Breaking Down Burnout with Eve Ettinger

fun puns you include or adjust on the fly. Here, I'm Katie Soul. Uh. It's Cody Johnston Johnston and today you introduce yourself. Okay, I'm I'm eve At Injured. Nice to be here with y'all again. We're happy to have you back. Uh. Robert is not here with us this week. Um, and I get to make all the jokes about him now. Yeah, And so we Sophie frantically reached out to eve uh

and they agreed to join us, which we were thrilled about. Well, it wasn't exactly, I just it wasn't frantic, calmly and responsibly, calmly and delightedly because it took him. She was like, how about Eve, And we were like, yeah, absolutely, Well, Eve wrote this article for Bustle. Is that correct? Is that the publication pronounced boost? Yeah? Oh, thank you so much, Thank you so much, Katie. UM and I really thought it was something that needed to be talked about even more.

It was such a beautifully written article that is so poignant to the Times right now, and I loved it and I'm so glad that Eve has given us their time to talk so much. The fact that people are resonating with it is really depressing. Um, but really it's really nice. Um. Yeah, the response has been really cool to see. It's it's yeah, it's absolutely something that we

all resonate with right now. And I think the way you put it so eloquently, I mean in the in the piece, you can talk about the piece, but it basically it is something that relating these experiences in these symptoms of burnout to your own experience with CPTSD and seeing those parallels and maybe reframing how we think about what it means to be burnt out out. Um and more people are are realizing it as they are experiencing these symptoms that maybe it's not just burnout. Maybe we are.

Maybe we are experiencing the thing that we all collectively warned about, which was a severe trauma for the past few years. You know. Well, the way I kind of went into it, and I've been I worked on this piece since August last year, so months and months, and I had to cut so much out of it, and there were so many valuable moments that made it in and others that didn't. And I just I probably could have written like ten words on it easy. Um. But I kind of went into it being like, my theory

is that burnout doesn't exist. It's just complex PTSD for that now because capitalism is eating the rich alife too. Now we're talking about it, giving it, we're giving it the like you know, a fancy name burnout and um, and this is on a new phenomenon and everybody's been experiencing this for forever if you're not privileged and that white and um, so I, you know, kind of with that theory, decided to go see if I was confined anything. And oh boy, everybody was too excited to talk to me, yea,

which is really upsetting. Yeah, for sure. Um, do you want to give a brief summary of the article for our listeners and everyone should go read this article. It's phenomenal. Pause, go read and come back. Don't do that then yeah. Yeah, So basically, UM, in the article, I kind of cover complex PTSD UM as a phenomenon and comparing it to burnout.

So going and asking these people who are pretty open about their experiences of burnout, especially most of them are women of color, talking about, um, you know, what it means to be really successful person in their field and also experienced burnout and how they define it and what you know they would like to see happen and change, and then kind of comparing that to my own experience of complex PTSD and like watching the symptoms like dovetail

and UM. And then I took this to um some researchers when he's a former family doctor who now specializes in preventing physician burnout and helping hospital administrators like revamp their systems to do that, and you know, kind of asked him like what's your take and he was like yes, finally UM. And then UM, this wonderful gentleman named Thanos Um who's a yeah, the great, great name. He's a

researcher in Scotland. Um. You know, he helped develop the Definite Definition of complex PTSD for um, the you know, equivalent of the d s M five that everybody except for the US uses. Uh So, quait real quick, just define what d s M guide is for people five? Sorry? Um, yeah, d s M is the diagnostic manual and I I'm blinking on the exact acronym, but it's a diagnostic manual that you is used to diagnose mental health issues. So

complex PTSD is not in it. Yeah, but there's a lot of things that aren't in it that should be in it. There's a lot of things that are in it that shouldn't be in it. There's a lot of things that are mislabeled, and so it's only as good as like what you want to use it for. And it's basically it's basically a way of justifying treatment to insurance companies. It's allowed to crap. But when when he when I emailed him about it, he was like, oh my god, we've been talking about this. Um, I'd love

to talk to you. And I was like, oh no, here we go again. So yeah, it seems like one of the interesting things is like burnout is not a medical condition. Burnout is a phenomenon that shows up that can have medical side effects, but it's not recognized as a medical diagnosable condition. So then what the funk is? It was really what I was starting to figure out. Yeah, And I mean it does resonate with everybody right now. I just want to circle back to like this point.

Right now, everybody's feeling this, uh in different degrees or has been over the past couple of years, and even before that, uh, during this past administration and the world getting worse and climate change, and it's not gonna It's not going to go away, is I guess? My point? Um?

And and and it is very a point, very well taken that you make in the piece about how it is about the rich, white, primarily like people of the world waking up to the reality that the vast majority of people have been experiencing and the level of anxiety and what that actually physically does to your body, you know. So he was talking about this earlier, just there's an element of it that's not even something you can control.

It's a physical response. Well, and there's this also this thing that's happening, and I wasn't really able to include this in the piece, but it was in the back of my mind. It's like, we don't have a way to turn off work in a way that past generations have.

So the wealthy have always been a leisure class. And now the wealthy are proving that they can work harder than anyone else because they have access to things and they you know, they can have someone on call, and they can have the private jet and they so they can be anywhere whenever they want to be. So they're just like, it's not a leisure class anymore. And suddenly they're experiencing that same kind of like loss of margin, loss of space to rest and play as everybody else's.

And it's not threatening their you know, actual existence in the ways that it is everybody else, but um, they're experiencing some consequences, and so now we're talking about burnout. Yeah right. They like push, like hustle culture and like the grind for so long and then they adopted themselves and they're like, oh wait, this is actually kind of terrible lean in, but oh, maybe we should leave our phones outside of our bedroom at night. Yeah, no TVs

in the space where you sleep. Mm hmmm. For those people that can afford a place with more than one bedroom. I was going to ask Sophie, what what about the piece resonated so much because you were very excited to talk about it. Yeah, I mean, I think that you know, your connection to the economic system and and how Bernard is a form of oppression was very uh, something that stuck out to me. I think that, you know, the conversation around complex PTSD is not a conversation that happens

very often. UM, I have PTSD, and complex PTSD has never been brought up to me in a professional setting and has been brought up to me by you know, a loved one being like, hey, I don't, I don't, I don't know. Maybe this is what that is. And I'm like, what are you talking about? And so, I what do you mean. I'm I've just worked too much,

I'm just tired. I'm just over. You know, there's a war, the planets on fire, you know, things like that, and yeah, So I think those two things really stuck out to me. And you know, knowing that you wrote it meant like got of course got my attention because you're so brilliant and the way you wrote this article. I really loved it, even than really loved it. I'm glad that complex PTSD is getting some intention it should understood. Yeah, and and for me that stood out. I uh, I had not

considered it before. PTSD has seemed like as much as I talk about it and and talk about awaren as we all do, I think an awareness of it when people say that they're they're struggling with it and um, but it hasn't seemed like something that I could be experiencing personally and experienced trauma. No, I'm fine, and and

I have realized that I've had it. But prior to this, to this article, um, and at least in certain arenas of my life, but I had this really did um make me stop and see like, oh, oh, I see how this is manifesting in different areas and other and other ways that this is also a trauma response. And for me personally, at least in my past, when I name something, that's the first step towards having relief. Almost. Um. So if I'm able to pinpoint what this, this physical

sensation that I'm experiencing is bigger than me. There's a piece in that, and so it's vitally important. I think that people are are educated have the tools to to understand what's happening in our bodies because most people don't know most of us do not have access to our

emotional life and can articulate what we're experiencing. Sorry, go ahead, no, I was just gonna say, this brings me back to the d s M, because like what we have is like you know, diagnoses, a lot of people treat it as a like a like characteristic like I have it in eyebrows like that. I also have PTSD. I will always have both like that kind of level of like

fixedness to your your persona and who you are. And um, it's the like a diagnosis of mtal health issues just a description of a cluster of symptoms like it's a it's a it's a like a description of a manifestation of something in your body. Um, and it doesn't describe you. And so I think that's one of the reasons that there's so much I don't know if you saw the like piece about like trauma plot that was going around

lit Twitter a couple of weeks back. I didn't, but like there's this like ongoing fight about like at least everything Channa now um, And I'm like, yeah, Actually I was going, that's not interesting. Like it's both like I'm sorry, a rape is not an origin story for like an

interesting character. Try harder, and also like, yeah, everything is probably trauma in ways that you didn't expect, Like your body is going to like react to things and you're going to carry that with you and everyone has a different way of um my personal term for the way I described like processing intense emotions is emotional metabolism, Like everyone's emotional metabolism has a different rate, Like you're going to carry that in your body for longer or less time,

depending on who you are. So sure, like something might be really intense and really like you know lingering that for someone else might be minuscule and not not a big deal. Might just like you know, they wouldn't even think about it twice. Also some of those people, oh

is everything about trauma? Yes, and you too, sir or madam or non binary binary person you know, like it's it's we all have it, and there is a freedom and acknowledging it because they're carrying that we are ashamed of is rooted in trauma, Like the things that you struggle with are rooted with this. These these formative experiences and if you can acknowledge it, you'll feel better. The people who bitch about everything being drama and using the word trauma too much, I feel like the same kind

of people. And I'm not saying they are the same kind of people, but like they feel similar to the people who are like, well, I got spanked as a kid and I turned out fine. You're saying, you're saying that clearly you're okay with hitting small people. Know. I was gonna say, yeah, like I gotta spanking as a kid, and I turned out fine. And so to my kids who I spank, they're fine too, Like, okay, so you're spanking your kids then, so yeah, that is that the

healthiest way for you to release your anger or frustration? Right? Are they really listening to you? You know? Um? Yeah? Can I can I just like check on definitions here, like in terms of like PTSD versus c PTSD. Please, I don't know that everybody's like, you know, like we're talking about not everybody's run into it. So um, I'm gonna grow strawberry and a Robert metaphor for this, Like you can you can like cook meat in the ground over a million hours like he does sometimes um, real slowly,

real low um, and it will taste great. And you can flash cook a steak on a grill real fast and it will also taste great. But you know, the PTSD is the flash Ryan. Um, It's it's a you know, an isolated incident. You can point to it and say this is what happened. Um. And like when I got my complex PTSD diagnosis, which like is not really a thing given DSM stuff, but like is a thing. Um, my therapist was like, okay, so like what's your primary trauma?

And I was like, my what It was like, uh no, that's not that's not that's not a question that will work here. Um. And that's kind of how it is. It's like, it's this is the slow cooker experience, Like it's the act of cooking is taking so long that you can't delineate it from one to the next. It just like it exists to everything. Yeah, it's just it's like, yeah, it's the air you breathe. You don't even know that you're in it until you leave it. Usually. Well yeah,

yeah that's really well said. Um. So if you should we take a break now, this would be a great time to take a break. I think we're gonna take a break real quick. Perhaps perhaps would now be a good time to take a break. I'm just wondering. Probably, probably do we want a break, Katie? Break? I think, yeah, I think maybe we can do this for another minute

and then we take a break. Just go ahead and then but we but with spend a minute of asking if we think that we should probably talk about it first? How do we feel about taking a break? I don't know anymore. I'm dead, feel like a little two burnt out. You know, I'm just gonna call it. We're gonna take a quick break, and then we're gonna be back everything. So don't don't, don't. And we're back from that break, right. It was good. We feel good to be back from break.

Did we talk about this yet? Were I just barked right ahead? I'm so sorry. I did it again. I did it again, just so we're all good. We're all good, you say, okay, well, thanks for checking in. We turned out fine. Yeah, Sophie, why don't you you had something

interesting you wanted to just start us off with. We talked a little bit bit about the first thing that stuck with me from the article, which was you know, the complex PTSD aspect of it, but I wanted to get into a little bit of you know, how the economic system influences this and how uh it can lead to oppression and different different, different things like that, and um, yeah, so you know, easy topics like that, Yeah, really really

easy topics like that. M yeah yeah, Well, I mean capitalism is designed to like keep you busy, and capitalism is designed to constantly be taking from someone, and um, you have to like eat your feelings about that in order to like keep going. Um. And you know, it's that classic MLM. Capitalism is an m L and that's

how like we got MLMs. I don't know, um, but the thing is, like, yeah, the way I think about it, in the way I was recognizing these things as people were talking about them is I grew up in a fundamentalist group and I considered a cult. And like one of the things that was really useful to keep people from questioning the leadership is to have everyone be constantly on edge about like how good they were and like whether or not God love them, and like how they

were measuring up. And so this constantly anxiety, this like ambient anxiety about like your performance and your worthiness like kept you, you know, distracted, so that you didn't have any energy to think about like huh now how did I end up here? Like you and urge, Um, why is this a good idea? Uh? And I think that like having so little margin on life, you know I talked about like room to play and rest, Like we don't have that in most of our our day to

day lives, and so we don't have time. Aim, you cannot be creative unless you're bored a little bit, So you cannot be You cannot be able to like really analyze you know, why am I hearing? Do I like this? Unless you have that space and so like getting to burnout point, having that crisis, like that point of collapse, like that's where you finally get time, and that's when you finally realize, like what the fund have I been doing? Because capitalism is designed to keep us like ambiently anxious

and caring you also everybody else and like not questioning anything. Yeah, you can't recover from that kind of deep fatigue with a long weekend where you're also trying to do your laundry and like, um, organized the drawers that you've been putting you know whatever, it is like you get the you get to the weekend, and it's not the same thing. This is we're talking about starvation, Like your body needs

to heal deeply and we don't have time. I recently went through a huge breakup and it's dramatic loss of a family member all at the same time, and it was just ugly. But work was ramping up and for the right I felt so grateful for all of the good opportunities and that I needed to show up for

all of them. But I needed to heal too, and there wasn't time for both of that, and it made my work suffer for a while, you know, and I but I at a certain point I recognized what was happening and just gave myself permission to cut as many corners as I needed for the remainder of the year at least. And like a hallmark of trauma, it's like you had like that intense mormonal response to get you through the bush, and you can't sustain that love yeah operating,

and so you crash afterward. And so like I'm really good en a crisis and then like and then yeah, like two weeks later, I'll be like, um, and you know that delayed reaction is you know, just a part of like who I am because of complex PTSD, and I think that like we see this all over the place here with like you know, people will go through stuff and they'll be like why am I acting like this like a month later or a week later, and I'm just like, yeah, you just went through this, this, this,

and this, and they're like uh, And I'm like, you haven't rested, you haven't like recovered, you haven't actually processed any of that. You culture doesn't. We don't talk about it, so we don't make space for it, you know, in the same way, and people have that internalized capitalism, that idea of identities connected with our productivity, and so they don't. We all don't feel like we can take that time

in space to endure it and continue. Yeah. Yeah, So one of the other things in this article that you wrote that they discusses, you know, you can wake up, you can do your normal routine, but you're still like in this trauma response and doing your normal routine can be like part of that. At least my and my experience. It's like Okay, it's the way like it keeps you going as a momentum. Yeah, I can get up, I can do X, Y and Z, I can do my job,

I can call my friends. But like you're you're not you're not you're you're not your best self in any way, shape or form, but you're able to go through the motions. If that makes sense. Um, Yeah, that that was the other thing. I was like there, Yeah, I'm the I'm the friend who's like, so have you eaten today? Did you not get? Like I'm as a professor, I try to emulate this with like how I interact and set

boundaries with my students. I'm like, you know, I'm not going to respond to things during these hours, Like you will. You you can figure it out, Like if it's a crisis, you will. You will find a way to get in touch with me. But like, I'm not going to respond to you right away because like we have boundaries here. This is not urgent, Like this is not like for death. This is a fucking college class. This is one oh

one level. Like let's be realistic and then like I'm gonna have you have a big deadline before break so that you actually have a break, Like yeah, because I want to create as much space as possible, and so I try to lead with that by like I have to set my own boundaries for myself so that they

know how to like interact with that. It's really hard that, like, you know, I it's easier to just kind of be on all the time and be constantly thinking about it rather than to like delineate you know, spaces and time times that belong to this and only this. Yeah, you talk a lot uh in the piece about like just the environment that you're you're in, and there's no real um like escape or from from that environment. You you know, you can't take You can take a weekend from it,

but then you go right back into the environment. UM. And I've I've talked about this a little bit before, but I'm curious about sort of your like opinion on like working from homes. I think there are a lot of benefits from it, um and sort of separating from like you, we all kind of go in the same space, and like there are reasons that they want you to come to the office that aren't like about performance or your well being or like the benefit of the company

or anything like that. It's just like we need you here to like watch over you there's a lot of aspects there that the end they're pushing to get back to get back there. But yeah, but it's I'm I'm always thinking about, Like, yeah, but isn't it also bad to have your workspace be at your home? Like that seems like so unhealthy, but also like humans have always done that, like we've like having the workspace be separate from the home is not necessarily like right historically like

consistent phenomenon. So like I don't know, Um, the way I do it is is I just have different spaces

for different things, and that's a privilege. That's a huge, huge privilege of where I live, and like that I'm able to afford to have a couple of different rooms for things, So like not having my workspace in my bedroom is priority number one, Like no matter what my living situation is, I've always even in like a studio, just like not having those together so that psychically I'm not in bed thinking about work, Like it's really important

delineation so that rest is rest and work is work. Um. The other is just like I don't know, putting on pants, Like I don't have to hard pants, but just like putting on pants, like you know, again having that delineation, but also getting out of the house, walking around outside, even if it's twenty minutes. Like having a dog has been great for my my brain because like she forces me to meet people, She forces me to go outside

multiple times a day. You have something that you have to care about, Yeah, right, and forces you to care about yourself in a way I've always been good about like having something else to care about, Like I'm the oldest of nine kids, Like I helped raise a bow, Like I've always had cats, Like that's not the thing, but like the act of having to vid the house, that having a dog has been really revolutionary for me

on that regard. I'll just throw this out there for anybody listening, um who lives in a small space or perhaps a studio environment where it's really difficult to find that it's tough. But with that, there are ways that you can can make it feel separate psychically at least, you know. Yeah, you can paint the wall, you can put a divider up, you can you can have a divider. You can just make sure you're never eating at your desk. Yeah,

that go a long way. But yeah, like you're saying with like you know, putting on pants, and like we all joke like, yeah, we don't have to put a pants at work, but even like just putting on something, it's like this is like my work. Yeah close, I'm awake. Um right, I'm awake. It's like it's like business time.

Here we go. And then being able to separate that and like you were talking about, even with just sort of the communication aspects, I feel like a lot of people, because they're working from home now, also have this pressure of like, well, therefore you're always kind of at work, therefore I can always contact you absolutely, which which is

not like should not be the case. But I think that there's like the part of the danger of um of this new sort of set up for a lot of people, and a lot of employers want to have that power over people's time when they absolutely shouldn't. Well, and it's a privacy violation to like one of the issues.

So I was teaching at a community college and super deep Southwest Appalachia, Southwest virg and Apple Logic at the start of the pandemic, and so we went online in that community for zoom, which meant that there would be there was like a situation not my class but a fellow teacher was teaching a class with multiple black students in it and a white student who had a Confederate flag in our bedroom, and like, is that her space?

Her space has now become the classroom. What power do you have to control that space in terms of like that's the privacy, freedom of speech thing, but it's also hate speech bring brought into the classroom because the classroom is now here and those delineations, like we haven't had to navigate this before, and so like, you know, it just translates directly to work too, Like, um, you know, if you're a manager, learned how to use the schedule

email function and send things later, just like we send that we're thinking it, the schedule it for tomorrow, because that's you know, just setting those boundaries for your off and others is really important. Uh that's a really good point. Um, the managed thing, I should look into that for because it's hard. It's hard. We have to respect you. Also reminded me of a Reddit thread where a worker, some guy I'm not going to remember this, he had a life size cut out of Danny DeVito in the back

of his zoom background. And when you're unfortunately the Confederate flag reminded me of this story. And yes, the ethical the questions, but he's like up and coming he was, and it became such a problem. He became a fight between him and the manager, and the manager was like, I'm sorry, you're gonna have to remove your Danny DeVito cut out, and he was like, no, I'm not, I'm I quit. You can't tell me what to do in my space. First off, my favorite Baron Ronoke has like

who is the asshole? I'm sorry? My favorite barn Rono vir Jinny has he's like paying up Danny de Vito pictures all over, So that reminds me of that fond memories there. But it's if you have a good relationship with your employees and you're taking care of them and you're interacting with them as a human, you can make an ask like that and not have it be an issue you just like if you haven't established that report, sorry, that's your problem, buddy, right right, Just like I guess,

I guess it. They didn't want him doing meetings with clients or something with Dan need to Vito and look, you know, okay, I don't know anyways, come on, it's like where do we learn on Danny de Vito. He is polarizing, that is for sure. We're all just thinking of Danny Vita now, Um yeah, no, it's it's like, how do you control that space? Who's is it? I think these are things that we don't have like a lot of systemic precedent for. Yeah, and now they're there's

such a push to go back to the office. It's like we're going to just skip over those conversations. Um, that could happen now, you know, you could all just you and your noise everybody. Interesting theory, interesting theory. The union could negotiate to keep you out of the office. That right, right, depends on who our leadership is. I guess I live in so it's super hard to you and you use here, but not with the power Danny

DeVito by your side, I can do all things. All right, I'm going to make an executive call and we'll take into a quick ad break. I'm sorry, Katie, hopefully Danny DeVito voicing all of them please always. I mean, that would be really smart approach. I made a joke. I think that Danny DeVito is a gem. Okay, we'll be right back. Everything and during the break, I was like, you know, uh, should we just do a national strike

or we at that point yet? And then he was like well, and they're like, all right, let's come back on air to go ahead. Okay. I mean so in Minecraft, like just burning it all down it seems like one of the only options left at this point. It's like civilizations lost only so long and like you have like in order to survive, you have to adapt, and like

we're not adapting very well. But like m hm, one of the things that I have learned as a cult escape who like ended up losing a large community that I grown up in and having to start from square one with my belief system and my community and like, you know, how I interacted with my family, what I thought about myself and my place in the world. A lot of people are really up for that level of like risk and commitment. People don't like standing up for things.

They don't want to be uncomfortable. Um, and forgive me for being super cynical about it, but like on the flip side, it's really frustrating to me because I know that they can do it, and I know that you can be fine because I've done it and I'm fine like fine, um, but like but like you can do it and you can get through it, and a lot of people just can't imagine what that would look like. And I think that's that's one of the biggest obstacles

to something like that. We have. We have a generation that hasn't grown up with a strong labor rights movement, and we don't like have a positive vision for what that future could be. And we really need to get creative with that, start dreaming. Yeah, I think I think you're correct. I mean, and we are seeing I would hope, um, signs of a shift in thinking in I mean, just this yer number of strikes and you know, labor movements

over the past year, uh, you know, since since the pandemic. Um. And so I do feel hope sometimes, but it is hard to look at me. I mean, I mean, there's just so much. This is the through line of if we can get get it the funk together to do a national strike on student loans, I feel like the rest would take care of usself. But like, yeah, like we have to start with something that like universal. Yeah, um, well yeah, what do you look like you had some you know, I agree, it's just we can't get on

the same page on any thing. I mean, even like you know, uh, we shouldn't have our health care tied to our job. I know that's what I was going to say, But you can't convince everybody to agree with you on that. Some reason everybody to care for other people like but also yeah, you're you know, asking people to like strike to get healthcare not tied to their job. Well, if I strike that I don't have the health care

that I need because I'm on strike. Um, And like you're saying, like there's no um, real like vision for how how it would work, Like how do you how do you do that and survive well in the trouble? I mean yeah, but the exhausting thing is like other people did this and they didn't have a positive vision for how it would look, Like, um, you could do

this too. I mean, obviously it's nice to have a model that like you can point to and be like like that, right, like you know, society's reinvent themselves all the time without a plan. Yeah. Humans are actually like really really really good interestingly enough about like adapting all the time all the time. Are resilient, yes they are, um and not but not necessarily even like collectively in like a like like we as a society are necessarily good at adapting and saying like we got to do this,

and then we do it. But um, you know, when our packs are against the wall, we always seem to pull through. But but to what you're saying about how it is, it's it's hard to get people. The situation has to be so extreme for people to be willing to risk, um, you know, the outcome or whatever, the unknown of going up against I mean like, yeah, go ahead, Oh I'm just I know she's controversial. But Amanda Palmer had this thing in her phone. Um, yeah, well that

we'll just let that stand. Um, it's fine, Um, we

don't need to go there. But like in there's this story that she tells about, like she's like with an older gentleman and there's a dog in the other room and the dog just like lying on a wood floor with like a nail sticking out of it, and it keeps whimpering because it's lying on this nail and it's uncomfortable, and she's like, why isn't it moving And he's like, because it doesn't hurt enough yet, And it's like we are all that dog is her larger point and it's like, yeah, like, yes,

he will stay in an abusive relationship because it doesn't hurt enough yet. Yes, you will stay in an abusive job because it does not hurt enough yet. Um, because you like being comfortable and you feel like you can like wiggle around just a little bit, so like you can make a work, like you can do anything for five more minutes, right, yeah. Yeah, and the irony being there's so much freedom and peace to be found if you take that leap, that scary thing, that scary step.

And I think this all actually goes back to Eve's article. I mean it does. It does definitely economic system and oppression and c p t s D. It all circles well, and this is like yeah, c PTSD. Like one of the things that does is it makes you unable to imagine what's going to happen in the future, Like I have to really like actively proactively planned things, um, because usually I'm like I know what I'm doing tomorrow, I'm

like after that, like like that's how my brain defaults. UM. And this is one of those moments where it's like is it a d h D or is it c PTSD. Probably both, but like I've heard enough from the complex PTS community to think that it's it's largely that where it's like if I, you know, don't if I don't have to get through it immediately, it doesn't exist and

you can't prey up plan a revolution that way. Well yeah, that's like, uh, come back, Like just the environment that we're all in now, there's that uncertainty just in like you know, anything on an individual level in all people's lives, but also just the world, um, with things like climate change, with the current war going on, all these sort of things where it's like I don't know, you don't know what's going to happen the next day. I think a lot of people sort of feel like, well then why

bother planning anything? Um, why not just live this sort of moment to moment, not think about the future because we have no idea what will come of the future, right, because the assumption is that like you don't have control over the future, when actually the fuck you do. Exactly. Yeah, it's just instead of ignoring it and like trying to put it out of your mind, like take grab it. Yeah.

I think like lighter fluid to that where it was like we were all in the state of well, I have no idea what's going to happen, so I can't plan anything. I can't even plan my next couple of hours, all right. Uh. Yeah, that's when I was like, oh, funk, this is bad because I was like, everybody is relating to time like I do. This is really scary. This is not like I'm the weirdo here, Like, let me stay the weirdo. You all need to stay normal. We have to get through this. Yeah. I felt the same

exact way. The same way I was like, I was like, Okay, I'm used to this, but I don't want anybody else to be This is not nobody else should be here. This is the this is not this is not the side of the table that anybody else should sit at. Yeah. I remember um going for a walk socially distance walk with my friend uh during that time, and she went, Honestly, Katie, I don't know anyone that isn't just absolutely burning their

life down right now. And I was like, yeah, just like it's just like they're like cutting off back, like having really extreme reactions, like everybody behaving in very erratic ways. Okay, So here's the other thing, is like maybe it wasn't so erratic. Maybe this was all the like stuff that you put off while you were trying to catch up on laundry over the weekend that you like suddenly you had to face because you were in the apartment with it all day every day, and you're like, I don't

like living like this. I'm going to there's no from it. The number of people who came out as strands during the pandemic. Yes, yes, you just having to live with yourself and only yourself like reveal so much. Yeah, Um, are there any resources or things that people should should know about that that we can give listeners as a guide after reading an article listening to this discussion. Okay, I'm going to give you two different versions of these.

One is I'm going to give you, um, the recommendation for the body keeps the score, which is ubiquitous. I was gonna bring it up is Yeah, has been accused of predatory behavior in the workplace, So like take that with a grade of salt. But like it is a fucking good book. Um, there's a memoir out. Oh my god, I'm blinking on the name of it. Stephanie Foo is the name of the author. Um, and it's a memoir

about complex PTSD. I'm only halfway through it, but it's really fucking good and it just came out UM, and then I think it's what my bones know that that is what it is. Okay, good, good, thank you. UM. And then I'm going to give you a couple of semantic tips just like. So, semantic therapy is the only

thing that I found that's helped me. If you have access to e m d R through your UM insurance or if you can afford to find an e m DR practitioner, it's literally the only thing that I have found that has helped it because talk therapy and complex CPT therapy is often counterproductive for complex PTSD. UM, So

semantic therapy is releaseful. And here's a couple of tiny semantic hacks that you can do, just like in a moment if you're feeling flooded, which is like when you're you're on the way to being triggered and you're away on the way to like losing control over your reaction because it's too much. UM. One is called I mean, my therapist just called it tip tap fingers, but like

I'm sure it has like a more professional name. But you just take your thumb and you start on your pinkies and you tap your thumb to your pinky than to your ring finger, than to your middle finger, than to your first finger, and you work your way back the same. So don't double tap, but just go. You have to do both hands at the same time because it crosses the hemispheres of your brain. And wait, wait, that is something that I self soothe that way your brain,

your brain cairal, the can spiral while doing that. This is really it is integrating the hemispheres of your brain. So you cannot dissociate. You physically cannot dissociate. No, I just thought I was a weird person who did doing this. Yeah, that's a thing that is tap fingers in notes. Side question on this is it is there something uh to music?

I guess with this um in how like I'm thinking of like playing piano or playing a guitar, where like your relationship between your hands and your brain, it's basically like can you get out of your like spiral and back into being present in the moment and like present your body. So like whatever it is that does that is going to be the thing that's going to like

cut that spiral cycle. Um, So if it's like singing or playing an instrument or dancing or like something where you like your your mind body connection gets restored so that you're you're in sync with yourself. Um, you're present in your body in real time. That that's like the fastest way to cut that cycle. So the next thing, the other thing that I was gonna share is like

just it is a semantic breathing exercise. You just put your your right hand on your heart, your left hand on your abdomen right at the top of your belly, and you're just like breathing really slowly. Is that just like basic yoga breathing belly breathing very slow in and out, you know, count like in for hold, for out for But um, the act of crossing the hands in those that position again crosses wires in both hemispheres of your brain so that it's again you're you're you're restoring that um,

that somatic rhythm. Love that it is really helpful. Yeah, thank you. Wow. The finger thing, I'm like, it's like such a good hack. It's such a good hack, Like you can do it and like people can't see it. You can like have your hands enter at the table will be doing it. It's a little tiring, it's a little finger workout, it's not disruptive. There there are other

exercises like that. I mean, the point is to like get your mind into play mode and distracted and like present, so it's not like that feeling of looseness and oneness with your body that you're trying to achieve. And whatever gets you there, like go for it absolutely. And also heard somebody to talk about like cold water, running your cold water over your hands to get you into your

body again to like connect the sensations and whatnot. And one thing I also say is like if you've experienced a lot of trauma, your body is not going to want to come back. Like you're not gonna want to reunite these parts. And its not going to be easy, and it's going to take practice and it's gonna take time, and it's going to take space. And like, um, you

know in Minecraft you might want to do mushrooms. Um always anyway, I'm not in so we're gonna do it in Minecraft here, but you know, um, but like there are other ways to get there, but just it's it requires just kind of allowing your body to take its own time. Yeah, this has been really good, really fascinating. Eve. Is there anything I'm gonna link this article in the episode description? But is there anything you'd like to plug at the end here? Yeah? I have a podcast um

coasted with Karan dark Water. It's called Kitchen Table Cold. We talk about all things fundamentalist, Christian and current politics. Uh. Super fun that it's still relevant. I would love to be obese, but we're not yet. Um and I don't know you. You can find me on Twitter. I hang out there sometimes. Unfortunately. What's your Twitter handle? It's e Vettinger with an underscore between awesome. Um. Yeah, follow them, check them out all the shows. Thank you again so much,

thank you for having me anytime. You're You're welcome back any time. Truly a delight, all right by everyone? Follow us at worst your pod at COSNBIA. Have a wonderful day. We haven't plugged that so long. I know I'm plugging it. Every dull Everything I tried. Worst Year Ever is a production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts from my heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.