The Push And Pull Of Discomfort

Do you know someone who is an addict and just can't seem to tolerate discomfort? Or are you that person who can't tolerate discomfort? 

Transcript

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It's time again for Doc Jock, your addiction lifeguard podcast. I am Dr. Jock DeBerker, a psychologist, licensed professional counselor, and addiction specialist. If you are suffering from addiction, misery, trauma, whatever it is, I'm here to help. If you're in search of help to try to get your life back together, join me here at Doc Jock, your addiction lifeguard, the addiction recovery podcast. I wanted to be real clear about what this podcast is intended for. It is intended for entertainment and informational purposes but not considered help. If you actually need real help and you're in need of help, Please seek that out. If you're in dire need of help, you can go to your nearest emergency room or you can check into a rehab center or call a counselor like me and talk about your problems and work through them. But don't rely on a podcast to be that form of help. It's not. It's just a podcast. It's for entertainment and information only. So let's keep it in that light. All right. Have a good time. Learn something and then get the real help that you need from a professional. Why do addicts use? Why do they have to use to... get out of their brains. Why is that? I get asked that question all the time. I get asked that question by people who are in recovery when they've gotten through the whole cycle of addiction. I get asked that by family members of people who are addicts and are confused by what they're seeing. I get asked that by people who are at the early stages of recovery and they just can't figure out why they can't stop and it doesn't make any sense to them. I get asked by people that question all the time. Literally, all the time. It's almost a daily event. And the answer that I give is always the same. It's because that person is uncomfortable. And there's a series of videos that I ask people to watch sometimes. It's called The Soft White Underbelly. And it's real people being interviewed for 30 minutes, 40 minutes about their tragic lives. And the videos, sometimes they're in black and white, sometimes they're in color. And the ones that are the interviews, and they're on YouTube, by the way, so it's called the soft white underbelly. And they're interviews of just a person. They're just being interviewed about their life. And it could be a prostitute. It could be a drug addict. It could be somebody who's a drug dealer. This guy will literally pull people off the street asked them if they want to just come in and can be interviewed about their lives. And he sits them in a chair, in a stool, in a studio, and they just tell their lives. And it's really interesting when you watch. And they're pretty compelling stories. I mean, it's just... And a lot of times you can tell they're just very uncomfortable. A lot of times they just don't want to be participating in this interview. They don't... It's just feeling very uncomfortable. And so they're asked these questions about, you know, how did you get here? What happened to you? How do you live now? And it's really interesting because I can see that, you know, when they started off, you can tell that like there was always this traumatic experience. experiences that they had use of their childhoods if they talk about their childhoods they'll say it was really bad and they'll go into detail about it but what's really interesting is that the amount of trauma that these people have experienced in their lives is always it's just off the scales and so they're and they got derailed right and then one thing led to another and it led to another tragedy upon tragedy homelessness getting assaulted uh having to you know you have no money so you end up prostituting yourself or you know seeing stealing or whatever the case is. But it's always just incredible amount of discomfort and tragedy and horror that they're describing. And that's what comes in to me when I'm treating people. The person that comes in, they always have these just horrific stories of just tragedy. And it's heartbreaking many times, the stories that they tell. And it's interesting because they tell them with a level of dissociation, the disconnect, in order to understand that what they're telling is perhaps not their story. They have to get into that place in their head where they're talking about... it's almost like they're talking about somebody else right i mean there's a level of dissociation that has to occur in order for them to be able to survive in that that uh that world that they were in and it's like it's turned it's like it was somebody else and it's at first i thought it was kind of an apathetic approach that they were feeling this apathy this lack of feeling uh about their own tragedy but then i realized that's purposeful right they are trying very hard It's hard not to feel the pain that has been inflicted upon them and the only way they can do that is to describe it as if it's somebody else. I've heard the same thing from women who have been in my office who are They're in the porn industry, and they talk about the things that they're doing for money, and they connect to themselves when they're telling the story. Yes, this is what happens, but they give the person that's doing the act as somebody else. That's a different person. They don't use these like a stage name, right? Well, that stage name takes on a persona, and it's not them. That's how they approach it. Like, it's not me. It's Cherry Delight or whoever, whatever their name is they've given themselves when they're engaging in these acts. And it's a way of dissociating. It's a coping skill that we learn as children, the little fantasy world. Unfortunately, as adults... It becomes problematic because living in a fantasy world and having a fantasy identity when you are a full-grown adult and supposed to be functioning in society is not helpful at all. It makes you dysfunctional. But the push and pull of that dissociation, the push and pull of discomfort is what people who have addiction engage in. And so if you are a loved one and you're watching somebody that's engaging in nonsensical use of drugs and alcohol and it doesn't make any sense to you, it's like, why don't you just stop? Well, they can't, right? They're trying to not feel discomfort. And that's the best way they've come up with. So whatever it is, huffing paint, shooting up, drinking... pornography, gambling, shopping, you know, just you go through the whole list of addictive things that you do. But what you're doing is you're trying to not feel discomfort. So to me, what's kind of an interesting thing is trying to teach people how to sit with their discomfort. It's very difficult for them to do that. Many times the the trauma that they've experienced as you know, as you as you You probably, if you're listening to this, you probably have that. It's so overwhelming, right? It's not just a, yeah, I flunked out of school. You know, it's my... nephew or or not nephew probably but like uncle was molesting me or my aunt was was beating me or my mom put cigarettes out on my on my arm and used to punch me and just i mean these are just really severe things now you may have not suffered that level of trauma that was severe like that but one person's trauma is another person's tolerable so you you may not have been affected by a heavy amount of trauma seemingly but it doesn't mean it wasn't traumatic to you uh my my uh family i had trauma going on there was a lot of verbal and emotional abuse that was heaped on me by my father my mother was physically beating my sister and that was unknown to me i never ever saw it And my sister could describe in graphic detail the things of the beatings, slapping. She even broke my sister's collarbone at one point when she was three. And so it's a terrible thing when you suffer in emotional abuse, but it leaves no scars. Verbal abuse, it leaves no scars. Physical abuse sometimes can leave no scars. Getting punched or kicked may not leave a bruise, but it definitely is inflicting pain. So it doesn't have to be something that's completely visible. So you feel uncomfortable because you were traumatized. Combat vets get traumatized. People who are first responders get exposure trauma or direct trauma through dealing with trauma. victims of car accidents and whatever. So it just takes all kinds of different forms. So you feel uncomfortable, and now you can't offload that discomfort. Many times people can't really talk about it. They're not in a place where they can. Police, first responders, EMS people, they talk to themselves. They talk amongst themselves, but they don't talk to the outside world. So then you have... The red wall or the blue wall, the wall of protection around a police officer that makes it impossible for him to or her to talk to the general public. And then they become the general public becomes unrelatable. And unfortunately, with police officers, there's also a high degree of suspicion that people have in society of them and they treat them differently. So it's like as soon as you put on a uniform, you get treated differently, and that separates you from the regular general population, which is unfortunate because police officers are usually very good, kind people. They just are separated from society through their own doing and through society's doing as well. So when you're feeling uncomfortable, you want to get high, you want to get drunk, you want to offload that feeling, but you can't. So what you do is you try to alter it. So the answer of why are people using it is because they're uncomfortable. Why can't they do something else? Because other things they tried didn't work. That's what it comes down to. Now, if you have a situation where you have a drug of choice going into it and you get traumatized, then you're just going to start overusing that drug of choice. But many times it's the person gets exposed to the drug of choice and now you've instantly got an addict. And off to the races you go. But the push and pull of trauma, or discomfort rather, the push and pull of discomfort is interesting because there are times when you get through your day as an addict and you can tolerate the discomfort. Maybe it's because there's so much noise going on around you. So you're at work or you're at school or you're around a lot of people, friends, family, whatever. And there's a lot of commotion. There's a lot of talking. There's a lot of stimulus going on around you. It tends to drown out that low-level hum in the background of that discomfort. So you get distracted from it because there's so much going on around you. I notice that people, when they get high, get drunk, they tend to isolate. That was my thing, right? Isolate and then get drunk. What's the isolation about? And the isolation is where the push comes. So you isolate because you're starting to feel uncomfortable, but you don't want to be around people because you don't want to have to explain anything. So then you tend to isolate even more. And that's when you start using. So people who are addicts, they do their best thing. usage when they're by themselves that's when they're like they turn into the professionals and that's that's the time that you um are very definitely going to be actively engaged in your addiction at a much higher level right i mean you're going to be using more you're going to drink more you're going to shoot up more you just want more and what happens in your head is you start really focusing on those things that are uncomfortable So I'm always very concerned when I hear that somebody is isolating frequently and they're an addict. To me, that's like, they're probably using a lot. And it's for extended periods of time. So somebody who doesn't have a job or somebody who's not going to school, they're living by themselves. They're just kind of isolating. In that way, there's too much time going on. What happens when you're trying to get through that, what do we do? Like we put you in a rehab. And for some, it seems like, oh, I'm being imprisoned. When in fact, you're not actually being imprisoned. What's happening is we're putting you in with other people. And people will come into rehab and they're very uncomfortable because they're around people they don't know. And they can't be by themselves a whole lot. It's very limited, the time that you can be by yourselves. And they get checked on all the time. That's the other thing. There's room checks, right? So in the middle of the night, you're going to come in and check on you and see if you're doing okay. And when you're in the process of going through rehab, what are we doing? We're doing groups. We're doing process groups. We're doing AA groups or NA groups. We're doing... yoga we're doing meditation groups everything's a group group group group and that's because we're trying to teach people to um to not get in their own heads too much right there's a lot of sharing so we'll sit in a group and ask to participate uh and be called on to participate that's the other thing is like it's a little uncomfortable because it's not like aa where you can just sit there the whole time and not say anything and get up and leave at the end but In a process group, in rehab, you don't do that. You actually get asked to speak. You're told to speak, right? What's on your mind. So being in a group is helpful because it changes the isolation thing. But it doesn't change the discomfort. What does change the discomfort? What is the thing that breaks through the discomfort and makes it so that you can tolerate comfortable? That's the pull. And the pull is the thing that pulls you out of discomfort. Or in full recovery, we just learn to be able to tolerate discomfort, which is not a skill set that addicts have. So being able to tolerate uncomfortable, how do you get there? I have people practice experiencing it in smaller portions. The feeling of discomfort can be so overwhelming. First, it's kind of like one of those white noise machines that's in the background that you're still able to talk over it. And then as the discomfort gets more intense, that white noise gets so loud that it's like you're in a room and there's a jet going on. There's a jet airplane starting up right next to you and you can't talk. It's just so overwhelming. You can't tolerate it. So I have them practice... Being in discomfort, being uncomfortable in a short duration, so maybe five minutes or eight minutes or ten minutes, where you can sit and you can actually feel your feelings, that's what we call processing. Processing is just feeling your feelings. That's another term for feeling your feelings. So you process it. Now, sometimes I'll have them come into my office and we will talk about the feeling that they're having like what is it you're uncomfortable can you tell me why what's going on how's this how are you experiencing this what's happening and they talk about it now the point is not to make them feel worse I'm not going to get all Dr. Phil on them and have them talk about their problems and cut to the commercial and there's no resolution to anything it's no describe it to me like what's happening because I want them to be present with it and I'm checking to make sure that they're you know they're having an appropriate response If you're describing it in that weird, disconnected, disinterested third-party description of what's happening, that's you dissociating. If you can't get through the description, that's too overwhelming. So you either go... You're underwhelmed or you're overwhelmed. There's a happy medium between them. It's just tell me the story. Tell me what's happening. Tell me what you're thinking about. And then I let them do that for five minutes. Even if they just give me like two sentences. But I'll give them five minutes in that discomfort. And then we will change the subject. We'll move away from it. Then I'll ask them... you know, 10 minutes later, like, so when you were feeling uncomfortable, how are you feeling now? Are you feeling still uncomfortable with what we, you know, you were describing or is it less? And if it's less, that's great. That's not the point to get them to feeling at last, but it's, I want to know that they've backed off from it a bit. So they've been able to experience feeling uncomfortable in the presence of another person and then come back from that discomfort and in the presence of another person and get nothing from that person. In other words, I'm not rejecting what they're doing. I'm not telling them they shouldn't be feeling that way. I'm not telling them that they should feel a different way. I'm not trying to distract them when they're in that discomfort. I'm just letting them experience discomfort. And they get through it, right? They get through the discomfort and they realize that Okay, I guess I can describe it. It's okay on the other side. And they didn't use. And they're back. It's like they're there, they're uncomfortable, and then they're back. If you can practice that slowly over time, like in these small durations, the discomfort becomes less impactful on you. And that is... The pull, right? I'm pulling away from the discomfort. I'm pushing into it, then I'm pulling away from it. Being able to tolerate discomfort is a skill. I think it's a skill that you practice. At least that's my opinion. Now, you may have a different opinion about it, but that's my opinion. The skill of the push and pull of discomfort is learning how to embrace the discomfort and tolerate it. There are things in the medical community when we're describing, when we're doing a nurse diagnosis, for example, a nursing, somebody who's a nurse will ask questions about, you know, are you washing your face? Are you showering? Are your clothes clean? Did you clean your clothes? Do you brush your teeth? Are you eating regularly? These are called the activities of daily living, the ADLs. When somebody is not engaging in their ADLs, we know there's an issue. There's something going on. Now, we don't know what it is, but it's an indicator of something. So we've diagnosed that the person is not engaging in their ADLs, and then we have to look at causes. That's like the definition of addiction right there. It's like there are no ADLs going on. They kind of fall away. And again, it's the discomfort thing. So what I'm looking for are, are you able to engage in the ADLs? And then are the everyday misery, is that something you can tolerate? Everyday misery is you go out to get in your car to go to work and you got a flat tire. Or... You were planning on having dinner with some friends and you got sick and you can't go. Or you wanted to go to the movies and you got some friends and you went to the movies and they were sold out and you couldn't go. That's called everyday misery. Tolerance for everyday misery goes down exponentially if you are prone to intolerance of discomfort in general. And addicts... That would be the excuse for the addict to say, hey, well, we couldn't do that, so let's go drink. Because I really was looking forward to the movie and I can't do it. And I can't say that and I don't know how to process that. So everyday misery tolerance goes down to practicing being able to withstand uncomfortable in short durations and progressively over time, weeks, weeks. months you learn how to tolerate discomfort more and more and that is what recovery is about if you have a horribly traumatic childhood you feel horrible in relationships and you have all those relational dysfunctions and personal habits that are coping mechanisms all that stuff So when you have those and they're fully present in your life and taking over, you're probably going to end up engaging in your drug of choice. If you can work through those things through a therapeutic process with a therapist and you can relearn how to tolerate discomfort and work through the traumas that you experience through EMDR or... visualization techniques or attachment theory approach to treating how you know engaging relationships and change whatever whatever it is whatever the therapeutic process you use if you can do that engage in a therapeutic process with with a licensed trained therapist who specializes in that kind of work and you work on the um A little bit of exposure therapy, I suppose. You're exposing yourself to some discomfort and coming out on the other side feeling okay. You're pushing into it, then you're pulling away from it. And you learn how to do that. You will start... your path of recovery. I'm always very, very concerned about my clients who just cannot tolerate discomfort and they will not try to change that. I'm very concerned for them because I know that it's going to be very difficult for them to stop using a coping mechanism or even trying to find a replacement coping mechanism because they're going to go to what works. That's what they think. This works. It never works as good as it did the first time, obviously, but But it works, sort of. And so I'm very concerned about them until they start exposing what's making them uncomfortable. What is it that's making you so uncomfortable? What happened to you? And it's the what happened to you that will lead you to the path of recovery. So, fearlessly and bravely, with courage and... Certainty, moving into a therapeutic process for recovery is not about not using your drug of choice. It's about healing from the traumas that you have and learning how to tolerate discomfort in a much healthier fashion. So what I want you to do is I want you to work on that and try to see if you can get into the presence of somebody else and preferably a therapist and practice that. working on feeling comfortable when you're uncomfortable. I hope you enjoyed this episode of Doc Shock, Your Addiction Lifeguard. I am Dr. Jacques Debrucker. Doc Shock, Your Addiction Lifeguard on the beach of potential misery, but I'm here to help rescue you from all that misery. Listen, if you're having problems with addiction and addiction-related stuff, go get help. Don't risk your life to save your addiction. That's insanity. So get the help. Go to rehab. Get a therapist. Go to the rooms and Go to AA or NA or any of the A's and get some help. But don't destroy yourself. And if you like this episode of Doc Shock, your addiction lifeguard, subscribe, like, and tell a friend. You can also comment. But until next time, this is Doc Shock, your addiction lifeguard, saying see ya.