333: How To Find Peace (Even When You’re In A ‘Shame Tornado’) | Live Coaching Session

Introduction 

You're listening to Biceps After Babies Radio Episode 333.

Hello and welcome to Biceps After Babies Radio. A podcast for ladies who know that fitness is about so much more than pounds lost or PR's. It's about feeling confident in your skin and empowered in your life. I'm your host Amber Brueseke, a registered nurse, personal trainer, wife and mom of four. Each week my guests and I will excite and motivate you to take action in your own personal fitness as we talk about nutrition, exercise, mindset, personal development and executing life with conscious intention. If your goal is to look, feel and be strong and experience transformation from the inside out, you my friend are in the right place. Thank you for tuning in. Now, let's jump into today's episode.

Hey, hey, hey! Welcome back to the episode of Biceps After Babies Radio. I'm your host, Amber Brueseke. And today I have such a good Coaching Call Replay for you from our last round of MACROS 101. My client, Katie, came on and, you know, shared a lot about her experience that I think is incredibly relatable of seeing, you know, getting discouraged, seeing, you know, her, her measurements not go the way that she wanted them to go and really finding herself going into, like, this shame spiral into the shame tornado. And she does such a good job of  explaining it and and I think a lot of you have experienced the same experience of just going into like I should be doing this better or I you know I'm not doing it enough and you know if I would just did it a little bit better would be more successful and really going into that that shame tornado is what she calls it. And so we kind of dig deep in this and we start to talk about because this is not the only place in her life that she experiences this and she understands that and and shares a little bit about her background and you know what she saw growing up that kind of led her to this place where a lot of it is is victim mentality of like people don't like me. And and they don't care about me. And, you know, making making other people's actions mean something about her. So I took her through a really powerful exercise that I think would be really helpful if you're someone who also kind of tends to make up stories about experiences that you have that are negative towards yourself. And that's a really common experience. And and this exercise that I take Katie through is something that you can implement yourself, do it yourself and trying to work on getting yourself out of that shame spiral, out of that nobody likes me, out of that victim mode that so many of us very, very easily fall into. So I thought after we did this, this coaching call in our MACROS 101, I reached out to Katie and said, hey, this is so relatable. Are you willing to let me share this on the podcast? And she's so graciously said, yeah, so I'm really excited to be able to share this because one, I think it's so relatable, so many of you have probably experienced some of the same, similar feelings as as Katie explains in this coaching call and then the exercise that I take her through is something that is totally something you can implement in your own journey. And you know, see how this exercise that I take her through is helpful to you and being able to differentiate between, you know, facts and what happened and the interpretation that your brain immediately goes to. And then how can we retrain our brain to create different and and more empowering interpretations. So, without further ado, let's jump in to that coaching conversation with Katie. 

Katie 03:17 

So I guess I need to preface this by saying I know you're not a therapist, but mine isn’t about number. I feel like I'm doing really good. I feel mentally like I am. There has been a big shift and this has been thank you for that, you know. However, I feel like this morning I stepped on the scale and it was down even again and that was amazing. That was such a win, that was huge. And then I had my husband do my measurements. And it was like all of the sudden, the shame tornado, just like came in. And and he he's, like, scared. He would like. I don't want to do your measurements like you get, you get mean and mad every time. And I'm like I do. I do. I get hot inside. I I can feel it. I can feel like what shame feels like for me when it's coming on. Yeah. I that is tough. I don't. I don't know why like. That's a hard one and you're self-sabotaged like that has been, like, so helpful. But it's like I feel like I was raised first of all by like the victim. My mom is a huge victim. I love her so much but something I didn't see for a really long time, and because I didn't see it. I like I. I couldn't even see it that she was such a victim until like literally till like even this past year, like six months of my life. And I'm like oh, and so it was like that was just like ingrained into how I function.  

Amber B 04:52 

Of course. 

Katie 04:53 

You know, I can still remember stories of her. It's like tells me about like when she was pregnant with me and like, nobody came to her, to the party and nobody came. And she was so sad. And I always just like held space for all these stories. And I was young and like, oh, my poor mom. My poor mom, my poor mom. And it was like. Oh wait, my mom has no power. Like watching your thing. It was like this. Like aha moment of like, I can take like, power back. I don't have to live as a victim. But that's like a very huge tendency for me. I just don't know if you actually had like, some of your nice like. Wham bam, 123 out of like out of shame click when like around food, you know. 

Amber B 05:32 

Yeah. OK. So it was, I mean, this is such a pertinent conversation because the shame cycle is such a familiar one for so many of us. And I and I really want to first approach this conversation from recognizing that the shame. It is an indication that there's work there to be done right. So, we sometimes it's like, and shame feels terrible, and it feels awful. And I know we don't want to feel it but when we can kind of take the shame away from feeling shame because, like, that's what we get into is like now, not only do we feel shame, but now we feel shame that we feel shame because we're not supposed to feel shame. It’s not a good emotion to feel, right. And so then you get that's what you talking about, the same tornadoes like. 

Katie 06:12 

Yes, yes. 

Amber B 06:13 

We should get ourselves for feeling the shame. We gotta first pull ourselves away from that and recognize like I feel shame and I don't have to feel any shame about feeling that. It is just an indication that there's something here to uncover, right? It's actually a gift like it's a gift to you. It's like when we get triggered, for whatever reason, it's a gift for us to be able to do the inner work, to figure out why is that so triggering to me? Because there's growth there to be done, right. And so when we can separate and say what a beautiful experience that you had this morning of getting of feeling shame because we can now see something that we didn't know was there and and sometimes we trick ourselves. I kind of liken it to like if you're in a dark room, you can't really see what's in the room, and so sometimes we're like, oh, it's it's super great in here. It's super safe. There's nothing in here. And when we turn on the lights and we see that there are spiders in the corner, we're like, oh, crap, there's spiders in the corner, but like those spiders were there. We just had the lights off, right? So you had that experience where, like the lights got turned on. You saw something bad. But now, because we can see it, we can get rid of those fighters. We can like, take care of it. So it is such a gift to be able to have these experiences where we get triggered because it's an opportunity to see something that was always there, but now we can actually fix and we can actually work on and solve it. OK, so the way that we're going to do this is we're going to go back to this experience that you have, right? There's going to be lessons and learnings here. Are you present to what was going on in your mind as you were having the measurements be done, as he takes the first measurement and it's nothing changed or it's gone up or whatever, what was that conversation like in your head? 

Katie 08:01 

Yeah. Oh, gosh. It was like it's just so wild how it's so quickly. Just like this onslaught of like. Yeah. Like what have you been doing? You haven't done this, right? Basically just goes down to like, you're not enough, you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah. 

Amber B 08:19 

Ahm, thats really good, when I talk about the self-sabotage is that the one that you resonate with, like the fear of not being enough or the fear of not being worthy, right? So, when that is the fear we're looking for confirmation of it. Right. And you found it. You found confirmation of like, your deepest fear that that I'm not enough that I'm not doing this right. And there's just confirmation that that's that that's the case. Uhm. You had mentioned your, that you know you can see it in your mom of like the victim mentality and how she's giving her power away? I'm curious. Are you present to how you are currently or what you are currently?  

Katie 08:53 

Oh, I’m such a victim. 

Amber B  08:54

What specifically are you giving your power away to? 

Katie 09:01 

I think, I think just other people like allowing them to like so like fear rejection is a huge one for me. So like this is a perfect example. This weekend was my four-year old's birthday party and like leading up to it, this is what I'm saying. Like, I feel like I've been putting in work, like in work, as in like self-help books. And like all that stuff. So it's like this, this like verbiage and stuff isn't new to me, but it's just crazy how the layers keep healing back, which is a wonderful thing. But I'm like, oh, my gosh, like, I'm grateful for the gifts, but holy moly. Like they're coming fast. You know what I mean? I'm like, let me figure that one out ‘cuz Oh my gosh. So anyway, so like working up to because I know that this has been the thing for me. Like if people don't come to my parties or if like I have something, they're not going to come, what does that say about me? That I'm not enough. Like the day's working up to it. I'm like, feel really healthy in my head like it's fine, it's just a four-year-old birthday party. I know that people but like you know, it's fine. It's fine if, like people can't make it or it's fine. And then, like, the morning of it's like I can just feel, I can feel and then it's like the first text, like, we're actually not going to make it you know, totally valid reason. Totally fine. I know they're not thinking about us. I know. Like, I I know that here. But like here, it's just like it just. So that's an example. That's an example like where it goes to. 

Amber B 10:22 

OK, I'd love to do an exercise with you on that if you're up for it.  

Katie 10:27 

Yeah.  

Amber B 10:28 

Okay. So, we're going to go through that experience and we're going to look at it through two different lenses. So the first way and you kind of did this. But I'm gonna have you retell the story again because I really want you to focus on what the facts were. OK, So what exactly? If I was like watching this with the camera and I'm just like, taking notes on what happened, I want you just to report just the facts of, like, what happened this last weekend? 

Katie 10:52 

OK, so my 4-year-old daughter had a birthday party and we invited people to come over to spend the day with us. 

Amber B 11:00

Okay. How many did you invite?

Katie 11:04 

Ahm. We invited 15 people to come over to our house. We rented a bounce house and it torrential down poured. And the morning? So no. So we did not get to bounce, which I was proud of myself for that. Yeah, because that was OK. It was just OK. Them the morning of I got 2 two or three cancellation texts and we continued to have the party and had a great time. But those I don't know if I'm getting is this. Am I not being factual enough? 

Amber B 11:41 

No, you're doing fantastic. So we have two or three cancellation texts. So how many people end up showing up to the party? 

Katie 11:48 

Uhm, so say 12 people now, at this point, 12 people came to the party. 

Amber B 11:56 

Okay. Awesome. So 12 people attended the party. Fantastic. So that's really factual. Right, we went through all the facts. OK, so now what our brain loves to do is make interpretations about those facts right? So we can lay out these are the facts. This is what happened. But then your brain starts to go. And it starts to make interpretations of what this means or what that you know why they made that decision and and that. So we're gonna do this again. But we're gonna. I want you to go through some of like the facts. But then where did your brain go when that happened? What were the interpretation of it.  

Katie 12:26

Okay. Yeah. So perfect, so when, when I got that first text from from, you know our first the first person who said that they weren't going to. Ahm, so sweet, he was like he went camping with his dad, but he thought he's so sweet at preschool. We love him and he he talks about her and and maybe it was just my girl. And I get really afraid of projecting this onto her because it's been so awful for me. Like, it's been the bane of my existence.

Amber B 12:58 

What's this?  

Katie 12:59 

There's so much to like make everything about me to be that victim to literally make every single thing about me I'm like God, Katie, you are not the center of everyone's lives. And I can let you know that. But like in my head, it's like she did that because she doesn't like us or she did that because she didn't care. Sunny's friends aren't coming. They they don't want to be around her like so. 

Amber B 13:20 

Yeah. Kate. So Katie, is it that she doesn't like? They don't like you or that they don't like your daughter or do or both? 

Katie 13:28 

Both like mostly me, but like I think that the fear of that already it’s like maybe projected slightly. 

Amber B 13:37 

Yeah, because it's so painful for you when you experience the feeling of rejection that of course you would want to prevent your daughter from feeling the same way that you feel. 

Katie 13:44 

Yes. Yes. And like, yeah, your love for your kids is just so empathized. So that, like, feels like if anyone ever did it like you around her. Like, if I can't even like. Yeah. 

Amber B 13:55 

Yeah, absolutely. OK. So that was the first text and then what about the second text. 

Katie 14:01 

Then I was mad. So it went from that one, and then it went to anger of. 

Amber B 14:07 

What were the thoughts? 

Katie 14:09 

Ahm, like whatever. Like OK? Who cares? Like whatever. Like I'm already. I'm, like, mad at them now. You know, I'm like like now there's like something because they didn't care enough. Right. It wasn't like worth it to them. And then it still goes to like worthy, but like it was my aunt who canceled and I was just like. She's just been flaking, like she just I guess she doesn't care. But it wasn't even like sadness anymore. Just went to like anger, like, because that that's that's like how I just like, you know, then I'm just like, it's fine, but I'll just hold a grudge for your whole life just so you know. 

Amber B 14:40 

Yeah, anger is a secondary emotion, right? It covers the primary emotion which is the hurt that we're feeling. Yeah. OK. And so then the third text. Was there another one or is it just two? 

Katie 14:50 

Okay, I think it was just the two. I would also, yeah, I I think it was the that and then handling the the actual bounce house that wasn't going to be bouncy balls. And so I was having to let go of like it doesn't matter about the money, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. Just like a lot with like I'm telling you all these things I'm trying to like fix it was like they were all coming at me. 

Amber B 15:08 

Yeah, sometimes the gifts that are given to us are a little bit much. You're like. Yes. Please let the green things please. And I I do think it's important to note, Katie, that like I can already. I can tell that you've done a lot of work. I can tell that you're working on this, that you brought a lot of awareness to you. 

Katie 15:17 

Yes. 

Amber B 15:26 

And it is important to give yourself a little bit of grace of I do think if it had been anyone of these things, maybe you might have been able to like coach yourself through it and handle it. But it was three things that were like back-to-back to back and you're still learning this like you're still getting better at it, right? You've had a lot of programming up until now watching your mother and then your own programming. That was you playing as the victim and you're starting to wake up to that and realize that and make an adjustment and make a change moving forward in your life. But we have to. You're still baby in this, right? You're still learning. And so I I do think giving yourself a little grace and just recognizing like I had three things that kind of just piled on top of me and it it was a lot. And there's, you know, you. You came here and asked a really great question. And so we can work through this so that we can continue your growth so that the next time you have things get piled on top of you. It's not the last time it's going to happen. You'll feel better about being able to handle it.  

Katie 16:17 

Yeah. 

Amber B 16:18 

Okay. So here's what I want to do with you. So the exercise, so we, what we've done is we've gone through, what are the facts and then we went through what are the interpretations? So the interpretations that I wrote down is like they don't like me. They don't like my daughter, that's why they're not coming to the party. They don't care and it's not worth it to them to come to the party. OK, so those were the interpretations that you made about, not them, you know, cancelling. They're coming to the party. OK.  

Katie 16:45 

Yeah.  

Amber B 16:46 

So, because we know that your brain made-up those interpretations, right, that that's not what they said. Nobody said to you. I don't like you, so we're not coming to the party. Your brain, just like leaked in logic, OK? 

Katie 16:58 

Such a punk brain. 

Amber B 17:01 

I know, it's worse. So I wanna go through and I want to go through what could be some other interpretations of it. OK, So what happened was that somebody called, two people called and cancelled that said they weren't going to come to the party, right. Our brain went to they don't like me, they don't care, it's not worth it to them. That's the interpretation you made. What are some other interpretations that could have been the reason that they did that? We're just brainstorming. We're just playing. 

Katie 17:30 

Yeah. So like, well, like logically, I mean I could say like they to like two of the kids from Sunny's class. Logically, they're their kids had birthdays the same exact day. So like, those were two people that couldn't come because they had, you know, and and Owen, logically, he went camping with his dad. Or they they have. They all are moms with other kids. And I'm a mom who can understand that like, it's a lot. You know, we kind of live far and like, it just says nothing about us, that maybe it just didn't fit into their schedule that day.  

Amber B 18:00 

Yeah.  

Katie 18:01 

And that feels really good. It just doesn't stick as much as like those little, you know.  

Amber B 18:05 

Yeah. Of course. Of course. And. And so you did a really good job. Like, we can come up with other interpretations, right. We have. There's the facts that are like, we get not arguing with the facts, but our brain does make these leaping logics. And you could have also gone to the leap of logic of like they're all they have other kids. We live really far away, like they have birthdays, the same day, right? 

Katie 18:27 

Yes. That's why I want my brain to go. That's where I want my brain to go. 

Amber B 18:29 

Yes. Well, So what I want to offer you is that both of those are still just interpretations. Right, like we don't know. We have no idea why they did what they did. I I don't know. Maybe they don't like you. I I I can't say that for sure. But what I can say is that you going to leap of logic if they don't like me is sending you in a tailspin. And so going to the leap of logic of like well, we live far away you're still kind of lying to yourself. You don't know. 

Katie 19:02 

Yeah. Why not make it nice? 

Amber B 19:04 

Why? Why not make it a nice lie that makes you feel better, right? And so when we can just understand that all interpretations are at some level, just us lying to ourselves a little bit of, like, making an interpretation. But why not make an interpretation that is making us feel better? And like move forward with life, instead of choosing the interpretation that causes us to spiral to your point. A lot of us can see this and it gets hard. It's it's hard to make the switch, especially when your default for so long has been the way has been the self deprecating, has been the what with me, has been the victim mentality. And So what the reason that I can tell that you've done some work and that you're on your way to figuring this out is because even the understanding that you can you can go there in your brain, right, you can at least consciously see, I'm going to this negative Nelly. 

Katie 19:55 

Yes. 

Amber B 19:57 

You don’t need to go there. I could go this other positive way. But what you're struggling with is it's not automatic yet yes, OK. Yeah. So, what I want to tell you is that it's never going to become automatic until you practice it over and over and over. It's kind of like sitting down at the piano and like trying to play something for the first time and being like, oh, it's not automatic. It's not like my fingers just don't fly over the over the keyboard it's like how do you how do you get your fingers to fly? You freaking practice it over and over and over and over again. And so a couple of things that I want you to take away from this and I want you to kind of go into into practice mode with is one, seeing it as a gift when you're given the opportunity to practice this. So this morning when you got into that shame spiral, how would it have changed things if you really saw it as a gift? If you're like this is amazing. I get to practice this thing, but I've wanted to practice that I want to get better at, how would that have changed that experience? 

Katie 20:51 

Yeah. I think it would have like just even like bringing it into awareness at that very moment and like realizing, OK, this is a gift, would allow me to have that grace piece because that piece is the that's my word for this year. That's, you know, he's like you are the hardest person I know on yourself, so hard on yourself. Like it that just doesn't come natural. It just come like it's like, does it? So yeah, I think it would give me. Well, that would be the gift, too, is allowing myself to say even, hey, like, this is tough or hey, here we get to do this again like we get to now we we are getting presented again to like change it this time so you're not mad at yourself. So you're proud of yourself?  

Amber B 21:35 

Yes.  

Katie 21:36 

Like you get to be proud of yourself. So, like take a second. And how do you want to? How do you want to proceed so you can be proud of yourself? 

Amber B 21:44 

That's right. And you said something so beautiful. You said that this doesn't come natural to me yet. And it's ironic because the only way for it to become natural is for you to get a lot of practice at it, and that's where like the gift comes in. It's like you say, you say I want this to be natural, but then we don't want to actually have to practice it becoming natural. 

Katie 22:00 

Yeah. Yeah, yeah, that's right. Yeah. 

Amber B 22:03 

And so we can when we can really see it's like I want this to become natural I. And listen again. We can have grace for you, Katie. You're running on a lot of outdated programming. You had a lot of experiences growing up where you saw modeled for you a very enticing reality of playing the victim. There's a lot of enticed. It's really enticing to do that, right? You don't have to. You're not responsible for anybody. And everybody else's fault, you can just kind of sit back like it's very boring and enticing, but at the cost of it. 

Katie 22:30 

It's so there's so much suffering, yes. 

Amber B 22:32 

Right, exactly. Yeah. So it's like it's like, it's like the junk food, right? It's like you feel great in the moment, but at the long run, it's like it's really crappy. It's not getting you anywhere. So you're waking up to that. You're now saying I want to change this. I want this to be a a natural thing for me. And now you get to practice it. You get to have opportunities to practice it, because that's what it's going to take for it to be natural. And so your job is in moments where you get triggered, where you start to notice that, like, shame spiral that you were talking about, an opportunity to step back and look at it as a gift of, like I said, I wanted to practice it and this is an opportunity to practice it. We ground ourselves. We're like, what? What am I thinking? Where is my brain spinning to and recognize I'm just telling myself more lies. Why don't we tell ourselves some lies that make us feel better, like that's the lies. It's all lies. But it's like productive lies versus not productive lies.  

Katie 23:26 

Yes. 

Amber B 23:27 

It's like. What? What? Like what am I telling myself? And again, that separation between fact and interpretation can be so helpful if you can walk yourself back and say what happened here. My husband measured my waist and it was up 1/2 inch from what it was last week, that that is fact, that is fact. And that doesn't make you feel a certain way. What makes you feel a certain way is the interpretation that's bad. That's wrong. It means I did it wrong. It means I'm not doing it right. It means I'm never going to be successful. Means I'm not. That's what makes you spiral and feel bad. It's not the facts. So when we can get really good and this is going to be your work. It's like, how do I separate the facts versus the interpretation and if I'm going to go into interpretation then I better be going into a positive interpretation, lie to myself that's better than a negative lie to myself. That makes sense?  

Katie 24:21 

Yes.  

Amber B 24:22 

Okay. So what are you? What are you thinking right now? What are you at? 

Katie 24:26 

I’m just honestly like, I'm just even what you said. Everything you said. I feel like you really just gave us steps actually for it, so I feel. I'm I'm. Yeah, I feel like even just hearing kind of that like non judgment piece of like Get the facts, Get the facts without the judgment, really use your prefrontal cortex and just like figure that out now, like, what can you do? Because you're just telling yourself. Yeah. Like you said, it's a story you're telling yourself. So what story do you want to choose to tell yourself today? Yeah. And like, we keep telling ourselves more of about our story. It'll just be more better. 

Amber B 25:02 

Okay. And so I have an assignment for you. Your homework assignment is I want you to go and teach your husband this concept, OK? And the reason I want you to do that is twofold. One, it is because we learn better when we teach, so we understand and we find holes in our knowledge when we have to present that information to somebody else. So that's gonna be really helpful. The second reason I want you to teach it to your husband is because you can enlist his help in this. When he sees you going into the same spiral, his prompt for you can be like, OK, well, let's what is the facts like, let's go back to the facts. Like what are the facts about the situation and that can prompt you to be like, OK, yes, I need to go to the facts and then let's list those out. Right. Notice that when you told me all the facts of that experience like you were there was no emotion with it. It was just like this is the thing that happened. So if he can help prompt you with that, because I I'm sure that he wants to help, a lot of times spouses are just sitting there being like I don't know how to help. Stop being hard on yourselves. Don't be like. 

Katie 25:59 

I'm scared. I don't wanna do this like. 

Amber B 26:01 

Stop being hard on yourself. You're like ohh that was it. Thank you so much for that. But if you can give him something to be like, hey, just prompt me to go back to like, what are the facts in this situation that can be a helpful prompt for getting you into a headspace of like, Oh yeah, I gotta go back to the facts. Let's go back to that. What are the interpretation? And then being able to separate out those two. 

Katie 26:23 

Yes, thank you so much. 

Amber B 26:24 

You're welcome. Good question.  

Katie 26:25 

Amazing. 

Amber B 26:26 

All right. Thanks, Katie.  

Okay. What was your biggest take away from the episode? This is something I always like talk to my clients about. It's one thing to like, listen to a podcast or listen to a coaching call or listen to a module in MACROS 101. It's an entirely different thing to take that and make a change because of it. So what is? What are you taking away from the episode? What are you going to implement or change or try out or test out because that you listen to this episode? So many of us can relate to the shame spiral that Katie talked about and you know her experience of, like, not having people come to her kid’s birthday party is so relatable. I've had that experience as well, you know, maybe not the exact same, but having a party and nobody shows up and it's really easy to go to that dark place. Like nobody likes me, I'm not good enough. You know that dark place our brain wants to go to. So I hope that this exercise that I took her through can be really helpful to you as as you start to retrain your brain and again make it work for you instead of against you to get out of that victim mentality and into creating your own empowering life.

If you want to get on the wait list for MACROS 101, go to bicepsafterbabies.com/waitlist. We open up doors you know once or twice a year and we always let the wait list know when that is, so definitely get on the wait list if you're wanting to have access to more coaching like this, more information, more support as you go through your own fitness journey. That wraps up this episode of Biceps After Babies Radio. I'm Amber, now Go out and be strong because remember my friend, you can do anything.  

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