Finding a Way Forward: Navigating Stuckness and the Journey of Acceptance - Deanna deBara
“When you let the right people in, like the people that love you, they're going to be there to support you. And that vulnerability isn't going to create distance; it's going to bring people closer.”
Deanna deBara
Deanna deBara - Bio
Deanna deBara is a writer whose work has appeared in Glamour, Cosmopolitan, Men's Health and more.
She is also a podcast host; her podcast, Season of Stuck, explores the all-too-human experience of feeling stuck: how and why we get stuck, what stuckness feels like, how to learn and grow from it, and ultimately, how to get unstuck and step into the next version of ourselves and our lives.
Contact Links:
Summary
What if the challenges of living with autoimmune conditions could actually lead to personal growth and strength? That’s the journey Deanna deBara shares in this conversation. Living with Hashimoto’s thyroiditis and rheumatoid arthritis, Deanna has transformed her experiences with chronic pain and fatigue into sources of resilience and inspiration.
She opens up about managing her health while running a business, finding acceptance, and learning to advocate for herself. Deanna shares the powerful tools she uses to get ‘unstuck,’ such as rewriting negative stories, practicing vulnerability, and setting boundaries to honor her needs.
Her story resonates with anyone who has felt stuck or overwhelmed by life’s challenges. Through methods like releasing emotions and reframing difficult situations, Deanna shows how embracing acceptance and openness can lead to true freedom and resilience. Tune in to discover how she’s breaking barriers and learn lessons you can apply in your own journey.
Takeaways
Stuckness as a Shared Experience: Feeling stuck is a universal experience, especially with invisible conditions, reminding us we’re not alone in facing these challenges.
Impact of Invisible Conditions: Living with conditions like Hashimoto’s and rheumatoid arthritis brings daily hurdles, and finding ways to manage them can help create more freedom and resilience.
Acceptance and Reframing: Embracing limitations and reframing negative thoughts fosters a sense of hope and empowerment, making it easier to navigate tough moments.
Vulnerability as Connection: Being open about invisible conditions can lead to deeper connections and stronger support from others, showing that vulnerability is a powerful tool for building relationships.
Practical Tools for Self-Care: Techniques like journaling, emotional release, and setting boundaries serve as effective ways to manage the mental and emotional impact of chronic conditions.
Creating Compassionate Spaces: Open conversations about invisible conditions reduce stigma, promoting understanding and support in all areas of life.
Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA)
Defined: Rheumatoid arthritis is an autoimmune disease where the immune system mistakenly attacks the joints, leading to chronic inflammation. Symptoms include joint pain, stiffness, swelling, and fatigue, which can fluctuate in severity.
Workplace and School Accommodations:
Ergonomic Adjustments: Provide ergonomic seating, supportive keyboards, and tools to reduce strain on joints.
Flexible Schedules: Allow for flexible work hours or remote options, especially during flare-ups.
Reduced Physical Tasks: Modify or eliminate heavy lifting, prolonged standing, or repetitive motions.
Frequent Breaks: Ensure breaks for movement and stretching to alleviate stiffness and pain.
Accessible Workspaces: Ensure accessibility in facilities, such as elevators, ramps, and easily reachable resources.
Resources:
Arthritis Foundation: arthritis.org – Support, education, and advocacy for people living with arthritis.
Rheumatoid Arthritis Support Network: rheumatoidarthritis.org – Information, resources, and a community for RA patients.
National Institute of Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (NIAMS): niams.nih.gov – Research and information on rheumatoid arthritis and related conditions.
Hashimoto’s Thyroiditis
Defined: Hashimoto's thyroiditis is an autoimmune disorder where the immune system attacks the thyroid gland, leading to hypothyroidism (an underactive thyroid). This can cause symptoms like fatigue, brain fog, sensitivity to cold, weight gain, and muscle aches.
Workplace and School Accommodations:
Flexible Schedules: Allow flexible start times or remote work options to accommodate fatigue.
Rest Breaks: Provide additional breaks throughout the day to manage low energy levels.
Workload Adjustments: Minimize heavy physical tasks or back-to-back activities to help manage energy.
Quiet Environment: Create quiet workspaces to help with brain fog and concentration challenges.
Temperature Control: Ensure access to a warmer workspace or seating area to counter cold sensitivity.
Resources:
American Thyroid Association: thyroid.org – Educational resources on thyroid conditions, treatments, and support.
Hashimoto’s Awareness: hashimotosawareness.org – Information, community support, and resources for living with Hashimoto’s.
National Institutes of Health (NIH) Thyroid Information: nih.gov – Up-to-date medical insights and research on thyroid diseases.
Transcript
Deanna (00:00)
what I've realized is that nothing keeps us more stuck than the stories we tell ourselves, right? So the stories that you were like talking about, about you know, creating a narrative about how people were going to respond to you and your conditions. That will make us feel stuck. And I had the same exact experience, like vulnerability for anyone listening, I just want to call it out. Vulnerability does not come easily to me. I, for the longest time, was the person when anyone asked, how are you? The only answer was, I'm great, how are you?
So that was a journey in being able to really get vulnerable and allow people in. But what I found was that when you let the right people in, like the people that love you, they're gonna be there to support you. And that vulnerability isn't going to create distance, it's going to bring people closer.
Tim Reitsma (01:00)
Have you ever felt stuck in life, like really stuck? Like you're trapped in your own body or your own mind? Today we're exploring what it's like to live with that feeling, especially when you're dealing with an invisible condition. Hey, Tim here, and thanks for tuning into another episode of the Invisible Condition Podcast, where we talk about advocacy, disclosure, and the conditions we live with. We will end the stigma of invisible conditions by empowering voices, and today's voice is brought to us by Deanna Tabarra.
Deanna is a writer whose work has appeared in Glamour, Cosmopolitan, Men's Health and more. She's also the host of Season of Stuck, a podcast that explores the all too human experiences of feeling stuck, why we get stuck, how we learn to grow from it, and ultimately how to get unstuck and step into the next version of ourselves and our lives. Living with Hashimoto's and rheumatoid arthritis, Deanna has learned to reframe her outlook and challenge her mindset to find strength in every situation.
Now, if you're looking for inspiration to face your own challenges, build resilience, and maybe shift your mindset no matter what you're up against, have a listen.
Tim Reitsma (02:06)
Well, Deanna, here we are on my show, but before we get into it, I just have to shamelessly plug my episode that I did with you on seasons of stuck and seasons of stuck. The stuckness is a topic that has been on my mind, not necessarily framed in that wording, but we're going to get into that today and talk about the conditions you live with and talk about being stuck and how to get unstuck. So.
Take it away, why don't you introduce yourself a little bit and tell us a little bit about who you are.
Deanna (02:39)
Yeah. Thank you so much for having me and thank you for being on my show. That episode was amazing and I've gotten such positive feedback about it. But my name is Deanna DiBera. I am a writer and I am the host of Season of Stuck, which is a podcast about what I now know is the very human, very universal experience of feeling stuck.
So on the show, we explore how and why we get stuck, what that experience can feel like, how to learn and grow from it, and ultimately how to get unstuck and step into the next version of ourselves and our lives. And we explore stuckness from a number of different angles. And as someone who lives with two invisible conditions, one of the areas that I often feel stuck and have often felt the most stuck
has to do with my body and these conditions that I live with. So I'm really excited to chat about that with you and about how these invisible conditions can contribute to our feelings of stuckness, but also how to work within that framework to get ourselves unstuck in spite of those conditions.
Tim Reitsma (03:56)
I think that's why I'm really excited for the conversation. And I think, you know, when I share this out, people are going to also resonate with it because maybe somebody is going through a diagnosis journey. Maybe you're in the workplace and you need to ask for an accommodation, but you're stuck. don't know how. Maybe you're struggling to find work and you're in that stuckness. You name it, the scenario, the situation. I've been there. I am there way more than I like to admit. And so.
We're gonna talk about stuckness in the framework as you've kind of developed through numerous interviews now and through your own journey. What conditions do you live with if you don't mind sharing?
Deanna (04:40)
So I have two autoimmune conditions, rheumatoid arthritis, which is an autoimmune condition that impacts the joints and Hashimoto's, which is an autoimmune disease that impacts the thyroid. And I more specifically have hypothyroidism caused by Hashimoto's, which means that my thyroid is a little bit of an underachiever.
Tim Reitsma (05:03)
and underachiever, what impact does that have on your life?
Deanna (05:04)
You
Yeah, so I guess I'll just start with Hashimoto's because that's what I was first diagnosed with. So I had no idea and I feel like many people don't have any idea that the thyroid, which is like a little butterfly shaped gland near your throat, regulates so many different systems and processes within the body. You know, it influences energy, it influences
weight, it influences hormones, it just has a very large effect overall in how you feel. So I was diagnosed with Hashimoto's when I was 31, I believe, and I am turning 40 next week. So I've lived with it for about nine years. And it took a long time to get my Hashimoto's to a manageable place. When I was first diagnosed the first few years, it was
pretty rampant and out of control. My body was in a very intense autoimmune response and that was having a very intense impact on my thyroid. And in terms of impact, there's a lot of symptoms that were challenging. For me, the symptoms that have been and still occasionally are the most challenging is intense fatigue. So when your thyroid is off, there's this feeling of fatigue
that you can't sleep your way out of. You can't rest your way out of it. It is a very specific type of exhaustion that is directly related to the thyroid. And there's really nothing that you can do about it other than try to adjust your meds and get yourself back to a solid place. And then the other is what we call brain fog, which is kind of a sense of confusion. I mean, as the name suggests, you just feel like your brain is foggy.
You can't really concentrate, you can't really focus. I feel like thoughts kind of slip out of my head when I'm in that brain foggy state. I'll be doing something or I'll be thinking something and then it'll be gone. And that's really challenging, particularly in terms of work, in terms of running my business, in terms of showing up for my friends and family. That can be challenging. And then...
The rheumatoid arthritis, I was diagnosed with about three or four years ago. And the biggest impact that RA has had on my life has been pain. When I was first diagnosed with RA, it was a very strange story. I was diagnosed in a little bit of like a roundabout way. I wasn't having pain when I was diagnosed. I was having like an other random symptom that generally happens in late stage RA. But...
I got the diagnosis and then shortly after is when I started experiencing pretty severe joint pain. My feet and my wrists in particular, just a lot of pain on a day-to-day basis, which is hard for me to say and hard to admit. When I was first experiencing daily chronic pain, I didn't want to talk about it.
I didn't wanna sound like I was complaining. I didn't want to really accept that this was my reality and that it was going to be something that I would have to learn to manage. So it was hard at first to have a dialogue about it. But as mentioned, it's been a few years. I've gotten much more comfortable sharing my story and being honest about what I'm experiencing, which has been
really, really powerful. And also I am so grateful to my doctors who it took some time. It took a couple of years, but I am currently on a medication regimen that is working really, really well for me. So I have many more pain free days than I do painful days, which is like so incredible. Like I'm just incredibly, incredibly grateful.
Tim Reitsma (09:14)
First off, thank you for sharing. And I can feel that emotion in your voice and that coming to a realization that, this is your life with these diagnosis. I think what's a couple of things stand out for me is that, you know, that acceptance piece, accepting that, I'm in pain, but also admitting that you're in pain.
Talk to us a little bit about how you overcame that fear of sharing. And I know you're a writer and you work with different clients, so they might not see it in the way that maybe your friends or family or the impact on your activities is.
Deanna (09:56)
Yeah, so I don't know that overcome is the right word for how I feel about it. I think I have come to terms with and created ways to better manage and navigate it. But it still can be a struggle for me. Like I'm certainly not at the end of this journey. I think this is a journey that I'll be on probably for the rest of my life. But.
when I was first diagnosed and first started experiencing pain, and even going back to when I was first diagnosed with Hashimoto's and was having those low energy, exhaustion, brain fog kind of days.
there was almost a sense of embarrassment. I had a really hard time, as you said, acknowledging, admitting, and sharing what I was going through. And so my solution to that, to not being able to accept what was happening to me, was just to continue pushing myself forward, to just continue doing what I needed to do in the hopes that
I don't know what I was thinking, that it would just become more manageable or I'd get used to it. But pretty quickly, I discovered that that does not work. And I had to admit to myself that with these invisible conditions comes some conditions that I have to live by in order to feel my best, in order to do my best. And the biggest step that I made was accepting that.
and allowing myself the grace to slow down. I historically have been a bit of a workaholic, a bit of like an achievement junkie. And so I was extremely busy with my business. I always had multiple assignments going on at once. I always had multiple deadlines per day. And once I was diagnosed with the RA, it just wasn't manageable anymore.
And so I gave myself the permission to change my business in order to go along with the changes that I was experiencing with my life. So, and I mean, this is a privilege, right? Like I know that not everyone is able to do this, but because I manage my own business, I intentionally started taking on less assignments.
I got really intentional about the clients that I was working with and the kinds of things that I was writing. I tried to focus on things that felt energizing and like really connected with me and tried to, made an attempt to avoid work that I felt very draining. I also gave myself some more padding in terms of getting things done, you know, no more deadlines every day.
because then if I had a day where I was in a lot of pain or I was like having extreme fatigue or whatever the case may be, I could give myself that time to rest and recover and feel better and go about it like the next day or the day after. And same goes for things in my personal life. I have a very active life. Like I exercise, I have...
friends that I like to see often. I'm married. I love to spend time with my husband. We hike. We do all of these things. And for a while, I would show up to those things even if I was feeling terrible because I didn't want to let other people down.
And it wasn't until I started having more vulnerable conversations with the people in my life and being honest and open about what I was experiencing that I was able to allow myself to put myself first. And so even if I had a plan or there was something I was supposed to do, because I had this honest, open, vulnerable communication with the people in my life,
they were really supportive and I knew that if I needed to cancel a plan or to back out of something last minute because I wasn't feeling well, that they knew what was going on and they supported me and they loved me and it was okay if there were times that I had to show it for myself at the expense of showing up for other things. And that was a huge burden off of me, you know, to know that I could be vulnerable with the people in my life.
and that they would embrace what I was going through and support me through it rather than judge me or feel like I was a flake or whatever was going on in my head that I thought would happen.
Tim Reitsma (14:47)
so much coming up for me right now and so much that I can relate to and even just scenarios and stories that I used to make up in my own mind that's coming up. One, I love that terminology change from overcoming, you're overcoming something to coming to terms with because it's very different. Like overcoming a cold, I'm coming to terms now living that my life is with Hashimoto's. It's very different.
And I love that you went to the space of vulnerability because I've been there too. You don't want to let others down. I'm sure somebody listening to this is resonating with this. Maybe it's with friends, family, maybe it's in the workplace. You just don't want to others down. So you don't want to talk about it. You don't want to share it with anybody else. That creates in itself, I believe, that stuckness because all of a sudden we've now made up that narrative in our minds.
How has this idea of stuckness when you've embraced this term, has it reshaped how you look at life through your conditions or you live life through these conditions?
Deanna (16:00)
Hmm. So first off, I just want to say you are on the nose with the stories. One of, as I've done research, had all of these conversations on my podcast and moved through my own seasons of Stuck, what I've realized is that nothing keeps us more stuck than the stories we tell ourselves, right? So the stories that you were like talking about, about
you know, creating a narrative about how people were going to respond to you and your conditions. That will make us feel stuck. And I had the same exact experience, like vulnerability for anyone listening, I just want to call it out. Vulnerability does not come easily to me. I, for the longest time, was the person when anyone asked, how are you? The only answer was, I'm great, how are you?
So that was a journey in being able to really get vulnerable and allow people in. But what I found was that when you let the right people in, like the people that love you, they're gonna be there to support you. And that vulnerability isn't going to create distance, it's going to bring people closer. But to answer your question about how has this idea of stuckness related to my invisible conditions?
in so many ways, I mean, there's the very obvious way that, you know, Hashimoto's and RA particularly can make me feel stuck physically. There are just certain limitations that I have when I'm in a flare up that like my body just can't do. I remember. So the year after I was diagnosed, I had gone snowboarding.
with my husband and with some friends, which is something that I love to do. I'm terrible at it, but I love it. And I was just in an intense flare. Like I hadn't gotten my meds correct and my feet were just in very, very bad shape. And I couldn't get the boots on. They hurt so badly that I just, I couldn't snowboard. And I sat there at this like table.
outside of the lodge and I just remember crying and telling myself this story that that was it, that now I can't snowboard anymore. This is like a permanent limitation. And over time, and I mean, that kept me stuck, right? So there wasn't just the physical limitations. There was also these spirals that I would go down in my brain that kept me very stuck.
spirals like this is just going to get worse. I'm gonna be able to do less and less as time goes on. People aren't gonna want me around because I can't do the things that I used to do. All of these like really negative internal narratives that I would get stuck in and they were paralyzing, right? Like I could just be stuck in my brain thinking all of these negative and scary thoughts. And to get unstuck from that took
a lot of work, right? I think that one of the most important elements of getting unstuck is shifting the way that we talk to ourselves. So I had to reframe a lot of things in my brain. So to use the snowboarding example, over time, I had to change the narrative from, I can't snowboard anymore to,
I can't snowboard right now, but I don't know what is going to be in the future. And I might be able to snowboard tomorrow. I might be able to snowboard next year, but right now I can't do it and that's okay. And that narrative creates space, a sense of freedom, right? Because I'm not stuck in this box of what I can and cannot do. I allow...
the parameters to change, right? To give myself flexibility and just focus on the moment that I'm in and encourage myself to not believe that this moment is indicative of all future moments. right? That like I can have a hard day and that doesn't mean tomorrow's gonna be hard. I could be in pain today, I could feel great tomorrow. And that sense of hope and possibility
has been key to me feeling unstuck in terms of my conditions.
Tim Reitsma (20:51)
We're so good at making up narratives, aren't we?
Deanna (20:53)
Ugh, so good. It's like, if there was an award, I would be like, I would win the Oscar for creating stories in my head.
Tim Reitsma (21:01)
Yeah, you know, it's, we create narratives and those narratives in some cases become reality and become our truth. I released a, I do journal entries. I publish, I record a lot of my own thoughts, whatever's going on in my head. And once in a while I published them and I published one recently and I called it a bad case or a case of the what ifs. And what you're talking about just reminds me of that. Well, what if I'm in pain tomorrow?
What if I can't get out of bed? What if I put on weight? What if somebody doesn't believe me? And all of a that narrative now becomes our perception or our outlook on life versus what should be versus, you know, turning that negative what if into a positive what if. What if today is bad, but what if tomorrow isn't? And if tomorrow is bad, what if the next day isn't?
or the next day or the next day or the next day. It might be a year long journey or five year journey. What if, and it's for me, it becomes grounded in our value system, our own personal core values. And where does our hope come from? Where is our hope grounded?
Deanna (22:18)
Those reframes are so incredibly powerful and it allows us to shift our perception towards something that feels more open-ended, that there's more possibilities, that there are better days ahead, which is a really helpful way to navigate through hard times, hard days. But also another thing that has been
really important for me in terms of getting unstuck is that sometimes I have a hard time with it. Sometimes I am angry. Sometimes I am sad. Sometimes I feel hopeless. Like sometimes I will get really caught up in challenging emotions. And for a long time, I would try to push those emotions away, right? I would say, no, like we're fine. Everything is fine. We're gonna be good.
no need to feel sad or angry or whatever I was feeling in the moment. And I found for me, when I tried to suppress those emotions, they didn't go away, they just showed up in different ways. I was more irritable, I was more tired. It would just show up in other ways. And so to not get stuck there, I had to give myself permission
to feel those feelings, not to stay in them, not to wallow in them. But like, if I feel angry, okay, let's be angry. Like if I'm in a place where I'm like, this sucks. Yes, it sucks. Like feel that, give yourself the time and the space to feel those feelings. Just don't stay there for too long. And that has kind of helped me with a deeper level of acceptance.
and also to release those emotions, right? I'm not carrying around this anger for my diagnoses and the challenges that they present. I'm feeling the anger and then I'm letting it go. So when I walk away from that experience, I'm not burdened with those challenging information anymore.
Tim Reitsma (24:31)
releasing those emotions, it sounds easy, but what I find personally, it's not always hard, or sorry, it's often hard. And what I mean by that is, yeah, recognizing that emotion, know, hey, I'm angry, I'm sad, I'm mad, now what do I do? And I'm curious, I'm based on people you've heard through your show and just your own strategies and your own tools.
Deanna (24:42)
Hmm?
Tim Reitsma (25:00)
that you have and you use, how do you release those emotions? What do you do?
Deanna (25:07)
So one of the first guests that I had on my show, her name is Erica Hornthal and she is a dance movement therapist. And she said, emotions are energy in motion, right? So for me, what I found is when I am having those big feelings, the way to process and release them is not in my head. It's in my body and moving my body.
Right, like physical expression. And that can take a lot of forms. I started dancing, which I have never really done before and I'm not very good at, but it is like an incredible exercise in feeling and releasing emotions. I also do whatever physical thing that feels right when I'm in that emotion. So if I'm angry, I will yelI will just like scream into a pillow, right? If I'm sad, I will give myself the space to have an ugly cry, like an ugly, ugly cry, right? And that sense of release that comes with it, like you can feel that energy and motion like leaving the body. So for me, I've done like 15 years on and off of talk therapy.
And it has been extremely helpful in understanding why I am the way that I am, why I do the things that I do, and to help me understand myself on an intellectual level. But it wasn't till I started working with my body in a more somatic way that I felt I was able to release these things and really change the way that I act and the way that I show up and the way that I react.Tim Reitsma (26:59)
And there's lots of scientific evidence and you know, somebody might call me out on this, but I'm going to say it anyways, just, you know, how our brains react to that, you know, level of physicality. And maybe somebody's listening and going, well, I'm maybe your body doesn't allow you to do that. Maybe it's something as simple as getting some fresh air. Maybe it's as simple as just going out for a walk or I like to bike.going for a hard bike ride, pushing myself really hard. Whatever works for you and to release that emotion, we need to do, you know, I was called out on this recently by my partner and she looked at me and was like, what is going on with you? Like, you're solo. We need to figure out how to get you out of this because it's really impacting me and the kids.
And I let go and I got angry, not at her. I was just angry at life and things. And we cried together. We told each other we loved each other and we hugged and went about my day. And I just felt a release because you hold that emotion. And I live with Crohn's disease and stress is a trigger for me.
Deanna (28:01)
Hmm?
Tim Reitsma (28:25)
My doctor said, hey Tim, you need a job without stress. I haven't found that. So if you do have a job without stress, send me the job posting because you know, I might apply. But that stress on our bodies is damaging. It's hard. so figuring out for yourself, what does that unstuckness look like? If you're feeling stuck, it's crucial. Like you need to do yourself a service to.
get there, maybe it's finding your voice, maybe it's, maybe it is that exercise. Dance, terrible dancer. I don't think I could do it. Yeah. I dance with my kids and that's a lot of fun, but you know, figuring out what works for you because somebody's listening to this going, yeah, something's off, something's not right. I haven't found my voice.
Deanna (28:59)
Same.
And to your point of finding your voice, another really, really helpful tool for getting unstuck, whether in relation to invisible conditions or just in general, that has really, really worked for me is journaling. There's something about physically putting the pen to the paper and writing down
what you're feeling, what you're experiencing, the stories in your head, whatever the case may be, that's similar to like energy and motion. Like it pulls the thoughts and the feelings and the stories out of your head and puts them on paper where you can look at them in a more objective way. And more specifically, one of the most impactful tools that I have used for getting unstuck is
All of those challenging stories that we were talking about, the stories that we tell ourselves, you know, I am not going to be able to do this again. Like I am a burden on, you know, my partner or whatever these stories that I have going on up here. I will actually rewrite those stories in my journal. So I'll identify what the story is and then I will write a different narrative. So the opposite, you know, like you have no idea.
all that you are going to do. And there are endless possibilities and your partner loves and supports you and whatever the case may be. And there's something, it doesn't happen at first, right? For me, it wasn't like, I wrote this one letter challenging these stories and the stories are gone. But over time, if every time or often when those stories come into your head, you're embodying the opposite and writing the opposite,
over time it starts to shift those stories. And for me, it has made my internal dialogue a lot kinder, a lot more compassionate. And that puts us in the position to better navigate experiences of stuckness and get ourselves unstuck. When we're approaching it with kindness and compassion, it's much easier to navigate than if we're approaching it with self judgment or criticism or shame or whatever the case may be.
Tim Reitsma (31:38)
think it ties nicely right back to what you said earlier is coming to terms with, right? Because we come to terms with what we're living with. How do we do that? Because we might be stuck in there. You know, I've never been a journaler. I've tried, I sit down and I go, I'm just gonna write all my thoughts. And then I just, I don't know, I just get anxious in that. But I love that I was taking some notes, you know, writing that narrative of what we're telling ourselves.
and then rewriting that narrative. So I love that idea of rewriting it from another perspective or through that positive what if versus that negative what if. And just, I'm really, I'm going to try it. You for me, I record, like I said, I record my journal entries here. Either I use Riverside for my podcast, I'll load that up. Another tool I use is called V Note. I'll put a link in the show notes called Vnote.ai basically just transcribes your stream of consciousness, whatever you're talking into it and it organizes it and asks you some fun coaching questions. But whatever it is, just getting that out, whether it's physical activity, whether it's writing, whether it's yelling into a pillow, going for a walk and talking to the trees, whatever it is, is getting that narrative out of our minds and reframing it. And it takes work. Like this is as good as it gets in that negative sense or, hey, this is as good as it's gonna get. Let's embrace it.
Deanna (33:09)
I love that idea. And that's like a one-two punch, right? Because you can move that energy and do something physical like go for a walk and rewrite the narratives at the same time. It's like very, very efficient. So I'm excited to try that.
Tim Reitsma (33:26)
Yeah, I'm about efficiency. My background is operations. So it's like, what's an efficient way to get things done? You know, as we look to kind of wrap up, there's a couple of questions I like to ask guests and, know, on that lens of self-advocacy. And when you hear that word self-advocacy, you know, based on your experience of going through diagnosis and, you know, I even just have that image of you sitting on that table crying.
Deanna (33:29)
You
Mm-hm
Yeah.
Tim Reitsma (33:56)
there at the ski resort and it breaks my heart. There's a lot of advocacy just in that. When you hear that word for self-advocacy, what comes to mind?
Deanna (34:04)
When I hear the term self-advocacy, what comes to my mind is being the person that stands up for yourself the most, right? So for example, when I was going through the process of getting diagnosed with Hashimoto's, I kept having doctors tell me that my numbers were fine, right? They were using a rubric in terms of what fine is defined as that's like no longer in place. But I knew that something was wrong. I knew it in my bones. I felt it. And so I stood up for myself. And when one doctor told me, no, I think you're fine, I went to a different doctor and I demanded more tests. And I stood up for myself because I knew that I was right. And that can be hard, right? It can be hard to advocate for ourselves but like we are the experts on us. So if you have a feeling that something is wrong or you're experiencing something that you need help with, like be your best friend, be your advocate, be the person that stands up for you.
Tim Reitsma (35:15)
It's amazing, I love that. It's standing up for yourself. You know what's wrong and just fighting for that answer and pushing for that answer. Maybe somebody is listening to this and maybe they're an employee, somebody in the workplace or maybe it's an employer who's listening to this trying to educate themselves. And that big word of disclosure or accommodation is coming up and it ties directly into self-advocacy. based on what you have maybe heard from guests and
And maybe from your own experience, what advice would you leave someone who just really needs to stand up for themselves and get unstuck and find their voice?
Deanna (35:54)
So first off, I just want to acknowledge that that is a challenging and vulnerable experience. Like it's vulnerable enough to talk to your loved ones. It can feel like an extra step of vulnerable when it's with your boss or your teammates or in relation to your career. So I just want to acknowledge that that can be a challenging place to be. But in my experience, going back to the stories again, what I was telling myself in my head of what would happen if I disclosed what was going on for me and the reality of what happened when I disclosed what was going on with me. There was a very large gap in between that. I eventually told most of my clients about my RA diagnosis because there were just some days where I couldn't type or I couldn't work and I didn't want to come across as flaky or incapable or whatever, you know, stories I was making up in my head. And everybody reacted well, you know, everyone was like, yes, of course, take the time you need, keep us posted. If there's anything we can do, let us know. So that was really positive. And I know that that's not everyone's experience. And unfortunately, there are people out there that aren't necessarily going to react in a positive way.
But I think if you disclose something about yourself, anything, including an invisible condition, and someone judges you or shames you for it, that's really important data. Like, is that someone you want to be working with? Is that somewhere that's gonna empower you to do your best work and to do so in a way that supports your conditions and your health? So yeah, I think that...
Oftentimes it's just ripping the bandaid and trusting that people will give you the grace and space that you need. And also acknowledging if they don't, that that's a them problem and not a you problem. And maybe it might be time to rethink some things.
Tim Reitsma (38:05)
I couldn't have put it any better way. What's coming to my mind is, and I'm not gonna quote it word for word, but my friend Alicia, she was on the show and she actually wrote an interview, a written interview series on self-advocacy as well. And she talks about disclosure and often, we have to believe, I believe that most people don't have ill intent. Most people aren't malicious. They are out there, they are out there and you might run into somebody or someone or a workplace or you might be listening to this and going like, well, that's my boss. They're malicious. So they have ill intent. I believe most people don't, but I also believe most people will put their foot in their mouth at some point and they're going to say something silly. They're going to say something that they don't even know is silly or irrelevant or not helpful. And that's where I think it's part of disclosure, part of accommodation, part of self-advocacy is helping people educate themselves providing that education. So I love it. I honestly, just talking this out with you today, I feel a little less unstuck. I woke up this morning that the morning we're recording this and when I'm so overwhelmed, I just want to watch Netflix all day and cancel my upcoming workshops and events because it's hard making up the narrative in my mind that it's not going to go well. And I need to go for a walk and reframe that. And so thank you, Deanna for helping me, this episode is speaking directly to me. And I know people are gonna resonate with this. Where can people find you and track you down and listen to your episodes?
Deanna (39:41)
Yeah, so there's a few different places. So you can visit our website, which is seasonofstuck.com. We have all of our episodes there. You can also sign up for our newsletter, which will allow you to get episodes delivered to your inbox each week, along with actionable insights and tips on how to apply the information from each episode to your own stuck journey. You could also find Season of Stuck on apple podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Tim Reitsma (40:12)
And I know that you're looking for opportunity within workplaces. before we hit record, you're telling me a little bit about some of the workshops that you're planning. And so why don't you take 30 seconds, a minute, whatever you need to just share about your vision to bring this into workplaces.
Deanna (40:30)
I would love to. Thank you. So in creating this podcast, I really see it as the first step of a much larger kind of hub around stuckness and supporting people in getting unstuck. And part of that is workshops, stuck workshops on what stuckness is, how it can manifest in the workplace, and how you can support yourself and your team in getting unstuck. So that is a service that I am rolling out.
for leadership teams, for businesses, for professional groups that really want to better understand what it means to be stuck and more importantly, what they can do to get themselves, their teammates, their colleagues unstuck.
Tim Reitsma (41:12)
I can imagine if somebody's listening to this and maybe they're a leader or manager and they have somebody on their team who's not performing. And instead of jumping right into a performance conversation, maybe it's a pause, take pause and ask yourself what's holding them back? Are they stuck with something? Are they going through a season of stuck? And how can I, as a leader, help them? And if you don't know how to help them, you got to reach out to Deanna, all the links in the show notes and we'll have them there.
Thanks for coming on. Thanks for.
Deanna (41:43)
Thanks for having me. This has been so wonderful and I so appreciate this platform you're creating for people to share their stories. I think this open dialogue is just so important, not only for educating people, but for letting people know that they're not alone.
Tim Reitsma (42:01)
Yeah, for those who are listening, you're not alone. If you need to chat, I've had many people reaching out now to just have a conversation. Please do so. Head to invisiblecondition.com slash connect. But if clear call to action that I have, it's a selfish one, head to invisiblecondition.com slash subscribe. Subscribe to the newsletter. That's where we share all the content about once every two weeks.
if I'm really on the ball every two weeks, maybe a little bit longer than that. But there's an incredible amount of content coming out of Invisible Condition right now, and I don't want you to miss it. Feel free to also sign up your boss. Maybe they don't, you know, just sign them up if they need to hear this. Sign up your friends, your family. That just helps expand what I'm trying to do here is really just to end this stigma of Invisible Conditions by empowering voices and through education. And maybe you want to bring this into your workplace.
I am doing workshops and keynotes in the workplace. So let's talk, bring me in, let's have that conversation. So that's my selfish plea, if you will, right there. So, but Deanna with that, thanks for coming on and thanks everyone for tuning in. I hope you have a good one.
Deanna (43:07)
Ha ha ha ha ha.
Thanks again, Tim.
