Stephanie: Hi, Marcy. Welcome to the podcast.

Marcy: Hi, Stephanie. Thank you so much for having me.

Tell me the forces that shaped you into the person you were when this midlife transition started. Tell me a little bit about your formative years.

Marcy: Yeah, sure. So I was born with a cleft lip and palate, which required major medical care, really, from day one. I've had over 20 surgeries, starting at three months old and my last one when I was 18 years old. And, so the way I look today is very different than the way I spent the first 18 years of my life.

And, I was brought up in a Catholic family and went to a Catholic school. And so none of that jived well at all. So, things were always interesting, but what I was learning as I was growing is that if I could just be who you wanted me to be, then I could find a way to get accepted and, felt like I was belonging in some way.

And that I always thought that if I just didn't deal with things, it would be okay. You know, we just kind of keep hard charging all the way through and that, it was okay not to feel the way I felt and, just really just suppress everything. And then that way I wouldn't have to deal with anything and that worked well.

And like by middle school, though, I started experimenting with alcohol. And by high school, I was, experimenting, well really actively d rinking and using drugs,

Stephanie:

It was so exciting because I was having my last surgery. My braces came off my teeth after getting them on in kindergarten. Like, all the doctor's appointment and medical care was winding down. And I had applied to college and I was ready to go and start this new life and this new beginning. And, I was so ready and so excited I was on my way to my afterschool job in January of my senior year and I ended up getting in a horrific car accident.

Three people lost their lives that day. And, um, so that, uh, Sorry, that's still tender for me to talk

And then this. And, people are always curious, you know, were you drinking or using drugs at the time of the accident? And the answer is, no, I was not.I was not found responsible in any way. However, because of the home I grew up in, and the coping mechanisms I'd used all of my life, I assigned that blame and guilt to myself.

I took responsibility for the loss of those people's lives. And so every day I woke up thinking that I didn't deserve to be alive, for the next 10 years. And the only way I really knew how to handle the pain of literally just breathing air was to drink and drug, to just try to escape myself.

Her name is Brianna and I picked her up one day after school and as I was driving back to the bar with her which is, you know, what my dad did with me

Stephanie: Mm hmm.

Marcy: It became so clear in that moment in time that I was doing exactly the same thing to her that had been done to me. That was it. Within 10 days, I found myself in a 12 step meeting, and that was over 21 years ago, and I've never drank or used drugs since that day.

Stephanie: Wow. Congratulations. That's amazing.

Marcy: Thank you. And that kind of feels like, oh my gosh, yes, you've arrived, you know.

Marcy: Yes. And it wasn't. It was the beginning of the end really for me. And, what I ended up doing is switching addictions from drinking and drugs to working. And seeking my value externally from me. And I got in a sales career of mortgage banking and, that was great. You know, I excelled in every way in my career and got all the accolades.

What ended up happening as my body continued to deteriorate because there was no more masking anything. And, I sought out a lot of significant help for all the trauma I had lived through, and I was going to 12 step meetings and I was working a program of recovery. So, you know, like I was checking all the boxes.

Thinking like, Hey, I'm doing all this stuff. I must be healing. Things must be going better. Right?

Stephanie: Right.

Stephanie: Before we go down that road to, too far, cause I do want to explore that with you. That happened, your body finally threw up all the white flags when you were about 45. Do you remember what your mindset was, what your thought process was, around your 40th birthday? Do you remember your 40th birthday? Like how did that sort of time period play in your life?

Not, I didn't get sober for this, you know, to be sick and, right? Like all this, all the stories we tell ourselves about the way we think our life is supposed to be and look.

Stephanie: Mm hmm,

Marcy: So, my thirties was just such a cluster that I remember, being so excited about turning 40. Like I was so excited because not only was I going to be 40, but it was like this new decade,

Stephanie: mm hmm,

Marcy: And it felt like this, sort of rite of passage, to be 40, like, more mature, maybe have some things figured out, a more stability, really reflected a lot on the way I looked and felt was so different from my mom being 40

Stephanie: mm hmm,

Marcy: and like just intergenerationally, like how aging looks so much different, you know?

Stephanie: Yeah,

Marcy: Like turn the page. What's next? You know?

Stephanie: Yeah, yeah. Like clean slate, clean fresh page in the book of life and, and let's go, yeah. You mentioned a while ago you said something about having a chronic illness through your life. What was that?

Marcy: No one knows.

Stephanie: Yeah. Just sick. My whole life. I mean, part of that is around being born with a cleft lip and palate. That's not uncommon to experience excruciating chronic ear infections. To have sinus infection issues. All of that kind of stuff is really typical, but normally what they see is that you outgrow it.

Marcy: And for me, I outgrew the ear infection piece of it, but I never outgrew the sinus issue of it. And, um, I woke up every day feeling like I had the flu. Yeah, it's a miserable, miserable way to live.

So it was all sort of like the head and respiratory system and you could never pinpoint why I was getting them or where they were coming from. So I can relate a little bit, certainly not to the larger issues I used to say, it wouldn't hurt if only I could just not breathe. It only hurts to breathe.

Marcy: Yeah. Oh, that's awful. That sounds so miserable.

Marcy: Yeah,

Stephanie: just going to keep going with my life.

And, you know, I was in my twenties and living in Boston and I was, burning the candle on both ends and then having a party in the middle. So it was, you know, as there were, as there was an element of being able to talk myself into, I knew why I was getting sick so often, cause I was doing so much, but there were plenty of people who were doing as much as me and not getting sick at all. So there was definitely something there. Yeah. Yeah,

And you overcame it? I just finally kind of, I don't know if I grew out of it. It just kind of dissipated in my, late twenties, early thirties. I stopped having those as much. And then for another decade, I got them, but much more occasionally, not, every 6 or 8 weeks. But, like, I mean, who gets pneumonia in July?

Nobody gets pneumonia in July. Nobody gets bronchitis in August. Like, they were bizarre things.

Marcy: Yeah.

Stephanie: Okay.

Stephanie: Mm hmm.

Marcy: you know,

Stephanie: Mm

Marcy: My father knew another farmer and he was able to buy, a field, 14 acres of land, but there were no utilities or anything on the land. He worked it out where he could just pay him every month and he drug the mobile home that we owned out on the land, but there was no foundation, no running water, no electricity. And so we lived there, it was like camping. And we live there until my parents could earn enough money and save enough money to be able to drill for a well, and to be able to get the electricity up onto the property.

And I don't know how long. In some ways, it feels like it lasted a lifetime. And in other ways, it feels like it was a short amount of time, but I think it was literally a couple of years that it took for my parents to be able to pour the foundation, get all of the utilities and the water. It wasn't because my parents didn't work hard.

It's just, they, they literally just didn't have the means.

Marcy: We all have mast cells in our body. They're part of the immune system and where they're really closely connected for everybody nowadays is COVID, right? Is that when the mast cells would just go crazy, and that's what was causing people to not make it from the disease.

So that was happening to me on a daily basis without COVID. And basically it's just the immune system thinks that every single thing, literally, in the environment, internally and externally to you, is a threat. And so the body just keep sending mast cells, which creates inflammation, which theoretically is supposed to create healing.

I couldn't breathe. I got down to only being able to eat boiled potatoes. That was all that I could eat. Anything else I would have an allergic reaction to. I was reacting to my thoughts. So if I started thinking thoughts that were based in like the fear of the future or the regret of the past, then my body would react to that and I'd have a full blown allergic reaction.

Marcy: So I didn't know that's what was going on until I started connecting what all was going on, you know. But basically it started with, food and supplements that I was taking. After I would eat something, then my heart would start pounding and racing. And then, I would start getting heart palpitations.

Stephanie: Yeah, all I'm doing is laying here.

Stephanie: Okay.

Marcy: So I saw that if I could think the reverse, like I'm okay. Right now, this is really uncomfortable, but I'm okay. I am okay in this moment and everything's going to work out the way that it's supposed to. Then the reactions or the all of these symptoms are happening all of the time, right? But a reaction would consist of all of it happening at one time like converging and amplifying by like 10.

Stephanie: Okay.

Marcy: So if I could just be calm then everything would be like a five out of ten instead of ten out of ten.

Stephanie: Okay.

Stephanie: Yeah. Oh my goodness.

So at first I thought I had a cold. And then 6 weeks later, when I was still feeling terrible, it was like, well, maybe this is a stress crash from last year. Because, you know, of course, that's completely reasonable. And then, 4 months later, it was like, maybe this isn't a stress crash. And I was debilitated.

I was, you know. Thank goodness my business was in the house at the time so I could crawl up into the loft and work for a couple hours and then crawl downstairs and my husband would deliver dinner to me on my lap and that was it for about a year and a half. And then, finally, about 2 years, I got a diagnosis of Lyme disease, which, of course, I'm in New England.

But I remember ticks as a kid. So, it's also possible that, I had it on board, historically, and it was activated by this big, stressful year and, much like your, your body just waving the flags and saying, I'm done.

Marcy: yeah

Stephanie: But that was almost 8 years ago. And so I say that I manage a chronic illness. Not that I suffer from a chronic illness, but, yeah, it's been a challenge. I've had to rework my whole life around it to maintain the right balance with, owning a business and, having a life.

And, you know, a couple of years ago I decided crazily to start a podcast. And so, you know, there's one more thing to balance. But, yeah, and really not knowing what the cause is, has been a major frustration because, chronic Lyme is a thing, as much as some of the doctors don't like to believe it.

Marcy: You still have symptoms presenting.

Stephanie: yeah. Yeah.So I'm

Marcy: oh, I did that.

Stephanie: Managing the illness and, it's mysterious and it's challenging because I have a wonderful husband, thank goodness.

Cause he's kept me going for the last, eight years and more. But people get tired of hearing about it. People get tired of even having to deal with me. And it's like, well, I can't go there and I can't do that. And I can't eat the things that you're eating there and, I can't go out for drinks.

And so it's, I can relate to some of your story, certainly the mystery illness piece is something that I have also been dealing with.

Marcy: I get it. I did it all of my life. Thankfully, I, I don't deal with that anymore.

Marcy: Yeah, right. And I say that so humbly and so gratefully.

Stephanie: Trust me I understand

Marcy: It's a doozy, and to deal with it for a lifetime is really difficult, or any extended period of time, people don't,

Stephanie: It weighs on you

Marcy: It does mentally, emotionally, physically. yeah, there

Stephanie: don't understand

Marcy: They don't get it. Until you're physical being as compromised, you can't understand what it's like.

And, so yeah, it brings its own set of challenges for sure. So, definitely I send all the best to you for that

Stephanie: Thank

Stephanie: Oh just that?

Marcy: Just a few small things, Stephanie.

Stephanie: Just your entire life

Marcy: Just my entire life.

And really what I mean by that is literally what I just said, is changing my entire life. And so if you think in terms of how, the illness, the way I see everything in my life today is that we are energy first. The body is energy first and we are physical second. And what happens is as we go through life and we have experiences. Those experiences literally create a problem for our physical being. And our energy is meant to flow in certain patterns and ways through the body, so that the body can work effectively and efficiently.

It's not just physical. And so people who have trauma and are holding that in their body and you don't know why you're sick. That's really the number one place to start. I also have come to learn in my own journey that, you know, what I believe leads to what I think and what I think creates how I feel.

And that the, you know, those thoughts created feelings of, feeling worthless, despair, depression, anxiety. And those feelings led to behaviors like drinking alcohol, drugs, eating, overworking, over exercising. anything to escape the pain of those feelings. And those behaviors led me to the life that I have.

And so it's like, you have to unwind all of that in order to change who you are. And so all of the programs within me were based on, I'm not safe. I'm not okay. And the world is a danger. I'm never going to have enough of what I need. So I always was working in my life from this place of scarcity

Stephanie: Yeah.

Marcy: Right. So it's like, yeah, some of it is literally subconscious and it's deeply rooted and buried and there's a process to uncover that. And then the other stuff is, it's like right now, you know, I probably have 15 tabs running while we're doing our recording on my program, right?

And all those tabs are running in the background while we're recording. Well, that's how the mind works too Because i'm engaged with you right now. I'm not thinking about what that subconscious program is that's running in the background.

So I worked, using the concept of neuroplasticity. I rewired my brain, literally, to start thinking things of, I'm safe. I'm okay. I have everything that I need. Everything's going to work out the way it's supposed to, And then I had to learn how to heal my nervous system,

Stephanie: Yep.

Marcy: because the body can't heal until the nervous system is working correctly, because the nervous system's job is to put the body into a parasympathetic state.

They were chronic. Four were viral, one was bacterial, and I could not get rid of it. I never could understand why I am, I not able to rid myself of this. And it's because I never got into a parasympathetic state, which would allow the nervous system to relax enough to tell the rest of the body it's safe enough, do your job, right?

Stephanie: Yep.

Marcy: So you have to move the body out of that chronic state of survival and into a place of rest, digest, ease, parasympathetic, so that yes, now the body is like, okay, so what's on the to do list for today?

Stephanie: Let me go back one step. When you said you used the theory of neuroplasticity to rewire your brain. Give me a practical example of that. You talked about the things that you were trying to program your brain towards all, these positive thoughts. Were those just mantras that you repeated, or how was it that you rewired the brain?

Right? What is the program running in the background all day, that's running the engine, which is me. Once I started understanding, I was constantly thinking about my safety, my survival, that I was hyper vigilant, that I was always worried about the future. Anytime that I had that, a thought that was associated with any of that, and I caught it in my mind, then I would say cancel. Out loud. So as soon as you say cancel, what you've just done is all of those thoughts run on synaptic connections in the brain, right? And the synapses are literally like wired together. So when you say cancel, you interrupt that connection.

So you have to create a timeline, and by speaking out loud, it helps the nervous system to start to differentiate where it is in time.

Stephanie: I have a friend who, big into personal development, had a course she taught for years, and there was an element of it that I, I have always remembered. I loved, because There were elements of her program where it was talk out loud, talk out loud. And she used to say, your body is like a golden retriever and it needs to be told what to do or to be given directions.

That's right. Yeah, it's so powerful. I like that. The cancel method. I've not run across that yet, but I, I really like it. So, thank you. Thank you for sharing

Marcy: course.

Stephanie: So you rewired your brain and then you, worked on your nervous system. And then what after that now, I say those things as if they're easy.

Marcy: Yeah, right,

Marcy: That's right. Yeah, it takes so much. So my hat's off to you if you're doing your nervous system work. It does take a lot of work and a lot of persistence. It's like I always envision it as like turning around a freight liner.That's literally what you're doing. You, you are working against your own physiology to change your way of being, right?

So it is a task. So the other thing that I learned is that you have to raise the frequency of the body.

Stephanie: Mm hmm.

Stephanie:

Mm

Marcy: Because those are dense and they create density in our body. And in order for the body to function properly, we need to be more light and less dense. So the frequency needs to be higher. And, that also is a chore. It's an ongoing chore that I work with every single day of my life, to keep my frequency as high as possible.

I tried to just do frequency work, by following a lot of different teachers, took classes, read books and all of that. And I found with my level of trauma that that's, That's, it's like bypassing. In my experience, it was like me trying to bypass that and it did not work.

Stephanie: Right.

Marcy: You can't inverse that.

Stephanie: There is an order of operation there.

Marcy: That's right. Sometimes, though, for some of my clients, I do find that we have to start with the body before we can start with the mind. So some people, those two are inverse, but you can't put the frequency before either of the other two is what I found in my own experience.

Stephanie: That kind of makes sense to me. There's a picture in my head of like, something that's super sludgy and you gotta clean the sludge out before it it's clean and vibrating.

Marcy: Absolutely.

Stephanie: And so today, three years later, you are symptom free. You are healthy as can be.

All of these things are in check, right? But it takes a daily approach from me and I know for sure if I stopped doing what I'm doing now every single day, and I probably stopped for a couple of months, it would not surprise me that any number of those things would return to the same degree that I used to deal with them.

Stephanie: Yeah.

Marcy: You know, all of them. The trauma, all of it, right? I used to have this idea that one day I would arrive, that if I could just figure out the magic compilation of everything, I would figure it out and then I could toss the key out and I could just live my life.

Stephanie: Yeah, it, becomes the act of living, right? Because it is your way of life. It is your way of living. I'm so thrilled that you found the key. And that you were able to achieve such amazing health and vitality after, just a few short years after being in a real tough place and after a lifetime of trauma, it's wonderful.

Marcy: Thank you so much.

Stephanie: Yeah. Marcy, thank you so much for being with me today and for being so generous and sharing so much of your story. I really, really appreciate it.

Marcy: Yeah. Well, thank you so much for having me. It's really an honor to be here. Thank you.

And one of my main frustrations with subconscious thoughts, patterns, and beliefs is that they are subconscious. They are, by definition, not conscious. So we don't know about them, which means how do we become conscious of those thoughts and patterns and beliefs in order to address them, even if we wanted to,

well, through my many conversations about this midlife transition and the research I've done in the reading I've done, I have a few ideas on how to do that

These are a couple of questions that are really helpful in Identifying the areas of our life where we need a little bit of help Our subconscious beliefs create those default outcomes. So if you're, if you're consistently struggling in certain areas, relationships or career, self worth, your health, it's a sign that there's an underlying belief dictating those results.

So you're not always ready to face these things, but when you are, there are a few questions that you can try and work through. All right. Second, take a look at your emotional triggers.

Because that's usually the crux of that reaction that you're having.

For example, if constructive criticism feels devastating to you, there may be a subconscious belief that your worth is tied to perfection. And if rejection feels unbearable to you, then maybe you have a core belief that you are unlovable. and rejection in any way just triggers that. These triggered reactions are the nervous system's way of defending you against a deeply ingrained belief that it, the nervous system, believes is true. And it's not until we can reprogram it to understand that that belief is not true that we are at its mercy.

And that is no fun at all, as I'm sure you are aware.

I've told the story before about how I have two voices in my head, and for the longest time, one of them was exceptionally mean and loud, and the other was much nicer, but too quiet to be heard most of the time. And around that time in my mid to late thirties, a mentor gave me an exercise that helped me change that mix, and it was life changing.

Do you maybe downplay your accomplishments or tell yourself you don't deserve good things? I did the downplaying thing for a long, long time. And I still have to work at celebrating my wins. What rules do you assume about life, about success, about love, or about happiness? Do you believe that all wealthy people are jerks? Or people like me don't get to have that, whatever that is for you? Those beliefs are pretty insidious, but it's, it's not like you can just stop them because you want to. Like Marcy did. You have to actively and consciously retrain yourself out of those patterns and habits.

All right, fourth idea. Take a look at the childhood messages that you were given.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that most of our subconscious beliefs were formed Very early in life. So reflecting on your childhood experiences can sometimes help you reveal some of this hidden programming. Just this year, I have made a New Year's resolution to waste food. Because I am programmed to clean my plate.

But what messages did you receive about yourself, about success, about love, or money? And maybe it wasn't explicit either. You might have to look at the behavior of the people around you. I have a friend who just recently said something about how she probably should leave her partner, and it's somebody she's been with for a long time, but her parents stayed together.

When they probably shouldn't have. So she's just got this image in her head that you're supposed to stay together. And that's keeping her stuck in a relationship that's not serving her. I had a similar thing with relationships for a long time. I thought that leaving a relationship that wasn't quite working was quitting and that quitting was bad.

So think about if you were praised only for your achievements, you might believe that your worth is tied to productivity. So if that's the case, maybe you have a hard time relaxing. Are you always filling your time with doing, doing, doing, doing? Maybe that's because You believe that you have to be achieving something in order to have worth.

Not true, by the way.

Once we can recognize that a belief wasn't chosen, claim the power to change it.

He said, ask a question, and then once you hear the answer, ask the person who's answering. Ask them why. And do that three times in a row. And you should get something deeper than that original answer to the question. So I'll give you just a quick example.

That kind of digging can reveal the hidden scripts that have been running. in the background your entire life. But it can also be scary. So be gentle with yourself as you go through this. And maybe one of these five different ideas is going to work for you. Maybe two of them. Try them. You may be drawn to one or more of them. You may want to try all five of them and see what works for you.

All right. So now that you have spotted some of these patterns that you have, these patterns, these beliefs, what do you do about it? Well, bringing a subconscious belief into your consciousness is a great first step, but the real work is in replacing it.

You can replace it with a new belief. Anytime you hear one of those negative beliefs running in your head, speak in Opposite or an empowering truth out loud to counter it. When you hear, I never get what I want, wandering through your head counter that with, I am fully capable of creating the life that I want.

Something like that helps you rewire and reprogram those synapses. You don't want them just firing on default over and over again, because that's where those patterns come in and we have to interrupt them. Another way to do that is to engage in So this is not a new belief, this is a new belief in the inner self.

So our subconscious may be hidden, but it leaves clues for us everywhere in our emotions, in our patterns and in our self talk. And when we start paying attention and asking deep questions and intentionally choosing new thoughts, we can begin shifting our inner narrative. And when you do that, everything in your external life starts to change too.

All right, next week, you are going to meet Shea Sparks, a fellow podcaster and host of the Shea Sparks show who left an abusive 12 year relationship in her mid thirties and then embarked upon her healing journey. I'll see you next week.

The Big 4 0 podcast is produced and presented by Savoie Faire Marketing Communications.