Change Your Brain Every Day - When Circumstances Lead You to Become a Reluctant Healer

Episode Date: April 23, 2019

Tana Amen’s father wasn’t there for her much during her childhood. So when he became ill, the last thing she wanted was to have to be the one to take care of him. However, by doing so, she learned as much about herself as she did about him, and the dynamic change in their relationship made it all worth it. In this episode, Tana relates this life-changing experience.

Welcome to the Brain Warriors Way podcast. I'm Dr. Daniel Amen. And I'm Tana Amen. In our podcast, we provide you with the tools you need to become a warrior for the health of your brain and body. The Brain Warriors Way podcast is brought to you by Amen Clinics, where we have been transforming lives for 30 years using tools like brain spec imaging to personalize treatment to your brain. For more information, visit amenclinics.com. The Brain Warriors Way podcast is also brought to you by BrainMD, where we produce the highest quality nutraceuticals to support the health of your brain and body. To learn more, go to Brainmd.com. Welcome back. We are talking about reluctant healers in these episodes this week, and we're talking about the story of my dad and my husband, who tends to bring people back into my life. So we've been talking about how he was

diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease and he was recluse and not coming out of his room and your sisters were freaked out and they call you and you're like why is this my problem this is a guy that's not been part of my life in a good way he's actually brought more pain in my life than anything and when i scan him he does not have alzheimer's disease he has something called pseudo dementia so now we're going to get to the rest of the story as paul harvey would say but first uh uh hannah raul um writes in thank you very much for sharing this podcast. I appreciate so much both of your expertise in the field, the complementarity of your couple,

the willingness to share your passions. Always a great pleasure to watch your exchange, no matter what the topic. It makes me feel great and fun about relationships and myself. It points out how much should be still done in expanding the knowledge and technologies, access to nuclear medicine and scans and care. You make me feel real progress in love.

Aw. Hannah, thank you so much. We adore each other, which is why we've done 412 podcasts. We haven't killed each other. You're my best friend. And I'm staying that way. You're not getting rid of me. Till death do us part.

That's it. And we're trying to keep you alive as we try to keep ourselves alive and so not the rest of the story with david but the next part of this story is he does not have alzheimer's disease yet he's being treated for it he's depressed so obviously if you're depressed being in a room all by yourself is going to accelerate the illness it's not going to decelerate it and i couldn't think of someone better for him to be around than his daughter who why you had that thought was just completely beyond me. But I was witness to him being better. And actually, he's quite a bright man who'd been involved in teaching seminars on the disc,

which is personality inventory. He'd done it for businesses and done it for couples. I had him actually do it for our business. And I realized how smart he was. And as he began to get better through socialization, learning not to believe every stupid thing he thought, omega-3 fatty acids, SAMe, which is a supplement that's been shown to support mood. Wait, wait, wait. You took him off of the medications he was on.

You put him on the correct medications. Well, it was mostly the correct supplements that really helped. Oh, and the interesting thing is he was convinced his entire life that he had ADD. So that was a really fascinating discovery. He didn't have ADD. Now, my mom, who didn't believe in ADD, had ADD from hell. So that was really really, really fascinating discovery. He didn't have ADD. Now my mom, who didn't believe in ADD, had ADD from hell. So that was really kind of fascinating. And your uncle.

My mom's ADD was terrible. My dad was convinced he had ADD. So now you've just shared with everybody, not only did I scan you, I scanned your dad, I scanned your mom, I scanned your uncle. You've scanned my entire family. Just about. So yeah, it was really fascinating though. So my mom just believes you need to work harder, you know, and just stick with it. My dad couldn't really stick with stuff very well, and so he believed he had ADD, and he didn't. He did not.

In fact, depression ran throughout his whole family. There was significant issues with his mother and other people in the family. And so as his depression got better through working in our four circles approach, right, we always talk about, so what's the biology? That's why the supplements support it. The psychology, learning not to believe every stupid thing you think. The social circle, which is then getting reconnected with his daughter. For him, it was church and me and church. And then church, which is social and spiritual.

And then he began to develop a sense once again of meaning and purpose. And so over four, five, six months, we really saw this closed flower open. So we, I should, you know, we should really sort of lay this out for people. So obviously moving someone in with me who I did not have a relationship with, did not just like, it wasn't just all of a sudden this magic thing just happened and oh, it was all rosy. No, it wasn't just all of a sudden this magic

thing just happened and oh, it was all rosy. No, it didn't. That was not what happened. It was weird and it was rough at first. So I found myself staying away from home. I didn't like it. I didn't like having him in my house. He was getting better. I was annoyed. It was just like, why am I doing this? But at some point, I actually got some therapy over it. And I think through my process of getting therapy, I learned to let it go. I dealt with my own stuff with it. EMDR really helped. And so I really learned how to let it go for real, like finally let it go. And I was able to talk to him. What's really interesting is I actually did let it go. I had no idea how much guilt he was holding onto. He couldn't let it go. He could not let the past

go. And that was actually more painful to watch. That was really painful to see him, to see this man not be able to let the past go and to just sort of beat himself up. And so I had never seen that. I had always just seen this very sort of arrogant, proud facade that he had. You know, that's all I ever knew of him. So now when he let that go and he's in my house, I'm watching the other side of that. And it was actually this, he really just didn't like himself for the past. And he could not forgive himself, which I thought was fascinating for a man who was sort of a man of God.

And so it was really sort of an interesting thing. And I kept saying to him, why are you still holding onto it? I'm not holding onto it. Why are you holding onto it? So I'm confused. What's this about? And it really wasn't until he died

that he was able to let it go. You're like way ahead of the story okay let's not get let's not get to death yet okay but we had to talk about how hard it was but it's coming in a beautiful way i promise so yes things just don't go away. That you have to work through them. And you have to do your part. But you have to work through it. And this is the point. If your brain's not right, it's really hard to work through past emotional pain. Hardware, software. You got to get the hardware right. And then the software can kick in. And for me, it was more a software issue at that point. So I was not having very positive thoughts because I had a lot of the past that I was holding on to.

All right. But as we start to nurture his brain and your relationship begins to get better, what happens? Well, like I said, a big part of it was me letting the past go. So as I start to let the past go, I start being able to focus more on who he is now. And so what I started to notice was he started to get really healthy. He lost 20 pounds. He's walking. I lived right across the street from a church, one of the big churches in our area, which he got connected to and loved. All of a sudden, I come home one day and he's got men's Bible study going on in my house. I'm like, oh, he's back. But this time I felt a very different person emerging. I didn't feel like he was doing this at this stage in his life for any type of reward or facade from his family, which is what I had always felt before.

This time I really felt the sincerity coming from him, like it was something he was doing because it was his connection, because it was something he loved. And so it was very different. He was connecting. And it was a young group that he was teaching because he was sort of their mentor. And they loved him. They looked up to him and they needed him. So it was very interesting to see. So I started to see him in a different light.

And then about six months after I first met him, he went to the church and did an all-day seminar. Seven hours. Teaching. Yeah. This is a guy who couldn't come out of his room. Yeah. So it was miraculous.

Yeah. So we had the sense things were going in a better direction. And in the next episode, we're going to talk about how your relationship with him gets healed. Stay with us. If you're enjoying the Brain Warriors Way podcast, please don't forget to subscribe. So you'll always know when there's a new episode. And while you're at it, feel free to give us a review or five-star rating as that helps others find the podcast. If you're interested in coming to Amen Clinics, use the code PODCAST10 to get a 10% discount on a full evaluation at amenclinics.com. For more information, give us a call at 855-978-1363.