Eileen Filliben overcame breast cancer twice by the age of 42; 10 major surgeries in 10 years; debilitating back pain; severe migraines; depression and PTSD. This is her story and she is RESILIENT A.F.

Buy the books: https://theglobalresilienceproject.com/books/

About the Guest:

During her successful career as an attorney, HR consultant, and senior executive, Eileen was sidelined with major health issues including:

• Breast cancer twice by age 42

• 15 major surgeries

• Debilitating chronic back and leg pain

• Chronic migraines including one mimicking a stroke

• Depression and PTSD

Her journey back to health involved a deep dive into the connection between the mind and the body. Using cutting edge techniques from neuroscience, Eileen was able to 𝗿𝗲𝘄𝗶𝗿𝗲 𝗵𝗲𝗿 𝗯𝗿𝗮𝗶𝗻 to overcome her health challenges.

Using her groundbreaking 𝙍𝙚𝙬𝙞𝙧𝙚 𝙂𝙤 𝙃𝙞𝙜𝙝𝙚𝙧 framework, Eileen Filliben empowers individuals and organizations to rise above obstacles, build sustainable resilience, and move forward with clarity and confidence.

Eileen is also passionate about 𝗽𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗮𝗱𝘃𝗼𝗰𝗮𝗰𝘆. Speaking at medical and nursing schools, she helps students understand the enormous impact they have on patients' lives, gain insight into what patients really want, and build a practical toolkit to help prevent burnout.

Go to eileenfilliben.com to learn more.

Links:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/eileen-filliben-jd-mba-speakerauthorcoach/

www.EileenFilliben.com

⚠️ Content Note: Some episodes may contain themes that could be distressing. Please take care of yourself while listening, and don’t hesitate to seek support from a mental health professional if needed.

About the Hosts: 

Blair Kaplan Venables is a British Columbia-based grief and resilience expert and coach, motivational speaker and the Founder of The Global Resilience Project. Her expertise has been featured on media platforms like Forbes, TEDx, CBC Radio, Entrepreneur, and Thrive Global. She is named the Top Grief and Resilience Expert of the Year 2024 by IAOTP. USA Today listed Blair as one of the top 10 conscious female leaders to watch and she empowers others to be resilient from stages around the world. 'MyStory,’ which is a television show available on Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV+ and Google Play, showcases Blair's life story. She is the host of the Radical Resilience podcast and specializes in helping people strengthen their resilience muscle using scientifically proven methods and guides grieving high performers with her Navigating Grief Framework. The Global Resilience Project’s award-winning book series are international bestsellers, and her fourth book, RESILIENT A.F.: Stories of Resilience Vol 2, will be published in January 2025. In her free time, you can find Blair writing, in nature, travelling the world and helping people to strengthen their resilience muscles. 

Links:

https://www.blairkaplan.ca/

https://theglobalresilienceproject.com

https://www.linkedin.com/in/blairdkaplan 

https://www.facebook.com/blair.kaplan 

https://www.facebook.com/BlairKaplanCommunications  

https://www.instagram.com/globalresiliencecommunity

https://www.instagram.com/blairfromblairland/

https://www.facebook.com/globalresiliencecommunity  

https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-global-resilience-project 

blair@blairkaplan.ca 

Alana Kaplan is a compassionate mental health professional based in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. She works in the mental health field, and is a co-host of the Resilient A.F.  podcast. Fueled by advocacy, Alana is known for standing up and speaking out for others. Passionate about de-stigmatizing and normalizing mental health, Alana brings her experience to The Global Resilience Project’s team, navigating the role one’s mental health plays in telling their story.

Engaging in self-care and growth keeps her going, and her love for reading, travel, and personal relationships helps foster that. When she’s not working, Alana can often be found on walks, working on a crossword puzzle, or playing with any animal she sees.

Thanks for listening!

Thanks so much for listening to our podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page.

Do you have some feedback or questions about this episode? Leave a comment in the section below

Subscribe to the podcast

If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or on yourfavorite podcast app.  

Leave us an Apple Podcasts review.

Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you have a minute, please leave an honest review.

The second component is the neuropathways in your brain.

So I'm sure you're very familiar with things that fire together,

wire together. And that's true of the good,

the bad, and the ugly. Right? And so if you're a

chronic pain patient or migraine and the research is

just mind boggling to me, they're now tying it to

autoimmune diseases, but essentially these and grief, which

I'd love to hear more about your model, but your neuropathways

kind of get locked and loaded through repetition. Fire

together. Wire together. Fire together. Wire together, fire. And it's actually

possible to interrupt those neuropathways

and overwrite them with new and different

ones that help your body interpret external

stimuli as safe rather than as pain.

Welcome back to another episode of Resilient AF with Blair and

Alana. But like most times I do this, it's not Alana

today. Dun, dun, dun. It is Eileen

Philibin. So I met Eileen actually only a few

minutes ago, but I've been getting to know her while preparing my

notes for the show, and she has quite the story.

So during her successful career as an attorney, HR

consultant, and senior executive, Eileen was sidelined with major health

issues, including but not limited to breast cancer.

Twice by the age of 42, 15 major surgeries,

debilitating chronic back and leg pain, chronic migraines, including

one mimicking a stroke, depression, and ptsd.

Her journey back to health involved a deep dive into the connection between the mind

and the body. Using cutting edge techniques from neuroscience,

Eileen was able to rewire her brain to become. To overcome her

health challenges. She uses her groundbreaking Rewire

Go Higher framework. And I can't wait to dive into that today because I

love neuroscience. She empowers individuals and organizations to

rise above obstacles, build sustainable resilience, and move forward with

clarity and confidence. She's also passionate about

patient advocacy. Speaking at medical and nursing schools, she helps

students understand the enormous impact they have on their patients lives. Gain

trust. Sorry. Gain insight into what patients really want and

build a practical toolkit to help prevent burnout. Her links are going to be

in the show notes, but holy smokes. Welcome to the show,

Eileen. Thank you, Blair. Really appreciate this opportunity.

And thank you and your sister for doing this super

important work because community really

matters. Yeah, it does. And you know, it's

interesting when I read this that you have this framework based on neuroscience because

I actually have my own framework based on neuroscience.

Yes, right, yes. And it's called the Navigating Grief framework.

And it's basically I became the expert. I wish I would have had it while

going through the worst experiences of my life, including the loss of both

of my parents, my father in law and a baby. And

I'm like, I'm neurodivergent. And I'm like, give me a

list, like, I just need a checklist, like, what can I do to make a

difference? And I just started researching and

trial and error and I created a framework based on neuroscience. So I

really believe in it because like I'm

seven years, almost seven years sober, and I

didn't relapse during all of this. And I got through like the darkest

period that you know, I think hopefully I ever have to face.

And it's all because of neuroscience. So I want to dive

in, I want to dive into your story because

you went through, you had breast cancer twice

before the age of 42, many surgeries, debilitating

pain, depression, PTSD. Like why don't,

why don't you share your story and then let's dive into that and then how

you came up with your framework. Absolutely. So

in 2008, my health fell off a cliff.

So I was diagnosed with breast cancer for the second

time. I was 42 years old. I had a

4 year old at home and an 18 month at home.

I had a double mastectomy that year that went

completely off the rails. And within

12 weeks of that double mastectomy, I was hospitalized for two

emergency surgeries back to back because of things

that had gone awry during the double mastectomy.

That year was also the year that I started with chronic migraines

and then I developed chronic back pain in

2009. Fast forward over the

next 13 years. Actually I had just had

debilitating chronic pain, had four failed

back surgeries, including a two level

fusion and the fourth one, they just kind of gave up

on solving the root cause and they put something called a spinal cord

stimulator in my back. So it's like a TENS

machine if you've ever had pt. So it's these little electrical.

So that is in my spine. I have a cute little battery pack in

my butt, which I'm always telling my massage therapist, don't press too hard

there. And then in

2021, I had a

migraine that mimicked a stroke and

paralyzed the left side of my body. And that

was, that was kind of my rock bottom. Not personally,

because health wise, I had incurred several worse

things. But my son was an 8th grader slash

9th grader that year. It was Covid. He was having

a Lot of challenges. And I was in the hospital

for a week, utterly unable to be that present for him,

mentally, emotionally, physically. And so I said

I thought all along that there was likely some

golden thread that tied all of this together.

And so I was attested for a bunch of autoimmune diseases,

thinking it was none of that. But in 2021,

again, after getting out of the hospital, I went on just

this massive deep dive into research

and discovered this whole brand of,

excuse me, pain management, or new therapies in pain management

called pain reprocessing therapy,

founded in neuroscience. So there are a couple

key components which I think will resonate with you. One

is that your and a couple of

your previous guests have mentioned to this, your body's always talking

to you. Yeah, always. And I know that was an

issue with myself and I was, you know, it started with whispers, then it

got a little louder, then it finally hit me over the head with a frying

pan about 15 times until I, you know, know, literally

succumbed. And so your nervous system gets into

overdrive and there's, that's great if you're being chased

by a dinosaur or a tiger, you know, for 20 minutes, but it's

horrible on your system if that's, you know, chronic

stress. Your body's being flooded with hormones and cortisol,

which can be really damaging in the long term.

So your nervous systems in fight, flight or freeze. And this

particular branch of pain management, one of its tenants

is a stimulus comes into your body, goes up your spinal

cord, and because of the data

bank of memories you have about chronic pain, about

migraines, it almost becomes an involuntary reflex

like, oops, I know what this is. Oops, I know what this is. And so

your body is, in a sense, misinterpreting

signals that are safe as being not

safe as being painful. So that's one component of

it. The second component is the

neuropathways in your brain. So I'm sure you're very familiar with

things that fire together, wire together. And

that's true of the good, the bad and the ugly, right?

And so if you're a chronic pain patient or migraine, and

the research is just mind boggling to me, they're now tying it

to autoimmune diseases, but essentially these and grief,

which I'd love to hear more about your model. But your neuropathways

kind of get locked and loaded through repetition. Fire

together, wire together. Fire together. Wire together, fire. And it's actually

possible to interrupt those neuropathways

and overwrite them with new and different

ones that help your body interpret external

stimuli as safe rather than as pain.

So it was this huge aha. For me, it just made sense on

so many levels. And another

underlying theme is stress is the devil, right? And, and

until. And unless we deal with our stress, it's going to show

up in our bodies in all sorts of really

unfortunate ways. So I started in this path,

down this path, and you know, up until that point, I

had had 15 major surgeries over the course of

multiple years, but 10 for 10 in a 10 year

period. So I was just exhausted

and because of the back pain and leg pain, I became very

opioid dependent. Oh no. So I was

doing everything that Western Med had asked me

to do, advised me to do, and wasn't getting better.

And through this pain reprocessing therapy,

I started with an app called Curable, which I can,

I'm sharing, scouting it from the mountaintops because it literally saved my life.

And it, it teaches us how pain is

generated in the brain and how sometimes those

signals get confused. And then it

helps us learn a lot of mind body techniques

from journaling to meditation to group

therapy to working to visualization

to help calm the nervous system and

reinforce messages of safet. And that was

really my turning point once I got into this group of people. And

also I was saying earlier how important community is and how it's

so wonderful that you're doing this through your podcast and your books,

because it was really group therapy with other

chronic pain sufferers and severe migraine sufferers,

because up until that point, nobody in my life

could relate to, they had no idea because it was

just one thing, another surgery, another hospitalization,

another ear. And so being with people who were going through

on a similar journey and using the same tools was a huge

breakthrough for me. So. Well, let me pause

there. That's the health. And so I'm really passionate about

getting the message out to people who are in chronic pain

because it is really an invisible epidemic. There are

about 51 million Americans, and I know you're in Canada,

so forgive me, I don't have the Canadian stats, but

51 million Americans who suffer with daily chronic pain

and 17 million who suffer with something called high

impact chronic pain, which interferes with daily

activities. And I was in that category for about 13

years and it was so demoralizing and I

completely lost hope. So very passionate about getting

the message out to the chronic pain community and

migrainers and, you know, other folks who could really have

better health and less suffering if

they could implement Some of these techniques that were so helpful to me,

I love that. So is that work that you've learned, like through the

app and whatnot, what you implemented in your framework? Like, let's talk

into your framework because. And first of all, thank you for sharing all that. That's

a lot. Oh, well, thank you for, you know, giving me this

platform because I really. You said something earlier where

you felt you were position to help somebody

who was just like you, and that's how I

feel. So I don't mind sharing because in that loss

of hope, I was ready to take my own life.

The pain was catastrophic and

western medicine was giving me zero hope.

And being without hope is a really, really dark

place. Yes. And I simply couldn't imagine

living another year, let alone another

decade, without hope.

And ultimately it was my children

and I just could not leave them.

And that's what kept me here. But to your earlier point, I

feel like if I had known somebody like me

who was, you know,

utterly lost hope, who was literally at the end of her rope

and literally stumbled upon these

tools, I just feel like I can help

people. So onto my own model. So

I started my career as an attorney and found

that was way too reactive and argumentative. And

I'm much more about positivity

and helping develop skills and talent. And so I spent most of my

career as a strategic HR consultant and leadership development

consultant. And so the more I got into this

neuroplasticity of the brain. So it's essential what we've been talking about,

neuroplasticity, fancy word for changeability. So

you can absolutely change your brain over time.

There are so many overlaps within

whatever world you want it to be, frankly, whether it's your own health.

Awesome. Whether it's your career, whether it's

leadership. There are so many things.

And for me, if I had to put it down into one word, it's

resilience. And so helping, you know, kind

of rewiring your brain for resilience in all

sorts of different circumstances.

And, you know, I have a couple my model

has. It's a little tacky, I know, but a lot of R, a lot of

R words, so it's easier for me to remember. But I think

resilience, that's

an adjective that's attributed to people way after

the fact, right after they've been through

it. And for my own

journey, part of the resilience was

realizing that it was up to me,

nobody else was coming, the cavalry wasn't on the

other side of the hill. I really had to recognize that it was up to

me to pull myself out of this.

The other thing is, resilience is

messy. Messy, messy, messy.

Like, before I went through all this, I thought, like, resilient people

had this superpower, right? And they had red capes in their

closet, and they did everything with ease and grace in

my. It could not have been further from the truth. I mean, I was

a hot mess, you know, sobbing,

crying, depression, ptsd.

And I want people to understand, because

when you're in it, at least when I

was in it, I don't know how you feel. I didn't feel resilient. I

felt lost. I felt demoralized. I.

You know, I wanted to take my own life. I mean, it was

horrible. So I want to provide.

Inject that realism into

people who are on a difficult path now

and resilient. It's not. It's not a straight line. Right. I

mean, I have been on so many zigzags, and I know you

have, too. And, you know, being younger

and naive, I thought my life would unfold in this great

straight path and everything would be wonderful. And obviously, it

didn't turn out that way. And now looking back, it's,

you know, kind of the detours are where I. I learned the greatest

lessons. Tough at times,

really tough at times, but it's. It's not linear. And

even now, I'm doing so much better. But I still have setbacks. I still

have pain flares, and. But I

have the tools now when I do have a flare, to name it,

recognize it, call a timeout. Yeah.

And one of my favorites is that resilience

is a team sport.

And as it was really, before all of this unfolded, it was

super hard for me to ask for help.

You know, I thought I had to do it all myself and keep a

stiff upper lip and. And I am super blessed.

I have a very large family, a caring family. I have an

incredible tribe, friends. So I have an incredible

support network, but I wasn't asking them for help.

So that's another message that if I can, if somebody's in it,

you know, people want to help you, so

empower. Allow them to help you, because so they want to

help, but they have no idea where to start or where to. What to ask

or what to do. So relying on your support network

was fundamental for me. Yeah. Wow,

that's great. And so if someone wants to access

your framework, like, how do they find it? Like, what do they do?

Sure. So I have a website, eileenphilibin.com which

I guess will be in the show notes. And so

I'm doing a lot of keynotes and workshops

and I do team building activities and, you

know, lots of podcasts. So really just trying to get the word

out. And I have a special place in my heart for

patients, especially chronic pain patients. And

if I can just mention that briefly. So please do.

Yeah. As somebody who has been somewhat of a frequent flyer

with the US Health care system. Yeah. You know, I have seen

really how broken it is, just utterly broken,

and the devastating impact that has on patients and

caregivers. And my feeling is

that most medical professionals, they came

into this industry to be healers and to help people. And

our insurance system is

so flawed and all the financial

incentives are in the exact wrong places.

Doctors get to spend less and less and less time

with patients and more and more time on paperwork.

You know, you have to get prior offs to do. It's. It's nuts.

It's just nuts. So I'm also very into patient

advocacy and trying to bring the patient point of view

to some much needed health care reform in our country.

And I know you Canadians are very, very fortunate. I'm sure it's not

perfect, but you are a far, far cry from where

we are. Yeah, no, no, definitely. And I think it's amazing that

you've taken everything you've learned on your healing and your experience

as a patient and you're able to do this work on various

levels. Do you,

do you find, like, do you think that. Because I know

like even like the beginning of your career being an attorney, super high

stress, high powered. Do you think having

a high stress job has

an influence over, you know, that, that golden thread

through all of those health challenges you've

navigated. Absolutely. And I

also think I do read or listen to Gabor Mate at

all. Of course I do. Yeah.

And his, his most recent work, the Myth of Normal,

really speaks to that and how our culture

is so crazy with it being,

you know, very achievement oriented. And he

talks about, you know, as a child, we

have two primary needs. One is to attach

so, you know, food, shelter, live,

and the other is to be our authentic selves. The two ways

attach, authentic. And if we have to

choose between the two of them, we're going to go with attachment because we

die otherwise. Right. And so during childhood,

and he's done tons of research, as have others,

you may get conflicting messages from your parents. And my

parents were, they loved us. They were very well intended.

They had, you know, and they had

limited tools. Right. Yeah. You know, they had limited tools, so they did

the best they could. And that said there was alcoholism in the

house. And that hit me hard

for a wide variety of reasons. And that's the other thing. Childhood

adverse childhood experiences or ACEs,

they impact different people differently because

of our chemistry and our brains, all of that. But his

fascinating work is about how we

adapt or adopt. Excuse me, we adopt

strategies as little kiddos to survive, to

attach that somehow are inconsistent

with who we really are, our authentic selves.

And those strategies are great to get us through childhood,

but then later in life they're not so great. Right.

And I think for me, I was like, if you looked up high

achiever, it was like, like my. It was

ridiculous. Like just one high achievement after the next, after the next, after the

next. And so having gone through

this work, I see that I was predisposed

to have my nervous system go off the charts.

I was predisto. Predisposed not

to listen to my body. Yeah. I was

predisposed to like think express was just

normal. And I do think as a culture

there is a reckoning that we have to have

with what are we asking of our

people? And another big, you know, I'm

on a lot of soapboxes. I know. But mental health

is as important as physical health and

you truly cannot have one without the other.

Right. And so if you are going to be in a

super stressful job, awesome. And

make sure that you're listening to your body. Make sure that you are

engaged, actively engaging in stress

relieving activities. And I also think,

you know, as a mother, with, with kiddos, what am I? Role modeling? You know,

where were my priorities? What did all that look like? But long winded

answer. Yes, I feel like I was predisposed to

stress and that

absolutely had a devastating impact on my health

because I waited way too long. I just

kept pushing it down and pushing it down and it's like.

And I forget. So this is a great analogy. I forget who did it, but

it's like holding a beach ball underwater. Oh

yeah, yeah. And I think, I think that's really like a really

great visual. And thank you for sharing that. So

as we wrap up, what

advice do you have for someone who

is going through something similar? But at the beginning of when you start going through

things, what advice do you have?

So a few things, you know, listen to your body. It's always

talking to you. So listen while it's still whispering because it

will continue to escalate until it gets your attention.

Number two, it's okay not to be okay.

And I think it's a huge risk in our social media

focused society to think that

everybody's having their Instagram, that their whole life are their Instagram

reels, and that's just not real life.

So it's completely okay not to be okay.

And you know, resilience is super messy,

so you may feel super messy, and that's perfectly part

of the course. And let your team

rely on your team. Ask for help.

You would do the same for your friends, your family, your

neighbors. So stop. Especially women,

frankly, were socialized not to ask for help. So

please reach out and rely on your network. Yes.

I love that. That's such beautiful advice and that's what we stand for here at

the Global Resilience Project. Eileen,

thank you so much for sharing everything and

being here today. Thank you for this wonderful opportunity and

thanks again for the platform and what you're doing with both the

podcast and the book series. It's awesome. Oh, well, thank you. And thank you

to everyone who tuned in to another episode of Resilient af.

Eileen just reassured you what I've been saying

every week. You are not alone. It is okay

to not be okay. You will get through it. You have to put one foot

in front of the other. You have to want to feel better. You

don't have to do it alone. Let us be that lighthouse in the storm for

you. And just remember, friends, you are resilient

af. Yeah.