Anxiety Recovery: When You're Trying To "Win" (Episode 154)

SPEAKER_03 0:01

This episode is for people who see their anxiety as the adversary and they want to win.

SPEAKER_02 0:07

How will I know when I've won? How do I measure it? Is there a number? Is there a formula? How do I know that I'm recovered? How do I know I won?

SPEAKER_03 0:13

The win is when it doesn't matter. It's like I'm anxious, it doesn't really matter. The ones that are hell bent on winning can't help but constantly and habitually check to see if the anxiety has gone and they've completed it.

SPEAKER_02 0:26

The social media environment around anxiety often uses terms like warrior. I will win. There's a fight that will be over and I will have won. There's no bell, there's no celebration, there's no nothing.

SPEAKER_03 0:36

There's no you're looking for that closure. Roundover, you win.

SPEAKER_02 0:40

Doesn't work that way. It's very anticlimactic and it just sort of peters out. Because here's a paradox. How do I know I won? Well, first of all, when you stop asking if you won.

SPEAKER_03 0:52

Welcome to Disordered. This is episode 154, entitled Anxiety and Wanting to Win. My name's Joshua Fletcher, and I'm a psychotherapist and author based in the UK. I go by the handle anxiety Josh, and I love specializing in all things anxiety and anxiety disorders. Um, and disordered is the place to talk about that. And I'm joined by my esteemed co-host.

SPEAKER_02 1:20

Yes, from New York. I'm Drew Linsolata, also a therapist that specializes in treating anxiety and anxiety disorders. And if more suffer of the things we talk about on Disordered, but much better now. Thank you very much. An author, podcaster, social media dude, all of that stuff. And I too am an anxiety nerd. Hi, I'm Drew, and I'm an anxiety nerd. Hi, Drew. Cool. So hi Drew, how are you doing? So today we're all good. Yeah, we're gonna talk about the need or the desire to win, the want to win. This was your topic, and I'm here for it, man.

SPEAKER_03 1:50

It comes, it's come up in my practice over the 10 years of being a therapist. The wanting to win. This episode is for people who see their anxiety as the adversary, as something that took something away from them. This anthropomorphized thing that has come in, ruined their life, and they want to win. I want to beat it, you know. But you are trying to go toe-to-toe with the doubt response. And when people want to win and want to beat something, they want evidence that they've beaten it. You know, this is how I've beaten anxiety, this is how I've won, this is how I've desensitized. But at the same time, that can lead to trickier things. This is particularly applicable to the perfectionists. Now I did a perfectionist workshop um not so long ago in the um disorder group, and we spoke about um perfectionism on previous episodes. But yeah, this episode, so if you're a perfectionist and you want to see everything through, get everything completely right, you know, get everything done perfect, then you often have this thing where I want to win. It took something away from me, and I want proof that I've won, I've beaten anxiety, and I've won the battle. Uh, which often, if you're a listener of this podcast, can lead to some kind of you know ramifications. Um, yeah. Some kind of thing. I'm talking about perfectionism recently, by the way. Someone in the audience is like, I feel attacked talking about perfectionism. Yes, I think perfectionism is one of the biggest hurdles, actually, when it comes to anxiety, anxious recovery. I mean, look at Drew and I. We're we're not perfectionists. We wouldn't turn up with these haircuts if we were perfectionists.

SPEAKER_02 3:36

100% just stumbling through every day. There's no perfection here at all. I'm happy for that.

SPEAKER_03 3:41

You paid money for that t-shirt, see?

SPEAKER_02 3:43

You're willing to, but clearly happy with that perfectionism, right? So I totally get it. I think part of it is I I like this the the the desire to win, the the the need to win or the want to win. And I think there's a couple of things here. Number one, how do you go about winning? How how do we do winning in this game that we're playing? And how do you know if you're winning? And sometimes I think that's the tricky thing because people will be like, Well, how will I know will I won? How will I know when I've won? When I'm recovered, when I'm desensitized, how do I measure it? Like, is there a number? Is there a formula? Can I put it into Chat GPT? Like, how will I know for sure? How do I know that I'm recovered? How do I know I won? How do you define the win?

SPEAKER_03 4:21

It was inspired as well by like a lot of terminology that you use on the anxious truth, which is you know, surrender. And what's the opposite of surrender? Wanting to win. Uh yeah, yeah, yeah, it's true. I want to win, I'm gonna win, I'm gonna beat you, you're gonna go away. Yeah, yeah. And it's just like, no, absolutely no surrender. I don't, this isn't a game I want to play. You know, like I I don't want to do that. I I I surrender, whatever, you win, whatever. I'll take you with me, you can follow me. I'm not engaging, but yeah, a lot of the perfectionists that are like, no, I want proof. I want my certificate that I have won, I have beaten anxiety. I don't have that certificate on my wall. Do you drew? I don't really say that. I'm just like, yeah, like no.

SPEAKER_02 5:04

I have a lot of big Lebowski references, but nothing, nothing that says I won anxiety.

SPEAKER_03 5:10

Yeah, exactly. Should we hear from the um the community? Yeah, I think we can. Any voice notes from disordered.fm?

SPEAKER_02 5:20

We have a good one that I want to play right now, so how about we do that?

SPEAKER_01 5:24

Hey Josh and Drew, this is Lily again. If you all recall, I was the gal who called up after dealing with a pretty painful rejection from a male friend of mine. And by the way, thanks again for the guidance there. I still hold it deep in my heart. And maybe one day we'll be able to do that whiskey that you all are suggesting, because I know I'd be down. But if you all also recall, I deal with general anxiety, panic disorder, and health anxiety. So today I had my second 5k race ever after almost two years of getting into running. Throughout the entire race, I was dealing with some pretty bad stomach cramps. In the past, I could totally see myself probably spiraling about this and thinking about the worst case scenario, even just flat out stopping and not finishing the race. But instead, both of you were in my brain, and I did it anyways. And I actually ended up PRing, or I guess in British terms for Josh. I ended up PB and finished in 27 minutes and 30 seconds. Just really wanted to say thank you both for providing the words of guidance, tools, all of the techniques to really allow folks to feel empowered to and eventually get to a more desensitized state. So really, thank you both.

SPEAKER_03 6:58

I love that. Good um uh and a good PB. Thank you for translating the running terms uh for your uh cross-atlantic cousins there. Uh fantastic. Uh with it, and you took all that with you as well. Brilliant, love it, excellent, you know. You won. You won because you did it with the anxiety.

SPEAKER_02 7:20

Yeah, all the like, no, she, you know, I love this. There's a couple of so many good things to love about this. I love a good comeback story because last time we heard from this person, she was sort of pinned down, and now look, you know, she's setting personal records running, which is really great, and even in the midst of that doubt. So she heard the stop instruction. Stop. This is too much, stop, and she kept going. That's win. Even though you can't measure it. Well, she did measure it 27 minutes and 30 seconds, clearly, but that's not the win. And yeah, there's so much good stuff here. Like I had some stomach cramps, but you know, we're like, what are we seven minutes in and I got it in? Yeah, I'm winning. I'm winning.

SPEAKER_03 7:57

I I went for a run the other day. I've never run 10k in my life. Okay, I don't run it very fast, but I went for a run around Manchester and I got to like 5, 6k, not as fast as 27 minutes. Um and I thought, I wonder if I could just do the 10k, you know. And I remembered it, and I got to the 10k and I was really emotional. I was like, I've never done that in my life. You know, I was like, I'm really proud. I didn't stop, I just ran like the don't get it wasn't very fast, but it doesn't matter. I'm not, I don't care, I'm not competitive. And I just thought, well, that was I I've got yeah, I got quite emotional. And I was like, yeah, I've just done 10k, it's great. I've completed running. Yeah, so I thought I thought I'd throw in my own did it running, did it anyway there. And that technically was a PR, a PB. Right. Although I could have crawled 10k and that still would have been the PB. I would pay for a video of that. I really would. So uh and then I went out for a run yesterday to do it to try and beat my PB and tore the car, the the uh my calf muscle. Good job. So now I can't walk properly.

SPEAKER_02 9:11

So you went from Rocky at the top of the steps to like I'm I'm broken. Oh yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 9:16

Oh yeah, I was running around Manchester, went to near the AO arena, uh, and I was really enjoying the run, knees weren't hurting, everything was cool. Just jogging very slightly downhill, and then pop in my car. I was like, what the hell was that? And then the searing pain, I was like, Oh, I don't think that's good. Yeah, uh, so I got so I got an Uber back home. Couldn't walk. I was like, oh my god.

SPEAKER_02 9:40

Had to do it, what are you gonna do, right? The searing pain, searing pain, never good. We don't like searing pain.

SPEAKER_03 9:44

Yeah, no, it's a bit better today. Iced iced and raised it, but yeah, good job. Yeah, always do your stretches and stuff, people. I did stretch, but be careful.

SPEAKER_02 9:51

Yeah. So how would we know if we use Lily's did it anyway? As like, how do people know? Somebody in the studio audience said, like, this is me today. Like, how do I know I'm even making progress? How will I how do I know? What how do we measure that? Well, in this, you know, example that Lily sent in and shared with us, she was having all the feelings, she just knew enough to recognize the okay, I don't have to follow that and I can keep going. So that's one way you know. Can I recognize what's happening here and maybe react a different way? In the past, she would have stopped. In this situation, she she saw that. Like, no, no, no, I'm not gonna do that this time. That's progress.

SPEAKER_03 10:28

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. The win. Well, I don't even use the word win, it's when it doesn't matter, your favorite thing. Uh-huh. It's like I'm anxious, it doesn't really matter. It's the gap between, oh my god, oh well. But there's a lot of people that have come a long way on their anxiety journey, yeah, you know, where they they can suddenly do golden rule number one and go and do all the hard things, and they don't avoid stuff and they do things like that, you know, uh, and they've got a lot of their life back like accessibility-wise, I can access my life again. But the ones that are hell bent on winning and the perfectionists, yes, that is a win, but then they're the ones that can't help but constantly and habitually check to see if the anxiety has gone and they've completed it. Yeah, and sometimes for some people, the driver of there, and I've discovered this over years of being a therapist. Sometimes the driver is, yeah, but I never used to feel like this, and I want to win, I want to beat it. And I but here's these are called like kind of like testing compulsions, like I call them like examination compulsions. If I check and test how I feel, because I want to win 50 times a day, I'm not gonna get 50 out of 50. If I did that today, as someone who is desensitized, who doesn't struggle with anxiety disorder anymore, if I tested how I felt 50 times a day, am I anxious? Is it over? Uh one of them at least I'm gonna feel probably anxious, stressed, and on edge. Yeah. But for the people that want to win, they misinterpret that and they're like, see, it's not working, and they get frustrated and they're banging their head against the wall because they want to win. Yeah. And there are no winning conditions. There's nothing to win here. All feelings are welcome.

SPEAKER_02 12:14

That's a really good point because I think that drive to win, and sometimes that's created by the environment that we're in. Like the social media environment around anxiety often uses terms like warrior, W-A-R-R, or warrior, you know, I'm banished. It's a war, it's I'm gonna, you know, kick its ass. It they're very these things indicate that like I will win. There's a fight that will be over and I will have one, which doesn't kind of work that way because you don't really know when the fight ends. You have no idea. You look back one day and thought, hey, I really thought about how I felt for a couple of weeks. Well, I guess the fight was over. I didn't even know it, though. There's no bell, there's no celebration, there's no nothing. It's just true.

SPEAKER_03 12:49

You don't know when the bet there's no you're looking for that closure.

SPEAKER_02 12:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 12:53

And just no ding ding, round over, you win. No, no, you just don't. You just let, oh, I'm anxious for a while.

SPEAKER_02 12:59

Yeah, is like you show up at home and there's a big banner recovered, and like all your friends and family that it doesn't work that way. It's very anticlimactic and it just sort of peters out, and you just don't think about it that much anymore. But you might in a year, who the hell knows, right? That's why we would both fail the checking test. But it also compels people who and I know we see this, whether it's in the community, the community app or in the comment section, or even in our practices. I see somebody winning, but continually denying that they're winning because they they don't feel certain that they are winning. How do I be absolutely certain that I'm winning? It's like watching a guy on stage with a guitar absolutely shredding it while he's saying, Man, I wish I could learn to play the guitar. Like you are you are playing the guitar, but you keep saying that. How do you know that you can actually play the guitar? So it's it's a little weird, but that's I think the need to win. I need to be sure that this is right, this is working, it's done. It's gonna, I'm gonna win.

SPEAKER_03 13:53

Yeah. Yeah. And I think as well, this this kind of for different people, it's kind of lear how how you assess how you're doing. Yeah. I mean, Drew and I will say, you know, don't really need to assess it, it doesn't need to be in the middle of the room. Yeah, but for some people, they have literally measured their entire life, and particularly perfect perfectionists, as my output has been graded, either with praise or with literal pieces of paper or whatever. Yeah, you know, how do I know that I'm doing well and winning? And that's that's the people that get pulled into these compulsions that often stick get stuck on the last hurdle, and it's really important to remember that. It's not helped as well, and you put in a really good point there, Drew. Like a lot of the literature and books and stuff out there are like beating your anxiety gremlin, winning the war on anxiety, becoming an anxiety warrior, and these are all kind of offshoots of connotations of like you have to win. There is a battle. You know when the battle's over, yeah, the enemy has been felled. And no, what we're doing is like, nah, this ain't my fight. It's like, whatever.

SPEAKER_02 15:02

As much as this pains me to say, I want to say that the subtitle of one of the Claire Weeks books, at least on the cover in the US, is End Anxiety Forever. Really? I want to say if anybody in the studio audience has one of those books in front of them on paper.

SPEAKER_03 15:18

That's the US version of that.

SPEAKER_02 15:19

Yeah, I want to say that maybe Hope and Help for Your Nerves. And you could tell that's was a hundred. But first of all, she never said that. But you could tell that's a publishing thing. Like, oh, let's put the subtitle of the End Anxiety. There's another big book that I know a lot of people know, and I the new way to end anxiety, ending anxiety forever. Like Judson Brewer wrote his whatever anxiety book, all about ending anxiety, overcoming, never banishing it forever. People in other communities online are part, he uses title like peace, promising peace, calm forever, never panic ever again. Give me 20 minutes and I'll I'll end your anxiety forever. And that looks like winning, but that's not winning. That is not what it is.

SPEAKER_03 15:57

Yeah, yeah, yeah. They're promising you the win. Right. And there's no there's no there's no win, there's no competition. You leave it alone. It's almost like having the subtitle of a book called Living with Anxiety in the Modern World. I would I would go as far as say that's a 10 out of 10 subtitle to a book. If you ever see a book with that subtitle, buy it. Buy one for your friends, buy it on all formats. Somebody should write that book.

SPEAKER_02 16:20

Maybe they maybe they already have, possibly. Maybe you can get it in Manchester in a couple of weeks. I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 16:25

Yeah, maybe, maybe, maybe.

SPEAKER_02 16:28

You should look at that. I don't know. Just throw it out there. That was the most subtle, slick like plug I've ever heard in my life. Uh very good. You know, we need a paradox sound effect. We we'll have to get one of those because here's a paradox. How do I know I've won? Well, first of all, when you stop asking if you've won. That people will say all the time, like, how do I know when I'm recovered? When you stop actually asking, you stop having a need to ask, Am I recovered? You you're probably recovered or desensitized, whatever word you want to use. So, like, the win will come, you'll know that you're winning when you stop feeling the urge, the need to ask if you're winning.

SPEAKER_03 17:05

It reminds me of a nice story. At one Christmas time, my very intelligent and autistic uncle was doing like a family quiz at Christmas time. Uh, there was a family quiz, general knowledge, stuff like that, really nerdy. And he was answering all the questions or whatever, and then for the last round or two, he just got bored. I think, no, no, there's a football match on. He was like, I'm gonna go watch Manchester United now. And he left the room, he didn't participate in the last two rounds, and he went to watch the football. We continued with the family quiz, whatever, and we totaled everything up, and we got all the points. And it turns out my uncle actually won the quiz because he's so smart, he won all the other rounds. He didn't even do the last two rounds, he totaled it up. And my little niece went through to my uncle and said, Uncle, like you've won the quiz. And he's like, I I I don't really it doesn't, I don't really care. I'm watching the football.

SPEAKER_02 18:00

Yeah, that's it.

SPEAKER_03 18:01

So it's I don't care if I won the quiz.

SPEAKER_02 18:05

So if you want to win in anxiety, desensitization and recovery, be like Josh's uncle. Like, let's get him on the podcast so we can talk to him about that. Like it's I don't care.

SPEAKER_03 18:13

Winning is not uh yeah, yeah, I don't know. I'm all good. Yeah, I know I can do quizzes, I don't need the certificate. Sure. You know you don't have to compulse and do safety behaviors, you don't need the certificate.

SPEAKER_02 18:25

So the win is not that, you know, and people will like the win must be the change in state, right? No, the win is when you stop having to change your state. Like, yes, yeah, yes, yeah, yes. Oh, the win comes when I feel different. No, no, the win comes when you stop declaring that you must feel different.

SPEAKER_03 18:43

So I think it's not measured by the absence of symptoms and feelings, it is measured by your willingness to accept all of them.

SPEAKER_02 18:52

Yeah. It is a little weird because at least, I mean, I can only speak to the US. In the US and our treatment sort of environment here, especially with third-party payers and stuff, like we get really data and like results driven. So our progress notes have to show some sort of progress and measurable, and they love assessments. And like, you know, the people who pay the bills for therapy really want to be able to measure, like, oh, it was that guy's GAD seven score six months ago is now. That's how we know if it's working. I hate that because it's all ingrained a little bit that, like, and many therapists will even say, Well, how do I know my patient is winning or progressing less anxiety symptoms? Except when you measure it that way, and then they have a really tough week because something big happens and and stress symptoms come up, that person can collapse back into the avoidance state. So was it really the symptoms that we were trying to get rid of? Oh no, it wasn't. Like it's the acceptance of like, I can tolerate my experiences, I can be with them.

SPEAKER_03 19:44

Yeah, but it comes to mind that in practice about people winning. Someone's having a full-on adrenaline rush in front of me, yeah, and they're going, I'm just having an adrenaline rush. I'm like, okay. And they're like, Yeah, I'm I'm cool. Just let you know, you know, if I'm a bit fidgety, but I'm alright with it.

SPEAKER_02 20:02

Yeah, win.

SPEAKER_03 20:03

You know, I can't wait to talk to you in a bit when you know my brain's kind of calmed down, but I'll still try to talk to you. I'm like, that's a win.

SPEAKER_02 20:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 20:11

Somebody are winning. I don't matter.

SPEAKER_02 20:14

It doesn't matter to me. The need to win can be very powerful. In this in this thing, of course, because everybody wants to feel better. It's okay to want to feel better. But somebody just said, She wants to win so bad. I flipped a table if I don't get a point in cards against humanity. Don't don't do your anxiety that way. No flipping tables. Like there's no table flipping in therapy. So but it's it's powerful though, isn't it?

SPEAKER_03 20:35

Because when everyone has their first OCD intrusive thought, the first panic attack, the first foray into sensitization, it's a vote, it's emotional, it's deep. It feels like something's been taken away from you, and you want emotionally to like clasp it back. Yes, I want to win this. And it's like what you will learn from it is that actually to go easy, to be compassionate, to not constantly measure stuff. When you're trying to win at something, it can sometimes inadvertently point to you somehow thinking you're broken or flawed. I mean, don't get me wrong, we're all flawed. But I always go back to stop making anxiety the most important thing in the room. And that sometimes even applies to those who want to win. I want to win, I want to beat OCD, I want to beat panic disorder, I want to beat agrophobia, I want to win. It's just like we encourage you to be like, let's just assume you're already winning. We just step out of a bad habit and stop making it the most important thing in the room.

SPEAKER_02 21:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 21:32

It's okay to do things scary. That is, I suppose, the win, but you ain't gonna get confirmation. Or also the irony is when you're checking to win, you're doing it when you're anxious. And anxiety is a doubt response. So even if you said, like, oh, you're winning, or Drew and I turned up at your doorstep with a massive certificate, your doubt response would be like, Yeah, but how do they know? How do they know I'm winning? Actually, they don't know what's going on in my head. In fact, no, whatever. And it's just that's the paradox. Yeah, you can you're checking to see if you're winning. But you're never gonna get that, oh yeah, yeah, you're right. Yeah, I'll shut up now. You I've won.

SPEAKER_02 22:06

Or you know, the whole like, hey, you're doing great. And I know you've had this conversation in your practice. Hey, really well done. And the person will counter that immediately with like, yeah, but you should have seen me yesterday. Why that's like the need to win or the drive to win. So, how do you do? So that how do I know if I went? And then how do I know how do I win? If I need to win, how do I win? You know, you mentioned before, I I often use the word surrender. And it's interesting because somebody, I can't take credit for this, I'll but I will pass it along. Somebody said, you know, like that surrender thing, they pictured it as like a castle, like you're on the castle walls. Normally the moat is on the outside of the castle. So you're just like swinging your sword and dumping hot oil, trying to keep the enemy from coming over the walls. And it's you're exhausted, right? Because you're fighting. That's the enemy coming over the walls, is I don't want to feel things. But if you just stand there and let the enemy run through you, the moat that they drown is on the other side. Let them come over the wall and drown in the damn moat. Like you're like, if you let them do that, you will win. It's backwards. But like, so we got to get rid of the whole like, how do I, how do I win as I learn to control my nervous system and regulate and and do all the things and make my symptoms go away, and I know how to fix this and fix that, and I I manage my triggers. That is like standing on those those walls, like always fighting forever. And like that sucks.

SPEAKER_03 23:27

I can command an unconscious part of my brain that's on demand, that is the win. That's what we're taught, and that's what's pushed constantly, isn't it? Yeah, yeah. I this in 20 minutes, I'll banish anxiety forever. No, sometimes anxiety is just unconscious, but what you can do is with your conscious behavior and attention, respond to it in a way that over time teaches the unconscious, you know, actually it's it's all it's it's all right, you know. That that that uh involuntary nervous system part of us, but you can't do that. It's like the win is no I I'm alright being in this discomfort. Yeah. Um, would you like a did it anyway? I would. How about you read one? You got any good ones? Yeah, I got one from the community app in the Did It Anyway section where members of our community share their did it anyways, and we all celebrate. Um, I have a big did it anyway to share. I've recently been resensitized after a long period of low symptoms, I've been getting lots of very loud bodily sensations and high anxiety. But yesterday I went to London. I used the tube and went to an event held by a sibling bereavement charity, which is close to my heart, as I have lost siblings. The entire time my heart was racing. I was having ectopics every few seconds and felt sick. But I did manage to do it anyway. Had a rough sleep when I got home and don't feel amazing today, but I managed to do it even though I knew it would be hard. Oh.

SPEAKER_02 24:55

Hey, what happened?

SPEAKER_03 24:57

There it is. What I like about that as more is that you you're allowing all feeling. If you're going to like a sibling bereavement charity as well, that's gonna bring up other emotions as well. Yeah, that's the all feelings are a welcome kind of thing. Well done. I really love that.

SPEAKER_02 25:15

Yeah, outstanding. Somebody in the in the chat in the live audience just said sat with my adrenaline rush at the restaurant yesterday, almost canceled the plan to go to the mall afterwards, but did it anyway and brought my anxiety with me until it wasn't with me anymore. That gets this too. Little Minnie did it anyway. Well done. Yeah, winning winning. That's exactly right. Winning 100%. So yeah, really good. Um I'm banging rocks every three.

SPEAKER_03 25:42

That's Charlie Sheen.

SPEAKER_02 25:43

Somebody mentioned that before. Like, all she can hear is Charlie Sheen saying, winning. Win the voice it is. Oh my god. Yeah, yeah, I get it.

SPEAKER_03 25:52

Have you won, Drew? Have you beaten your anxiety disorder?

SPEAKER_02 25:56

Yeah, I I guess I won. You know, I will call it winning, I guess, because I never think about whether I've beaten my my my anxiety disorder. So I yeah, I'll call that a win for sure.

SPEAKER_03 26:06

You never think about whether you don't know.

SPEAKER_02 26:08

I never think of that. I don't wake up thinking, like, oh, am I recovered today? Have I won? Is this war over? Am I am I gonna be anxious? I I literally never consider whether how I'm gonna feel.

SPEAKER_03 26:18

Yeah, yeah, it's it's one it might not apply to everyone, sure, but it definitely applies and it comes up a lot in my practice. And again, with the perfectionists, where they're like, I've gone through my entire life and I've poured my attention and effort into everything. And when I pour in a lot of attention and effort, stuff gets done. Output is great, I win. Yeah, there's a confusing thing that happens when you apply it to this, an anxiety disorder. And hold on, I'm I'm just going around and round in circles and getting more frustrated, and I need to find more evidence that I'm winning, and usually manifests as checking compulsions, examining compulsions. Am I doing better compulsions? Am I doing better than yesterday? Am I how is my anxiety compared to last year? How is it compared to this morning? Comparing constantly, monitoring. No, it it doesn't matter. Press the button for me.

SPEAKER_02 27:06

Yeah, you got it. Here it is. It doesn't matter.

SPEAKER_03 27:09

I'm such a fan. Thank you. It's the first and only time I'll just request that.

SPEAKER_02 27:15

Uh yeah, uh, I I hear the checking compulsions can be really tricky though, because I I suspect that you see people who have are are winning one, they're way along that, and then that checking compulsion will not only be like front and center in their sort of recovery or desensitization, but then it will start to like weasel its way into everything birthday parties, dates, like family nights, like meetings at work. Everything can possibly become a referendum on if they're winning or not. So, like, oh, I've been having a really good couple of weeks, but then I was at a really important meeting at work, and I don't know, I started feeling DPDR, and like, and now the fact that they did well in the meeting. Right. Like, so that that it's like, no, forget the part that I was made in charge of a big project or praised for the win or whatever, or led a team successfully, or got through the meeting feeling bad. No, no, I ignore that part, and I just say that the fact that oh the that was all ruined because I because that was an indicator that I'm losing. Like, no, that's don't let it do that. It's gonna take that away from you, right?

SPEAKER_03 28:13

So, yeah, you're copying like the ebb and flow of battle, but we're saying no, we're dropping resistance. There's no there should be no ebb and flow of battle, right? Um as well, it's like this applies to people like the anxious people that when they're not anxious, they celebrate. Now, don't get me wrong, it's nice to not feel uncomfortable, sure. But when they celebrate, like, yeah, I'm doing it, I'm gonna make all the plans. Uh, you know, one, just be careful. Of course, you're allowed to enjoy feeling good. You know, we're not robots, but when you're like, you know, the banners and the and the and the brigade, yay, parades and all that stuff. Uh, when you're not anxious, it's almost celebrating the fact that, yeah, anxiety is not here. Yeah, but be careful because you're still making anxiety the most important thing in the room. Yeah, I'm enjoying anxiety not being here. That's great. Yeah, but it doesn't matter if it pops its head in again.

SPEAKER_02 29:04

I like to try and like reframe that when it comes up as like, hey, you know what? I'm glad you're enjoying that. Or you like, you know what, you worked really hard. You deserve a nice day. I want you to have a nice day. It's like I'm enjoying the nice day, I'm taking the win, I'm grateful for this, whatever it is, but not as a measurement against the bad day. Just it's a good day and I'm loving it, and I'm allowed to love it. I think that speaks to another thing that sometimes I I've I've talked about a little bit. It's the roller coaster, like the emotions about the process. And people sometimes get caught up in the whole, like, they'll have a couple of good real experiences or successful exposures or good days, and they will be riding high and then jump on that high and get up on the mountain and scream, I did it, like I kicked its ass, I'm good, I get it now, I understand everything. And then they have a bad couple of days, and it's like, oh, what was I thinking? That was so wrong. Like, you gotta try to even that out a little bit. There's gonna be good days, gonna be bad days. It's okay. Like, don't declare victory on the good days, but don't declare forever failure on the bad days either. So that's a real trap. That roller coaster of emotions is real in this thing, so yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 30:09

Excellent. Yeah, yeah. Well, did you take that from the the community the the audience as well, studio audience? The self-comparison good day versus bad day versus how I felt last week versus last year is a big hurdle. Yes. Yeah, it is. You're trying to well, good versus bad, you're going back into the battle mode again.

SPEAKER_02 30:27

Yeah, but you know, we talked about this. Uh, I think I don't remember when I talked about this one. I, you know, if I am to measure somebody's progress, or if somebody's asking one of my clients to ask me, What's what's the measure of progress? It's your functional, the functional impact. So if the functional impact is dropping every time you get triggered, like it used to take you out for a week, now it takes you out for an hour. I don't care about the trigger. The functional impact is shrinking. You are living your life in a more functional way again that matters to you. That's the win.

SPEAKER_03 30:54

Oh, I like that. The functional oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 30:57

I mean, I always try and bring people, I'm not a huge fan of the DSM and diagnosis, don't get me wrong, but I cannot diagnose you with an anxiety disorder here, at least here in the States, unless there is a functional impact. So the presence of the symptoms does not define the diagnosis in my world, it just doesn't. There has to be an impact. Otherwise, there are a lot of people who walk around feeling like nervous, stomach, or slightly dizzy all day, but they they don't care. So that's not a disorder. It's weird, right? So keep that in mind.

SPEAKER_03 31:24

Yeah, really keep that in mind. I know I do find I do find that really interesting. Yeah, um, yeah, and again, uh this comes to mind with people that have gone a long way to, you know, on on their recovery desensitizing journey and getting their life back. But this often that last hurdle that just keep checking, keep checking, keep checking, keep checking. I can't believe I'm here. I can't believe I'm almost this far. And then they get really annoyed and start to resent it by like the imprint it's had on its life. It's just like, no, no, no. Look at the functional impact it's actually having there.

SPEAKER_02 31:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 31:58

Just it just by the mere effect of having it there. I don't avoid things, I do everything. I don't, yeah, but look at that slight functional impact there, it's impacting those compulsions, they're impacting your ability to just engage.

SPEAKER_02 32:09

Yeah, yeah, 100%. There was a comment too that I want to point out, and not to call somebody out, but like but the physical symptoms don't let it pass through me. So anytime there's a but at the beginning, at the beginning of a response, that's always gonna get an eyebrow, like people's eyebrow from me, right? But the physical things don't let it go through me. Because I was talking about surrender is let the enemy go through you and drown in the moat behind you. Okay, and the answer with that to that would be because everybody will carve at an exception, but but the thought, or but this symptom, or but this feeling, or but this emotion, or but this this disturbing image, okay, that just means you don't like that. And you know, the win isn't part of winning is recognizing I am refusing to acknowledge that my body makes sensations when it's upset. So therefore, as soon as I discover that I have something, a pain I don't like or a symptom that I don't like, I will declare full stop. Nope, no progress today. This is awful, this is terrible, never gonna get better. Okay, then that is not winning. Like part of winning is at least over dropping that resistance a little bit, right?

SPEAKER_03 33:12

Yeah, when people say, Oh, but the symptoms make it hard, but the thoughts make it hard.

SPEAKER_02 33:16

Oh, yeah, it does.

SPEAKER_03 33:17

Yeah, I understand. I relate, I relate to that. It is making it hard, but the win is yes, I can have the thoughts and the scary symptoms, but the win is giving myself permission not to stare at that.

SPEAKER_02 33:27

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 33:28

Just because something is uncomfortable doesn't mean you have to stare at it. Yeah, but the symptoms are uncomfortable. Okay, so what are we gonna do? Stare at it until it leaves, or remember, attention is always in our agency. We can allow it to be there and bring it else somewhere else. There's so much, so much benefit from practicing with your attention when triggered because you're teaching the brain this isn't important, you're practicing with your attention flexibility. Actually, when it comes to sensations, you know, this basic psychology says when you fixate and focus on a symptom, it is perceptibly worse. Yep. You know, uh, there's literally no reason to keep an eye on it because it's not threatening, but we do anyway because uh us anxious people are fixators, and it feels like the right move in the moment.

SPEAKER_02 34:14

Like I staring at it feels like the safer, better move until three hours later, you wish you hadn't stared at it for three hours.

SPEAKER_03 34:21

So that's good from the studio. There's one. I've been doing so much better with handling my DPDR spikes in my house ever since I stopped trying to fix it. Now I just have to start doing the outside. That part scares me. Well then that's just the next bit. Good win. Good win. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 34:37

Do we have any um audio good anyways? We have another audio, we even have a written that's relationship OCD, so I want to get to that, but let's listen to this one first.

SPEAKER_00 34:47

Good morning to you both. Uh, my name is Ray, you can use my name. I uh got resensitized a few years ago, worked really hard. Um, so I wanted to share doing it anyway with you. Uh, and that is that my digestive system is very overactive when I get nervous. I feel like I have to run to the toilet. I got an IUD a little while ago, and when my body is adjusting, and I hope it continues to adjust, uh, it was telling me that I was gonna make a mess of myself almost every day. But every day I went to work, every day I kept going, uh, I ignored or tried to ignore the overactive thoughts that were telling me, oh, you're going to embarrass yourself, you're going to shame yourself in front of your work colleagues and everyone else. I also went to a fair that I was terrified of. I went into a full panic, thought I was gonna be sick and stuff like that as well. But I did it, I went, and I'm still doing things now, still going to work, even though I work outside and I have access only to one toilet uh if I'm in the right place. So to anyone else out there who struggles with this, which we don't really talk about, you can do it.

SPEAKER_03 36:04

You can yeah, so good. I love that.

SPEAKER_02 36:11

Uh-huh. All the stuff popped up, but Rhea decided, I don't not gonna stare at it. That I love what you said about that. Yeah, I'm not gonna just keep going looking ahead and the fare and things like that.

SPEAKER_03 36:23

Like, yeah, I love it.

SPEAKER_02 36:24

Sure.

SPEAKER_03 36:24

Yeah, exactly. It's like, no, you're very vulnerable. Keep yourself, nah, yeah, screw it. Yeah, come on.

SPEAKER_02 36:31

Dead stop, stop everything and just look at this, monitor this threat. No, I'm not gonna stop everything, keep going. So that's how you well done. That's how you that's how you learn. That's how you learn, right?

SPEAKER_03 36:40

So and thank you for encouraging others as well, like when people do that. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 36:44

At the end, I want to read an ROCD did it anyway, because this one it makes me smile. And we don't talk about relationship OCD all that much, although we did an episode on it for sure. But um, this one was emailed in, so you can do that on disordered.fm. And it says, Hello, Josh and Drew. My name is Anna. You can absolutely use my name. I have been dreaming about submitting a Did It Anyway for such a long time. I've struggled with anxiety, depression, and OCD since I was very young. About two years ago, not long after getting engaged to my long-term partner, I was diagnosed with severe ROCD. That's relationship OCD. It completely paused my life. I couldn't work, it deeply impacted my relationship for a long time. First time I ever heard the term ROCD and realized what I was experiencing was through your podcast. I had been searching OCD on Spotify and came across your episode, and that was my first real click. Of course, as we know that clarity doesn't always stick. Over the past two years, I've had many ups and downs, including periods where I was compulsively listening to the podcast, always wishing that one day I could submit my own did it anyway. Well, two years later, after a lot of therapy, personal work, uh, listening and growth, I'm happy to say that last weekend we got married and it was the most perfect day. I won't pretend that my OCD didn't show up. It absolutely did, both in the lead up and on the day, not just with ROCD but other themes too. But through willingness and leaning into the discomfort, my partner and I stood there anyway. And now we're happily married with the most beautiful memories from that day. I'm so grateful that I found your podcast on this journey. I'm incredibly proud of myself for getting there. And on top of that, I've just returned to work and found out that I have been promoted as well. Oh, Billy Mays moment, right? To anyone struggling right now, it does get better. It takes time and it's not linear, but it does shift. Keep going.

SPEAKER_03 38:27

Oh yeah. Wow. That was that was that was a superb, wasn't it? How about that? Like I go back to work and I know the snoff spot for the O C D you did anyways, but that's phenomenal. Absolutely. It's got maybe quite uh emotional. Well done. I love that. I see on the cake. Where's where's the Billy Mays button?

SPEAKER_02 38:46

Oh, I can't even find Billy Mays. I think he might not be in the soundboard anymore. Oh no, he is. Come on, Billy Mays. Hang on. But I'm not done yet. There he is. My buttons are getting sticky. Sticky. Sticky buttons. Yeah, I did I'm not done yet. Yeah. I did this great thing, and then by the way, I went back to work and they were like, hey, you've been promoted. It's literally like a scene from a movie. Like everything's coming up, Anna. Love it.

SPEAKER_03 39:08

Yeah, that's so good. Well, well done. Thanks for submitting that, Anna. That's so good. And you deserve that. And I'm glad you've got the lovely memories as well.

SPEAKER_02 39:16

100%. So, what else we got? Anything else on wanting to win? We covered, have we said anything?

SPEAKER_03 39:22

No, there's nothing to win. Yeah, nothing to win. There's nothing to win. It's okay. If you're one of them, like have I won? Have I beaten it yet? They might just be checking compulsions and measuring. And it might just tap into kind of who you are as like a as in your personality. Maybe your personality is I I want to win. I I feel like something is it's tapped into something, like something's taken something away from me, and I want to feel like I've won that back. And actually, no, a lot of it's just surrender, don't resist, willfully tolerate the discomfort. There's no battle to go to.

SPEAKER_02 39:56

Well done. If you want to submit a did it anyway, or an email message or whatever, you can always go to disorder.fm. If you want to participate in a taping of disordered, I feel like a 1990s like late night talk show for tickets to disordered. Uh, you can always check out the disordered community space, which there's a bunch of lovely people there. They watch us record, and that's where you see us reading the studio audience comments. You're welcome to pop in on that. Not required, just a little bit of optional support and community to be had. So you can check that out at disordered.fm. What else, dude? Anything else?

SPEAKER_03 40:26

No, I think that's all good. Oh, thank you for the pre-orders, by the way, of same time next week. Uh, for those in the UK, thank you for ordering it from the UK stores. And those abroad, thank you for ordering it from Blackwell's UK store because they do ship abroad, and I really appreciate that. And you still get the uh morning anxiety audio and the intrusive thoughts ebook as free goodies. So thank you so much. If you that's running up until May the 14th. So if you want those goodies, get it in quick.

SPEAKER_02 40:56

That's when you contact someone every morning and it gives them anxiety. That's what you're talking about, because that's what I have with you. No, yeah. That's exactly it. Anyway, when's release day again? When is the actual release day of the book? May the 14th. All right, it's coming up. It's gonna be good. I've read it, it's solid, man. Solid. So thank you, man. All right, guys. Thanks for hanging out. We'll be back next week with another one.

SPEAKER_03 41:18

Cheers, guys.