4 Healing Reframes for Anxiety & Depression (pt 1) Artwork

Regulate & Rewire: An Anxiety & Depression Podcast

Millions of people struggle with anxiety & depression every single day. Regulate & Rewire is where Amanda, a nervous system focused and trauma-informed practitioner, teaches you the lessons she learned on her healing journey and the tangible research-based tools she uses with clients everyday to help them regulate their nervous system & rewire their mind – in hopes of helping you do the same. Each episode features specific takeaways for you to apply to your healing journey today. Website: www.riseaswe.com

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Regulate & Rewire: An Anxiety & Depression Podcast

4 Healing Reframes for Anxiety & Depression (pt 1)

July 23, 2024 • Amanda Armstrong • Episode 74

This is the first part of a two-part series that's all about healing reframes. I'll break down the first of four super helpful reframes, or mantras, that can totally change how you look at your healing journey.

In this episode, we’ll take a deeper look at how these reframes—originally shared in a parenting context—can be applied to all of us trying to live more regulated lives. We’ll explore how understanding your past can shine a light on your present behaviors and, most importantly, figure out what you can actually do about it with our "So now what?" approach. Trust me, you won't want to miss out on these insights and practical steps to start making some real changes.

Want me to talk about something specific on the podcast? Let me know HERE.

Here's the 3 takeaways:

This healing reframe of "how appropriate of me to [INSERT A GIVEN BEHAVIOR OR TENDENCY YOU HAVE THAT FEELS ANNOYING OR UNHELPFUL] Given that I [INSERT THE CONTEXT HERE]"
When you're ready, add to the end of that reframe statement "So now what?"
An invitation to join us in our Regulated Living Membership if you're looking for support in this work.

Looking for more personalized support?

Book a FREE consultation for RESTORE, our 1:1 anxiety & depression coaching program.
Join me inside RISE, a mental health membership and nervous system healing space.
Order my book, Healing Through the Vagus Nerve today!

Website: https://www.riseaswe.com/podcast

Email: amanda@riseaswe.com

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Welcome to regulate, and rewire and anxiety and depression podcast where we discuss the things I wish someone would have taught me earlier in my healing journey. I'm your host, Amanda Armstrong, and I'll be sharing my steps, my missteps, client experiences and tangible research based tools to help you regulate your nervous system, rewire your mind and reclaim your life. Thanks for being here. Now let's dive in.

After recording last week's episode, I turned off the recording, I reviewed my outline and I thought man, I could have done a full podcast episode on each of those regulated parenting reframes or mantras. And how they don't only apply to parenting but how they apply to each of us in the ways that we can approach healing anxiety and depression or more regulated living. And I think I even said something like that mid episode as I shared those. And that is what I want to do with this week and next week's episode. This week, I am going to spend the whole episode just reflecting on and unpacking, reframe, number one, and then next week, I'll cover the other three. But quick reminder, or if you missed last week, here's a refresher of these four reframes that I shared last week in the context of parenting that today I want to unpack for anybody and everyone in not just regulated parenting but regulated healing regulated living.

And these four reframes or mantras were number one, how developmentally appropriate of you to insert a particular behavior.

Number two was firm, but kind.

The third one I shared was, I am the anchor while they storm. And we talked about CO regulation, and it not being our job to fix their feelings, but instead to make space for them.

And number four was connection before correction.

And so moving in to this first one, this first reframe, or healing mantra, quote, how developmentally appropriate of you to. And last week in the context of parenting, I said, to insert the behavior that your kid was doing that make that made, you want to flush them down the toilet. And for the purposes of using this with yourself, we are going to ditch the words developmentally appropriate. And instead, add the words given that to the end. So what this could sound like instead, might be, and I'm going to share a number of examples in this framework, hoping that one of these hits you in the heart, one of these makes you go, oh.

So using this framework, this new framework, repurposing this for your relationship with you, using the framework of how appropriate that you that that that, given that, dot dot dot, how appropriate of you to shut down when receiving feedback, given that you grew up in a household where criticism was harsh and frequent, and you had to shut down then because you were a child who couldn't fight or flee.

How appropriate of you to struggle with perfectionism. Given that approval was only given when things were done, quote, just right by the standard of your parents.

Or how appropriate of you to feel exhausted all the time. Given that you're only sleeping six hours a night and rarely do things that feel fun?

How appropriate have you to feel irritated when your kids are angry or loud, given that you weren't allowed to be either of those things growing up?

How appropriate of you to constantly be hyper vigilant of your surroundings or other people's emotions, given that the neighborhood you grew up in was rarely safe?

How appropriate of you to feel anxious, given that your iron and vitamin D levels are so low.

How appropriate of you to be indecisive. Given that most things were decided for you growing up so you didn't really learn how to make decisions or learn how to trust your own judgment?

How appropriate of you to have emotional outbursts. Given that you've suppressed your emotions for so long.

Or here's a few that I am personally working through right now.

How appropriate of you to struggle with doing less, given that so much was expected of you and your mom got sick.

How appropriate of you to feel burdened by old grief given that you just had a failed embryo transfer and that feels just a little bit too similar to your past miscarriages.

How appropriate of you to feel triggered by your husband's avoidant tendencies towards big emotions, given that that was the pattern for you growing up as well.

And my hope is that as I read some of those, there was at least one if not two, or a few that resonated with you, that allowed your internal system, maybe some of your younger parts to go, Oh, yeah. That was hard. And what I want to add to this is that for a while, I struggled with statements like this, like, what good is it, I'm not going to like, just sit here and like blame my parents, it was what it was. And it took me a while in coaching and therapy and a lot of self work to realize that I could both acknowledge and express and feel so much gratitude that my parents did the best that they could, and see that there were needs that still when I met, and I can especially see this as a parent, now, I'm doing the best that I can, and my kids needs are going to go unmet. Sometimes, I am going to show up and parent for my own wounding for my own conditioning in a way that will be Miss attuned to my kids. It's okay, for me that they're going to need to untangle some of that in adulthood. My goal is just to be a healed enough person, a healed enough version of myself that if they ever do, come to me and talk to me about it, also, when you have these aha moments about maybe why you are the way you are, you don't ever have to tell that person, you don't ever have to be like, hey, parent, because you did this or because this need when I met I'm this way. But my hope is that I'm a healed enough version, that I don't need to have been right about how I did everything, that if they do choose to bring something up to me, I don't meet them with defensiveness, that instead I've done enough work to respond with, with something that's gentle for them and gentle for me. Maybe it's Oh, man, I'm sorry, that that felt that way for you. My intention as a parent didn't always match my impact. Thanks for sharing that with me.

So coming back to this reframe structure of how appropriate of you to insert a behavior that feels frustrating for you a cycle you feel stuck in? Can you come up with your given that this awareness and compassion is compassion, compassionate awareness, if you will, is always what will precede change, allowing these younger parts or these wounded parts of you to feel that validation, to feel seen, to feel heard, helps to soften your system to make a little space to shift to change to explore different, but this compassionate awareness alone isn't enough to make anything different in your life.

And so I want to come back to a few of these initial examples with a final add on of quote. "So now, what?" Using this first example of how appropriate of you to shut down when receiving feedback, given that you grew up in a household where criticism was harsh and frequent, and you had to shut down then because you were a child who couldn't fight or flee. So now, what, what is the work to know? Or do or be different? And with this example, you might ask yourself the questions or explore how can I bring more awareness to how I experience shutdown? How does it feel in my body? How does it show up behaviorally, building more awareness around this gives you an opportunity to catch that shift into that shutdown state a little earlier, and choose to either take steps to move out of shutdown, or take steps to support yourself in that state of shutdown. So now what, what tools do you have to navigate this experience? What support do you need to unpack and work with the parts of you who don't feel safe receiving feedback? How can you offer support and validation to those protective parts of you, so that they don't need to take over so often, so that you don't need to completely shut down or disconnect that you can start to see, oh, I'm an adult now. I'm safe. Now this person isn't my parent. This person actually loves and cares and wants the best for me. And maybe your parent wanted those things too. But it also just came with their own dysregulated story. What can you do to see that the person in front of you offering feedback is actually a really loving partner. And it's safe to receive that without shutting down or disconnecting.

So asking yourself so now what? Coming to this next example of how appropriate of you to struggle with perfectionism given that, approval was only given when things were done just right by the standard of your parents. So now what can you allow yourself to explore times recently when you didn't show up perfectly, and everything was okay. I love to look for countering evidence that maybe maybe I don't have to always show up that way. What if you experimented at work with sending an email before proofreading or rewriting it four times? What if you left the house a little messier than feels comfortable for you for a few days? Where you didn't perfectly clean before that friend came over? Did anyone die? Did you get yelled at? No. They're still your friend. Oh, interesting. Oh, interesting. Our nervous system learns and reshapes through experience. Through stretching into an uncomfortable zone, and realizing that we were safe there, we have to give our brain and our nervous system felt evidence of a new reality for it to feel safe enough to shift.

Another example of how appropriate of you to feel anxious given that your iron and vitamin D levels are so low. So now what? What lifestyle habits or supplementation are you doing to remedy this? What support resources accountability or strategy do you need? To make those needed habit changes your new baseline? Or how appropriate have you to feel irritated when your kids are angry or loud, given that you weren't allowed to be either of those things growing up? So now what? Maybe you're now what is that with a coach, therapist or a journal? You reflect on whether or not you let yourself ever feel angry or loud, even now as an adult? And I'm not saying angry and loud. That's a scary combination. But do you let yourself be angry? Or do you feel it? And then suppress and invalidate it? Do you let yourself be excited or playfully loud? Or do you often stay quieter than you feel an impulse to? We won't ever be able to let our kids be or feel more than we allow ourself, to be and feel.

Or the example of how appropriate of you to feel exhausted all the time, given that you're only sleeping six hours a night, and rarely do things that feel fun? I lived that life for a really long time. So now what? How are you going to make space in your life enough to get more sleep? Can you prioritize, play? I'm not even going to say as much as you prioritize productivity. Man, I, I've been working on this for the better part of eight years. And I don't know that I'm there even quite yet of prioritizing play as much as productivity, but I do prioritize play. You are not going to want to get out of bed in the morning, if you're under rested. And not living a life that you like. That's not depression. I mean, maybe it's depression, but not because of some chemical imbalance. Because you're physiologically exhausted. And your life feels draining and soul sucking, of course, you don't want to get out of bed. So now what, what can you do about that? What support do you need to do something about that? What guidance but accountability.

For the last example I'll share is this one that feels really alive in my life right now? How appropriate of me to feel triggered into this old grief given that I just had a failed embryo transfer that feels really similar to my miscarriages. So now what I've been asking myself and exploring how can I just make space for it in my life? How can I just make space for the grief? How and when it wants to needs to show up? Can I decrease the expectations I have on how productive I am over the next couple of weeks? While I carry this invisible load? Grief is a load can I plan for way way less? Can I give myself permission to just be or to play versus my old patterns of just staying too busy to feel it?

And for us at Rise As We the follow up of quote "So now what?" in our practice this is this question this exploration is a whole human whole life approach that is tangible and personalized. To many times I have gotten stuck talking in circles about these things without getting the guidance or support to actually make the change. I can't tell you how many times I have talked with a therapist about my mom getting a brain tumor when I was 14, and I'm the oldest child of four and the parentification and over and over and over and over, unpacking that compassionate awareness is not enough. At some point, we have to say, Okay, I have enough awareness, there's enough compassion. So now what? What guidance and support can I get to actually make change?

Our brain needs the context, that compassionate awareness, but our nervous system needs the felt experience of something different. So many of these things are wrapped up in the process of healing anxiety and depression, especially when you understand anxiety and depression, the way that I talk about it here on the podcast, not as these arbitrary diagnoses, but as natural physiological and psychological results of too much or too little of the things that we need as humans. The part of the framework that is quote, given that gives you the context that offers the self compassion needed to soften your system enough to make change, and then following it up with the quote. "So now what?" Gives you the personal agency and accountability to do something differently in your life, to get away from cycling round and round and round through old patterns that are keeping you stuck, and dysregulated.

Alright, here's today's three takeaways.

Number one, is this healing reframe of how appropriate of me to insert a given behavior or tendency you have that feels annoying or unhelpful? Given that I insert the context, I'll repeat that one more time, here's the framework How appropriate of me to insert behavior or tendency that feels annoying or unhelpful. Given that I insert the context that you have.

Takeaway number two, is that when you're ready, add to the end of that statement. So now what so now what and

Number three is an invitation, if you are looking for support in this work, we're here, I would be honored to be invited into your healing journey either through our one on one anxiety depression coaching program, or through my mental health, membership, and nervous system healing space.

I will put a link in the show notes for that, as well as another plug for our newest program that is currently in development. That'll involve working with one of our practitioners to run labs to help you work on and bring awareness to your underlying physiological problems that might be contributing to anxiety and depression, to the low iron, low vitamin D hormone imbalances, things that can fuel dysregulation under the surface, and have nothing to do with our childhood trauma. And if we can dial in our physiology, we can oftentimes create so much more capacity in our lives. And like I said, you'll find the links to learn more about each of those in the show notes. Thank you. Thank you, thank you for being here. And we're gonna touch on those other three healing reframes next week. So I'll see you there.

Thanks for listening to another episode of The regulate and rewire podcast. If you enjoyed what you heard today, please subscribe and leave a five star review to help us get these powerful tools out to even more people who need them. And if you yourself are looking for more personalized support and applying what you've learned today, consider joining me inside Rhys, my monthly mental health membership and nervous system healing space or apply for our one on one anxiety and depression coaching program restore. I've shared a link for more information to both in the show notes. Again, thanks so much for being here. And I'll see you next time.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai