Examining the Relationship Between Anxiety and Grief (Episode 062)

SPEAKER_02 0:00

Hi, Josh and True. I have been uh dealing with GAD and panic disorder probably since I was 17, I can remember. I lost my mom about two years ago to brain cancer, and we were very, very close. So that has been uh definitely hard to uh battle and to manage, but through your podcast, it has definitely helped me in so many areas. More than you guys could know. I just recently got resensitized with my anxiety just through triggers and life experiences. And I woke up this morning to find out my dad's in the hospital with pneumonia, and that he's probably not gonna make it. So I guess I just want to know, Josh, I know through your own personal experience, how you um coped with anxiety around grief, um, and how you process that, I guess. And is it any different from the steps that we take through panic disorder and all the other sensations that we get um with anxiety attacks? This morning's really rough, but I got up and I took a shower. So I guess you can say I did it anyway, kinda, through my anxiety. Um, but I guess uh any advice or help with this would be great. Um appreciate all that you guys do. Love you guys. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 1:38

Welcome to Disordered. This is episode 62 entitled Anxiety and Grief. Um, thank you for the question, Senderina, for such a raw and emotional and uh honest question. Um this is uh a much requested topic, and we're gonna talk about it today. Um this question was sent in um several weeks ago. Um so hopefully when you turn it on on on Friday um that you'll be able to get something from this. Uh, I'm Joshua Fletcher, also known as Anxiety Josh. I'm a psychotherapist who specializes in anxiety disorders. Um I'm based in Manchester in the UK, author of And How Does It Make You Feel, and co-host of Disordered.

SPEAKER_01 2:28

And I am Drew Linsolata. I am a therapist in training in New York, also specializing in anxiety and anxiety disorders, one of the co-hosts of this podcast, an author and whatnot, and a former sufferer of these problems for many years of my life. And this this was a tough one to listen to. This question was really hard, very raw. Thank you for sharing.

SPEAKER_00 2:48

Yeah, I I appreciate you sharing the vulnerability. And this is a subject we need to talk about. It's a subject that I'll I'll be honest, it makes me feel uncomfortable as well because of you know, grief is something that I walk around with, but you know, we practice what we preach and we're gonna talk about it. Uh, and we'll also talk about how grief uh overlaps with resensitization and and and and anxiety disorders and stuff. Um, but yeah, uh, and we'll try and cover it the best we can. Um, interestingly, I my anxiety disorder started when I was pre-grieving. So um the person who sent sent this in um obviously that lost their their mum to cancer, which is usually a prolonged thing. And uh yeah, mine started when I was uh losing my brother, and obviously when with an anxious mind, it's it's it can be quite frustrating. Um because you feel very selfish, and then there's all the stress going on, and you're worrying about your family members, etc. Your stress jug builds up, and I'm gonna talk a lot about the stress jug today in relation to grief.

SPEAKER_01 4:05

You mentioned uh, you know, sort of pre-grieving when your brother was ill. Like that's a thing. Anticipatory grief is a thing.

SPEAKER_00 4:13

It's one of the main things that filled up my stress jug, Drew. So obviously, and it's just a maelstrom of different emotions that fill up the stress jug because you've got hope, you need hope. You always have to have hope. And if you're in a similar situation, never lose that hope. But you've got raw cynical pragmatism, and then you've got hope, you've got love, you've got grief, you've got to try to prepare for something, and there's loads of unknowns and what-ifs around the corner. Yeah, that fills things up, and then the grief itself, which overfills your stress drug, but then weirdly kind of makes you feel empty or in the inside. Um, when you do the exposure work and you're teaching the amygdala that you know, this I don't need to fear fear anymore. What's left is that when you start to do well with your anxiety disorder, you're then faced with the other emotions. Um, did you find that true? Like anxiety disorders will just consume your attention and your emotions constantly. And when you start to do well with an anxiety disorder, there's a whole queue of other emotions that have just been waiting.

SPEAKER_01 5:23

Yeah, I found that to be definitely true. When my unfortunately, the the losses that I experienced are the people closest to me happened when I was in the middle of the struggle and and it I was sort of medicating it away, so I wasn't really having a lot of emotions at the time. So I did not have responses to like losing my grandparents, whom I was very close to. But then years later, I was no longer in the medication and I was doing all my recovery work, and that stuff came out in full force. So I was in like delayed grieving for the loss of people that were so huge in my life and played such a huge role in my childhood. It came out years later, and I was completely blindsided by that. I didn't did not expect that.

SPEAKER_00 6:09

Yeah, it's like they get queued up, isn't it? Yeah, they did not go away. Yeah, they were waiting. And one of the biggest fears that people in our community have is when they go through like huge life events, a lot of their core beliefs that we challenge is that I what if I can't cope? What if I can't cope when things become overwhelming? Um, you can, and you've coped it with literally everything life has thrown at you. Yeah, that's not going to end today, you know. Um, but often we get asked about grief, it's like, what do I do? Um, and as as the person asked, how do I process this? Now, where do we start with that? How do you process grief? Is it similar to processing and you know, the fear of fear and the misinterpretation of an anxious response when it comes to an anxiety disorder?

SPEAKER_01 7:00

I think that's it's such an excellent question, and it's very nuanced. One of the things that always surprises me, and I've had the privilege, I think, to learn from my community when you get to listen to them, is sometimes we run the risk of like thinking, oh, this cool like anxiety disorder recovery thing is a thing that I apply to everything. So, like, do I float in a how do I float through? I've had people ask me, how do I supposed to float through this grief? Well, I don't like you know, I think maybe the first thing I would say is be careful of the assertion that there's a technique for grieving, like you would use sort of techniques to overcome distorted anxiety. I don't think there is, it just is. Grief just is, it's a powerful experience, it feels terrible, it will drag you through all kinds of different states, and that's just the way it is. So the first thing would be I'm in for a ride here.

SPEAKER_00 7:50

Yes, but that's part of being human. You're in for a ride, definitely. Um, I could tell you how not to process grief.

SPEAKER_01 7:59

That's how you're right.

SPEAKER_00 8:01

Although my own inner Craig the Critic would say, This is not not how you do it. But then my inner compassionate voice would say, This is what a therapist told me, you got through it. You know, I was making poor choices when I was grieving, you know, uh drinking and growing up because I didn't want to feel what I wanted to feel, um, drinking heavily, um, and making other poor hedonistic choices, and just yeah, going to bed at like 5 a.m. and sleeping all day and things like that. And in a craig, the critics like that's not how you process grief. But then compassionate Josh now is like, well, yeah, ideally we don't do that, but at the same time, you know, you were hit with a maelstrom of emotions and traumatic events, so you know, I'm not saying go and do that, definitely don't. But what I am trying to say is that there's no scripted way to do it. What I would advise though is try not to avoid feelings, that's where it does avoid. I was trying to avoid feelings, and so therefore the process was longer. Yeah, and I was avoiding feelings, trying to numb myself, you know. But they like Drew said when he was on antidepressants and stuff, they wait, they wait and queued up. Yep, you know, um, there's no set way to do it. Sometimes you we hear this with a lot with anxiety recovery. It's like, am I doing the right things? Yeah, with grief, no, you've just got to strap in. Some days you're gonna feel like shit, some days you're gonna feel empty, some days you might smile and laugh and then feel guilty for that. Why? Why am I laughing a week after I've lost this person? Um, it it's sometimes you feel things very intensely and then not at all. You know, there's yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:50

Oh, I'm sorry, Josh, I stepped on you, but uh it's sometimes it's really hard because you can't compartmentalize yourself. Like we are whole people, right? And things like get bunched up together and they bleed into each other. But sometimes I think a helpful thing to consider is I do have to try to compare compartmentalize, it's at least conceptually, my emotions and my fear of my emotions. Like I'm having a lot of emotions. Oh, yeah, and that's right. I'm also having this other problem where I fear my internal state or I see it as dangerous, or I see it as something that I cannot allow. So if you can always keep that there are those two things in mind at the same time, it can be helpful to stay out of the trap of because because things like you know, how am I going to do this without how am I going to do this without my dad, for instance? How am I gonna do this without my mom is a common thing for anybody to to fear and worry about. I lost my partner, I lost somebody close. How am I supposed to go on without my biggest cheerleader in life or whatever? Anybody would ask that question. And then the person with an anxiety disorder asks a second question. How am I supposed to deal with not being able to feel like I can deal with life without my whoever and cert person here?

SPEAKER_00 11:06

Um, yeah, yeah, it's very normal to have existential thoughts because grief taps into what your what how you see life. Grief is particularly when it's someone close to you, is part of the framework of how you exist. It will tap into things about your own personal philosophies about what life is. Maybe you're a person of faith and that's challenging. Maybe you're struggling, someone who struggles to have to develop some kind of framework. Um, an existentialist. And when you lose someone who is such a huge part of your life, don't be surprised if that threat response is then telling you, no, no, you need to find an answer for this missing puzzle piece that's no longer here. Um I still have that now, I think. You know, the and and it grief does change you forever, not in a way that makes the anxiety worse. It will just change. Change doesn't necessarily mean a bad thing, it will be there. Um the it gets complex because we try not to allow space for anxiety to source rumination, trying to find the miracle thought, trying to get rid of anxiety. And with grief, you've got to flip it on its head. Actually, do make space for it. Yeah, you know. Um I remember started seeing some progress when I'd sit in the park and just be like, you know what, I'm gonna sit in the park and just feel what I have to feel. Maybe some of that's even fear of fear and panic. Whatever. I'm just gonna sit and feel whatever I need to feel need to feel, and that really helped. It's like, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:53

Yeah, that's a tough one too, because people who are afraid to feel things spend so much time trying to not trigger themselves. So it it's that's almost like diametrically opposed there. Like, well, I I probably need to sit at my kitchen table and think about my grandma because I want to, and I it but it makes me feel horrible, but I want to, and it's part of the process. But I don't want to, I don't want to do that because that might make me too anxious. So I think sometimes the anxiety disorder can can say, no, no, no, no, no, don't don't grieve. Don't do that. You know, we have to lock that down somehow, and that's it's not being fair. But again, you're in for a ride. So yeah, you might get triggered into some extra anxiety if you do those things. But one of the most valuable things I ever heard somebody tell me was my friend Jessica Seidner, who's was on the Anxious Truth my other podcast a long time ago. She talked about losing her husband. She had to tell stories about him. She wanted people to use his name because people would not want to say, you know, like, don't say anything about it because you know what triggered the person. No, I want to talk about it. So helpful to hear a grieving person say, No, no, no, I needed to talk about him. And I wanted to tell stories, and I wanted people to ask me, but you might get triggered by that. That's true. Can't do anything about it. What are you gonna do?

SPEAKER_00 14:05

Yeah, it's that emotional, emotional conservatism bit that we have, isn't it? Where we're one, we're considerate and we don't want we don't want loved ones to feel awkward or or or re-experience that pain, if particularly they're presenting as um happy, but at the same time, it's also actually I don't like you know, a lot of people just don't really like talking about grief or they're emotionally conservative, you know, showing showing emotions is weakness. Um no, it's not. No, it's not. I started to feel better when you know, shedding tears sometimes every day, and that's okay, you know. Also it was a double exposure because one of my fears was what if what if all this emotion gets so much that I have a a psychotic break or something?

SPEAKER_01 14:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:57

Or a breakdown. It's like, no, it doesn't.

SPEAKER_01 15:00

It doesn't. We're built for that, really. But it's interesting because before you said the experience will change you, and right away I'm thinking, oh, we better better talk about that because people listening will hear, what do you mean? You know, what do you mean it changes me? Because they will be afraid that such a huge emotional experience will break them. Because that anxious brain is saying there's too there's a breaking point, you have to hang on tight or you'll break. But we're not we're designed to feel those things.

SPEAKER_00 15:25

Yeah, you're still you, right? Yeah, you're still you. It doesn't change you, doesn't yeah, because anxious people, their threat response is like, change?

SPEAKER_01 15:33

No, right, I don't want change, or I'm fragile, my mind is fragile, like it might break.

SPEAKER_00 15:39

So yeah, it's interesting that change, isn't it? Because it's everything that every person with an anxiety disorder craves, but also fears. And fears because anxiety can become weirdly the ever print, the ever-present comforting constant. What does it mean? What what what do you mean things are going to change? No, they changed for me in just in worldview, my life, my priorities, things like that change. Yeah, um, also as well, and yeah, weirdly, as well, with the grief, um, particularly when my brother was unwell, uh, I became angry and actually used that anger in my exposures, and actually was helpful, weirdly. Yeah, I remember being really angry and I had nowhere to channel my anger. And then so I put it there, yeah. Interesting, yeah. And and almost like it's nice, it came up with my own personal therapy, but it was like when I I hate I hate this word, like relapse, when I was resensitized, like the quote like the uh person stated before, I found it more difficult the next time because in the first time I had a purpose. You talk a lot about value-driven recovery. My value was that I need to get better to look after my brother. Second time after he'd passed, I was resensitized and I struggled to do it for myself because I had survivor guilt. Um I had an inner critic, Greg the critic, and I'm like, how how am I gonna do this for me? Because there was an excuse last time. I have to get better because I have to look after my brother. But the second time around, I was like, What? I just have to do this for me. That doesn't seem like enough. Yeah. You know, and that's really yeah. I don't think like that now. I'm a raging narcissist, but like back then it was, you know, I I have things so low of myself, it's like, yeah, who am I doing this for?

SPEAKER_01 17:42

But even people who maybe don't have a negative self-image, what a big loss like that sometimes leaves a big hole. Like, I don't know what my values are. Nothing makes sense now. People who have a strong faith that that guides them through their life will often say, like, well, I'm in a crisis of faith now, because how could this thing have happened? Especially if you had a loved one who maybe suffered through a protracted illness or really had a difficult time at the end. You had to watch that. How could this have happened? And they lose the framework. You mentioned a framework before. Suddenly the framework that I have built into my life that I live by just crumbles, and now I'm a little bit aimless, and I don't know where my values are, I don't know who I am anymore. That's gonna happen, and that's gonna make things even harder. I feel like we just keep coming back to like this is gonna be hard because it is, it is, but it's it's a natural process that's difficult to go through.

SPEAKER_00 18:33

It's hard, and sometimes you'll be hit by multiple waves. Um, I know the question stated that her father was unwell, and you know, we hope that whatever happened there, that you're okay. Um, and you're, you know, we're we're thinking of you, you know, but but also assure you that you can cope, and you are coping. And if you're listening now, it shows us everyone that you are coping. Yeah, you may feel like crap. That's that's normal, you know. Uh, you're not gonna go back to square one. There's no hidden realm of anxiety that you're yet to explore, you know, because this has pushed you over the edge. You're just gonna feel like crap and you have a fear of fear. Keep things simple, you've got this.

SPEAKER_01 19:20

And that resensitization, she did mention that you mentioned it. Of course, why wouldn't you be? Like we know this already for people who are even fully recovered from anxiety disorders. When big things happen in their life, you know, I always use the sagging metaphor and analogy. We sag, our flexibility sags, we get a little more rigid, we get a little bit less resilient, we get a little bit shorter tempered. Like that happens. And a lot of people will find, especially in the OCD community, hear it all the time. Like, I'm my OCD flared again after I went through a divorce or my dog died, or I was laid off from my job, or whatever. Yeah, that happens, it's normal. So here it's normal too.

SPEAKER_00 19:58

It's a stress drug as well, isn't it? Uh, I love the stress drug, it's great. Like sometimes our stress drug fills up slowly. Sometimes it's been three quarters full for a long time, and then a little bit of stress tips it over. Sometimes you can have absolutely nothing in your stress drug. I mean, that's impossible, but absolutely nothing in your stress drug. Yeah, and then wham. And the event both our parents become unwell. Exactly. It gets filled instantly and boiled down. That's part of life, too. Yeah, and the key here is not to be like, well, how do I empty it? No, no. I use the analogy because to conceptualize what's happening. You can cope if it overflows. Yeah, I just use the analogy to explain why it's happening. So if you're in the bath having a panic attack because you've recently lost someone or whatnot or whatnot, or whatever, then oh yeah, my jug's overflowing. This makes sense because as creatures we're inquisitive, we want to fix, we want to work the stuff out. As we know with this, with anxiety disorders, no, you know, I I now know why I know what this is. I can leave this alone, let this pass, let this particular trigger pass. And then in the terms of grief, when I've calmed down a bit, whatever, I'm gonna take some time to let some other intense emotions in.

SPEAKER_01 21:18

Yeah, I'm supposed not I'm supposed to feel like this now, but you know, it's so tempting for us to be like, oh no, I'm feeling very strong anxiety again, and maybe haven't for a while. So therefore I must be relapsed. Like, no, no, no, I know why I'm feeling these things. It's okay. Like, it's not I'm not supposed to have techniques to prevent me from having big reactions to big things in my life. That's not fair. It's not being fair to yourself. That's tough. Let's talk about for a minute, like coming at the other side of that. What does that even mean? You know, so when you say like it changes you, there's that thing where even the big, and I know it doesn't feel like it now, especially at the beginning after a huge loss and you had an anxiety disorder on top of that. Like, I this isn't how am I? Ever going to get through this, but you do. And part of that is every experience becomes part of our narrative, right? So working it through means I incorporate this experience. It's even part of trauma therapy, really. Like you got to put that experience, it has to become part of your story, right? So you got to go through what you go through, and at the other side, at the risk of ridiculous, like silver lining platitudes that don't aren't going to land for anybody who's in the thick of it. The experience becomes part of who you are. You take it with you. The memories of that loved one come with you, you know, and it just becomes part of who you are. You have to incorporate it into your life story. That's how you come at the other end. It's not like, oh, I just don't wait for the pain to go away. Yeah, it does. I have to go through the feelings to go away. It goes away because we incorporate the experience into our narrative. They become part of who we are then. Not in a bad way, in a good way, a healthy way. That's how we go through these things.

SPEAKER_00 22:55

Which requires time. I know they say time's the greatest healer, unless you have chronic OCD. Um, but time's the greatest healer. I want to say about by the way, with the chronic OCD, not just time, time and psychoeducation and the right approach. Because we don't just wait for it, you know. Oh, well, maybe if I just keep waiting, then these compulsions will disappear. Not necessarily. But with grief, time, yeah, the brain is has been given a fireball, and it's created little fires everywhere, and it's just gonna take time to just extinguish them, sweep them up, and file them away in the nice in a nice orderly fashion. Um, and that's what happens there. Um it's interesting. I you won't get the acute feelings, I don't get the acute stabs of grief anymore. Um I get a sadness when I think about it, but it's a sadness that doesn't feel cumbersome. Um what really helps as well, I can't believe I've not mentioned it. Um talking about it, going to a counselor to talk about your loved ones. Let your that literally helps the brain process it as well. Yeah. About how the magnitude of it and don't, you know, don't struggle on your own with it.

SPEAKER_01 24:19

It's funny because it's such an opposite message. When we're talking specifically about an anxiety disorder, we tend to not, we don't want to encourage, keep talking about how you feel because that becomes that's the problem there. But in this situation, we do have to talk about how we feel, it's part of the process.

SPEAKER_00 24:34

Because grief is not a grief is not an anxiety disorder.

SPEAKER_01 24:38

That's exactly right. It's not a disorder, like it's not a pathology. We don't treat it, you just go through it. So this could be really confusing if you're in the middle of recovery and also dealing with grief. Sometimes you're gonna really just talk about how you feel, and that might also include the anxiety sort of like horning in on that. Oh, and by the way, I feel dizzy today and I feel nauseous today. Uh okay, what are you gonna do? Like the best you can that day. Your anxiety disorder is gonna chime in and try to ride the wagon of talking about your feelings. Let it there's nothing you can do. There's no perfect recovery, there's no perfect grieving. Just do the best you can.

SPEAKER_00 25:13

Yep. And this applies, don't be surprised when there's anniversaries or you go to a certain place or whatever. Of course, that's gonna give you a lot of emotion and stress and whatnot. You don't avoid those. Yeah, just go with whatever feeling is there and let let the brain, let you as a person process it as well. Yeah, you know, um, and yeah, you you just gotta let you just gotta let the brain do it with time and self-compassion. Like, I lost my dad like a year and a half after my brother in horrendous circumstances as well. And just like I I remember someone with OCD and a perfectionistic tendencies to recovery would be like, Well, how do I do it? Do I do I grieve my dad in the morning? And then what's the process of grieving my brother in the afternoon? And and then I've got this anxiety disorder, and then what if I've got a and then the health anxiety was kicking off or whatever? Oh, there's another thing as well. Grief expect health stuff like health anxiety to rear its head, it's your threat response. It will use grief. This is where anxiety could be a bully, and OCD is a bully. It will use grief as ammunition, yeah. It will take things that have happened in your inner circle and be like, see. They do happen. This does happen. This does happen, yeah. Yeah, yeah, and we just ignore it. It's like the probability is not changed.

SPEAKER_01 26:35

Right, exactly. It's a tough one. I think one of the core principles that you can hang your hat on if you can, and this does apply in both anxiety disorders and grief, is the the intensity of what you feel in any given moment is not a predictor of your ability to be okay in 10 minutes or 10 weeks or 10 years.

SPEAKER_00 26:54

Oh, that's a good one.

SPEAKER_01 26:56

The intensity of how you feel does not predict your ability to get through the feeling. It's just intense. Just is.

SPEAKER_00 27:05

That's such a good yeah. Yeah, that's that's the line.

SPEAKER_01 27:09

Yeah, because we feel like I feel so strongly that I must draw a conclusion from the intensity of this feeling. Must mean I won't cope. It's gonna break me. I can't, I'll never get better. No, it just means right now in this minute you feel very intensely for known reasons.

SPEAKER_00 27:23

Yeah, that's so important. Well, I might play that back later. I like that. And then say I never came up with it.

SPEAKER_01 27:29

What's the timestamp on that? 27. I'm gonna post it on social media so you can't steal it.

SPEAKER_00 27:36

I'm gonna I'm gonna comment underneath it. I'm so glad that you were listening to me this morning.

SPEAKER_01 27:42

You're gonna AI yourself over my voice. Yeah. Anyway, tough spot for sure.

SPEAKER_00 27:48

No, and we appreciate this, and we we dedicate this this episode um to you late, mother, and to anyone else listening who's lost someone either recently or far in the past, someone where you feel a bit empty. Um, no matter what that grief is, you know, it could be sort of a close family member or a pet or someone like where you feel that grief, you know. Um try not to sweep it under the same rug as an anxiety disorder. It does need to be treated, bring it along with you, but try not to techniqueify or you know, process it will process in its own time. You know, just take it with you and let the brain get to work in the background.

SPEAKER_01 28:33

And if it means that your anxiety disorder recovery has to take a back seat on some days or for a few hours or even for a couple of weeks, okay. You there's no way to force I I must also be recovering while I'm grieving. Maybe you will. On some days, you might combine them. And if you don't know which one you're doing at any given moment, that's also okay. Am I recovering now or am I grieving? I don't know. You don't know.

SPEAKER_00 28:59

It's okay. It doesn't it doesn't matter now. We don't need to quantifying right and and referring to these metrics of success. It's okay. Just matter out, just exist.

SPEAKER_01 29:09

It's okay for somebody to experience a major loss in their life and for that to sort of like put the brakes on for any human being. That's why we have things like extended leave from work. Like nobody questions that. If you lose somebody and you're off from work for two or three weeks, no one would question why this person not at work. They would know why, because it's part of the human experience. So if your recovery slows down for a while, okay. Doesn't mean it's gonna end.

SPEAKER_00 29:37

Yeah, and also see that resensitization as part of the process. Horrible things happen in life, including grieving, but don't misinterpret you being resensitized as going backwards or in reverse. No, this is part of it. So reframe it. I've been banging on about reframes on my social media this this week, and it's reframe, it's like, okay, I could deal, I desensitized myself to my daily stuff routine and day-to-day stuff when I was diagnosed or when I developed an anxiety disorder. Bam, I was hit with a double whammy. I'm resensitized again. So now's an opportunity to show myself and prove my to my brain that I can desensitize myself even when tricky things happen in life. Do not make the mistake of being like, oh no, I'm back at square one. Oh my god, my anxiety is so bad. I can only cope when I was doing it. No, it's part of the journey. Yeah, that's just the way it's gonna be. Yeah, because so many people see it as pass and fail. Oh, I'm resensitized again, I'm going backwards. Absolutely not.

SPEAKER_01 30:44

No, yeah, you're right. You're not recovery from an anxiety disorder does not mean somehow or other you only have good days from there and there on out. It's just not that's not realistic, it's not possible.

SPEAKER_00 30:55

No, absolutely not. Um, so yeah, thank you for sending that in. And maybe we'll talk more about grief, get a grief expert on. I'm certainly not one. Yep. Um, and maybe we could talk about the psychoeducation behind grief as well, which would be really interesting. So, yeah, we'll we'll do another grief episode with an expert on at a later um date. Um, as always, we like to celebrate the community and have a QA. Uh, what have we got, Drew? What have we got in there?

SPEAKER_01 31:23

We have an audio QA. Um, it's also a big life event. This is an audio, not an audio QA, it's an audio did it anyway. Uh it has to do with actually a wedding. So, how about we hear that one and then we'll go. Okay, so let's do it.

SPEAKER_03 31:36

Hi, Josh and Drew. My name is Jamie, and you can use my name. Um, first, thank you both so much for everything you do and have done for the community. Um, I've been following you both for years, and this podcast is just one of my favorites. And so wanted to share a pretty big did it anyway with you all. Um, three weeks ago, I got married, which was an exposure in and of itself. Just lots of emotions, a full uh weekend full of events, dinners, obviously the day of you're busy the whole day, and not really a lot of ability to escape or run or hide. Um, and then just yesterday we got back from a week-long honeymoon, which is like, I can't even believe I'm saying that. It involved a three and a half hour flight uh one way to a place I've never been, with seven days of being out of my safe uh places, my home, my bed, my animals, um, restaurants I've never been to. Um, I just not that long ago felt like I couldn't even sit in a drive-thru line or eat out without being in sheer panic. Um, so it's really shocking to me that I was able to get on a plane for three and a half hours is just like mind-boggling. And the whole last weeks and months were not without, you know, stress and anxiety, um, panic attacks. There were plenty leading up to and during the honeymoon. Um, but I'm just so proud of myself that I was able to do something that um I remember a year ago, I didn't know if I would be able to even have a wedding and invite a bunch of people and have a big celebration or go on a week-long vacation. Um, and I did. So just wanted to share that with you all. You've helped me so much.

SPEAKER_01 33:12

Um, and it just needs to be really good. Your audio faded out, Jamie. If you're listening for some reason in your recording, you just droop faded out at the end. So it didn't end very gracefully. But great job, and thank you for sending it in.

SPEAKER_00 33:26

Dropped it into a river as it was just falling slowly away.

SPEAKER_01 33:32

Amplifying it, I couldn't amplify anymore. So sorry, Jamie.

SPEAKER_00 33:35

Yeah, no, brilliant. That's so good and um challenging. It reminded me of what you said before about um anxiety. Don't try to draw conclusions by what anxiety is presenting to you now. Yep. Uh, and you proved it wrong. You got on the plane, you did this, you went to a new place. Well done. That's excellent.

SPEAKER_01 33:51

Yeah, it's a good example too of how even happy things are stressful. Happy stress is stress. Happy stress is definitely stress, you know, like recording this podcast. Oh, so stressful. Every time he comes on camera, I'm like, oh my how am I gonna do this? No, I'm kidding.

SPEAKER_00 34:07

Um, I've got a did it anyway. Let's do it. It's from uh Jen from Canada. Hi, Josh and Drew. Notice she's uh used uh Josh first there. I mean, don't want to don't want to bring attention to it, but I I entirely want to bring attention to it. Uh big fans of the podcast. Wanted to share my did it anyway moment. First off, I have GAD adjustment disorder and recently discovered that I have OCPD. So big decision making isn't my thing, but I'm working through it. So back to why I'm messaging you. My big did it anyway is is the fact that I said yes to a new job. My current job is very toxic, and my manager is very micromanaging and controlling. So when this opportunity came up, it took a long time for me to say yes or even believe someone else believed in me, thanks to my current situation. Even though I am afraid and frustrated, I did it anyway and said yes to a new opportunity. I'm a mixture of proud and scared because anxiety and the fear of the unknown. Anyways, thank you for your support and knowledge, as it's really helped in my anxiety journey. Stay well. Oh, very good. Love that. Brilliant. Leaning into the unknown.

SPEAKER_01 35:24

Yeah. Right now, every boss in Canada that listens to disordered, which of course is millions of them, that has an employee named Jen is on the war path right now. Hopefully, Jen already left her job since she now added her boss as horrible.

SPEAKER_00 35:37

Um, yeah, there's so many Jens are being called into the are you are you leaving?

SPEAKER_01 35:41

Am I horrible? Am I horrible narcissistic boss? That's a great job. I love the ability to hold space for two things to be true at the same time. I'm excited and afraid at the same time. Imagine that. Human beings having multiple experiences at once.

SPEAKER_00 35:56

Who knew? Love it. Love it. Um, should we have a question? Yeah, let's ask. Let's do it. What do you got? Uh uh here's one. Hi there. I just had a question about the what if part of anxiety. Lately I've been getting triggered a lot by almost comparing myself to other people. For example, I'll see a post on social media of someone talking about depression, and I'll start getting overwhelmed with fear, thinking, what if that turns out to be me? So I guess the question comes down to how would you go about not getting triggered as much, slash not comparing yourself to others? Apologies if this has been answered, but I've been listening to a fair few podcasts and hadn't heard anything about this. That's from Dan. Thanks, Dan. Good question. What do you think? How do you not get triggered? What I'm hearing from the question is something we have spoken about in the past, and that's depression versus fear of depression. You know, so you're reading these people. What if this person who's in a situation that's tricky and I've got an anxiety disorder? What if I lose control and end up like this person? It's very similar to the depression, fear of depression um question. Uh, it's you don't avoid triggers, but at the same time, the rule is do what non-anxious you would do. Would non-anxious you be scrolling through social media, listening to countless stories of mental health and depression? I know non-anxious me wouldn't. What about you, Drew?

SPEAKER_01 37:26

Yeah, and I would not. But in that situation, the trigger says, You better do something about this. That's a bad, that's a hard story to hear. Now I'm afraid that it might happen to me. Okay, all reasonable, because anybody might have that reaction. Now I have to do something about this discomfort. No, you don't. So the way you learn to not be triggered is to go ahead and be triggered because you can't not be, and then start to react to it in a different way. Yeah, that's real. I'm scared of depression right now. What else? Next.

SPEAKER_00 37:56

Yeah. Yeah. Just it's not a thing that you have to go away and fix the the drawing board. It's just, yeah, I'm at the moment, I'm anxious, and my threat response is suggesting to me that this video I've seen is a threat because it is a wild premonition that this could be me. Yeah. Which is now leading me to compulsions where I'm checking my mood, checking things, checking everything, avoiding. And suddenly I am going to feel different and I am going to relate to the person I've just seen on the video because I'm literally spent days comparing and compulsively checking. Watch out for the comparison compulsion. It's sneaky. You think you're doing it to protect yourself, but you're actually keeping yourself in a heightened state of awareness.

SPEAKER_01 38:39

Notice when you think you're doing something, but if I think about it and I ask about it and I read about it, then I'm doing something. No, you're not. It does nothing. That's literally doing nothing. So I always like to use the smoke detector analogy. Like what twice a year or whatever, when the clocks change, you always get those like public service announcements. This is a good time to change the batteries in your smoke detector. Oh, that's right. I need to be worried about my smoke detector. Now I can do something, actually change the batteries, and then I'm done. I actually did a thing to address that worry. Now I'm done. Googling about depression and checking yourself. And I know people who will literally like download like the back depression inventory and give it to themselves as a test. Don't do that. Don't do that. Just let yourself be afraid of depression and go along as best you can.

SPEAKER_00 39:24

Yeah, you can do that. Great advice. Great advice. Um, I don't think we've got time for any more. Yeah, we're about to. If you want to squeeze one, yeah, we're about time. Let's not let's not get carried away. No one's not. Yeah, try not to make it too long. So yeah, uh, yeah, but I'll save them for the next episode. Um thank you all for tuning in. Um, also a big congratulations to my co-host Drew. Um, we have reached um half a million downloads of Disordered, which we'll rant and cheer about more in the next episode. Uh and that's all thanks to you listening at home. So thank you so much.

SPEAKER_01 39:59

Yeah, that's uh that's a big number. And uh thank you so much, guys. We appreciate it. It's just you and I, it's just you and I listening to it back and playing it over. Do you know how many times I had it replay to get to 250,000? A lot.

SPEAKER_00 40:12

No, no, the key is to buy 5,000 devices and put them in a warehouse and just keep playing it over and over again.

SPEAKER_01 40:20

Just box farm in China listening to us on a repeat. It's like we only have four listeners, but thank you, everybody. It does make it more fun to do the podcast when you know that a lot of people are listening and we appreciate it, and all the lovely reviews we get. Thank you so much for that.

SPEAKER_00 40:35

So yeah, yeah, and final words, thank you once again to the person who sent in that question, and we wish you all the best. And just know we're here every Friday and keep going. You've got this.

SPEAKER_01 40:46

Yeah, thanks for listening, guys. We'll be back next week.