Part of creating The Holistic Psychiatrist podcast involves reaching out to people I want to interview. Recently, I was fortunate to talk to two patients from over a decade ago to find out what happened to them. One person finished working with me in 2006. Another finished working with me in 2011.
After my podcast interviews with them, I reflected on the ripple effect of each person's healing journey and the profound effect that our choices have over time. Read on to learn what happened to these individuals after they left my holistic practice!
The Ripple Effect
A look at seeds planted in the past
Don't we all struggle at some point with low self-worth? We wonder, "Do our lives even matter?" How can one person make a meaningful difference in this world? These questions may exist in contrast with a deep desire to magnify our potential and be a positive force for change.
When an opportunity arises for us to help someone, we often don't know what transpires afterward. What happened to that person after they left our lives? If we knew the answer, we might better understand our roles in others' lives and find greater meaning and purpose in our own.
This is exactly what happened as I was working on my podcast. In taking the opportunity to reach out to patients who worked with me over a decade ago, I learned more about the ripple effect of our healing journeys together.
This Saturday, I talked with a woman, Dilcia, who worked with me when she was an adolescent. I have not treated her since 2006. Now she is a mother of three boys, working two jobs, and living in Florida. She works with high school students and helps them when they struggle emotionally.
She loves her job and finds fulfillment in her role as a wife, mother, and teacher. Her history of severe bipolar disorder has been well managed through the skills she learned from the short time we worked together. She helps many students through her work and willingly shares her personal healing story to inspire more hope in others.
Another young man, Justin, who worked with me when he was a high school student, went on to attend Bastyr University, a naturopathic university, and became an acupuncturist who specializes in Natural Medicine.
His goal was to be able to provide the kind of help to others that he received during his own healing journey. He has accomplished that and much more, healing others as a holistic clinician.
I also reached out to Max, who is now working as the manager of a golf course. I remembered how he loved working at a golf course and wanted to manage his own someday. At the time we worked together, he was stuck with ADHD, depression, anxiety, and marijuana dependence. He couldn't graduate from college and had been on medications since he was seven years old.
I always remember Max as the patient who told me that he wasn't going to change his diet because he loved eating at McDonald's. In spite of that, he did very well and was able to successfully come off his medications, apply to college, got straight A's, and now he's living his dream.
I feel so fulfilled, happy, and delighted when I learn about how well each person is doing. I also feel grateful that despite my own struggles with low self-esteem, I kept working on what mattered to me. As my summary at the end of each holistic update states:
My life is dedicated to creative freedom and holistic health. Through service, education, healing, and simply being, my goal is to strengthen people with the tools they need to live life joyfully, authentically, and fully.
Once, as a college student, my boyfriend said that I had the lowest self-esteem of anyone he had ever known. At the time, I didn't even know that I had low self-esteem. But I believed him. He later asked me to quit my premed studies and marry him because he wanted to have 12 kids. When I prayed about it, I had a spiritual experience that helped me to stay on course. Thirty-eight years later, here I am.
With every patient I tried to help heal, I was also healing. My self-esteem is not quite so low anymore! I remember feeling suicidal when withdrawing from Zoloft, but I didn't want to inconvenience anyone. Had I gone ahead and ended my life as Dilcia, Justin, and Max at one point wanted also, I would never have made a positive difference in their lives. I would never have known that my one life was worth living.
Today, my nephew asked me, "Auntie Alice, do you ever want to retire?"
I thought about it and replied, "I feel that I've just learned all the things I need to know to help patients get off their medications. I have an obligation to psychiatry to share it."
He then asked, "You going to write a book about it?"
I sighed and smiled, thinking of how long I've procrastinated the task, "Yes, I will need to write my book."
Perhaps I need to have more faith that just one book can matter.
The Holistic Psychiatrist Podcast (Ep. 28):
Coming Off Six Psychiatric
Medications Successfully and Safely
Check out the teaser for the new episode out tomorrow!
Integrating functional/orthomolecular and energy medicine allowed Ana to safely and successfully come of six psychiatric medications. Ana was a top executive of a large company and cancer survivor. After healing from cancer, she encountered the hardest health challenge of all: losing her mental health.
She shares what she experienced and how she successfully overcame her illness and created a vibrant, joyful, and empowered life. At the end of the podcast, we share key interventions that can help others transform their lives as well.
Click here for the full episode available on Wednesday.
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