Mentality

111: The Grief of Chronic Illness

We talk about the grief that can accompany having a chronic illness. When endometriosis causes us ongoing losses in multiple aspects of our life, over and over again, it’s absolutely heartbreaking. We talk about some reasons why we might grieve due to chronic illness, what we personally grieve, and how our grief has impacted our…

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Ep88: It’s Okay If All You Did Today Was Survive

Updated 10/2023. There are days when it feels like all we are doing is surviving. We talk about how we get through heavy feelings and how we try to stay open to possibility even on the most hopeless-feeling days. AMY’S BOOK: Finding Peace with a Devastating Disease by Amy Corfeli. CONNECT WITH US! INSTAGRAM: @in16yearsofendo…

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Ep86: Interview: Acceptance, DBT, and Endometriosis with Maggie Bowyer. Part 1

Today we welcome Maggie Bowyer (they/them) to the show for a beautiful chat on acceptance and DBT. DBT stands for Dialectical Behavioral Therapy, which is a type of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy that teaches additional skills such as acceptance, mindfulness, interpersonal skills, emotional regulation, and distress tolerance skills. We talk about these skills in relation to…

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Ep73: Exploring the Idea of Happiness

Updated 9/2023. CW: Brief mention of suicidal ideation. // What is happiness? Is it possible to have while living with endo and other chronic illnesses? If so, how can we find it? We explore the idea that happiness is a skill that can be learned and share our experiences trying to find deep happiness anyways…

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Ep61: Is Finding Peace with Endometriosis Possible?

Updated 4/2023. Is it possible to find peace with the pain, the symptoms, and the countless ways endo devastates our lives? We discuss our own journeys of searching for peace – what ‘finding peace’ means to us, what benefits it has brought us, and where we are in terms of acceptance. While there is no…

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Ep51: Practicing Gratitude to Help Our Mental Health

Updated 2/2023. Gratitude has many benefits and can even change the way we feel about our lives, but it can be hard to practice when we are suffering and exhausted from our endometriosis symptoms and challenges. We talk about how powerful stories are and how books, movies, and connecting with each other can help us…

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Ep40: The Silver Linings Endometriosis Brought Me

Updated 2/2023. There are so many negative ways that endometriosis can affect our life, from living with chronic or acute pain, infertility, or fatigue, to affecting our relationships, to making it difficult to work or study or go after our dreams. But since endo can also cause us to rethink and even rebuild our life,…

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Ep34: The Strength Inside of Us

Updated 2/2023. How do we keep going even when everything seems impossible? When life just keeps throwing problem after problem at us, how do we find the strength to go to work, take care of the kids, and to keep doing the things we need to do, when we really just want to curl up…

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Ep32: The Way We Face Our Problems

Updated 2/2023. How many of us feel like we react to difficult situations in ways we don’t want to? They say that the only thing we can truly control in life is the way we face our problems, yet most of us feel like we have no control over our reactions at all! In this…

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Ep29: Negative Self-Talk and Limiting Beliefs About Your Illness

Updated 2/2023. Do you have beliefs about yourself or your illness that are limiting you in some way? Limiting your growth, your opportunities, or your chances to feel even just a little bit better? Often times our beliefs are subconscious, and we don’t even realize we have them or how they are affecting us. We…

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