The Power of DBT - Nelson

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Welcome to the Amjits podcast, the How I Survived series. In these mental health episodes, I'm creating a space for real conversations about the things we often keep to ourselves, our struggles, our healing, and the stories that shape who we are. Hello, welcome to the podcast. Thank you so much for joining me today on another mental health discussion. Um, before we begin, can you give yourself a little introduction?

SPEAKER_01 0:33

Hello, yes. My name is Nelson Gray. I'm the author of the book DBT with Sherlock Holmes. Um I have been deeply involved with mental health therapy after the loss of my daughter four and a half years ago, sent me into a tailspin where I had, I didn't realize I had CPTSD from my childhood that was boxed up my entire life until my daughter passed. And then it just leaked open and came completely wide open. And I had to deal with um the fallout and therapy help, especially DBT. And I was involved in DBT group therapy, and from that, with my writer background, I developed DBT with Sherlock Holmes that uses therapeutic fiction to teach DBT skills by reading mystery stories.

SPEAKER_00 1:30

Wow, so you've turned your trauma into something that helps others. That's really cool. Um, was there a moment when you realized your story could actually make a difference for someone else? Like, do you think that whatever you went through had to happen?

SPEAKER_01 1:45

Yes, that's a good point. I I started writing uh stories with the DBT skills I was learning because I was trying to understand them. And my background is uh writer for television. So I started thinking of what are characters that could be useful for it. And then I came across uh Sherlock Holmes, who pretty much um he is wiseman, how he talks, how he is removed, but he's also connected and he's always present. And then Watson, I realize could be expanded more because he had served um in the war in Afghanistan. So I could give him PTSD, and I could also give him CPTSD with his childhood, and I have him also lose his daughter, like I did. So there's a lot of what I've been going through and all the crazy stuff that happens with CPTSD, where you start overreacting or misinterpreting um situations. And so I was keeping a journal of all my triggers or things that were happening to me that I thought were 100% real, but they're not. And I thought, well, how can I put this into a story? How can I put this into a DBT skill? And it just came from that. And initially it was just introduced in class uh in our group therapy. And from that, people said, wow, you should uh you should add more to it. And then people encouraged me to put the cases into a book, which I did. And then people love the books, and then they keep asking for the second volume, the third volume. Um, and I think what a lot of people see is that I talk about grief and I talk about mental health from the perspective of someone who's lived that experience. And I think that's different from other therapists who haven't gone through the mental health journey themselves. I my writing kind of crosses the bridge between people who are suffering and those trying to help them and trying to find a way to convey that information that can help people.

SPEAKER_00 3:57

Congratulations on your book. And I agree, I think people only truly understand what it's like if they've been through it. Um, what do you hope readers take away from your story?

SPEAKER_01 4:11

I hope first that readers felt seen. The way that I wrote the book, I wrote it from um Dr. Watts' point of view, and it's in the writing style of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. I studied how he wrote, and I found it was an effective way to um talk to the reader. Uh, makes it very personal, very intimate. Um, people come away, they want to, they I keep getting messages. When's the next book coming out? And they read the cases over and over again because usually when you do DPT therapy, they present a skill like, I don't know, stop. And then you ask them for an example, and they'll say, Well, it's stop stands for stop, uh, take a moment, observe, proceed. And you say, Okay, well, what's an example? And they'll say, Oh, well, imagine you were going down the street and someone cut you off. Um, and you go, Okay, that's probably that's okay example, but it doesn't feel intimate. It doesn't feel the things that I'm dealing with that are personal, that are the interfamilial relations, you know, dealing with your wife, your husband, with your um children, with your employer. Those are more uh, I guess, basic situations than just someone cutting off in her car, which yes, you can get mad at. So, what I did is I could do a whole story where, you know, Watson is dealing with uh an emotion with his wife, and he overreacts. And so he darts out of the house, um, which a lot of people with CPSD, CPTSD do. Those with borderline personality also do it, though it's uh it's it's never you're running out because you're overwhelmed and your body just says, I can't take anymore. But it's processing false information. And it's hard to see that in the moment because it it all seems 100% true. Everything, all the facts, everything lines up. And it's only afterwards, maybe a day or two. Um, usually I call these SNTs, like when you're in a SNIT where you really think something is true and then you've been wronged and you demand justice. Um that's when DBT scales become useful. So I did that with Watson. I gave him a situation where he's talking to his wife, uh, something is said, he misinterprets it. So he goes for a walk. He ends up at uh with Sherlock Holmes' house, 221B Baker Street. They're talking. Holmes can tell there's something wrong with Watson. And then he uh tells him an acronym for TBT. And Watson, of course, is dismissive and just goes, What's what is this nonsense? What are you telling me? And Holmes explains it in uh in a very wise-mind manner. And then they go on a case. Usually the case involves somebody that involves the same situation, and through it, Watson sees how Holmes helps somebody, and then Watson is able to imply that skill when he gets home and imply it in his own life, not perfectly, uh, just a practice, figure out how to do it. And my stories never wrap up where everything is wonderful. It's just like, oh, here's another tool that I can use as I try to survive this process of dealing with my mental health. And people, uh, they love it because they I think it's because Victoria, England, it's 1890s, it's it's Sherlock Holmes and Watson. It's a totally different world. So we don't have our biases we have today on things. We can just get in that environment, see things, um, see ourselves through Watson, see our therapists through homes, and go do an experience that teaches you therapeutic fiction, where you come away with it and you're like, oh, oh, okay, I remember that. That Watson handled that. Okay, that's how he handled that. I can do the same thing because I'm in the similar situation. And that's that's been the formula, and it's been working, and people just love it. And I'm like, okay, I will write more, as many as you guys want.

SPEAKER_00 8:38

I'm glad that the book resonates with many people. I'll have to check it out at some point. Um, now would you say that you are now free of all of the mental health challenges? Like, even though you've written a book, I would assume you still have bad days. Um, do you sometimes feel like reading your own book helps you as well?

SPEAKER_01 8:57

I think you're right. I I don't think the mental health challenges ever go away, but the response time is different. The book was helpful because it taught DPT skills. These are coping skills, dialectical behavioral therapy, that allow you to hold two notions at once in your head, even though they may be opposite to each other. And that allows you to have a pause. I think I'm more mindful of how I interact all the time. I'm constantly working on being present. Um, I see I guard my health in terms of uh diet and exercise and food, because these are all things we know that when you're hungry, your response time is slower and you can overreact. Um also have a clarity when I talk to people now. Like before, I would always try to get approval, um, try to pretend that, you know, or make them think that somehow I'm not a danger. And I realized that was a result of insecure attachment as a child, where basically when your parents are don't pay attention to you and just kind of dump you off, uh, you never form a secure attachment. So when you're talking to people, you're thinking at any moment they could just reject you. And after a while, you're just used to being, I guess it can be good in some ways, because if you're used to rejection, then you're not worried about when people reject you. And you can be a little bold in terms of talking to people because you're so used to rejection, it doesn't surprise you when people reject you. Um, but sometimes that confidence can lead you to talk to people you normally wouldn't talk to just because you're not afraid of rejection. Uh, the book has been helpful in terms of um processing the skills, and I keep taking incidents from my own life and I put them into notes. Like right now, I probably have about 65 cases to write out. Um, I'm working, I finished the first book, the second book just got published, DBT with Sherlock Holmes, Volume 2, and volume three is being worked on right now. Volume two actually goes in deeper than volume one, it tackles some really key emotional things, and all my books deal with the theme of grief because I lost my daughter, so there are so many uh elements of grief that are involved in the stories that um and I think it's a real uh good example to use for mental health because grief is basically loss, and people who are suffering from mental health are also grieving because they also lost something, and they are trying the rest of their life to become whole again or do things they can to become uh less empty.

SPEAKER_00 12:19

Yeah, well said. Um, everyone who struggles with mental health is longing to feel whole, right? Um, what does feeling whole personally mean to you? Like I know you lost your daughter, but do you think you could regain a part of you that uh was missing?

SPEAKER_01 12:36

I don't think after a loss like that that anyone can ever be whole again. And you can never uh conquer that grief. I think what I've learned in therapy and in writing these books, uh DBT with Sherlock Holmes, and going through the grief that Watson is going with the loss of his daughter. I've learned that you can't conquer grief, but you can learn to walk beside it. I think it's given me um an understanding of other people that I didn't have before. Uh you see things differently. You don't think about potential grievances, people I don't know, parking in your parking spot or neighbors leaving their garbage cans out. You just don't care. It's just not important. Uh things that were important before are just not uh value and connection as important. And that's why I like writing the the books because they connect with readers and they feel seen. Um you write, especially if we go on the Amazon reviews, you should just see people just stunned by the book. They're just like, wow, this is so I feel like there's someone writing me a letter from a friend and telling me not what to do, but what they did, and inviting someone else to, hey, try this, maybe this will work. But you know, it's your choice. You decide what you're you're gonna do. And I think that empathy and compassion is is really what has come out of this journey that was well, everybody knows that mental health when you start going in, it can be very rocky and bumpy and overwhelming. But I was determined uh to fight through it, and I did. And a lot of it was just doing reflections, which I think are so helpful. You can look at your day and just write things down and try to understand it. And that reflective part helps develop the wise mind, where you can look at things and ask yourself and pause between what's happening, what you immediately think is happening, and what is actually happening. And I think that's been helpful.

SPEAKER_00 15:13

Yeah, it's amazing how certain traumatic experiences can make people view others differently, especially through um like a deeper understanding and compassion. Um, what advice would you give to someone who's trying to develop more empathy from their own experiences?

SPEAKER_01 15:32

That's a really good question. I would refer to radical acceptance from DBT. And I actually in volume two, there are two cases that actually deal with radical acceptance. I think in order to have empathy for others, you first must have empathy for yourself. And that includes forgiving yourself, forgiving yourself for life choices that you made. Um where now you maybe you regret those choices, uh, things you may have done, things you may have said, uh behavior you may have exhibited. A lot of it, you just have to learn to forgive yourself. And I've also been exploring the concept of um there's a story that's going to be coming out, I think it's in book nine or ten, where Holmes talks to Watson about little Watson and Big Watson, and how when trauma happens, it's usually your child that deals with it first. So the first age that you dealt with this trauma that is the age you kind of go back to when you're dealing with similar events of today. And that would be the little Watson in you that was forced to do handle an adult situation that was far beyond their years. But as we get older, uh with CPTSD and borderline personality disorder and PTSD, that child inside of us, that little Watson, it becomes an expert in handling the trauma, but unfortunately, it's not an adult. So it cannot access the adult side, the big Watson side, the one that can see the past, present, and the future. Because little Watson only sees now, doesn't see the past, doesn't see the future, only sees what is right now. And that's that's a child, that's a kid, that's what we do. So what I've learned, and I'm gonna be doing this in uh future cases with Watson, I think book 10. Um he learns to when those irrational thoughts come up, those childish thoughts that in the moment seem totally real, but upon reflection or a couple days later, you realize, wow, I was not thinking correctly. What you can do is take that child part and visualize it around you and tell that child to, hey, you're okay. Um, everything's gonna be okay. Uh, why don't you go and play? And then Big Watson can take over and handle the situation. Big Watson can be present, big Watson can do wise mind, big Watson can do stop. At the same time, he can also remind little Watson that you're safe, that you're protected, that this is not the same situation, that we're adults now, we have some agency. That's been helpful. Um, and that's really been a breakthrough for me in terms of realizing behavior, past, present, future, things I may have done in the past that I feel horrible about now. Um, but now looking at through my big Watson versus little Watson, I'm able to um accept it and go, yes, that's what happened, but that doesn't mean that's what will continue going on. The whole process is just once you start thinking about stuff and start looking at patterns and looking at your own behavior and being honest with your therapists about stuff, um, even if it's really awkward, uh, journaling is helpful, writing things down. You can see patterns, you can start seeing behaviors and thinking in terms of is this something that little Watson would think about, or is this something big Watson would think about? Because that helps you separate the two and realize that um, because I don't really want to punish the child, the little Watson, because Little Watson did a hell out of work and kept us safe till we got to this point. But little Watson's overwhelmed and doesn't want to have all the adult responsibilities, just wants to be a kid and go play. So Big Watson needs to take over. And once you start doing that, you start seeing things differently. And events that may have triggered you before don't have the same power that they did before. I don't know. I I started this journey and I didn't know what I was getting into, I didn't know how I was going to come out. Um as a male course, you're scared to go to therapy because you think of John Wayne, you think of all these macho guys, or you've seen therapy on TV and it's like Kramer, or it's uh, you know, ridiculous things. You think it's sitting on a couch, you don't understand what therapy really is, is trust and it's talking to somebody else so you can understand what's going on inside of you, so that then you can start making decisions that are active to improve your life versus being passive and letting life just happen to you.

SPEAKER_00 20:53

Yeah, therapy is never what society makes of it. Um, I like how you said it's important to know that even though you went through something horrible as a child, it doesn't mean that it's gonna happen to you as an adult. Um, someone once told me you can look back but don't stare. What do you think about that quote? And also what has been the most helpful part of therapy in helping you move forward?

SPEAKER_01 21:18

I like that quote about you can look back but don't stare. And I think we get caught up into that completely. We start focusing on the past and then we get depressed and we think things aren't gonna change. I think what helped me the most with therapy was developing or further developing the skill of curiosity. Instead of thinking or foreseeing calamity or disaster about an event or talking to somebody or asking about something, approach it with curiosity, as Holmes would say, because you don't. Know what the facts are. So why not be curious instead of assuming everything is horrible? Uh come into it with curiosity. Let's find out. Let's see what happens. Maybe it will, maybe it won't. Maybe things will go bad, maybe they'll go good. We don't know. But we have to experiment to find out. And that's okay. You don't have to be perfect. You don't have to do everything right. And it's okay for other people to have emotions and feelings. It doesn't mean that there's something wrong with you. I think growing up with CPTSD, we're tend to be mindful of the room, the emotions of people around us, that somehow we feel responsible and we can control them, or you know, humor or manipulation or I don't know, things that somehow we can keep bad things from happening. But in reality, as an adult, the bad things we're talking about are just conversations. They're not they'll have the same power as we did when we were kids. And that's been a huge huge understanding. Curiosity is fantastic to be curious about things, to be curious how something will resolve itself. Um curious if you ask, just because you don't know, and then you're shocked, especially when you apply curiosity into a situation that you assume everything is going to be horrible, and you um I'll give a case in point. I was investing some money uh in a 401k, and I put it into these accounts using AI, and then my wife questioned what the amount was doing, given that the economy's going down right now. And normally I would have immediately responded with um thinking I was under attack or she doesn't trust me, all those kind of things. Instead, I I approached it with curiosity and I said, uh, what do you think we should do? And she said, Well, you did better investing when you were using this other technique. Um, maybe you should go back to that, because I thought you were really good. And that's something I didn't anticipate. I thought she was just going to criticize my investing. But of course, that's the little Watson in me, assuming that someone's going to correct you and not the big Watson in me that's an adult that said, Well, let's see how the situation ends. Let's see how we can work through it. Is it really as horrible as I think it's gonna be? And it turns out it's not. So curiosity is very helpful. And if you think about Holmes, every case he has, it's always about curiosity. He's always curious about things. He doesn't just accept what people say to him. He he's curious and he asks more questions. So I think learning about curiosity and applying it towards mental health has been helpful because then you're able to talk to your therapist and then go home and you can think about what was said and be curious about the exchanges and try to figure out some sanity from the situation without going quickly, um, I'm right, you're wrong, or you're right, I'm wrong. But just that it is. It is what it is. Um, and there's no shame attached to it. There's just people make mistakes, it happens, you acknowledge it, and then you move on. That's it. And that that's been the real eye-opener to me.

SPEAKER_00 25:54

Well, I really like that approach a lot. So basically, it's important to be curious as opposed to having expectations all the time. That's really well said. Um so listen, I'll end it here. Uh, thank you so much for your time today. I hope you keep writing and making a difference. Uh, keep doing what you're doing and take care.

SPEAKER_01 26:17

Thank you. And thank you for allowing me to uh do this interview with you. And for those who like, uh DBT with Sherlock Holmes is available on Amazon. And volume one and volume two are out right now. And this is Nelson Gray, and I thank you for letting me do this interview and have a wonderful day.