Pushkin Hay Slight Changers, Happy New Year. We in the Slight Change family have been hard at work preparing new episodes for you in twenty twenty six and I can't wait for you to hear the lineup. But first, today is a very special day because my book, The Other Side of Change, Who We Become When Life makes Other Plans, is officially out. I'm sharing a sneak peek of the audiobook with those of you in the Slight Change community.
The book features stories you've never heard on this show and pairs them with cutting edge science to help you navigate change with less anxiety and a greater sense of possibility. You get your copy today wherever you like to buy books. Okay, now on to the beginning of the Other Side of Change preface. There are moments in each of our lives that seemed to change everything. A relationship ends without warning, a close friend gets into a serious accident. Routine medical
tests reveals something concerning. Secrets about a loved one come to light. A job is lost. As our lives veer off course, it can feel like time is dividing into a before and an after. I had one of these experiences recently. My husband and I were on the cusp of becoming parents after years of navigating various obstacles and disappointments. We were brimming with relief and excitement, emotions that I
imagine many parents to be feel. As we received one piece of good news after another, we allowed ourselves to conjure up cozy images of life life with our future child, snuggling in bed and reading Calvin and Hobbes together, or breaking out into a silly dance in our kitchen. We were finally starting a family, until suddenly we weren't. I still remember how I felt when I heard the news.
Anxiety polled in the pit of my stomach. Ordinary sounds like the closing of a door or a stranger's voice were jarring, as if the volume of the outside world had been dialed up. My colleagues at work, unaware of what was going on, were emailing me about assignments that were due. I struggled to comprehend how everything was just moving forward as usual. I knew my situation was not unique, but somehow that awareness couldn't penetrate the visceral, chilling feeling
that I was alone. As the weeks and months passed, what disoriented me the most was the loss of control I felt in everyday life. It's easy to overestimate the degree to which we influence how things turn out. Psychologists call this the illusion of control. When a bad thing happens unexpectedly, it can shatter that illusion. As my detailed plans unraveled one by one, I became agitated by all
the uncertainty that now lay ahead. There's a research study showing that people are more stressed when they think they have a fifty percent chance of receiving an electric shock than when they think they have a one hundred percent chance. This finding resonates deeply with me. I like knowing how the story ends. Whenever I faced a setback or a failure, my instinct has been to jump into action and to try to reduce any uncertainty by outworking the challenge. But
what would it even mean to work harder? In the context of trying to become a parent, I'd often heard that while we can't control what happens to us, we can control our reaction to what happens. It's meant to be an empowering mantra, but as I with my negative emotions, it registered as a platitude. Sure, it'd be great to somehow react in a more constructive manner, but how was
I supposed to go about doing that. It's not like I could flip a switch in my brain that would make me feel more at peace, or more hopeful, or more certain about what to do next. I wanted to figure out how exactly to think and feel differently about my situation. As I sat there, isolated in my sorrow and confusion, I sought to connect with others who'd navigated big life disruptions. What began as a series of informal conversations eventually grew into a podcast called A Slight Change
of Plans, which I started in twenty twenty one. Each episode was an opportunity to have a one on one conversation with someone who'd gone through a life altering change. A young self proclaimed health nut who was diagnosed with aggressive bone cancer, a woman who found out that her late husband had had an affair. A friend of mine who lost her little sister in a car accident. I didn't know what their stories might reveal, but I hoped that my academic expertise might lend me a unique perspective
in my work as a cognitive scientist. I've spent the past two decades exploring the human mind through disciplines like psychology, neuroscience, and philosophy. I've studied how we develop our beliefs, make decisions, and respond to uncertainty, risk and failure, and so in these interviews, I focused on understanding people's interior lives. What was shifting within them as they went through their changes. What were they experiencing on a psychological level that might
not be visible to us from the outside. I was moved by my guest reflections and often thought back to what they'd shared with me. After spending more than one hundred hours interviewing people, I noticed patterns emerging across their stories. People whose situations looked nothing alike on the surface were nevertheless encountering similar challenges. For example, the cancer patient who felt like his body had failed him and the woman who was cheated on by her husband struggled with a
similar feeling of betrayal. And it wasn't merely the challenges that people had in common. They were also using a shared set of strategies to overcome them. Those of us going through changes of all kinds are far more connected than we may have thought. We can learn from one another's stories, even when they don't look like our own. I was heartened by this realization and also energized by it. There was so much to potentially discover about the universality
of the change experience. It was clear that I'd only just scratched the surface. I wanted to combine long form interviewing with our best understanding of how the mind works to build a deeper well of wisdom to draw from during life's time moments, and that's what led me to this book. I've written this for anyone who is currently in the choppy waters of a change, is trying to make sense of a past change, or is anxious about a future change. This book is part narrative and part
practical guide, rooted in the latest scientific research. I started this project by seeking out people with remarkable stories of change whom I'd never interviewed before. I then spoke with each of them repeatedly over a period of several years. Their motivations, reactions, and reflections frequently ran counter to what I would have gleaned from the basic facts of their stories. I am grateful for their willingness to open up in such an unfiltered way. They offer an intimate view into
the experience of upheaval. When we imagine what it will be like to navigate an unexpected change in its aftermath, we tend to assume that will be the same person from the beginning to end. Research shows that we greatly underestimate how much will change in the future, even though we fully acknowledge that we've changed considerably in the past. This bias is known as the end of history illusion, a term coined by the psychologist Dan Gilbert and his
co authors. People, it seems, regard the present as a watershed moment at which they have finally become the person they will be for the rest of their lives, they write, But we are constantly evolving, and a major disruption in our lives can accelerate this process. When a big change happens to us, it can lead to profound change within us. The unique stresses and demands of being thrust into a new reality can uncover unexpected and sometimes astonishing insights about
ourselves in the world around us. These insights, coupled with the experience of the change itself, can transform us in extraordinary ways. This is an empowering realization when we're daunted at the outset of a change, there is some comfort in knowing that the person who will undergo the full experience will be different from the person we are in
this very moment. We will become new people on the other side of change in ways we are capable of shaping, and so the relevant question isn't how will I navigate this change, but rather how will I, with potentially new capabilities, values, and perspectives, navigate this change. The first half of this book tells the stories of people who, as they confront new circumstances, must grapple with all that they've lost in their own way. They each experience an internal transformation that
allows them to imagine freeing possibilities for themselves. The second half of the book shows how that sense of possibility can ripple outward and inl luence how we relate to others and the world. Together, these stories offer a portrait of our varied, complicated reactions to change and how we can learn to open ourselves up to it. I've been inspired to consider the changes in my own life through a new lens, a personal evolution that I share throughout
the book. A negative change can feel like an apocalypse, as if the world we knew has now been destroyed. But apocalypse comes from the Greek word apocalypsis, which actually means revelation. This etymology is instructive. Change can upend us, but it can also reveal things to us. What if we saw the hardest moments in our lives as a chance to reimagine ourselves rather than as something to just endure.
What potential could change unlock within us? In going on this journey with others, I've become far more curious about who I can be on the other side of change. I hope that after reading this book, you'll come to feel the same way. Chapter one, locked in On a warm October afternoon in twenty eighteen, Olivia Lewis wrapped up an assignment and walked from the campus library to her bike.
A month earlier, she'd started her senior year at Virginia Commonwealth University with a clear resolution to stop making such a big deal about her health issues. For nearly a decade, she'd been periodically plagued by a strange constellation of symptoms,
including vision problems, facial numbness, dizziness, and crushing migraines. She was a regular at the doctor's office, but more often than not, her symptoms would resolve while she waited for her appointment to begin, and the doctor would tell her that there was nothing actually wrong with her. Her friends, too, had grown impatient with her her over the years. Sometimes she noticed them sigh or roll their eyes when she
told them of yet another headache. She hated the idea that her anxieties about her health might be taking a toll on her relationships. She told herself she would just have to toughen up. But as she bent down to unlock her bike from the rack, she felt a sharp twinge in her neck. When she stood up, little gray and black specks appeared in her field of vision. A dull headache set in. She shook her head and got on her bike to go grab some lunch. It was
probably nothing. That evening, though, at a friend's house, Olivia again felt strange. She just plopped down on the couch to watch American Horror Story. When as the show's moody theme song filled the room, her face went numb. She began to feel faint and nauseated. She excused herself and slowly made her way to the bathroom. When she looked in the mirror. She saw black splotches where her reflection should have been. She blinked hard, then splashed water on
her face. She looked at the mirror again. The black splotches were still there. She cast her eyes around the room, but the splotches followed her gaze. Maybe she needed to take a few breaths and calm down. She knelt on the floor, leaned her forehead against the bathtub, and closed her eyes. A few minutes later, she cautiously opened her eyes. She could now see her legs clearly. The splotches were gone. Relieved, she picked herself up and fixed her hair in the mirror.
As she walked back to the living room to rejoin her friends, she was grateful that she wouldn't have to make a scene in front of them. Olivia had only recently started to feel like her peers accepted her. Growing up, she had attended a private school where she was surrounded by kids from wealthy families. Olivia's family was middle class. Her parents had taken out loans and cobbled together the money to afford the tuition, and her background made her
stand out. Her classmates made fun of her clothes and the things she liked, they disparaged her modest home in her family's mini van with its dense and missing hubcats. In the fifth grade, Olivia was voted ugliest girl on a list that circulated in her school. But in the past few years it seemed as if things were beginning to go her way. She had built a tight knit
circle of friends in college. Just a week ago, she'd invited them over for a dinner party, where they feasted on a big pot of spaghetti while sharing stories and laughing late into the night. She and her boyfriend from high school, Sean, had maintained a long distance relationship, and she was looking forward to visiting him in a few weeks. She was also on track to graduate with a degree in communications and planned to get a master's degree in copywriting.
After so many years of feeling inadequate, Olivia could finally see an exciting future taking shape before her. Later that evening, as she and her roommate drove back to their apartment, Olivia rolled down the window, took in some fresh air, and let the serenity of the night sky soothe her nerves. She reassured herself that she was fine. Now her focus was on getting to bed. She had an important class in the morning, and she had a habit of sleeping
through her alarms. She took a quick shower and then performed her nightly ritual, setting six consecutive alarms on her phone, starting at eight a m spaced ten minutes apart. It was just after four in the morning when an excruciating sensation coursed through Olivia's body. It ran from her spine into her head, jolting her awake and causing her to lurge upright as her body seized up, she fell out of her bed and her skull crashed directly onto the
hardwood floor. Her head throbbed. She needed help. She tried to reach for her phone, which was dangling off the side of her bed by its power cord, a mere inn above her face, but her arm wouldn't move. She tried to yell for her roommate, her mouth wouldn't move either. Suddenly, a cascade of fluids erupted from her body. A warm, thick substance oozed out of her ears, A puddle of urine formed beneath her. A mixture of vomit and blood bubbled up in her mouth. If she hadn't landed on
her side. She thought she might have choked on it. Though she was not particularly religious, she found herself talking to God, Is this it? Am I just going to die like this? She lay frozen in place for about two hours, fighting to keep herself awake. Then a strange sense of peace descended upon her. She allowed herself to drift into the darkness. The next thing Olivia became aware of was the footsteps of her roommate, who burst into
Olivia's room annoyed by the incessant beeping of alarms. Olivia heard her roommate scream, oh my God, the alarms cante you to go off. Beep, beep beep. Her roommate was now calling nine one one. Olivia registered all of this as if it were coming from far away. She could hear the wails of an ambulance siren. Soon, a medic was leaning over her, asking her questions, Olivia, Olivia, can you hear me? When Olivia woke up, or sort of
woke up, her eyes were still closed. She was lying flat in a bed and hooked up to a ventilator. The metronomic noises of hospital machines filled the air. Two people were talking. They sounded like her parents, and they sounded distressed. Do they even know I'm alive in here? Olivia thought, with sudden panic, are they going to pull the plug? But before she could do anything, she again
drifted out of consciousness. The next time she came to, her eyes opened, a nurse in blue scrubs was dabbing a wet sponge against Olivia's lips while doctors talked to one another by the side of her hospital bed. When she woke up again, a kind looking woman she didn't know was strumming a guitar at her bedside, singing a song by Maroon Five, one of Olivia's favorite bands. When the woman finished the song, she asked Olivia if there
was another one she might like to hear. Olivia heard the question, but the words passed over her like air. And then later, her aunt was sitting next to her, looking at her intently and holding up a board with each letter of the alphabet printed on it. What were the letters for Olivia? Her aunt said, Olivia, if you
can understand what I'm saying, please blink. Olivia blinked. Olivia had suffered a massive brainstem stroke, which damaged the regions of her brain that controlled voluntary muscle movement for the entire body except for the eyes. The stroke had left her with a condition called locked in syndrome, unable to voluntarily move, speak, make facial expressions, chew, or swallow. People with locked in syndrome can mistakenly be thought to lack
consciousness altogether. They do, however, retain their full cognitive abilities and personality traits. They are able to think, reason, and feel the same emotions as before. Their cardiovascular, digestive, urinary, and other autonomic systems also generally continue to function, though breathing support is often required. Some people with locked in syndrome can make noises or vocalizations like crying or laughing.
The condition gained greater recognition after the publication of the memoir The Diving Bell and the Butterfly by Jean Dominique Boubi, a former editor in chief of the French magazine L bob suffered a brainstem stroke in December nineteen ninety five. After being in a coma for twenty ti he awoke in a hospital to find that he was unable to initiate any muscle movement except for the muscles controlling his left eyelid. Which allowed him to blink to help him communicate.
His speech therapist would recite the letters of the alphabet, and Bob would blink when she arrived at the correct letter. Using this method, he could slowly spell out words letter by letter. In other cases, like Olivia's, caregivers will slide a finger along a board that lists the letters of the alphabet, and patients blink when they arrive at the correct letter. Bob completed his memoir this way, spending at least three hours a day on it for two months.
He wrote about what it was like to grieve the loss of basic pleasures, such as hugging his son. The memoir's title offers a metaphor. His body is the diving bell, a rigid, heavy chamber that divers used to go deep into the ocean, and his mind is the butterfly, fluttering about but trapped within. Locked in syndrome is exceptionally rare. It's estimated that fewer than one thousand people in the
United States currently have it. There is no cure, and although some people are able to recover limited voluntary motor function after extensive rehabilitation, the long term prognosis is very poor. The vast majority of patients never regains significant motor control. They continue to live with severe constraints, requiring round the clock care to meet their daily needs and to prevent complications that can result in death. Bobi himself died fifteen
months after his diagnosis from pneumonia. Olivia did not know any of this as she drifted in and out of consciousness, her mind one big jumble from the steady stream of narcotics and others their medications that were being pumped into her body through an IV. She didn't know that she was being kept alive entirely by machines, or that she
had had brain surgery days earlier. Nor did she know that the hospital chaplain had informed her mother that Olivia was per the hospital's judgment past the point of reasonable return. Physicians were recommending that Olivia move into a nursing facility. Her grandmother, a school psychologist, was mentally preparing the family for Olivia's death. All Olivia knew was that she had to focus on blinking so that she could communicate her needs.
By the end of her first week in the hospital, Olivia gained more lucidity as doctors weaned her off some of the medications. She became consumed with figuring out what had happened to her. She painstakingly blinked out question after question. Her my mom explained to her that she had had a stroke, which had left her in a locked in state, but Olivia was still unable to internalize that her body
had been profoundly altered. It was only when her boyfriend Sean brought his family to visit the following week, his parents, aunt, and uncle filing into her cramped hospital room, that the gravity of her condition began to dawn on her. As Sean and his family stood at the foot of her bed, trying to puncture the silence by sharing lighthearted memories from a summer beach trip they had taken with Olivia, she
sensed their unease. Oh God, they must feel so awkward right now, Olivia thought, do something to make them feel more comfortable. Fix this. Olivia had always been intimidated by Shawn's family. They ran indifferent, more elite social circles than hers, frequenting the local country club and living in a wealthy
part of town. Every time Olivia went over to Shawn's house for dinner, his dad made her feel as if she were being interviewed for a job, she had no chance of getting convinced that she didn't have his family's approval because she wasn't accomplished enough, or pretty enough, or sophisticated enough. Olivia had joined them for their summer vacation to the beach, determined to win them over. In the weeks leading up to the trip, she brainstormed ways to
show them that she was worthy of their son. Sure, she was currently working as a hostess at a restaurant, but it was her competitive fall internship at a marketing agency that she really cared about. Oh, and did she mention all the books she was reading. Despite her best attempts, though she had left the trip knowing it hadn't been enough, she would simply have to try harder next time. But as Olivia lay in her hospital bed, she could, of
course do nothing. With a trichyotomy tube now hanging from her neck and no ability to make facial expressions, she could not project poise and grace. She could not thank Shan's family for coming or encourage their halting efforts to connect with her. She could not make jokes about the hospital food or not a long and offer reassurance that she knew they meant well, that their nervous laughter and
tense body language were totally fine, totally understandable. As Sean's family got ready to leave Olivia's room, his uncle walked over to her bedside. He hesitated for a moment, uncertain about how exactly he ought to say goodbye. He placed his hand gently on hers Hang in there, Olivia, he whispered kindly. Suddenly the room filled with loud, piercing screams, like a hyena's, Olivia thought. Then it hit her she was the one making the sounds. She was crying uncontrollably,
but it was coming out as screeches. Alarmed that they might have said something wrong to cause Olivia's outburst, Shawn's family quickly ushered themselves out. This was more than Olivia could bear. Afterward, when she was alone with Sean, Olivia used her blinks to apologize for having made a scene. She wasn't sure why this particular moment had led her to break down. For nearly two weeks now, she'd endured
the harrowing experience of being walked in. Why had it taken interacting with Shawn's family for the magnitude of it all to register. Why was she concerned with how she appeared to her boyfriend's family when she couldn't swallow a bite of food, use the bathroom, speak, or move a single limb on her own. As the weeks passed, though, Olivia could not shake her self consciousness, this deep instinctual feeling that everyone else's opinion of her mattered so much,
even more than her own suffering. She cried from embarrassment when nurse discuss her bowel movements in front of Sean and her friends. She cried when her team of physicians shared every detail about her physical state with medical residents. She cried when one of her closest friends, Emily, brought her new boyfriend along on a visit and Olivia, her mouth now hanging open by default due to the paralysis of her jaw and facial muscles, drooled on herself in
front of them. Olivia cursed so loudly to herself that she wondered if Emily and her boyfriend could hear the words reverberating through her skull. That night, as was now the case, every night, Olivia cried, her wails, rousing patience nearby. It had taken so long for Olivia to feel like other people were accepting her, and now she could no longer be who she wanted to be in front of them.
Friends from high school and college came to visit, as did her professors, the dean of her college, and even her boss from her internship. Though she was grateful for the outpouring of care, Olivia resented their visits. She could not stand being so exposed. It was easier to just not see anyone. At night, staring at the ceiling from her hospital bed, Olivia thought about evenings back in high school when she'd complained about doing the dishes after dinner.
She closed her eyes and conjured up the green apple scent of the dish soap. She imagined herself standing in front of the sink, slowly and methodically washing each plate, bowl, and utensil by hand. Then she made a promise to the universe, if I ever recover, I will never ever complain about doing the dishes again. Olivia's initial physical therapy
sessions involved a relatively basic task, sitting upright. Her therapist would prop her up against a sturdy set of pillows in her hospital bed and challenge her to sit in this position for only a minute or two, but the sessions were excruciating, the pain in her limbs so fierce and unrelenting that she would sometimes vomit. I don't want to be here, she blinked repeatedly to her parents. Why had this happened to her? Of all people. She rarely drank,
never did drugs, ate well, and exercised regularly. Every time a nurse came around with scissors or a needle, Olivia imagined lunging for the instrument and stabbing herself in the neck. She wondered if she might be able to persuade a friend to bring her pills so that she could overdose. The thought of having such agency was intoxicating. Olivia's family
knew that she was in desperate need of inspiration. Her grandfather, a former rehabilitation counselor, discovered the memoir Running Free, written by a woman named Kate Allet, who had become locked in after suffering a stroke at the age of thirty nine. Kate had made a miraculous recovery, regaining her ability to speak and walk in less than six months. She had
even gone on to run in a race. As Olivia's grandfather read the memoir aloud, Olivia clung to the details of Kate's story, she decided that she too would have a miraculous recovery. If she didn't, she told herself she would have no choice but to move someplace far away and live underground, maybe in a cave. She would cut off contact with everyone. In the weeks that followed, Olivia became obsessed with Kate's recovery, memorizing every element of her
rehabilitation plan. She asked her friends and family to email Kate on her behalf, requesting more detailed information about how and when exactly she had met certain milestones. Kate even became a bit of a hero among Olivia's friends. When they came to visit Olivia in the hospital, they'd scroll through Kate's Instagram account and oh Olivia videos and photos to encourage her. One afternoon, at Olivia's request, her grandfather opened YouTube and found a TEDx talk that Kate had given.
He stationed his iPad in front of Olivia so that she could watch it with headphones, and then he returned to his chair to read a book because his YouTube account was set to AutoPlay, though a new video with similar content immediately started after Kate's finished this one was about a woman who'd become locked in at the age of twenty and had only minimally recovered over the years. Olivia watched in horror as images of this woman's daily life played out on screen, but she could not yell
out to her grandfather to stop the video. As it played on, she grew increasingly panicked. Finally, the video ended, but the possibility of encountering another story like this one became her greatest source of anxiety. She asked her grandfather to watch the iPad carefully whenever he pl play things for her in the future, so that she could shield
herself from any stories that did not resemble Kate's. What she needed from her family was constant reassurance, often two or three times a day, that Kate's story would be her story. But by December, two months after her stroke, it was clear that Olivia's recovery was not at all resembling Kate's. Other than regaining the ability to breathe on her own, Olivia felt she'd barely made any progress. She could only tilt her neck a tiny bit upward, raise her left arm by an inch or so, and sometimes
lift her left index finger by a centimeter. When she'd first moved her finger, her family had cheered out loud it was a remarkable achievement and not one to be taken for granted, given the fates of so many other locked in patients. But Olivia felt patronized. She was going to be the next Kate. Why couldn't her family understand this? Being able to walk would be a milestone, wor it's celebrating.
Her grandfather tried to give Olivia more realistic expectations, telling her that she might experience a range of outcomes and that that was okay. They should rejoice in any improvement, however modest. But Olivia rejected this advice. The prospect of being a diminished version of herself was simply intolerable. How would anyone, her boyfriend, her friends, her community accept her? How would she even accept herself? In order to go on, she denied the possibility of anything less than a full
and speedy recovery. Before her stroke, Olivia could not have imagined, even with her health related anxieties, just how suddenly she be thrust into uncharted territory. The same can be true for any of us. In a moment, a change can disrupt all that was familiar, and the changes we face may be nowhere near as severe as what Olivia experienced, they can still send shockwaves through our lives. When a romantic relationship ends, we must conceive of a life without
the other person. When we get laid off, we might be unable to pay our bills. When we receive a diagnosis of depression, we may struggle with the stigma that surrounds it. As we muddle through these transitions, it can be tempting to deny our new situation as a way of protecting ourselves from negative emotions like grief, shame, fear, or helplessness. Although denial commonly occurs in the immediate aftermath of a change, it can also emerge later on in
different ways and at varying degrees of intensity. People are constantly seeking a way to comprehend what is happening to them, writes the psychologist Richard Lazarus. This ongoing process of construing reality is a constantly changing one, depending on many variables within and outside of the person. Lazarus says that when it comes to denial, we are dealing with flux, and we must always be aware of the slippery nature of the event we are trying to understand. Denial can take
different forms. If a person is experiencing first order denial, they will deny the basic facts of their situation, like the diagnosis they've received or the death of a loved one. If, like Olivia, they're experiencing second order denial, they will accept the basic facts of their situation but deny the implications of those facts. They might minimize the seriousness of what is happening, or project an overly optimistic view of the
path ahead. They might also engage in avoidance and steer clear of anything that contradicts their narrative, as Olivia did when she shut out recovery stories that weren't Like Kates, you can think of denial as a kind of psychological immune response, so the moment our minds detect a threat to our internal state, protective measures are deployed. Olivia's denial was a response to a threat to her self identity.
In the months following her stroke, she held on to the belief that she would quickly recapture her old self, not just because she was in pain and wanted it to end, or because she wanted to walk, talk and eat on her own spend time with her friends and hug her boyfriend, and do the activity she loved. Though of course all of this was true. On a deeper level, she experienced denial because her stroke had destroyed the version of her who was just starting to feel like she belonged.
For any of us, our attachment to a specific identity can stand in the way of accepting our new reality. If you anchor your worth to your reputation as a parent, you might initially dismiss reports that your child is having behavioral problems in school. If you pride yourself on excelling it work, you might refuse to accept a poor performance review. If you've long valued your steadiness during stressful times, you might struggle to accept the onset of an anxiety disorder.
A threat to our sense of self is, of course, only one potential cause of denial. Denial can also stem from a fear that you or those you love lack the skills or resources to handle the consequences of a change. For example, a parent who receives a scary medical diagnosis might fool themselves into believing they're not actually sick, so that they can avoid burdening their young children with the news.
Denial can also emerge if your change carries a social stigma and you're afraid of how others might now treat you. As another example, when you're responsible for causing the change, perhaps your excess spending has led you into debt. You might engage in denial because it's easier to ignore your situation than to acknowledge the decisions you've made. In certain contexts, denial can be beneficial. It can offer us a powerful feeling of control, motivation, and hope. There is a grace
in denial. Rite the grief researchers Elizabeth Koopler Ross and David Kessler, it is nature's way of letting in only as much as we can handle. One study explored the recovery trajectories of patients who had been hospitalized for heart problems. Those with high levels of denial had better short term outcomes than those with low levels. High denial patients spent less time in intensive care and had fewer heart related
symptoms during their hospital stays. For Olivia, her belief that her recovery would mirror Kates not only boosted her optimism but provided a jolt of motivation to push her through a grueling physical rehabilitation regimen, but denial has its downsides. The same study on patients with heart problems showed that those with high levels of denial had worse outcomes in the year after their discharge from the hospital compared with low denial patients. They were less consistent in following their
medical recommendations and ended up requiring more rehospitalization. For Olivia, the downside of her specific denial was that it set her up for potential devastation in the likely event that she never recovered as fully as Kate had. As Olivia lay in her hospital bed, she decided that if she really wanted to get back to who she'd been at a rate that was acceptable, she would need a change
of scenery. Her days had fallen into a rhythm, with her friends visiting her between their classes in the afternoon, and Sean occasionally spending the night on a pull out cot. She appreciated their support, but also felt stuck. As she saw it, she was wasting her mental energy feeling anxious about her appearance and trying to make her interactions less awkward.
She really needed to focus on was learning to walk again, and so when her family told her about an opportunity for treatment at one of the top rehab centers in the country, Spalding Rehabilitation Hospital in Boston, more than five hundred miles away from her family's home in Virginia. Olivia didn't hesitate because she wouldn't have the ability to press an emergency call button or yell out if an issue arose.
She would require round the clock care at Spalding. Fortunately, her aunt and uncle already lived in Boston, and her grandfather offered to move there to spend his days with her. Olivia was thrilled the change would spare her friends and especially Sean, the messiness of it all, her expressionless face, her physical pain, her hyena shrieks. She would work hard away from their gaze, and when they came to visit, she would be ready. I will be back to my
old self, she thought. Hey, thanks for listening to that sneak preview of the other side of change. You can finish Olivia's story and read the rest of the Other Side of Change by getting your copy today wherever you buy books. It's available in hardcover, ebook and audiobook. And a little housekeeping before we go, a slight change of plans will now appear in your podcast feed on Tuesdays instead of Mondays and exciting news. We'll be publishing episodes
every week this year. That means we'll be back in your feed with another episode on January twentieth. Until then, thanks for listening.