How Do You Deal with Perpetual Trauma? - S04E04

On this week’s show Kristin and I are talking about the recent mass shooting in the US, how we are all living in a state of perpetual trauma, how it affects our lives, and some things we can do to deal with the ongoing pain in our lives.

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DISCALIMER:
The views expressed on the Hey Let Me Ask You Something Podcast are solely the opinions of your hosts Kristin Wood and Ralph Andracchio and are based on their years of practical and clinical experience. These opinions do not constitute any kind of advice, diagnosis, or treatment of any mental, physical, or emotional issues. If you are having an emergency or any serious ongoing situations please contact your local hospital or a trusted professional.

Transcript

The Hey Let Me Ask You Something Podcast
Season 04
Episode 04
How Do You Deal with Perpetual Trauma?

[MUSIC INTRO PLAYS]

Ralph Andracchio  
Time to get curious! It's the Hey Let Me Ask You Something podcast. The show dedicated to inspiring more people to ask more questions and have more interesting conversations. On this week's show, Kristin and I are talking about the recent mass shooting in the US, how we're all living in a state of perpetual trauma, how it affects our lives and some things we can do to deal with the ongoing pain that we all share. 

Ralph Andracchio  
I think sometimes we think of trauma as this very finite event. This this traumatic event happened and now we're spending time dealing with it. I think in this country specifically, we don't get a chance to do that.

Kristin Wood  
You know, they say the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. But tweak it and say definition of insanity can also be not doing anything over and over again. 

Ralph Andracchio  
There is no good news anymore. You wake up and it's like, what got shot up today who died today what what law has been repealed today?

Kristin Wood  
People have been saying to me just in the elevator and stuff like Why is everyone so angry? Why are people are so angry lately. 

Ralph Andracchio  
The best way for you to help us inspire more conversations and easily find more of our great episodes is to hit that subscribe button and share the show with your friends. And check us out on YouTube if you want to see us as well as hear us. And remember we love that you're listening but the show is for entertainment and we are not your therapist or your coach. We are not providing professional advice either from us or our guests. Give the full disclaimer in the show notes a once over for more info on that. Alright my friends, let's start this conversation.

Ralph Andracchio  
We're starting. Fine, we started okay are you happy? I gave you I gave you the On Air signal 

Kristin Wood  
And 3-2-1

Ralph Andracchio  
3-2-1 contract.

Kristin Wood  
What do they really say in real life?

Ralph Andracchio  
They do. They give you a countdown but they don't say two or one because the audio could pick it up. 

Kristin Wood  
What do they say? 

Ralph Andracchio  
So they say three and then they go [MIMES TWO AND ONE WITH HIS HAND]. Yeah. 

Kristin Wood  
Be vewy vewy quiet. 

Ralph Andracchio  
Well, not us because we have to be talking.

Kristin Wood  
I know. I know. Are you sure you like your drink?

Ralph Andracchio  
I love it. I love it. We're... today's drink is seltzer Clink. Seltzer with a whole I have a whole half a lemon in mine.

Kristin Wood  
A whole freshly squeezed half of lemon. Let me tell you it's a delicious summer refreshment. Well he asked to tell me likes it cuz I keep asking him every 5 minutes.

Ralph Andracchio  
I am enjoying it immensely. So, hot tip. If you're looking for a nice refreshing summer drink, it's just Seltzer and some lemon. 

Kristin Wood  
Yeah, you got to do the fresh lemon. It does not taste the same if you put lemon juice in it and you got to do like a half of a large lemon for the real effect.

Ralph Andracchio  
I am a fan of we were just talking about this. I'm a fan of cucumber in drinks. I think it adds a nice refreshing note to it. Over the weekend I went to a christening had some lemonade with mint and cucumber in it. And it was freakin delicious. It was so refreshing and delicious. I wanted to steal the whole jar. 

Kristin Wood  
And it was hot this weekend 

Ralph Andracchio  
And it was 90 degrees and it was great. It was a welcome. Welcome respite from

Kristin Wood  
It's my weather. I don't like this weather now in the 60s. Nope. cold to me. 

Ralph Andracchio  
Yeah, no, I love the summer. I'm a summer baby.

Kristin Wood  
Yeah, but yeah, I was of course in the pool

Ralph Andracchio  
Is because I was born in December that I love the summer so much?

Kristin Wood  
I don't know in your mom's stomach it's probably always warm. 

Ralph Andracchio  
True

Kristin Wood  
But then you came out you're like what the hell?

Ralph Andracchio  
What the heck is this? Right? Also excuse me if my burps stink but I...

Kristin Wood  
I have not smelled a stink on you once.

Ralph Andracchio  
Thank you know we made a delicious lunch of stuffed shells and homemade meatballs and garlic bread and 

Kristin Wood  
I'd be asleep though.

Ralph Andracchio  
I did go to sleep for a little while before I came over, but it is it's definitely in there working its way through the pipes. So if I apologize in advance everybody watching and or listening you're safe. Kristin is in the blast zone.

Kristin Wood  
But I have a very strong sense of smell as I've said, I have not smelled you at all and hopefully you haven't smelled me.

Ralph Andracchio  
Okay good. Thank you. I'm very, I'm very no I'm very self conscious about how I smell so

Kristin Wood  
Me too. but I bathe I think I even put a little perfume on earlier today so

Ralph Andracchio  
For me for moi? What?

Ralph Andracchio  
Stop it. Stop it. Boy, what are we going to get into today? What kind of trouble are we going to get into today?

Kristin Wood  
I don't know but I some some trouble's fun.

Ralph Andracchio  
Some trouble is fun. It is a it is a dark angry time here in America. If you're if you're watching the news, or you just like scroll through your Twitter feed, you're gonna know we just had another school shooting. 19 Little children, elementary, two to fourth grade and two teachers and it is I mean I don't even know what to say about it anymore because it's it is it is we exist in this perpetual state of trauma in this country. I mean, I know we've talked about it before on the show, in relation to the pandemic and quarantine about trauma and like dealing with different aspects of it, but I think there is in reference to this specific topic of gun violence, I think and mass shootings I think the other ending and the onion. I don't know if anybody else knows what the onion ends is satirical newspaper, but the onion has this great headline that they trot out every time this happens and it's like there's no way it's I'm paraphrasing but the the the headline is there. There's no way to avoid and avoid this says the only country in the world where this keeps happening. And then their front page today is just that article over and over again. Changing the location of the article for every mass shooting we've had in the country so far just in 2022.

Kristin Wood  
He said how many this morning in total and it was something ridiculous. And how many in this year how many total? I was gonna say something Yeah, this is really been, bad today.

Ralph Andracchio  
Your brains going... bless you.

Kristin Wood  
Everything's all jacked up. All right.

Ralph Andracchio  
Yeah. So we could I mean, we could talk about the politics of it. But there's other people who, I think could could more eloquently put that into words that we could I think what we could do with our, with our expertise is and platform is talking about the trauma aspect of it. And how how do you how do you deal with perpetual trauma? I think is the word for today or the question of the day because I think sometimes we think of trauma as this very finite event. This this traumatic event happened, and now we're spending time dealing with it and processing it and kind of getting over it or you know, helping moving through it. But I think in this country specifically. We don't get a chance to do that because there is no finite trauma. There is ongoing, systemic trauma. And you know, it could be racial, you know, political it could be you know, human sexuality. It could be gun violence, it could, you know, throw a dartboard throw a dart at the board, and whatever you whatever topic you hit is something that America is perpetually in trauma about. So I thought today would be nice to kind of walk through what perpetual trauma is and how you know how you can deal with it because usually the first thing people say about trauma is just remove yourself from the situation is is a great way to deal with trauma, make it finite is to say remove yourself from that situation. We can't really do that

Kristin Wood  
And that doesn't make trauma go away.

Ralph Andracchio  
It doesn't make it go away. But it can remove you from the cause of it being triggered and being triggered. So for people who cannot remove themselves from the perpetual trauma, like I don't know what I had a couple of things.

Kristin Wood  
Well, one thing that came to mind for me, which is just like a little quick story, is I remember when I worked in New York, and I was weighed much younger and had been pretty darn sheltered. And I worked in Harlem in New York City. And, you know, these kids would get into fights a lot, you know, a lot of fights on the street in the school and stuff like that. And I remember how the kids you know, when I'd be on an outing with them, or whatever, and they'd see another kid, a kid beating up another kid and they would laugh. And I was like, What the hell like I'm over here. I'm, and I'm disturbed, and I couldn't understand why these kids thought it was funny. And what I learned then and now like I see clearer and clearer as I get older, and more and more happens is like they were desensitized. And that was how they coped. You know, it was like they were so used to it, that it just it didn't have that. Oh my god, this is happening. Stop it. effect. It had like a laughing effect. It was almost just like, like, no longer really affected about the violence. But but it being humorous. Again, I do think it was also a coping strategy that they used subconsciously that they didn't realize the other thing I was thinking was, you know, they say the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. And I think witht this is the sort of same thing, but I would, I would like... I was gonna say twerk it?

Ralph Andracchio  
You can twerk it if you want.

Kristin Wood  
but tweak it and say definite definition of insanity could also be not not doing anything over and over again and expecting a different result, which is where we are. And that interview with the NBA coach really sticks in my brain. Oh, yeah, I want to seen it or he's basically in tears and he's just had it with the fact that everyone just with the shrines with the moments of silence and all that crap and just like we're not getting anywhere. And what I was saying to Ralph is a lot of what people are experiencing that are watching this right, is called vicarious trauma, which is when you are traumatized by someone else's trauma, I guess you can say so somebody else has been traumatized, and you're seeing the effects on them, and it actually can traumatize you. So I think that's a lot of what it is. So I won't say That's all of it. But I think that that's what's happening too. And I also think people get stuck with thinking about this today. What can we do? The politicians and lawmakers aren't doing a thing, in my opinion. But what can we do and I think there's a powerlessness about it, and a helplessness about it. Yeah, we can get involved politically. Yeah, we can fight the NRA if we want or whatever the case may be. But people have been doing that. I think and it's not gotten us anywhere big.

Ralph Andracchio  
I have a theory. 

Kristin Wood  
Yes, please share 

Ralph Andracchio  
and i i I shared a little bit of it. When we were all talking about Roe v Wade. Which guys still, that's another fun freakin trauma. That's okay. That part of another trauma that we're all going through. I think and don't correct me because I'm not wrong. I think I'm right about this, I think the right wing in this country in America has a bunch has fetishized different aspects of humanity, sexuality, morality to a point where they need to see they need to see it around them all the time. And enact laws where it's a country full of these fetishized aspects of life to prove their superiority in some way and let me let me define let me break it down a little bit further. So you know, we're talking about in the case of abortion rights, which is healthcare rights for women. The right wing says that life starts at conception now. So soon as soon as the eggs fertilized it's you know, it's a living, breathing human being. They only care about that living, breathing human being until it's born. Once that baby is born, they don't care about it anymore, as evidenced by all the school shootings that we've done nothing about. They've...

Kristin Wood  
And foster care and done all the things right or being born into these different situations that nobody's doing anything.

Ralph Andracchio  
Right. They fetishize women being pregnant. They, they don't care how she got pregnant, but if she's pregnant, she needs to stay pregnant. We want to see her pregnant for nine months. And I think they fetishize this aspect of like the pregnant woman that they meet because that's the only way I can think about it. That makes sense. Once the baby's born they have no use for it anymore because it served its purpose for that nine months of like, making this woman pregnant, you know, and it's a power it's a power thing. And then again, with gun rights, it's like, no, we need we need to have guns around because they make us feel a certain way and it's like they you know, screw kids and screw anybody, you know, screw all these maps. It's mental illness. You know, it's not the guns we need guns, guns, gun guns, pregnant women and Bibles is what we like. It just seems like this very, very fetishized version of what what life is, you know. Am I making sense?

Kristin Wood  
I understand.

Ralph Andracchio  
So. I don't know how to. I don't know what a counteractive measure would be to that because you're not dealing with people who are thinking logically because if you follow their logic of every life is precious life begins at conception. All those babies have heartbeats. We know who else had heart beats, those 19 kids, and then that school that just got murdered yesterday slaughtered, they had heartbeats.

Kristin Wood  
And the 1000s and 1000s of children in the foster care system because their parents weren't able to care for them or had a drug or mental health problem that wasn't treated.

Ralph Andracchio  
right? All those all those kids have heartbeats and you don't care about them one iota. You all voted against getting baby formula into the country, you vote against more money for same social safety net issue programs. You vote against gun reform, you vote against everything that could help people in some way so you're not pro life. Here's something else that I don't know what it is. And I don't know how to counteract that. And that that in and of itself creates the perpetual trauma because we have a whole half of the I don't even know if it's half I don't think it's half we honest. I think it's a 20% 30% of the country that just screams the loudest and has this really fetishized idea of what life should be that we're fighting against that don't share our version of reality. So you can't, you know, any good conversation, both sides have to come to the table and at least agree on a shared reality. And that's not happening and that's why conversations aren't happening. And that's why laws aren't getting passed because you're dealing with a group of people that just doesn't agree with, you know, the sky is blue and grass is green.

Kristin Wood  
I was thinking about the fact that I don't want to get too political around a gun thing. But I do think that, you know, we have all people that go that are police officers have to go through the Police Academy have to learn how to use guns have some type of evaluation done, I'm not sure what it is. But there they are observed. They go through the police academy, before they're given guns and out in the streets with guns, people in the armed forces. They go through bullets and boatloads of training. I think they have some type of mental health assessments. in there somewhere some point I'm not sure. And then they get big guns, you know, all types of I obviously don't know about guns, that's clear. But then anyone can go in a store and buy one and that's what blows my mind is like, oh, but the big NRA people are like I don't want to be bothered with extra steps. Well, I want to curse real bad at those people right now. Not allowed. And I'm sure you can imagine what I want to say. Because I feel like if you have to do a couple more steps if the owners of these places have to do a couple more steps so that we know that the people that are getting these guns are are fairly stable and human beings then and that could save all these children and people's lives. I don't know what the answer is. I understand that can't do a psych eval for every person getting a gun because that would be probably way too much for gun gun shops and stuff like that. I get that. But there's got to be something that they could do something especially when we're talking about weapons of mass destruction that I don't understand why any civilian needs I do not understand it. I do not know why they're sold. I have a real problem with it. Like what are you doing with that like you're a hunter great. You want to protect yourself? Great. Do you need like I don't know, a bazooka? I'm sure that will help as it gets, but we're not far off from but my point is, is like anyway, that's my rant on guns. I'm done. But I think that people don't often even realize from time to time so we've talked about this in the context of of code in this context anyway. I don't think people always see it as readily, especially vicarious trauma. We've talked about it a lot as far as how COVID is affected people. We've definitely touched on this problem more than once, and how we're all sort of still dealing with it and it's creeping in and popping up and showing up for people different ways at different times throughout the past few years. Also, around the whole social inequality, unrest and racial relations. I don't know what the word is. But, you know, there's that too. So, you know, it's very difficult. And what I said to Ralph, before we started I dunno if this is a good place to bring it up. And then I'm going to shush is you know, people have been saying to me just in the elevator and stuff like Why is everyone so angry? Why are people so so angry lately? I said to Ralph I'm like wow, this might tie in anyway,

Ralph Andracchio  
it does. I think I think it's a part of the trauma response to is people are just angry at everything because everything pisses me off. Now it's just there is no good news anymore. You you you wake up and it's like, what got shot up today who died today what what law has been repealed today that protected people's rights? What you know, you when you live in a in a country in a society that is it just doesn't make logical sense anymore. It's all about who, who can who can pay the most money to get their agenda through and you get angry at that. And I think that's where a lot of the anger comes from is living in perpetual trauma, be re traumatized by things. The what kind of trauma Did you say? I carry is trauma that we all feel watching stuff, it builds up. And people show it in different ways. Some people get super angry. Some people get depressed. Some people eat a lot. Some people don't eat at all. Some people drink too much. Some people do drugs, some people you know, we all have different responses to it, but I think we're all in the same boat of all of this stuff is happening all at once and I'm not quite sure how to process it.

Kristin Wood  
Yeah, I mean, it is it's a lot to process and people aren't necessarily like, like I said, aware consciously of how it's affecting them. You know, they may notice that they're eating too much drinking too much or angrier than usual. And maybe it's probably more than just what's happening in the world. It's probably a personal stressors in addition to everything else, you turn on. The TV, and then your choices to either some people get so engrossed in it to an unhealthy space where it really started to affect them. And then there's others which I'm guilty of it would just like tune it out, because I can't, I can't process I don't know what to do with it. I'm trying to take care of me and so too much of that affects me. And so then there's that and then that's not good either. So it's like what do we do? And that's what I was saying to to was like I think people feel powerless. What are you do? Absolutely. Like okay, vote great. There's lots of people doing more of that trying to get involved. Trying to get involved with gun rights and all kinds of things that are going on right now. Not just guns and violence. But we're still in the same position. What? We're still in the exact same position. And yeah, I don't know the answer.

Ralph Andracchio  
And the you know, the whole just vote just get out and vote. Yes, absolutely. Voting Yeah, vote every time, every election, they all matter. But even then, the landscape has been rigged and gerrymandered to the point of it, foolishness at this point. So sometimes even if you do go out and vote all the time, it doesn't pay kind of doesn't work, you know, because the other person the other, the other side is still gonna win because they've gerrymandered the maps so ridiculously that it's impossible for anybody else to win. So short of removing yourself from the situation which I've, you know, I think everybody would agree would be the best way to start is like, I'm going to remove myself from this we do it all the time. If there's an argument we don't like or we're in a meeting that we you know, we're getting frustrated. That's the that's one of the things I say to people don't be afraid to get up from your desk, take a walk, go outside, get some fresh air, you know, but if if your desk is the whole country, you can't really just, you know, walk, walk to Canada or walk to Mexico and get some fresh air. You know, what would what could we share with people that can't leave the area of the trauma as like a good first step to kind of dealing with just everything. And oh, I would say the first thing would be that's what it was. Tend to limit how much news slash social media you're getting in your life. I think that's number one. If you can't remove yourself, remove the news, the 24 hour news feed which I we could do a whole episode on how the 24 hour news cycle has exacerbated a lot of this stuff. Yeah, find the minute but that's a whole other show. Don't watch the news. I'm guilty of this. I have the news on when I first wake up because I'm I'm like, What is it's more it's for me it's like watching a train wreck. Like what is happening right now. Like what happened now? And Dan tells me all the time, can we watch HGTV or something like can you turn this off and I do and it helps with that I do scroll through Twitter or like I go on Facebook. I'm guilty of this too. But I think the first thing I would say is take a break from the news. Take a break from social media. Go outside ride a bike, get some fresh air it really does help kind of settle your emotional state.

Kristin Wood  
I mean, honestly, you touched on a lot of it and that's stuff I talk about with my clients a lot is and many have done this which is to limit or for some people if they just get off for a while more and more of the social stuff and the new stuff. Like if if you're comparing yourself to someone or you're feeling really bad or you wish you would do that, then that's a little bit different than the news part. But with the news and things like that I say we talked about how to limit it and what that looks like and then people play around with it like what makes sense and then doing a check in with how they're feeling. But what what you just said and what I say all day every day, which is the only thing that we can control is ourselves. And so the one thing we can do, which is not always easy is take care of ourselves. So it's riding a bike it's getting together with friends. It's watching silly TV. It's reading a book, it's exploring your hobbies and interests. It's seeing a therapist if you need to, it's exploring medication if you need to. It's figuring out what you need to do to feel okay, because that's literally all you can do. And I mean if this is serious trauma that is literally paralyzing you, then you do need professional help. If you don't feel it, it's gotten to that point and taking the steps to try to do things for yourself that take care of you that make you feel good is literally the only immediate thing that you can do. This stuff is big. It's terrible. It's obviously still a question mark on what the hell to do about it. I mean, we know but no one's listening their download, but as far as like the political structure and what's going on in this country, in the immediate, all you can control is you and all you and by taking care of you, you may you're in a better position to handle it. It doesn't mean it won't affect you. It doesn't mean you're going to be like oh this is great, because you're not but being able to figure out what are your limits being able to check in with yourself how am I feeling and that can also help you determine when the news needs to go off. You know is like my starting my day off every day in a really bad mood and the longer I go it gets better than maybe that hour and a half before work of the news on is starting you off on the wrong foot.

Ralph Andracchio  
And on the same thought pattern, thoughtline train of thought. As I get it I get it eventually... the thought train coming into town, train same train of thought of social media. You also control what shows up on your feed. The more you look at certain things and certain topics like the topics and certain creators, your feed starts to reflect that stuff. And I mean, you know, for me, like on Twitter I last week, I had this great feed because my my feed on Twitter was just filled with black excellence and I loved it. It was like all these people graduating and like a dot It's Doctor something now and it's no one's lawyer, this like, Esquire and I was like, look at all these fantastic people. Pretty faces graduating and I'm like, This is wonderful. And it made me feel good because it was like look at all these people living their dreams and like, helping people and it wasn't just that it was like funny memes and like, I follow this this thing on Twitter, this profile on Twitter called liminal spaces where it's just like pictures of really interesting places where nobody's asked and it's like, that's cool or like science stuff like weird science facts and like, I sometimes my Twitter feed is just wonderful because it's full of all this positive fun stuff and I have control over that. Because I like certain things or I follow certain things and then Twitter's like oh, he likes to look at this. Well, great!

Kristin Wood  
Puppies, puppies, puppies. 

Ralph Andracchio  
Puppies, puppies, puppies, and same thing with anything else like my TikTok feed is very much like creepy paranormal videos and then like funny cartoons, and then people making meatballs in a weird way. It's like, that's because that's the stuff I like that I respond to. So if you look at your feed, and you're like, it's super negative, and there's all these crazy people talking about all this, but you kind of had a hand in that so you can control the stuff that comes across your feed more than you think.

Kristin Wood  
And the people that you're associating. You know, in group chats and just day to day life, if you continue to surround yourself with people that are doing these things that doesn't necessarily matter what you're doing. Because it's just gonna erase a lot of it if you're caught if you're around people that are constantly talking about it, constantly negative, constantly upset about it, and that's also going to affect you, you know that so I'm not saying never talk to them again. But if someone's all caught up, maybe you take a beat and you kind of take a step back and look like give it a minute, give them some time. They may not be good for you. To be around. I've actually talked about this with a client of mine. It's just they're in their space and they're fired up and no one's going to change their mind and they want to be on negative train to wherever they let them be on it. That's their that's their prerogative but taking care of yourself, maybe at least temporarily limiting your time around that person.

Ralph Andracchio  
Yes, yes. Just like you can call not cultivate but there's another word curate. Just like you can curate your social media feed you can curate your friends feed to in real life. If you if you have people in your life who are negative constantly and you don't like to see their points of view, scroll past them and hang out with friends. Who do make you feel better. And yes, I am all for getting different points of view in your life and talking to different people with different points of view and having, you know, good deeper conversations about things. Yes, absolutely. More of that, please. But there's some times where you just need to take a break and focus on getting yourself on an even keel and talking to people who can support you and love you and you know, so yes to good, good, wholesome, solid conversations, but also yes to taking care of yourself first.

Kristin Wood  
Yeah. And I know I'm being repetitive, but really evaluating how this is affecting your life. You know, and maybe, especially if this stuff is triggering old trauma, like I don't mean old meaning and I mean trauma that you had outside of what's going on in this country. You know, then that back to become more serious and evaluating, again, I'm just giving We're both just getting hints, right and ideas. If these things are putting a dent in it, then I have to stress the people reach out because it's one of the things I've been concerned about through this whole pandemic and everything else going on. This but as I was specifically talking about around the pandemic is that somebody that already has trauma, somebody that already has depression or anxiety or something else, then these types of events really can set people off. It's like I'm having a hard enough time managing this right here in my own personal life, but being compounded by all these outside factors. If you can't do it alone, then, you know, reaching out for professional help. I just have to say that once again.

Ralph Andracchio  
Absolutely. And let's not forget we are still living through the trauma of a pandemic that has not ended 

Kristin Wood  
And now the monkey came in 

Ralph Andracchio  
and now monkey pox. If anybody was in doubt that the world is trying to get rid of us,

Kristin Wood  
I felt like saying what the you know what. I can't say I'm like, now the monkeys are against us. 

Ralph Andracchio  
New for summer 2022 Monkeypox. 

Kristin Wood  
I saw the funniest meme about it. It was like COVID, it was like Beetlejuice and like the clown from IT. It was really funny.

Ralph Andracchio  
Yeah, yeah, it's the end times and things are falling apart. Learn. I think everybody should learn how to grow vegetables in your backyard, because you're gonna be a hot commodity.

Kristin Wood  
It's like again you wake up and you turn the news on you're like, what now?

Ralph Andracchio  
What now? What Oh, monkeypox? Great

Kristin Wood  
What is it? Unicornpox? like what are we going to have next?

Ralph Andracchio  
I literally, honestly I did not have monkey pox on my bingo card for the end of the world.

Kristin Wood  
What is it next? Like I literally can't.

Ralph Andracchio  
I can't even with the monkey pox.

Kristin Wood  
I was like I was one of those people that's so desensitized at this point I'm like bring on some monkey pox now throw that in the mix. Why don't we all wear hazmat suits all day? Masks are out the window We're all wearing a suit.

Ralph Andracchio  
Oh no, it's fine. I think that's all we can do is digress at this point.

Kristin Wood  
We have to do a little laughing, and funny banter. 

Ralph Andracchio  
I was having a talk with somebody last night and the idea of comedy came up and why I do it. And I think that's one of the reasons is, it's very, it's very rare when when somebody has that gift where they can make other people laugh. And I think anybody who has that gift should be using a 150% right now because laugh comedy laughter is one of the one of the universal languages no matter who you are, what culture what language what country laughter laughter there is no there is no different language or you know, accent to laughter I think laughter is just laughter and it's something that immediately connects us and suits us and and is a great way to short circuit everything we're talking about today. The anger, the fear the atrium. It's really hard to feel all those things when you're laughing with somebody. Yeah. So that's another way to kind of short circuit the perpetual trauma is find some things that make you laugh, make you happy and do more of that. I would I would never say there's, there's such a thing as too much laughter there is no such thing. No. So do more of that to read things that make you laugh. Watch. Netflix specials that make you laugh, you know, go to a comedy club, go to a go to a comedy show, go to an improv show, go you know, anything that can help you forget about the world for a little bit. Do do that.

Kristin Wood  
And like, tell me if this is right. It's it's a win win, right? You get something out of it as far as for your your own coping by making other people laugh and the people that are there laughing with you at you would have heard is they're getting something they're getting. They're getting it too so it's it's it's

Ralph Andracchio  
oh absolutely the people on stage are getting something out of it too. We love being on stage we love making people laugh. It's a high getting on stage getting in front of an audience getting your first I still remember my first laugh it was it's amazing you know you it it's it's a win win for everybody like you said so do and especially right now that we're coming out of lockdown and quarantine and the comedy world the comedy community is starting to open back up and shows are starting to happen again. Please patronize your local comedy clubs. Go see comedy shows as much as possible because we really do need it. We need people to come see our shows and laugh along with us. So do yourself a favor and do more of that. What else we talked about circle of support too right? friends...

Kristin Wood  
Kind of like not directly.

Ralph Andracchio  
Go you talked about getting professional like help if you really need it reaching out for help from a professional Yes, but also your circle of support that's already around you, your friends, your family, people that you lean on without even thinking about it when something happens in your life. More of that to to reach out more.

Kristin Wood  
The worst thing you can do is keep it in. I think there's a lot of people that do that. Unfortunately, that might be the angry people were don't know how to talk about it. Don't feel comfortable opening up to someone about how they're feeling. And so when that happens it's a bombs gonna go off like eventually you're just gonna or little bombs go off whatever the case may be. You're walking around with all that and you're not doing anything with it. So people lash out. Sometimes people hit a wall and they have like they call it a meltdown are crying. You know it's gonna come out some way or another. But I do recognize that people sometimes have a very hard time doing that. And again, that's something for a professional to help you with but if not, if you are somebody that can do that, just talking about it just to sharing and having fun with your friends and support system. You know, thing to like we already mentioned,

Ralph Andracchio  
absolutely. Get the poison out of your system. Talk about that's something you could do too. If you're somebody who likes to journal if you're somebody who likes to make tic tock videos if you're somebody who likes to make audio recordings or do podcasts or whatever, you know, whatever the case may be, do more of that. Get the Get it out of your head. They get you know, ideas want to stay ideas and roll around in your head getting them out of your head onto a piece of paper into a microphone into a video really does help clear your system and clear space. You know getting the negative out so the positive has room to come in.

Kristin Wood  
Yeah, thanks for bringing that up. Because that's often a thing I tell people first step especially well, I encourage lots of people to journal but I think if you're having trouble talking to anyone or specific somebody putting it on paper, getting it out, just getting it out it sounds just try it. If you haven't, it can it's not going to make your your life you know rainbows and butterflies and everything else but it it can give people relief. It can take off some of that weight of what you're carrying around.

Ralph Andracchio  
Try it you'll like it. Try it. It's delicious. Hey, Mikey,

Kristin Wood  
I was just journaling before we started. Yes. I told you I was writing. 

Ralph Andracchio  
I'm not gonna ask you what it was. Because it person 

Kristin Wood  
it's personal. That's why it's called a journal Or you can call it my diary.

Ralph Andracchio  
Why are you reading my diary? Stop it.  

Kristin Wood  
Where's the hot weather from the weekend? It's cool. 

Ralph Andracchio  
See, that's why I don't journal because I say that in that voice. I say everything. I'm writing out loud. Dear Diary, and then Dan comes downstairs. He's like, Are you journaling again? Knock it off. We talked about this.

Kristin Wood  
I would die if I heard you downstairs. Dan is not being nice. I Don't have anyone in here to write about so I can talk. I can talk about everybody who''s gonna hear me.

Ralph Andracchio  
If you listening have any ideas about how you deal with trauma to make yourself feel better to focus on the positive rather than negative? Share it with people share it with your friends and family. Share it as a you know, write us at heyletmeaskyousomething@gmail.com And share it with us and we'll share it with people make it a post on one of our YouTube videos or on our Facebook or Instagram because we're everywhere. Yeah, to share, share, share, share, share parents caring Sharing is caring. That was one of the Care Bears right Share Bear think there was a Share, share, Bear Bear Bear. Love it. Any other final thoughts?

Kristin Wood  
No, I was just I keep forgetting. Yes, I was gonna say that trauma is an enormous topic, just like we said last week and we said about many other topics we could I mean, we can break this down to a freaking couple of months of talking about this. So again, like I said last week, you don't leave something you want to comment about, say something you want us to to address further. Whatever the case may be, just send us an email at Ralph just went through it. Yeah, do that.

Ralph Andracchio  
And as you're writing the email, I want you to say out loud Dear Diary...

Ralph Andracchio  
Oh boy, you gotta laugh. All right, everybody, I think I think that's enough for this. Thanks again. And remember, reach out. Love each other, support each other because that's one of the only ways we're gonna get through any of us.

Kristin Wood  
Thank you.

Ralph Andracchio  
We'll see you next time. Bye.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai