211-SYNCPodcast_ShanennBryant

[00:00:00] Jenny Swisher: Welcome friends to this episode of the sync your life podcast today. I’m joined by my friend Shannon Bryant. I had the good fortune of being on her podcast recently, and I’m excited to swap, here and have her on mine. I know when we originally met to have a conversation in advance, it was just.

[00:01:14] Jenny Swisher: the world aligned, right? We were talking about how we really do dominantly talk to the same, the same type of person. I know the person listening to my podcast is a female most likely in, you know, midlife, um, kind of wanting to know more about her hormone health, but also maybe Because of things with her hormones or her physical health, also dealing with relationship struggles or, dealing with just what I call being the sandwich generation or whatever, of, of caretaking for parents while also having small children.

[00:01:42] Jenny Swisher: I know that’s the role that I’m in as well. So I’m excited to have Shannon here. I always find it’s best to have my guests introduce themselves. I want to hear your story. I want my guests to hear all about you and how you got to doing what you’re doing. So I’ll just hand it over to you and let you take it away.

[00:01:56] Shanenn Bryant: Thanks, Jenny. And yes, you gave my audience so much good information. So thank you for being on the podcast. Uh, my name is Shannon Bryant. I am a relationship confidence expert, and I never thought I’d be in this role or doing this and trying to help other people overcome jealousy. But, you know, uh, I grew up with a very chaotic.

[00:02:22] Shanenn Bryant: Alcoholic father, and that led to certain insecurities and challenges in my adult life, jealousy and my relationships being one of them. And, you know, at 12 years old, my father was still drinking. My parents just recently divorced. He came to pick up me and my younger brother. He had been telling us that he was going to a.

[00:02:45] Shanenn Bryant: And he was sober and when he showed up to pick us up, he had a beer in his lap. And so at 12, I said, you know what, as long as you’re drinking, I don’t want to have anything to do with you. And he took that to heart. And I didn’t talk to him again until I was 25. And then not again until just this last three years, which was the last three years of his life.

[00:03:04] Shanenn Bryant: So not having that father there, I grew up and I just kind of told myself the story of, well, if my own dad doesn’t love me, why would anyone else? I’m not worthy of anyone else. Loving me. So I had very insecure feelings about myself and in my relationships. And I struggled with jealousy for the last three decades.

[00:03:27] Shanenn Bryant: I was able to finally figure out how to master this thing and overcome it. And so now I’m trying to help others to overcome it much sooner than I have done. And I do see it show up a lot of times in this midlife, you know, they may have had issues with jealousy in the past, but it’s really glaring at this age.

[00:03:48] Jenny Swisher: Yeah, this is so good. I’ve, I’ve never had, we were 210 episodes into the podcast and I’ve had relationship or marriage experts, but I’ve not had a relationship competence expert. And I love that combination. I love, I love that. This is something that you kind of have turned your own struggle into how you serve.

[00:04:05] Jenny Swisher: Right. Because yeah. And I think it’s, it’s so true. Like, I remember when we were chatting before just nodding my head thinking, yeah, like this is so needed. I mean, it’s, it is so needed. I’d love for you to just share with us. Because I always feel like things have to start with awareness, right? It has to start with awareness before you can really fix a problem or make improvements.

[00:04:25] Jenny Swisher: So I would love for you to share with us, you know, what is that first step in becoming aware that jealousy might be an issue in a relationship?

[00:04:33] Shanenn Bryant: Yeah. Well, I mean, in a little jealousy, that’s fine. It’s, it’s fairly normal to have a tinge of jealousy here and there in a relationship that could be, but when it gets to the point that it’s everyday anxiety for you, you’re constantly sick at your stomach, you’re looking at your partner’s phone, their email, their text messages, you know, who’s liking what on social media, it becomes a, okay.

[00:04:58] Shanenn Bryant: A very hard thing to focus at work to spend time with your children and feel like you’re focused and even on yourself, you have so much energy going into that partner where that’s when the jealousy becomes something that you need to start digging in. And becoming aware of the things that you’re doing.

[00:05:21] Shanenn Bryant: So you’re right. It starts with awareness. And I always say you can’t, you know, you can’t move what’s in your way unless you acknowledge what you think, do and say. And as these jealousy sufferers are going through the relationship, one of the first things we do is go, well, what, what are the things that you’re saying to your partner?

[00:05:38] Shanenn Bryant: We have some favorite jabs probably, and it doesn’t sound too horrible if you just say it, but my favorite one in my relationship. Let’s say my partner was trying to tell me about, you know, Hey, remember when this happened or we went here and if I didn’t remember right away, I’d say, Oh, that must’ve been your other girlfriend.

[00:05:57] Shanenn Bryant: Or that must, you know, so we have these things that we say that sentence in itself is harmful, but when it’s said over and over and over again, it starts to ruin the relationship. And so that’s just even what we’re saying. So I really have people go in and look at like, what are the things that you’re saying?

[00:06:16] Shanenn Bryant: Because they know some things that they’re probably the comments that they’re making to their partner, but. They may not know how often and they may not know how much is affecting their partner. So think, do and say, that’s how we start with that awareness. The thinking part is like, what, what is driving that?

[00:06:34] Shanenn Bryant: We know that those thoughts are driving action. So what is behind that? A lot of times we don’t do inventory on our old belief system. You know, it’s not very often that we take out that junk drawer and dump it out and say, let me go look at, What I’m thinking and where this is coming from, so we do deep dives into that.

[00:06:56] Jenny Swisher: Yeah, I would have to think that, you know, and hearing you talk, it makes me think sometimes, yes, jealousy is what’s manifested in the issue, but insecurity is really at the root, I would think. I’d love for you to share more about just like underlying factors that contribute to jealousy.

[00:07:14] Shanenn Bryant: Sure. Yeah. I, I say that, you know, and people go, what are you talking about?

[00:07:19] Shanenn Bryant: But jealousy is not the problem. Jealousy is the solution. So I often hear when I have people come to me and they say, Oh, I have such a problem with jealousy. I’m so So jealous in my relationship, jealousy is the problem in my relationship. No, that is the symptom, right? That is what’s showing up. So what is deep rooted?

[00:07:39] Shanenn Bryant: What I found is there’s typically two buckets that people fall into. One, they grew up with some type of dysfunction, maybe similar to mine, but some type of dysfunction growing up where maybe they had a parent who didn’t parent well, and, or maybe they have, um, those abandonment issues. And certainly that.

[00:07:59] Shanenn Bryant: That anxious attachment is what comes out of that. So certainly people who grew up in that type of environment. And then the second bucket is often where. You’ve been in a relationship, it’s a serious relationship, and then there was some infidelity. Or maybe you were in a series of relationships with infidelity.

[00:08:18] Shanenn Bryant: And so then you start, you know, that trust factor of, okay, you know, my brain, now my amygdala is taking over and saying, Hey, I’m going to watch for signs of this everywhere and I’m going to be hypervigilant. And then we get into these insecure habits that we do to try to prove. Fidelity. Well, we can’t prove that, right?

[00:08:40] Shanenn Bryant: We there’s no sign of fidelity with somebody. And so it becomes this insecure habit that we do. .

[00:08:49] Jenny Swisher: Yeah. This obviously honestly goes both ways, right? I’ve seen this happen. Um, I used to be, so I was, I’ve been a personal trainer for years, but we used to have a, a physical gym and studio that I would train out of.

[00:09:01] Jenny Swisher: Mm-Hmm. . And I trained both men and women. And it’s interesting because regardless of what you are male or female or, uh, you know, when you come into embracing a physical wellness journey after maybe not having done that for a while, I saw this happen over and over and over again where. Even my male clients would come in and they would say, I’ve got to do something.

[00:09:22] Jenny Swisher: And my doctor tells me I need to lose some weight. I, our, our studio was on a car dealership, um, a strip. So I had a lot of car salesmen as clients and they were, you know, smoking cigarettes, you know, going out after work and drinking, like they were in a very unhealthy. Lifestyle, but then they would come in and join the gym and they knew they were they were like, this is out of my comfort zone.

[00:09:43] Jenny Swisher: Like this is totally new and they would start to feel better. They would start to exercise. They would start to, you know, drink the shake at the bar after the workouts or whatever. And they started to feel better. And I actually, I actually got a phone call one time. Um, we were, it was the, the class had just ended.

[00:09:59] Jenny Swisher: It was like a 6 PM class. Everybody had left the studio. I was mopping the floor, the phone rings. And it was one of the men clients wives. And she was calling because she didn’t know why, like why he had gone to the class again, when they had had a conversation and he wasn’t going to go back to the gym.

[00:10:16] Jenny Swisher: And this is, I mean, you know, this was one of my favorite clients to work with. He’s a funny guy, like he was in weight. He was feeling good. And I mean, of course, I didn’t want to interject myself into anything, but it really caught me off guard because I had to stop and say, like, okay, I’m sorry. Who is this?

[00:10:33] Jenny Swisher: And okay. While he was here for class, he left at 7 o’clock. Like, you know, I’m like, oh, I got to want to be, um. But he, you know, when he ended up coming back a few days later, he, he explained to me, he’s like, this has been an ongoing issue in our relationship. He’s like, she’s constantly worried about where I am and constantly worried about what I’m up to.

[00:10:53] Jenny Swisher: And she really doesn’t like this physical health journey. Apparently had even asked him, you know, well, what are you trying to do? Get hot or something? You’re like, he even, she even had made that, that, um, reference. And so. I could tell how uncomfortable he was about it. And again, I didn’t interject myself into any of it.

[00:11:09] Jenny Swisher: I just, I mean, he vented and then we moved on and that was the end of it, but I saw this happen both, both directions. I saw this happen, both wife, jealousy, husband, jealousy. I did see it creep in quite a bit. So, um, you know, and I, like I said, at the beginning, I think a lot of the women listening to my podcast are.

[00:11:27] Jenny Swisher: Maybe in their thirties to forties, they’re in that sort of midlife zone where I don’t know about you, but like, I feel very overwhelmed a lot. Like, I feel like I’m taking care of my kids. I’m helping out with my parents, you know, I mean, you know, sometimes you can kind of feel like there’s so many different hats that we’re wearing and we’re so quote unquote busy.

[00:11:47] Jenny Swisher: That communication in our relationship starts to go missing or starts to go, you know, maybe just not as powerful and strong as it once was. And so. I know I’ve had, um, Kimberly and Matthew Hoffman on the podcast before they have the marriage podcast that they, they specialize with. And they talk about the key of communication, like communicating with your spouse or significant other so that there is more security as opposed to insecurity.

[00:12:12] Jenny Swisher: So I’d love to hear your perspective on, on that as well. Communication.

[00:12:15] Shanenn Bryant: Yeah. Communication is definitely a very important thing. For example, if we’re talking about, you know, the example that you gave where she is very jealous, she’s actually. So much so that she’s reaching out to you, his trainer to say, Hey, why was he there?

[00:12:30] Shanenn Bryant: This is something that we talked about. He’s really not supposed to be there. You know, that is certainly a breakdown in that relationship. And we’re, what tends to happen is us reaching out to go, I need that reassurance from my partner. And it becomes sort of as an addiction of I’m feeling very insecure about myself.

[00:12:53] Shanenn Bryant: So I’m going to my partner to say, Hey, you need to reassure me. They try, or they do for a moment. And then that lasts for just a little bit. And then I’m back in that loop again of, Hey, I need your reassurance again. So I think we have to be very careful with these types of people who are suffering from jealousy to say, yes, communication is very important.

[00:13:14] Shanenn Bryant: Knowing and being able to communicate your feelings. And those boundaries in the relationship, what’s okay. What’s appropriate. But I think sometimes when you are someone who’s suffering from jealousy, you’re constantly questioning like, well, is this somebody, you know, something that a normal person would be okay with, or am I just feeling insecure because of my jealousy?

[00:13:36] Shanenn Bryant: Like, am I just upset about this because of my jealousy? So those are the types of conversations I think that need to happen because it gets very tough for the partner to always have to be there. to reassure that person. And when they do, it’s just kind of keeping them in that loop too. So not that we shouldn’t be comforting and reassuring to our partner, but when it’s this extreme, we’re, we’re kind of hurting that and keeping them in the cycle a little bit.

[00:14:04] Jenny Swisher: Yeah, I’m so glad you brought that up because it’s so true. I mean, I’ve seen this. It’s funny because I flashback to like high school days of, you know, I mean, I hate to say that, but like high school arguments, you know, where all of a sudden you’re like, there’s a lot of jealousy in high school, right?

[00:14:17] Jenny Swisher: Hormones are running hot. And, um, I was actually, I married my high school sweetheart, so I can say this, but like, uh, very heated, you know, heated arguments. And then all of a sudden you’d. You’d communicate and you would calm things down, but then that jealousy would just return, right? Um, yeah, we would be totally, I mean, it wouldn’t be my podcast if I didn’t also mention the role that hormones do play in this whole thing.

[00:14:39] Jenny Swisher: I had an interesting conversation with a friend of mine who went through my course. She’s about 45, and, um, she works from home, she works with her husband, they’re together all the time. Um, and so we were actually touching base for something else totally unrelated. And as we’re on our Zoom, he like pushes, you know, pushes away from his desk and wheels into the picture.

[00:15:00] Jenny Swisher: And I see him in the picture and he was like, thank you for this course. He was like so much about her body and her hormones and how she waxes and wanes throughout the month and how her energy changes and her mood changes. And then therefore he’s learning about that too. And so, you know, and so I think it is actually really helping them.

[00:15:20] Jenny Swisher: And so I want to interject that here because whether it’s my course or the podcast or whatever, it doesn’t matter. It’s just becoming more aware of your body and what you’re going through. And I do see this with women, especially over 40. Where all of a sudden, I’ll just be real, your progesterone declines first.

[00:15:36] Jenny Swisher: Okay, so your progesterone is your calming hormone. So what did I just say? I said, you’re going to start to get really wound up. You’re going to start to feel, maybe not always, but the anxiety might come. You might not sleep as well. You’re just not feeling you’re irritable, right? You’re not necessarily wanting to be touched all the time or, or whatever.

[00:15:56] Jenny Swisher: And it can affect the way your significant other might , perceive you, whether it’s, I’ve seen this happen with, um, women that I’ve interviewed and women that I’ve talked to you through my course, where. You know, maybe the spouse starts to feel insecure. Like she doesn’t want me anymore.

[00:16:10] Jenny Swisher: Or the libido starts to go away physically on the behalf of the woman during these years. And really she’s not feeling that way. She’s not feeling negative toward the relationship. She’s just literally having physical changes and hasn’t the awareness to know how to ask her doctor or what to do or anything like that.

[00:16:26] Jenny Swisher: And so that’s just one example. I’ve also seen it, um, where. You know, the significant other might think that there’s some sort of, um, like she’s disconnecting when in reality, she’s just not feeling herself. Right. And so again, yes, communicating that is key. But I do think the more that we as women can understand our bodies and understand.

[00:16:48] Jenny Swisher: Listen, when it, when it’s time for my period, I just like, please don’t try to touch me. I’m just going to be honest, please watch a movie, like popcorn and chocolate, whatever. Let’s just have some quality time together or apart. And then when I am in my like high hormone phase, like let’s go out, let’s, you know, and it really does.

[00:17:09] Jenny Swisher: Um, I don’t, I don’t want to be the girl that’s like psychosync everything, but it can make such a difference when you’re at least in tune with what you’re wanting. You know what I mean? Like, you can’t just, you can’t just, I think that we, as a society, we expect Women to just always feel the same. We should always feel good, right?

[00:17:26] Jenny Swisher: And it’s like, it’s like this. Men always feel the same. Their hormones are constantly at a flat line. Ours are different, right? Like I got my friend, Dr. Page talks about, if you ever Google a female hormone chart, it’s like four or five different roller coasters superimposed on each other. And then we wonder why we have different moods and emotions and our.

[00:17:44] Jenny Swisher: Or, you know, male counterparts sometimes are like, what is happening? So I just want to bring that to, you know, to the, to it. I mean, it’s not necessarily jealousy involved, but I do think that it can wreak havoc on a relationship when a female’s body is changing or when she’s going through those highs and lows, if she’s not totally tapped into it.

[00:18:02] Jenny Swisher: So. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:18:04] Shanenn Bryant: And you bring up a good point in terms of the, you know, the hormones changing because we’re also, you know, there are times where we’re not feeling the sexiest we’ve ever felt, right? When all of these things are going on, we’re not even sure what’s going on with our body most of the time if we haven’t had the education.

[00:18:21] Shanenn Bryant: So then we just know we’re just not feeling great. So I don’t feel sexy. I don’t feel good. I don’t feel like the way that I did before. Also triggers this jealousy of going, uh, great. Is this is when, you know, this is when things start to fall apart. This is of course, they’re going to be more attracted to this person.

[00:18:43] Shanenn Bryant: Of course, maybe they’re looking at other people. And so I think this is why we see this a lot at this time. Sometimes people are gaining weight during that time as well, which again, makes them feel even more insecure. And something that you said, I think even on my podcast, that I think. It’s important here as well when it comes to the topic of jealousy is it’s okay to be kind of this, you know, riding these waves.

[00:19:10] Shanenn Bryant: It’s okay that you’re not just the same all of the time and understanding that. So yes, I think being able to communicate those types of things to your partner so that they do understand a little bit is certainly going to be helpful.

[00:19:26] Jenny Swisher: For sure, for sure. Yeah, we were not meant to be the same every day.

[00:19:29] Jenny Swisher: We’re not meant to feel, um, the same. So yeah, I, I love that. I’d love for you to share, you know, if, if someone’s feeling like this speaks to them, they’re like, man, this isn’t my relationship. And I’ve never thought of it this way before. You know, what would be your first. Steps or tangible tips on kind of getting out of that, or we’ve already talked about the awareness, but now that if someone’s listening and they’re like, Ooh, yeah, I think I have that awareness.

[00:19:53] Jenny Swisher: What is the next step?

[00:19:56] Shanenn Bryant: Yeah. So one of the things that, um, I do is this really great lifeline exercise where it’s super easy to do. Just take a piece of paper, turn it horizontally, draw a line through the middle, and then from your earliest memory, go back and say, Okay. Whether it was positive or negative and just make a tick mark.

[00:20:17] Shanenn Bryant: And then what was that event that happened? You know, so you’re looking for anything that really impacted you in any way. Again, positive or negative. Positive, you put up high. Negative, you put low. When you start doing that from as early as you can remember to current day, you’re going to start to see some patterns.

[00:20:33] Shanenn Bryant: And what we’re trying to do is get to, when’s the first time that you felt this jealousy? Like, when did this first show up for you? So that we can. Help to dig into what might be behind that. For example, I had someone who, you know, their, their thinking was all men cheat. All men cheat with people at work.

[00:20:57] Shanenn Bryant: When we did the timeline, she was in as early as 16. In these jobs where the men, you know, at the time, this was a long time ago and they were certainly different in the way that they spoke to women in the workplace, the way that they treated women in the workplace. And so she saw it over and over again when she was younger.

[00:21:18] Shanenn Bryant: And so then just kind of had that idea of, Oh, you know, now my husband’s in the workplace, this might be something that he’s doing. So one just really lets getting to the root of it. But, being open to the power of one, I call O N E, so open to new, and then you fill in the blank with the E, a new explanation, new evidence, new examples.

[00:21:42] Shanenn Bryant: You want to be able to be open, so when I was in the throes of this with my husband, we would go to dinner, and I was so insecure at the time and dealing with this jealousy that when we would go to dinner. I was already looking to see the potential threats in the restaurant before we even put in our name at the host, you know, with the hostess.

[00:22:04] Shanenn Bryant: So if we’re having dinner and then he looks that direction, that was a big blow up and it got so bad to the point. We weren’t going to dinners. We weren’t going to the movies. We weren’t able to go to events and he could have just been looking. Where the restrooms were or at art on the wall. So I had to then bring in and incorporate, okay, I have to be open.

[00:22:24] Shanenn Bryant: Like what other thing could it be? So, you know, my brain is telling me that this is happening. What else could it be? So I have to be open to new things.

[00:22:34] Jenny Swisher: Yeah. And I have to imagine that like retraining your brain and your thought patterns are, it plays such a huge role in that. Um, just, I mean, my, my listeners know I’ve been struggling with migraines again, um, in the last six months or so, and just actually had a conversation today with my, with my doctor about retraining my neural pathways as far as like.

[00:22:58] Jenny Swisher: You know, stress exacerbates the migraine. And so I need to stop stressing about the migraine or else the migraines, right. So it’s like this kid’s terrible cycle, but it’s this through here, right. Where like, um, we had someone on the podcast that talked about body image, right. And she talked about how she had to retrain her brain, that she was enough.

[00:23:18] Jenny Swisher: She had to do the, she had to put the signs on the wall and on the mirror, like she had to do that kind of stuff to really change those neural pathways. And I, I assume that that’s the same here, right? Like you had to enter a restaurant and have different thoughts. Yes. And that had to be an intentional.

[00:23:36] Jenny Swisher: on your part, you know what I mean?

[00:23:37] Shanenn Bryant: Yeah. It’s going from like, okay, let’s identify the trigger. You know, there’s the trigger, there’s space in between, and then there’s your response or your reaction. And so it’s like, let’s figure out what the trigger and really that trigger then needs to become a prompt for you instead of, Oh, this is a trigger for me.

[00:23:56] Shanenn Bryant: No, what that is now is a prompt for you. So let’s do something different.

[00:24:01] Jenny Swisher: Absolutely. Yeah. Well, I want to ask this question because you started this off with your story. You talked about, you know, your father and, and that, and it’s, it’s interesting because I always like to ask this, um, anytime someone’s talking about anything that impacts generations, anything that impacts our kids.

[00:24:20] Jenny Swisher: And so obviously you’ve been able to kind of shift your own narrative based on the way you were parented and you’ve turned this. Like I said, this struggle into your story that can now serve other people and, and, and in this relationship, confidence coaching, um, you know, if we’re, if we’re looking at this from a generational perspective, like how does that then impact our children and what they see and set them up for healthy relationships?

[00:24:45] Shanenn Bryant: Yeah, it certainly does. You know, one of the interesting things is when I started to really work on my jealousy, I thought for, for the longest time that all of this was a result of my father being absent. And that story that I told myself about, you know, if, if my dad doesn’t love me, who will, which played a big role in it.

[00:25:06] Shanenn Bryant: But I also watched my mother, my mom was the one that was around, you know, all growing up. My mom was someone who was very insecure and jealous as well. So, you know, it’s watching that over and over. So I had to be really careful. And it was one of the things that you do is say, I don’t want this for my own child.

[00:25:27] Shanenn Bryant: And so how am I going to change this? Because we know they’re picking up on our behaviors. And so, you know, we just. You have to just make that progress and, and talk through it. He and I have had my son as an adult now, but we’ve had many conversations. And I think when early on, when he was in high school, I started to see a little bit of hinge of that, you know, that little bit of jealousy in him.

[00:25:51] Shanenn Bryant: So us having conversations and working through like. Why is it that you’re experiencing this? Um, so it’s definitely generational. Unfortunately, you know, my dad wasn’t an alcoholic on his own. His father was an alcoholic. And so we do pass those things to generate, you know, from generation to generation.

[00:26:09] Shanenn Bryant: So the more work you can do on yourself, which is why it’s important. So sometimes when we say, gosh, I need to spend time on myself and you feel guilty about that, you know, like, no, let me fix myself. That’s for my children. That’s for their children.

[00:26:22] Jenny Swisher: Right. Yeah, it’s, it’s so funny because So I mentioned my husband and I were high school sweethearts, and I would say any of our high school teachers would agree with this statement, but up until we had kids, like, we were, I mean, I would say very, like, socially affectionate.

[00:26:39] Jenny Swisher: We would hold hands in public. You know, we were, um. I won’t go into the high school days, but we were, we were very affectionate and very, like, we sit next to each other on the couch or whatever, you know, and you know, how life happens. Like you, you have the kids things, you get tired, you get, you know, and it’s funny because I just told him recently, um, you know, that you need to work on it.

[00:27:02] Jenny Swisher: When I, when I walked up to hug him and he was like, what are you doing? I was like, wait a minute. Um, and so I told him, I just, I heard a podcast or something that was like six. It’s six second hugs per day, boosts oxytocin. So I was like, I’m just going to, this is like one of my things, like, I just want to walk up and hug you randomly throughout the day.

[00:27:21] Jenny Swisher: We work together. So it’s easy to just pass, pass by the kid. I take, I go pick up, we do the things. And so it’s interesting because we, we started this where it’s like, we’re stopping and we’re pausing. I think, um, often it’s called that sliding door moments, um, ways that we can kind of just step in and, and give a hug or a kiss or whatever.

[00:27:42] Jenny Swisher: My both of my kids this weekend, when, when we stopped to hug for a minute, they both stopped and like turned around at the table. We’re like, what are you doing? Because usually like our time together and our quality time together is like, after they go to bed, right? Like we’ll sit and watch a movie or snuggle or whatever.

[00:27:58] Jenny Swisher: And we’re not doing a lot of that, like affectionate stuff throughout the day, so they’re not seeing it. So it’s so interesting how we’re already seeing, like, their eyes. And then so, of course, they immediately want to run up and hug us, like, at the same time. They want to be part of the big family hug. And you realize, wow, like, just that one small decision of, like, A touch point has such an impact on them too.

[00:28:21] Jenny Swisher: Like it, it provides them a sense of safety. It provides them a sense of love. It provides them a sense of this is what we do in this family. Um, we’re just talking about it last night because his parents were very non, well, they really were, um, Very non confrontational in general when it came to conflict, but they were also just not super affectionate.

[00:28:41] Jenny Swisher: Like we, I don’t remember ever seeing his parents affectionate ever. And so I was like, you know, that’s one thing that I remember about my parents that I loved. Like, I always loved seeing that. And so just asking yourself those little questions of like, You know, where in my relationship, am I, am I, am I duplicating the right behaviors?

[00:28:59] Jenny Swisher: Like, am I duplicating jealousy? Am I duplicating affection? Am I duplicating whatever, you know, insert, insert things. So, um, it’s all very, very fascinating to me. So how do they’re mostly,

[00:29:10] Shanenn Bryant: they’re mostly seeing you be parents versus being in a relationship, right? Like, I think a lot of us get into that habit and they’re seeing you parent and be parents, but not seeing a relationship and how the relationship

[00:29:22] Jenny Swisher: works.

[00:29:23] Jenny Swisher: Right. Exactly. Yeah. So for anyone else listening, um, who might need to do little six second hubs throughout the day, there’s your tip. Okay. So, um, when it comes to, you know, obviously there are probably varying degrees of this, right? There are people listening that are like, Ooh, yeah, like this is something that I am.

[00:29:40] Jenny Swisher: Newly aware of, I want to work on for others. It may be a very glaring issue. It might be something that’s really sort of stopping them in their tracks, um, with their relationships. So I would love for you to share, you know, what, how do people work with you? Of course, but also what are some, you know, when we talked about the first steps, but what are some things that people can start to do?

[00:30:00] Jenny Swisher: And this is what I mean by that. Brendan Burchard talks about, um. Transitional moments. And I’ve said this so many times on the podcast. It’s like one of my favorite personal growth takeaways. He talks about putting sticky notes above your doorways, um, little things like, you know, you’re coming home from work.

[00:30:17] Jenny Swisher: And so there’s a sticky note on the garage door that says. I’m putting on my dad hat. I’m no longer at work, right? Like just entering the space with a deep breath, entering the space with being as present as you can. I want to talk about this idea of presence because I know it’s something that you’ve mentioned and I want to, I want to, I think it ultimately is probably a solid solution, um, to so much of this.

[00:30:38] Jenny Swisher: So I’d love for you to go there for us.

[00:30:41] Shanenn Bryant: Yeah. So, being present is super important when it comes to someone who is extremely jealous. We do one of two things. We either go back and think, oh, well, you know, two weeks ago, he came home late or she came home late, two nights that week. And so we do this old wondering.

[00:31:00] Shanenn Bryant: And so I always use now, N O W, no old wondering. So not wondering about the past and trying to figure out what happened, but then also no onward worrying, because that is the thought, the part that really gets our stress and our nervous system out of whack is us, then creating these stories. So maybe they just went to lunch with someone and I would do this often, you know.

[00:31:23] Shanenn Bryant: There was a new coworker and they went to lunch together. And by the time I’ve told the whole story in my head, they’re running off to Mexico together and my, and I’m, and I’m a wreck. My nervous system is a wreck. So stopping that and then just saying, okay, I. Need to stop this going forwards, going backwards.

[00:31:42] Shanenn Bryant: So I’m just going to start observing what I see. And even in those moments, if you have to calm yourself down and do some box breathing, you know, I call it the self regulation recipe. Let’s figure out what works for you in those moments when you know that your stresses. is spiking up when, you know, when our stress spikes up, our blood sugar spikes up, that can lead to weight gain that just further continues the way that you’re feeling.

[00:32:08] Shanenn Bryant: So let’s be present. I’m just going to sit here and I’m going to notice what’s around me. I’m going to say it out loud. So maybe I see the white curtains. Maybe I see the book named this just to Calm yourself down and get you back to center where you can be present. And I would say incorporating just one thing that is just for you that you want to do.

[00:32:30] Shanenn Bryant: We hear this all the time, but I don’t think we do it enough to say, I have this one thing that is mine that I’m going to focus on. That’s important to me that I want to do because we’re spending so much time focusing on our partner. We need that one, at least starting with that one thing. That’s just ours that we can go and we can focus on.

[00:32:49] Shanenn Bryant: Maybe it’s just reading a book. Maybe it’s a project that you have going on. Maybe you like to write poetry, whatever it is, but having that one thing that you can do. So keeping your mind in the present, no old wondering, no onward worrying and staying now, staying now in the present.

[00:33:08] Jenny Swisher: Yeah. And that goes for so many things truly.

[00:33:10] Jenny Swisher: I mean, I’ve, I started offering virtual health consults alongside Dr. Page, um, this fall. And so I get the great fortune of meeting with three to five women a week just about their overall health. Right. And because it’s a functional approach, we’re talking about lifestyle factors. We’re talking about relationships.

[00:33:26] Jenny Swisher: We’re talking about sleep. We’re talking about the things that are within our control. And. It’s interesting because one thing that I’m hearing Dr. Page repeat over and over and over to so many different clients is the more you’re telling yourself that you’re not okay, the more not okay you’re going to be.

[00:33:46] Jenny Swisher: Right. Yeah. And so she’s, you’re constantly looking in the mirror, like, oh, I hate my arms or, oh, I hate this, or, oh, I hate that. You’re sending a message to your nervous system, right? Whether you know it or not, you’re sending a message to your nervous system that says, I am not okay. I am not okay. I am not okay.

[00:34:02] Jenny Swisher: And I’ve had to hear her say that so many times. Um, and here I am, like I mentioned before, like dealing with migraines and it’s easy to just get right back into that cycle of like, I’m not okay. I’m not okay. Here’s the migraine again. Right. And the same thing goes here. It’s exactly what you’re saying is how can I ground myself and say, everything is okay.

[00:34:21] Jenny Swisher: Like I am saying, you know, my partner is safe. Like, am I overreacting or am I right? Do I just need to take a breath? Right. But whole, um, we’ve had a daughter. She’s very, a very passionate child. Right. So we’ve had the conversation with her about. Before you react, take a breath before you get mad before you talk back to your grandma or whatever the case is like you take a minute and then you decide if it’s worth doing it and I think there’s so much benefit to that.

[00:34:48] Jenny Swisher: Like we tell our children to do it, but yet we struggle, right? And we say, yeah.

[00:34:52] Shanenn Bryant: So I mean, our emotions are our emotions don’t continue, but our actions that we do, those are the things that are going to outlive us, right? Our emotions, those will calm down. So even the way if I’m in that hyper sense of feeling upset.

[00:35:08] Shanenn Bryant: That will calm down at some point. It’ll go away. It’ll be different tomorrow when I look at the same situation, but whatever I did in that moment, that’s there to stay, especially with your partner, you know?

[00:35:20] Jenny Swisher: Yeah. This has been so good and so needed. I think, um, relationship confidence coaches should be, uh, this should be more plentiful.

[00:35:28] Jenny Swisher: I’ve never, I think it’s so key. Uh, and when, when we, I mean, we, we hire people for personal training, you know, and nutrition, we hire people for, for so many things. Why not? Ask for help when it comes to bettering yourself and bettering your relationships. I think that’s at the end of the day, I think it’s Chalene Johnson that talks about the relationships are really what life is all about.

[00:35:48] Jenny Swisher: Right. And so if we can really enact in those relationships, the way that we want to be, if we want, if we can show up in the ways that we want to be, if we want to have healthy. relationships that duplicate like we talked about, um, having the confidence in those relationships is key. So I would love for you to just any final thoughts and also just point people in the direction of where they can find you as well.

[00:36:09] Shanenn Bryant: Yeah. So, um, I would just encourage people to know that you are not alone. Being a jealous person is something that comes with a lot of, you know, different emotions, shame, guilt, self conscious emotions. All of those are wrapped into it. And people feel really alone when they’ve talked to their friends who aren’t feeling that way, they don’t understand, you know, what are you talking about?

[00:36:31] Shanenn Bryant: They’ve never given you any reason to think that. So they’re not understanding family members can’t really relate. So they feel very alone. Just know that you’re not there. Ton of people who are suffering from this. Just like you. So if that’s you and um, you would like further information, you can reach out to me on Instagram at topselfcoach or my website is just topself.

[00:36:55] Shanenn Bryant: com. There are some free resources there that they can. They can grab,

[00:37:01] Jenny Swisher: We’ll make sure that we link everything up in the show notes for everybody so that they can find you. They can reach out to you and connect with your materials and whatnot, but I thank you so much for, for being here, um, for sharing your expertise, for helping the women I have listening, um, better their relationships.

[00:37:17] Jenny Swisher: Thank you for having me. All right, guys, until next time, we’ll talk soon. Bye bye.