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Finding Your Way Through Therapy
Join Steve Bisson, LMHC as he unravels the complexities of therapy and counseling. Engage in straightforward dialogues, enriched with insights from special guests sharing a like-minded perspective. Each episode presents valuable, easy-to-digest information designed to help you perceive therapy, and those who partake in it, in a grounding, relatable manner.
Finding Your Way Through Therapy
E. 179 Empowering Minds: Erica Curry on DBT, Self-Care for Therapists, and the Healing Power of Connection
Discover the transformative journey of Erica Curry, a former Division 1 athlete who has seamlessly transitioned into a licensed therapist and coach, bringing her unique perspective to the world of mental health. Erica opens up about her passion for Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) and how it has become a linchpin in her approach to helping athletes and first responders excel not just in their careers but in life. From mindfulness to effective communication, Erica reveals the profound impact these skills can have on overcoming challenges such as sports injuries, addiction, and relationship struggles.
We also shine a light on an often-overlooked topic—the mental well-being of therapists themselves. The conversation delves into the necessity of self-care for mental health professionals, emphasizing the importance of therapists seeking therapy to combat burnout. We explore the barriers aspiring therapists encounter, including financial and logistical hurdles, and discuss potential solutions to make the path to becoming a therapist more inclusive without lowering standards. This episode is a heartfelt call to action for the mental health community to support its own.
Finally, join us as we underline the indispensable role of empathy and connection in therapy. The discussion highlights how genuine human bonds can often transcend specific therapeutic techniques, creating a healing space that fosters emotional well-being. We touch on the societal influences that have shaped our emotional health, including the isolating effects of COVID and the pervasive impact of social media. By advocating for systemic changes in education and community-building practices, we aim to equip everyone with the tools needed to navigate life's emotional landscapes.
Her Website is https://coachericacurry.com/
Freed AI converts conversations into SOAP note.Use code Steve50 for $50 off the 1st month!
Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a commission at no extra cost to you.
Hi and welcome to Finding your Way Through Therapy. A proud member of the PsychCraft Network, the goal of this podcast is to demystify therapy, what can happen in therapy and the wide array of conversations you can have in and about therapy Through personal experiences. Guests will talk about therapy, their experiences with it and how psychology and therapy are present in many places in their lives, with lots of authenticity and a touch of humor. Here is your host, steve Bisson.
Speaker 2:Bonjour aussi, content de vous voir. Always happy to see you. Welcome to episode 179. If you haven't listened to episode 178 yet, please then go listen to it because we prepare you for the holidays. I know I'm about two, three weeks early before the holidays, but might as well get that coaching in from finding your way through therapy before you go there. So please go back and listen if you haven't listened to it yet. But episode 179 will be with Erica Curry.
Speaker 2:Erica is a former D1 athlete and now is a licensed therapist and coach. She helps athletes with their goals for athletics as well as career goals. She uses mindfulness, distress, tolerance, emotional regulation and communication. This is a lot of stuff from dialectical behavioral therapy or DBT, so I'm sure we're going to talk about that. She likes to develop the skills for her clients. She also talks about mental healing after an injury, finding yourself after sports, retirement, addiction, self-harm, as well as relationship issues. We're going to talk about all that.
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Speaker 2:Well, hi everyone and welcome to episode 179. I'm very excited to have Erica Curry on my podcast. I saw her. We met through I believe it was a Facebook page of some sort and you know there's a lot of curiosity. I like talking about sports. She was a D1 athlete and she is now coaching athletes and how to work on certain things, so I was very excited to see her. So, a little change of pace with you know we went from dogs to first responders to now talking about this, so I like to change the pace on my podcast. Erica, welcome to finding your way through therapy.
Speaker 3:Yeah, thanks so much, steve. We did connect on Facebook and your your stuff really did stand out to me of some family that are first responders and being an athlete my whole life, I see a lot of similarities between the discipline of first responders and being an athlete. It really sets you up for having a disciplined routine. And yeah, I'm a licensed therapist for the last seven years and then I also provide coaching for people who are outside the state of California because I'm licensed here and I've been doing specifically dialectical behavioral therapy and radically open dialectical behavioral therapy for about the last five years. And once I found dialectical behavioral therapy, I knew, like I found the therapy that I will be doing the rest of my life.
Speaker 3:I don't know why anyone does anything else, and yes, it's not gonna be for everyone. I just know it was for me and there's so many people that it could be for, so I'm very excited anytime I get to chat about it.
Speaker 2:We're gonna chat about it for sure, because I'm actually trained in dialectical behavioral therapy or DBT. We're going to chat about it for sure, because I'm actually trained in dialectical behavioral therapy or DBT. We're going to use that as an acronym from now on. I was trained by people from Marsha Linehan's team, so that's how long ago I did it and I really enjoy and I think it's very beneficial. But you know, we'll get into that a little more detail. You said you're a D1 athlete. What did you play?
Speaker 3:I was a springboard and platform diver. I went to school on the East coast. I was at a tiny private liberal arts school called Wagner college on Staten Island, okay, and I was there all four years and that's where the door really propped open for figuring out that I really wanted to go into mental health, um, and everything from. I remember in high school I had a teacher who said, like you seem really interested in psychology, to majoring in psychology and really liking all the therapy related courses that I took that and like I was always the friend that people would come to to talk about this, that or the other thing and I do love talking so it kind of made just made sense.
Speaker 2:Well it's. It's perfect for the podcast too, for having you talk a lot. So, yeah, I actually know where Wagner was, so it's not so small that I didn't know where that was, but I am on the East coast, so that could explain. Oh, yeah, yeah. And you know, when you said the platform diving and the springboard, I'm like I just watched that on the Olympics, I don't watch it otherwise and I'm like, oh my God, I'm having like heart palpitation for them. It's really, really, it's nerve wracking.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's so nerve wracking and especially this, the last two Olympics. I've had a former teammate who he's been in the Olympics both this last round and the round before and it's like extra heart palpitations Cause like I know him and I'm like all right, I know you got this, like you've been training for this since you were 10. I was there.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think that you said it yourself, where you you know first responders and people who are D1 athletes. They have a lot of similarities, not only to discipline, but also missing the holidays and being very isolated sometimes because of the work that you do.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it really sucks you into your own subculture and your own community. And when it comes to and yes, it's like same, same and different because it's the whole once you're not in your sport anymore, it's like how do you reintegrate? And then, similarly for first responders, like if they've been like deployed or they've been just in their job for a long, long time, trying to acclimate to being in a group outside of that can be really, really hard. And that's one of my like sweet spots as a therapist is helping people figure out those transitions in life is like okay, so what is important to me? How do I take what's important to me from my job or my sport and take those values without losing myself?
Speaker 2:And also just integrating a world that you may or may not know, because it's so different. People who are not D1 athletes don't understand the commitment. I just see it in my high school daughters who are now going through just varsity stuff, school daughters who are now going through just varsity stuff, and you know it's. They play soccer six, seven days a week and you gotta be available, you gotta move them around. So there's a whole lot and this is just high school varsity, division five stuff in Massachusetts.
Speaker 3:So yeah, it can get really. I remember before I was a diver, I was a gymnast and I thought that I like, I was like I want to go to the Olympics for this. This is what I want to do. And my parents started looking into, like, okay, how do I go to an alternative school so I can just train? I ended up suffering a career ending injury and had to pivot. Luckily, diving is like a really great pivot, but that was also really hard. So, yeah, like, yeah, I'm no stranger to knowing just how much sports can pick up and like change the whole trajectory of like what a normal life looks like growing up.
Speaker 2:And I also think about those sports that you just mentioned. It's a different stress than if you play for a basketball team, a football team, and I'm not putting it down, I'm just saying it's very different. It's apples to celery, as I call it, because being on that platform alone, having to dive, it's not like you have a redo, you don't have anyone to cover for you, it's just you.
Speaker 3:Yep, exactly, it's a lot of heat on and that's probably, I think that's the thing I miss the least from being a diver. It's like the whole place going silent and you can feel all the eyeballs on you. And I was just talking to an athlete the other day who, like got to try. I actually met Alona Mar, the rugby player, and I asked her. I was like what's the difference to you from being in your rugby games versus like dancing with the stars, where it's like you and your partner? And she said basically to the same effect she was like well, my partner's a professional dancer and I'm not, so obviously all eyes are on me and when I'm with my team and there's a mistake, I at least have that like village around me. I was like that's a really good point. And yeah, that's I know the feeling of film like all eyes are on you and you have no one to blame stuff on but yourself if it goes wrong. It can be so much pressure.
Speaker 2:You know I I once heard Michael Phelps talk about that pressure that he went through and how isolating it was and how difficult and he had to go to therapy for a long time, even led him to thoughts of suicide, substance abuse, the whole nine yards. He's very open about this. This is not something I'm breaking a wall here, you know. I think that we can go on and on about individual being a lot more difficult, in my opinion, than a team, not that team is easier by any chance and by any stretch, but it's just a different type of mentality.
Speaker 3:It is different yeah.
Speaker 2:So well, let's talk about just what I just talked about. Mr Phelps, I worked for a company where he was one of the spokespersons for therapy, so now I always ask the same thing to all my guests, and this is a standard question here have you ever been in therapy?
Speaker 3:I have been to therapy and I currently go to therapy every other week. Natasha is great, that's the name of my therapist. I really like normalizing, even just saying like the names, like the name of my therapist, just because it's like therapist, like we kind of just like live under a rock, it almost seems, because like it's not talked about. And obviously, yes, there there's things like confidentiality and, I think, things that clients don't realize is you're allowed to talk about your therapist all you want. Like that is totally fine. Your therapist is going to keep everything extremely close to the vest because confidentiality is very important, but when it comes to the client, like you, want to say like oh yeah, my, my therapist Erica like you're
Speaker 3:allowed to say whatever you want and yeah, I've been. I think therapy is just so important that, as I'm attending to so many other people's mental health, that it helps me be able to recenter and focus on mine as well, especially when it comes to like like warning, fending off burnout, because I'm someone who I really like to work, I really like to help as many people as I can, and sometimes to my own detriment, and I remember when I first started, I really had to figure out that balance and I would probably say not until I started my own private practice did I feel like I really had the option to create balance, just because I mean, hey, you got to pay bills and stuff, and when you're working for somebody else, it's very difficult. You have to see so so many people and I mean I live in Southern chore.
Speaker 3:Now it feels like something I get to do because I feel like I have the space and actually really want to attend to my own mental health and I'm benefiting from that. My clients benefit from that and I personally think every therapist should have their own therapy. And just for me to graduate from my graduate program for my master's, I had to get at least 40 hours of my own personal therapy. I had been in therapy before that, but I'm really glad most programs, if you're going to become a therapist, you have to go to your own therapy.
Speaker 2:You know it's so refreshing because you know when the psychoanalytic world was around much more predominant than any other treatment they used to have to do. I think. Three or four years of therapy three times a week in order to become a therapist, and while maybe in my opinion that's a little excessive in some way, I also see the value in that and I think it's very important to know what it is to sit in the chair of a therapist.
Speaker 3:Well, and I think you also bring up because that leads to another topic in my own brain of like having to go to therapy that much. There's also a a barrier to becoming a therapist that that's really hard to see until you're in it. It is not an accessible profession by any means. The things that are expected of therapists before they ever make a cent doing it is sometimes an entire 3000 hours Like. Personally, I am so grateful that I went through my traineeship and, yes, a huge chunk of my hours were unpaid, but that place did eventually end up hiring me before I was licensed.
Speaker 3:Not everyone is so lucky and can you imagine if you're having to pay to go to your own therapy to graduate and then you have to also pay to go to work because you have to drive there? Some people have to pay their supervisors, so it's not only are you're not getting paid, you have to pay for your supervisor's time. But yeah, if it used to like back in the day when it was like, oh, yeah, you have to go to hours and hours of therapy, it's like no wonder there's a therapist shortage. And yes, it does. There does need to be a lot of standards to become a therapist because it's a very vulnerable setting and I'm always like I wonder how we can make therapy, like becoming a therapist, more accessible with making sure that there are high standards to become a therapist. So that really comes to mind when you mentioned, like the frequency of therapy and all these like invisible barriers that you don't really know until you get into it, and I remember feeling shocked.
Speaker 2:Well, I remember also reading, and it's still true to this day. Having a mental health counseling or social work degree is like the second and fourth least paid master's level program in the country, like philosophy, and I can't remember the other one is, but philosophy is number one. It's kind of scary how much we have these things that we need to fulfill and for you know, I I'm okay with some of those, but then, besides that, oh, by the way, you're going to be paid less than most people. Good luck.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and that's why it's like anyone who is a therapist. They are in it because their heart has called them to do it.
Speaker 3:They are not no one's no one's becoming a therapist to be like, yep, can't wait to get that fat paycheck. It's like no, this person has taken years and has honed a skill and is still continuing. And we're typically people who love to learn. We love to keep learning and gaining new skills, and that's what's been so exciting to me about DBT and now RO DBT because I'm getting to, because they're broken up into specific skills.
Speaker 3:I feel like I get to be so detail oriented about how well I can apply these skills and help people learn when they need to use what set of skills. It's such a beautifully paved roadmap and that's the big part with DBT that I'm like and why isn't everyone just using this? How come this isn't like a court Like to me? I'm like this should just be in schools. This should just be a class Like you should have social emotional learning and it could just be you are learning these coping skills. You'll get distress tolerance, emotion regulation, mindfulness and communication Like that. To me, that just sounds obvious. So anytime I get to talk about it, I'm like let's get into it.
Speaker 2:You know I've always been a fan of DBT. The only thing I was never a fan because when you do the training you also have to do some of it. Doing those diary cards just drove me absolutely bonkers.
Speaker 3:Oh my, they are detailed. I had to do a diary card too when I went through my training and I was like, oh, my goodness, Okay, I'm trying to watch a little less TV and yeah, it is something that you'd have to. You have to pull out every single day and it's like I'm trying to think like the, the amount. I think it's like a sweet spot with how many targets you give yourself or someone else. It's like you can't have a list of. Oh, my gosh, stop. Is that your teacher's manual?
Speaker 2:Yeah, of oh my gosh, stop. Is that your teacher's manual? Yeah, do you want to share it with everyone? Good, this is one Bible that I love. There's so many things in here, and there's things that you hand out to people that I absolutely adore, that I don't have here. My handouts are another room here are the handouts.
Speaker 3:That's the handout book.
Speaker 2:You know, Marsha had something going when she created that and I give her a lot of credit.
Speaker 3:Well, and her beautiful story. Have you read her book called Building a Life Worth Living? I highly highly recommend it. It is just her amazing life story of how she pulled because do you know a? Little bit anything about her story.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I know a little bit anything about her story.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I know a little bit about her story I. It is just such a beautiful read and I think that it can really help anyone who's struggling figure out. Okay, what does it mean to build a life worth living? And it just paints this picture of how she struggled so, so hard and she promised, if she pulls herself out of hell, she will go back and pull everyone else out of hell. And like geez, does she stay true to her word? Like, look at everything she came up with? So I think, like anyone who's like looking for a good therapy read, that's the first book I always recommend.
Speaker 2:We were off line when we said this, but I think it's important for us to say it here too. Dbt is not just for personality disorder, particularly borderline personality disorder. It is used. I use it personally. I know me and Erica were talking about how she uses it and I use it in therapy, but you know I work with a lot of first responders. If I ever said that we're doing DBT, I think they would run away from the room as fast as they possibly could.
Speaker 3:Yeah, if they've heard about it, right, cause it's like you Google it and it's like, oh, I don't think I need that, and the thing that and the thing cause since I work with primarily athletes when I tell them like this is the orientation that I use and I'm able to like share my own experience, cause I'm personally not diagnosed with any personality disorder. I've generalized anxiety disorder and the one skill that I'm always able to really like nail home for all my athletes is the emotion regulation skill of coping ahead. And the manual comes straight out of sports psychology, like that's where she got that one from and it's all about just like how athletes visualize success. Guess what you can do that in your regular life. It doesn't only have to be in your sports setting. It can be with a, with a conversation going the way you want it to. It can be with a trip to the grocery store going the way that you want it to. It can be anything, and then it's just like the rest of the skills make sense because it's like, oh, okay, so I kind of just can take the ways that I've learned to cope and then generalize that to my life.
Speaker 3:It's like, yep, that's what we're going for and there's very specific sets of skills that I can teach you, because I remember my first boss, when I like really dove into DBT.
Speaker 3:She told me she was like you know, I really hate you because I remember my first boss, when I like really dove into dbt. She told me she was like you know, I really hate you because you like have the dbt skills built into you already. I was like, oh thanks. She was like, yeah, you just have to like learn the names of them and then apply them. But like you're one of those very regulated people, I was like I'm really just very anxious on the inside and hold it in. Well, but thank you. So and and I do think it speaks to the basics of coping skills you gain as an athlete and I think first responders can be very similar in that way there's a lot of skills that you learn, but you don't have any names for them. So what DBT does is it puts names on the skills you already have so that you can more readily pull from your toolbox. So that you can more readily pull from your toolbox.
Speaker 2:Right, and I think that that's you know. You were mentioning Marcia earlier. I also remember you know when you start off you're in a house and you're in the basement. The house is on fire and you got to get out of hell and you know you can accept the latter or you don't, and just that imagery is a good way to think about what these skills can do. You can get out of a fire or you can stay in your basement of hell. You can choose, and I always liked that imagery so I wanted to share that with the audience Mostly. I know you know that story, but you know, when you think about DBT, there's a lot of specific skills, there's a lot of skills that you learn from it. Which ones do you think that really apply to the athletic background of the people you work?
Speaker 3:Oh, I'd say like coping head is like a very obvious one, but I would say, outside of that, when it comes to like ones that are very helpful would be mindfulness and that's like, of course, the core foundational skill set. It's what is taught in group therapy between every single module, because it's so foundational, like, specifically, the how skill of nonjudgmentalness and what it means to be nonjudgmental. I kid you not, steve, when I learned this, like it changed my life, because I was like everyone likes to say they're nonjudgmental, right, like I don't judge anyone and it's like okay. Well, actually, from birth we are all taught to be judgmental, and for good reason. Being judgmental is part of what helps keep us safe. The difference is, what type of judgment are we using? Because there's a difference between discernment and evaluative judgments. And once I learned, oh, what we're trying to leave behind or drop is the evaluative judgment and stick with discernment, it changed everything.
Speaker 3:Because discernment is describing specifically what needs to change or what's different from before, and it reminds me of coaching. Like a good coach is able to discern what you need to do differently to be better. And if you're like, if a coach is saying, oh, that was good, that was bad, it's like okay, but what was good about it, what was bad about it? You can't just have those evaluative this was good, this was bad, that was worse, this is better. You have to be able to describe it, and that's what nonjudgmentalness really hits home with, and it also, once you start using nonjudgmental language to describe other things, it starts to seep into how you talk about yourself, which I love too. It is the long game. It's not like you practice nonjudgmentalness for a week and, all of a sudden, you love yourself. I will say, though you do like. I remember I stopped doing things like. I don't say like oh, I'm such an idiot.
Speaker 1:Like why would I say that to?
Speaker 3:myself. That's something I used to say all the time and I didn't think much of it, and now I'm like no, that's actually really damaging. I wouldn't say that to anyone else and also like what does that even mean? That's an evaluative judgment, like if I'm trying to discern, what is this even coming from? And it like puts me in a position to actually look at the facts for what they are and look at what I'm thinking about. So I would say the mindfulness module is very pivotal and specifically nonjudgmentalness from the mindfulness house skills.
Speaker 2:And how we talk to ourselves is so important. I talk about that all the time and you know, calling yourself an idiot or calling yourself whatever your name is not helpful. And the other, the other one that I kind of use loosely from DBT is people who apologize for everything. And I and I go look and true, truthfully, I'm, I'm, I'm Canadian, I'm born and raised in Canada. So I tell people I'm a Canadian, I don't apologize all that much, don't be the Canadian, all right, just just don't apologize for just being you all that much, so don't be the Canadian, All right.
Speaker 3:Just just don't apologize for just being you. I do love that that's like and the communication skills. How cool is it that there's legit scripts that you can use, Cause you're? Pulling that from what deer fast right, no apologies.
Speaker 2:Don't tell anyone I'm doing this.
Speaker 3:And it's like I love that so much, though because it does, it doesn't say you just don't apologize. I love that. It's specific on like I need you to step back, take a beat and think about if an if an apology is warranted, and then taking the extra step if the apology is warranted, let's make that apology meaningful. Let's talk about how your behavior is going to change, that this doesn't happen again, cause your apology doesn't mean much if your behavior is not going to change. And so it's like it really holds that dialectic of not apologizing and if you need to. We need this to be effective.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I and I like that. This is what dialectic is. It's, you know, cognitive behavioral therapy all or nothing thinking happens a lot. I practice Buddhism, so thinking about how life is not just the ends, we're both and we got to find the middle ground. I mean, I always think about dialectical as a basis for most therapy and anything that's healthy in this world.
Speaker 3:Absolutely. I couldn't agree more. That was another thing. When I learned what a dialectic was, I was like how come everyone doesn't know this? Two things can be true at the same time. And when I see when that light, when that understanding happens and you see like the light switch flip on for someone, it opens up so much opportunity and possibility. Cause I remember always feeling like stuck when it felt like it was either this or that and you couldn't have both. I wish I had like a specific example, but I remember specifically in college I would feel like that a lot Like it was either you can spend time with your friends or you are going to practice really early in the morning. You can't have both. And it's like, well, you can't have both. It's not like you can go all in on both of those. Like you can spend some time with your friends so that you and then still be very ready for practice in the morning. So no, you're not staying out till 2am in New York city because you have to be up by four for practice.
Speaker 3:But, I just remember things feeling very black and white and then learning what a dialectic was really bridged the gap.
Speaker 2:And I use that in emotional standards too. When people talk about, well, I'm sad and I said, what else you mean I can have more than one. I'm like, yeah, you can be sad and angry and happy and everything else. And it's learning that dialect. It's not either or approach, it's somewhere in the middle. And finding that middle ground is always the challenge, in my opinion. But I agree with you a hundred percent and for an athlete, like you said, I can go out to New York, to New York city, for until 10, 11 o'clock, but I gotta be at my practice at four and you can do both, but you pay the price and you're willing to pay the price. I guess that's okay.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and that's like one of my, one of my favorite like little games. Well, I think it's a game, cause I find it fun to play with clients. It's like when we're when they're learning about what a dialectic is. It's like just notice throughout the week how many times you say the word but and I want you to see if you could say the word and instead and just see how that changes things. That I'm not saying it's not like you messed up If you said, but I just want you to notice it because, remember, we're being nonjudgmental, so it's just about noticing it and kind of turning your mind to like huh, how would that go if I said and?
Speaker 3:And then, similarly, with nonjudgmentalness, I think it's a lot of fun to play the game of like okay, now notice every time over the week when you say the word good and bad. It's not that it's a bad thing to say those. I just want you to notice how often evaluative judgments come up in your life. And then usually people come back the next week and they're like oh my gosh, all I do is say good and bad all week long. I think I said it more than I ever did. I'm like no, you're just building your awareness over how often you say that there's nothing wrong with it. It's just about noticing it and seeing if we can start describing instead.
Speaker 2:One of the things that I talk about with my clients is it's in my office, not here in the studio, but it's. There's a seven dirty words in my office and it's if, but, try, could, should, would, probably. And they said those are all dirty words in my office because they're all conditionals and you can't live in the world of conditionals but to me it's too conditional. You got to say and or find another word to say and people really gravitate towards that and I didn't tell anyone. I stole it from DBT but nonetheless I did.
Speaker 3:Yeah, well, there's a lot of beautiful little nuggets that come out of DBT and I like what you said about the word but cause. It also wraps around. To back around to apologies, right, like we've all heard the person say I'm sorry, but and it's like well, guess what? You just negated that entire apology for whatever you're going to say next, like I literally don't care that. You just said I'm sorry. So it is true, it is a conditional, and I feel like, did you say the word Maybe? That's one word that I really maybe I don't do, but that's a good one to add.
Speaker 2:I can't with that word I'm always like well, I don't know what that means, so I, I, I like those words. The reason why I put in the seven dirty words I could have added maybe, but then it takes away the call to his stand-up comedian stuff. So I don't know if I can add maybe, but it'll be in the asterisks or something yeah, sometimes, sometimes, yeah, well, I think that that's what a lot of people live in, if I can add, maybe, but it'll be in the asterisks or something.
Speaker 2:Yeah, sometimes, sometimes, yeah, well, I think that that's what a lot of people live in and I think that you know this is. You know, you talked about sorry or things like that. You know, the more I do therapy and fawn is not quite recognized just yet everywhere, but for trauma it is recognized a little bit. But fawning for other people is also something that happens a lot. I'm sorry. If you're not sorry, why are you fawning for me? Just tell me you're not, it's okay, shit happens.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, it's an encourager to be more direct.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they don't need to fawn for the person across the whatever on the phone or whatever for that reason.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and what's interesting is, I think a lot of the times when something like bonding is going on is it's difficult to even see that that person may be feeling dysregulated and needing to do something like a distress tolerance skill, and it's almost like that apology is the way that they're self-regulating and it's like why don't we stop, stop, take a step back, observe what's going on within us, go splash some water on your face, do a little ice dive and then come back and it's just like reworking, relearning how to take care of ourselves, because when we do, when we are in a state of like fawning and apologizing again, it's like it's how we've learned to cope and it's gotten you this far. It's not like it is working to a certain extent and it's just at a certain point. It's likely not going to fit with your set of values or what you're trying to accomplish and you can end up self-sabotaging. So it's worth it to look into more effective ways of coping that will make sure you don't get in your own way.
Speaker 2:And again another DBT skill about self-sabotage and addressing that stuff, you know. The other part that I want to mention is you know, when my therapist, joe and I'm very open that I go to therapy myself, lets me like I go use any of those words or I start fawning. He always goes all right. Where do you feel it in your body when you say that? And that's another great thing that I've learned, that it travels across your body and where you hold your anxiety and everything else.
Speaker 3:It's an incredible thing Once you can start noticing the sensations in your body, because, especially when, when you're new to therapy, you ask someone where they feel it in their body and they're like what do you mean? I'm like all right, we got some work to do, we're going to get used to this.
Speaker 2:So what I get from you is DBT has changed your life. Yeah, and how? Is it really like? You talked about day-to-day stuff already, but do you have other examples of how it influences your life in a good way?
Speaker 3:I mean I know that, like the mindfulness stuff, nonjudgmentalness has to be number one. Coping ahead really stands out. And then I would say beyond, maybe even more so, like if I had to judge it and put something at the top. The way that we make treatment plans and DBT is based off a literal skill from emotion regulation and it's building positive emotions in the long term. And it's about identifying your values and we usually stick to a top three to five, no more than that, so you don't get lost in it. And then you define those values for what they mean to you and then identify goals within those values and have a top prioritized goal. And, like I know, what I do for myself each year is I map out, because our values will shift and grow over time. Mine have been pretty consistent recently because I'm just kind of in like a stable part of life right now. But like I revamped my values this year and I'm very clear, if someone asked me what my values are, I'm able to say kindness, community and grit, like that's what I believe in, that's how I try to hold myself in every situation and interaction that I'm in, and it also means that my goals are very specifically tailored to those values. So when someone asks me why I'm doing something, I can relate it back to my values and for me, that brings me such a strong sense of identity. But, yeah, I would say that building positive emotions in the long term is it's a game game changer. Just to be able to know that, and that's what I tell my clients too I'm like, hey, when we do your treatment plan, you're learning a whole skill and I want you to be involved in it and we will learn this skill again. But I want you to be able to make your own treatment plan for your life, because I'm hoping that you don't work with me forever.
Speaker 3:Some people do like to be in therapy forever, and that's that's great. Like I'm one of those people, I probably will be in therapy forever. I do like continuing to peel back the layers of the onion, but there's a lot of people that by the time they find DBT, they're fricking done. They're like I have been going to 12 different types of therapy for so long. Nothing's ever worked, and I'm like all right, I need you to just give me your all one last time. I'm telling you this is going to be helpful, and this is, of course, after like an assessment and actually making sure that DBT can be helpful because it isn't the fit for everyone, and if I'm getting the vibe and based on their assessment, I'm like, oh, this is going to be helpful. It's like please just give this a shot and it could potentially only take you seven months to a year and you could be done.
Speaker 2:And they're usually like okay, I can do that. You bring that up and it was interesting because I'm a fan of therapy for life. That doesn't mean every week, that doesn't even mean every month, but I'm a big fan of therapy for life. So what are your thoughts about therapy being for everyone for all the time, or what's your thoughts on that?
Speaker 3:I have historically said I do not believe that therapy is for everyone. Like I, I believe that there are some cultural aspects to therapy, especially in the US, where it does not fit for every single culture or every person's experience, and I do believe that there are a lot of therapies that can be experienced as very invalidating for specific cultures, especially if the therapist is not well informed on the background or cultural identity of the person sitting across from them. That doesn't mean they can't do great work together. It does mean that that therapist needs to do some work and understand that there's going to be some people that aren't going to be a good fit and there'll be some people that simply never seek out therapy because they've found some ways to cope, Kind of like I think of how my boss told me like oh, you kind of have all these DVT skills built in, you just need the names of them.
Speaker 3:I think there are some people that do have these skills built in and if they don't encounter any crazy, crazy roadblock, speed bump in the road and they're able to navigate some of life's curve balls because they built up these skills, they might be able to do it on their own and that's. That's awesome, like cool. It doesn't mean anyone's lesser if they need the help. It doesn't mean you're better if you don't. It just means okay, we've all grown up a little differently and I think a lot fewer of us would need therapy if we got to learn something like these coping skills throughout school, and that's something that I think would be amazing.
Speaker 3:And there's that one of the things that I do on the side is like talk to different schools about like hey, have y'all ever heard about this? It's really helpful. And there's a charter school out in Southern California nearby myself. I went and met with helpful and there's a charter school out in Southern California nearby myself. I went and met with them and now they actually do social emotional learning, but they specifically tailor it to DBT and all their kids learn that because they're just like, oh my gosh, this is amazing.
Speaker 3:Our kids do need this. I was like, oh yes, awesome. So I think not everybody needs therapy and a lot less of us would if we learn these skills growing up in a very clear way, like how DVT delivers them.
Speaker 2:You said so much in this. I have so many things I want to say the school stuff. It is absolutely pivotal that we learn these types of things. I had to learn how to do my own, but you know We've lost that ability. Nevermind COVID, but even through social media and the keyboard warriors that we have to deal with on a regular basis. There's so many things I would say that I would change in schools, but anyway, that's maybe a different conversation for a different time.
Speaker 3:Especially with you having kids. Oh my gosh, I could only imagine. You could probably talk for hours on that topic.
Speaker 2:I coached for 10 years younger girls I think the oldest was 14. I stopped last season and I did it for a long time and you clearly saw the ones who had emotional management skills and the ones who did not. But as a coach you can't just stop everything. All right, let's do distress tolerance, everyone. It's not something that's really well received. You talked. You talked about the U? S and the cultural competencies. If I did that, some people would be frightened. If you ask me, yeah, no I agree, and you know.
Speaker 2:Talk about cultural competencies. You're absolutely right. You know, working with first responders, that's always the first thing. They check with me to make sure I can handle their stuff and I think that if you are a sports athlete, you know, while I could probably help out, I'm not someone who could. You're much better than me at that and that's okay because you've lived it, and I think sometimes lived experience means a lot. However and this is a big however for everyone listening I've never had schizophrenia, but I worked really well with people who had schizophrenia and you don't need to have that diagnosis in order to work Well and that's such an important distinction to make.
Speaker 3:I think because I remember when I first became a therapist, or like when I knew I wanted to become a therapist, I was still in undergrad and I was talking to one of my professors and I told her I was like oh, I think I want to go into grief counseling. And one of my other professors like walked in, he heard me say that and he was like well have you really lost anyone?
Speaker 3:I was like I mean I have. I was really young, it was like my grandparents and like I can't say I like got. It was like this huge problem. And he more or less was like oh well, if you haven't really lost anyone, I don't know how you're going to do that. And then this other professor told me she was like no, if you want to do that like you do know what it's like to to like if that's where your heart's pulled and you're able to sit and hold that space for people, you can still do that. Like that's okay. And that was the.
Speaker 3:The first thing that I did as a therapist was help run grief groups and it's a lot of heavy work. I found out very quickly I can't only do that because it is a lot of heavy emotions to hold all the time. But to your point of like you don't necessarily had to have had like a specific experience to help somebody and it's a dialectic right. And at the same time, if you do have that experience, it's going to be very helpful. And that's where I know like my lane being with athletes is such an important one to me because it's like I there are so many points in session where it's like therapy can almost move a little quicker, because it's like, no, I know what you mean, I've been there myself and we're on the same page. It goes a long way in building rapport because you know, the person sitting across from you gets it.
Speaker 2:Right and I think that that's the other shift in therapy is that we bring our personalities a little more to the session. We used to be blank slates when we, you know in the past, nowadays we bring our personality in. I encourage all my interns that I've worked with, and even my colleagues who sometimes struggle like tell them why this is important for you or why it's not, and they can't do anything with it. It's just your story, as Brene Brown would say, someone who makes fun of your story. They're the idiot, not you for making fun of your story. So I'm a big fan of that too, but I don't know what you think about that. But when I worked with I was 25 years old, never had kids at that point, and I was working with kids and all the parents would go well, you've never had kids.
Speaker 2:I've never had schizophrenia either, but somehow I deal with them too, and that was a standard line.
Speaker 3:Yeah, no, that's. I had a very similar experience when I graduated from my master's. Like when I started my traineeship I was 22 or 23. And I had to teach parenting classes. I still don't have kids. I'm 30. Now I don't have kids, I have a dog.
Speaker 3:And I got it about every single week of like well, how are you supposed to be helpful? And I'm like, well, I the, because I remember it was really hard for me too. And I remember talking to my supervisor and he was like your job isn't to tell them that you know what's best. Your job is to tell them that you've read a lot of research and you've gotten trained in multiple parenting styles and you are there to deliver them helpful parenting tools that are outside of hitting their kids Because all the parents I was working with had been accused of physical abuse towards their children. And he's like you're just you, you're just there to do that, like you're there to offer the science. You're not saying you know what's best. They are the parents. You're the one who's saying I've done all the reading, I have this in my brain and I want to give that information to you.
Speaker 3:And I found that to be super, super helpful and pretty effective when talking with parents. Now I don't face that so much. I don't know if it's just because I'm older. People assume they like see a wedding ring. They think I don't know what happens. But just being older I don't get so much of that anymore. But yeah, that was not easy. And what you said about being able to be yourself, more so in a therapy room, that was another thing that I feel like DBT wasn't like. Marshall Linehan was an amazing pioneer for that, because she was such a huge advocate for, like, stop acting like.
Speaker 3:You have this freaking therapist hat on and you are like a blank slate of a person like no one's getting rid of their biases ever. Like we all have our own biases and you might as well show up in that room, be yourself, of course, within reason. That session is not going to turn into your session and it's important to be an equal human being. Nobody, like think about even making a friend, like you're going to make a friend who, like doesn't really tell you anything about them. Like, when I have a first session with someone, before I go into their intake, I literally tell them I go, I'm going to tell you a little bit about me.
Speaker 3:I feel it's only fair because I'm going to ask you so much about you today. I want you to at least feel like you know a little bit about me. And then I asked them if they want to know anything else. I'm like literally anything you want to ask me. If you hit up on a limit, I'll let you know. But if you want to know if I have siblings, if you want to know where I grew up, like ask me. That's okay. I want you to feel comfortable, whatever it's going to take. So I love that DBT encourages that, because I definitely didn't get that in grad school and I mean I graduated in 2018. I mean, that wasn't all that long ago and it was still very much so like blank slate. The client is the only like human in the room, and that just doesn't work for people.
Speaker 2:And thank you for making me feel old. I graduated in 2003. So thank you very much for making me feel old. You're welcome. All joking aside, though, you're right.
Speaker 2:I think that you know once I Marsha's stuff and I also think bringing yourself. I tell people my story and I say, if you know, I this is my second language, so THs don't exist in French. So sometimes, when there's a TH, I said if you make fun of me, that's okay, I'm used to it at this point and everyone laughs and it also brings that connection. I think that when we think about therapy in general you talked about that space in therapy I go back to Gabor Maté, if you've ever read his stuff.
Speaker 2:When you are curious and you connect with a person across from you, even on a video call, it's your heart, is almost that electricity from your heart and from your brain just connects with that person and that's much more powerful than CBT, dbt, ifs or whatever technique you mean. I think that those techniques enhances that content, obviously, but I also like the fact that our job is to give a good connection, have that empathy, but also have that connection with someone, because if you don't agree, when I don't agree with my clients, I don't go. Let's explore that more. I'm like look, I don't agree with you. This is why Convince me and most people are like good, and we're going to have a good conversation and we can have those conversations conversation and we can have those, those conversations Well, and I couldn't agree more with you, especially on the front of cause.
Speaker 3:When it comes down to it, so much of therapy is human beings needing more connection. Like we literally live longer in connection to other people, and that's something that we haven't talked about it so much. But radically open, dialectical behavioral therapy is literally the treatment for emotional loneliness, and it's all about learning skills to better connect with the important people around you. You don't have to connect with everyone. It really is quality over quantity and it's important that the therapist is able to use those skills in that setting to be able to connect, because it's such an important part of our life. That's how humans evolved the fact that we could connect, form teams and like, build bridges, spaceships, roads. Like we could do all these things in connection with each other. Without that connection, we are not advancing. Like we're not at the top of the food chain because we can run the fastest or we have the biggest claws or the sharpest teeth. We're at the top because we know how to work together and connection is how we build that team.
Speaker 2:Well, I think connection is exactly how we you know we're pack animals, humans are pack animals and if you don't have connections with others, it just kills your spirit. There's a research that just came out and I don't know where it's out of, but they were talking about you want to prevent dementia. Get connected to other people. It actually will help and not take it away completely, but at least alleviate some of that symptomology because you're connected to people.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's like a grounding center, and that's where it's like. I know there's, especially with, like, younger adults or teens like the whole. Whenever I hear someone who's like, oh, I'm a lone wolf, I go at this by myself. I'm usually like, oh, like little tiny red flag, because I'm like, oh, none of us can do this alone, and it brings about an important dialectic Like you can have your uniqueness and be in connection with other people. You do not have to sacrifice your connection to have your uniqueness. Like, yeah, sure, maybe you're not for any, for everyone, none of us are.
Speaker 3:It is important you find your community, though, and you find that space to be in connection, and I think that's why things like AA communities have grown and they are just across the whole country. Like it's a shared specific value that's created connection, and it's like when two people cause I worked in addiction for about a year and it was like whenever I'd see two people who've been in the program connect, it's like they've known each other for years because they have that one thing connecting them. Like there is something about everyone that someone can relate to. Don't see, see that as a benefit, see that as an asset. This is your, your tether to other human beings.
Speaker 2:And we need that Right, and I think that that's what you know loving to do. This podcast is also to connect with people who are far away from me yet still connect, whether it's my audience, whether it's my guests. It's just a great way to connect because, you know, I think it's important for people to have this. I'm not alone, as my one of my clients last week asked me. Like you know, I was sad, so I listened to sad music, so I can really feel it. I said do you actually know why we listen to sad music? And she says no, why? I said because when we hear someone else have a sad situation, we're like oh God, I'm not alone. Thank god I'm not alone. Thank god I'm not alone, and that's really why we listen to sad music someone gets it, I mean, and so much music regarding so many different emotions.
Speaker 3:It's just they get it and it's like, and it's like the tipping point right, because if you're really dysregulated and then also listening to sad music, it's like we don't need to be a puddle on the floor and there's a lot of people like I know, since I'm an anxious person like I, I will like hold back tears and I'm like, oh, I don't want anyone to like see that that things like listening to sad music or watching a sad movie is really helpful for me to actually get that release, because I it's the like, the inhibited grief, you know, that part of dbt, that's something that was a big issue for me.
Speaker 3:I would just like hold it back. And I just watched what movie was it that it ends with us with like lively, oh my gosh, I I was sobbing Like it might. The first job that I ever had was at a domestic violence nonprofit and it just, oh, my like I was. It brought me back to so many different stories I've heard and it it was such a release. So I do think that it is so helpful for anyone who struggles to get tears out.
Speaker 2:Listen to that sad song, watch a sad movie it'll, it usually does, it does the trick well, I think that it's important to have those emotions, and even in therapy, as a therapist sometimes I'm not taking away from my clients, but if I do feel sad, I'm not hiding the fact that I'm sad about it. If I'm angry about something, I don't hide that I'm angry about it because I think then that normalizes their feeling and that's so important.
Speaker 3:Well, and especially when a client gets, like, some really sad news or they're working towards something and they they don't get the job or they don't get into that grad program, like how invalidating would it feel if your therapist just sits there and doesn't say like, oh, like. To me it's like, oh man, I know we've been working on this for months and how hard you worked. I am so bummed out for you if you just sit across from someone going through something really difficult or like a job they didn't get, a school program they didn't get into and you're just a stone wall. That's going to be damaging.
Speaker 2:You want to screw up a relationship. In therapy, someone's crying and being upset about things they've worked on and you say and how does that make you feel? Great way to cut the relationship really strongly. I'd rather say oh shit, or I'm sorry, or something like that. That sounds a lot more empathetic and truthful from my emotional standpoint than saying and can you tell me more how that feels? I mean, no one wants to hear that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's definitely not the moment for that. And where do you feel that in your body?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I don't think that Joe would even do that to me. He's a pretty good therapist. But as we wrap up here cause we've been going for a while I want people to be able to reach you. How would they be able to reach you in regards to getting some coaching done or anything like that?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I mean you can find me on. If you're in California, you can find me on psychology today, pretty much every therapist under the sun is on there and I'm also on Instagram at Erica Curry LMFT, and there's a link in my bio that takes you to my website. My website is Erica currycom and then there's just you can just hit the button for like contact me. You can also send me a mess. If you can't figure that out, you can send me a message on Instagram and I can send you the link directly. But, yeah, that's probably the best way to get in touch. I'm also on TikTok, not as much, but same handle Erica Curry LMFT.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Well, I'm going to put that on the show notes. I actually was thinking I'm going to put Marsha's book also for people who are curious about DBT. I think it's a great thing. I wanted to thank you for your time. This went by really fast, and thank you for bringing in the RODBT in, because we never got to it. So thank you for that too. Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 3:I had so much fun. This is a great way to connect and start off the day.
Speaker 2:Well, I thank you again for your time. Well, this completes episode 179. Erica Currie, thank you so much for being here, looking forward to hearing more from you in regards to your therapy practice and everything else. But on episode 180, we are going to talk to old friends of mine. We're going to talk to Tamar and Lane, which they have a new book out. Can't wait to share that with you and their new developments in their career. So I hope you join me then.
Speaker 1:Please like, subscribe and follow this podcast on your favorite platform. A glowing review is always helpful and, as a reminder, this podcast is for informational, educational and entertainment purposes. Only If you're struggling with a mental health or? Thank you.
