S9E14: Reframing your thoughts after stroke.

Hello beautiful survivors, this is Karina, the host and creator of this top 2 podcast, Stroke. Surviving the Odds is all about moving forward past the events of the stroke and giving you hope that there is so much more life to live after stroke. You see, 27 years ago, I suffered A brainstorm dissection that led me to coma and a lacton syndrome, and I vowed that I was going to be there for my community of survivors.

So I'm sharing all my tricks, hacks, and how to how I got to survive this world as a survivor. If I can do it guys, there's no reason why you cannot grab yourself a drink, a pen and paper because today's show is about to be recorded. Before I go on with the show, I'd like to do a little bit of clean house.

You can make sure that you like and follow on all the platforms that you're listening to your shows. However, if you download the episode, you can sit back and enjoy today's show and re listen to it next time and take some notes and do the exercises that we talk about. At the same time, I need to ask you to share with Sugar Banner and go ahead and share the podcast.

Let other people know that you are finding value in this and that they might too. Let them decide for themselves. Either way, the algorithm is going to know that our show is here to stay. Yes, I said our show. Because without you, my listeners, there will not be any stroke surviving the odds. And I'm well aware of that.

So I want to thank you immensely for being with me for the last few years and continuously feeding my soul as I hope I am feeding yours. I often say how when you had the stroke or when I had the stroke for that matter, we became something and somebody else for a certain amount of time and many of us regressed. We might be older in age, we might be 25506037 and we might think to ourselves, I'm a grown ass adult, why am I acting like a 5 year old child?

Why are my thoughts regressing so much? Well, I'm happy to tell you that you're not alone, my love. We we all go through that at some level and at some point in our recovery of stroke. The level of intensity, that's what I want to bring about today. The level of intensity of your thoughts will determine your rather would predetermine the way you would recover.

But the show today is all about restructuring and reframing some of those thoughts that you've been carrying along with you for the longest time. And now that you're a stroke survivor, those thoughts and those negative feelings that have weighed you down over all these years seems to be coming up to the surface. And when things come up to the surface, it's actually a very good thing.

I often give when I teach emotions, anything related to emotions. When I teach it privately or in sessions. in Group sessions, I'll often give the example. Let's say that you were jumping feet first in the pool. I'm not saying that I dive because I don't know how to dive. I'm a 52 year old that doesn't know how to dive. Whoa.

So let's say you jump feet first in the pool. Well, in order to move back up, you will need to touch the ground, right? Do you follow me this far? So in order to get the momentum to go up to the surface like your emotions have resurfaced? Well, the good news is that the stroke was your bottom, was your pool bottom, and it's only gonna go up from now on if that's what you want.

And that's what I want today's episode to propel you to move forward, move upwards. Don't stay stagnant. And I'm gonna give you examples, and I'm going to give you some strategies on things you might be capable of doing right now as a stroke survivor to reinforce that part of you. How does that sound? Before I get into the meat and potato and the heart of the subject, I need to apologize.

It's extremely hot here. And the sound you hear behind is my fan that's aimed at me. Umm, Between being a stroke survivor, still having a little bit of anxiety but going through major menopause right now, I know some of you lady listeners are following my pain. You know what I'm talking about. So excuse me if there's some some sounds and noises behind, I'll try to keep it at minimum. What I'm about to talk about is something that I personally had to work on at the age of 38.

I was seeing my social worker that noticed some patterns, patterns and some ways of my talking and some stories that I have talked about and my behaviors. She noticed that, so she sent me to a psychologist, no, a psychiatrist that analyzed me. I've told you that my childhood was very tumultuous to say the least.

So when I went to the psychiatrist, I stayed with him for a few hours and he interviewed me and just were talking and at the end the diagnosis was that I had bipolar traits as well as double personality traits. Bipolar is not normally identified in a 38 year old. It's more in, I will say mid to late teens, that early 20s that that is really present. However, I had been bottling up so much of that traumatic, beautifully traumatic childhood that I had that it became part of my identity.

And that's why I think it's important that I talk about what I'm going to talk about because I know I'm not alone. I'm very vocal and I'm very comfortable talking because my telling my story might help one person around the world. Yes, the show is for stroke survivors. Yes, 115% yes. However, I do know that many stroke survivors out there have the same upbringing and life was very close or similar or even worse than me.

And again, I want to make it very well understood that if I can get out of this, if I can make it to use all this bad stuff to my advantage, you can too. So at 38, when I was diagnosed, I had my moment of crying in the doctor's office and I had a little baby tantrum. But my initial reaction afterwards was, all right, what do we do as mad, pissed off, enraged that I had to go through a treatment right now that I did not bring on my life was imposed on me. But now I'm the one that that had to go through something. And it was probably one of the hardest things that I personally had to go through.

But it was so rewarding guys. So in the episode today, I am giving it to you in a nutshell, making it easy for you to understand. I had to do cognitive behavioral therapy 3 hours a week for nine months. I'm not asking you guys to do 3 hours a week for nine months. That is not me and I'm not a doctor, OK?

But I'm gonna give you in a nutshell, every little thing that I've learned that helped me become I think I'm a decent person. I think I'm a good person. I think I have a good heart. I have a generous heart. My mom then just gave me trauma. My mom gave me a lot of beautiful, amazing qualities that without having doing these treatments and doing this inner solar research, I probably would never have seen. My mom was my superhero, believe it or not and what do you think I get on with this show grab your pen and paper, guys. So one of the very first things that I had to do was really do a lot of self observation, pay attention to my patterns of languages, my flare ups and my blow ups and my reaction because I was very reactive.

I was holding on a lot of resentment. And since this stroke, remember what I said, everything came back up, which is an amazing thing. So I did a lot of self observing of how myself talk was along the way. And to this day when I see a crossword puzzle, I see the image of my mom, my beautiful mom, that at the time I was in grade 5 and we had to make up a crossword puzzle, a very small crossword puzzle.

I had to invent it and my mom said she was going to do it and it was great. Mom did it for me, but at the same time I felt like I couldn't do it. I honestly did. I was about 10 years old and I said, and my first idea was I can do it, I can try. But mom said no, no, I'll do it for you. So it made me feel like, hey, so that's the first thing I noticed. Fast forward in life after my stroke, when a visitor would come at the house and from the generosity of their hearts and from the goodness of their hearts would offer to do something to help me out.

Here, let me do it, Karina. I would get defensive. No, I got this. I really would get defensive and naughty. After doing all this self observation, I realized that many many many many. This is only one example I'm giving you now, but there's many self belief that I had inside of me. Things had been suppressed. Things had been.

I had been protected, but not in in the right way. And now after my stroke, I just want to be me. I just want to live. I just want to show to the people what I am made of. God, I know I'm made of a lot, and I know that you are made of a lot more than me. That's how much I trust you #2 is reframing.

Reframing your thoughts. Challenge your thoughts by identifying your fears. By identifying them, you write them down. By writing them down, you have a better view and understanding of what is going on and you can challenge yourself. So I had the fear that I wasn't good enough, that I wasn't good enough to have my grades in grades six and seven in high school.

I started feeling not good enough and comparing myself to my best friend Isabel, that was a brainiac that was in Arishi, which is like the higher classes. I forget to say how it is in English, but I felt like I wasn't good enough because I was only in regular class and she was in the higher up for the brainiacs.

And that stayed with me for many, many, many years. By doing that self reflection, that self observation, by writing down my thoughts and going back in time, I got to identify where things came from. Many times, guys, we have to face where things come from. We need to see the end before we see the beginning. And once you do, you can reframe. So instead of saying I'm not good enough, then I started saying out loud to myself in front of the mirror, I am good enough.

I'm good at what I do. I'm good at hair and makeup and style and cooking. She's good in math and science. I'm good in what I do. All these feelings came up when I was in my 30s, but nevertheless they started when I was much younger. So #2 is reframe and restructure yourself. Talk #3 is probably my favorite because I had to learn to name my emotions.

You see, if I say I'm mad, I can't go to the store and buy a pound of mad. But if I say I'm mad, it's only a name. It's only, it's only. How can I explain it? Another thing on my agenda? I'm giving it a personality and I choose do I want to hang out with Matt or do I not because Matt is toxic and if Matt is toxic, hey, I don't want to hang out with it.

I don't want it in my life. Do I Make sense? That's probably the easiest thing I've done. Name my emotion, give it a personality and decide do I want to have it with me or I want to get rid of it? When I want to get rid of it again, I give myself a mantra and I say I release you. I don't need you in my life anymore. Thank you, but no thank you.

Bye, bye. That's how I dealt with it. You see, it's not brain surgery. When we take care of ourselves, we can't say bad or good things. We say what we need for ourselves often. I mentioned to you guys, don't let other people's weigh on your parade. Well, this is an occasion. Don't let people piss on your parade. Fuck and and and and tell you that you should be doing this and that and this and no, you think you talk and you are the way you want to be.

I have a good one. You know when I talked about noticing your patterns? Well, I love to use the expression, the little story of the two fishes. There's these, this older fish and these two younger fish and they're both, they're all swimming. Sorry, they're all swimming. And the older fish looks at the other ones. Oh, what a beautiful day for a swim. And it just keeps on going.

The two fishes look at each other and said there's water. That story is symbolic. It means that if you've been in shit for a long time before the stroke and now after the stroke, well, you've been in it so long before those emotions are imprinted in you that you didn't even notice they were there.

They're just part of you. Your reactions, your actions, your speech, your blow UPS. They've been there all along, and now they just seem more amplified since the stroke. Well, the stroke is a sign that life is telling you maybe you need to deal with it in your own way. I'm just giving you ideas guys. This is what I had for you today. I hope this was helpful.

You know, you can reach me on any social media platforms. I'm going to leave you my coordinates in the descriptions. My e-mail is Kate Lemire. LEMIRE at Consultant CONSULTAN t.com. Make sure you like follow and you subscribe and I will talk to you soon. I love you immensely and you've got this, guys, you have got this 'cause you are winners.

S9E14: Reframing your thoughts after stroke.

Kapitelklicken springt direkt hin

Shownotes

Transkriptvom Podcast bereitgestellt · Zeitmarken springen hin