The Therapy Edit - One Thing with Dr Michelle Tolfrey on finding joy when the plan doesn't go to plan

Episode Date: June 14, 2024

In this guest episode of The Therapy Edit, Anna chats to Clinical Psychologist Dr Michelle Tolfrey about her One Thing: finding joy when the plan doesn't go to plan.Michelle is a Clinical Psychologist with over twenty years of experience. She has a particular interest in reproductive trauma, loss, and grief.Michelle’s own losses on her path to parenthood have significantly shaped her work as a psychologist, and she proudly integrates her professional expertise with that of her expertise by lived experience.Michelle’s newsletter, From the Other Chair, provides a wealth of information on navigating life after loss and finding joy in living the life you didn’t expect or plan. Alongside her private therapy practice, Michelle also runs The Loss Collective. Here you can find high quality and easily accessible information and guidance about navigating life after pregnancy and baby loss.We hope this episode offers comfort to those of you navigating a life that isn't quite as you'd always imagined it would be.

Hello and welcome to The Therapy Edit with me, psychotherapist, mum of three and author Anna Martha. Every Friday, I invite one guest to tell me the one thing they would most like to share with mums everywhere. So join with me as we hear this dose of wisdom. I hope you enjoy it. Hello, everyone. Welcome to today's guest episode of The Therapy Edit. I have with me today, Michelle. She's on Instagram as from the other chair with underscores in the middle. And she is a clinical psychologist and she's got over 20 years of experience.

Now, Michelle's got a particular interest in reproductive trauma, loss and grief. And this has, I guess, been spurred on by her own losses on her path to parenthood. And those losses have significantly shaped her work as a psychologist. And she proudly integrates her professional. expertise with that of her expertise of her lived experience. And this is so evident on her social media. And I think she shares so openly, but there's that amazing thing of kind of underpinning it with her psychological insights as well. So you don't just feel like you're not alone. You also are given that further amazing insight into maybe a different way of seeing it or just challenging or validating an emotion in a way that perhaps you hadn't been able to do

so before. Now, Michelle has got a newsletter. It's called From the Other Chair. And this newsletter provides a wealth of information on navigating life after loss and finding joy in living the life that you didn't expect or plan. And whether you might be listening to this thinking, actually I haven't experienced loss in this way. But actually, Michelle, just that encouragement to feel grief at different kinds of losses that you might have experienced in life, and I'm sure she'll talk about that, and how you might find joy in living a life that you didn't, that hasn't worked out as you might have expected it to. Alongside her private therapy practice, Michelle also runs the loss collective.

Now, here you can find high quality and easily accessible information and guidance about navigating life after pregnancy and baby loss. And I know a few friends of mine that have just found such solace in finding Michelle's account on Instagram at a time that has been incredibly painful, but just seeing their experiences reflected, just that powerful thing really of reminding us that we're not alone. So welcome, Michelle. Thank you for all that you so generously share of your own experience and your psychological knowledge too. Oh, thank you. you so much. It's so nice to be here and thank you for inviting me on. No, I'm looking forward to chatting with you. So, well, how are you doing to start off with? I'm good. I was just

thinking, just looking at us both on the screen, it looks like I'm dressed for like the middle of winter and it's really gloomy. It was so nice yesterday. I felt like I was here and I had this energy and now it's really like soggy where I am at the moment. So it's kind of it's interesting how the seasons kind of impact your energy health falls. So true. And also just, you know, because we're going to be talking about loss and grief and stuff today and how those seasons and changes in things like the weather and the seasons have an impact on how we feel emotionally.

Doesn't that just mirror, that mirrors life and it mirrors the pain of life that there are going to be dark times, but the light does still come back. And I know that sounds maybe a bit cliched and a bit trite, but I don't know, I do find that really helpful to remember that. Yeah, and it does come. It does come. So, yeah, the seasons, eh? So I would love to ask you, what is the one thing, Michelle, with all your knowledge and experience, both in life and in the therapy room, what is the one thing that you would love to share with people today? It's such a nice question to be asked, and I had a good, long think about what is the thing that I would like to share. And the thing that I've been thinking about a lot more recently,

I think from a personal perspective and also I feel like it's something, a theme that comes up again and again with the clients I work with, is this kind of finding joy, even finding contentment, if joy feels like that's a little bit too far away in the life that we have when this life isn't how we expected it to be. And I think this is something that pretty much all of us can apply to our lives because, you know, I think this is something that pretty much all of us can apply to our lives. because we may realize it or not, but often we have these stories in our mind of how we think life is going to go. And that might be because that's what we think society expects of us, or maybe it is something that we have this real desire that we want, for example, our family to look a certain way,

to have however many children with this age gap, to be married, for example. You know, it could be anything, could be in a certain job. And when that doesn't go to plan, how painful that can be, that sort of, and I think about this a lot with the clients I work with in terms of their reproductive journey, that sort of hopes and plans, and not realizing that there was maybe a hope or a plan until it doesn't go to plan. And having to acknowledge that and grieve that in order to be able to try and find hope and contentment and joy. And going back to

what we were just talking about, kind of finding light in those moments. And, you know, actually just how important it is that we allow space for all those losses to be recognised and to be seen and to be heard and to be validated is, I think, just one of these kind of core basic human needs that we have. Yeah. It's so true the importance of making space for these feelings. I've got a book and I've mentioned it a few times on this podcast and I still haven't flipping read the book. And it's called, this wasn't what I expected. And I bought it because I just loved the title because it was just so affirming to permission giving

to actually be able to say, no, this isn't what I expected. And it's not that I'm not grateful for the good things. It's not that I'm not able to see the privileges, but actually this is different to how I imagined it. And there is a grief in that. And yeah, I just wonder what that might look like to make space for that recognition, that grief? Because I think in our culture, it's so

encouraged that we don't have to feel discomfort. We don't have to feel, we can get everything tomorrow. We can, everything is about, you know, you only love, you only live once, just if you don't want to feel something, just change it, just escape it, scroll on your phone, have a glass of wine, anything just to, it's like we're almost encouraged to kind of sidestep that feeling. But for someone listening thinking, oh yeah, actually, if I'm honest with myself, I do have grief that I've not looked at. What does it look like for me to make space for that? How do we go there? I mean, that's it. How do you go there? Particularly when I think often we're not very good just at talking about those things or holding space for other people to talk about those things

because we have this innate urge to want to make it better for people to, you know, either we want to make it better for ourselves or to escape those feelings. But, you know, so often, and we're, you know, I'm sure we can all relate to this, that urge to sort of say or do something to make it better for that other person. And sometimes that might come out as something like, oh, but at least you've got this or think about this or you've got this to look forward to and how that is true and the other is true as well. It's not by the raw. But I think, you know, as you were saying there is just this this drive within us, this urge within us to escape that and to not feel that because it is painful. And we might feel that if we go there, the dark clouds

descend and we're not going to find the light again. But sometimes I think that can be the route to finding the light is going through that is to acknowledge that, yeah, this is hard or that was hard. And yeah, look what I've learned from that as well. Yeah. And I guess the more that we do this in the little things in life, we learn to trust that those feelings, you know, they reach their peak and it feels almost inconceivable that anything might ever feel okay again. But as you let yourself process that, maybe through talking or crying or whatever it might be, that you start recognizing that those feelings kind of soften and change shape and sit inside of you in a different way. Definitely. It's interesting as well. When you were talking, it's just making me think about how, I suppose how we talk to our children now is different to how, I guess, when we were growing up, how people would talk to children and how now we are, we know how important it is to validate those feelings, even if it is seemingly a small thing that the child's upset about, we'll validate that and say that feels really hard or you didn't want that to happen or you didn't want to, yeah, this to go this way. and we're validating we're teaching them that that's okay how do we do that to ourselves as adults as yeah this might look like or feel like a small thing potentially to

someone else but it's a big thing to you and that's what matters so I think it's also about how do we self-validate how do we how do we cultivate compassion for ourselves and also each other so that we can hold space for all of all the feelings all the feels. And how can we do that? So say someone's listening to this and they've just felt this kind of big ball of sadness or that sense of, you know, this isn't fair. And it's so easy and often encouraged to think, well, actually, you know, look at so-and-so, they've had it harder than me. So therefore I should be, I should be grateful or I should be dealing with this better. How can you maybe encourage that person to validate that?

I feel like we almost need to have this internal alarm or claxon if we hear any thoughts that are saying should. Yeah. I should or I shouldn't. So these kind of really blanket, quite extreme dichotomous statements and recognizing that, oh, that's really interesting that that's where my mind is going. I wonder what that's about. And that just being maybe a bit of a warning signal, that's often when we're self-invalidating is when we're saying we should or shouldn't

feel a certain way. And I think ultimately the sort of first step is being curious, is kind of stopping and giving space to think. And it doesn't have to be, it doesn't have to be the big stuff. Like, you know, I'm not saying you definitely have to go to therapy to unpack all of this. It can be those little micro moments of just being curious about what is that feeling that's coming up. Maybe I should write that down. Maybe I should talk about that with someone that I trust who I feel like is able to kind of hold that space for me. But, you know, I suppose the first, it's almost like the first step is recognizing it before you can do anything about it is noticing this doesn't feel, this doesn't feel great,

I wonder what that's about. Yeah. And often it doesn't, these feelings aren't great, are they? They're painful and messy and maybe traumatic and you can feel. helpless and hopeless within them. But I'd love to hear maybe some advice for the friends of those who are really in the thick of it. And what might you encourage, you know, I get a lot of people saying, what can I do to help? What can I say? And at the end of the day, we probably can't really say anything that will help help

because we can't undo what's happened or we can't fast forward. But what, yeah, what would you say to the friend or the family member? I think sometimes we can get caught into, caught in this trap of I need to do something. And actually, again, that's something to be just mindful of is that I've got this urge to do something. But actually one of the most powerful things I can do is to be with. Because I think it's sometimes it's less about, well, there's a menu of things to do and a list of things I should or shouldn't say. But it's more about how can I, how would. I like this person to feel after an interaction with me. I want them to feel safe. I want them to feel

that I, you know, I'm a trustworthy person and space that they can bring things to. And sometimes that might be just checking in, sitting alongside someone. Often it's saying things like, you know, I don't know what to say. I want to say something. But what I really would value is if I get it wrong, like tell me. Tell me if I get it. it wrong so then I can do something different and just being able to sit alongside some of the really yeah painful dark feelings that can come up when life is not good um rather than yes or feeling like there's if I tick off these things and do these things and they're going to feel better it's a process it is and I guess as we choose to validate those emotions that come

up with us and recognize the end that you can feel in pain and you can be grateful. You know, you can be grateful for what is whilst also grieving what isn't. And as we do that, we can then better find it less hard to sit with the friend that is experiencing those feelings too. If we want to shut them down in ourselves, it's going to feel really unfamiliar and uncomfortable, isn't it? It is. Yeah, absolutely.

Absolutely. And sometimes being with someone else who's going through a difficult time means we have to confront stuff within ourselves. That's really hard. And sometimes we can't do that. And that, you know, we're all humans. We can't always be there and show up for people in the way that they need because we don't have that. But if we can be honest about that with ourselves and each other, that's better than just ignoring the reality. I guess this is where your community and your newsletter comes. in where people can come and feel really understood in the nuances of their situation because we won't always be understood by everyone. As you're speaking, I'm reflecting on the biggest experience of loss that we had. We lost my sister to cancer when I was 10. And I'm just thinking about the different ways that people behaved around us. And I think it was made slightly easier by finding a community through a charity actually that had also experienced the same losses. So you have your pocket of people.

Exactly. You get it. Exactly. There is such power in community and seeing your story reflected in other people. I think, and I don't know whether you experienced this, but certainly I found it really helpful to see people further long in their journey

because it was almost like, I can't believe or even hope that this is going to feel better. But if I can look at someone else see that it's possible, but you can hold the burden of that hope for me because it's too heavy for me to hold right now. It's so helpful. And it's really nice to be in that position now to be that person for other people and also still look to other people who are further down the line as well. Sort of, you know, your elders, they might not even be older, but, you know,

those wise elders within your community who are like, yeah, they're helping me to see that there is a way forward. And, you know, in the community, again, because the word nuance is so important, isn't it? That how do we hold space for the similarities in our journeys and also the difference that we're not always going to feel exactly the same way about the same thing? And I think, I'd probably said this many times already in the last 10 minutes,

but that holding space for all of those things is one of the biggest gifts that we can give ourselves and other people. So that's it really, isn't it? That's the kind of the little nugget, the golden nugget, is allow yourself to be with yourself, how you are feeling and in doing so and accepting that that is how you feel at that time. You're not going to feel like that forever, although it may well feel like that, but that's valid in itself. And also holding space for other people, not feeling like you have to get the right, do the right thing, say the right thing, Because actually, if you're so stifled by that, you might do and say nothing.

So just taking the pressure off yourself by saying to a friend, I want to say the right thing and I'm worried that I won't, but I'm here and I'm with you. And it's painful and I'm hurting for you, but I'm here. And that's, you know, people don't forget how you made them feel. If you made them feel, they might forget everything that you said or what happened on that day, but they might remember that in that day I felt okay or I felt that there was a bit of hope and you know ultimately that's that's such a gift that we can give people yeah yeah so looking for those lighthouse people as well those people that may still be in the thick of it but

perhaps they've journeyed through a few more of those seasons to realize that actually there is some light that starts breaking in and my mom often explains it as she said it's like she had these spiky stones that have you know over the years they've they've kind of like tumbled and the sharp corners have kind of been, you know, ground down and they're pebbles, they're still there, but they just, they're not as spiky anymore. And I just, I shared that with a friend who'd lost a baby and she just found that really hopeful. So it's, it's sharing your story with people, but also asking people maybe to share theirs or go where people are sharing their story. And I guess that's what the lost collective is about as well. It is. But it's funny, I've got an analogy

that I use, which is about sea glass with grief, that, you know, glass, at the beginning, glass is sharp, it's dangerous, it's really, I mean, it can cut you really badly and hurt you deeply. But over time, sea glass, when you get a piece, it's so smooth, it's so worn, but it's still there. And if you smashed it, it would still be able to cut you. And that's how I feel grief is. It's that, you know, weather's and it changes shape and it changes form, but it's still there, and sometimes it can really still hurt. And it doesn't go away. I think that's the thing. How do we learn to live? And I think this is the thing about finding the joy. It's not that joy is a destination and you get there and that's, I'm cool, I'm cool with everything that happened. I've accepted it all.

It's the fact that that coexists alongside the dark. Yeah. And sometimes I wonder whether the light is even brighter when it's so next to the dark, but they have to coexist and we sort of weave our way in an hour. of them all the time depending on maybe what season of life we're in or season of our grief that we're in. And that's another beautiful thing about choosing to validate how you feel at that time because sometimes I think there can be moments of joy after loss and then a sudden kind of pouncing on that of I shouldn't feel happy. I shouldn't be when actually in that moment

that's where you're at. And who knows what the next moment holds. But if there's joy there, grab it it's not it's not yeah it's not a statement of invalid grief or anything like that it's just in fact it's actually a really healthy part of grieving is the the model and strobe and shoots model which is about moving between those two spaces is is the grieving itself that you have to we need respite from the painful feelings so we will distract ourselves we will have moments where we laugh, we'll have moments where we literally need to sort of, you know, really cut off. But we stay in neither of those forever. We will move between them and that, that is the grief. That is the grief work. It's moving between them. That's so helpful.

So helpful for people that are going through it and people that are supporting others. So thank you so much for your really warm wisdom, Michelle, and all the resources that you put out there that will just be such a relief. like a little oasis for people to find when they are just yeah in in those really painful places just trying to process what what has happened and how things are maybe not as they expected just really validating and giving words where people might find them hard to find so thank you so much for everything i would love to ask you a quick-fire question um what is oh what Yeah, what's something that makes you feel good that you do?

What makes me feel good? There's quite a few things at the moment. I'm just sort of trying to tap into those kind of small things. Because I could say, obviously, there's obviously all the big things around my family, my daughter, all those things bring me like so much joy. It's almost overwhelming at times. But things that I'm really trying to cultivate at the moment are creativity.

That is something that is very important. to me and does bring me a lot of joy. I've recently just got a guitar. I've never played before. I love it. And I'm just messing around with like, you know, on YouTube and stuff. But that kind of being a complete beginner at something, lots of mixed feelings, lots of frustration and, you know, irritation that I can't just do it. I'm sort of finding joy in there being a beginner and starting and enjoying that process of learning something new. And gosh, you know, when you can hit a good note. Oh, my goodness. It's so joyful. Oh, that's so great. I think we often, you know, say motherhood that identity is so challenged and people want to

kind of refine themselves. But actually, sometimes it's in trying the new things that you've never done before. I've been playing squash and I love it and I've never played at any kind of teams or anything before. And it's just nice if you just take that pressure off to be someone that you were at a time when actually life was totally different. You hadn't experienced half the things that you have now. So I absolutely love that you're playing the guitar. Thank you for sharing. Don't expect me to be doing any concerts anytime soon. That's for sure. I just love it. I think it will probably inspire some people to have a think what they might like to try. But thank you so much for your kind and affirming words, Michelle.

Thank you so much for having me. I am so excited to announce that my brand new book, The Uncomfortable Truth, Change Your Life by Taming Ten of Your Mind's Greatest Fears, is available for pre-order now and is out on the 8th of August. And in this book, we tackle some of life's big, unavoidable, uncomfortable truths, such as some people don't like me. I am going to fail. Life isn't fair.

bad things will happen. And in this book, we tackle these big, uncomfortable trees that rob us have so much headspace and energy as we try and control and avoid them. And as we move into a place of radical acceptance of these truths, you will find yourself living more freely and intentionally with more presence and confidence than ever before. So come on this journey with me and pre-order now at Wardstones and Amazon. We can celebrate together. Thank you.