107. Working Through Difficult Emotions and Suicidal Thoughts feat. Liz + Mollie

Jul 20

listen to this episode:

TW for suicidal thoughts ~42 minutes into this episode

Today's guests are Liz Fosslien and Mollie West Duffy, the co-authors of the WSJ bestseller No Hard Feelings: The Secret Power of Embracing Emotion at Work and Big Feelings: How to Be Okay When Things Are Not Okay. We discuss why the 7 "big feelings" (burnout, perfectionism, comparison, uncertainty, anger, regret, + despair) are so difficult to navigate and tips on working through them, why it's so important to identify the emotions you're feeling, tips to lean into the emotional experience to understand what your emotions are trying to tell you, recovering from suicidal ideation (+ what to say to someone in this headspace), and advice on supporting someone struggling with these feelings.

Liz + Mollie's Website: https://www.lizandmollie.com/

Liz + Mollie's Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lizandmollie/

This week's DBT skill is Cope Ahead (as mentioned in this convo + at the end of the episode in more depth). Learn more HERE!

Mentioned In The Episode…

+ No Hard Feelings: The Secret Power of Embracing Emotion at Work

+ Big Feelings: How to Be Okay When Things Are Not Okay

SHOP GUEST RECOMMENDATIONS: https://amzn.to/3A69GOC

Episode Sponsors

🛋This week's episode is sponsored by Teen Counseling. Teen Counseling is an online therapy program with over 14,000 licensed therapists in their network offering support with depression, anxiety, relationships, trauma, and more via text, talk, and video counseling. Head to teencounseling.com/shepersisted to find a therapist today!

🍓This week's episode is brought to you by Sakara. Sakara is a nutrition company that focuses on overall wellness, starting with what you eat. Use code XOSADIE at checkout for 20% off your first order!

About She Persisted (formerly Nevertheless, She Persisted)

After a year and a half of intensive treatment for severe depression and anxiety, 18-year-old Sadie recounts her journey by interviewing family members, professionals, and fellow teens to offer self-improvement tips, DBT education, and personal experiences. She Persisted is the reminder that someone else has been there too and your inspiration to live your life worth living.

a note: this is an automated transcription so please ignore any accidental misspellings!

[00:00:00] Sadie: Welcome to she persisted. I'm your host. Sadie sat in a 19 year old from the bay area, studying psychology at the university of pencils. She processed. It is the teen mental health podcast made for teenagers by a team. In each episode, I'll bring you authentic, accessible, and relatable conversations about every aspect of mental wellness you can expect.

[00:00:20] Evidence-based Tina proved resources, coping skills, including lots of DBT insights and education. Each piece of content you consume, she persisted offers you a safe space to feel validated and understood in your struggle while encouraging you to take ownership of your journey and build your life worth living.

[00:00:37] So let's dive in.

[00:00:41] Hello. Hello and welcome to she. Persisted. I am so excited for today's episode. I mentioned on Instagram stories that this episode is like kind of late. I got on a terrible schedule where I was releasing episodes like Thursday and Friday and Saturday. And our upload day is Tuesday. So I took a couple of days off and held this episode until this week, so that we're back on schedule.

[00:01:01] And it's a good one. So I think it's well worth the wait. But before we get into this conversation with Liz and Molly, about all things, emotions.

[00:01:09] I wanted to give you a little Midsummer check in, catch up. I'm starting to think about the fall semester and how I'm gonna organize and plan and stay balanced. I definitely am gonna make sure that my morning and my night routine are staying super consistent.

[00:01:23] Sleep is still a huge priority, really, a lot more walking and staying consistent with working out so that I am still motivated and tired when I go to bed, which is a huge thing for. I'm really excited to get back to Philly, get back into my routine, see friends, get back into the schedule of school. It's been so nice to have a break, so I didn't feel burnt out and overwhelmed through the whole summer, but I'm also excited to get back into the rhythm of school and podcasting and that structure I've been doing a lot of reading.

[00:01:52] I have two books that I wanna recommend to you that I've read this summer that are mental health related. In addition, I've also been reading lots of romance, novel novels. So if you have recommendations, DM me, I wanna hear them. But the mental health books are building a life worth living by Marsha Lenahan. It is her memoir. So it's her entire life story. And Marsha Lenahan is the woman that started dialectical behavioral therapy. And she actually started it because she herself struggled with suicidal ideation, emotional distress all of that kind of stuff.

[00:02:20] And she spent some time in a really terrible Mental hospital a really long time ago. And from that, she really wanted to create a compassionate, effective evidence based treatment for patients that were really struggling to find treatment, to be effective. And so that's how DBT was born and it's such an amazing story.

[00:02:38] it's, it's so inspiring and it's just so good. So if you are a D B T fan, I highly recommend reading that because she puts the skills in the book, but it's also about her journey with spirituality and how she really wanted mindfulness to be a part of D B T and what her mental health looks like when she was 18, 19 20, and at the lowest of lows in the hospital.

[00:03:02] And then leaving that, starting to work in research. All of that kind of stuff. So really good. The second one I've mentioned it before, but atomic habits, everyone uses habits in some way. And if you want to improve habits or you just wanna stay consistent or understand how to be more effective in creating habits, I highly recommend you read that it's by James clear, it's literally applicable to every aspect of life, whether you want to.

[00:03:26] Learn to plant instruments or be more consistent with working out or be better at studying all of these things come down to habits and consistency, and he breaks down the science of habit building in a really easy to understand way. There's lots of great anecdotes. And if, yeah, if you are struggling to build habits, you wanna see a change somewhere in your life.

[00:03:47] And you're like, I don't really know how to do this highly recommend. I'm sure you've seen it on TikTok, but it is amazing.

[00:03:52] And I wanted to bring those up because we have authors on the podcast today. We have Liz and Molly, the authors of big feelings, how to be okay. When things are not okay. They're also the authors of the wall street journal. Best seller, no hard feelings. The secret power of embracing emotions at work.

[00:04:09] So for all of my book, worms, myself included, these are three books that are applicable to any aspect of a life of life emotions. I mean, maybe not the D B T one, but emotions have it setting. And then just learning about D B, T and Marsha, because who doesn't love that. But yeah, that's kind of how things have been going. I am thinking about doing more solo episodes on the podcast. So I would love to have your feedback on that. Do you wanna listen to more solo episodes? What do you wanna hear more of? What topics do you want me to dive into? Do you want more Q and a ask me anything advice, style episodes.

[00:04:44] Do you like these interviews? Let me know. And to wrap up this intro. You should follow on Instagram at, at she persisted podcast because I've been working on some merch for the podcast. And I'm very excited to share that with you soon. So with that, our guests today are Liz and Molly. They're the co-author of no hard feelings and they're second book.

[00:05:07] Big feelings, how to be okay. When things are not okay, which we really dive into in this interview, we discuss why the seven big feelings, which are burnout, perfectionism, comparison, uncertainty, anger, regret, and despair are so difficult to navigate and tips to work through them. Why it's so important to identify the emotions you're feeling.

[00:05:25] Tips to lean into the emotional experience to understand what your emotions are trying to tell you, recovering from suicidal ideation and what to say to someone in this head space. And lastly, any advice on supporting someone struggling with these feelings? So I do wanna give a trigger warning. We do talk about suicidal thoughts and suicidal ideations a bit after I would say the 35 minute mark, that's not accurate a hundred percent because I am gonna add the ads and this intro in.

[00:05:53] So if you listen to after the 35 minute mark, if you, that is a trigger point for you, just be aware of that up until that. Totally fine. We talk about all these other topics, but I would cut it off around there. After we talk about regret. So that is your point to stop listening. If that is something that hits home for you.

[00:06:10] Liz and Molly do mention this in the episode, but their website is Liz and molly.com. L I Z a N D M O L L I e.com. And their Instagram is the same. So at Liz and Molly and Liz is a phenomenal illustrator. She is so talented. With creating graphics that accompany these really difficult to address topics like burnout and overwhelm and relationships and anxiety.

[00:06:34] So if you are looking for some amazing drawings in your Instagram feed that are mental health related, I highly recommend following her. And there's a ton of them in the book as well. So love that so much. I always love when books have charts and graphs to explain things, atomic Abbots does that.

[00:06:49] And it's great. So. That's the intro for this week. We're just gonna dive in because this conversation is a great one and I'm so happy that Liz and Molly reached out and came on the podcast. So with that, make sure to subscribe so that you don't miss next week's episode. Thank you for listening. And let's dive in.

[00:07:06] Thank you guys so much for joining me today on she persisted. I'm so excited to have you on the show and dive into all things, emotions.

[00:07:12] It's something I'm super passionate about and really doing the emotional education and understanding what happens when emotions arise, why they arise, the functions that they're serving, and really just doing that education piece was a game changer for me and navigating those big, heavy emotions. So I'm so excited to bring this conversation to my audience.

[00:07:30] Mollie: thank you. We're happy to be here.

[00:07:32] Sadie: Of course. So before we get started, I would love for you guys to share with listeners just a little bit about their, your book, where they can get it. The process that went into writing that as a little bit of a foundation so that they know where they can dive into so much more depth on this conversation.

[00:07:48] Mollie: I can start and Liz can jump in. So we wrote this book, it's called big feelings. How to be okay. When things are not okay. It came out at the end of April and we had published our first book called no hard feelings, which is all about emotions at work. And that came out in February, 2019. And after we wrote that book, we realized actually there are some really hard feelings.

[00:08:09] We both went through really difficult moments in our lives, which we can talk more. And we wanted to understand how do you work through these big feelings? We are really honest in the book that there's not like a magical checklist or a shortcut but that you can indeed work through them. . And so we share our stories.

[00:08:28] We share some of our reader stories and we talked with experts. You can find it on Amazon. You can find it on bookshop.org. And we are Liz and Molly, M O L L I E. We are on Instagram at Liz and Molly. And our website is Liz and molly.com. You can find the book there as well.

[00:08:46] Sadie: Amazing. So you guys outline seven different emotions that can be especially difficult to navigate that you've learned both from your own experiences and in all this research you did for this book, I would love to kind of break those down and talk about. Why those emotions specifically can be so diff difficult to navigate how you can be more effective and educated when navigating those and also touching on your own experiences there.

[00:09:11] Liz: So we started out with many more than seven. Yeah. But we kind of came up. I think it was a list of maybe 10 to 12 initially. And again, this was based on Molly and my experiences, just things that we had grappled with.

[00:09:25] And then we started turning to readers who had read our first book and our audience on Instagram and people who read our newsletters. Just to really survey them and start talking to them about which of these also resonate with you because we wanted the book to be broadly useful and also keeping in mind, Molly and I are two white women kind of both live in California.

[00:09:44] So we just, we wanted to make sure we were hearing from a range of people. And what we found that was interesting was that the seven that we ended up with, which include things like burnout, uncertainty, comparison, despair really seemed to. Evoke the biggest responses from people. And we've gotten questions around like comparison is not really an emotion.

[00:10:08] It's not necessarily a feeling, but what's interesting is when we ask people about envy, which is the emotion that comparison creates. They didn't have a strong of a response, but then when we said things like, well, do you compare yourself people, there was this overwhelming outpouring of like, yes, this, I struggle with this so much.

[00:10:26] So I think it speaks to how often we, we live in such an emotion phobic society that even if we can identify the behavior that we're engaging in, we still are a little removed from the emotion that that behavior leads us to feel. So we. Really wanted to meet people where they were, which is also why we chose words like perfectionism, uncertainty, as opposed to, you know, fear of failure or anxiety, which are truly the emotion.

[00:10:52] So that's a little behind why we ended up with those seven that are in the book.

[00:10:56] Sadie: Yeah, I think it's really interesting. And even just identifying those at face value, what you're experiencing can be really powerful. I think what you're talking about with people having that really emotional response, when you name what they're experiencing shows, how effective that can be and becoming in touch with the emotion when you're trying to suppress and avoid and not totally address what you're navigating.

[00:11:18] And I remember at many points during my mental health journey, what I was working on was. Acknowledging like what emotion was coming up and trying to look internally and being like, okay, is this like apprehension or is this anxiety and really getting very specific because once you know what you're actually experiencing, it's a lot easy to address it and work through it.

[00:11:38] Starting off, I think with burnout is a great one that I think a lot of people are experiencing right now. We are sort of like still in this weird limbo period with COVID burnout was something that many, many people have experienced. Why is that so difficult to emotionally navigate?

[00:11:52] And why is that? One of the things that you chose to highlight

[00:11:55] Mollie: burnout is something we hear about all the time. And yet it can be really difficult to recognize in ourselves. The reason for that is. A dangerous aspect of burnout is that it affects our own self-awareness.

[00:12:08] So it can actually feel really good to be on the verge of burnout.

[00:12:12] you know, like I'm getting things done, I'm crossing things off my list, you know, in the context of being at school, you're like, okay, I'm in finals, but everyone else is in finals and we're all in it together. And it's only, you know, after we get sick or after we come up for air or something else gets added onto our plate, that we really hit that wall.

[00:12:30] And we, we lose the adrenaline. And, you know, I, I remember this after, you know, periods of burnout, especially in school where I was so glad to have something like a summer break, but yeah, we, we need that. And if we don't have that and we don't say, okay, I'm gonna give myself some time after finals and we go directly into a really intense job.

[00:12:50] We end up. Not being able to actually like let the stress out of our system. So there's, there's research that shows it's really important to let that stress cycle fully happen. It's natural for us to go through periods of stress, but we need to then return to that rest and digest part of the cycle.

[00:13:10] And a lot of times we force ourselves to skip that. So the number one thing you can do is, is look out for the early warning sign. And the one that I'll share first, cuz I think it, it really helps people think about this in a new way is sometimes it can feel like you would like to get sick, not like COVID sick, but just like have a cold.

[00:13:28] So you are forced to shut down because it's so hard to force yourself to take a break. And when you're in a place where you're like wanting to be sick, that's not. You know, super healthy mm-hmm but some of the other things are that you feel that everything is overwhelming. Even things like going to the grocery store, you find people really irritating.

[00:13:46] You're saying yes to things that you should be saying no to. And so if we don't recognize these early warning signs, And they're hard to recognize, right? Cuz it's not, you know, they're not things that we, we have to recognize. That's when we get in trouble and, and we spoke with somebody who is an expert on helping people recover from burnout.

[00:14:05] And one of the things that he shared was he said, Sometimes life taps you on the shoulder with a feather, and sometimes it runs you over with a truck and we need to learn to listen to it when it taps you on the shoulder with a feather. So that's, yeah, that's part of something that, that Liz and I have both worked on, on getting better at, I think we still, it's still really difficult and, and we both have gone through periods of burnout.

[00:14:29] Sadie: Yeah, Elizabeth, you mentioned another, one of the difficult emotions of sorts to work through is perfectionism. And I think that is something that really goes hand in hand with, with burnout. And I've noticed from my own experience, my friends and peers that do have those perfectionist tendencies are the ones that have voiced feeling burnout and being more prone to that towards the end of the semester, the end of the year, during a stressful period What are, what's your advice there?

[00:14:54] Like is the, the goal to become on the other end of the spectrum? Like a Buddha not be a perfectionist or is it just like coping through that emotion? Giving yourself more grace? What's your advice? .

[00:15:05] Liz: Yeah. So I think it's really important for us to clarify that a lot of people who are perfectionists don't identify as perfectionist because they think they're so far from perfect.

[00:15:16] That there's no way that this could describe them. And perfectionism, sometimes people have a hard time distinguishing between perfectionism and being a healthy strive. So healthy striving is like, I wanna get a hundred percent on this final. I got a 96%. I feel really good about that. Perfectionism is I got a 96% and I'm gonna beat myself up for that one question I got wrong and I'm gonna like, just obsess over it and feel terrible about myself.

[00:15:44] So perfectionism is really about a fear of failure. It's not, it's actually not moving towards quote unquote perfection because that. If I asked you what your perfect day is, it would probably be different than what my perfect day is. Yeah. So it's very subjective. So I. The first thing is really to understand that perfectionism is not helping you move towards your goals.

[00:16:08] It's actually holding you back because it makes you so anxious and afraid. And it's this like scarcity mindset where you think this is the only opportunity I'll ever have. I need to do this. I need to keep pushing myself. And that's just not the way life works. So if you could, as you said, give yourself more grace.

[00:16:26] give yourself the breaks that you need. You'll actually be more successful in the long run. And it is some of it takes this belief that there will be cool opportunities for you beyond the one that's currently in front of you. Mm-hmm . And then a very specific thing that I've found really helpful is starting to identify when you find yourself using the words always and never.

[00:16:50] Yeah. So I like so often will find myself thinking, you know, a good. Manager a good employee is never late to a meeting or always has the answers. And the world is just not that's. Those extremes are not helpful. Like a good student. Doesn't always get a hundred percent on the test. You know, like sometimes they have a bad day.

[00:17:11] Sometimes they just don't do well on, on the exam. So moving away from seeing the world in these like black and white extremes, and instead saying, I'm gonna give myself grace. I did the best I can. There's still opportunities for me to improve, but this one. Moment. Doesn't define my whole self worth. It.

[00:17:31] Doesn't define who I am forever.

[00:17:33] Sadie: Yeah. Yeah. Comparison. I feel like that's one of the biggest buzzwords right now. The number of times I've seen comparison is the thief of joy on my Instagram feed this week. couldn't even tell you. But it's something that so many of us struggle with and I think that.

[00:17:47] Partially our society. It's partially like that perfectionist mindset that we do, many of us hold ourselves to. And it is so difficult to work through because it does bring out all these other emotions, whether it's like jealousy or anger or sadness, guilt, all of these things can come from jealousy.

[00:18:03] And we, we did touch how it touch on how it brings up envy as well. But why is comparison something that is so difficult to work through and to move away from.

[00:18:12] Mollie: Comparison is a little bit hardwired into us. So I think we, we can start there. It's We think that, oh, you know, we'll get off social media and we'll be free of comparison, but unless you're living, you know, off the grid you will always be able to be in contact with someone, whether you're getting a text message from someone or running it into them at the store or seeing them online in your classes.

[00:18:33] And so we, we, we can't say to ourselves, the goal is to just stop comparison and actually comparison helps us figure out who we are. So it, it, it can be helpful to us. We're not the only species who are guided by comparison. There's really interesting research with monkeys where if the monkeys are together and they're getting fed and one monkey gets a better piece of food than the other, the others are really unhappy.

[00:18:56] So this is, this is really hard hardwired. So a couple things There is this idea that we should compare ourselves less to other people. And we wanna challenge that and say, actually, you should compare yourself more, but thinking, but think more broadly about who that group is, who you are comparing yourself to.

[00:19:15] So a lot of times we are only engaging in upwards comparison, which is comparing ourselves to people who we believe are better or have something better than us in some way. And we're not comparing ourselves to people who don't have what we have. There's also something about you know, listening to what those, those triggers are.

[00:19:33] So if we say I'm, you know, I shouldn't be feeling jealous, I shouldn't be feeling envious of this person and we shut that down. We're actually not learning from. Whatever that is, which can help us make decisions. So we give the example in the book G Gretchen Rubin, who is the author of a book called the happiness project.

[00:19:49] She was a lawyer. She went to law school and then after she went to law school, she had a really prestigious career. She clerked for the Supreme court, and then she was looking through her law school's alumni magazine. One day. And she realized that the people who she was most envious of were not lawyers.

[00:20:06] They were writers, they were lawyers who became writers. And so she said, that's really interesting. I think I should become a writer. And if she had just shut that down and said, I, I shouldn't be thinking that, you know, I need to move on. She wouldn't have gotten that. So asking yourself, what do they have that makes me feel less than, is there a way.

[00:20:25] I can get that. And maybe it's not that exact thing. Maybe it's telling yourself, oh, there's a piece of that, that I, that I want. Yeah. And Liz, Liz has a great story up at this, from her own career that I'll let her

[00:20:38] Liz: share. Yeah. I had a friend who, or it was like a friend of a friend who got a promotion and she start, I think she started managing like 200 people, this enormous department.

[00:20:50] And I, Molly and I were both proud introverts, but I just like. Hate being in back to back meetings. It's very stressful to me. It's just not my ideal day. The idea of having 200 people and their families depend on me is incredibly anxiety inducing. Yeah. And so it's just like, I've never aspired to like lead 200 people.

[00:21:10] . And yet when I heard about this promotion, I was, I was so jealous and I didn't understand where that was coming from because I was like, this is, I know this is not who I wanna be. Like, do I know myself at all? Like, should I change my whole career? It's it's like, am I not an I right. Do like, who am I?

[00:21:29] It was just whole identity crisis. And I went to bed that night. This. My advice to everyone is like, just sleep on it. Just go to bed. yeah. See how you feel in the morning. And when I woke up the next morning, I realized that no, I, I didn't want that job, but I did feel kind of stagnant in my own career.

[00:21:45] And I just, I kind of wanted to have something exciting to tell the world that was happening to me. And so what that allowed me to do. Was figure out, okay. Like what in my life could I have a conversation with my manager about a new exciting project? Should I try to push myself to learn something new?

[00:22:03] Just how can I put some more excitement into my own life and feel like I'm making progress, but I don't like. My personality has not changed. And I certainly don't need to frantically start applying to these like, jobs that I will passionately hate if I actually get

[00:22:17] Sadie: them. Yeah. Yeah. No, I think that's interesting.

[00:22:20] And I think I'm so I'm very indecisive, but once I also like to make decisions, so I'm like, I wanna be in control, but I don't really always know what I want. So it makes me think of like the age old question of like, okay, what are we doing for dinner? Like, which restaurant do you want to go to? And one of my friends and I were talking about this like a week ago and she was like, okay, we're gonna make the decision.

[00:22:39] And then if you have an emotion about it, you know what you want, and it's the best trick because you immediately rather be like, okay, this is fine. Or you'd be like, no, I actually don't wanna do that. So like looping someone in and be like, okay, make this decision for me. And then I'm gonna see how I feel about it.

[00:22:53] Can be really helpful in getting in touch with those emotions that can come with comparison, but they're kind of hard to like, feel out exactly what they are.

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[00:24:32] So very similar to this restaurant, uncertainty, unknown, let's dive into that.

[00:24:38] Uncertainty is a huge thing and I think it's one of what I could identify as one of the most uncomfortable emotions that I. Feel and like internally, like I like being in control, being out of control is something that is very anxiety provoking. Why is uncertainty so difficult for people to deal with and how have you guys recommended that people navigate that?

[00:24:59] Liz: Yeah. So humans are hardwired to hate uncertainty. Like there's research that shows we would rather know that something bad is gonna happen tomorrow at 1:00 PM than have like a maybe bad thing maybe happen, even though that's sort of a better scenario. Yeah. So one of the things that you just touched on is we often in the face of uncertainty, we feel like we wanna control everything.

[00:25:24] So we start doing what psychologists call anxious fixing. And this was like my life for months before I figured out what was going on. Yeah. And I would wake up and feel just. Anxiety about the future. And I would just do stuff. I would vacuum the floor. I would do the dishwasher. I would, whatever, like do my email.

[00:25:43] I would respond to every message on every social media platform and just like work myself into this frenzy because I could control everything. And at the end of the day, what I found was that I had done all this stuff, but I didn't feel better. I felt worse. I actually felt burnt out. And part of that was because I had worked myself into exhaustion without ever addressing the source of my anxiety.

[00:26:06] So I think it's really important to. Kind of suffer through the moment of realizing that you cannot control the future. And that it's like, okay, I'm gonna sit with this anxiety instead of running myself into the ground. And I'm gonna really try to figure out, like, what am I actually afraid of happening?

[00:26:26] Because often we just push that aside and aside. But when we really confront our fears, we can start to figure out a path forward. We can, sometimes they don't even seem like they're that scary, but it allows us to at least. Start to take actions that help us address those needs, as opposed to like, you know, organizing your bookshelf 15 times, which is not really gonna too much for you, even if it feels good in the moment.

[00:26:51] And then one last thing that I'll share. I think it's such a powerful phrase that has been really comforting to me over the past couple of years is. I'm a person learning too. So let's say that you are taking a new class or something, instead of saying like, I need to know everything. I have to get an a, I have to have a good answer to every question.

[00:27:12] It's just like, I'm a person learning to do well in this class or to participate. In conversations or I'm a person learning to make new friends, because it allows you to give yourself more grace and see yourself as someone who can improve, who should just be open to feedback as opposed to this, like, Very perfectionist mindset of, I need to have everything figured out right now, which is just a completely unrealistic expectation to set for yourself.

[00:27:41] Sadie: Yeah. I, I think that's so true. And I love what you mentioned about sitting with like the uncertainty, because. Until you accept that the uncertainty is happening and then kind of unpack, like why that's so scary. You're like forcing yourself to be uncertain about the uncertainty and then you're just making it so much worse.

[00:28:00] There's this skill in D B T dialectical behavioral therapy. Called cope ahead. And it's where you, like, imagine the worst case possible scenario and you like fully walk through and mentally cope through and give yourself a plan for how you're gonna navigate that. And it's one of my favorite things to share on the podcast, because if you are uncertain about like college admissions, for example, and you're like, okay, worst case scenario, I don't get in.

[00:28:25] And it's like, okay, you go to community college, you can work really hard and transfer to an amazing school. And how are you gonna deal with opening those rejection letters? What emotions are gonna come up? How are you gonna cope with it the night of the day after? What steps are you gonna take? And you're no longer uncertain about how things are gonna proceed.

[00:28:44] And so it's really an amazing. Skill. And it's something that can be so helpful with navigating that uncertainty because you take the power away from the unknown and yeah, may, you're probably not gonna get into no colleges. You're probably not gonna have to go down that route, but if it does happen, you know exactly how you're gonna deal with it.

[00:29:03] Mollie: I love that. And I think, you know, say to you, you do such a great job talking about this, and I know you have. Episodes on your podcast where you, you do share your story of, you know, having anxiety and those tools are so, so helpful. Another tool I wanna share. It's just having an understanding of your own tolerance for uncertainty.

[00:29:23] Yeah. So many people have actually different tolerances for uncertainty. And I think sometimes our society valorizes people who are like, I can tolerate any amount of uncertainty. Yeah. My husband, who I met in college you know, he. Loves variety in his day. He never wants to know what's happening in the future.

[00:29:41] And I'm a little bit different on that spectrum, but, and we have an assessment on our website and in, in our book that can help you understand your own uncertainty tolerance profile. But I think it's okay to say to yourself, you know, I, I, I'm dealing with a lot of uncertainty. Are there ways that I can add more certainty into my life because that is something that I value.

[00:30:03] And even, you know, if you, you are waiting for College is to get back to you or you're playing to jobs. You know, these moments where you, you can't add, you know, necessarily you can't know what's going to happen. Maybe there are other ways to add more certainty in your life by saying, okay, I'm gonna like eat the same thing for breakfast every morning, because that's gonna be a grounding moment in my day when everything else is up in the air.

[00:30:23] Mm-hmm . And also just to know that, like how much uncertainty you want can change over the course of your life. So I remember in. School. It was like, I just really wanted to know, you know, what my future looked like. And I wanted that certainty. Where was I gonna college? What was I gonna do? What would my life be like?

[00:30:38] Who was I gonna end up with? You know, it's like, you answers to all these questions. And then I feel like in your twenties, there's a period where you're like, I don't wanna know what I'm gonna do for the rest of my life because I wanna do everything and I don't wanna shut down all these possibilities.

[00:30:53] And then, you know, now Liz and I are in our thirties and it's. Well, it is sort of nice to have some, some certainty because you're having to, to set up and pay for your retirement and all these things. So it, it will shift. And there's gonna be moments when you, you want more and less certainty.

[00:31:08] Sadie: Yeah. I think that's a such a great reminder and it's something that is really helpful to be mindful of, because again, you can go into these situations and.

[00:31:17] Know, like what your point is, where you're like, okay, I gotta cope with this emotion before it gets any bigger and that's different for everyone. I think another emotion that's also very subjective and can be so all over the place, depending on who you are in the situation you're in is anger. And it's, I, I, a lot of the times do think that's like the biggest emotion, because it's an, a lot of the times an external emotion.

[00:31:39] It's when you see in conflict, it's when you see. In interactions with other people, whereas like comparison, it's very internal burnout. A lot of the times you don't have like a physical representation of that. Whereas anger, we, we see a lot, especially in teens and younger people and in adults as well. Why is that such an like overwhelming experience?

[00:32:00] I know there's so many evolutionary reasons for that, but what are your guys' thoughts there?

[00:32:05] Mollie: Yeah. So, I mean, anger is, again, this is a hardwired emotion. And it does help us advocate for things that we care about. So, I think we're taught that anger is just like, you know, oh, I'm frustrated at someone else, but there's a reason that you're frustrated about someone else. And you're having a biological reaction where it's like, something has been violated either you have been violated or something that you really care about has been violated.

[00:32:36] And there are probably even

[00:32:38] Sadie: secondary emotion.

[00:32:40] Mollie: Yes. Exactly. Exactly. So there's probably even some fear there, you know, underneath that anger there's fear of, of something being taken away or something bad happening. When you're in the moment with anger. It's really important to give yourself a little bit of space to identify what those deeper emotions are, which usually means not like immediately reacting.

[00:33:00] And so you can say something like I'm having a strong reaction right now, and I need to take some time before I respond to you, but it is really important to follow up with the person to come back to them. Maybe that's 10 minutes later, maybe it's the next day and say, you know, Let me talk to you about what was going on there, why I was feeling angry, but, but talking about it in a way that's not getting emotional.

[00:33:21] So we, we need to learn how to talk about our emotions without yelling or getting emotional about them, which is like lengthening that time between the, the trigger and the response. But for, for many women, and people identifying as women. We have been socialized to say, okay, I'm just gonna suppress that.

[00:33:37] And now I'm not gonna come back to that because that's not an emotion that I'm supposed to feel. Yeah. But we lo again, we, we lose out on all that data about, there was something that felt violated and, and that's something that we need to pay attention to. I think there's also, you know, sometimes we feel.

[00:33:53] We wanna vent about something and that's a good way to deal with the anger. It's like, oh, I'm so angry at this person, cuz she did this and you don't tell the person directly, but then you go off to another friend and you like vent about it. And sometimes venting can make us feel better, but often it just leads to sort of like a chronic rehashing of the situation without actually changing the situation.

[00:34:15] Yeah. Because you're not talking to the person directly about it and it can be difficult. The other person to just listen to you, vent. I mean, that's an emotionally, that's emotional labor is listening to someone else vent. And so instead of venting, we like to say, you know, how can you go back to the person of the situation that caused the anger and try to deal with the root cause of that.

[00:34:36] And again, that anger is going to be fuel for you to go do that. It's like, it doesn't feel good, but it's telling you something needs to change. Yeah.

[00:34:45] Liz: Yeah. I think it's also it's, you know, there's I found myself in situations too. Where first I think it's just to emphasize Molly's point, like it's so important to recognize your anger.

[00:34:57] I think a lot, like a lot of people we spoke with were like, oh, I just don't get angry. And then we would talk to them about scenarios and they would be like, Oh, yeah, that was a violation. Or you bring up

[00:35:06] Sadie: all the synonyms for anger. Yeah. Totally feel those every single day. . Yeah,

[00:35:11] Liz: but they just don't wanna self-identify as an angry person, because again, it's such a stigmatized emotion, especially for women or people identify as women.

[00:35:19] And so I think it's just like, just letting yourself be okay with that feeling and sitting with it. And then also, you know, unfortunately there are going to be circumstances where. , it's actually not the best thing for you to go talk to that person directly, or you have talked to them and they just don't care.

[00:35:39] And that's sort of like a terrible but realistic part of life. And so then the question is like, what do I need for myself in this moment? And maybe it's, I just need to draw a boundary around this person. So I think it's, it's also important to. Yeah, kind of recognize if you try to make things better and they don't get better and you find yourself still angry, seeing like ways to indirectly meet the need that you have.

[00:36:06] And again, that might be like putting yourself in a different situation, cutting someone out for a while, at least. I think those are really important steps too, to have to like, just set those boundaries for yourself.

[00:36:18] Sadie: Yeah. The, the common thread that I think we keep coming back to is that like these emotions are all trying to tell you something like with anger it's that there, there is that.

[00:36:29] Primary emotion that is secondarily making you angry. Like there's that need to change something, whether there's fear underneath, whether it's insecurity or sadness anger is trying to get you to change the situation comparison. You feel again, that you wish something was different. Uncertainty, there's a fear that you're really worried about potentially happening.

[00:36:50] It's we, I feel like we forget that that emotions are trying to tell us things like we, we just, it's part of being human, but they really do serve a purpose. And if we listen to them, they can be really effective and it can also be a lot less uncomfortable to experience them. Yes, absolutely. A hundred percent.

[00:37:10] Yeah. The second to last emotion experience that you guys outline is regret I, I feel like it's one of those that really goes hand in hand with rumination a lot of the times. And I is that one of the reasons why it's such an uncomfortable emotion to experience or were there other things that came into play when you guys were researching and exploring regret?

[00:37:32] Liz: Yeah. Regret is extremely painful. Especially in the scenarios where you can't change the situation. Right? So there's like. I regret kind of being rude to my husband or whatever, but then, you know, there's like a 99.9% chance that I can just apologize and make it better, but there's like, I regret not telling my loved one that I lost something and I there's just no way to fix that.

[00:37:57] And so I think it can be this like extremely painful emotion, which is also why we often try to run from it. And it's interesting to watch there's, you know, I think we were all familiar with the like hashtag no regrets, live a life of no regrets. And it's important to say. You will have regrets because you can only live one life.

[00:38:18] So if you let's say you're choosing between two amazing colleges, it's totally normal. You have to pick one. And then you might think from time to time, like, what if I gone to the other one? Especially like on days when you're struggling or when things aren't so great. So just the fact that we have to pick a path for ourselves means you're going to have regret they're not inherently bad.

[00:38:40] And so even though they're painful, They also really help us make meaning in the future. So for example, I share a story in the book where my grandma died when I was in my twenties. And my parents are immigrants. And so I just went to my grandma's house a lot growing up. And it was kind of this connection to the extended family that I didn't know that well, cause I'm the only one in the us.

[00:39:05] And when she died, my mom asked me if I would go with her to clean out my grandma's house and kind of like helped sell it. And I, I don't know. I just like, didn't go. I was like, I can't get on an international flight right now. I have so much going on at work. And that is like thinking about my mom alone in that house is like horrendous for me.

[00:39:27] Like, I just feel so much shame for having made that decision, but sitting with that and realizing how much I regretted it a year ago when my dad was having heart problems, I just dropped everything and immediately went home. Cause I was like, I never, ever want to regret putting work over family again.

[00:39:45] And so. I wish that I had made a different decision. Right? Like I wish that I hadn't learned this painful lesson and yet it really does. There's also anger in there at myself. Like it does give me the strength. Now when the people I love need me, I'm just like, this is the priority. This is what I will always pick, because I don't wanna experience that regret again.

[00:40:08] Mollie: One, one thing I wanna share about regret is that I think sometimes we, we blame ourselves because we think, well, why didn't I make a different decision then? And for the most part, we made the best decision that we could. There are times when we talk in the book about different types of regret, and sometimes we do something called self sabotage regret.

[00:40:28] which is where we know in the moment that we shouldn't be making this decision, but we do anyways. Mm-hmm . But for the most part, it's sort of a, like, you didn't know in some way, and now you do. Yeah. You know, I think about this we've talked about choosing colleges a couple times on this, and I think, you know, I, I'm very happy with the decision that I made.

[00:40:46] I've met my husband in college. I've met many wonderful friends. I think in many ways though. Choosing to go to college on a, on a different coast from where I grew up, made my life more complicated. It meant that I was further away from my family. I stayed further away from my family. And I, you know, my life is more complicated than it would be if I had just never left my home city.

[00:41:06] And I was talking to my sister about that one day and she said, But you like, you know, you wouldn't be you, if you hadn't made that decision and like, you know, you made that decision because you wanted adventure and you wanted something different. And so like, you know, that was a decision that you made at 17.

[00:41:23] That was the best decision for you then. And of course you could have a different life, but it's like reminding yourself that, you know, you, weren't trying to. To cause yourself pain or make things more complicated. You are weighing the cost and the benefits, and you are making the best decision in the moment.

[00:41:37] And you know, 10 years later, you're going to see things that you didn't see then That can be helpful to, to then decide, you know, what do you wanna do about it now? So, you know, to Liz's point, I can, I can look at that regret and say, well, maybe I wanna live closer to my family now. And I did two years ago, I moved to be closer to my family.

[00:41:56] Maybe I wanna simplify my life in ways that I can now, rather than saying, you know, I, I never should have gone to school on, on the opposite coast for my family, cuz there's no way that I can change that. Yeah.

[00:42:07] Sadie: It's it's interesting. And I really like that. You highlighted how. You can, that emotion allows you to understand really where your values and priorities lie and make decisions going forward.

[00:42:19] But it's also. I think a really painful emotion, because while anger is urging you to make a decision to decrease the emotional intensity that you're currently feeling with regret, you're having an emotion, that's something about something that's already happened. Like you can't change that experience.

[00:42:34] You can't change the decision that you've made. And with that comes a lot of helplessness. And, and that's something that's really difficult. And I think that makes regret and guilt. So painful and really overwhelming because you do have that helplessness, that uncertainty which I think a lot of the times going right into the next emotion you guys outlined can, can lead to despair because you're like, what do I do?

[00:42:56] How can I move forward? I just, you, you again are really in that like helpless victim Headspace, which head space, which a lot of the times is kind of where you, you need to sit for a bit before moving forward. So, Molly, I know you mentioned in the book and also when we were talking before this recording, About your experiences with despair.

[00:43:14] And I think a lot of the times it goes hand in hand with experiencing depression. So I'd love to hear your experience there and the insight that you gained from navigating.

[00:43:22] Mollie: Yes, I'm happy to share. And I will give a little warning. I'm gonna talk about suicidal thoughts. So despair is actually the most recently defined emotion that we talk about in the book.

[00:43:35] It was not clinically defined until 2020 actually. Wow. And the there's seven indicators. It's feeling hopeless. Having low self-esteem feeling unloved. Worrying frequently, loneliness, helplessness, and feeling sorry for oneself. And some of those indicators do overlap with the diagnostic criteria for major depression or generalized anxiety disorder.

[00:43:58] But the last three. So loneliness, helplessness feeling sorry for one self, those are not symptoms of any other specific psychiatric disorder. So in other words, despair involves feeling depressed and anxious, but piling on feeling hopeless and unloved and helpless and sorry for yourself. And that really pushes it over into the intensity of despair and fall of 2019.

[00:44:21] If I had looked at that list, if that list had existed, which it didn't, I would've checked off all seven of those indicators and you know, what got me there. I had You know, I had no history of depression. I was 32 at the time. And I was a pretty upbeat person and I, a lot of things happened. I had been dealing with chronic pain for months.

[00:44:40] I had an experimental procedure done that made the pain. Worse doctors didn't believe that I was in pain. I had just moved from New York to LA I. Was feeling really lonely and no friends, my husband and I were ready to start trying to have a kid, but my period had gone away because of stress. So I was possible to get pregnant.

[00:44:57] And I wasn't sleeping at all and I just. I said, I can't go on my life is too painful. I don't wanna keep living. I, I didn't particularly want to kill myself, but I just really didn't wanna be alive anymore. And those thoughts were extremely scary because I had no idea what to do with them. I knew that sharing them with other people I thought would be really dangerous.

[00:45:19] Because I, I, I, you know, I never discussed these things with other people and, and what I, what I wanted was more stories of people who had had suicidal thoughts and had worked through them, because I think there's a lot of stories that we hear about in the media of people having suicidal thoughts and acting on them.

[00:45:36] And I'm glad that those stories exist because it's really important to share those as well as painful as they are. But I think, you know, there's, there needs to be more stories. Of people having these thoughts and being able eventually to go through periods where they don't have those thoughts anymore, or they don't have those thoughts as frequently.

[00:45:56] So they're not disrupting their lives as much as they were. And it's difficult for me to share this, you know, especially thinking about, you know, like my cousins hearing, you know, this story, but for me working through it was really about finding the right medication, which was helpful. Meeting with a therapist.

[00:46:13] I, I met with a therapist. Twice a week. I mean, I, I really needed to talk to someone that, that much, and then slowly opening up to my husband and my friends about what I was feeling and having them be able to say like, okay, you know, we hear that those are scary emotions. But we're here for you and you know, that's okay.

[00:46:31] It's okay that you're having those thoughts. It's not okay that you act on those thoughts, but it's okay that you're having those thoughts. And it, it was a very slow process. And when I talk about this in the book it started with, with really. Chunking time. And this is true for a lot of the emotions in the book.

[00:46:46] Like, all you have to do is get through the now. So it, it wasn't even about getting through the day. It was like, okay, it's 4:00 PM. I can go to bed at 8:00 PM. Can I get through the next four hours? Yes, I can be awake for another four hours and then slowly starting to do things again. So there were days and weeks where I like, you know, I, I couldn't do anything.

[00:47:05] I was. Didn't wanna get outta bed. And then it was like, okay. You know, I, I went to the drug store and, you know, previous version of Molly would be like, okay, that's all you did today. You went to the drug store, like compared to what you used to be able to do, but it was like, no, like that's a very small thing that I did.

[00:47:20] And I did go to the, the drugstore and collecting those things over time. And It's falling into despair, feels like falling into a bottomless pit. And it's like, well, how deep am I gonna go? I have no idea how deep I'm gonna go. And that's really scary coming out of it is like throwing. It's like climbing a wall and it's like throwing a pick against the wall.

[00:47:38] And it's like, maybe not that high above you, but it's one pick. And then like slowly and slowly working your way up and. For me, the thoughts then, you know, went from being like multiple times a day to, you know, once a day then to once a week. And, you know, they just, it's very, very slowly got better over time.

[00:47:55] Sadie: Yeah.

[00:47:56] This week's episode is sponsored by teen counseling. Teen counseling is an online therapy program with over 14,000 licensed therapists in their network offering support on things like depression, anxiety, relationships, trauma, and so much more via talk text and video counseling.

[00:48:11] So depending on what level of support you're looking for, they can help you out. If you haven't heard of teen counseling before they are better, helps branch specifically for teenagers. So what you do, if you haven't ever used better help or teen counseling before is you go to teen counseling.com/she persisted.

[00:48:28] You fill out a quick survey about what you're hoping to work on, whether that is relationships, depression, stress, burnout. They will match you with a therapist that specializes in that area. If you start therapy and you don't like your therapist, they make it super easy to switch and find a therapist that meets your needs.

[00:48:44] And then after you fill out the survey, if you are under 18, you put in a parent or Guardian's emails that they can give consent for treatment and provide payment. And I sent the emails to myself. All that it says is Sadie or whatever your name is, is hoping to work with a therapist from teen counseling.

[00:48:59] Please learn more here, give consent. None of your information in the survey is disclosed. Your privacy is completely protected because HIPAA is enacted. So. Super vague. You're then able to work with a therapist, start addressing what you are hoping to, and that's it. You are able to, again, text talk and video all from your home.

[00:49:18] It's a great solution. If you're looking to try therapy, but you don't wanna have to go into a therapist's office and deal with first intake sessions and all of that overwhelmingness and waiting list that happen when you try to find a therapist near you. So it's a great solution. and I'm a huge proponent of therapy.

[00:49:35] It was what changed my life. So highly recommend trying therapy out if you haven't before. So to check out teen counseling, you can go to teen counseling.com/she persisted again. That is teen counseling.com/she persisted to find a therapist today, I, I remember a lot of the same experiences and, and the same process of working out of, or working to get out of that, that pit of despair and suicidality. And it's something that's very difficult to do because you've almost labeled that as your go to skill or alternative. Like, I remember being in the head space where it was like, Everything sucks, but there's always this option.

[00:50:15] Mm. This is always either a behavior I could engage in or a mental spot that I can sit in and get some kind of relief emotionally. And so. It was my go to way to relieve the distress that I was experiencing, whether that was depression, anxiety, these other large emotions. And I had to get to a point after slowly starting to like decrease the intensity and frequency of those suicidal thoughts of being like, okay, but this is no longer an option.

[00:50:43] Like, yes, for a while I survived by having this as the plan B, this was on the black back burner. This is the only way I was making it through these intense feelings. But now I'm at a point where that can't be an option because I have to get to the point where I, my, my life worth living was not having suicide be on the back burner.

[00:51:02] That's not, wasn't the end goal. That's not where I wanted to be. And so at some point I just had to kind of make that decision and allow myself to explore other roots of coping, whether it was distraction or asking for help or venting or talking through things. And taking away that safety blanket, that for so long had allowed me to, to work through the distress that had arisen.

[00:51:23] Mm.

[00:51:24] Mollie: Sadie, that's such a good way of describing it. That that was so true. That safety blanket, because it's like, yeah, it's like it's a learned habit and it's like a safe space, not a safe space, but it's a, it's a comforting space for your mind to go to when things are going bad. And you're just like, well, You know, I could always not be here.

[00:51:43] Mm-hmm and it does. It takes. A while. And it, you know, the interesting thing is like, there's not a clear line in the sand where it's like, suddenly you don't feel like that anymore. And I think when you're in that you want that. Cuz you're just like, these thoughts are so bad. I either don't wanna, you know, I just don't wanna be here anymore.

[00:52:00] So I'm not thinking them or I just wanna be out of this completely because this is just so hard. It's those thought are so distracting because you have them. You're like, okay, well, you know, at least I could do this. And then you're like, But then I'm having these thoughts again. And what is that telling me about it?

[00:52:16] And, and it really is. It's a slow process and it, it doesn't happen overnight, but you are right that eventually you realize, oh, I haven't had those thoughts in a while. And then sometimes they do come back. I think once my therapist. Put it as like looking over the edge and deciding that actually you don't wanna go there, but it's okay.

[00:52:33] Like sometimes we do have to look over the edge and even today, you know, it's not that I never have those thoughts, but I have those thoughts and I say, huh, like, that's interesting because that no longer feels as appealing. I, I know that that's there because I've gone there and, you know, I've made my, made myself think about that as an option, which I hadn't done for the first 32 years of my life.

[00:52:53] But. You're slowly, slowly, slowly, you do make your life better to the point where that doesn't feel like the automatic comforting place where you go

[00:53:05] Liz: to.

[00:53:05] Sadie: And you're like, no, I do wanna be here. It's like, your life is no longer a place that you wanna leave. It's the place where you wanna

[00:53:15] stay. And so it's like first navigating. Thoughts because the thoughts are making your life worse and then it's creating a life that discourages the thoughts because you really do enjoy it. And it allows you to feel better

[00:53:27] Mollie: and creating that life may not be going back to the life that you had previously.

[00:53:32] Yeah. So I think that's another thing we we're, we're sort of like, well, I just wanna get back to, like, before I had these thoughts, well, most likely your life is going to look pretty different than it was before for a good reason. Whatever was happening there wasn't working, which led to the despair. Yeah.

[00:53:47] So it does require recrafting your life. And for some of that it's acceptance. So I had to go through a journey of just accepting some of the pain or, or how long it was going to take in physical therapy to work through the pain, even though that, but, but I did get there. And, and so rebuilding an acceptance means that that that life after that is, is going to look different.

[00:54:07] Sadie: Mm. So when someone comes to you with these really big overwhelming things, whether it's struggling with suicidality, whether it's struggling with despair, burnout, comparison, how do you guys recommend that people respond? Is it validating? Is it just creating space? I think a lot of us just wanna problem solve and throw advice at it. What is your guys' advice there? How through the resource that you did for your book, how would you recommend that people support others who are navigating these really tough emotions?

[00:54:39] Liz: Yeah, I think I, I wanna call out something when it comes to despair that I actually learned from Molly while we were writing this book together, which was she shared a story where someone said their therapist and Molly, correct me if I'm.

[00:54:51] Getting this wrong. Just said to them, like, if you are gone, I would miss you. And I think that's just like such a nice to your point, I think we often try to jump to problem solving, or there's often this tendency to be like, I'm gonna fix this, you know, like your life isn't that bad. Like, look at this, like, look at the bright side you're you have all these privileges and what we don't realize that that does is like really.

[00:55:13] Minimizes someone's emotions. And so I think the biggest thing is just like creating space for them and saying like, I hear you, I acknowledge you. Like, I love you. I'm here for you. If you did something really drastic, I would miss you. I, I just like, that has stuck with me for a long time. And then this, so when I was, when my father-in-law was dying I also found.

[00:55:38] That a lot of people that I knew loved me and cared about me. Didn't know how to show up for me. And I just didn't have, like, I had no energy to help them show up for me. And so they would kind of like send me a text and be like, let me know if you need anything. And I was just like, I do, I do not have the time to figure out like what I need from you right now.

[00:56:01] And then one of my friends who had gone through something really similar sent me this text that was like, Hey, I'm thinking of you. Here are three things. You just text me one, two or three, and I will do them for you. One, I will get you food at your apartment two. You can call me and I'll pick up the phone right away.

[00:56:18] And I will just listen. And three. I will like send you something to distract you, like a funny joke. And like, whenever you need me to, as soon as I can, I will try to respond with these things. And I thought that like, she just got it. Like, she just totally understood that. I didn't have the capacity to come up with those things, but it was just like, I don't even think I ended up texting her that much, but it just like knowing sometimes at night when I couldn't sleep that, like I had someone to text to, to that she would like immediately respond made me feel so much better.

[00:56:54] And I think it was just the like, Really trying to see it from my perspective and not it wasn't the fixing. It was just like, I'm just gonna be here for you. Here are three ways for me to do that. You don't have to, you don't have to like creatively come up with a full way for me to show up for you. I found was like, just so, so helpful.

[00:57:14] And then yeah, I'll hand it to Molly cuz I think she also has great advice here.

[00:57:19] Mollie: I think. Checking in constantly. So I had a friend who, when I opened up to her, you know, I said, I I'm feeling like I don't wanna live anymore. And she, then, you know, she was stayed on the phone with me, but then she texted me every day.

[00:57:32] she just, and it wasn't didn't require a response, but just like. Check in, in, she would tell me something about what was going on with her, or, you know, it was really thoughtful. And it's people who don't always expect who, who call and check in. And it doesn't need to be a big thing, but it, it, it really does help in these moments.

[00:57:51] Sadie: Yeah. I, I really like what both you guys highlighted where it's like, not necessarily expecting the response or the reciprocation from the person? I remember my grandmother had pancreatic cancer and she got into remission and Really did the, did the full circle thing recovered, but once she was initially going through chemo and had the Whipp all of her neighbors and friends and family members were like dropping off meals and writing letters and texting and calling.

[00:58:19] And I remember her saying years after the fact that that was so exhausting and almost. Opposite of what was helpful because they would drop off a meal and the person was like, oh, this will be so helpful. I am giving her one less thing to do, but the way she saw that was like, no, but I have to clean the Tupperware and return it to this person and say, thank you.

[00:58:39] Or they would call. And she'd be like, now I have. 45 people to call back, or they would write a letter and she's like, now I have to go to the post office and add a stamp and mail this to the person. And it's like, maybe going into it. You're like, no, I don't expect a response. But when you don't say that and make it very clear, like, especially when that person is so.

[00:58:56] Prone to feeling overwhelmed. And again, in despair, it can seem really overwhelming to them. Same thing with like when people would drop by and she'd be like, I have to get off of the couch. I have to go and offer them a beverage and make them feel at home. And all I wanna do is just sit here and recover and relax.

[00:59:14] And so. I think making it abundantly clear that you're just there and that they don't need to do anything in return or as a response. And I, I really do love what you said, Elizabeth, that Molly said when she was struggling, which is to say, I would miss you. That was all I wanted to hear from them, everyone.

[00:59:31] It was like, I remember wishing someone would say that when I was. Through that low point in having those thoughts. And so I think any of those things that you guys mentioned would be hugely appreciated and just very beneficial to the relationship. If someone does come to you with one of these big overwhelming things, Great point.

[00:59:51] Well, I know this conversation is gonna help so many people and I, these are things that all of us, I feel like navigate. At some point, we all experience these spectrum of emotions, and I feel like this gives a lot of ways to cope through these things and. Your book just has so many helpful resources to continue this conversation and it breaks it down so well, like even the charts and the graphs and the pictures, just amazingly verbalize on and just explain these emotions in an amazing way.

[01:00:22] So I highly recommend everyone check that out to wrap things up once again. Where can people get the book and follow along with you? Two?

[01:00:31] Mollie: Well, again, thank you for having us. And people can find the book it's called big feelings, how to be okay. When things are not okay, and you can find it on Amazon bookshop.org, your local bookstore.

[01:00:42] We are Liz and Molly with an O L L I E with an I E. You can find us on Instagram and our website is Liz and molly.com. And again, I, we really love your podcast. We, we really like what you do. Especially for this audience. And thank you for sharing your story with the world.

[01:00:58] Sadie: Yeah. Thank you. Both.

[01:01:00] And everything will be linked in today's show notes, so you guys can get their new book and their first book and continue to fall along. Thanks so much. Of course. Thank you guys.

[01:01:11] This week's D B T scale is a cop ahead scale. The COA ahead scale is part of the emotion regulation module, and the goal of this skill is to reduce stress by preparing in advance for a emotionally overwhelming, stressful new situation.

[01:01:27] So there are five steps to this. The first is that you describe the situation that is likely to prompt uncomfortable emotions. So maybe it is the first day of school. So you are anxious about meeting new people or making new friends or introducing yourself. You are going to check the facts about what is accurate, what is likely to happen and be very specific in describing the situation.

[01:01:49] Make sure. You know, the who, what, when, where why, and put names to the emotions and actions that are likely to interfere with you using skills. Are you anxious? Are you overwhelmed? Are you feeling alone and isolated? What is gonna get in the way of you being effective? Second, you are gonna decide what coping or problem solving skills you are going to use if those emotions arise.

[01:02:12] So be specific and write down in detail how you're going to cope with the situation, your emotions, and then your action urges. So if you feel anxious, are you gonna do deep breathing? Are you gonna go to the bathroom and drink some water? Are you gonna use an affirmation? Are you going to count things around the room?

[01:02:27] What skills are you gonna use to target each emotion? Third, you are going to imagine the situation that you've outlined in your mind as vividly as possible. Imagine yourself in the situation. Imagine watching the situation. And then the fourth step is to, in that imagined situation, rehearse coping effectively.

[01:02:46] So imagine exactly what you would do, actions, thoughts, what you would say, how you would say it. How you would cope with a new problem, if that comes up and really make sure to use these coping skills and your imagined worst case scenario. So if it's the first day of school and you're like, I'm worried I'm gonna fall down the stairs in front of everyone.

[01:03:05] Okay. What would you do? You would get up. Would you leave the situation? Would you laugh it off exactly what you would do to handle that? And the last thing is to do a little bit of relaxation. And calm down after going through the anxiety of rehearsing the situation to get back to your baseline. So self-care distraction, accumulating positives, just bringing yourself back to a good head space.

[01:03:27] So that is the cope ahead skill as mentioned in this week's episode, and then a little bit more in depth here at the end. If you used the cope head scope, make sure to send me a DM telling me how you used it. I'd love to hear about you guys using your D B T skills. So with that, thank you for listening.

[01:03:42] Thank you so much for listening to this week's episode of she persisted. If you enjoyed, make sure to share with a friend or family member, it really helps out the podcast. And if you haven't already leave a review on apple podcasts or Spotify, you can also make sure to follow along at actually persisted podcast on both Instagram and Tik TOK, and check out all the bonus resources, content and information on my website.

[01:04:03] She persisted podcast.com. Thanks for supporting. Keep persisting and I'll see you next week.

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