The Days Grimm Podcast
The Days Grimm, "arguably Indiana's most comical, thrilling, and controversial podcast", This three-pronged mandate acts as a primary filter for their guest selection. The "comical" aspect is reflected in its official genre of "COMEDY INTERVIEWS" and its history of hosting local stand-up comedians. The "thrilling" component is evident in interviews with individuals who have extraordinary life stories, such as people who survived shootings, rare medical conditions, and combat. Finally, the "controversial" element is demonstrated by Brian & Thomas’ willingness to engage in difficult or unfiltered conversations, touching on topics like homelessness, artificial intelligence, and religious hypotheticals.
A crucial element of the show's tone is its tagline, "Brought to you by Sadness & ADHD (non-medicated)". This self-aware and raw positioning signals a modern comedic sensibility that embraces vulnerability and finds humor in personal struggle. The podcast's brand is not built on polished narratives but on the authentic, often messy, intersection of hardship and humor. The most compelling guests are those who have navigated a "Grimm" reality and emerged with a story to tell, and ideally, a sense of humor about it. This dynamic is the core of the show's appeal and the primary filter for identifying a story worth telling.
The Days Grimm Podcast
Ep.239 EMDR Therapy Explained: Safe Spaces, Trauma Healing, & Bilateral Stimulation with Lori Riley, LCSW
In this special mental health episode of The Day's Grimm, hosts Brian Michael Day and Thomas Grimm welcome back Licensed Clinical Social Worker Lori Riley of Blue Skies Mindfulness to take a deep dive into EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) therapy!
Brian shares his personal journey of finally committing to therapy and his initial, intense experience with the first stages of EMDR, including the crucial process of building a mental "safe space".
Lori Riley, LCSW, breaks down everything you need to know about this powerful trauma treatment modality:
- What is EMDR? Defining Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing as psychotherapy that helps heal emotional distress from disturbing life experiences by using bilateral stimulation.
- Bilateral Stimulation: Discussing the different tools used for bilateral stimulation, such as eye movements, the "buzzies" (vibrating eggs), or tapping.
- The Safe Space & Container Technique: Explaining the importance of building a mental "safe space" as a pausing mechanism during sessions, and the "container" technique for temporarily putting away triggering thoughts, people, or nightmares.
- Managing Intensity: Lori explains that EMDR can be intense and draining, and emphasizes the need for a therapist to allow time for processing after each session, rather than immediately ending the appointment.
- Coping Skills: Discussing practical, in-the-moment coping skills like grounding (focusing on the tangible environment) to manage fear-driven anxiety cycles and developing a personal mantra to combat intrusive thoughts.
- The History & Stigma of EMDR: Lori recounts how EMDR was once dismissed by professors as a "fallacy" in the early 2000s and why the training is so intensive.
- Overcoming Barriers to Therapy: The hosts and guest discuss the hurdles of seeking help, such as embarrassment, the "manly man" complex, and the frustration of having to "shop around" to find the right therapist.
If you're curious about EMDR, seeking therapy, or looking for new mental health coping skills, this episode is a must-watch!
GUEST INFO Lori Riley, LCSW Blue Skies Mindfulness https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/therapists/lori-riley-evansville-in/290090
TIMESTAMPS
00:00 - Episode Start & Guest Intro (Lori Riley, LCSW)
03:13 - Lori's Practice: Blue Skies Mindfulness
03:34 - What is "Grounding"?
05:56 - Brian's Therapy Journey & A Therapist Crying
07:09 - Introduction to EMDR Therapy
08:30 - Building a Mental "Safe Space"
13:17 - The Container Technique & Four Square Breathing
17:35 - How EMDR was viewed 20 Years Ago (A "Fallacy")
26:42 - Official Definition of EMDR
35:20 - The Power of a Mantra/Saying to Combat Anxiety
1:05:20 - Overcoming Barriers to Seeking Therapy (Embarrassment, Manliness)
#EMDR #EMDRTherapy #MentalHealth #TraumaTherapy #TheDaysGrimm #LoriRileyLCSW #SafeSpace #AnxietyRelief #CopingSkills #GroundingTechnique #Therap
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[The Days Grimm is brought to you by]
Sadness & ADHD (non-medicated)
Hello. Hello, hello, hello, everyone, and welcome to another thrilling episode of The Day's Grimm. My name is Brian Michael Day. My name is Thomas Grimm. Who is joining us today?
Speaker 2:Joining us for a special mental health episode on the Day's Grimm podcast is Lori Riley. How are you?
Speaker 5:Good, how are you?
Speaker 2:Doing great. Haven't seen you since Tuesday.
unknown:That's right.
Speaker 1:How you're doing good? Yes. What have you been up to? I have a feel like it's been a year or longer since I've seen you, but I don't know because my memory years and almost since I was on. Has it been that long for a while?
Speaker 5:I think so. I think it's a good idea. Because we saw you when you was on once since then, but it's still been a year.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you guys have gotten just gotten married when we saw Pete, right? Oh, that's what it was.
Speaker 5:We just had our second anniversary.
Speaker 1:Nice, man. How is uh marriage life? Yeah, congratulations. How's it going? That's good. Yeah.
Speaker 5:I'm about to get him, you know, shaped up and trained.
Speaker 2:Shaped up and you did this. Is that like a crochet ordeal? Do you have a stick that you use or all sizes of a stick with my crochet?
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 5:I can I can train him with my therapizing.
Speaker 1:Uh just jokes, folks. Uh, you know, the therapist does not beat her husband. At least I don't think so. Um so everything's been going good for you, right? Yeah. Anything new since we've seen you in the last uh couple years? Anything new popping off in the therapy world?
Speaker 5:Um still working from home. Okay. Still doing telehealth. Um I'm almost full right now, so that's good.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's uh stressful but good.
Speaker 5:It is there is some stress to it, but um I like to have the challenge of having new clients, and you know, it's psychology today is is my only marketing, so it's working for me.
Speaker 1:Well, the good news is uh this world is batshit insane, so there's a ton of people that need to talk to you. Uh so that's a plus. Um I love therapy.
Speaker 2:Uh let's swing swing your mic in a little closer. Yeah. No, you're good.
Speaker 1:Yeah, just closer. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Closer the better. Um, but yeah, anyway, so maybe for the folks at home that haven't like seen your other episode or episodes, uh, give a brief description of who you are and what you do, Lori.
Speaker 5:I'm a licensed clinical social worker since COVID. It's been five and a half years now. I've been working from home. I had an office before that. And uh that's where I just before that I went fully um on my own. I was doing contractual work for about three and a half years before that. And prior to that, since I've lived here, I worked at um uh Brentwood Springs for a while. And uh I provide mental health and substance abuse.
Speaker 2:And the name of your business is Blue Skies Mindfulness.
Speaker 5:Yeah, so there's that's just to let people know that we're focusing on the positives and we're focusing on grounding and you know not chasing anxiety around trying to live in the moment. Constant all-day challenge for I every human.
Speaker 1:When you say grounding, can you expand on that a little bit? What do you mean by that?
Speaker 5:Yeah, like um when we are noticing our thoughts start darting around really quickly, and we're not able to even maybe finish a thought, we're getting caught in that fear-driven cycle of thinking. Does that make sense?
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 5:Then we want to focus on we're not in the present, in our in the moment. We usually when we start that we're um worrying in advance. It's a snowball thing. Like, what if this happens and this is gonna happen, and this and this, and you know, we just chase that down, it's exhausting, and we're headed for a panic attack and and maybe even hyperventilation. And so if we ground ourselves and we focus on something that's real, because those things usually aren't, and we focus on something tangible, you know, like some folks really benefit from having a worry stone, we call it, in your pocket, something you can touch. Or just start naming things that are in your environment. If you're sitting in a doctor's office, this is a good example because that makes people anxious. Yeah, don't go to doctors. Exactly right. Just don't go to the doctor. Stay home and be sick by yourself. No. If there's a picture in there, name all the colors in the picture. Okay, just to think about we truly can only think one thought at a time. I mean, that's just how brain was work. So we need to take advantage of that and just try to focus on what's around me. You know, what can I see, what can I touch, um listen to some music. If you know that you're gonna be anxious in a certain situation, having your headphones, playing music on your phone, uh anything like that that you can do, kick like I said, carrying something in your pocket. But even if you don't do that and it just comes on you suddenly, just start talking to yourself about what's in your environment.
Speaker 1:I listen to a lot of music. I'm a big music guy, like all different genres too. And I'm also probably the most anxious person you'll ever meet. I don't know what that says. I think I'm broken, Lori. Uh yeah, but so in the two years-ish that I since I had last seen you, I actually did start therapy uh big step because I remember like the first time slowdown.
Speaker 2:I remember the first time Lori came on, you were like, Yeah, I'll probably never see a therapist. Yeah.
Speaker 1:I have I have gone and seeked therapy in the past. It just never pans out.
Speaker 4:Right.
Speaker 1:Uh like I had told one actually this most recent go about it. Um, so I actually went to I found a therapist. Um I don't know if I should say I probably won't say her name, but anyways, found a therapist and she was great for like the first session and then the second session, we got into some of the trauma. And then I quick I told her uh it may have been the third, but it was like within the first three to four weeks, like the first whatever stint. And whenever I explained to her this the most traumatic event that I had incurred, uh she like her eyes welled and started crying, and I was like, I get it, okay, you know, it's pretty dark. Uh and then at the end of that session, she was like, I really think you'd benefit by seeing so and so. So I got transferred to another uh lady who's really great, by the way. Um, and this is all out at Cross Point. Um really great facility, good folks out there. Um, but I'm seeing this other lady now, and she does the EMDR or EMDR.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:She does the EMDR. And her first name's Kristen CH. I can't remember her last name for the life of me. Great gal. Um, but I kind of felt like I got shuffled in her response to like that traumatic, the one event, mind you, just one.
Speaker 5:Right.
Speaker 1:Uh, I was like, oh, this this has happened before where like I tell therapists like what bothers me about what I've done or whatever in my past and you know what I've incurred, and they just they're they're like, what the a therapist has never said like what the fuck, Brian. You know what I mean? But they want to. They want to, I promise you. Like, uh, yeah.
Speaker 5:So they come bring some surprising things to the table. Everybody, even if you're a therapist, everybody's not can't tolerate it, I don't think.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so that's what I've incurred like most is like I just find a therapist and I'm willing to give it a shot, like every couple of years, and then I go, and then I it's disappointing, or they give me pointless advice that doesn't really help, and blah blah blah blah blah. But then I found I got referred by this one lady to this other lady, Kristen. Excellent. It it's it's different. I say excellent very prematurely, but it has she has handled everything very well. Good. So A plus.
Speaker 2:An she had you do the EMDR, which you actually went through a session.
Speaker 1:We started like the and if you know anything about you, obviously Lori, you do, but the folks at home, and we're gonna get pretty deep into EMDR today, but um if you know anything about EDM EMDR, the first the beginning it like it's like stages, right? To like get to the final place to where you're actively doing this whatever modality they're using. There's like stages to it, and I just started like the first stage. So uh we did the safe space one. I don't I don't know what the other stages are or phases are that you can use, but we can talk about that today. Yeah. But I just built my safe space, and that's kind of where I'm at right now. That's as far as I've gotten.
Speaker 5:Okay. So we've done no little vibrating eggs or so you haven't I was gonna ask you like what um if you had a session, you know, you have to have the bilateral stimulation. I was just wondering what she was using with you for that.
Speaker 1:Actually, we did start the egg thing. But it was in the building of the safe space process. Okay. So like I don't remember like I think I only did one session of it, and this has been a couple of months ago, and I'm uh currently unemployed, so I don't have uh insurance, so I haven't seen her in a couple months, but I'm planning on picking right back up whenever I get. But anyways, uh I think I had done one session with him in my hands, but I know it was like building the safe space.
Speaker 3:Okay.
Speaker 1:But that being said, before we get balls deep into this EMDR stuff, I will say that like just having that safe space built, and then I'll let you elaborate on kind of like what I'm referencing, but just having that built in my head, like as I'm speaking with you, I can see it. You know what I mean? Like, and it does help a little bit with like I call it like the shaky voice syndrome, like when my chest gets tight and I'm like telling a story or whatever, or something embarrassing, or that anxiety starts to spark up. Like just imagining that is definitely like like I can close my eyes and see it right now. It definitely helps a little bit just having that four by four trailer. So I in my safe space, I'm I'm uh in a trench, I have a machine gun. No, I'm just kidding. Uh, but I'm on a beach. You like that. Uh she likes it. Uh it's funny. I don't care what you think, Tom. Um, but yeah, like I'm on a beach of Normandy. Yeah, we're storming the beaches. Tom just doesn't uh no, but I'm on a beach, I'm in a lounge chair, my wife is right next to me. Um, and I don't know why. I'll ask you about this later. Uh but there's storm clouds like off in the horizon, and then there's like a rocky incline, like a uh full summit off to the far right of the beach, and then in the sand is written home. That's like the safe word or like the name of the place. Yeah, so perfect.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I'm just like lounging, you know, and I can't like common for like EMDR or yeah. Is that like common to build a safe space?
Speaker 5:Or it is, it is. It's definitely a good place to start with it because one of the one of the I don't know if you want to call it a downside. There's been times that I've thought maybe it it is that we have absolutely no idea what the brain's gonna do when we start the EMDR. And sometimes it's really surprising what people have said that's totally different from anything we've worked on up until that point sometimes. And you don't know what topic your brain's gonna go to, and you also don't know how it's gonna present it to you.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 5:And sometimes it's really dark and it's and it can get scary and it can cause, you know, anxiety to build. That's why we also use, you know, the numbers. Where are you where number are you at when we start, what number are you at now? We gotta, you know, I'm I always tell everyone if you need to stop, we need to st you just when I would don't don't keep going 'cause you think I want you to. We if you need to stop, you need to stop. But being able to even pause and go to that safe space gives you an opportunity to remind yourself that you're not reliving anything. You can go there and everything where everything is okay.
Speaker 1:And then so she did when when we first started and I was introduced to the EMDR, she said that there are several different types of that like of the building blocks that you can like start with. And she explained it to the to me. There might have been three or four. Do you know those offhand? And and the safe space is one of them.
Speaker 5:The safe space is one. I think it's one of the most important ones. The other one is the these are the ones I do with people. That one, four square breathing, and then um you can use a box or some other thing if you want to, but a place where you can put things or people in. Some people just want to imagine it. And that's I mean, that works for some people. You gotta have a pretty solid imagination. I think it's good to have a container. I th that's really actually what we call a container. That's where you can put things and it cannot come out until you're ready to take it out. You know, some people like to make um a shoebox, paint it, dress it up, um, and you put put the cot right on your cards what you want to put in there, what you need to put in there for a while. And then you know, you can just I don't have to think about it right now because it's in the box.
Speaker 1:What goes in there? These are like bad things?
Speaker 5:Yeah, like things that are triggering, things that um maybe you know, cause panic or maybe you even have a nightmare. A lot of times when people have PTSD, nightmares are common. It's nor it's really n a a norm. And you can write something that went happened in that nightmare on a on a card or piece of paper and put it in the box and close it, and then I you know, it's surprising how our brain responds to tricks like that. I can tell myself that can't come out unless I let it and and it it will work.
Speaker 1:That's wild.
Speaker 5:It's just like writing, you know, I have so many people over my years of doing this, and I'm guilty of it too. We get in the habit of calling ourselves a derogatory name, and we'll say it all the time so frequently up here that we don't even notice how often we're still.
Speaker 2:I don't even have that voice anymore. It's just Brian's voice.
Speaker 1:You don't even want to know my pre-gym.
Speaker 5:We'll have to have a group session, guys.
Speaker 1:You don't even want to know my pre-gym regiment. Uh part of it is I just stand in my underwear in front of a full-length mirror and talk shit to myself. Like David Goggins. Yeah. Oh, you piece of shit. Look at you. You call yourself a man, you sissy. Like, yeah, I get weird. Uh yeah, I like that kind of uh derogatory stuff, but it's probably not mentally good for me.
Speaker 5:Probably not. It's not as effective as what you think, I'm sure.
Speaker 1:But like there is something to it though, because like when you're about to go exert yourself, right? Like if you're in there like trying, oh, you slob, you piece of crap. Look at you, you know. You're trying to get into a state of and then you get out there and go get after it, and then you're like, Yeah, you're you're a slob. No, you're better than that, and you're like fighting yourself the whole time. So it like makes you I don't know, it works for me. Maybe I'm just too violent. Uh I don't know.
Speaker 5:I'm not sure if you really mean that though, the way that you're describing it, the way that I'm describing people choosing a name for themselves that they not the same, yeah.
Speaker 1:You see what I mean? Yeah, no, no, no, not the same.
Speaker 5:I call myself that all day, all the time. Yeah. If if I'm talking to myself like that, if that's what my inner dialogue's focus is, I cannot expect for my depression and or anxiety or anything else to improve. My self-esteem certainly isn't going to be.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you're just driving towards becoming that thing. Right.
Speaker 5:Yeah, those people might not even be around anymore. But we will record all that, add some to it, and then take up where they left off. Yeah. And just keep having those conversations. And sometimes writing that name on a piece of paper and then burning it or flushing it or however getting rid of it, it's really effective in helping people stop using that word.
Speaker 1:I like that. I like that. I still need to call myself names in the mirror, I think. It does, it does get me kind of amped up.
Speaker 2:So of like if something goes wrong and it's like your fault and you're always calling yourself an idiot because you're forgetful or whatever, you know what I mean?
Speaker 5:I think that's where it's snowballs type of thing, is what yeah, what I'm talking about. Yeah. If you talk to yourself that time that or that way enough, you're you're definitely gonna believe it and you're gonna really get stuck. I really think what you're doing is working yourself into a state of just getting juiced arousal.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 5:I mean, you probably get a little bit of adrenaline flush going, and that's what you want to help get you going. And I I understand that. I'm sure it's related to military.
Speaker 2:Yeah, a hundred percent.
Speaker 5:Sure, sure.
Speaker 2:Well, uh, so we we mentioned uh like clearly we're gonna talk largely about EMDR, but uh uh in the beginning of like therapy and your journey on therapy, EMDR wasn't like necessarily like common.
Speaker 5:Like oh no, no.
Speaker 2:Was it even a thing?
Speaker 1:Because how long have you been doing therapy now? Two years. Three years?
Speaker 5:Twenty.
Speaker 1:Oh, twenty years.
Speaker 5:Yeah, but I've been doing giving therapy, providing therapy for twenty years. Okay. And well, I did some in my in internships, but not not to like since I graduated completely so it did exist twenty years ago. But you know, I I come from a rural area, southern Illinois. Never nobody ever heard. Salukies, right? So, like I said in in my previous podcast, I went to college at um SIU Carbondale from 2005 to 2008. I did bat I did my bachelor's there and my master's in one year. And one of the in one of our classes, we had to write each of us um a paper about a different treatment modality. And everybody's had to be different, you know. We had to talk with the professor about it beforehand, and one lady chose EMDR. That was the first time I ever heard of it. And he was so angry with her for choosing that, and when she did her what do you call it? She gave her like presentation and that's it. I'm sorry, she gave her presentation in front of the class and explained it all to us and everything. I'm like, wow, that's really interesting. He failed her paper.
Speaker 1:Hell yeah.
Speaker 5:When you get one failed big paper like that, you know, you're pretty much read for the semester.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, you're done, dude.
Speaker 5:That's a do something, and he's like, This is a this is a fallacy, and it's a way to um take advantage of minds of people that are in a vulnerable state, and it's you know, and and it's probably not even real. I know he was really angry, and I was like, Isn't hypnosis a form of therapy? You have to be yes, I can't do that.
Speaker 1:Right. No, I'm not saying that you do, but to his point, or you know, to work with somebody that was to counter his point, though. Hypnosis is literally taking control of someone in a vulnerable state.
Speaker 5:It is.
Speaker 1:So shut up, dude.
Speaker 5:I've never tried to talk anybody into it. Yeah. But I, you know, like I said, I hadn't know anything about it, and she was obviously very upset. And why he let her even do the paper and then get so angry at her, I don't understand, but that's how that went. So I left college really thinking that it was like witchcraft or something.
Speaker 1:That yeah, dark arts.
Speaker 5:Yeah, I didn't have a good, a good, a good feeling about it. So then as my career went along, especially when I moved to Indiana ten years ago, that's when I really started hearing more about it, and then the training ability came up. And so when I was working at virtual consult, that's when I got uh went for the training. And the training is fairly limited. I think that I went there was two separate trainings like three or four months apart, and you were gone for the training for three or four days. So it was very intensive, it was all day, yeah, every day, and they jumped right in the very first day they had us doing EMDR on each other. And I will say I did not feel prepared for such.
Speaker 1:Whatever. Um, but anyways, uh Kristen was telling me that like all the time people come out of it like crying, and I was like, I hate to break it to you, lady. I don't cry. I let her know that right up front. I'm sure you uh but yeah, it is like really, really um intense. It is. I I've not done it like all the way through to the final stage or whatever. Um, but I keep I'm all I'm hearing about is like how intense it is.
Speaker 5:It definitely can be. And I don't know if you had things come up that you were expecting, but I've probably I would say over my time of doing it, and I don't do it, I don't that's what I in my opinion, that's one of the downsides of telehealth is I'm not as comfortable doing it virtually as I was doing it in the office because of just being in the same space with the client, you're able to provide, in my opinion, more support that I can't do if you know we're not gonna be able to get it.
Speaker 2:Well, it's probably a little easier, like if you the lights there in the room with them or the buzzies and like because uh if not it's a tap, right? Like you're supposed to tap.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I feel like for something so intense, I I really feel like it should be more personal than just like I don't feel like you're gonna get a hundred percent of what that modality has to offer virtually. I feel like they need like the therapist should be in the room. You know, both to like control not control the person, but like if things get overwhelming, you need to be there to there, tap them on the leg or touch them on the shoulder or something, like hey, come back to me, you're not in Vietnam, dude. Relax, bro. You know what I mean? Or whatever. Yeah, whatever it may be. I don't know.
Speaker 5:I have met a few people, you know, and someone else's office to do it, to still be able to do it in person since I've been working um virtually. But um even when I was still in the office, I still didn't always necessarily follow all the things that I was learned in the um training. Um they tell they told us in training that you don't ever have to do talk therapy again. I completely disagree with that. Um that you can just do only EMDR all day, every day with everybody. Everybody doesn't want to do that.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 5:Some folks are scared of it, and you I don't believe in trying to push somebody into it. And I also, even when I do um an EMDR session with somebody that I has done it before, I'm still not gonna do it for your whole time because we don't know what's gonna happen. And I want at least 15 minutes afterwards to be able to process whatever happened, you know. I'm not just gonna be okay, bye. You know, we gotta talk about it. What what how do you feel about what happened?
Speaker 2:But I feel like it'd be nice if it was broken up, like an EMDR, and then let's have a session afterwards talking about whatever came up during that EMDR. Let's space it out a little bit. Yes.
Speaker 5:And I don't I don't do it, I don't want to do it every single session either. Right. And I have had a few people in the past want to do it every time, and I think we can easily get in that mindset of I want to see what happens. This is not like this is not uh, you know, it's not just a test, it's not a test. It's not a trick. No, it's not for fun. It's not just for fun. And I I there's a few other things that I encourage people to is I would prefer that they do it when they don't have a uh a lot of other things that they need to do that day, because once you get your brain processing in in this manner, it can leave people feeling really tired and sleepy and unable to you know, it doesn't shut off just like that. And you need to be able to relax and rest. Sometimes people feel like they need to sleep for a little bit even afterwards. It can be a very traumatic experience. And um I don't want people to have to have like a really busy day at work where they have to focus a lot because I don't know that you would be able to. I can't.
Speaker 2:You're probably having flashbacks throughout the day still.
Speaker 5:You know, when I had it, I you know how when you have a really intense dream, and then the next day sometimes it'll like flash in and out of your consciousness through the day.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And you're like, oh, that's that dream. That's what that was about.
Speaker 5:Yeah, that's what happened to me when I do the EMB EMDR. I can't see clients after that. I'm not gonna be able to focus. And uh it doesn't it does make me feel tired and drained. And so that's definitely they didn't mention that when I wasn't training, but that's definitely something that I try to encourage. I will try to schedule it, you know, for later in the day so they don't have to go back to work afterwards or anything like that.
Speaker 1:No, absolutely. And also I just now realize we're 10 minutes deep probably on just EMDR, and we're gonna go deeper, obviously. But first and foremost, for like the folks at home that maybe don't even know what EMDR is, I just now realize that we didn't really define what it is.
Speaker 5:Right, eye movement desensitization and reprocessing.
Speaker 1:Right. Um, and this is the AI overview. It just says psychotherapy that helps people heal from emotional distress of disturbing life experiences by focusing on distressing memories while using bilateral stimulations such as eye movements, but you've also described um the little vibrating edge.
Speaker 5:I did, I brought my buzzies with me.
Speaker 1:Oh, did you really? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Tom told me about these.
Speaker 5:I never did use the light bar. Um, I had some concern. Well, I've had a few um blind clients over the years. Yeah, that doesn't bode well for them. And uh also I'm concerned about the the how bright the lights are and the way that they can run. What if a person has um epilepsy? Yes, I'm concerned about how that might affect them.
Speaker 1:Oh, dude, if it was like undiagnosed and you were the reason.
Speaker 5:That'd be terrible. I don't want to do I would feel horrible. Right. So I never did the light bar. I started out with just the tapping until I got these, and that's what they taught us with in no, it wasn't the tapping. We didn't start with the tapping. They have you hold your fingers up like this and have the person watch your fingers. Now that's what I started out doing. And what I noticed was people get so hyper focused on my hand that that's all they think about. They they can't think about it.
Speaker 2:So you might as well just go sit in a car and turn the windshield wiper blades on and that hey dude, honestly, low-key, that might work better.
Speaker 1:I like where your head's at, Tom. Uh dude.
Speaker 5:But I think tapping, um, if you sit, you know, really close to the person and tap one knee or the other. Now I have um treated people that part of their trauma makes it extremely uncomfortable for them to be touched. Yeah. Or to even have someone get that in the personal space. Yeah, you can't you can't not get in their personal space if you're gonna tap it. So tap their knees or their back of their hands. So they can people can do the butterfly tapping on their shoulders, you know, crossing their arms across their chest and tapping their shoulders. That's one way. And then they can tap their knees. But I when I got these, I really feel like these work the best of anything that I tried. Um, you hold one in each palm. I always encourage people, you know, don't squeeze it really hard. Right. Just hold it gently, like right in the palm of your hand. And the thing that's good about this, the control box, you are able to adjust how quickly it goes from one to the other. You know, different speed has a different impact, and also the intensity, like how strong the vibration is. Now, this also came with um headphones that you can play sounds at the same time. I never had one single person like that. It's I think it's too much to concentrate on to listen and focus on the the buzzy at the same time.
Speaker 1:Oh, at the same time?
Speaker 5:Yeah, because it everybody that I tried it with, and I even tested it on myself a few times, they say, you know, my brain is going back and forth to the sound and this, and nobody so we just tried the sound alone. Nobody liked that. This was they being able to hold this in their hand has always for me than everybody I worked with, this was the most effective.
Speaker 1:What is the sound that they because that was going to be a question that I have. Is it just like a low tone, like a low frequency tone type of noise?
Speaker 5:I think I said music. That's not right. No, you didn't. You didn't.
Speaker 1:You just said some kind of I think you just said the earbuds. But it is a tone. I always wondered that because I know they do the eyes and I know they do the hands and the tapping, like on the arms, shoulders, knees, whatever, but I hear very seldomly, if at all, people talking about like auditory and for this EMDR. So like almost no one's doing auditory.
Speaker 5:No one was ever interested in it for me when I was in the office.
Speaker 1:I wonder, uh yeah, that's that's uh that's enlightening. I wonder what it is about the the auditory.
Speaker 5:I don't know. It's just um people don't seem to be able to focus on it as much. They're more apt to have their their minds just wander off into what I've got to do when I leave here type stuff.
Speaker 1:I wonder if the light bar is similar to.
Speaker 5:I don't know, because I didn't I I know someone that does that, but I've never done that.
Speaker 1:Intriguing. I'd be interested to talk to him, her, or they. I don't know what uh who they are, but that'd be interesting.
Speaker 5:Um These do work pretty good. And one thing too that I've noticed is that s that slower and not high intensity seems to work better for people overall. If this goes back and forth too quickly, it causes anxiety.
Speaker 4:I can see that. Yeah. Okay.
Speaker 5:It slower usually has a better effect with having something come across. I've never had a bad reaction to doing EMJR with anybody. The only thing that I could even say that was remotely adverse is that nothing happened at all. And that was only a handful of people, and I felt like it was probably because of fear to relax enough to let it happen because you don't know what's gonna happen. I can't tell anybody, I have no idea.
Speaker 1:No, absolutely, yeah.
Speaker 2:And you opened up the show with that. Especially if that I bet they know that like something's happened, but their brains, God bless you, not letting them bring up that moment like throughout or they they're questioning, you know what I mean? They're like, Maybe I was touched, but I just don't know, you know, and they don't want they don't want to know.
Speaker 5:So they just Right. And I I never had that come up, but you can't say that it won't. No one right. No one has any idea. We just have to wait and see. And so I really think it was just a block. I've tried to be hypnotized before, it didn't happen. I know I had a block on it, but I couldn't I couldn't.
Speaker 2:You didn't like see a hypnotist to quit smoking back in the day?
Speaker 5:I did try that. They were they were having I was really young because I quit smoking when I was 24 and um they were having a big thing at the at a uh hotel in Mount Vernon, Illinois, and we went and uh I could not I just couldn't do it. You're in a room full of people.
Speaker 1:Oh, so you never went through with it?
Speaker 5:I I did it. I mean I did it and I tried, but I still had that I don't think this is a good idea thing going on in the back of my head.
Speaker 1:Oh, so you weren't like open to the experience, and that's what you're calling a block. So you're almost like mitigating any effects before even ever starting.
Speaker 5:You can't focus on it enough. The thing when we went to that hotel experience, it f it seems crazy now when I think about it that I even agree to such because you just go in this, they had it in one of the big conference rooms. Oh, yeah. And they're like, everybody just find a spot anywhere on the floor. So you're in a room full of strangers, people are laying all over the floor in there, yeah, and you're supposed to let this person hypnotize you. I could I couldn't do it.
Speaker 1:Damn, that's wild.
Speaker 5:I know. I felt like I was gonna be too much.
Speaker 2:How many people were smoking cigarettes right afterwards outside?
Speaker 1:Golly, that's a stressful situation. I think I'd rather I think I'd rather attend an exorcism. Like, golly, dude.
Speaker 5:I'm like, if I'm hypnotized, then what's gonna happen? Yeah, dude. What is everybody else in here gonna be doing, you know? Just couldn't do it. Yeah, that's it. Maybe if I was by myself, well, you know, or with just the person, I would be more likely to have it work for me, but not there was a hundred people in there, I bet.
Speaker 2:So you think that's the biggest like reservation for somebody doing like EMDR is like that fear or that basically having that block already. Don't look at me. I don't have that. I know. I I'm not looking at you. You've done it. Yeah, I haven't done it. Lori's mentioned it like 15 times to me. Yeah. It's like, ah, I'm good. I don't want to pressure. I'm totally good at not pressuring, you know what I mean? Like in all the all the years that you've been my therapist, I don't I don't think I felt pressured once.
Speaker 1:I think that's the one plus side to uh to me is that like I've I've had I like I'm so open to anybody making this craziness go away that's happening in my brain that like I'll do whatever you want. I'll dance on one foot, you put a cake on my head, whatever's gonna make it stop. So like I'm totally mentally open to like I think the CIA has uh things for that. Uh MK Ultra? Yeah, hell yeah, dude. Hell yeah, brother. Um talking to goats.
Speaker 5:Well, you know, you can do it anytime you want to.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I know. Yeah, you gotta get in there, Daddy. Sometime it's nice. Um I say it's nice, like I'm I I'm an expert. Uh I just started. No, but so now that we kind of like defined what the EDMR uh EDMR is. E D R. That's what I said.
Speaker 4:Okay.
Speaker 1:Now that we ex uh explained now that we explained what EDM is, you said that like when you want it.
Speaker 2:When they close the process, they basically recommended it for everybody, but you don't necessarily approach it to everybody.
Speaker 5:I d I don't. I think I'm very conservative in things like that because I guess when it comes down to it, I'm afraid of harming someone. I mean, that hasn't happened, but I will not do EMD. You know, this was like a big fad thing for a while. And that I think that made me cautious also. I'm not interested in fad. I feel like the things that have always worked still work.
Speaker 2:Is this sourdough, not a fad?
Speaker 5:I don't know, but I like it. I like it. And I like Oh, is she slapping sourdough?
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, dog all the time. Hell yeah, dude.
Speaker 1:Dude, I slap some sourdough.
Speaker 2:Dude, Paul, nice big sourdough guy, too.
Speaker 1:Oh, is he, dude? Hell yeah, dude. That's what's up.
Speaker 5:Um enjoy doing it though, also.
Speaker 1:I don't know that I've ever heard like an ad adverse story come out of EMDR. Um I just know that it's like really, really intense. That's all that's all I've been told is that it can get really, really intense, which if anyone had to live a day in my brain, that's really that's really intense. Yeah. So like that's what you know what I mean.
Speaker 5:So like we're not gonna do with anybody unless they're unless, in my opinion, they're fairly stable anyway.
Speaker 1:Well, why did you look at me like I'm very stable? Uh oh, okay. Checks out. Yeah, not stable.
Speaker 3:Uh I was looking at him and Pete.
Speaker 1:I have a foundation of concrete. I am unshakable.
Speaker 2:No, but uh like so like uh both Brian and I, I I I think you've referenced before that like our anxiety levels, like if a normal person's like a four, Brian and I would be at like a six or seven. So like do you recommend EMDR to like the people that have the higher anxiousness or not as much?
Speaker 5:It's a very common one because that's is part of EMDR, is we check in before we start. First of all, we have to be very specific in what are we gonna be focusing on for this EMDR session. Yep, you kind of have to name it.
Speaker 2:Sounds like a bathroom trip. No, no, no. But you know what I mean? You gotta go into it with intentions, you gotta, you know, uh that's probably not the thing to recommend. Not quite as visual. They don't know what we're talking about.
Speaker 5:Not recommending any trips.
Speaker 1:Uh yeah, probably not excellent if you have a severe amount of trauma.
Speaker 2:I know it's a nice one, like I have my therapist, I'm like, yeah, I didn't mushrooms, and she's like, You probably shouldn't do that, you know. Yeah, that was this therapist. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 5:And then I also explain to you why you're getting those trips when you're doing it. It's because you're damaging your liver.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know, you're just slowly poisoning yourself for a few hours. Yeah, it'll be fine, dude. It it'll buff out.
Speaker 1:Uh it'll buff out, dude.
Speaker 5:But I have had frequently people they'll say they're at a seven or an eight with anxiety. When we're talking about the this is what we want to work on today, we have to come up with a starting sentence basically. Um but I'm gonna be monitoring that when you know where you're gonna do a few rounds. You don't want a whole lot of conversation in between because it can st interrupt that flow that we've started.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 5:Now it typically takes a few rounds before anything comes up because at first usually they're focused on the sensation. And then it still will take, you know, a couple that may take a few more times. So I don't expect anything after doing it as long as I have off and on off and on, because I didn't do it at all for a while after I w went um Tella. Um it takes three or four rounds for anything to start to come up, and then I I um check in and say, you know, what number are we at now? If it keeps going up, I think we need to stop. You know, take a break, see where we are, do some deep breathing. Go have a cigarette. Maybe don't do it anymore today.
Speaker 2:You adjust the speeds at all during that? Like if if after like one round, they're like, All right, I feel a little more anxious.
Speaker 5:You do drop the intensity down, turn the speed down.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 5:Yep. And one another thing that I've noticed over time of doing it is that when they were training us to do it, they basically said stick with 20 to 30 seconds for a round. And a round is just how long you're experiencing the bilateral stimulation. So it doesn't matter what type it is, you time it, you know, while it's happening, or just don't do it for several minutes at a time. I'm sure that would not be good for your brain. You need to take a moment, but I've for the most part, people don't have a whole lot happen in 30 seconds. So I typically go 45. So the things that I've noticed is it seems to me like that 45 seconds I don't usually go past that, but forty-five seconds and a lower intensity and a lower speed work the best for most people. We just want to do things really fast and right now, and I think that actually increases people's anxiety. So we need to calm down. We always take a deep breath before, we take a deep breath at the end, we check in, what did we notice? Where and then that gives the person an opportunity to say, This is what come up. And then we take a deep breath, what's your number now? Do it again, and we just do round after round with not a lot of discussion in between to keep what is started going.
Speaker 1:When do you when do you typically like cut the person off like hey, we're stopping? Whenever they answer one through ten on their anxiety level.
Speaker 5:If it if it goes if it just continuously goes up and not down, I'm gonna stop.
Speaker 1:So what do you say to and I've never really asked my therapist this, but like anxiety is like the primary reason that I'm there again. Like Tom described, he's he's probably a seven or an eight, I'm probably like a 14 or a 15 daily, just on on the regular. Yeah, I'm in the teens. Uh I'm having a quince in that with my freaking anxiety, you know what I'm saying? Yeah. Um, but like when I walk into the therapist's office, like I'm usually pretty chill, so like, but still at that 13 or whatever, just constantly ready to roll at a moment's notice, you know what I mean? And uh so like if I'm starting my this treatment, like a session with her, am I losing out for going into it already so anxious? If like I mean, my anxiety just does not stop.
Speaker 2:Well, sure she like I don't think your therapist would likely prep you if you go in here like I'm really anxious. It's like, hey, let's do this square breathing. That's the point though, I was thinking.
Speaker 1:That's the point though. Like, I'm always anxious. Like it doesn't matter what I do.
Speaker 2:If you did like Wemhof or something, and like we're focusing on your breathing and like maybe changing, you know, in through the mouth, out through the nose, and like you've re That Yeah, that's part of the four-square breathing.
Speaker 5:That and the four-square breathing is a component of EMDR. And the good thing about things like that, and your safe space and the box the you know container is you can do these anywhere, anytime. Even if you're at work or out in the out in the store or whatever, you can still do it. Everyone else is breathing too. No one's gonna think that anything weird is going on.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 5:You I I'm just encouraging, you know, everybody practice these things all the time. Don't uh feel like you can only do it if you're at home or in your car. If an if anxiety hits you strongly when you go in the grocery store, do some of these things in the grocery store. If you're thinking about grounding technique, which is honestly what these things are, these are basically if you boil it down, it's just grounding techniques. And if you're focusing on that, you're not gonna be able to think back and forth and you know, and get into that cycle of fear. You're gonna be self-calming while you're shopping.
Speaker 1:Okay. I like that.
Speaker 5:You could do it.
Speaker 1:Uh yeah, I'm I'm real nervous about getting into it now.
Speaker 2:So does that the hardest part is like the distraction. Same with like when you go to pray or whatever and you get a random thought and it takes you off the process. You know what I mean? So it's like it's the same thing as like breathing when you're like, oh, all right, five, ten seconds or whatever through the mouth, hold it for five seconds, out through the nose for longer than you inhaled, and then like repeat, and then like you're thinking about that process, and then you're like, Oh, did I leave the oven on? Did I and then you're like, oh, wait, let's go back to square one, get the breathing down. Yes.
Speaker 1:Funny he brings up prayer since I've last seen you as well. I started going to church.
Speaker 5:Awesome city. I'm happy for it.
Speaker 1:I'm super pumped on it.
Speaker 2:He's a twice-a-week mass attender. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:I'm going Sundays, Sundays, and Wednesdays, doubling down on the Lord, you know what I'm saying? Uh, it's gonna hurt you. Yeah, dude. We're just well that I haven't uh I learned in the past few weeks, like in the last month, that I wasn't baptized as a baby. So now I've got to go through the whole rig and roll of like the introduction to I'm going to St. Boniface, so you've got to do this like introduction to Catholicism for adults, and it has a fancy name. I can't remember what it is, but doing that on Wednesdays and then going to Mass on Sunday. So it's been pretty tight, dude.
Speaker 5:But uh there's things that you can use from that to help with this anxiety.
Speaker 1:That's why I wanted to bring it was awesome that you brought up prayer because that does I've always prayed, like I've always been religious. I just turns out I I wasn't baptized and I wasn't going to church. That sucks, but you know, here we are. Right. Uh but anyway, so but every time for like the last since Afghanistan, really, to the last 10 years or better, uh, or you know, yeah, 12, 13 years, I'll get into a prayer and then like my mind will just like go off this way. Yes. And I'm like, man, did he have two different shoes on when I met him earlier? The devil is busy. He had two different shoes on. And I was like, oh no, son of a bitch, get back over here. And I'm like, uh praying for the pygmies down in South. You know what I mean? Like I'm just like trying to get back to the thing because it happens all the time. But there, I think, so not having seen my therapist in a couple of months now since uh becoming uh ungainfully employed, um, or unemployed rather, uh the the journey in church has like helped fill that void a little bit. And I'd be curious to know your thoughts on like how to complement your therapy with not Catholicism or Christianity, you know, any religion uh with religion in general, or how to use religion instead of therapy, is that possible or can you use therapy without religion? Like, what are your thoughts on kind of those three different scenarios?
Speaker 5:I think that if we have faith, we definitely can use that as a tool to help you know, a coping skill to help manage anxiety and or depression. And um I know for a lot of folks, as soon as they start noticing feeling anxious that if you go to say a prayer, that is that helps. Again, w how many things can we think of at once? One time one thing. And if I'm focusing on praying, then I'm not thinking about what I was worried about, right?
Speaker 1:What if I'm going to pray and then I can't focus on that?
Speaker 5:I d when I now I w I'm glad that you said that 'cause I wanted to say something more about that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, please.
Speaker 5:Sometimes when we feel like we have we I need to pray, that it's gotta be a really long, eloquent sounding that I'm gonna be using language that I never use any other time.
Speaker 1:That's not Hence thou forth on a summer fortnight. Yeah, yeah, no, dude.
Speaker 5:That's not helpful. God knows that you're anxious, He doesn't expect that. So I really encourage people just to sp to pick like a really short five or six-word thing that's like a mantra type of a thing, and just repeat that have it memorized. You can just pull it out anytime.
Speaker 2:What's a mantra? It's like a like a phrase.
Speaker 1:Like I gotta follow up with that follow-up question. What's a mantra?
Speaker 4:Before I see you again, I want you to read the entire dictionary.
Speaker 2:No, but it's it's like a phrase. So like sometimes like uh in your Catholicism journey, you could do the Lord's Prayer, and like that could be your mantra. So anytime you get distracted, you restart the prayer with the Lord's Prayer, and then from there you can go back into your cycle.
Speaker 1:That's honestly that's how you're describing it, is how I pray at night before I read the phone.
Speaker 5:Every night when I go to bed, I start the Lord's prayer. Sometimes I get distracted. I and I will repeat and fall asleep.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I like to do like uh just like different phrases, you know what I mean? Like God just is like God willing, or I'll praise be to God, and you just say that on like all praise be to God on repeat until my mind's calmed down, and then I can go back into where I was at.
Speaker 1:That is so interesting. I'll have to try the repeat. I've never done that before, but I'll have to give that a shot.
Speaker 5:The repeat is the key. Just keep saying it. Don't worry about, you know, we judge ourselves for things that God absolutely does not care about. He doesn't care if you get distracted, and he knows that. He knows how our brains work, he created it. And so not judging yourself is part of the the work of doing this. Does that make sense?
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 5:Let yourself do it. Don't don't oh my gosh, I did it again. That doesn't matter. Just start over, just keep starting over. And the practicing of starting over is also honing these coping skills that you're working on creating for yourself.
Speaker 1:And and we're talking pretty heavily on uh like Christianity right now, but I do want to preface with like this would be applicable with any religion, just for the folks at home. Like if you're Buddhist, you know, throw down on your boy Buddha or Judaism or whatever. Yeah.
Speaker 2:If I get distracted and it's like stuff from my day keeps going up, then it's like, all right, I'm gonna pause this prayer and reflect on my day. Like, all right, where did I fall short? What do I want to improve on? Get let me think about all this stuff as like a meditative thing, and then let's go right back into the process.
Speaker 1:Hell yeah, dude.
Speaker 5:I ha when I worked with um senior citizens only before I moved here at Greenville Regional Hospital. That's so sick.
Speaker 1:I didn't know you did s uh senior citizens only.
Speaker 5:That's great.
Speaker 1:Dude, I love I love an old dude.
Speaker 5:And now we'll tell you that it's very uncommon to have just senior focused treatment like that. Yeah. And they benefit from it so much because we would have people come in from home, also from nursing homes, yeah, and assisted living. And they would think that they were had um dementia, and a lot of times it was depression, and we would work with them and it was an intensive outpatient. So they would come two or three days a week and be there for five or six hours.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because what do they have to do? You know what I mean? They got like bingo, and that's it. Like, dude, get I'll see you on Wednesday. Get back in here.
Speaker 5:They loved it, they made friendships there. Hell yeah. And we served them lunch, we fully engaged with them, and their dementia would symptoms would drastically.
Speaker 2:Ooh, Tom Sr. Yeah. And we had men, and I went over there the other day, and he's like, My grandma was like, he's in there watching the podcast. And I was like, Oh, really? And I went in there, he's watching his episode, and I was like, How's it going, Graham? So he's like, I'm watching this. He's like, I got so many more memories from these moments. See, and I was like, write them down and let's get you back in there, you know?
Speaker 5:Let's write things down is really good. There's there's that doesn't mean that people don't get dementia. I don't want it to sound like that, but things can improve with with stimulation and with help and just with being heard and being listened to. But there were a few people there that really were amazing that came, and I had this one lady, and she was so smart, and we were talking about what we're talking about now, coming up with a saying that I can go to when I'm anxious.
Speaker 1:A mantra, if you will.
Speaker 5:A mantra. And hers was the rain waters the good earth. And I thought that is one of the most calming things I've ever heard, and there's no religion or lack of it that is going to be contradictory to that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's awesome because I guarantee you we have like a bunch of non-religious listeners, you know what I mean? So your mantra could just be something like my great grandma's was I'm a lucky duck.
Speaker 4:That works.
Speaker 2:I'm a lucky duck. Like when when something was going wrong, she'd be like, you know what? I'm a lucky duck. Like I'm even if it's raining, you know, at least the duck's in the pond. Or, you know, whatever.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah, brother.
Speaker 5:It doesn't have to be complicated, it doesn't have to be good, it doesn't have to be dramatic. It just needs to be something I can remember and I can say it and repeat it as much as I need to until I stop focusing on the thing that's triggered the anxiety in the first place.
Speaker 1:That is fascinating. I'm gonna have to come up with one of these.
Speaker 5:I still think the rainwater's the good earth is just a pretty, you know, it's a beautiful you can picture it when you're saying it. It's natural.
Speaker 1:We had a mantra in the infantry. It was um it they use it all the time in like different uh like marching to the grass. No, no, no, even better, but it does have a grass in it. It said this is I might have to edit it. It's awfully violent, but it's uh the the red blood makes the grass grow.
Speaker 5:Oh no. I'm not sure that don't use that one.
Speaker 1:Home of the infantry. Uh born and bred killers, folks. I don't know what to tell you, but we were good at our job. Um, so anyways, yeah, that's something more peaceful than that. But I can come up with a mantra. That's you can that's interesting, dude. Something short, yeah.
Speaker 5:Something that you're not gonna struggle to remember. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. Dude, that's exciting. I like that a lot, actually. I like blood talk anyway. Yeah, my bad dog. Oh, we're good right now. All right, we gotta check in every now and then. Like, you do all right? What number are you at? I like a two.
Speaker 4:Shut it down.
Speaker 1:Dude, honestly, uh, we didn't shout him out, but Drew's running the show for us today. He's off off camera, off mic. Thank you, Drew. You're a stud. Came out of producer retirement. But dude, Drew has been on like, I think, all of the shows but one that you've passed out on. Right?
Speaker 2:Have you been no, he wasn't there for the first one.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so that one he missed, but then he was there for your second one.
Speaker 2:Was he?
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 5:You fully passed out?
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh yeah. I passed out twice now. And then I think Drew passed out even once, too.
Speaker 5:It's just I think I'm the only one I hope I don't catch that here.
Speaker 1:I'm the only person on this podcast crew that has not passed out.
Speaker 5:I almost lost you in my office once, and it really scared me.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, yeah. That's what's that's what's funny. It's like I tell people about, you know, like, hey, like what do you call it again? Vassavegal syncope. Nice, dude. It's like, hey, like we get going on this, I drop.
Speaker 5:And then like Brian the you turned the color of your shirt.
Speaker 2:I believe it. Brian Brian heard it for years and never saw it. And then like he finally saw it one time and he was like, I thought he was I thought he was flatlining.
Speaker 1:I thought we were losing him.
Speaker 5:Well, he told me, and I didn't think he was lying, but I thought that it wasn't as severe as what something lights out. He totally means it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, lights out, no one's home. Maybe the lights are on, but doors locked, no one's home.
Speaker 3:Um you gotta be careful driving.
Speaker 1:That's insane, dude. Um, no murder podcasts on the road for you.
Speaker 2:Well, that's a I passed out once just listening to a Lance Armstrong podcast. About doping audio only. Yeah, about blood doping and his cancer treatment.
Speaker 1:Maybe we just stop talking about blood. All right, moving forward. Uh I'm getting nervous. I don't need you to pass out in our new studio. Yeah, um the new studio is great. Yeah, thank you so much. Yeah, glad no stairs involved, very handy, uh handicap accessible, which the days Grimm has never had before. So um, you know.
Speaker 5:Here I am a therapist with a fear of height so extreme I can't hardly go downstairs.
Speaker 1:I get it, dude. I get it.
Speaker 2:Um, but I think that's like a a benefit to like being like being a therapist, but then like still having like you know the the fear of this. It's like you can relate to somebody, like you can relate to me and my fear of needles and blood because due to the fear of stairs.
Speaker 1:Do you believe in exposure therapy?
Speaker 5:Yes.
Speaker 1:So question how do you follow-up question. Sorry, I should have two-parted that. I should have prefaced with this is a two-part. Do you believe in exposure therapy? Part B. What does exposure therapy for heights look like for you?
Speaker 5:I d I've done that before. What does that even look like? I had to live with my son for a few weeks before I found, you know, got into an apartment, found a place to stay. And he was living in an upstairs apartment, and I was terrified. A really long staircase, um, no turn, you know, no half turn and like straight shoes. Straight up, and it was so steep looking to me, and there was only a railing on one side, and I told him I said, I don't know how I'm gonna get the dog out when you're not here. And all of our schedules were different. I had to figure it out. So I had two days to do exposure therapy myself before I had to start work. I you know, I just came here on Friday, started working on Briwood on Monday. So me and him just went up and down, up and down the stairs, and we started out with him walking in front of me with my hand on his shoulder, which is my normal. And um we just kept doing it, and then I would say, All right, now you're gonna have to be one step ahead of me, and I'm gonna have to stop putting like you know, no touching.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 5:And the reason I like to have someone's body in front of me is because then I can't see.
Speaker 1:I because I have this very strong sensation. It's a field of view thing.
Speaker 5:Nothing is gonna stop me from falling down the stairs, and as far as I know, I've never even fallen down the stairs. So, but that's that's my fear.
Speaker 1:Like you say, as far as I know, maybe when I was a toddler, but it's deep embedded.
Speaker 2:Let's turn on these let's turn on these vibrating.
Speaker 5:That's right. I need to work on that, right?
Speaker 1:I can just imagine you as like a two-year-old just like toppling down some stairs, like that's where the fear comes from.
Speaker 5:It wasn't as bad. Dang. So we just would go back up and then do it a few times like that, and then um go down a couple more steps away from me, and then not at all. And while I stayed with him, I got where I didn't even think about it. And it was great.
Speaker 2:That's what when I had my my surgery. Before I had my surgery, they had to go do blood work and stuff, and like I was still always get I'd always have somebody come with me, I'd get the blood work and I'd feel all lightheaded and stuff, but it it wasn't as extreme as it is now. Like now I can barely go in a hospital without feeling that way.
Speaker 5:Yeah, so it's like See, my problem now is I don't have steps, I don't have to do it.
Speaker 2:You don't encounter it.
Speaker 1:No, so now you've lost ground.
Speaker 5:Yeah, you know, it happens every time. I rented a small office space and the first one had steps in it, so I'm like, I'm gonna have to do this. Someone's not gonna be able to walk me up and down these steps all the time.
Speaker 1:Time to man up.
Speaker 5:So I did it, but now our house, there's only like one or two little steps to get in.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 5:I don't I don't need to step, you know, use stairs enough.
Speaker 1:I don't want to therapise, I don't want to therapise you, but hear me out here. Hear me out here. Next time you encounter or you know you're gonna encounter, it only works if you know you're gonna encounter some stairs. This could be like a training mod, like a modality for you. So what we're gonna do is when you're gonna go encounter some stairs, find a full-length mirror. Okay, you're gonna find that full-length mirror and you're gonna stand in front of it and call yourself a bunch of names, like a sissy, you scaredy cat, are you afraid of heights? What are you, a little baby? Are you a little baby that's afraid of heights? You a little baby boy, and just get yourself so jacked up about it.
Speaker 5:I'll leave my mom to clear me on the escalator.
Speaker 1:And then you find those stairs and you're like, I'm no baby, and you'll go running. Yeah, dude. You'll just be like fired up, you know what I mean? I hear me out. I think it works. Give it a shot. I'll see you in another couple years, and we're gonna we're gonna talk about it.
Speaker 5:I'll see how I'm doing.
Speaker 1:I'm just kidding. Uh again, not therapizing anybody.
Speaker 5:Right.
Speaker 1:No, that's crazy though, that like you can gain and and lose ground. You know what I mean?
Speaker 5:Like, if you don't just prove how effective it is, though, to do that, and then how it loses we can we can lose it if we we will lose.
Speaker 2:I think a lot of life's that way, too. Like if you're not constantly using it, your brain's gonna just slowly get rid of that.
Speaker 5:It's absolutely true.
Speaker 1:If you don't use it. It you do in fact lose it for all the folks at home that are wondering.
Speaker 5:Absolutely.
Speaker 1:Um bouncing back to the the EDM or EMDR EMDR XYZ back to the EMDR. So for I guess like a two-part question. What are some of the more challenging? Yeah, how do I want to word this? What are the what are so from the person receiving EMDR and the person that is like the therapist side of administering EMDR? What are some of the biggest challenges or the biggest challenge that you've seen in your experience? Because you've been doing this stuff now for five, ten years EMDR?
Speaker 5:The EMDR probably it's probably been about eight, seven or eight years since I got trading, yeah.
Speaker 1:So in your seven years of experience with this modality, what are some of the biggest hurdles that you know maybe you've encountered or you've at least heard people encounter both on like the patient side and the clinician side?
Speaker 5:I think one of the big hurdles is that especially when it first started, you know, acting like a fad kind of for a while, that um people thought it was an instant fix and I wasn't there not gonna have to engage in therapy. They can I only need to come like three or four times. You do this on me and it's I'm it's a fix. I'm gonna fit there's no fixing these things. We have to keep working on it. And so trying to explain to people I lost a few clients because I wouldn't give it to them the very first time I saw them. We have to do an assessment first.
Speaker 2:Well you gotta build a relationship to go deep with somebody.
Speaker 5:Therapeutic rapport is really important. You have to be able to trust the person that's gonna do this with you, or I don't think that's gonna work either.
Speaker 1:So I th I definitely think that's a yeah, call back to earlier in the episode when I said I make all of my therapists cry. Immediate loss in rapport. So what about on the clinician side? Like what's the biggest hurdle that you've seen on the clinician side? Maybe something you've incurred or you know, like a constituent or someone else that you'd I don't know if I feel like it's been problematic for m probabl not problematic, but I guess like uh problem I would say is that people trying to force me to give it to them when I did not feel like they were stable enough to do it. Oh, like the patient wanting it more than you thought it was necessary?
Speaker 5:I just didn't f if I don't think you're ready, if you can go find somebody else and do it, I'm not gonna do it. I will not do it if I if for example someone is suicidal and wanted me to do EMDR, that's not gonna happen. I'm not gonna do that. Have an even passive suicide. Even passive I'm not I mean, we all do things differently, of course. I'm just kidding. Right. But if somebody has even passive suicidal ideations, I do not think that's not gonna be a fix for that in my opinion. We've got to do other work first before I've seen people for a few months before, you know, as a new client before I ever felt like it was safe.
Speaker 2:I think w I saw you for a year before you even mentioned Yeah.
Speaker 5:Yep.
Speaker 2:I don't know what that says about me, but not stable if you were ready.
Speaker 1:Not stable. Probably Lori probably still not stable enough. So maybe just maybe we just leave it alone for a while.
Speaker 5:Uh but you know they're gonna leave, and I I was concerned about what was what mental state they were gonna be in afterwards. Oh, absolutely. And so if I just if I'm too concerned about where we are and I I and if the only goal for the client is to get a quick fix and th b still have holding that false belief that this is a quick fix, like you know, putting a band-aid on it, I'm not gonna do that with somebody until they have a better understanding of what it is that we're actually doing.
Speaker 1:No, a hundred percent.
Speaker 5:I don't want I I don't want scary bad surprises to come up, you know that they're not prepared for.
Speaker 2:And as we get towards the end, because it we're approaching a solid amount of time here, if we can go back to the psychology today page, f uh you have a few opening client spots like you mentioned, you're kind of booking up, but where can people find you if they want you, you know, if they want they want the Lori Riley.
Speaker 5:Emailing through Psychology Today is is the best way to contact me for me. That's that comes through my work email, and then it's easy for me to um email back. Okay, so when folks put their um phone number, which they don't always do, in that email, I will often text text people back too.
Speaker 1:Okay, nice. And then again, that's uh psychologytoday.com, P S Y C H O L O G Y Today dot com. Psychology, sometimes a difficult word to spell. Yep. Uh I get it, folks. Um, but what about uh uh so I guess do you have any like big events coming up or anything?
Speaker 2:Or do like advice that you would give to somebody that's maybe going through something right now that maybe doesn't want to see a therapist that's like uh, you know, it's like a last-minute like uh motivational speech to somebody out there.
Speaker 5:Um so what do you think some reasons are that somebody might not want to see one? Or what do you think?
Speaker 1:Because you Yeah, I'm the expert. I'll I Tom, I got you. Uh no one may answer better. So embarrassment is the key one for a lot of folks. A lot of the guys I've talked to is that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but the beauty of it's embarrassed to like counter that, I feel like in the embarrassment side is like contractually, you can't say anything to anybody about what I say unless it's about like harming myself or somebody else. Exactly. Unless like you have my permission. So that's kind of like my loophole around it. You know what I mean?
Speaker 1:It's for me, it's the manly man thing. The the guys that I know, it's it's a lot like religion, like we were talking about a couple of weeks ago at the folks are gonna think about at the Ruck and Rosary. We were talking about like submission, or maybe I was talking to Paul about submission. In the line of work that I come from, submission is not a good thing. No. And for a lot of gentlemen out there, I'm sure there's some ladies too, predominantly gentlemen though, yeah. Um, where force and um maybe force isn't the right term, but capability, like overall competence and capability is like uh a steeple to them.
Speaker 5:That's a strength that you've been leaning on all your life.
Speaker 1:Then having the guts to go to somebody and say, I I submit, I don't have the answer, I'm wrong, I'm fucked up, here's the problem.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 1:That is what I kind of mean by embarrassment. And then the second thing is the primary reason is just um because you're not gonna find the right person right away. It's searching for the right therapist is a process. You're right, it is. And you start like when you finally swallow that pill of embarrassment, and then you start, and then you fail. And you're like, oh fuck this, I'm not going back. Pardon my language, by the way, but seriously, that's how you feel. You're like, fuck this, it's stupid, I'm not going back.
Speaker 5:Right.
Speaker 1:And then you'll try again in a couple years, that'll fail. Fuck this, I'm not going back. And it's just if you can just realize that everyone is not a winner, and if you can submit, I feel like you know, just keep plugging away at it like anything else you would do that you're trying to succeed at because ultimately you have to succeed at this.
Speaker 5:Well, I think that a key answer then is to recognize that everybody needs help sometimes. That's not a weakness, and that it is a strength to seek it. That does that doesn't mean you're weak. And I do think that sometimes people give up on a a therapist too quickly. You that therapeutic report, just like when you're developing a friendship or getting to know anybody, it doesn't happen the very first time you see them. And so since the first time is an assessment, you have you know, you're not gonna be able to see how this is really gonna go. So I encourage people to give a therapist at least, I would say, a month or two. Six visits, yeah. Yeah, a month or two minimum to decide if this is a possibility that you know we're gonna be able to work. If you're not gonna be able to develop rapport, it's absolutely not gonna do you any good at all. Um, one of the most important things when people are talking to therapists is tell the truth. I know there's there's a fear because I've experienced I've been in therapy. Uh there's a fear of saying everything, because you know, we we all have that underlying fear. If you knew everything about me, you wouldn't like me. And when we are in in a vulnerable situation, like in a therapist's office, they're seeing all of me and they're you know, we don't give back to the client the way the client is giving to us. We're not on an equal plane. That does make it harder for some people.
Speaker 1:It's challenging.
Speaker 5:It is challenging. It is challenging. That's why that safe place is so valid and important and you know, feeling feeling safe with that person and I will tell you that it's not uncommon in my experience for men with the issues that you described to not be able to do this with another man and needing a woman to because it doesn't feel as um like it's gonna be as judgy of a situation. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I can agree with that. Yeah. I do think that finding a therapist that you do not feel is judgmental is very important because obviously everybody I see does not think and believe everything that I do. It's not required. I have several atheist clients I always have had.
Speaker 1:Hell yeah.
Speaker 5:But and most of them know that I'm a Christian and they they still they still see me. Um I'm not just I'm not there to shove it down people's throat. If you want to talk about it, we'll we could definitely talk about it.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, yeah. I'm the same way. I'm the same way, yeah. That's why I mentioned that earlier too. Like that if we were leaning heavily on Christianity, but I want to make a point that like all religions or lack thereof work, like just positive when we were talking about the mantra. Right. Um, but yeah, no, I'm the exact same way. I get that, and I appreciate that that quality about somebody. Yeah, that's nice.
Speaker 5:Don't you think that the not feeling judged that's the that's the most important thing?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I would say not feeling judged. I I feel like, you know, like I feel like I didn't even really open up to you for like the first three months that we met, you know, and it was just like this is what I did today, this is what I did this week, this is what bothered me. But then like after a few months, that's where we went in deeper and like actually were able to talk about stuff. Not gonna talk about almost dude.
Speaker 1:I hit them right off the rip. Like as soon as they're like, so why this goes? Yeah, they're like, Why are you here? I'm like, Alright, here we go. You know what I mean? I'm like, yeah, buckle up Tiffany, because this is gonna be a fing ride. Yeah. Uh yeah, they don't all love it, you know. I'm at I'm definitely a handful. Um, but yeah, no, I think there's uh I've always known that therapy is like pertinent. Like it is important. It is. There's battles that you're just not built to win, brothers, sisters.
Speaker 5:It's not it's not against the what the Bible says either. Yeah. It says that we can go to each other for help. We should be able to talk to each other. 100% about things. And so, you know, I I don't feel that it goes against my spiritual beliefs.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, it's um yeah, it's been nice, dude. I'm looking forward to uh some things are rolling down the pipe for me. So like I'm looking at getting some insurance again real soon. So very, very excited that I'll be uh coming back to see Kristen soon. Uh there's a fat chance in hell that she sees this episode. Maybe I tell her about it because she'll probably get excited. But um And let's not make it another two years. Yeah.
Speaker 4:Oh no, no, no.
Speaker 1:Come on, dude. Yeah, I want to I want some report back on that angry talk in the mirror to yourself about stairs. Okay, so I want to see how that goes. Yeah. All right.
Speaker 5:So your homework is I need to know what your mantra is.
Speaker 1:Oh, yes, ma'am. Yes, ma'am. I will have a mantra. You know, funny thing, last thing I want to say on the podcast. I have no more questions, but the one thing I do want to say, the mantra rings to me because I was listening to uh a guy. I like to do a motivational speech sometimes before the gym if I'm feeling slouchy or tired or whatever. I was listening to this guy in this motivational speech talk about a creed. And I was like, ooh, tell me more. And he's like, This is my creed, and this is what I tell myself, and this is what I believe in. And I wake up every day and read this, I was like, damn, I'm gonna make myself a creed. And in that creed, I will build a mantra just for you. And that mantra will be in my creed. Very excited. Drew, you better have a mantra after today, alright, brother? I'm talking to you.
Speaker 2:That better involve a bridge.
Speaker 1:Alright, Drew Skis. Uh, this episode was produced by Mr. Drew Head. Uh, find him on his socials, dude. He's all over it. We missed him. Killer photographer. Yeah, killer photographer.
Speaker 2:Um, I'll put a little photo of his Instagram in here.
Speaker 1:Such a stud. Um, so thank you again, Drew. Lori, you could have done anything else on a Sunday evening. You came in and saved us and talked to us about EMDR. And therapy in general. And therapy in general. It's been nothing short of a pleasure. I'm super pumped we caught up. And it will be less than two years before we see both of you guys again, okay? Um, short of that, another thrilling episode of the day is Grimm. My name is Brian Michael Day.
Speaker 2:My name is Thomas Grimm, and this has been Lori Riley.
Speaker 1:Thank you, Lori. We love you.
Speaker 2:Thank you guys.