Send Me a Message! After what’s felt like forever, I finally have a date locked in! I'm seeing a psychiatrist for an appointment to determine the next steps as far as my goal of tapering off all of my medications. Thank you, NSW public mental health system! The main theme of the episode though is all about my morning. How an amazing opportunity for gratitude was driven away by my over-excited amygdala which sees threats everywhere. A beautiful drive around Newcastle on a perfect winters day, wit...
Jul 25, 2025•21 min•Ep. 208
Send Me a Message! In this episode, I share how the NSW mental health system has picked up my referrals and is starting to piece together a plan to help me move forward. It’s a big relief — and a hint of hope on the horizon — but of course it’s also tangled up with my daily battle against anxiety. So much of this process relies on me: on finding the social capacity to answer or make phone calls, to push through the fear that is always there, and to keep these critical conversations and opportuni...
Jul 15, 2025•28 min•Ep. 207
Send Me a Message! ** Content warning: This episode discusses suicide, suicidal ideation, and severe mental health crises. Please take care while listening. In this episode of The Dysregulated Podcast , I unpack my latest therapy session — one that left both my psychologist and I scrambling to try and understand thoughts and feelings that were much more serious than ever before. The stakes couldn't be higher; this was very much a life-or-death scenario. These looping dark thoughts come from deep...
Jul 11, 2025•45 min•Ep. 206
Send Me a Message! In this episode of My Therapy Reflections , I explore my latest psychology session, which admittedly wasn’t particularly productive. With my mind in overdrive from lack of sleep, stimulant dependency, and sheer frustration at life, I spent most of the session ranting—about how I’m not getting the help I need, how my life feels worthless, how all the suffering and sacrifice hasn’t led to the happiness I thought it would. I leaned hard into that old belief that there are winners...
Jul 04, 2025•27 min•Ep. 205
Send Me a Message! I've been working on a deeply personal episode about retroactive jealousy, but my inner critic has been relentless in sabotaging my attempts to record it. This is going to be my most revealing episode yet, explaining how retroactive jealousy has been my borderline personality disorder's "weapon of choice" throughout my life. But as I explain in this episode, my mind is stopping me from getting on with the job! I also take a brief look at the current NSW mental health system an...
Jun 24, 2025•26 min•Ep. 204
Send Me a Message! In this episode, I share my ongoing battle to getting help from the mental health system in reducing my medication load. And progress continues to be hard to come by. I share the latest letters my GP has sent off to Bloomfield Hospital and ISMHU, pleading for an inpatient stay to safely reduce and taper off my psych meds. I open up about the financial barriers to private care, the paradox of needing to make anxiety-inducing phone calls just to access treatment (for anxiety dis...
Jun 20, 2025•30 min•Ep. 203
Send Me a Message! The Discharge Papers returns — but not all of it is good news. In this episode, I read through my latest discharge papers from the Mater Mental Health Hospital, offering an unfiltered and completely vulnerable look at what actually happens during a psychiatric assessment in an emergency department, during my most acute mental illness battles. • The hospital notes describe me as articulate and intelligent, with strong insight into my mental health • Diagnoses listed include BPD...
Jun 18, 2025•30 min•Ep. 202
Send Me a Message! Awake up at 4 AM and recording from my car, I'm sharing some thoughts during a tough winter period where both physical illness and mental health challenges have been colliding. Winter has always been difficult for me, and getting sick complicates many of my energy-dependent coping strategies for managing my mental ill health. Burnout is a tough foe to battle, along with the various disorders that I’m up against. But the fight for peace of mind rages on! — Follow my journey thr...
Jun 13, 2025•7 min•Ep. 201
Send Me a Message! Follow my journey through the chaos of mental illness and the hard-fought lessons learned along the way. Lived experience is at the heart of this podcast — every episode told through my own lens, with raw honesty and zero filter. This is a genuine and vulnerable account of how multiple psychological disorders have shaped my past and continue to influence my future. Support the show You can follow me on Instagram: @ elliot.t.waters, and the show on Facebook!...
Jun 05, 2025•9 min•Ep. 200
Send Me a Message! Opposite action is a powerful DBT skill that helps us override our automatic emotional responses by choosing behaviours that counter what we're feeling. This skill works by strengthening neural connections between our prefrontal cortex and amygdala, physically changing our brain to improve emotional regulation. • Identifying what emotion you're experiencing (anxiety, anger, sadness) • Understanding what your emotion is urging you to do (avoid, lash out, isolate) • Consciously ...
May 30, 2025•44 min•Ep. 199
Send Me a Message! Elliot explores the challenges of being stuck in a "mental health holding pattern", while waiting for professional guidance on medication changes. • Recounting a recent visit to Mater Hospital seeking help to reset medication and establish a new baseline • Attempting to reduce Seroquel dosage independently, resulting in disrupted sleep patterns during a week of early starts • Using State of Origin football as a crucial psychological anchor during a difficult period • Experienc...
May 28, 2025•7 min•Ep. 198
Send Me a Message! I’m drenched, exhausted, and dragging myself through the rain—because I’m about to blow. This is a real-time recording, on my phone, just moments before I walked through the doors of the Mater hospital. Not in crisis, but not far off. I’m tired. Tired of the medication merry-go-round, the constant inner turmoil, the anxiety and depression. Im also tired of my inner critic telling me I’m not “bad enough” to deserve any help. But, I didn’t show up for fun. I didn’t walk from hom...
May 22, 2025•8 min•Ep. 197
Send Me a Message! When silence falls on The Dysregulated Podcast , it usually means something's amiss. Today, I'm breaking that silence with a raw, unfiltered check-in from the front seat of my car at Nobbys Beach during an East Coast Low storm system. Despite feeling spaced-out and fatigued, I needed to let you know: I'm still here, still fighting. The past week has been unlike anything I've experienced before – mood swings cycling every 5-10 seconds, bouncing between slightly depressed and de...
May 20, 2025•8 min•Ep. 196
Send Me a Message! In the next chapter of My Therapy Reflections , I share a very significant IFS (Internal Family Systems) breakthrough that has reframed how I view some of my darkest moments. When life feels too loud and too bright (which is most of the time), I tend to mentally retreat, like hiding in a tunnel—a cold, dark place that where I sometimes I can sleep for days. But this session revealed something surprising: my internal parts weren’t trying to trap me there like I had thought. The...
May 07, 2025•55 min•Ep. 195
Send Me a Message! In this episode, Elliot records from inside his car as rain pours down outside, reflecting nicely the turbulence felt within all week. Battling extreme and rapid mood swings that have left him exhausted and overwhelmed, Elliot shares how poor sleep, stimulant medication, grey weather, and sensory sensitivities have compounded to intensify his struggles. As the rain falls mirroring his rapidly dropping mood, he offers listeners a genuine glimpse into the exhausting reality of m...
May 01, 2025•14 min•Ep. 194
Send Me a Message! Follow my journey living with mental illness and the hard-fought lessons learned along the way. Lived experience is the driving force of this podcast, and through this lens, my stories are told. This is a raw, honest, and authentic account of how multiple psychological disorders have shaped my past and continue to influence my future. Support the show You can follow me on Instagram: @ elliot.t.waters, and the show on Facebook!...
Apr 23, 2025•12 min•Ep. 193
Send Me a Message! After years of trying a myriad of psychiatric medications—SSRIs, SNRIs, NDRI's, Tricyclics (TCA), mood stabilisers, antipsychotics, stimulants, benzodiazepines, and everything in between—I’ve reached a breaking point. Nothing has truly worked, my anxiety has never been worse, and the side effects are piling up. My body’s jittery, my mind’s exhausted, and I’m stuck somewhere between sedation and overstimulation. In this episode, I open up about my plea for a full medication res...
Apr 12, 2025•49 min•Ep. 192
Send Me a Message! The next instalment of the "My Journal" series sees me having a look at a very recent entry. So recent in fact it was written just yesterday. Unfortunately the tone of the writing is bleak. I explain how across all facets of my life there is pressure building. Pressure for change, the need to perform, and how anxiety derails every effort that I make. No podcast goes this deep into what it is like living with mental ill health. -- Follow my journey living with mental illness an...
Apr 06, 2025•11 min•Ep. 191
Send Me a Message! I’m back! It’s been a little while between episodes, but in this check-in, I bring you along for the ride—literally. I talk about my recent solo road trip to the Gold Coast (via the very chill detour through Nimbin) to watch my beloved Newcastle Knights take on the Titans. The trip was meant to help me slow down and de-stress... but let’s be real, it didn’t quite go as planned. From battling anxiety on the open road to grappling with post-trip blues (and watching the Knights c...
Apr 04, 2025•16 min•Ep. 190
Send Me a Message! This week, anxiety hit me in a way that genuinely scared me. Not just the usual panic or dread—but the fear of anxiety itself. When it spirals beyond my control, when I’m bedridden for days, sweating, hiding from the world, and feeling powerless to stop it… that’s when the real bad thoughts creep in. I felt like anxiety could take me down at any moment, and I wouldn’t be able to get back up. But somehow, I crawled out of my anxious den. I went for a run, got a haircut (despite...
Mar 14, 2025•13 min•Ep. 189
Send Me a Message! Discover Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (DBT) with ' The Dysregulated Podcast '! Episode #3: Pros and Cons Support the show You can follow me on Instagram: @ elliot.t.waters, and the show on Facebook!
Feb 28, 2025•21 min•Ep. 188
Send Me a Message! Follow my journey living with mental illness and the hard-fought lessons learned along the way. Lived experience is the driving force of this podcast, and through this lens, my stories are told. This is a raw, honest, and authentic account of how multiple psychological disorders have shaped my past and continue to influence my future. Support the show You can follow me on Instagram: @ elliot.t.waters, and the show on Facebook!...
Feb 26, 2025•14 min•Ep. 187
Send Me a Message! In this episode of The Dysregulated Podcast , I take you back to one of the most pivotal moments of my entire life —my first kiss. But this isn’t just a nostalgic teenage memory; this was the moment that set everything in motion. From high school struggles and crippling self-esteem issues to the deep insecurities that shaped my identity, this night ignited something far bigger than I ever could have realised at the time. Looking back, I can see that this was the spark that ign...
Feb 15, 2025•1 hr 36 min•Ep. 186
Send Me a Message! In this follow-up to My Therapy Reflections #8 (Part A) , I take a clearer look at why my workaholic identity is feeling under threat—and why that makes me so damn anxious. Like so many of my parts, the workaholic exists to protect me, keeping me constantly busy so life doesn’t have the chance to bring me down. Always on guard, always working, always driven by pure anxiety. But maybe—just maybe—building my entire identity around being the hardest worker in the room isn’t the h...
Feb 11, 2025•24 min•Ep. 185
Send Me a Message! Following my last therapy session, my anxiety was still super high—so I decided to run with it! In this episode of The Dysregulated Podcast , I share how I went for a run (big deal) to help soothe my anxious mind. Did it fix everything? No. But did it help? Absolutely. Despite feeling so mentally drained, today turned out to be surprisingly productive—therapy sesh, two podcast episodes, and a run even! Sometimes, you just gotta show up and face anxiety head-on. Support the sho...
Feb 10, 2025•5 min•Ep. 184
Send Me a Message! In this episode of The Dysregulated Podcast , I reflect on an unusually difficult therapy session—one that left me feeling worse instead of better. My anxiety has been at an all-time high, and the very foundation of my workaholic sub-part is being challenged, leaving me feeling unsettled and unsure. It’s been a massive day, even before therapy, and I break down the emotions, thoughts, and struggles that came with it. I'm a wounded warrior in this one. -- Follow my journey livi...
Feb 10, 2025•14 min•Ep. 183
Send Me a Message! In this episode of 'The Dysregulated Podcast' I take an in depth look at the problems plaguing the NSW public mental health system. Over 200 psychiatrists in the public system have indicated their intention of resigning from NSW Health. This is a disastrous outcome for the people of NSW. Although pay is at the heart of this battle, it isn't necessarily about money. This is about funding a failing system and attracting enough mental health professionals to ensure the NSW mental...
Feb 07, 2025•47 min•Ep. 182
Send Me a Message! In this episode of The Dysregulated Podcast , I take a look at the all-too-familiar "Dexy Blues"—the wave of anxiety and depression that hits when stimulant medications like Vyvanse and dexamphetamine start to wear off. I share my experience with these emotional crashes, how my prescription had to be adjusted to soften the blow, and some quick tips to help avoid those tough afternoons. I also reflect on my friends' experiences, how these medications affect her differently and ...
Feb 02, 2025•18 min•Ep. 181
Send Me a Message! Follow my journey living with mental illness and the hard-fought lessons learned along the way. Lived experience is the driving force of this podcast, and through this lens, my stories are told. This is a raw, honest, and authentic account of how multiple psychological disorders have shaped my past and continue to influence my future. Support the show You can follow me on Instagram: @ elliot.t.waters, and the show on Facebook!...
Jan 31, 2025•5 min•Ep. 180
Send Me a Message! In this episode of The Dysregulated Podcast , I explore the vital role Seroquel plays in my ability to get a good night's sleep and how its absence leaves me battling through the day. Sleep deprivation exacerbates the negative ruminations that seem to take centre stage of my psyche, and today, they’ve been particularly focused on my inner workaholic—the sub-part of me constantly pushing to apply for new jobs and to (hopefully) improve my life! That is one part of me that doesn...
Jan 23, 2025•23 min•Ep. 179
