Let’s Talk Love Podcast Season 5 Episode 3 with Dr. MaryCatherine McDonald| Transcript

12.10.23

This transcript is from the Let’s Talk Love Podcast, available in our Podcast Feed.

Robin Ducharme | We have recorded over 50 episodes to date. And I feel so grateful for the incredible guests that I get to meet and learn from each week. Today is no exception. I had the privilege of speaking with Mary Catherine McDonald, PhD or MC for short. MC is a research professor and life coach who specializes in the psychology of trauma, stress and resilience. I listened and read her book Unbroken, the Trauma Response is Never Wrong. She uses her great understanding of neuroscience and psychology to overturn the misconceptions about trauma. MC tells us what trauma is, what triggers are and what they're not how our brain and biology are wired to help us deal with trauma, and shares tested practices and tools to help you work with your body's coping mechanisms to accelerate healing. MC says if I could snap my fingers and change just one thing about the way we understand trauma, it would be this, at its core, the trauma response is the strength response. It is not a sign of weakness or disorder. When we begin there, healing from trauma is possible. I know because I've seen it in other people and I've lived it myself. This is a conversation I hope you get a lot from just as I did. Enjoy. Welcome to Let's Talk Love the podcast that brings you real talk, fresh ideas and expert insights every week. Our guests are the most trusted voices in love and relationships. And they're here for you with tools, information and friendly advice to help you expand the ways you love, relate and communicate. We tackle the big questions not shying away from the complex, the messy, the awkward and the joyful parts of relationships. I'm your host Robin Ducharme. Now, Let's Talk Love.

Hello, everyone and welcome to Let's Talk Love. I'm very excited to welcome our guest, Mary Catherine McDonald, who we were we are going to adoringly. call MC for the rest of his interview. Thank you for joining

Dr. MaryCatherine McDonald | Thank you so much for having me. I'm so excited to be here.

Robin Ducharme | I have been preparing for this interview and enjoying learning from you through your book is called Unbroken. The Trauma Response Is Never Wrong. And I have to say I am new to learning about trauma. And so we're I've been working with different experts and reading these books. And I'm still like, I think baby stages of understanding. But I think your book was such, it was very well written.

Dr. MaryCatherine McDonald | Oh, thank you.

Robin | So it was entertaining, as well as, like, I just I just I felt like I said when I when I was preparing to one of my best friends works with us. And we do the podcast planning together. And I said, I'm so excited to meet Mary Catherine like, she's like down to earth. She's funny, like, Your stories are great, I can tell you, but you got a great sense of humor you. And you're just like, really cool, cool woman. So thank you.

MC | You know, it's it's so funny that you say that because I think because of what I studied. So serious people are sometimes like, Oh, you're funny. And I'm like you, I don't know how to take that. Because these are people who you know, know me or whatever. But, um, but yeah, I think it's really important actually to bring the lightness to this conversation, because I have found that some of the brightest light that we can find is actually right in the darkness. And I think it's really important that we don't lose our sense of humor, which might sound, you know, counterintuitive, but.

Robin | I completely agree. And something we will talk about closer to the end is just how important it is to bring joy into these dark times, because that is the medicine.

MC | It really is. Yep.

Robin | It really, really is. So tell us about your story. I mean, you you share, you share your personal stories throughout the book, and your experience of how you experience trauma of loss of your your parents.

MC | Yeah

Robin | But tell us what led you to specialize in this study? Was it through going through that your study of trauma and coaching people through trauma?

MC | You know, youwould think that's but it was kind of hilariously, I think, like a good 10 years into the study of trauma that I was able to actually recognize any of my own life experiences as traumatic. And part of that, I think, is because of the incredibly sophisticated defense systems that we have in our brains to keep us from what we're not ready to deal with yet. But part of that is also because of the way that I was encountering trauma in the psychological literature when I was studying it. My experiences didn't match up with the kinds of events that count as traumatic clinically. So I just didn't see it for a really long time. I was studying trauma. I did my master's degree in grief. And I was looking at philosophy and psychoanalysis and trying to get really deep into the experience of grief and mourning and what is it give and all these things. And in the process of that, lost both of my parents pretty unexpectedly so I was I was I picked to study that and then I lived, it wasn't the kind of the other way around.

Robin | Right. Wow.

MC | I know, and then when I did my PhD, I wanted to look at the way, the extent to which human psychology is structured by story. And there was this huge debate that was going on at the time. This was like back in 2008-2009, about how much the human experience is a story. Is our identity a story should we try to make it a story? What happens when the events in our life don't conform to story form? And on the one side, there were people that were arguing, yes, human psychology is unequivocally, you know, it is narrative, right, you have a beginning, middle and end to your life. Most of the stories and events that happen to you have a beginning, middle and end all this stuff. On the other side was this really strong minority arguing that this is not true, and we are doing psychological damage when we try to get our lives to conform to story form. And we are not narrative, we live in episodes. And these episodes have nothing to do with each other. So who I am right now is not the same as who I was two seconds ago. And these two things have nothing to do with each other. And that exploded my brain. So I reached for trauma, because it seemed to show that there is a narrative regardless of whether you attach your identity to it or not, because so often when people talk about a traumatic event that happened, one of the things that they invariably say is that they were telling a story, and then that story shattered, or it slipped out from under them, and then nothing made sense anymore. So it seems to me that like the heart of traumatic experience was proof that we are structured narratively.

Robin | So you tell the story of you, there's so many great stories that I think we can relate to, through this story. Right. That that is the beautiful thing, like you were just saying is like, we can learn so much from each other's stories, and reflect on our own experience in some way. So you talk about how when you you were experiencing anxiety attacks, you were having panic attacks, and you couldn't concentrate. And you just felt like your your life was completely unstable. And you were managing by taking Xanax doing jumping jacks. So like I just when I read that I was like, well, you could you can see that. Right? And you went into your therapist office. And and you were one of the ways you were actually coping was to lay on the ground. And can you tell us a little bit about that learning? Yeah, because that was awesome that how and how really the human, how we we are so wired to actually manage trauma in ways that we don't feel

MC | Totally,we naturally reach for adaptation. And I think that's something that we see in the trauma response, and then in our adaptation to any kind of incredible amount of stress. And so, I was living in this moment where I had these coping mechanisms that I got from being raised in the house I was raised in, and they essentially looked like disconnect from your emotions and manage them, you know. And then my father died. And I those coping mechanisms worked for about six months, you overwork you keep yourself busy, you don't think about things, you don't feel things you disconnect from your body, you just manage. And then six months after my father died, I, it was just I remember this moment so vividly, I was walking across my apartment, at the end of the day, going to get into my reading chair, and I just collapsed. And I almost went to the emergency room because I thought I'm having a cardiac event like this is so bodied, and so out of nowhere that like I'm dying. I had no idea that this was panic, I didn't know that I had had panic attacks before, but they were more like, they seem to connect to the context more clearly, if that makes sense. This just felt like getting hit by a train out of nowhere.

Robin | Nice

MC | So I started very seriously going to therapy. And I made this hilarious phone call to a therapist, and I said, you know, I, I'm having these panic attacks, they're getting in the way of work, I guess I have this, you know, recent loss. and that's probably part of it. But really, I just I need to get back to work. And this is getting in the way. So I'd like to do maybe like six sessions and we could figure this out. Then I'll be on my way. And I've been in therapy ever since that was 2005.

Robin | Right

MC | So she probably would laugh if she still remembers that. And so I you know, constantly I think because of the intensity of the body and symptoms and the way that they were getting in the way I really felt like I was losing my mind. Like why was it the case that I could do okay for about six months and then all of a sudden that collapse? I thought I was having a breakdown. And in a way I was I think but so I was doing all of these things out of absolute desperation and necessity and one of them was lying on the floor. And because I thought I was losing my mind and I hadn't ever heard of anyone lying on the floor as something that was like, you know, beneficial therapeutically, like, I went to, like,

Robin | Groundhog

Mary Catherine

But that's that's exactly what it was. So I went to my therapist and I said, you know, I'm doing this thing. And I don't know, like, every session I was like, Is this the one I'm going to be committed? You know what I mean? Like, these, these behaviors felt so strange, you know. And I've said, I'm lying on the floor, I made this admission, like, I'm lying on the floor. This is where I'm at now, clearly, I'm not getting better, I'm getting worse.

Robin | Yeah, you're thinking this is so embarrassing.

MC | And the response was like, Oh, that's a great grounding technique. And I was like, What, uh, what, and like, I was in a Ph. D. program, studying the psychology, neuroscience and philosophy of trauma. And I did not know what what a grounding exercise was. And so I think that points to a huge gap in our cultural knowledge and understanding of nervous system regulation, which is what I was trying to convey.

Robin | And I think that is, this book your book is so full of this is, that's one of the things that I love about this, you wrote this book to give people tools that we can access, all of us can access these tools to deal with, and also be a therapeutic, create a theraputic relationship with the people in our lives that are going through trauma and teach them these tools to walk them through them. So I have a personal story that relates to what you went through my my twin brother passed away when we were 35, very suddenly, of a heart attack. And it was like completely traumatazing, just in the fact that he was such a close person to everybody in our family, and me being his twin, but, and I disembodied, and I knew that I was, I was like, searching for him reaching for him. But and the other symptoms were actually because he died of a heart attack, I was convinced I'm going to die of a heart attck.

MC | Of course because your his twin, right.

Robin | And so I was having panic attacks out of nowhere, like, I've just been walking down the street, pumping gas, and all of a sudden, I feel like my body is and my heart is going to explode. And it wasn't, I've never had a panic attack in my life. So you know, I'm calling my friends going, like, I think I might have to go to the doctor. Number one, I think I'm having a heart attack. And they're giving me these breathing techniques. Isn't this interesting. Because you've teach in your book, one of the one of a very solid tool is diaphragmatic breathing. And I wasn't doing the same breathing way up on my chest as you do. And you're right.

MC | Yeah.

Robin | Yes. And the other thing that so this is like this human biology nature thing, that I wasn't able to access these tools, but I had people around me that were that somehow intuitively knew what to do. And one of my best friends called me and said, meet me at the hotel. And I will I'm gonna come to you. So she came, and she said, lay down deep, deep breathing. And she gave me a foot massage. And, and that was completely grounding.

MC | Right,

Robin | Right.

MC | Yeah.

Robin | Like these are. So those are two examples of something that you do talk about in your book that are tools that are human like, biologically, they're going to help us deal with the trauma. Somehow, we can't access them ourselves. But we hopefully can help each other. When we can't do it ourselves.

MC | There's this amazing field called the Interpersonal Neurobiology, which is headed up by Daniel Siegel. And the idea, essentially, is that we think of our brains and our nervous systems like these independent things, like we're moving around the world as these independent beings because that's, you know, that conforms to our experience most of the time. But what we disregard is the ways in which our nervous system is modulated by other people's nervous systems. And so, so many grounding techniques involve touch by somebody else, or talking with someone else, and what you're essentially doing in that moment, you know, we talk about connection and the importance of energy and all of that stuff, which is, of course, also true. But on a neurobiological level, you're sort of like leaning on the other person's regulation, to regulate yourself, which is wild.

Robin | Yes. So I tell us, what is the biggest misunderstandings that that are around trauma, because there is a lot like you've already, I would love to talk about big T little T. Like, there's no such thing, but also just what trauma is, and what are the misunderstandings are on trial.

MC | I think the biggest misunderstanding is the idea that if you have a trauma response, and if you're having any symptoms after a traumatic event that this means that you're broken, that is scientifically false. And that's why I called the book unbroken because the trauma response, this is not my opinion, this is scientific fact is an adaptive set of responses in the body that are designed to keep you alive. So the root of what can become of course, distressing symptoms like we're talking about like these panic attacks. The root of that is this inherent will to survive this strength. It is not a sign of weakness, and it is not a disorder. In fact, one of the things that has been consistently argued about it In the field of psychology in the US, is the the fact that we call Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Because it's not actually a disorder. We know that scientifically, the whole field knows that. And so why are we still using this language of, of disorder. And I think when we,

Robin | So we should take the D off that.

MC | Yeah, and call it post traumatic stress injury, or just post traumatic stress, because what's happening is that you have this, this stress response system that gets flipped on as it is supposed to, because it's designed to keep you alive. And then problems occur when it gets switched on, and it stays on when it doesn't need to be on so these experiences that we're talking about, like when you're pumping gas, and you have a panic attack, all of a sudden, that's not a situation where your stress response needs to be acting like that. And so what we need to do is recalibrate it back to its baseline, not get rid of it. And so I think that's the most fundamental misunderstanding is the idea that if you have trauma, you are broken, that is false.

Robin | Right. And the other, this other misunderstanding that, and again, we're culturally wired, almost like not wired. But we're taught this, so much comparison in so many ways, right? And give examples of trauma on how there's this one story, I thought it was just this beautiful story. With so many lessons about a woman that you were treating, she was emergency response person. And of course, every day, day in day out for her career, she's seeing people go through trauma, she's dealing with it face to face. And she was coming to you because she was having all of these she wasn't able to work. She wasn't able to travel for work anymore. Like it was difficult. She had all the debilitating, life altering symptoms that were like affecting her life. And can you tell us about that? Because she thought he had big T. Sorry she thought she had little T that wasn't worth talking about.

MC | She didn't even think she had any T at all.

Robin | But there's no there's no big or liitle T. Right?

MC | Exactly. Yeah, the distinction of big T, like capital T and lowercase t are simple and complex trauma comes from a clinical space, which we can talk about if you want, but we have like twisted it in the weirdest ways. And it is obscuring our ability to see and respond to our own traumas correctly. And so what happened was, and this, so each chapter has a case study, and all of the case studies are compilations. So they're little pieces from different clients. And so I've seen this frequently, where a client will come in, and they are describing, okay, I have these symptoms of PTSD or the symptoms of trauma. And I think the source is X. And in this case, in the case study in the book, she thought that the source was her job, which was one of the things that would potentially count as clinically, potentially traumatic, because she was, you know, as you said she was witnessing other people's traumas every single day. And we've come to the realization in psychology that vicarious trauma is a thing. And so if you're a first responder and you're exposed to trauma, even if it's not affecting you directly, you're still exposed to it. And so this can create PTSD over time. So she was having these these symptoms and thinking that that is what was the source of the trauma. But but the more we dug in, like I just couldn't find any connections, all of the stuff was resonating with her. She felt like the tools made sense. But like the story wasn't connecting. Every time she talked about her work, she would light up, she seemed like she had no distress. She didn't have memories of these moments of stress that she was reliving. There was no intrusion around that. And this breakup kept coming up. And she would talk about the breakup and then dismiss it and say like, I'm a first responder, you know, I just talked to somebody who lost their entire family. This breakup is dumb. So she was kind of dismissing this. And then one night when we were having a session, I was like, hold on, like, can we just can we talk about the trauma? Or can we talk about the breakup for a second? And she's like, I guess, and I was like tell me what happened. What is the relationship, right? And it turned out that she was in a situation where she was planning a future with someone they weren't yet married. But they were looking at homes together. They were having this plan and he took up with somebody else and left. So like one weekend, they were looking at homes the next weekend, he was living with another woman. And that whiplash shattering event of her entire future was the thing that was causing the symptoms. And I'm so glad and every case that this has happened, that we've been able to locate that, because what she was about to do was quit her job that she loved. And it continued to miss the source of the pain, which is wild. So very wild, we weren't, so it's really destructive and corrosive when we have these categories, and hierarchies around traumatic experiences and we try to label ourselves as traumatized or not traumatized. The other place that I see this come up all the time is in the ACES Adverse Childhood Experience. A study that people will you can go online and you can get your ACES score. And they will then decide they're legitimately traumatized, or they're not legitimately traumatized. But maybe their partner is legitimately traumatized. And that metric is problematic in so many ways. But we just we use it to sort of work against ourselves and steep ourselves and each other, and even more shame, and that prevents healing.

Robin | And when you were able to locate the source of the trauma, how did that lead to her healing?

MC | So I think, the, the first thing that we did, and this takes a long time is to validate that the source is real, because you have to work against all of the societal narratives that are telling you that this thing is traumatic and this thing isn't. And your your body is telling you the thing that isn't labeled as trauma is actually the thing that's causing the problem. So a lot of it was about kind of re educating her that this was that this was allowed that this, of course, was painful that when someone walks out of your life, and you've planned a future with them, that is incredibly traumatic, and it reveals to you a vulnerability that you might have been ignoring. And that vulnerability is not something you can unsee or unknown. And so it follows you and you feel haunted. And like, of course, you're traumatized by this, a lot of work was almost in that conceptual place. And then we were actually just kind of applying the tools that we had been trying to apply to what we previously thought was the source, which was the, which was her job. And so you know, she went and did EMDR, with an EMDR specialist, and did some narrative work, which I have a tool and I think it's the first chapter, where she told some different versions of the story and was able to kind of re label that. So we were working with her memories and meaning around the events. And then over time, it just it integrated.

Robin | Right. And that's, that's what you do. That's what you talk about MC is how when we go through, first of all, can we talk about triggers, and then traumatic memories and how, because I think you started, you started explaining about how, you know how important story is in the human experience, like having the beginning, middle and end. And when we go through a traumatic event, our brains are in survival, right? Our bodies and survival. So the memory part of us is not able to like to register like recording almost like the recording devices.

MC | You're right

Robin | I've just tried to explain this. To make sure I understand it. So then we can't form like a complete memory through a traumatic event. And so our memories are kind of scattered all over the place, like there is memory, but it's not an organized fashion. That's exactly right. So, so what happens with a trigger? And because we're using we're overusing that word to we're misunderstanding that word. We're being like, oh, I'm triggered. Well, probably, if you're using it in a very light fashion, you probably aren't like a trigger is something like can you explain that twice about triggers and traumatic memories.

MC | Yes, that was I'm kind of laughing because that was sort of a fun thing to talk about in the book, because I got to use these real life experiences that I've had where I've overheard people talking about something being a trigger, or my students have told me that something is a trigger. And even while they say it, they kind of have a smile on their face. Like, I'm triggered by the dorm food or by my roommates snoring or you know, like, yeah, and it's like, okay, so what we're describing is relevant and important. It's important that the dorm food is terrible, it's important that you report that experience, it's important that you file it away. And at the same time, it's also important to mind your addiction, because words matter. And that's not,

Robin | Words matter

MC | But that's not when we talk about triggers. In neuroscience, what it is meant to capture is that there is a kind of memory that is very, very different than the rest of our memories. So if you and I are hanging out, and we walk into a coffee shop, and we and I smell the smell of like cinnamon bread, and I have this memory of my mother making cinnamon bread, I might turn to you and say oh my gosh, I have this memory. Let me just tell you about this time, I used to sit on the counter in the kitchen. And I just love that smell feels like home to me. And then when when you know it's our turn to order where I'm able to kind of put that memory down and talk to the barista and order whatever I was going to order, right and then we're able to continue to have our hangout and talk. That is an integrated memory and integrated memories when you can pull out you can talk about you can feel some of the emotional content and then you can put away and move on with your day. When you have an overwhelming event, one of the amazing miraculous adaptations that your brain does is that it turns down the activity in the hippocampus, which is the part of your brain that has all of your long term memories. And so what results as you said is that you get a memory in there because all of our memories, all of our experiences get filed away in some fashion. But instead of being that really organized memory file that I can pull out and talk to you about and you know, feel some of the emotions and and put it away, I get a fragmented memory. And the fragmented memory is not something that the hippocampus likes, because it doesn't know what to do with it, it doesn't know where to put it, or what it means All it knows is that it's connected to danger. And danger is something we really need to pay attention to. And so every time something comes up in your perception that reminds your hippocampus of that memory, it sort of tosses it to the front of your mind to give you the opportunity to process it, because you didn't process it before. The problem is that the fear center, the limbic system in your brain also recognizes that fragment as danger. And so instead of going through the processing, and the integrating process that you can do when all of your brain, you know, capacity is online, your fear center sends you right back into the trauma response. So you are standing there in your office or at home, or whatever you're doing, and your body is in the past, reliving the experience, as if it were happening all over again. That's a trigger.

Robin | Yes. Yes. So it's it's you say? It's, it's not like traumatic memories are not?

MC | No, they're not

Robin | They're instances of reliving, you are, you're reliving the experience, although it's not, You're reliving a past experience in your present.

MC | And in a way that is intrusive. So we could say like, going back to the bakery example, like in a way, like I'm reliving my childhood, when I get to tell you about the cinnamon bread. The difference is that it's not intrusive. And it's something I can talk about. And it's something I can put away, when I'm reliving in the sense of having a trigger, I am totally derailed. And so and that will get in the way of my life that will get in the way of my behavior, my relationships, my work all of these things. And so they're really important to distinguish from the from the other kinds of memory, I think there's a couple of other misconceptions around triggers that I think are really important. And one is that we always, like, we think we always have conscious awareness of what our triggers are. And I think this especially comes up in spaces where we're talking about trauma and relationships where we think like, okay, I know my triggers, and here's my triggers. And I'm gonna give you my list of triggers, and then we can work through them. But often what happens is a trigger is something that has no conscious connection, you just react or have rage or fear, or you have this outsized response in a situation that you consciously know, isn't threatening, but all of a sudden, you're acting as if it is. And so usually, there's a lot of work that needs to be done to even just connect the dots to understand that this reaction is coming from this stimulus. And the other one is that if you have a trigger, this means you should avoid that thing for the rest of your life. That's a huge misconception that comes from the era of trigger warnings, which is really corrosive to healing, because a trigger is, and you can see it from the neurobiology. It's supposed to be an opportunity for your brain to integrate what it didn't get a chance to integrate before. Is it painful and awful? Yes, of course. And what your brain is trying to do is help you put this thing away, so that it looks like the rest of your memories. You can't do that if you avoid the thing for the rest of your life. It's impossible. And so what ends up happening is that your life just gets smaller and smaller because your brain learns, okay, the things we avoid, are the things that keep us safe. So let's avoid more and more things instead of healing, which is growth. So yeah.

Robin | Right. You give an example of how, for the longest time you had an aversion like to pasta with tomato sauce, and you had no idea it wasn't like this thing. And you're like, I used to love spaghetti sauce, like that spaghetti sauce. And so and then you realized, right, how did you realize where that where that? Would that be? Good? That'd be called a trigger.

MC | I think so yeah. Because what I was happened, like, talk about a kind of an inappropriate response, I would make myself dinner and I'd be like, Oh, I'm craving tomato sauce. I'm gonna make some spaghetti, make some tomato sauce, put it together. And then I would look at this bowl, and feel nauseated. And I was like, I can't eat this. And I was like, what's happening is it's a brain tumor, like what is happening to me, you know, and again, I was this by the time I realized this, I was well out of a PhD, studying trauma, like, so if there's going to be someone who notices at what a trigger is, is doing it, we will hopefully be me. But um, triggers are so sneaky. And so I just stopped eating spaghetti sauce. And then I don't actually even know why the memory got corrected. Our brains are kind of are consolidating and re consolidating memory all the time, kind of in the background, while we sleep while we do other tasks. And so there was one day where I just, it was like, guy got hit by lightning and all of a sudden I was like, oh my god. The last thing my father ate before he went into the hospital and then died was spaghetti. And so my poor little brain had connected these two things as like mortal danger, and it was trying to protect me don't eat that thing. It's poison. I know, right?

Robin | It's just like, you have to have compassion.

MC | But then as soon as I realized that I was like, Oh, little, little, little scared part of my brain, that's not what killed him. He had colon cancer wasn't the spaghetti, we can eat spaghetti, it's okay. You know, you almost turn to your, that part Exactly. It's a part of yourself as if you're talking to a toddler. And now I can eat spaghetti. It's kind of a funny thing, once we bring the thing into the light and kind of dispel what the mechanism at the center of it is, it can really lose its potency.

Robin | Yeah. So you do talk about shame, and how there is this, there is so much shame around how we look at trauma. It's like I shouldn't be feeling this way. Like, can you talk about that MC about how we like it is rethinking what trauma is. And you're saying the shame response, or sorry, the trauma response is never wrong, you are not broken. You reiterate that message over and over again, on how this is how we are wired, and we're wired to protect ourselves. And it's very natural on how we are responding. But there's still a lot of shame.

MC | And I think a lot of that shame comes from the history of the study of trauma. And we don't realize the way that when we don't study the history of a thing, we don't have any idea about how the history impacts our current understanding. And so before we had all of this neuroscience and this understanding of the trauma response and the stress response system in the body, and how that works, and what symptoms it causes, we didn't understand trauma. And so we had to make guesses about what was happening. And those guesses were usually they were wrong, for sure. But they were usually is kind of like conceptualized as some sort of weakness or failure or issue in the person who was suffering. And so you would take you would look at two veterans who came home from the same war fought in the same battalion had the same position. One of them had all of these symptoms, the other one didn't, the field of psychology looks at the person who has the symptoms and says, well, there must be something wrong with him because his buddy made it out fine. Right. And so there was just there was no way to kind of conceptualize these things. And I think we think we have come a very long way in the understanding of trauma. And in many ways we have certainly technologically but societally, we have inherited these definitions of trauma that are based in these very twisted ideas that if you are traumatized, you are broken. And so that means that like, in the very heart of the definition of trauma is that you should be ashamed. And the science has corrected that in the in science field, we know that that's false. But societally we haven't caught up with the science. And so we are perpetuating these stories about weakness. And, and the idea of brokenness around trauma and any mental illness, and for that matter, and it's it's so corrosive. And so if we want to heal, we need to first understand biologically what's going on and recognize that there is no nothing to be ashamed of being ashamed of your trauma responses, like being shamed of being hungry, or breathing. Like it's not, that doesn't make any sense. And once we get rid of that, get rid of this huge barrier, because trying to heal from trauma with shame is like trying to climb up a mountain with a car strapped to your ankle. It's not going to work.

Robin | Yeah, I, there's so many so many great tools in your book. And I just encourage everybody that's listening to please read and listen, I loved reading and listening. Because I think it's just there's just so valid, so much value in doing both. Can you talk to us about trauma bonds? Yeah, because obviously, we're in like, with Real Love Ready, Let's Talk Love. We talk about relationships all day long. And I am really interested to learn more about trauma bonds, because I think that's another term that is misunderstood.

MC | Yes.

Robin | And, and it may be, right, like if you're in some sort of, it's just like to hear it from your from you. And you educate us on really what a trauma bond is, and how that shows up in relationships.

MC | It's funny, I think we take these terms, and we've our first impulse is to get the widest paintbrush that we have and paint everything with this term that we just learned. Right. And so this happens often in the mental health space with boundaries, and narcissists and

Robin | Yes

MC | Trauma bonds.

Robin | And I do want to talk about narcissists too.

MC | And it's it's super important that we like i don't i in some sense, I don't want that to go away because I think what's happening is that we're grappling with these things that we've not looked at on the societal level and that is good. We need to grapple with trauma bonds, we need to talk about them and we need to bring them into the light And we need to make sure that we're getting them, right. So right now, there's a lot of sometimes people when they say trauma bond, they mean, the two of us friends have bonded because we both had the bad chemistry teacher, you know, or we've been through this similar traumatic event, because we were bonded in trauma. And sometimes people use it to mean, you know, I'm having a hard time getting out of this relationship that I cognitively know that is bad, so it must be a trauma bond, or I keep dating the wrong kind of person, and therefore, it's a trauma bond. And like that may be the case. But it's really important to drill down and figure out what that means. Because, again, there's this whole history behind the term trauma bond and where it comes from, in the study of domestic violence. And it's important that we get this correct. So a trauma bond in short, is when you have a very, very strong bond in a relationship that has intermittent abuse, and that could be physical, psychological, emotional, and or all three. And in that experience, the bond between both people becomes really, really intense. And the result is that it's hard to break for either party. And I think that's important to understand. Because I think in the conversation around trauma bond, we villainize one person, and we call the other person, a victim. And so it's, it's important to understand that it's the bond that is also shaping the people and creating the intensity of the experience that makes it really, really hard to shake. And so people are like, okay, why do I find myself in a trauma bond? If that's the case,.And there's a lot of all we have here is guesses, we don't really know. I think there are a lot of reasons we find ourselves in trauma bonds, usually what's happening is that there is some fragment of our developmental experience or our previous relationship or experience that we haven't been able to process. And so our brains seek out a similar situation to give us the opportunity to re experience it and have a different outcome. And so again, this is an attempt at adaptation that that goes awry in your life.

Robin | Attempted integrating, right,

MC | And, and then you end up repeating this, and then you feel shame at repeating this and you think I'm broken, I can't have relationships, because all I have is trauma bonds. The last really critical thing to understand is that when you're in a relationship that has intermittent abuse, meaning the person is abusive, one moment, and then they're very loving, or they're really critical, and then they're very giving you tons of praise, that is profoundly confusing to the brain. And so what ends up happening over time is that you become disconnected from the parts of your brain that know yourself as a self, recognize that this is a bad situation, and can plan an exit and then execute on that exit plan. So the longer you're in those relationships,

Robin | Essentially lost your, you're losing your self.

MC | And neurobiological like, that's not just how you feel, it's like what is happening in your brain. So when we turn to someone, and we say, why don't you just leave, clearly, I would never accept this kind of relationship, you need to draw these boundaries, like cool, conceptually, that person is going to understand that very well. But being able to actually do it is something that they're not going to be able to do on their own. And so we have to stop shaming people who are stuck. And people who are stuck have to stop shaming themselves because what's going on in their brain is very real. And the way back is to reconnect with yourself and build that strong foundation. And then those things your future becomes possible again, you know,

Robin | The other the other thing you say, because we talk a lot about is we're trying to learn how to like learn ourselves, like you said, so that we are not repeating patterns, like you said, like we're attracted to what we know. Like all the experiences we've been through a we are trying to integrate we're trying to heal. And so the other I think overt overused or misunderstood term, and label is like toxic. Yeah, that person is toxic. Yes. And you say there is not a toxic person, it's toxic behaviors. So when you're working with people that have, have had unhealthy relationships, and it's like, this is a pattern, or they're they're out of this unhealthy relationship, and they're like, I do not want to repeat that right? How am I going to get to know myself better and understand myself better to, sso I'm not repeating that pattern of having, of bringing of creating a relationship with somebody that does have toxic behaviors, let's say not a toxic person. I'm learning MC, I'm learning.

MC | It’s so hard because like I think part of our brains like just want it to be simple. And we want to divide the world and,

Robin | Oh yeah it's not.

MC | I wish it were but like we wanted By the world and say, Okay, here's the toxic people, here's the non toxic people, all I have to do is figure out which is which, and then I'll be fine. And the truth is that we we constantly change in dynamic with each other, the other I think term that gets thrown around in the incorrect way, or the attachment styles. Because they're too often talked about as if they're fixed and unchanging, there's nothing you can do about the fact that you are anxious or avoidant or whatever. And that's not true. And it also misses the idea that a lot of the behaviors and tendencies arise in one dynamic and wouldn't in another. And so if you're feeling anxious in a relationship, it's important to understand that part of the reason you're anxious is the relationship and the other person. All like,

Robin | It's the dynamic you're in.

MC | It's not all located,

Robin | So look at your one person as the cause and you you as or vice versa. It's the one plus one equals

MC | Right, right. Right.

Robin | I get that I get that. Okay, so and the other thing, you say, I love this, I put a dog here on this one on page 114, the takeaways and tools, you're saying there isn't a tool that will single handedly extract you from a harmful relationship, there isn't a tool that will swiftly sever the chains of a trauma bond. There, there isn't a tool for this, you need all the tools, you need a therapist, you need a strong support network, you need the painful awareness that even when you use all the tools, you may still find yourself humbled and bruised. Sitting days at the wreckage with a collision between the rare earth magnets has caused yet again. Yes, it's just like that is that is the reality of life. Right? Like you could have all the tools employed. I mean, I think about all the tools I know. And most people do in our relationship space is over the books for this podcast. We're like we're doing it, we're using the I state we're doing this like, oh my gosh, that doesn't lessen the work.

MC | No, it doesn't. And I think like if we understand that, like a part of the human psyche is always going to elude us. And that doesn't mean we've failed, I think then we can take on those experiences with more humility and say like, oh, okay, here it is, again, here we are, again, doing the thing. I think we hold up this like this ideal of what it will look like when we have healed, what it will look like when we have done the work. And we will have checked the boxes, and then we'll be able to engage in any situation relationally with out any kind of bump in the road. And that's just not that's setting us. That's we're setting ourselves up for failure when we do that. And I think you know, when I I have lots of relationship triggers, I know about them that I'm sure there's some I don't yet know about the ones I do know about still come up and knock me out sometimes. And that doesn't mean that I have failed at the task of healing, it means I am healing in the relationships, right? Like we have to just keep encountering these. This you know, it's almost like, if you have a skill, you don't just learn how to paint so that you can put away painting, you learn how to paint so that you can continue painting and have more fun and have a horizon that opens up to you of different possibilities and more things you can paint, you know what I mean? So if we see relationships like that,

Robin | I really like that analogy.

MC | Then I think we let ourselves off the hook a little bit, and then we can step back and look at you know, going back to your question about trauma bonds, I think the question to ask is, How am I energetically involved in theis situation? What is it, what is this repeating that might be helpful for me? What is my brain trying to get me to relive and re experience and those are hard questions that should be taken on with a professional. Because it it's hard to look at the ways that you're invested in the things that you that are hurting you. But I think if we don't look at that we miss really critical parts of our experience, and then we repeat them. And that doesn't mean it's our fault. Like we can't keep swinging from one side of the pendulum to the other and saying it's all my fault, or it's all the other person's fault. It is far more complicated than that.

Robin | Yeah. So I wanted to talk about your newest project that you're working on. And I see you posting about Tiny Little Joys. And it's like it starts you talk about this in the back of the book in the epilogue. So tell us about your online course Tiny Little Joys and the neurobiology of joy because first I just want to say this is like, I am the biggest advocate that when it comes to joy. Like I am all about creating joy and how important joy is and how I'm wired for joy. And I didn't realize that until I went through all the traumatic things that I've gone through the last like 10 years, 12 years, but I'm like, but I've I've naturally in my I guess it's my own neurobiology reached for joy. Like, you know, I want to laugh, I want to like find, like, talk about the greatness of my brother and laugh about all the funny hilarious, hilarious, ridiculous stories of him. So that we can focus more on like, there's a balance, there's like a pendulum. I'm like, oh, I'm way over here, I'm going to dark, I gotta bring some light gotta get some light. Right. So and that's what you're saying. But that's a brain. It's like there's neurobiology with joy.

MC | Which is so exciting, because I think I'm, interestingly, maybe not wired for joy. I'm a reluctant joy seeker, maybe, in my life. And, and so I was really on the fence. So the field, the whole field of positive psychology is about this, it's about, okay, let's put our obsession with pathology and symptoms down for a second and think about positive emotions, and positive experiences, and what those might do to impact someone's resilience and general well being and psychological state and all that. And I was kind of embarrassingly, really on the fence about that, especially working with folks who are dealing with acute trauma, because a lot of the tools that were coming out of positive psychology were like, okay, cool, we know that if you make a gratitude list, or if you have hope for your future, you will, you will fare better psychologically. But if you turn to someone who's just been through an incredibly traumatic experience, and ask them to make a gratitude list, like that's pretty offensive, you know, and so that's, that brings, you know, brings us to toxic positivity, which of course, we want to avoid. But then the neuroscience came in, and it like proved that everything that was happening in positive psychology was right, because they found that there's two circuits in your brain, there's lots of circuits in your brain, but there's two circuits in your brain that are essentially counterpose, they can't be online at the same time. And one of them is the fear circuit. And the other one is something that they've called the hope circuit. And the hope circuit is the part of your brain that's responsible for future planning, imagining, dreaming, experiencing moments of kindness and gratitude. And so it was like, oh, crap. Okay. So now we have to do this work of adapting these, these tools that we know are effective for the population who stand to benefit from them the most, which is folks who are dealing with acute trauma. So how do we do that? And so this is my next book project, which is about Tiny Little Joys about how can we build this bridge and make a set of tools that does work, even if you've just experienced a traumatic event. And the first tool that I created this was the very early in the pandemic and 2020 Was this practice of Tiny Little Joys, where you kind of recognize and accept that everything around you is falling apart, and you make a commitment to noticing at least one thing a day, that gives you a little blast of joy. And it should be tiny, like something on your desk, the way the light is coming in, when a song comes on a playlist that you didn't remember was on that playlist, and you feel like Oh, I love the song. Like the bubbles that come out of the the dish soap bottle when you pick it up like that small. And when you notice an imprint these things, what you are doing is kind of especially if you're in a really dark moment in your life is recognizing that even though everything is falling apart, and you are in the worst grief, or trauma or whatever that you've ever been through, that there are still these really almost like relentless pieces of joy there to anchor you.

Robin | Right. So I really liked that relentless piece of joy. I really like that.

MC | Joy of like, the like of, It's funny in the in the beginning, I just finished the proposal for the Tiny Little Joy book. And in the beginning, I'm kind of defining joy, and it's like, okay, it's not this kind of joy. It's this kind of joy. Like, it's not the kind of joy that's like, silly and like we think of as like, disconnected from reality. You know, it's the kind of joy that you find in these moments that are really gnarly. The moment when you find yourself laughing at a family member's funeral. And you think like what is happening? Because something funny just happened at a funeral because that's how the world is the joy is right there next to the deepest darks. And so it really is and I think when you've lived that, it's like then you're like, Okay, this is how we build this bridge, you know?

Robin | Yeah. Wow. Well, I I love talking to you about trauma, it's been so fun, that's the thing that is that is the greatest thing about this. We can talk about dark things. Not dark traumas not dark,

MC | It is but that's okay

Robin | Yes, but it's a heavy, it's heavy. And I when I was talking to Kirsten about, getting ready for this podcast, we were both like, whoa, this was dense, but there was also a lot of levity, which that, hey there you go.

MC | It was funny because a lot of people over the summer were sending me pictures on Instagram of like, this isn't my beach reading and I was like guys get some better books for the beach. On the beach, but I from what I hear. I think that the experience of it is like you said, it's not it doesn't have to be this deep, dark thing that brings us down.

Robin | That's right. Well, I'm going to close our podcasts with a blessing. I do that every episode because I think that it's very important that we will be blessed for this time together and learn together. So may we remember, life is a journey of healing. There is no end of healing and it is never too late to heal. This is on your sentiments MC. And they we know that we are still working to heal, we are not failing, we are doing it right. That is something I learned so much when you're on a journey of healing for our whole lives. And we're doing it right. So,

MC | Yeah.

Robin | Thank you for for everything.

MC | Thank you so much.

Robin | You're brought to this conversation. And what you're doing is real.

MC | Thank you.

Robin | Please visit realloveready.com To become a member of our community. Submit your relationship questions for our podcast experts. At reallovereadypodcast@gmail.com We read everything you sent. Be sure to rate and review this podcast. Your feedback helps us get you the relationship advice and guidance you need. The Real Love Ready podcast is recorded and edited by Maia Anstey. Transcriptions by otter.ai and edited by Maia Anstey. We at Real Love Ready, acknowledge and express gratitude for the Coast Salish people, and stewards of the land on which we work in play, and encourage everyone listening. Take a moment to acknowledge and express gratitude for those that have stewarded and continue to steward the land that you live on as well.