Ep. 32 - Restore Your Nervous System and Why That is Important with Rachel Rauch
Kathy Washburn: [00:00:00] Our guest for today's episode is Rachel Rauch, the founder of Aero Wellness. She is a doctor of naturopathy and a master herbalist from Trinity College of Natural Health.
After 25 years of experience in the natural health industry, Rachel noticed an important trend. Most women coming to see her were dealing with the effects of stress and burnout, even if their primary symptoms seemed unrelated.
Things like brain fog, irritability, trouble staying asleep, wired but tired, a tendency of being all things to all people, and exhausted from this, as well as a need to keep the peace with the world around them. So there was an emotional suppression also present. These are all just some of the symptoms.
Any of them sound familiar? Well, in our conversation, Rachel explains how internalizing is a form of drain and [00:01:00] stress. We can't serve from a place of emptiness. We all know that. And many of us live in a state of crisis. It is just not sustainable and sometimes our bodies begin to get louder and louder and telling us.
So, as we talk to Rachel, we learn about the need to replenish, to restore and to rest in order to provide our nervous system, some regulation. Rachel also shares some actions that you can take today to help you gather your sense of self. If you want to nurture, take care of, and protect those around you in a way that is sustainable, this hour is for you.
May this podcast be a catalyst for you to become the better version of you, just bursting to step forward.
[00:02:00]
Kathy Washburn: I
am so excited to have Rachel Rauch with us from Aero Wellness, and I believe you are in Indiana, is that correct? It is, yes. Yes, Rachel and I had a fabulous conversation which kind of blew open a few, a few doors for me, and I'm hoping that you, the listeners, will have that same response, because she shared with me.
Some information about adrenal glands and menopause that have never [00:03:00] really been explained to me. So I'm hoping this is new information for our listeners. And there's so much more that we're going to talk about.
Kathy Washburn: But I'm going to start by asking Rachel to introduce yourself. Just let us know who you serve, what you're doing in the world.
Rachel Rauch: Yes, thank you. Appreciate that, Kathy.
First, I am very honored and excited to have this conversation with you. I really enjoyed when we talked whenever it was. Few weeks ago, and it was just, yeah, it was a great conversation. So I'm excited to continue it. Mm-Hmm. . Like I, like you said, I am Rachel Rauch and I serve women that have experienced some form of chronic stress or trauma in the past.
And now that is showing up, if you will, in physical symptoms in the body, you know, whether it's in the hormones. Or, you know, and that can be, you know, PMS, or that can be, [00:04:00] you know, menopausal symptoms or anything in between. But often we'll see in the mood as well, anxiety and depression and irritability, and just a sense of overwhelm.
And then that overwhelm and the anxiety can go on and contribute to digestive issues. You know, it's just kind of, it's a, it's a cascading effect, but at the root of it, if we go back, it's, it's a dysregulated nervous system from the hard things. That women have been through in the past, and maybe I've had to suppress have not been able to to find the support that they really needed at the time.
So those are the women that I serve. And yeah, I love it and thrilled for the opportunity to support women in this journey.
Kathy Washburn: And
that this is where we collide because I work with people who. Identify themselves as people pleasers, conflict resistant, very, very apt to stuff their [00:05:00] emotions or repress difficult things.
They're recognized as type C personalities. Which is the work of Lydia from the seventies that I'm trying to bring to light. So people have, sometimes we need to identify with things in order to address them and suppressing emotions, suppressing trauma. And not dealing with them does not, as you and I both know, does not mean it makes it go away.
No,
Rachel Rauch: no, not at all.
Kathy Washburn: Yes. Yes. So it, it comes out in many different ways. And this is where I usually see clients. They have been very successful. They're, they're very used to doing for other people, getting things done. They're often very loyal employees and loyal friends. They're the, the one that you call if you have that last call, that's the [00:06:00] person.
But then It starts to show up in the body and that's when they can't ignore it anymore. They can't ignore the alarms. The alarms are getting louder
louder.
and it's often people say, Oh, I have adrenal fatigue. But when I looked up adrenal fatigue, not many places address the emotionality. Behind that. And you did so brilliantly when we talked the other day.
Kathy Washburn: Can you just explain to us what our adrenals are responsible for doing?
Rachel Rauch: Yes. But if you're okay with it before you do that, I would like to make a comment about something you said just a moment ago we talked about how, women going through hard things, how they suppress what they're feeling, or they go on to try to please other people.
And you're probably familiar with the of fight or flight, but there's also the FON response. Are you familiar with FON? Oh, yes. Very familiar. And, and that is very much [00:07:00] exactly what you're talking about. So if we, like God made us the first, We're Run away, you know, it's that it's that knee jerk response, you know, we're going to hide we're going to you know, flinch You know We're going to run and if we can't do that Then we're going to fight and if we can't fight then we either have a choice of freezing and hoping that we survive or we fawn and just People please to keep ourselves safe.
And so what happens like going to the adrenal glands? So the adrenal glands produce adrenaline and cortisol Okay. They're, they're cousins. They coincide together in a lot of situations and the fight or flight response is adrenaline production. Okay. Freeze is simply when the body is producing, the adrenals are producing that adrenaline that all that energy is mobilized to run or to fight, but we can't run and we can't fight.
So we [00:08:00] shut down. Okay. The challenge in that is that we're basically paralyzed in the fact that we're not necessarily moving, you know, or whatever, but we have all of the, that energy that's still mobilized. It needs to go somewhere. Okay. So it's like all the alarms are going off, there's no way to get away. Okay. Or fun. All those alarms are going off. And the way to, to deal with the adrenaline is to just simply try to please. So your brain doesn't know the difference between what is real and what is perceived so when you experience a stressful situation or you think of a stressful situation Your adrenal glands are going to produce cortisol and adrenaline in response to both because the brain doesn't know the difference It's going to send the same message to the adrenal that hey, we need help Get this cortisone adrenaline going to fight, to run, to freeze, or to fawn. So I'm not sure, I forget your original question now, [00:09:00] but hopefully I
Kathy Washburn: answered
Rachel Rauch: it.
Kathy Washburn: Well, that really sets the stage for, I think, the rest of the conversation, because there's often this thought that if we keep our emotions inside, and we just keep them inside our head, And, and one of these cognitive disorders, I don't like to use that word, but it's called rumination, where you keep telling yourself this story, you're not expressing it, you're not telling the person they hurt you.
You're not, you're not trying to act or fight for yourself. But you keep telling yourself the story every time you tell yourself the story and keep it in your head, your body is acting as if it is under that stress or pressure or alarm and that constant, constant, feeling or cortisol injection weakens the adrenals.
So this [00:10:00] is where, when we come into this time of menopause, that The, the adrenals are supposed to start shifting over to take some responsibility to produce hormones. But if it's been living under the pressure of silent suffering for years upon years upon years, these adrenal glands don't have a chance.
And this is what I learned from you, which I was just like. Whoa. Okay. It did not know that.
Rachel Rauch: Right. Right. Because during the menstruating years, your ovaries obviously are producing the the progesterone and the different forms of estrogen. And then, and that's good for pregnancy, you know, like the whole purpose of menstruation.
Okay. But when that stage of life is over, menopause is simply the transition [00:11:00] of the ovaries giving up that responsibility and the adrenals taking over. But here's the thing about that. So your adrenals are supposed to take over producing small amounts of progesterone small amounts of estrogens.
Okay, here's the, here's the clincher in all that. Okay. Your adrenal glands use progesterone to make cortisol. So,
if
if there's a lot of stress, your body, your adrenal glands are going to say, Hey, I've got to produce cortisol because this is an emergency. Whether it is or not, your brain doesn't know the difference.
This is an emergency. I've got to make more cortisol. So we're going to sacrifice the progesterone. And make sure that your body gets the cortisol that it needs and then some to keep you safe because that God create our bodies to do everything they need to do to remain safe So if they sense a threat rare or perceived That is going to take [00:12:00] over any other bodily function in the moment.
So, not only do we have smaller amounts in menopause because it's coming from the adrenal glands, but then our adrenals are too busy making cortisol instead from the stress.
Kathy Washburn: And often the solution, and I'm not against it, I take hormone replacement therapy. myself, but often the solution is progesterone in pill form and estrogen in various forms, but without getting to the root of the issue, which may be that emotionality of Suppressed trauma, suppressed emotions.
So it really is. And I love that you shared that arrow wellness. Your, your company arrow is spelled E I R O. And Rachel shared with me what that meant. I'm going to let you, you explain that.
Rachel Rauch: So, it's an [00:13:00] old Greek word. It actually, it's a derivative of the word Irene that is the Greek word for peace in the New Testament of the Bible.
But aero, e i r o, in itself is an archaic Greek word that means God's gift of wholeness.
Kathy Washburn: Wholeness. So that's what we're after. It's that wholeness. You can't work with the body without working with the emotional body, without working with the mind and teaching people how to work with stress. And, and so a lot of this leads to this umbrella of adrenal fatigue. so is that how people, when some, when you, when they say adrenal fatigue, is that the overwhelm, the depression, the exhaustion? Is that usually where people go?
Rachel Rauch: Yeah, you know, Adrenal Fatigue in itself probably a bit of a misnomer. Because There is some [00:14:00] some will say today that some scientists some doctors will say there is no such thing as adrenal fatigue and what they're actually talking about is it's not that your adrenals themselves are too tired to Make, to do their job to make the hormones.
It's that your body has other
Emergency breaks if you will in your system to turn off The hormone production from the adrenals to protect the, The body from essentially burning itself out and overproducing like the adrenaline, so on and so forth. So what happens is there's a feedback loop in there and the body says, this is too much.
Like we can't continue to produce this, this amount of cortisol. We can't continue to produce this amount of adrenaline. So we're going to just turn this process off. Okay. Which is also going to affect, you know, the estrogen and progesterone. And so it turns that off to [00:15:00] protect the result is as if the adrenals have worn out.
You know, you get all of the effects of the adrenal fatigue, but it's not that the, the adrenals are actually fatigued. It's that, the brain has turned off the communication with the adrenals to give the adrenals a chance to try to recuperate because it can't sustain what's happening. It's an emergency break in so many words, you know.
You are careening down the mountain and you've lost your regular brakes, you know, and we're full speed ahead with adrenaline. The body's gonna, we're gonna pull on that emergency brake next to try to slow things down. And so that's actually what happens. And it then brings on the effects of what's considered adrenal fatigue.
Kathy Washburn: So what are some signs of that?
That
People experience
Rachel Rauch: Definitely fatigue. Any hormone issue can be contributing brain fog, irritability, any mood [00:16:00] related issue can be part of that. Weight gain through the middle for sleep, particularly they may be okay going to sleep, they have trouble staying asleep.
They wake up sometime after midnight and. They could solve the world's problems at that moment. Like the brain's just full speed ahead. You know, that is classic of an imbalance of cortisol production in the adrenals, also blood sugar issues. So it can be low blood sugar. It can be high blood sugar, a lot of sugar cravings, salt cravings.
Is very common with adrenal issues as well. A wired but tired So you're tired, you know, you should sit down and rest, but I can't sit down because I have a list 20, 000 things to get done and I can't rest until I get everything done. It's also just that tendency to want to be all things to all people.
It's the people pleasing again, you know, trying to keep everybody happy, [00:17:00] you know, can often happen with that as well. Sometimes fatigue with exercise. You know, whereas exercise should be making them feel better, and instead they're exhausted from it. And that sometimes can be a classic symptom as well.
Kathy Washburn: Wow.
Kathy Washburn: Now, can you tell us a little bit about your Wholeness Restored program?
Rachel Rauch: Yes, I'd be delighted to. So, Wholeness Restored basically addresses not just physical healing, but also the emotional, the mental, and the, or the relational, I should say, and spiritual health. Because, like you said, it has to be comprehensive.
Wholeness is not just a piece. We don't have wholeness with just one little piece. We have to put it all together. So we address the the dysregulation in the nervous system. How do we settle that down? How do we restore the nervous system? How do we turn back on the brain in a way to respond appropriately to stress?
You know, and not over [00:18:00] fire or under fire, you know, how do we support and nurture the adrenal glands so they can do the job they need to do for the hormones or, you know, the other functions of the body And so, you know, we look at that from a physical perspective, but it also do a lot with that from the emotional perspective.
Pulling a lot of even somatic exercises, which is basically body base exercises. It's amazing the things that you can do to help your body relax, just using your ears and your eyes.
There is the vagus nerve. It's a primary nerve that runs through the core of your body and your brain down through the rest of your body It's like an information super highway So it brings all this information from the brain down to the body from the body back up to the brain But about 20 percent of the communication is from the brain down.
So top down 80 percent is bottom up. So body up to the brain. So what [00:19:00] happens in your body? Okay. Impacts how your brain responds. So that's where a lot of those somatic exercises come in is helping your body establish a sense of safety. So then it can respond to the brain, but then we also pull in the relational side of that because Relationships like let's talk type c here That is a whole factor of what makes a type c or what becomes the biggest challenge for a type c personality Is the people pleasing aspect,
GMT20240708-190916_Recording: you
Rachel Rauch: and then the spiritual side of this our relationship with god, you know that nurturing loving relationship that You Creates that sense of safety as well. So those are all aspects, you know, we address the hormones, we address the stress we address, at times if we need to do any type of cleansing or rebuilding we, we work through all of that. That it's a six [00:20:00] month program. We also include, and this sets homeless restored apart from a lot of programs, and that is we do some pretty extensive testing, like hormone testing either urine or saliva.
We do some genetic testing, not ancestry testing, but more of how well can your body metabolize certain nutrients to even support the hormones or the adrenals, you know, or things like that. So that is kind of the unique aspect of wholeness restored along with the consultations, the community support, you know, all of that as part of it.
Kathy Washburn: It sounds like such a fantastic program, and it's at those times when, especially for type C, when you think you can do it all, and there's been this very others directed way of being where for me, I almost forgot how to feel. especially combined with radiation and, and chemotherapy. It's like I had this [00:21:00] really abrupt disconnect with my body, both physically and relationally as I, I really became reliant upon others feelings in order to feel myself.
And that's the only way I could work it. So that understanding, well, wait a minute, my body's under stress. 99 percent of the time, although on the outside, everybody thinks I've got it all together, but then the wheels start falling off and you know something's physically wrong. This isn't working anymore, but it's often not the people that are closest to you that you're going to go because go to, because they're the ones that rely on you in a way that's become unsustainable, but it's still the relationship.
So having a community that you can walk into and just [00:22:00] be that version of yourself in that moment, like you need to try to figure out how to let go of some of that. And it's really hard to be a changed person in an unchanged environment. So found finding communities like yours, where you're doing the work and you're getting that feedback from people that don't know who you are, really, you don't come in with that baggage.
I could see how that would be super helpful.
Rachel Rauch: Yeah. And just to know you're not alone, that you're not the only person that's dealing with this. You know, that this is actually more common struggle than what sometimes we realize. And, you know, often when I start to talk to women about the necessity of stopping long enough to take care of themselves, their resistance comes from feeling a need to serve, like somehow it's selfish or it's.
It's [00:23:00] bad, it's wrong, whatever words you want to use to take care of yourself. And I will often encourage them to remember that you can't continue to serve and do the things that you feel called to do unless you have first filled taking care of yourself. You know, it's kind of like pouring from an empty water bottle. I, I use this demonstration a lot in consultations. I realized that, you know, the. Audience can't see us, but if I would up my water bottle and I would tip it over, you know, at some point every it's going to empty out, there's nothing left in it. And that's often the way that we live and type sees that internalizing is a form of draining, you know, because there is no, there is no support.
It just sucks out of them, sucks that life, you know, right out of them. Because there's nobody there to, to, to be present in what they're feeling. And so at some point that water bottle is empty [00:24:00] and we can't continue to serve from a place of emptiness. We have to refill in order to continue to serve.
And I think that that paradigm shift is really critical for women because we are nurturers. You know, we do want to take care and protect and. um, serve, but we can't do it unless we
Kathy Washburn: refill. I love that example. And it's so, it's so indicative of my own experience when I started taking care of myself and got beyond that.
This is a selfish thing to do to go away to Kripalu for a weekend. You know, this is selfish or my being controlling. Nobody's going to be able to watch my kids like I do while I'm gone. You know, they're not going to be. But once I got over it, I realized it was so much easier to, to have the [00:25:00] deeper connection.
And be able to serve the people I loved and cared for in a much deeper way when I was coming from that place. And at first I would just do it once a year. I would allow myself to, to go for that weekend and I would feel that. That power that came from it for maybe a week after or two weeks after and then slowly just watch it disappear as I fell back into old ways of being.
Kathy Washburn: Do you have any recommendations for that, that moment where people are like, yes, I'm doing the thing and then, oh, I don't, I think, I think the word that comes to mind is that worthiness, like
the
worthiness kind of goes away and you start pouring. To others again.
Rachel Rauch: Yeah, it's, a very real problem and challenge.
I,
[00:26:00] what I often teach wholeness restored that.
that
What we do must be sustainable. We, we all have expectations. Sometimes worry are our worst enemy when it comes to expectations. It's not even what somebody else places on us. It's our perception of expectations that becomes the issue. And so we, we have this expectation that we go away for a weekend, you know, in a year and we're going to.
Reap the benefits for the next 365 days, but it's really not sustainable. And so the weekend planned is great and fantastic, but there's things that we have to do in between to maintain that benefit. And so I often teach women to and I do this a lot, not just with maybe women that have kids are grown and out of the home, but also young moms.
And the concept of just taking 20 to 30 minutes per day for downtime. And [00:27:00] obviously the first response I get is why I can't do that because of all these people that need me throughout the day. And so I will encourage them that as a household, you take a 20 to 30 minute break. Okay. And during that time for the adults, the goal is to do something that replenishes.
So that might be a nap that might be reading light, you know, fiction that might be taking a walk outside that might be calling a best friend to chat about. Okay.
Rachel Rauch: You know something but the way that you know that it's helping is if it if when you're done you feel refreshed Okay, if you finish up whatever it is and you feel drained you finish up that phone call and you feel drained That's not going to work choose something different the next time.
Maybe it's a bath, you I mean, there's there's it might be a craft or you know, maybe you're artistic there's lots of things that [00:28:00] you can do the key is it, It's not going to include any form of technology, movies, no phone, no technology, your brain needs a break from that during that time. So that's the first thing.
Rachel Rauch: And then for the mamas. That have kids at home, do the same with them. And for littles have a basket of special activities that they can do independently on their own, but it's something they can only do during that time, you know? So maybe it's, you know, sticker books, or maybe it's some special Legos or it's some type of whatever it happens to be.
But it's something that they can do independently on their own, but they're only allowed to do it during that time, maybe it's some special books or something else. And at the end of that 20 or 30 minutes, it all goes back the basket until the next day. Hmm. So that you build some anticipation for that time.
[00:29:00] Like it should be something that everybody looks forward to.
Kathy Washburn: What a great idea.
Rachel Rauch: And what you're going to find, what I find with a lot of moms and even in my own life is. If you take that 20 or 30 minutes to do that and refresh in between the retreat, you know, a year or maybe more often, however, whatever that looks like, it's going to help to make that a little bit more sustainable. And it's something that you're going to anticipate you can almost feel yourself relaxing just thinking about it
Okay.
Rachel Rauch: Now I will encourage moms if that goes well, you know, to consider even one day a week where you maybe expand that Into maybe an hour or maybe it's two or three or even four hours and then for some they're going to do everything individually It's going to still be out of that basket, you know, but it's just going to be for maybe a little longer period of time You Or it may also be something as a family, you know, we're going to go take a walk somewhere together We're going to play a board game together.
We're [00:30:00] going to you know, but the the point is is that you're spending time Refreshing, you know, you're going to enjoy some good food. This is time when it's like eat off of paper plates Don't do dishes. This is a time to rest refresh You know, but make it something that fills you up and replenishes.
So when you're done, whether it's 20 or 30 minutes, or it's a little longer period of time, once a week, you walk away and it's like. Oh my word, I think I can handle the next however many days because I just was born into.
Kathy Washburn: You make such a, such a interesting point and really important one that we often when we, when we go to chill out or relax, it's often I'm going to grab my phone and I'm going
Page
through Instagram for a half an hour, or I'm gonna pour myself a glass of wine and I'm gonna jump into Netflix for a half an hour.
And those things aren't filling us [00:31:00] up. They're actually taking from us, even though they're chill or we're relaxing, it's not really helping us. So these, these ways of being, and you alluded to it, Or you spoke about it earlier about the embodiment part, the work that you do with embodiment. And it's really what I'm hearing from you is that reengaging the senses just through our senses.
And I love the work of Charizard Charmaine, his positive intelligence where, you just spend
two minutes or one minute focusing on what you're hearing or what you're seeing or the touch or some of these Vegas nerve exercises. One of my favorite ones is just looking around and finding three blue things in your room or four yellow things or three or [00:32:00] green things.
And just doing that brings the nervous system back into a place where it can be restful of Igniting it. Do you have any other exercises for the nerd?
Kathy Washburn: Cause I think that's almost, if people can incorporate that in those moments of calmness of just going into the senses for five minutes to re reset.
Rachel Rauch: Yes, absolutely. Well before I answer that, let me just touch on when you were talking about scrolling on our phones or, you know, binge watching Netflix. . Yes, it does not restore us. What it does is it numbs us.
Kathy Washburn: And
Rachel Rauch: I think it's a really important concept for all of us to recognize is that it, it feels relaxing, but it's actually just numbing.
Mm-Hmm. And there is a distinct difference between those. But yes, other ways to engage the [00:33:00] senses. I love to tell people to go outside and just take a 10 minute walk and engage all five senses. So it's like, notice, you know, look around, notice the clouds in the sky. Notice like this morning I took a walk and I loved watching the sunrise, just reflect off of the clouds kind of on the other side of me.
So the sun's coming up on one side and then I can see the reflection in the, And the clouds on the, when I looked the other direction and like the contrast and the intensity the birds were waking up and flying through, you know, the air, the rabbits that were, you know, hampering away from me, you know, like, so noticing nature, noticing everything around you, using your senses to smell, like, what do you smell?
What do you hear? What do you see? What do you feel? You know, can you feel the breeze? Can you feel the pavement or the grass under your feet? You know, like just engaging all five senses to take a short [00:34:00] walk can be really powerful. I would agree with what you said as well, you know, like looking around another thing thing you can do to engage your senses is just grab like a pillow or grab anything in your room and just notice the way it feels like this is soft and fuzzy or this is Yeah.
Slippery and cool or it's you know, hard and Noticing and feeling texture can bring you back into the present and engage the vagus nerve and the nervous system as well.
Kathy Washburn: Yeah, it's so important to really, we, we walk around so amped up with our nervous system dysregulated, it's often.
We don't know what it feels like to not have a dysregulated nervous system.
Rachel Rauch: Right. It's almost uncomfortable. Like we don't know what to do with that discomfort. We have to be willing to sit in that [00:35:00] discomfort of not being amped up in the beginning.
Kathy Washburn: And just being and not doing. Yes. Yes, absolutely. Really hard for women.
Can you share other things that might interfere with healing?
Kathy Washburn: Sugar, sugar,
Rachel Rauch: sugar is a big one because it will rev up the nervous system. But it also can cause it to crash. Your nervous system will follow your blood sugar. If your blood sugar is high, your nervous system, you're going to be ramped up.
If your blood sugar crashes, your nervous system will crash. Your adrenals and your nervous system will follow blood sugar. So focusing on eating protein
GMT20240708-190916_Recording: and.
Rachel Rauch: Quality facts and reducing sugar consumption, particularly in in the evening, is important. And then eating protein before bed actually can help during the night.
But sugar is definitely an issue. Over exercising or not exercising at all. So being intuitive again with your body, noticing how you feel with [00:36:00] exercise, you may feel exhausted from a, you know, a major workout, but you feel incredibly refreshed with a brisk walk, or you may feel incredible and awesome with that really strenuous workout.
It's paying attention. To how you feel afterwards the exercise is really important.
Rachel Rauch: Setting boundaries Yes The hard one but a really important one as well And just remembering that when you set a boundary, you're not setting a boundary on somebody else You're setting a boundary on yourself because you can't control somebody else So you can't tell somebody, you know, if you talk to me like that again, you have to leave the room You know, that's putting a boundary on them and you can't force them to leave the room You But you can say if you choose to continue to speak to me like that.
I am going to leave this room
like recognizing the difference and setting Healthy [00:37:00] boundaries, on yourself.
Kathy Washburn: Ooh, that, that's a really poignant point there. Cause boundaries often people have this image that where I, when I work with clients on this, I say it's not an electric fence
Right.
to keep people out.
It's really like almost like a moat that you can open up when you're expressing yourself clearly and articulately.
articulately
And asking for what you need and being on your own side. That's not an electric fence. You come, you come close me and you're going to get zapped. And so that relational element is such an important part of, of being healthy.
Rachel Rauch: Yes. Yes. And you know, it, it really, in a way boundaries demand respect on both sides. You know, it, for us to set a boundary. And not respect somebody else's boundary or to speak in a way that [00:38:00] is harmful to them. We can't turn around and set a boundary back expecting something out of them. You know, it, it really, it, it requires on both sides.
So we set a boundary, you know, because we, we want them to respect, our needs, but at the same time, we're also honoring their needs and recognizing that we need to be respectful on return.
Kathy Washburn: Yes. This is a big issue for type C individuals in that people pleasing. And I remember when one of my teachers said to me.
You know, a lack of boundaries makes you a very untrustworthy person. And that hit me right to my heart and my core because. Being honest and authentic was what I was trying attain. So to understand that no boundaries, me believing, Oh, whatever, I'll do whatever we, you want to do. [00:39:00] And that is not helpful to your point.
It's not helpful to the other person. Cause they're like, well, what is it that you want to do? If, if it's whatever, then it's almost an unsafe relationship to be in because of that lack of clarity. So. You think you're doing everything to please other people when really you're pushing them even further away and what you desire so deeply are those intimate relationships that are not possible when you can't stand up in a place of self respect and articulate and respect another person.
Rachel Rauch: Yes, yes, I have heard boundaries described as.
Three different forms of balls so you can you can have a boundary like a bubble if you touch it It pops so you can set a boundary but you never keep them Because of the people pleasing, you know, because you don't want to [00:40:00] hurt somebody else and you feel too bad It somehow seems wrong.
You can have a boundary like a bowling ball It is so hard that drop it. It's going to smash a toe. Like there's, there's nothing soft about that. It is going to blow over those pins and it's going to blow everybody else. And that's not healthy either. A healthy boundary is like a like a kickball, like a rubber ball.
There's some flex there that it can consider the environment and who, who they're interacting with. To set a boundary that is healthy for the relationship and really like that because I think all of us You know even type c's it maybe would be more like the bubble can over correct to the bowling ball and some of us that are type a's Can start out like the bowling ball and then over correct to the bubble because we feel Was like if the boundary is hurtful, then we shouldn't have any boundaries But all of [00:41:00] us need to settle into the middle where we're more like a ball that is able to adjust, and set boundaries according to the relationship that we're in, you know, with that boundary.
Kathy Washburn: And that relationship starts with the relationship of self, which I, I believe your wholeness restored program really allows somebody in, into me to see, which is what I talk about intimacy. You have to be. Intimate with yourself first and understand who you are, what you're, what you're wanting in the world.
And once you can gather that respect for yourself, then you can respect another. There is that flexibility that ability to bend and, and morph if you need to, but not give yourself away or shut yourself down.
Rachel Rauch: Yes.
Rachel Rauch: One of my modules in Wholeness Restored [00:42:00] is just recognizing, recognizing physically what's going on, like what's contributing to, what we're dealing with at this point recognizing what's going on on an emotional level a relational level and a spiritual level, because if you don't recognize it, you know, that into me, see, you know, then how are we going to be able to address it?
Kathy Washburn: Right. And sometimes, and I'm sure many people come to you when they're stressed out, overwhelmed, exhausted. they've, they've not. Often taken the time to just be so that they can recognize that must be a gift.
Rachel Rauch: Yeah, it's, it's a, a tool, a skill that all of us need to develop to identify and recognize.
Kathy Washburn: So if you were to if somebody is listening to this and they're, they've, they've nodded head a few times in our conversation and said, Oh my gosh, yes, that is so me. Or maybe it's raised some awareness that [00:43:00] they, there some, maybe emotional suppression or adrenal, adrenal fatigue or, hormone imbalance.
What,
What would you recommend to them to do if there's one thing they should do today for themselves? Other than find your website, which they will find on the of these show notes.
Rachel Rauch: Yes, they can schedule a free a free call with me to learn more that way. But in addition to that, what would be the first step that I would take that is a good question There's a dozen different ones that come to mind all at one time here I think the first thing that I would do is just find some silence even if it's just for five minutes, sometimes we're just so overstimulated that we don't even recognize what we're feeling.
We can't even begin put together the connections of, Oh, I didn't sleep well last night because I ate too much sugar the [00:44:00] evening. Or, you know, Oh, I, you know, I'm upset at my kids because I am so depleted drained because nobody else is filling me up. We have to have some silence. Before we can actually begin to recognize that.
Kathy Washburn: Hmm. Yes. And it doesn't have to be an hour. It doesn't have to be even a half hour. It can be five whole minutes. I really appreciate this
invitation
to go walk in nature for a few minutes and engage all the senses. Just. That sounds so grounding. Yes, yes, definitely. Is there anything, oh, I had one other question I wanted to ask you.
Kathy Washburn: I often, adrenals seem be very women related, but I know males have adrenal glands. Are there issues you see in males or that [00:45:00] are common males, that happen because a similar way of being where they're constantly in stress?
Rachel Rauch: So men process stress differently. They're able to more easily categorize stress. They have boxes for stress. Women, we just have a ball of yarn, you know, that's just all tangled up, but men have boxes. And so stress definitely affects men, but it doesn't affect them in the same way,
For that reason. So men can, they're probably more likely going to deal more with like the cardiovascular or the digestive issues from stress, more so than the typical like dysregulated nervous Yes, can happen to men, particularly if there's like extensive trauma,
GMT20240708-190916_Recording: you
Rachel Rauch: know, it's, it's more likely going to show up then and that they're not going to have maybe that the tolerance. But I would say men are maybe not [00:46:00] triggered quite the same way because they have boxes for stress and it just, it makes it easier.
That being said though, I will say this. While women go through menopause, men go through andropause.
Kathy Washburn: Ooh,
Ooh, I've never,
Rachel Rauch: there is a hormone shift in men. Their testosterone levels change. Their testosterone starts to drop. They do have some estrogen and progesterone their bodies as well. You know, just like women have testosterone.
So there is a point in life where that begins to change, and it's called andropause. And you can sometimes see men become more moody.
Sometimes they can become more maybe more soft in this, in the sense where they don't even have boundaries like they used you know, where they just, the, The, what I want to say, what word do I want to use?
They don't, they're not as quick maybe to defend, you
GMT20240708-190916_Recording: know, it's
Rachel Rauch: kind of that, that sense that [00:47:00] resilience is gone. And so it's like, oh, well let them walk over me. And some of that just the result of low testosterone. Because a lot of what creates that strong male sense, it comes from the, the higher amount testosterone in their bodies.
Kathy Washburn: So
Rachel Rauch: that might be more than what you want, but.
Kathy Washburn: No, that's interesting because I have a lot of family members that are in helping professions like firemen, EMTs, and. There they can be unhealthy and I always wondered, is it, is it their bodies are in this fight or flight all the time, you know, at the ready. Or, you know, in that same way, is it depleting them? Do you know what I mean? I, I,
Rachel Rauch: in that situation, absolutely. You know, if you have a job like a fireman or, you know some, some job like that, you are living with. Chronic stress. You're living with adrenaline overload. You're in [00:48:00] fight or flight all the time.
That's the demand of your job. And you need that. You need the adrenaline to respond to the emergency at hand. Okay. It's a difficult to be because you can't lower adrenaline and do a good job in an emergency. That's the way God created us. He created that adrenaline. Bloods our brains with all of these.
Hormones and different signaling cells that give us what we need to survive. Okay. So in that situation, yes, there is the potential for health issues is going to go up in a lot of different areas, whether it's heart, whether it's digestion or autoimmune or some other type of immune issue or whatever it happens to be.
Inflammation, it's a huge one. So the structural system becomes an issue pain those can be big ones all connected with that fight or flight from a helping profession But for the but for the man that works in the office [00:49:00] He is probably able more easily able to set aside What happened in the office and categorize that into a box?
This is women. We're going to stew over it all evening long all the way until we get back the next morning And we will have blown it up into a much bigger issue in our mind by the time we get back again Because we are a tangled ball of yarn
Kathy Washburn: I really appreciate that analogy the the drawers versus the The tangled ball of yarn that does get like bigger and bigger and bigger as we as we feed it Wow, thank you.
That was really helpful. Is
Kathy Washburn: there anything before we wrap up? Is there anything you want to add?
Rachel Rauch: Not really i've really enjoyed this this conversation. It's yeah, it's just been really good to just think through How type c's are affected, you know, mean whether you're type a type b or type c you all have unique challenges strengths and weaknesses [00:50:00] and so Sometimes the type c's are overlooked.
So it's just good to to look at this through the lens of What a type
Kathy Washburn: c deals with and I really really appreciate your approach to health Especially for type C people, I think because of the wholeness, your arrow, wellness, I think it's, it's really important because of the getting the prescription and.
You know, checking it off your box is not getting to the root of the issue, which is that emotional element or maybe past trauma that just needs to be unearthed and, integrated in a different way. So thank you for what you do. I'm so grateful I got to meet you and we'll have all of your contact in the show notes.
I have one final question for you. I asked all of my, my guests, if I were to crush up and put you in pill form, what effect would [00:51:00] you have on someone taking that pill?
Rachel Rauch: I am pretty sure that I would shift them into problem solving mode.
Yes, I, I feel like I am always in problem solving mode, which, which can be a problem because I can create extra stress, but it also is very important in thinking outside the box of, you what do we do in different situations to remain healthy?
Like the example of taking 30 minutes to rest. Well, what do we do whenever we have three kids underfoot? You know, we have to problem solve through that.
Kathy Washburn: So, yes. As you, As you spoke, the word agency came to mind. Giving yourself agency through that problem solving.
The,
The two are connected as I think about you. Yes, I would agree. Well, thank you so much, Rachel. I am so grateful for your gift of time, and I hope we get to do this again soon. Rachel, that's a [00:52:00] great website with with a free download about the adrenals. Is that right?
Rachel Rauch: I do have one on adrenals. I also have one on just being able to identify like the four The four key things that you need to consider whenever you're searching out how to feel better The four things that you need to really
Kathy Washburn: great.
Thank you so much for those resources It has been a
Rachel Rauch: delight. I wish you a fabulous day Thank you. Same to you. Thanks so much for this opportunity.
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