EPISODE 8.2 STOP SAYING YOU'RE OKAY - Stress and its effects - Pt.2

"Now, let us embark on a deeper exploration of how to navigate the complexities of illness and the invaluable lessons I gleaned throughout my personal journey. I found myself attempting to uncover the subtle, hidden fragments of what had gone awry within my body—what had shifted and enabled this inflammatory condition to take root so profoundly. I was confronted with the unsettling realization that my own stubbornness, coupled with an unwavering determination to maintain independence and self-sufficiency, may have played a significant role in my unraveling."

"Don't worry about things you can't control. Focus on the things you can" - John Wooden

#MultipleSclerosisSymptoms #AutoimmuneDiseaseTreatments #ChronicInflammation #Remedies #MSDiagnosis #FlareUps #MSAndExercise #InflammationAndDiet #HealingAutoimmuneDisease #InflammationAndStress #MSAndLifestyle #ChronicInflammation #PainManagement #MSAndMeditation #ImprovingAutoimmune #Recovery #Fatigue #RestorativeSleep #SleepHygiene #ChronicIllness #AutoimmuneDiet #Anti-InflammatoryFoods #EliminationDiet #GutHealth #PaleoDiet #LeakyGut #HealingDiet #HealingFoods #Supplements #StressManagement #AutoimmuneHealing #MSAndStress #AutoimmuneDiseaseAndStress #MentalHealth #MindfulnessAndHealing #MS #ChronicFatigue #Autoimmune #Inflammation #HealingAndStress #ReducingAnxiety #InflammationSuperhighway  #Love #SelfLove

Transcript

EPISODE 8.2 STOP SAYING YOU'RE OKAY - Stress and its effects - Pt.2

Hello, and welcome to Inflammation Superhighway. My name is Claire Tierney, and I am your host. We are coming to you from Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, on this beautiful, sunny, and very hot day.

Before I begin recording this episode, I would like to honour the original custodians of this saltwater-encircled country, who lived in harmony with the lands and the sea. I honour their elders, past and present, and recognise that this is, was, and always will be Aboriginal land.

Welcome back to Inflammation Superhighway—part two of the episode on stress. We're here today to provide some more positive and, hopefully, useful information on how to approach and manage your stress levels. I aim to offer positive encouragement for the challenging journey of resolving stress in your life and to highlight the wonderful outcomes that come with it.

I hope to share effective and low-cost ways to cope, which will be beneficial for everyone. Additionally, I'll balance it out with an example from my own life—a story about the difficult decisions we sometimes need to make for our health and well-being.

Now, let’s explore how to cope with your illness and some of the lessons I learned during my journey. I was trying to identify the hidden pieces of what had gone wrong in my body—what had changed and allowed this inflammatory disease condition to become so prominent. While searching for things to lean on, I came across a book by Mel Robbins. She has an excellent podcast as well.

The book I read, and knew nothing about her at the time, was called Stop Saying You're Fine—and I'll say that again: Stop Saying You're Fine. It was a real eye-opener for me. Mel Robbins is a mindset, motivation, and behavioural change expert. Her book focuses on encouraging the mindset needed to overcome procrastination and other obstacles, and she advocates for acting on a great idea within five seconds, which she calls "The Five-Second Rule."

I was challenged by the idea that my stubbornness and overriding determination to be independent—my self-sufficiency—could have been part of my undoing. It was very confronting and a time to take stock, as I had held on so firmly for many years to the belief that I could stand alone. Even in a relationship and as a mother, I felt that I needed to stand on my own two feet. But I had been pretending for a long time that everything was okay, when it wasn't.

At the same time, I also came across Dr. Joe Dispenza. He is a leading expert in the epigenetics of health and mindset. While there are other experts out there, Dr. Dispenza is particularly skilled at converting complex scientific information into a practical, easy-to-consume guide on how our thoughts influence our bodies and health. The first book I read by him was You Are the Placebo, and it was incredibly empowering. It gave me the language to understand that the time for change required me to remove some of the stress in my life and to take charge of the fact that I had been complicit in the stress for a long time.

I realized that I was the common denominator in all my stressful situations. Therefore, I was the key to making changes and reclaiming my wellness. It was a powerful realization. Since then, I attended a seven-day retreat with Dr. Joe Dispenza in Niagara Falls, America.

The experience was extraordinary. I was surrounded by about 1,500 people, all with the same mindset for change. Everyone was positive, owning their current situation, and willing to challenge the things that needed to be challenged in order to make meaningful changes and reduce stress.

This journey isn't always easy, but from that retreat and through these books, I know that it is possible.

Today, let’s start with vital acceptance. I love that expression—vital acceptance. The acceptance I'm referring to now is the acceptance of support and help from your friends and family.

Like me, you may have been the most independent person in your life. You may have never needed anyone, always managing on your own, whether as a self-employed entrepreneur, a leader, or a one-person band. I take my hat off to you because I relate to these kinds of people. However, I’ve learned that, right now, you’re doing yourself a disservice by not sharing the load.

I was not good at asking for help, and I wasn’t great at delegating. If I could do the job myself, I would, because I believed it would be done quicker and my way. I’m not a control freak, and I do value others’ input when brainstorming ideas.

As I’ve mentioned before, I’ve worked in the professional field of production and event management, and I know that you need a team. I’ve always loved working with a team. However, unless you give them enough autonomy to do their job, you're wasting your time employing them. I’ve surrounded myself with very capable people, and I’ve learned that, in the end, we all need support.

But at the end of the day, it’s my company. I’m a single person dealing with all these plates in the air that are spinning, needing deadlines to be met. Sometimes, I’ve found myself staying up until 3 or 4 in the morning getting something finished when, if I had asked for help earlier, it may have been taken off my plate.

The need to ask for help and to accept help is incredibly beneficial to your health. Psychologically, it will alleviate your stress and triggers. We know, because I focus on MS here, that stress is a huge trigger for flare-ups in MS. I dare say it’s a huge trigger for flare-ups in all autoimmune and inflammatory diseases. Chronic stress—like the repetitive stressing I was living with, continuously repeating the same mistakes and putting pressure on my shoulders—elevates your cortisol levels. This leads to an imbalance and, potentially, it will definitely increase your inflammation responses, which can, in turn, damage your myelin sheath in MS.

The myelin sheath is vitally important for communication from your brain down through your central nervous system to all the parts of your body so that they can react and do what you need them to do. When it’s damaged, those signals can disappear.

I was exhausted in my life from always doing everything stoically on my own. As deadlines got closer, I was causing myself fatigue. I guess this is probably a moment to share my own example because I think this story demonstrates different levels of stress and how various influences can pressure your DNA, leading to unfavorable outcomes like disease—diseases that may have laid dormant if those pressures hadn’t been applied.

Let me share a story. It’s very condensed, and I can't give you all the details because we’d be here for hours. But when things started to fall apart for me, I was around 45, and I think it came with several parallel situations. One of them was perimenopause.

This caused my brain to become a lot more fractured than it used to be, and I struggled with recall. I started making mistakes in my business, confusing things like print and production dates, times, and things that needed to go out to the public for events I was running. Menopause had caused such a cloud in my brain, and as a secondary issue, I also became completely intolerant to heat.

The situation was such that I was living in far north Queensland in the wet tropics, which I thought was the most beautiful part of the world—and it is. I had built a two-story house, completely open to the climate, with sliding walls and no air conditioning. The airflow was supposed to be all natural.

However, with this change in my body, I couldn’t cope with the lifestyle I had set up. If I chose to complain about it, I would have to circle back to the fact that I had chosen it. So, complaining to someone else was never going to give me any relief—it only compounded the reality that this was a result of my own choice.

But I did love where I lived. I had also built near a sugar cane mill, and that’s another long story. It was probably a result of a lack of research on my part. After we had completed the house and moved in, the mill decided to run 24 hours a day. It was spewing out copious amounts of black soot, which, depending on who you ask, was quite toxic. It was all over my balcony, my feet, my child's feet, and his toys. We lived mostly outdoors, and so it was everywhere.

This environmental load on my body was adding stress. Another issue was the mold in the wet tropics. I was constantly cleaning to prevent mold from growing on my furniture, pillows, and clothes. The house was brand new, so there was no mold in the bathroom or other typical places, but mold easily developed on clothes, shoes, and furniture. I was constantly cleaning and probably disturbing the spores as I inhaled them. This was another environmental stressor.

So, menopause, the mill, the mold, the heat, and then the stress of my relationship—again, I won’t go into too much detail because it was a marvelous relationship in many ways, but my partner and I had made choices that led us down slightly different paths. The gap between where we were and where we wanted to be was growing wider. The stress of all these things—the mortgage, what we were doing, and my inability to cope with the climate—led to circular arguments, over and over again, with no clear resolution.

This was adding more stress. I had a moment when I dropped in on a very connected, soul-searching friend. We were having a cup of tea, and I was doing a bit of a whinge. She said to me, "Claire, you don’t whinge a lot, but you always complain about the exact same thing."

That really hit me because, again, I don’t consider myself a whinger. I’m a "dust yourself off and get it done" kind of person. I don’t like listening to myself complain. But whenHere's the corrected version of your text with improved punctuation, spelling, and sentence structure:

But when somebody who observes your life from the outside says to you, "You are continuing to bring up the same topics over and over," then you are going in a circle. There needs to be a way out. You need to break that cycle. I went on a retreat—a health retreat. I spent a lot of time thinking about what I could do to alleviate this situation that I found quite stressful. I kept coming back to the same solutions, most of which I didn’t like. My partner liked them even less.

Just thinking about how to resolve the situation became more stressful. So, after a lot of soul-searching, making pros and cons lists, and honestly looking in the mirror, I realized that, as much as I loved this man and my life, I needed to leave.

I had known this man since he was 17. We had been together for 23 years and had a 13-year-old child. We had built a remarkable life, but I had to be honest with myself and accept that staying in the situation was no longer in my best interest.

When it came time to make the decision, I left. I moved 6,000 km across the country to a climate that supported my health, to an area in Melbourne where I had many friends and connections. My son was accepted into a fantastic school that supported his dreams for the future. We were near his grandparents and near my sisters, brother, and other family and friends. I had to leave an amazing life and community, and it was the hardest decision of my life. But, in the end, it was the only real decision I could make.

So, I share this example because now, three years later in Melbourne, my son is flourishing, my health is stabilizing, my opportunities are growing, and my network in the healing space is expanding. I see real hope and light for the future, but I had to go through the dark place to get to the light.

It’s really, really important that you do this. Sometimes, it can seem overwhelming. Let me explain. For some people, the largest stressor in their life can seem like too much to handle. I suggest you take a moment to write down the top five stressors in your life, then break them down into smaller actions—things you can do to release some stress in the short term and work toward longer-term goals. Put them in order of importance. Looking at this list might seem extraordinarily overwhelming, especially if you’re thinking about making a huge life change like I did. But your choices may not be that big—you may not have to make such drastic shifts, but you do need to make a shift.

For example, if your largest stressor on that list is your job, well, if you can afford it, leave tomorrow. If you can leave your job and still maintain your lifestyle—paying your bills, your mortgage, school fees, and eating—then leave.

But if you can’t leave immediately, it’s time to shift that stress. Maybe you need to change the type of job you’re doing, or start looking for a new one. You could start slowly, removing yourself from the situation you’re in. Or maybe you need to talk to HR to try to alleviate some of the stress within your workplace.

There are so many opportunities for change in your life, but you really need to take these steps toward change. If you don’t, tomorrow will be the same as yesterday, and your life will continue in circles. I’ve lived that circular life, and I can tell you it’s unhealthy.

If your biggest stressor is your neighbor, you might need to put on your “big girl” or “big boy” pants and have a conversation. Try to relieve the stress by finding out what’s causing the disharmony.

If you don’t own your home, you might be thinking, "Well, when the lease comes up, I’ll move." There are many options, and I think you need to look at all of them. If your stress involves balancing responsibilities with your partner and children—such as who is looking after the house—consider seeking couple's counseling, not because your relationship is on the line, but because there are unwritten chores and expectations that need to be addressed. Maybe you hate mowing the lawn, but your partner has never been asked to help. Perhaps they don’t mind mowing the lawn, but you’ve never communicated that you don’t like it.

Stress often comes from a lack of communication. I believe that while we don’t always have the skills to handle every stressful task, we can make an effort to move forward, and seeking help is part of that process. Asking for help leads me to the next topic I want to discuss: saying what’s bothering you is so important.

I think Brene Brown, in one of her talks (or was it in her book? I can’t quite remember), uses the phrase "the story I’m telling myself." This means that when something happens, you create a little story in your head about what happened and why.

For example, if you’re at work and someone turns on their heel and walks away from you, you might think, “Wow, that’s a really rude person. They didn’t care for what I was saying or they ignored me.” But when you actually discuss it with that person, you might find out that they were just desperate for the toilet and had to leave quickly because they were worried they wouldn’t make it in time.

You know, the story you’re telling yourself is not always the truth. It’s not always the bigger picture reality. I think it’s very important that we are aware, in our relationships, businesses, neighborhoods, communities, and friendships, that the story you’re telling yourself may not reflect the reality, or at least not the reality intended by a third party involved in that story.

Communication is vital in these situations because people can sometimes become defensive if you say, "Well, you did this" or "you did that." However, if you approach them with, "About that issue that happened the other day, the story I told myself was that you didn’t respect me, that you turned on your heel and walked away from me," it gives the other person an opportunity to clarify. For example, they might say, “Oh no, I was just desperate for the toilet.”

These might sound like silly examples, but they are a reality of the miscommunication that can happen. Some stresses are harder to define. For me, having worked in the public eye and in many of my jobs, one of the earliest challenges was the potential loss of independence. The thought that, in the future, not only would my quality of life decrease, but my presentation to the world would be affected—does that make sense?

It’s about how people see you. My dignity was a real concern. I needed to sit with that and change the story I was telling myself. How people see you in your community, especially when you’re not going outside anymore because you can’t brush your hair properly or can’t walk the way you used to—that can make you feel like you've changed. When you look at yourself and think you look funny walking with a walker or a walking stick, or when you’re concerned that you might fall, all those things can make you feel that your identity has changed.

But it’s not your personhood that’s changed; it’s your physicality. Yes, my physicality has changed enormously. But I spiralled for a while, thinking that because my physicality had changed, I wasn’t the same person. But the truth is, I am the same person inside. I just had to master a different way of presenting myself, which did change my personality a little. I won’t deny that. I had to adjust my overwhelming, bombastic approach to social occasions. But the person inside is the same.

And It may sound ridiculous, but I’ve had times when getting out of the door of my house has been extremely stressful. If you don’t have MS or if your MS isn’t affecting your physical abilities yet, you may not fully understand this, but I have major issues with the dexterity of my hands. I haven’t worn anything with buttons for years. Just getting dressed, putting on shoes, or, in winter, getting tights on—those simple tasks can take a long time.

I’m not exaggerating. What used to take me 15 minutes to get out the door now can take me an hour and a half. And that can cause stress, especially if you have a deadline, or you want to meet a friend and you’re running late. Sometimes you’re not with someone who can help. You end up heading out the door in tracksuit pants with no socks, slip-on shoes, and your hair unbrushed, and it just makes you feel less like you.

So, setting up your life to ask for help is really important. It can relieve a lot of the stress as well. I’ve had to relinquish control over so many things I once did myself. And I don’t mean "control freak." I mean basic things, like dressing myself, getting my own food, or not needing help. I’ve had to rethink what’s truly important. What really matters? What other people think of me, what I’m wearing—none of that is really important.

But it does mean that I don’t present in the community the way I used to. That’s one aspect of it. However, I must say that people are often extremely proud of me and the efforts I make to stay engaged in their lives and in the community.

One thing I’ve done during this process is to get counseling. Trying to get my partner to go to counseling was a harder story than I expected and probably should have happened much earlier. But at the end of the day, my efforts to go to counseling to work through my own issues have been one of the few things I still have control over.

I feel that we should all consider doing this. There’s absolutely no judgment in asking someone for third-party feedback or perspective on your story. I believe counseling and mental support are huge parts of overall health and wellness. And yes, it can be expensive, but sometimes you need to shop around for a while to find the right fit.

In Australia, you can go to your GP and express your mental health needs. They can prescribe six free sessions with a psychologist. If it works well, or if you need more, you can go back and get an extension to 12 free sessions.

This may not resolve everything, but it’s a great place to start. Another option is to explore TED Talks, podcasts, and books. You can get books from the library for free, podcasts online for free, and TED Talks on YouTube for free—as long as you have an internet connection.

I want to shout out to Podcasting! I think podcasting has changed the world in such positive ways that I can’t fully express how much I believe the podcasting explosion—people sharing their stories—has helped this planet.

If you raise your hand or go searching for it, podcasting can help you too. It will help you de-stress and feel heard, because someone else is going through the same thing. So I urge you to take advantage of all the free tools available, and of course, be kind to yourself whenever possible.

And it should, if you put your hand up or go searching for it, help you too. It will help you de-stress, and it will help you feel like you're being heard because somebody else is going through the same thing. So, I urge you to get help with all of those free tools that exist, and just, obviously, be kind to yourself whenever and wherever possible.

Accept any help that is offered. If someone isn’t offering help, it might be because they think you don’t need it—you’ve never asked, or they think you're so capable that they would feel wrong suggesting you might need assistance. People can’t help you if you don’t ask for it or show that you need it.

So, I ask you, why wouldn’t you ask for help? Look in the mirror and say to yourself, "This is really hard." But if this problem continues in two months, two years, or ten years... no, I’m not going to say that, I’m going to say rabbits again.

Rabbits. So, in the asking-for-help story, if it means shifting your life in a direction where the daily stress is less severe, wouldn’t you try that? Wouldn’t you ask for help? Wouldn’t you set yourself up for a future with more support? Wouldn’t you take steps to remove the stresses you can and make small changes in your life to ensure that, in the future, the stresses I’ve mentioned today aren’t part of your reality?

I mean, ultimately, I’m guiding you to accept help. I’m going to say it again: accept help, and it will improve your health. Help is not a sign of weakness; it’s a step toward managing your illness, and it will allow you to do that with grace. It means your time will be more fulfilling and comfortable, and your future will be bright. If you have a scar that needs healing, go get help.

One thing I haven’t talked about in depth today, but I think I will when I revisit the story of wellness and diet, is this: Don’t be surprised that the health or unhealthiness of your microbiome has a huge effect on stress in your life. I mentioned it in the "Joyful Diet" episode. Your gut microbiome is greatly impacted by stress, and it’s not just your mental health. If you don’t have a healthy gut, bad bacteria can cause all sorts of pro-inflammatory substances to leak into your bloodstream, contributing to systemic inflammation in your body—and also affecting your mental wellness.

This is all new to me, but I’m going to dig deeper into it. I’m going to learn more so I can summarize it well for you. It may seem disconnected from your inflammation story, but I promise you, your gut and your diet—your gut, specifically—are so deeply connected to your stress and have a huge impact on your chronic illness and inflammation.

It’s visceral, it’s not psychological. There’s a molecular mechanism to it. Stress affects your immune function, and chronic stress exacerbates everything, making everything more severe and pronounced. I just think it makes things really, really hard. I’m sure there’s a better way to put it, but I hope you get the point.

So, I’m going to say it again: If you can face stress head-on and say, "No more," wouldn’t you? Wouldn’t you take the steps to remove the stressors you can and make tiny shifts in your life to ensure that, well, in the future, these stresses are not part of your reality? You will see the benefits and joys of asking for and accepting help. It’s all going to improve your health. Help is a sign of moving toward managing your illness, and it allows you to show up. It allows you to show up in the community and not hide away.

It will mean the remaining time on this lovely planet will be more fulfilling and comfortable.

And, in the words of Dr. Joe Dispenza, I think, "We’re greater than we think, more powerful than we know, and more unlimited than we could ever dream."

Rabbits.

More powerful than we could ever dream. I’m going to leave it here. I think I’ve jumped around a bit, but I hope the main gist and the story I shared from my life is that no matter how big, no matter how small, no matter how overwhelming it may seem, you are the most important person in this story.

You are the only person in every part, every chapter, and every single moment of this story. You are the main character, and you need to treat yourself as the leading person in this story. I’m so passionate about this. I’m going to share something with you. In the next three months, I’ve committed to an intensive program, working with a wonderful woman and also an amazing gentleman 

I’m going to leave it here. I think I’ve gone on and jumped around a bit, but I’m so passionate about this. I’m really tackling some dark spots in my past. I’m really cleaning up the cobwebs and owning my future. I’m owning the choices I made in the past that didn’t lead to the best outcomes. They may have started well, but when it was time to move on, it was time to move on.

I’m clearing out the environmental aspects I can control. I’m shifting and changing friendship groups, cities I live in, and all sorts of things that I’m working toward releasing stuck energies, so my future just gets brighter and brighter. And I’m going to say it: I am going to heal.

I’m going to put this thing on the back burner and move into my future—bright, fully embracing what the future has for me. I’m doing everything I can to heal my body and my mind and move toward a future that’s bold and graceful.

So, I want to thank you so much for joining me on the Inflammation Superhighway today. I always enjoy traveling with you, and I’m proud of you because I know that, even though I’m monologuing in your ears, you’re doing some of the things I’m talking about, and you’re doing the hard yards. I know that if you haven’t already, you’re gearing up to tackle some of these issues—big or small.

I want to honor you, I respect you, and I’m so impressed by you. Until we see each other again, stay safe, stay strong, say no to stress, and I’ll see you soon on the Inflammation Superhighway. Enjoy the ride.