with Guest Rachel Gotto
On this week’s Wedotalk, David interviewed Rachel Gotto.
We talk about Rachel’s therapy and mentoring business, her experiences leading up to writing her book, her entrepreneurial spirit and the mental and emotional strength that has helped her through the darker times of her life and created a passion to help others.
Rachel first experienced a traumatic loss in her twenties, when her closest brother was diagnosed with cancer, and she nursed him for the last two years of his life, traveling the world with him to try and find a cure. Sadly, her brother died in 1996.
Rachel met and married her husband, who tragically drowned in a scuba diving accident while Rachel was 6 months pregnant with their first child. They had only been married 8 months, leaving her to give birth to their first child alone.
When her daughter was aged just five, things began to go badly wrong again. Rachel was diagnosed with a rare form of benign brain tumor and was told she didn’t have long to live. Determined not to give up, she hunted the world for a neurosurgeon who was willing to give her a chance at life. After an exhaustive search she found a neurosurgeon in Bristol who was willing to perform the risky surgery. 15 hours of neurosurgery surgery and one intracranial bleed later Rachel had survived, just.
But the ravages of surgery had unfortunately left its mark and Rachel woke days later to find that she had been left paralyzed down the left-hand side of her body, and it took her more than two years to regain full mobility. The neurosurgery had triggered epilepsy, and after decades of being on prescription drugs to keep the epilepsy at bay she found herself addicted to benzodiazepines.
This was the beginning of a particular period of hell as she embarked on a long and horrific withdrawal period in which she charted 47 symptoms over a 2.5-year period.
All of these events took more than two decades out of her life, and she felt that she was walking out of a prison in her forties and had to re-start her life completely, and now has a therapy and mentoring business and Amazon published her first book “Flying on the Inside: A Memoir of Trauma and Recovery” in December 2021.
Rachel’s Contact Information:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rachelgotto/
Twitter: @RachelGotto
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?…
Instagram: @rachel_gotto
Website: https://rachelgotto.com
Clubhouse: @rachelgotto
Trauma Loss Survival and Recovery
Transcription
Trauma, Loss, Survival and Recovery | Wedotalk with David
David: Hello and thank you for joining us you’re listening to a Wedotalk with David Jaques.
Hi and welcome back to this week’s Wedotalk. Over the last year and a half or so that I’ve been interviewing people for Wedotalks I’ve had some amazing guests and heard some incredibly inspiring stories. I always tie it to the human story and just about everyone that I’ve spoken to has overcome some major challenges and obstacles in their life. Well to say that today’s guest has overcome some obstacles in her life will be a huge understatement. It’s my pleasure to welcome to Wedo today’s guest joining us from Galway in Ireland, we have Rachel Gotto. So, Rachel a very good afternoon to you, welcome and thanks for joining Wedo.
Rachel: Oh, it’s great to be here thank you for inviting me all the way from Galway.
David: And Rachel if I had to really describe your life, I would say it’s a series of many traumas and many losses. So, as means of an introduction Rachel experienced her first traumatic loss in her twenties when her closest brother was diagnosed with cancer, and she nursed him for the last two years of his life traveling the world with him to try and find a cure. Sadly, they didn’t find that, and her brother died in 1996. She met and married her husband, was happily married and very tragically her husband died in a scuba diving accident after they’ve been married for only eight months leaving her six months pregnant and she had to give birth to their first child alone.
Then when Rachel’s daughter was about five years old things went seriously wrong again when she was diagnosed with a grade 6 AVM which is an arterial venous malformation, a rare form of a benign brain tumor and although this tumor wasn’t malignant, she was told that it would be fatal and that she didn’t have long to live. Well, she was determined not to give up. She had a young daughter that she wanted to live for and wanted to see grow up so once again she scoured the world to try and find a neurosurgeon that would be willing to do a risky surgery to try and save her life and after an exhaustive search, she did find a surgeon in Bristol that was willing to do this this very challenging surgery. The surgery took 15 hours during which she suffered intracranial bleed and she did survive the surgery but only just. When she woke several days later, she found that the left-hand side of her body was completely paralyzed, and it took her more than two years to regain mobility. In addition to that the neurosurgery had triggered epilepsy and she found herself on a heavy dose of medication to keep the epilepsy at bay. And after several years of being on this medication regime she found herself addicted to benzodiazepines.
Well, that started another whole period of what she really describes as hell in her life when she went through two and a half years of benzodiazepine withdrawal. During that time, she charted 47 symptoms and taken up two decades of her life and Rachel has been on record as saying that she would rather go through the process of losing her brother, losing her husband, and going through that neurosurgery all over again rather than have to deal with benzodiazepine withdrawal. Well, today she actually has her own successful therapy and mentoring business and in December of 2021 amazon are going to be publishing her first book flying on the inside a memoir of trauma and recovery.
So, Rachel do you ever kind of wake up in the morning and think to yourself wow I’m still here after everything I’ve been through, I’m here and I’m having a healthy life.
Rachel: That brings a lot of emotion up for me it’s a great question and the answer is 100 yes David. There isn’t a morning that I don’t wake up and I actually go oh wow I’m still here, but also that I have this feeling of gratitude that I actually have an ability to live, and a living and I have a family and I can go out and about every day is filled with gratitude quite sincerely.
David: Yeah, I can imagine it would be. And you know we could probably spend hours talking about the details of everything that you’ve been through and I’m sure that in your book you go through that, and I haven’t read your book yet it’s coming out very soon the launch date is coming out. I believe there is a kindle version available already, but anybody that wants to read the details of these traumatic events is certainly available in Rachel’s book. So, Rachel let’s turn to where you are today, your life today, and what you do and the first thing that I was going to ask you which I think I’ve pretty much answered the question myself is what was the worst experience you’ve had over those couple of decades in your life that in which you felt in prison? Was it the withdrawal from Benzodiazepines?
Rachel: It was David and of course I wouldn’t have been able to make that judgment until I’d come through everything and the coming through off benzodiazepines for me was a particular horror and a particular hell all of its own and I think the difference is that all the experiences and traumatic losses and experiences that I had up until that point society understood what had happened to me, there’s a place for somebody who’s lost a brother through cancer, there’s a place for understanding about the diagnosis of cancer, and there’s a place for a widow, and there’s a place for a young widow, and then there’s a place for a first-time mother who’s widowed. Society actually had places for me through all of that. When it became apparent that I’d inadvertently become the accidental addict and you know don’t get me wrong I’m grateful that modern medicine was there for me and saved my life, but it just was I wasn’t reviewed. So, after about seven years I found that I was this accidental addict. Now, the journey that I had to go through to withdraw from this particular medication it took away my mind, it took my sort of place in society because I became agoraphobic, I became paranoid and sadly at one particular point in time I became homicidal and I had a terrible battle to fight back the experience of being told from my crazy mind that it would be better if I took my daughter and my mother with me and we all went together. That was something that is etched into my soul, the battle I had to fight against those voices. So, it was a particular hell: my skin fell off, I could hardly walk, I was unable to leave my house, I had seizures, I couldn’t drive my car not that I would have been able to leave my house. Literally those 47 symptoms imprisoned me in my own house for two and a half years. And what happened then because as I said before society has a place for all of those usual losses there was no place for me in society as a person who was withdrawing from benzodiazepines. I actually became part of a subculture because it was sort of muted that I had underlying psychological problems and you know it would be an understandable looking at me that one could have thought that, but now we know a lot more about benzodiazepines. What I was experiencing was the result of being on the same dose of the same drug for nearly nine years. They were entrenched in myself. So, the journey to come off took me to the very core of my being and being able to survive that I had to dig even deeper than I had through tragic loss and trauma and even losing my physicality, I had to go into a place in me that I didn’t even know was there, David. And that is what I call now today finding your metal, finding your bedrock because I quite literally had to dive in and hold on to life and also to refute the instructions that were become from my mad mind and my mad mind was caused by chemical imbalance due to a drug being removed my system. And I did it incrementally, I did it slowly, I did it as safely as I possibly could, but it still has been the most traumatic experience that I have had to date and for my daughter, she actually had to live through that. So, the answer is benzodiazepines handstand for sure.
David: Yeah, and when I look at your story and everything you’ve been through you must have incredible physical strength to have overcome the physical symptoms that you have which included the withdrawal from the prescription medication, but also an incredible amount of mental and emotional fortitude to be able to come out of that and I’m sure yes going through it was hellish but being able to see the way to the end and see that light at the end of the tunnel. Rachel, I think you bring up a very interesting point about there being a place for people with situations at which people can relate and I think that something like addiction we tend to, society tends to think of addicts as people that do this to themselves and the term that you use accidental addict is a very interesting one because you did not go through recreational drugs or whatever that addictive personality, that people tend to have that often gets them to that point and that’s where society tends to pigeonhole us. You were doing this as you say to save your life, so you really didn’t have a choice, nor did you have a choice really to come off of it as well, so just an incredible accomplishment to have gone through that and get to where you are today.
Rachel: Thank you David. And the thing for me is that I’m not unique, I actually got my support through this and as you know we all thrive in community, and I needed somebody to support me going through this because my in-person support didn’t have the skills and the understanding and as you say the relativity to my experience. So, what I did was I actually found a forum online and I found there were hundreds of thousands of people like me. We were a subculture of people who had all got the same issue, we needed to come off the medications we had and sometimes the medical profession had truncated some of the people off they just said: “oh you want to come off then you stop taking it”. That was an event that happened to me earlier on. Thankfully I wasn’t truncated I was given the you know where with all by my physicians to be able to withdraw you know slowly and carefully and safely and the most important thing about benzodiazepine withdrawal is that actually it is sacrosanct that you come off safely because it’s a physical dependency as opposed to a psychological dependency and that’s the difference with it. And you know there’s a lot of people going through this issue, and I’m constantly contacted by people who are saying I’m having difficulty coming off these drugs.
David: I think the real important message there is whatever trauma you’re going through in life four very powerful words I believe in are: “You are not alone” because it’s very easy when you’re going through mental illness, psychosis, addiction, financial problems, whatever it is even personal problems, work problems it’s very easy to feel very isolated and to feel that I’m the only person that’s going through this because that’s the way we tend to feel because we need help, but if the help isn’t out there it’s very difficult to try and navigate this on your own, but I think the important message is you are not alone, there are online forums, there are support groups. It’s surprising how when you talk to people you find people have the same story if not identical to you, they have a similar story, they have something else that they’ve gone through that they can relate to and we can support each other, so humans are social beings and we need the contact of others and even in times of pandemic and hopefully post pandemic we can have more of that personal contact, but if not there are forums out there and there are places to go, so great that you’re able to go and get the help.
Rachel: And that’s it I mean if you are going through something research, research, research and really look for yourself and find a community that you can connect with that relates to what you’re going through, absolutely. And this is the joy of the online world we needn’t be alone anymore; we don’t have to travel to get support and it saved my life. So, you know for people listening for mental health issues and all anything that’s actually affecting your mental well-being, they will find a form all you need to do is actually type in your issue plus forum and you’ll have immediate access and that’s really comforting.
David: Yeah, absolutely true. So, Rachel let’s turn to your business. Today you have an active therapy and mentoring business. Would you tell me a little about the business that you have and what type of things you do and how you offer help to others?
Rachel: Sure, I’m a clinical hypnotherapist and a mentor. Now, my advent into clinical hypnotherapy was because at one point I was completely paralyzed down the left-hand side of my body and the journey to recovery meant that I had to actually make new neural circuitry and I had to adopt this whole wonderful part of my brain that causes neuroplasticity and how do we do that? We use our mind as a powerful tool, so I used my mind as a powerful tool to rewire my body to walk again and my left arm is still a bit wonky, but I have use of it and I was left-handed. So, that’s the other part of it is I wired myself to use my right hand from my left hand, so the brain is incredibly pliable it’s quite capable of learning new information because once before it was thought actually that once the brain is formed and you’ve matured that actually nothing changes in the brain. The you can’t teach an old dog new tricks sort of thing, but we now know through neuroplasticity that we can rewire, we can recreate new patterns of behavior, we can literally transform our mind and our mindset through the power of our mind. So, when I recovered physically I was a therapist in the becoming all these years it was when I understood what I’d done for my body and also I created a very positive mindset inside myself, I had transformed my inner world and my outer world. I said I have to be able to do this formally I have to be able to help people do what I’ve done so that’s why I trained to be a clinical hypnotherapist because we utilize the power of the subconscious mind to remove emotional blocks to people’s success. So, for instance we hold belief systems in our subconscious mind all the time that we’ve acquired from our earlier childhood and we’ve compound interest in them we’ve taken on new beliefs and behaviors, so the beauty about hypnotherapy is we can put something into a very focused state of mind which incidentally isn’t new we’re not conjuring up anything weird or wonderful all we’re doing is utilizing a part of the mind, the subconscious mind to find out what is the root cause and the reason we have this issue. When we do that, we can do the exciting work of discrediting the belief that we acquired the acquired belief.
That’s not enough because we need to upgrade our brains, we need to upgrade the hard drive so to speak, so what we do is we install a new program. How do we do that? I make a bespoke audio for each client, and they have it sent over to them and then they listen every single day twice a day they’re going into hypnosis every time they listen because I’m counting them in. So, what we’re doing is we’re truly harnessing the power of the mind, I harnessed the power of my mind to heal my body and my brain and to in less than 10 years create a phenomenal life because I’m harnessing the power that is innately there that I was born with and I’m just taking charge of it and becoming the architect of my own life. So, the clinical hypnotherapy side of my business to me is the most exciting thing and there’s not an issue really that can’t be looked at in terms of clinical hypnotherapy because of the body-mind connection. It’s a very win-win, so it’s a very advanced way of doing therapy it’s not for everybody. Some people do really well, but of course you’d know that because you come for an initial free consultation. I worked out when I was working with my clinical hypnotherapy clients that the changes that were happening sometimes were a little bit ahead of where they were ready to be and they needed mentoring to process into these changes, so I added mentoring on to my clinical hypnotherapy practice and that made a really good nuts and bolts therapy and that’s why I’ve been so successful today is because I have that lived experience, I’ve got the professional experience and I trained in talk therapy years ago and many other therapies that I bring into my toolbox, David, so that I can work outside of the box with my toolbox for each client because each person is so different so that’s how I like to work.
David: Yeah, so Rachel one thing I’d like to ask you, you just kind of alluded to that is this type of business something that is a direct result of all the trauma and loss and experiences that you’ve had over the last 25 years or so or is this the type of thing that you think you would have done anyway?
Rachel: When I was 12, I used to read formal nursing books, when I was 14, I was reading first year med I always had a really deep interest in personal health and personal well-being. When my brother died, I started to train to be a talk therapist, various incidents in life I always say I was a therapist in the becoming since day one. And I think that it might sound a bit cliché, a bit trite, but I do feel, David, that I had to go through more stuff to get to the place where I was able to do the work I do now with the groundedness, with the professionalism, but also that ability to work with each client on a completely bespoke premises and platform that I can really reach into where my clients need me to be and that’s what makes me alive and of course it makes me even feel more alive and grateful because when I see the results that I get from my clients then that is just to me the whole joy of having come through all I’ve come through because now I’m giving back and serving most powerfully and that’s what we should all be doing I think any way you know.
David: Yeah, absolutely and truly you show a spirit of an entrepreneur, definitely an entrepreneurial spirit and I believe even before all of this part of your life started you had started businesses at a pretty early age, so it’s no surprise that you’ve developed something as you have done today and turned it into something which is very unique and very powerful, but would you tell us a little bit about some of the early things you did you had a couple of businesses where you were pretty young, I think.
Rachel: I did when I was 23 I came back to Ireland from England and I began my own restaurant business and I also had three apartments and a little shop actually that I ran, so I was working seven days a week 24 hours a day running this business in the crazy way. I’m sure you know the restaurant world is all nighttime life and all of this I was very successful but I’ll let you know I did not earn a penny, not a penny. I knew how to start a business, I knew how to be a really good people’s person, I had no idea how to make money, so it was a wonderful experience at the age of 23 and it was interesting we were known for the only restaurant in the west of Ireland or south of Ireland at the time who was an all-women cruise, so we had great reputation and a lot of famous people used to come there and it was just a great thing for a young person to do. I wouldn’t be doing it now; I wouldn’t like to be running a restaurant now I think that I need to sleep but it was such a great start to life. I came from a family of entrepreneurial people and of course it was almost in my blood that I was going to end up doing something like that.
So, now to be running a business that I’m so passionate about um and I’m better at it than I was when I was 23, so it’s just such a joy day but it really is but it set me up in good stead, I think.
David: Yeah, I think it does I mean I look back at my jobs in my early 20s of working in mid-20s working in the trading room at Barclays bank and those crazy hours and crazy environment and there’s no way I would want to be doing that. I did it for a few years it was good at the time, but it was a great foundation it taught me a lot of technical skills that none of them are really valuable for what I do today, but it taught me a lot of life skills, taught me a lot about working with people, navigating my way through systems, the corporate world, sales skills, it just taught me a tremendous amount. So, all of those things that we learn in our early days are often a good foundation for something else that we may launch ourselves into later.
Rachel: For sure, for sure.
David: So, again turning to your current business. What are the type of things that you love to help people with if somebody comes to you as a new client? What are the sort of things that they come to you for? What type of conditions do you enjoy treating people for?
Rachel: I have sort of two client types of clients really. I have clients who come to me for trauma and depression and anxiety. And people are attracted to working with me because of course my lived experience means that I can truly relate, and I can absolutely, you know empathize in the way that is very very important plus people trust me that I’m not going to be shocked or moved they know I’m very grounded and I can really hold that deep listening space. For people who have got deep seated issues, that sort of work makes my heart glow, it really does I absolutely adore it. And I have another side of my business that is for people who are really successful on the outside, they’ve really got there in their career, but there’s something that is stopping them feeling into that space of yes, I am a success, so I work with sort of um executives who are in the boardroom, and they feel literally like that imposter. I work on those subconscious sorts of sabotaging blocks, and I remove them and it’s just fantastic to see people, I had a lady in there she worked for multis and she just dreaded the boardroom she was really good at what she did, but this standing up in front of the board horrified her. After I’d finished working with her, I got a gorgeous message from her, and she said I just stood up in the boardroom and felt I owned a space because I feel I’m contributing, I’m offering instead of this sort of exposure and feeling this, they don’t belong. It’s wonderfully transformative when somebody can move from that place into a place of you know I am whole I am me and I actually love and respect myself and I’m contributing. It’s such a joy to see people thriving in their business and in their you know professional realm, so I’m really lucky to be able to work with those two types of clients.
David: Yeah, that’s great. And how many people have you helped in the five years or so you’ve been doing this?
Is there a number you can put on it?
Rachel: I suppose I could say thousands because I’m constantly interviewed and give you know press conferences and that kind of thing. In terms of my one-to-one work, I think it’s about 600 one-to-one clients that I have worked with, so um you know it’s a beautiful place to work I feel deeply honored, I really do, I’m so privileged you know.
David: Absolutely and great power to you for everything that you’ve achieved. So, clearly you have this successful business as a therapist and a mentor. Now let’s turn to your life as an author because you’ve written your first book and it’s soon to be published and I think there will be many great accolades that will come with that.
Simple question: what prompted you to write a book?
Rachel: There were many reasons and it’s evolved actually, David. I remember clearly a time when I was in hospital and my mother was sitting beside me. This is when I was still in the brain injury unit in Bristol, the French hospital in Bristol, and I remember my mum looking at me I remember her face it was so wooden and worried and I was devastated because I couldn’t move and I was devastated because I was going to be transferred to a rehabilitation unit and she leant over and I remember her saying one day you will recover and one day you will tell people about your story. And I remember being furious because I thought what a crazy idea, I’m so sick I can’t move. So, that probably was the first seat I think and then it was when I started to recover, I started to get this sense that I need to share this story because I know other people go through terrible traumas and challenges. I felt so alone in my journey, I felt as if I was the only person who could relate to me because my difficulties seem to be so insurmountable and so rare and so strange. And it was that dawning that came upon me when I really came into recovery and I thought I could leave a torch shining down the tunnel for people who are coming behind me, for people who don’t have anyone to cheer them on, for people who don’t have anyone to say this is going to be all right. So, that was the sort of the growing essence of that and now what’s coming from it now for me is it’s funny how we evolve and change, and our expectations and directions change. I am in the becoming now of somebody who wishes to speak more on a platform of benzodiazepine withdrawal issues, and grief, and loss, and trauma as somebody who is warm and sort of rounded and it’s willing to stand the truth of what this stuff is because it’s quite tough stuff, but I feel adequately healed that I can give that message to anyone that we can do this and together we can all do it, you know, and we need tools in our toolbox. And that’s what I like to share is not the theory around it I like to share how to do that, how to come through, because when you’re alone and you’ve got no one to help you start to devise ingenious ways of navigating the way through that and I have developed ways for myself, and I wish to share them with other people.
David: Yes, and that concept of telling the story is so powerful I feel that it’s very healing for the person telling the story and it’s very profound for the person that’s listening to it. And one of the things which I’ve told people for some time now in my mental health advocacy is that I don’t have professional qualifications, I’m not a doctor, I’m not a trained therapist, so I’m not qualified to diagnose or counsel anybody, but what I am qualified to do is to tell my story and encourage somebody to tell theirs as well. I’m a good listener I’m happy to listen to somebody telling their story and encourage them that it’s okay to tell your story without a feeling of shame, guilt, and stigma. I think that’s the most important thing, the more people that do it whatever the subject is I think it’s just very powerful and very powerful messages go out there, so I really hope many people benefit from reading your book as I hope you have from writing it and putting it out there.
Rachel: Thank you David. And just to go back on that point. Absolutely, it’s great to tell you a story and when people are traumatized, funny enough, they need to tell the story over and over and over and over again because it’s a way of processing what’s happened to us and so that is very important. And I would just add on to that point is as well as connecting with community and as well as finding people to share and to relate to I would also say become solution focused. It’s the most important thing that we can do for ourselves is to do our own research and to find ingenious solution-focused ways to bring ourselves in if it needs be from minute to minute if it’s not minute to minute, go for half hour to half hour that we need to actually find ways to soothe and take care of ourselves and to nourish and nurture ourselves. And that is what we’re not taught in childhood, we’re not taught to take care of ourselves emotionally, not all of us anyway, I most certainly wasn’t. So, I think that the message is that we can do enormous amounts for taking care of ourselves once we start to become curious about what we like, what we don’t like, and what will work, and what we don’t and to trial it out. Of course, you need professionals, but you can also do a lot of work for yourself and there’s so much information out there I would invite everybody to start to become solution focus for themselves, be their own advocates.
David: Yes, very powerful message and final question on the book what are the early signs? How well do you think it’s going to be received?
Rachel: Well, I’m feeling really honored and thrilled. I’m quite excited it’s made a lot of number one best seller slots already, biographies for women, grief and loss, diseases and health. It’s made quite a lot of slots already, so these early signs are that it’s going to do really well. I mean my whole vision is that it lends a message that no matter what we go through, no matter what happens to us individually that we are stronger than anything that can happen to us and that our core our spirit is literally stronger than anything that can happen to it. And that anyone can find the metal and the depth inside them just like I did. It’s in there and you’ve just got to go and find it.
David: Absolutely, very true words. And Rachel before we wrap up is there anything else you’d like to add to anybody out there that is suffering some kind of trauma, grief, loss what type of words would you give of advice and there’s no one-size-fits-all for any problem that’s for sure, but what are the general words you would give to people?
Rachel: To get it into a nutshell I think that it is about tenderly tending to yourself that you become gentle and as soft as possible and as kind as possible to yourself that you can possibly muster and if you don’t have that language try and learn the language through watching the YouTube clips or something. The thing is remember that we learn through experience, we learn through repetition. I would invite you to try and be as gentle and kind and as loving to yourself as you can if you don’t have the language do go and find it, because that is where it all starts is when we start to nourish ourselves and in a nourishment it takes time, but that grows strong foundations and the other thing is that you are stronger than anything that happens to you and you can trust and know that you have all the capabilities inside and if you feel that you don’t reach out to somebody, but at the same time keep that solution focused attitude. Be curious about what you can do for yourself, and I think then you’re on the right track. It takes a long time to come back from major trauma, but the thing is you can live within the meantime, you can live within that trauma, you can find little ways to have gratitude and joy that help bring you through as you incrementally heal yourself and bring healing to your life and your spirit and your world. That’s what I’d say David.
David: Great advice and I think there’s powerful words there that could apply to everyone. That message of take care of yourself, make sure that you pay attention to yourself, do something for yourself, I think society tends to indicate that we have to work hard, we have to always be productive, we have to be heavy output, we have to be doing things, but what I’ve found and many other people have spoken to is that if you take some time for yourself, if you make sure you do something you enjoy whether it’s physical exercise, whether it’s growth, whether it’s reading, meditation, exercise whatever it is that you enjoy doing if you take that time to do that for yourself it will probably make you a better spouse, a better parent, a better sibling, a better employee, a better manager, a better person, a better version of yourself, so everybody should be able to do that even if they haven’t suffered major loss or major trauma like you have, I think it’s important to take care of yourself.
Rachel: Absolutely and it’s a language we need to learn I think, because you know I certainly didn’t have the self-care language I had to learn it and so that’s why I say start slowly and just build on it bit by bit you’re not in competition with anyone else you’re not in competition with life just bring that home and open yourself up to some form of nurturing every day. Whatever speaks to you. For me it’s walking in the forest, for me it’s actually talking nicely to myself, for me it’s my gratitude list whatever speaks to you will have your unique language that really helps you to heal and just keep at it and don’t give up. It took me so long to recover, but I got there and I’m still recovering today and that’s the point. We recover incrementally, so keep working at your health and you will never fail.
David: Yeah, and you’re a testimony to that Rachel, you didn’t give up and you’re still not giving up and that’s very admirable. So, thank you Rachel for joining us today, thank you for your profound thoughts everything that you’ve said here today has been fascinating and just very impactful I hope for many people, and I hope many people have been helped by what you’ve had to say and by sharing your story with us. I wish you every success with the book publication and everything that will come behind that in the coming weeks, months, and years.
Rachel: Thank you David, it’s been an absolute pleasure to chat to you and I just love the invitation.
David: Yeah and thank you again and thanks everyone for watching if you enjoyed this video please subscribe to our channel, leave your comments below and until next time be well and pay attention to yourself.