Go Ask Sawyer
Go Ask Sawyer
Couch Conversations with Jamie: Finding Peace Beyond Fixing Others
Jamie shares her healing journey from anxiety, stress, guilt, and shame, revealing how therapy helped her recognize these feelings stemmed from childhood patterns rather than personal failings.
• Growing up in a household with alcoholism where Jamie took on the caretaker role
• Learning to separate her emotions from others' through EMDR therapy
• Understanding that her value isn't tied to fixing others or making them happy
• Creating space in relationships by asking "do you want advice or just listening?"
• Facing the fear of losing relationships when stepping back from the fixer role
• Using tools like writing thoughts out and sharing vulnerably with trusted people
• Recognizing healing as an ongoing process of identifying patterns and choosing new responses
Stay cute, stay loud, maybe check out therapy, and dance even when everyone is watching.
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Hey, good morning, happy Sunday, welcome back to Go Ask Sawyer, season 5, in which I am listening to you. As I've said before, I have talked about my story so many times, but at the end of the day, the best way we learn is from each other and through each other's stories. So today I'm welcoming on Jamie Hello, jamie, hey, and I have asked her to think about again something in her life that she has had to heal from, and everyone that has come on my podcast has talked about different types of ships with themselves, with family, with loved ones, with exes, even jobs. So I'm welcoming Jamie on today to talk about whatever she felt like she is healing from or has healed from. I'm going to ask her some questions and I just again welcome. Thank you for coming on. I want to hear your story. Thank you for having me on. Oh, okay, this is going to be musical. This is what happens when I get nervous I'm not ready.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:This is going to be fun. It will be Okay. Jamie, what is something you have either healed from or you are still working in the process?
Speaker 2:I think I'm constantly working on this, but I did start this journey a couple years ago when I realized I was anxious and stressed and feeling guilt and shame. But at the time I didn't know what those things were. I just knew that there was something quote unquote wrong with me.
Speaker 1:Can I ask a quick question? Yes, were there certain moments in your life when you were feeling anxious, stressed, ashamed, or were you just noticing these feelings coming up more often than they had?
Speaker 2:I was noticing them because it was coming out in my relationships, like my marriage or at work, or with friends or with family. It was kind of this same reoccurring body feeling and also people telling me why do you always feel guilty for this or why are you always doing this? And I thought there was something wrong with me. I needed to go to therapy, I needed to figure out how to fix me, because something had to be wrong with me, that things weren't going right. So that's really where my journey started and what I thought I was healing.
Speaker 1:I love that and I think that's a very woman response and I hate to put us on a box because we won't go there, but I do think automatically when people are asking us, we think something must be wrong, I must fix myself, and I think it's so important to understand that there is nothing wrong with us, but we just don't understand where we're coming from. So it's not about fixing, it's about understanding and seeing and realizing and being and like holding ourselves yes. So first question I have for you is before we get into the event or person or whatever it is, what does healing look like for you? Like how has it felt? What does it look like For me?
Speaker 2:healing has been a journey. It's been a practice. It's been understanding, identifying emotions that I'm having and figuring out what to do with them, which is something I work on every day. I don't think there's I'm a healed, this is a I'm, and I don't even know if healing is really the right word. It's how do I rewire my thought process? How do I restructure how I handle my emotions? How do I rewire my thought process? How do I restructure how I handle my emotions? How do I identify them and then how do I work through them in a healthy way?
Speaker 1:I really love that, like practicing the pause when I feel this, when this emotion is coming up. It's not about like, oh, we gotta fix it, but like, wait, what is this telling me that is so scary? I don't know about you, but like it is scary to sit in that, whatever that emotion is, without being like, oh, I quickly need to push this down, I need to fix it, I need to move forward, I need to put on this brave face and instead thinking like I'm going to sit with this for a second.
Speaker 2:Yes, I think the biggest part in that for me was identifying and being able to separate my emotions from those around me, because something that I worked through a couple years ago in therapy, especially doing EMDR, is that my emotions are different than the person's emotion across from me. I don't have to absorb theirs. I get to have separate emotions and I get to have separate feelings and separate experiences and I didn't realize that almost my entire life, that I didn't do that, I didn't validate that for myself.
Speaker 1:I didn't validate that for myself, that is if I remember. I'd love to come back to that. Okay, but could you talk about what you have currently been healing, working on, from whether it's a person, situation, whatever that is?
Speaker 2:Sure. So, like I said before, I thought I was going to fix me, which obviously therapy is about me if I'm going to therapy but to dig into what I need to do to fix myself. But really, what we ended up working through is figuring out when did I first start having these feelings, what moment, what scenario happened so that, through the EMDR, we were able to put me back in that place to identify what was really happening. And I think that was the biggest moment for me to realize that there's nothing to fix about me. I'm not a bad person. I'm not like. I don't need to feel all this guilt.
Speaker 2:It helped me realize that there were more players at the table in scenarios than just me controlling everything that needed to happen. For example, in childhood, growing up in the family, I had very loving parents, always showing us love, but they didn't always have the capacity to understand that, outside of what they were going through, their children were going through other things and I had resentment, I had anger, I had disappointment. Once I started realizing that those things caused trauma. I guess in me I didn't have a traumatic childhood where I was abused or something crazy happened. My parents loved me. It wasn't that it was more of what they were doing, instilled things in me that I don't think they realized, nor did I realize that that's where those things came from. So it gave me the ability to see it from a different lens and give them grace, give myself grace and understand that my parents and the family you know, my family around me really were just doing the best, that they had the tools to do the best with. You know, if that makes sense, that makes sense.
Speaker 1:That makes sense. So you were feeling stress and anxiety. How did that connect back to, we'll just say, childhood, like in the EMDR, which, I'm so sorry, fans and the people? I forgot what that stands for. Do you remember what it stands for?
Speaker 2:Eye movement repetitives. I forgot what that stands for. Do you remember what it stands for Eye movement Repetitive? I don't know. It's Yep.
Speaker 1:I have done it in therapy and it does take you to places where it is like emotions, like it is. You didn't know the emotions were there, right, until all of a sudden you're there and now you're crying and you're like why is this happening? So the anxiety and stress you were feeling in your adulthood, in your relationships, how did that stem back to childhood? Like, did you figure that out?
Speaker 2:So I figured that out in therapy because anytime there were people around me that were going through something it was, I've just always been put in and put myself in the role of something's unsafe. It's my responsibility to fix it. And I'm not unsafe, like physically, but somebody is upset. What can I do to fix it? If I can't fix it, then something's wrong with me. Why can't I help them? Why can't I make them happy?
Speaker 2:I took ownership of all of that and growing up in a household with alcoholism and kind of that whole scene that's really. Some people like myself become the caretaker, the person to be, like I got you, I'm going to fix this, you're going to be okay, and there's always something going on. There's always some uncertainty and the more I get close to people and I understand them and I hear them and I feel them, I lose myself, because that's where I have learned, through what has happened in childhood. My value is tied to how happy or comfortable or safe I can make people feel. And that's when doing EMDR and going through the different big moments in my life that I needed to revisit. I realized what I was doing today was because of what happened then and I could handle it in a better way.
Speaker 1:That is a lot to take on, though, okay. So I do want to ask you how do you before I ask you this, but I'm going to ask you so you can think on it for a second how do you find value in yourself now, compared to maybe how you did? But also like, what load did that take off your shoulders, if any? To be like I don't have to fix all of you.
Speaker 1:I have also been a fixer in many situations, and it is such a load to carry that I finally realized no one asked me to carry except me, which, once I realized that I was like what is wrong with me Now? What is wrong with me? And like what is wrong with me? But I was like I am no one's asking me to fix them. No one is asking me to carry this stress. I'm just doing it because I want them to see my value, I want them to see how great I am, or I feel like I have to, or everything's going to fall apart, which then I asked myself like so what if everything falls apart? I didn't cause the chaos in the first place and again, all the suitcases to unpack. You can either answer how do you see your value now, or find value in relationships now, without fixing people or taking on stress. Or and did anything? Get lifted off your shoulders once you realized you didn't have to be that person.
Speaker 2:The weight coming off my shoulders is per scenario, per experience. Still today, it's something I'm working on, but when I can actually separate ownership of what someone else is going through versus how I can handle it or what I'm going through, it does lift a big weight off, and the way that I work to do that is to create space, to make sure that that person has space. I don't need to always have something to say, I don't need to always offer advice. I think you and I were even talking one time and we were having a conversation and I asked you. I tried to make space by asking you do you want my advice or do you want me to just listen? Like being able to do that stops my mind from spinning of the seven scenarios that I have to go through to figure out how to help you feel better, because that's not my responsibility to make you feel better, but, as your friend, it's my responsibility to support you.
Speaker 1:And same in all other relationships in my life. So real quick, can I ask is it scary Because we only know of? I feel valued when I can fix, when I can help, when I can give advice, if I'm like trying to extend my help and the other person is like I don't want it. Or when you stop and realize, dang, no one is asking for this. You know when, like you say in friendships, like stop texting and stop calling and see who actually shows up, and then all of a sudden you realize like two people keep showing up and no one else is and you're like, okay, I was carrying that. Like is there any fear behind that? Once I do pull back, are people going to value me the same? And when I say people, I mean either jobs, ships, whatever that is Like is there any fear there?
Speaker 2:There is fear.
Speaker 2:There is fear with losing people who matter to me.
Speaker 2:I'm not sure how much I matter to them. I think the bigger fear to me today is if I lose you because I didn't fix you or I didn't put in the effort, is it because I overcorrected something I was trying to fix, or is it truly you just weren't supposed to stay there because I was done lifting the weight? I'm still trying to work out. That's definitely something I talk about in therapy even today, because a lot of my fear is tied to me failing, and I think where I create more chaos in my head about failing is I will always come up with four to seven scenarios in my head and I need to slow down, give people autonomy to be and react however they want to react without me trying to fix it. So that's a big lesson in this and how I take the weight off of my shoulders and also that takes the weight off of the other person, because I'm not projecting all of my thoughts and fears onto them. I'm letting them just be and give them the space to be.
Speaker 1:Don't you also think by like, letting people, what is it, the whole let them theory? Right, by letting people just be and not interfering and not fixing, you're kind of allowing, like you're allowing yourself to finally see where they want you in their life. And I mean, I know for me that's scary. And it's scary in the fact of because all my listeners know I struggle with choose me, the choose me attachment. But I do worry that once I stop like who's showing up for me, who's letting me fall back, who wants my advice, who wants to be in my presence without anything else from me so I know my choose me part comes out. But I think the more I'm able to like, let go of that and realize, the more I choose me, even if it feels selfish to other people, like I don't even want to help you handle that, I don't even want to help you fix this mess, because this is not my, this is not my drama, this is not my circus the more I am choosing peace so hard.
Speaker 1:Maybe some people are starting to fall back and, yeah, certain things hurt, but I feel like I'm starting to overcome that. I need to fix. I need to fix and the people that want the advice, that are like, hey, I need you to help me, are reaching out and I'm like holy cow, you do value me, you do want this from me. Or even just like you want to hang out with me because you enjoy my friendship and you want nothing else. You don't need me to fix you, you don't need this, you don't need that, you don't need anything else, you just want me, which is a very different feeling, because I know you and I have talked about like our upbringing and I don't know, have you experienced that Like where someone is like just like, I just want to be in your presence. I don't want you to do anything.
Speaker 2:I don't even know if I've been aware of that yet, but that feels like something I should start thinking more about, I think right now I'm so in my head on trying to control what's happening upstairs here.
Speaker 1:So now Jamie can't control other people, she's going to control herself.
Speaker 2:I can't control the whole situation anymore. I don't have the mental capacity for that anymore, but I'm really trying to stay out of assuming what other people. Yeah, but that's an interesting thought, like I've never really thought, like just paying attention.
Speaker 1:Just pay attention to who shows up and wants to just like hang out.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I've never looked at it that way because I'm always trying to figure out how I'm showing up for other people, like, am I doing enough for the people so they know I want them in my life? I've never looked the mirror the other way.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, I think that's definitely your next suitcase to look at. Yeah, I like suitcases, I want to look at them. So you looked at stuff in your childhood. You're working on that. You're going to therapy EMDR specifically. I'd love to know what other tools do you have, because I talk a lot about journaling, I talk about going for walks, I talk about, you know, exercise, eating, well, like, we all have different things in our toolbox, and the self-care movement, the self-love movement, is an all-time high. What tools do you have that either A help you with your healing, or B, when you are stuck, when your past self is trying to pull you back, when you're like, whoa, how can I get out of this? Or I know what's happening, I need to get out.
Speaker 2:Tools that I have. I will write things down. I don't have a constant journal, but something that I I mean you are following my journals.
Speaker 2:I'm kidding, you follow the journal, kidding, kidding, kidding. However, when I feel stuck, or I need to get past something, or I need to pull something out of the toolbox, I will type out a letter to whomever or myself, or just ranting and get it all out, because the messiest place in the world is in my head and that's where all my confusion and anxiety you know everybody's is up in their noggin. But I type it all out and then I delete it. Otherwise, another tool that I have is and I didn't realize this was a tool or a strength until my therapist told me it was but two people I know I can be vulnerable for. I just spit out all the information my wife. I'll just say this is something I'm working on and I think I feel here, or I think I could do this better, or this is something I'm struggling with. I just say the things out loud. I think doing that, instead of keeping it in my head, is the best tool for me that I can pull out of the toolbox.
Speaker 1:Do you, when you say that stuff to her, do you preface it with? I need you to say this, Like, does she know you're saying it to get it out of your brain? So, like she supports you in. Like okay, Jamie is going to say a bunch of things and then we're going to work through whatever we have to. And is that scary? Because I feel like that'd be really scary for me.
Speaker 2:It is scary, but the most helpful thing that she does is after I have a therapy session, she asks me how therapy goes. Therapy went, how. What I had to talk about, like how it went what my therapist said, you know all the things. She's curious about it so that when I do randomly bring things up she already knows where it's coming from.
Speaker 1:Oh, they talked about that. Okay, here we go.
Speaker 2:But I also do that at work too. I think I've become a very vulnerable person in certain aspects of here's what I'm working on, not always like here's my heart, but here's what I'm working on. I do that at work. My boss knows my coworkers know changing language, even to. I feel like this would be helpful to. I'm confident this will be helpful. Or you know, just changing those words, though I did have a mix-up at work, because I got excited about working with this person who has way more credentials and degrees than I do. Again, this is my. I do tie this back to childhood somewhat, just because I've always looked up to people who seem in control, and the only way to get them to like me is for me to point out that they are better than me. And I did that at work and I was so mad at myself and I texted you and other people.
Speaker 1:But what did I say? I said you acknowledged it, yes, and now you know yes, and now going forward and that's the healing, that's the growth part.
Speaker 2:The whole healing journey, or the definition of healing, is really identifying, understanding and having the choice to do something different, and that's something I'm working on all the time. Okay, I love that.
Speaker 1:So, before we wrap up, is there anything else you want people to know about why healing is so important? What are some things they could do? How the Jamie I met six years ago 2018, something like that is a different and better version than she is today. And that's the thing is. We never want to be like I'm so happy I changed, because we're never changing, but we're always evolving. We're always understanding, like how is she different? Why should people even take the chance of like healing their things?
Speaker 2:Yeah, my, my last thought on this is people people that I have talked to that seem to not have the growth mindset or are a little more closed-minded. They question why go to therapy or why go through growth? Why can't you just accept who you are and love who you are, the way you are? The thing is is, if you're who you are but you're not happy inside, something's eating at you physically or mentally, or just not sitting well, it's interrupting how you want your life to be. There's always an opportunity or way to dig deeper into that. It doesn't mean you're changing who you are. It just means you're choosing to handle things like emotions or situations or other people's needs in a different way that serves you better.
Speaker 1:I think it's also so powerful Everything you just said about just changing and understanding and how I handle and how I deal with there is something so powerful in seeing a moment where maybe you would normally lash out or maybe you would normally say really rude things to somebody and all of a sudden you're noticing inside yourself ooh, this is the moment because I want to handle things differently. Yeah, Because we can't change if we don't change. So I think that's not just important, but really strong and powerful 100%. So I appreciate you coming on and sharing. I know this is not easy, so anyone that comes on and all of my people in my circle that I've asked to come on and talk about things I realize this isn't an easy thing to do, so thank you.
Speaker 1:Thank you for giving the time to me, of course, and to all my listeners please stay cute, stay loud, maybe check out therapy and dance, even when everyone is watching Peace.
