 Hi. Hey, it's Bridget. Welcome to Above Life Channel. The purpose here is to inspire your spirit and to fill you with hope. I think in these times that we're living in, we sure need and deserve to be filled up with hope. So I hope today that the conversation that I have with Twitch in the afterlife will help to inspire you by giving you insight into the topic and the concept of mental health and specifically depression. It can be very difficult if you haven't experienced it directly personally or by watching or observing a loved one, family member, friend, struggle with depression, or maybe you've lost someone to the disease of depression. So I want to talk about this with Twitch and I will also share because it's deeply personal to me as well as I've been having struggles with depression over this last year. And just recently in the last month have taken steps to not just consult with a counselor, a mental health professional, which I've been in counseling for the last couple of years very consistently. But hadn't experienced a depth of depression before. I hadn't had that experience. I had been in counseling for anxiety, but not depression. And it just got really bad the last probably four or five months. And I finally talked to the doctor about it and got on some medication. So it's been great. It's helped me a tremendous amount, but some days are better than others. And so you live with it. And so I thought it would be a great idea to talk to Twitch about it to get some additional insight. So Twitch, come on in. He's like, oh, oh my gosh, like, I don't really know him very well, but he's like trying to hug me. You can hug me. He's like, yeah, he's like super friendly. I'm like, okay, I know some of you that don't understand kind of the whole spiritual thing. Like, how does that work when it's a spirit? Well, they host and hold their personalities or personas so that I can describe that to you. So you understand and can recognize their energy vibes. Okay. So they do have personality traits or personification. That's how I connect as a medium, as a psychic. So he very much has that. And so, yeah, he's going to come across like that. Yeah, it is so incredible to meet you. Thank you. So thank you. So I'm so proud of you. I'm so proud of you for sharing. Oh, thank you. He says, people need to understand that. He says, like, he says, you get it. He says, you get it. He says, people need to understand that lots of people are going through private hell. Like, people don't share that. Not everybody shares that. He says, it is a common misperception that when somebody's sad or depressed that they're sad all the time, that they're just, they can't, they just can't function. They don't shower. They don't get out of bed. And he says, yeah, if there's some chronic depression or when you're in a bout, he says a bout of depression. You got a downtime and you're on a down slide. Yeah, you can be like that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm like, yes, I know. Yes, I know. Yeah. I relate. I can relate. And he says, and it's not about not taking your medicine, not taking your meds. He said, it's not about that. So don't, don't, he says, I don't want to hear people telling me all about what they think about how you should medicate, how you shouldn't medicate, what you should do to improve like meditation or prescription medication or counseling. Or he says, I don't want to hear people telling me what they think I should do. And he says, I don't want to tell people what I think they should do. He says, because the truth is he said reality, real, like we be, we can be real. He says, it's, there's no one way. He says, there's no one combination of things that's going to work. And he says, and the thing with depression, it's kind of like a virus. He says, it comes back and it affects you in different ways at different times. He said, it's not the same. Like you don't expect it. It, it shows up unannounced. You can kind of start to feel a little bit when you're starting to kind of slide. He says, slide down the hill. He said, it's like a, like I'm going to say it's like a slippery slope. He says, you can kind of feel it once you've had the experience once or twice or three times. He said a couple of times, you kind of know when it's starting to get low. He says, but you can't plan it. Like you can't plan your, it's hard to plan your life around that. He says, so people are okay when you're like actually sick with the virus, like a physical virus, like nobody wants your coffin on them and stuff. He's saying, but when you're depressed or you have a mental health situation, it's people aren't as, because it's not so obvious. See, he said, that's a thing. That's a thing. He says, that's a thing we need to tell people. He says, we need to tell people it's not obvious and it's more dangerous than a virus. He says, you know, the pandemic comes through and it like wipes people out and creates all sorts of health problems. And he says, relationship problems and financial problems and all sorts of things. And he says, we're just, you know, you're dealing with all that. And he says, and the truth is his mental health has been the same thing. And people are, are finally potentially, potentially going to start to wake up and realize it because there's such a stigma. He says, there's such a stigma. And he says, I had support. This is Twitch talking. Okay. So Steven boss, right? I had support. He says, I had counseling. I had medication. I had people who love me and who know me and who accept me and who support me and I had reasons, lots of reasons, three little reasons to live. And he says, and it's not about that. It's not about, you can have all the support in the world, but you still feel alone and you feel bad. And he says, okay. So, so Twitch described depression because I have a, I know how it feels for me recently now that I know how that feels because I've been in that scenario now describe it for you. How does it feel? How did it feel? He says, alone, alone, you've literally really isolated, very isolated. And he says, it kind of feels like you're two people. He says, you know, like Clark Kent Superman. He says, but the thing is, is you're not Superman. Like it feels like you're being Superman. He says, when you're doing normal stuff, like when you're with the kids, when you're going to work, when you're, you know, talking to a friend on the phone, he says, it feels like it takes everything in you to do that. He says, and then the Clark Kent side, he said, the, the, the dark side is the part that, you know, let people see too much. And he says, the people are close to you can kind of tell, but it's really subtle, especially when you get good at it, because he said, we're so used to hiding how we feel. We're so, he says, you know, we're a society that hides feelings that we, we know that would be judged as like bad, or that would could impact our livelihood. You know, if you're a TV personality, if you're somebody who makes your living, he's like pointing at me, like, makes your living by like inspiring other people or, or providing advice or, or giving, giving the, the insight he says from an area of expertise that requires you to be in the best mental fitness or the perception of you have to have all your shit together. He says, if you're not what people think you are or what, if you don't show up in the way that people expect you to show up, he said, there's this huge kind of it, there's a confusion, you know, that happens. And he says, so it's just easier to play the role. It's easier to play the role. Yeah. He says, although he says, although, um, so there's moments, he said, there's moments when you're in depression. He says that you do feel good or, or sort of good. He says, you feel not, not as bad. He said, I wouldn't, he says, uh, Bridget, I wouldn't say good. Right. He says, I would say not as bad. And he says, that's like when you're with your family or when you're around people that just, or you notice something really simple or sweet. And he says, then, then you don't feel quite so bad. You're, he says, when you're taken out of your mind, you're, you're taken out of your brain state, then you get a break from it, you know, or maybe for a half a day or a day or maybe two days. And then it kind of settles in again. You know, he says kind of like the weather. Yeah. Right. I would say that, like for me, I didn't realize how bad I felt until I felt so bad that I actually was like, okay, I had two really, really low moments in the past. Trying to remember when that was the holidays were hard. There's two very significant, like that I can, that stand out in my head. One was in January. One was in November, December from the holidays where I just felt extraordinarily disconnected from everything about my life. And I felt like kind of like I was falling, but I was also suspended. Like, like there was this, this, the movement that I felt was this low going deeper into like this well, where everything was just really dark and, and just not like there wasn't, I couldn't like, like I couldn't grab on to anything. Nothing felt solid. And I, I didn't have like a fear. There was no fear. There was just almost this like numbness and this strong feeling of disconnect is how I would describe that's how it felt for me. And, and I'm like, this is not good. And I know from my past experience and my struggles with anxiety, I was diagnosed with anxiety like formally and went on medication for about nine months of my life. I think it was about nine months. It was less than a year, but it was more than six months. And that was back when I had a first major transition where my oldest kid, my daughter actually left the house and went to college and I was really worried about her. And so it was that summer before that. So it was like 2019. And so I don't know, was it 2018 or 19? I think it's 2019. And I know it might have been 2018. I can't remember. Anyway, oh, she's going to be like, Mom, you remember and graduate. I'm like, no, I can't even think right now because I'm in like spiritual spice. Um, but with anxiety, I knew or at least because I've had it so off and on so much where I haven't I've been able to self manage it, you know, like you said with like different pieces that you put together that help you at the time and you have to have like a toolkit. So you pull it out or like a drawer, a drawer metaphysical drawer filled with like this is what I do. I go for a walk or I I start doing yoga every day or I start doing tapping EFT or I start doing meditation and I start using essential oils. I start using supplements that help me. So like with my anxiety, I would use like the melatonin, the liquid droppers, a melatonin. I would use the alfiamine. I would use other supplemental, um, some CBD. I've used that that seemed to work with that my anxiety stuff and then vitamin D to help the mood stay higher and then, you know, caught like a cod liver oil kind of thing. That's what I used for me to kind of balance that and I have that kind of on the ready. If I need that, right? Um, I could add that in, right? And so I learned like how to balance or manage that, but I knew that with the anxiety when it started to slide down the slope was when I felt numb. If I ever felt like totally numb and started to disconnect, then I knew that that was a problem. That's like a safety release for me. And that's like a, okay. Okay. Step him back. And as soon as I started to notice that pattern, then I'm like, okay, this is a problem now. Now I got to get on this to manage it. You know, the depression is hard because I don't know enough about it yet. Um, I know that I've had situational depression now with the stuff that I've been dealing with and going through for me. And so the I think for me when I reached out and I actually had a friend that reflected to me that I seemed very like not, not myself. And I was like, oh, cause I was feeling the anxiety, but then I was also depressed. And so I was having like, anxiousness, higher energy and low energy. And it's like kind of the swing of energy. And I was like, whoa. And I think it's because I had never really experienced depression before. Not like that. Not like, oh my God, I have really like, I could feel high for a while and feel like positive and inspired and then get really, really low. And usually the low times are at night in the evenings that night, that kind of thing when it's all dark and there's nobody around and like that, you know, and I don't know if that's normal for everybody, but um, and not a lot of motivation. Like if it's hard for me to get out of bed, I know that's an issue because I like the morning, you know, I'm an early riser. So when I was sleeping later, that was a problem when I had disrupted sleep. I knew stuff was going on stuff was up. So tell us then you so were you on medication formally diagnosed? Yeah. He said, yes. Yes. I knew, I knew about, he says, I knew about myself. Yes. He says, I should have been going to counseling. It looks like he wasn't in counseling at the time. I don't think it doesn't look like he was. Um, but that's not the reason. He's like, that's not the reason for my death. He says the pain becomes so insurmountable and the depression. Yeah, let's talk about pain, depression pain. Yeah, it's this, it's this incredible. He says it's incredible heaviness. It feels like somebody's sitting on your chest. Yeah. You know what? It feels like to me that somebody's holding you like underwater and you have to do everything you can to keep your chin up above the water so you can breathe. Like that's how it feels to me. Like just this constant state of like, oh my God, like heaviness, like the whole body below the neck for me just felt really heavy. Yeah. He said, yes. Yeah, exactly. Exactly said, but so the thing is he said the differences. I go under. Okay. So I'm also seeing like a cannabis and stuff like that. Or other medicinal things potentially. I probably shouldn't talk about that on YouTube because I think that that's a thing because in different states is legal and not legal and whatever. So let's talk about that because I don't want to like affect the YouTube algorithm stuff. But it was mentioned briefly. Does he know by him? I think it's normal for people to self-medicate. I am going to say that like, I know like with anxiety, if I would have a glass of wine, it would totally chill me out. But then all the sugar, all the way it affects the body and just rubs the sleep and makes you feel like shit the next day. Like that kind of thing is hard. You know, you deal with it and it's not healthy. It's not a healthy way. He says, yeah, he says exercise for me. He said, if I, if I could get moving, if I could get in the studio or if I could just lift some weights, he says, you know, get the endorphins going. He said, that would help. He said, but you got to get to that place. He says, and when you're feeling your body just feels heavy, it feels like he says concrete. It's like it feels like everything's concrete. He says, and there's nothing that anybody can do. He says, you barely even notice that people are there, you know, he's like, I have little kids. You barely notice they're there. He says, and, you know, that's not, that's not good. That's not a good place to be in. And he says, it's like you said though, it's like the disconnect. You feel just a total disconnection. So talk about the pain. Peace. He says, I think everyone goes through has their own personal pain and everybody's got a different threshold and that's not judgment. He says, that's not judgment. People who, who decide to terminate their experience. He says, it doesn't mean that they're less that it doesn't mean that they're less than it doesn't mean that they're weak. It just means that they had a moment. He says a moment that they just couldn't bear it anymore. He says, there's a lot of things that come forward and he says, it's like a snowball, you know, you had, maybe you had one bad experience that a defining moment that then set you out on this course of mental health challenge. You know, he says, whether it's like panic attacks or, you know, some kind of traumatic event, you know, like an experience you had that to no fault of your own, this happened. And so then you all of a sudden have this like healing journey that you're on. He's referring to like, because I said healing journey, you know, last year. So he's healing journey that you're on. Like it's not your choice, but you're on it. He says, or, or you have, you know, things that come up from like your childhood or toxic relationships that you've had with other people and things. And you kind of as an adult, especially you start to remember things, especially when you become a parent, he says. And then you have, you know, your own kids and you can't understand how somebody could parent or could treat a child in such a way that somebody that was like a trusting adult. You just, you can't, there's things you can't come to terms with and that's when like counseling, like the right counselor, it's not just any counselor. He said there's counselors that are not that good. And he says, but you got to find the right match for you, the right one and people that get it. He says that understand, you know, and it's not easy to find that he says. So he says to your point, Bridget, being a life coach or a counselor that has experienced depression or understands what it's like and understands like the whole medicine part of it and counseling part of it and the structure and the support part of it. And he says, that helps. That's helpful that like uniquely qualifies you. He says, he says, it's not just about being compassionate. It's there is a depth of pain. He says that no human, it's just, it's just too much for a human to hold no matter what that pain is. He says that everyone has a different threshold and there's no judgment about that. There's no judgment. He says about that and the choices you make are your choices. You know, he says, so would you do things differently? Of course I would. He says, of course I would. Of course. Yes. Absolutely. Yes. Yes. Of course I would. And what would you have done differently? I would have waited. I would have tried to hang on a little longer than I did. He says, you know, when you choose to terminate your experience here, he says, you basically just transfer the pain. You take the pain that you have and then you hand it out. You shuffle it out like a deck of cards to other people. He says that passing along that. He says, you don't really realize that until you're here. He says after like the afterlife. He says, you don't realize that that's basically what you do. He says that if people really got that then nobody would would would end their experience here by their own by their own doing, you know, with that intention because there's a lot of different ways you can ease pain or ease your your your own personal experience without having to then hand it off to your loved ones, your family, your friends, that kind of thing. So he says, yeah. Yeah, I would have been different. I would have been different. He says, and that's real. That's real talk. That's probably one of the most important things I would like people to understand. So what do we do to alleviate or lighten our pain through our pain load because it's hard. People go to vices. People turn to things that are not so healthy. People isolate or disconnect. What what can we do? I'm like the best you can. That's what I feel. She got to have some choices. Says like you like you shared before he said you've talked about like having a safety plan. I did talk about that, but I haven't shared that on I was going to do a podcast about depression and talk about that like the need for a safety plan. So what you do for those of you who don't know you get your phone and you create a contact and your phone you can call it safe. Whatever you want to call it and under that contact you put a list of numbers phone numbers like a crisis hotline a 1-800 hotline mental health hotline and you put 1-2-3-4 you put exactly what you're going to do when you feel really really bad. And it might be call my sister or tell my partner or if you can't do that it might literally be called the anonymous 1-800 number. It might be get out of the house go get the dog. So you're not alone and then go tell someone because the biggest thing the most important thing in your safety plan you got to tell somebody else you have to be committed enough to yourself when you're in a healthy state of mind and a healthy state of emotion where you know that you have to you have to accept the fact that you need to reach out to somebody or it could be a counselor on speed dial it could be a chat online chat like I'm thinking of all the LGBTQIA stuff that's showing up now and like the Trevor project has you go online and they have an online chat right away instant they can help you out with support especially with all the transgender stuff that is legislations and stuff like that that's going on oh my god that's just making me sick to my stomach that stuff like for example like there's other online resources for general mental health there's like the suicide prevention hotline there's all sorts of stuff okay there's all of that that is available and so you make you set a contact in your phone and you have like one two three four and like you just put that in there and you literally because you can't think when you're all everything's awful and heavy and you're just trying to you open it up and you see and you just follow one two three four you do what you you go down the list that's all you do and then just by doing that it gives you a little bit of a structure you know a rhythm fortunately like for me I had never had to use my safety plan after I realized I needed one up to this point I haven't needed to use that so but it's also good to have just on hand in case you have teenagers or kids at home so you know where you can call to get resources and support for them if they are in a low state or if you suspect that they might be contemplating completing suicide for example or if they're really struggling with mental health stuff or bullying or anything like that that you're concerned about their mental wellness and their physical health as well get yourself some resources and put them in your phone like that like do it because as a parent you just go you can freak out you know and you don't want that you need to be like hey boom boom boom boom you need that as well okay or if you have like a significant other that has challenges like that create a safety plan so that you have that in place and then share with them and say hey I'm concerned about you here's what I've done you know so good alright twitch thank you for being here I appreciate it he popped in this morning when I right after I got out of the shower and I was like trying to do this hair he says well you because you got to do the hair right I'm like I know it's not that it's not that spiky today it's a little bit more mellow but that's okay and I literally saw him in my mind's I am like oh you would be a perfect person to have a conversation with because I just recorded partial Sunday morning coffee where I talked about depression and he came up and came to mind and so I'm like hmm because people seem like we have everything together and everything's great and while we can and do we can compartmentalize and show up for projects and people and to bring the kid to school or to do session like for me that grounds me giving me having work kind of gives me consistency and it's like I feel great when I'm being psychic that's like the best part of who I am and I can't not feel that good supportive energy no matter what you and I are talking about in our sessions I still feel the good supportive energy and I bring it in right and share with you that's what happens and so I get that so when I work it actually helps me a lot so I can totally do sessions it's fine you guys and I'm feeling better too because I have some medication I've been on so it's good it's good all right let's not make this a big stigma or taboo subject let's have conversations about it let's be real about it and let's fucking start taking care of ourselves let's how about we do that so other people don't have to worry about us all the time let us take care of ourselves in a way that is loving and kind and compassionate let's love ourselves the way we love other people let's just try that shall we so this is Bridget I hope I've inspired your spirit today and filled you with hope with that twitch energy about this very real topic of depression and mental health all right thanks for being here oh remember though so this is your life and you get to live it just live live it thanks for being here