Dr. Jody Carrington: How To Embrace A Family Secret and Authentic Human Connection 

00:00:00:01 – 00:00:34:12
Claudia
Hello and welcome back to Shift Happens. This is season five and I am super excited to bring you more compelling conversations with women from around the globe. With my podcast, I’m creating a space for women to share stories, to listen, and to feel heard. Thank you for finding me and shift happens. I hope you feel connected as you will hear from women who took life as it unfolded and courageously pivoted into another version of themselves.

00:00:34:14 – 00:01:15:06
Claudia
I am talking to doctors, changemakers, cancer survivors, authors, founders, widows. In some episodes, we hear about grief, a taboo and a topic often brushed off. I want to hold space for this. Thank you for bearing with me. I am so curious to read your feedback, and I invite you to leave your reviews and thoughts. And please don’t forget to hit the subscribe button on YouTube and wherever you get your podcasts.

00:01:15:08 – 00:01:28:03
Dr. Jody Carrington
We like it best where people are calm. If you’ve ever been married, if you’ve ever looked at your child and and we’re proud of them, we are happiest when we are regulated. And the only way you learn to do that is in relationship to another person.

00:01:28:05 – 00:01:28:19
Claudia
Yeah.

00:01:28:21 – 00:01:42:22
Dr. Jody Carrington
And if we’ve never been this disconnected, that will be the greatest cost of the generations of followers, because we don’t do something.

00:01:43:00 – 00:02:16:09
Claudia
Welcome back to season five of Shift Happens. With this season. We will transition from a bright and happy summer into fall. Time seems to go faster and faster. No. Today I’m in conversation with Doctor Jodi Carrington, a powerhouse speaker, a psychologist, and fearless champion for authentic human connection. Her doctor, Jodi, is highly sought after for her expertise, energy and genuine approach to helping people solve the most complex, human centered problems.

00:02:16:11 – 00:02:59:17
Claudia
And she is clear on one thing we were never meant on doing any of this alone. In our conversation, we talk about grief, family secrets, and how Jodi, at the age of 36, received unexpected news from her parents that she had a full biological sister. Live nearby. Tune in and listen how this discovery reshaped her understanding of her family is story and her own identity.

00:02:59:19 – 00:03:01:11
Dr. Jody Carrington
How are you?

00:03:01:13 – 00:03:07:18
Claudia
Very, very good. How are you? Just looking at your photo while I was waiting. Put me in a good mood.

00:03:07:20 – 00:03:14:07
Dr. Jody Carrington
That’s so lovely. And I know you know Dale him. And so I’ve been looking so forward to this.

00:03:14:07 – 00:03:22:18
Claudia
Yes, yes. Yeah. A very special woman. A blessing to have known her. To still know. Yes. I believe she’s still around. Yeah.

00:03:22:20 – 00:03:29:19
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yes, yes, I know, I know, so I’m so excited. Tell me everything. What? Yes. What do I need to know?

00:03:29:21 – 00:04:07:08
Claudia
I am excited about you to be here. You know, Shift Happens is a podcast I started because I thought especially. I mean, we all of us were just sprinting through life, right? And, and everything needs to be so fast. And big moments happen, pivotal moments happen, turning points happen, and we just race on and I thought, why not take a minute to pause and reflect on something that was truly pivotal and why was a pivotal and and yeah, so these are conversations I started to have with women from around the globe, which is really fascinating.

00:04:07:10 – 00:04:30:14
Claudia
You know, they they share their stories. They I create a space for them to share their stories, but also what they’ve learned from it. And even though each story is so individual, there is so much that connects us. And you know, you is such a trailblazer in terms of reconnection and bringing people together and the knowledge that you’ve created over this.

00:04:30:14 – 00:04:35:13
Claudia
I thought it’s it’s like just the perfect, perfect match for us to speak.

00:04:35:15 – 00:04:37:16
Dr. Jody Carrington
I’m all in. I’m all in. Let’s do it.

00:04:37:21 – 00:04:51:09
Claudia
Yes. So, before I get a little bit further into the topic, I usually ask my guests a few questions. Dogs are cats.

00:04:51:11 – 00:04:56:22
Dr. Jody Carrington
Are you allowed to say neither? Sure.

00:04:57:00 – 00:05:09:18
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah, either I can’t, I can’t stand, and I was bitten by a dog, when I was little. And my babysitter made me watch Cujo when I was six. So I’m like, I’m not. I mean, there’s certain dogs that have captured my heart, but they’re for you.

00:05:09:20 – 00:05:11:11
Claudia
Okay? Okay.

00:05:11:12 – 00:05:12:05
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah.

00:05:12:07 – 00:05:16:19
Claudia
They still are sparkling,

00:05:16:21 – 00:05:18:19
Dr. Jody Carrington
Sparkling all the way.

00:05:18:21 – 00:05:20:23
Claudia
Apples to oranges.

00:05:21:00 – 00:05:22:05
Dr. Jody Carrington
Apples.

00:05:22:07 – 00:05:25:22
Claudia
What is your superpower?

00:05:26:00 – 00:05:33:17
Dr. Jody Carrington
To translate really hard things into messages that resonate with the soul.

00:05:33:19 – 00:05:37:11
Claudia
What is your current state of mind?

00:05:37:13 – 00:06:09:01
Dr. Jody Carrington
I’m so sad. My father passed away. We buried him on Thursday. And I am in this paradox. Yeah. Thank you. I’m making this paradox of, sadness and, hopefulness because the spirit of guides that I’ve gained, including our friend Dale, the, in the last six months, has given me a unbelievable shift in this universe that made me so sad that they’re not on this side anymore.

00:06:09:03 – 00:06:28:02
Dr. Jody Carrington
But the hope in what we can do now with people who I think know, me or my soul, and that they’re on the other side just gives me so much hope. And so I feel like it’s this very interesting juxtaposition in this moment.

00:06:28:04 – 00:06:52:04
Claudia
It’s such a tender, tender phase and tender time. So. Wow. I mean, thank you so much for being here and and sharing this I mean grief is grief is such a big process right. It’s also one of these shifts that we often now I don’t know, I mean it’s they’re very individual, but it’s also often very rushed through this.

00:06:52:06 – 00:07:11:09
Dr. Jody Carrington
And I’m like, I’m not a fan. Okay. So this is what I have to be true. I’m not a fan. I’ve been a psychologist for 20 years and I am very good, as we talked about, you know, at this process of, I think, assisting other people in making sense of hard things. And I love that I do not making sense of my own hard things, not a thing.

00:07:11:11 – 00:07:32:01
Dr. Jody Carrington
And I would really like to just put all of those things together and let’s go. Okay. We got so what I love and hate about grief is that it is such an asshole because, just when things are going so incredibly well and you know what I mean? Yesterday I was in my body and thinking like, all right, well, you know, this is okay.

00:07:32:01 – 00:07:56:22
Dr. Jody Carrington
I can do whatever I want, and I’m ready. I had the kids at lacrosse and they were singing and I was laughing and all the things were happening. And then this morning at 330 in the morning at 303, actually, I woke up and I was like, I cannot remember crying that hard. But ever maybe. And, you know, I’m a 49 year old woman and I think who understands a lot about this process and the necessity of leaning into emotion and feeling emotion.

00:07:57:00 – 00:08:36:14
Dr. Jody Carrington
And, I just I had no say in how that was going to happen in, in my body. And I am so amazed at how many people I dislike right now, particularly seven year old men who look healthy. Anybody right now who has a dad, not a fan, anybody who’s speaking about doing things with their father, including my own personal husband, who right now is with his dad and his brothers and I don’t even want I’m at I’m at like, it’s just so fascinating to observe it and be on the ride all at the same time.

00:08:36:14 – 00:08:41:13
Dr. Jody Carrington
And so I’m, I’m, I’m grateful for it, but I’m just I’m blown away by it.

00:08:41:15 – 00:08:48:18
Claudia
Yeah, yeah, yeah I mean it’s a roller coaster. It’s a of abused word almost. But it really is. But.

00:08:48:18 – 00:08:49:19
Dr. Jody Carrington
It’s, it’s accurate isn’t.

00:08:49:19 – 00:09:17:08
Claudia
It. Up and down and criss and cross. Yes. Yes. Absolutely. Yeah. And and one has to give in and I’m wondering if, if the struggle to go with the emotions also is connected to the loneliness epidemic that you detect is here and, and because we we’ve become out of touch so often with ourselves, with what should guide us, certain natural rhythms, it’s it’s a lot less that distracts us now.

00:09:17:10 – 00:09:34:07
Dr. Jody Carrington
Oh, Claudia, you’re so right. And here’s what I know to be true. Okay, so there’s two rules to this human race. All right? So whoever created this, it doesn’t matter to me what you believe, right? Jesus or Buddha or Yahweh or the creator of the Big Bang. It doesn’t matter to me how you believe we got into these, this human existence.

00:09:34:09 – 00:09:52:15
Dr. Jody Carrington
We are way more like we are different. We all start in exactly the same place and whoever or whatever created us said in my, in my opinion, in my mind said there’s two rules. Okay. Number one, I’m going to make you neuro biologically wired for connection, okay? You disconnect them in which they die. We will not automate relationship in the vast foreseeable future.

00:09:52:17 – 00:10:13:07
Dr. Jody Carrington
So despite the fact that we are very, very enamored by AI in this season, the only AI that will matter if you want to create a successful business or stay connected in your family, is authentic interaction full stop? Okay, so we are number one rule. We are neural biologically wired for connection. Okay. And then the second rule of whoever created this sort of like through a curve ball.

00:10:13:09 – 00:10:33:13
Dr. Jody Carrington
And we’re like despite the fact that you’re neuro biologically wired for connection, the hardest thing you will ever do is look at each other. Yeah. And that started the great human experiment. And we have never had so many opportunities to look away. Yeah. We are the first generation of people who are dying faster from emotional illness than from physical illness for the first time in history.

00:10:33:15 – 00:10:53:03
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah, I am amazed mostly that in just two generations our great grandparents looked at their children 72% more of the time than we look at our babies today. And you can’t tell people how to be amazing or how to mourn or how to regulate emotion. Yeah, you have to show them, and we have never been this out of touch with each other.

00:10:53:05 – 00:11:07:23
Dr. Jody Carrington
And the hardest thing we will do is sit and have a conversation like, this is look into the eyes of the people we love, the people we lead. Fair. As a psychologist, I can do this all day long. You want to bring me your partner or you tell me your kid’s messed up? I can tell you. Yes, tell me more all day.

00:11:08:01 – 00:11:24:15
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah. I walk through the door. My personal husband, who tells me that he’s tired or worn out, or he thinks our kids are awesome or whatever. I want to throw punch him. Yeah, you you bring I can. I worked on a psychiatric inpatient unit for kids. Hit, kick, beat. Tell the self I love them all day or my heart into them.

00:11:24:17 – 00:11:44:16
Dr. Jody Carrington
I come home through the door and my own personal children say to me. Hey, what’s for supper? I’m like you. Are you kidding me right now? Obviously you’re going to be your drunk Uncle Richard. You’re going to jail. I have failed, I should have married you for you know what I think is happening the most is that we haven’t lost our ability to be great humans.

00:11:44:22 – 00:12:06:13
Dr. Jody Carrington
We’re losing access to the best parts of ourselves because we never had this much noise. Yeah. And so it’s very difficult and it’s only going to get harder. Right. It’s only going to get higher I think Claudia like if I think about different cultures globally, if I think about human, what has been a major shift is the amount of time we get to spend alone.

00:12:06:14 – 00:12:26:19
Dr. Jody Carrington
We’re in connection with each other. So even in one generation, when my father would come home from work, nobody could get nobody home. Now I wake up in the morning before I even pee. Like we don’t have a script for this in our in our acellular level because it where the where a half a generation into it. Yeah.

00:12:26:21 – 00:12:46:09
Dr. Jody Carrington
But before I even pee, I’m checking myself and I’m in that email. There’s nothing in there that’s going to be good. Okay. So the neurophysiology, the changes that never had an opportunity to change from my mother, your father was my cortisol spikes, because there’s nothing in that email that’s going to lower it. Generally speaking. You know, we don’t get the email that says, oh my God, you landed this big guest.

00:12:46:11 – 00:13:04:20
Dr. Jody Carrington
The funding came through. 98% of it is like, that was a shitty episode. You said these things wrong. You of messed up here, here’s your bad test result, whatever the deal is. And so our shoulders are like this before we even pee. And then we jump into our socials just to see what other people are doing.

00:13:04:20 – 00:13:26:21
Dr. Jody Carrington
And obviously, we’re not drinking enough collagen. Everybody got the menopause. People are all having family pictures. We don’t. We’re, you know, whatever. Before that, we even step into our people. Our shoulders are up and entirely throughout the day. We’re attached to the bone. And, I mean, I wear an Apple Watch because I’m, you know, almost 50, and I’m trying to keep my steps up so I don’t die.

00:13:26:23 – 00:13:46:06
Dr. Jody Carrington
And I have this accent. This this now connects me to all of my children, all of my best friend, my parents, and every sports mom that is attached to the app that talks about where the kids should be all the time. Right? All the bitches that are in there telling me all the things that I’m not doing right.

00:13:46:08 – 00:13:55:22
Dr. Jody Carrington
Okay. And so this ease of accessibility to my nervous system. Yeah, it’s something we’re not. It’s too much. Right. Yeah. And so I.

00:13:55:22 – 00:14:18:14
Claudia
Am hopeful though. I mean it is too much. And we realize that now it’s all in a way very young and very fresh and, what like 20 years that we have the iPhone almost. So I am hopeful that we are now discovering that this is not a good path to continue on. Yeah, I mean, it’s difficult, but bridges are being built.

00:14:18:14 – 00:14:44:09
Claudia
I mean, people finally are much more open and perceptive that for children we need to regulate the use of phones or, you know, gadgets. But, I, I’m doing these salons and, and I’ve started them many, many years ago in New York City. And, and I invite people into my living room because that’s something that people don’t usually do in New York City to invite.

00:14:44:11 – 00:14:45:02
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah.

00:14:45:06 – 00:15:15:07
Claudia
And it is it has always been about the connection and real. Not not the small talk, but the substantial conversation where you really sit in a circle. And it’s not about eating, it’s not about drinking. And like, no one eats and no one drinks because they are so immersed in these, like 90 minute conversations. Yeah. And and, and I think people start to realize that this is what they are craving and that they what they need.

00:15:15:08 – 00:15:29:05
Claudia
Probably spaces like in your podcast, you would you speak to people who have, you know, so much knowledge in this space and, and luckily the message can be spread, that we are all one, right?

00:15:29:05 – 00:15:50:02
Dr. Jody Carrington
Oh my goodness. Yes. And I, I agree with you. I think that I’ve never had this much hope for humanity. I do feel that we are going to have to break apart a little bit more. I do think that we haven’t reached that crisis point, despite the fact that we are, you know, dying faster from an emotional illness for the first time in history to improve physical illness.

00:15:50:04 – 00:16:15:16
Dr. Jody Carrington
That we’ve never seen these levels of, of mental health issues, in, in children, in young mothers. It’s it’s staggering. And the data is irrefutable. The question becomes we’re wired for connection and what technology has offered us. And I don’t even know that the creators of this space, you know, the Steve Jobs or the menace of the world, understood how good they were because we are wired for connection.

00:16:15:16 – 00:16:40:04
Dr. Jody Carrington
And what happens is in these little devices that are portable, everything and everybody I love is right here. So when I’m giving a speech, I talk 100 times a year, and I have to be so good because what I’m up against is your boyfriend, the sale on Spanx, that is only going to be on for the next 20 minutes.

00:16:40:05 – 00:16:55:13
Dr. Jody Carrington
That your block blast game that allows you to just. You got to get, you know. And so, John John Height to your point, has written a book called The Anxious Generation. Yes. And, you know, the most brilliant, I think, in really taking a hard line in the of it is, you know, kids are not that good.

00:16:55:15 – 00:17:21:14
Dr. Jody Carrington
They cannot separate, not because we, we want to sort of hearken their, their freedom or their access to technological advances. It is we actually have to be the prefrontal cortex that says, look at me, baby boy, and take away the opportunity that their Snapchat buddy or the person they’re trying to date or their group of friends because we’re wired for connection is so much sexier than learning integers like no educator stand a chance against those things.

00:17:21:14 – 00:17:40:11
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah. And so when that is removed, even if it’s put in their bag or their bag at their feet, the data is irrefutable. They cannot separate. Even if you allow them in their locker, they will make any excuse to pee that they’re not feeling well, all of those things because they want to get to that connection, not because they’re awful, not because they’re attention seeking, manipulative liars.

00:17:40:13 – 00:18:06:13
Dr. Jody Carrington
Not because the kids these days are going to be terrible is not true. It is providing the situations in which, I mean, we’re not that good at night. I understand that the greatest predictor of wellness is sleep. That is so true. I know there’s I’ve written books about it, and at night when I have solved the problems of the world and I’ve been inundated with lots of messages during the day, I feel justified to watch another Dateline episode at 1 a.m..

00:18:06:14 – 00:18:29:05
Dr. Jody Carrington
Okay, the perfect thing to regulate a nervous system, right? Some girl is getting murdered in Tallahassee at 1:00, and my body does not know that she’s not in my bed, okay? She. My body doesn’t know. I mean, I’m writing to Narcos right now. I watch a Pablo Escobar, the greatest drug dealer of all time. And I think that I get exhausted to to I shut it off and my body doesn’t know we’re not in Colombia, you know.

00:18:29:09 – 00:18:49:13
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah. So two hours later, I wake up and. Yeah, like this. And, you know, women say this to me all the time. I’m so exhausted. It must be the, you know, the menopause. It must be the no, no, man. We it maybe it is, but we are now so inundated with so much noise that, you know, we know eastern philosophical practices know this better than anybody, right.

00:18:49:15 – 00:19:12:23
Dr. Jody Carrington
This stillness that is required to process what this life brings us is huge. And an even one generation ago, our parents, regardless of your spiritual beliefs, had a day of rest. Yeah, Sunday you were obligated, even if you didn’t believe, to sit in a in a church service or to a mass or to a prayer. And even if you didn’t go, nothing else was open.

00:19:13:03 – 00:19:38:18
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah. So you were obligated. Yeah. And at the end of the day, you know, the TV shut off at a certain time, you the phones, nobody you couldn’t. We don’t have that luxury. And so now the accessibility has proven to be, I think, the most detrimental thing to our nervous system. And I think the smartest intervention will be to understand how the focus on our nervous system is going to be more important than any behavior we take.

00:19:38:18 – 00:19:49:19
Dr. Jody Carrington
Because you can drink all that kale or go for all the runs, do all the yoga you want, but if you’re doing that in a dysregulated body, it is a waste of time. Yeah yeah.

00:19:49:21 – 00:20:01:16
Claudia
Yeah yeah. So true. So what is, one of your favorite talks that you give like, what is what is the I think, bandwidth of topic that you cover.

00:20:01:18 – 00:20:28:01
Dr. Jody Carrington
I think, okay. So I fell in love with your friend of mine, Dale Hadden, and we started talking about the importance of looking after the big people. It’s the big people aren’t okay. The little people don’t stand a chance. And she and I were both at the UN at the same time. The head of the General Assembly this year we were speaking about what, what do we think the world needs to, to shift in this mental health crisis, this loneliness epidemic, because again, I don’t think we’re in a mental health crisis.

00:20:28:01 – 00:20:49:19
Dr. Jody Carrington
I think we’re in an understandable human response to a loneliness epidemic. And the response for me is really around investing and not in the people needing the services or the care, but the people doing it. If teachers aren’t okay, if parents aren’t okay, if police officers aren’t okay. And historically we have focused on those who need the services, which is make sense to me.

00:20:49:21 – 00:21:05:23
Dr. Jody Carrington
Let’s make sure the kids are okay in schools. Great. Every part of education that I speak to now globally, I would say fantastic. What do you have going on for the children? Oh my God. Oh we everybody got a Chromebook. We got the whiteboard. We got the one, two three magic. We’ve got zones regulation. We’ve got this program leader in me.

00:21:05:23 – 00:21:13:17
Dr. Jody Carrington
We’re doing all the things. Fantastic. Oh my gosh, you guys are so brilliant. What are you doing for your educators?

00:21:13:19 – 00:21:39:17
Dr. Jody Carrington
Well, we do a potluck. Holy. But nothing says you matter. Like bring your own food. Okay. If we don’t invest in the mental health of police officers, they will not be able to continue to serve the most disregulated among us. The only reason a police officer is called is when somebody is emotionally dysregulated. It is a breeding ground for racism because the most marginalized tend to be the most dysregulated.

00:21:39:17 – 00:22:00:02
Dr. Jody Carrington
You cannot give away something you’ve never received if you’ve been told you’re awful your whole life. It is very difficult to stay calm in times of distress. So what you need is somebody to help you do that. If we don’t look after the helpers, if we don’t invest in the emotional regulation of those who will need to be the regulating others, we will not serve the next generation well.

00:22:00:04 – 00:22:20:07
Dr. Jody Carrington
And so if I could serve, you know, if I could pick three, I could pick three. I pick parents, teachers, the education system and first responders. I would speak vehemently on any stage around the world to any government official and explain clearly that the emotional regulation is going to be so much more effective in understanding the neurophysiology of humans.

00:22:20:07 – 00:22:35:12
Dr. Jody Carrington
Right. Because we’re way more like that. We are different. We like it best when people are calm. If you’ve ever been married, if you’ve ever looked at your child and and we’re proud of them, we are happiest when we are regulated. And the only way you learn how to do that is in relationship to another person.

00:22:35:14 – 00:22:36:05
Claudia
Yeah.

00:22:36:07 – 00:22:44:23
Dr. Jody Carrington
And if we’ve never been this disconnected, that will be the greatest cost of the generations that follow ours if we don’t do something about it. Yeah.

00:22:45:01 – 00:22:59:09
Claudia
Well said. Going back to your shift, that you shared with me beforehand, it’s such a fascinating story about discovering your biological sister.

00:22:59:11 – 00:23:00:11
Dr. Jody Carrington
Oh my goodness.

00:23:00:11 – 00:23:06:19
Claudia
Yes. You know how how did you discover her? And how how did it make sense to you?

00:23:06:21 – 00:23:23:13
Dr. Jody Carrington
Lord. Oh, right. So I’ll paint the picture for you. So I grew up in a little town in, Canada, a little farming community. And my parents, as far as we knew, were high school sweethearts, and they grew up, you know, six farm miles from each other. And so their parents were good friends. They were good friends.

00:23:23:13 – 00:23:46:07
Dr. Jody Carrington
They at 14, their first date was gopher hunting, in the pasture between their houses and they went to high school together and unbeknownst to anybody, at just after they were young teenagers, but I think 18 maybe, they got pregnant and both of them were very staunch Catholic homes. And so they decided to bound my mom’s belly and not tell anybody.

00:23:46:07 – 00:24:03:04
Dr. Jody Carrington
And so they I don’t know how this they did this, but the story is really I’ll save you the details. But dad found my, a home for unwed mothers, for my for my mother. And they made up a story that mom was going to go away and work just right after, you know, high school for a few months in this other city and learn some things.

00:24:03:04 – 00:24:20:16
Dr. Jody Carrington
And so everybody bought it. And, she had my sister and, painstakingly, you know, she talks about the sobbing mean the screaming of, you know, having to to hand her over to the nuns and, and the very clear conversations about you don’t look for her. You were signing her away. They did get some choices on who would raise her.

00:24:20:21 – 00:24:48:16
Dr. Jody Carrington
And, you know, they asked for Ukrainian background in a in a Catholic faith and all the things that they had grew up with. But my father had never even seen her. My my mom did all of this alone. And he picked her up, you know, two months after, six weeks after she had my sister and they came back home and the story just ensued that the job didn’t work out in a way, they went two years later, in 1972, they had her in 70, and they got married and they had me in 75, and they had to have me, at a hospital away from our small town.

00:24:48:16 – 00:25:06:05
Dr. Jody Carrington
And they made up a story that there was complications because they would have seen my mom’s car and the local doctor, who was also, of course, our family friend. And, and so then we go on with our lives. They they’re me. They’re my brother. And ironically, you know, my parents were very, you know, stand up citizens in our community.

00:25:06:07 – 00:25:22:15
Dr. Jody Carrington
Later we come to find out that my, my father was having multiple affairs. He was a very, very successful businessman. But, at the time, not a lot of people sort of knew that about him, about them. Their marriage dissolved and were devastated as a family of four. And that becomes the mark on our our story.

00:25:22:15 – 00:25:37:21
Dr. Jody Carrington
Like, how could this have happened? We just I didn’t understand any of it. As the oldest daughter, I tried to put all of it back together and, you know, maintained a relationship beautifully with both of them. And then we go on and, my brother gets married, and I get married and I’m pregnant with my first son, our first son and my dad.

00:25:37:21 – 00:26:00:15
Dr. Jody Carrington
My mom calls me home to the house that, you know, we were for the weekend and my husband was away. So I was like, of course. I’m like, gosh, I’d love to come over the weekend. So we’re sitting at the kitchen table and and into this house. My dad and mom had been divorced for many years, but in the house that we grew up in, my dad locks in the back door is my brother, and we all sit down at the kitchen table and in the places that we had sat when we were children, and my dad starts to cry and my mom starts to cry, and my father says, we need to tell you

00:26:00:15 – 00:26:21:06
Dr. Jody Carrington
something that we haven’t told anybody in 40 years. And I think, well, what could that be? So I don’t think you could be dying for 40 years, so maybe you’re gay. Like, this was the thing that I was thinking, like, what possibly could the saying be? And he said, you have a sister, you two have a full biological sister, and she’s found us.

00:26:21:06 – 00:26:39:13
Dr. Jody Carrington
And so we were like, well, at least you’re not dying. So it was sort of like, oh, okay. Like, we can handle this. And they’re like, and she’s found us. And we were like, what? And they said, she looks so much like your mother. And God, she sounded just like you. And I was like, whoa, time out. You’ve met her.

00:26:39:15 – 00:26:55:00
Dr. Jody Carrington
And they’re like, yes, yes we have. We both met her separately and and we just wanted to know if you’d like to meet her. And I was like, Jesus. Like, hang on a second. Like two minutes ago, I was the oldest child and the only daughter. And now I’m the middle kid. Like, no, I don’t really. I mean, just a minute.

00:26:55:02 – 00:27:15:11
Dr. Jody Carrington
And my brother, who’s much nicer than me, he’s like, of course, dad, of course we’d like to meet her. And he’s like, okay, great. She’s in the garage like a puppy. And she always corrects me because she’s like, I wasn’t in the garage. I was on my way to the garage. But anyway, within a few minutes, in walks this human that is my full, our full biological sister.

00:27:15:11 – 00:27:33:15
Dr. Jody Carrington
And I remember my brother and I holding hands as we watched her drop, you know, and this is not what I do, but we’re standing there holding hands, and she drove up the driveway and came in, and it was just like the most surreal experience. And, she’s remarkable. She she grew up, two hours from our front door.

00:27:33:17 – 00:27:47:16
Dr. Jody Carrington
We were at the U of a university at the same time. Together. We lived six blocks apart. We never knew it. She got an undergrad degree in psychology. She married a firefighter. She has a baby. That is, you know, the same age story about the same age as our children. And he looks more like me than.

00:27:47:18 – 00:28:14:16
Dr. Jody Carrington
Than my boys do. And she’s now she’s been with us for for 15 years, and, we just buried our father. My father, her biological father, last week. And. And she, you know, she’s a part of all of it now. So it has been, a I. Yeah, it’s been the most beautiful love story. And, I know it asks and, you know, sometimes doesn’t work out, you know, for adoptive families in this way, but it has been the greatest gift.

00:28:14:16 – 00:28:34:09
Dr. Jody Carrington
I’m so grateful that she found us when the the records were unsealed. I can’t imagine learning this about my father, and not having had a decade to talk to him about it. Watching them, the two of them, you know, just making sense of like, how could you have held this secret from everybody, including all four of their parents went to their grave not knowing.

00:28:34:11 – 00:28:55:22
Dr. Jody Carrington
And I’m just so grateful that as their children, we got to process this together and put some pieces back together about, you know, how it must have been hard for them to look at each other. You know, we talked about this great human rule. How do you hold something so sacred and into the eyes of somebody that, you know, you know, you share this big chasm with?

00:28:55:22 – 00:29:14:12
Dr. Jody Carrington
And so, so many of the pieces started to fit when she found us. And, and just even, you know, my, my longing to to speak of a human connection, you know, I’ve read books on it, like. Yeah, it just all seemed to make a lot of sense for me. So. So yeah, it was it’s been the greatest gift of all time.

00:29:14:14 – 00:29:40:01
Claudia
So the connection when you then, you know, grew into the fact that you, you had your sister and you got to know her. Was there like a feeling, I don’t know. Did you grow up having a feeling like sometimes one has these, like, unconscious nudges of something? Was that ever do you think that was now, or did it come afterwards after you met.

00:29:40:03 – 00:29:40:13
Claudia
Yes.

00:29:40:18 – 00:30:00:12
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah for sure I, I if I would say like I, you know of course I would. I think I always say I wish I had a sister and I, you know, I can’t imagine what those conversations were like for our parents, but I don’t ever it never felt like anything was missing until we found her. And then it’s a complete until she found us, and I, I still feel a little bit like.

00:30:00:12 – 00:30:19:12
Dr. Jody Carrington
And, you know, we’ve talked about this openly, but I feel jealousy. I feel, mad, kind of, you know, she’s, you know, even in this process of, you know, when my father dies and she’s there as we walk him home, I’m like, you don’t no, no no no no no no. Step back just a wee bit. Right like this is also not your full job right here.

00:30:19:14 – 00:30:41:08
Dr. Jody Carrington
And what I love about her is that she’s she’s so healthy. She’s so available for those hard conversations and she’s so I just I’m so grateful for her parents for giving her just such a great gift because she was raised by a beautiful family and you know, she was raised as you know, a very strong daughter. So two of us coming together is really interesting in this lifetime.

00:30:41:13 – 00:30:59:11
Dr. Jody Carrington
It’s we we both navigate things very similarly, but we’re we’re so different. I mean, she loves to cook. She loves animals. She loves all of those things. And I’m just like not. And so we, we we’re so like it’s so many ways but it’s it’s a it’s a very nice fit. And I, I would take some times you know like it doesn’t even feel like necessarily a sister.

00:30:59:11 – 00:31:15:17
Dr. Jody Carrington
It feels like a cousin sometimes. Like there, there is this undeniable connection between us. We are mannerisms, like, did you see us in the same room? Like people get us next out. Which I don’t see to the same degree. But you know, my father’s funeral, somebody was talking to her thinking it was me like to that degree.

00:31:15:19 – 00:31:37:06
Dr. Jody Carrington
And so our mannerisms are very the same. She’s got dark hair and I’m blonder but the other than that it just, it is apparently uncanny to people. And I even said this, you know, to her last week, like, I don’t know if we were walking her on the campus where we would have been many times that if I had I passed her, I would have been like, you will look like me because I don’t I still don’t feel like that.

00:31:37:09 – 00:31:53:10
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah, I feel like now that I know. Right. But I don’t I don’t feel that connection with her. I feel like there’s something bigger in that universal connection that that, you know, the reason she’s here is not maybe just about her and I. It’s about this whole system, for sure.

00:31:53:12 – 00:32:19:20
Claudia
And then there’s this whole topic, right, of Family Secrets, which is another topic that is connected to connection and to communication. Why is it so difficult to reveal? Why do we miss a certain point in time where it would make sense to share? Or why we why do we struggle with the fact of revealing? And then it’s so much easier to sweep it all under the rug and pretend as nothing has changed?

00:32:19:20 – 00:32:45:22
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah, and it’s so interesting, Chloe, because I asked my mom just recently, like had Valerie not found us had and I like I’ll preface this by saying that I adore my mother. I don’t know that there is a soul that I’m more connected to on this planet. We I feel very lucky to, to to be in the presence of this woman and she’s been my biggest fan, my biggest supporter, the biggest, you know, everything.

00:32:46:00 – 00:33:06:09
Dr. Jody Carrington
And I can’t imagine not knowing things about her, you know, especially something this intimate now, watching her navigate the divorce, all the things she’s never one time would she have ever considered telling me or anybody else that heard my dad, my dad, who ended up hurting her so much in this process or broke promises in this process? Never one time.

00:33:06:11 – 00:33:22:01
Dr. Jody Carrington
The integrity of this woman is really interesting to me. That was a promise that that she made at a in a 17 year old body or an 18 year old body. I guess by the time Valerie is born and never that was never going to waver no matter what, even as she said of the death of her own mother.

00:33:22:03 – 00:33:50:17
Dr. Jody Carrington
No. And I said to her, even when let’s just say she didn’t find us, okay? And I am where they are. You are 82. I am sitting with you. Would you have said to me she’s like, absolutely not. That was the problem. And so just watching her turn into that 17 year old girl again like that, there’s nothing in her body that would have suggested that would be helpful for her as a now 75 year old woman to to ever reveal that,

00:33:50:19 – 00:34:15:21
Dr. Jody Carrington
And it’s powerful to me how those secrets hold where they were stuck. That’s what that is the wherewithal that we get to make that decision about when we talk about something or if we talk to we reveal it now. And typically the issue is, is because we’re still processing whether we tell in the moment when it became a part of our story, not who we are now.

00:34:15:21 – 00:34:35:07
Dr. Jody Carrington
And that’s ultimately therapy is helpful, because it grows us up from that point. But I don’t think and of course, because she never told anybody about it, she had she’d been into therapy, you know, over my father and, you know, our family and, you know, reconnecting to my dad. They had a they had quite a beautiful relationship at the end of their of his life, friends, you know.

00:34:35:07 – 00:34:54:19
Dr. Jody Carrington
Certainly. And, but she, she never told that story. And after about found, as I said to her, so do you think it would be helpful, you know, to go into therapy and talk about it? And she’s like, no. Like we’re good now are we. And I was like a little I don’t know that we all have but okay.

00:34:54:21 – 00:35:16:01
Dr. Jody Carrington
And you know like it’s just like this is the way it goes. And she’s just. Yeah. Nope I got it. I’m like, all right, okay. You know, so it’s fascinating to me about where it’s safe, whether you’ve had the permission in your life to talk about hard things. I don’t think that I, I don’t think anybody keeps a secret with the intention of harming other people.

00:35:16:01 – 00:35:25:05
Dr. Jody Carrington
I think they keep the a secret because in their bones, they believe that is the best course of action. And at one given time it probably was. Yeah.

00:35:25:07 – 00:35:27:16
Claudia
I mean in this case of course to protect yourself.

00:35:27:18 – 00:35:47:13
Dr. Jody Carrington
My mom says even to this day. Yeah. She didn’t want to disappoint her mom. She didn’t want to disappoint dad’s parent. And there was no anything she said I had many opportunities in the hospital because my sister, when my sister was born, she there was some. Her head was a bit cold, which is often, you know, happens in C-sections or, you know, whatever.

00:35:47:15 – 00:36:02:16
Dr. Jody Carrington
And so I’ve heard that in the delivery room and was like a crying loudly because they weren’t even going to let her hold her. And she just was screaming and said, please, please, please, please, I just need this here. I just need to know she’s okay. And so the nurses were like, look, I listen like, look at me, look at me.

00:36:02:16 – 00:36:19:18
Dr. Jody Carrington
You need to understand that if you hold this baby, you might not want to let her go. And mom’s like, I will let her go. I have to, I know I do, but let me just see her. And so she held her for 20 minutes and you know, loved her and loved on her. And as they took her from her, you know, she said, I wailed.

00:36:19:20 – 00:36:45:14
Dr. Jody Carrington
And they kept saying to me, are you sure? And she said, I am so sure I am that there is nothing in my life that would allow me to return to that little town with a with a baby, and she will be better. Can you? That’s my mom. Wow. That’s my mom. And I just I’m just so amazed at, you know, this this rank and the integrity of her.

00:36:45:14 – 00:37:04:03
Dr. Jody Carrington
And I think about, you know, my, my gift to be able to use that in this way. So I, I think about her often and I think in, you know, in as dad has worked home even I think about mom probably more than I thought about dad, but I also can’t imagine what that would have been like in his body, how much he would have let down the the first woman he loved.

00:37:04:04 – 00:37:21:02
Dr. Jody Carrington
And knowing that, knowing that he wasn’t with her, that he just picked her up after she had a baby, that they never really talked about it again, that they had another daughter five years later that look just like her. Like, yeah, as a psychologist now I’m just like sweet mother.

00:37:21:04 – 00:37:23:01
Claudia
Like my how.

00:37:23:06 – 00:37:26:08
Dr. Jody Carrington
Are we this normal? Yeah, yeah. Right. Yeah. And,

00:37:26:10 – 00:37:47:19
Claudia
But you connect and you have this gift of sharing connection and of speaking about the importance of connection and helping people to find their way to each other. In which form it may be. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. No, that’s really fantastic. So I wanted to ask you just, a little bit different and coming to the end of the conversation.

00:37:47:19 – 00:38:09:10
Claudia
So you said you are giving like 100 talks, all over. You have the podcast. You’re you’re an author. You’re a mother, wife. So how do you how do you balance yourself? Because you spoke of the nervous system and regulating the nervous system. What do you do to really take care of yourself? And, and recharge?

00:38:09:12 – 00:38:27:12
Dr. Jody Carrington
So first of all, I would say I don’t balance it. So, it is probably the greatest ongoing debate of all time. So yeah, I would say, I’m sure he had it most days. But what I do know to be true is that it has to start from the inside out. And that it is never an end game.

00:38:27:14 – 00:38:42:15
Dr. Jody Carrington
So I understand. So you know we talked at the top of the show a little bit about you know the, the neurophysiology that I think becomes the most important thing. And what I mean by that is regulating your own system. And so we’re very good at understanding breathing. We’re very good at understanding, you know, those sorts of things.

00:38:42:15 – 00:39:01:17
Dr. Jody Carrington
But when you feel it in your body, it’s something very different. And so for me, it starts a lot in the shoulders and in the tongue. The most primitive response to stress is when we slam our tongue to the roof of our mouth. So what I often say to my patients every time I get to speak, you know, incorporate, I just I always want you to think about where your shoulders are.

00:39:01:19 – 00:39:29:07
Dr. Jody Carrington
And in this world where there’s so much noise, what happens is that we prepare for battle. When we get the email notification, when we get the watch, but when we get the things that used to just be, you know, watching the tiger come over the hill or, you know, the the guy, the soldier. Now we are instantly like so the vast majority of us, Claudia, spend our days with our shoulders each year, and I’m showing you my shoulders up and our tongues at the top of our because we get so much cortisol.

00:39:29:07 – 00:39:48:17
Dr. Jody Carrington
Okay, so the reverse engineer to that, I think is going to be a much more, a focus on the neurophysiology. So being very clear about where your body is at in time and space and putting little reminders, like I often say to people, put the word shoulders on a sticky note and put it on your bathroom mirror.

00:39:48:19 – 00:40:08:01
Dr. Jody Carrington
Put it on your computer and put it in your car. And every time you see it, all I want you to do is drop. I want you to give your body the message that it isn’t under siege. That it is safe at this moment that we will navigate those messages in due time, that people can wait in our email even though they have instant access to us.

00:40:08:02 – 00:40:33:01
Dr. Jody Carrington
Our body matters. First are the safety that it feels matters first, the indications that we’re not safe, right? Because we’re hooked to everything. And watching Dateline or Pablo Escobar at 10:00 at night would indicate to our body that it isn’t safe out there. And the antithesis to that is going to have to be done on overdrive. So that’s the first thing for me is that, like, I know that if I’m not okay, the people I love, the people I lead don’t stand a chance.

00:40:33:03 – 00:40:54:00
Dr. Jody Carrington
And that is bigger than just self-care. That’s bigger than a bubble bath. And, you know, having a nice glass of wine. It is really about, am I doing enough work in a day to drown my shoulders, to ground myself? Because if I’m not doing that for me, everybody I let doesn’t stand a chance. So that’s number one. And then the second thing for me is the outside.

00:40:54:00 – 00:41:10:16
Dr. Jody Carrington
Then the inside has to then turn out how am I giving it away? And I know I’m best when my empathy is high, when I’m shitty to everybody else, it isn’t their problem, it’s mine. Because I’ve lost access to the best parts of myself I am. So I mean I say this online, I wrote a bestselling parenting book.

00:41:10:16 – 00:41:28:03
Dr. Jody Carrington
It is so fucking good every time I read it. I think this should have been the New York Times bestseller. If you watch me with my own personal children, you wouldn’t buy the book. Okay? Because this isn’t about our ability to be great. It’s access to it and the noise and the burnout and the inundation of social media.

00:41:28:03 – 00:41:49:11
Dr. Jody Carrington
Right? Like you should have had a dolphin assisted pool birth. And if you didn’t, you know your kid has ADHD. Like don’t that we have constant access to that shit all the time. And since that pool birth. Right. But you know, you’re breastfeeding your baby, you’re full of hormones. You’re rocking at 2:00 in the morning and you have access to 48 million people saying stupid shit like that.

00:41:49:13 – 00:42:07:14
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah. How how do you ever. Then the next day, go to your group of friends and be like, I don’t like my kid. I actually, I want to get off the motherhood train. I like I didn’t have a doesn’t. I think they’re done like I didn’t I use drugs, I’m feeding them formula. Like all of the things.

00:42:07:16 – 00:42:23:10
Dr. Jody Carrington
And so I think that it becomes it becomes very unsafe in our environment because we’re in this place that would suggest we’re not doing anything right, particularly as parents, particularly as female entrepreneurs, like all of those things where we see people shrinking the most these days. And so I think it’s sort of a three step process for me.

00:42:23:10 – 00:42:39:08
Dr. Jody Carrington
It is like going in first, where’s my shoulders, where’s my time? Can I give myself that gift as much as I can in the run of the day when I’m in that space and give it away, wave at my neighbor, give people compliments, notice the good in humanity. And number three is do that on repeat.

00:42:39:10 – 00:42:40:17
Claudia
Do that. What?

00:42:40:18 – 00:42:41:23
Dr. Jody Carrington
On repeat.

00:42:42:01 – 00:42:44:18
Claudia
Oh. On repeat. Yes, yes.

00:42:44:20 – 00:42:47:18
Dr. Jody Carrington
Go and go go go back.

00:42:47:19 – 00:42:48:05
Claudia
Yeah.

00:42:48:05 – 00:42:49:10
Dr. Jody Carrington
It’s really that simple.

00:42:49:10 – 00:42:51:02
Claudia
Like the waves. Yeah.

00:42:51:04 – 00:42:57:11
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah, it’s really that simple. It’s nothing new. We just know it to be true. We just got to get back to it.

00:42:57:13 – 00:43:05:18
Claudia
Do you ever have a moment where you feel all sluggish, but you know that you need to be energetic, you need to go on stage. You need.

00:43:05:18 – 00:43:07:02
Dr. Jody Carrington
To always.

00:43:07:04 – 00:43:08:03
Claudia
Always.

00:43:08:05 – 00:43:28:19
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah, I do, you do. It’s a constant battle. I think that I mean, the thing that snaps me back the quickest in the mind, most hard moments is the recognition of the privilege it is to be in this body. I am one of the most privileged humans on this planet, and even in my worst moments, I am the blessed, one of the most blessed humans I know.

00:43:28:21 – 00:43:53:02
Dr. Jody Carrington
And it’s okay that I’m tired. It’s okay. Sometimes that I don’t feel like it’s okay, that I’m sad, and that I’d rather go back to bed and miss my dad today than get on a podcast. I have been given the gifts. True. I mean, in this particular case, you know, the the most sacred team that, you know, you and I both know and damn, what a gift it would be to get to know you today and how many opportunities I wouldn’t have to do that.

00:43:53:02 – 00:44:07:15
Dr. Jody Carrington
And even if, you know, one person was listening to this today, my gosh, how could I not? How could you not? You know, when I and I and I think that’s the thing that gives me so much hope, it makes me get out of bed every day. I’ve never been at 49 years old. I’ve never been this optimistic in humanity.

00:44:07:15 – 00:44:26:08
Dr. Jody Carrington
I’ve never felt this good in my body. I think because it is so critical to stay grounded in the fact that we’re just walking each other, that’s around us, and we are just walking each other home. And when you have the privilege of being a walker, either because you’re a podcast host or a speaker or a therapist or a parent or a oh man.

00:44:26:13 – 00:44:27:19
Dr. Jody Carrington
Yeah. That’s why we’re here.

00:44:27:19 – 00:44:36:13
Claudia
Yeah. That’s why we’re here. Yeah, yeah. It’s a beautiful it’s a beautiful gift and and purpose. Yes. Yeah. To live.

00:44:36:13 – 00:44:42:17
Dr. Jody Carrington
On. Yeah, yeah. And it’s endless. It’s just, it’s, it’s the fuel that, that I need on the hardest days.

00:44:42:19 – 00:44:53:05
Claudia
Yeah. Beautifully said. Beautiful ending. I’m really very sorry for the loss of your father. And, I appreciate.

00:44:53:10 – 00:44:54:10
Dr. Jody Carrington
The loss of your friend.

00:44:54:10 – 00:45:04:07
Claudia
Tremendous effort that, that you took the time today to speak to me and, Yeah. And and share these incredible insights of stories.

00:45:04:09 – 00:45:06:12
Dr. Jody Carrington
Well, it’s such an honor. Thank you for having me.

00:45:06:13 – 00:45:11:07
Claudia
Thank you so much, Jody. It was lovely. Lovely to care with you. Okay. Bye bye.

00:45:11:08 – 00:45:24:19
Dr. Jody Carrington
Bye for now.

00:45:24:21 – 00:45:52:23
Claudia
So many takeaways and so much valuable input from Doctor Jody. She really is a rocket. I loved her important advice to regular our nervous system during the day. And it’s easy to do by breathing, dropping our shoulders and dropping our tongue. What was your takeaway?

00:45:53:01 – 00:46:23:06
Claudia
Thank you for listening to Shift Happens. Please follow and subscribe to this podcast. It’s an easy hit for you with a huge impact. For me, it helps me grow even further and bring you more conversations with women from around the globe. Shift happens has been created and is hosted by me. Claudia Mahler editing Andy Boroson and social media Magda Reckendrees

00:46:23:08 – 00:46:28:19
Claudia
I hope you felt connected and heard by listening to shift happens.