S2 E 41: Skills for Recovery with Eryn

Making Headway

A first ever solo episode! Join Eryn as she delves into all the skills that have helped her post brain injury. Listen to learn more about pacing, the value of a broad support team, monopolizing on your new ‘slower’ brain, and for some awesome pod, book, and movie recommendations. You won’t want to miss this one. It’s all that and a bag of tricks! (Just a little biased:)

• In this episode:
• **note: this was recorded before our season opener, we WILL be releasing episodes every week starting Jan. 3, 2022
• Value of rest
• Value of the community. We got you! I know they had me and still do.
• Lessons learned in recovery:
• Reaching out and helping others
• Not here to preach to others on what to do or not to do
• Value of life coaching
• See links below for Joanne Susi
• Brain Injury Association of Massachusetts (BIA-MA)–has great support group resources
• The pitfalls of doing what you “should“ do or some rule you need to follow
• …this is your ego talking. Your mind’s voice.
• The ego is based on what you have done in the past and values keeping you safe. Left unchecked, it can keep you stuck
• The other voice is your spiritual self i.e. god, intuition, universe, etc..it can help you try something new
• The art of slowness
• Sitting and reflecting
• Brain injury may make you feel slow, the art of getting through brain injury is figuring out how to monopolize on this
• Rest
• Prioritization
• Suggestion: write dpwn each thing you need to do and then put it away. Take a rest. Come back to it. Narrow down which things need to stay on the to-do list based on the due date.
• What date is it actually due? Do you really need to get this done ahead of time?
• Do things for when they are actually due.
• Work on a piece of each thing gradually.
• You don’t have to over-achieve or have things done early.
• Time out how long common tasks take you. This will help you plan so that you can avoid overbooking yourself
• Time blocking
• Try to avoid rigidity. Leave some flexibility in your schedule
• In order to time block you have to know how long each thing actually takes you (on average)
• Once you know how long things take, were you scheduling realistically or trying to cram too much in?
• Do you have realistic expectations?
• Reflect on how you use your time
• The dangers of unsolicited advice and trying to force moments with other people. What you want might not be realistic
• “Brain injury strength”: the opportunities found in hardship; where you see the beauty
• Movie: Collateral Beauty- seeing the beauty in the hard times
• Beauty still occurs while awfulness is happening. The world is filled with oxymorons
• It's ok to be human; to be imperfect. Dichotomies exist. We have to be flexible. It’s not black and white. Good exists with the bad. Look for the collateral beauty.
• Brain injury journey
• I lay out what I’ve been through. I’m vulnerable.
• I’m a caterpillar that can see butterflies and wants to be one. I’m slowly becoming one.
• Synopsis of my stroke experience (related to perimesencephalic subarachnoid hemorrhage)
• The lows of depression lasted 10 months
• Mental Health Therapy and life coaching have been a must!
• Support system: family and friends
• Best hubby award goes to…Troy!
• Low self-esteem with depression
• Hyperactivity, headaches, tingling, no-energy, fatigued, and impulse control issues rear their ugly heads
• Unsupportive healthcare providers
• Functional neurology (turned out to be a dead end, OT ended up being the most helpful)
• Asking supports to give me a check if I am acting out of line
• Resources
• Coaching for Leaders with Dave Stahowviack (podcast): Listen on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/coaching-for-leaders/id458827716
• We Can Do Hard Things (podcast): Listen on Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/we-can-do-hard-things-with-glennon-doyle/id1564530722
• Untamed by Glennon Doyle (book): buy here
• Collateral Beauty (movie): buy here
• The Upside (movie): buy here
• Links to any resources mentioned:
• Instagram @joesorocks. Survivor Clubhouse rooms Wed & Fri 6pm PST/ 9p EST
• Joanne Susi, life coach and stroke survivor at Healing for Helping Professionals
• BIA-MA, follow this link for free online support groups and activities
• Collateral Beauty: buy here
• Joe and Mariah’s episode: E30 Crawling out of the Dirt
• Functional neurology episode: E34 Help for the Hopeless
• Coaching for Leaders with Dave Stahowviack (podcast)
• We Can Do Hard Things (podcast)
• Reach out to:
• Eryn on IG @eryn_makingheadwaypodcast
• Mariah on IG @mariah_makingheadwaypodcast
• MHP on IG @makingheadwaypodcast
• Using our Amazon links to buy products gives us a small kickback. Thank you for your support!
• Untamed by Glennon Doyle (book)
• Collateral Beauty (movie)
• The Upside (movie)
• Support us at:
• Patreon
• Donate!- section on our website. 10% of profits go to our favorite non-profit of the moment

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Apple Notes:

HELP US SPREAD THE WORD!

If you dug this episode, kindly leave us a rating, a review, and subscribe!

Visit the Making Headway Podcast website at www.makingheadwaypodcast.com to learn more about Eryn and Mariah and our journey to podcasting.

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