March 2025 – Bottomless to Sober

Podcast Episode 65. Fall Down Seven Times, Get Up Eight

Posted on March 29, 2025March 29, 2025 by Jessica Duenas in Uncategorized

In this episode:

Imagine being at the pinnacle of your career, celebrated as Kentucky State Teacher of the Year, while secretly battling severe addiction. That’s the reality I faced, living a double life until a car accident shattered my illusions and forced me to confront my need for recovery. Inspired by Paulo Coelho’s wisdom, “The secret of life is to fall seven times and to get up eight,” I share my tumultuous journey through multiple treatment stints over 14 months, debunking the myth that recovery is a simple, linear path. Join me as I open up about the painful truths and the resilience needed to continually rise after each fall.

Resources:

Coaching Information

Bottomless to Sober – Coaching, Classes, and Workshops⁠⁠

Transcript:

00:03 – Jessica Dueñas (Host)
Hey y’all, welcome back to Bottomless is Sober. I’m Jessica, and I’m so grateful to have you here. So, whether this is your first episode or your 60 something episode, this is our space where we continue to get honest about what it means to recover, not just from addiction, but from shame, perfectionism, grief and, honestly, just life. So today, I want to anchor our conversation in a quote by author Paulo Coelho You’ve probably heard it before, but if you haven’t, I invite you to really feel it today and he wrote the secret of life, though, is to fall seven times and to get up eight. It’s so easy to throw that around like a motivational slogan. I’m not going to lie, but when you have a history of having relapsed, right when you’ve fallen in a way that shakes your whole sense of self, it’s actually. It’s not just a quote, it’s a hundred percent, it’s a lifeline.

01:03
I want to share a story that I haven’t told in a while, but you know it came to mind when I read this line recently, um, back when I had won, you know, the Kentucky state teacher of the year award in 2019, this was a few months after winning that award, and you know like, on the outside, um, my life did look like everything was on track, right, you know, being an award-winning educator, considered a community leader, back in Louisville, kentucky, you know, someone that people legitimately looked up to, but the thing was that on the inside I was completely unraveling, you know. So I felt like every celebration that I came across it, really it just felt more like this really heavy pressure, and every compliment that I would ever receive honestly just felt like this huge reminder that I was living a double life. Right, I was deep in addiction, drinking every single night. You know, by the end of my drinking days, I was drinking a fifth of liquor a night, and that was numbing the fear that I was going to disappoint everyone. Right, I did not want to get caught, and so I literally lived my entire life in a way where I could drink heavily and yet appear really functional and successful on the outside. My liver was shot, I had been diagnosed with alcoholic liver disease and the thing was eventually trying to navigate all these different things at once that were completely opposing forces. It all came crashing down, and so there was one morning where I had actually flipped my car in Louisville and this street called Bardstown road after drinking, and I remember coming to hanging upside down in that car and realizing that I could have died right. I mean, honestly, I probably should have given the impact of that accident, but somehow I walked away physically unharmed, emotionally though, I was shattered.

02:56
So after that, that same night, I actually after I went to the emergency room, I went straight into a treatment facility where I stayed for five weeks, and while in treatment, you know, I started to put the pieces back together. I found a sense of community. I have a friend there that I’m still friends with today and, you know, I started to find hope and I started to start to connect with myself again. But let me tell you something that I wish more people talked about, and that is that assumption that just because you go to treatment, that you’re good, right, that the work is done, that if you go to treatment once you’re one and done no, no, no, I went to treatment like seven or eight times in the span of 14 months, so that’s already not true. I wanted to put that out there. Just because you go to treatment does not mean the work is done. Healing definitely not linear. If I would have been put in charge of creating healing and how it worked as a construct. Yes, I would have loved to have made it a linear process for all of us, but it’s not. In recovery, it’s not a straight line either.

04:02
So a few weeks after I left the facility, I had a relapse. I was completely overwhelmed. I was still dealing with so much grief after having lost my then boyfriend, ian, to his own addiction right. And so I just felt completely isolated. I felt tired of trying so hard and I slipped and I had the one drink. But of course the one drink turned into two, and then it turned into more, and eventually I had that old voice in my head whispering you know, you’re never going to change. Who are you kidding, jessica Right? And when you have that voice in your head, it becomes so easy to just want to say I’m done, I don’t care, why bother trying? If I can’t get this done perfectly, then I might as well not try at all.

04:46
And so that night I remember sitting on the floor of my bathroom, you know, crying, with the empty bottle having had thrown up. And I wasn’t just disappointed in myself, I was just in this place of feeling completely devastated. You know I had already promised myself and the few people who were aware of everything that was going on, especially my sister, that, like I, was done right. But here I was drunk on the bathroom floor again. But something shifted right. Things start to shift over time. The more that we practice our sobriety, the more that things start to click. And this time I didn’t ghost anyone. I didn’t disappear. I didn’t hide. For weeks, I didn’t try to pretend that it didn’t happen. In fact, I reached out to my sister. I had texted her and I said I messed up and I need help, which is a huge leap. Huge leap for me. I thought she would have been upset with me, I thought that she would have been disappointed, but all she said was I love you, come, come visit me and try again, right? How simple was that? How simple was that? And so that was the moment that I started to understand what getting up again really means.

06:00
It’s not flashy. It’s not always about heroically turning your life around in one grand gesture. Sometimes it’s literally about reaching out instead of retreating. Sometimes it’s sitting in a meeting that next day, even if you’re hungover and ashamed, but still showing up. Sometimes it’s saying I fell, but I’m here. And here’s the thing right In this work, because some of you may have been, maybe sober for a while. It’s not just relapse that makes us question ourselves. So I want to recognize that the fall here is not always directly tied to alcohol. Sometimes the fall that we go through in life can be subtle, way more subtle than taking a drink, but it can be just as discouraging.

06:45
So maybe you snapped at your kids or you snapped at your partner and then, damn, you’re like instantly I just undid months of inner work. Or maybe you had recently committed to a morning routine whether it’s like meditation or journaling or moving your body and then you fell off for a week and now there’s a shame kind of looming over your head of not following through which makes you feel like you just want to give up altogether. Or maybe you shared something vulnerable right With a friend or in a group and someone gave you a response that was really uncomfortable, like maybe they sounded judgy or they didn’t respond at all. So you feel like whatever you said landed on like deaf ears. Now you’re questioning if you should have even said anything or if you should even bother going back to them and opening back up, and I just want to say whatever else it could be for you, whatever that fall could look like that these moments count too. They’re the quiet heartbreaks, right? They’re the mini falls and, just like with a relapse, they still offer us the same invitation, which is get up again, try again, stay in it, right? And as you’re looking at these invitations to recommit, maybe ask yourself what can I do differently? Right? What tool do I need to use that maybe I haven’t explored yet In sobriety, right?

08:10
That’s why I love this quote the secret of life is to fall seven times and to get up eight, because, in sobriety, falling does not mean that you failed. It simply means that you’re a human and standing back up. That’s where the magic is, that is where the healing happens. So today, right, whether you’re celebrating getting through another 24 hours sober, or whether you are in the middle of picking yourself back up, in general, I want you to know, I want you to understand that you are not alone and you don’t have to get up, gracefully, right, this doesn’t have to look magical and beautiful, you just have to get up. And so take a moment, let’s reflect, right? Whether you’re journaling or you’re out on a walk or you’re listening to the podcast, just kind of, you know, with your heart open.

08:58
Here’s a couple of questions for you to sit with. When was a time that you got back up after a setback in your sobriety? How do you talk to yourself in those moments when you feel like you’ve fallen short? And, lastly, what support or reminder helps you to stand back up again? And as I close out, I just want to remind you for this week, right, that you deserve grace, you deserve support and you deserve to keep going.

09:26
Okay, thanks so much for being here with me this week. A reminder again that the reason we rise, it’s not because we never fall, it’s not because we never fail, it’s not because we never fail, it’s not because we’re perfect, but the reason we get up and we keep going is because, no matter what, we can always rise again. Right, as long as you’ve got breath in you, as long as you are still here and alive with us, you can absolutely do something to get back up again. We don’t need to stay down that perfectionist narrative, that black or white thinking. It gets us nowhere really, really fast. So, thanks so much for hanging out this week. I will catch you next time.

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Podcast Episode 64. Breaking Free from the ‘Good Girl’ Mask

Posted on March 22, 2025March 22, 2025 by Jessica Duenas in Uncategorized

Link to Spotify

In this episode:

Jessica explores the emotional cost of people-pleasing and the liberation found in breaking the “good girl” script. Reflecting on her own experiences before and after sobriety, she shares how unlearning the need to be liked led to deeper self-worth and authentic healing. This episode speaks directly to women in recovery who are learning to say no, set boundaries, and reclaim their truth—without apology. Jessica leaves listeners with heartfelt reflection questions and a bold reminder: you are still good, even when you’re no longer the “good girl.”

Resources:

Coaching Information

Bottomless to Sober – Coaching, Classes, and Workshops⁠⁠

Transcript:

00:03 – Jessica Dueñas (Host)
Hey everyone, welcome back to Bottomless is Sober. I’m your host, jessica Duenas, and so glad to have you here this week. So, whether this is your first time listening or, you know, reaching out to your support system or simply just breathing through a tough day, that is a victory, right? That is recovery in action. So I just want to take a moment and recognize that Now, today’s episode is, for all my recovering people pleasers, especially if you have been socialized as a woman, right, and you were taught, directly or indirectly, that being nice is the same thing as being lovable, right? I think for so many of us, that was definitely a message that we were taught, and essentially, we’re talking about something that I’m calling breaking the good girl script, because that internalized role that so many of us were handed early in life right To be agreeable, to be helpful, be easy to be around. Don’t rock the boat, don’t say no. Smile, and especially smiling at family members that creep you out, right, even when you’re dying inside, right. Smile no matter what. Being in recovery means breaking from those things, and so I want to open with a quote that I absolutely love, and I’m even using it in sobriety support meetings that I lead, and it’s from Nedra Glover Tawwab, the author of Set Boundaries, find Peace, and she wrote this line. She wrote when you consistently prioritize yourself over others, you diminish your self-worth. People-pleasing is not kindness, it’s self-neglect in disguise. So take a deep breath and let that quote sink in.

02:04
I don’t know about you, but I spent years confusing people-pleasing with kindness. You know, I thought that I was being a good friend, a good daughter, a good employee, a good partner, right Like the desperate, clinging girlfriend. But really I was abandoning myself over and over again and I wore the good girl mask so well that most people could not see how much I was suffering. And I’ll be honest with you, I wore that mask so well. There were times I couldn’t see it either. I remember there was a time back when I drank where I was just constantly saying yes to everything, you know, whether it was a social gathering, whether it was a work commitment or favors for people you know who rarely return the energy. I was just always in this yes mode, and one weekend I had three different events lined up back to back and I was just always in a space of burnout. Right, I was emotionally raw and I knew deep down that I needed just some time alone. But I didn’t want to seem flaky, I didn’t want to seem ungrateful, so I pushed through. But what did I do? I smiled when I didn’t want to smile. I drank, I drank heavily, I charmed other people, I made other people laugh, and then I went home and got really, really wasted and probably cried and, just you know, woke up on my couch hung over. I wish that I could say that that was rare for me. I wish that I could say that that’s a rare experience period. But you know, it’s not. It’s not rare, and I’m sure some of you listening can be like oh yeah, I’ve been there before.

03:43
What I’ve learned in sobriety, and what I’m still learning, is that practicing kindness, the practice of real kindness, absolutely includes yourself. You have to be the first one who you’re being kind to. Being liked by others is nice and all, but it means nothing if you are rejecting your own truth in the process. Sometimes the most loving thing that you can do is say no, not just to others, but also to that part of you that still believes that your worth is tied to your usefulness, letting go of that good girl script, you all. It has not been easy and it still is not easy, it’s still a struggle for me. But what I realize is that every time I choose myself that, every time I say actually I can’t make it or I need time to think, or this doesn’t feel good to me, what I start to find is that I feel stronger on the inside, I become freer and I get closer to the woman that I’m becoming in recovery. And this is someone who’s been sober almost five years, right. And here’s the thing recovery. And this is someone who’s been sober almost five years, right. And here’s the thing for women in sobriety, this kind of work can feel especially radical, right, like especially badass.

05:02
You know, we were so often praised for being selfless, for putting everyone else before ourselves. We’re told that we’re strong when we stay quiet, when we carry the load and when we don’t ask for help. But sobriety actually flips that upside down. It tells us you matter too. You and your needs are valid. Your peace is not a luxury, it’s a requirement. And so when we do these things, when we believe these things, that is when we’re actually practicing strength.

05:37
But I also want to recognize that that’s where some grief can come into our process, right, once we choose to break the script. We do often have to let go of certain identities, certain relationships or certain expectations that we’ve had. We’re going to disappoint some people, we may lose some friends, we might see family dynamics more clearly, which might mean that we start to see family dynamics more painfully, and we may feel like we’re walking away from a version of ourselves that we’ve tried so hard to perfect and in many ways we are. But at the end of the day, we’re also walking toward something better. Right, we’re walking away from an old version of ourselves and we’re walking toward authenticity. We are walking toward boundaries, toward peace, presence, wholeness.

06:31
So if you are in a season, right, where you’re unlearning people pleasing, where you’re trying to say no more often, or where you’re realizing that being nice has just caught you or not caught you, cost you too much, you know, please stop and understand this. You are not selfish, you are not broken. You are not broken. You are becoming free, you are allowed to take up space and you’re absolutely allowed to be misunderstood. You are allowed to say no without having to do like a whole 10 paragraph text explanation. Right, no itself is a complete sentence and you are still good. Right, you are still a good person even when you’re not. The quote unquote good girl, right.

07:19
And so just some reflection questions for you to take with you. Um, these can be great journal prompts or just something to sit with throughout the day. But first question to think about what messages were you given growing up? You know directly or indirectly, about being a good girl or being liked. How has people pleasing shown up in your life, especially in your journey towards sobriety? What does it look like for you today to choose yourself over others’ expectations?

07:52
And I want to recognize that this episode I’ve mostly talked toward women, but I also want to recognize that you know men, there have absolutely been expectations placed on you that sobriety flips upside down, right, and so feel free to take this and adapt it to your experience as a man. I’m just obviously speaking from my perspective as a woman, but you know the same expectations placed on people based off, you know, gender happens to men as well, and so, anyway, if this episode resonated with you, please consider sharing it with a friend or leaving a review. Right and again, if no one’s told you today, you are doing an amazing job, even when the work is messy, even when the healing feels slow or incredibly painful and you want to throw up. You know you’re here, you’re showing up and you’re doing it, so keep on keeping on. So thanks so much for spending this time with me. Until next time, be absolutely gentle with yourself. Being bottomless is not a part of your story anymore. Thanks y’all.

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Podcast Episode 63. Shame Is a Liar: Reclaiming Your Worth and Breaking Free

Posted on March 14, 2025March 22, 2025 by Jessica Dueñas in Podcast

Link to Spotify

In this episode:

Shame is sneaky—it twists our thoughts and keeps us stuck. In this episode, Jessica gets real about how shame shaped her struggles with addiction, relapse, and self-worth. She shares personal stories, unpacks common shame traps, and offers powerful questions to help you shift your narrative.

Ready to rewrite your story? Tune in for a raw, honest conversation and take your first step toward self-compassion. You are not defined by your past—you define you.

Resources:

Coaching Information

Bottomless to Sober – Coaching, Classes, and Workshops⁠⁠

Transcript:

00:02 – Jessica Dueñas (Host)
Hey y’all, welcome back. Today we are talking about something that I know far too well, which is shame. I recently saw a loved one struggling a lot with personal shame and it just moved me to put together this episode just to talk about it a little bit, because it really does impact so many of us, right, if not all of us. And here’s the thing about shame shame, it is so sneaky, you know, it doesn’t show up very blatantly like fear or anger does right, like I feel like fear, anger. Those are emotions that when they come up for us, when they rise up in our bodies, it’s pretty easy for us to pinpoint and say, oh, I’m feeling fearful or oh, I’m so pissed off, right. But when we’re feeling shame, it’s so much more subtle, you know, it kind of just comes in when you might be alone with your thoughts. It might come in and start twisting up memories. It might come up for you when you start doubting yourself or questioning things, especially when it comes down to if you start questioning your worth right, like whether you question that you are worthy of love or worthy of forgiveness or worthy of a fresh start, right. Anytime that you start doubting whether you are worthy of something. Chances are that is shame speaking through you in code. And so you know and I know this right, because I carried shame for many, many years. I mean, I was ashamed because of my drinking. Then, when I got sober, I was ashamed that I didn’t stop sooner. You know, I was then ashamed for the things that I did while I was deep in my alcohol abuse. And the thing is it’s like, just because you get sober, shame doesn’t necessarily go away, right, it can easily find brand new ways to sink its claws in, right. I mean, I just remember, with love and relationships, like, one of the biggest things that shame would tell me is that nobody who is healthy, right, nobody who has like a solid, healthy, stable mental health history, is going to be interested in me. That I would only have to find other people who are recovering from addiction, right, who’ve been to the bottoms and depths of hell, that those are the only people who would be good for me. That’s what shame told me.

02:18
But one of the other biggest speaking of loving relationships, right, like one of the biggest sources of shame for me, especially once I got sober, was really reflecting on the people that I would often go back to, who I knew weren’t good for me, and this would even happen in sobriety, until I got my stride, until I got confident. You know, it’s just like I would go back to people who didn’t respect me. I would go back to people who didn’t show up for me. I would go back to people who made me feel like I would have to prove that I was worthy of their love, or people who I knew at the core, fundamentally, that we were not a match, but yet my, my need for company, my need to not be alone, would always push that to the side. And so, you know, I would always be caught up saying like never again, I’m not talking to that person, I’m blocked, I’m done. And before you knew it, I was just answering the text, giving them another chance, you know, convincing myself that maybe this time things would be different. Right, there’s one moment that really sticks with me, and it was after I started to work on my sobriety. So for those of you who don’t know my story, maybe you’re just jumping on today. I’ve had many day ones, and I’ve had many starts and stops. Currently, I am four and a half years sober at the time of the recording of this podcast, or about four and a half. But when I started to work on my sobriety was in 2019, september, and I didn’t get sober till November of 2020. So just to give you a sense of that was a solid what 14 months of me kind of going in and out. So in September 2019, I’ll use a name Thomas. I never dated a Thomas, but we’re going to call him Thomas.

04:04
I was dating him and while in this relationship with him was when I kind of had that epiphany of like holy shit, I think I’m an alcoholic, right, and again, I don’t identify as an alcoholic at this time, but back then that is the language that I use. So those were my thoughts back then. And I remember we were flying back from New York City one time and the airport was closed or not the airport, but the airport bars were closed and I was going into withdrawals and I started crying in the airport and I told him I was like, oh my gosh, I really need a drink. I think I have a problem. And you know his behind was like no, you don’t have a problem. I mean, look at all the different things you do. I had already won teacher of the year. So he was like you don’t have a problem, people like you don’t have alcohol problems. And, of course, I would just listen to whatever he would say because it would make me feel better, even though, fundamentally, I knew right Our, our intuition is always right and I knew that there was a problem. I just kept, you know, drowning it out. So, anyway, when I went to rehab the first time, I came out of there making the decision to break up with him because I knew you know, I don’t diagnose other people, but I struggled a lot with my drinking around him because he did consume a lot of alcohol too, and so I just knew that that relationship was not good for my sobriety goal.

05:29
But lo and behold, you know, a couple of months passed. It was the holiday season. I had flown to Tampa to visit my sister for Christmas and I lost my mind at a holiday party that she was hosting. So I come to, apparently, on the floor. My niece found me unconscious and my sister at that point saw what was up in terms of my relationship with alcohol, relationship with alcohol and she was just like Jess, what are you going to do? And I was like I promise I’m going to go get help as soon as I get back to Louisville, I’ll go back into that treatment facility that I had gone to originally. And you know what happened, y’all. Like as soon as I got to the damn airport, I decided to text this bozo Thomas, right, so-called Thomas and see if he’d pick me up from the airport. And before you knew it, I landed in Louisville, kentucky, and I was over at his place shooting back bourbon, right, and I mean like I was out. It was all a blur. I can’t even remember how many missed calls I had from my sister checking up on me and things like that. So, again, she’s an angel because of everything she’s tolerated with me.

06:33
But once I got out of there and I did eventually go to treatment, I was really embarrassed, right, and I just wanted to bury my head in the sand like dang Jess. You said you would never go back to this person. You’re working on your sobriety. And then you had this huge relapse and you went back to this guy who was pretty awful and I really, really poo-pooed all over myself after that and that was the thing I just I carried the shame of that relapse along with all the other relapses that I had.

07:07
You know, I carried that like this huge weight on my chest, and it doesn’t help that society tells us, right that we should be ashamed of things like that, that we should quote unquote know better. You know that self-worth is supposed to be this like very easy, logical thing. I’m only gonna do things that serve me. I’m gonna like move away from people who don’t serve me, move away from situations that don’t serve me. That all sounds really nice in practice and it sounds so elevated, right, but it’s really hard to do Sometimes. The familiar is what’s not best for us, and yet it’s the most comforting at the same time.

07:52
So, anyway, for so long I let that shame eat me up and again just asking myself these questions why am I like this? Why do I keep doing this to myself? I just a hundred percent let my shame convince me that I was broken, weak and incapable of healthy love. But thankfully, I get to look back at that now, right, and and I do see it differently I can reframe moments like that in my past. You know not that it was proof that I was unworthy, right, but it was proof that I was still learning, right, that I was on a search for something that I just couldn’t figure out how the hell to give it to myself.

08:23
It’s not a human weakness to want love. We are social creatures by nature and to be accompanied is oftentimes a sign of safety. We don’t thrive in isolation. So why am I calling myself weak for wanting love, for wanting companionship? The problem just was that at that time I hadn’t yet realized, right, that I deserved better. And that was the thing, right. Once we know better, then we have the opportunity to do better. But that is the thing about shame it simply, it just isolates us and it convinces us that we’re the only ones who’ve ever struggled like this, we’re the only ones with this problem, and that we are unfixable. But shame is a liar. And how do we take back our power? We bring our stories into the light. We stop letting shame write the narrative and we start owning our truth instead.

09:22
So let’s look at a couple situations, because obviously, maybe you didn’t like hop off a plane and run straight into someone’s apartment and just get drunk and stay there for a couple of days, right. But maybe you’ve had a couple other situations, so let’s talk through them, right. So again, relapsing after a period of sobriety right, maybe you’ve been sober for months, maybe even years. And then one day, boom, you have a slip, you drink, and immediately the voice in your head is like ah, you see, you’re a failure, you’ll never get this right. You might as well go back and get some more. You might as well go back down to the bar. Forget it, forget your day count, you know. Whatever it is that you might use to kind of help motivate you. Here’s the truth. Having a relapse does not erase your progress, right? It is absolutely a symptom of something deeper that needs your attention, but it’s not a sign that you’re broken.

10:13
We’re talking about addiction, you all. If it was easy to quit drinking, if it was easy to stop doing drugs, we wouldn’t have treatment facilities all over the place, we wouldn’t have a million and one different programs to quit alcohol, right? So if it were so simple, we wouldn’t have people struggling. But it’s hard. And so, again, when there is a relapse, when there is a slip, whatever you wanna call it, instead of beating yourself up, ask yourself what was I struggling with before I went and picked up? Right, what was going on? What do I need to do to adjust, to support myself better? What tools did I use? What tools did I not use? What tools do I need to potentially add to my toolbox? You’ve got to look at the bigger picture here. You’re not flawed because you’re struggling with addiction to a substance that is pretty much shoved down our throats from the beginning of time.

11:14
Another scenario maybe you are feeling, if you are a parent, maybe you feel like a bad parent. Or maybe, if you are in a romantic partnership, you’re feeling like a bad partner or insert bad whatever connection you have to other humans. Maybe you feel like a bad teacher because you’re an educator. Maybe you feel like a bad daughter because your mom is aging and you’re getting increasingly frustrated at the demands of taking care of her needs as she’s getting older, right, and so shame is going to whisper to you. You’re a shitty daughter, right. Shame is going to whisper to you. You’re a bad girlfriend, a bad wife. You’re a bad partner, right, and shame might even dare to whisper even darker things to you, like someone would be better off without you, right. So here’s the actual truth though You’re a human, humans make mistakes. Repair is possible, right. I’m not saying it’s guaranteed.

12:11
If we did wrong somebody, it’s on them if they want us back in their lives or not, right, but we can always be living amends, right, and what I mean by living amends in 12-step programs, right? Step nine involves making amends to other people for the wrongs that we’ve done. Now, in my opinion, I think you know running around and telling everybody I’m sober now and I want to apologize. I think that that can sometimes create its own issues with the people that we wronged in the past. But regardless, what we have the opportunity to do that definitely does not increase the harm that we’ve already done is living amends, which means that whatever hurt that we caused onto other people in the past, we take that, we learn from the situation and we make sure that in our behaviors we don’t repeat those patterns or those behaviors to anyone who we encounter. From that point, moving forward, right.

13:01
So humans are going to make mistakes, but you can always live from your learned knowledge, from your lived experiences where you may have caused harm. And so, instead of letting that shame make you shut down and convince you that that’s it. You’re hopeless, acknowledge what happened, take responsibility and ask yourself what can I do differently next time? Right? How can I treat other people better? What can I do differently next time? Right? How can I treat other people better, right? If it’s, maybe someone who has chosen to end their relationship with you, or if it’s someone that you still have the privilege to keep in your life, because maybe this is a child of yours or a significant other who’s still there, right Again, what can I do differently next time? How can I improve?

13:44
And then the last scenario just to think about right, this one is a big one that I struggle with on occasion is the whole being ashamed of where you are in life. Like you all, I used to have a house and I had to sell the house and move into my sister’s guest room with my dog. Right, I just had a baby at age 39, when I could have had children. Like from my twenties or thirties right, or earlier thirties. I am basically starting over in a new version of my career because I had to leave my old career that I was, like, exceptionally good at. So these are all things where I could be, in theory, ashamed of where I am in life. Oh, not to mention I have a baby and I’m not married, right, like these are all the ways in which I basically don’t measure up according to society’s like measuring stick, and so it becomes very easy for any of us to be ashamed of where we are in life, because maybe you are not where you thought you would be by now.

14:39
Maybe you fell behind in your career. Maybe you’re drinking. Your addiction has negatively impacted your ability to, you know, get promotions. Whatever the case may be, maybe it has ruined some relationships that you have. Who knows? Right, we’re all in different places, but we might be like dang, I should be doing better.

15:00
And that’s shame, right? That’s shame saying that you should have it quote, unquote together by now that everyone else does Like number one first of all. Everybody else does not have it together, right, that’s shame saying that you should have it, quote unquote together by now that everyone else does Like number one first of all. Everybody else does not have it together, right. Again, if we’re looking at everyone else through the lens of, say, social media, that’s, people just put whatever looks cute on social media, right, like I show all the cute pictures of my daughter, amara, I’m not going to show the picture of when she’s like screaming her head off, because, because I’m not right. And so remember that your timeline is your timeline and comparison is what? Like a thief, I always butcher sayings, but that comparison is a thief of joy, or whatever that saying is.

15:41
You just need to focus on what small step you can take to move forward. If you have specific goals that you’re trying to accomplish, if there’s a specific lifestyle that you are wanting to live, a solid resource I would recommend James Clear’s book Atomic Habits great way to look at breaking things down into tiny minute steps that can eventually lead to bigger gains. But at the end of the day, right, you’re exactly where you need to be and you have the power to move that needle. So you know when shame tells you that you should have together. No, you’re where you’re supposed to be and you have the opportunity to change it. So if any of this is hitting home for you, right, take a moment and sit with these questions, cause again, I’m we.

16:27
We all have shame stories and I’m sure that yours could all be totally different than what I mentioned now. But take a moment and sit with these questions. One, what is a moment from your past that shame has told you to hide? Two, if you looked at that moment with compassion instead of judgment, how would the story change? Three, what is one belief about yourself that shame has made you hold on to and is it actually true? Right, like, what else could be true here? And number four, what is a small step that you can take today to rewrite your story on your terms? And again, these are heavier questions. Feel free to pause or grab a journal and reflect on these, but let yourself be honest because, again, shame wants to keep you silent. But the healing process it happens when we give ourselves permission to tell the truth without the weight of judgment.

17:26
If this is something you want to dive deeper into, I invite you to work with me in two ways Either explore my Writing for Healing program right, I just started my last six-week round, but I have the wait list going for whenever I open up the next six-week round. I also am now offering a workbook where you can work on this on your own, or get work with me through coaching. I do offer coaching for people in recovery, right, who are ready to rewrite their story and step into that next chapter of their lives, right, like, let’s get some clarity, let’s get some confidence in you. So if that sounds like something you need, let’s talk about that. The show notes will have both links to my six-week writing for healing program as well as coaching.

18:08
So I’ll leave you just with that last thought. Right Again, the past, your past. It doesn’t define you. You define your own past. I’m sorry, not you define your past, you define you right, point blank period. And so hopefully you wrap your mind around the fact that you deserve to step into your next chapter with confidence and some self-compassion. So, sending you all lots of love, I’m glad you all are here and listening with me. Take care.

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Podcast Episode 62. The Hidden Reason Tough Conversations Set You Off – And How to Fix It

Posted on March 8, 2025March 8, 2025 by Jessica Dueñas in Podcast

Link to Spotify

In this episode:

You ever have a conversation that immediately sets you off? Like, your whole body tenses up, your heart starts racing, and suddenly, you’re 10 years old again? Yeah, same. In this episode, I’m sharing a personal story about my late mother, a comment about my body that sent me, and what I wish I had realized in the moment.

Resources:

Bottomless to Sober – Coaching, Classes, and Workshops⁠⁠

Values Assessment

Transcript:

00:00 – Jessica Dueñas (Host)
Hey everyone, welcome back. Today we are diving into a topic that honestly affects all of us, whether we realize it or not, and that is the fact that we all have values and they all impact us. Have you ever had one of those conversations that, just a hundred percent like set you off? Like you feel the heat rising in your body, you feel your heart racing, you feel your breath picking up speed. Those types of conversations can often be set off because of our values. I mean, I have 100% been there, so I’ll share a moment with you.

00:34
Actually, one of them that had me completely heated, and it was a conversation with my dearly departed mother. At the time, you know, we were talking about body image or, honestly, we were more so arguing about it, right, you know she had looked at me it was one of my last visits to Costa Rica and you know, she, just out of nowhere, was just like oh, you know, like you would look better if you lost a little weight and despite all the work I’ve done, y’all, like the second, she said that you know my whole body tense, my heart started to pound and you know I just felt anger like boiling up inside of me. Right, it’s like, despite the fact that I was in my late thirties, you know, boom, that comment gets said and in my body I feel like I’m 10 years old again. You know hiding food from her. You know the way that I eventually did with alcohol. And I definitely snapped back at her and I was like, why do you care? Why is this so important? I was just so frustrated. I had spent the last year or so again just unlearning all the toxic messages about weight and beauty that society and my own family and my own mom had ingrained in me. I’d worked so hard to kind of push back against those standards, but still when I hear those words I’m just transported right back to age 10.

01:51
But here’s the thing, what I didn’t consider in that conversation, right, that for my mom, beauty and thinness it wasn’t just about looks, right, for her it was about respectability in her world. Right, in her world it was about self-worth. My mom, she grew up in Costa Rica and in that country and in so many other westernized places, right, a women’s value was very much tied to how she looked, and my mother was born in 1939. So think about the decades that she was like an adolescent, and we’re talking about the 1950s, right, and so she was taught that to be beautiful, to be thin, was a way to achieve success. It was a way to secure a husband. It was a way basically all the different pathways to success came from how you looked what.

02:46
What I needed to recognize right is I did not need to agree with her, and though she wasn’t trying to hurt me, she was essentially just passing down what she was taught, wasn’t trying to hurt me, she was essentially just passing down what she was taught, and so I can recognize okay, that’s what she’s been programmed with. I don’t have to accept it, I don’t have to agree with her, but if I had taken at least a second to recognize that that was what she valued and the why behind it, I might’ve been able to respond with more understanding with my mom, instead of just being purely frustrated. Because the second she said those words, right, I became the 10-year-old. I was the one who was pissed off. I immediately made it all about me right, instead of looking at it from the bigger picture. Again, I’m not saying that that thought process is right or that it’s okay or that I agree with it, but I probably could have saved my body from some stress. So you know, this got me thinking.

03:41
How often are we clashing with people because we just don’t understand the values that are behind their words? Right, I am back to coaching one-on-one, and when I coach my clients, one of the first things that I have them do is a values assessment. It’s a simple but super powerful exercise to get clear on what matters to them, because our values, they shape everything. They shape how we see the world, the assumptions that we make about other people and also how we show up in tough conversations. Again, imagine being in a tough conversation and thinking why the hell don’t they understand where I’m coming from? That is probably because your values are playing a big role in the conversation. So, for example, if independence is one of your top values, you might assume that people should handle their struggles on their own, but if community is something that is more important to you, you might assume that asking for help is just what you do. Here’s the thing Neither one of these is right or wrong, but these assumptions do impact how we engage with other people, and I see this all the time, especially in sobriety coaching.

04:48
So I’ll give you a couple of examples. So let’s say that a family member offers you a drink, right, they do it repeatedly. If you value respect, you might assume that they are pushing your boundaries on purpose. But if you are someone who values traditions, you might look at their insistence on you offering drinks as someone who is just trying to connect with you based off traditions that have been passed on in families. Or another example might be that your friends you got sober and now your friends have stopped inviting you out. If you value connection, you might assume that they have abandoned you, right, Like, oh my gosh, the world is ending, my friends hate me, et cetera. But if you value responsibility, you might assume that your friends are respecting your sobriety and so they’re not going to invite you out to drink with them. Or you might recognize that it falls on you to reach out to them and set the tone for how you will or won’t hang out with them.

05:46
The last example that I have here is maybe you’re feeling judged when you share about your sobriety, right? If you are a person who values vulnerability, you might assume, like everyone should just openly like, receive your sobriety story with you, know, big smile, open arms and the same level of openness back to you. But if you’re a person who values privacy, you might assume that they’re uncomfortable with you being so vulnerable, right? Or if you’re someone who really values privacy, you might not be the one who’s actually openly talking about your sobriety. You might just say I don’t drink or I’m not drinking right now. You might be one of those folks, right?

06:27
So what happens when we do challenge these assumptions? What if that family member who was offering you a drink wasn’t trying to disrespect you, but they just didn’t know how to connect in a different way with you? What if your friends weren’t abandoning you? Right, but they were just waiting for a signal from you that you still want to hang out even though you quit drinking? What if the judgment you think you’re feeling is actually just their own discomfort with something they don’t understand when you’re talking about your sobriety story, right?

06:58
So one of the biggest things that I’ve learned, both in my recovery and again through coaching other people, is that being flexible with our assumptions can change everything your values. They don’t have to change, not necessarily, but even then recognize that your values can change as you go through different life experiences. Right, we are humans. We don’t stay in one stuck format. So your values can change, but they don’t have to. But when you do pause, when you do question the assumptions that you are making as a result of your values, and when you get curious instead of defensive because I got defensive with my mother Right you create space for better conversations and deeper relationships. You create space for better conversations and deeper relationships.

07:43
So, the next time that you are in a tough conversation, try asking yourself these questions. One what values are influencing how I see this situation? And if you need a values assessment, check the show notes. I will link a values assessment there. Number two what assumptions am I making about the other person’s intentions? Number three how can I reframe my perspective to create more understanding? So using these questions can help you in terms of just reducing your stress in terms of engaging with other people. Right, it can help strengthen your relationships and make some of these tough conversations so much easier to navigate.

08:28
So if this hit home for you, I’d love to hear your thoughts. Please don’t hesitate to reach out through socials. Send me an email about what resonated with you the most. Also, if you’re interested in diving deeper into this work, I am currently accepting new coaching clients. I’m open to new coaching clients. So, um, whether you’re navigating through tough conversations or building your confidence and sobriety, or just redefining your life on your, your life’s terms, right, I would love to support you. I will post a link to coaching consultations in the show notes as well, um, but yeah, that is it for today. Thanks for listening and I will catch you.

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