Hey everybody.
It's finally Friday.
You know what that means.
That means I'm on facebook.
And so if you already asked questions using the #KatiFAQ
I know I'm on a little earlier today.
But I have stuff going on later.
And I'm working a little later.
So I wanted to make sure that I get this taken care of.
And uploaded before it's Saturday.
Because then it's not finally Friday.
Then it's, everything's off.
So, I have three questions.
As well as a journal topic.
And I tried to make these kind of all over the board.
And things that I know some of you may be struggling with currently.
Because, you know, Thanksgiving is coming up soon.
And so a lot of you are having some trouble.
Which is to be expected.
And I have a lot of videos coming out,
That I have been preparing for living a stress free holiday season.
So I hope that those are helpful.
And you really enjoy those.
So first question,
It says, 'Hi Kati, I have lost weight due to my eating disorder.'
'My co-workers are already asking me. And holidays are coming up.'
'I'm going to see my family that I haven't seen in a month or so.'
'What do I say when they ask me if I've lost weight?'
Now, I have a couple of clients struggling with this very same thing.
And I have heard from many of you online that you're worried about the fact that you,
Gained weight.
Lost weight.
Being around food.
And all of the above.
And so I have some videos coming out about how to manage the food thing,
During the holidays.
But specifically how do we manage their conversations.
Someone asks us why we have gained weight.
Or why you've lost weight.
What do we say?
Now, it's going to be different from person to person.
I usually tell my clients, you know,
What's the easiest thing, or the most comfortable thing that you can say to them?
Like what are you comfortable speaking about?
I will usually encourage people to be kind of honest.
And then change the subject.
For an instance, like an example would be,
Let's say my aunt is like,
'Wow, Kati, you know you're not looking very good. You look like you've lost a lot of weight,'
'Are you, you know, what's going on with you?'
And hopefully, a lot of your family members know.
They may not.
But this is just one example.
I would say,
'You know, Aunt Rhonda. (Or whatever) You know, I've just really been struggling'
'But I'm working on it. I have my treatment team together.'
'It's just been a really hard semester. (Or whatever)'
And I would change the subject.
'So how are things with, you know, your daughter. I heard that she went to school.'
I mean, I would just say a little snippet.
And move on.
The reason that it usually gets really stressful for people.
And the reason that we tend to struggle with this.
Is because we don't know what to say.
And we hum-ha.
And it goes on for a lot longer than we need to.
And without saying anything, you are actually giving someone an answer.
They are going to ask again.
And they are going to probe.
And then they are going to want to know more information.
So I find it's usually best when we're just honest.
Now I know that that's hard.
And some of us are like,
'But I don't want my whole family knowing.'
Or whatever.
Then come up with what you're going to say.
How you're going to say it.
And then I would just stick with that story.
So, you know,
'Had a really stressful semester. And I was just sick. So I lost a little weight from that.'
Or whatever.
You know.
'It's been really stressful and so I've gained a little weight,'
'Because I didn't have time to work out.'
Whatever your story is.
Have a simple short story.
And then change the subject.
Move on to other things.
We don't want to spend the whole holidays talking about why you gained or lost weight.
Or whatever.
Don't they have better things to do?
And the answer is, they do.
So, think of something to say.
Really short.
And then change the subject.
Okay.
That usually helps.
And once people have an answer, they move on.
Now question number two,
'Hello Kati. I hope you answer this question.'
'How do I get over an obsession with someone?'
'That person treats me like crap. And obviously does not want to talk to me.'
'Even though I know this person doesn't deserve my attention.'
'I still can't get over them.'
'I've only known this person for less than a year.'
'Thank you for your videos by the way.'
Now I made some notes about this.
Because getting over an obsession with someone.
Can be difficult.
But the steps are pretty simple.
Like, I would take notes.
If this is you, and you're worried.
And you're struggling with an obsession with someone.
It could even be a celebrity.
Or it could be a friend.
It could be an ex-boyfriend or ex-girlfriend.
The steps are simple.
But the actions can be a little difficult.
But if we just keep pushing through.
We keep trying.
It will get easier.
Now some of the steps I have are,
The number one is,
Get distance from the person you're obsessed with.
Often, we're going to have a four day weekend.
If you see them at school.
I would try to avoid the hallways that you know you'll see them.
I know you're not going to want to.
But you're going to have to, this is why it gets a little hard.
You're going to have to force yourself to get distance from them.
To not 'run in' to them.
Not go to the places where you know you'll see them.
That can kind of help us put a little space between us.
So we have time to kind of let the obsession die.
Because then we talk about, you know, stop feeding it.
When you think about the source of your obsession.
You talk about it.
You bring it up with your friends.
Let's say it's a celebrity, for the sake of an easy analogy.
Stop following their twitter feed.
Stop talking to your friends about it.
Stop watching the tv show that their in.
Or stop watching the movie.
And just put it on lock down.
The less we feed these obsessions.
The less we run in to the people.
The less we talk about it.
The less we do stuff revolving around the obsession.
The less power the obsession has.
And the more time we will have.
And space we will have in our brain to do other things.
Another thing that we can do is distract.
If you find yourself, you're trying to avoid them.
And now you're thinking about them more.
Which is common.
That can happen because our brain is like,
'But wait, what about that person,'
'Wait, you haven't, well you're going to miss them. And blahhh.'
And it kind of gets worse at first.
Then we need to distract.
So have some tasks that you need to get done.
Make your Christmas card list.
Maybe write out your Christmas cards.
Maybe organise your closet.
Clean the house.
Call a friend.
Go get coffee.
Jump some rope.
Walk your dog.
There's a ton of things we can do to distract us in the mean time.
And the less, the more we avoid them.
The less we feed the obsession.
The less time we spend seeing them.
You know, we can distract ourselves.
And then we can reinvest in the things that have been lacking,
Because a lot of our energy has been going in towards that.
It could be school work.
It could be relationships.
It could be any number of things.
But we get to re-engage in that.
So I would encourage you to work on that.
Write down those steps.
Think of ways that you can do some of those things.
And lets start putting it in to action.
I know it's easier said than done.
But we have to start somewhere.
Right.
Okay, now question number three,
It's a little long.
So I will try to read it quickly.
'Hey Kati, I'm trying so hard to work on stuff and stay positive.'
'And constructive. But it takes a lot of physical energy to do emotional work.'
Agreed.
'I have chronic fatigue syndrome and it drags my mood down.'
'And acts almost like depression because when I'm exhausted,'
'It's hard to fight the negative thoughts or see things in an objective way.'
'Or even to think clearly.'
'Because my brain physically can't function properly with so little energy.'
'And it feels all foggy and weird.'
'Plus the illness itself is depressing because it robs me of so much.'
'So my question is, how can someone with a chronic physical condition.'
Wow, say that five times fast.
'Work through emotional issues.'
' Is it possible for me to still beat my BDD and anorexia when I'm physically so unwell.'
Now the short answer to this is,
Yes.
You can definately still beat your BDD and anorexia.
Even though you have chronic fatigue syndrome.
Or any chronic illness.
The thing that I always encourage my clients who struggle with chronic illnesses,
Is to remind themselves of where they are.
The recovery process needs to meet them where they are.
The expectations of someone without chronic fatigue syndrome might be this far along.
At step five.
And we're only at step one.
And so it makes us feel really bad.
And some days we wont get anything accomplished.
And I think the main.
The, I guess the most important part of recovery,
When we have a chronic illness.
Is going easy on ourselves.
Being forgiving.
Being understanding with ourselves about what we are going through.
And what our body has to deal with.
Because, yes we can still recover and we can get over, work through our issues.
And do the emotional work that is so hard.
But we have to be patient with it.
We have to be forgiving.
We have to know that our goals will be changed over time.
And they are, you know, malleable.
And maybe today we don't get anything done because we're really worn out.
But tomorrow we will try again.
Having that perspective.
And that thought process that our goals aren't rigid.
And we don't have to finish things in exact times.
Will stop that cycle of negative thinking.
Because the thing is, is we're usually,
Trying to fight that negative thinking that's leading to our BDD.
Or our anorexia.
Depression.
Whatever.
And so when we're trying to beat that.
We can't quite meet the deadlines that we've set in our mind.
And then we talk bad about ourselves again.
And we get back in this cycle.
And so the sooner we can stop talking badly about ourselves.
About our chronic fatigue sydrome.
Which is something we no longer have control over.
We need to change that language.
And start being forgiving.
And start setting smaller goals.
And giving ourselves some appreciation for all of the work we have done.
And if you're having a really tiring day.
And just a shit day in general.
Take it off.
Give yourself a break.
It's okay.
It's something that you have to go at your own pace in.
No one can set the pace for you.
You have to set it yourself.
So that would be my encouragement for that.
Is that we can all get better.
We can all work on our issues.
But we all are going to have a different timeline too.
Okay.
Now the journal topic, something I got from my sister-in-law.
Thank's Dana for this.
She posted it on her facebook and I really liked it.
And it says,
'When you choose joy you feel good. When you feel good you do good.'
'And when you do good. It reminds others of what joy feels like.'
'And it just might inspire them to do the same.'
I really liked that.
Because it is a choice.
We can choose to be happy.
We can choose to feel sad.
A lot of times we will ruminate on bad things, because we're just in a bad mood.
But if we change the way we thing about it.
And we during our day are thankful for things like,
'Thanks for that green light.'
And, 'Thanks for that person letting me go first.'
And, 'Thanks for the coffee, the line in Starbucks not being so long.'
And, 'Yes I got a fresh bagel, and it was warm this morning.'
And, 'Wow, and I didn't have any trouble finding the clothes that I wanted.'
'The dress that I thought was dirty was actually clean. Yay!'
There can be all sorts of little things that we can be thankful for.
We can choose joy.
We can choose to see the positive.
And it's infectious.
So lets go infect our areas.
I know that sounds really gross.
But it's actually a good thing.
Infect, we want to infect with joy.
Nothing negative.
Obviously.
Oh and, someone made a comment at the end of yesterday's video.
And I wanted to correct myself.
I was talking about medication and how it can help jump start us.
Now, I meant to specifically with depression, and specifically for that person's question.
The person who commented said something to the effect of,
'You know, I have to be on medication for the rest of my life.'
'Because I have Bipolar Disorder.'
And that is very true.
Many people who struggle with mental illnesses that,
Like Schizophrenia, Bipolar Disorder, that can be difficult to manage without medication.
Most likely do need to be on medication for the long haul.
For potentially their whole life.
And that, everyone's treatment is different.
I was just talking about that specific question.
And I should have made mention of that again as I was talking about it.
So I just wanted to clear that up.
Okay, I love you all.
Have a wonderful weekend.
Get out and have some fun.
Get together with friends.
Enjoy the cold weather maybe.
It's getting cold here in LA.
And I will see you all on Monday.
And on Tuesday I will be on tumblr.
So ask your questions there using the #KatiFAQ
Bye.
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