Soles to Soul Care for Trauma and AuDHD with Eve Menezes Cunningham

It was such a joy to interview my own herbal medicine magician for this episode. I cannot overstate how much Colleen has helped me over the years and hope this episode helps you…

Full transcript

Food is there to be enjoyed. We're very blessed to have an abundance of food around us and you know what? Like yeah, a bit more gratitude that we're lucky that we can have whatever we want whenever we want really and that we're being nourished and nurtured and not to be having the negative dialogue around food. There's a lot of negative dialogue around...

Hi I'm Eve Menezes Cunningham and welcome to The Feel Better Every Day Podcast. I am so excited to be sharing new trauma-informed and ADHD-friendly ideas for you to help you take better care of yourself, that highest, wisest, truest, wildest, most joyful, brilliant and miraculous part of yourself, as well as the basic self-care which we all know can be so challenging at times. I really appreciate you tuning in.

If you want a deeper dive you'll be getting bonus content each week if you sign up to The Sole to Soul Circle. You can do that for free or from as little as eight euros a month and you can also find more ideas in the book, 365 Ways to Feel Better: Self-care Ideas for Embodied Wellbeing.

Hi Colleen, I'm absolutely delighted to welcome you to The Feel Better Every Day Podcast.

Thank you, I'm delighted to be here, really happy to be chatting to you today.

You're one of the first people I thought of when I had the idea to do it but um I'm so glad I followed up because you hadn't got my email!

I'm so glad you did too because you don't always get emails and sometimes things can go missing so it's a good lesson for me actually as well to touch back with somebody if they haven't you know responded to something that you're keen on so yeah so good on you.

And also you've been such an enormous support, you are part of my self-care basically, you and Yvonne with the acupuncture. I don't know what I'd do without you both and so I'm delighted on a personal level that more people will get to hear what you do.

So I started working with you three or four years ago where?

It was, it was about four years ago now I think and yeah it was great. You were coming in very eager to learn and I think I remember your excitement of learning some concepts around your blood sugar balance and how you could control and manage your energy levels, your lifestyle and overall your outlook and brain fog you were coming in with as well.

A lot of what a naturopath does is teaching and educating and trying not to be too preachy because nobody's perfect as we'll discuss today but I think it's a, it really allows for a compliancy when you understand why you're taking something or why I'm advising you to do something.

I think in my experience over the years in practice and even as a lecturer as well you have to, you have to give a bit of the ‘why’ and then people because ultimately what this medicine is all about is empowering you to take the reins in your own health care.

It's very much an empowerment medicine and you know so that comes with a little bit of that education as well.

And I remember how you were telling me to imagine the plant magic, the plant medicine working its magic moving through me and how because I've been sober since 2001 I could like feel it in my elbow and my knee. And I was talking to a herbal medicine friend in the UK and I was like it's amazing she said to imagine this… and she was like, ‘Evei, that's the alcohol’ so kind of feeling that but just I really appreciated your yeah and your I didn't feel judged.

My work is all about self-care and I was confessing to you about like my crisps for dinner every night and all the rest of it and you're like that's contributing as well as perimenopause and I didn't know but ADHD with brain fog.

And yeah well this is it for such complex creatures. I think you know what it’s like. It's very interesting today and I see this a lot with the students as well and people being ashamed of their of their food choices and shame should never be around food. My God, like I mean that's what's got this problem today where the weight loss industry is how many billions of dollars worth you know to the economy? And you know we're set up for failure and we're not listening to our own body cues and it has to come from acceptance as well if it's going to be lasting.

And the other side of that coin is as well sometimes I feel like we need to pull ourselves out and have a look at the greater picture in the world and, my God, like food is there to be enjoyed. We're very blessed to have an abundance of food around us and you know what like yeah a bit more gratitude that we're lucky that we can have whatever we want whenever we want really and um that we're yeah we're being nourished and nurtured and not to be having the negative dialogue around food. There's a lot of negative dialogue around food.

Oh my God, January is a big time for that as well and um after Christmas so yeah it's about nurturing a healthier relationship with food as well.

And I think you know you did um really benefit from that as well you know not being not beating yourself up for having crisps but knowing how to talk about food um in a in a kinder way.

And yeah, what we what we tell ourselves is really important yeah and I think because I did have a lot of shame because self-care is such a huge part of my work and because what you were telling me is very basic nutritional advice.

I was in my 40s already but I remember studying a bit of nutrition with the yoga therapy training like in my 30s and learning how important it was as children and teenagers. I used to even write about nutrition for the UK national press and I'd kind of dismiss it for myself like, ‘Oh yeah, but it's too late for me.’ And working with you it's like, no it's really not too late.

This morning I added chia seeds and flax seeds to my mixed fruit and vegan yogurt (the plain one I no longer have the sugar one for breakfast) but these things like, I keep, I'm kind of overemphasising this a bit because I have been working in this area for so long and I want people who might be listening or watching to realise that probably food stuff for me is the least natural in terms of what I've integrated into my own self-care.

And some of what you were telling me back then, I understood it at some level but it felt like the kind of thing that aliens might do: like to chop fruit and have granola and seeds and vegan yogurt for breakfast. It's like yeah, but that's not really me.

Whereas I do now have that like three or four times a week!

Yeah, great, yeah it's a habit isn't it? It becomes a new you. Know it's a skill and it's a habit and it is exactly that it is self-care. It's nurturing yourself and putting in lovely vital plant food into your body. Yeah that's key for your inner vitality.

Yeah. I really want to hear about your ideal and actual daily self-care so I imagine some of it will be around food and plants but whatever feels…

I always have I'm here in my clinic at the moment and you know it's great for me when I'm in clinic here, I probably drink more herbal tea when I'm in the clinic so I make up a big pot and I have that big go and I always share a cup of tea with whoever's coming in to see me and I end up drinking quite a bit of herbal tea over the day.

Then when I'm in here myself and I always like I think that brings me into the zone and it's hydrating as well. So yeah, there's a lovely there's a lovely I don't know what the word I'm looking for is but there's a there's an ally feeling almost. When you have these herbs and they're here they're here to support us on so many different levels.

I think herbal medicine is so special. We know it works on the physical and that's what you know where people will tangibly come to herbal medicine initially it's because it'll do this for that you take this for that.

But we know and when you're taking herbs for a while you can see that works much deeper and herbs work very much on the emotional and spiritual levels as well so I find that it brings me, in certain terms, will bring me into a more calm and a parasympathetic state.

And so that's really important for me when I'm working as well. That's an ideal thing that you do manage pretty much every day but more so when you're in clinic and you have it in your environment prompting you. Exactly, yeah exactly, yeah. And what else would I do when you know when I'm when I'm on track and my schedule is a little bit you know better? Better run… it hasn't been well, it's been very busy for a few different reasons for the last couple of months and I haven't been getting to the gym as much as I'd like but I do like to get a gym session in in the morning if I can.

Because if it runs away after that, I tend to be quite busy in the evenings either doing online classes or with my two teenage boys and things can just go awry after that. So I find if I don't get it in in the morning then it can it can slip away from me. And I know how I feel when I've got that regular routine in so I'm missing that at the moment. And I know this week was a bit of a write-off because I I've other things to do but next week for me, I'm going to be back on track.

And when you say going to the gym again it's that kind of thing that people imagine it has to be something really high intensity or something really like heavy or whatever it might be what feels like an ideal workout and what feels like a good actual workout. Like if you were to have a spectrum for you getting to the gym and you're doing some or all of it?

Yeah, I like you know I do like weights and my body you know responds well to that. I like feeling strong and because I'm a woman in my mid-40s now, you know this is what I preach as well.

It's very much, you know, weight bearing exercise is really important for our bone density and also for our muscles. You know we want to have good muscle. We want to build good muscle in our body. So yeah, that's important for me.

The weights and I enjoy it. I like weights. I've been trying to do the pull-ups a bit more. I'm challenging myself not enough but you know the pull-up bar where you're like…

Yeah, oh my God I know it exists there's no way on earth I could pull myself up…

I think I'm going to give it more of an emphasis this year because I'd love to I'd love to be able to do that. You know but like you know you're putting different body weights and different people can pull themselves on those bars I'd like to give that a go I'd like to challenge. Yeah, I'd love to be able to do that a bit easier and not be absolutely aching for two days afterwards.

Yeah, there's the one at one of the pools in town. My shoulder is healing much better and I've been kind of doing push-ups on. They have like kind of jacuzzi jets but in my imagination I'm doing that full on. But as it heals, I don't want to make it worse but that's brilliant.

What about later in the day and evening and winding down?

Yeah, so you know it's not been, that's probably not been great for me over the last while because I've been doing an online course with a bunch in the States so I've been on a bit later some evenings. And also, my kids play rugby so I'm out so I try and I always try and work my day around getting home and having dinner together when the boys come home from school. So that's kind of like a good fulcrum point for me in the day. Where I'll always have home-cooked dinner we'll have dinner together.

That's the best time for all of us to eat together and then after that it can get quite busy again. So yeah, I find that can be quite taxing on me sometimes because I'm driving around a lot in the evening and you know juggling quite a bit.

But if I can get your ideal…

Yeah, if I could get out for a walk you know in the evening as well, that's ideal for me. And if I have a chance to you know wind down with a book in the evening time um or do a meditation. Or I listen to some astrology or I work on my astrology course that I'm doing. That for me would be ideal, if I had more time for that.

Yeah and because I know how compassionate you are with me and presumably with your other clients and others, right now, how compassionate are you being with yourself around your ideal and your actual self-care?

Yeah, look it, I'm in a very building, growth phase of my work at the moment as well so I'm I'm doing a lot of planning in the background. I'm building a new online hybrid course and I know at the moment I'm doing a lot extra and it's, you know it's, I need my sleep so I'll definitely get into bed now you know for me 11 o'clock is really good. I don't leave it past midnight I know we talked about that a lot.

And yeah, you know I know it's really important for me. Sleep. Sleep helps me through the busyness. And water and herbal teas, like just making sure I'm hydrated. And um and maybe some fasting in in between as well. That can help me as well, just to kind of clear.

It clears the head, it clears it clears the busyness because it's an interesting one. I find fasting can actually really help when I'm that you know that much on the go it kind of clears space and it just allows it allows for a little bit more clarity and calmness. Actually calm. Yeah, I strive to be calm. I'm not always calm at home in the evenings but I strive for that.

Well you have a busy life! I was gonna ask about your like ideal and actual self with an uppercase Self for that more like transpersonal spiritual element. You mentioned like meditation and astrology. Do you want to say a little more about that?

Well, I've always I've always had a deep interest in, I suppose, I don't know, esoteric medicine, would you call it? You know I went to India when I was 22 and I was in Thailand when I was about 20 and I started to learn yoga then.

Like that was back in 1999 around that time I think we went to Thailand and so that opened up my eyes to, Wow, oh my God! I remember doing yoga on an open platform up high in the jungle with trees around us and then we'd have like a bowl of porridge with loads of different I always remember the ginger and the cloves and all of that lovely flavour and the porridge and I can remember that so clearly. And I always I always felt connected. That there was a lot more, there was a lot more to our physical beings here. You know, our spirit. Our ancestors. And yeah, we're here for a purpose this lifetime but there's so much more outside of us. And your soul journey after you know, when you pass away and what happens after that.

I was always really intrigued with all of that and so I'd have a very deep faith in that and I think that that's really kept me kept me happy, I suppose. And centred and content in my own company for a lot of a lot of my life. Yeah, it's something that I can lean back into and I do incorporate in every day really, in some way shape or form. Yeah.

And I was gonna ask what love and care and advice you'd be sending to a Younger You but it sounds like it's coming in both directions. Like 20 Year Old You and 22 Year Old You helped set you up good habits. But is there any love advice and care you'd like to send back?

Yeah, I suppose I was I was very unorthodox when I was that age. Like I didn't kind of follow through the trajectory of, I did go to college but then I went traveling and I kind of like I really did follow my own flow. And maybe I was always feeling a little bit, back in the back of my head, I might have felt a bit guilty about that.

That maybe I should have gone and, you know, done that or you know, got into you know buying property here when I was younger and all of that kind of thing. But I actually have no regrets on that. I don't, yeah, just, oh my God, enjoy. Enjoy the fun. Enjoy the travel. Enjoy because we're here for such a short time.

And yeah, you know those early years, I'm so glad that I went traveling. I'm so glad that I had all those lovely experiences. And all the different countries I worked in. All the different people I've met has all had to form where I'm at today.

And that given me the drive and the belief that I can you, know, my own business and work for myself and help other people and be of service to other people. And that's, you know you know, I think I got a lot of that belief from having all those different experiences when I was young.

So yeah, just to enjoy it. Enjoy it.

Well thank you so, so much.

And we'll be sharing more for the Half Moon members and Full Moon members in the separate videos. For now, I just really appreciate you joining me. Where can people find you? Like do you want to say, I'm going to have details in the show notes, but what would you like to plug now?

My website is herbalhealthcare.ie and if you google Colleen Kennedy you'll find me. I'm also on Facebook and I'm on Instagram. Again my Instagram handle is @colleenherbnut but I might be changing that soon too. But herb nut, nut for nutrition.

I thought it was brilliant. Yeah I love it so maybe I'll leave it then. But that's my Instagram and then Facebook is I've built a personal profile which I'm using more for work now as well Colleen Kennedy and then Colleen Kennedy Herbal Healthcare.

Well thanks again!

Thank you for listening to this episode of The Feel Better Every Day Podcast. I want to help as many people as possible with trauma histories and/or ADHD learn how to help yourself to connect with your Self with that uppercase that highest wisest truest wildest most joyful brilliant miraculous part of yourself and to become more fully embodied at peace and at ease in your own skin so to help me do this if you can think of someone who might benefit please share it and if you haven't already and would like to you can subscribe comment rate review and this episode like all of them so far has been produced by me your host Eve Menezes Cunningham thanks again for listening and if you'd like more on this week's theme you can subscribe as a free subscriber or paid member of The Sole to Soul Circle at evemc.substack.com find out more at selfcarecoaching.net.

Each week Half Moon members, that's the free subscribers, get some bonus content to support balance and harmony. It's a bit of a deeper dive into the podcast theme. And then the following day, Full Moon and Supermoon members get additional deep dives into helping themselves shine. By really supporting, really soothing, really working well with your nervous system so that you feel safe enough to expand your comfort zone and do the things that you already know to do perhaps. But just supporting yourself and taking those steps let me know if any of that is of interest and I hope you have a gorgeous day.

Including 4 new letters that may become as familiar to you as ADHD as Drs Hallowell and Ratey’s potentially less stigmatising VAST model (Variable Attention Stimulus Trait) becomes better known…

Which of these 25 terms resonate most for you?

Which ADHD (or VAST) terms had you hoped to see included?

Comment or reply to let me know for a future episode.

le grá (with love),

Evei

FULL TRANSCRIPT

I remember part of the training involved the recognition, both through our own practice and through working with others, that often if, for example, someone is working with anxiety and they start practicing mindfulness, it's not uncommon for them to report feeling more anxious. In reality, they've normally been experiencing those physiological symptoms and the mindfulness practice makes it more conscious and helps us get better at making choices that alleviate the anxiety. Hi, I'm Eve Menezes Cunningham and welcome to The Feel Better Every Day Podcast.

I am so excited to be sharing new trauma-informed and ADHD-friendly ideas for you to help you take better care of your Self, that highest, wisest, truest, wildest, most joyful, brilliant and miraculous part of yourself, as well as the basic self-care, which we all know can be so challenging at times. I really appreciate you tuning in. If you want a deeper dive, you'll be getting bonus content each week if you sign up to The Sole to Soul Circle.

You can do that for free or from as little as eight euros a month and you can also find more ideas in the book. 365 Ways to Feel Better: Self-care Ideas for Embodied Wellbeing. Welcome to episode 53 of The Feel Better Every Day Podcast.

Today we're deconstructing some of the jargon around ADHD. It's not quite an A-Z, but there's a lot there and I'm smiling because I remember I used to feel completely overwhelmed by all the jargon and over the past few years some of it still makes me laugh because it's not very intuitive and other bits are completely of course. When I learned to practice and teach mindfulness well over a decade ago, I remember part of the training involved the recognition both through our own practice and through working with others, that often if for example someone is working with anxiety and they start practicing mindfulness, it's not uncommon for them to report feeling more anxious.

In reality they've normally been experiencing those physiological symptoms and the mindfulness practice makes it more conscious and helps us get better at making choices that alleviate the anxiety and that help us regulate and help us make changes to our lives. Similarly with the ADHD jargon, I'm never a fan of jargon, but I have felt like it's been learning a new language the past few years and some of it is so helpful when I realise it's not just me. I do occasional newsletters called ‘Is This Me or ADHD?’ because I think like so many people with the diagnosis, whether it's self-diagnosis or official, it can be like well tick tick tick tick tick, I feel really like, ‘Yep this is all me’, but I thought they were personality traits.

So understanding that they're traits and symptoms and then also recognising that ADHD presents differently in different people obviously, so getting a sense of which ones feel most resonant for you and finding ways to support yourself through it. I just sneezed, I hope I don't need to edit that out, I tried to pause it in time.

We're going to start with ADHD burnout and it's different to regular burnout but it can be a real problem. I know that I'm constantly amending my schedule in order to minimise it because even now more than 20 years into being my own boss, being in the really fortunate position to be able to control my own schedule, I will still do too much, I'll hyperfocus, that's coming later and then I'll be fit for nothing for days.

It's really useful as with everything to notice for yourself when you feel it, what helps you when you're in it, what helps you recover more quickly, what helps you prevent it, the more awareness you have the easier it will get for you to actually prevent this endless cycle by building in more rest, taking more off your plate. Progress not perfection as with everything but it's a practice and just even recognising that you're potentially more prone to it can help you recognise that you are worthy of the extra supports and accommodations in your own life and if you're your own boss or if you're working for someone else, really advocating for yourself and knowing you're worth it.

The second term is convocoaster which is not a clinical term but it's for when we go off on a bit of a conversational rollercoaster. The people who know and love us might be patient and wait knowing that we will come back eventually.

I remember my housemates when I was at Bangor University in the ‘90s talking about me being a bit like a runaway train and that if they kind of hung on I would get back to the point eventually. I had no idea about ADHD back then but being patient with yourself, being patient with loved ones, recognising okay there is a point and you will get back to it and also supporting yourself if you're in a meeting or if you're in a situation where you want to be as focused as possible and making brief notes for yourself.

Number three, we've got Glimmers, a term coined by the delightful Deb Dana who has helped make Polyvagal Theory accessible to more people. We're all so familiar with triggers and how something that others might not notice can have a pretty debilitating effect on the nervous system. Glimmers are their opposite.

It might be the way the light looks on a puddle, it might be the way it can be all kinds of tiny things, larger things but getting to know your glimmers and creating an environment for yourself, creating a schedule for yourself where you are likely to experience as many glimmers as possible is going to contribute to your ventral vagal wellness and overall wellbeing.

It's a wonderful way to help alleviate some of the suffering and to really enjoy the way things look or feel or taste or smell or sound, just let yourself feel glimmery and set playlists for yourself, really enjoy it, really indulge yourself as much as possible.

Number four is moving on to hyperfocus and for Half Moon members (that's the free subscribers, you can subscribe at evemc.substack.com or selfcarecoaching.net) you'll be getting an email newsletter with a video around hyperfocus and how you can support balance and harmony in your life by working with your own hyperfocus a bit better. Hyperfocus is one of the many reasons why ADHD as a name is not loved by so many. I'll get on to that later but we don't have a problem focusing when we're interested in something. When something grabs us, we often have difficulty unfocusing. So often, people ignore bodily sensations like hunger or thirst or needing the loo or sleep or whatever it might be. Becoming aware of your areas of hyperfocus, becoming aware of your energy levels, of your interests, of the things that need to be done and finding ways as much as possible to make it work for you.

Like I said I'll go into this in more detail for tomorrow's bonus content, the deeper dive, but you can just think for yourself, when did you last hyperfocus? Was it a joyful hyperfocus? Was it a stressful hyperfocus?

It can actually be really enjoyable building time in to go down random rabbit holes, something you may never have heard of and all of a sudden it's the most fascinating thing in the world and we live in an information age and it's very easy to research and find out more and it's I think really helpful to recognise the joy in that and put supports in place and also to recognise the things that you perhaps need to be doing. I've recently completed a massive revamp of my website and it's taken a year and a half because I initially hyperfocused and then I got distracted by lots of other things and I wanted to complete it but there was a lot of behind the scenes stuff.

It's an enormous site and I was creating a library and my virtual assistant helped a lot but it just took a really long time and then in the last few weeks recognising I was near the end, I let myself go into hyperfocus.

I scheduled days in where I could work. I didn't have sessions those days and working around the clock but in a planned way. I'm not advocating working on the clock, it's something I'm still working on myself but in this instance it was such a joy to get it done and then I built in some time off afterwards.

Know that you're going to get hooked into things, knowing that certain things are going to produce more dopamine and you're just going to get really enthusiastic about them rather than beating yourself up for the way your brain works. Work with it as much as possible.

Moving on to impulsivity (number five), it makes me laugh that I didn't realise that I was impulsive until I got my diagnosis (combined). Once I realised it, I realised of course I am. I can remember going back decades, certain things I did. A couple years ago I leaped onto a conveyor belt at an airport because I thought that my luggage was being taken away without it being labelled.

It was the middle of the night in Norway, it had been a stressful few days, my uncle was dying and there were no humans around. I saw my suitcase disappearing and I just leaped onto the conveyor belt like a thing possessed. I'm surprised I didn't fall and hurt myself.

Suddenly there were loads of humans around and they were telling me off because I shouldn't have done that but it's that kind of impulsivity. I guess not everyone does that and I can think of so many examples through my life where I’ve been like. ‘Well obviously you had to do whatever’ and other people are like, ‘No, you really didn't.’ So like I said with the mindfulness earlier, knowing that I have this tendency towards impulsivity, my life has changed.

I'm still waiting to hear from the doctor if I'm able to take the ADHD medication. I've had the cardiology report, things are looking promising but just knowing I'm impulsive helps me attend to that impulsive part of myself. My spending has improved, my eating has improved, my time management has improved, all sorts of things have improved just by recognising that impulsive part of me needs to be attended to and loved and cherished and enjoyed when appropriate. But it cannot drive my life. It just cannot be in the driving seat. So recognising it's a thing is definitely helping that awareness, that consciousness and I hope it does for you too.

Moving then to inattentive (number 6), again I didn't really know that not everyone did this but I did know that I often gave the impression of listening really well and not taking anything in. And because I now understand more about my brain, I'm better able to own it and be honest. I think because my dad was a teacher when I was growing up, I kind of grew up pretending to pay attention and at school and all the rest of it but in my head I was all sorts of other places.

I was recently in B&Q and I asked where the loo was. The kind person said it is do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do and I was like, ‘Magic. Thank you so much!’ and then I immediately said, ‘Would you mind repeating that please? I said magic as if I understood it and I was nodding as if I understood it but I have no idea what you just said!’

And because I'm 49 now and because I feel safe now, I can own it. She laughed and she was so sweet and she showed me where it was and I found it. It was brilliant but I thought I can't tell you how much of my life I pretended to nod along and understand things that were just whoosh.

I think also being Indian Irish, I recently had an experience… not recently actually, it was over 10 years ago. I was in Italy at a psychosynthesis conference and some people think I look Italian or Spanish and I realised that when I was doing my normal nodding along. They were talking Italian at this conference in Florence and people were then talking to me and they thought I could understand and it was like, ‘Oh my god! I really can't!’

I'm not sharing a How To Do Things here, I'm just sharing how more awareness is helping me in hopes that it will help you.

Giving yourself anchors that help you when you're inattentive so you don't go down a rumination (number 8) pathway but you instead have nice happy places you can visit in your mind. Ways in which you can use that time to do something that works for you. I feel like I'm being naughty suggesting that! But it’s so helpful.

Moving on to justice sensitivity (number 9). Again, I didn't understand how other people seemed to function when certain things were going on in the world. I’d burst into tears reading the newspaper before I learned how to practice Metta and send loving kindness to all involved. I remember all sorts of situations which I'm actually not going to name now because I don't want to upset anyone. There's so much going on in the world now. There has been for such a long time but I didn't understand how other people functioned when I just felt just broken by something going on so far away. Understanding that justice sensitivity again is a symptom, is a trait, helps me recognise, ‘OK. It's just my differently wired brain.’ What can I do, not to fix the problem (because even though my name's Eve I'm not responsible for the whole world this is something I keep reminding myself of) but what is within my power what is within my capabilities and my time available and my energy levels and my desire to help.

We so often think we have to do all the things whereas just doing something in that direction can help alleviate some of that intense pain that accompanies daily life a lot of the time. There is so much injustice in the world and it's not about turning a blind eye it's about honouring your strengths and capabilities and energy and harnessing it so that you can potentially make much more of a difference without hurting yourself. Without burning out. Without feeling utter despair.

Moving then to misophonia (number 10) and I didn't realise there's so much I had no idea about. That actual pain that accompanies certain sounds. Again, I thought everyone had it and I didn't understand how they'd be able to focus on whatever other people were saying rather than, ‘OH MY GOD!’ But also thinking about adults in my life when I was a child.

Certain things they'd pick up on and certain things that they would criticise me for, well meaning potentially but painful to experience. Recognising they probably had misophonia and it was painful to hear whatever.

With all of this, I think there's a grieving not just for ourselves with late diagnosis ADHD but also if we then recognise symptoms in the adults in our lives and think not only how different our childhoods might have been and younger adulthoods if we had known about ourselves but how different, how much less intergenerational trauma there might be had they known. And had they had the support that they needed and deserved and that could have made them better in their roles as adults in our lives.

So we then move to neuroaffirming (number 11), which I hope you're familiar with. You want to, if you're working with anyone one-to-one, make sure they're neuroaffirmative rather than pathologising you, recognising a strengths-based approach and really working with your delightfully differently wired brain.

And doing the same for yourself, not dismissing yourself, not beating yourself up about things you can't change, but working with the gifts and the strengths that come with it as well.

PDA (number twelve) makes me laugh. The pathological demand avoidance. I used to hear the whole time as a child, as a teenager, that I was, I mean, I was, I can't remember exactly what I heard because I was kind of inattentive tuning it out, but I remember a lot of being told off about not doing what adults wanted me to do. And as an adult now, as a 49 year old, I still have to be careful with myself.

If I want myself to do something that I know is good for me, I have to really be gentle and I have to kind of approach it like an adult might in terms of giving a small child vegetables and kind of sneak them in because the pathological demand avoidance is high. And it just makes me laugh now and I can own it and I no longer let it sabotage me. It's like, ‘OK, I need to attend to that part of me that really doesn't want to be told what to do even by myself!’

Working with yourself again and reminding yourself you're not forcing yourself to do anything, but something might help, see how it goes, play with it, have fun.

Then we move on to the painful rejection sensitivity dysphoria (RSD) (number thirteen), which is incredibly painful. I also want to flag that everyone experiences rejection as painful, but with the rejection sensitivity dysphoria, it can feel especially like, ‘How to recover?’ but it's not an excuse to make your feelings more important than anyone else's. Obviously they need to be to you, but it's not fair to expect other people to put their needs and wants below because it's about recognising and having empathy for yourself and also for others, for ourselves and for others.

We might feel things more acutely, but again, when you say that, when I say that, I don't know how someone else actually experiences it. They might be feeling it much more deeply than I realised from their reaction, because they might be used to getting on regardless while dying on the inside. But rejection sensitivity dysphoria is incredibly painful. One of the things that helped me was becoming a writer, where I basically had to deal with so much rejection.

It didn't desensitise me to it, but it did teach me very early on that the best thing to do was to take action. I'm in a position right now where I'm waiting to hear back from a few different situations and teenage me would have languished and stressed and ruminated and all the rest of it. But when I became a professional writer, I just learned to get on with it.

It doesn't mean that I don't feel it. I still go through far too much of my life thinking that people don't like me or hate me or I've done something wrong or I mean, it's much, much better than it was, but it is a painful way to be. And it's very recently that I realised that not everyone goes through life like that!

Be gentle with yourself and use the pain you feel to be gentle with others as well and to be sensitive about the way you reject others.

Moving on to revenge bedtime procrastination (number fourteen), I know we covered this in the sleep issue and also in the second episode with Rebecca Seal (and later I think with the Chris Oxborrow and Louise Lucas episodes). Notice when you're staying up late and you don't want to be, notice again that potential PDA. That, ‘Don't tell me when to go to bed!’

Ask yourself what benefits you're getting. Often it is that kind of quiet time, that peaceful time. See if you can make changes in your schedule so you can get those needs met, but in a way that doesn't leave you feeling exhausted so much of the time. Log your...

This April Fools Day, we’re exploring ways in which our ADHD brains keep us fooling ourselves

And how awareness and compassion really help…

How about you?

Le grá (with love),

Evei

FULL TRANSCRIPT

For me, if I don't have something to read, I feel quite anxious. I don't want to be anywhere where I could be reading and I'm not reading, but also I don't know what mood I'm going to be in at that time, so I tend to bring like different journals and magazines as well as maybe a memoir and maybe a novel. And this might be just for one night, but I'm, especially now I can drive so I'm not lugging it all on the train, and like my brother has used a Kindle since they were invented and I know so many people use like Kindles or similar and I'm just like, ‘What if it ran out? What if it broke?’ I can't, I need to know, I've got stuff to read.

Hi, I'm Eve Menezes Cunningham and welcome to The Feel Better Every Day Podcast. I am so excited to be sharing new trauma-informed and ADHD-friendly ideas for you to help you take better care of yourself, that highest, wisest, truest, wildest, most joyful, brilliant and miraculous part of yourself, as well as the basic self-care which we all know can be so challenging at times.

I really appreciate you tuning in. If you want a deeper dive you'll be getting bonus content each week if you sign up to the Sole to Soul Circle. You can do that for free or from as little as eight euros a month. And you can also find more ideas in the book, 365 Ways to Feel Better: Self-care Ideas for Embodied Wellbeing.

Thanks for joining me again, Jayne Leonard, I really appreciate it.

Thanks Eve, thanks for having me.

We're celebrating April Fools today and talking about, especially with ADHD, how we fool ourselves, how we delude ourselves.

I'm looking back through 365 Ways to Feel Better: Self-care Ideas for Embodied Wellbeing and I just looked at the April Fools Day entry and it’s what we're talking about today:

Are you fooling yourself?

How can we really get honest in a compassionate and curious way about what we're doing and whether that serves us in terms of what we want to be doing and where we want to be going?

I'm just laughing that I was talking about deluding myself that yumyums were a healthy breakfast. We're talking also about how like we delude ourselves in terms of, do you want to say some of the things you delude yourself about? Some of the things you fool yourself about?

Yeah, the biggest thing I think I delude myself about is how much I can get done in a time period and I just think, so time is as we know like a really tricky concept for people with ADHD anyway, we just, yeah we struggle with it. But I think also I don't take into account maybe where I am in the whole, am I in the hyperfocus mode where I can get loads done or am I kind of on the comedown from that or am I in the burnout zone.

So it has been, yeah, it's been kind of a journey to figure that out and it's still definitely tricky. Like I sent you a photo when I was in Kerry, in November was it, I sent you a photo of about six books I brought and I was only there for four days and I also had a load of work to do and stuff but this was like, it's almost like the fantasy of, absolutely, the fantasy of oh and I could and I could get that stuff done if I sat and read.

But I also have all this other stuff to do. But it's like my brain compartmentalises like you want to get this done so just focus on this and get this done and it doesn't look at the other compartments that also need to be done.

Yeah I think that's the biggest thing I delude myself about. I love that about reading and I no longer call them to be read piles, they're like COULD be read piles because I don't want that pressure.

For me, if I don't have something to read, I feel quite anxious and it feels like I don't want to be anywhere where I could be reading and I'm not reading but also I don't know what mood I'm going to be in at that time.

I tend to bring like different journals and magazines as well as maybe a memoir and maybe a novel and this might be just for one night but I'm, especially now I can drive so I'm not lugging it all on the train. My brother has used a Kindle since they were invented and I know so many people use like Kindles or similar and I'm just like what if it ran out? What if it broke? I can't, I need to know, I've got stuff to read.

I think packing is like one of the hardest things for people with ADHD because you don't know what, you know, you're so used to something not catching your attention, your focus that you saw it.

It's like you have to have 50 different things in the bag just in case. Which is going to give me the dopamine now?

Thinking like in terms of music, the learning to drive has been hilarious. I drive, my partner lives, it’s an hour and 45 minutes to drive there. I'll have some grapes and peeled clementines on the seat next to me which I've learned over time to do.

Initially it's like, well there's nowhere really safe to stop to drink on the way so it's about having something you can just gently but I need to listen to an audiobook because if it's a podcast it might have ad breaks that I don't like. They are too jarring. Even if I have my liked music on shuffle they sometimes insert their recommendations and it's like or even if it's something I've liked, I'm not in the mood for it in that moment.

I've learned to stop fooling myself that I can be more laid back and I can't do radio at this stage at all but I think knowing I'm still new to driving I have to be really gentle with myself and it's like nope I have a really long podcast episode and then I can pull over to change it and this is a podcast that doesn't have ads. Or an audiobook. That's the safest thing and again predictable.

In terms of fooling yourself, we've talked about how much we think we can get done. We're going to talk a bit more in the Half Moon and Full Moon recordings so if you're not already a subscriber you can join at evemc.substack.com

Even though it's really, hard like I've always been really early, like I was at JFK airport nine hours before a flight from NYC. Same in Spain. I was so terrified that I would get distracted and wander off and miss my flight so I didn't realise that was ADHD until I did.

It's that knowing, OK, we know that we don't have a natural relationship to time. But we also know that time is not actually like time. Clocks were only invented a few hundred years ago. It's a social construct in a way you never thought about.

Like people with dyslexic brains, apparently it depends on the part of the world you're from because reading wasn't a natural thing that like all humans were born known to do. It evolved. We learn how to do it and depending on where you are in the world, you read from right to left or you read in other ways so it depends.

I think yeah we can fool ourselves but we can also be gentle with ourselves and think okay how can I make it how can I feel less foolish around it? I still love the over scheduling myself but by blocking out big parts of my desk diary, I know that that time is not available also for the do do do do do.

I think I also fool myself in that I like I think, ‘Oh, OK, I can pack this. I'll just survive with this little bag. I'll book my flight or whatever and I'll have this little bag and then I come to pack and I go, ‘Oh my god, no, I need to put everything in here!’ Yeah I fool myself a lot.

It's actually a lot around time. Now that we're talking about it, I'm realising it's actually almost all about time. I was talking to someone else actually who fools themselves around and this is not on purpose but again there's probably a time element. They would only cherry pick the last two instances of something so they might have had an interaction with a mother-in-law or something and they might say, ‘You know she's actually really awful to me’ but the 10 times before that it wouldn't have been like that. But it's again, I think the time and our memories.

Yeah, like if you've got a cold and you can't imagine ever being able to breathe easily again or if you're physically cold and you can't ever imagine being hot again or the other way around. So recognising that what we're feeling in that moment isn't everything true of everything, yeah.

The ability to zoom out is huge.

Do join us in the Half Moon and or Full Moon Circles and thank you so much for joining. Thank you for listening to this episode of The Feel |Better Every Day Podcast.

I want to help as many people as possible with trauma histories and or ADHD learn how to help yourself to connect with your Self with that uppercase S: that highest, wisest, truest, wildest, most joyful, brilliant, miraculous part of yourself. To become more fully embodied at peace and at ease in your own skin.

To help me do this, if you can think of someone who might benefit, please share it. And if you haven't already and would like to, you can subscribe, comment, rate, review. And this episode like all of them so far has been produced by me, your host, Eve Menezes Cunningham.

Thanks again for listening. And if you'd like more on this week's theme you can subscribe as a free subscriber or paid member of the Sole to Soul Circle at evemc.substack.com

Find out more at selfcarecoaching.net

Each week, Half Moon members, that's the free subscribers, get some bonus content to support balance and harmony so it's a bit of a deeper dive into the podcast theme.

And then the following day, Full Moon and Supermoon members get additional deep dives into helping themselves shine by really supporting, really soothing, really working well with your nervous system so that you feel safe enough to expand your comfort zone. To do the things that you already know to do by just supporting you and taking those steps.

Let me know if any of that is of interest and I hope you have a gorgeous day.

There’s something magical about simply slowing down enough to notice all the beauty around us.

This week, I’ve changed my schedule to actually make time to do all the things I ‘should’ be doing and ‘need’ to do in the garden and field.

We’ve made a proper start on the deadhedge I’ve been planning since before even moving to Ireland and I cannot believe how happy it’s made me. I’ve been taking my breakfast outside and eating it while looking at this pile of branches and sticks.

It’s the little things…

Today and everyday, what teeny tiny thing might you start doing in order to connect with the day’s energies and the earth itself?

le grá (with love),

Evei

FULL TRANSCRIPT

took us more and more away from our own bodies and more and more away from the earth that our ancient ancestors and some people still now recognise is our life support system. So this is not to get all depressing about the climate emergency and all of that but instead to remind you that you are part of nature, you are part of the divine, you are part of the earth.

Hi, I'm Eve Menezes Cunningham and welcome to the Feel Better Every Day Podcast.

I am so excited to be sharing new trauma-informed and ADHD-friendly ideas for you to help you take better care of yourself, that highest, wisest, truest, wildest, most joyful, brilliant and miraculous part of yourself, as well as the basic self-care which we all know can be so challenging at times. I really appreciate you tuning in.

If you want a deeper dive, you'll be getting bonus content each week if you sign up to the Sole to Soul Circle. You can do that for free or from as little as eight euros a month and you can also find more ideas in the book, 365 Ways to Feel Better: Self-care Ideas for Embodied Wellbeing.

Welcome to episode 51 of the Feel Better Every Day Podcast. Ot was Earth Hour on Saturday and it always feels like a shame to limit our connection with the earth to one hour or one day a year when we have that earthing, supportive, nourishing energy to draw on 24-7.

We are so lucky. It's a gorgeous, beautiful planet and wherever you are right now, you can begin to connect with that support, that energy that we were disconnected from like hundreds of years ago as colonisation took us more and more away from our own bodies and more and more away from the earth that our ancient ancestors and some people still now recognise as our life support system.

This is not to get all depressing about the climate emergency and all of that, but instead to remind you that you are part of nature, you are part of the divine, you are part of the earth and you can anytime, anywhere remind yourself that you are safe, you are held, you are protected and I want to encourage you to do that right now.

Wherever you are, if it's safe to go into a mini meditation, so not if you're driving but you can still listen if you're driving, it's not going to put you to sleep or anything, but pressing into whatever it is you're sitting or standing on.

If you're walking, you might continue to walk or you might pause for a moment, just press into the soles of the feet, feel the air around you.

Press into everything that is making contact with the earth through what you're sitting on. You can do this on an aeroplane, up in the sky, you can still ground yourself using intention, using your imagination. Noticing how it feels to really connect with the boundary of whatever it is you're sitting or standing or lying on and if it feels good, imagine that you've got roots going from the soles of your feet and any other part of the body that's touching the bed or what you're sitting on, going deep, deep, deep into the heart of the earth.

Letting yourself feel that earth's nourishing supportive energy as you breathe in, imagining breathing in that nourishing supporting earth in grounding energy from the heart of the earth, up through your imaginary roots and up into your body, up through the feet, through the legs, up to the lower lungs and back out again.

You can imagine yourself just breathing this nourishing supportive energy in and out, connecting with each breath.

If you want to go a little bit further, you can imagine releasing energies that no longer serve you and with each exhalation, letting them flow out down through those imaginary roots into the earth, knowing that energy is energy and it can all be recycled for the benefit of the planet. It doesn't help anyone for you to stay stuck.

Maybe pausing this and staying with this for a few moments if that feels good for you and if it also feels good for you, grabbing your journal, grounding your experience by writing about it, making a few notes.

It might be that you've got time to explore right now or it might be that you want to write a few notes and revisit it later. Writing can be really grounding, especially writing by hand.

Noticing where you are in any given moment can be really grounding. We are so busy, we're so delighted with our devices and we can get quite disconnected from the present moment.

Just taking a time moment every now and then to pause, look around you if you're walking, if you're listening to something.

You don't have to do a full-on mindful walk but just notice every few minutes or so or every half hour a degree that feels good for you, that's going to feel indulgent and enjoyable, not punitive like, ‘Put that phone down!’ or whatever it might be.

Other things that can be really grounding are to prepare food like batch cooking, making soup, if you peel potatoes, peeling potatoes, putting laundry away, sweeping the floor, anything that's helping you work with that base chakra energy. So you can go back to evemc.substack.com or the blog at selfcarecoaching.net and look at the chakra journey from last year, 2024 if you're listening to this later, and go back over the base chakra episodes and that has many many ideas.

Notice how you feel when perhaps you've been away or you've been really busy. The washing has piled up and the washing up has piled up, you haven't like kind of the simplest things like changing the bedding and sweeping the floors or vacuuming or cooking is such a nourishing lovely thing, especially if you're using vegetables, if you're using things to genuinely nourish yourself.

Really, really grounding, you're telling yourself you're worthy, you're honoring the fuel you're putting into yourself and it also it's something that humans have to do, we have to eat for fuel so we have to cook, we have to eat either way so you can really use what you're eating, what you're cooking. Even how you're cleaning, how you're tidying, how you're getting stuff organised and sorting through your finances can be really grounding. It can help you even if you're not happy with your finances.

Being honest with yourself and getting a clear sense of where you actually are as well as deciding where you want to be and making a plan to move towards that. Even looking at where you are now, very very grounding.

Gardening is obviously very grounding and there's all sorts of research about the microbiomes when we have our hands in the soil. Personally, I don't like that but I love being barefoot in the garden. I love being barefoot as often as possible wherever but I don't like my hands getting dirty which is embarrassing to admit but some of you especially with ADHD and other neurodivergence might feel the same.

I still get enormous benefits from grounding even if I'm wearing gardening gloves but there's something so delightful for me, there's the added bonus of feeding the donkeys next door with the safe to feed them weeds and grass and what have you.

Thinking for yourself, like if you like getting your hands dirty, whether you've got space indoors and outdoors for plants just placing your hands on that earth if that feels good for you.

With all of these suggestions, all of these self-care ideas, all of these self-care rituals, do what feels good for you.

You know yourself best but walking barefoot if that feels good for you, again depending on where in the world you are, if it's long grass you need to be careful but on many, many surfaces, on the beach, in the water, it can be wonderful.

I'd love for you to pause this or after you listen to this take some time to make a list of some of the things that help you ground.

With trauma therapy, if you're feeling flooded, anytime if you remember coming back into your body doing an EFT tapping can be very grounding bringing you back into the body. Tensing and releasing the thighs and noticing what's around you.

Some people look at like five things you can see, four things you can hear, three things you can feel, if there are any smells, if there are any like…

You don't have to make it complicated just letting yourself come out of your head, out of your ruminating mind and into the present moment.

Things like cold water swimming or yoga or being in the steam room or anything that is going to help you connect in your body with your body in a safe friendly you're part of this wonderful wonderful world.

How can you enjoy it more? I always go on about swimming as well as yoga but especially the swimming. As I'm moving through the water I feel most like myself. Hugs with loved ones. Sex. So many normal, everyday easy ways to ground yourself to connect with the earth to send the earth some love.

And you might also want to, as well as drawing on the earth supportive energy, think about how you can potentially leave the earth better than you found it.

Every day if you see litter and it's possible for you to be picking it up doing so maybe carry a bag with you on your walk. And maybe join others too. In Westport, we've got a strong Tidy Towns community (and in many towns around Ireland) but wherever you are there are going to be other people who want to give back to the earth by keeping things out of the streams and oceans.

It's about doing it with an open heart. It's about noticing energy use again with an open heart. Not being critical of yourself and others you share a home with but encouraging everyone to celebrate.

To nourish the earth as we nourish ourselves. And to remember to nourish ourselves more.

If you want to subscribe if you haven't already (to the Sole to Soul Circle) the bonus content this week for Half Moon members will be some embodied journal prompts to help you connect more with the earth's nourishing energy.

And a couple of yoga poses that I'll talk you through. For the Full Moon and Super Moon members we'll be working with some grounding crystals so I hope that you've enjoyed this.

I hope you have a gorgeous week and I look forward to sharing more next week when we'll be looking at ways in which we potentially fool ourselves for April Fools.

Thank you for joining me thank you for listening thank you for listening to this episode of The Feel Better Every Day Podcast I want to help as many people as possible with trauma histories and/or ADHD learn how to help yourself to connect with yourself with that uppercase that highest wisest truest wildest most joyful brilliant miraculous part of yourself and to become more fully embodied at peace and at ease in your own skin.

To help me do this, if you can think of someone who might benefit, please share it. And if you haven't already and would like to you can subscribe, comment, rate, review. This episode like all of them so far has been produced by me your host Eve Menezes Cunningham.

Thanks again for listening and if you'd like more on this week's theme you can subscribe as a free subscriber or paid member of the Sole to Soule Circle at evemc.substack.com and find out more at selfcarecoaching.net. Each week, Half Moon members (that's the free subscribers) get some bonus content to support balance and harmony so it's a bit of a deeper dive into the podcast theme.

And then the following day, Full Moon and Super Moon members get additional deep dives into helping themselves shine by really supporting really soothing really working well with your nervous system. Helping you feel safe enough to expand your comfort zone and do the things that you already know to do perhaps. Supporting you and taking those steps. Let me know if any of that is of interest and I hope you have a gorgeous day.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if everyone – neurodivergent and neurotypical – celebrated our brains and unique ways of seeing and being in the world? If the world were set up to better support ALL of us? If no one was shamed simply for being the way they were?

‘For us late diagnosed ADHDers, there is that mourning and that grief and that loss and that rage around how different entire lives could have been had we known, but also if the world were different and if the world were more set up. Even now, kids struggle having accommodations made for them even though the accommodations would support everyone, not just the neurodivergent children.’

Episode 50 of The Feel Better Every Day Podcast

is out a little earlier to help you make the most of the whole week’s worth of

events. You can sign up at https://www.neurodiversityweek.com/events

I hope you enjoy my ADHD chat with the lovely

Jayne Leonard as we talk about what’s helped and is still helping us to befriend

and celebrate our own late diagnosed ADHD brains.

le grá (with love),

Evei

FULL TRANSCRIPT

And yeah, I think just celebrate it, own it,

you know, allow it, accept it. It's not going to change, so you might as well

work with it and, you know, make space for it. Yeah.

Hi, I'm Eve Menezes Cunningham and welcome to

the Feel Better Every Day Podcast. I am so excited to be sharing new

trauma-informed and ADHD-friendly ideas for you to help you take better care of

your Self, that highest, wisest, truest, wildest, most joyful, brilliant and

miraculous part of yourself, as well as the basic self-care, which we all know

can be so challenging at times. I really appreciate you tuning in.

If you want a deeper dive, you'll be getting

bonus content each week if you sign up to the Soul to Soul Circle. You can do

that for free or from as little as eight euros a month. And you can also find

more ideas in the book, 365 Ways to Feel Better: Self-care Ideas for

Embodied Wellbeing (selfcarecoaching.net/book).

Welcome to The Feel Better Every Day Podcast.

I've got my vegan, ADHD, late diagnosed friend Jayne Leonard here again.

Thank you so much for joining me.

Thanks, Eve, looking forward to this episode.

So we're talking about the Neurodiversity

Celebration Week, which I did not write about in 365 Ways to Feel Better,

Self-care Ideas for Embodied Wellbeing, because when I wrote this, even

though I'd had a brain scan that showed an abnormality that correlated with

ADHD, I was years and years away from self-diagnosis, let alone actual

psychiatric diagnosis with ADHD.

But I think the whole world has woken up to

the fact that we are not all the same and it's a good thing and that there's

nothing necessarily wrong with anyone. It's simply about differently wired

brains and about conditions that support us rather than trying to fit round

pegs into square holes, in which case everyone comes out feeling like if you're

not completely normal, like what's normal, that there's something wrong with

you. And I'm thinking it's not that long ago that left-handed children would have

their hands tied behind their back to force them to write with their

non-dominant hand. How sadistic was that?

And I think for us late diagnosed ADHDers,

there is that mourning and that grief and that loss and that rage around how

different entire lives could have been had we known, but also if the world were

different and if the world were more set up. Even now, kids struggle having

accommodations made for them even though the accommodations would support

everyone, not just the neurodivergent children.

We wanted to just share a little bit about the

things we celebrate about our differently wired brains and what we'd like to

see more of for everyone.

Yeah, I love this. I love this topic. It's

definitely something I really do celebrate. I think even before I even thought

I might have ADHD, I used to love this part of me that could hyper-focus and

get so much done and learn so much about a topic. I did really well in certain

areas because of this. I used to call it my superpower and my friends, my

family say you're like superwoman, but I almost like over-identified with that.

So then, you know, the times when you have to

rest or you have the bit of the ADHD burnout, I would really berate myself, you

know. But now I think I've found the balance of I'm celebrating this, but also

recognising I need the downtime as well, the recovery period. Yeah.

Just for those of you who don't know, Jayne is

incredible. Not only is she a busy psychotherapist, she's Vice Chair, my deputy

on the Editorial Committee for the Irish Journal of Counselling and

Psychotherapy (IJCP), and she is doing her PhD. I don't know if you

want to say a tiny bit about your PhD and the amazing study you're a big part

of?

Yeah, well, just very briefly, I suppose, as I

was on your podcast before (episodes 28, 42 and 45) talking about food and

mental health and wellbeing.

So that's kind of the area of my study: How we

can use food to support us to feel better. And not just in terms of the actual

nutrition from the food, but also our relationship with the food, the

relationship it has to our culture, our identity, our social lives and the

social aspect of food. And so, yeah, I'm doing a PhD on that. We'll see how it goes now. We'll see how

incredible I am. I'm only a few months into it. We'll see how the burnout goes.

Well, this is it. I think knowing you as a

friend as well and knowing your schedule and just thinking, oh, my God/dess. And I also know that people hear some of what

I'm doing, which I consider completely normal. And they'll be like, oh, my God/dess,

what are you doing?

I've learned to build in rest. Like in my desk

diary, I've used purple highlighter to like carve out like a long lunch break

as many days as I can for a longer yoga nidra. I've used like pink highlighter to take (most) weekends off because

for so many years I was doing overlapping trainings in different types of

therapies and coaching and so much.

It's that challenge to honour the whole cycle,

not just the hyperfocus, but the burnout, the days where getting dressed just

feels impossible.

Yeah, I even booked a few nights away from

myself, you know, in Kerry last week, just so I could hyperfocus. And then I had the downtime after and it's

just, yeah, I think celebrating it is working with this rather than

expecting yourself to be either really super focused all the time or have it

act like someone who has a neurotypical brain or whatever that is. It's just

allowing it, working with it, like you said.

Yeah. And like when you said acting like

someone who has a neurotypical brain, I think like so many of us, we only know

our own brains. I mean, I grew up being called weird, but mostly in a friendly

way. And I was

happy to identify as a weird, but I think understanding where it's like, life

could have been so different.

But things like around nutrition, I remember

learning a good bit as part of my yoga therapy training, and how important it

was for developing brains. And like, I remember back then, in my 30s, then

thinking, oh, it's too late. I should have been eating better. I was vegetarian from the age of

like 11 or 12 and I didn't like vegetables. And I was pretty much malnourished. I had a growth spurt when I went

back to eating meat for a while at 17! I've been vegan now, since 2017. And I do eat much better but there is still

that strong, kind of like the questions around food were really like, oh, wow,

I really thought that was just me. Whereas now I celebrate the mushing up of my

food. And like,

sorry, loved ones who happen to be with me. But it just tastes so much better

like this.

Yeah, absolutely celebrate the differences,

you know, rather than trying to hide them or trying to change them.

Yeah. Like how important it is with ADHD to

have protein with breakfast. Like before we started our recordings today, wholemeal

toast, peanut butter, little bit of Vego (vegan chocolate spread) and mushed

banana. And it's

like, I spent decades being told by everyone, I should be having proper

breakfast. When I was at school, I might have ice cream for breakfast or

bourbon biscuits. And it's like, don't tell me what to do.

That's defiance. Yeah. Pathological Demand Avoidance.

Yeah. Even from myself! But I think

celebrating is even like saying, ‘Oh, well, that demand avoidance actually

served me in some situations. Yeah. And recognising now like, nope, I'm giving myself that protein

now, like at 49, I hope to have many, many decades to come and I'm doing what I

can to rectify that. And it is never too late, actually.

It's never too late to start eating well or

taking care of yourself or speaking to yourself more kindly or celebrating your

differences or whatever it is.

We're going to talk a bit more about what we

do to celebrate neurodiversity for the Half Moon recording, which if you would

like access to, you can subscribe for free at evemc.substack.com. You'd think

I've said this enough times. You'd think I'd know it off by heart. Well, I do know it off by heart. Compassion.

So hope you can join us there.

Thank you for listening to this so far. Jayne,

anything to add before we move to that?

 I've lots to add, as I always say, I've lots

to add. Yeah, I think just celebrate it, own it, you know, allow it, accept it. It's not going to change. You might as well

work with it and make space for it. Yeah.

Thanks a million. Thanks. If you're a Half

Moon member of the Sole to Soul Circle, trauma- informed and ADHD-friendly Self

care, you'll be getting a special recording where Jayne and I continue our

conversation and talk about the importance of owning the ADHD and any other

things.

How even talking about it reduces the shame we

still often feel around certain traits. I hope you find that helpful. And for Full Moon and Supermoon members,

we go into more depth celebrating our differently wired brains, at least some

of the time, a lot of the time, but we're human. I hope you enjoy it.

Thank you for listening to this episode of The

Feel Better Every Day Podcast. I want to help as many people as possible with

trauma histories and/or ADHD learn how to help yourself to connect with your Self,

with that uppercase, that highest, wisest, truest, wildest, most joyful,

brilliant, miraculous part of yourself and to become more fully embodied at

peace and at ease in your own skin. To help me do this, if you can think of

someone who might benefit, please share it.

And if you haven't already and would like to,

you can subscribe, comment, rate, review. This episode, like all of them so

far, has been produced by me, your host, Eve Menezes Cunningham. Thanks again

for listening.

And if you'd like more on this week's theme,

you can subscribe as a free subscriber or paid member of the Soul to Soul

Circle at evemc.substack.com. Find out more at selfcarecoaching.net. Each week,

Half Moon members, that's the free subscribers, get some bonus content to

support balance and harmony. So it's a bit of a deeper dive into the podcast

theme. And then the following day, Full Moon and Supermoon members get

additional deep dives into helping themselves shine by really supporting,

really soothing, really working well with your nervous system so that you feel

safe enough to expand your comfort zone and do the things that you already know

to do, perhaps, but just supporting you and taking those steps.

Let me know if any of that is of interest, and I hope you have a gorgeous day.

NEXT WEEK: ADHD TERMINOLOGY EXPLAINED

FULL TRANSCRIPT

Soothe your ruminating mind, again, especially with ADHD or trauma histories, getting away from all the catastrophic thinking, the stressful thoughts that are kind of putting you in Stress Response rather than Rest/Digest mode, allowing yourself to have something really easy and accessible to redirect your brain from those ruminating, catastrophising thoughts into something.

Hi, I'm Eve Menezes-Cunningham and welcome to The Feel Better Every Day Podcast. I am so excited to be sharing new trauma-informed and ADHD-friendly ideas for you to help you take better care of yourself, that highest, wisest, truest, wildest, most joyful, brilliant and miraculous part of yourself, as well as the basic self-care, which we all know can be so challenging at times.

I really appreciate you tuning in. If you want a deeper dive, you'll be getting bonus content each week. If you sign up to the Sole to Soul Circle, you can do that for free or from as little as eight euros a month. And you can also find more ideas in the book, 365 Ways to Feel Better, Self-Care Ideas for Embodied Wellbeing https://selfcarecoaching.net/book

Hi, welcome to episode 49 of The Feel Better Every Day Podcast. We're celebrating World Sleep Day with lots of holistic tips to experiment with. See what works for you, you know what's best for you. Some of them might appeal, some might not, they're all offerings. I've already recorded half of this and it turned out I didn't record it, so I'm starting again. In my imagination what I'd recorded was golden, so I'm just going to do my best to make it as good as possible.

#1 Set a positive intention around what sleeping well means for you

We often think about what we don't want to feel like, so tired, cranky, exhausted, drained, depleted. Think about what you actually do want. Think about how you want to feel when you wake up, like energised, refreshed, recharged, alert, feeling well, enthusiastic. Make it as vivid as you can for yourself, which leads on to…

#2 Visualising what you want

Worrying is exhausting for our nervous system and it's really easy to do. We get into rumination mode and especially with trauma histories or ADHD, it's really common. So replacing worry with imagining what you want is a discipline. It will get easier and it's the ideal thing to practice when you're trying to get to sleep.

So thinking about what you do want. So it might be a great night's sleep or it might be something you want in your life. It might be a holiday you're looking forward to. It might be something you're looking forward to in your relationship or work or with your home or travel or whatever it might be. Use images. I mean, thinking about counting sheep, you don't have to count sheep.

You can think about something you actively want, put that into images in your brain. That's going to move away from the more language-based thinking, which is more like kind of for the daytime and it encourages sleep, moving into that image-based thought pattern. So win-win. You're more likely to move towards what you actually want and also it will relax you and help you sleep.

#3 Make your self-talk soothing

Even if you feel like you're lying to yourself. Now I don't advocate lying lightly, but in this case I do. Even if you feel like you're going to be shattered tomorrow, imagining that now is not going to help you. And it's going to keep you awake rather than helping you sleep. It's going to inhibit any sense of Rest Digest parasympathetic activity.

Even if you feel like you're lying to yourself, imagine yourself as a beloved puppy, baby, kitten, goat, whatever, something you love and talk kindly to yourself about how no matter how tired you might be, it's going to be okay. It's going to be okay. You're going to be okay. This helps calm the amygdala and make sleep more likely.

#4 Relax your breathing

It's something really simple and has an enormous impact. So a deeper breath and a slightly longer exhalation helps to calm the nervous system. You can count if you want to, maybe in for one and out for two or three, or in for two and out for three or four, or simply sense it. If you're like me, numbers are not relaxing. Do what feels good for you, but aim for that deeper breath, that slightly longer exhalation.

You can find more breath practices and more in-depth on this at selfcarecoaching.net forward slash book and go to the book bonus videos. So it helps to remind yourself gently every time you notice that your attention has wandered from the breath and gently bring it back, but with compassion and with a congratulations for noticing.

#5 Make your bedroom as comfortable as you can

Think about your sleeping arrangements and think about yourself seeing them for the first time. We get desensitised to things that might be inhibiting sleep so walk into your bedroom now if you can, or just imagine it. Think, if your priority was amazing sleep, what would you be taking out of the room or at least making less visible?

For some people, you don't have a separate bedroom. I lived in studio flats for years in Cardiff and London. You might be in a bedroom in a shared house. You might have to work from your bedroom.

I started my practice from my bedroom, like I had a little desk at the foot of the bed, so it might be a sleeping area. I lived in teeny tiny studio flats for a really long time. But having some sort of division, whether it's through lighting, whether it's through furnishing, whether it's through colour, but also keeping it as sleep welcoming as possible.

Take a friendly eye rather than a critical eye and ask yourself if your aim were better sleep, what might be most helpful here and how can you do that for yourself?

#6 Experiment with aromatherapy

Aim for quality oils. You don't want any of the toxic scented candles or sprays. And unfortunately we live in a world where a lot of these things that look like they're good for us are actually filled with chemicals that you don't want anywhere near or below. Look into that and experiment with scents that you naturally find relaxing. Lavender has been shown to work for many people, but if you don't like lavender, don't use lavender. Experiment with what works for you. And over time, if you have a blend, work with that. I use a blend of lavender, rose, frankincense and geranium. It's something I've been using for nearly two decades now.

It helps me anchor that sense of being ready for bed. Find a blend that works for you or simply use lavender or any one scent, make it easy for yourself. But you're again helping to use your anchors around you, using your senses to help you recognise it's getting time to wind down, it's time for bed and allowing yourself to relax.

Take your foot off the gas and prepare for a gorgeous night's sleep. So something else you might want to do…

#7 Sleep inducing yoga

I used to teach Sleep Yoga classes every week, for a long time, at the golf and country club I used to teach at in Essex before I moved to Ireland.

#8 Longer yoga nidras

I also want to remind you that while it can increase dopamine, while it can be really yummy and relaxing and also help us make progress towards our goals and working with our sankalpas, it can, especially if you're a bit agitated about not being able to relax with trauma histories or with ADHD, it can feel quite anxiety provoking.

It's about really being friendly with yourself, starting with a shorter yoga nidra perhaps, experimenting with different voices. There are loads you can try on my YouTube channel, it's under my name, Eve Menezes Cunningham, or at selfcarecoaching.net.

I'm going to be sharing a Sleep Yoga abbreviated sequence that you can do on your bed for the Full Moon and Supermoon members as this week's bonus deeper dive. And an EFT tap along for the Half Moon free subscribers. Because these are things you can do on your bed or under the duvet, which just help to soothe the nervous system, help to prepare the body and mind for sleep.

And they're lovely practices, I do some sleep yoga many, many nights. It's just that getting ready and it helps you stay more comfortable, especially kind of post menopause. And if there are any kind of aching joints, the more you can work with your whole body, the easier it is for your mind and your body to relax.

So we touched on yoga nidra already. And I think I've said at selfcarecoaching.net and just type in yoga nidra, or through the Sole to Soul circle, there are bespoke ones for each theme for the Half Moon and for the Full Moon and Supermoon members.

#9 meditate or pray

Something as simple as breathing in and thinking calm and breathing out and thinking calm, or any other quality you choose. Breathing in, breathing out, doing this for three minutes or longer can help elicit the Relaxation Response (Episode 39). I'll link to the Relaxation Response episode in the show notes.

You can also use any kind of familiar and helpful meditation and prayers, whether you pray to God, Goddess, the Universe, Divine Love, Source, whatever works for you, Nature. It's about getting out of your ruminating mind again.

Especially with ADHD or trauma histories. Getting away from all the catastrophic thinking, the stressful thoughts that are kind of putting you in Stress Response rather than Rest Digest mode. Allowing yourself to have something really easy and accessible to redirect your brain from those ruminating, catastrophising thoughts into something more time to let go and let God, Goddess or whatever you believe in.

#10 Tap your sleeplessness away

As I mentioned, there's a tap along, an EFT Tap Along for sleep for Half Moon members (free subscribers). If you're not already and you want to sign up for free, it's at evemc.substack.com. You can also access loads of free EFT Tap Alongs for other things at selfcarecoaching.net/services/EFT

There are also other people who do Tap Alongs and other Emotional Freedom Techniques. There's more to EFT than just the tapping, but tapping is a wonderful place to start. Also, if you're a member of IACP, there’s the three-hour CPD for pretty much anything you can think of wanting to tap around.

It was intense to record and it's EFT for self-care for therapists and counsellors. So if you’re a member, you get that free and you might want to check it out.

#11 If you're really struggling to sleep, get active

This goes contrary to a lot of the advice about avoiding exercise late at night, but especially with ADHD or trauma histories, it can be really stressful lying there and knowing that you're not going to sleep. Getting up, giving yourself permission to do what your body needs, to do what your mind needs and go for a run, do some push-ups, do some sun salutations, go for a bike ride, jog on the spot or whatever feels good for you. Normally it's about winding down for bed, but there are going to be certain nights where some exercise is going to really help you sleep. So use activity to help you in a way that feels friendly for you.

#12 Step away from the bed

When you're lying awake for hours, the bed begins to feel far from comforting. After any kind of length of time that feels good for you, give yourself permission to get up.

You're not a child being sent to bed. You get to do what's right for you. You might want to do some light pottering or whatever feels like a break from trying to get to sleep. Give yourself that break and return to bed when you feel ready.

#13 Do a body scan

There are many online and you can also type body scan into the search tool on selfcarecoaching.net for some from me. Aim for stillness as you notice the most prominent feelings you become aware of as your awareness moves from part to part. For added TLC, you might want to thank each body part as you move up from the toes to the top of the head. This is super simple, just, ‘Thank you toes, thank you feet, thank you ankles, thank you calves, thank you shins…’ and so on. Just moving up, just sending a bit of love, sending a bit of gratitude to the only body you'll ever have.

#14 Notice the sounds and the lights

Notice if there are tweaks you can make to help your body prepare to wind down for sleep. I started dimming light hours before I went to sleep because this really helps me later on. You might have something soothing that you begin to listen to. Experiment, but again you're training the brain to recognise certain sounds and lights and smells. Ah, it's time to wind down. It makes it easier. It's just much, much easier.

#15 Become a sleep detective

Notice all the things that support and hinder sleeping well for you. Log them and examine the logs for patterns. Make tweaks to your behaviour and log the results of those too. Treat it like an enjoyable experiment. We’re all different. Honour YOUR body's wisdom by really listening to clues. What works for me might not work for you. What works for someone else might not.

#16 Avoid caffeine

Prime example, many people avoid caffeine in afternoon, as in after midday. Some people can have a caffeine, a coffee right before bed and it has no impact on their sleep or even calms them down. Caffeine can mimic stimulant medication for some people with ADHD. If you're fine with an espresso right before bed, go for it. Notice your response to caffeine. Notice what is going to support you in better sleep for you.

#17 Avoid raw fruit and vegetables before bed

It makes me laugh a bit that when I was doing my specialist sleep training, oh God, over a decade ago now, I was really like, OK, avoid salad before bed. I didn't use to eat salad at all back then, but it was like salad bad, raw fruit and veg bad. Chocolate absolutely fine.

You might be fine with a salad before bed or you may notice an impact, but the idea is that you want to eat long before you go to bed so that the Rest Digest Response is focused on rest rather than digesting. Raw fruit and vegetables can be harder to digest than something more gentle on your stomach if you are hungry, because equally you don't want to go to bed hungry and then be up because you're hungry. Again, notice, like some people keep a banana by the bed or really easy snacks to have. Have things that support you and your sleep. Get curious about what works for you.

#18 Aim to eat at least two hours before bed

Again, working with your physiology, we know that we're supporting the parasympathetic branch of the nervous system and aiding that Rest Digest Response and therefore sleep. It makes so much sense. Why make life tougher for yourself? And also there are going to be nights where you can't and that's fine. None of this is about being rigid.

It's about noticing the things that really support you and that you want to implement as often as possible and then things that you can get away with, but it's knowing yourself.

#19 See if a warm bath or wearing socks in bed helps

It might sound silly, but body temperature can have an enormous impact on our ability to sleep soundly. Some people need to be cooler, so it might be a matter, especially around menopause and hot flashes, it might be about opening windows. It might be about wearing less, it might be wearing more. Having layers, making life as easy for yourself as possible. You know yourself best and sometimes it might be that you're too hot, but you like that cosy feel. Experiment.

#20 Notice the impact of screen time

Some people really benefit from switching off the TV and all devices hours before bedtime.

Experiment with what works for you and create pre-sleep rituals that support your sleep. Other people fall asleep, especially with neurodivergence, it can be really beneficial to listen to a podcast as you're falling asleep or favourite music or some people audiobooks or old TV shows that don't overstimulate.

It's again, give yourself permission to experiment. These are cues that you might want to play with.

#21 Choose something to read before bed that will be soporific

So something that's sleep inducing. It doesn't matter what it is as long as you enjoy it and it's soothing enough for you to prepare for sleep. In time that genre will become an anchor for aiding sleep.

When I first got over my insomnia in my 20s, I'd been really terrible insomniac from primary school, like the age of six or so, until my 20s and I began reading crime fiction. So like Sue Grafton, Sara Paretsky, Linda Fairstein, really gruesome stuff in some cases. And I'd read a few pages and fall asleep. One day I was reading a bit on the Tube back in London and my eyes got really heavy and I realised I'd anchored crime fiction with sleep.

I read crime fiction before bed every night for over a decade and then all of a sudden it was like, ‘Oh, this is really gruesome!’ and I stopped. I think, looking back, it was helpful for me to have something more engaging for my brain rather than something that might be more stereotypically designed for sleep.

I'm again sharing that just to help you think it might be a memoir, it might be a children's book, it might be a textbook if you're studying, it might be, really experiment with what feels indulgent, what do you want to curl up in bed with and do that, experiment with it.

#22 Journal

It's a wonderful way to take stock of the day and ease into visualising tomorrow or a more distant future that you're working towards. And also for just unloading, unburdening your brain, letting yourself get it out, externalise it and be ready for rest.

#23 List all the things you're grateful for (or even three)

There are so many studies around the benefits of gratitude and it's a lovely habit to get into. It's not about forcing it though, there are going to be nights where you're feeling too angsty to feel any gratitude and be kind to yourself.

But where you are able to, where it becomes habitual, it really is so beneficial and it just feels lovely. You might, if you share a bed with another human (I'm saying that as opposed to cats. They do not talk back to me in that regard. They don't share my gratitude practice, but they are part of my gratitude practice for sure because I'm so grateful for them), if your partner's there or if maybe you have housemates, before you go to bed, you might want to do a gratitude practice together. Energising it, like talking, keeping each other on track, just saying out loud what you're grateful for as well as potentially journaling it. It can all be really affirming and it helps, again, move away from that ruminating mind that's going to prevent sleep more towards happy, pleasant thoughts.

#24 Play with afformations

So not affirmations, afformations are more questioning. So for some people, affirmations can be quite homicide-inducing in terms of not acting on it but feeling a bit homicidal because it's like, I don't believe myself. I would love to say, for example, I sleep with ease and joy.

And if you're chronically sleep-deprived, you might want to stab yourself or someone else for even suggesting such a thing because it's such a hideous...

This week, we’re making Polyvagal Theory even simpler with the help of Rainbow MagnifiCat and your own beloved animals.

I developed Cattitude (aka Cat Coaching and Feline Better Every Day) after adopting Rainbow MagnifiCat from the rescue cat shelter in 2013 and realising how attending to her nervous system, practising what I had learned about Polyvagal Theory and other trauma-informed therapies was helping me (and later clients and groups).

With ADHD and/or trauma histories, your extra sensitive nervous system can be a gift when you treat your whole self with compassion.

In this week’s episode, this simple but effective practise, adapted from Deb Dana’s Befriending your Hierarchy exercise (from her book, Polyvagal Exercises for Safety and Connection, Norton) is a wonderful way to build on what you’ve started from last week’s dopamenu episode (and deeper dives in the Sole to Soul Circle).

It really works. Simple Cattitude.

Am really looking forward to hearing how you get on with it.

le grá,

Evei

FULL TRANSCRIPT

Rainbow is part of my branding so I do probably have a disproportionate number of clients and supervisees who love cats but it works with any kind of creature and it just I love seeing people's faces change as they embody that sense of care for themselves that they've already been giving to their cats or dogs or toddlers or others they love. I love seeing the way people light up and I love that kind of eventual recognition that of course they deserve, of course YOU deserve the same compassion and tenderness and care.

Hi, I'm Eve Menezes Cunningham and welcome to The Feel Better Every Day Podcast.

I am so excited to be sharing new trauma-informed and ADHD-friendly ideas for you to help you take better care of yourself, that highest, wisest, truest, wildest, most joyful, brilliant and miraculous part of yourself, as well as the basic self-care which we all know can be so challenging at times. I really appreciate you tuning in. If you want a deeper dive you'll be getting bonus content each week if you sign up to the Soul to Soul Circle.

You can do that for free or from as little as eight euros a month and you can also find more ideas in the book, 365 Ways to Feel Better: Self-care Ideas for Embodied Wellbeing.

Hi, welcome to episode 48 of The Feel Better Every Day Podcast. For today's episode I want you to grab a piece of paper and a pen and get ready to improve or even transform any issue that you've been struggling with just by befriending your nervous system more.

We're taking inspiration from cats to work with Polyvagal Theory in a really simple but fun and effective way. I started the whole Cattitude element of my work years and years ago after I brought Rainbow Magnificat back from the cat shelter in 2013. I'd learned about Polyvagal Theory doing my yoga therapy for mental health training and, as I realised how Rainbow was helping me embody it, I created Feline Better Every Day and cat coaching.

So much of what I have done with Rainbow and now with Meadbh, and Teri Crews Cat and Angel Houdini, helps my nervous system as well as seeing the enormous improvements with them. Angel now lets me hold him and purrs at me! And then looks at me and remembers, oh no, he's feral and runs away. But there's something transformational about talking to ourselves as if we were a beloved cat, kitten, puppy, toddler, someone, another mammal.

I often say lizard as well, I know they're not mammals, but find something that you love. I'm going to slow down and I'm going to read from the script because there's so much I want to include, I don't normally use a script.

But basically we humans have very similar nervous systems to cats and by thinking in terms of cat coaching or Cattitude or Feline Better Every Day, it hopefully takes some of the jargon away and makes it less scary. Because all of this is common sense.

Stephen Porges has done a phenomenal work and Deb Dana is making it more accessible and so many other people are taking Polyvagal Theory and running with it. But the reminder is that you deserve the care, kindness, curiosity, tenderness and compassion that you'd give a beloved cat, kitten, toddler, puppy, etc. So you can find out more at selfcarecoaching.net/feline.

For now, just imagine cutting yourself some slack and think about something that is a stressor in your life, whatever it is you're feeling. All of us can benefit from paying more attention to our nervous systems and instead of trying to suppress all that wisdom, instead of trying to override it to really pay attention.

Especially for people with trauma histories or ADHD with more sensitive nervous systems, we've grown up often being told we're too sensitive, there's something wrong with us, why are we so dramatic?

I still get it now. I'm 49 and loved ones mean well, but they will tell me to not get sad about things but I've learnt to honour my nervous system. And that's absolutely fine. But growing up, it can be really confusing. And when you're younger, so it's really remembering as adults, or at any age, if you're younger watching this, you have a right to honour your nervous system.

And there's no need to be talked out of knowing what you're feeling. And you're not too much no matter what you're feeling. So this practice is adapted from the lovely Deb Dana book, Polyvagal Exercises for Safety and Connection.

It's the Befriending the Hierarchy exercise. But I'm using Feline Better Every Day terminology, Cattitude terminology, to help you think more easily than thinking in terms of ventral vagal wellness, or sympathetic nervous system, or a lot of the things I talk about a lot, but for this, or dorsal vagal. So Deb Dana is wonderful.

Stephen Porges's Polyvagal Theory changed my life. And I used to have anxiety dreams about the terminology. But it is so gorgeous.

If you are interested, and you go to that Feline Better Every Day page on my website, I'm linking some resources there for you as well. Check out Deb Dana's work as well. And also there are many interviews with the fantabulous Stephen Porges online.

You don't need to freak yourself out with heaviness but it's such a beneficial framework. And I'm hoping that the inspiration from my rescue cats will help you.

Even after all these years, more than two decades of integrating different therapies, and a decade of using more than a decade of using Rainbow Magnificat to support some clients as well as myself. And I love it when clients and I mean, I used to have Rainbow as part of my branding, so I do probably have a disproportionate number of clients and supervisees who love cats, but you can use any kind of creature. And I love seeing people's faces change as they embody that sense of care for themselves that they've already been giving to their cats or dogs or toddlers or others they love.

I love seeing the way people light up. And I love that kind of eventual recognition that of course, they deserve of course, you deserve the same compassion and tenderness and care. It's a transformative I know for me, I've had years of therapy as part of my training.

I'd had coaching, I'd been doing all these things on myself. But it was when I started working with Rainbow's nervous system, when I brought her back from the shelter, and she was terrified. And me softening my tone of voice for her using Polyvagal Theory knowledge to keep me doing it.

And it softened my own tone of voice towards myself. So even now, if I like drop something and break it, like thinking, ‘Oh, I love this glass, I've had it for 20 years’ CRASH. In the past, it would mean like, ‘Oh,’ I'm giving myself a hard time. Whereas now it's just like, ‘It's OK, Evei Cat’ cleaning it up and just honouring the disappointment, but not making it worse by my reaction to it.

You might want to paws this recording as you think about something in your life that is challenging for you right now. Whatever it is, large, small, I'm not going to stress you out by having you pick something at a certain level, just an issue that you're ready to transform, and get that paper and pen. So draw a line through the paper length ways.

Through the middle. And then write the issue you want to improve. I haven't written an issue, but on that middle bit there, if you're watching this rather than listening to it, and then draw three columns going down and another column at the top.

So you've got Purr! Hiss! and Freeze. So Purr is the first one, and that corresponds to the ventral state that we're going for. That real sense of embodied wellbeing. That ventral vagal wellness. And I'm not going to go too much into that right now.

Just write down Purr! at the top, write down Hiss! in the middle, and that's for the stress, sympathetic activation, but not only the excited, energised, motivated, sympathetic like we need all of it. We need that motivation. We need sympathetic activation for the nervous system.

There's a lot about encouraging more parasympathetic activity, which is great in this 24-7 society we live in, but sympathetic activation definitely has its place. All of these ways of being have their place. There's no right or wrong.

It's just helping you befriend your nervous system and get to know your hierarchy. And I hope that this helps. In the third column, write Freeze. That's the dorsal vagal. So it's the hybrid of the parasympathetic and sympathetic, because there has to be some sympathetic activity in order to not be completely collapsed, some vagal tone.

But at the same time, there's an enormous sense of overwhelm. And it's not the most pleasant, and especially with trauma and with ADHD, you might feel it.

This is about getting to know your nervous system. And this is about working with it and recognising even when you feel completely overwhelmed, you have choice, you have options. So once you have drawn those lines, start thinking. Just because I was just talking about it, think about a time when you felt completely overwhelmed, a time where you felt just like you were just sitting down or lying down, unable to do the thing you'd intended to do or wanted to do, or thinking about doing, you're just in that state of it's too much.

As you even think about it now, notice what you're aware of in your body, notice how you're feeling, notice any thoughts, notice any emotions that crop up, any shame, any guilt, any palpitations, anything at all, any heaviness, any lightness, just any temperature, just make a note of it.

This is about befriending yourself, knowing that there's rich, rich, rich, rich information here for you. So just think even as you write about it, as you think about it now, where in your body do you feel that sense of freeze most strongly? How do you know, like what's your posture like? You might want to embody it for a moment, lie down, sit down, connect with that sense of sometimes hopelessness. It's okay, I’m not going to leave you there.

Okay, so you may want to paws and keep writing, but to carry on, thinking about when you're more in Hiss! mode, so the pictures I'm choosing, they're the cats yawning, but it looks like they're roaring, but they're not.

Thinking for yourself, how do you know that your sympathetic nervous system has been activated, that you're in stress response? What is the tell tail (geddit?) sign for you? How do you know, do you have any kind of chronic condition that flares up? Does your stomach let you know, like do you need to get to the loo quickly? Do you flush? Do you like kind of get very hot or very cold? Like how do you know that you're stressed out and it goes beyond that positive eustress and into more distress?  

What are the thoughts, emotions and somatic sensations that you're aware of here? Just again, using your body as information, so maybe pawsing this recording and making a note of as many Hiss! symptoms as you can think of.

And when you're ready, coming on to the Purr! So imagining yourself in embodied well-being mode, ventral vagal wellness. How do you feel when you're in Purr! mode? I've noticed even just mentioning it, I've gone all soft and floaty and relaxed.

Who are you with as you think about yourself in Purr! mode? We co-regulate, we heal in company, but it has to be company we feel safe, welcome and can thrive with. What are you doing? Where are you? Where in your body do you feel the sense of embodied well-being, this sense of purr most strongly? When might you make more time for it and how more space for it? Again, paws this recording and write down as many symptoms of purring in your body as you can. So different times of day or night and different places, different people, different activities, really make this as easy to refer back to.

 Last week we were talking about dopamenus. Add these things to your dopamenu.

So this is where we're moving to the bottom part of the piece of paper and encouraging you to think of what can you do more of in your life, how can you give yourself more time and space to do the things that put you into Purr! mode more often? And then going back to the Hiss! category, when you're stressed, what can you do to support yourself? What can you do to honour that hiss and maybe speak up, maybe get someone to help advocate for yourself, maybe vent with someone else against the co-regulation so important, maybe take time out, maybe give yourself some space to recognise, ‘OK! I'm in Hiss! mode, I'm going to pull the duvet over my head and regroup and let myself be a human and honour my nervous system!’

There are so many things it could be and we're going to be going into this in more detail with the Half Moon and Full Moon memberships, but for now, paws the recording and just list everything you can think of that could help you.

Exercise is a wonderful way to get it out of the body, swimming is my medicine, honestly, or sometimes a bike ride, sometimes a brisk walk, yoga for sure, but swimming for sure is where I begin to feel human again.

Moving then back to Freeze and thinking what might help you when you're in that mode, feeling at collapse almost, maybe you've actually experienced it, maybe you can imagine it, maybe you're afraid of it, but that sense of overwhelm for your allostatic load, the stress has been too much and it's just too much. ‘Enough! I quit!’ So thinking to yourself what might help you when you're feeling that overwrought, that burnt out, that gone.

You might not believe that anything might help you, but if you were to imagine what might help you and even include superheroes, include magic, include whatever might help you. Write it down and you can, by getting to know these things, you can begin to put plans in place so that you can actually have supports in place when you need them most.

Listing everything, even if it feels unrealistic, even if it feels magical, even if it feels like you don't deserve it, because unfortunately that can be part of how so many of us have grown up that you might know what would help but you don't feel you deserve it. I used to pass out the whole time at school, from 10 to my teens and it used to be so embarrassing but I had no confidence and I was painfully shy and I'd feel myself going and I'd just pass out because I was too shy to draw attention to myself by taking a seat and putting my head below my heart like the doctors told me to.

I didn't understand that it was to do with the blood flow, the circulation, so now if I begin to feel that way I can stand on my tiptoes as I inhale, exhale as I release the heels to the ground and repeat as needed. That begins to get the blood pumping, the circulation going again and now I'd have no problem.

I'd be more scared now (all the times I passed out and hit my head as a kid!) but I was absolutely mortified. And even though I knew that this really basic thing would help, I didn't do it for myself.

It might be that just thinking about the things that you deprive yourself, that you deny yourself, that might help even if you don't fully believe them.

So you have now your notifications from your body when you're in Purr! When you're in Hiss! When you're in Freeze! And you also have some ideas that you might want to add to your dopamenu to help you get more into Purr! mode, enjoy life more, know that joy is your birthright.

Think of a relaxed happy cat, at peace with the world, just knowing that it deserves to be adored and cared for and loved.

Just like you do.

Remember, maybe you have included pets in your Purr! mode and maybe pets help you when you're stressed as well (if your energy isn't freaking them out). Spend a few minutes journaling about these ideas and then go back to last week's episode around the dopamenu and add some of these insights from today to your dopamenu and let me know how you get on. I love hearing from you.

As I mentioned there's bonus material for the Half Moon members (that's the free subscribers at evemc.substack.com) of the Sole to Soul Circle. We're going to be going into more detail with this helping you find imagining a cat, how it always knows the most comfortable spot, how to find that sun puddle. So I'm going to encourage you and those Half Moon members to find sun puddles in different areas of your life.

And then for the Full Moon and Supermoon members, supporting your nervous system and by exploring ways to work with your stress, that positive stress. So if you imagine a toddler, no one needs to tell the toddler to crawl or to walk unless there's been really severe abuse or neglect. That toddler knows how to thrive.

Even with like it's phenomenal what people come through, it's phenomenal how huge the capacity to heal is. But you think about toddlers, how they want to walk, they want to crawl, they want to toddle.

They're not like oh I'm not graceful enough, I keep falling over, all these things.

This drive is within all of us to be whole and to grow and we do fall metaphorically as well as physically sometimes as we expand our comfort areas, our comfort zones. But we're going to go into more of that for the Full Moon and Supermoon members of the Sole to Soul Circle. So they're the paid members, that's from eight euros a month and you can cancel anytime but hopefully you'll find it helpful and not want to.

And you can of course upgrade at evemc.substack.com.

Let me know how you get on, let me know how you found this. Is this something you've applied to your life already? How do you feel at the idea of Purr! and Hiss! and Freeze? Like hopefully it's a shorthand that will work for you. If it doesn't, I encourage you to think about your own.

You know yourself best. Thank you so much for listening. Next week we're exploring sleep and I look forward to sharing more then.

But I really appreciate your time and your comments and your questions and I wish you many, many, many moments of purry pawfection. And remember with all of this, it's a matter of progress, not purrfection. And I have a gazillion other ridiculous cat puns, but I will spare you for now. 

Have a wonderful week. Thank you for listening.

Thank you for listening to this episode of the Feel Better Every Day podcast.

I want to help as many people as possible with trauma histories and/or ADHD learn how to help yourself, to connect with yourself, with that uppercase, that highest, wisest, truest, wildest, most joyful, brilliant, miraculous part of yourself, and to become more fully...

Inspired by Jessica McCabe's How to ADHD (and building on 365 Ways to Feel Better: Self-care Ideas for Embodied Wellbeing) this week, we're exploring a super simple way to increase the odds of you treating yourself WAY better in those spare moments, minutes and hours...

WATCH HERE

FULL TRANSCRIPT

What I'm talking about here with the dopamine, they've not been measured in terms of how much they increase dopamine production. It's quite a subjective idea. You're thinking about the things that help you feel better, the things that are going to motivate you, the things that are going to reward you.

And the only thing that I can kind of say is science backed is the yoga nidra which studies have shown boost dopamine by up to 70%, which is amazing. Hi, I'm Eve Menezes Cunningham. Welcome to the Feel Better Every Day Podcast.

I am so excited to be sharing new trauma informed and ADHD friendly ideas for you to help you take better care of yourself, that highest, wisest, truest, wildest, most joyful, brilliant and miraculous part of yourself, as well as the basic self care, which we all know can be so challenging at times. I really appreciate you tuning in. If you want a deeper dive, you'll be getting bonus content each week if you sign up to the Soul to Soul Circle. You can do that for free or from as little as eight euros a month. And you can also find more ideas in the book: 365 Ways to Feel Better: Self-care Ideas for Embodied Wellbeing.

Welcome to Episode 47 of the Feel Better Every Day Podcast. Thank you for joining me. And today, we're still working with the idea of sending as much love to your whole self, especially your body, as possible.

And we're working with a really simple way in which you can do more things that help you feel better. When I wrote 365 Ways to Feel Better: Self-care Ideas for Embodied Wellbeing, it was a way to encourage people to trust in their inner wisdom and have so many ideas in one place. They could ask to be guided and open it at random and choose one of the tools.

And if it appealed, great. And if not, they could open it at random again, as well as going by the days of the year or by the index. It's a thorough index.

And before that, and I still do this with clients, encouraging them to potentially have a jar, maybe using colour coded PostIt notes for the amount of time that different self-care activities are likely to take and different levels of energy involved and other variable resources. So you can, at a whim, just kind of dip your hand in, ask to be guided to something that's going to suit you in that moment. And again, it's your choice.

If you choose something that doesn't appeal, you put it back in. And if it does, then brilliant. It helps take all the decision making out of the process every time when you might have suddenly a spare five minutes or a spare hour or a spare afternoon.

And it helps to get those, ‘Yes, I deserve this time, this space, this treat, something that's going to help me feel better’ easily accessible. So I was delighted to come across Jessica McCabe, author of How to ADHD, her dopamenu. Basically, she's created an entire menu for herself and shows readers and people who follow her channel how to do it.

She worked as a server alongside building up her YouTube channel so it kind of makes sense that she would do it. But I just love the image of a menu.

And she talks about having entrees and starters, side dishes, your main courses, your desserts. And once you've got it, making it as visually appealing as you possibly can, having it somewhere where you're going to see it often. And it's like, yeah, I have half an hour there, or I have an hour, or I'm going to carve out two hours or even five minutes.

You don't have to constantly be deciding and thinking from scratch, because we all forget what helps us. And that's part of the reason why I have it all in one place. And she says that's why she started her YouTube channel, to have all her research about ADHD in one place.

For dopamine, dopamine is very important in terms of ADHD. You can read some about it in the book, but you can also easily research it. What I'm talking about here with the dopamenu, they've not been measured in terms of how much they increase dopamine production, it's quite a subjective idea, you're thinking about the things that help you feel better, the things that are going to motivate you, the things that are going to reward you.

And the only thing that I can kind of say is science backed is the yoga nidra, which studies have shown boost dopamine by up to 70%, which is amazing. So you could have a short one like for a side dish, a 10 minute yoga nidra. And I'm going to be including a short yoga nidra for the Full Moon and Super Moon members.

There are lots of longer ones and shorter ones available through my selfcarecoaching.net site and through my YouTube channel and podcast. And obviously the Sole to Soul Circle membership at evemc.substack.com

So you can check lots out for free. But this idea of just taking 10 minutes and it having an impact for hours or half an hour or 20 minutes, it's the same activity.

And you could do the same with movement, you could have as an entree, you could have taking a stretch, just checking in with your body, asking yourself, how do you want to move in this moment and allowing yourself to do that.

A side dish might be a short yoga practice or a mini dance break. A main course for me would be a proper yoga practice and a longer yoga nidra, a swim. A swim always restores me. After the swim or being in the sea, there’s the dessert of getting into the sauna when that's around sometimes and watching an entire episode of something in one go or curling up with a good book without a time limit on how long I can read it for or going to the cinema, seeing an entire film. Sometimes that can feel quite torturous, but it's also really brilliant. A side dish might be 10 minutes of an episode in between doing something, just thinking, ‘Right, I'm going to finish such and such and then I'll reward myself with just 10 minutes’ and that can be really lovely.

Desserts might be things that you know you don't want to overindulge on, but that give you a real boost and they're going to be different for every person. So as I mentioned, there's going to be the bonus content for the Half Moon subscribers. For free subscribers is a special, unique, short yoga nidra and for the Full Moon and Super Moon subscribers this week, it's an opportunity to share with me, I'm really excited about this, share with me your ideas for YOUR dopamenu and if you want to show me what you're creating or what you've created I'd love to see it.

Do check out Jessica McCabe: She is phenomenal. I'd heard an interview with her ages ago and it's only recently that I've started listening to the book and it's again, as I go down this ADHD rabbit hole, the number of ADHD books I've listened to where I'm almost, well I am crying as well as laughing out loud and almost punching the air as I'm driving along like, ‘Yes! Oh my god, I thought it was just me,’ but her approach is so delightful. I'm sure you will love it and learn something from it.

I hope you've enjoyed this episode and learnt from this. I hope you give yourself permission to connect with what feels good for you and that you create as haphazard or as beautiful and sparkly a dopamenu as works for you at this time. You might do it in stages too. An starter version of your dopamenu might be jot down ‘make dopamenu’ or ‘begin creating dopamenu.’

A side dish might be a very rough draft, a main course might be giving yourself, I don't know, half an hour, an hour to really think about and they're going to be journal prompts for the members, what you want to be including and the dessert might be the decorating it and making it look all pretty and deciding where in your home you're going to put it.

We might have it in a mobile version as well so you can keep it with you when you're out and about and you can always find something that is going to help you feel better and that is going to work with your energy levels, with your mood, with your resources at any given time.

Thank you for listening, thank you for watching and please rate, review, subscribe, follow, share, comment whatever feels good for you and I look forward to sharing more next week. CHANGE: WE’RE TAKING INSPO FROM RESCUE CATS AND WORKING WITH THE NERVOUS SYSTEM.

If you subscribe you're less likely to miss it. I will of course be sharing it across my platforms but thanks for listening again and this episode like all of them is produced by me, your host Eve Menezes Cunningham and I hope you have a delightful week and really notice the things that help you feel good, things that help you feel better, the things where even though you're not literally measuring the dopamine production. You are getting a subjective sense of what really nourishes you, what helps you feel better and you can add that in the appropriate place to your dopamine you. Thanks again.

‘It's the abundance of diversity. It's not about tolerating. It's about welcoming…’

Much as I adored Moana, I think I loved Moana 2 even more. And with the current threats to #DEI (Diversity Equality and Inclusivity) in America, it feels like an especially good time to remind everyone that immigration (yes, I’m biased as a daughter and granddaughter of immigrants and now immigrant myself) is A GOOD THING.

I hope you enjoy this week’s episode and I’d love to hear your thoughts on it and the film. If you’d like to read some of the older Sofa Session posts where I take inspiration from other fictional, animated and historic characters as well as current affairs, you can READ MORE HERE

le grá (with love),

Evei

FULL TRANSCRIPT

It's the abundance of diversity. It's not about tolerating. It's about welcoming…

It's about appreciating. It's about supporting. So that is one of my favourite themes and self-care lessons from Moana 2.

Hi, I'm Eve Menezes Cunningham and welcome to the Feel Better Every Day Podcast.

I am so excited to be sharing new trauma-informed and ADHD-friendly ideas for you to help you take better care of your Self: that highest, wisest, truest, wildest, most joyful, brilliant and miraculous part of yourself, as well as the basic self-care, which we all know can be so challenging at times. I really appreciate you tuning in. If you want a deeper dive, you'll be getting bonus content each week.

If you sign up to the Sole to Soul circle, you can do that for free or from as little as €8 a month. And you can also find more ideas in the book, 365 Ways to Feel Better: Self-care Ideas for Embodied Wellbeing

Welcome to episode 46 of the Feel Better Every Day podcast.

And while I've done many, many blog posts where I've either written open letters to fictional characters or shared self-care coaching lessons from various films and TV programmes, things that are going on in the news, this is the first podcast I'm doing along those lines.

And it's 10 self-care lessons from Moana 2. So it does include some spoilers, but hopefully in the Greek Chorus kind of way, or Brechtian approach, so it won't actually spoil it.

It's such a lovely film, I don't think anything could spoil it.

But what I'm sharing is so vague, it's not going to ruin any plot lines. But I hope it will encourage you to watch the film, enjoy the film and take inspiration from the film like I have.

#1 Know who you are

Moana repeats, ‘I am Moana.’ And even me, I'm not Moana, but even just saying that I kind of sat up straighter. And I'm 49 years old, but I will admit there have been a few challenging times since I saw Moana 2, where I've stood up straighter and said, ‘I am Evie.’

Try it, whatever your age, just ground, check that the feet are fully on the ground. If they don't reach, put something below them, like maybe a cushion, maybe a bolster, maybe a few cushions. Sit up straight, stand up straight.

‘I am… [whatever your name is].’ Notice how you feel in your body. Notice, yeah, you might feel silly, but also connect with who you are and know that who you are is worthy, is lovable, is good enough, is enough, is not too much.

#2 Recognise that there is always another way

So I also have a theory that Moana has ADHD, based on a theory that people with ADHD moved further from Africa as humans evolved, because the ADHD people in hunter-gatherer societies were needed in terms of scoping out newness, scoping out new ways of being. And Moana, of course, being an explorer, very much did that for her people. So lesson number two from Moana 2 is to recognise that there is always another way.

Whatever's going on for you, however stuck you may be feeling, however impossible the odds stacked against you may feel. And I realise I'm regularly taking inspiration from fictional characters, and in this case an animated character. But it's true, there's always another way.

So think about your situation and look at it from different perspectives. If you are into yoga, you might want to play with one or two poses. Just seeing the room you're normally in from those different perspectives can help.

Or even if you're not, you may want to lie on the ground or sit in a different chair. Look for that other way. Don't give up on what you want or what you're working towards.

#3 Immigration rocks

Number three, and my favourite theme from this film, because unfortunately we live in times where this is such an unusual message to be getting, immigration rocks.

From the very beginning, she's begging to find others. She knows that there must be others out there, and this is a spoiler for the ending, but others do arrive and they are welcomed with open arms because her people recognise that their people all have unique talents and gifts that will complement and will add to what they all can.

It's the abundance of diversity. It's not about tolerating. It's about welcoming.

It's about appreciating. It's about supporting. That is one of my favourite themes and self-care lessons from Moana too.

#4 Being of service and kindness

In everything she does, she's so open-hearted and she's strong. She's adventurous. She's powerful and she's always looking out for the greater good. She's not being selfish. She's being of service.

She's being kind to herself as well as to others. So again, notice in your own life, think of ways in which you might be able to do that for yourself.

#5 Even really, really, REALLY annoying people have gifts

Oh my God, I don't know how she managed on that boat with all those irritable people. But she did. (And again, Evie, it's a cartoon. It's an animation.) But it's worth remembering that we all have so much more in common than we do. Those irritations can be overcome.

And it might be a matter of whether it's your partner, whether it's a friendship, whether it's some colleagues at work, whether whoever it is, if you're in community with someone or people who are annoying you, remember, again, changing your perspective, maybe focusing on their gifts, focusing on what unique talents they bring and how you can support them in bringing more of that out and helping them also focus on the greater good. So you will get out of the nitty gritty grr of it all and keep that focus on what you can accomplish when you work together. This is not about staying in abusive, intolerable situations.

It's about those icky, irritating situations. Hopefully you're not trapped on a boat with people who are being really annoying.

#6 Hurt people hurt people

Another theme, number six, is about there being another misunderstood villain. It was something I loved from the first movie and it's something that I love here as well. The fact that basically, whether it's something you're doing yourself or whether it's something you're facing in the world, it can be helpful to recognise that hurt people hurt people. So I'm not again saying… definitely don't be staying in abusive situations.

Set those boundaries, assert yourself, make yourself safe and do it with love. Do it with compassion for yourself and for others involved, recognising that hurt people hurt people. It's a cliche, but it's true.

And the more we can work with our own pain, the less likely we are to project it out. The more likely we are to be able to hold space to help others heal.

#7 Keep the faith and trust the process

So number seven, keeping the faith and trusting the process.

Moana never gave up on finding other people. And every time she had that awful, awful, awful but funny chicken play a prank on her, she was gracious, much more gracious than I would have been. Again, this is partly why I think she might have ADHD.

I'm not a psychiatrist. I'm not a psychologist. I'm not able to diagnose. And again, she's a fictional character. But I kind of loved how she kept forgetting that the chicken kept doing this and each time she'd fall for it. But she kept the faith. She kept hoping to make contact with others. She didn't give up on it. She didn't think, ‘No one but the chicken is ever going to respond.’

#8 Value what you have to offer

And eventually other humans did respond. So number eight, again, valuing other people's skills and valuing your own skills. Thinking about what you bring to the table and not underestimating it.

Not giving away your bone marrow to be of service too much, but valuing what you bring and giving in that wholehearted way. You're not depleting yourself. You are challenging yourself when needed, but it's all done with grace and with ease and you're looking after yourself through it all.

When I say with grace and with ease, I don't mean to put pressure on yourself to be like a fictional animated character. I just mean to give yourself grace. Let yourself go as easy as possible as you can as you navigate life's challenges.

Again, here, Metta [a Loving Kindness meditation] really helps me.

#9 Transitional objects are not just for babies

Number nine, doesn't matter how old we are, transitional objects can help. They're not just from babies and toddlers.

So they might be a kinaesthetic anchor, something you hold. It might be a crystal. It might be a toy. It might be… Moana used shells that her little sister gave her and she would hold that for courage. She would wear it around her neck. It's something, whatever you're facing, think of something that you can literally hold onto to remind yourself that you're not alone.

And even when you feel you're alone...

#10 Intergenerational healing

So that leads us nicely into number 10, which is remembering that you're not alone to connect with your ancestors in a loving way, to work towards that intergenerational healing of intergenerational trauma. Even if you've had challenging relationships with your more immediate ancestors, and even if you know nothing about that, if you've been adopted or other reasons why you might not know anything about your ancestors.

Imagine yourself supported by a long line of people whose DNA you have within you. You are whoever you are and you carry a part of them. Imagine their pride in all you're accomplishing and all you're dreaming of and let yourself feel that support.

For the deeper dive for Full Moon and Super Moon members this week, we're going to do the Dragon's Tail exercise again to help you really connect with that and embody it and move around with that sense of connection. You might remember it from the Lisa Woodruff episode a few weeks ago, and also it's in the book 365 Ways to Feel Better: Self-care Ideas for Embodied Wellbeing.

And you can do part of it without, so you can easily join the Sole to Soul Circle if you want to, but you can simply sit and think about where you came from, even if you don't know where you came from and where you come from.

Think about your own life, think about all you've overcome, all the challenges you've faced, all the things that didn't kill you, that might have, as Jessica Jones says, made you stranger, and as Nietzsche said, might have hopefully made you stronger, but recognising that it's time to honour that. To really embody all you've come from, all you've come through, as well as who you have come from. And just notice, again, in your body, how you feel as you think about your parents, if you know your parents and what they went through, your grandparents, maybe some people might be lucky enough to have known their great-grandparents. Think about some of their journeys, some of the stories you know about them.

Moana came from wayfaring people, but that was a few generations before they became landlocked. She reconnected with that in the first film, and she was able to be more fully herself and she was able to save her people. Again, fictional, cartoon, I know, but thinking about what you carry within you and trusting your dreams, trusting your goals, trusting your visions, trusting your impulses, not necessarily acting impulsively, but honouring that what you want is there for a reason, what you crave. 

Go see it and let me know what you think

And I hope you enjoy the film if you haven't already seen it. If you have already seen it, let me know what you think. And if you're watching it again, or you are watching it for the first time, again, let me know what you think. And if I missed any lessons you would like to add.

Thank you for listening. Next week, we’re making self care more accessible to everyone by working with the idea of a dopamenu. So creating a way in which you can access something, even when you don't have energy or when you have a lot of time or a little time. It's about helping to make those decisions much easier and I can't wait to share it with you.

If you'd like to get it straight to your inbox, do subscribe or follow via your favourite podcasting app or YouTube or the Substack through the Sole to Soul Circle. And if you are a member of the Sole to Soul Circle, look out for your bonus content tomorrow and Thursday for your deeper dive and more.

With special guest Jayne Leonard

WATCH HERE

Does the idea of loving your whole self (including your ADHD brain and/or traumatised parts) feel impossible? You’re not alone. In this episode, I welcome my vegan and ADHD friend Jayne Leonard of Vive Counselling back. Our conversation includes shock that we’ve both found it easier to accept ourselves since a psychiatrist gave us permission! Even though this is our WORK. You too may be surprised at how much better your life feels when you amp up that self care, self love, self compassion and self understanding. Even by a tiny bit. It all adds up.

Thanks for listening or watching. I really appreciate it. New episodes come out every Tuesday morning (Ireland time) and if you subscribe (via your favourite podcasting app or by becoming a Half Moon member of the Sole to Soul Circle), you’ll be notified about each new episode.

This week, the Half Moon bonus has some ideas for visual and kinaesthetic ‘anchors’ to keep you focused (sorry, I know I hate that word but they really do help). And the Full Moon and Super Moon deeper dive is to help you discern between what’s right for Now You and Future You and all the other Yous…

FIND ME ON SOCIALS

You can find me almost everywhere – please say ‘Hi’ and let me know what questions or comments you have:

YouTube @evemenezescunningham

Substack @evemc

Bluesky @eveimc

TikTok @evemenezescunningham

Insta @evemenezescunningham

Facebook @FeelBetterEveryDay

I’d also appreciate you leaving a review and/or rating this and other episodes you’ve enjoyed. Your feedback and support helps me help more people (of all genders) with trauma histories and/or ADHD take better care of their whole selves and create lives they don’t need to retreat from.

OTHER WAYS TO WORK WITH ME

·       There’s the book – 365 Ways to Feel Better: Self-care Ideas for Embodied Wellbeing – and all the book bonus videos.

·       All the free resources I share across my platforms and the growing library of self care ideas and practises at selfcarecoaching.net

·       You can join the Sole to Soul Circle on Substack (evemc.substack.com) and get bonus content designed to enhance each podcast episode. Half Moon members (free subscribers) get self care ideas to support balance and harmony and Full Moon and Super Moon members (paid subscribers) get more self paced self care recordings to help you support your nervous system and whole Self as you expand your comfort zone to shine even brighter.

·      If you want to support my work but don’t want to commit to a membership, even for a month, you can choose an amount HERE

·       While my private practice (trauma informed and ADHD friendly therapies, Self care coaching, clinical supervision and supervisor’s supervision) is almost always at capacity, if you’re based in Ireland or the UK, it’s still worth completing the short form at https://selfcarecoaching.net/contact to BOOK YOUR FREE TELEPHONE CONSULTATION in the hope that we can find a mutually convenient time to work together.

TRANSCRIPT 

maybe I don't need the reason. Maybe I just need to say, well, I am how I am regardless of whatever it is.

And I'm just gonna allow that. And I do have two small kids and I say, well, they do all these things. And I still say, oh aren't they lovely? They're great. That bit maybe wasn't great, but they're lovely. They're great. So it's trying to do that then for myself.

I love it.

Hi, I'm Eve Menezes Cunningham and welcome to the Feel Better Every Day Podcast. I am so excited to be sharing new trauma informed and ADHD friendly ideas for you to help you take better care of your Self: That highest, wisest, truest, wildest, most joyful, brilliant and miraculous part of yourself, as well as the basic self-care which we all know can be so challenging at times.

I really appreciate you tuning in. If you want a deeper dive, you'll be getting bonus content each week. Sign up to the Sole to Soul Circle. You can do that for free or from as little as €8.00 a month. And you can also find more ideas in the book 365 Ways to Feel Better: Self-care Ideas for Embodied Wellbeing.

So welcome again, Jayne Leonard. Thank you so much for joining me for these ADHD chats around some of the themes we're focusing on. We're both late diagnosed, both diagnosed 2024.

And today you're joining me to talk about for Valentine's Day, self-love, self-compassion, thinking about whatever your relationship status, how the more loving and accepting and compassionate we can be with our whole selves, the more we can offer that to our partners, our loved ones, children, if you have them, strangers, whatever it might be. So welcome, thanks for joining me again.

Thanks, thanks for having me.

So what would you say you struggle with and find easier about self-compassion and self-acceptance? I know you spoke in the previous episode about acceptance, radical acceptance. Would you like to say a little about that?

Yeah, I think sometimes it can be really, really easy. Sometimes it can be so easy and then other times it's just a little more difficult.

I definitely think getting, even realising I had ADHD, which was years ago and I only got diagnosed last year because I said, you know what? I might try some medication, but otherwise I was fairly confident I had it myself. But definitely realising that has made the acceptance even easier. Like just getting that understanding of myself.

Oh, this is why I do what I do. It's not actually because there's something wrong with me or I'm weird. It's because I have this brain and this brain works like this.

And so I wish I had kind of been able to practice that before, but that's a learning I've taken since. And I kind of say now, look, maybe I don't need the reason. Maybe I just need to say, well, I am how I am regardless of whatever it is.

And I'm just gonna allow that. And I do have two small kids and I say, well, they do all these things. And I still say, oh, aren't they lovely? They're great.

That bit maybe wasn't great, but they're lovely. They're great. So it's trying to do that then for myself.

I love it. And that tone of voice with Polyvagal Theory, it's so important. I regularly encourage people to talk to themselves like they would with a beloved cat or child or puppy or lizard or whatever, because we're generally more accepting. But I completely agree. Up until the day I had the diagnosis, I still, part of me thought I was wasting everyone's time.

I'd worked with so many clients who'd gone through the process and so many people had told me that I had it. I had a brain scan in like 2013, around I think 2013, 2014. And it showed an abnormality, which when I Googled it correlated with ADHD.

And back then I dismissed it. But then with perimenopause and menopause, it was like, oh yeah, there's definitely. But up until that day, it's like, I'm wasting everyone's time.

I'm wasting, and she's like, yeah, severe ADHD with combined presentation. It's like, oh. So even though I had massively amped up the self-compassion over the decades of doing this work, but then also realising like kind of self-diagnosing in a tentative way, because I'm a trauma therapist.

I'm not a psychiatrist. I can't diagnose. But I remember us talking when we first met.

We’re both vegans. We both thought we had ADHD. We were both going through that journey, but I'm absolutely shocked at how much easier it has been to accept myself since a psychiatrist gave me permission.

Yeah, I know. Isn't it amazing? It is. I had the same experience, even though I knew, oh, I struggle with focus or hyper-focus or whatever else I do.

Once you understand it through that lens, it's like, oh, that's fine, so. But I think, oh, you know what? You actually could have done this for yourself before. So I've really taken that now, and I'm really trying to say, okay, you're doing this, that's okay.

Yeah, a differently wired brain, just a differently wired brain. And like the other day, I was nearly, this sounds ridiculous, but I was nearly crying, surrounded by piles of bank statements and receipts as I was trying to get my bookkeeping for 2024 fully onto the new accounting system. I've never used an accounting system before, and I've been in the process of it since May, end of May.

And I got there last night, but the day before yesterday, my living room was just covered. And I just felt like all I have to do here is put things in date order and add them to an already created spreadsheet. And it was just like every fibre of my being, like, I can't do it, I don't want to.

And it's like, I can do all sorts of other things. And recognising that, holding space for the part of me that really struggles with numbers, and the part of me that's really good at other things, that finds other things easy. And I think the diagnosis has helped me.

Like, I used to feel like I was cheating a lot. Like if something came easy to me, I'd complicate it, I'd make it harder.

Whereas now it's like, no, some things are really hard. Let what's easy be easy. Yes, yeah. And I actually have had a similar conversation with so many other people who have neurodiversity.

It's like, we do almost feel like we're cheating if it's a certain area that's trickier for us. But yet then you see other people who have no problem asking for help. I mean, all these different services exist because no one person can do it all.

So I think that's, yeah, absolutely proud of. Self-love and self-care is recognizing, I can't do it all and I shouldn't have to. I don't have to.

Why am I trying to make things harder for myself? 100%, yeah. Yeah, how can you make life easier? So we're gonna move into the Half Moon Soul to Soul Circle recording for free subscribers. So if you're not already a free subscriber, you can access that through evemc.substack.com. But for now, thank you so much, Jayne, for joining me.

Thank you.

Thank you for listening to this episode of the Feel Better Every Day Podcast. I want to help as many people as possible with trauma histories and or ADHD.

Learn how to help yourself to connect with yourself with that uppercase, that highest, wisest, truest, wildest, most joyful, brilliant, miraculous part of yourself, and to become more fully embodied, at peace and at ease in your own skin. So to help me do this, if you can think of someone who might benefit, please share it. And if you haven't already and would like to, you can subscribe, comment, rate, review. And this episode, like all of them so far, has been produced by me, your host Eve Menezes Cunningham. Thanks again for listening. And if you'd like more on this week's theme, you can subscribe as a free subscriber or paid member of the Sole to Soul Circle at evemcsubstack. com. Find out more at selfcarecoaching.net

And each week, Half Moon members, that's the free subscribers, get some bonus content to support balance and harmony. So it's a bit of a deeper dive into the podcast theme and then the following day, Full Moon and Super Moon members get additional deep dives into helping themselves shine by really supporting, really soothing, really working well with your nervous system so that you feel safe enough to expand your comfort zone and do the things that you already know to do perhaps, but just supporting you and taking those steps. Let me know if any of that is of interest and I hope you have a gorgeous day.