Hi, guys. Welcome to Preview Alliance Podcast. This is Sarah and I have our favorite therapist, Whitney. How are you? Hey, friends. I'm good. How about y'all? Well, I think we're all better because guess what's upon us? Whitney's favorite season, spring. I love spring so much, y'all. It makes me so happy. Spring's the little joy. The sparkles in Whitney is spring. We've survived the cold flu nightmares of the post-holiday, January, February, and now we're starting to literally see live bloom in front of us. Yes. The sun is out. There are colors again. It's not just gray and bleak. And you know, seasonal depression is real. And I feel like the aftermath of returning back to school, we've put up everything and every kid's sick and we're like, wait, we can't just sit and watch TV all day and break. It was just a hard couple of months. It is. The pressure is releasing of the new year. People have circled back when we're like, hey, let's get back after the holidays. That's kind of over. It's this whole new season. But. We're actually supposed to be on our game now. We're actually supposed to be fully functioning. But what we're here to hopefully do is to talk about why things are new in spring and we're blooming, why it's the best time to start. Not like we're trying to add your plates, listeners, but a gentle self-check-in about spring, how we can kind of look in ourselves and say, okay, what's working? What's not? We are not self-diagnosing. We're not going to TikTok. We're not going to Instagram, chat GPT and putting in our symptoms. But what we are doing is a pause, like a moment of awareness. We're trying to recognize things, patterns, feelings, reactions that maybe we're happening right now and you're going, okay, well, that sounds great. Should I judge myself on this morning's drop off with my kids? No, you probably should tint on one moment, one day. Right. But let's look maybe in the past week. Let's look at the past month and you know this, Whitney. And listeners, it's research shows early awareness and reflection, especially using CBT, cognitive behavioral therapy techniques, can help us reduce anxiety, depression, overwhelm, and actually just help us access support sooner. So we don't want to start thinking check-in is because something's wrong, right? It's kind of like a car of maintenance. Like, you know, when the old lights on is a little too late, right? So like, right, but we want to get ahead of this. So that's what we're trying to do. And we want you, you're not, we're again, you're not being your own therapist, you're not Googling like crazy, but you're going to say you can do this paper, you can do this with a friend, your partner, your whatever therapist that could actually be really good to have your therapist kind of do this with you as your sounding board and reality check because we are going to have blind spots in our own lives, like we're human. That is. So the step one is kind of going what showing up with me lately? What emotions have I been feeling this past week? You know, am I anxious? Am I sad? Am I snapping? Do I feel like so overwhelmed? Am I happy? Do I feel lonely? Am I finding like myself at the end of the day feeling like it's another hamster wheel day? What am I, am I rating these emotions, right? Cause it's like, and that may be something you've never done in your life. I never really done that. Right. It's kind of weird to be like, Hey, Whitney, rate your happiness zero to 10 right now. But what we're getting that is there is different levels of all these emotions. Well, and I will say, especially if we try to track them where there were logging it in the notes app on our phone, pen and paper, whatever it is, you know, we could say Monday, my happiness was kind of a two out of 10 because I woke up and had a flat tire and then I was late getting my kids to school and then I was late getting to work. Like, and you can say that, but if we are starting to see a trend of our happiness stays between a two and a three on a regular basis, or especially if we're thinking about our cycles, like if we notice those dips the week before our periods, it's like, Oh, something more clinical could be taking place. You know, same thing if we say, well, my sadness was, you know, typically like a seven to a nine on any given day, and we get to see that pattern and we're kind of tracking it. That can be a really good indicator and help have us have objectivity with it and say, Oh, maybe there's more to this than just the flat tire. Yeah, being said, if you plot it out, or you write it all out, and you say, Okay, well that Monday, yeah, my happiness was a two out of 10, like it was just a bad, bad day for me there kind of thing. But all your other ones went back up and your happiness was typically between a seven to a 10. Yeah, you had external factors. That's not clinical depression. That's not clinical anxiety. That's you had some really bad luck that morning. That's life, right? Life was life in that day. You know, like last spring, it was when I had one of those days where God bless it. No joke. No joke. My husband had passed a kidney stone that morning. I'm driving to work. Now mind you, it takes me about 15 minutes to get to work. And I'm not even taking the interstate. I'm just taking normal city roads. I was five minutes out from working on sudden my car started making a weird noise and pulled to the right. I had picked up a box blade of nowhere and my tire was flat as a pancake. Friends, my happiness was quite literally a zero out of 10. My anger and my anxiety and frustration, we were nine and 10 out of 10 on that. Yeah. And I remember telling my therapist and I said my window of tolerance was about as big as a sheet of paper. And that's a good room. Whitney had no extra capacity. I had no extra wiggle room. However, when I look back on it, it was one of those my husband had been struggling with that kidney stone for three or four days. So it had been multiple days in the works. So I was default parenting. I was doing all the homework, all the drop offs for kids, picking kids up, taking them to softball practicing games. I was doing all of that while maintaining my normal daily things. And then I just had to pick up that box blade and then, you know, literally put put around the corner to go get a new tire and drop $400. I didn't know what was going to spend when he was on well that week. Okay. What is window of tolerance? What is that? Because I love that analogy. I think of what it is. But I've actually seen it. Okay, go back to Don't Instagram and TikTok it. I've seen it. And I was like, what is window of tolerance? What is that? So our window of tolerance basically in a nutshell is saying it is our capability or our capacity to handle adversity or its challenges. However, you want to say that. So again, I'm working on like three or four days of my husband not feeling well, legitimately not feeling well. Like it's not the main flu and he's got the sniffles like we had already been to the ER once for this. And that was a whole that's a whole nother can of worms right there. So there was that. And then my daily responsibilities, that does impact our window of tolerance. But then I'm default everything at that point in time. And it's running around like a chicken with my head cut off. And then I just had to pick up that box blade. Yeah, I had to call the office and bless my first person of the day I said, I'm so sorry, I have to reschedule you because I literally can't drive to work right now. Because my tire was as flat as it could have been. Like I was driving on the hubcap. So not a good thing to do. And then I had to go drop $400 I didn't know was going to drop on a tire. Because I still have a box blade and you know, flatten my tire. So my window of tolerance, we could not tolerate much more. I was I was at capacity, if not over capacity. And I knew that then and I remember telling my therapist about I was like, if it could have gone wrong, it legitimately did go wrong. And I'm not really want to throw a pity party, but I was very realist about it. Yeah, I said, However, I knew that I had multiple external factors that were playing a role in my anger in my frustration in my anxieties. My happiness was kind of non existent if I'm being honest about it. However, that was not a pattern. It was not weekend week out zero out of 10 happiness 10 out of 10 anger 10 out of 10 anxiety that we was absolutely an anomaly. That was my outlier of Hey, life said, let me throw everything at you in about four or five days. And we're going to see how you tolerate that. Yeah, that is that window of tolerance of how much capacity or capability we have to tolerate adversities. Now, if they had been one thing, if they have been just the tire alone. Okay, yes, frustrating. Absolutely. That is frustrating. I get it. I don't think I would have been 10 out of 10 anxiety and anger for days. Yeah, it would have been a few hours, maybe the whole day, but it would not have been multiple days in a row. But also, it was that week, because the next week, guess what, my husband was recovered. I had a tire at that point, I could share parenting and household management responsibilities again. So anxiety and anger, we go down, we go down to probably a baseline of like a two, maybe a three given any day of what's going on, then my happiness goes back up to its baseline of probably a six or seven, given whatever the circumstances are, my window of tolerance, guess what, thought roomier that week. Yeah, I didn't have this pattern of high anxiety, high anger and no happiness. When we see that consistency in that pattern, that's where we would say we have a clinical indicator of something. Something's going on and right to the fact of sometimes I think this happens to all of us, which keeping track of what's going on, just making little notes because life comes at mom so quickly and so fast. And to your point, it can avalanche. So like you can go back and say, okay, yeah, well that Monday, I got this work email, this happened with my mother-in-law, this happened, the baby was sick, and something else happened, right? And then, oh my gosh, and this happened that day. And sometimes we tend to forget because so much happens and your throat, you're just like a jugular, you know, just fall that ball, that there is a lot and that can help get perspective of you too. Or on the opposite side where you're like, okay, well, nothing really external is happening. So both lenses are really, really important to kind of just take a bigger picture and go to your therapist and be like, okay, so yeah, this was my past month. And some people, it is unreal what's thrown at them in a month. And other, it's just like, okay, so that was a pretty routine month. Let's talk about, then you go into some other things, right? You go to your body kind of energy check of like, well, am I sleeping? No, my child is in a four month regression and I'm awake now every hour. Or how's your body feeling, right? Because we always say, you know, are you sick? Are you back on chronic illness? Are you noticing stress like in your shoulders, in your back? Are you having migraines? Are we having GI problems? Are we going to the bathroom frequently? Growing up acid reflux. Yes. Yes. It's saying what, you know, let's again, we're pulling back or we're trying to put together a whole picture. And you know, people are like, well, why doesn't matter about my body? Well, because body or health mental health affects our bodies, like it is all connected. So even though you may be score, you're not showing it your body screaming, hey, I'm experiencing rage, anxiety, PTSD, overwhelm. It's feeling like it's too much and crashing. I think sometimes it's like, okay, well, do you find yourself dupes crawling that night? Or do you find yourself wanting to meet up with a friend? Or does that like, or to your famous one, I always remember is like, do the things you normally do that bring you joy, do not want to do that. Right. That's the biggest thing too. And you know, changes in appetite of either we eat quite a bit for comfort, not because we're actually physically hungry, or are we not eating at all? And we just have no appetite. That's an indicator of depression. I would also say sleep changes. Like, are you sleeping all the time as a way of escaping? Are we not sleeping because we're so wired and our cortisol is through the roof type situation? Yeah. Yeah. I think boundaries, are we having boundaries? Are we having reset times? Are you taking, you know, are you rushing from work to pick up your kids to food to homework to down to bed? Are you ever giving yourself that little space? Like just look at your day, even just back after your day. Is it going a million miles an hour? Or are you setting healthy boundaries? Just again, that whole big picture. And I think another important thing is asking yourself, okay, how am I responding when things are getting hard? How did Whitney respond in that external event versus how does Whitney respond? Do I have to pull on myself? You do not. How does Whitney respond when her daughter doesn't want to put her shoes on? Right? Like, there's a two different responses. Right. But it's like, are you pushing through and you're feeling now that you're withdrawing, you're doom scrolling, you're snapping, you're crying, you find yourself in the pantry eating a bazillion reasy pieces. Like, what do you do? Because we all do something. Right. No reaction is reaction. Now, if anybody who listens to the podcast, drive by and saw Whitney when I had the flat tire, words were said. And that's what I'm trying to say. On the side of the road. They're going, that's my therapist. Yes, all the way to the right. Whitney was saying some words that were not child friendly. We'll say that much. And I told my therapist, I was like, Hey, I'm just really glad you did not see my very bad coping skills at that point, because it was language. There was some language. And everybody has a coping skill, you know, and healthy one. I'm not saying it. It can be healthy or unhealthy, but it's important to say in that moment or these situations, again, patterns, it's not the one off. It's the every day. How do you respond? Right. And what are your responses? Because sometimes we don't even know. And a lot of times our children, our spouses, our best friends, our coworkers, they can very clearly say, No, this is how you respond when this happens. Right. So get curious a little bit. We're doing a self check and we're not trying again to make ourselves worse, but we're getting curious because a small kind of recognition of a repeated behavior thought or reaction is where we then start like making progress. Right. Absolutely. Name it to tame it. If we don't even know what we're doing, we're never going to tame that. Right. Absolutely. Well, and here's the thing. Doing this insight, doing this introspection does take vulnerability. That's not a pleasant feeling, but just because something feels unpleasant doesn't mean it's bad or wrong or harmful. So keep that in mind. Also understand that when we are doing this, it is not to be self deprecating. No. It is not to be judgmental. It is so that we can improve upon ourselves. Yeah. And if you grew up, or this is your personality now, a feeling shame every time someone said, Now, Whitney, you responded wrong or why did you do that? Or you felt like a mistake was an opportunity to learn. It was more of a, like, you made a mistake. How dare you write all these things you could feel like, Oh, my nervous system feels really unsafe, even hearing things that I'm doing wrong or I can't do this. Or it's just never been safe for you to improve on things. Or it's never been safe for you to recognize patterns. Right. That can be really scary. Absolutely. Well, again, it's not enjoyable. We, you know, it's not enjoyable to have that insight. It's not enjoyable to open yourself up to it. It is necessary if we want progress and improvement. It is. And you know, we got to think about it. Progress and great achievements are not made without hardship of some type. Yeah. So whatever that is. And so reminding ourselves, hardship is necessary to achieve what I want. Hardship is not failure. And I'm not bad. I'm not a failure due to hardship. Yeah. Yeah. And there's not a moral assignment with that. No, no. Uh-uh. And then if you're even struggling with that, I think that things to know and talk to a therapist be like, Why do I feel like it's not okay for me to struggle? Why do I feel that I push through everything? And I never, and I feel guilty for giving myself a rest. Or I do see myself snapping. I do see myself withdrawing. I do see myself X, Y, Z. But I, again, you know, our brains are so interesting, right? They're, they're pliable, they're fixable. But the more we, you know, we will go to what's safe versus what's right. Absolutely. So if discomfort feels safe, right, you know, you're able to push through because you know, it's on the other side. But if it feels scary, you're going to try to improve and it's going to be like, Oh, no, no, no, I can't do this. And you retreat. So, but that is, again, this is not meant to be like, you have to fix yourself. There's something wrong. It's just like, it's like, use this new opportunity to get curious. What's your experiencing? You may come away and say, My gosh, I have 50,000 things on my plate. I really only need 100 of them. You know, or you may say, I am being anxious more. Or you know what, the grief is bothering me more than I ever realized. Or I miss friendship. I need to figure out how to get into it. You find we just moved. I need this or, you know what, I'm seeing something in my kid that I see myself and we need to figure this out. Absolutely. And it's okay that we do that. So we, with this message, really hope that you are just curious. And as always, if you are in your noticing things, a safe space is a metronomical health therapist or your therapist, or to work out some of these thoughts. And it doesn't mean you're going to have to go into intensive therapy. It doesn't mean any of that, but just means that you need someone who is trained to help you recognize patterns behavior. Absolutely. And things about yourself that you need a professional to tell you. Absolutely. Well, because here's the thing, we all have those blind spots. Yeah. A therapist is supposed to be objective. They are the person from the outside looking in. And they can give you that feedback. They can help spot those patterns if you can't spot them yourself. And again, it's okay if you can't spot them yourself because you're in the thick of it. You can't see the forest because you're in the trees. But your therapist can see the whole forest because they're on the outside looking in. They're removed from that. No, I love that. And sometimes in the word of the devil, we got one or four out of the woods yet. So I think we will be with our therapists. But Whitney, thank you for being vulnerable. As always, my friend, we're wishing you no tire issues in this season. No. Spring is for refreshment and rejuvenation. And that's what we're doing. All right, listeners, we will be back next week, but we hope that this has been insightful and we're encouraging you and we'll do our self checks just like you guys till next time. Returnal mental health is as important as physical health. The Previous Alliance podcast was created for and by moms dealing with post-partum depression and all its variables like anxiety, anger and even apathy. Hosted by CEO, founder Sarah Parkhurst and licensed clinical social worker Whitney Gay, each episode focused on specific issues relevant to pregnancy and postpartum. Join us and hear how other moms have overcome mental health challenges as well as access tips and suggestions on dealing with your own challenges as moms. You can also browse our podcast library and listen to previous episodes at any time. Please know you're not alone on this journey. We're here to help.
