The Only Way Out is Through: Understanding the Consequences of Avoidance

Cinnamon: Hello, Erin. 

Erin: A B Abc.

Cinnamon:  A, B, C... that's awkward. Yeah. So there's not a day that we talk on the podcast where we're not talking about my favorite things, like we talk about specific things that I get excited about. But this is a mental health podcast for first responders, which that encompasses all of my favorite things to talk about.

Erin: And every time you say that, I'm like, ugh, you're sick and twisted. But then I think the difference between being excited and being passionate, like it's that thing that is your driving force that keeps you, getting out of bed and.

Cinnamon: It's not sadism,  the job of the curiosity of connecting those dots. And then being [00:01:00] able to help other people connect those dots when they're like, I saw this thing, I had this thing happen, and I do this thing over here, and there's that disconnect, right? And to be able to take that red string on the rogue detective's home living room wall and draw the connection.

Erin: Yeah,

Cinnamon: that's the fun part. So it's not the, oh, I love hearing about everybody else's misery. that's not it. it's the recognition that our behavior, our experiences, how we feel, how we act, how we think are not in these situational silos where what just happened is the thing. And the only thing that's Guiding our life in terms of those behaviors, thoughts,

Erin: Yeah, it's really 

Cinnamon: and emotions.

Erin: I think of it like when my four year old son is doing a puzzle and there's like that one piece. It's like, where did that piece go? Is it under the couch, under the table? Where is [00:02:00] it? And then you find it and you put it in and it's like complete. So to me it's having the understanding, why do I feel this way?

Why do I act like this? What is causing these things? That's what makes me. Excited about all of this is oh, okay. So I'm not just totally whackadoo. There's a real reason for all of these things. That's what's exciting about all of this for me.

Cinnamon: and I even think that to take your metaphor with Brooks' puzzle a step further is that you don't get to see the front of the box,

Erin: Yeah.

Cinnamon: right? Like the box that has the picture of what the puzzle looks like complete.

Erin: Mm-hmm.

Cinnamon: So you might have a 500 piece jigsaw puzzle and you count your pieces and you have 499, but you don't even know what's missing or what it's gonna look like, in the end to figure out.

Is it an edge piece? Is it, a part of the, [00:03:00] top bottom left? Like where we don't know. And so this is a process that takes patience. And I think a lot of times when there's stress and grief and angst and irritability and relationships that are struggling, everybody wants this super quick fix.

Erin: and the reality is, is that it takes time. if it was that easy, then it would've already been done, Absolutely.

Cinnamon: So 

Erin: know. I do know.

Cinnamon: you do know.

Erin: of fact, yes, I get this.

Cinnamon: Oddly enough, I have some experience with the time that it takes to get all your puzzles pieces in the right

Erin: Yeah. Uhhuh done it. So yeah, this is about avoidance. How do we avoid the stimuli around us? Right.

Cinnamon: Yeah. the stimuli around us, but also the things that lie within us. And, there's only two criteria here, but. It's so simplified in the language that it really is more of the discussion that [00:04:00] we have with folks after we read that they may say, oh, no, I don't know how that applies to me.

But when we break it down like we will today, it is oh, okay, maybe you're onto something.

Erin: I see how I do that, or I see how that happens in my life. Yeah. So Criterion C specifically is the persistent avoidance of stimuli associated with the traumatic event or events beginning after the traumatic event occurred as evidence by one or both of the following.

One would be 

 avoidance of or efforts to avoid distressing memories, thoughts or feelings about or closely associated with a traumatic event. And two is avoidance of or efforts to avoid external reminders such as people, places, conversations, activities, objects, situations that aroused, distressing memories, thoughts or feelings about or closely associated with the traumatic event.

Whew.

[00:05:00] Tongue twister

Cinnamon: So if we were to slow this down, number one is the key here because that's where we're looking to avoid or try to avoid. Those internal things, right? The memories, the thoughts or the feelings. And then number two is avoiding the things that might bring about the things that we're trying to avoid.

Erin: So like the areas, like people, places and things would be more number two.

Cinnamon: So if I'm trying to avoid a thought about an event, then I am more likely to avoid driving by where the event happened.

In an effort to avoid thinking about it, having the memories that come up with it and the feelings that those memories generate.

Erin: Yeah, that makes sense.

Cinnamon: Yes. so there's that very basic, simple level of I don't wanna feel these things. I don't wanna think these things. I don't want these visual images or memories to come up. So remember how we talked [00:06:00] about intrusion, and how now we're going to start trying to control because we like to be in charge, and we are the helpers and we know how to help everybody else.

So we're, struggling to figure out how to help ourselves, and this is our best bandaid. I won't drive by that. Spot, right? But now we're trying to control these uncomfortable intrusions to the point 

 Cinnamon: where sometimes we're engaging in behaviors to avoid, we're, engaging in, in isolation to avoid, So if I am, at a kitchen table in a firehouse, and the discussion is happening, And I don't feel comfortable enough to say Hey guys, I wanna stay here, but I don't wanna talk about this. Or, I don't wanna be the buzz kill, or I don't wanna draw attention to the fact that I don't wanna hear about this.

 I might go to my bunk room

And

now I'm by myself and I'm isolating.

Erin: Buy yourself sitting in your own shit,[00:07:00] 

Cinnamon: Or in your pee pants. 

Erin: Or in your peep pants. Yeah,

Cinnamon: Or in your peep pants sitting 

right here in my peep pants. 

Erin: The ruminating, spinning around and round. And round. Okay. 

And 

Cinnamon: okay, so now let's take that a step further and say, now I'm in my bunk room, or I'm in my basement, in my lazyboy, right? There's all kinds of ways that, we isolate and what is the likelihood of those things that we're trying to not think about. Staying, at bay where we're actually not thinking about them

Erin: pretty unlikely unless you're distracted 

Cinnamon: and whatever, watching Die Hard. One more Time, right? the next episode, what are we on like the 30th, episode of The Fast and Furious or, I mentioned on a previous podcast starting a fight. So I don't have to go do something or go be with people so I can sit in my peep pants at home with my apology already ready for my family or my spouse when they get back.

So our [00:08:00] brain doesn't work in the negative,

and what I mean is if I say, don't think about a banana,

Erin: Look how excited I get about this. I'm always telling people that, and I'm like, let's think about how we're gonna choose our thoughts and words because it doesn't work like that. 

Cinnamon: if I say, I'm not going to think about how crappy my day is, oh, that doesn't work. If I think, what am I grateful for today?

So as woowoo is a gratitude list can sound, it really is. It comes down to the science of rewiring a brain that is trained to detect threat. 

Erin: Yeah. 

Cinnamon: And if you have that person in your life that's like a constant complainer, which my husband wouldn't say that I am sometimes, it's not so much that I think that.

Just identifying things on a gratitude list is gonna change your life, but I think it's gonna change your brain wiring 

Erin: And, 

Cinnamon: to move away 

from all the negative

Erin: Yes, but in turn it can [00:09:00] change your life. It's the, it's this concept of, rather than focusing on what you don't want, it's focusing on what you do want. So it's like, I don't want to go to the grocery store. This is so lame, and, but I don't wanna go to the grocery store. It's I wanna. Have an abundant amount of food in my fridge, like something to be healthy and help my family, like that's so small,

Cinnamon: so maybe I've got another one.

This works. So there's a interchange with the highway and a road out I have to drive for work a lot. And, I don't like it. I don't like getting on the main road from where that is. And so how I think about it is if I'm like, I don't wanna hit the bush, I don't wanna hit the bush, I don't wanna hit the bush.

 All I'm looking at is the bush that I don't wanna hit. As I'm driving and so maybe I don't hit the bush, but heaven only knows where I am gonna go. But if my focus changes to, I wanna make sure that I stay in this lane and I don't get [00:10:00] distracted by the other cars or the interchange and I focus on where I do wanna go, then I'm more likely to be successful.

Than to focus on where I don't wanna go and end up potentially anywhere but where I don't wanna go, hopefully. But that still doesn't give me a lot of direction. That means I could still hit another car, end up in a wrong lane, accidentally get off the wrong exit. I'm incorporating a bush because I use it in a metaphor.

But for those who have ever left the city of Hamilton, Ohio to get on 75, y'all know what I'm talking about cuz I do not like right there at Liberty Township trying to get off of 1 29 and getting onto 75 South. because there's way too many places to go and that road runs out.

Erin: Yeah, and what I often hear folks say that's common is, I don't wanna fight with my husband or don't wanna fight with my wife. Okay, what do you wanna do? I wanna learn how to better [00:11:00] communicate, I want to be able to ask for what I need. It's that little bit of shift, and then it goes into the whole law of attraction and these universal things outside of course, the most important part is retraining your brain.

And, so look into the law of attraction as woowoo 

Cinnamon: Well,I even heard someone say, in terms of what you're talking about, of I don't wanna fight like this anymore. how do we do that? we have to at least create a counterbalance of pleasurable interactions, right? So maybe It's not necessarily just trying not to fight.

It's go have fun together. we talk about in terms with kids, you and humans at this point, but how many compliments we need to offset a criticism. 

And

the ratio is pretty high. 10 compliments to one criticism and. So when we're looking at avoiding like that confrontation, it's not just about how do I not do that, it's how do [00:12:00] I offset that by creating pleasurable interactions pleasurable for both people.

So maybe it's a date night, I'll walk in the park, whatever it is but it's something together. where it's formulating a new memory of good to start to help offset all of the bad.

Erin: so

if 

Cinnamon: see, see,

Erin: we get, yeah, we get in our ways. We get so pa so excited and

Cinnamon: I know there's so much to talk about. There's so always and the way to do that is in an organized manner, which we've ideally set up. But then once you give us microphones, it all hell breaks loose

Erin: and we just like to talk to each other, okay. The avoidance of trauma related stimuli after the trauma and the following ways, one. Is trauma related thoughts or feelings, and two is trauma related reminders. So the thoughts and the feelings are those negative, intrusive thoughts as you were saying, those negative sensations in our body and we want to avoid them.

And there's tons of ways to avoid the [00:13:00] obvious ones with alcohol, drugs, sex, food, gambling. Like all of those external things that we try to use to avoid and feel different. 

Cinnamon: What we call substances or process, addictions, and even if it's not to the degree of an addiction, It's still a problematic behavior with, misguided motivation.

Erin: That's right.

Cinnamon: One of the things that I do a lot with clients, and I feel like this is interesting, I've discovered this over the years, is if I ask somebody who tells me that they're feeling anxious, I'm like, tell me what feeling anxious feels like in your body. a lot of times they're like, I don't know.

It just feels I'm 

anxious. 

It just feels anxious. this is like a great universal descriptor that it's not, we're so disconnected at this point from our bodies that we don't know how to. Use it given the language that we have. And there's actually a space in a region of [00:14:00] your brain, that helps regulate our, understanding of where we are in physical space.

Like I always use the idea of like dancers on a stage. How do they know? Where they are to not hit each other and turn Swan Lake into Swan Nightmare. but then there's also like inside the skin, Where am I feeling this awfulness that I'm trying to describe? So it's like I get a lot of I feel it everywhere, and it's because there's a dysregulation of interception.

That ability to tell you, I feel butterflies in my belly. I feel a lump in my throat. I feel tension in my shoulders. I feel a tightening in my jaw. I can't necessarily do that because I don't have the regulatory ability. To identify that. So when we don't even know what the physical sensation is that we're feeling, it makes it even more difficult to avoid it [00:15:00] because, but then we just try harder

Erin: Yeah.

Cinnamon: and that's when, if we don't know what we need to fix because we don't know where it is, our next best step.

Is to numb the whole damn thing.

Erin: Yep. it's like, I don't know. I just feel uncomfortable. I feel uncomfortable with my skin. I feel off, those kinds of sensations where you're like, this doesn't feel quote unquote normal,

Cinnamon: Yeah. I like to call it the little Green Army men running through your bloodstream,

Erin: right? there's just like this vibration. In your body that is so intolerable and so uncomfortable that it almost feels aggravating to try to put words to it because it just heightens the anxiety.

 Yeah, that's right. And then what you had already touched on is. the concept of avoiding entire spaces. that could be trauma inducing, that could, trigger all of these sensations. So avoiding the spot where the accident happened, avoiding the spot where that fire happened, avoiding the spot where, you [00:16:00] found that one baby on the side of the road, whatever the thing is, that's really hard.

You will not go in that area. and there is a part too where if there are certain folks that are associated with a particular event, you might stop going to that bar, stop going to that person's house, stop going to wherever that person might

be. 

Cinnamon: out of that softball 

Erin: Mm-hmm.

yeah. Whatever the thing is to stop going to that particular gym, which by the way, Working out as healthy as it is and great for your body when it's done in a healthy manner is lovely.

I don't wanna forget about that because we see folks that go to the gym and work out pump iron like excessively. But it can be also used to avoid. 

Cinnamon: Yeah. We can turn anything dirty, right? Like we can muddy up anything. And so you're absolutely right, like we encourage exercise as part of somebody's mental health care plan, and we also know that it can be warped to become an avoidance strategy.

Erin: And we can rationalize it.

Cinnamon: [00:17:00] I'm, it's good.

Erin: I'm just being healthy. Yeah. I'm being healthy.

Cinnamon: So that takes that personal reflection, no one else is going to be able to tell you that your.

Coping mechanisms are not serving you if you are going to rationalize that they do. And so maybe there are people out there who don't necessarily. feel like they're avoiding. so I wanna go a step above the severity of actual avoidance of, physical reminders. And I wanna speak to those out there who will drive around their communities.

 Or the areas that they work or live and as they're driving through, they're like, I remember that house fire. I remember that OD over there. I remember picking up the baby. over there. I remember that's where the teenagers wrecked the car. Like you're in a landmine field. Field trauma reminders.

And I'm differentiating, I'm not saying triggers. It's [00:18:00] because we may not be having a triggered response, but they are reminders of what had happened. That may have been a traumatic event for someone, That you happen to be there for. So even if you're thinking, I don't really do this, it helps us understand how someone could. 

Erin: Yeah. 

Cinnamon: Because if you are driving around and having these thoughts, if that particular event was perhaps not traumatic for you but has lingered with someone else, it's just another step. To understand why somebody might not drive by there or might not wanna participate in that softball league or in the bowling league, or go to their kids' soccer field there.

Cinnamon: not only do we want for folks to hear it in terms of oh shit, that's me, but also, okay, it's not me. But I'm starting to understand a little bit better so I can have more compassion and understanding for [00:19:00] the people who it is difficult for.

Erin: yeah, we keep talking about compassion fatigue and what that looks like and how to. Take a few steps back and view things with a different lens and that supports you and other 

folks. 

Cinnamon: Well, I think it's two sides of that same coin, right? It's the compassion and understanding coin in one side is for others. It's for everyone else. When we are trained to thank. That someone is, weak for not being able to handle it. But the reality is, is the other side of that coin is the compassion for ourselves to recognize that, we're allowed to still be good at our jobs, still be able to do our jobs, still want to do our jobs, and also recognize that there is an impact. 

Erin: Mm-hmm. 

Cinnamon: Of our jobs and that it can cause distress.

Erin: Yeah. In fact with these particular jobs, it's just about impossible to avoid it because like you just said, it's [00:20:00] everywhere most of the time in our lives because

Cinnamon: Yeah.

Erin: I don't wanna be like we shit where we eat, butwe live where we work often or in some kind of close proximity that.

It's hard to avoid. what can happen here is becoming completely emotionally numb or like having these extreme bouts of what we might call forgetfulness, but there's actually something even more in depth going on

at that point, 

right.

 Dissociation. So that's part of one of these factors too,

is the emotional numbness. 

Cinnamon: yeah, I think kind of, what you're saying in terms of that, numbness, and I think we've said this in a previous episode, is we don't have the luxury to numb one end of the emotional spectrum, right?

So if we were going to be as crass as to say, there's one end that is the good. And the other, that is the bad, right? the negative versus positive feelings where happiness is on one side and sadness is on the other. we don't have [00:21:00] the capability to numb only one end, so we end up numbing everything. And that oftentimes does feel better than having, the ability. To feel all those negative feelings, and we may even misconstrue the absence of positive feelings as good, simply because the negative feelings aren't there,

Erin: right? Like I may not have the ability to get really excited about anything anymore, but I'm still gonna consider it better than when I felt like crap.

Cinnamon: And I was constantly sad or triggered and grumpy or whatever else. so as we're talking about this, I don't wanna muddy all of the criteria that we've been talking about up until now, but really that is exactly why this is, under one umbrella is because one begets the other.

Increases the [00:22:00] severity of another, which, jumpstarts another, it all works together. And so it's not these siloed, symptoms. we've almost taken so much of the humanity out of these diagnoses because really it's a person trying to get by.

Erin: Yeah.

Cinnamon: and so I'm gonna do this, which results in this, which requires me to need to do this, and then I'm gonna have this as the end result.

Erin: Mm-hmm. Yeah, unfortunately, this is temporary. The avoidance is a temporary fix. 

Cinnamon: it doesn't go away. it doesn't go away. The only way, like we talked about on the last, episode, last month, I guess it was 

Erin: that as hard as it is to admit and surrender to, the only way out is to ru so we can mask, we can avoid, we can throw in every coping mechanism known to man and the problem will still exist. the feelings will still exist. They get to be addressed, [00:23:00] so,

Cinnamon: and the thing that we're trying to avoid, as painful as it is, Icompare it to, the, cutting through with a butcher knife versus cutting through with a butter knife.

Erin: mm-hmm.

Cinnamon: Like maybe my belief in the beginning is that the butter knife will cause less pain, but in actuality it's causing way more pain.

It's causing it to drag out way further and. It starts out with the belief that I can get this done with a butter knife,

Erin: Yeah.

Cinnamon: right? Like this is fine, this'll work. I grew up in a household where we used the site of a fork to cut through a variety of items on our dinner plates, 

and it works 

Erin: not as effective.

Cinnamon: not as effective, not nearly as effective.

And so, yes, what we're inviting. Listeners to do is to face these things head on

Erin: Mm-hmm.

Cinnamon: and as scary and as painful and as uncomfortable as it may [00:24:00] be, it's sure shit better than a butter knife.

Erin: Yeah, it is. 

Cinnamon: that just drags it out way longer. And with that goes, our families, our friends, our relationships, our work performance at all of it, like it all gets,affected, negatively impacted.

Where had I said, I need a steak knife, I need to deal with this right now. I need a butcher knife, whatever that is, let's get it taken care of. Then, not everything else in our life has to suffer because this one thing happened.

Erin: Yeah. I heard a fantastic story. I don't know, it was probably like six months ago we started touching on it, on criterion B about the cows and the buffalo.

Cinnamon: Oh, here we 

go. 

Erin: we go,

because this is

Such an incredible way to consider how going through it [00:25:00] cuts it in half in the sense of allows you to get to, ease and recovery and freedom so much faster. So imagine, if you will, that there's buffalo in the United States of America, which there aren't. We have bison, but still buffalo. the theory about the buffalo and the cows is 

the theory about the buffalos and the cows are that when there is a storm, of course, neither one of them want to get soaking wet. They hate storms. But what happens is that the cows will begin to run, they will see the storm coming, and they will run away from the storm. The buffalo, however, will run towards the storm because the idea is that they know that if they run towards the storm, yes, and they're also gonna get wet much faster.

But they will get out on the other side of the storm much quicker. Whereas the cows, eventually the storm [00:26:00] will catch up and they're gonna get wet no matter what, and they're gonna go through it, but it prolongs it because they're trying to outrun it. And I love, love, love how that correlates so well with all of this.

 again, it's the only way out is through. Be willing to get wet.

Cinnamon: and to not get drenched and fatigued and get wet longer.

Like we probably need to find a better, word there. but yes, I actually was looking for the, I'm like, oh, Buffalo cow, why don't you come out tonight? That's what was popping in my head. But 

what you were 

Erin: Buffalo girl, won't you come out tonight?

but 

Cinnamon: it's. 

gal. 

it's. Buffalo cow. 

Erin: Yeah, that's right. 

Cinnamon: tonight. 

Yeah. 

Erin: need to put the word cow in there 

and make it a 

song. 

Cinnamon: and cow. Buffalo cow. Won't you run? Okay. That's not my [00:27:00] profession, right? There is not, but what you're describing is like what I consider like something when we zoom out. When we're, it's not so subjective to us, we're not in the throes of it, but when we zoom out, it looks an awful lot like logic.

And that's one of the problematic things with this, whole fight or flight system that we have that, we tend to not have full access to the logic. That we possess because of the way our brain reacts to stressors, it shuts down. And so I think that example that you provide is so good because 

 you can see the role that you're playing in that be able to see how what you're doing is. Actually not advantageous and is inadvertently causing more suffering, right? Because you've got buffalo that are a little bit wet, but you've got cows that are hot, sweaty, tired, and still [00:28:00] not at peace,

Erin: Still not outrunning it,

Cinnamon: not outrunning it. 

Erin: it's still coming.

The other thing I, often think about too, as an example, and I say this is when we experience pain and we shove it down that pain will sit in the basement. And continue to work out. Growing its muscles getting stronger until you're ready to face it.

And then it's gonna come out. Guns a blazing, kicking some ass because it's gotten stronger and stronger as it just festers and quote unquote works out, 

Cinnamon: we see that in some of the trauma work that we do. When we finally do take on a traumatic event that has happened, a decade or more ago, however long now you've got 10 years worth of stuffed pain. That is going to come out with this and now it's even more intense, right?

So in a, compacted amount of time and space and the surgeons of that pain from that event [00:29:00] is so huge that we automatically wanna back away from it. But every time we back away, we're creating this futuristic, time where it's gonna be even bigger. And so there's no way around that pain, even if that pain is brief.

 So we have to, get through it. And avoidance is a great strategy. For some things, but not these things.

Erin: A great strategy for, surviving but not for thriving, 

Like you could just live a world of, I'm in survival mode, but we're not here just to survive. We're here to thrive and experience love and connection and so many things, and community and all of the things. 

Cinnamon: and it's always so interesting to me when we talk to people post-treatment or we talk to like our guests that we interview, how one common theme that we consistently hear is, it was so bad. And then [00:30:00] I walk through the fire 

and I cannot believe how good it is now. there's still struggles, but I have a different perspective and I see the beauty in my life and I have joy and love in my relationships.

And my fear is always that one person who's sitting back there going, yeah, but that's not how it's gonna be for me. My experience is gonna be different. And I say this with as much love and compassion, as I do anything with, but my words to you are you are not that special.

Erin: Mm-hmm.

Cinnamon: You are not so special that this won't work for you too.

Erin: Yeah. And what I hear behind that is, but I'm afraid, but this is gonna be scary, but this is gonna take commitment. This is going to take vulnerability. This is gonna take. Feeling it deeply for a minute, and I am afraid of that, and so it is gonna work for that person, but that's not me. I'm not them. Mine is worse.

Mine is greater. Mine is bigger. Mine is [00:31:00] whatever we have to tell ourselves to avoid walking through it.

Cinnamon: And the irony is that. We're talking about people who run towards bullet fire, who run towards fire, fire, fire, fire who go into those dangerous situations. And I've heard Dr. Abby from the I A F F Center of Excellence, she's the medical director there. She has said like, when there is trauma, and 

when we've been in these situations where in life or death we're a little eh, like I, I face these risks because I, for all these other various reasons, may not feel the worthiness of being able to have this happy, healthy life, right? Where I get like mediocre on the fence about survival, even that we're willing to put ourselves in physical danger, but the emotional danger. Is way more terrifying, [00:32:00] 

way more painful. the folks who have, chronic pain from carrying their belts around their waists as patrolmen or bad knees and rotator cuffs and,all the things that get hurt and can cause chronic pain in this job, these jobs. lower back pain is a big one too.

 they will push through that. They will endure that because that is something that they feel, at least they know they have the tools to handle. But when it comes to that emotional pain, it's that fear like, I don't know when it's gonna stop. I don't know how big it's gonna get. I don't know when it's gonna end.

I don't know what kind of shape I'm gonna be in when it ends. And I don't know where this myth came from, that if I start crying, I will never stop. And I'm like, there are a lot of people out there who you will walk by during any given day that are not crying. And I guarantee that they have cried in the past.[00:33:00] 

I watch people avoid crying and I'm like, that is literally your body giving you an opportunity to regulate and get back to homeostasis. 

 Right? When we stuff that down, we're making it harder for ourselves and we're not listening to our bodies.

Erin: So what it boils down to is, The only way out is through. 

Cinnamon: Don't be a cow.

Erin: don't be a cow. There's so many people at the ready that are waiting to support you, that are waiting to show you the way that are waiting to hold you up as you go through the process, you know that will not let you fall. And so avoidance is not the answer.

The end, no.

Cinnamon: And done 

Cinnamon: and scene. One thing that I do wanna add to that, because we're inviting vulnerability, we're inviting acknowledgement, and when someone has conjured up the courage. To come forward and say, I'm struggling, or, this is really hard for [00:34:00] me so the other side of that is the invitation to not be that person in your agency, in your department, in wherever it is that mocks it, minimizes it, uses it as fodder uses it to make fun. 

Erin: 

Cinnamon: and it

Yeah,

 we've seen shame be used as a tool to keep people in their place, keep people quiet, keep people suffering. 

Erin: and people aren't gonna like that. I'm gonna say this, but I don't care. The 

folks that are doing that are also often experiencing immense amount of pain, have experienced their own hardships because only folks that have experienced something like that act like that. It's like when my daughter comes home from school crying because some kid was a jerk on the playground.

I'm like, I'm so sorry that happened. And sometimes I say I wonder if he gets hugs at home. 

Cinnamon: Yeah. Well, and then, even to go as far as when Lila, your daughter, if Lila acts like a jerk to some [00:35:00] other kid,

Erin: right? Like, you know, that her well enough to know that she's not innately a jerk. She can act like one, just like all of us can, and you have that insight to understand she's probably having a bad day, 

Cinnamon: something's going on with her.

And so if that's what it takes, that we tell you right now and let you know that the bullies are struggling too. the comedians, the jokester, the ones who are probably less sensitive. Maybe the ones that people don't want to be vulnerable around.

Erin: That is an avoidance tactic 

Cinnamon: Absolutely. 

Erin: So boom, a mic drop.

Anyways, 

Cinnamon: Okay, but they're on stands and they're expensive and we don't wanna create damage and additional

Erin: they're not really that experiential. It's worth a mic drop. okay, let us know how we can support you. ask questions. We invite you to utilize the contact page. We invite you to utilize the resource page, which I'm continuing [00:36:00] to update, and the caller hotline. Leave a message.

How can you help the next person? How can you get the answers that you're looking for? How can you learn more? it is there for a reason, so go to the website and use it. That's what this whole thing is about. 

Cinnamon: Yeah. All right. this is a call to action for those who, are ready to stop avoiding reach out to us, send us an email.

We wanna hear from you. but also find a safe person.

Erin: Find a safe person whether it's a peer support, whether it's a clinician, say, I'm done doing the thing that I was doing, and I wanna do something different cuz I don't wanna feel like this anymore.

Yep.

Cinnamon: And then we take it on.

And then it all starts to fall like dominoes. Maybe a lot slower than what we see in a domino fall, but 

Erin: but a fall, nonetheless. 

Cinnamon: it's, a fall nonetheless

Erin: Mm-hmm. 

Cinnamon: All right. E 

Erin: go, 

Cinnamon: think,

 we gotta go. 

Erin: got, 

go, got shit to 

do. 

Cinnamon: important things to [00:37:00] do, but still

Erin: Like, you know, caring for children,

Cinnamon: right.