In This Together: Building Resilience When Caregiving for Your Partner

28. Unpacking Trauma's Hidden Impact - A Conversation with Stephanie Romeo

September 03, 2024 • Marika • Season 1 • Episode 28

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What if past traumas are silently shaping your caregiving experiences? Join me as we sit down with life coach Stephanie Romeo to unpack this profound interaction.

Stephanie opens up about her own journey through trauma and recovery, revealing how these experiences can resurface later, multiplying the emotional load. We discuss the dangers of trusting our thoughts when we're emotionally vulnerable and the importance of staying present to avoid unnecessary suffering.

This episode is packed with insights and practical advice that you'll find invaluable, whether or not you've faced trauma yourself.

In our deep conversation, Stephanie sheds light on common pitfalls people encounter when grappling with trauma, including how it can unconsciously influence our relationships today. Stephanie emphasizes that our thoughts can be particularly unreliable when we are feeling down and shares techniques to manage this, helping you find emotional stability even during difficult times.

This episode is a treasure trove of wisdom on managing emotions, healing from trauma, and finding peace in the midst of life's challenges.

See below for more resources and to connect further with my guest, Stephanie Romeo.

References:
www.stephanieromeo.com
Go to the Work With Me tab to download her free guide.
Watch the video of this interview: A Conversation with Trauma Coach Stephanie Romeo

As a Resiliency Coach for people who are caregiving for their partner, I'm here to support YOU, the caregiver. Learn more about my work at www.coachmarika.com.

Marika Humphreys:

Hello caregivers and care partners out there. Welcome to episode 28. I have a special treat for you today. I did an interview with a fellow coach and friend of mine, Stephanie Romeo, and we talked about the impacts of trauma. Stephanie is a life coach who helps people heal from past trauma, and where that interlapses or overlaps with caregiving is that I have definitely encountered clients who have been triggered by the things experiences they're having in their caregiving journey. Sometimes it's with their partner and what they're going through caregiving journey. Sometimes it's with their partner and what they're going through. Sometimes it is other things, but something in their life triggers a past trauma and they find it extra difficult. Sometimes we aren't even aware of these traumas. Other times we are, but Stephanie has suffered a trauma as well and she learned a ton from her own experience and now helps people through that process of healing from trauma.

Marika Humphreys:

In the interview, I want to highlight a couple things that we talk about here which are just really helpful for anybody, whether you've gone through a trauma or not. But one of the things we touch on is some of the mistakes that people often make when they're going through a hard time, and one of those is that when we are emotionally down, whether we're in a depressive state or even just not feeling well, haven't slept well, we have a brain that offers us thoughts that are not reliable. Basically, our thinking is unreliable. That's one of the things Stephanie points out, and I have found that to be so true in my own life and in my clients' experiences too, too, that when we are not at our best or when we're not rested or feeling well, our thinking is unreliable. So it's something that you really want to be aware of and conscious of. And the second thing that we talk about is that the way we think about the past and the future, we can use it against ourselves to create more suffering. That is something I've seen a lot with my clients and I think shows up a lot in life, whether you've been through a trauma or not. So this conversation is really packed with some great things, and I think we could have talked a whole lot more. Both of these topics are really important.

Marika Humphreys:

If you want to learn more about Stephanie, go check out her website. I will post it in the show notes stephanieromeocom. I again highly recommend it's not just for people who've experienced a trauma. You can go to the work with me section and download her free guide. So I do want to also offer that, if you want to watch this interview, watch the video of this interview. The link to watch it is in the show notes, and that is closed captioning as well. If that is more helpful for you, All right, so let's dive into my conversation with Stephanie Romero.

Marika Humphreys:

Hello everybody, I'm Marika Humphries and happy Monday again, and today I'm excited to share with you a friend that I have made recently. She and I went to the same coaching school, the Life Coach School, and we met recently and we decided to talk about some of our overlaps in coaching. She is a trauma coach, and so what I have found is working with lots of my clients. Oftentimes, when their partner has a diagnosis or they kind of go through this crisis in their life, it can often trigger potentially a past trauma that they've experienced.

Marika Humphreys:

And so today we're going to dive into a little bit about trauma and I want you to hear Stephanie's story, because it's pretty incredible, and we're just going to talk about sort of all things around that and also really how you can take this time to whatever challenge you're experiencing in your life to see the really that, the magnification that it gives you on how, to, how current life right now is precious, and then some of the mistakes we make by. You know, like Stephanie and I were just talking about suffering more than we need to, so we're going to talk about all of those things here in the next half hour. So, stephanie, welcome, and why don't you go ahead and introduce yourself and then just tell everybody a little bit about yourself, your story and what you do everybody a little bit about yourself, your story and what you do.

Stephanie Romeo:

Well, thank you, marika, for having me, for inviting me to this conversation. So I'm Stephanie Romeo. I'm a trauma coach, creator of a CAL method. I'm also a speaker and an author. I came to life coaching after a life-changing event For me. That was an accident that I had while I was eating lunch at a restaurant. I went to get some food at the buffet and the buffet exploded in front of me, so I was the only person hit, sprayed with burning chemicals and a fireball in my clothes. That was yeah, that was a thing. Yeah, I ended up with severe burns and, beyond the excruciating amount of pain there was this I felt into depression, like a deep depression. I suffer from ptsd and I thought I would never be happier again, and this event has triggered um, like as we called, maybe as trauma, which was the death of my dad in the in his um in the crash of a plane, in a plane crash, and he was trapped by the fire, so being burnt after him, uh that was uh, I mean that the the situation.

Stephanie Romeo:

I was not equipped I would say it this way I was not equipped, like I am now, to face whatever life throws at me. Yeah, this is what I do actually now as a as a trauma coach. I help people stop reliving the pain of trauma, feel better and be equipped to handle whatever comes and and not feel an endured by by the past trauma.

Stephanie Romeo:

And live happily and delight again, which I thought was not possible. I really thought I was trapped In some kind of yes, okay, happy, yes, I am, but when you recover Because it's a long process and I thought I would never be light again this is the lightness, like knowing about the pain, how much it's possible to suffer. I thought it was like a print like okay, this is, this is the way you live now. Yeah, fully happy, and I'm here to say that you can be whatever you're going through now. There's another path anyway.

Marika Humphreys:

I, you know your story. I mean it just gives me chills hearing about it because I can just, I mean it's so, um, no one expects that it's the kind of crazy story that you hear about. You know that happens to other people and to, yeah, I don't think anybody could ever be prepared for that. It's, it's and. But I feel like also, that is life. Life takes these turns that we do never, not ever, expect, and then it becomes. How do you deal with them?

Marika Humphreys:

And you're talking about how you never thought at one point you would never be happy again or fully happy again.

Marika Humphreys:

I can really, I definitely felt that way after I lost my husband it was about a year after he passed away and I just remember thinking I can't imagine having joy anymore, like, and I was working and you know, basically living, my quote unquote on the outside look like a very regular life and I, you know, I think people at work would have thought I was fine, but I just had no joy in life.

Marika Humphreys:

And also, like you, I'm happy to say that I love my life now and have great joy in it, so that what we feel in those moments of dark times are can, don't have to last forever or don't have to be our new permanent state, um, which is yeah, so, yeah. So you talked about how that experience also brought back the memory of of losing your father. What would you say just for people who may not really understand what trauma is? How would you describe it to people, like for someone who doesn't maybe fully understand the word trauma, which we use, I think, a lot more these days, but maybe people don't really know. How do I know if I've had a trauma? What actually does that mean?

Stephanie Romeo:

So I describe it this way, like something that you have lived in the past and that conditions in a negative way your life. Now, when you think about it, it's painful, or maybe you may not remember the trauma consciously, but your choices, your actual choices, your current choices, are made according to this past event abuse in when I was younger. I may have difficulties to be in a relationship because of the, because of the fear, so that I'd like to, but I can't. Maybe I sabotage all my relationships. So this is um, this is the way I would describe it like, like the negative impact that it can have and, if you are aware of it, like the memory that comes back to your mind.

Marika Humphreys:

Yeah, that's. I have found that with some of my clients, as I mentioned before, when they're going through their partner's diagnosis and potentially, if their partner gets worse, it can trigger something in their past that is traumatic and that happens sometimes and I think again, like we don't always, we're just not always aware of it or it may not impact us in conscious ways, like you mentioned, but subconsciously you're subtly or subconsciously sabotaging relationships because of a past abuse that maybe you weren't even aware of. So, okay, that's really helpful. The other thing I wanted to ask you was you know we talked about before we started recording, just like what do you think some of the you mentioned, some of the mistakes you feel like people make? Can you talk about that a little bit?

Stephanie Romeo:

Yeah, so when you were describing like cancer can impact our lives and that when we think that we will never be happy again, that when we think that we will never be happy again, I wanted to mention something here is that when we feel bad, we feel bad. We cannot rely on your, on our thoughts. Our thinking is not reliable because when we feel bad, our vision of the world is distorted. We lack clarity.

Marika Humphreys:

Yeah.

Stephanie Romeo:

To. We are not our best. Of course we know that we feel bad, but it also we are not our best. Of course we know that we feel bad, but it also we have thoughts that, um, create a disservice to us. They they are not useful. They are not helpful and that's why I say that when we feel bad, it's like a rule that I have now for myself and that I teach also do not trust your thinking. Step back until you take yourself to a better place, where you feel calm, at peace, when it comes from love, actually, when you feel grounded, and then the mind doesn't go crazy again, and then you can find hope and a space where you can feel better. So this is the first thing that I think it's really important, and we are not this, we are not saying that, like we are used to trust our thoughts, we don't question them. Actually, we just think, we think and we leave. We don't even think about thinking.

Stephanie Romeo:

Right, right, right yeah but, for example, when I so, for example, when we have these thoughts like when I had or when you had, like I will never be happy again. That's a lie. Because, why? Because it makes me feel bad, right, when I think that, that makes me feel despair, yeah, plus, and that's a sign that my thinking is not right, I feel bad, I lack clarity. I cannot trust these thoughts. It's just like so, be patient, take yourself to a better place. Well, there are tools also for that, but I think that's the the most important things. And then there are other things. So do you want to react to that?

Marika Humphreys:

maybe, yeah, I, you know, it occurs to me that, um, that's also true when it can be little things in your life. So I recently got over like a two week it felt like three weeks, I don't know I'm still getting over a hundred percent just being sick, like this constant chest congestion and sore throat and coughing and even little things like that. And then I have my sisters struggling with some arthritis herself. And you know, in those moments even of just when we're not feeling well or we get bad news, for a lot of my clients that can be like a doctor, what something the doctor says at the their most partners, most recent, you know recent, you know appointment.

Marika Humphreys:

And I just, I love the way you said that, like when you are feeling bad, you just can't trust those thoughts because that is where your mind goes to dark places, and you do, and we often tend to project that it's going to feel like that forever, you know. So I think that's true and just with little things, like little daily, not so much daily, but just the ups and downs of life, when we aren't feeling well. Or you know, we, I don't know, got a bad night's sleep and then we're. You know, for me I get grumpy when I have a bad night's sleep and just kind of recognizing that whatever is in your head at those times is not reliable, I think that's just. Yeah, that's really a great way. I like a really great way to think about it. Yeah, so what else?

Stephanie Romeo:

And because what we need is actually this is we need us in these special moments, like in face of challenge.

Stephanie Romeo:

Whenever I face a a challenge, I'm always thinking I need to be there for myself so it means that we really aware of how I feel and like maybe my thoughts are not like, oh, I feel bad, so like, let's not trust this thought, so. So this is already a way to be there for ourselves. So another thing that we do is related to the past and the future. So let's talk about the future first. We are as humans. We need to make sense of the things and we need to make plans. So we built a future in our head so that we can learn things. And this future and we forget about it is hypothetical, right, yes, this future does not exist and but we need we do that so that we can just act and live because we are. This is the way we are.

Stephanie Romeo:

But what happens is when we go through some like a challenge, like oh, this is not going to be this way, we use this hypothetical future, which is meant to help us create our lives and feel good. Actually, that feels good to feel and to plan things, but we use it against ourselves, thinking and we will not do that and we were supposed to do that, and maybe, as time goes by, we think and we should be doing this or that and we should be going there, and instead we are here doing this or that and we should be going there and instead we are here. No, actually this is, this is some pain that we create that thinking to this hypothetical future, which is only here to help us just be humans and live our lives. We use it against ourselves yeah, and how did?

Marika Humphreys:

And how did you? How did?

Marika Humphreys:

you did? You find yourself doing that when you were recovering.

Stephanie Romeo:

Oh yes.

Marika Humphreys:

Like in what ways? Yeah?

Stephanie Romeo:

Well, that started at the hospital. That was during summertime, and the accident happened in a very nice place, fancy place, where I used to I like this kind of place, of course, it's like, it's nice, you can dance, you so it was a nice place and and I have. I had all the things planned during my summer, yeah, but when I ended up in, stuck in my bed, um, I had my both my body and my both hands burnt. Couldn't, uh, do anything.

Stephanie Romeo:

No, no and I I found myself thinking about my plans for the summer, of course, like what I should be doing, or, and it happened, like the, the following years, like for, because I was, when you are burnt, you, um, you have to wear compressive garments for maybe two years. So it means that, well, you, there are things you can't do, you are impeded, like physically. And then I I, yes, like, as long as I had plans, things that were planned, I would use those plans against myself, comparing this is what I have now and I don't like it, and I should be doing that at this moment in time. I shouldn't. So I created more resistance. And so if I had more resistance, like I didn't feel good, like a bad, like, you know, a bad, a bad state of mind, creates more bad thoughts and feelings, and so on.

Stephanie Romeo:

It's a cascade, yes, and so this is like typically not being there for, for oneself, while what I needed was to be like with myself and and maybe, and focusing, focusing on what was good at this moment, because there are always good things the nurses who would take care of me, all the people and the support that I had.

Stephanie Romeo:

This is redirecting our mind consciously to what we learn, because there are always things to learn. But if we are not looking for things to learn, if we are not grabbing this curiosity, if we don't explore the curiosity and the creativity and using this is all is there all the time. And it's true that when we don't feel good, we shut ourselves down, and it's more difficult than to be curious, to be to, to, to think about learning something. But when you shift your mind about, when you shift your mind and you don't create more suffering than needed, like you don't go to the future or maybe to the past we can talk about that too then you are more present to what is going on and and you can be more accurate and about who you want to be in this period of time.

Marika Humphreys:

Yeah.

Stephanie Romeo:

Especially like not missing the love that you carry, because all of the sadness you have is always about the love that we are, that we have. But by focusing our. What we do usually is that we misinterpret our feelings and we focus on the pain Because it's painful. It doesn't feel good, of course, to feel sad and the anger. And anger is terrible because it puts us in danger, like we get blind when we are angry. So that's yeah, yeah.

Marika Humphreys:

And we focus on, like you said, the hypothetical future that we thought we were going to have, which was always was never a solid like, never a guarantee.

Marika Humphreys:

But we kid ourselves and I think I mean that is what I experienced for sure, especially when my husband was first diagnosed with cancer and then when his cancer came back.

Marika Humphreys:

I just remember like the despair I felt about our future plans being just gone and in reality they were never a guarantee. But we feel like we're owed them or that's how life is supposed to be, and we get very attached to that. You know, this idea in our head that was always hypothetical and, like you said, it keeps us from being present in the moment, like this is where I am now. That is so, it's so. That's huge. I mean, even now, I find, like you know, just practicing this is where I am now, you know, as we grow our business, I mean in all things like it's the this future that we either want or feel like we're going to have or feel deserving of. Sometimes I think people can also feel like, well, you know, I, we deserve to have a normal life, or we deserve, you know they don't deserve to be sick, and all of those ways, all of those thinking, those types of thinking, are just torturing ourselves really, because it's not what's happening.

Stephanie Romeo:

And yes, and we torture ourselves with concepts like the concept of deserving. To deserve is a human creation.

Marika Humphreys:

Yeah, yes, is is a human creation. Yeah, yes, I and that is a sneaky one, you know or people like deserving or things. Being fair, I think, is another way of torturing ourselves. We have this idea that life should be fair and it's never been fair in the history of humanity, and and why we expect it to be is it's again just kidding ourselves in a way that doesn't serve us yeah, but it's all, it's always um, what the meaning of it is that we care for each other.

Stephanie Romeo:

It's like always love is talking behind, underneath everything that's love talking. But if we recognize that, like things should be fair or we should, we deserve, like, if we recognize it and acknowledge it, just that, thinking that, oh, that means that I care and that this is important and love is important and actually.

Stephanie Romeo:

But love is where actually. But love is where it's like, here in the present. It's not in the future, because everything is in the present. I mean it's just in the present. It can't be found anywhere else. And about the past it's the same. Actually, you know when we can torture ourselves with the past like this thought we will never do this again.

Marika Humphreys:

We used to go to fake and now.

Stephanie Romeo:

We will never do this again.

Marika Humphreys:

Gosh, that's a big one for my clients.

Stephanie Romeo:

Yes, yes, okay. So the thing is that one moment when we leave something, this moment is always unique, and this moment it's done, it's passed and it's never like to be. This moment will never be replicated again. There can be some similarities, like we can do it right again another day, and like it seems to be like an habit. But, um, when we think about something that we will never do again, it's painful, so we create some space, pain, and when we do that, we block ourselves from the from what, from a version of ourselves, the version we need to be the most like, to be our best friend, our. We need our, our support, and when we do that, we're not supporting ourselves, we're just torturing ourselves. This moment and every moment is gone at the minute it's done. So it's, if you, if you plan to do something again, that would be like a new moment. Yeah, um, yeah, and so, and, and the and I'd like, I, maybe you, if it's something that you talk to with your clients too, it's what we want is always. It's not what we get.

Stephanie Romeo:

Actually, it's always the feeling that we want like the connection like, like something is because I like it, because of the connection I had, all the joy and that's why actually, we can explain, why we can be happy again. It's because we always seek for the feelings the feeling yes whatever circumstance.

Marika Humphreys:

Yes, yes and that yeah yeah, that was that is also, again, a big thing that happens for my clients, um, is that looking to the past and thinking of all the things that they're going to miss out on or that they won't be able to do again, and it can often be a combination of past and future, like the birthday celebration with the kids that their partner might miss in the following years, you know, like a combination of, oh, we always do this and they might not be around next time and, yeah, it's just, it is torture for ourselves. Yeah, so I realize that we are already at the half hour mark, which went very quickly, I know very quickly, and I wanted to keep this at least at the half hour mark. Why don't you tell people how they can work with you, how they can find out more about you, and you know if you want to share anything that you've got upcoming? Yeah, please feel free.

Stephanie Romeo:

Yes, thank you. So we can find me on homeocom, the website. I'm also on Facebook and on my website you can grab a document which is called. It's about the CAL method. So it's about trauma and and actually it's for everyone, because it's how to manage our feelings and the mistakes we can do. It's kind of a guide that you can download. That is on the website how to get over trauma and of your life. Again, it's called Okay and the way you can reach out to me and thank you for having me, marika. Thank you very much and thank you everybody.

Marika Humphreys:

Yes, well, thank you, and I will put that link in the. When I post this on Facebook, I will put that link to your website there as well. Yeah, I think I mean all the things we just touched on just today, a few of the things, but both of those are. They show up for us all, whether there's a major thing going on in life or just our regular, the regular life. So it's good stuff. Stephanie, stick with me, I'm going to stop recording here. And to everybody, thank you for joining us and go check out Stephanie's webpage.