A Therapist Takes Her Own Advice

Rethinking and Reworking A Therapist Takes Her Own Advice

• Rebekah Shackney • Episode 40

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Episode Summary:
When standard treatments for depression stopped working, I found myself in uncharted territory—searching for healing in unexpected places. This episode marks the relaunch of A Therapist Takes Her Own Advice—and the beginning of a deeply personal journey through soul sickness, alternative medicine, holotropic breathwork, and the longing for true community.

Join me as I share what led to the podcast's rebrand, how I began exploring alternative healing modalities, and why this space now exists as a lifeline for anyone navigating profound inner work.

What You’ll Hear in This Episode:

  • Why I started this podcast—and why I kept the name
  • My experience with depression, despite “doing everything right”
  • The surprising moment my doctor called it soul sickness
  • My first retreat at Omega and what it unlocked
  • Starting psychedelic-assisted therapy—and tapering off antidepressants
  • The intensity (and relief) of medicine journeys and somatic release
  • How DBT skills helped me survive the chaos
  • Discovering community through holotropic breathwork
  • Meeting Katy—and how soul friendships can change everything
  • Why this podcast is now a resource for integration, community, and support

This is a space for the brave—those walking through the fire of healing, and those curious about what happens when traditional care falls short. You are not alone.

Resources & Mentions:

Next Episode Preview:
Don’t miss our next conversation with a local mom who found healing through shamanic work out now, plus two new tools in the next few weeks: a bilateral stimulation to support sleep and a meditation to help navigate difficult relationships.

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Welcome to a therapist takes her own advice please like and subscribe you can contact me on Instagram @atherapisttakesherownadvice or at rebekahshackney.com

 

I’ve spent my life helping people through their emotional struggles while also looking for my own answers. Now I’m looking beyond traditional methods. Welcome back to a therapist takes her own advice.

 

 

When I first started this podcast, A Therapist Takes Her Own Advice, my goal was to consciously practice the skills I teach others. But what do you do when the standard of care—the things you’ve been trained to recommend—just aren’t working?

Over the last year and a half, I’ve been on a quest to answer that question. It’s taken me down unexpected paths, exploring new healing modalities and confronting my own struggles. I don’t have all the answers. In fact, I’m still at the beginning of this process. But I feel compelled to share what I’ve been learning with you.

My producer (and husband) and I decided not just to restart the podcast but to rebrand it. Consultants advised us to change the name, and for months, I was stuck trying to figure out what to call this new iteration. Everything I considered was either too generic or too specific. Ultimately, we decided to keep the name, A Therapist Takes Her Own Advice.

I love this name. To be clear, it doesn’t imply that I have all the answers. It means that when I ask others to dig deep, to walk through the fire of their pain, I’m willing to do the same. I’m committed to walking this path alongside you, sharing what I’ve learned in the hopes of easing your way.


When I started this journey, about a year and a half ago, I was really struggling with depression. It was frustrating because, as I said, I was following all the standard treatment recommendations…seeing a therapist, taking an antidepressant, and exercising—at least 30 minutes of cardio most days. I was also eating well and meditating regularly. Still, I’d wake up each morning already planning when I could go back to sleep. Joy felt distant, and sleep became my escape.

This wasn’t because I had a bad life. I had a beautiful family with three amazing sons and a loving, supportive husband. I had a thriving therapy practice, a lovely home, and good friends. Yet, staying awake during the day was a struggle—sometimes even physically painful. Was I able to function yes. Was I able to be a competent wife, mother, therapist? Yes. Was I happy? No. 

My doctor thought I might have narcolepsy, so he prescribed stimulants. They worked great! I felt so good while I was on them, but when they wore off, the heavy fatigue and malaise came rushing back. I remember having an appointment with him after taking a stimulant. I appeared happy and energetic while reporting how miserable I was. I had taken the medication that day because being awake was causing me physical pain. For me the stimulants were a band-aid, helping me get through the day but, I knew that stimulants become less effective over time.  

Then my doctor suggested something that surprised me. He said, “I don’t think this is psychological or physiological. I think this is a soul sickness.” He recommended that I go on a retreat.

After much hemming and hawing and mom guilt about leaving my children, I finally went to the Omega Institute in Rhinebeck, NY, and took part in a Relax and Write workshop. It was fantastic. The workshop involved deep meditation designed to access the subconscious mind, followed by writing from that space. It was incredibly therapeutic, giving me access to a deeper state of mind. After meditating and writing the participants share their work.  I was amazed by how willingly a group of strangers shared very intimate vulnerable stories about their lives. We were laughing and crying together like the closest of friends. By the end of the weekend, we felt connected in a way I haven’t experienced in a long time. It felt as through we’d be friends forever, but as often happens when we returned to real lives living hours away the connection, we hoped for faded away. I loved the experience. However, when I returned home, so did the malaise and my overwhelming need for sleep. That’s when my doctor suggested something completely different: a medication healing journey. He gave me the name of a practitioner who facilitated these psychedelic medication journeys, and I made an appointment.


I’ve never been a person who used recreational drugs so taking drugs therapeutically felt way outside of my comfort zone, but I didn’t feel like I had a choice. I needed relief. I met with the practitioner. And they explained the process. You take the medication, lay on a couch with a mask on and the medicine will do what it will. This sounded terrifying and thrilling. The therapist told me they struggled with depression as a well. IN fact, they had been in a similarly dark place a few years before me, and after several medicine journey’s they’re doing much better. I was suffering so much, and I desperately wanted relief…real lasting relief. So, after much discussion I decided to start the treatment. 

But, before I could begin the work, I needed to go off my anti-depressant. What? I need my anti-depressants. I’d been on anti-depressants since college. How would I manage without them? Then I took a step back and honestly asked myself, are the anti-depressants working for me now? The truth is, they weren’t. I was suffering tremendously, and I needed relief. 

Just to be clear that wasn’t always the case. When I had my first episode of depression in college Prozac gave me my life back. For years after that, antidepressants worked wonders for me. I am in no way anti-medication.  Anti-depressants save and enhance the lives of millions of people. Mine included. And, at some point they were no longer working for me. I didn’t make the decision to stop the antidepressants lightly. I thought long and hard, but in the end, it seemed like the best decision for me. 

 

With the help of my doctor, I very slowly started tapering off the medication. 

When the medication was cut in half something miraculous happened…I no longer felt that powerful need to nap during the day anymore. This told me clearly that the anti-depressant was linked to my severe exhaustion. The taper was grueling.  There were the withdrawal symptoms, mood swings, headaches, nausea, body aches, etc. And now I didn’t have sleep to escape the unpleasantness. Still, the discomfort felt worth it if the medication journeys offered deep relief. 

In Oct 2023 I did my first journey. I was on a couch with a mask on bouncing from event to event in my past talking about old pain and hurt that I didn’t know still bothered me. I had talked about them so much in therapy, but it seems the emotion connected to the events were still in my body.

In the days following it was clear that I’d opened something, and emotion was still pouring out. Anger, anxiety, fear. My mind and body were processing a lot. Most mornings I was waking with what I dubbed “the horrors.” It was a pervasive sense of existential dread and fear. Yoga, meditation, cardio and long car rides with David singing along to Yacht Rock gave me some relief, but it was very hard to face daily. 

 

During this time, I relied heavily on the Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) skills I teach my clients. As we’ve discussed on this podcast in the past, DBT is a model of therapy that helps people struggling with severe anxiety and depression learn to tolerate distress and manage emotional pain. My training helped me ride the waves of my emotions, distract when I needed to and communicate my need for support or time alone when necessary. I don’t know how I could have faced these journeys without DBT. During this time, I developed a deeper level of empathy and understanding for my clients struggles, and it made me a more effective therapist. 

Over the next several months I continued to do the journeys monthly. My journeys became more body based. My muscles would vibrate allowing trapped emotions to be released causing me to purge (dry heave, sweat, vomit, cry). This was very powerful work and very painful. The work felt endless for a while, like no matter how powerful the journey there was still so much work to be done. I still wasn’t feeling the kind of deep contentment I hoped for, but I also knew deep down I was on the right path. This kind of deep healing is not for the faint of hard, its long, arduous and messy. But I know there is a light at the end of the tunnel. 

My body-based journeys seemed to be all about somatic release. As many of us do, I suppressed a great deal of emotional stress over the years. The unexpressed emotions were trapped in my body and now they were being released. My long-time massage therapist noticed that places in my body that felt congested/stuck for years were now starting to release. 

By January I was longing for community to connect with for support to share experiences etc. But I couldn’t find what I was looking for because this work was so underground. I started doing hot yoga which helped. I found a chakra cleaning video that gave me some momentary relief when emotions felt stuck in my body. I started working with a reiki shaman who was also helpful. But I still yearned for community.  

I finally found community when I shifted from solo healing to holotropic breathwork. This fascinating practice involves lying on a mat, blindfolded, in a room where others are doing the same. Each person has a sitter—a dedicated supporter who stays beside them throughout the process. By breathing rapidly and deeply, you enter an expanded state of awareness where anything can surface—from reliving your birth to gaining profound insights about your life’s path. For me, the experience remained deeply physical, just as powerful as my work with medicine. But I was still in the thick of it, working hard to release so much, with even more ahead of me. One guide told me, "You’ve only been doing this for a year—you’re a one-year-old." And that’s exactly how it felt. Emotionally, I was just beginning to walk.

Life really shifted for me in June, during my second holotropic breathwork journey at Kripalu. That’s where I reconnected with Pamala—someone I’d journeyed with before—and where I also met Katy.

On the first night, we were in the opening circle, introducing ourselves. Katy described her experiences with individual journeys, and it sounded so familiar.

Later, we discovered that not only did we live just 20 minutes apart—we were also seeing the same therapist for journey work. And all of this came to light two hours from home, at a retreat. We’d both asked our therapist to connect us with others doing this work, but it never happened. It seems clear to me now: we were meant to meet. When the therapist couldn’t make the connection, the universe stepped in.

From the moment we connected, it felt like we’d always known each other. She sees me in a way few people do, and I see her just as clearly. It’s exactly the kind of support we’d both been missing.

when you’re doing deep healing, especially through alternative paths, it can be incredibly isolating. Everyone needs someone they can talk to without fear of judgment. For me, that’s Katy. She’s a true soul sister.

Staying close to her—and the breathwork community—has kept me grounded. Hearing from those further along on their journey gives me hope that healing is possible.

While friends and family can offer love and support, they often can’t fully understand what you’re going through. My husband David is incredibly supportive and completely on board with whatever I need. But even he admits he doesn’t always know how to help.


This is where my journey meets this podcast.

There’s a profound lack of support for people doing this kind of deep healing. It’s long. It’s hard. And it can leave you feeling raw and disoriented. After a powerful journey—whether it’s through breathwork, medicine, or any other deep inner work—you don’t just walk back into your life unchanged. You need help navigating the aftermath.

I kept hearing about the importance of “integration,” but honestly, it often felt like a vague to-do list, not a real path toward healing. What I needed—and what I believe many of us need—is community, tangible skills, and ways to tolerate and work with the pain that gets unearthed along the way.

That’s what I want this podcast to be: a supportive space for those brave enough to step into the fire of deep healing.

If you’re facing your past, or thinking about it, or even just curious—you are welcome here.

In this space, you’ll find personal stories, interviews with healers, meditations, and practical tools for navigating what arises in your healing journey. My hope is that by sharing my experiences—and the wisdom of others—you’ll feel less alone, more grounded, and more empowered.

My dream is to share this widely—to support people across the world in healing old wounds. Because when pain goes unhealed, it doesn’t just disappear. It gets projected outward—as conspiracy, hatred, jealousy, or narcissism—or it gets suppressed in the body, showing up as disease, depression, or anxiety.

But when we heal… we soften. We come home to ourselves.

My goal is to help you cultivate a life rooted in love, curiosity, empathy, and acceptance. To fully experience your humanity—so you can step into the life you were meant to live.

In the next episode, I’ll be speaking with a local mom whose life was transformed after working with a shaman. I’ll also guide you through a bilateral stimulation to support sleep, and offer a meditation designed to help you improve your interactions with difficult people in your life.

Thank you for joining me on this path. I’m so glad you’re here.

Thanks for listening. If you found this helpful, please follow the show, leave a review, or share it with someone who might need it. You never know who’s quietly searching for support.

And remember you’re not alone. Healing is hard, but it’s possible—and you don’t have to do it in the dark.

You can find me on Instagram @atherapisttakesherownadvice or visit the website rebekahshackney.com to sign up for updates, meditations, and upcoming offerings.

Be well.