Episode Transcript
Speaker 1 00:08 You are listening to our anxiety stories, the anxiety Canada podcast with Jon Beekman, checkout anxiety, canada.com for more totally free anxiety resources, including our app mind shift at CBT
Speaker 0 00:22 <inaudible>,
Speaker 2 00:25 including myself. This is, uh, actor, writer, comedian Kathy Jones.
Speaker 3 00:34 Hello. Hi. How are you? Oh, I'm fine. I'm just, let me see if I'm doubling back when I hear myself. No, I'm not. I'm good. Hi Tony.
Speaker 2 00:43 There you go. Somebody calls me Johnny. That's better. Um, I'm, uh, I'm kicking off these interviews with the same basic question, which is cause we're called our anxiety stories. And so I'm, I'm wondering what is your anxiety story?
Speaker 3 01:03 Oh yeah. You know, I don't feel like that I've got this kind of, there I was and you know, my anxiety came up, you know, like, I feel like it's a sort of, um, an overall kind of fabric of my life. Uh, so, you know, wanting to completely avoid things and, you know, not caring whether opportunities pass by because it's too stressful to make leap, uh, that are required in terms of a lot of internal stuff that you need to, you know, accomplish that. You just have too much fear and anxiety around it. Uh, rooted in a relationship with, with oneself I feel like. So, you know, um, when you have shaky ground starting off and you don't like I see my, my daughter's children, he did this very like Herculean job of really being present for them in a way that you think like if someone being such a grown up here and being so understanding that these children's nervous systems seem to be very calm and people think all three boys and mostly running around like maniacs and there's this quality about them that I feel like most of us don't get what we need to keep our nervous system kind of like on a state stable key plane.
Speaker 3 02:38 So I feel like, you know, anxiety is just a big part of, uh, of the fabric of my everyday and, but you know, at the same time, when I was a kid, I was very, very anxious about going to school. I didn't want to go. Even in kindergarten, I started skipping school and begging my parents, let me stay home and you know, but just a, what do we impose on children that caused them to go down that road anyway? Like when children go to school, a lot of times people feel like kids, parents be like, I've got to teach you, it'd be a big boy now I feel like we pre scare children, we think we're all going to be scary. You better hiring right now. It's like you don't need to rush anything because I go to find out kind of thing. I think that some of the things that we impose until then and jangled the nervous system and caused that kind of anxiety that lasts a lifetime.
Speaker 2 03:25 Yeah. And that's, that's, you know, when I was young and going through anxiety, you know, what, what they jangled me with, what's a nuclear war, you know, that's what I was mostly scared of. And there's always something. And you know, I have a real problem with the way that, uh, that climate change is being approached in the high schools and that in the schools because now it's basically making it, they're used, a lot of people use fear as a tactic to deal with it. And that's triggered my kids for sure.
Speaker 3 03:52 Oh my God. Anybody that I know that has children, their teenagers are either dealing with, you know, complete jocks who are somehow managing to keep themselves afloat by being totally, you know, is it the football or in some way like sing LA LA LA, I can't hear you to what's going on. Or completely like overly like for example, highly sensitive people, which is a huge percentage of people. And the kids, they just, they're just overwhelmed. Some of them are depressed and some of them have had a hell of a time like getting on and off weed because it really doesn't work when you're a teenager. It kind of always depletes your life. And so it makes it really hard to get back up on the horse. The little lights on. I was the young people for sure. And I think when we were kids too, we were, yeah, we were Catholic, you know, and I feel like, yeah, Wilson senior with anxiety is everywhere and I'll pervasive. And the idea is what, how you, your view, your view is very important at this point. Like when you think that there's something that you are not getting because you don't feel safe, then that's the wrong tack because there is no, there is no ground and there never has been. And the more you embrace that view, um, I think that helps you with kind of like, okay, now there is no ground, there's no guarantees. Now what am I going to do, you know?
Speaker 2 05:10 Yeah, definitely. So did you say you have, you have grandchildren now that are that?
Speaker 3 05:16 I have three grandchildren. I have a 11 year old and nine year old and a six year old. Wow. Yeah.
Speaker 2 05:22 That's fabulous. And so with your, with your daughter, does, does your daughter like to cheer? Were your kids okay when it came to the anxiety spectrum to that stuff or were they just like most, most kids?
Speaker 3 05:34 My older daughter, you know, when I was, when I had her, I was, uh, gallivanting around of the single mother and luckily she came equipped with a very strong nervous system, you know, even at that, she's done a lot of work with her own stuff, you know, and, and uh, and then my other daughter, I've basically, I said to her, coming off, I said, I'm doing a terrible job. I was very stressed out when I was with her father and I said, I'm doing terrible job and I will pay for your therapist and I, and I am paying for her therapist.
Speaker 2 06:04 Interesting. I can see I've never really heard of that. I've never really heard of, you know, of a parent kind of taking that kind of responsibility, you know.
Speaker 3 06:12 Well, I think that that accountability is so Healy in a family. Like, for example, you know, you have a situation where <inaudible> you know, constantly you have an a really, well this is early days when I read that guy, uh, the guy who wrote the road less traveled, he was talking about a psychology as evil, like parents completely blaming their kids for being nuts and never looking within. And that's the whole approach to anxiety that I think anything that's paid attention to actually gets better. And so if you really go into your anxiety instead of trying to get outside and you will never win, it is there. So how do you kind of give in to whatever it is? Like whether it means that you are anxious because you feel justified in behaviors or you know, like if you don't examine what, what's coming up in your mind, you don't look at the contents of your mind and you can't be trying to get away from the mind. It's really quite attractive. And I think that with my kids, I was always kind of accountable. Like, and that was my saving grace in all of my roses.
Speaker 2 07:16 Yeah, avoiding avoiding anxiety certainly causes anxiety. In my experience, but, you know, there's not, not everybody it seems like is, is open to because in my experience with mental health issues, um, going in where it was kind of the, was one of the big solutions, you know, becoming, you know, B just going inward and thinking about myself, thinking about what I'm, what I am and what's causing this. Not, not everybody is ready to do that or willing to do that. And I guess that's kinda one of the, one of the hard nuts to crack when it comes to this.
Speaker 3 07:49 Absolutely. I mean, I think that people think that, first of all, I think we absorb and internalize aspect of abuse in our lives and we then have a representative of people who scared us living within ourselves. And we scare ourselves all day long. So when, when we break down, uh, you know, I think this, no, I don't think it's crazy or kooky to, uh, break yourself down and go, okay, who's in here and go, gosh, look, you know, there's a really, like, I just grew a relationship after relationship with this incredible, you know, um, uh, critical. Um, energy of mine and um, until I met somebody who, who had so much space that that and that they just couldn't, there's nothing, like they say you can't punch a space like spaces open, then it's just like a mirror. Right, right. And so I've heard tell that of an anxiety tech of being a sounding like someone's being completely aggressive.
Speaker 3 08:50 And I know that a lot of my anxiety has come out with this kind of like, cause I think of it now because my boyfriend provided so much the base for my, for myself. Yeah. I realized I was just like shouting down the hallway saying like, you know, basically is it okay for me to need to be alone right now? I don't know how to do this. I don't know how to be this close to somebody without thinking it's going to kill me. It's very, you know, you have this high alert thing on the go, right? You think, Oh my God, if someone gets that close to me, I will die. I will lose money.
Speaker 2 09:20 Yeah. Yeah, yeah. It's interesting how we, how, how people react to that kind of thing. I've got, I've got a question here because you're a performer, you know, you were Cod co and this, you still are Cod COE and this hour has 22 minutes. Um, how did you, you're kind of a classic example, you know, you're, you're a funny person who deals with these issues and so many times we hear but funny people who deal with do this use. But how did you, how did that inform your ability to perform or ability to write, you know, ability to be funny.
Speaker 3 09:52 Yeah. I have a really hard time writing Johnny. I have a really hard time. Like I'll, I'll have a burst of really interesting ideas and then I'll, I'll completely like, I don't know how to bring myself back to the, to the board and push through. I need support and I've never really had it. I've never had the guts to say how much support I actually need or the confidence to say, I have an idea. So good that you guys gotta give me four people to work with. Like I've never pushed through with the collective energy that I've wanted and working on my own. Very challenging for me. I have add and I was until I met a certain therapists like in 2012 who said, listen, listen, you go, really? I made it easy when I was younger, I didn't know. I had add and I used to write on a typewriter so we didn't have the internet in it.
Speaker 3 10:38 Yeah. Oh God. And then, and, and uh, someone said to me the day I drank, I learned things every day. I'm 64 years old and I'm always looking to learn something. And the director said to me, do you lock your phone in a box and tried to just write three pages a day? And I'm like, Oh my God. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. You know what I mean? Like it has affected me. Mary used to always say, Mary was always the enemy. You have add and I didn't know what it was and it wasn't big. Then I would just, I would like, my mind is like a jazz mind. Like all of a sudden I'm, I'm sort of putting in a whole new riff in there and you're like, why are you going there? You know, that embarrassing. And I always felt, I felt really insecure about the way my brain worked.
Speaker 3 11:19 But like I worked with a lady very recently a girl came to work with me and me and my other friend had pitched a TV show where my friend kept referring to me as, you know, dah, dah, dah, dah, dah, symptoms of untreated ADHD. And my friend who had worked for me, he said, listen, you can't, you're being like, you're being like, you know, uh, prejudice against your, the way your own brain works. People gotta accept different types of thinkers. I remember David Mills, he used to write a, he wrote, he just, he has Alzheimer's right now, but he wrote Deadwood. He wrote a healthy food. And I read one day by the way, he wrote, he like, he had somebody who was writing down who was typing it and he was lying on the floor. He had about 10 people in the room. It was somebody making go up on the big screen and like, Oh my God, you know, that really helped.
Speaker 3 12:05 I've only a couple of times in my life had those done in situation one, I worked, my brother who really, really focused me. I worked an Ricker who really, really focused me. And I also got to work with Janet Spence when I was younger and then wanted to get back to that situation. Ever since. I'm not a political person, I've never watched the national all the way through ever. Yeah. And, and I am, but I like working in a collective and I'd like to do that. And also I smoked weed for my, when I'm, I don't need to do it when I'm alone, but when this stuff was going to happen, I think, you know, really good. You know, I've haven't drank for 25 years, but I still have draw to, to work with my, my mind at work with my mind, work against my mind. Maybe. I don't know, sometimes we did a week kind of way out from me, but sure is nice.
Speaker 2 12:51 Yeah. Sure. Um, what other, do you have any other strategies, coping strategies outside of, you know, will you say week, but anything else that you can go to that
Speaker 3 13:01 I have done EMDR, which I find is very straightforward. I don't know why all trauma therapists say, Oh well I can't really use that. I'd rather use reenact mandate. I'm off to people.
Speaker 2 13:12 I'm not sure what EMDR is. What's EMDR?
Speaker 3 13:15 EMDR is eye movement desensitization and reprocessing especially goes for small teeth. Strom is like the things you're really embarrassed about. Like I always say, yes, you should sweat the small stuff because notice you pull a little small stuff with you to every different therapist you go to and say, well there was that dumb thing. And they said, well, Oh, okay. And they don't know how to work on it until you realize the little things that happen to you really were impactful and EMDR really works on that. It's a wonderful kind of therapy that really peeled a lot of my doom and gloom feeling about being depressed. And now like I can get some perspective on depression. I can see that it kind of, it comes and goes and, and you know, like just as good times are not permanent, bad times are not from, everything's always changing and I always, I eat really well.
Speaker 3 14:01 I don't eat any lectins or colored candies or any false colors, you know, like the blues and yellows that really help. I really, my diet is really, you know, got a lot of nutrients in it, you know, brain food and I've really cleaned out like a lot of debris out of my body so that my brain is not as, you know, I really believe I can, I can feel it. Some people when they're, when their gut back here is foul, then they're sick of mentally and they're not as able to kind of, you know, kind of really accessed, they're brilliant. The other day I had this strong impression that children are magical and connected to the earth. Like just like mushrooms are connected to each other. Like you could have a magical, magical life. And I think we do take children's power away when we give them white sugar because you're turning them into little addicts who deserves to have that kind of high and low going on with them. When did that little, we should just be able to be our whole firm sales.
Speaker 2 14:52 Yeah. Well, the white sugar is an addiction I work on every day. Trust me, Kathy.
Speaker 3 14:56 Me too, bud. Yeah, me too. Because then I think, Oh, I'm not eating any one of you ever having honey and maybe there was this deal my daughter did last week. She gave up all sugar up theories to everything and she was crying for about seven days and how she's great. You're ready to take on city hall.
Speaker 2 15:10 Okay. Get go. Maybe I'm going to try that. Kathy, I really appreciate you taking the time and opening up to us today on world mental health day. It's very important and it's very important from hearing from people like you. It's invaluable.
Speaker 1 15:23 Everybody out there listening. Thanks so much. I really appreciate what you're doing, John. Thanks very much. Nice to talk to you again soon. Okay, good. Take care. Bye.
Speaker 0 15:33 <inaudible>.
Speaker 1 15:36 Thanks for listening to our anxiety stories, the anxiety Canada podcast with Jon Bateman. Check out anxiety canada.com for more anxiety resources, including our app mind-shift CBT. And if you like what you hear, please consider making a donation. This podcast is made possible by listeners like you. Until next time,
Speaker 0 15:57 <inaudible>.
