Celebrating Pride Month, Mary Ellen interviews friend Trevor, a licensed realtor from NY, to bring light on what it means to be a part of the LGBTQ community and their personal experience. Growing up in a small town with only one doctor and counselor, Trevor felt a lack of support and was only able to express his partial self in the theater arts program at school and through his parents and brother. With pressure being put on him on his way to college, Trevor visited therapists and grew the confidence he needed to fully express his sexuality in NY by finding support groups on campus, his current therapist, and being offered a job that accepted who he is. Going through his job as a realtor, Trevor points out the dos and don’ts of when is appropriate to ask about someone’s sexuality in a professional setting, as well as not having to dress the part for people to accept you. This is a heart lifting episode everyone should tune into to learn how you can be an ally to the LGBTQ community and hear how you can seek help if you need support. 

Like what you hear?  Leave a review and give us a follow on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, iHeartRadio, or any of your other favorite platforms!

Related episodes 

Episode 39: All About Trauma:  (TW) In this episode, Maryellen tells the truth about trauma and its relation to eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) therapy (not it’s not hypnotism) while also guiding you through the symptoms and different types of traumas there are and give you advice on processing it.

Episode 34 -Stress Awareness Month: In this episode, Maryellen stresses the powerful emotion of stress and shares the 3 common types of stress: alarm, resistance, and exhaustion. As stressed as we might feel, Maryellen guides us through properly recognizing our stress and the damages it can cause us if we ignore it.

Follow or Find us at:

The show:

https://daydreamernetwork.com/okay-ish-2/

https://okayishpodcast.com/

The network:

@daydreamernetwork

https://daydreamernetwork.com

Host’s Contact Info

https://maryellendance.com/

@maryellendance

About the HOST

Maryellen Dance is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor (LMHC) based out of upstate New York. She focuses on providing skills using cognitive behavioral therapy, often using mindfulness techniques that are vital to personal growth. With a passion for psychology and propensity to ask questions, Maryellen entered this field to educate, learn and share what it means to be “Okay-ish.”

We’ve all had the feeling of anxiety and feeling a sort of panic attack, but how does anxiety work and what’s the “cure”? Mary Ellen dives into this episode with hard facts in uncovering the truths of anxiety disorder and how not everyone can endure an anxiety disorder but have anxiety. As Mary Ellen’s goal is to bring to light the types of anxiety disorders, reminder to not go and diagnose yourself with any of these disorders as this is to inform and educate you not to therapize you. Going through generalized anxiety disorder, to phobias, agoraphobia, social anxiety disorder, and panic disorder, these all fall under the category of anxiety disorder and all share the same irrational thoughts in our brain. For those who may suffer from these disorders, Mary Ellen explains the process of cognitive behavioral treatment/therapy and her own method with patients to help look at logistics and fight against the nasty irrational liar that’s in our brain.  

Like what you hear?  Leave a review and give us a follow on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, iHeartRadio, or any of your other favorite platforms!

Related episodes 

Episode 40 - Defense Mechanisms: In this episode, Mary Ellen dives into 6 defensive mechanisms and how each one is a form of coping and hiding our emotions through denial, repression, projection, displacement, regression, and rationalization. 

Episode 35- Emotional Fitness with Karin Gold: Get the chance to meet Karin Gold, owner of emotional fitness gym Coa, about what it means to be a Coa participant, the 8 week emotional fitness series, and all about how Karin’s goal is to make mental health proactive and accessible through physical and mental fitness. 

Episode 22- The Dark Side of Wellness: Maryellen exposes pursuing wellness as a mechanism to set aside our dark emotions and live up to societal expectations of following self care. In order to achieve wellness, feelings such as guilt, anxiety, and stress are meant to be felt. 

Follow or Find us at:

The show:

https://daydreamernetwork.com/okay-ish-2/https://okayishpodcast.com/

The network:

@daydreamernetwork

https://daydreamernetwork.com

Host’s Contact Info

https://maryellendance.com/

@maryellendance

About the HOST

Maryellen Dance is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor (LMHC) based out of upstate New York. She focuses on providing skills using cognitive behavioral therapy, often using mindfulness techniques that are vital to personal growth. With a passion for psychology and propensity to ask questions, Maryellen entered this field to educate, learn and share what it means to be “Okay-ish.”

We’ve all tried to cheer someone up, but have you or a friend said something positive with no meaning behind it? Maryellen expresses how toxic positivity has grown in the past year from COVID and how it’s an inauthentic way of expressing our true emotions by minimizing them and acting fake. This can also be a form of gaslighting, questioning people’s thoughts and sense of reality by manipulation. Maryellen shows us examples of toxic positivity and how ignoring our emotions can damage not only ourselves but loved ones around us and gives us 5 ways to deal with this toxicity. 

1. Recognize the toxic positivity 

2. Remember basic facts about feelings such as they’re meant to be felt and are dichotomous 

3. Don’t feed into it, follow Maryellen’s rule of thumb: only offer advice when asked 

4. Go off social media 

5. Know that we are all Okay-ish 

Like what you hear?  Leave a review and give us a follow on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, iHeartRadio, or any of your other favorite platforms!

Related episodes 

Episode 11: Understanding and Overcoming Trendy Therapy Terms: Focusing on pop culture, Maryellen shows what a positive mindset actually looks like compared to the trendy hashtags on social media. This episode educates those on how coaches and therapists are different and how psychology is a part of mindset and motivation.

Episode 19 - Feeling and Showing Gratitude: Continuing the discussion of family, Maryellen explores the idea of gratitude and why posing genuine feelings is necessary in family relationships, as well as giving you 3 tips on what not to do when thinking of gratitude.  

Episode 21: Is This Manifesting Thing Worth It?: Entering 2021, Maryellen breaks down the term manifesting and explains what the law of attraction is (not scientific based) and how there’s good and bad positive thinking. This is an episode all about the chain reaction of thoughts, actions, and feelings.  

Episode 40 - Defense Mechanisms: In this episode, Maryellen dives into 6 defensive mechanisms and how each one is a form of coping and hiding our emotions through denial, repression, projection, displacement, regression, and rationalization. 

Follow or Find us at:

The show:

https://daydreamernetwork.com/okay-ish-2/

https://okayishpodcast.com/

The network:

@daydreamernetwork

https://daydreamernetwork.com

Host’s Contact Info

https://maryellendance.com/

@maryellendance

About the HOST

Maryellen Dance is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor (LMHC) based out of upstate New York. She focuses on providing skills using cognitive behavioral therapy, often using mindfulness techniques that are vital to personal growth. With a passion for psychology and propensity to ask questions, Maryellen entered this field to educate, learn and share what it means to be “Okay-ish.”

Following the trendy term “empath”, Maryellen shares her own scientific research and statistics on the word and how it’s a synonym to empathy, but in a narcissistic way. To start off, Maryellen exposes the term “empath” and how it originated from a Star Trek character who healed people’s pain by taking it as their own and how pop culture has turned it into a reality. As empathy is the ability to share feelings of another person and is the foundation of functioning in society and building relationships, there are different levels of assessing people’s feelings and recognizing people’s emotions. With “empath” trending and people diagnosing themselves as an empath, along with Facebook groups for empaths being created, Maryellen shows the hard facts and statistics of how being an empath isn’t a spiritual gift/talent but is just a person who has no boundaries or is someone who experienced past trauma and experiences burnout from feeling others emotions. This episode isn’t to discourage you but to help you see the issue from a therapist's point of view and peel back the layers to help you understand from a psychological and mental health perspective. 

Like what you hear?  Leave a review and give us a follow on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, iHeartRadio, or any of your other favorite platforms!

Related episodes 

Episode 36 - Sorry, Not Sorry: In this episode, Maryellen explains the difference in authenticity of saying sorry and apologizing with the 3 Do’s and Don’ts of apologizing.  

Episode 19 - Feeling and Showing Gratitude: Continuing the discussion of family, Maryellen explores the idea of gratitude and why posing genuine feelings is necessary in family relationships, as well as giving you 3 tips on what not to do when thinking of gratitude.  

Episode 18: Family Boundaries: It’s that time of year again to be with the whole family but aren't prepared for the family drama and uncomfortable situations. Maryellen digs into boundaries, what they are, how we set them up, and reminds us that setting boundaries is for ourselves. 

Follow or Find us at:

The show:

https://daydreamernetwork.com/okay-ish-2/

https://okayishpodcast.com/

The network:

@daydreamernetwork

https://daydreamernetwork.com

Host’s Contact Info

https://maryellendance.com/

@maryellendance

About the HOST

Maryellen Dance is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor (LMHC) based out of upstate New York. She focuses on providing skills using cognitive behavioral therapy, often using mindfulness techniques that are vital to personal growth. With a passion for psychology and propensity to ask questions, Maryellen entered this field to educate, learn and share what it means to be “Okay-ish.”

At the show's 40 episode landmark, Maryellen discusses six common types of defense mechanisms we (and the people around us) use all the time.

 1. Denial: by not accepting the painful truth we lie our way through the pain and eventually feed into these lies. 

2. Repression: related to traumatic experiences, we push memories out of our unconscious to forget. 

3. Projection: with families, couples, and friendships we blame our insecurities and mistakes on the ones we love as opposed to being held accountable. 

4. Displacement: relating to the phrase “we hurt the people we love” we take our anger out on people who are considered acceptable and displace our feelings. 

5. Regression: in stressful, overwhelming situations we revert back to our childlike behaviors such as whining or laughing in high tension situations. 

6. Rationalization: in a situation that’s hard to process we rationalize our thoughts by creating “excuses'” or reasons to accept the situation such as saying the phrase “it was god's will” or “at least I didn’t hurt anyone”. 

Like what you hear?  Leave a review and give us a follow on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, iHeartRadio, or any of your other favorite platforms!

Related episodes 

Episode 39: All About Trauma:  (TW) In this episode, Maryellen tells the truth about trauma and its relation to eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) therapy (not it’s not hypnotism) while also guiding you through the symptoms and different types of traumas there are and give you advice on processing it. 

Episode 34 -Stress Awareness Month: In this episode, Maryellen stresses the powerful emotion of stress and shares the 3 common types of stress: alarm, resistance, and exhaustion. As stressed as we might feel, Maryellen guides us through properly recognizing our stress and the damages it can cause us if we ignore it. 

Follow or Find us at:

The show:

https://daydreamernetwork.com/okay-ish-2/

The network:

@daydreamernetwork

https://daydreamernetwork.com

Host’s Contact Info

https://maryellendance.com/

@maryellendance

About the HOST

Maryellen Dance is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor (LMHC) based out of upstate New York. She focuses on providing skills using cognitive behavioral therapy, often using mindfulness techniques that are vital to personal growth. With a passion for psychology and propensity to ask questions, Maryellen entered this field to educate, learn and share what it means to be “Okay-ish.”

Trigger Warning: This episode goes into depth on trauma and experiences of it so some information shared may be sensitive. 

In today’s episode, Maryellen talks about what trauma is by breaking down the process of saving information in the brain and how memories become traumatic. First things first, trauma and PTSD are not connected in the sense that you can experience traumatic events without PTSD. As both are serious topics, Maryellen explains how having a traumatic experience doesn’t mean you have PTSD as well as experiences are different for everyone. One person may share the same traumatic incident but both will react differently. So, you’re probably wondering how our brains are connected to trauma. Maryellen shares how information goes through our limbic system and travels to the cortex, but some information stays in our limbic system, which causes trauma. As Maryellen explores how people respond to trauma, such as disassociating or being retraumatized, she reveals the truth on EMDR (eye movement desensitization and reprocessing therapy) and how it’s not hypnosis but a way to allow information in our limbic system to flow. This is an episode full of facts, science, and personal experiences which you can utilize to help those around you who suffer from trauma. 

Like what you hear?  Leave a review and give us a follow on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, iHeartRadio, or any of your other favorite platforms!

Related episodes 

Episode 38: Borderline Personality Disorder:  Entering Borderline Personality Disorder Awareness month, Maryellen breaks down the stigmas of BPD and shares its relation to people with trauma or PTSD with its symptoms and 4 tips on how you can better understand BPD. 

Episode 32 - Suicidal Ideation: Maryellen brings to light the topic of suicide and shares the 4 motives of suicide as well as breaking down the stigmas of suicide while also giving you information and facts on everything you need to know behind the action. As some key factors of sucide may be mental health issues, alcoholism, PTSD, or others, Maryellen guides you through this episode on understanding the motives.

Episode 31: COVID Anniversary: After going through a year of COVID, Maryellen shares 4 tips on how you can process traumatic memories associated with COVID and optimize your emotions and feelings to battle COVID in a positive way. 

Follow or Find us at:

The show:

https://daydreamernetwork.com/okay-ish-2/https://okayishpodcast.com/

The network:

@daydreamernetwork

https://daydreamernetwork.com

Host’s Contact Info

https://maryellendance.com/

@maryellendance

About the HOST

Maryellen Dance is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor (LMHC) based out of upstate New York. She focuses on providing skills using cognitive behavioral therapy, often using mindfulness techniques that are vital to personal growth. With a passion for psychology and propensity to ask questions, Maryellen entered this field to educate, learn and share what it means to be “Okay-ish.”

As May is Borderline Disorder Awareness month, Maryellen breaks down the stigma of borderline personality disorder by guiding us through what it means to have this disorder, symptoms people may have, and giving us 4 tips on how we can help those around us who suffer from BPD. 

DO NO SELF DIAGNOSE! Everyone gets moody, but it doesn't mean you have BPD.  BPD is defined as a rigid and enduring pattern of behavior that impairs life via extreme and dysfunctional personality traits. People with trauma or PTSD are more likely to have borderline personality disorder and can experience: major mood swings, unstable emotions, and impulsive behavior. As BPD is also associated with alcoholism, anxiety, and depression, Maryellen also explains the truth behind self harm and how it’s a serious matter but for a different motive. 

If you or a loved one suffers from BDP, here are Maryellen’s 4 tips on how you/others can better understand BPD: 

Read the book “I Hate You- Don’t Leave Me”.

During someone’s mood swings with BPD, stay neutral and don’t defend yourself.

When coming to terms on relying on someone who has borderline personality disorder, it depends on the friend whether they are getting treatment or choosing not to.

Recognize when someone with BPD is acting differently.

Like what you hear?  Leave a review and give us a follow on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, iHeartRadio, or any of your other favorite platforms!

Related episodes 

Episode 37- Alcoholism Awareness Month: Join Maryellen in this fact heavy episode on uncovering the dangers of alcoholism and the top 3 facts to help us understand alcohol.

Episode 29- Self Harm Awareness: Maryellen dives into the truth of self harm, how it’s not correlated with suicidal behaviors and categorizes the types of self harm. The categories broken down for the types of self harm are: attention seeking, self punishment, and stress relief. Maryellen explores each of these groups and explains how to manage the addiction of self harm.  

Episode 39: All About Trauma:  (TW) In this episode, Maryellen tells the truth about trauma and its relation to eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) therapy (not it’s not hypnotism) while also guiding you through the symptoms and different types of traumas there are and give you advice on processing it. 

Follow or Find us at:

The show:

https://daydreamernetwork.com/okay-ish-2/https://okayishpodcast.com/

The network:

@daydreamernetwork

https://daydreamernetwork.com

Host’s Contact Info

https://maryellendance.com/

@maryellendance

About the HOST

Maryellen Dance is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor (LMHC) based out of upstate New York. She focuses on providing skills using cognitive behavioral therapy, often using mindfulness techniques that are vital to personal growth. With a passion for psychology and propensity to ask questions, Maryellen entered this field to educate, learn and share what it means to be “Okay-ish.

Trigger warning: If you or a loved one is struggling with alcohol addiction, please call NCADD at 1-800-622-2255 or SAMHSA at 1-800-662-4357 for assistance and information.As April is Alcohol Awareness Month, Maryellen dives into uncovering the dangers of alcohol addiction with statistics showing:

14.4 million Americans have an alcohol use disorder 

2 billion people consume alcohol in the whole world 

26% of Americans report binge drinking 

Although this episode highlights the dangers of alcohol, Maryellen provides 3 facts to help us understand alcohol and look at our relationship with alcohol:

1. Alcohol overdose and withdrawal are both deadly, literally. 

2. Alcohol is ranked higher than opiods and other drugs combined as a cause of death. 

3. All alcoholism effects are different for everyone. 

 This episode isn’t to scare you away from alcohol, but to give you information about the dangers of alcohol, how you can help your loved ones, and hear from a counselor’s perspective. 

Like what you hear?  Leave a review and give us a follow on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, iHeartRadio, or any of your other favorite platforms!

Related episodes 

Episode 32 - Suicidal Ideation: Maryellen brings to light the topic of suicide and shares the 4 motives of suicide as well as breaking down the stigmas of suicide while also giving you information and facts on everything you need to know behind the action. As some key factors of sucide may be mental health issues, alcoholism, PTSD, or others, Maryellen guides you through this episode on understanding the motives. 

Episode 34 -Stress Awareness Month: In this episode, Maryellen stresses the powerful emotion of stress and shares the 3 common types of stress: alarm, resistance, and exhaustion. As stressed as we might feel, Maryellen guides us through properly recognizing our stress and the damages it can cause us if we ignore it. 

Follow or Find us at:

The show:

https://daydreamernetwork.com/okay-ish-2/https://okayishpodcast.com/

The network:

@daydreamernetwork

https://daydreamernetwork.com

Host’s Contact Info

https://maryellendance.com/

@maryellendance

About the HOST

Maryellen Dance is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor (LMHC) based out of upstate New York. She focuses on providing skills using cognitive behavioral therapy, often using mindfulness techniques that are vital to personal growth. With a passion for psychology and propensity to ask questions, Maryellen entered this field to educate, learn and share what it means to be “Okay-ish.”

Maryellen covers the big S: sorry. She talks about the difference between saying sorry and apologizing, and gives 3 dos and 3 don'ts for a good apology.Have you ever heard people say “Sorry not sorry” or an insincere sorry? Well, join Maryellen’s crash course on diving into the word sorry and where sorry came from and distinguishing sorry vs. apologize. As sorry has been used by everyone of us, including celebrities, influencers, politicians, literally EVERYONE, over the past years it’s lost its sentimental meaning and has turned into a self empowerment or sarcastic word such as Demi Lovato singing her song “Sorry Not Sorry” using the word sorry as an indication of “sorry not sorry for who I am” or celebrities publicly saying sorry but they don’t mean it. So then what is the solution of saying sorry and really meaning it? You use the word “apologize” and apologizing and saying sorry are to completely opposite actions and hold different sentimental value. Now here are the 3 Dos and 3 Don’ts of apologizes: 

1. DON’T blame the other person when you are apologizing, aka be responsible for your actions and hold yourself accountable. 

2. DON’T explain your past, the point is to apologize and move forward with new behaviors and attitudes. 

3. DON’T apologize if you don’t mean it, it’s as simple as that. 

Now for the Dos: 

1. DO thank the other person for understanding. 

2. DO be sincere as the reason you’re apologizing is to show you’re regretful of your actions. 

3. DO (if you’re feeling nice) give apology gifts as this is a gesture to show your assurance in changing your behavior 

Like what you hear?  Leave a review and give us a follow on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, iHeartRadio, or any of your other favorite platforms!

Related episodes 

Episode 19 - Feeling and Showing Gratitude: Continuing the discussion of family, Maryellen explores the idea of gratitude and why posing genuine feelings is necessary in family relationships, as well as giving you 3 tips on what not to do when thinking of gratitude.  

Episode 42 - Toxic Positivity: Maryellen dives into the way faking a smile can negatively affect our mental health and those around us. Follow or Find us at:

The show:

https://daydreamernetwork.com/okay-ish-2/

https://okayishpodcast.com/

The network:

@daydreamernetwork

https://daydreamernetwork.com

Host’s Contact Info

https://maryellendance.com/

@maryellendance

About the HOST

Maryellen Dance is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor (LMHC) based out of upstate New York. She focuses on providing skills using cognitive behavioral therapy, often using mindfulness techniques that are vital to personal growth. With a passion for psychology and propensity to ask questions, Maryellen entered this field to educate, learn and share what it means to be “Okay-ish.”

Introducing Karin Gold, a licensed marriage and family therapist in California who runs and emotional fitness gym called Coa. Karin has been in the therapy field for 6-7 years. Her inspiration for becoming a therapist was her love of giving advice and getting to the nitty gritty of mental issues such as suicide, depression, anxiety, and so many more. With Coa, the goal of the emotional fitness gym is to make mental health as proactive and accessible as possible including physical fitness either by joining their 8 week series program or just meeting one on one with professional licensed therapists. In the 8 week series, you focus on 7 traits of emotional fitness which include: self awareness, empathy, mindfulness, curiosity, play, resilience, and communication. After completing the 8 week series, you’re able to join a practice pod at Coa, which allows you to put your skills to  use and interact with other trainees and have the ability to explore yourself and give/get support. 

Like what you hear?  Leave a review and give us a follow on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, iHeartRadio, or any of your other favorite platforms!

Related episodes 

Episode 22- The Dark Side of Wellness: Maryellen exposes pursuing wellness as a mechanism to set aside our dark emotions and live up to societal expectations of following self care. In order to achieve wellness, feelings such as guilt, anxiety, and stress are meant to be felt. Tune into this episode to learn more about opening up about our emotions and feelings and how we can be okay-ish. 

Episode 33 - Bipolar Awareness: In this episode, Maryellen describes the two types of bipolar disorders and shares the misconceptions of the mental illness, and no it’s not just having mood swings. She explains how depression is a part of being bipolar and how to handle experiencing so many emotions at once, along with sharing insight on what it’s like to suffer from bipolar disorder.

Episode 24 - Wellness With Depression:  To wrap up the series on wellness, Maryellen explores the relation of wellness and depression and explains how the mental illness can have different effects on people as well as breaking down misconceptions of depression. 

Follow or Find us at:

The guest:https://joincoa.com/IG: @joincoaTwitter: @joincoa

The show:https://daydreamernetwork.com/okay-ish-2/https://okayishpodcast.com/

The network:

@daydreamernetwork

https://daydreamernetwork.com

Host’s Contact Info

https://maryellendance.com/

@maryellendance

About the HOST

Maryellen Dance is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor (LMHC) based out of upstate New York. She focuses on providing skills using cognitive behavioral therapy, often using mindfulness techniques that are vital to personal growth. With a passion for psychology and propensity to ask questions, Maryellen entered this field to educate, learn and share what it means to be “Okay-ish.”