Trauma-Informed Weightlifting: Flipping the Script on Teen Therapy with Nick Bremer | Ep. 64

Teens Uncharted: If you've ever sat across from a teen who is completely checked out on the therapy couch You know that just talking about trauma doesn't always cut it. So today on our podcast, I'm sitting down with Nick. ⁓ he is a pre-licensed therapist out in Michigan who is completely flipping the script on somatic work. Nick is weightlifting certified and he is using physical resilience, literally picking up heavy things, to help teens process anxiety and trauma when words just aren't enough. ⁓ we're getting into exactly how he integrates this into his practice and how you can rethink body connection with your own clients. So Yeah. Hi ready. Welcome back to Teens Uncharted. I'm your host, Charity Chafee, where we dive into everything teen focused. I'm an LMHC based in Massachusetts, and teens are my entire population. So this entire podcast is focused on teens and it's geared towards parents, guardians, friends, family, providers, teachers, anyone who has a connection with teens that this could be helpful. So we spend time interviewing different people from different professions, really helping get information out there. about what could be helpful for teens. So thank you so much for listening. Let's jump into today's episode. Nick, welcome to Teens Uncharted. I'm so happy to have you here. Hello, thank you for having me. I'm very excited to be here today. Yes. So give me a little bit. So you're in Michigan. Yes. Yep. I ⁓ I am in the Grand Rapids area. ⁓ I went to school out here for college. practice is right outside Grand Rapids in Jennison, Michigan. And then I live a bit south of Grand Rapids. Perfect. Okay. So I have I have a question. Before we get into like the practice and the weightlifting stuff, what called you to be a therapist, specifically with teens? So, ⁓ by many I get this question a lot. I most therapists do, I think. Many, many different reasons. More of the darker, harder stuff. Personal suicide attempt as well. ⁓ that was a big thing for me kind of What helped me get through that? Extensive bullying growing up. And I at a middle school age wanted to I learned very quickly I wanted to be a therapist. I wanted to be someone that could help other people at this age group navigate what they're going through. On top of just other stuff, just poor community dynamics, families very close to me, but everything outside of that was very difficult growing up, and then just other little bits of fun. trauma here and there growing up, college years, all that fun stuff. but I've always my main goal was to have fun in my job and help people. And so I can successfully say I've officially been able to do that, which has been a very big blessing. Yes, I love that. I have to say I think it's so interesting how people get into the world of therapy. And I think I think that like ninety percent of the time it's because we have our our own personal experiences of like what it's been like to go through all of that. And I'm I have run marathons and done tries and like done a lot of like different physical stuff. And it's interesting because when I really sit back and think about it, I'm like, I never would have hired a marathon coach who's never run a marathon, right? But we have this like really like boundaried thing in therapy where it's like, ⁓ don't talk about yourself, don't talk about this, but like that's so much of what inspires us sometimes. Yes, I agree. I think too with working with teens especially is I don't obviously tell them my trauma history, but letting a teen or a young adult know that you kind of understand lets another step closer to that rapport building and connection there. Yes. I I totally agree. So back me up a little bit. You just recently graduated, like two years ago, right? So you're working on your like licensure process. What called you to get involved in the the certified weightlifting, the trauma incorporated stuff with that? So I'll have to back really far up to explain this whole process. So I grew up very ⁓ I had a construction father. ⁓ I was like out the womb playing sports, if you will. ⁓ so sports, active activities, movement, fitness has always been a huge part of my life. I actually struggle with an anxiety and in ADHD. And ADHD actually wasn't diagnosed until adulthood, which actually cleared up a lot of things because we were like I was in band, I was a swimmer, tennis player, I did every sport growing up. ⁓ so I was just go, go, go, go, go. So it was regulated well, but when I became an adult, it was harder to regulate. So that was one key thing. Plus movement always just Help me with my panic and anxiety. If I can move, it helps kind of release the energy. I've always used movement as a way to cope and regulate. As I got older with weightlifting and playing sports, what I realized was in grad school, I was coping with weightlifting in a negative way. Meaning, when I was weightlifting, I would relive my trauma to then get myself an extra boost of how could this happen to me? very like a self harming language and utilizing in a self harming way. So it's healthier than like cutting, burning that, but it's still rooted in self-harm. And I noticed I would I would get injuries. I have like knee pain from tennis and all that stuff. So I was like, wow, I I need to like kind of understand that more. And then as I was researching on my own, this trauma informed weightlifting ⁓ certification popped up. And I was like, ⁓ wow, that's like exactly what I'm looking for. So I sign up to take the certification. They themselves are a brand. It's not a modality by any means. It's more of just a certification. But I incorporate then therapy into the movement with the weightlifting now. ⁓ we're just so cool. I and that's the thing, like it comes from personal experience, right? You had that experience and you're like, I know that A, there's probably other people that this would be helping. And other people that could really benefit so much from having this process. Yeah. And it's it's really cool. I mean, I have a connection with the gym. So thankfully at my practice, ⁓ the person I work with, her husband owns this gym. And we actually got to do a collaboration and now I have the key to the gym. So after I do my sessions in my office setting, when the gym closes, I get to go in and then we just basically do therapy in a gym. And it's really, really cool. I love that. Okay. Do you I have so many questions for you. ⁓ but I'm curious, do you have like a specific type of clientele that usually seeks out the weightlifting type of therapy? So it's quite wide range. So I specifically cater to teens and young adults. That's probably my bread and butter. But I do see a few kiddos pending circumstances and I do see some like older adults and elders. But it kind of depends what the client or person's coming in for. ⁓ you can kind of use it. There's a lot of wrong ways to do it, but there's a lot of right ways to do it too. So if I'm working with a student athlete, a lot of it will be performance anxiety, breathing techniques, how do you introduce breathing to an athlete that doesn't find that enjoyable or thinks it's dumb. But then there's also I work with a lot of trauma, childhood abuse, ⁓ sexual assault survivors, and that they feel like they lost their lower autonomy. So maybe they want to enhance that or ignore it and work toward the body. ⁓ we kind of do a lot of person centered type of stuff. Some just want to cope through movement. I have a lot of ADHD people I see and movement just helps cope and emotionally regulate. So there's kind of a lot of different things we get to do there. Yeah. It's it's like so cool because it feels like depending on your lens, depending on like the person coming in, there's so many different ways to apply it. So it really could be that like never ending, you get to be almost as creative as you can be with the level of comfort with your client. Yeah. So that's why I can say I don't I'm not so trauma-informed waylifting is also like a a brand. So I have to say I don't represent them by any means. I'm just certified in it. ⁓ but what's cool is that you get to basically do CBT, motivational interviewing and somatic skills in a gym setting. It's kind of like play therapy. We don't say we're doing Uno therapy. We're doing play therapy, Uno's just the tool. That's kind of like the weight lifting is you had a bad day, ⁓ you got broken up with, you're like you're grieving, you're angry, let's cope now. Or do we need to process and you kind of get to like make it creative in your own way. Yeah. Would you would you say that you tend to work or you tend to see more like young boys reach out about this or like like teens that would present as like masculine. So I don't I don't stray anyone away kind of thing. I do see more masculine presenting people coming to this. ⁓ but I also would say I have a good even of also female presenting as well. I'm also I do a lot of gender work. I'm panel with the Pride Center in Grand Rapids. So I go to ⁓ Pride festivals all the time for work and also just as an ally to support. So I really believe in also males seek out more extraneous stuff to cope rather than therapy. Catering to a gym setting allows them to open up more. But we also want to be more inclusive in a gym. So more women, more ⁓ LGBTQ plus openness to that, more cultural diversity, disability, age, beginner, starter. We want to just broad that up open. In media and current day gym, there's this kind of huge stigma of You gotta look a certain way, you gotta be a dude. There's just like gym bro culture, which is fine if that's your thing, but that can't be the main thing. That's there's still a lot of other people that exist in a setting. Yeah, yeah. I I love so much that you that we're talking about this 'cause I I do think that there is this kind of like toxic like gym culture that sometimes happens where people feel like they're not allowed to be there. Right. I don't I'm not looking the part, I don't lift heavy enough, I don't do this. And like I know that like I do I do CrossFit. I do Olympic weightlifting. And I know that that is also sometimes part of those environments. It's like I don't feel like I fit in if my body type is different or if like this is happening. And it's it's so unfortunate to me because I feel like I know how much I've gotten out of l ⁓ like Olympic weightlifting. I know how much I've gotten out of CrossFit. I know how much I've gotten out of even horseback riding. ⁓ and in like the horseback riding world, like I am like an you know, like a a fat bodied person, right? Considering where you typically would see people ride. But I have also gotten so much out of that and so much stronger in like all the ways. ⁓ and I want that for people. So oftentimes when I'm working with like a, you know, a a preteen or like a teenager who's like really struggling with like self confidence or something, one of the first pieces of my treatment plan is like, how are you moving your body? Right? Like and what does that really look like for you? And I think having sport, having movement, having the ability to kind of like really see how strong you are and test yourself physically and like work through all the stuff that happens when you're like building yourself as an athlete can be so empowering for mental health. Yeah. I do a lot of psychoeducation as well in my sessions to like the neuroscience of it, why it works. If I just tell you to breathe, teenagers are just gonna go, Okay, that's stupid. So you have to kind of like cater it. One tactic I use is if LeBron James, Shohei Otani, Michael Phelps, these big famous athletes, before they do a really big thing in their sport, what do they all do that's in common? They breathe, they center themselves, they have positive self talk. So when you introduce it in that lens, s teenagers are more like, ⁓ I guess that is kind of more important than just saying find your breath. So when you phrase it like that, then they're more inclined to work and then the psychoeducation's a lot easier too. Mm. Okay. I could see that. I think I think like if I was a teen nowadays and someone was telling me to breathe, I'd probably just laugh, right? Yeah, exactly. And and it took me it took me years of being a therapist to realize that like ⁓ like being able to control my own energy is actually really important. And so like I remember myself as a teen and I'm like, I would never breathe. But I I do think it's explaining The the why, right? And giving them an understanding of like what does that actually look like. Because even though we can see it in our heads, they're teenagers. They haven't seen all of that yet. Yes, I I would definitely agree there. But okay. So tell me, how does it how does it work? Okay, so this is this is gonna take a little bit 'cause there's a lot of a lot of background that I've been studying in. So it kind of depends again who we're dealing with client wise. ⁓ I guess who I can I'll say my background experience kind of might add a little context too. So I've been in the mental health field since nineteen. ⁓ I'm currently twenty-eight. ⁓ I first started working at a psychiatric hospital in some parts of the nation, psych wards is what they're called. So I was a mental health technician for there for two years from nineteen to twenty one. ⁓ and that was like a very eye opening experience there. Very young to be working in that setting. It was quite intense. I mean I Very that is like people at their lowest crisis, that is quite intense work in those settings. Kudos to any w any nurse, doctor, technician that is currently still doing that. I think it was great experience though. I mean, I have so much crisis training and work now that that actually is very helpful in this gym setting because while my clients work out, if I know there's trauma or self harm, I'm very good at identifying, hey, you lifted that a certain way. Are you having self harming thoughts? Yes, okay, let's pivot now to something else. So I did that for a very long time. I ran groups, tack the checks, the whole whole nine yards there. After that in grad school, I then worked at it's called Bethany Christian in Grand Rapids. It's a ⁓ service for refugees and immigrants. So I got to work at a all boys refugee home for about a year and I actually installed like a gym program with them where I would take some of the guys and just work out with them to like cope with their crazy trauma and their stories that they were navigating. After that, my last internship in grad school, I worked after there for a couple months as well. ⁓ I was a therapist in Muskegon, Michigan. Miskegan is like either you view it as the beach town or it's the very poverty gun violence drug usage area. It's kind of like those two sides of the city. And I did community mental health there. about a year and a half I worked there as well. I was on the in the independence or transition age to independence team. So I specialized in working with fifteen to thirty year olds. After that, that was also crisis involved as well. Got got a little burned out and then I jump shipped to private practice and I have been here since. I didn't realize you had such a history. Yeah. Yeah. ⁓ my goodness. So I love this. I I actually like randomly became a therapist. Like it was the best it was the best impulse decision I have ever done because I I was gonna be a bioteacher. That was my goal. ⁓ I had done student teaching, I had gotten through the entire process, and then I re just remember I graduated and I had my diploma and I panicked. ⁓ and my like resident director at the time, who was a school psychologist, ⁓ she was the one supervising me, had known me for like four years at this point. And she just randomly at one point was like in my panic and she's like, You should become a therapist. And I was like, You think? And she was like, Yeah. And I was like, okay, great. And I just like literally applied for the program, sat for my GRE, got in, and I have never looked back. And like all of that happened within like a week. Like Wow. R really crazy. But then I think about it and I'm like, I never would have chosen a different career for myself knowing all of this. And like, like hearing you talk about it, I'm like, well, it's It's like so critical that we understand our own experiences. Cause like I'm actually going through equine therapy training ⁓ because I understand like the power of horses for me. And I'm just like, I want to give that to everybody, right? Like I want everyone to be able to expose to that. but we have these passions and we put them into practice, right? And like so cool. So I actually I didn't get into the field until I graduated and started working as a therapist. And I give you so much credit for doing all of the behavior tech stuff. Like it's rough. Like I worked in those environments where like I was not necessarily like the one to one for people, but it is rough. But it gives you so much good information and like ability to organize if like your nervous system sometimes and to like understand what that looks like. Yeah, I was ⁓ to get back in sorry, straight off a little bit there, to explain kind of how it works too. I also have background as a coach. So I always tell clients I'm not here to strengthen, like strength and condition you. I'm not critiquing form. Like we're doing it a safe way. But I have been a coach and weight lifted for like over 10 years. So I have like the like basics to understand so we don't have injuries and stuff like that. So I'll do kind of down the line of the modalities I incorporate. CBT is my bread and butter. most therapists I would argue have heard of or know of of cognitive behavioral therapy. For those that are listening or viewing this that don't know what it is, essentially to think about it briefly and quickly is a situation creates a thought, your thought creates an emotion, your emotion creates a behavior, and then a cycle continues. So to pivot to really specific gym thing, I like use myself. Situation is coping with trauma in a gym setting. I'm reliving and thinking about my trauma. I get angry I react poorly and injure myself. Next time I'm in the gym, that same cycle happens again. A little more simpler version is student has a PowerPoint, they think they're gonna fail, get made fun of, they have panic and anxiety, they skip the class. Next time they have a PowerPoint, same thing happens. So then what I think other therapists struggle with with CBT is where do you work with the emotion or the thought? Cause a lot of people just go to the thought. And that's that okay. Like obviously go work on the thoughts. But if I like to explain it to clients, if your emotion is panic and you're panicking, are you going to be able to sit there and go, What am I thinking? I would be so impressed if you could do that. So this that's kind of where the somatic part comes in is how do you cope with these emotions? Cause sometimes you can't go to the thought. So you kind of determine where that client is. stuck in the coping or the thinking. So if we go to the thinking, then it's the awareness to your thoughts, challenging those thoughts. Are they helpful? What are they doing for you? Is it conscious or unconscious? And then reframing is trying to change the thought to change the emotion, thus changing the behavior and breaking the cycle. Going to the somatic part, a lot of what we do is incorporating the window of tolerance. We're explaining the neuroscience behind that. So the window of tolerance for those who don't know, essentially it's like a box. If I'm really tolerable today, my box is huge. I can be I can be mad and annoyed, but I'm not triggered or upset or anything. If I'm having a really, really bad day and I'm like snappy and I'm reacting to everything, that window of tolerance is very, very tiny. So you kind of explain that to clients and how it works. Then you explain, okay, so this line, your box. If you break that line, you enter your threshold, aka like you're triggered. You're entering a triggered state. Up here is hyper arousal. Down here is hypo arousal. So then you work with a client, ask them, and you kind of help them identify because it can be hard as a teenager to like reflect on your own stuff. Of are you more of hyper arousal, which is like anger, rage, ADHD, panic, worry, those upbeat of negative emotions? Or you more a hypoarousal reactor where you're isolated, withdrawn, depressed, sad. And then you also it takes time to learn how a client's body likes to engage with stuff. ⁓ but then you ask them, Do you like to go with your state or against? So if someone's depressed, is it better to use that energy and deep breathe and relax through it, or get up, do the opposite? Go on a run, do some push-ups, do something movement, vent or express to someone, punch a pillow, something healthy. But you kind of learn how people like to cope or how if you need to encourage the opposite. So I see a lot of ADHD panic and worry. We usually go with that state, get that energy out. Let's lift heavy, let's let's get it out. Let's breathe hard. Let's get cardio going. So when you do that, what happens is you go, okay, so now we know your states. Kind of where you are, how can we get back into your window of tolerance now that we've entered that state? This is going into some neuroscience here. So when we get to those we're we'll stick with hyper-aroused, because that's the one I just see the most and work with. When you're hyper aroused, what happens is your nervous system enters a sympathetic nervous system response. Essentially what that means is you're in fight or flight. Adrenaline's high, you're sweaty, heart racing fast. Achey, fatigued, on edge. Most people know what that feels like. It's not fun. So what happens is that gets triggered, and we need to come back down to parasympathetic, our rest and digest, a calm state, which is going back to our window. So, how do we trigger our sympathetic nervous system to relax? I kind of like to describe it as when our nervous system gets tight, it's like this. It is just tight, tight, tight, and we want to loosen it. So, what do we do? This is where a lot of the somatic skills come in. We are going to do a certain breathing technique, which actually stimulates our nervous system. We're going to do mindfulness, grounding, really deep breathing. So, an example, what I'll do is if I have someone that struggles with, let's say they have child abuse, heavy bullying, and panic, and then maybe symptoms of disassociation. We want to recreate their panic symptoms in a gym. As in hard breathing, fatigue, sweaty, heart racing, the differences is the emotion. Near internally, same thing's happening. Heart racing, like that's not fun, but panic doesn't feel good. Working out kind of does. What happens when you show your body we can we can get to that hyper aroused state and then de-escalate it? When you leave the gym, your body understands that it can do that better. When you enter a trauma response. So I'll have clients, all right, put some dumbbells in your hands and let's go. Like hit heart rate up. When you're breathing, stimulate. Do you notice the cold metal in your hand? Can you feel the pressure of your weight forcing your shoes into the ground? It's the grounding, mindfulness, deep breathing. So we'll do that while they lift, or we'll lift, lift, lift, lift, cardio run, and then just stop and then lay down, deep breathe, mindfulness. And then you incorporate the CBT stuff as well. So you're kind of combining both of them at the same time. That's so cool. That was a long explanation. No, but I love it. I love it so much because this is this is the stuff like I'm literally just sitting here imagining like some of my clients that I like know could really benefit from this. ⁓ and there's like no one in my area that does it. I'll just like say that, right? but I'm imagining this and I'm imagining my own CrossFit workouts, my own stuff, and it's like, man, like That's like so fair. But then I so then I have all these questions, right? Cause it's like who who writes the treatment plan for that? How does your treatment plan look compared to like traditional in therapy, like in office therapy? And then like what are the ethical ramifications? And I'm also so curious about the 'cause I I know I work with a lot of like trans youth as well. And I think that they often feel so disoriented or disconnected from like gyms and same HPers and spaces and whatever. And so I have like so many trans clients that would benefit from like being able to be in the gym, but it's just too much to get there. And so I'm just like, how can we like bring some of this to them in a way that makes sense as well? Because everyone deserves to be in the gym, right? Like Yes. And what's cool about trauma informed weightlifting is if you are affiliated with fitness and work with trauma, you can get certified. This is not therapy specific. I just get to incorporate it with therapy, which is really cool. So like the ethical stuff is I make sure when my clients are in the gym, it's just us. So that's why it's a little hard to do. Most of my caseload is in my office, but I have like gym equipment in my office so we can do it in there, just not to the the more fun, bigger extent that the ⁓ the gym I have a key to is. But when we go there, there's virtually like people will be wrapping up, then we leave, then we start. It's just me and the client in there. And this isn't like a planet fitness type gym where there's like machines everywhere. It is like a giant warehouse and it's just open. There's like a mini turfe. There's it's like very CrossFit Olympic weight lifted oriented. I have been in personally like I d I did training this morning there. I just it's fun to work I d work out or by myself all the time, but having like an assisted coach is makes it a bit more unique and challenging in different ways. Well, so because I'm doing that so long and I was an athlete for so long, I kind of know the tips and tricks around the gym. I always emphasize, like, again, I'm not training you. We're just finding what your body likes. So my first question most for my clients is what's on your mind today? So it's open-ended so that they can't say yes or no, or I don't know, because that's how teens talk. ⁓ and then I ask them, what does your body want to do today? Are you wanting to do cardio? Do you need to cope? Do you need to express? Sometimes I have sessions where we won't even use gym equipment. They get in there and they're like, I gotta just talk about this today. And then we'll just sit and talk. So it's very client specific. I have I don't know how I treatment plan to be honest, because I am very good at just like be I'm very person centered, so I don't have session one's this, two's this, three and so on. Mine is very like, what do you bring in today? And if you have nothing, we'll find something. I'll we'll do psychoeducation, we'll just do play therapy and then build rapport. I kind of prefer when a client doesn't have something to talk about as a teenager because then it lets their guard down when we play or engage in movement and then it just bleh starts coming out. Okay, so question. How would someone know that trauma-informed like weightlifting was actually helpful for them? Like what would they notice as an outcome? So without giving away like client obvious confidentiality and HIPAA stuff, I have one I have had one client where we navigated trauma symptoms very well. Like disassociation was gone, more confidence was instilled. I think I remember them saying, like, I've never had my disassociation this well managed before. So lack of it's confidence and I also like it helps anxiety. You're in a new setting. It's scary. You're doing stuff that's really difficult to do. So it works on that active real life coping and like almost exposure therapy because you're removing the office therapy setting and you're doing it in a much bigger setting as well. I think I was just kind of referencing because I think that sometimes talk therapy feels like it can go on for years, right? People are in in therapy for years and kind of working through it. And sometimes I think people lose sight of like what what helpful therapy can look like and what helpful like how do they know they're making progress? ⁓ and so you answered that part. But then I have my other kind of follow-up question is like how long would you say people are typically using this particular type of therapy for? Or is it something that like they would stay forever? So I kinda leave that I usually work with clients to kind of determine what's best for them. So I've I've I've been therapy for Since high school. So like I I like long-term therapy, but I think it's very client specific. So I would say routine after four months is when I'm like, or probably after half a year. I'm like, okay, like we've kind of gotten through the present problem, but that's that present problem can last who knows how long. so I mean, I've had clients on my caseload, I will hit two years in private practice in October that I've been seeing for two years straight. ⁓ and that obviously changes treatment throughout time. I typically say after I notice the presenting main difficulties have been coped with and managed well, I kind of then say, Hey, if you want to go deeper into kind of more like understanding these underlying behaviors, your childhood, family dynamics, that deeper level stuff or long-term check-ins, because obviously You can have i I had anxiety in high school and I have it now. The anxiety is very different. So it's important to keep that. I always just like the check-in from me, I like it. So I usually offer long term and then I have quite a few that do long term with me. And those are like the maintenance, check ins, the loneliness stuff, someone to talk to, communication skills, all that stuff. But it kind of just Just depends on each person, I would say. I would say if you've you've gotten like what you've needed and you don't want to go deeper, then you're probably good. Because then you can always go back or find a new therapist too. Like, I got this good, I went two months without therapy, noticed some new stuff or regressing, you can go back. So I try to pivot clients to like after unless it's like needed each week, I'm like, hey, you've done weekly and we're noticing growth. Let's go to buy weekly now. And then I can go to three weeks and then a month and then maybe we don't see each other anymore. Kind of it's unique for each person, I would say it's specifically on my caseload. Yeah. Okay. And that that makes a lot of sense. I think that, you know, I think we learn ourselves in layers in the same way that like we are just like a varied layer, you know, like people. and I do think it's hard because I think there are some things like when people are showing up and they're still committing to the process, to me that's still value, right? Yeah. I think that like the insurance companies would disagree with that. ⁓ I I hundred percent agree with that. ⁓ but I but I think like I always say too, like I think therapy doesn't just have to be a place to treat, you know, like the the big heavy stuff. I think it could be a place of like self-development and growth. ⁓ and I I think about like the the impact right like movement has on our bodies and I think about how special it would be to share that with someone and process the trauma and do like all these pieces. And then also be able to show them like just how capable their body is and that like movement is really good and working out doesn't have to be scary and that like none of the feelings you're getting during exercise have to be like, you know, so uncomfortable that you never do it again. ⁓ you know. So and I I'm curious like if you see people that that do this process with you, if you see kind of an increase in their like physical drive afterwards, if they're working out more, if they are like sleeping better. Like I guess I'm wondering like how does this transition into like potential lifestyle shifts? I would say so because of my caseload right now, it's been I had a lot of people kinda like iffy on like the long term usage of it. I would say I've noticed much healthier coping. so a lot of my depression anxiety people, we I ⁓ usually am checking on their mood Each time we meet, of did you like go for a walk? I'm always make sure to phrase it as an intentional movement. Because if you're telling someone they need to work out, they have to work out, they should work out, or you should be in fitness, there's creating a pressure. And to get to that pressure is really hard. And if you don't get there, then there's a lot of negative and shame and guilt. If you phrase it as intentional movement, I'm gonna go get some intentional movement today. That is more open and inviting and that can be anything. It doesn't have to be weightlifting. It can be a walk, a run, pickleball, shooting hoops, yoga, stretching, playing with your cat. It could really be anything as long as it's there's the intention behind it. Yeah. Yeah. Like physically moving your body. I I always connect it to joy. Like I think when we feel joyous about stuff, when we really like have fun with something, we're like that much more able to do it. Like I I love lifting. I lift heavy. It's like one of my favorite things. And like I have met people who would rather run a marathon every day. And I loved my marathon experience, but like give me an Olympic barbell any day and I'd be like, That is my that is my workout, ⁓ over the other things. And so I think it's like connecting a getting to show people that it's okay for them to connect and to be in their body and to physically feel those things. And be like I think getting to push yourself through that. but then getting to find joy and movement, right? Like I I feel like sometimes, somehow, we as a society have almost ruined the idea of fitness and exercise. And like it's it's become so toxic. Yeah. I emphasize I tell this to my adults too that I don't know why where there's a societal norm of we stop playing when we're adults. That is ridiculous to me. I I play games, I play sports, video games, like any game I love, it's my favorite, and that's also why I like working with teens, is traditional talk therapy is just we call it old school. Like a teen doesn't want to sit there on a couch depressed, not sitting and just talking about why they're depressed. They'd rather engage within their interest or play a game or use some humor. Humor is appropriate at times in therapy. You just need to know when to use it. But yeah, teens are teens are interesting for sure to work with regarding the lifting stuff as well. I I had I had someone ask me the other day if I knew what sarcasm was. ⁓ and I thought it was like the nicest, funniest question. And I was like, I will forever remember that. because I was like, I of I love humor in session, I think it's great, but I also think there's a time and a place for it. the same way it's it feels like there's so many tools, right? So many tools have a time and a place in session with different people depending on what you're working through. ⁓ but that's what I think it's so cool about having access to like the lifting part and like anything that's like physical movement oriented because it just helps you process it in like a totally different way. Yeah. It is we're actually working on so the therapist I work next to, she actually got into the program this cohort time period. So we'll have two people at the practice I work at work at certified in it and we're gonna start working on ⁓ some mental health group for teens as well in the gym setting. So groups are coming soon. ⁓ my god, I love that. I love that. And groups are so hard to fill traditionally, but I feel like Yeah. You give them something to do like that and you give them like the workouts and the movements, like it's really gonna help them like bring it together. Mm-hmm. So Okay, so tell me a little bit. Have you gotten to a point where you've been able to incorporate like gender understanding and like gender identity like journeys into the weightlifting piece? ⁓ s a little bit. I see I have a couple of trans youth on my ⁓ case load right now. ⁓ A couple of them do the weightlifting. It is a lot of timidness. I mean, ⁓ a few weeks ago it was like their first session ever, like ever s first stepping put into a gym. So but it's really rewarding seeing someone like play and have fun and not have that standard of, ⁓ you need to get on the bench and try to do as much weight as possible. No, you can take laps on the turf field or you can grab the sled and push a couple pounds 'cause it feels good and it looks cool to the lift a lot weight. So you can it's yeah, you can incorporate it in ways like that. Yeah. I just think I'm I'm thinking, and of course I've never done this because I am not ⁓ certified in in trauma informed weightlifting, but I I think when we're talking about like our our gender queer gender identity population, specifically with with teens, there there's like such it's so hard for them to just be in their bodies because their body has historically not felt like a safe space, right? ⁓ and I think like the cool part I'm thinking about is like when you look at some of the athletes in this world, when you look at the CrossFit athletes, when you look at ⁓ you know, these like elite folks, you have so many different diverse bodies that are different with different things that are like they can be masculine and feminine and all these like different, you know, ⁓ kind of things. And so I'm thinking about how cool it would be to be able to offer that to trans youth to like, Hey, like your body can actually do a lot of things and your body doesn't have to just be in a box, right? Like Your your body has so many beautiful things to give. And at the same time I feel like because they spend so much time hating the things that are uncomfortable or that they're disorienting to them, which is like so fair, giving them the gift of being able to be like, Hey, like this is actually a really cool thing your body can do. Yeah. It's really empowering to like find how your body feels and functions for yourself throughout the day. I know through my own journey it I look forward to every type of movement possible 'cause I just feel s I feel grounded and intact and you like know yourself and how your body feels and reacts to stuff. And for trans youth that's really hard to do because of the body dysmorphia and all the other traumatic things that they encounter societally and internally. so it's really rewarding to be able to go today we're gonna focus on what your body wants to do and how can we empower its body in in the gym setting today. Okay, here's here's a question 'cause I'm curious. Are there people or are there situations or things that you're looking for that would make this not a good fit for a teenager? Age, for sure. ⁓ I will say if there's no interest in sports or to use movement, that can be a struggle. I I'm very good at motivating. I have a lot of motivational interviewing background, but if there is no interest or motivation to change or cope or regulate through movement, I would suggest probably not doing it. I have a lot of ADHD people, I have a lot of student athletes. ⁓ so those are like more inclined to like I already move and I worked really well with people that are already weightlifters and already student athletes, and they can just incorporate what they do in our sessions, and I'm kind of there as the hey, notice that, or okay, let's go a little harder this time, or the encouragement, like the dosing body. awareness stuff or I know it's cut and breathe. So that fits well into it. If you're kind of like, I want to try it, that's totally okay. It's more of I think the people that work best for it are like looking to use fitness routinely in their life or considering it and this is because like a good we lay in. I'm really connected with the gym there. ⁓ I've even had I think one client That started with a trainer that then went to me or and vice versa. Started with me and they're like, I love it here, like it's really inclusive. The trainers are really accepting and really cool there. And then they pivoted to having a trainer and they just went to do ⁓ where workout sessions and they were like, I don't need therapy as much anymore, which was fine. That's just what they needed. So we could do a bunch of that too. Huh. Okay. With the student athlete part. Are you also like collaborating with coaches and kind of like keying them into what you're working? Trying to. That's the start right now. Yeah, it's well, I was listening to their earlier podcast. I think it was the Geek Therapy one. ⁓ I can't remember the name of the person on there. ⁓ very good podcast episode. but they mentioned that in grad school they do not teach you the business side of stuff for therapy, and that could not be more accurate. I am not an accountant. I am not a marketer. I that is not my wheelhouse. Therapy is my wheelhouse. Those are not. ⁓ and when I jumped shipped to private practice, I had to learn a lot quick. And I was very much like, whoa, was I ready for this jump? I've always wanted to do private practice. Like I knew like this was what I wanted to do. So I thankfully made it work. But they it is trial and error. I I remember my first few months I am making flyers, I am business cards wherever I can. ⁓ as of late, I've been doing a lot of lunch and learns and talk ⁓ like ⁓ just public speaking. ⁓ my supervisor that I do supervision with ⁓ is actually my old professor that I did grad school with and she was my field director, so she has a lot of connections. So I've spoken at the YMCA in Grand Rapids and gave them a t like like I don't want to say like a TED talk, but kind of like a like a Talk like that kind of thing. And I've partnered with them on a few stuff. I've spoken at rehabilitation centers, gym settings to kind of like spread awareness and discuss it. I know they've reached out to coaches, I've reached out to schools and stuff like that. ⁓ so I'm definitely like spreading it out. It's more of to like finding there's a huge stigma with mental health and sports, I would argue too, of finding a coach or an athletic program that values that mental health part to that degree would make it easier. So I'm definitely spreading the word, but I would love to work with like a varsity team or anything like that to like do mindfulness skills and deep breathing and grounding and during like a weight session or anything like that. I I love all of that and I I totally I think in the world of technology, the world of SEO, the world of being inundated by like headway and other, you know, virtual platforms that don't necessarily have maybe like the same parameters. ⁓ I it's really hard to get it out there, right? And then at the same time, because you are like selling a service, you want to make sure that you're wording things in a way that like people are gonna be able to understand. And I do think that like therapy is a hard sell for a lot of student athletes because I think that the same I went to I went to a conference last year, it was great, and the the person, Cindy Miller that was presenting on student athletes, had basically said that the same skills and characteristics that help make student athletes successful are the same barriers they face getting into mental health. And I was like, if that wasn't a true statement, right? Like so true. And I think so many athletes, it's hard for them to a admit that they need help, right? It's hard to admit that like their mental health is where it's at and it needs to like that needs to be fixed or worked on in order to get to their performance. ⁓ because I think so often there is this intense pressure, right? They're like, I have to be perfect and I have to be this. And like, what does it mean if I'm in therapy? Right? Like, does that mean that I'm like not perfect anymore? Yep. It's a lot of stigma of working through I know part of the reason I started this too is when I was in heist or growing up, I'd have panic attacks while pitching. And I was like, I wish I knew this back in like middle school and like performance anxiety with college and tennis. ⁓ that would have been very helpful skills to learn. And as I was learning them, I was like, why did I not know this earlier? Like, this is just so helpful. ⁓ so definitely breaking that stigma. I think because of the certification itself, that has gotten I've gotten more athletes because of that. I've had parents reach out and they're hey. My kids having a lot of anxiety lately. We saw that you were catered to kind of like the sport side of stuff. We want to see you. So that does kind of leeway into that nicely of like, ⁓ you kind of understand this a little bit. But like I would say the entry into therapy is almost the hardest part for a lot of people. Yeah. Yeah. No, I a a thousand percent agree with you. ⁓ Es I and I think too, especially when you're talking about student athletes who often they have they're having five, six practices a week, dry land, wetland. I was also a swimmer. We we would do dry land in the morning, we'd have swim practice from eight o'clock to ten o'clock at night, and like my whole day was taken up by like swim and school and homework and work and then that. And so adding in, you know, like an hour for me to do this other thing w just felt really hard. And so it felt like unless it was a requirement or unless it was something that was like absolutely part of what I needed to do, it was a lot harder to get there. I think that's why that rapport is so important too is teenagers will come to me and they're like, I like coming to see you. Like I've had during my intakes, I always ask people if have you had therapy before? And if so, like what was your experience? Good, bad, ugly? And I'm always baffled at hearing how some negative stories people encounter in therapy or just I couldn't relate to them. I couldn't open up more. And I was like, you're not even getting the benefit of therapy if you can't find someone to connect and be vulnerable with. So I think that's why that is so important to cater to teens as well, is to be yourself, be open, and also to like share interests. I have so I have a ridiculous amount of hobbies besides sports and weightlifting. And that leads into weightlifting. I'm a big anime card collector. Like really anything nerdy is like my jam. And I can find a way for any person to leech that into like anything of do you think Obi Wan would act that way? Or do you think Goku would give up in the gym right now? Like you find like humorous ways to incorporate it, but again, that connects with a teenager more than just going breathe and work out. So finding that rapport is huge with teenagers, especially. I ⁓ One of the first things I did when I started doing private practice, ⁓ I didn't want to have a super huge private practice, like I didn't want to see 60 people a week, right? ⁓ I wanted to give really good quality care to, you know, a handful of people and and really make sure they were getting it. And so I remember like part of my initial business pitch was like, if your kid brings something in and I don't know about it, I will do the research, I will do the watching, I will do the whatever I need to do to learn that. So that I can use that as a bridge to translate the mental health stuff. Right. And at first I think parents were like, ⁓ yeah, whatever. And it's like, no, if you need me to learn softball, I will learn softball, right? Like I'm gonna be that creep that someone says, like, ⁓ I watched this thing and I really like this character. Girl, I will watch that entire thing. I will like have a critical analysis of that. Like I want to understand how to connect with you, right? And the ways that like I am connected with as an adult, as a human. very different from the ways that somebody else does. But I make the commitment to be like, I'm gonna figure it out. Mm-hmm. I think if also like with teens, if they're sharing an interest and you are cu I always say, I do some talks with my ⁓ professor for her classes every now and then and I always tell people I'm like the biggest thing you can do is just meet people with curiosity. That is the biggest step. I think there's numerous studies done then grad school that we read where Clients care more about the rapport rather than your trainings. And obviously trainings are important for knowledge and to be ethical and moral, but that rapport building is the most important part for treatment. If you cannot connect to someone or do mental health work if you cannot connect to that person in some way. No, I a thousand percent agree with you. I think I think being able to do curiosity and being able to have rapport are like the two most important things. You know, 'cause I I feel like if you can't connect with someone, there's already a wall there. ⁓ you know, and not to say that there's no benefit to break down the wall or to like continue to engage in that, but I would never put that on a teenager. Yeah. And it's empowering for them. Like they get the choice to speak about what they want, what they wanna say, what they wanna express to you. It it allows autonomy and confidence and independence to increase as well. Yeah. Yeah. No, I I love it. So I'm I'm curious because I have never done like the weightlifting cert. What does that actually look like in practice? How long is the program? What was the cost put for you? Like what was that like? I started it so I did it in I believe twenty twenty five. It was a roughly half a year or a year after graduating. ⁓ 'cause for private practice, as you know, it's hard to find a niche that sticks out. Like you can say you specialize in anxiety, but so does the entire nation. So it I was I was like, how can I like pivot something and like how I already weightlift and all this stuff. So I found it. ⁓ when I did it, I believe it was an eight eight week course. it is it's really it's I'm gonna and if you take anything from this podcast, sign up for it. It is such a rewarding experience. I loved it. ⁓ we met every Wednesday for about two or three hours. For eight weeks, you do a lot of for it depends on who's in your cohort. So I had like trainers, teachers, ⁓ coaches, therapists, h nurses, anyone can really do the certification. So you kind of get to see the lens of how everyone can incorporate as well. ⁓ they it definitely kind of felt like a recap of grad school of like the like a lot of the trauma and the neuroscience and all of that mental health component. But then they also pivoted to like ⁓ certain gym like symbolicism of we're going to like drop the weight and then you can you can pick it up. So it can be very symbolic. They teach you like why a trauma-informed lens is important. You then get to connect with people in the cohort. I know in my group there was someone in I believe Wisconsin and Chicago. In the overall cohort I was in, we had people in like India, the UK, I think Canada as well. So it's really cool seeing how all these people connect to do this one thing. And then they just you do like a project at the end, but it can be fairly simple. My project was just creating a PowerPoint for lunch and learns. ⁓ so now I just have a PowerPoint. If people want to learn about this stuff, I kinda or about like how I do therapy, I'll just go and present to them. ⁓ but the last final projects were like how do you incorporate a safety play in your gym or How are you more trauma-informed now after this? And like a written statement for your practice. So you kind of can make it however you want. And then you get to meet with the two cohort founders, Candace and Mariah. They are awesome. ⁓ one's, I believe, is coach trainer specific, civil rights activate, and the other is like clinical therapy. So they get to combine together. You get both sides of them as well. And it's just, yeah, you kind of learn from everyone. It's really cool. Price-wise, too. I I wanna say two grand. Total. I think if you sign up certain times you there's also they do ⁓ I know my ⁓ coworker that just signed up, ⁓ they do like scholarships too for certain situations. So it's not always out of pocket. I think it's like sixteen hundred to two grand in that range, but there's also scholarships and stuff too. Okay. Okay. Yeah, actually I mean, I think that sounds like pretty reasonable given you know, like all the other trainings that are out there as well. And I just love that this is like kind of niche focused, but then you get the perspective of other cohort members. Stems from trauma informed yoga. So there a lot of that basis stems from that. So trauma informed yoga is a modality you can use. Trauma informed weightlifting is like slowly getting there. It's still kind of in that developing just a certification stage. They're trying to eventually, I believe from what I'm remembering, That they're trying to get it eventually to like a modality kind of thing. So it's still fairly new. That's why they say there's a lot of ways to do it right, but a lot of wrong ways to do it as well. Yeah. Yeah. No, I could totally see that. What's your when you think about like your practice, all the effort and the kind of the time commitment you've made to getting the certification and to doing the work, what's your what do you want your practice to look like in five or ten years? What's the dream? ⁓ I have this dream a lot. So I've always wanted ever since high school, I've always wanted to own a practice. I currently work at a private practice under someone. Happy to kind of just work under someone for a couple more years. It is a lot to own a practice. Absolute dream scenario would be I have a building where I have access to a some type of gym facility, a private room, and then a kitchen. I believe that mental health on top of therapy is also holistic. I haven't gotten to do it at this job or private practice yet, but my old jobs, I actually ran self-care ⁓ groups and a lot of them were cooking meals. I believe, especially with weightlifting and mental health, what you put in is what you get out. If you are eating oily and sugary food, that is going to create more depression and worry versus eating cleaner, more protein heavy, being aware of how your body functions with your diet, that affects how you think. So in a dream world I'd have access to all three of those components, the the office therapy, the gym, and a kitchen, and I would circulate in those in a building and my have my private practice. End goal. I l I love that so much. If you if you added like a horse stable on the side, I can just have someone that is ⁓ trained in that at our practice as well. And she does that too. It's incredible. I think I I love therapy. I think there's so much good that can come from therapy and from talk therapy and from being in that space. And I think that it's just starting to become more of a thing for like alternative types of therapy, right? Like weightlifting therapy, equine therapy, like people are starting to really see that there is like so much benefit and these other pieces that you can do and like so much processing we're doing somatically. when that is happening, it's it's incredible. So I love that dream for you. I like want that dream for you. I can actually see you with like a whole gym full of other clinicians that are like working on that. Cause it's let's let's be fair. Like when you when you create a business, you are offering a service. You're offering a niche, right? Like so you're working with a very specific like demographic or a very specific like you know situation or need. And then you can build that, right? And like Sometimes I think the more specific you can be, the better off your business is because you're like, this is what we do. And like I think about all my teenagers that I have at this point and I'm just like so many of them would like cook a meal with me. So many of them would like go and like lift heavy weights. Like so many of them would like welcome those opportunities. And so I really, I really hope we're moving in a in a space where like progressive therapy and like situations like that are just commonplace. I'm hoping so. I a lot of my clients are like I don't like old school therapy. And I'm like, yeah, it's it's also you I'm I would argue fairly not young, but like younger on the side of therapists. So I think clients can resonate with that too, with being a teenager as well. Yeah, yeah, that's fair. I love old school therapy. I always I always think that like technically therapy's only been around since like the eighties. Yeah. Mm-hmm. So like we're kinda going on fifty years of like therapy and education and training. Yeah. and I I often like I have clients that are like, wow, really? And I'm like, Yeah, like it's a very new science, arguably. Yeah. Yeah. So I think I think that means there's a lot of like really awesome ways to do it. And of course, as you said, there's a lot of like really wrong ways to do it. So Yeah. I think too breaching out from like what is taught as the norm helps 'cause mental health it doesn't have a rule book. I hate to say it. No there was no class that I took that was like, okay, that that made me ready to be a therapist. It is the work you do in with people is what teaches you how to work with people. My psychiatric ⁓ hospitalization experience, my refugee homing, community mental health, all of that played a role of how I do therapy now. Those were the kind of the key things there. Still school's helpful, but it's not the end all be all. No, I I think school gives a really good, depending on the program, a really good foundational experience of like here's some things and here's how to think about it and here's this. But like honestly, like I when I look back to my practice, when I look back to the things that like super impacted me, it was my immediate experience post graduation and it was my experience up until I got licensed and then it was the supervisor that I have paid and paid and all of the Maybe right, supervision, everyone needs it. But it's it's all of those experiences that have really led me to this point where it's like this is my population, this is my niche, this is the thing I love to do. so it's it's a growth process. And I think grad school is like a very small part of all of that. Yeah. It's a very tiny part. Yeah. They only have two years to teach us. How in the world can they teach you all of that? And then also understand that because we're layers, we have to like infiltrate all of that through the layers. We just don't have enough time. Yeah. I think and also volunteering. I volunteer every summer at the Special Olympics. So and that that's not therapy, but that like opens your eyes and viewpoints to other stuff you wouldn't consider. So I think any of that is good as well and helpful for other therapists listening. Yeah, yeah. Okay. So question. Any advice you would give to someone who wants to do this work with teenagers? Therapy. Be yourself. ⁓ don't be afraid to loosen up a little bit. don't be afraid to set stern boundaries as well. That is healthy, whether th they wanna know your gamer tag or your phone number or not, that is healthy to set a boundary. It can be hard. Teenagers are very fun, but it takes work. I know there are a few clients I have where it was I almost was like, I don't even want to see them today. Like this is this is gonna suck. And then it eventually will work out. I think it it really does It's very rewarding. ⁓ I heard in grad school one professor say if you help one person out, it's worth it. And I can definitely say I have had that experience and it it is very worth it. It's a very rewarding experience to let someone be vulnerable with you. It's a v I would argue it's a privilege. I also would recommend don't focus on progress. We hear a lot of, especially in community mental health and insurance-based stuff, it is progress, progress, progress, progress. That's not how our brain and mental health work at all. I know I have to kind of cater progress notes to kind of be like, session was medically necessary because of this, and the clinician utilized this during this, and we just played Uno. So you need to write it to with the system to get paid and obviously make the service count, but don't focus so much on progress and more meet the client where they're at. That is the key part of holding space for people. And if you're so focused on why is their depression not getting better. 'Cause you're not looking at you're looking at the wrong thing. You gotta look at the person and meet them where they're at and help them out. Yeah. No, I a thousand percent agree. And you had me because you had said that getting that vulnerability is a privilege. And like that is one that is like a hill I will die on. When a teenager is willing to be vulnerable with me, like that makes me feel like I did my job because I earned the privilege to be able to like sit with that. And it's also something that I think when we're talking about parents, like Parents need to understand that just because they're the parent doesn't mean they'll always have the privilege. Correct. I have many clients in transgender youth and queer youth, if you will, that I've they've been I've been the first person they've told that they've come out to. And that is like a huge like, wow, that is like an absolute honor kind of thing that you felt safe enough and vulnerable to enough enough to share that with me and no one else yet. So it's it's a very profound feeling. Yeah. I love it, but that's why we come back, right? That's why that's why we deal with burnout and secondary traumatic stress. And we lived heavy shit. Yes, yes we do. ⁓ my God. Okay. Nick, thank you so much for joining us today. I'm like I'm obsessed with you and I can't wait to follow your journey and all of your stuff because I just think you have such such a good head on your shoulders, such good like focus for these teens and anyone that gets to work with you is so lucky. Well, thank you. Those very kind words. Thank you for having me on today. It was thank you for taking your time to talk and interview. This is a lot of fun and I greatly appreciate it. Yeah. Yeah, of course. ⁓ all right, everybody who's listening, I'm gonna drop all of Nick's info below. Anything for the luncheon learns, any sort of information that will connect you with him. ⁓ again, you're based in Michigan. Are you licensed in any other states or gonna gonna get licensed in any other states when you get your Once I'm offici license is hopefully happening within the year. I'm taking the exam in a couple of months. So hopefully I pass. ⁓ and goal, dream goal. I would like to be licensed in numerous states. I'm thinking like Seattle, more out west kind of stuff, but I'm kind of open to see wherever my journey takes me. Perfect. Okay. All right, for now, we can find you in Michigan. Yes, you can. All right. All right, everybody. I will let you wrap up. Happy Friday. We will catch you next time.