Encore: S03 Ep. 19 - Kate’s People-Pleasing Trap

This is an I Heart Podcast. Guaranteed Human. Hi, it's Jo Interesting, host of the Spirit Daughter podcast, where we talk about astrology, natal charts, and how to step into your most vibrant life. And today I'm talking with my dear friend, Christa Williams. It can change you in the best way possible, dance with the change, dance with the breakdowns, the embodiment of Pisces Intuition with Capricorn Power Moves. So I'm like delusionally proud of my chart. Listen to the Spirit Daughter podcast starting on February 24th on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your podcast. I'm Amanda Knox, and in the new podcast, Doubt, the case of Lucy Letby, we unpack the story of an unimaginable tragedy that gripped the UK in 2023. But what if we didn't get the whole story? The moment you look at the whole picture, the case collapsed. But if the truth was disguised by a story we chose to believe. Oh my god, I think she might be innocent. Listen to Doubt, the case of Lucy Letby, on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Nancy Glass, host of the burden of guilt season 2 podcast. This is a story about a horrendous lie that destroyed two families. Late one night, Bobby Gumpride became the victim of a random crime. The perpetrator was sentenced to 99 years until a confession changed everything. I was a monster. Listen to the burden of guilt season 2 on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Clayton Nackered, and in 2022, I was the lead of ABC's The Bachelor. But here's the thing, Bachelor fans hated him. If I could press a button and rewind it all I would. That's when his life took a disturbing turn. A one night stand would end in a courtroom. The media is here. This case has gone viral. The dating contract. Agree to date me, but I'm also suing you. This is unlike anything I've ever seen before. I'm Stephanie Young. Listen to Love Trap on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Lori Gottlieb. I'm the author of Maybe You Should Talk to Someone, and I write the dear therapist advice column for the Atlantic. And I'm Guy Winch. I'm the author of Emotional First Aid, and I write the dear guy advice column for Ted. And this is dear therapists. Each week we invite you into a real session where we help people confront their biggest problems and then give them actionable advice and hear about the changes they've made in their lives. So sit back and welcome to today's session. This week we're in session with Kate, who wants to break free from her people pleasing tendencies. I felt even guiltier for leaving. I was in this impossible position of trying to split up my time between my brother and his family and my mom. And neither side would be happy with the amount of time spent with them. First a quick note, dear therapist is for informational purposes only. It does not constitute medical or psychological advice and is not a substitute for professional healthcare advice diagnosis or treatment. By submitting a letter, you are agreeing to let I Heart Media use it in part or in full, and we may edit it for length and clarity. In the sessions you'll hear, all names have been changed for the privacy of our guests. Hey Lori. Hey Guy. So what do we have in our mailbox today? So today we have a letter from a woman who is struggling with people pleasing, and it goes like this. Dear therapist, I'm a first generation immigrant and realize that our family situation might not be uncommon for other immigrant families. My father was always absent due to work and prioritizing traveling in his free time. He also cheated on my mom multiple times and has other children. I don't know how many. My mother relied on me for emotional support as she was always lonely and depressed. I spent most of my teenage years consoling her instead of going out with my friends. My brother is 10 years older than me and it felt like he was more of a father than a brother. He was always very dominant, angry and loud. It was very easy to upset him and he often gave me tasks like going to the store or cleaning his room, but somehow I always seemed to do something incorrectly. I was scared of him and I think so was my mom. My response to all this was to flee after graduating and to move to another city and later country to study. It gave me a legitimate reason not to be there and to enjoy my life a little. But whenever I would come home to visit, my brother and mother always made me feel guilty for not spending enough time with them. My brother has three children and it was important to him that I spend time with my nieces and nephews and helped out my sister-in-law, cleaning the house looking after the kids. I felt like I made it my brother's place and a counselor and my mom's. Lately it's been bugging me that my mom never asked how I am when she calls. She immediately starts to talk about her life and problems. I also have a very difficult time creating boundaries with my brother because he so easily gets angry when I even attempt to say no. I need to break free from the people pleaser tendencies that keep me feeling imprisoned. Please help Kate. I'm really glad Kate wrote to us and I'm really glad she recognizes that she's a people pleaser because it sounds like this light thing but it can be damaging to every aspect of a person's life. They can really dictate their relationships, their self-esteem and how they deal with things. It's such a broad problem. So many people deal with this. I get so many messages on social media and we see it both in our therapy offices. So many people were told that somebody else's needs were more important than their needs. There's always this conflict going on inside of them. Do I do what I need or do I do what the other person needs? If I don't do what the other person needs there's this incredible guilt. So let's go talk to her and find out more about what's going on. You're listening to Deer Therapists from My Heart Radio. We'll be back after a short break. Hi, this is Joe Winterstein, host of the Spirit Dollar Podcast where we talk about astrology, natal charts and how to step into your most vibrant life. And I just sat down with a mini driver. The Irish traveler said when I was 16 you're going to have a terrible time with men. Actor, storyteller and unapologetic, aquarium visionary. Aquarius is all about freedom loving and different perspectives. And I find a lot of people with strong placements and Aquarius like are misunderstood. A son and Venus and Aquarius in her seventh house spark her unconventional approach to partnership. He really has taught me to embrace people sleeping in different rooms on different houses and different places, but just an embracing of the isness of it. If you're navigating your own transformation or just want a chart side view into how a leading artist integrates astrology, creativity and real life, this episode is a must listen. Listen to the Spirit Dollar Podcast starting on February 24th on the I Heart Radio app Apple Podcast or wherever you listen to your podcast. Hey, I'm Jay Chetty, host of the on purpose podcast. I'm joined by Luke Combs, award winning country music artist and one of the most authentic voices in music today. Luke opens up about success, self-doubt, mental health and what it really takes to stay true to who you are when your life changes overnight. I hate fame, I hate the word celebrity, I hate those words that you make me uncomfortable. But I think when you get to a certain point, the fame or the success or the influence, it just accentuates and exacerbates the inherent person that you are. The guy that says he's always going to be there and that will do anything to be there is the only guy that's not there. I'm in Australia when bow is born. My whole identity is that no matter what, I'm going to prioritize my life and my children. Over my job, I dread the conversation with my son. What do you think you're saying? Listen to on purpose with Jay Chetty on the I Heart Radio app Apple Podcast or wherever you get your podcasts. Ready for a different take on Formula One? Look no further than no grip, a new podcast tackling the culture of Motor Racing's most coveted series. Join me, Lily Herman, as we dive into the under-explored pockets of F1. Including the astrology of the current grid. Louis Hamilton, Crap the Corn Sun, Cancer Moon. Wouldn't you know it? Michael Schumacher is also a Capricorn Sun, Cancer Moon. The story of the sports' most consequential driver's strike. We have one man who upon hearing that he was going to be fired, freaked out and apparently climbed out the window of the bathroom. And was Daniel Ricardos a illustrious F1 career, a success story, a cautionary tale, or some combination of both? He started getting all this attention and he may be started to think, "I'm bigger than this. I'm better." And plenty of other Mishaps, scandals, and sagas that have made Formula One a delightful, decadent, dumpster fire for more than 75 years. Listen to no grip on the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. In 2023, a story gripped the UK, evoking horror and disbelief. The nurse who should have been in charge of caring for tiny babies is now the most prolific child killer in modern British history. Everyone thought they knew how it ended. A verdict? A villain? A nurse named Lucy Levy. Lucy Levy has been found guilty. The moment you look at the whole picture, the case collapses. I'm Amanda Knox and in the new podcast Doubt, the case of Lucy Levy, we follow the evidence in hear from the people that lived it, to ask what really happened when the world decided who Lucy Letby was. No voicing of any skepticism or doubt. It'll cause so much harm at every single level of the British establishment of this is wrong. Listen to doubt the case of Lucy Letby on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Lori Gottlieb. I'm Guy Winch and this is Dea Therapist. Hi Kate. Hi. Welcome to the show. Thank you so much for having me. Oh it's our pleasure. We wanted to start by hearing a little bit more about your current situation. Tell us a little bit about how old you are, how people pleasing might come into your life. Now what are you doing in your life professionally and socially? Sure. I'm 31 years old. I currently live in Lebanon. I'm an eight-worker so for the past couple of years I've deployed to different emergencies around the world. I was born and raised in Austria but my parents are originally from Bangladesh. I have an older brother, he's 10 years older than me and I guess I left home when I was around. 19 years old to study humanitarian aid and then I started working since I was around 23. Can you tell us a little bit more about how some of these tendencies might play out in your friendships or your professional relationships or romantic relationships? Sure. Yeah Mary to a great guy. We met actually at work so he's in the same field as I am and I also have a bunch of great friends. I guess my people pleasing tendencies. I see them really more in my family. I feel like I'm much more myself and what I want to be with my friends. I guess it always felt like it felt liberating, going abroad, making friends that are more like me. So I think I don't have those people pleasing tendencies so much with my friends and with my husband but really more with my family. But I might be wrong. Maybe I just don't see it. Well you're in a profession, both you and your husband of helping other people, it's humanitarian aid. You've found a profession in which you get to do some of the things that come naturally to you like helping other people's paying attention to other people's needs and it's possible that in doing that and in meeting somebody else who does that might set up a situation so you're less likely to express the people pleasing because you're with people who are pleasing as well. Yes, while you were talking I was just thinking that especially during my last job which involved a lot of different deployments to many different emergencies ranging from a couple of weeks at a time to a couple of months at a time, it was very taxing, it was very tiring as well and I didn't prioritize me for those couple of years just because it felt like I wasn't really a priority when there's so much suffering all around me. So you have this idea that there's some kind of hierarchy that if somebody else is suffering more than you are that your needs aren't as important. Yeah, I think so. Yeah. So when you were going through that you're saying over the past those two years you might have neglected yourself a bit and your own priorities and needs got pushed to the side of it. And I read at that time when you're going on all these deployments. It was actually kind of crazy. I remember deploying to one emergency. It was in Africa and I got back and I got married two days later. I tried to somehow build my life around my job or my deployment. So that also reflected in meeting friends, I didn't make friends at all during those couple of years. It was more connections that I made during my deployment but not really friends or even maintaining my friendships. I think I was not really there. I missed a bunch of weddings and birthdays. I guess I never really asked what I wanted. I missed out on a lot of things. So you and your husband went given these deployments and given the separations that they force upon you both. How much is there an ongoing dialogue between you about, hey, we're only going to see each other for a little bit of time. Here's what I need. What do you need? Is that a conversation that you both have? So actually after I did those deployments for about four years, I moved to Afghanistan for two years. So that was even harder in a way because I was permanently there. And it was hard and then COVID hit and that meant we saw each other even less. But I think we have this understanding that I do this for a limited amount of time and I'll be back. Now I'm back with my husband. We love together and it's refreshing and nice to actually be together in the same country. He's super supportive and I think we have this understanding without actually having to discuss or talk about it much. We want to start a family too. So I think it's the first time I'm trying to prioritize my private life. You're kind of implying that we kind of sense each other's needs and we know the drill and so we're there to support each other. But he doesn't express, hey, this is really hard when you're away. Maybe we can figure out how to spend more time together in the next deployment or whatever it is. You don't actually verbalize those things to one another? You would never say, don't go. I don't want you to go stay with me. He is the type of person who would say, do it if you feel like it's going to advance your career. We'll figure it out as long as you're happy. So he's a people-pleaser too? I guess so. We found each other. Tell us a little bit about your relationship with your family now. My parents are actually back in Bangladesh. They moved back a couple of years ago. I see them around once or twice a year. I speak to my mom once a week or so. I don't speak to my dad often. In fact, we hadn't spoken in years just up until recently. What change there? I think he feels guilty for his actions in the past. He never really actively reached out. I was never fully guilty. I was never fully upset just because he was away so often. He wasn't even really present for me to be upset. I think he never reached out. I felt like I should never reach out because he was literally not there. I was growing up. I guess as he's getting older, I felt like it's just silly that we're old holding up this wall. I was also curious. I never really got to know him. I just wanted to get to know more about him. But I don't feel the need to talk to him as much as I thought I would. With my brother, it was always my sister-in-law who was the connection to my brother because my brother was also always busy and 10 years older. I feel like we didn't really have much to connect with each other. You say in your letter that when you visit your family, that you feel like a made to your brother and a counselor to your mother. Yeah. Is that still the case? So maybe I'll start with my brother. He was very demanding, growing up, he was sort of my father figure in the absence of my actual father. He would be the one I would actually be scared of, scared of bad grades, scared of saying out to late, judging me. He gets angry and mad very easily. I always felt like I did something wrong because whatever I did, he would either laugh at it or get mad. Can you paint a picture of what would happen when he got mad? What was that like? It was very loud, so he would literally start yelling at me. I remember one time he even shook me. It was very intimidating as a small girl. And I guess I sort of shut down. I would not speak much. I would not say much just to protect myself because his reactions were so important. Unpredictable. Where was your mom when this was happening with your brother? She was busy helping my dad run the business. I think sometimes she witnessed it or she would sense it and I remember she would always say, "Okay, don't be scared, then up for yourself." But it was just too hard to implement as a child. I just couldn't do it by myself. So she would tell you to stand up to him, but it sounds like she never did what she should be doing as a parent, which is she should have stood up to him. Yeah, I think she was also scared of them, to be honest. And I think she still is because he shows the same reactions towards her. She wasn't really a mother. to him. She was almost more like the child being scolded by my brother. It's weird. And in terms of your father, you said he cheated on your mom. He had several children. You don't know how many. It sounds like your mom might be a little bit of a people pleaser where she was afraid to say anything. They had many fights. Growing up, I remember so many weekend mornings waking up to fighting or even in the evenings and overhearing really terrible things that probably no child should hear. She would yell at him as well. But there was never a moment where I thought, "Wow, you're actually going to get divorced." And as a 13-year-old me, I advised my mom to get divorced to my dad. But she decided to stay despite everything that happened, despite him leaving us, leaving her in the worst position also after the business failed. You said that when you're old enough to leave the school, you kind of fled because it was a way to get out. But once you had left home and you at least had a taste of adulthood, was there a difference in how you felt or how you reacted once you were a little bit older? Whenever I left, I felt so free. I felt like I could finally be by myself. But whenever I would come home, I would fall back right into where I left. And in fact, I felt even guilty of her leaving. And I remember how I was in this impossible position of trying to split up my time between my brother and his family and my mom. And neither side would be happy, but be a amount of time spent with them. It would always be a struggle to make both of them happy. My brother even counted down the days of how many nights I spent at their place versus how many days at my mom's. Whatever I did, but still obviously I felt guilty because she was all by herself. She doesn't have many friends. She only had my dad who also did his own things. I felt like she was always alone. And yeah, I was sort of the only one she wanted to be around with ever. It sounds like you did a lot of care taking for your mom growing up. You talked about that in your letter as well. You described her a little while ago as sort of the child. What was it like for you as a child to feel like you had to take care of your mom? It was really hard. I remember when my dad left for a couple of months. I would come home every day after school and I would find her sitting on the couch just crying. So every day the first thing I do after coming back from school is to console her and talk to her for what felt like hours. And there were so many times I didn't go out with my friends because I felt like I had to be there. Sometimes she would say, "Please don't go tonight." Sometimes she wouldn't even have to ask. I would just stay because I felt guilty. So yeah, it was tough seeing her like that. What other feelings did you have other than guilt? Did you feel resentful? Did you feel angry? Were you jealous of friends who didn't have that situation? Absolutely. Everything you just said, "I was angry. I was resentful. I didn't want to spend time with her in the living room. I would just stay in my room, which actually doesn't even make sense for me staying at home to not be with her." I wanted to live a happy teenage life and I would talk to my friends after the party. They would say, "How great it was." And I felt like I missed out on a lot of things. Did you ever express that to your mom? I did when I was angry, but not in a meaningful way. I don't think I actually ever sat down with her and told her how hard it was for me because I always had to be the strong one. She would have crumbled and she seemed that I was suffering from the effects of her failed marriage. She was always very thankful and she would always say how much she loves me and how proud she is that I pulled off school while dealing with all these troubles. But I don't think she ever truly understood how much it affected me, because I've never showed it. The reason that we people please and the reason that we don't say something is because we're afraid of some negative consequence. So what did you think the negative consequence would be if you said, "Hey, mom, I really want to go to this party or I really want to go out with my friends?" Or, "This is really hard on me. I don't know how to take care of you." I don't think she would have been able to handle it. She would have probably just cried more. Maybe she would have tried not to pour her heart out to me. I just knew I had to take care of her and I knew that I was the only person she could rely on. I actually think she was clinically depressed in hindsight. I just know that I had to take care of her. What often happens with people's leases is that there's something quite empowering about being able to be that antidepressant for your mom when she's going through such a hard time. You are the only medication that worked. You were the one thing that she needed and she appreciated it at least, which is good, and she expressed that a lot. So the connection you felt with her was in some significant way related to the fact that she expressed her love and appreciation for you in those ways. She also appreciated you able to do well in school. So there were messages she was giving you that were really valuable to you on the one hand. They were very damaging on the other because they kept you in that prison. But they have that value as well. It's a double-edged sword. Sometimes people are afraid of losing that positive part of losing that feeling of empowerment of like, "I'm just a kid, but I'm powerful enough to save my mother from her distress." And that's difficult to give up. Yes, I guess you're right. I did want to be valued and appreciate it by my mother. Definitely, yeah. There's another aspect to this that I think is important too, which is that you had a lot of feelings about your father's absence and your father's neglect, really. And your mom had a lot of feelings about your father's absence and his neglect toward her. And if you were taking care of your mother and her feelings about your father, you didn't have to deal as much with your own. Because so much of that was about, "Let me manage my mom's feelings about my dad. I have feelings about him too, but I'm not going to think too much about that because I can channel it all into taking care of my mother's feelings about my dad." And I wonder if at any point you started feeling your own feelings about your dad, that were separate from your mom's feelings about your dad. Did you ever get to that point where you weren't so enmeshed with her around this and you could come up with your own ideas about how you felt about your relationship with him? I mean, I was mad at him, but I was mad at him for leaving my mom. I wasn't really mad at him for leaving us, the kids. And I didn't talk to him for years at a time because I felt like I was on my mom's side when I was protecting her by doing that. I'm trying to hurt him by not being in touch with him. But I guess I never really, just because he really wasn't around. I don't even know this person so much. I have some good memories of him coming back home from his business trips and bringing me nice things and I would run into his arms, but I feel like I don't even know him enough to have my own feelings towards him. I want you to hear what you're saying. You're saying, "I feel like I didn't know him enough to have feelings toward him. You're a child and your parent is away." So the fact that you didn't know him is enough to have feelings about him. It's not that out of sight, out of mind because he was away. I don't have feelings toward him. It was because he was away. I have so many feelings toward him. And they got squashed down in the service of your mother's feelings toward him. Now she had legitimate feelings toward him. She was dealing with a lot. He was cheating on her. He was having other children. He wasn't there. Clearly, she was in distress. But your distress never even made it on the radar. And the way that you convinced yourself of this was to say, "I don't really know if I have any feelings toward him because I don't know him well enough." Even though the fact that you didn't know him is a huge statement of abandonment. It's really strange. I think of him sometimes. And I think that, and maybe that's how I justify it, but I would always say that He's a funny person, he's charming, he knows how to talk, he's educated, knows about different cultures and religions, but he's just not a family person. And I guess that's what I always told myself that he's actually a pretty cool person, but he just, the family is not for him and he preferred traveling abroad and spending time outside and part of it was working, part of it was fun, but yeah, I never really thought about the abandonment and that he left me dealing with so many things. Okay, if you think of yourself at that young age at six or at seven and your dad's not around and your mom is miserable and because your dad's not around your brothers around and he yells at you and he shakes you and he scares you and if you think of a seven year old girl in that situation. Do you think that she would have feelings about the fact that her father isn't there and that those feelings might not be well, he must be a cool dude is just not a family person. Does it seem reasonable to you that another child might have had quite strong feelings about the consequences of his absence. I think so rationally speaking and your other child would be pretty mad about the fact that the dad was not there and that's what we're saying that you need to be interested in the fact that you really absolved him of all guilt from everything that was going on you suffered so many consequences for that absence. But you really didn't blame him in any way in fact he remained a cool dude in your eyes and that's what Laurie was saying earlier that part of the reason that happened was because you channeled those feelings into helping your mom and trying to make up for his absence. So much so that you weren't able to take any look at all at your own feelings and still struggle to do that now about how you feel about the abandonment about the situation he left you in about how that compromised your childhood and so much of your life in certain ways. Even now. And she would always say you have to also look at your issues with your parents but I would always think why like up until recently I thought everything was fine even with my mom. And I guess I did not even consider my dad at all or my feelings towards him. When we are children and we have intensely difficult feelings about our parents that are so so threatening to consider how you would feel about your dad's absence or to consider how challenging it was to have to parent your mom even when you have the abusive brother yelling at you and screaming you and scaring you in the home would have been so big that you truly had to push them aside and not see them because they were too big to deal with not that they were absent they were too big to deal with. And that means that you do have to dip into that now because unless you do you will really be stuck in that people pleasing mode in which you really dismiss your feelings in favor of other people's and it's important to consider. To consider as guys said both parents because the abandonment was very clear from your father because he was absent. And you might not have considered that your mother abandoned you to because you were so close you were always together. But in fact she abandoned you because you had to abandon your own personhood to take care of her. So she couldn't protect you from your brother or chose not to she didn't see you as a separate person as a child as somebody in middle school somebody in high school who wanted to go and make friends and do the normal teenage things. She didn't see that it was not healthy for you to have to be in that parentified role of taking care of her. So you really didn't have a mother acting as a mother you didn't have a father acting as a father so you have the double abandonment. But you only saw it as my father abandoned me but hey he's a cool dude and he's really interesting and he's just not a family guy. But that hurts maybe he's not a family guy but he has a family and when you are the child in the family of someone who isn't interested in being a part of the family. That's extremely painful and you didn't have to feel so much pain because you were so busy taking care of your mother. And I can see your eyes are starting to get watery you can start to access some of this in your body but I don't think you've really started to put your toe in there yet of what that felt like for the same reason that you were afraid as a child. I am afraid of what will happen if I start to feel these feelings. And you're not in. I guess everything you said really hits home. I guess I never really had to think much about my feelings and I guess it hurts now just because it didn't. I've heard me for so many years and I sort of pushed away those feelings and I never gave myself room to even think about what it meant to me as a child. And I had to deal with so many things I had to deal with my crazy brother trying to escape his madness and I had to deal with consoling my mom. I always fleeing because it felt like I could just be free and whenever I would come home, I would feel exactly those feelings of being eight years old again and having to deal with all these things just in a different time and space now. The tears that you're experiencing now. Did you ever see those tears when you were younger or did you not even let yourself feel any of this. I remember a time when I was really, really sad and it was my best friend who was there for me, but I remember thinking that if I keep doing this and keeping so sad, I will lose her too because it's not fun to be around a person cries all the time. So I just pulled myself together and put on a happy face. I'm the people pleasing again. I can't be authentic and get support from my friend because I will be a burden to her. Yeah. Yeah. Was there ever a time when you cried the way you're crying now and just let yourself feel all of the sadness, the anger, the sense of abandonment, any of that. I'll let your body do some of the speaking that you couldn't do with words. I cried so many times. I cried about my mom and about just our overall terrible situation. Hurts or yours? Turs, not mine. Right. Because your brother was the one person you allowed yourself to feel about. And I want you to keep in mind this link between people pleasing and shoving your own feelings down because to people please you really have to allow other people's needs and feelings to loom way larger than your own. And it really trains you to be much more oriented towards the needs of other people truly to not even ask yourself how you feel. So that's the connection that you need to be able to break. Yeah. I don't think I've ever done that. Yeah. Because when you were crying, you were crying for your mom that never for you. And it was today that you were crying for you. Did that feel different to you? Yes, because a part of me doesn't even really understand what's happening right now. There are so many. I don't know what the tears are just coming, but it's like my brain doesn't really understand. I never thought I felt abandoned because as you said, Laurie, my mom was always around. So it never struck me really. I would say the opposite. Your mom wasn't always around. You were always around. She was depending on you to be around. Yeah. Yeah. And I think the part that. keeping you from feeling your feelings too is this idea that if you feel these feelings toward your parents you feel guilty for feeling that way. And it kind of is that both and that we talk about so much on this podcast which is that your parents can have good qualities and they can also have let you down and both of those things can be true. It's not one or the other. Yeah, I guess they're only human beings. Yes, but you've always given them the benefit of the doubt. My dad's a school guy, he's not a family guy. Oh, well, no big deal. He goes off, he has a Ferris, he has other kids, he's not here. And then our family goes into chaos without him there. My mother becomes depressed and lonely. My brother becomes the father figure. I become the lone person who has nobody there to protect me. Oh, well, that's just how it is. And there's a way that we cope as children that is very effective for us because as guys said, we can't handle all of these big feelings or these big realities. But now you say you're still in this people pleasing prison and in order to get out of it, I think you're ready to start feeling some of these feelings because you're not the little helpless girl in the house anymore. Right, I feel like I'm just really at the beginning of this road and I don't even know what I'm feeling. One exercise that you can consider, you mentioned your only husband want to have a family. If you imagine having a daughter, and if you imagine that daughter being in that position of having an absent father and a mother who was just relying on her at incredibly young ages to support her, if you can imagine having a daughter who never got to feel her own feelings because she was always in duty to other people and that she was sad and that she didn't get to do stuff, it might be easier for you to access those feelings because I think it would be easier for you to feel like that is not okay for my daughter. Can I ask you perhaps if you've dealt with other people phasers like me, I mean, I don't want you to put words into my mouth or feelings into my head, but just because I'm so lost in my feelings other than abandonment, what should a little girl have felt in that moment? I'm wondering where you went when guy asked you that question. I think he touched something very tender in you and you got scared and went into the intellectual part of yourself. You went into, okay, let me intellectually understand that because that's safer and that's familiar territory for me. So we want to help you. We aren't abandoning you. We're actually here and I don't think you're used to that. I don't think you're used to people being there and sitting with you when you're having a feeling that feels scary to you and we want to give you a little taste of that. Like if you could contemplate guys' question for a second and imagine that little girl who is your daughter and she's in that situation. What feelings come up for you before you get scared and run away and want to know all about people pleasing? Sorry guy, I think I zoomed out while you were asking you the question, could we do that again? Yes, I want you to visualize your own daughter at say seven, eight years old. A little girl who wants to be happy, who wants to play, who doesn't want to have to deal with too many adult problems. I want you to visualize her face as she comes home from school and she had friends, she was playing with them, everything was fine and she walks in and dad isn't home and mom is weeping on the couch. Can you keep the focus on your daughter's face and what that face looks like when she walks through the door and sees that? Can you describe that? Yes, it will be so annoyed, so so annoyed that she would have to deal with this again just another day with the mother crying. The happy mood would be gone, actually not even caring or concerned, actually just really annoyed. And what is it like for you to imagine that being your daughter, how would you feel if that were your daughter watching her in that scenario? Watching her come home and go from this happy child to this numb child, this child who can't have any feelings because she can feel a little frustrated and angry but that's all because otherwise it's too much. That would be so sad, that would be hard-broken not to see her laugh and play and. Yes. Yeah. How would you comfort her? I'd probably give her a big hug and what as-colored day was and what she experienced, what she would like to do this afternoon. I would like to listen to her instead of always talking about myself. That is so beautiful. To hear the adult you thinking about how you might take care of that child because that child is still right there inside of you. And to be able to see you cry and feel the sadness and know that as an adult you're now safe and you can comfort her and say, "Wow, you were just robbed of your joy the minute you walked in that house." Your spirit was quashed when you walked in that house. You were terrified of what you might have done wrong that day because your brother's going to start screaming at you, depending on what you did or didn't do right that day. Your mom's going to be dependent on you to maintain her and you become invisible. Yeah. And when you can imagine the face, that's what you would never let yourself feel or see. Right. Okay, what is so painful, I think, in that moment for you is that when you described what you would do as a mother which was so lovely, it gave you a glimpse of the childhood you should have had but didn't. And that brought up a lot of feelings for you too. And I think a part of me, whenever I speak to my mother now and I get annoyed that she doesn't really ask me how I'm doing, when she starts to talk about her troubles and her life right away, I get so annoyed and that's probably the reason why. It's an exact repeat of what you experienced as a child. It was help me with my problems. Daughter. And I wish it wouldn't affect me so much. I wish I wouldn't care so much about her not asking me how I'm doing but it does. And I told her a million times why don't you just ask me how I'm doing. And then the next time she calls she'll ask and then the following times it's forgotten again. The whole thing would start all over again. I wish I could just accept that I don't need my mother to ask me how I am but it really bothers me. I'm wondering if we can look a little bit at some of the other relationships as well. So where are things with your father? Sounds like growing up. He would come back. He'd bring some nice gifts. You'd run into his arms and then he would leave again. And there was this unspoken secret in the family that he was having these affairs and other children. How did you learn about this and the other children? So it's actually really terrible. We had someone to help us in the household and she turned out to be one of his affairs and she was living with us and she was like a sister to me. How did you know that was going on? The day when my mom found out she went into her room and she saw my dad there and I heard her screaming early in the morning so I ran up and I saw my dad come downstairs that was obvious. Shortly after she left but I think my dad then left us for her although he never mentioned it obviously to us. He told us that he needed to to find a new job and it happened to be abroad, but I knew that something fishy about it. And then years later, I found out I had a half-sitling from my brother, she contacted my brother. - And you've never discussed this with your father directly? - I never discussed it directly with him. I caught him once talking on the phone with some woman and I went back into the house and told him he's disgusting. I think he was really ashamed, but we never discussed ever since. I stopped talking to him and I told my mother, I don't want to have anything to do with him. So he knows. But we never really discussed it. And I guess recently, I don't know why I felt like I needed a father in my life, but I don't even know what that feels like. - So what happens when you talk to him? Are you then playing this game where you're pretending everything's fine? - Yeah. - 'Cause I don't think you're gonna really gonna get a father like that. - No, and it doesn't really feel good either. It's the I'm good and what happened happened and we don't really talk about things that happened in the past, so we just kind of start from, I guess, the superficial stuff. - To feels empty. - When you're not being authentic, the conversation can't feel authentic. When you're engaged with the cool dude, rather than a father in that manner where you're not sharing how you feel, where you've never brought up, hey, we never spoke about why I stopped talking to you and what happened and I would like to, without doing any of that. Then conversation is artificial and it can't feel satisfying in the way that you would like it to. - Yeah, I just feel like whatever he'd say, it almost doesn't make up for, he's so old now, it almost doesn't make up for all these years that were lost. - Having a relationship with your father now, is it going to take away the pain from the past? But what it can do is it can give you a sense of what it's like to have a father, which can be very healing for you. He may not turn out to be exactly the father that you want or need, but the more you're in touch with your own needs and the more you can express them to him and you can see what he's capable of in terms of responding to them. It could be a very important healing experience for you now that will help you with this issue of caring more about other people's feelings than your own. In Kate, it will do another thing potentially. It might make him, as a grandfather, be more meaningful to you because that connection that you forged with him, even though it's not going to make up for lost time, but it's more authentic and a present will resonate much more deeply when you see him interact with your future kids than it would right now, 'cause right now it would be the stranger interacting with him. And in that case, it might be a father and grandfather. - And on a similar note, let's talk about your brother. Right now you say every time you go to visit, you feel like he's still telling you what to do and you still seem very afraid of him. - Yeah, I have also had quite a difficult conversation with him. It actually happened because one time he was criticizing me and I actually stood up and left because I couldn't take it anymore. And then when I came back, we had this huge fight for I think the first time in our lives. And I just sort of exploded. Whatever I do, he finds a way to criticize it one time. I'm leaving my job for love and he thinks I'm crazy and makes fun of me earning as much as a cab driver. And then a couple years later, I take up a job in a different country because it seems interesting and he thinks I'm crazy for taking up that job and leaving my husband. So I feel like whatever I do, it's always wrong and I told him everything I was so frustrated about back then I was just so mad. I literally, I was at one point just screaming. It was like a big screen coming out of me and I had to try to stop myself and he was very defensive and he criticizing me and telling me how selfish I am for doing my own thing and not considering the family or him or the kids. He was mad because I came to visit them too late. The kids had to stay up for me while I wanted to visit a friend on the way. And so yeah, that was hurtful but also liberating in a way. - Kate, it sounds like with your brother, the premise to this day is that you are there to serve his needs that it's incredibly lopsided premise for the relationship. Is there anything that he does that feels good? - No, actually, no, nothing. He was never really there when I needed him. He knew how difficult it was back then with my mother but he just sort of lived his life and built his family and had other priorities. So he wasn't really there when I needed him and when he was there, he made my life so much harder. - What is the relationship you want with him and his family? - So all I ever wanted was to be close to my brother. I wanted a brother and sister relationship where we could just let loose and make jokes and we never had that sort of openness. And it's interesting because it turns out he's the same sort of criticizing husband to his wife and they're going through a, not a divorce, but they're close to it. He is now living away from the kids and his wife and I think he's had a lot of time to reflect and actually tries to make things better with me. So he just recently came to visit and he told me that he wants to work on our relationship and he wants us to do trips, visit my mom together and share a hotel room and all these things but it's almost too much for me right now. I appreciate it. But it's almost as if I have some sort of blockage. - It might be possible Kate that you don't know yet how you feel about it and that's okay. In fact, that is healthy. I'm thinking about that moment when you were going to visit and you wanted to see a friend first and he got mad at you because the kids were gonna be asleep and that reminds me of your mom with, don't go out with your friends, make sure that my needs are taken care of. It's a very parallel kind of thing. Make sure that my needs are taken care of. I don't care if you experience joy by seeing your friends. And then to have that whole history with him and for him to say, okay, now I'm ready to be the kind of brother that you want me to be. I'm having this reckoning in my own life and I'm starting to see things. You may need to take that at your own pace. You may need to be able to actually express for the first time what you do need and that will be part of the coming together. It's can you let me go at my own pace because part of the problem to your brother is that my needs were never in the equation. So I really welcome this. I've hoped for this for so long. But we need to do it in a way where both of our needs are taken care of as we figure out how we can be different with each other. - Yeah, and I think in the back of my mind, a part of me thinks, well, now you're ready, now that you're alone, now that you're alone in your apartment, now you're ready to travel with me. And now you want to be that brother it just almost feels selfish to me again that he wants to travel with me now and do all those things when I know that he's doing that because his life is so sad right now. - Like your mom. Like my mom. - Kate, what you said just now is real. You just didn't say to him. And that's what you need to be able to say to him. It's very fair to say, yes, I really wanted this for a long time, but you're asking me now when you're lonely, when you need it, not when I do. you're still not asking me what I need, you're still not asking how I feel. It's that authenticity that allows for close ones. Yeah, and I feel like that when he tells me he's going to come visit again in a couple of weeks, and I don't really want that. It's exhausting for me to listen to his problems now, and I just want my peace and quiet, which is so crazy because all I ever wanted was to be close to him, and now that it's here. It's not actually here. What's here is he has someone to talk to about his marital problems. That's different from we have a reciprocal relationship. I'm not saying it can't become that. It's just that for good reason you don't trust it. And what I think we're asking you to do in all of this conversation today is to learn to trust yourself, to listen to yourself when no one else was listening to you. It was very hard to do that as a kid, but now as an adult, can you listen to yourself, access your needs, and then communicate that? It's a legitimate kid for you to say, you know, brother, when I was a kid, I would come home and mum would cry on the couch, and I had to be her support, and she never asked about me, and it was always about me having to support her, and that was really difficult for me. It's very difficult for me when a relationship isn't reciprocal, and I've wanted us to have that kind of relationship for a long time, but when you come now, and you expect me to just be there for you the way I was for mum, that feels too unsided for me. That doesn't feel good. Yeah, yeah, I think you're right, and I'm afraid again of his reaction, because I feel like he's going to be so mad and say, no, you don't understand, I actually want to be a good brother to you. When he says, you don't understand, I want to be a good brother to you, you can say, and part of being a good brother to me is making room for my feelings too. So I can be able to say, you know, now's not a good time to visit. I have a lot going on in my life right now too, but maybe we can visit another time, or let, yeah, sure, we can talk about what's going on with your marriage, and also let me tell you a little bit about what's going on with me, so that you can actually see, is it possible for us to have more of a give and take in this relationship? Is it possible to talk to him about you scared me so much when I was a kid? Or you try to impose your values on me, and it makes it hard for me to want to get close to you, because I'm happy with my choices. So as we sit here now, having had this conversation and imagining a universe in which you might be able to be more open about what your needs are and how you're feeling in these relationships with your family members. Is there any sense of lightness, any sense of relief, whether or not you think it can happen, but just imagining a small possibility, you're probably worried, you're probably thinking about how they're going to react, but imagining just saying those things and showing up, is there any sense of relief or lightness in your body that feels a little bit different? Yeah, that will be amazing. So Kate, we have some advice for you. We'd like you to have a conversation with your mom. And we'd like you to keep in mind that when there's a 30-year history, it takes time to change a dynamic. It's like a big ship. It's a lot of effort to change course. So there needs to be repetition. And you've started that journey already, and we'd like you to continue it. We'd like you to first, when she asks you questions about how are you doing, would like you to not answer with good, but be a little bit more nuanced in your answers there. But we'd also like you to share with her two things in that conversation. One thing that you're concerned about, but we'd also like you to share something that you're joyful about or excited about. Because opening up emotionally and sharing should be both about the difficult things and about the good things. She can talk about her, but there are a couple of things that as her daughter, you get to say, "Mom, I might not be the best person for this." She wants to talk about your dad, whether her concerns about the affairs or whatever it is. Unless it's just informational, you get to say to her, "Mom, I really want to try and build a relationship with dad. This is not good for me to be your counselor in your marriage." And I think you could find one and speak to one. The counselor, religious person, community person, friend, but as your daughter, that makes me really uncomfortable. And I'm happy to hear other things that are going on in your life, but not about dad. And the same thing goes for if she's going to talk about her depression. If she's still depressed and she wants to, but I'm just miserable, my life is so difficult. Say, "Mom, those are the kinds of things you need to talk to a professional about. It's too much for me as your daughter." I'm going to ask you to find someone professional who can really help you with that. I want us to have a mother-daughter relationship. Okay, so that's the first conversation you're going to have this week. And along those lines, we want you to have another conversation this week, and that one is with your father. And we want you to say to him, "Hey, Dad, I am so glad that we are in contact and that we are trying to build something with each other. But in order to do that, it has to be an authentic relationship. And that doesn't mean I'm here to blame you for what happened. It means that I need to be seen authentically. And that means that I want to be able to share with you what my experience with you has been like, so that there's room for me in this relationship too, so we don't have a fake relationship that feels empty and where I feel abandoned again. And I want to know if you're interested in that. Because if you aren't, what I'm afraid is going to happen is that I'm going to share some things with you and you will abandon me again. You will get angry. You will not want to talk to me. You'll disappear. And I'm doing this, Dad, not to push you away, but to bring you closer. Because I think that at this point in our lives were both realizing it could be very good for us to start to have a relationship with each other that feels real. And in order for us to enjoy being around each other, it has to feel authentic too. Are you willing to do that? Are you willing to let me talk about my experience growing up and my experience with you in the present how it feels so that we can have a relationship that feels real to both of us. And while you're having that conversation and also the conversation with your mother, we want you to notice in your body, since you have more access to how you feel from how your body reacts. Notice how you feel in your body. Notice what that is like for you to not worry so much about what the other person is feeling and to notice what you're feeling. So those are two conversations. We're actually going to add one more and that's with your brother. And the conversation there has to be a similar one to your dad. It has to be something like brother, I've wanted all my life to have a brother's sister relationship with you and to feel close. And I'm so glad that you're open to that now, that you're seeking that out now. I'm worried though that you're doing that now because you feel only and because you need me. I want to feel like you are here to listen to my needs and to my feelings as well. Because that's the only way we can really be close. So for example, it's important for me to be able to be honest with you and to be honest with you. This is not a good time for a visit. So I would love to see you soon at some other time. But in the meantime, I'd love to continue talking and I'd like you to share an interest with me and I will try and share things with you. But I need you to hear them and I need you to take them seriously and part of taking my needs seriously and my feelings seriously is not to mock me for the decisions I make or for the values that I have or for the work that I do to be respectful, to really get to know me as an adult because you truly don't. You know me as a little sister that's there. to help you and serve you and that's not who I am right now. I'm an adult, I'm an independent person, you need to see me that way, you need to respect me in that way and I think if you could do that, you could become close. But that's what I need for that closeness to happen. You don't have a lot of practice stating your needs and it might be hard for you to remember that what you're doing is actually very kind, that you are not abandoning them, you're doing something very kind which is I want all of you in my life and we've had this difficulty and we need to change things so that we can be close. And so because these are going to be probably uncomfortable conversations for you to have, we would like you to have some support as you do this. But we were thinking about your husband and how supportive he is. Is there a way that he can support you? For example, would you like him in the room when you're on the phone with these people? Would you like him in the adjacent room? And then we would also like him to be available to you and tell him, I might feel lots of things after I have these conversations, even if they go well and they might not go well. I might feel guilty, I might feel unheard again, I might feel criticized again, I might feel like that little girl again who's helpless and doesn't know what to do. And I would say to him, what I'd like you to tell me, regardless of how the call went, is how proud you are of me for being able to speak my mind and share my real feelings in a very difficult circumstance. And if I'm feeling guilty, I want you to talk me down and tell me that I did something that was overdue and that I meant, really entitled to do. I think thinking of that little child probably makes it easier. So I'm going to try and think of the little me and how I feel. It's not just the little you to think of, it's the little you through the eyes of the adult you. Just like before in that other exercise, that was where you were able to get in touch with your feelings and also the confidence that you have as an adult, you knew exactly what she needed. You said, I would go hug her. I would go ask her how her day was. I would say, how do you want to spend the afternoon? You knew exactly how to take care of her and we know that you know exactly how to take care of that little girl inside of you. So you are not the helpless little girl anymore. You are the adult who is very competent and capable of doing this as long as you can see her. Thank you. I think what Kate was discovering is that people who have a tendency to people please often have a long history of having their needs dismissed, of being told in various ways that their feelings don't matter as much as somebody else's feelings. And then they carry that message with them throughout their lives. And I'm really glad to hear that she hasn't carried that into her marriage. It sounds like she is able to express how she feels with her husband and she is able to be supported when she wants to do things and her needs are getting met. But I do think that when you have these relationships that have gone on for decades and now people are trying to redefine them. She is trying to redefine it with her mother and now both her father and her brother are saying, "Hey, I want to have a relationship with you, but it has to be on different terms." And once she is able to access her feelings as we got her to do a little bit in this session, I think she is going to get a lot of mileage out of that in terms of really being able to say, "Here is what I need. This has to be a reciprocal relationship and it is going to be better for all of us if it is." It was really remarkable to hear that her father who had abandoned the family essentially, who had left her to the difficult brother and the needy mother, that she thought of him today as a "Easy Cool Dude." It was so distance from how she actually felt. And that is indeed a result of implementing this idea that her feelings don't matter. And when you are told as a child and when you are given the message that your feelings don't matter, you yourself dismiss them and so thoroughly that you are that disconnected from them. And I think that the part of her that knows exactly what that little scared lonely girl needed is going to step up. And once she starts doing that, I think she is going to see some big changes. Even if the other people don't change in the way she wants, I think she is going to see some big changes in how she responds to those other people. So I am curious to hear how this week goes for her. Me too. You are listening to Deah Therapists. We will be back after a short break. Hi, this is Jo Winterstein, host of the Spirit Dollar Podcast, where we talk about astrology, natal charts and how to step into your most vibrant life. The Irish traveler said when I was 16, you are going to have a terrible time with men. Actor, storyteller, and unapologetic, aquarium visionary. And I find a lot of people with strong placements and Aquarius are misunderstood. He really has taught me to embrace people sleeping in different rooms on different houses and different places, but just an embracing of the isness of it all. If you're navigating your own transformation or just want a chart side view into how a leading artist integrates astrology, creativity, and real life, this episode is a must listen. This is your daughter podcast starting on February 24th on the I Heart Radio app Apple Podcast or wherever you listen to your podcast. Join me, Lily Herman, as we dive into the under explored pockets of F1, including the astrology of the current grid. Louis Hamilton, Crap the corn son, Cancer Moon. But it you know it, Michael Schumacher is also a Capricorn son, Cancer Moon. The story of the sports most consequential driver's strike. We have one man who upon hearing that he was going to be fired, freaked out, and apparently climbed out the window of the bathroom. And was Daniel Ricardos a lustrious F1 career, a success story, a cautionary tale, or some combination of both. I'm better." After Mishap's scandals and sagas that have made Formula One a delightful, decadent dumpster fire for more than 75 years. Listen to no grip on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, I'm Jay Chetty, host of the on-purpose podcast. I'm joined by Luke Combs, award-winning country music artist, and one of the most authentic voices in music today. Luke opens up about success, self-doubt, mental health, and what it really takes to stay true to who you are when your life changes overnight. I hate fame. I hate the word "seller" to hate those words that you make me uncomfortable. The guy that says he's always going to be there and that we'll do anything to be there is the only guy that's not there. I'm in Australia when Bo is born. What do you think you'd say? Listen to on-purpose with Jay Chetty on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. A verdict, a villain, a nurse named Lucy Leppie. Lucy Leppie has been found guilty. I'm Amanda Knox and in the new podcast Doubt, the case of Lucy Leppie, we follow the evidence and hear from the people that lived it, to ask what really happened when the world decided who Lucy Leppie was. Listen to Doubt, the case of Lucy Leppie on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. So we heard back from Kate and I'm curious to hear how she did with the Home Oak Week Ava. Hi, Laurie. Hi, Guy. Thank you again so much for speaking to me. It really meant a lot. And I really took your advice to Hardin's book to my family this week. I first spoke to my mom and I told her how I was doing that I felt a little bit tired from work this week, but also that I really enjoyed attending a friend's wedding the other day and she wanted to hear more about that and actually ask questions. So that was great and it showed me that opening up to her actually means that I can also drive the conversation. The second conversation I had was with my dad and that was a little bit more difficult and I shared with him how much of an impact his abandonment had on my life and on my childhood and at first he kind of brushed it off and said we should leave the past in the past but I kept moving the conversation back and told him how important it was for me to share my feelings with him and when he started talking about his pain and how he can't sleep at night thinking about what he's done to us I also brought it back to me and told him that this conversation at this very point is not about his pain but it's about mine and that I really wanted to share it with him so we can have a meaningful relationship and I think he really understood and he thanked me for opening up to him. The third conversation I unfortunately wasn't able to have with my brother because he was traveling this week but I will and I will share with him how I want my future visits to be joyful for me and not out of obligation or guilt and I think he's going to react well but also if he doesn't I hope it's not going to affect me too much because I will be more confident and this conversation with you actually brought a new perspective to my life and so many other aspects as well also in terms of my job I'm wondering if my profession as an eight-worker is something I truly did out of passion or if it's something where I thought I could help other people it's probably a bit of a mix of both but I do feel lately that it's out of service for others and it's not serving me so perhaps it's an opportunity for me to figure out what I actually really want to do. I also wanted to share some good news I just found out I was pregnant so I'm really really happy that I get to have these conversations now so that I can also become a better mother for my child so thank you so much I really appreciate your time. I was so impressed by this voicemail and what Kate did over the week it's not just that she took the advice to heart is that she really had to especially with her dad circle back and insist no I want to have this conversation and then when he said okay we'll have it but let's talk about me she said no no no this is about my pain she really insisted with him and that was successful and with her mom she was really successful in opening up and talking about some happy and regular things in a way that felt good to her so I really felt that she got it she did it so well she felt the results of it and she says that really increased my confidence and yes she hadn't had a chance to talk with her brother but I do get the sense from how well she did with the first two calls that she will have that conversation with her brother and I really trust that you'll do a good job with it. This whole session was based on her letter saying I feel like I'm a people pleaser and I don't know how to change that and I think when we got to sort of the root of what that was all about and she really was able to not only understand it but to feel understood to feel like oh maybe there is a way forward I love that she was able to talk about things that were joyful with her mom because that had been a problem and usually the conversation was about the mom's issues and it didn't go that way because of the boundaries she had set and also with her dad there were three things that happened the first was that he said let's leave the past in the past and she said no and then he said okay we can talk about pain but basically he was talking about his guilt and his pain and she said no and then she talked about her own experience and he thanked her for opening up to him so I thought that was beautifully beautifully done and I like what she said about the fact that even though she hadn't had a chance yet to talk to the brother she has in her mind the sense that even if he doesn't react well it's going to be okay that she'll be able to kind of bring things back and keep having the conversation until he really can hear her so I'm very optimistic about the changes that she's been making and what I think was so interesting is that when she understood where it comes from this people pleasing and how much her childhood impacted her and made her feel like she has to be in the service of others it gave her this insight about her job and her career and she started to question am I doing this because it's truly a passion or is it just a professional people pleasing that I've gone into because that's a complicated question and she needs to spend some time thinking about that but the fact that she's thinking about that shows how much insight she gained from that session and how much you really understood the impact of this childhood on most of her choices in life and there was one thing that she really was clear that she did want which was to become a mother and her comment about that was that what she's learning about people pleasing and where it comes from and how to have more reciprocal relationships is really setting the stage to become the kind of mom that she wants to be for her child so she can model for her child what it looks like to have that healthy balance of your own needs and meeting somebody else's needs so I feel like it all tied together for her and I'm very excited for what the future holds for her. Me too I'm very hopeful for Kate. We hope you enjoyed season three of the Atherapists. As we get ready for season four we have two special bonus episodes to share with you. Sometimes after a session we like to think about what worked well and also what we would do differently if we could do it again. In these two bonus episodes we do a case consultation with our intern Ben a psychology graduate student who pre-interviews the guests and helps select who gets on the show. Next week we're going to unpack what worked with the session we loved Adam's cheating boyfriend. If you're enjoying our podcast don't forget to subscribe for free so that you don't miss any episodes and please help support dear therapist by telling your friends about it and leaving a review on Apple podcasts. Your reviews really help people to find the show. If you have a dilemma you'd like to discuss with us email us at Lori and Guy at iHeartMedia.com. Our executive producer is Noel Brown. We're produced and edited by Josh Fisher. Additional editing support by Helena Rosen, John Washington and Zachary Fisher. Our interns are Ben Bernstein, Emily Gutierrez and Silver Lifton and special thanks to our podcast Fairy Godmother Katie Curric. You can't wait to see you at our next session. The Atherapists is a production of iHeart Radio. I'm Amanda Knox and in the new podcast Doubt, the case of Lucy Letby, we unpack the story of an unimaginable tragedy that gripped the UK in 2023. What if the truth was disguised by a story we chose to believe? Oh my god I think she might be innocent. Listen to Doubt, the case of Lucy Letby on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, it's Jo Interesting, host of the Spiridotter Podcast where we talk about astrology, natal charts and how to step into your most vibrant life. And today I'm talking with my dear friend, Crystal Williams. It can change you in the best way possible. Dance with the change, dance with the breakdowns, the embodiment of Pisces Intuition with Capricorn Power Moves. Listen to the Spiridotter Podcast, starting on February 24th on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your podcasts. I'm Nancy Glass, host of the burden of guilt season two podcast. I was a monster. Listen to burden of guilt season two on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Clayton Nekkerd, in 2022. I was the lead of ABC's The Bachelor. The media is here. The dating contract. I'm Stephanie Young. Listen to Love Trap on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Guaranteed Human.