REAL JOY RECOVERY PODCAST

Join me for Part II of my conversation with Renee Schuls-Jacobson--artist and author of Psychiatrized: Waking Up After a Decade of Bad Medicine for a deep, intense, and heart-felt conversation about her recovering from an iatrogenic injury she sustained from taking a benzodiazepine as prescribed by a psychiatrist for insomnia.   This episode is real and raw. Be mindful of your own needs for those in the midst of healing trauma. We will discuss adverse childhood experiences including sexual assault, birth trauma, and many other topics that lead to Renee being “psychiatrized.” We will also discuss her 8 year recovery from discontinuation syndrome caused by taking benzos as prescribed, plus the miracles along the way, lessons learned from inpatient trauma treatment and how the gift of art therapy, which started as a comforting distraction from her injuries, later become her passionate, purposeful, heart-centered profession.    Renée A. Schuls-Jacobson graduated with a Bachelor's degree from Hobart & William Smith Colleges (1989) and a Master's degree from University of Buffalo (1992). Eight years after suffering an iatrogenic brain injury, Renée's brain has mostly healed. Today, she is an independent artist whose paintings hang in private collections throughout the world. In addition to making and selling her artwork, it has become her mission to educate the public about the dangers associated with long-term psychiatric drug use. A Certified Recovery Peer Advocate, she offers emotional support to people suffering through protracted benzodiazepine and SSRI withdrawal syndrome. Her home and studio are located in Rochester, New York.   You can connect with Renee: website: www.rasjacobson.store Facebook - RASJACOBSON ART https://www.facebook.com/rasjacobsonart Instagram - @rasjacobson   Renee's book Psychiatrized waking up after a decade of bad medicine can be purchased here:   https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B099BXJWLT/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B099BXJWLT&linkCode=as2&tag=rasj-20&linkId=0a6254368c84111f28613d860167cab0   Thank you SO much for tuning in to The Real Joy Recovery podcast! Please subscribe, leave a review, and share with your community.    It's time to build a trauma-wise toolkit KNOWING you have the power to regenerate your mind/body/spirit + reimagine a whole new life.   To learn more about my offerings visit  www.michelewaterman.com or connect with me on instagram @michelewatermancoaching.    Be well!

Join me for Part I of my conversation with Renee Schuls-Jacobson--artist and author of Psychiatrized: Waking Up After a Decade of Bad Medicine for a deep, intense, and heart-felt conversation about her recovering from an iatrogenic injury she sustained from taking a benzodiazepine as prescribed by a psychiatrist for insomnia.   This episode is real and raw. Be mindful of your own needs for those in the midst of healing trauma. We will discuss adverse childhood experiences including sexual assault, birth trauma, and many other topics that lead to Renee being “psychiatrized.” We will also discuss her 8 year recovery from discontinuation syndrome caused by taking benzos as prescribed, plus the miracles along the way, lessons learned from inpatient trauma treatment and how the gift of art therapy, which started as a comforting distraction from her injuries, later become her passionate, purposeful, heart-centered profession.    Renée A. Schuls-Jacobson graduated with a Bachelor's degree from Hobart & William Smith Colleges (1989) and a Master's degree from University of Buffalo (1992). Eight years after suffering an iatrogenic brain injury, Renée's brain has mostly healed. Today, she is an independent artist whose paintings hang in private collections throughout the world. In addition to making and selling her artwork, it has become her mission to educate the public about the dangers associated with long-term psychiatric drug use. A Certified Recovery Peer Advocate, she offers emotional support to people suffering through protracted benzodiazepine and SSRI withdrawal syndrome. Her home and studio are located in Rochester, New York.   You can connect with Renee: website: www.rasjacobson.store Facebook - RASJACOBSON ART https://www.facebook.com/rasjacobsonart Instagram - @rasjacobson   Renee's book Psychiatrized waking up after a decade of bad medicine can be purchased here:   https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B099BXJWLT/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B099BXJWLT&linkCode=as2&tag=rasj-20&linkId=0a6254368c84111f28613d860167cab0   Thank you SO much for tuning in to The Real Joy Recovery podcast! Please subscribe, leave a review, and share with your community.    It's time to build a trauma-wise toolkit KNOWING you have the power to regenerate your mind/body/spirit + reimagine a whole new life.   To learn more about my offerings visit  www.michelewaterman.com or connect with me on instagram @michelewatermancoaching.    Be well!

In this episode I have a conversation with Chris Paige, LCSW to talk about how trauma affects the nervous system and how modalities like EMDR and the Safe and Sound Protocol (SSP) can help people integrate trauma. The Safe and Sound Protocol (SSP) uses specially-filtered music to train the neural network associated with listening to focus on the frequency range of the human voice. Through the SSP program, the vagus nerve becomes stimulated and the state of feeling more safe and calm becomes accessible. Chris Paige, MSW, LCSW is a licensed therapist and coach with more than 28 years of experience resolving trauma. He graduated from Barry University with a Master's of Social Work after completing his undergraduate studies at Southern Methodist University. He has worked in a variety of professional and therapeutic settings and has coached professional and Olympic athletes to achieve peak performance. Highly skilled in treating trauma, Chris has been featured on Dateline NBC for his work with children of divorce as well as in the national magazine, Muses and Visionaries, in which he had his own column called “On the Couch with Chris Paige.” Chris is trained in hypnosis, Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR), the Safe and Sound Protocol,  Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT), and Somatic Psychotherapy-- all of which he incorporates in his work. He has been in private practice since 1998 and provides trauma resolution coaching to clients across the nation.  To learn more about Chris and his offerings visit www.chrispaigelcsw.com or you can connect with him on FB at https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100009338069769 To work with me or discover more about my offerings visit www.michelewaterman.com. You can also find me on Instagram @michelewatermancoach - DM me. I would love to hear from you.

In this episode I have a conversation with Holly Higginsto talk about the power of the subconscious mind and how limiting beliefs take hold (like believing “there is something wrong with me”). We unpack the art + science of using Rapid Transformational Therapy (RTT) to access the subconscious mind to change deeply held beliefs.   Holly Higgins is a hypnotherapist who takes a root-cause approach to holistic mental wellness. She works with unconventional souls to help them overcome their most challenging inner blocks. In addition to serving international clients in 1-1 and group settings, she is passionate about sharing knowledge through her top-rated podcast, Mindspeak. Holly is an avid homesteader and hiker, and lives with her husband Sean in Knoxville, TN.   To connect with Holly, visit her website www.hollyfisherhiggins.com or you can connect with her on Instagram @hollyfischerhiggins. You can also listen to her top-rated podcast Mindspeak https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/mindspeak-holistic-mental-health-with-holly-higgins/id1481418291 which explores holistic mental health and all things mind-body wellness.    To work with me or find out more about my offerings visit www.michelewaterman.com. You can also find me on Instagram @michelewatermancoach - DM me. I would love to hear from you.

Thank you so much for tuning in and taking the time to keep the oxygen mask on you. I've been sober for twenty years. I've struggled with anxiety and depression. I took antidepressants for almost two decades.  I was told that I needed meds to balance my brain chemistry. I was told that the “dose that got me well, would keep me well.”  I was told that I had a progressive mental illness that was TREATMENT resistant. But sixteen years later, parked on a multi-med cocktail, I was numb and completely disconnected from the real me and I didn't even know it. The medications were suppressing symptoms of trauma and once I was off them, I learned the drugs were never designed to heal trauma in the first place.  That's why I am creating the Real Joy Recovery podcast--because it's time to have a REAL-conversations about generating mental wellness and we just cannot get there without addressing trauma. We are complex, dynamic human BEINGS. Our brains, our nervous systems, and all of the systems in our bodies are interconnected. It's time for us to take our power back, listen to the wisdom of our bodies, heal our trauma, and truly connect with ourselves and one another like never before. This podcast is designed to help you understand what that means for YOU. And I promise you this—You are not broken. I'm on a mission to connect you to the TRUTH of what is possible! Thanks so much for tuning in today and I can't wait for you to dive into the next episode.    We live in a fast-paced, performance based, quick fix, biohacking, get shit done, get to good, sleep when you die kind of culture. We're dealing with a pandemic, cancel culture, prejudices, polarization, isolation, exponential increases in anxiety, depression and we're freaking tired, stressed out, and overwhelmed but instead of resting and having compassion for each other we're medicating, numbing, dissociating and feeling shame for not being positive all the time or living a life that matches what we see on social media. Mainstream doctors, therapists, and psychiatrists treat symptoms and assign diagnostic codes so insurance companies can be billed and then hand pills out like candy, increasing the dose every time we feel the shit we'd rather not feel instead of saying “yes, it makes sense that you're tired, overwhelmed, not sleeping, have a foggy brain…” We must stop reducing people down to labels based on a cluster of symptoms and start getting curious about the whole person—mind/body/spirit—in the context of their whole life.