Episode 24: 8 Things That Would Have Saved Our Clients SO Much Stress

Many people wait to seek help—whether it’s pelvic floor PT or couples therapy—until things feel so “catastrophically bad” they can’t ignore them anymore. But by then, you’re not just dealing with a symptom or a disagreement,you’re dealing with months (or years) of built-up stress and a life that’s been reshaped around the problem instead of addressing it. 

In this episode, Dr. Rebecca and Dr. Alex share what they wish their clients knew sooner, and what could have saved them time, money, and a lot of unnecessary stress. They also get personal, from Dr. Rebecca being told “there’s nothing we can do” about her postpartum diastasis recti; to navigating “inner child” moments; to what it realistically looks like to “stay regulated” when you’re just really %$^&ing angry.

This discussion is about what's possible when you finally have the right information, and the right support.

What you'll learn:

• “Holistic” care isn't "crunchy" or "woo" - your symptoms often make more sense when you look at the whole body.
• “Staying regulated" isn’t the same thing as suppressing your feelings.
• The difference between “weather vs. climate” in relationships (and why it matters more than the fight itself)

Tune in if you’ve ever thought:

• "I've seen multiple doctors and they all say I'm 'fine,' so what am I supposed to do now?”
• “We’re not in a crisis, but I’m tired of the constant bickering and snarky comments at home."
• “Is this something I just have to live with now?”

Helpful resources:

• Find a pelvic floor PT near you: pelvicrehab.com or Pelvic Global Directory
• Parents in Love: A Guide to Great Sex After Kids by Dr. Rebecca Howard Eudy 
• Secure Love: Create a Relationship That Lasts a Lifetime by Julie Menanno - attachment-based approach to relationships
• The Fair Play Deck: A Couple's Conversation Deck for Prioritizing What's Important – a tool to help couples divide responsibilities and reduce mental load

Connect with us:

Dr. Rebecca Howard Eudy
Website: rebeccaeudy.com
Instagram: @rebeccahowardeudy
Newsletter: Parents in Love Substack

Dr. Alexandra DiGrado
Website: bostonpelvicpt.com
Instagram: @bostonpelvicpt
Newsletter: Under the Hood

Under the Hood Podcast
Instagram: @underthehooddocs
Website: underthehoodpod.com

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:04

Welcome to Under the Hood with Dr.

SPEAKER_03 0:06

Alex and Dr. Rebecca, where we share pearls of wisdom from our 30 years of combined clinical experience.

SPEAKER_02 0:16

Hi. Hi. Okay, so we are talking about what would have sh saved our patients, clients, six to twelve. I mean, that's arbitrary. It can be whatever.

SPEAKER_01 0:28

What would save our clients stress if they're in months of stress if they have time? All right, you go first.

SPEAKER_03 0:36

Oh God, I was hoping you would go first. All right, well, I can go first if you want. I mean, I can also go first. Okay. Well, I think the first thing is that pelvic floor PT even exists. So a lot of times patients think that they're having multiple unrelated problems. They're having constipation, they're having pain with sex, they're having urgency and frequency and maybe even leaking. And they're going to a urologist, a gynecologist, a colorectal surgeon, a gastroenterologist. And so they have all these different separate specialists who are giving them lots of different information. And then they come to pelvic floor physical therapy and realize it's all housed under one roof, you know, or under above one floor.

SPEAKER_02 1:15

You're almost like the provider of the exclusionary diagnosis. It's like once you've ruled out everything else, then Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:24

And the really interesting thing is we were just doing some work on our website, which I know sounds unrelated, but every single pelvic floor PT website that we went to and looked at talked about holistic care. The word holistic shows up a lot: holistic, holistic, holistic. But I'm not actually sure that that word resonates with the lay person or the public who's not in the pelvic floor world. Yeah. But what we're really trying to say is that we have to consider the body as a whole unit. And our healthcare system is so siloed that we only look at the bladder, then we only look at the pain with intimacy, and we only look at the colon and whether or not the person is having, you know, specific GI issues. And if we actually could look at the larger picture where their diaphragm, they're not breathing, they're gripping their abs, their pelvic floor is so tight. And all of those structures are contributing to all three of those problems. So maybe even more so than excluding other things, it's including it's all connected. It's all connected. And really looking at the whole canister and the body as a whole is how we fix the problem. But it's hard to put that into one word. And we as public 4PTs try and do it with the word holistic. And it's like, what does that even mean? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 2:44

You know, I mean, everybody uses the word holistic. Therapists love to talk about holistic too, and it means something totally different. But really, what it like, I think a lot of times when people think holistic, they think, you know, it's kind of crunchy. You're thinking about like your mind, body, spirit.

SPEAKER_03 3:00

And it feels so woo-woo.

SPEAKER_02 3:01

It feels woo-woo, but in pelvic floor physical therapy, it genuinely is really all connected. And it's so effective.

SPEAKER_03 3:10

So I recently had someone that came after suffering tremendously postpartum, and they were dealing with bloating and distension and not able to eat and really limiting the amount that they were able to take in. And you know, postpartum, you need a lot of nourishment. And there was so much it felt going on. It could feel really overwhelming, perhaps, even to maybe a more novice therapist. Because it's it's hard to focus when there's all these different directions that you could go in. And we started with some really simple strategies mindful eating, not hunching over when you're eating, kind of aligning the esophagus with the stomach, doing some humming, getting the body to come out of that fight or flight that so many of us are in in the sleepless early postpartum days where you're just trying to figure out what's down and what's up. And suddenly the bloating, the distension, the gas, the constipation, all of the issues just started to dissipate. You know, because she finally felt safe.

SPEAKER_02 4:12

Yeah. In her body. It makes me think of the story that you told a little while ago about your patient who was thinking about early retirement because yeah, he's like having to go to the porta potty and the junk and donuts. Exactly. And you had him get up an hour earlier.

SPEAKER_03 4:27

And he just changed his strategies for routine, especially because the bowels are so routine. He gave himself time in the morning to get that gastrocolic reflex to kick in. He drank a warm beverage, he ate breakfast, he did some light exercise, and then he had time to go into the bathroom to sit and relax when he felt the urge to listen to it. He wasn't rushing out the door trying to not know where he was gonna possibly be able to have a bowel movement.

SPEAKER_04 4:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 4:55

And I was a young therapist at that time, and I'm like, is this strategy even gonna work? And is this person gonna take me seriously? Yeah, sure. Because here he is, a Boston police officer. Yeah, you know, coming in, it's hard enough to talk to a 20-something about you know his background.

SPEAKER_02 5:12

I mean, talk about the courage. Courage. Yeah, he was desperate, he was desperate. He was desperate.

SPEAKER_03 5:16

He was ready to retire. Yes. And so, I mean, it was really ruining his life. So, anyway, that's a great example because you sometimes underestimate how the simpler strategies can really make a global impact. Yeah. But it makes a lot of sense.

SPEAKER_02 5:32

It does make a lot of sense. I mean, it sort of sounds to me that it's like if you're having an issue, maybe a PT can help. Oh gosh, just come in.

SPEAKER_03 5:42

Just come in. Whatever you'll shoot. We'll we'll we'll sort something out. Especially now, it's 16 years in. I feel like because so many of my patients end up parlaying into something else, we start with a very specific pelvic health issue, and then suddenly we're like, hey, why don't we make your weightlifting better? You know, we have a client right now who's going into weightlifting competitions when they came for stress incontinence. It's it's awesome. Yeah. Because we just sort of the relationship builds, the trust builds, and we are physical therapists at the root, at the core, and that's what we went to school for. Yeah. So it kind of does we we look at the broader life and say, you know, how grand could this be? It's really cool when it is really bigger. Yep. Where they start so small. And sometimes I wish, I wish I could figure out some sort of slogan on back to the website because that's what we've been focusing on. But it's hard to put into words when you've made your life so small. Yes. I don't have to jump on the trampoline with my kids anymore. Ah, I don't really need to jump anymore. Yeah, when they do jumping jacks in my workout class, I just stepped from side to side. I don't need to run. You know, I'm in my 30s, I don't need to run. But why? Yeah. It doesn't have to be small. Your life can be big. I love that.

SPEAKER_02 6:53

You know? So it's like don't accept less when you can have more. Totally.

SPEAKER_03 6:59

Yeah. And honestly, it's not about bigger and better and and and that kind of thing. It's more about loving yourself and and and really feeling at home in your body and feeling good in your body.

SPEAKER_02 7:11

Yeah, yeah. It's like that, it's like almost like, I mean, I'm gonna say optimizing, but I think we think of like that bigger, that better, that, you know, next thing. Totally. But really, it's like, what is it that you could dream of if you had permission to be able to live fully the way that you want to?

SPEAKER_03 7:30

Yeah, and I think the bowel, the bladder, and sexual function really can impact every aspect of your psyche. It impacts your self-esteem, it impacts your self-worth, it impacts how you view your body. And it also can, similar to what we were hearing from Alyssa with the endometriosis episode, sometimes you don't even want to be in your body anymore, you know? And so uh being able to come back home into your body and feeling good in your body again and and and enjoying being here is such a gift. And that to me is the ultimate success with my patients.

SPEAKER_02 8:04

Yeah. Yeah, when they're like their vessel is their home.

SPEAKER_03 8:08

Totally. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 8:10

And we just get the one.

SPEAKER_03 8:11

Yeah, that's right. And also, I think we have so much self-hatred through all the social media, cultural input. And so we're trying to make ourselves smaller and we're restricting and we're doing all kinds of cosmetic stuff. And it's sort of like that's not my focus at all. And so I really am very particular about the branding and things that we do in our pelvic floor clinic because I'm not talking about a mommy pooch or a mom butt or whatever those horrible terms are that are so misguided. But you're right, I do want to help someone's core strength. I do want to help their glutes fire appropriately. I do want to get that canister, you know, functioning. It's just that I want to kind of come from it in a in a loving way, you know, and not a sort of self-hating way.

SPEAKER_02 8:58

Yeah. That's I mean, I I would say that for me, being physically active and working out is the single biggest biggest thing that I do for my mental health. Yes, totally. And, you know, it does make me feel strong.

SPEAKER_03 9:11

To and to lose that is devastating.

SPEAKER_02 9:13

It is devastating, but I don't do it because it makes my body look a certain way. I do it because it makes me feel a certain way. And so I think that that being able to tune into, well, how does it feel in your body?

SPEAKER_01 9:26

That's right.

SPEAKER_02 9:27

How could it could it feel better?

SPEAKER_03 9:29

Could you feel better? And also could you trust your body again? Yeah. You know, because we do feel betrayed suddenly. Oh, it's true, especially with bladder and bowel issues, like yeah, and postpartum. And postpartum, yeah. Because your body has stretched and changed, so it's so incredibly malleable, which that in and of itself is miraculous. And it's just completely different from what we're used to. And then we have a lot of external input saying, Oh, gotta change that, nip, tuck, bounce back, you know, we've done an episode on that. And so, as a physical therapist in the pelvic health world, really my goal is for people to expand their view of what's possible in their body and truly think about how they want to feel in their body and what they want their life to look like. And not to sound grandiose, but I do think these basic functions of being able to be intimate, not worrying about peeing on yourself when you're out and about and trying to exercise. And also when you're constipated, you just feel like absolute crap, no intended. So you really don't want that to be distracting you. Yeah. So I know the episode is what would have saved my patient months of stress. One of it is knowing that pelvic floor physical therapy exists and finding the right provider who really can look at you in that way and and listen to you and really understand what your goals are, but maybe they even help you grow your goals a little bit. Yeah. They're like a partner. Yeah, a partner. That's what it should feel like. Yeah. And we're an accountability buddy for sure. I say that jokingly all the time, but we're also there to sort of reflect back, which is totally you as well, right? What what we're hearing and what could be. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:11

God, I wish it's like I'm hearing this through the eyes of my younger self, right? My kids are 10 and 11 now. And there was a time that I went, I had them really close together. I had the diastasis rect, you know, and I was really so I went to a pelvic floor physical therapist. And she did she did do an internal, which I was also not prepared for. Okay. I mean, there no, there was no like Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:36

And this was at a big medical, I'm not gonna say where, but it was a big medical provider in Boston.

SPEAKER_01 11:42

Uh-huh. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 11:44

And so she was like, Yeah, there's nothing we can do about this.

unknown 11:51

Ooh.

SPEAKER_02 11:51

Yeah. I was, I think I was like a year or two postpartum. Maybe it was more. Maybe it was like three years postpartum. And I had been physically active. I wasn't having any like really overwhelming symptoms, but I was really struggling to connect my abs back. Like I just I would go to Pilates classes or I'd go, and I couldn't even feel my abs. You know, and so I I and she was like, Yeah, it's been too long. There's nothing we can do about this. I know, Alex. I know. It's like, and so I was like, oh, okay, I guess this is just how it is. Wow. And you know, it has gotten better over time, and I don't struggle as much with it. I did some reading myself, and I was like, you know, I think I worked with some Pilates instructors who were really good, and they were like, oh yeah, we gotta get the transverse. That's right. And so they were like, don't do any of the crunches, don't do any of that. You gotta get the deep core. And so, you know, I found it in other places, but I I wish it was like this quick thing. She's like, All right, do some, you know, squeeze my finger, you know? Okay, yeah, I don't think there's anything we can do about this.

SPEAKER_03 12:52

We have our we have a whole episode upcoming about this, which is Kathy. Yeah, Kathy, I know. I'm excited to talk to her about it. Who had tailbone pain and went to a provider who never even did a rectal exam, which is where your tailbone is located. And so I was able to say, no, you need to go to someone else who actually is. But I also feel like this is a reflection of our healthcare system. We want to fix what's broken. We're not trying to, number one, prevent it from breaking in the first place. You know, like would would you have benefited from some work ahead of time before you had your kids? Definitely. And then also, if it's not super broken, yeah, we weren't we're not gonna get re-immersed.

SPEAKER_04 13:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 13:33

They're not gonna pay. Fair. I think that that could have been part of it. I mean, she was perfectly lovely, but I mean, as I have gotten into this podcast, I'm like, I had a um, no, I can't even think what's it called when they cut.

SPEAKER_03 13:45

Oh, epesiotomy. Apesiotomy.

SPEAKER_02 13:47

I had an apesiotomy because my first son, I pushed for like five and a half hours and they ended up having to do a vacuum extraction. And like, my kids were big. They were like nine-pound monsters. They're just like staying in and growing out of their newborn clothes for weeks until they finally literally dragged them out, you know? And but I was like healthy and I kind of, you know, got back in and stuff. And and she didn't even ask about that. I didn't I didn't know to bring it up either because it wasn't something that that was causing like a lot of issues, but I just think like, what could have been?

SPEAKER_03 14:24

Totally. And also I feel that was a huge reason why I sort of exited the traditional healthcare model, but was because I wanted to spend a full hour with patients, I wanted to hear their birth story, I wanted to understand holistically what was going on in their body and what their long-term goals were. And so having the luxury of being able to look a little deeper into your core and figure out how are your obliques, your rectus, your diaphragm, your transverse abdominis, how is your pelvic floor and your core coordinating, and then maybe look at your movement patterns and go to your scar and see, you know, how is your scar healing? Scar tissue only has 80% of the flexibility and doesn't self-moisturize. So undoubtedly, just like when you have knee surgery, you needed scar massage. Oh yeah. And I use the word need, you would benefit from it.

SPEAKER_02 15:09

Yes, that's right. You know, and what a what a what a gift to give yourself to be able to go and do something that maybe you don't need, need, need, but that you would benefit from. And even flourish. Yeah, and even just having the the somebody who knows more than you do. I mean, I I don't think before this podcast and before, you know, my training as a therapist and everything, I I I didn't connect.

SPEAKER_03 15:35

Probably a whole lot of things that were connected. Yeah. And I also feel like that one of the things that inspires me so much about doing the podcast with you is I learned so much from you and from our guests. And I just want the rest of the world, anybody listening, I want them to know what resources are available. And with social media, which is a blessing and a curse, I do feel like there's less gatekeeping. And so you suddenly realize, oh wow, that that exists, or that style of therapy exists, or perhaps my type of therapy exists. But then the second step is how brave is it? And I've said this before, but I'll say it again. How brave is it when someone is willing to go and get a second opinion and try again because you weren't prepared for that internal exam. You didn't even know what was gonna happen. To say, okay, that didn't feel like the level of expertise that I was hoping for, and I'm gonna try and seek it out elsewhere, it's tremendously brave to me because it's so personal and intimate and private, and you're you're trusting the person that you're going to. And so that's where I feel like pelvic floor PTs, we really need to hold ourselves to the absolute highest standard. And we have a huge budget for continuing education at Boston Pelvic PT. And the reason for that is because the world is constantly putting out incredible knowledge and research changes and resources change. And so I want our therapists to have that level of knowledge and care. And some of it's not even physical therapy, it's more the trauma-informed.

SPEAKER_02 17:06

Yeah, oh, of course. So important. You know, I recently did a consultation with a couple, and that's one of the questions that they asked me is what I did, and I thought it was the best question. What did they say? They asked me, I can't remember what their wording was exactly, but they were like, you know, we think that like always learning is really important. What do you do for continuing education? I know. I was like, oh, that is the right question.

SPEAKER_03 17:29

It's the right question to ask. It's the right question to ask because I'm always doing something. And also, are you willing to learn and change and update your opinion? And so it's not the dogma. And I took the original public floor courses six 15 so many years ago when we really were doing Kegels on your back.

SPEAKER_02 17:47

If I had stayed doing biophysics, and some people are, yeah, some people are. You know, they're technically qualified, but they're not doing that constant relearning and have updating to evolve.

SPEAKER_03 18:01

Yeah, you have to be humble enough to know that you don't.

SPEAKER_01 18:04

Oh, it does take some humility. It's humility, too. It really is. I know. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 18:07

Okay, so now let's switch the gears to you and your practice. What do you think would save your? I think I have a a clue because you've said in the past, if people didn't wait until things were catastrophically bad.

SPEAKER_02 18:19

Yeah, I do think that that would help a lot. Yes, I do. And that it that's where I was gonna start because you know, uh, more and more I am seeing younger couples. So couples who are dating, couples who are engaged. Before I I think the older model is you really need to be married to be like something's really wrong with your relationship. If you have to go to couples therapy before you're married and you, you know, things are bad.

SPEAKER_03 18:46

Yeah, I I think that's so great.

SPEAKER_02 18:48

It is great. I know. I love it. And I I really like working with those. I know. I know. I do think that there's a model where sometimes people will go for premarital counseling, but that tends to be a limited number of sessions and it's focused, you know, a lot of times they're focused on you talk about finances one time, you talk about so it's very specific.

SPEAKER_03 19:07

Okay. But I did, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 19:09

Yeah, which and and if you're not in a religious model, if you're not getting married in a church, you you may not seek that out, but I do think that that's within you know faith that was the Catholic Church. That's what we did.

SPEAKER_03 19:20

We had a couple who was not trained like you should kind of to walk us through the book, which was helpful. Super helpful, yeah. Other than the fact that I felt like I couldn't relate to any of the issues because we weren't having them yet. Yeah, you know, and now I do sometimes reflect back in the book. Yeah. Because I'm like, oh yeah, yeah, let's you know let's refer back. They had four kids and they both were PTs and and they were working and raising their children. And so I remember now when they were talking about they had cancer that and wow I just thought, oh, we'll never deal with that. Okay, so we're young, Alex. Yeah, exactly. Oh, yeah, totally. Same thing with parenthood. I'm like, yeah, I'm gonna kill it. Fine.

SPEAKER_02 20:05

Yeah. Yeah. So I do think that people coming in sooner is is really helpful. You know, you don't have to be in on the brink of divorce.

SPEAKER_01 20:14

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 20:15

I mean, I think of myself even dating and dating my husband. I think I look back to those days and like early parenthood, and now that we have done our own couples therapy, and we, you know, we are we're not, we have such similar values, but we're not similar people at all. Yeah. Which is one of the things that attracted us to each other. I think that that happens so often. Yeah. Yes. And yes. And so that's wonderful and very challenging to live with day in and day out. And the communication can get really mixed. Yeah. Mixed up. Yes. Oh, absolutely. And confusing. Yeah. We think we know, we think we know what our partner's behavior means. We think we know what they feel. And we don't. We don't. We don't. We do not know. We cannot assume, even people who you've been married to for, I don't know, 20 years, 50 years, how many couples do we know that are like bickering, you know, and they, oh, you always do this or you always do that, you know. So I I think coming in earlier, one of the benefits of that as well is that I find that when people come in when things aren't too bad, they are able to get right to the point. Cool. We can actually get to the point.

SPEAKER_03 21:26

Instead of peeling back the layers of resentment and anger and hurt.

SPEAKER_02 21:30

Exactly.

SPEAKER_03 21:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 21:32

And so when when you have this misattunment on misattunement, on misattunement, on misunderstanding and misunderstanding, and hurt and hurt and hurt, then we're we have to change the climate. The Gottmans talk about the weather versus the climate. And so the climate is the overall, you know, what what your climate is like year after year in your relationship. I see. The weather is what it's like day to day.

SPEAKER_03 21:55

I see. Okay, no, I wasn't familiar with that.

SPEAKER_02 21:58

Yeah, I I love, you know, I the visual is really helpful. It's really helpful. I think the Gottmans, you know, I I don't necessarily always use their method for couples therapy, but I find that they do a really good job of translating some of those things like into really easy to understand. And so in order to change the climate, you have to change the weather. So when someone comes in to me and they have sort of a cold or a terse climate in their relationship, over time, the weather is consistently misunderstandings or misattunements, or or they just don't have time to connect with each other. Yeah. Then that changes the climate over time and they start to say, oh, you never or you always, those sorts of things. And in order to change that, we actually have to stop that drip, drip, drip of things that are causing resentment. So when people come to me, we focus on the here and now. Like people are often surprised by that. And not all therapists do that, but the method that I use, I hear, I had a supervisor once who said, what I hear when couples talk to me is blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, feeling. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, feeling. Content, content, content, content, feeling. And so that's what I hear.

SPEAKER_04 23:08

Wow.

SPEAKER_02 23:09

Is you know, the content, the what you fight about doesn't really matter that much. You know, we can- I've heard you say that before. Yeah, it doesn't. You know, we can fight about a tone of voice or like, you know, whether or not to have another child. Like big, small doesn't matter. We know we can dive right into the deep end. Yeah. Like regardless of what the content is. And so getting that, paying attention, it it actually matters how you talk to your partner. Wow.

SPEAKER_04 23:38

It really does.

SPEAKER_02 23:40

Like we cannot count on the strength of our relationship to carry us through those snarky little interactions because it actually does matter. Yeah. And one of the things I think that couples often think, it's it's like, okay, this is my safe person. I should be able to be myself with this person. But I'm telling you, in this most important relationship, the gloves, they should never come off.

SPEAKER_03 24:03

Wow. And so what do you think for people listening who the gloves have already come off? I mean, how do you just break that habit asking for a friend? Like what happens if the gloves are off? Yeah, you gotta put them back on. Oh my god, how? Go to the couples therapy.

SPEAKER_02 24:20

Yeah, but be careful. Be careful with each other. Because here's the thing that we don't remember. We sometimes we feel it in our own bodies, but we don't remember it for our partners. Yeah. We really matter to each other. Totally. We really matter. And so when we really matter, we can really hurt each other.

SPEAKER_03 24:36

I know. That's right. Exactly. You know, it's like you are so special and important to me. That was one of the most significant things in your book, Parents in Love, was recognizing that the person that's retreating is not retreating because they don't care. They're retreating because they don't, they they care so so deeply that they're flooded and overwhelmed and can't respond. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 24:57

And they feel like they're never gonna be able to get anything right. Totally. And so if they engage, it's just it's gonna make it worse. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 25:03

Right. They can't say anything right.

SPEAKER_02 25:04

They can't say anything right, they can't do anything right. And of course, retreating isn't right. No, so it's not like they get positive feedback for doing the thing they do, but they don't know what else to do.

SPEAKER_03 25:12

Totally.

SPEAKER_02 25:13

Yeah. So I mean, no judgment there. I mean, obviously, and I've been married for over 10 years, like the gloves have come off.

SPEAKER_04 25:20

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 25:21

Right? Like we all take the gloves off. And because we get flooded, because we get overwhelmed, because our nervous systems are offline. Exhausted. We're exhausted and we're hurt. Yeah, and so then we when we're hurt, we lash out, you know, we we retreat or we fight.

SPEAKER_03 25:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 25:35

We we don't, we're not always our best selves, but you gotta put the gloves back on. And and what I mean by that very specifically is smile at each other. Like say something nice. If you think your partner looks handsome or beautiful, tell them. Yeah, send them flowers. Say thank you. Say thank you. Like uh give them a hug that really is a hug.

SPEAKER_03 25:56

Do you know, like something that's so tricky is I think I do a lot of that, but it's almost like it doesn't negate the nastiness. You know what I mean? So it's like hearing them saying thanks for make packing the kids' lunches, thanks for your help, thanks for you, you look nice, but it's almost like the hurt's already there. So then it's it's almost like it needs to go a little deeper.

SPEAKER_02 26:16

Well, so here's the thing. We were just talking about this before the episode because you walked in and I was like, Oh my god, I had a serious inner child moment this week. You know, it's like, oh wow. So yeah, I I I this is a tough thing to hear. Just sit let's lay it bite on me. We have to take responsibility. We have to take responsibility. We have to take responsibility because you know what, I'll tell you, Alex, sometimes I'm walking around the house and I am righteously pissed. I'm like, all of you all, I'm doing this and I'm doing that, and look at you just doing nothing. Totally. And I and I feel I feel righteous. Yeah. I feel like I feel like anybody would feel this way. Anybody wouldn't. I know. And so, but you know, I have to take responsibility for taking care of myself. And I literally mean like, what does that mean? I don't know. I mean, just this week, it's like it means acknowledging the part of me that feels overwhelmed and like I have to take responsibility not only for myself, but for everybody. That's my personal interior struggle that I'm very much in process with. I don't, I don't really know how to do that. I'm trying a bunch of things. Yeah. But it it does matter. It matters how we talk to each other, it matters how we talk to our kids, and we don't always do it right. So then repair matters.

SPEAKER_03 27:35

Yeah, I'm good with the rep, I do a really good job, and so does Paul.

SPEAKER_02 27:39

Which is so good. The repair mat I mean, the repair does go a long way to negate those moments when we're not our best. You know, it's like the kid's not sleeping, you're up in the middle of the night, your partner's, you know, doing something that you don't want them to do, and you're like snippy with each other. It's saying sorry, coming back together.

SPEAKER_03 28:02

I mean, that does. Yeah, as the oldest boss, I have a hard time with that, but I I do try and do it. Yeah. Yeah. It's interesting. Something's coming up for me, and I would love for you to speak on it. And our friend Sarah Harmon recently did a post about it where sometimes I don't know if you saw it or not, but basically she was talking about like that being regulated, being regulated, being regulated, but it's almost feeling a little handmaiden's tale of suppression, you know? And so how to be enraged and be furious and and have all these feelings. Sometimes that's how I feel is that here I am trying to be like placid and not freak out. But then I just feel like I'm suppressing myself, you know.

SPEAKER_02 28:47

I love how you say that because that's how I say it to myself too.

SPEAKER_03 28:50

It's like, I'm trying to be placid and not freak out. But it's like inside you freak out. And I'm I am furious. I'm angry. That's right. Like the world is burning outside, you know. So then it's like, okay, I don't want to be tamping it down. I want to be processing it, or what's going on there, if you have anything to say about that.

SPEAKER_02 29:11

Well, first of all, I will tell you that I completely relate to what you're saying. And I personally have a lot of judgments with myself. If I do, you know, it's like, I'm placid, I'm placid, I'm placid, I'm enraged. You know, it's like surprises me sometimes.

SPEAKER_03 29:28

And also it's like this is the real, this is how I'm really feeling. I'm it's like I'm trying to acknowledge that this is the truth for me right now. Yes. But at the same time, I'm really hearing you because I can't be taking that out on the people around me. Yes. You know? So, okay.

SPEAKER_02 29:45

I I'm gonna speak from my own experience. I could speak from my clinical knowledge, but I don't think that's as powerful. Okay. So I'm gonna speak from my own experience, and this is what I'm trying this week. Got it. So understand. Next week it could be something different. It's an evolving. So I'm trying this this week. Okay. What I'm trying this week is acknowledging it every time. When I start to feel stress in my body, when I start to feel anger in my body, when I start to feel overwhelm in my body, a lot of times for me it's overwhelm. So I feel overwhelmed, I feel out of control, I f and then I start to get angry.

SPEAKER_03 30:25

Yeah, that's exactly how I feel or reading my diary.

SPEAKER_02 30:29

So what I have been doing is I literally take sometimes I go into the bathroom if I can, you know, I go into the bathroom, I put the lid down, I sit on the toilet, and I take a couple deep breaths and I acknowledge I see you. Yep. But if I let the part of me that is polarized, both enraged and telling and and doesn't feel like it can be enraged, if I let that part of me lead, it's gonna make a mess of things. Yeah, it does. So I have to acknowledge the feeling and then put it aside.

SPEAKER_03 31:03

Yeah. Right, because then I take it out on my kids or whomever is my own. Yeah, that's right. I do the same thing. You know, and it's just so unfair for them.

SPEAKER_02 31:10

It's so unfair. They're not doing it. They don't deserve it.

SPEAKER_03 31:12

They don't deserve it.

SPEAKER_02 31:12

They're not deserve it.

SPEAKER_03 31:13

Three and six.

SPEAKER_02 31:14

Yes, exactly.

SPEAKER_03 31:15

Totally healthy, normal kids.

SPEAKER_02 31:16

Right. So I don't, I can't always, you know, sometimes I have to be physically present in the situation. You can't always take a time. But they follow me into the bathroom, definitely.

SPEAKER_03 31:25

They follow me into the shower, they follow me onto the toilet, all of that.

SPEAKER_02 31:28

Yeah, which, you know, it's okay to say, I am really I need a minute. I'm really dysregulated. Because here's the thing the people in our life, they are also dysregulated. And a lot of times the thing that makes me dysregulated is them getting dysregulated. And so it is genuinely okay. You do not have to pretend. You don't have to pretend with yourself and you don't have to pretend with the people around you. I really need a minute.

SPEAKER_03 31:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 31:51

I'm feeling really overwhelmed right now. Totally.

SPEAKER_03 31:54

Yeah. I actually notice because you know, my my six-year-old is getting a little older. And I actually think it's helpful for her to hear. Yes. Because when I'm saying I'm really frustrated right now, it gives her permission to do the same thing.

SPEAKER_02 32:08

Yes, exactly. To name the feeling. Yeah. Sometimes I've done this thing where I'm like, I'm really frustrated with you right now, and that's not so helpful, you know. Yeah, yeah. But you know, I mean, honestly, even modeling what you might tell your kids to do. Yeah. Like go and scream into a pillow. Yeah, totally. You know, because sometimes we're screaming at our kids. Yeah. It would be better. You know, we we feel like, oh, I I couldn't do that. I couldn't go scream in a pillow in front of my kids. That'd be too scary.

SPEAKER_04 32:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 32:36

But that anger is gonna come out. That that overwhelm is gonna come out. And so I would say I think it's important to acknowledge it. And I think it's important to acknowledge it, help each other out. Yeah. Like, oh how you doing?

SPEAKER_03 32:52

Do you need a break? Yeah. Yeah, whereas perhaps when you're both in the trenches, it feels like you can't take a break right now. You know? When we're both up with a sick kid or whatever, it's it's like I've been up for four hours now. It's your turn. Yes. Good night. Yes, that's right.

SPEAKER_02 33:12

Good night, sir.

SPEAKER_03 33:15

But you're so right though, because we're both really tired. We're both trying our best. That's right. We're both up. We're we are both doing it. That's right. And isn't there I remember reading that that the people in the relationship sort of underestimate how much the other person is doing. We we overestimate how much we're doing and underestimate. But perhaps because I am in a heterosexual relationship where there are a lot of societal norms, and I believe that the stats are that that the male partner is doing 30% on average, and that hasn't changed, that statistic hasn't changed that much in the past several years. That is challenging because then I think I almost bring that knowledge into my situation, yeah, which might not actually be super accurate in my personal situation.

SPEAKER_02 34:00

Yeah. I love the fair play deck. I mean, I don't use it a ton. I sort of assign it. It's not my method, but there's you know, there's a a deck of cards that you can actually go through with your partner. You know we did it. Yeah. Oh, you did it. Oh, I love that. It's helpful. Oh, I genuinely think it's very helpful.

SPEAKER_03 34:19

Yeah, yeah. One thing that I'm gonna comment about that is that the the things in the deck that I think typically in a heterosexual couple, mowing the lawn, doing the dishes, Paul makes all the food and cleans up after the doing the grocery shopping, none of those require mental load. They're in-the-moment tasks that don't exhaust the mind. That's right. Whereas I'm the one scheduling the reading tutor. Think about how many steps go into scheduling it, making sure that we are coordinating, coordinating different people, planning ahead, making sure we have the supplies versus these concrete tasks, like in the deck, a lot of them were concrete. Giving the kids a bath while super helpful doesn't require a lot of coordination or form.

SPEAKER_02 35:05

That's right. You could say to somebody, I would like for you to give the kids a bath. Yeah. You it's harder to say, I'd like for you to find them.

SPEAKER_03 35:12

You know, you have to sign up for gymnastics camp this summer. Yeah. And you have to basically give your leg and arm in the forms that you fill out. You know, you need the original birth certificate and a current photo of your child and and their physical, you know, from the doctor's office that you have to get. So it's like now I need to find the birth certificate, find this. So then it's like, okay, sure, you do a ton of the household tasks.

SPEAKER_02 35:36

But yeah, so I think that this is where, because people legitimately have reason to be frustrated and angry. And so when we're talking about just air in my dirty laundry now. No, no, no. I mean, genuinely though, I think it's very relatable that it's like, okay, so great, Rebecca, you say that it matters. You don't ever take the gloves off. But what about when things feel so unfair? When you genuinely feel really angry, when you feel like your partner has their gloves off. Like, how is that fair? And so that's why I think that getting into therapy sooner, individual therapy, couples therapy, I mean, you know, there's definitely, like we've talked about this before, there's an access issue for sure. It's really hard to find a provider who takes insurance. Getting reimbursed for a provider who doesn't take insurance, who's out of network is really challenging. And so, you know, there definitely is an access issue. I think that there's a lot of really good free resources as well. You know, they might not be a substitute for therapy, but there are the book was so good.

SPEAKER_03 36:37

So your book I thought was especially for postpartum people, Parents and Love. Oh my gosh, I learned so much from it. And I'm not even newly postpartum.

SPEAKER_02 36:46

So, right, so I wrote a book that's a definitely a resource. I think that there's some other really great books. You know, the Gottmans have some really good books that I think are really like very concrete steps that you can take to reconnect. Julie Minano's book, Secure Love, is really great. It's an attachment focus. It's really excellent. So there are a lot of really great free, even the fair play deck, you know, there's a lot of things that can prompt this communication. It doesn't have to be in therapy if there's access issues, but if you've tried a lot of those things, or if you're the person who's reading the books and your partner won't read the books, you know, having a third party who can Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 37:28

I mean, my you know my partner would never would never. I can only imagine other people listening. I mean, go to couples therapy by myself, but my partner would never go. That's called individual therapy. Yeah. Yeah. I'm already in that. So but this is super helpful. And I think it for people who do have a progressive relationship who would be willing. It sounds like it's a no-brainer. Yeah. It can only make it better. Similar to the PT. Yes. Is that even if nothing's overtly wrong, making it even more loving and kind and warm and and mutually?

SPEAKER_02 38:06

Yes, we don't have to settle for relationships that are stable. Totally. So I think that a lot of people are in stable relationships.

SPEAKER_04 38:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 38:13

Are they the relationship that you dreamed of when you were a little kid? Are do you feel really supported by your partner? I mean, we can't always be supported by our partners all the time, you know, perfectly because we're different people. But if you feel like your relationship is stable, but that you'd like more out of it, I see people understand each other and connect and and have more of what they want out of their relationship, more closeness, more love, more humor, more fun in their relationship. Exactly. Because so many times I think relationships are just surviving. So and and and even then people are reluctant to come in because they're like, I mean, this is just what people do. They just survive.

SPEAKER_03 38:58

I mean, and I think the flip end of the coin here is that if you grew up on, you know, Disney princesses or whatever, I do feel like then we we actually what you're really offering is depth. So we're not trying to have a Stepford wives perfect. It's not about that. It's not about having this sort of facade, it's about getting underneath that and really meeting kind of when you were talking about the inner child, it made me think of that, like meeting that true self with your partner.

SPEAKER_02 39:30

That's intimacy. Intimacy. It's intimacy, it's connection. Because the thing is, is that we do have to show up in the world and we do have to perform.

SPEAKER_04 39:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 39:39

We do have to go to work and we have to act like adults. We do have to parent our children even when we don't want to. Yeah. We do have to be up with them all night long sometimes when we really need sleep. So we do have to go out there. We have to put on our armor, we have to perform. But when that's what the relationship feels like on the inside, that's lonely. It's lonely. And you know what? It is so incredibly common and also not abnormal. Yeah. So, you know, this is sometimes what relationships are. We have to bear the loneliness of being lonely in the presence of someone else. That's hard, but it doesn't have to be all the time. Yeah. So when you can look at your partner and they see your struggle, it doesn't mean that they're gonna save you from your struggle. Totally. It doesn't mean that you get to act like a jerk. Yes, it doesn't mean that, but it does mean that if they can look at you and see what it takes for you not to act like a jerk in that moment, yeah. That's really helpful. Yeah, acknowledging it. It really is. Yes, yes.

SPEAKER_03 40:40

Yeah, that's really cool. Wow. I think that's maybe reading endorsement for couples therapy.

SPEAKER_02 40:46

Definitely. I mean, and not only am I a couples therapist, I have gone to couples therapy. You know, Lee and I spent a couple of years in couples therapy. We recently graduated, so I feel like I should get a medal or something, you know. Seriously, but it it I really, both on a professional level and on a personal level, it it really the change is amazing.

SPEAKER_03 41:09

That's fantastic. Well, when I can convince my partner to go, I'll announce it on the podcast. I'm sure he'll love that. Wow, thank you so much. What a fun episode.

SPEAKER_00 41:26

Thanks for listening to Under the Hood. We hope you enjoyed this episode. Please like, share, and subscribe.