Mental Health, Athletics, and the Holistic Approach

00:00 Tiffani

Welcome to Finding Your Balance, a mental health podcast. My name is Tiffani Fritzsche. I'm a

00:04 Tiffani

licensed mental health counselor. I'm joined with my friend, Kirk Fasshauer, licensed clinical

00:07 Tiffani

social worker. If this is your first time joining us, we're so happy you're here. Welcome. If this

00:12 Tiffani

is your second time or your third or fourth or fifth, welcome back. We're so happy you're here.

00:17 Tiffani

Absolutely. And today we have a very special guest. Joining us in our studio is Jessica Dobbertin

00:21 Tiffani

-Brusso. She's a licensed clinical social worker and founder of Willow's Path Counseling. Jessica,

00:27 Tiffani

we are so happy to have you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. So first of all, please tell us,

00:33 Tiffani

Willow's Path, what is it named after? It's named after my cat, Willow. That is my favorite thing.

00:39 Jessica

It's, you know, it's got a little unique twist to it. But yeah, so with Willow, I thought you could

00:44 Jessica

go with... You know, our pets are very special to us. They have a lot of meaning and connection,

00:48 Jessica

which you could also connect with counseling as well and pet therapy. And then also like willow

00:53 Jessica

trees symbolize growth and the changes and seasons in our lives and shedding of leaves and rebirth

00:58 Jessica

and growth and all that cool stuff. So that was kind of the inspiration behind the name. So I've

01:03 Tiffani

known you for a long time. And one of my favorite things about you and Kirk, I hope you will agree,

01:08 Tiffani

or maybe you have a different favorite thing, is I love how you really approach mental health in a

01:13 Tiffani

holistic way. oh thanks oh yes yes absolutely we are all it's all one thing not only with like

01:20 Tiffani

nutrition but also your sleep and also physical activity and so i've watched you through the years

01:26 Tiffani

just as you've grown you know in your career and in your practice with mental health and you walk

01:31 Tiffani

the walk And so I've seen you from afar and up close, and I've definitely seen you're consistently

01:36 Tiffani

focused on how do you holistically create a balanced, really, life.

01:41 Tiffani

And so we'd love for you to just kind of jump in and talk to us about what are some of the

01:45 Tiffani

practical ways that you practice mental health in a holistic fashion? And how is that something

01:50 Tiffani

that we can do like day to day? That's a great question. Well, I think that... of that was inspired

01:56 Jessica

from being in the mental health field and seeing the impact on ourselves as what we carry during

01:59 Jessica

the day, trying to hold space for other people. And then with being an athlete, wanting to figure

02:04 Jessica

out the best ways or the best ways for myself and my body and my lifestyle to continue to sustain

02:09 Jessica

what I wanted to be able to do. What were the specific questions? So many questions that I've

02:14 Tiffani

already forgotten. Let's reset. That's called rapid fire questioning. What brought you to Florida?

02:21 Tiffani

Why don't you jump into there? Because I think that leads into our next question. How did you get

02:25 Jessica

here? So I was recruited for the Florida Southern College water ski team. So I went to college

02:30 Jessica

there and competed on the team all four years. That sounded really repetitive. Please edit that.

02:37 Jessica

But I was recruited. I competed there. You know, looked into different master's programs.

02:43 Jessica

I always knew I wanted to be a therapist. So I kind of stuck around and have wanted to stay in the

02:48 Jessica

water ski community. And I've continued to become a competitor. So it was really fun to be

02:53 Kirk

realistic. Yeah, that was an exciting bit of you that I learned about when you joined us.

02:59 Kirk

And it was like, oh, that's cool. We've had conversations about that. What's it like? Is it hard

03:04 Kirk

competing? Things like this. But do you utilize that as a release?

03:10 Kirk

Is that for your mental health? Yeah. Or was it something else that drew you into skiing?

03:16 Jessica

Some of both. I mean, the passion, just like the adrenaline, the excitement of being involved in a

03:22 Jessica

sport and competing, all of that was definitely what drew me to it. But what's kept me in it was

03:26 Jessica

how much fun I had, the sense of community I got within the sport. It was a family sport.

03:32 Jessica

I grew up all, my whole family was competing. Okay. So we'd always travel to tournaments together.

03:37 Jessica

All family style, kind of fun, competitive vibes there. So coming into college, it was already easy

03:42 Jessica

to transition to that team environment of that's my new competitive family. Training together,

03:47 Jessica

practicing together, competing together, cheering each other on. So that kind of piece is…

03:54 Kirk

What was it about water skiing, though? I mean... When you think of…

03:59 Kirk

going into sports, people think, oh, baseball, softball, track, field, you know, those kinds of things.

04:04 Kirk

But water skiing is, wow, all right, yes. It's very different, right? It's different, yeah. So I

04:08 Jessica

was very fortunate to grow up on a public lake in upstate New York. And my dad and my mom,

04:14 Jessica

they both water skied. My dad used to manage a water ski team way before I was born that would do

04:19 Jessica

show skiing and things like that of that nature. And when we were growing up, we all got involved

04:24 Jessica

and connected to the right people to do competitive skiing and learn about. Nice. slalom skiing and

04:30 Jessica

kind of the fire just kind of kept going in our family. So that's kind of what continued the

04:35 Tiffani

passion. So the question that I've had while you've been talking about this is going from New York

04:39 Tiffani

water skiing to Florida water skiing. There probably aren’t alligators in New York. And so did you

04:44 Tiffani

have to learn special skills water skiing in Florida? Yeah, you definitely keep your head on a

04:50 Jessica

swivel down here. You also learn at the times of the day where the fellow other lake occupants like

04:58 Jessica

to spend their time. They have like a morning and an evening routine. So they'll just pass by and

05:03 Jessica

you just let them go and then you wait and then you carry on. Sometimes you got to nudge them a

05:08 Jessica

little bit because we don't want to be their lunchtime snack. But usually they keep to themselves.

05:13 Jessica

It's kind of just all share the water time. Works out pretty good. Wow. So you talked about

05:20 Tiffani

becoming an athlete. Well, you've been an athlete for a while, but whenever you came down to

05:24 Tiffani

college, I would imagine there's a lot of pressure on not wanting to disappoint your team. A

05:29 Tiffani

hundred percent. Or not wanting to disappoint your school group and your family. That sounds like a

05:33 Jessica

lot. Yeah. So with having like a scholarship, you have that kind of pressure, right? Because if you

05:37 Jessica

don't perform, you could lose that funding, which could be detrimental to your education. Your

05:43 Jessica

ability to be at that school. So that was one piece. Another piece is, of course, your family's

05:47 Jessica

worked hard to help you get to this spot. And everyone's proud of you talking about, oh,

05:53 Jessica

Jessie's over at school, right? So that's another layer of competing and being an athlete. And then

05:57 Jessica

you have your team. You don't want to let them down. So you want to perform well enough to carry

06:01 Jessica

the score for the team. And then on campus, everyone identifies you as an athlete. So that becomes

06:07 Jessica

your identity. And a lot of college athletes struggle with that being like their

06:12 Jessica

purpose, like that is the main core of who they are. So then a lot of weight gets put into

06:17 Jessica

performance, your output, your scores, like how you're performing, that kind of thing.

06:23 Tiffani

So hearing you talk, I think a lot of times people equate their sense of value or their self-worth

06:29 Tiffani

in how they perform or what they do. And I can imagine whenever it's going well,

06:35 Tiffani

it goes really well. And when it's not going so well, it can hit really hard. Yes.

06:41 Tiffani

Tell me, like, as an athlete, what are some ways that you have found to find that balance when

06:46 Tiffani

maybe it's not going well? How do you not lose yourself in that? It's an ongoing journey,

06:51 Jessica

for the record. But a lot of it is learning your support system, who can help you navigate those

06:57 Jessica

moments. Because sometimes when you're in it so deep, you don't see that it's just a Tuesday.

07:03 Jessica

And you're on the water. You know what I mean? Like you don't see the bigger picture. Like, okay, I

07:07 Jessica

didn't get injured today. Okay, exercise today. Okay, it was a beautiful day. I was outside. I'm

07:13 Jessica

with my friends. Like all the positive things you don't think about in that moment. In that moment,

07:16 Jessica

you think about I failed. I let myself down. I didn't accomplish my goal. I've invested time,

07:21 Jessica

money, resources, whatever, to get to this spot. Like you think about all the negative things. So

07:26 Jessica

some of the things that I've found that have helped me is creating that support system of the

07:30 Jessica

people that know. how to kind of guide you when you're stuck in it and you can't pull yourself out.

07:35 Jessica

And then also we all have our own little coping skills that help us with that. So for me, it'd be

07:38 Jessica

music is one thing because sometimes some tournaments you have multiple rounds a day. So even if

07:43 Jessica

you did terribly the first round, you still have to figure out how to clear your head and give it

07:48 Jessica

another go later in the afternoon. So music is really good. I love yoga,

07:53 Jessica

breath work, just to kind of notice how your nervous system is responding to how you're feeling.

07:59 Jessica

That has been very... it kind of keeps you more connected to like okay this is bothering me more

08:03 Jessica

than I thought it did or how can I let this go how can I best prepare for my next next round that

08:10 Kirk

kind of thing. So how would you you gave some ideas as to what what you did but how would you help

08:17 Kirk

somebody who's maybe just starting out some of our listeners or with colleges just breaking out on

08:24 Kirk

their own there they might be involved in sports and I Yeah, I totally see that. It's a big value

08:31 Kirk

piece for folks and a lot of pressure. How do you help them start to build a support network?

08:38 Jessica

So leaning on your teammates, the ones that you feel you really connect well with. Because, I mean,

08:43 Jessica

when you're on some soccer teams, there are like 20, 30 kids, right? It's really hard to connect

08:47 Jessica

with everyone. But usually you're able to kind of navigate and find a buddy that kind of thinks

08:52 Jessica

similarly to you. Or maybe it's a coach. Maybe it's a mentor. Maybe it's an assistant coach. Maybe

08:57 Jessica

it's another person in the sport that isn't necessarily at your college. Maybe it's your buddy from

09:02 Jessica

your hometown soccer team or whatever. That is still a very, very good support network. Some of my

09:07 Jessica

closest supporters, besides my close family and husband and coach, are... People that are in

09:12 Jessica

different states that support me that are also professional water skiers. So we kind of connect

09:16 Jessica

with each other. Even though they don't do the same discipline that I do, they might be jumpers.

09:21 Jessica

But I won't hold that against you if you're watching. But we're able to kind of have that

09:25 Jessica

understanding and support. So that's one way is leaning on your teammates, kind of finding how you

09:30 Jessica

connect with them. Another way is just kind of learning your body, learning what things set you

09:36 Jessica

off. And trying to identify like those. I mean, for lack of a better word, trigger. What triggers

09:42 Jessica

you into that downward spiral of thought processes? Is it that fear of failure? Is it that who's

09:47 Jessica

watching me and I'm failing? Is it, you know, kind of navigating those thought processes?

09:52 Kirk

Yeah, so is that something you just sat down and wrote out, or is it something you talked with your

09:57 Kirk

connection, your social network? Yeah, some of it was that. Some of it was social network.

10:03 Jessica

Over the years, I have hired a sports psychologist as well, and I saw them regularly for a bit to

10:08 Jessica

kind of help better understand the process. But as a beginner in the sport or as a college

10:13 Jessica

athlete, or maybe that isn't an accessible resource, yeah, like journaling, reflecting. Why am I

10:18 Jessica

doing this? What's your why? Why are you here? Why do you like to do this sport? What brings you to

10:23 Jessica

the water or to the court every day? Just remembering. And grounding in those things,

10:29 Jessica

like I said earlier, like, I'm at the lake. It's sunny out. I get to ski. I'm with my friends. It's

10:33 Jessica

beautiful. I got to exercise. I got to move my body. That's still something to be grateful for. So

10:38 Jessica

kind of having your gratitude list, for lack of a better word, can kind of help with that,

10:44 Jessica

too. Did I answer that question? You did. You did. I think, well,

10:49 Kirk

because I think there's two sides to being involved in sports. It’s one

10:57 Kirk

Physically involved, it helps with our mental health, keeps our head clear, things like that.

11:03 Kirk

But then there's also, like you said, the pressure of performance and finding ways to overcome some

11:10 Kirk

of those pressures, to have a little release valve because some pressure is good.

11:16 Jessica

Yes.

11:18 Kirk

Overwhelming pressure is not good. Correct. So that can debilitate you in your performance. You

11:25 Kirk

mentioned music. So how did music play a role in either moving you forward or slowing you down?

11:32 Jessica

So I have a certain playlist for my warm-up. Okay. Which has a variety of different genres.

11:36 Jessica

Depending on what mood I'm in, I'll select certain songs. And then in between rounds, if I need to

11:40 Jessica

kind of chill out, if I hear my mind is going a million miles a minute. Adding more pump-up music

11:46 Jessica

is not going to help that energy. It's going to make it worse than shifting into something a little

11:52 Jessica

bit more calming. But I like all different genres, just depending on my mood. So learning what kind

11:58 Jessica

of music makes you more motivated, gets you focused, gets you, you know. Allowing you to be in that

12:04 Jessica

headspace to move your body the way you need to, whether that is calming down, whether that's

12:08 Jessica

warming up, whether that's getting fired up. Right. So when I've done a stress management workshop,

12:14 Kirk

I talk about music being – and people look at me and go, how's music? Well, it can stress you or it

12:20 Kirk

can de-stress you depending on what you pick. And I said – because I do talk about it as a –

12:28 Kirk

utilizing anxiety and stress for performative issues. There's a certain level that you want to be

12:34 Kirk

anxious and stressed at that's like your peak performance. You don't want to go over that line.

12:39 Kirk

You don't want to go under that line. And I talk about a lot of athletes. They strive for this and

12:46 Kirk

often visualization being one of those things. We can talk about that in a minute. But music. And

12:51 Kirk

then I looked at my audience and I say, so what is your theme song? And they all look at me kind of

12:56 Kirk

funny. So I'm going to ask you, what is your theme song? Do you have one? It depends on the day.

13:02 Jessica

Does it? I mean, I have that like that core playlist. Like those are probably like I could pick one

13:07 Jessica

on that playlist depending on the day, how I was feeling. But it's definitely on that playlist. So

13:12 Jessica

it depends on the day, what headspace I'm in. If I need a little more energy, maybe a little more

13:17 Jessica

techno, maybe. This is totally aging myself, but Avicii's Levels is a really good millennial song.

13:25 Jessica

But it's a techno vibe for the most part, just not focusing on exact words. And then there's days

13:30 Jessica

where you need that motivational kind of message through music. So I love a lot of reggae for that

13:36 Jessica

purpose. Roots music, a lot more grounding, connecting to believing in yourself and believing in

13:44 Jessica

community and that kind of thing. Nice, nice. I've got two that really get me going.

13:49 Kirk

Okay. One is My Sunrise. It's by Audrey Napoleon. Ooh.

13:56 Kirk

Electronic music. Cool. Okay. And then Unstoppable. Oh, that's a good one.

14:02 Jessica

Sia. Oh, I have several of her songs on my pump-up playlist, to be honest. Yeah, yeah. That's the

14:07 Tiffani

one that's like, yeah. Yeah. That's it. So listen, I don't know my theme song right now because…

14:13 Tiffani

I can't say my brain is blank, but I vividly remember during college, for better or for worse,

14:20 Tiffani

the listeners, please do not age me with this response. But I was an RA at my college,

14:26 Tiffani

actually at this college, and I would open up the doors and I would start singing the song Good

14:31 Tiffani

Morning Baltimore from the Hairspray musical. Right. I can see that. And let's be clear,

14:38 Tiffani

no one asked for this. I'm sure someone did. And let's be clear. No one was grateful or thankful

14:44 Tiffani

for this. And I got many requests to stop. But you just filter out the noise, right? And so Good

14:49 Tiffani

Morning, Baltimore. I would sing it every morning to my residents. I'm picturing.

14:56 Jessica

the clip of the movie right now right yeah that was me and so i don't i haven't heard did you skip

15:01 Jessica

along the halls too that would be maybe some spinning i think that we both know my vibe um just

15:08 Tiffani

listening to you kind of talk through this one thing that makes me really um curious is what what

15:17 Tiffani

would you say has been like the biggest um i guess noticeable like factor like how your mental

15:24 Tiffani

health influences how you play the game or how you play the sport, which like water skiing,

15:30 Tiffani

I guess, is it like a game? It's a sport. But how do you see your mental health influencing how you

15:35 Tiffani

do? How do you guard that? You know what I mean? Oh, my gosh. Yeah. Very good question. So with

15:40 Jessica

skiing, you can kind of compare it to a lot of other sports as well. But with skiing, it's kind of

15:45 Jessica

like.

15:48 Jessica

You're working really hard for like 17 seconds and then you're resting. And then you're working

15:53 Jessica

really hard for 17 seconds and then you're resting. So in that 17 seconds, your brain is working in

15:58 Jessica

overdrive. If you are distracted thinking about what you're having for lunch, what you have to do

16:04 Jessica

later that day, that 17 seconds is going to be very, very difficult. So some of my warm-up prep

16:10 Jessica

and meditation and music and things I try to do off the water to prepare for that transition onto

16:17 Jessica

the water is to help calm down the mind, to limit that extra noise and chatter in the mind.

16:22 Tiffani

Kind of limit what comes in so you can know what to focus on? Correct. I would imagine that takes a

16:26 Tiffani

lot of discipline. It's a learning process. It's an ongoing experience,

16:32 Jessica

right? There are better days than others. That's just how it goes. That's the reality. Yeah,

16:37 Tiffani

absolutely. So talk to me about sleep and nutrition. Oh, my gosh. Those have been two really,

16:43 Jessica

really big factors in helping with focus and your attention span and your physical output in the

16:50 Jessica

sport as well. I noticed as I tracked my sleep and kind of kept an eye on it,

16:56 Jessica

when I felt the best was eight, eight and a half hours of sleep is what my body needed. And I've

17:00 Jessica

learned the better ways to wind down and prepare for sleep to get more restful sleep. Sometimes I'd

17:05 Jessica

be like, oh, I was in bed for 20 hours or whatever, and then I'd still wake up exhausted. Well,

17:10 Jessica

what was I doing? Did I have sugar right before bed? Did I watch TV in bed?

17:15 Jessica

You know, all the different things to kind of keep your mind going and the sugar affects your sleep

17:20 Jessica

as well. So different things like that to kind of help.

17:25 Kirk

So people have heard the term holistic approach. Yeah. What does that mean to you?

17:31 Kirk

What does that look like? To me, it means that you're looking at the whole body and the whole

17:36 Jessica

experience of how things interact and affect each other. So, for example, like nutrition, that's

17:41 Jessica

your input and your performance would be your output. But you need to fuel your body with the

17:47 Jessica

right things to help get what you want out of it. And sleep is recovery.

17:52 Jessica

If you don't have the right recovery, you're not going to be able to continue to grow and build

17:56 Jessica

muscle and to give your mind a break to then enhance the focus and all of that stuff.

18:01 Jessica

So to me, that all goes, all plays a huge part in each other. Okay. Because a lot of what you're

18:09 Kirk

saying, I look back and think, okay, that's... Also how you can study well,

18:15 Kirk

get through life pretty well. Work. Work. Relationships. Relationships. I mean,

18:21 Kirk

it covers a lot. Yes. It covers a lot if you do those things. Cool.

18:27 Jessica

Yeah. Some nutrition, focusing on what kind of foods your body agrees with,

18:33 Jessica

what kind of foods your body doesn't agree with, what makes you more sleepy. Don't eat those before

18:39 Jessica

you're about to perform. That's not going to be productive. Right, right. So just kind of learning

18:43 Kirk

those things. No, there's not one. Well, I guess you could go to the Internet and have people tell

18:50 Kirk

you this stuff, but really it's individualistic. I mean, what's going to work for you isn't

18:55 Kirk

necessarily going to work for me or for Tiffani. Correct. So would you say it's much more of an

19:04 Kirk

exploratory process? Yes. Trial and error. Trial and error. You know,

19:09 Jessica

it's common. You'll probably see athletes that'll be like, oh, I'm not going to drink coffee before

19:13 Jessica

I perform or before I, you know, exercise or whatever, because I'll be too jittery and I won't be

19:17 Jessica

able to think. And then some people are like, well, I need to wake my mind up. So it really just

19:21 Jessica

depends on the person. A lot of it's trial and error. There are some like foundational pieces. You

19:26 Jessica

don't want anything with, you know, excessive sugar or extremely processed foods because that's

19:31 Jessica

going to cause extra inflammation in the body. So it's going to be much harder for your body to

19:34 Jessica

recover. And it's also going to affect how your brain functions with focus as well. Okay.

19:41 Tiffani

I'm so interested in you talking about just the pressures that you don't even think about as an

19:47 Tiffani

athlete. I clearly was not a college athlete because I don't like to exercise.

19:55 Tiffani

And also, I exercise sometimes,

20:00 Tiffani

but it was never like a passion of mine. It was never like on my radar, the stressors that athletes

20:07 Tiffani

face because I wasn't a student-athlete. You know what I mean? And so one thing that I have noticed

20:11 Tiffani

on my children are pretty athletic and I'll go to these games and I'm talking about. middle school

20:17 Tiffani

games and there's so much pressure. The parents are yelling in the stands or um one thing that i'd

20:24 Tiffani

like to do and I think Kirk I think maybe you'd like to do this as well when i'm in public places i

20:28 Tiffani

like to just like watch people and see how they react which i'm sure somebody's watching me but um

20:33 Tiffani

i noticed very um just very keenly at one of the games i was at recently One of the teams did not

20:41 Tiffani

do well, and these are middle school kids. They did not do well, and the coach was so just hard at

20:48 Tiffani

them, yelling. And you got the kids just, they look so defeated. And you look at the parents, and

20:53 Tiffani

the parents are frustrated and disappointed. And I'm thinking, It's just a game. Now, I know I'm

20:58 Tiffani

not the one playing, and I know there's a lot of other factors involved, but I feel like for so

21:02 Tiffani

many of us, we forget that the kids or the college athletes, they're people, and they have

21:07 Tiffani

feelings, and they have emotions. And sometimes I think that the spectators want to be entertained,

21:13 Tiffani

and they don't remember that there are real people out there playing. And so I love hearing your

21:19 Tiffani

perspective as a student athlete. All the pressures that you're carrying, and even the weight of

21:25 Tiffani

disappointing other people. That's a lot. And so for people who are maybe not the athlete,

21:31 Tiffani

that maybe they're the friend or maybe they're the parent or the classmate, what can we do to

21:37 Tiffani

support that athlete and help hold their feelings when there's a lot of pressure going on? I think

21:42 Jessica

one of the biggest things that's helped me from my support system is validating. I can see you're

21:48 Jessica

really upset about how you skied today or how you performed today or today wasn't a good day. You

21:53 Jessica

know, just validating that experience. Because sometimes when we try to be super uplifting and

21:58 Jessica

motivating and inspiring, we're not in that thought process yet. Hopefully we shift quickly.

22:04 Jessica

But in that moment, it's just like you're trying to argue that the sky is purple. Like it's just

22:09 Jessica

not. Your brain is not computing that because you're in that headspace of being so upset or so

22:14 Jessica

focused on that failure piece. So the biggest thing is validating being with them.

22:19 Jessica

I know that sucks. I know. I know you worked really hard. I know. Well, what can you do better?

22:24 Jessica

What can you learn from this? Are some of the thought process shifts that people have asked me and

22:28 Jessica

that I've learned things that I need to kind of ask myself in that experience as well. It's like,

22:32 Jessica

how can I, what's one takeaway? that I can do from learn from this experience? What's one thing I

22:37 Jessica

can do better next time? And just treating it as like it's another opportunity to grow and to get

22:42 Jessica

better instead of I didn't meet my goal. It's a way to kind of reframe it. Well,

22:48 Tiffani

and you've said multiple times throughout this episode that it's a process or, you know, we're

22:52 Tiffani

still working on this. I really love to hear just that sense of grace and understanding that we're

22:57 Tiffani

imperfect people. And for the most part, we're doing the best we can do. And we're not going to get

23:01 Tiffani

it right every time. And sometimes we do and we celebrate and rejoice. And some days we don't. It's

23:07 Tiffani

okay to feel sad. It's okay to sit in it for a minute. And like you said, acknowledge how I feel.

23:13 Tiffani

Yeah. And then you take a breath and you get to work. Yeah, exactly. So that's really helpful

23:18 Kirk

information. Thanks. Yeah. Yeah, I really appreciate you being here. Absolutely. Thank you for

23:23 Kirk

joining us today. Absolutely. On our podcast. Thank you for having me. Wonderful. Thanks.

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