Speaker 1: Misspelling with Tory Spelling and iHeartRadio podcast.
Speaker 2: Here we are.
Speaker 1: It's December, which is a trying time, the holiday season
Speaker 1: for everyone.
Speaker 2: I believe.
Speaker 1: I am a single mom now five kids, a lot
Speaker 1: going on, a lot to unpack designer of course.
Speaker 2: Except the stuff I sold.
Speaker 1: But doctor Hillary, help me, help me. Yes, I'm ready. Okay, So,
Speaker 1: oh my gosh, where do we begin? So May sixteenth,
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy three. I was born in Los No.
Speaker 2: I'm just kidding. I'm just getting imagine.
Speaker 1: Sorry, I use jokes a lot, and I'm aware that
Speaker 1: is a coping mechanism.
Speaker 2: What does that mean? I've never asked anyone. I just
Speaker 2: do it.
Speaker 3: So glad you're talking about it. I think it's worth
Speaker 3: while to look at both sides. On one hand, humor
Speaker 3: is an amazing way to compartmentalize hard stuff and trauma
Speaker 3: and chronic despair and hopelessness and frustration and anxiety and
Speaker 3: all that. And compartmentalization is a critical component of like
Speaker 3: getting through tricky times. If you're assaulted by your feelings
Speaker 3: on the regular, it's hard to make choices. So humor's
Speaker 3: a great way to be able to silo some of
Speaker 3: the hard stuff. But you're sort of alluding to the
Speaker 3: fact that it's possible you overuse it, right, and if
Speaker 3: you do, why, And is there some avoidance of hard
Speaker 3: moments or awkward pauses or issues that feel really vulnerable
Speaker 3: or showing up in a way that puts you in
Speaker 3: a light that feels uncomfortable. It's not like a good
Speaker 3: or bad right, wrong, past fail. It's not dichotomous. It's
Speaker 3: just going to be curious about if it's something that
Speaker 3: you rely on regularly.
Speaker 1: I feel like I use it a number of reasons.
Speaker 1: I think it's one to people please, because I'm a
Speaker 1: people pleaser to a fault. I think I have learned
Speaker 1: throughout my life that my sense of humor people respond to.
Speaker 1: Obviously it's entertained people on screen, but it also in person.
Speaker 1: I see people smile and laugh, and it brings me
Speaker 1: great joy to make people happy. So I do use
Speaker 1: it as that. And the people pleasing thing is like,
Speaker 1: not okay, I'm.
Speaker 2: Aware of that.
Speaker 1: I'm aware of everything. I just don't know how to
Speaker 1: go to the next step. And I'm not everything. If
Speaker 1: I was aware of everything, I wouldn't be here with you.
Speaker 1: But how to like evolve past like Okay, I'm aware, now,
Speaker 1: how do I take action? But I also I think
Speaker 1: it's a way to not have to deal with my
Speaker 1: feelings as well, and and my feelings are a hard thing.
Speaker 1: I also joke with everyone, I'm like, I'm dead inside,
Speaker 1: like I don't have feelings, and I'm like, duh, I
Speaker 1: have feelings, like they're there. It's hard for me to
Speaker 1: access my feelings though, Like you show me a movie
Speaker 1: with like dogs and kids, and I'm like crying like
Speaker 1: a baby. But you talk about like any feelings about
Speaker 1: my life and I'm like, nope, nothing link slate.
Speaker 3: And so you have sort of a I mean, my
Speaker 3: quick hypothesis is you have sort of like a intricate, intricate,
Speaker 3: sort of exquisite, well oiled machine of like you know,
Speaker 3: sort of diminishing and minimizing and avoiding and denying hard stuff.
Speaker 3: And I imagine you came by that. Honestly, we aren't
Speaker 3: so born with that. It comes out of some version
Speaker 3: of overwhelm or trauma where the system kind of short circuits.
Speaker 3: It's like too much, too vulnerable, too emotionally, uh, sort
Speaker 3: of draining, and we come up young with a way
Speaker 3: to get past that and through it and to not
Speaker 3: feel assaulted and violated and undoing it. You bring up
Speaker 3: something so important because oftentimes people have the insight but
Speaker 3: don't really have a place to go from there. And
Speaker 3: I often say, like, insight alone is not enough. I
Speaker 3: can't have people walking around with like an understanding of
Speaker 3: what is going on with them, but with an inability
Speaker 3: to intervene and shift and make changes over time. I mean,
Speaker 3: you can't get to one without the other. But one
Speaker 3: alone does not lead to changes or sustainable changes, you know.
Speaker 3: So I think I'm sure it's true that some culmination
Speaker 3: of traum and experiences led you to find this way
Speaker 3: and to develop a sense of like, oh, this is
Speaker 3: how I get value. I people please and people laugh
Speaker 3: at my jokes, and I'm now identified with this way
Speaker 3: of being through the world, and in the absence of it,
Speaker 3: I'm not like as valued and as oriented and grounded
Speaker 3: and sort of stable and so shifting that requires you,
Speaker 3: and this is the hard part and why people usually
Speaker 3: end up saying like I don't know what to do,
Speaker 3: but requires you to abandon that in a moment, you know,
Speaker 3: to stay silent, to stay quiet, to get curious about
Speaker 3: what you're feeling, inside, and even if you come up emptier,
Speaker 3: even if you come up messy, you know that you
Speaker 3: stay with it. The messy is where everything is. And
Speaker 3: if we like won't sit next to our messy and
Speaker 3: like make friends with it, so to speak, we stay
Speaker 3: kind of swimming on the surface. And we all do
Speaker 3: that to a certain extent because sitting extra a messy
Speaker 3: is scary and overwhelming, but it really is the only
Speaker 3: way to get to like the heart and meat of
Speaker 3: our feelings, and otherwise we remain symptomatic.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that makes sense, It makes sense. But on the
Speaker 1: other hand, what happens if you're in constant fight or
Speaker 1: flight mode all the time? People are like, oh my gosh,
Speaker 1: you know, have you been in therapy since, you know,
Speaker 1: since the divorce, now your single mom, there must be
Speaker 1: so much to talk And I'm like, honestly, I haven't
Speaker 1: had a chance. And it's hard for people listen, if
Speaker 1: you're not in somebody's shoes, if you're not behind the
Speaker 1: closed doors every day, it's really hard to put yourself
Speaker 1: in somebody else's shoes. We all look at social media
Speaker 1: and it looks great out there. That's not what's really
Speaker 1: going on. We're putting our best foot forward on social media.
Speaker 1: What lies behind that is all the stuff that only
Speaker 1: our key circle knows about if we let them in.
Speaker 1: So when I say fighter flight, and it's hard for me.
Speaker 1: I'm so conditioned in this lifetime to be labeled words
Speaker 1: since birth, like you know, wealthy, entitled, Hollywood. You know,
Speaker 1: it's just nepotism. It just goes on and on and
Speaker 1: on that I'm very quick to say, like, oh, I'm
Speaker 1: already wanting to say, you know, fight or flight, And
Speaker 1: I'm like, but my situation's not as bad as somebody.
Speaker 2: Else's and that's just me condition.
Speaker 1: And I know though that it's like it's very individual,
Speaker 1: but I'm so used to getting such outwardly harsh responses
Speaker 1: to my life no matter what. And I'm not saying
Speaker 1: poor me here, I am defending myself again, But it's
Speaker 1: just I feel like since my soon to be ex
Speaker 1: husband and I separated, it's been fight or flight. It's
Speaker 1: been constant with five kids, and you know, whether it's emotionally,
Speaker 1: physically financially, we've just been going and there hasn't really
Speaker 1: been that moment where it's like my soon to be
Speaker 1: ex husband used to say, put the oxygen mask on first,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, absolutely not. I'm understanding that better now,
Speaker 1: but I just still am like, you know, the meantime,
Speaker 1: I trying, but it's just when life keeps serving you things,
Speaker 1: unexpected things daily on a daily basis, like you know, okay,
Speaker 1: you know, you're like, oh, I got past that, and
Speaker 1: then you have a plan all of a sudden boom
Speaker 1: and it's dated. So it's hard for me to take
Speaker 1: awareness to execution.
Speaker 3: There are a number of reality components that you're describing,
Speaker 3: but I imagine they're intersecting with what we were talking
Speaker 3: about before, which is that system of avoidance and denial
Speaker 3: and minimization, right, and which is then there's that which
Speaker 3: is quite complex. I mean, that's that's sort of a
Speaker 3: lot of emotional residue to work through. So let me
Speaker 3: say a couple of things to unpack, which is, divorce
Speaker 3: is nothing short of a trauma. And I'm please I
Speaker 3: get the opportunity to sort of say that out loud.
Speaker 3: It's really important in my clinical work to conceptualize divorce
Speaker 3: that way. It is a trauma, and all the requisite
Speaker 3: things that go along with a trauma occur, and they
Speaker 3: occur in different ways. Of different intensities for different people.
Speaker 3: And this is whether or not the divorce is like
Speaker 3: mutual and ambica or something else. It is a paradigm shifting,
Speaker 3: soul altering, life changing set of events that mean reorienting
Speaker 3: in every role you embody, as mom, if you have kids,
Speaker 3: as a single person, as a professional. There's a sort
Speaker 3: of redefining and reorienting that goes on that is nothing
Speaker 3: short of traumatic. And so I am not surprised to
Speaker 3: hear that you've experienced as many women going through divorce do.
Speaker 3: Fighter flight system constantly activated. And the fighter flight system
Speaker 3: is sort of like an asterisk is a thing. It's
Speaker 3: a real thing, and it's in place from like all
Speaker 3: those years ago when we had to be ready to
Speaker 3: run away from like a bear or who is going
Speaker 3: to attack us, and our bodies filled with like adrenaline
Speaker 3: and cortisol, and our muscles are now ready to run
Speaker 3: and our heart is ready to pump so we can
Speaker 3: use our body the way that we need to. That's
Speaker 3: what happens when fight or flight occurs, when we're having
Speaker 3: an emotional response, and in the aftermath of trauma, it's
Speaker 3: actually a false alarm because while you're going through something hard.
Speaker 3: You're not literally in danger, so the emotional labor of
Speaker 3: carrying around fight or flight systems over an extended period
Speaker 3: of time is really oppressive. And I think that's what
Speaker 3: you're kind of alluding to, And so your listeners might
Speaker 3: sort of be like, well, what are you talking about.
Speaker 3: I'm sure you can get to therapy, but that's really
Speaker 3: what you're talking about is kind of an itatability to
Speaker 3: move past this false alarm that's going on filling your
Speaker 3: body with adrenalinine cortisol. It's hard to make it through
Speaker 3: the regular goings on of the day with that occurring,
Speaker 3: let alone to sort of mobilize resources to get to
Speaker 3: a place that's going to be confrontative and vulnerable. So
Speaker 3: I think that's one piece of it that I imagine
Speaker 3: is going on for you, and that I observe going
Speaker 3: on with almost every woman going through divorce, no matter
Speaker 3: what kind of divorce it is. And then the second
Speaker 3: piece I think is a version of like, Okay, yeah,
Speaker 3: but still why aren't you there? But really, why aren't
Speaker 3: you there? I think looking at the sort of cumulative fear,
Speaker 3: it sounds like that has been curated over years for
Speaker 3: you of like what does it actually mean to sit,
Speaker 3: as you said in my mess, you know, to sit
Speaker 3: in my vulnerability, to sit in my flaws, to sit
Speaker 3: in the part of me that's like really deserving. Like
Speaker 3: what does it mean to carve out that space for myself?
Speaker 3: Is like a declaration of the soul. I mean, it's
Speaker 3: not a small thing, you know, if you're going to
Speaker 3: do it right, and so embodying that is a bigger
Speaker 3: thing than just I'm going to make a phone call
Speaker 3: and go to therapy. It's making a decision about yourself.
Speaker 3: And I wanted to go back to what you said,
Speaker 3: which was your ex husband soon to be x husband
Speaker 3: said you got to put on your oxygen mask first,
Speaker 3: and you said, absolutely not. And my question to you
Speaker 3: is is why why is that your reaction.
Speaker 1: Going back to everything you just said, I have feelings.
Speaker 1: I got really emotional inside and teared up when you
Speaker 1: said deserve me. It hit me really hard there it
Speaker 1: needs I don't feel like I deserve anything. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and that's my whole life there, I said it.
Speaker 3: Stay with that. I imagine it intersects with what you
Speaker 3: shared with us before, which is coming into your role
Speaker 3: in life kind of involuntarily with the trappings around you.
Speaker 3: I think pull for a sense of like I can't
Speaker 3: need or want anything. I've been given all these things.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I grew up that way and that's it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't know how to get that back, you know.
Speaker 1: And I read everybody's posts and my phone. Your phone
Speaker 1: gets to know you, and it's like, which is really
Speaker 1: weird sometimes because I'm not that constipated, but it's like
Speaker 1: it pulls up things all the time and it's just
Speaker 1: like empowering and and I'm like, I get it. I
Speaker 1: want to be that girl, like I'm ready. And then
Speaker 1: something insides like you don't deserve it. I'm like, oh,
Speaker 1: like I've kept myself small for so many years because
Speaker 1: I thought I didn't deserve it because of who my
Speaker 1: dad was. And I was handed at nine o two
Speaker 1: and oh, but I'm aware that while I was handed
Speaker 1: at nine two and oh, I created that character. I
Speaker 1: sustained that character, I embodied that character. I made that
Speaker 1: character what it was. I'm aware of that, but I
Speaker 1: still can't get back to Sorry, I'm going like all
Speaker 1: the way back now, but it just it comes from
Speaker 1: that and it's hard to change at fifty one years
Speaker 1: old and I feel like I'm constantly climbing that hill
Speaker 1: and I'm like almost there, and then something happens. And
Speaker 1: I know everyone can relate to this on different levels,
Speaker 1: but it's like, Okay, here I am made it again
Speaker 1: on my own and booms, look back down that hill again.
Speaker 2: You know, it goes away.
Speaker 1: And also I'm in a business where things aren't consistent,
Speaker 1: you know, it's not financially consistent or you know, is
Speaker 1: it stable.
Speaker 2: And with five kids, I feel like I'm sorry.
Speaker 1: I'm constantly letting them down because my life is not.
Speaker 2: Stable.
Speaker 1: Their lives are not stable. Yeah, the love's there. I
Speaker 1: can give love and an abundance, but they're on this
Speaker 1: roller coaster with me, unfortunately. And it's things I never
Speaker 1: as a parent, financially things, you know. And work was
Speaker 1: really stable for quite a long time, you know.
Speaker 2: I had multiple shows and multiple.
Speaker 1: Product lines and brands and just was a workhorse and
Speaker 1: an empire. And that's when I had four of my kids,
Speaker 1: and you know, so they were able to see a
Speaker 1: different side. They were able to have certain life that
Speaker 1: I provided for them through work, and then all of
Speaker 1: a sudden, you know, things weren't stable, and you know,
Speaker 1: life goes on, and so they've now you know, they're
Speaker 1: privy to more than I think that I'm comfortable with
Speaker 1: children being privy to just because we move as a
Speaker 1: family unit now because we're just and I know I
Speaker 1: shouldn't say fight or flight, but it's like we're going.
Speaker 1: They're on this journey with me, and I can't any
Speaker 1: longer keep things from them and be like everything's fine.
Speaker 1: And also, I have children that are old enough that
Speaker 1: read things online, and you know, they read the false stuff,
Speaker 1: but they read the semi accurate stuff and they read
Speaker 1: the true stuff.
Speaker 3: So the requirement is to narrate it for them in
Speaker 3: a way that's digestible and validates their experience. And I'll
Speaker 3: say more about that moment, but I want to frame
Speaker 3: it in this paradigm I see in my practice and
Speaker 3: my work. I see adult clients right and in I
Speaker 3: don't know, ten twelve years that I've been doing this,
Speaker 3: the adult client that is doing the best and is
Speaker 3: the most adaptive is a client that is clear about
Speaker 3: the love and investment and commitment and guidance and support
Speaker 3: from their parent or parents. Not necessarily the client who
Speaker 3: hasn't had ups and downs in terms of their external stability.
Speaker 3: This isn't to deny the reality of what your kiddos
Speaker 3: are going through. If things are unpredictable on those fronts,
Speaker 3: that's a real thing and it's going to have a
Speaker 3: real impact. But think it's really important for you to
Speaker 3: hold on to the intangible, kind of almost unnameable value
Speaker 3: of what you like set as a throwaway, which is
Speaker 3: love and abundance. So that's cool, it's not just cool.
Speaker 3: It's centering, it's everything. It's orienting and owning that. Embodying
Speaker 3: that to yourself and narrating that to your kids deliberately
Speaker 3: is a really important part of moving through a crisis
Speaker 3: or a version of trauma or difficulty that you could
Speaker 3: say out loud, like you may have noticed, like things
Speaker 3: are unpredictable, like week to week, we don't know what
Speaker 3: we're able to purchase, and that is really hard. And
Speaker 3: I'm sure that feels confusing and frustrating and upsetting. And
Speaker 3: I'm here in front of you telling you I can't
Speaker 3: fix it, and I'm validating our experience and I'm with
Speaker 3: you through it even though I can't make it all
Speaker 3: okay right now. But what I can do is like
Speaker 3: unending bottomless love for you. Are teenagers and even little
Speaker 3: kids going to turn around and be like, oh my God,
Speaker 3: thank you so much. I feel so much better. Maybe
Speaker 3: maybe not, But what we're doing is we're what I
Speaker 3: call breadcrumbing. We're leaving them a message that they can
Speaker 3: pick up the pieces of as they begin to conceptualize
Speaker 3: and understand their life and their own story. And that
Speaker 3: story is the story everyone wants. I see many, many,
Speaker 3: many clients a week. All people want is to feel
Speaker 3: like they're loved and wanted and invested in and cared about.
Speaker 3: So make sure that you keep that as a grounding
Speaker 3: truth as you move through this time. Don't be afraid
Speaker 3: to go to the hard thing. Meaning if you know
Speaker 3: a hard thing happened this week, a hard month occurred,
Speaker 3: a hard six months occurred, don't be afraid to say
Speaker 3: it out loud, don't deny it, don't dismiss it. Doesn't
Speaker 3: have to be this Christmas is going to be hard,
Speaker 3: but like last year's was good, Like you don't have
Speaker 3: to make it okay. You can say I know this
Speaker 3: is hard, I know it feels bad, and like I'm
Speaker 3: here with you and til it feels just a little better,
Speaker 3: that is parenting and connecting and like community during a
Speaker 3: time of difficulty. So I think it's critical for you
Speaker 3: to feel like nothing can take that part away from you. Nothing.
Speaker 2: I have a.
Speaker 1: Question for you, what if love's not enough as it
Speaker 1: relates to your children.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: I feel like in relationships sometimes you have to realize
Speaker 1: in a relationship and a partnership that it falls apart
Speaker 1: and sometimes love wasn't enough. Does that apply to everyone
Speaker 1: in your life, even your children?
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 3: I do and the answer is with children, love is enough, absolutely, unequivocally,
Speaker 3: the answer is yes. I in my work that, as
Speaker 3: I said, I've done for ten twelve years. I work
Speaker 3: with parents and their kiddos and individuals, and it is
Speaker 3: the core wound of every suffering being is experiencing imagining.
Speaker 2: A lack of love and value.
Speaker 3: Almost everything can be traced back to that, and having,
Speaker 3: particularly a parent's love, unwavering imperfect comes into different kind
Speaker 3: of flavors and doses because we're humans. But that is
Speaker 3: unwavering and narrated is just invaluable. It's a different question
Speaker 3: as it relates to other relationships, which we can and
Speaker 3: should talk about. But I think it's really important to
Speaker 3: make that distinction. It is all kids want to know,
Speaker 3: and when those kids become grown ups, it's part of
Speaker 3: what makes their life more tenable and resources and interventions
Speaker 3: when they face suffering and hard time more accessible. Is
Speaker 3: knowing that at their core they're valued and love so
Speaker 3: it is enough. And given what you've described so far
Speaker 3: in our conversation, say, I think that's a really important
Speaker 3: thing for you to orient yourself around daily. That doesn't
Speaker 3: mean you don't acknowledge and narrate and take them through
Speaker 3: the suffering that they're enduring, given whatever financial dress is
Speaker 3: going on and whatever emotional hangovers they have as being
Speaker 3: children of a divorce, right, I mean, there's a lot
Speaker 3: going on for them. But the answer is yes, a relationship,
Speaker 3: particularly a romantic one, but sometimes in a friendship. Sometimes
Speaker 3: sadly with family, love isn't enough and the dysfunction and
Speaker 3: toxicity requires separation so kurt is minimized or eliminated. Not
Speaker 3: with kids, we stay in it.
Speaker 1: But also like being a single mom and they're with
Speaker 1: me and their dad and I are super amicable and
Speaker 1: you know, working through everything for the futures of separate families,
Speaker 1: but the kids live with me. I'm the primary caretaker
Speaker 1: and as a single mom providing for them, it's just
Speaker 1: like there's times when I'm working and I'm hustling.
Speaker 2: In the last three months, I've.
Speaker 1: Really been working my butt off, and I'm super grateful
Speaker 1: for that work. But it's like it's been constant and
Speaker 1: there were days. You know, my kids range from seventeen
Speaker 1: to seven. The seventeen year old to sixteen year old,
Speaker 1: a thirteen year old, a twelve year old, and a
Speaker 1: seven year old. And to be honest, and she calls
Speaker 1: herself this, My six year old, who is my eldest daughter,
Speaker 1: has always said I'm the second mom, and she really is.
Speaker 2: And when I'm working.
Speaker 1: It's we don't always have the luxury of you know,
Speaker 1: people have babysitters or nannies or housekeepers or things like that,
Speaker 1: so it's we're just us. And I know that's probably
Speaker 1: really hard for the public to understand, but it's true.
Speaker 1: You know, it's all on me and the kids. And
Speaker 1: when I'm working and I'm gone all day, you know,
Speaker 1: it's it falls a lot on my six year old
Speaker 1: to really oversee the family and take care and I
Speaker 1: feel really guilty when I come home at the end
Speaker 1: of the day, granted I could have been working a
Speaker 1: fourteen to fifteen hour day. I come in and I
Speaker 1: feel so you know, she's also a junior in high school,
Speaker 1: she just got her learners permit. She is doing so
Speaker 1: great and she has a full plate. And then I
Speaker 1: feel like, here I am putting what is my quote
Speaker 1: unquote in my mind, my job onto her, and it's
Speaker 1: that feels bad inside. So, you know, during these last
Speaker 1: three months when I've been working constantly, and I was
Speaker 1: just out of town filming a movie for three weeks,
Speaker 1: and I'm grateful I was able to have someone come
Speaker 1: to stay with them during that, but it's still during
Speaker 1: this three month period of work, work, work, I'm not
Speaker 1: able to give them the individual attention on a daily
Speaker 1: basis that I would like to. They're all very different individuals.
Speaker 1: They need that. Perhaps they're used to that in the past.
Speaker 1: So my I guess my fear is during this time,
Speaker 1: last three months, and I know it's not that long,
Speaker 1: I fear they feel somewhere deep down abandoned.
Speaker 2: Yes, And I feel super guilty about that.