Welcome to iHeartRadio Communities, a public affairs special focusing on the biggest issues in facting you.
This week, here's Many Munio's and welcome to another edition of Iheartradios Communities. As you heard, I am Manny Muno's. Stress. It's something all of us deal with in one way or another for this reason or that. But the statistics on the number of Americans who are stressed out and getting burned out are concerning, especially because it seems to be worse among the youngest among us. To bring in an expert to discuss it, Doctor Lee Richardson is a
high performance brain specialist, coach, and consultant. Doctor Richardson, I appreciate.
The time, thanks for having me.
So let me start off with this. All of us know stress when we're feeling it, right, But what is stress?
Well, you know, we do all know it, but we feel it differently. And so for me, if you ask me, how do I identify? It's when somebody's you can see it in their body. It's when their autonomic nervous system
gets out of balance. And maybe it's that they're you know, their shoulders are really tight, or maybe it's they're they're kind of holding their stomach they feel it in their stomach, or you can tell their breathing pattern is they're breathing short, choppy breath because the body keeps score of everything that's going on in the brain. And so stress can look
really really different for different people. When you get into that that autonomic nervous system gets sewn out of balance, you just start riding the roller coaster, and the roller coaster is fight light or freeze, And when you're in that freeze state, you'll get that deer in the headlight look. And when you're in that fight stage, you've got some totally different energy coming at you. So stress can come at you in very different ways.
One of the most common signs or symptoms of not only just for us, because I think obviously all of us deal with stress on a daily basis, and as you mentioned, we deal with it differently, whether it's because of work or you know, family situations, financial issues. But are there outward signs that we can see if we're stressed out?
Absolutely, I can tell you know, I can honestly tell when somebody comes in my clinic the way that they're their body language, whether they're stressed out or not. Maybe they're not making the same amount of eye contact with me that they usually do. Maybe they're they're moving really short, chopping you know, their step, their gates ofuce. It affects the brain and the body. It's one unit. And just you know, when you talk with somebody, do they usually
talk with their hands? Do they usually you know, open up when they're speaking with you. And if they're and if they're standing back and they've got to arms crossed, that's a different behavior that's coming from somewhere.
Is there a difference between stress, being stressed, and being burned out?
Well, I think being burned out is when you've gone beyond stress, right, it's you know, you've gone beyond that and you just you just ride the roller coaster, fight like freeze, up and down, up and down, up and down,
and it's exhausting. It's absolutely exhausting. And when what I see in life Center at the Brain Performance Center, when people are burnt out, they they're not communicating with their family or their friends, they're not showing up at work, and they know that they they're not showing up for themselves. And that's what's really difficult.
Right, How does how does stress affect our mental health because it's not only obviously physical reactions that we guess to being stressed.
No, it absolutely brain. The body or one unit the body keeps score of what's going on in the brain. And when we get stressed out. There's four things that puts a brain into a dysregulated stake. Genetics is one, physical head trauma, emotional trauma, and stress. So depending on what's in your DNA, the four things we've talked about when you get stressed out, you may react differently. If you've had severe head trauma, it will what I have seen in my clinic, and you get stressed out, you
know you'll feel it. You will physically feel it in your head. And if you're more of a you're stressed out and everything's in pretty balance, maybe you get nauseous. I've had people come in and you know, I'll say it's to down. They're like, oh, thank you. So you'll
feel it. And sometimes when people get really stressed out, they isolate, they just want to be by themselves and it may affect somebody else or they will make coming at you talking ninety miles an hour, and you know, want to be in front of you want to have your attention, want to communicate. So I always suggests people do is look for shifts in a behavior. If that person is behaving a little bit different than they normally do,
it could be nothing more than stress. And I shouldn't say nothing more than stress, because stress will call you.
Yeah, yeah, no question about it. We're speaking with doctor Lee Richardson, high performance brain specialist, coach and consultant. Her website is the Brain Performance Center dot com. The latest numbers I've looked at found the twenty five percent of Americans experience not stress burnout before the age of thirty, with Generation Z and Millennials reporting a peak stress at the age of twenty five on average. That seems really really young to be so stressed out.
Absolutely. I mean that's an age where the brain is just finally fully developed, right, And I have my own philosophy around that. If you look at that, you know, the people that are around twenty five, think about where they were when we were in the middle of the cod pandemic. Maybe maybe they were graduating from high school.
Maybe they were supposed to be going away to college and that didn't happen, so that that emotional trauma that I mentioned earlier that lives in the subconscious and when you know, if your whole life so far, you get up to go to school, that's where you see all
your friends. That's where you get your identity because you're playing the band, right, you know, I mean all of that was stripped away, so they don't they're more vulnerable just because of the you know what they they from a life experience they didn't have, and those life experiences they're building box.
All right. I'm a fifty five year old guy. I feel stressed every day. We get used to living with it. Sometimes when I feel stressed out, I like to get home I have a nice glass of bourbon or a good a good bottle of red wine. I don't imagine those are the best ways to deal with stress. What are some good ways to deal with stress?
Well?
I think that, you know, one of the best ways to deal with stress is be aware of it and you are just like I know, I'm stressed out. I'm going to have my boatman, I'm going to have my red wine.
Yeah.
Well, when you know you're stressed out, ask yourself, Okay, you're stressed, what do you need? Do you need some alone time? Do you need to just go outside a lot of times I just need to go outside.
Just to walk outdoors.
Right, yeah, yeah, I fill the sun on my shoulders and I can feel the tension just released from my body. Or do you need to connect with somebody right? You know, are you feeling stressed out and you're feeling lonely? Pick up your phone and call somebody, don't text them.
How important is sleep in either helping us de stress or in making our stress works worse?
Oh? Sleep is your foundation for your brain. Your brain has two pillars that it stands on sleep and nutrition. And all day long, you have to understand those neurons and dendrins. They're wiring and firing and they're creating all this toxic waste. And the only time that those little glial cells come out and clean that mess up is when you're asleep. So if you're not getting enough sleep, you're not giving the body, the brain, the opportunity to
reback and rejuvenate. And you're also not giving the body because I know, I just came home from these rents and I woke up this morning and I was kind of stumbling around, not my own gosh, I'm so clumsy I'm just tired.
My body.
Yeah, it's just tired, so it sleeps. It is a foundation and people say, oh I can get violin four or five hours of sleep, you get buy a lot better around seven or eight.
What about diet? Are there certain foods that we should or should stay away from if we're strust?
Absolutely, and you know, there's it's amazing this new diet has come out. It's no protective diet and it's a lot of research and I'm really proud to say I'm on the scientific Advisory Board for that. They've done so much research. But my basic and I'm proud to say my basic advice on diet hasn't changed, and that is if it comes in a bag, a box, or a can and it's good for a couple of years. It's not just for the brain, right, stay away from processed food.
I mean we've learned so much, you know, blueberry, salmon, avocados, and now thank goodness for the Internet, Google brain healthy foods. It's not hard or look at the vibrant diet. I mean, Google brings so much information to us.
The last thing for you, we've heard so much over the last few years about mindfulness, right, and meditation things like that. I don't want to get too much into the weeds on it, but how important is just and you mentioned this a couple of times, just being aware that we're stressed and doing the small things to kind of, you know, distress a little bit, being mindful of the fact that sometimes we just need a break. How important is that?
It is so important? And sometimes if you just hit the pause button and just say, I'm going to sit down, I'm going to take five long, slow, deep breath and you have to focus on that to do that, to push that the air all the way down to your tummy in that diaphragm. You got to focus on it. But you'll notice it changes your heart rate. And when your heart rate changes, it comes the whole body down.
And if you can do nothing but take a few minutes focus on your breathing, get your breath rate to dance with your heart rate, then you've created heart rate variability. And that's a sign of will being. And a lot of people they'll close their eyes, they'll turn to prayer, they'll put some music on, you know, and they'll just kind of lose themselves in the moment, and that that's almost for me. That is almost like waking up and feeling so great. You know it's five minutes, maybe it's ten.
Yeah, don't discount the music and a glass of bourbon always does the trick for me. Doctor Lee Richardson a high performance brain specialist coaching consultant. Her website is the Brain Performance Center dot com. Truly appreciate it for your time, Thanks for sharing your expertise.
Thank you bye.
April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month? What does that mean? What is its goal? What should you know? Let's get some answers as we're joined by Clara Reynolds. She's President CEO of the Crisis Center of Tampa Bay. Clara, I appreciate the time. Thanks for joining us, Manny.
It's such an honor to be with you and speaking to your amazing audience today. Thank you so much.
Yeah, well, let's start with that. What is Sexual Assault Awareness Month and why is it important for communities nationwide?
Sexual Assault Awareness Month is the opportunity for the community really to be educated in what does sexual assault mean and if somebody has been assaulted, where can they go to get help and support? So it's an entire month dedicated to understanding what sexual assault survivors experience and what they really need in order to be able to get to their place of healing.
Let's talk about some of the I guess common myths or misconceptions about sexual assault. What are the biggest ones that you encounter that people don't understand well.
In America, every sixty eight second, another American is sexually assaulted, and one out of six of every American woman has been a victim of an attempted or completed rape in her lifetime. But I think that the other myths, it's about three percent of American men, or one in thirty three have experienced an attempt or completed rape in their lifetime.
So those are some of the myths out there. I think that there's also myths out there that that rapes happen with between strangers, that it's somebody that the individual doesn't know. And what the research tells us is that more often than not, a sexual assault occurs with somebody, occurs with somebody that they know, whether it was a date, it could even be a spouse, maybe a family member, it could be and we certainly see this it's a power. You know, that's another myth. And let me say that
first of all that that rape is about sex. It is absolutely not about sex. It's about power and control. And so we oftentimes see these sexual assaults happen in situations where somebody is trying to take control and power over another one. And so when we talk about sexual assault and why people either report or don't report, there is usually because of its power and control. There can
be a sense of shame. There can be blame blamed upon the victim that for some reason that they asked for it or they quote unquote wanted it, when that is absolutely not the case. If there is not clear consent for sexual experience to occur, then that is a sexual assault.
You mentioned shame there, and I imagine similarly to other things in our culture. Maybe we've come a long way in addressing those things, but I imagine a lot of women, a lot of men, as you mentioned, might not come forward and report a sexual assault because of shame. Is that part of the educational process of sexual assault awareness months?
Yes, man, Thank you for setting me up with that beautiful part. Absolutely, you know, and I think that's really important that when we bring awareness to something, we tend to see more people start to talk about it. So when somebody discloses that they have been sexually adulted, the most important thing that any of us can do is just to believe them in that moment. It is not our job to determine whether or not a sexual assault happened in the mind of the person that's coming forward
and saying this experience happened to me. The most important thing we can do is believe them, because once somebody believes them and what their story is, it really helps to reduce that shame and all the feelings that associate with shame. So first of all, we believe them. Second, tell them this is not their fault, because that oftentimes
is a reason why somebody didn't come forward. Maybe they believed, you know, something erroneous, that it was because of what they were wearing, it was what they said, it was what they did. It's like any other crime. You don't ask to be a victim of any crime, and sexual assault is the same way. And finally, what's so important and the other nice thing about Sexual Assault Awareness Month is that you can connect those those folks to resources,
and there are in every community across our country. There are resources that people can turn to in that time. The biggest, the easiest one is by calling two one one, But we also have a national sexual Assault hotline and that number is eight hundred and sixty five to six HOPE,
and that's available in every state. In the state of Florida, the Crisis Center of Tampa Bay answers that line, but in every state and across our country, that line is available to connect family members, friends, people who have loved ones that have experienced sexual assaults to get them connected to resources.
We're speaking with Clara Reynolds, President and CEO of the Crisis Center of Tampa Bay, about the fact that this month, April is Sexual Assault Awareness Month, since you brought it up on the website, by the way, is crisiscenter dot com. What do you do at the Crisis Center of Tampa Bay and these other crisis centers across the country.
Oh, every crisis center is a little bit different, but I will tell you what we do. In Hillsborough County, which is in Tampa, Florida. We are the certified rape crisis center. So somebody is sexually assaulted in our community, rather than going to a hospital, maybe to get a rape exam or some other location, individuals come to us.
Survivors of sexual assault come to us, sometimes with law enforcement, sometimes without law enforcement, because somebody doesn't have to report that they've been sexually assaulted in order to get a sexual assault of examination. We do that examination and we can provide not just the rape kit, but we can
also provide for their medical needs at that time. We also have advocacy and support services that can follow that individual from the moment that has happened until there's a court case or any kind of dispositions of the legal case, or somebody just needs support but they don't want to report. Our advocates can help out and provide that support. And those types of services are available everywhere in the country, but it may look different depending upon where you live.
So that's why it's so important to make sure that if you have been a you are a survivor of sexual assault, please know that you can call that National Sexual Assault Hotline. They're going to be able to provide you not just with how to get a rape exam, but also all of those follow up services. Because mainly, I think one of the things that's so very important is to recognize that the sexual assault is a trauma, and trauma has long and short, short term and long
term impact. It can impact job performance and relationships and academic performance. It can impact physical and mental health, and individuals can oftentimes not realize that they are experiencing a trauma. They may recognize that suddenly they may be anxious to go into a bar, they may be anxious to walk by themselves. And individuals could turn to substances or other
ways to numb pain or to manage anxiety. That's the other reason why Sexual Assault Awareness Month is so important, because it's recognizing that after you have been assaulted, what you experience will not go away overnight, and that by reaching out and asking for help, you can receive that help and support to get you beyond that trauma so that you can then function and be able to be yourself again even after something like this has happened. What is the.
Age range of the women that you come that come to you seeking help. I imagined probably as young as as school aged and wait in the elderly.
Women know absolutely and remember as women, and many always want to write that out. So for us at the crisis center, we work with anybody age thirteen and over. What our experience has been, at least in our community, is that if somebody is under the age of thirteen and they have been sexually assaulted. There is oftentimes a child abuse component to it because it is oftentimes somebody very close to a child that has resulted or has
perpetrated that assault. So we have a whole separate system that is involved in our child welfare system, But in every community, we all of us see unfortunately individuals as young as infancy and as old as you know, ninety nine and one hundred. We actually had a woman that came to us who was sexually assaulted in her seventies. She was on a miss trip. So I think that's you know, that kind of got begs itself to some of the other myths that is just a college a
college age individual. No, absolutely not. Sexual assault happens all along the age continuum, and every person that has been assaulted needs to support that's individualized to their experience.
What just happened there where I referred to women coming to you, and you straighten me out mentioned that that men as well. How prominent is it that that a man is sexually assaulted? And are the numbers likely much much higher than we know because men, I imagine are probably less prone to even come forward and admit something has happened to them.
Yes, and you're absolutely right, Manny. You know I mentioned before, you know, one in every six American woman has been a victim of an attempted or completed rape, but one in thirty three men have experienced an attempted or completed rape, and we know that that's underrepresented. You know, we talk about the shame for a woman, it really does double
for a man for a variety of cultural reasons. And so this is you know, I really appreciate this opportunity to talk about this many because sexual assault for men is is just as impactful as it is for women. And then fortunately we don't talk about it in the same way for men as we do for women.
What are the warning signs that somebody may have been be experiencing sexual violence, or someone has experienced sexual assault but maybe they haven't come forward to discuss it yet.
That's a beautiful question, and so it could look very different. But certainly, if somebody says that they've been sexually assaulted believing, that's number one, and that's one of the most important messages. If somebody has, they're starting to exhibit maybe changes in their sleeping behavior, maybe changes in eating, changes in their use of substances, whether they're alcohol or other substances, change in just change in maybe work or their school work.
All of those are signs that something has happened. And one of the most important things that we can do is just ask the question, how are you what's going on in your life? Have you recently experienced something that has that has impacted you and with somebody, and you know what, Manny. First of all, most of the folks
will usually say, oh, no, no, no, I'm fine. And this is when it's so important for us, as there as a person that cares about them to push back a little bit and say, you know what, this is what I'm seeing. I'm seeing that you're drinking more. I'm seeing that you're you're not engaging in things that you've used to. I'm worried about you. I care about you. Talk to me about what's going on and give them
the space to tell you. We see the individuals who are contemplating suicide, that have experienced a trauma such as sexual assault, and so it's really important to observe and then ask the question that is what is so key?
It just kind of struck me the important. Another reason sexual Assault Awareness Months is important and important to have this conversation. We had a reckoning in this country a few years ago, right the meats movement. It feels like that is something so far in our history right now, with everything that's happened, that it's kind of on the back burner. We don't pay attention to these things as much as we did for a period of time a few years ago.
You're absolutely right, Mannion, And what we really saw is when that Me Too movement hit, people really did come forward and start talking about your experiences. And then we had this pesky little thing called a pandemic, and so you know, I think that you know, we lost sight of that because of everything else that was going on. And again that is why having Sexual Assault Awareness Month
be identified in the month of April. It does give organizations like the Crisis Center of Tampa Bay the opportunity to remind the community that sexual assault is real. Sexual assault is important to talk about and we should not continue to sweep it under the rug or blame the individual who who was assaulted as if it was their fault that a crime was committed against them.
I think so many of us have seen, you know, TV shows Law and Order and things like that as best for you, And we've heard about rape kits and all of that. How exactly does the process work, What exactly do you do in collecting the evidence for a rape kit?
So, Manny, what we start with, first of all, is an interview with a forensic nurse. They are known as sexual assault nurse examiners. They have been certified by their state to be able to do this process. They are registered nurses, nurse practitioners, but they have the specialized medical training along with the forensic training to be able to gather that evidence. They are also the ones that are
certified to be able to testify in court. So it starts with an interview with that sexual assault nurse examiner. They're going to ask the survivor what happened, tell me your own words what happened. And in that interview process, they're going to ask questions about where did the perpetrator maybe hit you, lick you, bite you, penetrate you. That is all information to know where we can gather DNA evidence. Maybe somebody got licked on the cheek or they got
bitten on the arm. We know that those are areas that are ripe with DNA. So we're going to basically then take swab samples of every place in an individual body where they have been touched, bitten, or penetrated. We can do a rape exam up to one hundred and twenty hours post as salt. That's essentially five days, so even if somebody has showered maybe or has changed their clothes, that DNA will continue to live on the human body
up to one hundred and twenty hours post assault. Obviously, the earlier we're able to get somebody in to gather that evidence, obviously that is preferable, but we do have up to five days, and so that nurse will then perform the exam. They're going to look for any kind of medical bruising, abrasions, any kind of medical things they're going to treat for the medical and then they're also going to swab versus externally as well as internally, vaginally, anally,
anywhere that we can potentially get DNA evidence. That evidence is swabbed. Those swabs are then placed in individual containers that are labeled where that swab came from on the body. And then now all of that information is placed into an actual envelope, which is known as the kit. We will also sometimes collect blood and urine samples if there
is a potential that somebody was drugged. We also will take, if possible, the individual's clothing that they were assaulted in, if they were assaulted in a bed and somebody had access to the linen or towels, we will take all of that as well anything that we possibly can to get DNA evidence, and if the case then moves the forward in the legal process, that DNA evidence is entered into a DNA database that can be utilized for matching
purposes as well. Additionally, we also take photographic evidence. We have very sophisticated cameras that can take internal pictures to be able to pick up any tears or abrasions internally as well as externally. So all of that is put together as part of the rate kit.
Strikes me then probably another reason why sometimes people victims don't come forward because they kind of have to relive the trauma all over again, don't they.
They absolutely do, and all of us as sexual assault as sexual assault centers or rape crisis centers, we are specially trained to be able to reduce the retraumatization of somebody who has experienced oftentimes the worst thing that ever happened in their life.
The crisis hotline number, the national number again one.
Eight hundred six five six hope and that is again eight hundred six five six four six seven to three.
Clara Reynolds, president's CEO of the Crisis Center of Tampa Bay, talking to us about April being Sexual Assault Awareness Month, truly appreciate it for the time, what you do and for sharing the information with us.
Thanks so much, Thank you so much many and for anybody out there, please know you don't have to face this alone. Please call us. Help is available.
And that'll do it. For another edition of Iheartradios Communities. I'm Manny Muno's until next time.