Have you ever had a relatively small situation create a surprisingly big emotional reaction?

Someone doesn’t text you back. Your partner’s tone changes. Someone seems irritated. You feel left out, criticized, or unappreciated—and suddenly your mind is creating an entire story about what it means.

If you grew up in a dysfunctional or unpredictable family, there may be a reason those moments feel so intense.

In this Tammy’s Takes, I’m following up on my conversation with Meagan DeMatteo and going deeper into something we discussed called emotional sobriety—learning how to experience our emotions without automatically allowing them to determine what something means or what we do next.

For many adult children of dysfunction, being highly aware of other people was once a survival skill. We learned to watch faces, listen to changes in tone, sense the energy in the room, anticipate what might happen next, and adjust ourselves accordingly.

But those patterns don’t necessarily disappear when childhood ends.

Sometimes the person or situation in front of us activates something much older. The emotion we're experiencing is absolutely real—but the story our brain attaches to that emotion may not be the whole truth.

In this episode, I’ll teach you how to begin separating three things that can happen so quickly they feel like one:

The trigger. The feeling. The story.

We’ll also talk about why a big reaction can sometimes be a clue that an old belief or wound has been activated, and how my Body Before Story approach can help you slow down before automatically reacting.

I’ll give you three questions you can use when you notice yourself becoming activated:

What am I feeling?

What story am I telling myself about what just happened?

What do I actually know to be true?

Because there’s a big difference between:

“She hasn't answered my text.”

and

“She hasn't answered because she's upset with me, I did something wrong, and she's pulling away.”

One is what happened.

The other is the story your nervous system may be creating around what happened.

The goal isn't to stop having emotions. Anger, sadness, fear, anxiety, frustration and hurt can all give us valuable information.

The work is learning how to feel the emotion without automatically handing it the steering wheel.

And that little bit of space between the trigger and your response? That’s where you begin to have something you may not have had when you were growing up:

Choice.

💜 READY TO UNDERSTAND THE PATTERNS UNDERNEATH YOUR REACTIONS?

If you grew up in dysfunction and find yourself overthinking, people-pleasing, fearing rejection, shutting down, reacting strongly, or constantly trying to figure out what everyone around you is thinking or feeling, this is exactly the kind of work I help people with.

Book your complimentary Clarity & Calm Call here:

Book Your Complimentary Clarity & Calm Call

We can look at the patterns that keep showing up in your life, what may be underneath them, and how you can begin building more nervous system safety, emotional regulation, and self-trust.

💜 You survived the dysfunction. Now you get to discover who you are beyond it.

Well, hello everybody, and welcome back

to another episode of Tammy's Takes, where

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we take powerful conversations and turn

them into practical strategies, honestly,

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that you can use right here, right now.

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So today I wanna go a little

bit deeper into the conversation

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I had with Megan DiMatteo.

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And it really got me thinking about

something I see all the time, not

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only with the people that I work

with, but something that I've learned

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to live with in my own life too.

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And that is the difference between feeling

an emotion and allowing that emotion

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to decide what something means, because

those are two totally different things.

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So Megan used the term emotional sobriety,

and I love the way she explained it.

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If you haven't listened to the episode,

go back to yesterday's episode.

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She does a very, very good job at

explaining what emotional sobriety is.

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And when you grow up around alcoholism,

addiction, dysfunction, unpredictability,

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or other kinds of trauma, you can

become really good at reacting.

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So you're watching what's happening

around you, you're putting out fires,

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you're preparing for disappointment, and

you're always ready to protect yourself.

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And when you think about it, that

honestly makes complete sense.

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So as a child, you didn't have a lot

of control over what was happening.

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If the adults around you

were unpredictable, you had

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to learn how to read them.

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You learned to watch their face,

listen to the tone of voice, feel the

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energy in the room even, and figure

out what you needed to do next.

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So you became a very good reactor.

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The problem is, when you grow up, leave

the house, build an entirely different

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life, that ability to react comes right

along with you, like all these other great

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things when you grow up in dysfunction.

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So sometimes things that are Really

small feel really big because you're

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still living in that childlike state.

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Have you ever had something

relatively small happen and your

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reaction felt completely out of

proportion to what actually happened?

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Maybe somebody didn't text you

back right away, or maybe you're

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talking to your partner and his

tone just changes a tiny bit.

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Maybe somebody asks you for something

when you're already overwhelmed,

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or your boss sends you that

dreaded message, "Can we talk?"

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Or somebody cuts you off in traffic.

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I mean, a million different things

can be so small, but s- you would

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think they would be relatively

insignificant, and your reaction

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would be maybe mildly irritated, but

instead, your entire body is activated.

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Now your brain starts writing a story.

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"They're mad at me.

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I'm being taken advantage of again.

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Nobody appreciates me.

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I did something wrong.

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What the hell is wrong with these people?"

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Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

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But it always ends up

being the same thing.

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Something bad is about to happen.

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That's the part I want you to

notice because honestly, in

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your body, that feeling is real.

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It is 100% real.

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But the story that your brain

attaches it to might not be.

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Megan gave a great example of this.

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She talked about one day when she was

walking through Central Park in New York

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when she was in a period of her life

where she was really feeling kind of

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depleted and overwhelmed already, right?

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So a woman walked up to her, simply

approached her and asked for directions,

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but inside, Megan had this huge reaction.

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Her story became, "Everybody

always needs something from me.

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I never get time for myself."

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Literally, from just a simple

comment of somebody saying,

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"How do I get to X, Y, and Z?"

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So the woman, the woman, sorry, that asked

the question wasn't really the issue.

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She had bumped into an old belief,

and I think that's where we can

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learn so much about ourselves because

often these triggers, they're clues.

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I say this a lot when your

reaction is much bigger than

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the situation in front of you.

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Get curious.

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Don't immediately shame yourself and

say, "Oh my gosh, Tammy, I'm ridiculous.

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Why am I so upset about this?"

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But don't also immediately

assume that everything your

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mind is telling you is true.

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There's gotta be kind of a

middle ground here, right?

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Something in you got activated,

so find out what it is.

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This is where something that I

talk about all the time comes in.

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It's the body before story approach,

and I'm sure if you've listened to any

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of my podcasts, especially my Tammy

Takes, that you have heard it before.

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Because what you need to do is this.

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Before you start deciding what the other

person's intentions were, before you send

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back a text, before you react and, and

really do something or say something that

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you probably will regret, or before you

shut down, before you start rehearsing

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that story in your head over and over

again, just come back to your body.

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Where do you feel it?

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Again, many of us feel it

in many different places.

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Maybe your chest gets tight.

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Maybe your throat closes up.

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Maybe your shoulders go up and

you're l- right around your ears.

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Maybe you get that pit in your

stomach or you feel your jaw clench.

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Those are all different things

that happen to your body, right?

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And Megan and I talked about this a lot.

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Learning to identify where the

emotion is showing up in the body,

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and then name what you're feeling.

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Instead of saying, "Everything

is terrible," maybe say,

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"Ooh, my stomach hurts.

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I'm a little anxious right now."

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Instead of feeling, you know, instead of,

like, doing these all or nothing comments,

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really, like, maybe, you know, I…

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Instead of saying, "Nobody likes me,"

maybe, "I'm feeling rejected right now."

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So you need to really name how you're

feeling, and you can feel it in your body.

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How does that feel?

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Give it a, give it an object.

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Like, if it's in your chest, is it heavy?

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Is it light?

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Is it thick?

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Is it hot?

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Is it cold?

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Give it some dimension,

and then name what it is.

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Because you wanna start being

able to notice the emotion instead

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of becoming the emotion Megan

used a really good, um, analogy.

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I think it was Megan, or it might

have been somebody else on one of my

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other podcasts, but it was an analogy

that kind of really stuck with me.

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So think of your emotions like somebody

sitting in the passenger seat of your car.

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They're allowed to be there.

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You've invited them in, right?

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You don't have to throw

them out of the car.

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You don't have to kick them out.

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You don't have to tell them to shut up.

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You don't have to pretend

they're not there.

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So listen to them.

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Maybe it's, maybe your emotions are

it's fear, and it's saying something

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about this doesn't feel safe.

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Maybe it's saying, "I set a

boundary, and it was crossed."

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Maybe you have resentment in you,

and it's saying, "I'm giving more

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than I actually want to give."

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Those are all useful information, but

you don't want them to be able to get

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into the driver's seat and drive the car.

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Does that make sense?

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Is that an analogy that

maybe you can put up with?

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So that's really emotional regulation.

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You can have it sitting next to you.

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You can observe it.

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You can see it.

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You can describe it, but you

don't let it run the show.

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So it's not I shouldn't ever feel angry.

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It's I'm angry.

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Let me decide what to do with that.

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Because many times when we have

these gut reactions, and we react

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before we can actually take the

time to process and respond, we

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say things we don't want to say.

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We do things we don't want to do.

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We get ourselves into a heap of trouble.

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Let's be honest, right?

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So the, the object here really

is to interrupt the pattern.

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So here's something I

want you to practice.

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You know, again, practical

strategies, tips, tricks.

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This is what I do.

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I wanna…

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You know, and if you like

this, subscribe, follow me.

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We get these every other day, and

they're things that you can put

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into practice on a regular basis.

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So the next time you find yourself

getting activated, do not exact- like,

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immediately try to calm yourself down.

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I don't even want calm to be the goal.

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I want space to be the goal.

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Give yourself enough space between

what happened and what you do next.

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They say there is power in the

pause, and they are not lying.

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But what do you do in that pause?

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Couple things.

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You can put your feet on the ground.

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You can take a slow breath.

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You can notice where you're

feeling the activation in your

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body and name the emotion.

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Then ask yourself a couple questions.

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One, what am I feeling?

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Two, what story am I telling

myself about what just happened?

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And then three, what do I

actually know to be true?

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Because sometimes the story that you're

telling yourself and what is actually

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true has nothing to do with each other.

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Maybe your friend hasn't texted

you, and the story that you tell

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yourself is, "She's upset with me."

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But what do you actually know?

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All you know is she hasn't texted you.

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There could be a thousand different

reasons she didn't text you.

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So don't automatically assume that

she's upset with me is the true story.

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That's it.

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Just facts.

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Let's stick with facts sometimes, because

boy, let me tell you, if you grew up

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in dysfunction, you are a great filler

in the blanker, I guess you could say.

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I like to call that.

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We fill in the blanks.

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If we don't know the

story, we fill them in.

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And how do we fill them in?

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We fill them in based on our

experiences, our past experiences, our

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perceptions of the world, or the lens

that we're looking at the world with.

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We wanna start to change that lens.

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So what we're gonna do here- We're gonna

just actually go with what we know.

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So maybe your partner walks through the

door one day and he seems irritated,

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and your nervous system immediately

says, "Oh my God, what did I do?"

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What do you actually know?

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You just know they're quiet.

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Do you see the difference?

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What we're doing here is we are

separating the event from the story.

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Because when you've spent a lifetime

reacting to everything around you, the

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little space in between what happens

and what you do about it is where

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you start getting your power back.

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So awareness is not the beginning,

or awareness is the beginning, sorry.

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Awareness is the beginning,

but it is not the end.

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Um, another part of the conversation

that I had with Megan that I really

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loved, because we talked about how

awareness is everything, and I said, yes,

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awareness is absolutely the first step.

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But once you become aware of your

patterns, now you have the opportunity

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to start doing something different,

and I mean that with all of my heart.

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You won't do it perfectly at

first, but I don't want you

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to beat yourself up about it.

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You might catch yourself after

you've already reacted and

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thought, "Ugh, there, there it is.

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There I go again."

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That's okay.

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At first you notice it maybe three hours

later, then maybe you notice it an hour

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later, and then within a week of noticing

it and paying attention and not shaming

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yourself, but just being curious, maybe

you now you notice it 20 minutes later.

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That is progress One day, you

might even catch it before

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the old reaction comes out.

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That is our goal for you,

and that is progress.

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So we're not trying to become

people who never get angry, who

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never get triggered, who never

get scared, hurt, or overwhelmed.

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We're learning that we can have

the emotions without handing them

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control over what happens next.

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So this week, I want you

to catch one reaction.

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Just one.

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When you notice yourself getting

disappointed or disproportionately

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angry, defensive, mad, sad, anxious,

hurt, rejected, whatever it is, don't

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immediately ask, "What is wrong with me?"

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Ask, "What did this just touch in me?"

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Then go to the body.

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Where am I feeling it?

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What am I feeling?

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What story am I telling myself, and what

do I actually know right now to be true?

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You will be absolutely amazed at

what you discover, I promise you.

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Because sometimes the person

staring at you in front of you is

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not the person the nervous system

is actually responding to, right?

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Sometimes you're responding

to something you learned 10,

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20, 30, 40, even 50 years ago.

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And once you can see that, you

can have something you didn't

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have when you were a little kid.

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You have choice.

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Now you have choice, and we wanna

start exercising that choice.

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So if you're sitting there listening

to me, thinking, "Oh my God, Tammy,

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this is exactly what happens to me.

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I think I'm overreacting because in the

moment I can't seem to stop it," that's

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exactly the kind of people I work with.

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In my complimentary Clarity

to Calm call we go over that.

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We look at the patterns and we see

what keeps showing up, and we see

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what might be underneath them, and

how you can bring them up and start

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creating that space between reacting and

responding, the trigger and the response.

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Those are the things.

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We're gonna bridge that gap.

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We're gonna bridge that gap and we're

gonna open up, make more space for

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logical thinking, using the logical

side of your brain, the one we all have.

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So if you wanna get one of those

calls, it is complimentary, 100% free.

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Just go to the show notes,

book a link, and we will chat.

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But until then, I want you to

remember this: your feelings are real.

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Listen to them.

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Get curious about them.

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Let them give you information.

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But remember, they don't always tell the

whole story, and you need to know that.

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The goal here, my friend,

is to not stop feeling.

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We've been doing that our whole lives.

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The goal is to feel and be able

to choose what happens next.

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So until next time, love you guys.

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I'm here for you, and come

back for the next Tammy's Take.

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Y'all have a blessed day.

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Bye.