The Recovered Life Show

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Life, a media network and peer support community

dedicated to mental health and addiction recovery.

We bring together expert voices, real stories, and

a peer support community to help you live

your best recovered life.

Join us at RecoveredLife.tv. If it's something

that's happening, and it's usually relational over and

over and over again throughout your life, those

feel different and they don't make sense to

us because we have a tendency to think

like, well, I'm an adult and I have

a job and I'm capable of doing these

things.

What's wrong with me?

Like I must be, there's something, you know,

I must be not good enough or whatever

because I can't function emotionally in my day

to day.

I'm struggling with interactions with other people or

I'm trying, or I'm isolating more than I

want to, or, you know, I'm scared of

interactions or whatever it is.

That is a, that's a more of a

complex trauma.

You're listening to the Recovered Life Show, the

show that helps people in recovery live their

best recovered lives.

And here is your host, Damon Frank.

And welcome back to the Recovered Life Show.

So thrilled to be with you here today.

We have an exciting episode and I have

a guest that has been on the show

before and I am thrilled to have him

back.

Welcome Kyle Miller, LCPC and the owner of

Nexus Counseling Services.

Welcome back, Kyle.

Yeah, thanks, Damon.

And I love that intro that sounded that

I'd never heard that song before.

That's really cool.

Everybody loves a new intro.

That is a Recovered Life band, as we

always say.

Always fun.

You know, you gotta, you gotta get people's

attention, Kyle.

People are so ADHD.

I hate to diagnose.

I'm not diagnosing, but come on.

Yeah, it's me.

I, so I, I like it.

It's new.

It's fresh.

It's a, it's a shiny object.

It's a shiny, exactly.

I, I, I love that.

I'm so glad to connect with you again.

We've been talking all month about trauma and

this is a big thing with addiction recovery.

And, you know, with Recovered Life, we have

all different types of people that come in

that suffer from process addictions, but also mental

health recovery because they, they, they need, they

feel that they want to join a community,

have support, get information about how to deal

with stuff.

And when I found out it was Trauma

Awareness Month, I thought that is it.

I'm going to, I got to get Kyle

on and talk about this.

I, I, I have to talk about this,

about like the whole idea of trauma and

how it shows up because I think a

lot of people, you will see, oh my

gosh, that person has trauma.

Again, not diagnosing, but you know, everybody will

say, wow, that has nothing to do with

the grocery store or whatever.

And, and this person is freaking out over

this and really triggered.

And you're wondering what is, what is going

on?

And there are so many people in addiction

recovery that think, okay, well, I did the

12 steps.

I went to therapy a little bit and

they never really got into the trauma.

They're like, I'm fine now.

I'm sober.

I'm fine.

I'm fine.

I'm on medication.

I'm fine.

I, I, I obviously don't have trauma.

How do you know, how do you know,

buddy?

How do you know, Kyle, if you know,

if you've got trauma?

Oh, and you know what I will tell

you, I think partially it's a, it's a

cultural thing that it, it's hard to identify.

And I think the kind of pull yourself

up by your bootstraps mentality stops us from

actually being able to acknowledge it sometimes.

But just to simplify it, Gabor Mate is

somebody that I really like and respect and

his perspectives on, on trauma and his quote

is, it's not what happens to you.

It's what happens inside of you as a

result of what happens to you.

And so trauma is like, it's different for

everybody.

Something may happen to me that lights me

up and I'm like, oh my God, you

know, I'm full of fear or pain or

all of that.

And it may happen to someone else and

they are able to, you know, experience it

and move on.

So just being, just being aware of what,

what goes on in your body.

I think the thing is realizing like the

symptoms that we talk about with, with trauma

is like, do you feel safe in your

body?

Do you often feel anxious?

Do you often feel worried?

Do you have anticipatory fear of things that

might happen?

Are you ruminating about worst case scenario?

And do you sometimes numb out unintentionally?

Do you shut down in situations where you

are not, where it's not appropriate to do

that?

Do you really have a low self-esteem

and have a tendency to beat yourself up?

Like those are all some of the like

signs of, of trauma being in our body.

Now, the physical signs as well are like,

you know, if you have sleep issues, these

are kind of also go along with depression,

like low, low energy, physical pain.

There's actually a correlation now where you're the,

the body responds and in your body, like

a lot of our issues in our stomach

and our gut, they're talking about a second

brain in your gut.

It's communicating, right?

So a lot of our issues sometimes stem

from that.

And so yeah, like all of it.

I think the biggest thing is realizing that

there are, there, there are different types of

trauma.

And and I know that it's also for

a lot of people, it's like, that word's

overused now.

I think that we're actually realizing that it's

more prevalent than we've ever thought before.

I agree.

So yeah, sorry, I'll not getting your, no,

no, it's good.

Not getting, but let's be clear because some

people will come in and are like, you

know what?

I wanted the sugar-free caramel latte and

I got the chocolate caramel latte and I

have trauma.

Like that's not what we're taught, right?

You just didn't get the latte you wanted.

That's not trauma.

Now it could have triggered trauma that maybe

you don't feel that you deserve.

There you go.

Yes, exactly.

Another thing is if it's hysterical, it's historical,

right?

So if you have an oversized reaction to

something, that's not about what's happening in the

moment.

It is, it was what happened in your

life, right?

So if you are having a big response

to that, I mean, I guess it could

be that you're also a very sheltered person

and maybe spoiled, but that oversized response in

our relation to other people is typically a

historical response.

And so that's why I think in my

work with people, I'm always going back to

their history and it's not, I don't want

to stay there, but we need to explore

it so that we can learn to let

go of it and then be able to

focus on the future.

You know, so many people that are in,

uh, recovery have a parent or guardian that

was an alcoholic or an addict, or I

would even say people that are in recovery

from a, uh, mental health disease or disorder,

same thing.

They had a parent, right?

So there's obviously, we're seeing that there's obviously

some genetic stuff.

Yeah.

How does that, how does that work in?

Because I, I made a statement the other

day on the live and I said, it's

my opinion that anybody who grew up in

a household that had an active alcoholic parent

in there, or maybe even an older sibling,

right?

That just that alone, you know, really everybody

has a form of trauma if, if they've

had that, because you're, you're gonna, you know,

and that obviously we talk a lot about

codependency being the same energetic pattern as addiction.

You'll have one kid who is, does everything

is quote, right, but isn't super codependent.

And you'll have another one that is super

angry and lashes out and rebelled.

You'll have another person that's an alcoholic, right?

Like, so it's almost the same energetic pattern

as I see that, that, that happens.

So can we talk about that a little

bit?

If so many people come in to addiction

recovery, having the, having had a parent, how

do they start to unpack that?

Maybe the big overreaction and it may be

not outwardly, but inwardly.

Yeah.

That's happening.

Could this be linked to that?

Yeah, there is there's a lot of research

coming out now about generational trauma.

It's, they talk about epigenetics and so you

can have a relative from your history.

They show that the stress can be passed

down generations.

And so you had, let's say if your

grandparent or great grandparent was a Holocaust survivor

and, but you've had all of your needs

met and all of that.

And you're stressed.

Like sometimes if the, if the environment that

you're in doesn't makes, it doesn't promote that,

that stress or that struggle that you're going

through, there is a possibility, which I think

it's, it makes it even more complicated, right?

Like, oh, you know, what do I like?

We all want to figure it out.

That's where our brains are designed to do.

It's why we like reality TV so much

is because we're, or the crime shows, because

we're trying to figure out like, how could

this happen?

You know, but I think really what we

need to, to, to think about is like

going back to what is going on in

your body?

What are the signs and symptoms that you

are having and why, you know, and then

looking at your, the comparison to others is

always a trap, right?

So oftentimes I talk to a lot of

people and I've had this myself.

I'm like, well, in comparison to this person,

my life wasn't that bad.

So why am I complaining?

You know, this doesn't make sense.

Or if, and I will say, if you,

if you have a, sorry, I almost went

off your question.

If you have a parent who is, had

an addiction or if, if they had a

mental health issue, we do, I think it

is a, my opinion is that it is

a part of that possible epigenetics.

Like, it's just something that some sort of

gene gets passed down or something that makes

you a little more susceptible to it.

Or it can make you, if you see

it and you don't have that gene, you

may be like really hyper aware that I

don't want that, right?

Like it's that, the trauma.

But what I will say is if you

do have a parent or a family member

or someone in your life that's really close

to you and they have an addiction, if

it's somebody in your, your family of origin,

you will end up, it takes you away

from your own self-development.

You can't focus on who am I and

what am I, what do I want to

do?

And because in some way that person can't

fully be with you, right?

And so you're paying attention to them.

How do I adapt?

How do I shift?

What do I do in this situation?

How do I live and how do I

be okay?

Right?

And some- emotions, you know, I, I,

I see a lot like this whole, I,

well, if they're not okay, we're not okay.

Yeah.

Which, which is a very distorted view of

the world because you could be totally okay,

but somebody has a weird reaction.

It triggers you.

Well, then we're not like, it's not okay.

And, you know, I got to talk about

this because I see different types of people

through my journey of recovery.

And I overheard a conversation the other day

where this person had the perfect shirt, the

perfect casual shorts, the perfect flip-flops, the

perfect, like not a hair out of place

talking about how they had been in a

car accident.

I just was at a coffee shop talking

about that they'd been in a car accident

and that it was unacceptable.

And that for 20 years, he had never,

you know, had anything that he controls every

single thing.

And I'm saying to myself, I'm like, oh,

the illusion of control.

Yeah.

That's trauma.

Like what, why do you feel that like

life wouldn't, it sucks that you got in

a car accident, but it's life-lifing inability

to be able to take life as life

comes that somehow everything has to be perfect.

Yeah.

What, what is this about?

I mean, because I know a lot of

people, I I've had this in my life

that it's like, oh, it's, I'm not doing

enough.

It's like, well, actually I'm doing too much,

you know, letting go.

Most of my, most of my spiritual practice

is letting go, like just letting go.

I don't, I have, I did what I

could do and I can't do anymore.

Like I could just do what I can

do.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That, uh, I think about that as a

trauma response, right?

I don't know if it had to do

with the car crash or if it, I

would imagine that guy was probably, uh, you

know, maybe a perfectionist before that happened.

It just heightens the awareness, right?

This actually brings me to like, I don't

want to get too clinical, but you know,

like there's single incident trauma.

Right.

Um, and those are like the, the, the,

the more like understandable, like we all agree

that it's trauma, right?

If you're in a car crash or you

witness a murder, or if you're, you know,

uh, in a hurricane or, you know, something

that's, that's really, it makes sense.

Uh, it's easier to heal from that.

I shouldn't say easier, but it's, um, if

you didn't have trauma in your history, that

single incident trauma, if you deal with it,

um, and you actually work through it, it,

you can recover from that because your brain

can make sense of it.

The, the childhood trauma or the, we call

it complex trauma.

If it's happening, if it's something that's happening

and it's usually relational over and over and

over again throughout your life, um, those feel

different and they don't, they don't make sense

to us because we have a tendency to

think like, well, I'm an adult and I

have a job and I'm capable of doing

these things.

What's wrong with me?

Like I must be, there's something, you know,

I must be not good enough or whatever,

because I can't, I can't function emotionally in

my day to day.

I'm struggling with, um, with interactions with other

people or I'm trying, or I'm isolating more

than I want to, or, you know, I'm

scared of interactions or whatever it is.

That is a, that's a more of a

complex trauma.

And there's, we have thrown around this idea

that there are big T traumas and little

T traumas.

And I think that that is outdated.

The, you know, the big T is the,

you know, the, the understandable traumas at the

little tree, little T, which is more relational

and, uh, uh, you know, like it's kind

of over time.

It's more of that complex trauma.

It's that is more insidious because it messes

with who you think you are.

So if you have a parent who is

not present in whatever way, as a child,

we can only look to the, the, the

adults around us to make sense of who

we are as a person.

Right.

And so if somebody is in an active

addiction or if they are just neglectful in

some way, or, uh, you know, aggressive in

some way, kids don't look at that and

say, well, you're a jerk.

It's more like, what did I do wrong?

There's gotta be something wrong with me.

We build an adaptive behavior to exist in

that.

And then you grow up being an adult

where you're looking at it saying, what my

dad or my mom or whoever was, they

were fine.

Yeah.

They had a drinking problem, but they, you

know, they were good people and they were

nice to me and, you know, and all

that.

And then we blame ourselves.

And I think that's that kind of like

overworking thing.

It's like, I'm trying to figure out logically,

I need to do something to, to make

myself better.

Okay.

Now, now we're getting into it.

Yeah.

Now we're, now we're getting into it.

You know, I think that's very, I think

that's very deep because I think there's a

lot of denial and you know, it's interesting.

The people that I have met that have

the most trauma will go to, well, they

were doing the best they could.

Well, they were, you know, they were doing,

they were doing, they, you know, it wasn't

that bad.

Yeah.

And sometimes it's true.

They were doing the best that it could,

you know, and and sometimes that's not true.

They weren't doing the right.

They both could be true at the same

time.

Like there may have been times they didn't

know and then they knew and they did

it anyway.

Yeah.

I have to, I have to ask you

about this, this idea of questioning this.

And you were talking about how this, I,

I gotta, I gotta phrase this right.

Cause it's, it's, it's hard to actually kind

of verbalize this, this idea that you're not

safe, but you know, you are safe.

Intellectually, intellectually, you know, you're safe.

No, one's coming through the door.

No, one's going to hurt you.

You're not going to be wounded.

Yeah.

But inside the, this, this conflict, when this

conflict happens, what are the outward signs of

this conflict?

Because I think sometimes people will maybe feel

this, but they don't, but they don't see

it.

They don't see that in an outward way.

If, if, if that makes sense, you know

what I'm saying?

How does that come out in the outward

sense?

Yeah.

So you're asking like, how does the logically

you're saying, I know I'm fine, but in

my body, I don't feel okay.

So, yeah, that, you know, it's interesting.

That can come out in a lot of

different ways.

And that it's, I think this is all,

it's important to say that this is all

person specific.

Sure.

Right.

It could come out as somebody who like,

I know like a lot of people shake

their leg or bounce their leg when they're

talking, but if somebody is doing it and

it's like really intense.

And you know, when, when you start talking

about a particular subject, you know, like you'll

see people kind of shift or but there's

other people that, you know the term dissociation

just kind of shutting down.

You may see people who can't give you

eye contact.

And when you're talking about something that, that

involves them and in their self, their concept

of self, they may not it's, it can

be really subtle.

The more, if you see somebody who is

like overly anxious you know, I have, I,

I know someone who, who talks really fast

and apologizes for things all the time, right

away to me, like that's historical.

Right.

Because there's no reason for you to be

doing that in a conversation with me.

You know, that I'm a safe space.

You know, that I'm someone that you can

just talk to and you can say whatever

you want.

I'm a therapist.

I can, or a counselor, I can, you

know, I don't judge anybody for anything.

You know, after 15 years of doing this,

I'm like, I don't have the right to

judge anyone about anything.

So, so if they are reacting to things

in a way that doesn't make sense or,

but even in your own body, if you

feel, feel nervous about something and it doesn't,

like it doesn't fit the situation where you

logically, I'm safe.

Right.

But in your body, you feel unsafe.

That is something that you should explore.

Right.

You know, I, you said so much.

It was like hard to verbalize it, to

put it out, but I got to go

to the thing that you were talking about.

Shame.

Okay.

Who you think you are deep down inside,

as opposed to guilt or remorse, what you

think you've done.

Yes.

Right.

If we're going to define it, shame is

who you think you are internally.

Yeah.

And I'm going to make a very bold

statement here before I coached.

And even when I was doing a lot

of 12 step work, I rarely would ever

meet with a, with a guy that I

was sponsoring or anyway, that did not have

shame misplaced shame.

And I think the one thing that, and

I'm going to comment, I don't want to

be misunderstood here by anybody that's watching that

they shouldn't go to a 12 step group

or shouldn't done this.

But I do think that like one of

the missteps, I think the misinterpretations of 12

step is, is that somehow people that have

unplaced shame about who they think they are,

that comes from trauma abuse, specifically, I'm going

to say violence, abuse, sexual abuse, that somehow

that they had a role in that, I

think keeps people stuck a lot in 12

step.

And I think like, for me, like I'm

always like one, no, that's not on this.

There is no role you had in being

abused, but your role now, your only role

in it is what you're going to do

with this information that now has come out,

which is trauma oriented, not to diagnose you,

but trauma oriented beyond the scope of this.

And I, and I'm going to tell you,

I, my personal thing is I held onto

a lot of stuff that I believe was

a character defect out of a misinterpretation of

very loving people.

Very, they, they didn't mean me any harm,

but they didn't have the, they didn't have

the experience in it to understand.

I was like, dude, that's trauma.

That's nothing.

You, you have no role.

Right.

Yeah, absolutely.

And that is, that's what, that's complex trauma.

That is, you know, uh, when you, if

you're, you know, if a parent isn't emotionally

or, uh, you know, even physically available, it's

the, it's tough to say this, but that's

neglect, right?

Like if you can't be there for your

kid, even if you have the best of

intent and you're providing a roof and you're

all that, we need that.

We all need it.

In fact, in the first three years, if

you don't have your parents, you're not going

to make it.

You literally can't make it.

Um, and it does create this inner world,

feeling that this is my fault.

Um, and I have worked with a lot

of people who come into my office and

I will, you know, I, this is, uh,

so I'm just going to say, I have

had a few people who at first I

was like, I wonder if they're on the

autism spectrum because they don't, they never looked

at me.

Um, whenever we were talking and, and then

I realized over time, I had to shift

my own ideas about like, it's shame.

It's shame that I can't look you in

the eye when we're talking about me like

that.

And, and over time I learned to feel

that in my body.

So I know that that's what that is.

It's not, you know, being on the, on

the spectrum, but there are a lot of

people in their life that wonder because they're

also the type of people their response to

trauma or perceived trauma is to shut down.

And so they have somewhat of a flat

affect.

And you can feel it, Kyle, energetically.

Oh yeah.

Yeah.

You can, once you attune to it and

you know it like, you know, I've worked

with people where I'm like, you know what,

from a coaching accountability standpoint, what, what you

really need is, is like, buddy, that's not

your, that's not your shit.

Yes.

And you just seen a big hug.

Yeah.

And this is not, this is not, and

you need to go work on that.

Like, because like you need to, you need

to pursue like that is your recovery path.

Because what I found is, and especially with

men, I'm going to make a bold statement

here.

Yeah.

What happens is if you, you're either become

a fighter, you become an abuser or you

try to make difficult people like you.

Yep.

Yeah.

I'm the latter.

I will say that.

So am I.

I'm the latter too.

Try to make people like you, which is

frigging insanity, Kyle.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Yeah.

It also makes you codependent, right?

Because the only way that you're okay is

if somebody else is okay.

And so the, the, that feeling of like,

and as a therapist, it can really, it

can be beneficial in my position, but it

can also be detrimental if I am only

okay, if my client is okay.

So early on in my career, I had

to be really careful of not trying to

just fix people or trying to, you know,

one of the things that really hit me

was when someone told me I was kind

of being a cheerleader, which a lot of

people who've experienced complex trauma hate, they said,

don't take that away from me.

That's mine.

That feeling that I have, that hurt that

I have, that's mine.

And I don't like you if you're dismissing

it by doing that.

And I was like, holy cow, like they

changed the trajectory of who I was, who

I am as a, as a counselor from

that day on because they confronted me with

it.

And so like, yeah, it's it, but it

was, that was my stuff coming out.

I was trying to help them be okay.

This is, this is such a breakthrough because

I think for, I know for me spiritually,

I've been saying when I, when I I'm

very empathic and doing the lives and having

people come up and, you know, crying and

looking for some path to recovery.

And we're all just trying to help the

best that we can and providing information.

A lot of the times I realized it's

like, oh, I've had to become very good

at like this feeling I'm having, this doesn't

belong to me.

This isn't mine.

Yeah.

And I think if you've gone through any

kind of abuse or trauma, what, what happens

is, is you believe it's yours.

And when you start to wake up to

the fact is like, this doesn't belong to

me.

This is unauthentic to me.

This is not me.

This is something else.

And I can choose whether I could let

it go.

But I think I hear, I hear this

all the time.

Well, it's the only thing I know it's

shit.

It's warm shit.

And I know it.

And if I go beyond this and I

let go of this, I am nothingness without,

without the identity of being broken.

I'm not, I'm nothingness.

Yeah.

That's the, that's the healing though.

Like I believe that the healing from trauma

mirrors in some ways, the grief grief healing,

because you're like, you were all in denial.

Yeah.

I'm sometimes still in denial of the things

that I've been through in my life, but

we have to actually go through it.

And some of that is you've got to

break it down and feel like you're nothing

so that you can build yourself.