Sense of Soul - PAIN: A Love Story

Episode Date: November 29, 2021

Today on Sense of Soul Podcast we have Dr. Serena Sterling, MA, PsyD, author of “PAIN: A Love Story.” Dr. Serena Sterling holds a master’s in International Journalism, a doctorate in clinical psychology, and is a certified Life Coach. As a journalist in Portland, Oregon, San Francisco, London and New York City, Dr. Serena Sterling wrote about health-related articles. Due to her own experience of overcoming chronic fatigue syndrome and finding ways to alleviate her own chronic pain from years of living with juvenile rheumatoid arthritis, Dr. Serena Sterling pursued a degree in clinical psychology and learned advanced stress reduction techniques to assist others in overcoming their own health challenges. She started her coaching practice in 2008 and has had offices in Philadelphia, San Francisco, Portland, Oregon, and Seattle. She works with people from all over the world via remote sessions and consults and cross-refers with physical therapists, chiropractors, acupuncturists, massage therapists and medical doctors when appropriate. Dr. Serena Sterling is also a speaker and gives talks on understanding how repressed emotions can cause chronic pain, inhibit athletes from recovering from injuries, and how identifying and releasing those emotions alleviates pain levels and improves health and performance. Get her amazing book “PAIN: A Love Story”, watch her awesome videos, apply for a consult and learn more here at Dr. Serena Sterling’s website. https://www.drserenasterling.com Tomorrow is Giving Tuesday, please consider donating to SAYAP Africa…  Improving the quality of life of communities in 54 Countries in Africa through local and global activities. https://sayapafrica.org/donate/ Don’t forget to rate, follow and leave us a comment, this truly helps support  our podcast! Thank you!! Please go check out our Sense of Soul’s merch and workshops including Shanna’s CLEAR ancestry workshop and learn more about us @ www.mysenseofsoul.com! Exclusively NOW on Sense of Soul Patreon  is the 777 Chakra Journey, 7 weeks 7 Chakras, beginning with the Root Chakra and end at the end of 2021!  You can also listen to Shanna’s mini-series about her ancestral journey, “Untangled Roots” and Mande’s mini series about her two NDE’s has begun.  https://www.patreon.com/senseofsoul

Hey, listener and friends, tomorrow is Giving Tuesday, and if you're looking for a good cause to donate to, I have one for you. The Sayop Africa organization, a non-profit organization headquartered in California, whose mission is to help the communities in Africa to improve the quality of life through local and global activities in the non-exclusive areas of education, health, economic development, clean water, energy, and women's rights, and more. So if you are looking for a place to donate for Giving Tuesday, I ask you to check out their website at sayapafrica.org.

That's S-A-Y-A-P-A-F-R-I-C-A.org. That will also be in the show notes. Thank you for giving hope and supporting a good cause. Welcome to the Sense of Soul podcast. We are your hosts, Shanna and Mandy. Grab your coffee, open your mind, heart, and soul. It's time to awaken. Today we have with us Dr. Serena Sterling. She is a mind

body practitioner. She helps people recover from emotional trauma, anxiety, depression, and chronic pain. She assists them with understanding the connection with what they think and how they feel physically in their bodies. using a number of advanced mind body healing techniques, which ask the body for answers rather than only using a talk it out approach. She facilitates people in releasing their pain and discomfort. And we can't wait to talk to Serena. Thank you so much for being with us. Thank you so much for having me. How about you share a little bit about yourself and how you got to where you are today? Well, I just posted something on my Instagram today. My business coach and my mastermind was telling me yesterday, like, you need to share

more of your story. I was like, well, I wrote a whole book about that. So my career path was never really in psychology. I loved taking it in high school and I took some classes in college, but I found it kind of dry and I didn't really like testing on rats and stuff like that. But I was always interested in the mind body connection because I developed arthritis, juvenile rheumatoid arthritis when I was nine years old. And I firmly believe that wasn't a coincidence that right at the same time that that happened, I was pretending to have pain that never existed so that I could get attention from my family because I felt like I was being overlooked and my brother was the golden child. And so I was like, if I have something visible, like visibly,

physically visible, I'll have to pay attention. And so I just, I was like this really athletic child and that wasn't enough. So I complained over a few months and eventually like, that's what I call the, well, it's not what I call, but it's called the nocebo effect. It's the opposite of the placebo effect. And I developed JRA at nine years old, always had that memory of how that developed. And then I tried to do like mind over matter techniques to get it to go away. But I think that I've had to understand why I wanted something in my body to begin with. But then I was, I didn't really have a direction in life. I was like, I like writing. I like reading. So I pursued a degree in journalism from a university in London. And then I got a little

tired while I was over there. And then I moved to New York city and I worked at this magazine called spirituality and health. And then I was there two blocks from the World Trade Center on 9-11. That was just really traumatizing as it was for many people. And I didn't know how to cope with it. And I was raised in a family where you just don't really talk about your feelings. So I just repressed everything. But I got so tired that it became chronic fatigue syndrome, that that's what I was diagnosed with by my medical doctor who then told me to just learn to cope. There is no cure for it. So because of my health issues, because I was like, not going to take no for an answer. And I

was like, I'm not going to live like this and move back home after just being really driven and getting a master's in journalism. I've been introduced to a technique when I was still an undergrad called neuro-emotional technique. And I found a chiropractor in New York city who helped me recover in three weeks. And I was so inspired and amazed with my results that I was like, I want to do that, but I had to get a higher degree in one of the healing arts to do that. And I looked into all of them. I looked into acupuncture and chiropractic naturopathy, and I decided to do psychology. The techniques I wanted

to learn weren't even taught in my school. So I decided to learn them outside of my degree program. And then I wanted to be able to work with people all over the world rather than just in my state. So if you're a licensed psychologist, which I am not because I wanted to be able to have this ability, then I took some coaching classes and got certified in coaching. And now I see people remotely and I do these techniques to help people feel better. That's amazing. And just the name of your book, Pain, a Love Story. Are you kidding me? That's like our love story. That's our story. That's how we started. I mean, that's what actually bring us to where we are today was our pain.

You know what I find is so funny too, just going right back to the very beginning, what you said when you were little, I was doing some research on some curses and that's kind of like what they consider a curse to be as well. Like if they had this case where maybe you've heard of it, where the guy was told that he had cancer and, but he only had till like maybe Christmas to live. So that was like his D-day, if he could get through that. And then he dies and they do an autopsy and they find out, oh my God, he didn't have cancer. So it's like, you can manifest these things. It freaks me out because it worries me about COVID and about all the fear that's going on in the world. Absolutely. I was always interested in like the mind body conditions and how our thoughts could create health and do the reverse. And so it was a easy decision in a way to go down the psychology

path. I mean, I remember reading books about how they had quantified and shown that like how a doctor talks to you, the bedside manner really matters and how they say like, okay, go home and take care of your affairs because you have six weeks to live. And then you have that belief in your head, or you could say like, you know what, we're going to give you these new supplements, these new medications, for example. And that's the placebo effect. It's a double blind controlled study. And they showed that like these people got sugar water. It was nothing, but it was their belief and it made them better. That's so fascinating. So Serena, did you say you had chronic pain syndrome? Is that what it was? Chronic fatigue syndrome. Okay.

So young. I totally get the whole emotional pain thing. You know, this is something that I learned, you know, through experiences, through my clients, that a lot of their pain usually was some sort of stress or trauma. And with, you know, touch a lot of times in movement, you can actually have these smoto-emotional releases. But I feel like a lot of people miss, I mean, the root cause is usually something that's in your subconscious that's going to constantly come back, I feel like, unless it's brought to awareness. How do you feel about that? Absolutely. And that's why people can get

back surgeries and it doesn't hold up because they haven't fixed the root problem where you can take all these medications or can do all these things that are fixing like the body. And I had an amazing massage therapist when I was in Portland and she, she's the one who introduced me to a chiropractor who did this first, who did the technique, neuro-emotional technique, but she would press on my body on my back and she'd say like, okay, focus on this and breathe into it. And I could get the knot to disappear, but she was like, you know, on days where you were just like, nope, nothing's going to work. The same was true. Nothing was going to

work because it's all comes down to your belief, but underneath more of like, why is that there in the first place? Why does it not go away? Could be something more rooted in a childhood experience or something that happened like two years ago with a relationship that was never fully processed. Sometimes it just lingers and gets stuck in your body. What do you think about like past lives? Sometimes that pain and things that are going on could be from something that happened in another life. I'm totally open to past lives. I've done some past life regression myself. I mean, I think it's fascinating sometimes that there are some cases where someone was like stabbed and they've always had like issues with their heart, for example.

And I feel like there's still probably like some past lives in me and all of us that we haven't fully worked out. And it would really, if this is really true, it really kind of sucks that like we come into this world and we have amnesia. We don't remember all our past lives and like, why are we here and the purpose? Like we have to figure it out again every time we come in. And let's not also forget about our genes, you know, and the trauma of our ancestors. I mean, people just think that we look like them. Well, we take all of it. Epigenetics, like you can absolutely control these things if you have awareness. Absolutely. But your mastermind, your coach said he wanted

to dig more into your story. So that's what I'm going to kind of try to pull out of you. As a child, I can remember like wanting crutches. I can remember actually thinking I wanted to break my arm like one time on the playground. I was had this very strange like infatuation with wanting to get hurt. And it was for attention as well. It's such a strange thing. You triggered these memories for me. How as a sibling, did you heal from feeling like you were always kind of in the shadow of your brother? Well, I mean, it continued throughout my childhood. And so I have a master's in journalism and a master's and doctorate in clinical psychology. My brother though has an MBA from Wharton business school and then JD from Penn Law like he still outdid me

in various ways I still think that he may be the golden child but I had to do my own inner work to be like that's okay like we're just two completely different people and how my parents treated him that's like it's just their stories and I like I can't I couldn't um change anything about him and his story and how he viewed me and our relationship I had to change myself and my reactions to him and my reactions to my parents and just decide that like it was like I basically had to do inner child work of all these years and just be like you know what I didn't get what I wanted it's okay I've had to forge my own path and just kind of like be my own parent in a way older or younger your brother older he's two and a half years older oh wow you're like Drew and Lindsay my my kids so I have

a 24 year old and a 22 year old boy girl and Lindsay grew up being Drew's sister. She didn't even have a name. She was just Drew's sister. Drew's sister. That's Drew's sister. Yeah. My brothers and I are, we're all two and a half years apart as well. My older brother, my younger brother, but it's interesting because sometimes we create the story. Like my 17 year old always says comments like I'm not Connor or, um, uh, you know, if I don't get a scholarship like Connor, you know, she's always comparing herself. We don't ever say those things to her, but you can tell that clearly she is comparing herself to him and feels like she has to follow in his footsteps and, you know, get the state championship ring and some sport and the scholarship to college. And we, we don't

have those expectations on her, but there's always that kind of there's, you know, sibling rivalry, which can be healthy to some point if it pushes you, but also very damaging to your confidence. So that's why I asked, thank you for sharing. Cause that's a real thing. Yeah, it is. And it's almost like if you look from this outside perspective, though, into a family like yours, for example. I mean, it's a completely unique situation, each one, but your daughter could just like she could totally have put no pressure on herself and decide, like, I'm going to be really academic or I'm just going to be really into books and stuff like that. And you can have two completely different people, whereas like some, but that pressure for whatever reason exists. And she feels on some level that she has to stay competitive and all these things. And I mean, my brother went into business. I went into like psychology, like that's completely different. So,

but it's still this kind of like, I think it's, it's the way we probably grew up. It's the way that our parents had that pressure on us to succeed academically, to do really well in sports and he didn't have arthritis. And so I always felt like I was kind of behind after that too. My daughter that I was talking about, she always had stomach issues. And I was always like, every day? I'm like, every day? But it must have been like this just subconscious want to get attention. Or maybe she did it deliberately.

I don't know. Did you do it deliberately? Or you think that it was just kind of like you figured that out as an adult looking back that that may have been something that you were doing to get attention? No, I did it intentionally. You did? Okay. This like light bulb go off in second grade when my best friend Becca hurt her foot in gym class and she came back with crutches and I was like, oh, that's what I'm doing next year. I'm going to have some, I'm just going to like pretend that I have pain and they're going to have to show me attention. Did you have busy parents? My dad was really busy. He wasn't home

that much, but my mom was pretty, she's home a fair amount. I just felt like that favoritism was so extreme that I had to go to certain levels to do you think it was boys the boy thing because like my little brother is like the messiah we that's what I call he's the messiah and still today like my mom will only burden me with her problems you know she will never burden him I do I think that I don't know if it's something in our society or it's just like mother and sons or like my cousin, Max. I mean, his mother enabled him and babied him. Like he could do no wrong whatsoever. Like they, his parents, my aunt and uncle pulled him out

of school when he was like 11, took, went on a vacation to the Caribbean, left my other cousin his sister in boarding school like yeah it is funny and I do it to my son admittedly I definitely my oldest son I totally did this too of course I don't now when I became aware and kind of awakened to all of this but definitely it was something that I was taught, you know, my family and we teach the women to like, kind of suck it up. And, you know, that kind of creates this masculine woman. I don't know what we're enabling is a great word to use for what I think even I did to my son for sure. That's an issue I'm working on now is trying to be more feminine

because I feel like I'm independent. I don't need anyone. I learned how to like deal with things by myself. Whereas my brother is still like this mama's boy who calls my mom a few times a day and can't cope. Even he has a wife though. Like why doesn't he talk to his wife? Like, dude, you should have seen my mother was praying like on a nightly basis in my brother's 20s that he would meet a girl that had Southern roots that she'd be able to take care of him. She was training me how to be a good wife. Totally amazing. You know, and I remember asking a friend of mine who has a son and a daughter and I was like, come on, you can tell me which one do you like better? I like my son, but this is why. Something about mama's boys. Can you talk a little bit about what guided you to this chiropractor in New York? And can you talk a little bit about what took place during those three weeks that changed your life

forever? Yes. So as I mentioned, I had been introduced to this one technique called neuro-emotional technique when I was in college. And it was that massage therapist who told me about this chiropractor, Dr. Alan Connect, in case anyone's in Portland. And I was pretty amazed by it, but I still was my trajectory. My career path was journalism. But then when I was like so tired in New York, my medical doctor was no help at the time I looked for, I say at the time, because there weren't that many people in New York doing this technique. So I found her though, Dr. Linda Randazzo. And even from the get-go, like she had me fill out this like, you know, 20 minute paperwork, whereas the doctor was just like, why are you here?

And he didn't ask me anything. He was like, what's your, what are your symptoms? I was like, I'm just sleeping so much. I'm so tired. And he was like, all right, well, we'll run some tests. Whereas she was like, where do you work? What do you do for living? Who are yours? Who is in your support system right now? Where is your family? Are you close to your family? What's your diet? Like, how are you sleeping? Like how long have you been in New York city? All these things that really affected me. And so, so basically she, she wouldn't ask me, she would ask my body. She uses something called applied kinesiology, which is muscle testing and ask the body for answers rather than our minds. And so, you know, she'd be like, okay, think about the fatigue, feel it. And then my, she'd hold onto

my arm. She'd press on my arm. It would go weak. And then she would find the emotion underlying that. And then she'd be like, okay, helpless. How do you feel helpless? And I was like, well, I don't know how to get better. Like I've exhausted my options right now. And then she would be like, okay, let's trace this back to an earlier time where you felt helpless to get better, to, to change something. And it went back to like, say 14 years old, my best friend in high school was like, I don't want to be your friend anymore. You suck. And then turned all my friends against me. And I was basically helpless to change their minds. And my grades plummeted. I couldn't do anything. I felt like I couldn't do anything about it. So even though that episode at 14, wasn't the same as like having some sort of health issue, it was the emotional feeling around that

was very similar. And it was still living in my body because they'd never processed it. I just kind of like went through the motions at 14, had to find new friends and just get through school. And so it was the same thing of like, okay, I'm just kind of like helpless in New York city. I don't know how to get better. And once I released what happened at 14, then I started to feel better. And so she would do things like that. Every time I saw her, I saw her twice I started to feel better. And so she would do things like that. Every time I saw her, I saw her twice a week for three weeks and I just felt incredible. And then this was around like October, November, 2001.

And then she was like, all right, I want to put you on a diet, like a anti-Candida, anti-toxin diet. It looked at what she was recommending and they started to cry because it was so limiting yeah that's scary it was I was like what am I supposed to eat she was like look I know you're young and in New York City but just like give this a try and I was desperate to feel even better so I did and that just accelerated my ability to feel even more energy. So I was just amazed. Did this take place before 9-11 or after? It was after. So I just assumed like PTSD was for people gone through military and were in the war or was really, really abused or something. So I had to work from home for five months because my office wasn't necessarily like

damaged, but all the ash from when the towers came down, came through the vents in the building. And so like everything was covered in ash. And so it had to be cleaned. So I worked from home and I remember sitting at my desk and every time there was a fire engine that would go down one of the avenues, I'd be like, Oh, they're finding someone. They're going to rescue someone. There's this huge underground mall that I used to go to. And I was like, I just had this fantasy that all the survivors were down there, just like just waiting to be rescued. And they could survive on like the restaurants and they could find clothing or, you know, I'd hear a helicopter, and I was like, okay, where do I run? I don't have the right shoes, but which way, which river do I run to? And so she helped with that too.

My gosh, I'm so sorry you had to experience that, and I think there's this misconception that trauma looks a certain way, that it has to be something big, like a near-death experience or a massive car accident. I mean, it can just be like the smallest things and you can't compare your, your pain and your trauma to other people or to what you see on TV because it affects everyone's nervous system differently. Well, I mean, I think that like now with with COVID that was a very similar time where people you know and a mass were collectively very fearful and I can't imagine being in that like right there I would have to have caused some trauma and how old were you you were in your 20s I was 24 yeah you know so unsure and we weren't taught to process emotions and talk

about them and put them somewhere other than in our muscle tissue. Right. I mean, even that day, like I had a friend visiting from journalism school. She's French. She stayed at my apartment and I called her and she's still sleeping. We'd see it out like super late. She was supposed to fly back to London on September 11th. And I just called her to let her know that I was okay. And I was like, here's my mom's number, like call her. And so by the time I actually called my, both my parents, they knew that I was okay, but they were still like, how are you feeling? They didn't ask that. They were like, what did you see? You were so close. And it was no sort of like, we're so glad you're

okay. Right. That's how I grew up. So why would I talk about my feelings? I was just the back burner. They go onwards. That's how my family was. You know, we were the fine family. How are you? Fine, fine, fine. You tuck it away and you keep on going. Right. Yeah. when I was doing a lot of work one of the things that I had found is that I was actually taking on my client's symptoms and you know I was like what is this you know like am I crazy you know the girl said her jaw hurts now my jaw hurts and it wasn't just the clients I started to realize how much I did around my house. You know, someone has a headache. Now I have a headache, you know, someone's left foot hurts, my left foot hurts. I'm like, what is this? Do you feel like it's along the same lines? Like we were talking about the beginning, like you're, you're just kind of manifesting these things or I've looked at it.

And I think that I'm probably aligned more with the fact that I'm such an empath that, you know, I care about these people so much that I'm actually taking on, you know, their energy and their pain. I had no idea what an empath was until years later. And I think that I definitely did that when I was in New York. I'd sit on the subway and I could just see, I could see people's, so their terror and their anger and stuff like that. And I was just kind of like, see people's, so their terror and their anger and stuff like that. And I was just kind of like, it was just kind of go into my system. And then even

when I was studying psychology and I would work with people with health conditions, I would feel terrible after a session. And there's actually a word for it. It's called somatic counter-transference where, and it just seems like a Jedi move is what I've been told. Yeah. Take on a client's issue from across the computer, but we feel we're all energy. That's how I can do my muscle testing from across the computer also. And so I absolutely think it's possible. And I've had to learn tools on my own outside of grad school because they don't teach you that they teach you how to people. They don't teach you how to like not take on their stuff. Yeah. Which they should be. Don't you see, I do. I have, now that I work on an energetic level, not just, you know, with the massage and the physical,

pain and emotions are so almost one in the same. They're messages like screaming at you. I need some attention. We need some work. You know, I need some attention we need some work you know I need something healed I mean most of the time and this is like traumatic acute pain how do you feel about pain and emotions being on that same line that you were just talking about I mean I feel like I could take some of the emotions just like you said just like I could take their actual pain absolutely that's exactly what I do it like, I help people understand what are the emotions that are getting stuck in their body that are causing them pain. And the thing is that I'm, I think I need to like talk about more maybe on social media is that just, even if you get rid

of one pain, that doesn't mean that your body's going to stop giving you these pain signals, because that's how our body communicates to us. Like if it's one big thing and you've had it for years, then it's trying to talk to you. You'll figure that out. And then your body's going to communicate with something else, but you'll have these tools that you will have learned so that you can figure it out on your own. You can have control over your pain rather than your pain, having control over you. That's a, like a game changer. Yeah, absolutely. So you're not affected anymore. Yeah. That's a hard one for me to wrap my head around because my husband had this thing called CRPS or it's also called RSD. It's nerves. So his hands and his arm would swell up like elephantitis. It's called the suicide disease. So many people that have it, the pain is so intense,

they end up killing themselves. And hardly any doctors know about it. I mean, it's starting to become a little more well known. But I mean, it was completely out of his control. And he was one of the lucky ones to only have it in his arm, because a lot of people have it in their whole bodies. Like they do nerve blocks through their neck, they do ketamine, they do where they actually put like a box on their spine. They implant it and you can turn it on and off to like, you know, manipulate the nerves. It's such a horrific disease. Have you ever heard of it? I think I have. It's nerve pain, right? Yeah. That's awful. But it makes me wonder like now if there were some emotions behind what was

happening for him because it was a sport injury and it was when he was like very into his career and and wanting to make sports his career so I mean it's interesting that I've never even thought about that before for him I mean how many different diagnoses and things that they've given a name to, like, you know, that, which is basically information and also, you know, like that chari, you know, they're new, they're a newer diagnosis that you're starting to hear a lot. And fibromyalgia is like thrown out like candy. And so is chronic fatigue, many of these things, not that I think that they don't exist, but are they temporary? And then some of us just

decide to keep them forever. And maybe they are more like symptoms of something like stress. How do you feel about that? And these diagnoses? I definitely think that at the time that I was diagnosed, I don't really know if it was chronic fatigue or not. I think that like the doctors, I have a lot of respect for doctors, but not really when it's chronic, because I think that they kind of fail at it. They don't know what to do with a chronic issue. So, but they've been trained to figure out a diagnosis and then be like, okay, there, you've got a diagnosis, even if they can't treat it. So I think there are a lot of people that are clumped into fibromyalgia or chronic fatigue or things like that, especially when they don't know what it is. So they're like,

oh, well you have this. Hey, Mandy, I just happened to look up rsd and cprs that's all you know obviously it's the nerves and so i looked up to see if there was any like you know if anything was big with the vegas nerve that they could do it says our groundbreaking non-invasive approach to crps the vegas nerve of course the veus nerve controls so much. Yeah. Do you work with any breathing techniques in the vagus nerve, you know, stimulating the vagus nerve? I personally don't do any with my clients, but I'm learning more about the vagus nerve, about how the emotional effect of the vagus nerve is to feel a sense of safety. And I think that's huge. Like once you feel emotionally safe, physically safe, then your body can feel safe enough to calm down. Whereas we're, we're constantly in it sometimes

in a fight, fight or flight response. It's the main nerve that controls inflammation. Curious. Did you start doing this with your clients over the computer because of COVID or were you doing it before? I was doing it before I had met, um, another practitioner at a conference for one of these healing modalities back in 2013. And I, at the time was living in Philadelphia and the conferences in Chicago and she and I wanted to trade. So she taught me how to do this remotely. And then I moved back to Portland and I had a client who

was moving back to Malaysia. I just started to see more clients remotely. And then at a certain point when I was still in Seattle, I was like, you know what, I'm just going to shift everyone to online and see how this works. And so I think that was 2018. And then voila, like, here we are all working remotely. So turned out to be fine. You, you absolutely would love the episode that we released called repatterning the brain. She uses the same techniques as what you were talking about that your doctor is at Randazzo. Okay. That's like the best king cakes in New Orleans, by the way, is the Randazzo bakery. So that stuck out for me. That's how I remembered her name. But yeah, she used that. I mean, I'm floored with the results I can get that. I mean, my training is in clinical psychology,

but if I were just to do a talk it out approach, there's just, it's limited. I just can't get the same. It goes so deep so quickly and resolves various pains and emotional pain. And it's just, it's amazing. I love it. You know, Shanna talked earlier about how much she also loved the name of your book. Can you talk about the process of coming up with that title? You would never think of pain as a love story. So how did you come up with that? I came up with it because the common denominator in what I see with my clients and what I've seen with myself is that it all comes down to relationships, not only how we relate to

ourselves. And I definitely get into places where I'm like, I don't need anyone. I could just live in the woods by myself, a bunch of dogs, you know, but like we're wired for connection and we either get wounded in relationship or we heal in relationship. And so in my book, I talk about feeling like that wounding in my family. And then I had this relationship with a man when I was in San Francisco in grad school. And within just a few weeks of dating him, the arthritis started to resolve. And so when I felt like seen and heard and not judged and my body just kind of like relaxed and was the most amazing thing. So I felt like, okay, so I've written all these stories looking at how if I don't express myself,

if I don't tell people how I really feel, it will get lodged in my body. And so it is all about love, how we love ourselves, how we feel love from other people, how we give and receive. And I feel like maybe I should have put a tagline under there so people knew what it was about, but oh well. No, I think it's captivating. Makes you want to open the book. My first thought when you were talking about that was, well, then maybe oxytocin is the medicine that we need. Because I mean, when you are feeling in love, that's what's being released. And maybe that's what can help that pain. I mean, I know for me, when you were saying that, I was thinking about my diagnosis of fibromyalgia and when is my joint pain gone? And when do I not feel fatigued? And like, I have the flu when I'm happy, when I'm feeling loved by myself or others,

it's when I'm stressed or under, or, you know, not sleeping enough or not eating correctly or not on my feet for too long. So it's when I'm lacking self-love that it flares. I would also point out for myself, it's when I'm not meditating because when you are meditating, you are producing all of the hormones that you need to help you sleep, you know, to fight your stress, you know, to, you know, keep you healthy and enhance your immune system. I can totally just sit there with my pain. And it's the first thing that comes to my mind. I'm like, oh, no self-care, no time, no space, no, I haven't meditated, you know, and I just know what I need, but we're not taught to do that. We're taught to get on the phone or't meditated, you know, and I just know what I need, but we're not taught to

do that. We're taught to get on the phone or go get a, you know, some Tylenol or, or literally just stay in your pain. And then you're just stuck in your pain. Like, what are you going to do? And you talk about that stuckness. I mean, I had fibromyalgia too. I have an endless prescription for, you know, stuff to help my muscles relax, muscle relaxer, pain if I needed, for anxiety, for attention. I mean, I had so many prescriptions and I can get them at any point because I have that diagnosis, which is unbelievable. Yeah, definitely.

How to get out of that. What is the first step for someone who feels like they're, they've been having chronic pain? I would say like the number one thing that I ask people and I work with them around is where were you and what were you doing when this pain first started? And you may have to go back into your calendar, like your online calendar, which most people use, or maybe whatever, whatever calendar you use, look at like, what, what was on your agenda? Like, and also think about who was in your life, who are you connected with or who were you having issues with? And it may not have been just then, it may have been like four months before that. Like I had a client a few years ago and he, he had gone through like three rounds of physical therapy for hamstring. Like he kept injuring it in, what was it?

Soccer or something. I was like, okay, so what was going on in your life when you first got injured? Like anything different, even if it was a good thing, like getting a new job, because that can be stressful. And he said that he had a month after the first injury, he had moved in with his girlfriend. And I was like, okay, tell me more about that. Was it a mutual decision? And he was like, well, no, she pushed for it.

And I was like, sure, I'll go along with it. Like thinking he could like save money. I was like, okay, well, a lot of women see that as a precursor to marriage. Is that what you also wanted? He's like, wait, what? It was like, um, yeah, she'll like every few months she'll be like, Hey, like, why are you dragging your feet around this? We've been dating for two and a half years. Like, when are you going to propose? I mean, you'd be like, Oh, I just want to make sure that you're the right person. We worked for like six months and he finally was like, Oh, I just want to make sure that you're the right person. We worked for like six months and

he finally was like, okay, she's not the one. And then once he figured that out and they parted ways, like the pain went away for good. I have an example like that. Like I was working with this one woman who had been having this, you know, basically her back kept going out, kept going out and we'd give her a massage, we'd fix it, but it kept, you know, kept working. And like, I, I, I do Reiki. So I don't just do massage anymore because I see longer results when you're able to really have them bring full awareness to the pain. And so one of the things I did is I asked as well, I was like, well, when did the start, you know? And then I, my next question, what were you going through, you know, around that time? And she's going through a divorce. I'm like, well, of course, well, that's what it is. And we just don't think about that.

And I also love the story. I heard it one time on some talk or something, but that, you know, two people get in an accident on the same day and one's healthy and one's not one's happy. One's depressed that pain, that like recovery will look completely different. The person that's happy is going to recover as should. And the person who is going through a divorce or going through, you know, moving in with their girlfriend, that pain is going to last longer and live in that tissue. Makes so much sense. And I mean, people grew up with different ways of responding to traumas. Like that would be the person who's happier

may be like, oh, well, you know, I just go through physical therapy and I'm fine. And it's a belief system. Or it could be someone else being like, oh, this is going to take forever. Now I have to deal with like the insurance company and blah, blah, blah. And then that takes longer as well or likes the fact that it's getting weight on at home

exactly you can have this and then now it's chronic and not everyone wants to like confront the secondary gain it was so hard with one client I was like okay well if you didn't have these issues then you wouldn't be connected to your family as much like and you were already isolated from covid so i think there is no no no that's not it oh yeah just you know and then i'm the opposite it was so frustrating to me because i'm going to doctor after doctor after doctor after doctor saying the fibromyalgia that you're diagnosing me with started six weeks after I got out of my coma in ICU. Clearly they are connected. Clearly the respiratory failure caused trauma in my body. And now it's storing in my joints, causing this pain. And you're telling me it's just fibromyalgia and here's this pill. Like I can exactly pinpoint when it happened and when it started and still they would not listen

to me. And they still just said fibromyalgia. And grief too. Mine happened after Nisha died, after my dad died, your mom got restless leg after Ryan died. Grief is another one that, you know, I think that really, really lives within because people are not taught to like, let it out. And I always found it to be amazing that toxins are in our tears of sadness, but weren't in the tears of happiness when they did that research. That's that blows me away. I mean, we're just like holding all this toxic shit inside of us. Well, and Serena, for someone like me, you know, like I thought I had done all the right things. I did EMDR. I went to a therapist. I

journaled, I meditated. I, I've tried medications. I have tried, you know, and chronic fatigue for me is a big deal because my asthma, cause my lungs function at very, you know, like high sixties, it's always there at some level, especially during the spring when my asthma flares. And it makes me wonder, like, is it the asthma in my brain that my muscle memory remembers the asthma attack? And that's why my, you know, joints hurt so bad when the springtime comes along, or is it just because I'm allergic to everything around me? So it's, there's a lot involved with it, but I would be very interested to see what my body would tell you. Well, I would love to offer, I don't know if I mentioned it before, but I would love

to offer both of you a complimentary session. And also for your viewers, the first three who take me up on this offer could get a complimentary session as well to see if they respond to this kind of treatment. Thank you so much. That is such a great offer for us and our listeners. What does the session look like with you? Like, could you just kind of go through what it would look like for our listeners? Yes. Depending on whatever issue you want to work out, whether it's physical, emotional, or mental, we just basically, I'll show you how I do the muscle testing via zoom. And then I basically ask your body, you know, so think about, or feel, feel the pain, get

in touch with the pain. And then I'm going to be doing muscle testing on myself to tap into your energy, which sounds totally crazy, but works. And then I'm just, I'm doing the same techniques that I was, that had been done to me, where I'm finding the emotion and I'm connecting that to it's full participation from you, but it's kind of like, okay, so I'll ask you about the emotion resentment. How do you feel about resentment? You know, as it pertains to something in your career, as something in your relationships or something about you based off of what I'm finding. So it's kind of like, is this about love? Is this about money? Is this about you? And then I find like an even earlier event that happened, whether it's like five years ago or when

you were like five years old. And then we look at like, what was an express then. And then we, so I'm tracing things back and forth to understand what got lodged in your body. And now it's acting out. Now you're getting triggered in the present because of something that wasn't processed before. Awesome. Yeah. It's a lot like using the distance Reiki.

And I wouldn't point that out because, you know, some people think, oh, that's bullshit. Energy has no distance. And I just think because people can't see it, they just don't believe it. But how the frick do you think you watch television even? I mean, and that you're listening to us right now. You believe that and don't question it. Well, I mean, everything's like we walk around and we see each other. I see you guys, but like there there's so much, you guys have

invisible illnesses and no one can know what you're thinking, but everything that we're thinking is intangible. Our beliefs are intangible. We can't like grab onto them. So I think that we've, we've been indoctrinated into this medical society where unless it's like a pill you're taking or like, I mean, even physical therapy, I guess, or doing some exercises, but it's like a pill you're taking or like, I mean, even physical therapy, I guess, or doing some exercises, but it's like, I guess, surgery, like all of these things we can like grasp, but we can't grasp like these thoughts in our head. Right. Or even trust. We trust that those things are going to work. We don't know these people. We don't know what the hell's in this medication, but we trust it when we don't even trust ourselves.

It's just amazing to me. Serena, what made you decide to put this down in paper and share your story and put this book together? What, what inspired you to do that? Well, I always wanted to write a book. I didn't know what it was going to be about, but I remember taking this public speaking course a few years ago and the facilitator, Michael Port was like, why are you all playing small? Like you have these amazing stories to tell and you're keeping them to yourselves and you're not being of service to people. And I was like, that's it. Like basically

I had been very concerned about how my family was going to react because like, you just don't talk about stuff in families where you don't express your emotions. But I was like, you know, I have a very unique, distinct experience given that I basically created arthritis for myself. And I, and then what I do for my clients is to help them understand how their emotions got trapped in their bodies. So I wanted to write something that was more of like stories about my life stories about clients I've helped rather than a, like a seven step. If you do this, this, and this, you'll get out of pain because I feel like people remember stories and they can be like, Oh, I remember when you like, you know, had all this back pain and you

realize that, you know, it was something to do with your family. So I felt like I'm just going to add to the books out there, but have it be a slightly different angle and hopefully it'll help people along the way. I think you're so right. I love that. I think stories and something very vulnerable and raw really reaches people that they'll remember that and they can find pieces to relate to. So curious, how did your family react to it? I didn't tell them basically. I was hoping that they never would find out. My dad passed six years ago, so he wasn't in the picture, but, and I still don't know how my mom found out, but like two weeks after it launched, I got this email and the subject heading was like your book. And I was like, Oh no. And she, she was a little passive aggressive, but she was, you know, I thought I honestly, I talked to three attorneys because I thought I was going to have my brother suing me for like

defamation or something. I mean, he and I don't talk anymore, but I have a feeling that my, my sister-in-law maybe was like seeing things on my Instagram. She pretends she doesn't follow me, told my mom and my mom, she was much more understanding than I thought she would be. And I have not been disowned. So that's all good. Gosh, you sound like you have my family, um, makeup. My dad passed five and a half years ago. My mom, um, would probably not know that I was writing a book if I did. And my little brother lives in a much bigger house. It is much more successful.

But he thinks Reiki is done with a rake. So I'm good. I've come to terms with that too. I'm good. I've come to terms with that too. I'm good. Serena, Shannon and I tend to always go back to two things that we believe are the core of everything, of everything. And that is awareness and self-love. How much did those two things play into you turning your pain into your purpose? Well, with awareness, I believe you can't really do anything unless you have awareness. You

don't know what to change. You don't know what to work on unless that comes up and you're like, oh, that's what I need to work on. So I think awareness is huge. And I think that self-love, I mean, I used to be so incredibly hard on myself and critical and thought it was a way to like, keep driving me towards my goals. But instead it was just, it was really limited me in what I could do with other people, even friendships or relationships. And so I felt like, I think self-love is key. Like you can't, and I would hate it. I hated it when people were like, you have to love yourself first. And I'd be like, no, I don't. But I really believe that, you know, it's, you can't whip yourself

every day and hope that you feel okay. Like how you treat yourself does like what you say to yourself. Like you look in the mirror and you're like, Oh, I look that today. Or like, I'm having a bad face day. Like your body listens to everything you say. And then, so if you feel bad, well, then it could be things that you're telling yourself. If you tell yourself nice things, like I would never say things to my, to my friends or my dog, the way that sometimes I could speak to myself. So I think self-love is a huge piece. Yeah. Agreed. That's where it's at. And we are always thinking about what we put in our body as in just the physical food, which is also very important, obviously,

because you said that that diet changed, you know, a lot, it was a game changer with your energy, but we don't think about the words that we're allowing to come in from outside of us, you know, that we listen to and that we put up with the lies and stories that we tell ourselves that are not true. Yeah. Same. And not just the body. And if you think about someone who said something to you that felt bad, like you felt you decided whatever he or she said, like you felt bad about yourself. Well, somehow it's okay. If you say the same things to yourself, because I'm immune to it, but it still hurts. It does. You know, I mentioned at the beginning, how much I loved your videos. I really did. They're, they're wonderful. You, you did a great job on them. So you have a YouTube,

you have a great informative website with all the things that you do and many great suggestions just right there on your website. Is that the best place to find you to also order your book? Yes. Order my book on Amazon. That's the main place it's being sold right now. My website, if you're interested in knowing more about me or seeing how we would work together, there is an application process on my website, or you can follow me on Instagram and send me a direct message. Those are the most easy places to find me. And now it's time for break that shit down? I would say to just not be afraid to be yourself because there's so many, there's so much noise out there to be like other people or to adopt what they say. And being you

is the biggest gift you can give other people. Thank you so much for being you. So that way you're able to help so many people. Thank you for having me on. I really appreciate the opportunity. Thank you. Hey, did you know that Sense of Soul now has a Patreon where you can get exclusive episodes, mini series that Mandy and I have been working on for a long time that we can't wait to share with you. Monthly readings, Sense of Soul sacred circles, workshops, behind the scene clips, and much more. Hop on Sense of Soul Patreon right now and sign up. Thanks for being with us today. We hope you will come back next week.

If you like what you hear, don't forget to rate, like, and subscribe. Thank you. We rise to lift you up. Thanks for listening.