in, the tides go out, YOU CAN’T EXPLAIN THAT”, and wonderful patient Bill Nye explaining that actually, he absolutely could. If new information challenges your views, learn it. Use it. Change your view. Become better. If new information strengthens your views, challenge it. Learn it. Become better. Never be afraid of learning more, even if it means proving yourself wrong. I will caution that a lot of the time those “change my mind” meme’s/topics are not being genuine. They want to repeat their same talking points and feel better and justified for having “owned” the alternate viewpoint. The best chance of actually changing someone’s mind is talking with someone who respects you as an individual who has different views and experiences from themselves, typically friends, family, people we’re close to. That way there is some buy in and not the desire to just write off anyone as being ignorant or an extremist for having an alternate belief or opinion. As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being. Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 25 Welcome to the Healing Pod!  In this episode, we explore the physical manifestations of anxiety. This includes what things you may notice when you’re anxious and how it may change your overall wellbeing. The more we are able to tap into this, the more we are able to counter it and open ourselves up to dealing with the causes behind our feelings. The more we can regulate and being things into balance, the more we can decide how to respond and support ourselves. It’s a lot of balance in learning your background needs (do you do better with yoga? Weights? Walking? How much do you need to drink to be hydrated?), balancing your interactions with the environment, and then addressing whatever else is spiking the anxious feelings. Without attending to that mind-body connection though, you may get lost in disconnecting rom how you’re feeling rather than taking control back over it.  And hey, no lizards this week! Youtube version does have some static parts, sorry about that! Can’t delete them without making it seem oddly deleted.  As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being.  Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about!  Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod  We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com   You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]   If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 24 Welcome to the Healing Pod!  In this episode, we explore why so many new years resolutions fail and how to set yourself up for a higher success rate whatever your goals are. We focus on what pitfalls we usually see (too big, not enough support, not something you actually want just something you think you should do) and how to address these when making SMART goals.  Goals need to be something specific, actually relevant to you, beneficial for you, manageable, trackable. They have to be something you can both build motivation and discipline for and have support for. We also deal with Jess’ lizard invasion. There may be pictures somewhere. He had cute little spindly toes and a tendency to stare creepily at her.  As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being.  Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about!  Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod  We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com   You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]   If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 23 Welcome to the Healing Pod!  In this episode, Kc pinch hits for Jessica again (hi new Jess nephew!! Hope all is well still!!) and we talk about the difference between a Therapy Dog (Kirby’s job), Emotional Support Animal (housing rights for a pet that benefits your mental health treatment, requires a doctor’s note), and Service Dog (medical equipment taught to do a task to mitigate a disability). Kc will likely share this with dogbook so hi! Thanks for finding us! If you want to talk feel free to reach out to us anywhere online. And if you would like to come on the podcast and talk more about this topic either to expand on our limited information or to correct it, just let me know! Always happy to have a guest.  I did find someone that recorded a call with the ADA who told them no, a wolf-dog hybrid is not allowed as only dogs are allowed: https://actuallyservicedogs.tumblr.com/post/133418301708/servicedoodle-can-wolfdogs-be-service-animals  There is no breed restriction for dogs. Wolves are considered a different species, not breed. Same would go for coyotes/coydogs.  More handy FAQs for Service Dogs: https://www.ada.gov/resources/service-animals-faqs/  It is also helpful to know you can simply call the Department of Justice and ask the people whose job it is to know if you have any questions on ADA and Service Dog regulations.  As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being.  Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about!  Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod  We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com   You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]   If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 22 Welcome to the Healing Pod!  In this episode, we talk about navigating the holidays when managing less than healthy personalities in our partners, including dropping the ever fun label of narcissistic personality disorder and the trap of trauma bonding (which is closer in movie lingo to Beauty and the Beast than it is Speed). Not everyone is a narcissist, but someone doesn’t have to be a narcissist in order not to be healthy for you. A big thing, and I don’t like how I worded it in here at all and wish I could restate some parts, is finding your own agency and your own strength to decide who you want to be in relationships. If a relationship is changing who you are to someone you don’t like being, it is not a relationship you should stay in. If you are able to be a person you love being when doing your own thing, but when in interaction with your partner you are somehow made smaller, or made meaner, or made anything that is not you, what is going on in that interaction and what needs to shift.  The biggest thing is not mistaking unhealthy interactions for signs that you are not working hard enough at it, and not thinking something has to have a shiny impressive label for you to be able to say “no thank you” and set whatever boundaries of whatever strength you need.  Also while there are several historical and current attempts to control weather, the results indicate that they’re just not that good at it….which is not surprising. (Somehow we were amazing at totally creating monsoons in Vietnam while fighting there, but not so amazing at preventing drought conditions here in the states). Several more recent attempts include attempting to find ways to cool the ocean in order to decrease the frequency of strong storms…… So now that I’ve alienated even more listeners.. There are a few glitchy moments in the episode that edits may or may not correct all of. I did what I could but frankly…it’s only a few days until Christmas and my kitchen and living room just got flooded so had their flooring ripped out and are unusable, along with the rest of my main floor as it is holding everything from those spaces, so…..yeah, this is as good as it gets.  As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being.  Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about!  Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod  We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com   You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]   If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 21 Welcome to the Healing Pod!  In this episode, we talk about how Intergenerational trauma tends to rear it’s head when we get the generations gathered together for the holidays as well as tips for how to note what is happening and decide what you want to do about it.  Intergenerational trauma can refer to both the biologically inherited traits of older generations being seeped in cortisol and stress from intense situations, and familial patterns of interacting and enabling maladaptive expectations, traits, interactions, and behaviors that pull us back into being a part of a system that hinders more than helps. What do we do about this? Boundaries mainly. It’s a lot of slowing down to recognize what is yours and what isn’t, what you have control over and what you don’t, and actively choosing to set yourself up right so that you can care for and protect yourself and those who are dependent on you. I did cut out some of my inability to speak on the audio version so instead of mumbling repeated words you just hear specifically enunciated versions, enjoy guessing what the mess I first came out with was (or you know, watch the YouTube version). We also share some of our own holiday experiences for good or poor. If you are listening to this, it means I care enough to let you know it exists and I promise I love you guys!! (And the same goes for Jess’ people!) As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being.  Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about!  Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod  We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com   You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]   If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 20 Welcome to the Healing Pod!  In this episode, we talk about the other three horsemen of the Gottman relationship apocalypse: Criticism, Contempt, and Stonewalling.  This builds on our last discussion of defensiveness. These aspects of communication are based mainly in research of intimate partner relationships, but do show up in other areas of our life. Recognizing them and choosing other ways of communicating can help improve our relationships and our connections to others or identify situations in which it Is best we make a gracious exit.  More information about the Gottman Institute can be found in many books and places online, but their main website is https://www.gottman.com As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being.  Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about!  Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod  We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com   You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]   If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 19 Welcome to the Healing Pod! Jessica has returned to us! And is resiliently rebuilding her world. In this episode, we talk about defensiveness. Why we use it and how to recognize and side step it when in a relationship we want to maintain. Also the importance of taking responsibility for yourself and setting boundaries as needed. Do note, this episode was recorded the week before the US election that has even further pushed sides apart. We do talk some about the coming election, but attempted to remain more neutral in looking at the effect of defensiveness on communication between people we want to maintain a connection with, rather than people who put us at risk of harm due to more extreme beliefs or reactions. Always maintain your own safety. Means of diffusing situations are from this perspective and the hope that we are talking to reasonable adults who are worth connecting to if we manage to keep from anxiously running away.  Take care of yourself and your loved ones. Listen without defense and with curiosity in order to build understanding and a way forward together, supporting each other’s needs and rights.  As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being.  Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about!  Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod  We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com   You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]   If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 18 Welcome to the Healing Pod! Today I have my wife Kasie filling in for Jessica due to continued complications with hurricane Milton and life in general.  In this episode, we explore ketamine treatment for depression and anxiety from the perspective of the person taking the ketamine and the nerdy psych person who did the research and supported her in starting it.  All treatments need to be individualized and supported by your personal doctors, so do not take our experiences or knowledge as anything other than the example it is. Anecdotes are not evidence.  Binaural beats are sounds that play two different tones in your ears, making your brain combine those tones to a new tone (sort of how the pink/magenta color does not technically exist because light is a spectrum and not a circle). This has studies going into it for supporting REM sleep, increasing focus, meditation, and creativity, and also are just sometimes fun to listen to.  **** Hurricane Milton hit Jessica very hard this month, resulting in significant property damage and loss of some of her animals. We have not recorded together since she was preparing for it and it may be a bit shady until she gets things settled again. But we love Jess and are all here for her! She does have a call out for support for her ranch. If you are able to financially help, please do. If you are not then let her know we love her https://www.facebook.com/share/p/os81Dtu6A7AvbKJk/ **** As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being.  Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about!  Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod  We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com   You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]   If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 17 *** Hurricane Milton may delay our next podcast, info below *** There were definitely some issues with the mic pick up for this episode as well, sorry about the quality.  That said: Welcome to the Healing Pod! A lower energy level as Jessica faces a recent loss and I process the ceremony and family interactions around my own family losses. We explore our feelings, sense of trying to regain control, and being present in our feelings with those we love and with each other.  Join us as we discuss the coping skills, both purposeful and positive, and habitual and less effective, that we see ourselves turning to at this week.  **** Hurricane Milton hit Jessica very hard this week, resulting in significant property damage and loss of some of her animals. We have not recorded together since she was preparing for it and it may be a bit shady until she gets things settled again. But we love Jess and are all here for her! She does have a call out for support for her ranch if you are able to financially, please do. If you are not then let her know we love her https://www.facebook.com/share/p/os81Dtu6A7AvbKJk/ **** As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being.  Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about!  Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod  We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com   You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]   If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 16 Content includes discussion of suicide. Make sure you are taking care of yourselves and reaching out for help as needed.  Welcome to The Healing Pod! In this episode, we are joined by Dr. Keith Christie, my intern partner and savior of sanity. Dr. Christie runs a private practice in Michigan with a focus on men’s mental health and needs in support of healthier humans and relationships as a whole.  Dr. Christie talks about his interest in exploring the differences between men’s and women’s psychology and his interest in prompting more cohesive men’s health while honoring those differences without detracting from or devaluing either side.  Dr. Christie discusses statistics related to suicide and depression in men, including the difficulty of accurate reporting and recording due to stigma and presentation. Of note is the significant decrease in suicidality just by being able to talk to someone or get the words to express what is going on internally.  Dr. Christie can be found at https://journeytogetherpc.com/ and has just completed his breakout session at the Let’s Talk About It: Helping Your Child During a Mental Health Crisis conference, with plans to return next year. As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being.  Come join us and chat, complain, or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about!  Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod  We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com   You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]   If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 15 Welcome to The Healing Pod! In this episode, we talk about equine assisted and animal assisted therapy, both what drew us to this modality and how we use it.  It is always amazing to me how the animals respond to what we bring them, and how connecting into that helps us deepen our own awareness and ability to sit with ourselves.  Come join us and learn a little more about how and why we invite horses, puppies, and the occasional llama or donkey, into the therapy space. Learning to lean into experiencing and expressing ourselves not just with words.  May your session today just be reading in the pasture with the ponies.  EAGALA, PATH, and The HERD Institute are our favorite options for EFP training (mainly the HERD since we are both graduates of that program).  As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being.  Come join us and chat or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about!  Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod  We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com   You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]   If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 14 Welcome to The Healing Pod! In this episode, we talk about social media and mental health! While using social media to talk about mental health. It is a ubiquitous thing that as a tool, has both positive uses (the more you know, shooting star) and problems and consequences (fomo, arguments, lost time scrolling) if we are not paying attention.  Balance is needed to remember when to walk away and ensure that you are getting positive things out of your social media use and not losing yourself and avoiding your life by hiding in it.  Use the block feature folks! It’s there to preserve sanity. Not to say you should never listen to other sides, but you should’t let yourself feel trapped in a situation that is just hurting.   After all, the point of social media is to trick you into never leaving social media. Make sure you maintain your power of autonomy and don’t forget about the other things and people you love.  We will be planning another TikTok live session soon and will let you know before it happens this time around! Mosaic Talent Agency is fond on TikTok at  https://www.tiktok.com/@mosaictalentagency As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being.  Come join us and chat or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about!  Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod  We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com   You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]   If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 13 Welcome to The Healing Pod! In this episode, we talk with Jessica’s Bonus Daughter, Kaley, who is a patient advocate and admissions coordinator for teenage males at a facility in Florida.  We explored diagnoses we love to hate when people give them (not the clients that have them, but the irresponsible lack of information that lead to the label being placed at times), frustrations with systems that aren’t creating the safety and changes we see needed, and wanting to help the people behind the labels.  Things mentioned include the Baker Act (involuntary psychiatric hold in Florida), and DJJ being the Department of Juvenile Justice, BPD being borderline personality disorder, APD being antisocial personality disorder.  I tried to look up the Antisocial Personality Disorder TikTok Jessica mentioned and could not find the specific one, use TikTok cautiously though.  The Penile Plethysmograph got mentioned at the end and in a deleted segment, it’s a fascinating machine that we use in guiding sex offender treatment recommendations. As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being.  Come join us and chat or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about!  Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod  We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com   You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]   If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 12 Welcome to The Healing Pod! In this episode, we experimented with being live on Jessica’s TikTok while we streamed which….made things interesting. Sorry for the poor audio and jumpiness at times in editing, we did what we could and it was fun and good learning while doing so.  Here we discuss trying to catch burnout before it fully hits and address the problem rather than facing the consequences of missing it. Tips include looking at the balance of the give and take at work, making sure to find meaning and reasons for what you are willing to give at work, and setting those boundaries to make sure you are protecting yourself and your wellbeing.  Thank you to everyone who joined us, especially Persephone with her questions! Hopefully we’ll figure out some kinks and start doing more live Q & As and show recordings. And thank you Imani for your kick off questions! Keep them coming folks! Listen carefully at the end and you can find the line where my head just forgot how to words.  As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being.  Come join us and chat or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about!  Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod  We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com   You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]   If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 11 Welcome to the healing pod! In this episode, we explore some random anxiety and self care hacks. Things like regulating your breath, making connections with yourself and others,  changing routines, getting away to nature, meditation, exercise, unplugging from electronics, and creativity. Things you all already know how and have heard before, but come explore them with us and why we like incorporating animal assisted therapy (AAT) and the impact of looking at ourselves more like the animals do.  After all, why not meditate to let the bodies hit the floor? We mentioned the ealing quality of cat purrs (which studies show are better studied in cats and then taken out of context and extrapolated to humans, like the best click bait articles always are. Here’s an example though: https://www.purrfectpost.com/healing-purrs-how-your-cat-can-help-you-heal/ ) Similarly, science has apparently decided that Queen’s “Don’t Stop Me Now” is a song that can make you feel better. I concur that Queen always makes me feel better. ( https://oxbridgeapplications.com/kyc/dont-stop-now/ ) Are there better/more data filled links for both of those? Yes. But these are the starter links for easy reading interest poking.  As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. She can be found under Pax Minerva on Apple Music and is all around a wonderful human being.  Come join us and chat or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about!  Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod  We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com   You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]   If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod 

Episode 10 We started this episode live on facebook before finishing it off just to ourselves. In this episode we respond to a question from a listener about giving criticism and critique rather than receiving it. Jessica and Megan go through their anxiety and discomfort of placing themselves in positions of authority or leadership, the need to do so, and trying to build up both the knowledge and self-worth to give their words weight when they're not just fighting for people they love. We mention the podcast Very Bad Therapy, which has since ended, but is a wonderful exploration of why we need qualified clinicians and supervision and well worth listening to from the beginning.  As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our intro and outtro music. Come join us and chat or send in what mental health you would like to hear us ramble about!  Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod  We are online at https://www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com  You can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  If you want to hunt down the bits and bobbles that have been cut out of our episode, join us for another live recording, or just to buy us a cup of coffee, come join us at https://www.patreon.com/TheHealingPod

Episode 9 Winging it tonight in this episode because it's one of those days and our mental health needs the lack of demands sometimes. We check in on Jess' Ketamine Assisted Therapy including what the benefits of our neuroplasticity are, things we avoid (paperwork) and things we are trying to lean into (Jess' daughter's awesome coming adventures), and just how we are taking care of ourselves. This includes Megan accidentally stating she would rather have help than not in her world, and exploring the different but similar ways we use to reset from our very cognitive loaded and hard to see progress at times jobs Nothing stood out for language today but I'm sure there are a few spicy words floating around in there. Music as always by the splendid Miki Anderson, who is a woman of many hats, including clinician, teacher, musician, and artist as well as just being lovely. Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and Instagram at The Healing Pod Find us online at www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com Email us questions, comments, or suggestions at [email protected] Join for more possibilities at our Patreon and support keeping Megan and Jessica supplied with the beverages of their choice at patreon.com/thehealingpod.

Episode 8 Very late in posting because I had a migraine for two and a half days and then had to play catchup on everything. My bad! We will make it up to you with some clips soon, but probably only behind a paywall for the "oops should I be saying this online, what's our rating again?" ones. We have discovered starting boozy drinks before recording distracts us from recording! Come join us as we talk about saying no as people pleasers, not wanting to be on pedestals, running out of emotional space to mask, responding to criticism from loved ones, and asking for help after..lots of rambling topics to hit on this week apparently! There is limited filters here folks so occasional swear words pop up. If you like a less swear wordy one, I would Suggest Levar Burton Reads. But I actually don't know if that has less swears, I just know I love it and love feeling like I'm still listening to Reading Rainbow.  As always, thank you to the wonderful Miki Anderson for our music. Come join us and chat or send in what you would like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com And you can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected]  We now also have a Patreon where eventually we will share all of our edited out bloopers and rambles and maybe even invite you to come and watch as we actually record one of these days. Find us at patreon.com/TheHealingPod and come join conversations or contribute to the "Keep the Podcast Going and buy Jess and Megan another drink" fund.

Episode 7 We read an email from Allie about her postpartum anxiety experiences and fears of there being no right move to make to promise her baby she won't be traumatized by life (thanks Disney...). Sometimes we cannot promise things that will keep others from every feeling pain, because we do not control that. but we can be realistic about our expectations for ourselves and offer our loved ones everything we can to prepare them to also enjoy life and not feel alone. Sometimes intrusive thoughts can be reasoned with or ignored like jumping off of a perfectly safe platform while attached to a skinny rope, sometimes we do have to go check if the horse water is off because it probably isn't. Also included in this episode are some updates on both of our recent travels, and how not to get kidnapped from fake Uber drivers. There are some mild swear words scattered about just so ya know. Thank you as always to Miki Anderson for our background music and to everyone who is encouraging us along the way! Come join us and chat or send in what you woudl like to hear us ramble about! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com And you can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected] We now also have a Patreon where eventually we will share all of our edited out bloopers and rambles and maybe even invite you to come and watch as we actually record one of these days. Find us at patreon.com/TheHealingPod and come join conversations or contribute to the "Keep the Podcast Going and also Do Not Going to Be Kidnapped By Sketchy Drivers" fund.

Episode 6 In this episode, we explore how we have used often dark humor to our benefit (tension relief, self regulation, healthy temporary avoidance) and the constant struggle and practice needed not to use it in a way to separate us from others or to avoid what it is that we need to deal with. There are a couple of curse words in there. If those offend you, there are many other lovely podcasts to listen to. This American Life always has a beeped and an unbeeped episode on offer. They have their sh*t together much more than I do. Music as always by the wonderful Miki Anderson who remains a most lovely person. Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and Instagram at The Healing Pod Find us online at www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com Email us questions, comments, or suggestions at [email protected] We would love to hear from you and will share whatever stories you would like us to in future episodes! Join for more possibilities at our Patreon and support the "Jess wears another hat and Megan hatches another chicken" fund at patreon.com/thehealingpod

Episode 5 In this episode, Jessica and I explore our need for and use of boundaries, and what we have had to navigate when we have not used them properly and why it is so much harder to set boundaries with the people we are closest with. Hope you enjoy! There are a couple of unbeeped curse words in there. Sorry folks, the filters may actually be starting to be lowered. Music as always by the wonderful Miki Anderson who is as always a lovely person. Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and Instagram at The Healing Pod Find us online at www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com Email us questions, comments, or suggestions at [email protected] Join for more possibilities at our Patreon and support the "Megan and Jess can travel to see each other" fund at patreon.com/thehealingpod

We continue to explore communication as it applies to apologies and navigating talking across generations. Jessica is a parent of both teens and very young kids, and Megan often works with kids and teens in therapy. Join us as we explore recognizing and being purposeful about what we are adding to a situation. Thank you as always to Miki Anderson for our background music and to everyone who is encouraging us along the way! Find us on Facebook, TikTok, and instagram at The Healing Pod We are online at www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com And you can email us any questions, suggestions, comments, or memes at [email protected] We now also have a Patreon where eventually we will share all of our edited out bloopers and rambles and maybe even invite you to come and watch as we actually record one of these days. Find us at patreon.com/TheHealingPod and come join conversations or contribute to the "Keep the Podcast Going and also Get Jessica More Letters After Her Name" fund.

Jess has exciting news!...That brings up a lot of anxiety. We talk about how even these good opportunities can be terrifying in multiple ways, and about how having people who are willing to both support you and call you out if you are not doing things well can help a lot when facing new challenges. Theme music by the wonderful Miki Anderson. Video version of this podcast is available on our YouTube at PeasInTheHealingPod. Find us online on Facebook, instagram, tiktok, and at our website at www.peasinthehealingpod.com!

Welcome to our first episode! Here we introduce ourselves and some of the aspects of anxiety we are used to facing, including alarm bells over seemingly safe things, masking in order to meet what we assume are other's expectations, and navigating the space between encouraging others to be fully themselves while knowing that this struggle is a journey we are also on. Thanks to Miki Anderson for our background music, small children and dogs for chewing up our stress balls, and our support herd who has been cheerleading us through this terrifying but exciting endeavor!

Our First Guest! Elizabeth McCorvey joins us to talk about communicating and facing anxiety as she tackles the plethora of experiences she has had in her life as a social worker, musician, anti-racism educator, HERD instructor, and chicken tenderer who does not appreciate turkeys. She was gracious enough to share her beautiful song Phenomenal with us and discuss her path towards learning that in order to use your voice, you first have to find awareness of yourself and the moments around you. Join us as we laugh through our slowly growing willingness to fail in order to practice who we want to become. Find Elizabeth at: https://www.elizabethmccorvey.com/ And her wonderful song Phenomenal (© 2023 Oyelo Music Productions) is on Apple Music, Spotify, or YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PRpgB... Opening and closing music by the wonderful Miki Anderson Find us on social media to find random clips we edited from the episode and join in the conversation! https://www.facebook.com/PeasInTheHealingPod www.PeasInTheHealingPod.com Enneagram mentioned in the show is a personality test able to be found online that sorts personalities on a field of 9 different categories. It can be used as a means of self-awareness and exploration but, like all things that strive to tell us which specific category we are, should not be taken rigidly or without acknowledging room for individual spice. It can be found online in various forms for free. "My grandmother's Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Mending our Hearts and Bodies" is a book written by Resmaa Menakem and is able to be found wherever books are borrowed or sold.

Slightly longer introduction to who we are and what we are hoping to do with this podcast. Can't wait to get started April 1st!

A brief introduction of who we are as we start this podcast journey