hey everybody! it's finally friday, and i'm about to hit the road a runnin', let the good times roll cause this week has been crazy busy. like i said the other day i did a wonderful collaboration with a wonderful girl, and i'm really excited for you to see our video which will be coming out soon. so wait for that. stay tuned and don't forget to subscribe! because you don't want to miss those things. and i get excited meeting with other youtubers. it can be really cool. and it makes me feel like i'm not such a weirdo, that i like talk to my phone like this and i put things up; it's kind of weird.
but anyways, if you're new to my channel, welcome welcome! on fridays i'm on facebook. and so if you asked your questions using the hashtag #katifaq, i found a bunch of them. and i already answered, talked to many of you. do you know you can send like voice things on there now? i got one of those which is really cool, so hi annie! thanks for sending that. i have 3 questions and i have a journal topic from sam, so thanks sam for sending me that. and let's get going. here's out first question, "hey kati, is it normal to make backwards progress when starting with a new therapist."
that's a good question. "on campus in college i've been seeing one counselor who referred me out to a different one over summer break. i see interns at school, and they leave after one year. is it normal to make backwards progress? i.e. depression again, flashbacks again or urges to self harm, eating issues etc. and how do i cope with constantly being bounced around between counselors? that can be terrible. and i want to talk about this, because many of you talked about switching therapist or finding out your therapist is leaving. and having a hard time with it. and then what do we do. and all of that stuff that comes along with it. sorry i just realized the light is really weird today. sorry half my face is dark.
it can be really stressful. and the best way to manage it is to talk with your new therapist about it. "it's hard being here. i was used to my old therapist. these are the things that we are working on." i guess the best way to manage it, and the best way you can make it better for yourself. is by talking to your new therapist about the worries. making sure they communicate with your old therapist, so you don't have to keep starting over. because that's the most frustrating thing is that when we start with a new therapist, we kind of have to start over. "okay, so back when i was ..." and we're telling our story over and over and over so i would encourage/really push your therapist, whoever you're seeing, let's say it was me and now i'm referring you to sally jo over here.
i would keep calling me if i'm not responding right away to call sally jo to tell her all about what's going on with you. so that you don't have to do it. therapists have a way that we speak; we'll all understand it. we're like we're working on issues of abuse with this and that's how far we are with this. and it's like shorthand to get the just, so you don't have to repeat yourself. now that can save you a lot of time and stress and anxiety. now the second thing that i would ask: i would ask at school if they have any staff counselors. they're always there. they supervise the interns.
there are people that they pay to be on staff. i actually considered taking a job like that awhile ago, but i'm doing this and i have my practice and it just doesn't fit. but they have them on staff, so i would ask to see one of them. say it's really really hard for you to work on your recovery and work on yourself while you're bouncing around. and i would just keep asking and asking. the squeaky wheel gets the oil, am i right. i know many of us struggle to speak up for ourself, but we're our best advocate. we're the ones that can say the stuff that we know we need. it's harder when we rely on other people to read it or to assume, because then we're not speaking up for ourselves. and i think that it's really powerful for us to speak up for ourselves and to advocate for our own treatment.
it can mean that we get an all around better care. so i hope that helps, and if any of you have been through this and have any words of advice, helpful hints and tricks, things that helped you get through let us know below because i know that many of us struggle with losing a therapist, moving therapists, and what do we do? okay. now question number 2: "i've recently started trying to process my childhood abuse, er childhood sexual abuse. it occurred frequently from the age of 3 til 9. however until a few years ago, i"m now 25, i had no memory of it. how is this possible? now i feel like i have two alternative lives, and it's making me question everything about myself. i feel like i don't know who i am anymore. i hope this makes sense."
it totally makes sense, and know that it's very very normal for us to not remember traumatic experiences. it doesn't matter if it was childhood sexual abuse, if it was a trauma, i've had cases i've gone over with other physicians and other therapists about people who have witnessed their parents being killed or been in a car accident where everybody died except for them and they honestly can't remember any of it. and they don't know why sometimes being in a car makes them anxious. there could be symptoms that we could exhibit without knowing where they come from, and it's very common for us not to have any memory. and the reason for that, is because it's a defense mechanism.
our body can kind of shut down. it's really overwhelmed. it's so frightened, and that fight or flight. our mind honestly (boop), blocks it out as a way to help us survive afterwards. it's a survival instinct. there's nothing wrong with it. it's very normal. it's actually really helpful, because like you said you're 25 now and you didn't really remember until then. it like helped save you when you were younger, getting through it. push through it. not realize that it even happened, like forget about it. so, that, i mean i know what happened is terrible, but it's kind of cool the way that our brain protects us from situations that happened to us. now, i totally understand that you're feeling like you have two alternate lives, because one is now when you have the memory of what's happened and the other is when you didn't.
but trust me, as you process this through with your therapist, like the courage to heal workbook is amazing. i would encourage you to pick it up, because i love it and it's really helpful at times like this. but as you process through it, as you talk about it with your therapist, as you begin to acknowledge what happened acknowledge where you are now and work for the future i promise that that whole feeling like they're separate lives will become more seamless. you'll recognize symptoms you were exhibiting before you had the memory of it and all the things that come in between. so i would just encourage you to keep working on it.
i know it's really hard. i know it's shitty. it's terrible. and just is the worst thing that could ever happen to us, know that there's a light at the end of the tunnel. people do survive from this. we come through it, and we can be stronger because of it. it doesn't have to define who we are, but it can help us become a better version of ourselves if we work through it. so stay strong, keep talking to your therapist, keep working on it. it will get better. okay, now question number 3: "hey kati, it's finals week here at college. i'm having such a hard time getting up and studying and writing my essays. what can i do to get me to do what i need to do?"
that's a lot of do's. "love your videos, thanks for all that you do." you're welcome, and diddly do. um, so i know that this may be a little late. some of you told me you've already finished finals. some of you are still in the midst of it. some of you have some next week, and then you go home. everyone's schedule is different. but in general, if you're on the quarter system you're gonna get back to school and have this happen again. school and deadlines, and i took my licensing exam, and all of the things that come along with testing and assessment is very stressful.
it can be hard to remain motivated when it feels like there's this big pile of stuff to do. it's like sitting on your desk, and someone comes and throws this huge stack of papers you're like "shit, i should just go back to bed and forget this happened." but the best way that we can navigate this, and then we can minimize stress is planning. i know that's not everyone's strong suit. i like to be organized. i'm a freakazoid of planner-ness, so it helps me stay on top of things. but even if you're not, all you need is a calendar. one of those little book calendars. maybe an empty journal with pages that you can make notes, write lists. i would encourage you each day to not require yourself to do more than 7 things.
there's a bunch of studies saying that we can only do 7 things a day. like 7 to do list things. don't make it more than that, because then our likelihood of actually completing the list goes down dramatically. but when it comes to schoolwork, i would encourage you to focus on 1 to 2 topics a day. period. that's it. if you're going to study for something, 1 to 2 topics a day. don't start getting into all your classes. let's do maybe 2 topics. and only study for 30 to 45 minutes, and then take 10 to 15 minute breaks. and i know that many of you are like "but i need to cram kati. i don't have time." but that doesn't actually help our brain absorb the information, and it's harder to recall it later.
trust me, there's a lot of studies on this. i was a psychology student, so i studied the studies on how to study. i promise, i do my research. so be sure you give your brain a break. it can't absorb the information is we just keep pushing it through. i know it feels like you won't get as much done, but you'll be more productive when you're actually studying if you do it that way. just trust me on this. so we're gonna plan our days out, and you're gonna give yourself a half day break. after you've studied, let's say for three days, make sure you get a day where you have most of the day off. so you can kind of relax and reboot and reschedule for your next chunk of days.
and if you fall a little bit behind, it means you need to push something to another day and push something back. so keep in mind, we're trying to stay on track. and i know this still sounds kind of stressful, but it's life. we have to start planning. the sooner we can learn how our brain works, and how best we study the better we'll feel about it, and the less stress we'll even feel in general. cause we'll be like "i got this. i planned this. i can do this." and we're all gonna rock. we can all do it. we'll all get through it. that's something i've always learned. tomorrow will always come, and we'll always get through the exam. so don't let your mind run wild with the what ifs.
like that journal topic i had: what's the worst case scenario, what's the best case scenario, what's the most likely scenario? maybe take some time, if you're really stressing, to think about that, so we have all the information that we've even plotted out. we've thought about. what our worst. what our best. what our most likely. and then remember to breathe. because i promise you it will be okay. okay? now the journal topic, thanks again for that sam, is "for a star to be born, there is one thing that must happen. a gaseous nebula must collapse.
so collapse, crumble. this is not your destruction. this is your birth." i thought that was really powerful. rewind the video and watch it again, and write it down. how have you collapsed and crumbled and born a star after it? i know i've had experiences like that. some real shit times in my life have really helped develop and shape who i am today. and i'm proud of it. i'm proud of those shit times. and i think you should be too. okay, i love you all. have a wonderful weekend. i'll see you on monday, and on tuesday i'll be on tumblr. see you then, bye!
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