Your Anxiety Toolkit

Welcome back, everybody. It is so good to have you here talking about hyper-responsibility & hyperresponsibility OCD. A lot of you may not even know what that means and maybe have never heard it, or maybe you’ve heard the term but aren’t quite sure what it entails. And some of you are very well acquainted with the term hyper-responsibility. I thought, given that it’s a theme that’s laced through so many anxiety disorders through depression that we should address it. I think that’s a really great starting point. WHAT IS HYPER-RESPONSIBILITY OCD? Let’s talk about first what is hyper-responsibility. Hyper-responsibility is an inflated sense of responsibility. It is feeling responsible for things that are entirely out of your control, such as accidents, how other people feel about you, how other people behave, events happening in your life. It’s ultimately this overwhelming feeling that the world rests on your shoulders, that it’s up to you and it’s your job to keep yourself and everybody else safe. Even as

Kimberley: Welcome. This conversation is actually so near and close to my heart. I am so honored to have Jessie Birnbaum and Sandy Robinson here talking about Managing the anxiety of chronic illness and disability. Welcome and thank you both for being here. Sandy: Thank you for having us. Kimberley: For those of you who are listening on audio, we are three here today. We’re going to be talking back and forth. I’ll do my best to let you know who’s talking, but if anything, you can look at the transcripts of the show if you’re wondering who’s saying what. But I am so happy to have you guys here. You’re obviously doing some amazing work bringing awareness to those who have an anxiety disorder, specifically health anxiety OCD, panic disorder. These are all very common disorders to have alongside a chronic illness and disability. Jessie, will you go first in just telling us a little bit about your experience of managing these things?  Jessie: Yeah, of course. I’ve had OCD since I was a little kid but

Kimberley: My tummy already hurts from laughing too much. I’m so excited to have you guys on. Today, we are talking about thriving in relationships with OCD and we have Rev. Katie O’Dunne and Ethan Smith. I’d love for you both to do a quick intro. Katie, will you go first? Katie: Yeah, absolutely. My name is Reverend Katie O’Dunne. I always like to tell folks that I always have Reverend in my title because I want individuals to know that ordained ministers and chaplains can in fact have OCD. But I am super informal and really just go by Katie. I am an individual who works at the intersection between faith and OCD, helping folks navigate what’s religious scrupulosity versus what is true authentic faith. I’m also an OCD advocate on my own journey, helping individuals try to figure out what it looks like for them to move towards their values when things are really, really tough. Outside of being a chaplain and faith in OCD specialist and advocate, I’m also an ultramarathon runner, tackling 50 ultramara

Welcome back, everybody.  Alright, alright, alright. You may already notice the sound of my voice has shifted, the tone has shifted, and that is on purpose. Actually, I’ve never thought of this, but it’s true. I often show up when I’m ready to do a podcast. I sit in front of my microphone, I’m in front of my desk, I take a deep breath and I just talk to you from a place of centeredness and calm, gathering as much wisdom as I can. That is a part of what I’m bringing today. But my other hope is I want to shift the tone a little bit because that’s what you have to do when you’re addressing this particular topic, which is motivation during depression. We’re talking about how to get things done during depression. That’s what we’re here for today. Thank you for being here. My name is Kimberley Quinlan. I’m a marriage and family therapist. I’m an OCD and anxiety specialist, and a lot of what I do is manage depression. That is because nearly 85% of cases of an anxiety disorder also have depression. That’s bec

Welcome back, everybody. Today we are talking about a topic that I commonly get asked as a clinician, I commonly get asked as an advocate for anxiety online and so forth, which is how to let go of intrusive thoughts. I think that this is such an interesting question because words matter. For those of you who know me, you’re going to know that words really do matter when it comes to managing anxiety and we have to get it “right.” When I say “right,” what I’m really saying is our mindset about anxiety and intrusive thoughts and any emotion really that is uncomfortable, we have to approach it with a degree of skill, effectiveness, and wisdom. My hope is to help you move in that direction. I know you’re already in that direction, but hopefully, this episode will be really powerful. I’m going to give you a metaphor that I hope really, really helps you. It really helps me. I’ve talked about it on the podcast before, but I feel like it’s important so I have to talk about it again.  When we talk about thi

TALKING BACK TO ANXIETY Welcome back, everybody. Today we’re talking about talking back to anxiety, and we’re really talking about the power of positive self-talk.  Now I know when it comes to this idea of talking back to anxiety, it can get somewhat controversial. In fact, even talking about this idea of positive self-talk can be controversial, and I will be the first to say there is nothing worse than when you’re struggling with something that’s really painful. People say, “Oh, just be positive.” That is not what we’re talking about here today. In fact, I have a personal twist on how I like to consider a positive self-talk. You probably have heard me talk about it before, but I felt like it was time for me to revisit these concepts that I find so incredibly powerful when it comes to talking back to anxiety, or being positive, staying positive, engaging in some form of positive self-talk. WHAT DOES TALKING BACK TO ANXIETY LOOK LIKE?  Let’s talk about it. When we consider what we mean, when we say

Welcome back, everybody. Today we’re talking about sleep anxiety relief. We’re talking about how to get a good night’s rest. Oh, the beauty of a good night’s sleep. I can’t even tell you and I can’t even explain for me personally how much sleep impacts my mental health and my mental health impacts my sleep. Hence why we’re doing this episode today.  For those of you who are new, my name is Kimberley Quinlan. I’m a marriage and family therapist in the State of California. I have a private practice. I am the developer of an online program called CBTSchool.com. I’m an author and I am the host of this podcast.  A few weeks ago, a psychiatrist reached out and said, “I have been listening to you for years, not realizing that I work literally down the street from you.” It made me realize that I never introduced myself on the podcast. I just talk and talk and talk and I actually don’t tell people where I am and what I do and what I offer. So that was a really big lesson.  Let’s talk about sleep anxiety

Welcome back, everybody. Today we are talking about Acceptance Scripts with Dr Jon Grayson.  So happy to be here with you as we tie together our series on imaginals and scripts. Today, we have the amazing Dr. Jon Grayson and he is going to talk about acceptance scripts and the real importance of making sure we use acceptance when we’re talking about scripts and imaginals. I’m so excited to share this episode with you. I think it really does, again, tie together the two other guests that we’ve had on the show in this series.  For those of you who are listening to this and haven’t listened to the other two episodes of the series, go back two weeks. We’ve got the first one with Krista Reed and she’s talking about scripts and the way she uses them. Then we have Shala Nicely and she talks about her own specific way of using scripts. Again, the reason that I didn’t just have one person and leave it at that is I do think for each person, we have to find specific ways in which we do these skills and tools so

Today we are talking all about ERP Scripting with Shala Nicely. Welcome back, everybody. We are on Week 2 of the Imaginals and Script Series. This week, we have the amazing Shala Nicely on the show. She’s been on before. She’s one of my closest friends and I’m so honored to have her on.  For those of you who are listening to this and haven’t listened to any of the previous episodes, I do encourage you to go back to last week’s episode because that is where we introduce the incredible Krista Reed and she talks about how to use scripts and imaginals. I give a more detailed intro to what we’re here talking about if this is new for you. This will be a little bit of a steep learning curve if you’re new to exposure and response prevention. Let me just quickly explain. I myself, I’m an ERP-trained therapist, I am an OCD Specialist, and a part of the treatment of OCD and OCD-related disorders involve exposing yourself to your fear and then practicing response prevention, which is reducing any of the safety b

Welcome back, everybody. Thank you for joining me again this week. I’m actually really excited to dive into another topic that I really felt was important that we address. For those of you who are new, this actually might be a very steep learning curve because we are specifically talking about a treatment skill or a tool that we commonly use in CBT (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy) and even more specifically, Exposure and Response Prevention. And that is the use of imaginals or what we otherwise call scripts. Some people also use flooding.  We are going to talk about this because there are a couple of reasons. Number one, for those of you who don’t know, I have an online course called ERP School. In ERP School, it’s for people with OCD, and we talk about how to really get an ERP plan for yourself. It’s not therapy; it’s a course that I created for those who don’t have access to therapy or are not yet ready to dive into therapy, where they can really learn how to understand the cycle of OCD, how to get them

Welcome back, everybody. Today, we are going to have a discussion, and yes, I understand that I am here recording on my own in my room by myself, so it’s not really a discussion. But I wanted to give you an inside look into a discussion I had, and include you hopefully, on Instagram about a post I made about being busy.  Now, let me tell you a little bit of the backstory here. What we’re really looking at here is, is being busy a compulsion or an effective behavior? Here’s the backstory. I am an anxious person. Nice to meet you. Everybody knows it, I’m an anxious person. That’s what my natural default is. I have all the tools and practice using all the tools and continue to work on this as a process in my life. Not an end goal, but just a process that I’m always on, and I do feel like I handle it really, really well. In the grand scheme of things, of course, everyone makes mistakes and recovery is an up-and-down climb. We all know that. But one thing I have found over and over and over and over again is

Hello and welcome back, everybody. We have an amazing guest today. This is actually somebody I have followed, sort of half known for a long time through a very, very close friend, Shala Nicely, who’s been on the show quite a few times, and she connected me with Dr. Ashley Smith. Today, we are talking about happiness and what makes a “good life” regardless of anxiety or of challenges you may be going through.  Dr. Ashley Smith is a Licensed Clinical Psychologist. She’s the co-founder of Peak Mind, which is The Center for Psychological Strength. She’s a speaker, author, and entrepreneur. She has her own TED Talk, which I think really shows how epic and skilled she is.  Today, we talk about how to be happy. What is happiness? How do you get there? Is it even attainable? What is the definition of happiness? Do we actually want it or is it the goal or is it not the goal? I think that this is an episode I needed to hear so much. In fact, since hearing this episode as we recorded it, I basically changed quit

Hello and welcome back, everybody. I’m so happy to be here with you. This is not the normal format in which we do Your Anxiety Toolkit podcast, but I wanted to really address a question that came up in ERP School about how to manage 10 out of 10 anxiety.  For those of you who don’t know, over at CBTSchool.com, we have a whole array of courses—courses for depression, generalized anxiety, panic, OCD, hair pulling, time management, mindfulness. We have a whole vault of courses. In fact, we have a new one coming out in just a couple of weeks, which is a meditation vault. It will have over 30 different meditations. The whole point of this is, often people say to me that the meditations that they listen to online can become very compulsive. It’s things like, “Oh, just let go of your fear or make your fear go. Cleanse away and dissolve,” and all the things. That’s all good. It’s just, it’s hard for people with severe anxiety to conceptualize that. That whole vault will be coming out very, very soon.  But

Welcome back, everyone. I am so happy to do the final episode of our Sexual Health and Anxiety Series. It has been so rewarding. Not only has it been so rewarding, I actually have learned more in these last five weeks than I have learned in a long time. I have found that this series has opened me up to really understanding the depth of the struggles that happen for people with anxiety and how it does impact our sexual health, our reproductive health, our overall well-being. I just have so much gratitude for everyone who came on as guests and for you guys, how amazing you’ve been at giving me feedback on what was helpful, how it was helpful, what you learn, and so forth.  Today, we are talking about PMS and anxiety, and it is so hopeful to know that there are people out there who are specifically researching PMS and anxiety and depression, and really taking into consideration how it’s impacting us, how it’s affecting treatment, how it’s changing treatment, how we need to consider it in regards to how we

In this week's podcast episode, we talked with Dr. Katherine Unverferth on Menopause, anxiety, and mental health. We covered the below topics: How do we define peri-menopause and menopause?  What causes menopause?  Why do some have more menopausal symptoms than others?  Why do some people report rapid rises in anxiety (and even panic disorder) during menopause.  Is the increase in anxiety with menopause biological, physiological, or psychological?  Why do some people experience mood differences or report the onset of depression during menopause?  What treatments are avaialble to help those who are suffering from menopause (or perimenopause) and anxiety and depression? Welcome back, everybody. I am so happy to have you here. We are doing another deep dive into sexual health and anxiety as a part of our Sexual Health and Anxiety Series. We first did an episode on sexual anxiety or sexual performance anxiety. Then we did an episode on arousal and anxiety. That was by me. The

Welcome. This is Week 4 of the Sexual Health and Anxiety Series. I have loved your feedback about this so far. I have loved hearing what is right for you, what is not right for you, getting your perspective on what can be so helpful. A lot of people are saying that they really are grateful that we are covering sexual health and anxiety because it’s a topic that we really don’t talk enough about. I think there’s so much shame in it, and I think that that’s something we hopefully can break through today by bringing it into the sunlight and bringing it out into the open and just talking about it as it is, which is just all good and all neutral, and we don’t need to judge. Let’s go through the series so far. In Episode 1 of the series, we did sexual anxiety or sexual performance anxiety with Lauren Fogel Mersy. Number two, we did understanding arousal and anxiety. A lot of you loved that episode, talking a lot about understanding arousal and anxiety. Then last week, we talked about the sexual side effects

Hello and welcome back everybody. We are on Week 3 of the Sexual Health and Anxiety Series. At first, we talked with the amazing Lauren Fogel Mersy about sexual anxiety or sexual performance anxiety. And then last week, I went into depth about really understanding arousal and anxiety, how certain things will increase arousal, certain things will decrease it, and teaching you how to get to know what is what so that you can have a rich, intimate, fulfilling life.  We are now on Week 3. I have to admit, this is an episode that I so have wanted to do for quite a while, mainly because I get asked these questions so often and I actually don’t know the answers. It’s actually out of my scope. In clinical terms, we call it “out of my scope of practice,” meaning the topic we’re talking about today is out of my skill set. It’s out of my pay grade. It’s out of my level of training.  What we’re talking about this week is the sexual side effects of antidepressants or anxiety medications, the common ones that peopl

Welcome back, everybody. We are on Episode 2 of the Sexual Health and Anxiety Series. Today, I will be the main host and main speaker for the episode, talking about arousal and anxiety. This is a topic that goes widely misunderstood, particularly in the OCD and anxiety field where people are having arousal that they can’t make sense of. It’s also very true of people with PTSD. They’re having arousal that makes no sense to them, that confuses them, that increases anxiety, increases shame, increases guilt, and from there, it all becomes like a huge mess to them. It becomes incredibly painful, and it’s just so messy they can’t make sense of it.  My hope with this episode is to help you understand the science behind arousal and the science behind arousal and anxiety so that you can move forward and manage your anxiety around arousal and manage your shame and guilt and sadness and grief around arousal, and have a better relationship with your body and with yourself and your soul. Now, these are more diffic

You guys, I am literally giggling with excitement over what we are about to do together.  Last year, we did a series, the first series on Your Anxiety Toolkit where we talked about mental compulsions. It was a six-part series. We had some of the best therapists and best doctors in the world talking about mental compulsions. It was such a hit. So many people got so much benefit out of it. I loved it so much, and I thought that was fun, let’s get back to regular programming. But for the entire of last year after that series, it kept bugging me that I needed to do a series on sexual health and anxiety. It seems like we’re not talking about it enough. It seems like everyone has questions, even people on social media. The algorithm actually works against those who are trying to educate people around sex and sexual side effects and arousal and how anxiety impacts it. And so here I am. No one can stop us. Let’s do it.  This is going to be a six-part sexual health and anxiety series, and today we have a retur

Welcome back, everybody. I had a whole other topic planned to talk with you about today and I’ve had to basically bench it because I feel so compelled to talk to you about this topic, which is the topic of having fun. Now, you might be having a strong reaction to this and maybe there’s a bunch of people who didn’t listen because the idea of having fun feels so silly when you are anxious and depressed. It feels like a stupid idea, a ridiculous idea. But the last few weeks have taught me such valuable lessons about mental health. I talk about mental health all the time. That’s what I live and breathe pretty much. Sometimes when you have an experience—I keep saying it changes your DNA—I feel to a degree my DNA has been changed these last few weeks and let me share with you why.  For those of you who follow me on social media, you will know that in the last couple of weeks, I made a very last-minute trip to the United Kingdom. What happened was pre-COVID, I had booked tickets to visit London for a work