Dr Claire Plumbly shares strategies for nervous system regulation when dealing with angry patients and difficult colleagues.
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When we're up against a challenging person, a difficult colleague, or
Speaker:an angry patient, our amygdala gets activated and our nervous system goes into
Speaker:fight, flight, freeze, or foreign mode.
Speaker:in our Shapes Toolkit training we describe this as being backed into the corner.
Speaker:We can find it especially hard to deal with other people's anger, particularly
Speaker:if it triggers something from our past experiences and our reaction is often
Speaker:to appease the angry person rather than saying, hang on a minute, I don't
Speaker:think I should be spoken to like that.
Speaker:This week, Dr. Claire Plumbly, clinical psychologist and author, is back on
Speaker:the podcast to talk about how we can regulate our own nervous systems to
Speaker:avoid those feelings of anger and frustration being transferred onto us.
Speaker:In our work and our lives, we'll inevitably come across difficult
Speaker:people or reasonable people who are just in a tricky situation.
Speaker:But this episode will help you understand what's happening in your own body and
Speaker:give you tools to work with the other person so you can protect your boundaries
Speaker:whilst respecting their feelings.
Speaker:If you're in a high stress, high stakes, still blank medicine, and you're feeling
Speaker:stressed or overwhelmed, burning out or getting out are not your only options.
Speaker:I'm Dr. Rachel Morris, and welcome to You Are Not a Frog.
Speaker:Hello, I'm Dr. Claire Plumbly.
Speaker:I'm a clinical psychologist specializing in trauma and in burnout, and I'm also
Speaker:an author on the topic of burnout.
Speaker:I've written a book called Burnout, how to Manage Your Nerve
Speaker:System before It Manages You.
Speaker:And I also run an associate practice of psychologists and therapists
Speaker:who help people with these issues.
Speaker:It's wonderful to have you back on the podcast, Claire.
Speaker:We were trying to work out, you've been three times already, I think.
Speaker:Yes, and I love it.
Speaker:I keep coming back for more.
Speaker:You keep coming back.
Speaker:You were one of our keynote speakers at our Work Well Live conference, and I just,
Speaker:I just love your work and I think it's so important for us to hear about it because
Speaker:we are just starting to understand so much more, aren't we, about our nervous systems
Speaker:and particularly the, this new, well, it's new to me, this new theory, polyvagal
Speaker:theory for, for people that haven't heard that before, can you summarize polyvagal
Speaker:theory for us in like two sentences?
Speaker:It is a fairly new theory, so it's not your fault that you haven't heard of it.
Speaker:It's not been around for many years, and it's only really starting to trickle
Speaker:down into the therapy therapy world in the last, like five to 10 years.
Speaker:But it's a, it's an updated theory of the autonomic nervous system.
Speaker:Most people will have heard of the idea that you've got the
Speaker:parasympathetic and the sympathetic branches of the nervous system.
Speaker:So we tend to understand the parasympathetic being the the
Speaker:mode we are in when we are pretty regulated and calm, and then we
Speaker:go up into the sympathetic nervous system when stresses are coming in.
Speaker:It just builds on that, to explain that actually the parasympathetic
Speaker:part of the nervous system is slightly more complicated.
Speaker:There's two branches within that, the ventral vagal and the dorsal vagal.
Speaker:The ventral vagal is the bit that tends to be the bit where we are calm
Speaker:and, and kind of feeling able to think clearly and deal with, um, everyday
Speaker:stuff in a kind of regulated way.
Speaker:And then the, um, dorsal is more the kind of place we go to when we are
Speaker:overwhelmed and completely flooded and the sympathetic nervous system hasn't
Speaker:enabled us to deal with incoming stresses.
Speaker:So that's the fight or flight response.
Speaker:If they have failed us or the, um, there's nowhere to escape, we will go into this
Speaker:kind of more closed down shutdown place, immobilization for safety essentially.
Speaker:And so why is it so important that we sort of understand this,
Speaker:this quite complex neurology?
Speaker:I think, and where I started using it way more in my work early on
Speaker:was because it explained the stress response in a more nuanced way.
Speaker:So rather than just being the kind of fight or flight or freeze, which I used
Speaker:to kind of use in my psychoeducation and therapy, it helped people to
Speaker:understand why in sessions, for example, they appear to just shut down.
Speaker:If we mentioned a word or a phrase or a memory, that was really overwhelming
Speaker:for them, it, it kind of, they would close down and look like they
Speaker:weren't really paying attention or connected, they'd be dissociating.
Speaker:Um, so it helped me to understand this process in the therapy room.
Speaker:So that's why I learned a little bit more about it.
Speaker:And of course, whatever happens in the therapy room is happening
Speaker:outside the therapy room.
Speaker:So when people go into that more Kind of appease kind of place or unable to, get
Speaker:moving and motivate themselves, they're very shut down in a physical way and a
Speaker:kind of cognitive way, you can't really think of imaginative answers or ability
Speaker:to kind of see far into the future, these are people with when I'm setting goals
Speaker:with them, doing the smart goal setting just doesn't really work very well because
Speaker:they can't really see what, what they would like to do other than just not
Speaker:be in this really rubbish place here.
Speaker:They just don't wanna be here.
Speaker:Um, and so it kind of just helped explain, you know, that
Speaker:level of kind of close downness.
Speaker:I think understanding ourselves is absolutely key to then being able to
Speaker:manage ourselves and manage, manage the situations and change what we're doing.
Speaker:And the reason I think your work is so important is that obviously you
Speaker:know our listeners a lot of them are doctors, nurses, senior healthcare
Speaker:professionals, working in these really high stress situations that
Speaker:are really high stakes as well.
Speaker:You know, literally people's lives are at stake.
Speaker:And if we dunno how to manage our nervous systems properly, then we're.
Speaker:Really up against it when we're sort of adding to the stress of not just
Speaker:like the overwhelming demand and the, the, the difficulty of the work, but
Speaker:we're layering on top things that just completely sort of stymie our
Speaker:performance, which is why I think your work is so important and so useful.
Speaker:And so one of the things we wanted to talk about on this podcast was tricky
Speaker:people, because not only are our listeners working in very often, very technical,
Speaker:tricky situations, you know, where you can make a practical mistake or a
Speaker:problem solving mistake, but we're also working with people who are frighten
Speaker:themselves, who are, who are difficult, who are also overloaded, who are stressed.
Speaker:And let's face it, no one is at their best when they come to hospital
Speaker:or go to the doctors, pretty much.
Speaker:And none of our colleagues are at their best when they are feeling
Speaker:overloaded, when they haven't got enough resources, when they are
Speaker:worried about their own performance.
Speaker:And so we all become tricky people, quite frankly.
Speaker:But the question I have is, why does some tricky people trigger.
Speaker:Certain of us more than other people?
Speaker:And there are other people tricky that other people find really tricky, that
Speaker:I'm totally fine with, but there are some people that I'm like, oh my God,
Speaker:that person is, is is really difficult.
Speaker:Let's just get it all out there.
Speaker:What are the universal things that people react to badly in
Speaker:other people all the time anyway?
Speaker:I mean, being criticized, someone behaving unpredictably, someone
Speaker:behaving in a kind of gaslighting or passive aggressive way, or being
Speaker:like attacking, um, putting you down.
Speaker:Something really pisses me off when people don't listen when they're just
Speaker:talking the whole time, and it's all about their opinion and they're not,
Speaker:they're not listening to other people or, or noticing, but I'm thinking all
Speaker:of those is it, that's very open to interpretation actually, if someone's
Speaker:being passive aggressive or attacking or.
Speaker:You are right?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And I think that's something to try and separate out, isn't it?
Speaker:So I suppose if you were, if you interpret that way, then universally
Speaker:that would be quite triggering.
Speaker:But it's possible that our history can make it more likely sometimes that
Speaker:we will interpret cues in that way.
Speaker:That definitely is something that happens and we have to unpick.
Speaker:Sorry, I keep talking about It's cool, comes back to the
Speaker:history, but it is so relevant.
Speaker:Well, it does, it does.
Speaker:You know, I know in my family, you know, my, I grew up in, my grandmother
Speaker:was Swiss, French Swiss, and she was very expressive, you know, and so my,
Speaker:my family, we would have these very loud debates at the dinner table,
Speaker:like pretty much shouting at each other, but they were borderline, but
Speaker:they, but they were, you know, sort of quite loud talky debates, let's say.
Speaker:My husband's family didn't have any of that, and so if I, if I raise my voice and
Speaker:I'm talking like this, he often interprets it as me being very angry and aggressive.
Speaker:I'm not, I'm just sort of making a point and it's not, I'm not angry at all, but
Speaker:then he'll say, don't need to shout at me, and that will then really piss me off.
Speaker:'Cause I'm like, I was having a perfectly nice, natural, normal conversation.
Speaker:Suddenly I'm accused of shouting me and angry.
Speaker:I'm not.
Speaker:I'm just being, I think exercised is the word.
Speaker:So, yeah.
Speaker:So there's, there's me, my background, and then there's him interpreting my behavior.
Speaker:So it, it's all, it's all quite subtle, but there is some
Speaker:behavior that is just blatantly
Speaker:Okay, so should we go back to what the blatant ones are?
Speaker:I think being, having someone being rude.
Speaker:I dunno what I mean.
Speaker:It, I think
Speaker:it's hard because even with culture, right?
Speaker:Sometimes things that we interpret as rude, it all blunt, rude
Speaker:actually that in culturally for people, that's, that's fine.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Maybe that, maybe that's a tricky question because I don't think it's
Speaker:necessarily gonna be, it's, you've gotta think about context and that's what
Speaker:you're always saying in, in therapy.
Speaker:What was the context?
Speaker:And there's observable behavior, isn't it?
Speaker:If someone's really rude and criticizes you, like in front of everybody
Speaker:and, and tells you, you're right.
Speaker:That that is pretty, that is pretty blatant.
Speaker:If someone ignores you when you are speaking, that is
Speaker:really blatant, isn't it?
Speaker:So there are things that if we interpret that as the behavior that will,
Speaker:that will particularly trigger us.
Speaker:What are the other categories of things that you see people who have maybe
Speaker:had certain traumas or wounds or or past experiences tend to get extra
Speaker:triggered by that other people might not?
Speaker:I think it's just all of like the interpretation of that, when something's
Speaker:ambiguous will be misinterpreted as being, yeah, that is being controlling
Speaker:or that is being passive aggressive and, and it's more likely to jump to
Speaker:that conclusion than it being neutral.
Speaker:And to assume you've got a bigger role in the cause for that, rather
Speaker:than thinking about the external reasons that someone might have had.
Speaker:And I think it's always interesting when you're watching something play
Speaker:out that you're not involved in.
Speaker:If you've ever kind of been in a waiting room, for example, you've seen someone
Speaker:kind of being passed over several times and then they finally blow a gasket at
Speaker:somebody who's nothing to do with it, and I think that's always a helpful
Speaker:observer role, isn't it to take.
Speaker:Um, but often if you're in the thick of it and you're just on the
Speaker:attacking end, you find that quite hard to kind of do that, stepping
Speaker:back and taking in the wider picture.
Speaker:So we're more likely, if we've had like difficult experiences in the past, we're
Speaker:more likely to, to personalize somebody else's behavior and the responses rather
Speaker:say if they're angry and aggravated rather than it's, they're having a bad day.
Speaker:The patient they've just been with was really difficult.
Speaker:It's like, oh no, what did I say?
Speaker:Why don't they like me?
Speaker:Why did I, why they angry at me?
Speaker:Rather than just seeing, seeing the whole thing.
Speaker:So we personalize things more.
Speaker:And, and also to say, I think, um, well my experience in therapy has certainly
Speaker:been that text message con communication can cause a real problem for people who,
Speaker:you know, are more sensitive to needing the social cues around it, rather than
Speaker:just like, as the amount of agonizing And what does this mean without the
Speaker:extra bo d language facial expressions.
Speaker:I mean, just to say about that, to link it to the nervous system as we started
Speaker:there, um, humans are social creatures, so we are wired for that social safety.
Speaker:So our, our nervous system is always on and looking around for cues of
Speaker:safety, not just in our environment, but in the people around us.
Speaker:So if someone's got a very still face or a stern looking face, or their eyes,
Speaker:language doesn't match up with the rest of their facial expressions, we will
Speaker:interpret that as there's a danger here.
Speaker:And people who grew up in a house where that danger, you
Speaker:know, was being played out a lot.
Speaker:Angry parents, very strict or controlling or critical parents, you know, might,
Speaker:might have used silence, for example, to be controlling, then we will have that
Speaker:dialed up sensitivity to all of that.
Speaker:So does that mean then that if someone silent with them or maybe
Speaker:doesn't hear them or something, they then interpret that as somebody's
Speaker:angry or cross or ignoring them?
Speaker:They'll, they'll read a lot more, reading lots into, it's essentially
Speaker:what we do over interpreting it?
Speaker:Exactly, because this meant this growing up, and so that's the
Speaker:meaning I now take into adulthood.
Speaker:And I've got all the strategies I need to cope based on that usually,
Speaker:you know, but it might not be the best strategies in adulthood.
Speaker:It might have been what kept you safe as a kid?
Speaker:You know, it might trigger shame.
Speaker:Shame is an emotion that makes us withdraw so we don't get further harm done to us.
Speaker:Um, whereas in adulthood, if someone's behaving badly towards
Speaker:us, ideally we would have a bit of annoyance, anger triggered, because
Speaker:if that's not okay, we need to then have the anger to tell us it's not
Speaker:okay so we can uphold the boundary.
Speaker:But that's another thing that goes a, a bit wonky, I find, is that people
Speaker:have downregulated anger for so long that they don't feel it in themselves.
Speaker:Instead, they feel this.
Speaker:Striving urges to make it better again.
Speaker:Um, and it's not the anger that's in the driving seat there,
Speaker:it's, it's fear and it's shame.
Speaker:That's very interesting.
Speaker:I've, I've, I've, uh, had a few interactions with a, a couple of
Speaker:narcissists, which I worked with over the last, um, few years.
Speaker:And, um, they said some quite outrageous things to me.
Speaker:And at the time I went into complete, oh gosh, I'm so bad.
Speaker:I'm so awful mode.
Speaker:And when I've got home and told my other half, he's been like, excuse me?
Speaker:What did, what did they say?
Speaker:But I think because I've had a DHD, I think I've been used to being
Speaker:a bit impulsive, often being the one in the wrong, a bit of sort
Speaker:of maybe rejection sensitivity.
Speaker:When I get some criticism, whether it's right or wrong, I immediately take it
Speaker:on, like properly take it on board.
Speaker:Oh my gosh, what have I done?
Speaker:Rather than have that.
Speaker:Righteous.
Speaker:Oh, hang on, hang on a sec. That protective anger.
Speaker:I, I do, I do go into that anger afterwards, but it's interesting what
Speaker:the, the, the first reaction is, and I guess vice versa, some, someone might
Speaker:have that defensive anger straight away to, to any criticism rather
Speaker:than they're taking it on board.
Speaker:I guess it's, it's two different extremes depending on how you've been
Speaker:brought up or what you've experienced?
Speaker:Yeah, and I definitely have had that sometimes in the therapy
Speaker:room where someone's felt a bit vulnerable, for example, or put
Speaker:upon, or just not expected something.
Speaker:These are, I guess, all the things you could get outside the therapy
Speaker:room too, and it's gone straight to anger, directed maybe towards me or
Speaker:to some, you know, you wanna place the anger somewhat somewhere, don't you?
Speaker:If you're the first person there to be on the receiving end, you might get it.
Speaker:And that's, yeah, that is really hard because when you're on the receiving
Speaker:end of that, it triggers your own threat response, and so you can get
Speaker:this COEs escalation happening, which is the opposite of co-regulation, where
Speaker:basically your nervous systems are kind of vibing off each other and both
Speaker:feeling like each other's dangerous.
Speaker:And so for me, if I'm on the receiving end of anger, I, you know, I get anxious, my
Speaker:heart starts going and I immediately want to appease, even if it's not my fault.
Speaker:So I have to make sure, not that I necessarily would get
Speaker:angry or do something unhelpful.
Speaker:I've obviously, as a therapist, I do have some strategies, but I would
Speaker:usually try and ground myself and notice that i'm, I'm really triggered.
Speaker:I'm finding it hard to think clearly and think of what I want to say.
Speaker:And so now if I'm in therapy, it's a bit easier maybe for me as a therapist.
Speaker:'cause I can say, oh, I'm noticing you're quite angry.
Speaker:I dunno how that would come across in a, in a setting, like in a medical
Speaker:setting, you can tell me maybe.
Speaker:Um, but I, I can't, I can't find my words right now because I'm on the
Speaker:receiving end of, of this anger.
Speaker:So I just need to take a moment.
Speaker:Could you just take a moment to, to try and manage your anger?
Speaker:I might say something like that, for example.
Speaker:I mean, goodness me, I, I lose count with the amount of times,
Speaker:yeah, that you are dealing, you are dealing with a patient who.
Speaker:Is really rude, really angry.
Speaker:And I think we've been taught that the professional thing to do is respond really
Speaker:well, respond, you know, calmly, whatever.
Speaker:But actually I think the professional thing to do is take that pause,
Speaker:like you've said, it's actually say, I just need a minute now.
Speaker:I remember I had a patient who, uh, it was when I was quite a young, young GP.
Speaker:She came and sat in front of me.
Speaker:I'd never seen her before.
Speaker:So, and she, in fact, she'd not been to the practice before.
Speaker:And she sat down and she said well, I just wanna start by saying every
Speaker:single doctor I've seen has been no effing use, and I think you are
Speaker:gonna be no effing use to me either.
Speaker:That was her opening gambit, right?
Speaker:And you can imagine what happened to my nervous system.
Speaker:It immediately went into, oh my gosh, I've got to please her.
Speaker:I've got to make sure that she, she isn't, you know, actually nowadays
Speaker:I'd be like, uh, right, hang on.
Speaker:Let's just take away.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Now I know myself a lot more.
Speaker:I'd be like, how can I possibly now have a neutral rational, uh, consultation with
Speaker:you where I actually do my best for you when, like you said, my nervous system
Speaker:is, which is wired for social safety.
Speaker:I think it's so helpful to think of it like that when my nervous system
Speaker:will be doing everything it can do to either appease you or to get or or to
Speaker:be safest, i'll probably end up over diagnosing, over investigating or saying
Speaker:something I regret or doing something because I'm not, I'm not thinking right.
Speaker:So it's hard enough for you as a therapist who knows what you're doing.
Speaker:The rest of us just trying to, like, manage these aggressive
Speaker:or rude people, um, with no tools in our toolbox to do that.
Speaker:You know, even knowing that it was okay to say, actually, I'm gonna
Speaker:pause this consultation and what should come for wasn't urgent.
Speaker:It really wasn't urgent.
Speaker:It was some minor investigations.
Speaker:Actually, I should have said, sorry, I'm not, I can't carry on with this
Speaker:consultation now because I, I don't think I can think straight having, you've just
Speaker:said that to me, which is quite triggering for me and I'm really worried now.
Speaker:Can you rebook?
Speaker:And that would've also been a very good boundary to say, I am not
Speaker:prepared to be spoken to that way.
Speaker:She was incredibly aggressive.
Speaker:It wasn't just my interpretation.
Speaker:If someone down and tell you no effing use before they even know you, that
Speaker:was definitely a her problem, not a me problem, but we're just sort of wide to
Speaker:go, no, no, you've got to deal with it.
Speaker:That's part being professional.
Speaker:But I think a lot of the time we deal with stuff and we shouldn't
Speaker:be dealing with it, and we get ourselves into trouble because we are.
Speaker:So mentioned there.
Speaker:I dunno where to start, but yeah, there was a natural, if there was a
Speaker:natural consequence, that's helpful.
Speaker:You know that the, the appointment's been closed down.
Speaker:I mean, I dunno how reflective somebody would be in that space, but
Speaker:if there are natural consequences to behaving inappropriately, hopefully
Speaker:eventually somebody would start to manage their behaviors a little bit.
Speaker:Um, but I think also, I dunno, I, I, I'm, I've been practicing in mental
Speaker:health for 20 years now, and I know you've probably been similar time-wise.
Speaker:I think that does help a little bit because you can kind of, over
Speaker:time, you've got the experiences of different interactions to hold
Speaker:in mind, like, I know I'm not a bad therapist, I know this isn't my fault.
Speaker:So I suppose just leaning on those, remembering this is, this is about this
Speaker:moment, they, there's something going on for this person I don't know about.
Speaker:Doesn't mean you need to excuse this behavior, but I can just focus on
Speaker:regulating myself before I make the first, next step for this interaction.
Speaker:And it, I think probably everyone listening to this conversation.
Speaker:Can bring to mind or might already be there with moments where they've
Speaker:had that torrent of anger at them because that's what, um, memories are
Speaker:like when we're talking about anger.
Speaker:Usually angry memories are retriggered, um, because the
Speaker:nervous system is trying to look after you and trying to go on yeah.
Speaker:And remember that time you don't want that to happen again.
Speaker:So I've got an incident incident in my head where someone had a pop at me because
Speaker:I'd asked if, um, if a trainee could sit in with the appointment and she just.
Speaker:It was all, and you know, it's quite normal, isn't it, for our profession
Speaker:to have to have that, but she obviously felt that that was, um, not appropriate.
Speaker:But the way she handled it was really difficult.
Speaker:And, uh, this was about 16 years ago, 15 years ago, and I, and I didn't know
Speaker:how to handle it was my first occasion.
Speaker:So, you know, just this could be an invitation to think about those times.
Speaker:Like how could you have done that differently?
Speaker:Because we take learnings from that, can't we?
Speaker:At the time, thinking back to it, I think I was in the mindset
Speaker:that it would've been weak to not carry on with the consultation.
Speaker:It would've been unprofessional not to carry on with the consultation.
Speaker:Um, and that was, I would've been open up to complaints, to criticism.
Speaker:It would've been the wrong thing to do.
Speaker:Looking back on it, I think it would've been actually the professional thing
Speaker:to do, to say the reason is not because I'm pissed off, not because
Speaker:I shouldn't be treated like that.
Speaker:That's not the reason.
Speaker:It's because my emotional system, my nervous system, is now dysregulated
Speaker:and I can't actually make the best decisions for you as a patient
Speaker:because that has just happened.
Speaker:And I think if, if we start to understand that that's the
Speaker:reason, that's the reason why.
Speaker:I can't have a conversation, you know, maybe if someone's just criticized
Speaker:me very heavily, I probably can't then have a conversation about
Speaker:how I can change or whatever.
Speaker:I probably need to go away, think about it, and, and regulate, and
Speaker:then I can come back and have it.
Speaker:So it's the, it's the understanding that it's about the dysregulation and what
Speaker:that does to our brains, not the fact that we're being rude or weak or unprofessional
Speaker:that will give us that permission to take that pause and and rearrange stuff.
Speaker:I think of so many situations that would've been so much better if I'd
Speaker:have just said, actually, I can't deal with this now because my, owning it.
Speaker:How, what phrase could you use to own that dysregulation of
Speaker:your emotional nervous system?
Speaker:Claire, what would you tell your clients to say?
Speaker:I mean, that phrase that you used.
Speaker:I think, I mean, I've, I've definitely had a few sessions where people have come
Speaker:in angry, , and it's been directed at me.
Speaker:I think the way I phrased it is something like, well, I can see you're really
Speaker:angry and this is coming at me, and this has triggered my threat response.
Speaker:So I'm finding it really hard to think clearly right now.
Speaker:And I have on one occasion ended a session early because I, I
Speaker:couldn't think what I could do.
Speaker:So I had to say, I, I don't know how to proceed with this appointment
Speaker:because I can't think now, so we are gonna have to rebuke.
Speaker:I like that.
Speaker:I like saying this, what's just happened, this behavior, this thing has triggered
Speaker:my threat response because what you're saying, and we talk a lot in our training
Speaker:about going over the net, which is this concept that if I say to you, Claire,
Speaker:you've undermined me, you've been really rude, well, that's over the net because
Speaker:I may have received it as rude, but I dunno that that's what you intended.
Speaker:Actually, what might have happened was that you told me I was effing useless.
Speaker:Now that that's the baby you can observe or, but you might have, You
Speaker:might have said something in a, in a loud voice, and I've interpreted
Speaker:it as, you are angry with me.
Speaker:Maybe you're just like excited or something.
Speaker:So I'm over the net.
Speaker:If I assume that you were intending harm to, uh, to be difficult, that you
Speaker:are being really angry or whatever.
Speaker:So saying like.
Speaker:I feel threatened here because what you've just said to me, or the way
Speaker:that you've just said it has triggered my threat response, whether you
Speaker:meant to or not, like I don't know that, but I'm feeling threatened.
Speaker:I'm feeling because I'm feeling threatened now.
Speaker:And it could be to do with all my, my previous shit that's gone on, you know.
Speaker:In, in A&E you know, if, if somebody is really drunk or whatever, um, and
Speaker:a nurse is thinking actually, i'm feeling threatened because the last
Speaker:patient that was in here in your state thumped one of my colleagues.
Speaker:You know, you're owning it.
Speaker:You're saying this is why I'm feeling threatened and now I can't think straight.
Speaker:So you're not saying you've done anything wrong.
Speaker:'cause the minute I think, the minute you start to imply that someone else has
Speaker:done something wrong, then that's where you get that COEs escalation, isn't it?
Speaker:Um, I mean, they might be annoyed anyway with you saying that.
Speaker:but at least you've tried to, not to trigger them too much.
Speaker:Yeah, it's really hard.
Speaker:I think acknowledging someone's anger and emotion is really important.
Speaker:It, I mean, it is the key part of any emotion regulation work
Speaker:in therapy, helping someone name it so you can name it for them.
Speaker:You know, it looks like you're really angry.
Speaker:I mean, it might be really obvious, but that's an intervention.
Speaker:And you could, you know, it might be coming from somewhere else, but I'm
Speaker:experiencing it that as threatening.
Speaker:And so either I need to take a moment and come back and then please don't
Speaker:talk, continue talking to me like that if you'd like me to carry on doing my job,
Speaker:but I can't carry on right now without a moment to manage myself, regulate
Speaker:myself back into feeling okay again.
Speaker:So I think recognizing that using tools like slower, regular breathing, for
Speaker:example, and with my clients I make little, um, soothing kind of packs.
Speaker:so, or kits maybe in a little spectacle case or a pencil case, like
Speaker:a little travel one, just a few bits.
Speaker:So if you know you get triggered a lot, you can take out a certain smell or a
Speaker:little thing to kind of squeeze or, just something that's grounding, you can come
Speaker:back to and feel a sense of safety in.
Speaker:I guess there's a, there's a different level, isn't it?
Speaker:There's that time where, you know, the patient's so angry with you
Speaker:that you, you just can't think straight that, that patient being
Speaker:really, you know, rude to me.
Speaker:I can't think straight, but there are just the, the subtle little things where
Speaker:it would be escalating it a lot to say, right, that's it, i've been triggered.
Speaker:I can't, I can't do anything.
Speaker:And that, that's the nuance stuff that is really difficult to deal with.
Speaker:And I love that thought of getting a nice thing outta your pencil case,
Speaker:but, but you can't, you can't do that say in the middle of a meeting or, you
Speaker:know, in a professional consultation.
Speaker:So what else can you do?
Speaker:I mean, I, I, I like the idea of having affirmations or,
Speaker:and embodied affirmations.
Speaker:I know I've spoken to you about them before, but some, some
Speaker:wording that, you know, you need to hear in a moment like that.
Speaker:Like I've got two or three phrases that I know I've got my sleeve.
Speaker:One is, for example, I'm doing my best.
Speaker:And, you know, if you aren't right in front of someone, I might
Speaker:put my hands on my heart just to kind of reinforce that message.
Speaker:This job is really hard, like it's just little reminders or I've got
Speaker:this, I I don't need to prove myself to anyone, i've already got this.
Speaker:Um, I deserve to be here.
Speaker:You know, some of those things I might say to myself.
Speaker:I like that.
Speaker:I, well, I'm, I'm thinking of some mantras that various different people
Speaker:on the podcast have, have talked about.
Speaker:Annaline Weston, who's their dental legal advisor dentist in Australia, she's got
Speaker:this mantra that she makes all her dental students say, and that is, I'm gonna make
Speaker:mistakes and some of them will be serious.
Speaker:She makes them like their first day of, their first year of their dental training.
Speaker:She sits with lecture this and makes them say that.
Speaker:But, you know, saying, I'm gonna make mistakes.
Speaker:Some of them will be serious.
Speaker:Like she know, okay, you've just told me I've made a mistake.
Speaker:I'm gonna make mistakes.
Speaker:It's just like normalizing some of that.
Speaker:Some other stuff I guess I found useful was, I try and do this
Speaker:sometimes, like, this does sound like a you problem, not a me problem.
Speaker:Like, but I wouldn't actually say, wouldn't say that, but you know, in
Speaker:your head thinking, oh, this is a, this is really a you problem not, not
Speaker:a me problem, which again, I think a lot of doctors do, and I'm sure
Speaker:psychotherapists as well, you know, take on their, their clients' problems,
Speaker:like they've got to solve them, that they, and often I think we can be
Speaker:triggered by the fact that someone dumping a. Unsolvable problem on you.
Speaker:And even if the patient hasn't said, you've gotta sort this, you know, we
Speaker:think to ourselves, oh, I've gotta sort this, what we're gonna do.
Speaker:And if I don't do that, then they're gonna be rude and I know
Speaker:what they were like last time.
Speaker:So we sort of trigger ourselves.
Speaker:So this whole, well, that's a you problem.
Speaker:I can't do anything about that.
Speaker:And I think one of the things I like to say to myself, although I often on
Speaker:my own, is, you know, again, hand on heart, of course you reacted like that.
Speaker:Look at what you're coping with.
Speaker:Because one of the things I've learned recently that has really helped me is
Speaker:the fact that every behavior makes sense to the person that's behaving like that.
Speaker:So if that person is like outside waving a, I don't know, sword around
Speaker:that, that makes sense to them.
Speaker:Whatever's going on in their head, they're not just doing it, there's
Speaker:something that's triggered that, that's a bit of an extreme example.
Speaker:But if someone, yeah.
Speaker:Is being really rude in a meeting, that behavior's making sense to them.
Speaker:It's not making sense to anybody else.
Speaker:But what is it in their past that means that they think that is an
Speaker:okay way to put they being modeled.
Speaker:What are they scared about?
Speaker:Like what, what that, that sort of thing about their really
Speaker:wide sensing social threat.
Speaker:Are they feeling really insecure that they just have to dominate everybody?
Speaker:I mean, it's fricking annoying, but I think it's starting to
Speaker:have a little bit of compassion.
Speaker:To the other person, yeah.
Speaker:I mean, it's not fun to be in that place and that the, what you are getting at
Speaker:sounds to me like the essence of trauma informed care, where instead of asking
Speaker:like, well, what's wrong with you?
Speaker:You're asking, well, what's gone on for you?
Speaker:What's happened to you in the past that you are in this
Speaker:space, behaving in this way?
Speaker:And you know, often when I'm in therapy and I'm hearing people's
Speaker:experiences in health settings, You know, the, the system is so squeezed
Speaker:and busy that the ability to be trauma-informed is really compromised.
Speaker:But they are things like showing that you're listening.
Speaker:It's like you said earlier, slowing questions down and, and allowing a bit
Speaker:more pause, which I know is really hard.
Speaker:But some of that might be within someone's control.
Speaker:Um, if you are slowing the pace down, that slows them down and it buys you a bit
Speaker:of time if you feel a bit dysregulated.
Speaker:If you kind of thinking about just that as an action, it communicates, I'm listening,
Speaker:but it also communicates, and we can take this a bit more slowly, and I think
Speaker:that can be really valuable for someone who's stressed or upset or nervous.
Speaker:'Cause often that's, that's gonna be underneath, isn't it?
Speaker:This.
Speaker:This anger or frustration that's coming at you, um, feeling of not being in control.
Speaker:Um, this, this has moved into mostly focusing on anger, isn't it?
Speaker:I dunno if that was your intention.
Speaker:Well, I think anger, interestingly, and I heard this, tell me if I'm right.
Speaker:I've been told that anger is a secondary emotion, that there's
Speaker:always something underneath anger.
Speaker:So there might be fear which comes out as anger or there's distress or sadness
Speaker:or, and often stuff come out, comes out as anger and, and I suffer with this
Speaker:affliction that when I'm really scared about something, there's a sort of
Speaker:bearing my soul here, there's a famous incident in our family and the, the family
Speaker:of our best mates where we went for a lovely pub walk lunch when the kids were
Speaker:quite little, and my daughter cycled home with the, the son they were about.
Speaker:Seven, six or seven.
Speaker:The son thought he knew the way home and we were going across
Speaker:the meadows and stuff like that.
Speaker:And so we lost these two kids on a bike and some quite, you know,
Speaker:difficult roads for about half an hour.
Speaker:And they had just cycled to the local Sainsburys and would
Speaker:sort of sat waiting for them.
Speaker:And when we found them, my best friend was like, oh, darlings, you're here.
Speaker:Whatever.
Speaker:I just let rip.
Speaker:I was like, I cannot believe you did that.
Speaker:I yelled at my daughter and, and this other little boy, it sort
Speaker:of gone down in history as Mum yelled at someone else's kid.
Speaker:I was so scared and worried about it.
Speaker:It came out as absolute rage.
Speaker:And often I think when we are scared, it comes out as anger.
Speaker:Sometimes when we're upset it comes out as anger.
Speaker:When we're worried, frustrated, often it, it, it, for some
Speaker:of us it comes out as anger.
Speaker:I dunno if you've experienced that with clients.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, definitely.
Speaker:I would say that that can be the case.
Speaker:Uh, I mean, I've not heard it phrased as it's only a secondary emotion.
Speaker:I feel like it can be a primary emotion too, if, if a boundary's
Speaker:been crossed and there's justified anger because that's not okay.
Speaker:Um, but I think helping people identify what's happened there can be helpful.
Speaker:And I do think, like you say, it can be a secondary emotion.
Speaker:And then of course you get.
Speaker:Another layer of that, which is then shame for feeling younger and for
Speaker:reacting and, and then there's that whole weight and burden of those emotions.
Speaker:So therapy, a lot of therapy is spent talking about are poor
Speaker:down regulating these emotions.
Speaker:It's actually harder to upregulate anger, believe it or not, than it is to
Speaker:downregulate if someone has never been able to be connected with anger, to get
Speaker:'em to start feeling anger, um, in an appropriate way is actually really hard.
Speaker:What are they feeling instead then
Speaker:Um, shame or it's directed inwards so it's not directed outwards
Speaker:to where it should be directed.
Speaker:Um, so hatred, self hatred.
Speaker:And that's hard, isn't it?
Speaker:Because with, we are told, I think in our society that showing anger is,
Speaker:is really bad and is really wrong.
Speaker:Actually, sometimes it's the healthiest thing to do and particularly if someone
Speaker:is being tricky and overstepping up, and actually I think a correct response with
Speaker:that patient that I talked about earlier should have been a bit of controlled anger
Speaker:rather than, oh gosh, I'm such a bad doc.
Speaker:Actually that is not okay.
Speaker:I don't feel, I now feel threatened and unsafe, and I'm feeling
Speaker:quite angry that you said that.
Speaker:You know, I think that would've been much healthier reaction than, oh gosh,
Speaker:I've got to make you, better and make you love me, and all that, all that sort
Speaker:of weird stuff that went on in instead.
Speaker:And, and I think it's difficult for women.
Speaker:Women aren't allowed to show anger as much as men perhaps.
Speaker:And so at work, if a woman is, if there's a tricky dynamic with people, if a
Speaker:woman shows that they are angry because that boundary's being crossed and that
Speaker:person has been tricky and they've done something rude, then it immediately
Speaker:becomes the woman's fault for reacting.
Speaker:Whereas I think men probably get away with a little bit
Speaker:more, hang on, that's not okay.
Speaker:And they can say, and it doesn't get taken as this, this dreadful, toxic anger.
Speaker:Now that's just my thoughts.
Speaker:I could be totally wrong.
Speaker:I don't know what your experience are.
Speaker:when I looked at this, um, for another podcast actually about the different
Speaker:stress response to men and women, women are more like to show their
Speaker:anger in a passive aggressive way where they gossip after the event, rather
Speaker:than setting or saying it upfront.
Speaker:And in, and they're also more likely to go to the kind of appeasement, fawning
Speaker:kind of behavior because in terms of, you know, our ancestors being kind of
Speaker:the ones in charge of the young we, that would've been a better survival
Speaker:strategy to kind of appease the kind of the threat so that, 'cause you can't
Speaker:run with all your young, very fast.
Speaker:And actually, yeah, that's exactly what women do.
Speaker:They, they don't say anything, then they go and bitch about it afterwards.
Speaker:And not, not all the time, but you know.
Speaker:I always think it is healthier to say something at the time,
Speaker:but it's this co-escalation and co-regulation that's the key, isn't it?
Speaker:What else can you do to co-regulate?
Speaker:So you can, you've already talked about slowing the pace of your speaking.
Speaker:You know, you're talking slowly, you are maybe showing some em empathy.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I, I mean, I, I try and soften my facial expression.
Speaker:I think about, you know, lots of, kind of gentle language without being
Speaker:patronizing, using eye statements like, oh, I noticed this and I need this.
Speaker:And, um, you know, just, uh, this is a pain in the neck, this form, isn't it?
Speaker:But, um, this is something we have to just try and at least do the basics of.
Speaker:Like, I dunno, I just use phraseology like that, that kind of tries to come alongside
Speaker:someone without patronizing, without, you know, making the situation worse.
Speaker:Is there any ever place for saying to somebody, actually, I think
Speaker:you need to take a break and step out and, you know, take a quilt.
Speaker:It it, the problem, this is really annoying.
Speaker:Someone telling you to take a chill pill, it's bad.
Speaker:It's as bad as someone telling you you're really angry when you're not.
Speaker:Then sometimes you take a chill pill when you're, when you're quite chill.
Speaker:Just, that really annoys me.
Speaker:But what can we do about these, these tricky people because okay, we, we've
Speaker:looked at people, you know, we've looked at our own response and what is triggered
Speaker:in us, and maybe stuff from the past.
Speaker:But if, if someone genuinely is difficult, everyone knows they're difficult,
Speaker:they're stressing everybody out.
Speaker:You kind of want to know your team is there for you, but not in a ver
Speaker:like a visual we are now gowning up on this person kind of way.
Speaker:Do you know what I mean?
Speaker:I think there's a bit of a subtle, kind of like a kind of little, I dunno ha like
Speaker:at home for example, if my husband's a bit annoyed, I might just put a hand on my his
Speaker:shoulder and just go so I'm there for him.
Speaker:It's like something like that being a team format that doesn't then involve
Speaker:other people coming in to kind of rescue you or like get involved, 'cause I
Speaker:think that can escalate it all as well.
Speaker:And I'm, I mean, this is a really boring response.
Speaker:I feel like I'm in a job interview now, but what, what policies,
Speaker:what do the policies say as well?
Speaker:Because I think it is helpful just to be aware of that, like, as well, just to
Speaker:have a sense of what, um, your managers might be think, uh, like aligned with.
Speaker:But I think it's gonna be uncomfortable.
Speaker:Expect it to be uncomfortable, and expect that sometimes when you are dealing with
Speaker:human distress, this is gonna be the result in a system that's chronically
Speaker:underfunded and um, stressed, and there's gonna be knee-jerk reactions
Speaker:that have happened somewhere in the system that may be, has been unhelpful.
Speaker:People's history of helping professions isn't always sunny and delightful.
Speaker:So the reaction to you might be colored by previous experience
Speaker:of helping professions.
Speaker:Um, actually that's something else I always, um, find out about in therapy
Speaker:with people, you know, tell me about what has happened in other scenarios
Speaker:where you've been in a therapy setting or with other doctors and, you know,
Speaker:helping professions, because that does often give some seeds of idea, like
Speaker:obviously you weren't listened to, so I wonder how that's gonna make you
Speaker:feel about how I might listen to you.
Speaker:I mean as a therapist, Claire, you did mention to me earlier that you've
Speaker:got a an EMDR type template that you use sometimes, which is quite helpful.
Speaker:This particularly works well if you know you're going into something that's
Speaker:gonna be tricky and you kind of have a rough idea of what that might look like.
Speaker:But you know, if you are in scenarios a lot, say that the A&E example, I
Speaker:imagine people do get a lot of, stuff thrown at them that's quite intense
Speaker:that tends to be quite similar, to just to run through in your mind's eye
Speaker:how you could handle it, maybe using some of the things we've talked about
Speaker:here, and just say that to yourself.
Speaker:I can cope with this, I can handle it.
Speaker:And picture yourself handling it.
Speaker:You know, it might be something like, I'm gonna just take a moment, or I'm
Speaker:gonna say one of the phrases that we've spoken to today, spoken about
Speaker:today, and then like picturing yourself getting to the end of that interaction.
Speaker:Um, and then you could just rehearse that.
Speaker:So in, in the mdr r we would pair that up with, with tapping.
Speaker:So obviously if you choose to tap, that's kind of at your own risk 'cause you're not
Speaker:in an MDR kind of setting in a therapy.
Speaker:But certainly visually practicing and rehearsing something and how you
Speaker:can handle it can be really valuable as a tool, even without the tapping.
Speaker:That sounds like a really useful, um, thing.
Speaker:I mean, you know, visualization of anything's good, isn't it?
Speaker:You're starting to lay down those mental pathways before it's even happened and
Speaker:you're sort of predicting behavior, which probably will never exactly happen,
Speaker:but at least you're sort of got some strategies that you've already thought
Speaker:of, like, well, if I find myself getting really, really triggered, this is the
Speaker:phrase I'm gonna use to get myself out of it, or I'm gonna make sure I,
Speaker:like you said, I use the eye phrase, it's like, I'm feeling this and I'm
Speaker:feeling that, so let's, let's just, rather than going, you are attacking me,
Speaker:therefore I'm gonna do this or whatever.
Speaker:But, um, it's a work in progress.
Speaker:And it sounds like the main thing is sort of understanding
Speaker:where people are coming from.
Speaker:I think sometimes just context is everything.
Speaker:If you know that a colleague.
Speaker:Is tricky yet you understand the experiences that they've had in the
Speaker:past, you'll forgive them anything really, you know, um, if you know that
Speaker:they've had a, a bad reaction with a dog, for example, when a dog comes and
Speaker:you can see them like thing and being a bit snappy with you around a dog, well
Speaker:you go, yeah, of course you like that.
Speaker:So the more you get to know people, the the better it is.
Speaker:'cause you just understand the context.
Speaker:Although I think there's that caveat of don't assume just 'cause you
Speaker:know somebody well, that you really know what's gone on in the past.
Speaker:You might not right.
Speaker:So Claire, can you give us your three top tips for sort of regulating
Speaker:yourself, co-regulating other people in, in a situation where
Speaker:someone is being a tricky person?
Speaker:Three top tips.
Speaker:So it would be just notice your own physiology, that you're
Speaker:struggling to think straight.
Speaker:Give yourself permission to step back and just tend to that.
Speaker:And try and if you can just try and communicate that.
Speaker:I'm just taking a moment, you know, because there's a lot that's just
Speaker:come at me and I can't do my job.
Speaker:I think those would probably be, I know I'm just rehashing what we've already
Speaker:said, but I think those feel like if it's anger, um, like don't expect
Speaker:yourself to be able to perform, like you were saying, at the same level you
Speaker:would if you were, had all your frontal lobes online because you were calm.
Speaker:I love that.
Speaker:Is that sort of like, that's my main takeaway from this is like communicate
Speaker:my frontal lobe's just gone offline, so I can't, I, I can't deal with this in
Speaker:the way that I really want to deal with it, so I'm gonna, I'm gonna need to step
Speaker:out or whether, but Claire, that's so, that's so helpful that every time we
Speaker:speak to you, there's, there's, there's more stuff and, um, gosh, there's so
Speaker:much more we can, we can talk about.
Speaker:So we'll get you back if that's okay.
Speaker:In the meantime, if people wanna find out more about you and your wonderful book,
Speaker:which a colleague of mine, a consultant urologist, just has described as the best
Speaker:explanation of the sort of polyvagal, dorsal ventral, vagal, or whatever
Speaker:it's called, system he's ever read.
Speaker:So high praise Claire.
Speaker:Honestly, it's a really, really good book.
Speaker:Um, you, we'll put a link in the show notes, but where else
Speaker:can people find, find you?
Speaker:Yeah, and just say it's also available as an audio book, for
Speaker:people who listen to this, probably consume a lot of audio books.
Speaker:So it's Burnout, How to Manage Your Nervous System before it manages You.
Speaker:Um, yeah, I'm on the social medias.
Speaker:I'm on uh, LinkedIn and Instagram and Facebook.
Speaker:and I've got a website, drclaireplumbly.com where you can find
Speaker:me and my associates if you want therapy.
Speaker:We also do EMDR, like you said, as as an intensive format.
Speaker:If people kind of feel like I've got a bit of leave coming up and I've got something
Speaker:I really wanna go deep on, um, it's good for people to know that that is an option.
Speaker:Yeah, an EMDR is a treatment for post-traumatic stress, isn't it?
Speaker:or trauma?
Speaker:Yeah, you're right, it's a trauma treatment, but now we apply it to
Speaker:lots of different things, not just PTSD, because often there's some
Speaker:sort of trauma, at least little Ty trauma, um, that's coming from that,
Speaker:so we'll, we'll put links to past podcast talks about little T trauma,
Speaker:but do to check it out and, and really if you are struggling with this stuff,
Speaker:therapy is genuinely eye-opening and changes, changes, everything.
Speaker:It's about that understanding.
Speaker:So, um, yeah, I would seek out a good therapist and Claire and the gang
Speaker:are a, a really good, a really good bunch and I'd recommend them highly.
Speaker:So thank you so much for being on the podcast.
Speaker:We'll speak again soon.
Speaker:Thank you.
Speaker:Bye.
Speaker:Thanks for listening.
Speaker:Don't forget, you can get extra bonus episodes and audio courses along with
Speaker:unlimited access to our library of videos and CPD workbooks by joining
Speaker:FrogXtra and FrogXtra Gold, our memberships to help busy professionals
Speaker:like you beat burnout and work happier.
Speaker:Find out more at youarenotafrog.com/members.