EP:3 When the Walls Fall Down and Someone Get Shot. A Raw Conversation with Leslie Yancey. Part 1

Are you ready to get up close and personal with the realities of trauma, military mental health, and the journey to healing? Join us as we sit down with Leslie Yancy, a seasoned respiratory therapist, and an inspiring mental health advocate. Her firsthand account of the inherent complexities of mental health and the unique manifestation of trauma offers a fresh perspective on a subject that's often glossed over.

Through a fascinating exploration of the unique bond shared by first responders and the military, we learn about the intense pressures of perfectionism, service before self-excellence, and the hidden trauma in high-stress professions.

 You don't want to miss this inspiring conversation.

Nurses and Medics: This is your platform! We want to hear your stories of the good, the bad and the ugly. Send us an email at cominghomewell@gmail.com

Do you know a health worker that needs a laugh?
B2B N.F.L.T.G. Certificate click here

Get the ammo you need to seize your day at Soldier Girl Coffee Use Code CHW10 for a 10% off at checkout!

Special Thanks to
Artwork: Joe Weber @joeweber_tattoos

Intro/Outro/Disclaimer Credits:
Pam Barragan Host of 2200TAPS Podcast
"Racer" by Infraction https://bit.ly/41HlWTk
Music promoted by Inaudio: ...

Transcript

Speaker 2: 0:12

I'm so glad that you're coming on to say this, because trauma is an individual dirty right.

Speaker 1: 0:19

Absolutely and so there's no comparison.

Speaker 2: 0:21

We shouldn't be comparing your trauma to my trauma, because when you tell the story and experience the story, they're two different things, absolutely.

Speaker 3: 0:31

Yeah, I've heard trauma described and I thought this was a very good description that it's not a pie, that it's not that there's only so many pieces to go around, and oh, if yours is worse than mine, then you get a piece of the pie and I don't. So I thought that was a really good analogy. That it's not. We're not trying to outdo each other. Your trauma is trauma to you and my trauma is trauma to me. So don't I hear a lot of people do that, a lot of oldie goldies do that. Oh well, you haven't seen anything yet or you know what this is. So, yeah, trauma is not a pie. There's enough for all of us.

Speaker 2: 1:11

Unfortunately.

Speaker 1: 1:12

I think we're particularly bad about that in the veteran community too, as soon as we start breaking it down well, where did you deploy, where was it to, and what was your job while you were there? All of a sudden, we're racking, stacking and they didn't. They didn't see shit. No, no.

Speaker 3: 1:27

Right, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So we've got to, we've got to do better, we got to do better at that Definitely.

Speaker 2: 1:35

I crossed the board because you know you include military into that, and now we're a whole other level and that's we actually did. Our previous podcast to this one was talking about military mental health, and so really we just probably need to go into this right now, since we're kind of starting to talk about it. Is that military mental health is we have to, or military medical mental health is what we're focused in on is that we have to deal with all the stressors of medicine all by itself, which we know is very stressful in of itself, and then we get to go put this other whole layer on it of the military, and that comes with its own flavor of trauma, right, and it's not like, ooh, we have more than you. No, because some people actually went through the military in medicine and probably had a very sweet life and didn't really experience a lot.

Speaker 2: 2:28

And other people, you know, they experienced a lot and they were in every you know, campaign or conflict or first one sent out or maybe they're with a special forces troop and they saw a lot more stuff, right, but the difference that makes for us is that we have to come back to work and we have this expectation of like perfectionism. That's what's always exploited in us, and I don't care what military person come back to say, oh, that's not really true. Yes, it is, because that is what they breed in us is service before self excellence. And all we do Semper Fi, you name it. We are supposed to be there when duty calls and we all believe in it because we're all in the military, we all do that. So when you add that environment on top of medicine, I mean you know it really wreaks havoc in our community.

Speaker 3: 3:23

You know. And one thing that you mentioned perfection and having these very, very high expectations. And you know as well as I do you can train all day long, you can do every advanced course, but until you get into that situation you don't know how it's going to go. You just don't.

Speaker 3: 3:42

And one thing that I had to do, part of the healing process, because I took so much pride and I only identified as my profession and I know that's common in the military community as well that there the sense of pride that you have and your sense of purpose is in your profession, and that's one thing that we do very wrong is we have to be somebody outside of those jobs. But one thing that I personally had to own and I was always I always had a strong spiritual belief, faith, but I didn't own it. But after I kind of went through my little meltdown that I had and I had to say you know what, I don't decide if someone lives or dies, that's not me, that's not up to me. I can be used as a tool to help save someone. I can do everything that I know to do to assist someone. You know survival, but at the end of it it's not my call Right.

Speaker 2: 4:50

And so that's something like I'm going to hold you on that, because that's kind of like where you get to right. So I'm going to back us all the way up. So if you guys were all joining us, we kind of jumped into conversation because it was really good conversation. And we're here with Leslie Yancey and they say that right, yancey, yes, yeah, okay, perfect.

Speaker 2: 5:10

So Leslie is a respiratory therapist by trade and she has this crazy story that I think a lot of us will identify with in the medical community is that she was working for 15 years at a level in trauma center in the greater Appalachia area. Is that correct? Yes, and so it's her story of what she dealt with and then what she realized that she started to develop PTSD and why she developed it. And then the rest of the story is what she did about it. So you know, we have two choices we can freeze up and we can just sit there and sit and spend on it, or we can do something about it. And so Leslie said she's going to do something about it. And we found her on Instagram and I reached out and I was like, hey, we want to do something about it. And then I heard your story and she said Okay, and so she popped up.

Speaker 3: 6:03

All right, yeah, I know this is awesome. I'm excited to have this conversation with you, ladies.

Speaker 2: 6:09

Yes, so back to where we were talking about. Where did you start? You were from the Appalachia area, and tell us your story from there.

Speaker 3: 6:20

Okay, sounds good. So I think my, I didn't know, you don't know what you don't know. So I realized later in life that my childhood actually probably played a big role into my mental health issues later. So that's why I kind of started out with saying you know, I was raised in a pretty rough environment, started having kids young in life and ended up in the respiratory profession. And I do I say that because, again, I think that all plays a very important part in my mental health. And so again I thought, well, if I'm going to be a respiratory therapist, I'm going to be the best that I can be. So I started working, actually as a student, because at that time I had two small boys and I needed to provide for them financially. So I started working out as a working as a student therapist prior to even receiving my you know, my licensure. And I started working at the trauma center that we talked about and in my head I thought it was kind of like a, it was a privilege to work in the intensive care units there. And again I think that my brain, looking back now, I think that I wasn't happy with my choices as far as profession and I, you know, I'm just going to be honest, respiratory therapist is an amazing profession. But I believe that in my head I thought maybe I should have done something different. And so I thought well, you know, I'm going to, I'm going to be the best that I can be, and I wanted to work in the critical care areas. But to work in those critical care areas, you know they were very highly skilled therapists that were working in those areas. So my next thing was well, if I can't work in those, I'm going to work the ER. Because, again, my thought process is, if I can handle anything that comes into the ER, then that'll graduate me up into the intensive care areas. So that's what I did for a lot of years.

Speaker 3: 8:22

And the schedule also. I worked evening shifts, so it was three to 11. My two boys were babies at the time, so they weren't in school. So that was a good shift for me because I would get up, I would be with them and then leave. So I got to spend some time with them and I worked the three to 11. Now, if you've ever worked in a hospital or a trauma facility, those are some pretty hop in hours, you know. So I yeah, I worked that three to 11 shift for several years and I got baptized by fire very, very young, and I think I was 22 at the time, so you know it was young. So I started traumatizing myself at a very young age and you have to be clear.

Speaker 2: 9:03

When you say like three to 11, it's like as soon as your foot is in the door, until whenever you can finish it done.

Speaker 3: 9:11

Right, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So, so, yeah, you hit the ground running. You never knew what was going to come in the door. We were always pediatric and burn trauma, and then we actually shared trauma with a hospital across. We shared adult trauma with a hospital across town. So we were odd days, but what that made us was every New Year's Eve, you know, and you know, 31st and 1st. Of course, those were back to back.

Speaker 1: 9:41

I did the 13th.

Speaker 3: 9:43

Yeah, yeah, so, yeah. So we were always odd days on trauma, so it was always a very hopping emergency room.

Speaker 2: 9:52

Do you? Just a curiosity question. You said something that kind of sparked my, my curiosity when you said you, you, you might have actually not wanted to do RT, respiratory therapy. Like you kind of questioned your choice and I relate to it because and I love being a nurse and I think nurses are amazing and I've been a nurse for over 30 years and I have huge amounts of respect to it. But if somebody said, hey, you're gonna do it over again, I might not have picked nursing not not for anything other than now that I know me better.

Speaker 2: 10:24

So I was just wondering if there was any similarity to that.

Speaker 3: 10:28

So I was actually my third year of college and I was in school to be a speech pathologist. That was my long-term goal and I ended up getting pregnant and having my first son. So the speech pathology is a master's program and I was an Ohio resident and I knew that for graduate school I was probably going to have to leave and at that point I had a son and I knew I wouldn't be able to.

Speaker 2: 10:58

Yeah, yeah, it's decisions right, we have to.

Speaker 3: 11:01

Now, you know, now I'm 22 years later and you know that son of mine, he starts medical school. Oh that's amazing. Yeah, yeah, so he just, he just graduated his undergrad and, yeah, starts, starts medical school here in a couple of weeks. So so we all turned out okay, you?

Speaker 2: 11:21

did. That's really awesome. Anyway, it just popped in my head. I was curious. So you're working in the trauma center, you know, and you're, you're bopping a lot and we know we were young going into these high adrenaline situations whether it was the hospital deploying. Actually, MZ works some mortuary affairs. So she got to see not some awesome things, yeah.

Speaker 1: 11:43

So to understand the whole questioning our choices and occupation, I didn't choose my my first job in the military. It was handed to me and was started off making sandwiches. Shout out to the services career field Not at all what I wanted ended up getting a shred out doing the mortuary gig and later on as a medic and even after that special duties. But can kind of understand the bouncing around and wondering did I make the right choice for me? And reflecting back on that, I think it definitely shapes who we are now and kind of what we wound up with in the long term.

Speaker 2: 12:22

Right.

Speaker 1: 12:22

It shapes us.

Speaker 3: 12:23

Yeah, it does. Yeah, and I mentioned the childhood thing because I think so many of us military included and first responders, healthcare workers I think that a large population of us were introduced to trauma pretty early in life and I think that once that sympathetic nervous system has been stimulated, that changes us from the jump. So I think that we are already a lot of us are already created. So when I talk to a lot of first responders and healthcare workers now, there's a lot of childhood stuff that they really need to work through and then it's just further compounded by the traumas that we see in our work life. So it definitely so many of us go into service fields because of things that we have experienced in childhood. So that's why I bring that up, because I think that was probably that. I think that I care for others and I have that, I guess, that drawl to take care of others because of childhood situations.

Speaker 2: 13:32

That would point. I mean, and then we're all adrenaline junkies on some level. We're extremely are Then you. I'm sure there's research on adrenaline junkies and childhood trauma because we're primed right, primed up to feel that, get that rush, and we think it in all sorts of ways, right Like.

Speaker 1: 13:54

Anthony Yep, no, most definitely the case. And then too I think that desire, that drive to help somebody else, make them their condition, their emergency step in and make it better. I think some of that childhood trauma can kind of fuel that desire to, later on in life, be of good use.

Speaker 2: 14:15

Yeah, because you don't want anybody else to feel like you did, whether you consciously believe this or not, you? Don't want somebody else to feel like you feel. So this is like perfect because we're primed, we're all primed.

Speaker 3: 14:29

There's actually a word for that, for the priming. But neuroplasticity is we rewire our brains and it's really crazy because I always use the. I always describe it as, as moms and all three of us here speaking we think of it as if we were to see a child get ready to run out into the street. The three of us here would naturally grab that child. There would be no thought process. We call it, we are wired to respond. Okay, so that's that neuroplasticity. But we've all seen the mom who lests their child run out in the middle of the street and they don't respond and you think, oh my gosh, why, why wouldn't they respond? Like, I don't understand that.

Speaker 3: 15:13

But we are actually rewired. We have rewired our brains to act quickly and to respond. So that's neuroplasticity and to me that it's just amazing that our brains do that. But what I learned later in life is that we've spent so much time rewiring our brains that now that we're in this place where, oh crap, I'm kind of a mess, what do I do we have to purposefully wire us back the other way to relax. And that's kind of where we all stick is in that response mode, that sympathetic nervous system, the adrenaline junkie. We have to purposefully work to rewire that.

Speaker 2: 15:56

Unlearn, we have to unlearn.

Speaker 1: 15:59

Yes, I'm okay, go ahead. No, I was just gonna say I understand what you're talking about, but can see where it would be such a challenge for people that are, especially those that are still in uniform, to take that journey on try and rewire their brains all at the same time, having military pushing their ideals, their values, their be quiet, sit down, suck it up, go color, while people are trying to do just what you explained rewire their brain, get it to calm down so that the central nervous system can begin to heal. So trying to do those two things at the same time can be so conflicting it doesn't work. I mean, it really doesn't.

Speaker 2: 16:41

But I'm gonna hold this thought because we're gonna go back to this neuroplasticity. Ask MZ. I'm like a total nerd in this stuff and you'll find out why in a little bit. But I wanna go back to your story. So you were doing this when did for like 15 years, and I said oh, go, go, go. When did you start realizing like this, there's something off here, like I'm not performing right?

Speaker 3: 17:04

Yes, so I ended up having and again, hindsight is 20, 20, I ended up getting divorced. I'm a mother of four and in 2014, I had a friend that dramatically died coworker friend and she passed away dramatically and after that, like I said, I didn't know at the time but was definitely in survival mode. We were all in survival mode, ended up getting a divorce and I think a lot of that now. Listen, I needed to get divorced and I don't regret it Whatsoever.

Speaker 1: 17:37

Hand me your business girl.

Speaker 3: 17:39

But when I look back I think that I think my friend dying dramatically. I think I was just done, and then that further spiraled into okay. Then it led to a divorce. So I was still working 100% in survival mode for little kids, soul income, and I had applied for several upper management positions, didn't get them and at that point I thought you know, I'm not going anywhere. I've been here for 15 years, I'm going to seek other jobs. So I applied for this clinical training position with the company I'm at now and I left bedside. And when I left bedside it was like my world fell apart. And I always say I like to listen, I'm big on analogies because I feel like that's how we understand things.

Speaker 2: 18:39

And I think that my person on analogies make the world make sense.

Speaker 3: 18:43

And I'm country, so this is what I say. You know, if you were raised in the country, you understand that barns catch on fire a lot because hay's put up wet, it creates a bacteria, the bacteria creates heat and barns catch on fire and the first thing you do when your barn is on fire is you have to run the animals out of there, because the animals will actually seek shelter in the barn that's on fire and the reason they do that is because that's their safe space, that's where they eat, that's where they rest and I, as being in the roles that we're in our safe space is that barn that's on fire. And when I left that place of fire, I crashed and burned.

Speaker 3: 19:30

I didn't know what I was doing in life. I thought, you know, and I prayed constantly God, did I leave the one thing that I was intended to do? Did I make this horrible bad choice? I was in a state of depression that and I'm not a depressed person, I'm not a, I'm definitely a, you know, pour yourself up by your bootstraps and get on with life type person and I, truly I couldn't breathe. That's the state of depression that I. It took energy just to breathe and that's the.

Speaker 2: 20:04

Thing.

Speaker 3: 20:05

You sure you enjoyed the military yeah.

Speaker 1: 20:07

That's the sound of like us leaving the military Shockingly familiar.

Speaker 3: 20:11

That's the best way that I can describe it. So you know when I left that fire, that's when you know I started. That's when the night terrors got worse, that's when intrusive thoughts got worse, the anxiety got worse, and it was because, I believe, my central nervous system was trying to regulate itself. During that time I was only in sympathetic nervous system overdrive and it was almost a physically painful experience and all I knew to do was to try to educate myself and try to find out why I was having such issues. Because you know, on the financial side I was making more money. I could have never made the money that I was making at bedside. I had a better schedule, but I lost all of my friends, all the camaraderie that you have, that social network. My job was my everything. It was who I was outside of, just being a mom who's washing dishes and washing clothes and doing homework. I was, and I don't wanna say a hero, but I had purpose and I left all that and I had no idea what to do with myself.

Speaker 2: 21:35

So you literally just described, probably almost perfectly, what happens to a lot of us when we leave the military, yes, yes, and if we do a dual fold, because we can leave the service itself but we can also leave our career field, and within the military we can leave our career field and go into other career fields, like with special duty assignments. So we're constantly in the state of transition. Within the military. It's not always as bad when you're going from one career field to another, because it's probably something you wanted and it's something more adventurous and you still have the shell of the military that's still providing that familiar structure. Yeah, there you go, good word and so.

Speaker 2: 22:22

But when you get out away from all of it, it is a whole different ballgame. It's even within the military. When you're going from either a deployment or overseas assignments back to the US, people will suffer a loss because overseas, whether you're in deployment or whether you're in a overseas assignment, there is a level of camaraderie there that doesn't exist in the US. And when they come back, we all experienced it and we're like, oh, this isn't the same, this sucks. Everybody does their own thing. What happened to our group?

Speaker 1: 22:57

Literally just like the little things too. I had lived out on a tiny little island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean for four and a half years and when I yeah, coming back home, stateside was, I was super excited. Finally going to get to see family now and then and be on American soil this is going to be amazing, so excited. Right, get home and it's overwhelming as hell. Even just going on a trip to Walmart, you go from not having. You can have deodorant A or deodorant B, and now you come home and there's 82 choices. Yeah, and it's those simple things that compounded, there's just a whole other way of living life.

Speaker 1: 23:41

But you touched on something I wanted to go back to educating ourselves on what's happening and kind of making sense of why am I feeling this way? How did we get here? Trying to find a rhyme to the reason. Because you know you don't feel well, you know you're off the mark, you're not performing at your best, and especially, you know when friends or even colleagues come over and say, hey, are you, are you doing all right? And then you realize, okay, this isn't just inside. People around me are starting to see it too. I think that there's power in education and arming ourselves with knowledge, and one of the ways personally I've been able to help myself and understand others is there was a book called the Body Keeps the Score, and it oh my gosh, it's on my Kindle, mine's on my Kindle, yeah.

Speaker 1: 24:37

Okay, so you already know. Yeah, I mean that read was so mind-opening for me and just understanding tangibly, in black and white, easy to understand language, what is going on. And why do I feel this way? Because I you know you feel crazy, You're.

Speaker 3: 24:54

Yeah, yeah, 100%.

Speaker 1: 24:56

Not yourself, but I think, when we can begin to understand physiologically why is this happening. There's power attached to that Huge power huge.

Speaker 3: 25:07

You know and I want to go back to you know, when my friend that passed away, we were, we had children about the same age and a lot of people don't understand, the general population doesn't understand when we talk about that camaraderie. You know I had worked side by side with her for 10 years and we had went through divorces together, we had went through pregnancies together, we worked our weekends. We had the same weekend shift. So you know, for 10 years we had that same group of seven ladies that you know we ran that hospital. You know, every other weekend we were together where you know we celebrated, you know, birthdays, holidays, christmases, whatever that that our shift fell on. You know we celebrated together. And when, when she passed away, you know we were expected number one to show up and still do our jobs and do our jobs in the environment that we shared with her. That the general population doesn't understand. We were still supposed to take care of people at the same expectation level when we had lost our teammate and it wasn't just someone who sat across from us at a cubicle or someone that we passed by, you know the coffee pot. We worked together saving lives, and that's something, again, that the general population doesn't understand with military, with first responders that you know she and I may have never spoke again about a traumatic situation that we're in, but we shared that moment together and that creates a bond that people truly just don't understand unless they've lived it. And so when I see, you know, first responders or military that's passed away, I have an ache inside of me because it's such a relatable heartache that I've. You know that I feel for those people because it's so much more than just a coworker and that's something that you know the general population doesn't understand. And I really go into when I do my presentations, upper management, preparing for that moment because statistically it's going to happen and you know you don't prepare for an emergency during an emergency. You prepare prior to that emergency and I really, really preach for people to have a plan in place for when that happens to one of our colleagues, because you know how that was handled was even more traumatic than the event itself.

Speaker 3: 27:43

And I look back now and again. So many of us that worked with her and that were close with her, we were in a downward spiral and I don't mean to laugh. This is that sick humor thing, right? We get to be worried about that. Yeah, so you know like and I do say this, what I'm putting, and my friend knows that I say this but you know, like, we were all in a downward spiral to the point that, you know, I ended up divorced.

Speaker 3: 28:06

Another one of our close friends. She shot her husband and, listen, she held pressure until the ambulance got there and he survived, but, listen, she shot his ass and I was like, oh my God. And again we look back and she knows that I mentioned this, but we were all in such a I mean like, I don't, we were, we were so aggressive because anger is a safe emotion and aggression is how we, I mean shoot, I mean we were aggressive. We were aggressive and that's because that was the only way we knew how to cope. Yeah, during that time, and you know, and I think that that probably started my downward spiral and then it just took it a couple years for me to completely crash.

Speaker 2: 28:58

It's funny. When you said the anger, I think of a friend of ours and I still I just teased her about it the other day. We were these years ago. She was going through some personal things and very faith-based Christian and we were walking and talking and she says you know, I don't, I don't get angry, and because I burnt my immediate, I burst out laughing right and I was like what? And she's like, oh no, I just throw it up to God. And I was like, well, why?

Speaker 1: 29:26

the hell. Did God give us the emotion anger?

Speaker 2: 29:28

then right, and so scroll ahead, she's. She decides, like you know, I gotta, I gotta go to therapy and I gotta work this out, and she did. She was like all into it and her therapist is you're angry and she goes, huh, and she goes. You've been talking to my friend, I know she was, my friend said that too, and she's like no, I just throw it up to God.

Speaker 2: 29:49

She goes yeah, whatever, you need to go, hit a pillow or something. She's like you're angry, Right. And then after that it was hilarious because again the warped hilarious, right, because she that weren't trying to do stuff and this anger is bubbling up and she's been like allowed, told you're angry, you validated that emotion and so now she can't really suppress it and so it would come out in these like random ways and she's trying to control things. Then she'd yell at me because I was trying to help her and you know, and I understood what was going on, so I would sit there and then she'd look at me and she's like I don't like this anger thing.

Speaker 3: 30:27

So one of the fascinating things. Another thing and I always bring this up too is anger is a secondary emotion. Anger is not primary Good point, so anger comes from some other place either. It's shame, abandonment is another place that anger comes from, and I always.

Speaker 3: 30:46

One thing that I learned after I crashed and burned was I was very, very angry and very aggressive. So I try to approach people differently, especially when they are deflecting anger towards me. You know I have to think okay, what could they be feeling right now? How can I reassure them? How can I help with whatever it is that is causing this anger? But if you've dealt with and I say respiratory therapists are a very, very aggressive group within the hospital because we're in every emergency situation and a lot of those emergency situations are with staff who aren't used to emergency situations. So when we respond to things like on the floor, on just the med surge floor, we are very used to critical care situations. We are very used to very, you know, emergent situations and that staff that we're dealing with isn't always able to deal with those situations.

Speaker 2: 31:44

You bring up a very good point. So if there's any civilians that are non-medical listening to this, you need to understand that not every medical person you see is good at handling critical situations. We've all seen it. So there's those.

Speaker 3: 31:59

They label us. Yeah. So lots of times we're labeled as aggressive, as know-it-alls, as pushy, because we can see that declining patient and they always can't. Right Now. Problem in lies that lots of us take that same personality and we bring it in public. We bring it to our families. Yes, and that's where we have to draw the line for sure.

Speaker 1: 32:26

That's hilarious. You have mentioned that anger is a secondary emotion and I agree completely. There's a there's a why that comes before that. But I also think anger is a safe emotion. Oh, absolutely, you know, it kind of prevents that vulnerability factor or keeps us from looking weak. I would much rather look angry or assertive, and bold and confident. Yes, then sit there and allow somebody to see me cry and be soft, right, right, and especially in our line of work. You know, in as healthcare professionals and also in the military too, from day one we're red, do not be weak. You pick yourself up by the bootstraps. Keep it moving. You need to cry, you go, do that on your time. But I think that might also be where some of that anger comes from, because one, it's safe, keeps us from looking weak, and just the nature of our occupation. We're going to go that direction.

Speaker 2: 33:27

When I was a as a flight nurse and we used to remember going into some of the countries where we had to I couldn't wear a uniform and I felt so uncomfortable just changing out of my flight suit into I had to wear like a long skirt or a long pants. I had to there was a dress code to what we couldn't wear, and I hated it because I had to go in as function, as the liaison and I was female in a patriarchal or Patriot or but I have exactly what you should have.

Speaker 2: 34:02

I'm a male dominated, Don't ask me. And a male dominated, yeah, society and we were just you could feel that energy. So and the whole point I make to that is that when you are taken out of your comfort zone and you, you now do have that vulnerability we're not used to that and we're not used to it as medical and we're not used to it as military which makes us even more of a ass, or bad ass, or pain in the ass or what you want to call it. We're just asses.

Speaker 1: 34:34

No, I think you're spot on though, because there's been a thousand times over the course of my career where I pardon me if this sounds cheesy, but almost feel transformed, Having a situation go on at home not feeling great about it, kind of just weak and uncertain, but something almost. I said it might sound a little cheesy, but bear with me Something almost magical happens when you put that uniform on, lace up your boots and get ready to go. It's almost like a superhero cape, like okay, whatever's going on, I can fucking handle it, I've got this and I'm good, it's your armor.

Speaker 2: 35:16

I mean that's your armor Scrubs. I mean same. You throw the scrubs on and you're now at business end of the story. You've got to get down to business. So we're gonna go take that, we're gonna go shove it into our Pandora box with everything else and we're just gonna and. I'll process it later, Later, 32 years later. Right now, we're gonna process it and we don't do small, we go big.

Speaker 1: 35:39

We're gonna process it all together.

Speaker 2: 35:41

We're gonna shoot a friend or our husband in the ass, and then we just. Which is so? That's a whole other story regarding in trade.

Speaker 1: 35:51

Some people shave their heads, some people get tattooed, some people shoot their, their spouse, I don't know Right.

Speaker 3: 35:57

And I won't say that he didn't deserve it either, so that's good to know he had it coming.

Speaker 1: 36:02

He had it coming.

Speaker 2: 36:04

You know yeah, so once you saw all this going on and you saw your decline and your friends. I mean, if you're gonna go down, you might as well go down together. But we that's right. Why is it glory? That's right, thelma Louise, that's what we always joke about. I always joke about retirement. My retirement was like one day I was in and the next day I was out because there was certain COVID. I had no retirement, I had no nothing. It was just very Right. But the running joke was like, yeah, I said hi, better that way, Because if I was going out normal, I would be that scene with the bomb going off behind me and me walking Right, you're walking, yeah, yeah, it's probably about a COVID happen. It was good. So when you got to this point, like, how did you? What did you do? You started educating yourself and how did you bring yourself to where you're at now?

Speaker 3: 36:52

So I did so. I started educating myself, reading books, anything I can get my hands on, and I reached out to several friends, just privately said, hey, you know, if you know what do you struggle with? And these were people that I had the utmost respect for, people that if my child was in a traumatic situation, if I was in a traumatic situation, these were the people that I respected and that I wanted in that room. And you know, when they started responding and saying you know, there's a situation that I relive over and over this. Actually, I have the dreams, I have, you know, the nightmares, this kind of stuff. And I started gathering information from those people too. And I thought you know what, if these people who I have all this respect for, if they can have issues, then I need to allow the idea that I've got some issues too. You know, and I think you know, going back to us saying that you know that we're bad asses and that we're tough, and I think that you know, if you ask the people that I worked with, that was me, like I, any situation. I was cool as a cucumber, I got this, but I never, I never admitted. You know, you wouldn't have seen me cry. You wouldn't have heard me say that, hey, this situation really bothered me. You know, I was never that person. And then I thought you know, if I'm having issues at the level that I know that I was at professionally, then other people are having issues too. So I kind of reinvented myself and that was how I also coped with leaving that fire, leaving that bedside care was I thought you know, I'm going to educate myself, I'm going to work on healing myself and then I'm going to reach back and I'm going to grab the next guy. And that was kind of that was kind of my journey.

Speaker 3: 38:47

So I started seeking, like different programs, different ways that I could gain, you know, certifications to you know, even bet more further my knowledge. And that's when I got my certified trauma recovery, coaching and a lot of that dealt with childhood trauma. So again I went in with the idea that no, I'm going to process this trauma from my work environment. And then we hit so much on childhood trauma. I thought, oh, maybe I started a little bit earlier than what I realized. So that's kind of where I went was I thought, you know, there's not a lot in the medical field, there's not a lot of support. A lot of people aren't talking about it. First responder community is doing a little bit better about owning the fact that these environments are, you know, detrimental to our mental health, but I don't feel like healthcare is really doing a great job at that. So that was my goal was to at least plan a seed and say, hey, you guys need to recognize that we're in, you know, traumatic work environments and that we need to focus more on mental health.

Speaker 2: 39:53

So is your. I saw your Instagram. I said hero to hero. Is that a non-profit? Is it just a G-page? Is it?

Speaker 3: 40:02

So I kind of I, of course I'm one of these that has, you know, so many irons in the fire, and it's not, it's something that most of the time I go and speak you know I'm not, I don't get rich off of anything by any means and actually and my employer is really, really great that they're supportive. So I speak at a lot of medical conferences and in turn, like I may speak, and then they give us a booth for free. You know, like they, I trade out my speaking. I still get to deliver what my message is, and then my employer, you know, supports that. And then, you know, I work my regular job at that conference. So, and it's, you know, I've spoken, spoken at national levels. It's really something and it's something that I will continue doing more with. And, of course, covid hit we all none of us were really doing anything during that time. I did, you know, some speaking virtually, which I hate doing Me too.

Speaker 2: 41:04

You get no feedback, you don't even know if they're hearing you Everybody's, just a camera off and I'm like I'm not really looking at you, but I'd like to know there's an audience there.

Speaker 3: 41:13

I've been in that situation too. Yeah, so, so no, it's just, it's something that I do right now. It is truly a passion of mine and I just I dedicate what free time I have to to, you know, getting getting word out, getting information, education. I do peer, one-on-one work and I've done that quite a bit and usually people just reach out to me and we set up a schedule and I will work one-on-one with them as far as you know, kind of counseling type sessions.

Speaker 2: 41:44

So I'm going to ask this question. So I told you in the middle of it. I'm like, ooh, I'm going to nerd out on this. Do you have, have you worked with, or done any work with, neurofeedback?

Speaker 3: 41:55

So I have not. I do think that, you know, all of that stuff is so fascinating and interesting to me and the reason I hit on that is because most of us in the medical field were very I feel like a lot of times when people are doing trauma, they hit on this. It's okay to have emotions, it's no. I don't want to hear that. I want to know scientifically why this has changed my brain. I want to know, give me scientific grounds as to why I'm feeling this or why my body's reacting in this way. So that's why I do the approach where you know, I I education on a scientific grounds, you know. So that's my take on that.

Speaker 2: 42:41

So neurofeedback, if you ever I could, I could nerd out all day on this, but it is definitely scientifically based. And what's very frustrating is that anything that is not fake pharma related, then you end up having to not get it covered by insurance. So if you guys hear dogs barking, my dog is outside here barking and will not shut up. So if you all hear that, I apologize. It's driving me crazy and distracting me, but what it really does is you know we, our brains, are amazing. Right, it is survival. That is what our brains are meant to do. We are going to survive and that's where the neuroplasticity comes in. And the earlier you get the intervention you know, the younger that we intervene with you know children and young adults the more neuroplastic the brains are and the better chance of a really good recovery.

Speaker 2: 43:42

It doesn't mean that adults don't have neuroplastic brains. We do. We're seeing that right more right. There was like a whole big article done like years ago it was on the front of Time magazine, if I'm not mistaken and they were finding benefits of exercise with Alzheimer's right, the neuroplasticity and the nerve building and all that. So our brains can still change. It just takes a little longer because we're a little older. But neurofeedback, I have witnessed it. I know more than I should ever know about it. I've had it done myself. It is amazing and this is what I like about things like neurofeedback, emdr, mechone therapy.

Speaker 2: 44:22

What people think when they have had trauma and me was like I gotta go talk about it and I don't want to talk about it and so forget it. Yes, talking will help the healing process. Not everybody can start with talking because they're so inflamed, absolutely. And so I've said to people well, you know what if you could actually do some level of healing without talking about the actual trauma? Maybe thinking about it like if it's EMDR and you know, or you know just working with a horse or neurofeedback, and they think you're crazy and I'm like no, because what you've got to do is get that inflammation down Neurofeedback. When you can get the body to not have that sympathetic, parasympathetic response, then guess what you can do.

Speaker 2: 45:18

You can talk about it, which is when they do things like ketamine injections, which still freak me out. But you know they people are like, oh my God, that's amazing. I'm like, yeah, it is, it is amazing what they do. But it also freaks me out that you're shoving a paralytic into a ganglion and what you're doing is stopping the brain from sending the message to the rest of your body. So you don't respond Right. And we know that with significant trauma, I've seen it. We actually had to stop somebody that was in therapy because their blood pressure was going through the roof. They were having such a physical response through the top right, so he may have been a person that could have done ketamine right, but doing the ketamine or doing the neuro by itself you do stop that response. But now you got to go back and talk and start working out and healing out those wounds right. To me it's like a multi modality.

Speaker 3: 46:16

Yeah, there has to be and that's just like we said, everybody's trauma is different and everyone's healing process is different and you truly have to find what works for you and be purposeful in doing that. Yeah, you have to be purposeful, you know you have to help yourself. Help yourself, yes, that is. That is a very important thing. And and it, yeah, you have to find what works for you.

Speaker 3: 46:40

And, as far as you know, going to therapy and I've heard a lot of people, their complaints are, their stories are so shocking to the therapist yeah, military specialist, yes, that you know and you know I could. When you tell and I, you know I don't say stories, but you know, like I could tell you, you ladies, the situation and you know you probably wouldn't bat an eye. But if I go into a therapist and I say, well, you know I was, I was sticking my fist in someone's chest cavity because every time I bag, the air was coming out their bullet wound in their chest, you know, you can tell that they become overwhelmed with what you're telling them and that's not a therapy situation that anyone is going to be comfortable in Well and there's also a whole other level of therapy which is trauma informed therapists.

Speaker 2: 47:33

Yes, says a therapist, and I am not downplaying any therapist. I think that is that is the key. Is that you guys connection and trust? Yes, but I have witnessed, I have been part of, I have helped receive, give care to people and I have seen the difference between a trauma informed therapist, a therapist that have worked with people in adulthood, that have maybe experienced some adulthood in trauma, not downplaying the trauma, it's just a whole different level on the approach. There's a whole different level. I mean we could get into what we're not going to because I'll go forever, but dissociation, different levels of dissociation and you know, etc. Etc. And and if you are, I mean I've had some my therapist friends say, yeah, no, not trauma informed, do not want to do that, they'll tell you straight.

Speaker 2: 48:29

I've had other people that are like I can do that and I can read it going yeah, now you know, maybe go work with a trauma informed and learn, and I think that's right, but please don't, because you're going to get yourself in over your head and it's going to be a bad experience for not only you but them.

Speaker 3: 48:49

And I think, yeah, that's why a lot of people avoid therapies is because they don't find the right fit and they, you know, maybe give up too quickly or you know they don't have the resources to help guide them to the correct fit. You know, and I think that's that's definitely. We need to do a lot better at that as well.

Speaker 2: 49:09

So here's a question that popped in my head Do you? So? You made a comment that that medical people were not good with the whole mental health care, you know, etc. Etc. But do you, do you see this day and age I don't know if I want to word it properly but where they can go get care quietly and still be able to like kind of do their career?

Speaker 2: 49:35

and I'll compare that to the military we talked about this in our previous podcast that you there's no, there's really no quietly getting care in the military, right, I'm saying you're healing with an audience you're healing with an audience and and people might be appalled by that and I'm like you get to understand it's not like they take your medical records and slap them up every everywhere for everybody to read. Although debatable, yeah, but it's. Commanders have a need to know on certain things and certain care groups will end up knowing. And then when you get into subcultures, like you get into guard and reserve culturally, guard is state right so you can be in a base and it's like your dad's there, you're there, your kids there, your uncle's there. It can get nepotistic and I have seen people move before they get care, like I'm out, because they know if they start getting care and other people find out it'll spread that level of privacy just isn't there.

Speaker 2: 50:43

So does the civilian community. Do they have an easier time getting that care?

Speaker 3: 50:49

No, I don't. I don't believe. I have actually seen very few friends or coworkers get therapy and and to speak to what you said, one that comes up in mind had had several infant deaths. That she worked within like a period of a week, two weeks, very traumatic, and she saw it, that's, and she saw therapy and we all knew about it. We all knew about it and it was a very and of course our manager had to have been the one that told someone. That told someone. That told someone because she wasn't telling us. So it was kind of like we knew about it and we recognize that, yeah, she dealt with some tough stuff, but yeah, we were all talking about it, we all knew about it. There was no confidentiality there.

Speaker 3: 51:38

And in regards to the speaking about traumatic events, one of my friends who was special forces had attempted to go to a therapist and he actually went to a social event and someone else approached him and said hey, I heard you're working with so and so, and so at that point he knew that the therapist he was working with had told someone else. So of course he didn't go back again and it's that let in, it's. You have to have that trust aspect you have to have that, hey, this is a safe environment, everyone's not going to know about it, and that's. That's something else that that we're doing really shitty at. I mean, we're you know you can't get any meds without somebody knowing. You can't seek help without everybody knowing. There definitely needs to be a better system in place for that.

Speaker 3: 52:28

And they want to preach us and want to preach us to go get help, but the minute we do, everybody knows about it backfire and blow up and people's faces, and it's wild to me.

Speaker 1: 52:38

We're medical professionals, we're all taking the annual HIPAA, the never ending briefings of you know protect patient information, operate ethically and we're all hearing this on a very regular basis. So why does this continue to happen? It's just crazy. But I mean I would encourage anybody that that might be struggling to tune in and just listen to what we're talking about, because that early intervention that these ladies touched on earlier is key. I mean I don't have the numbers or stats sitting in front of me, but I know for a fact that there have been studies done that show early intervention. Not only will it will get you feeling better sooner, but it can also slow down a host of disease processes heart disease, all sorts of stuff.

Speaker 2: 53:26

It's not just yeah, it changes your brain. I mean, when you're a kid that brain is. I mean, it is that there are gaps in. I was reading this last night and is, interestingly, my. I write a blog and, interestingly, one of the things that I noticed was that when they are little, you know, the younger they are, the more developmentally delayed they are, with the more trauma that they receive and then guess what happens. It impacts us later in life, but we don't relate all the way back to that. When they go get, when you go get care, you handle this acute event. You handle the events that happen in your adulthood, versus going all the way back to childhood, which, leslie, that's the first thing you said is that, to understand, I had a rough upbringing and that's what probably primed me up from the trajectory of my life, you know. And now I'm like, oh yeah, that says a lot, you know.

Speaker 1: 54:30

And I'm like, damn, now I gotta go think about that and that's important to note to that it's not going to look the same for everybody. Yeah, even if we happen to have similar traumatic experiences, the way to people heal and recover might look completely different. We are all unique and so are our needs. So I think understanding when we go to get help, having the mindset of kind of like a toolbox it's not always as cut and dry as see a therapist take an SSRI. Sometimes those require those other things like detox was talking about equine therapy. Some people do aquatic therapy, acupuncture, acupuncture yeah, battlefield acupuncture. There's so many avenues out there and I mean I'm not I'm not a doc, so this is just my docking box. Yeah, docking box. I saw this on Google one time. I just think it's important to go into it with an open mind and trial and error, because not every therapist is going to be a great fit and that's okay. Move on, get another one, but be open to the idea of trying a myriad of things.

Speaker 3: 55:43

Yeah, yeah, I'll say this too and this isn't a popular statement, but I do say this because I see a lot of people that are young in the professions that claim the mental health and the PTSD. And if you are early on in your career and you realize that it is affecting you mentally, find another career. Yeah. And you know, do not continue. Do not be 20 years into the woods and then decide, hey, I should have gotten out of this.

Speaker 3: 56:19

If you're early on and you're struggling, find something else. That job will still be there. Someone else will step into that position, because not everyone is made to do these roles. But then on, you know, we do need to do better at supporting those so that we can stay in these roles. But you know, these young people that are are admitting, hey, I've got, you know X, y and Z that I'm dealing with and I need to take all this. You know, maybe time off and things like that, definitely consider doing something else. You know, and that's okay. You've got to realize, hey, you know, that's okay, I'm going to protect myself for the long run and I'm going to find another profession, and that's okay too.

Speaker 1: 57:03

Leslie sparked a question when you were explaining that. What do you think the correlation between sitting in a job that's not necessarily fulfilling it's creating more problems than it is doing good? What do you think the correlation is between that situation and compassion fatigue amongst medical provide providers?

Speaker 3: 57:27

Oh, it's huge. And I think a lot of people, when you go into the roles for the wrong reason or not understanding, I think lots of times we go into professions and we don't really understand what it's going to ask of us. So I think it's a very high correlation between they're just unfulfilled and you know they need to get out and do something else. So definitely make sure that you're going into a role for the right reason. And you know and I I'm going to admit that I wasn't going in for the right reason and I didn't understand what I was going to be exposed to. So for those that that may be listening, that aren't sure what that job is going to entail, you know, do your homework, do your shadowing, do more than one candy striper shift.

Speaker 3: 58:17

And I think that we need to do a better job at educating in these programs, in the nursing programs, you know, in the early on in the medical field, maybe that first semester we need to be saying, hey, look, this is what you're going to be exposed to. This is this profession. This job is going to change who you are, how you parent, how you live your life, how you perceive the world. It truly does change us in that way. So I think if we did a better job at letting kids know this stuff you know from the from the get go maybe they would make more educated decisions.

Speaker 2: 58:55

I think I would. This was my little snarky thought when you guys were talking like if you guys don't know if you're coping or not, if you're like 26 and the profession smoking cigarettes and drinking alcohol after every share you're coping.

Speaker 1: 59:09

Here's your signs.

Speaker 2: 59:11

You might want to change the professions. Have a look at this. I say that humorously, but that is what happens. I mean, I think one of the again inappropriately funniest things I saw was I worked on a step down cardiac unit and I the people around me would blow my mind. They would go in and they would talk to them about you just had bypass surgery and now you need to eat like this and no smoking and no drinking and yada, yada. And then they step out and they grab their cigarette, grab their donut, go outside and have a break and they're right, 50 pounds overweight, and watch that and you're like what? Because we're coping. Yes, really taking it for the team, literally we're taking it for the team.

Speaker 3: 1:00:03

So, yes, or if you're I always say, if your payroll deducting a huge amount of your paycheck to pay for your anti depressants, anti anxieties, you know, maybe you need to reevaluate your coping mechanisms. Very good point?

Speaker 2: 1:00:17

Yeah, all right, and did you have any last thoughts?

Speaker 1: 1:00:23

Just one, one quick question, leslie. If somebody was interested in reaching out to you or might be interested in your coaching services, how would they do that?

Speaker 3: 1:00:32

Yeah, so I and you know, if you guys want to provide my email, that's, that's perfectly fine. I'm pretty easy to find. Social media is you know? That's fine for people to reach out to me there. I have the Facebook page and the Instagram or email is totally fine. And I also do you know, public speaking for healthcare workers. So so, yeah, I'm pretty pretty easy, just reach out to me and and yeah, I'll help in any way I can.

Speaker 2: 1:00:58

Thank you. Awesome. Alright, I think we're going to wind it down, because we probably could talk for like days I think we could yes. Yeah, we're like little kindred spirits all together, like a lot that we can unpack. Yeah, maybe we'll have to do a second session. I have to. I do think so because this is such a hot topic right now, I mean after COVID ripped through the medical community.

Speaker 2: 1:01:23

Yes we're feeling it now. I mean, there's a what's the movie called Gut wrenched? It's on Netflix. I have not seen it and I was highly warned to be careful if you're a parent on watching it. But it was about trying to get services, you know, medical services for kids. You know, and I'm like, oh my god, and I tell people like this is not the time to be sick and to you really need to take care of yourself. Like the medical community is exhausted, yes, the military medical community is equally exhausted, yes, and we're all just too stubborn to quit, and lucky for all you guys in the civilian world, we are willing to keep going. And when you see that not so awesome customer service and I'm not condoning it, I'm just saying when you see that or you see that lack of energy, ask yourself why? Why is that there, you know? So, all right, I think that's everything for right now, because we'll just keep going if we don't stop.

Speaker 1: 1:02:23

Now. I'm so glad that you agreed to sit and talk with us for a little bit today, leslie. This has been time well spent and I really do hope that we get the opportunity to talk with you more in the future. I think that this conversation has been great and I agree we could keep going. I got 1000 questions already sitting in the back and like no, nope, nope, save it for next time.

Speaker 2: 1:02:43

But do a part two, we'll have to figure it out.

Speaker 3: 1:02:45

That's totally fine. I'd love to spend more time with you, ladies.

Speaker 2: 1:02:48

Perfect, All right from everybody on the side of the world. Mz you ready?

Speaker 1: 1:02:54

Let's do it.

Speaker 2: 1:02:54

All right, we're out everybody. Thanks for listening to bullets to bed pants. Have an awesome week. Peace out, adios.

Speaker 1: 1:04:00

Hey, hey, yeah, hey, hey, hey, hey hey.