Sept 14th, 2020 Transcript – Mental Health Moment 

Transcript by Google Voice Typing – Please excuse errors

Topic – Adventure Therapy – Rock Climbing

Welcome, once again to the mental health moment it’s Monday and time to take a moment for your mental health I’m your host Joe Newman from Life Launch Centers and this is the show where we talked about all things for your mental health, healthy coping mechanisms, discuss current situations that affect our mental health and give you tips, ideas and resources that you can Implement right now. You know it seems like anxiety and depression are taking over society our kids but also a lot of adults are struggling right now with dealing with difficult emotions that are a part of life you know we’re talking about resilience here emotional resilience and that’s what we do at life on spinners we teach family counseling program kids ages 11 to 26 with anxiety or depression they come and learn the emotional tools they need to successfully launched into life group is awesome they just have an opportunity to realize that they’re not alone in their struggles and their defense walls come down real quickly and they see that you know there’s there’s actual things they can learn that will help them deal with these difficult emotions so we’re going to talk a little about some special send some some really unique resources that we have in our community out there that can help us build resilience and today on the show I’ve got with me Yuri mellow he’s a licensed clinical social worker who works at the wide variety range of clients and he has an interesting specialty based in adventure therapy and so you’re a God like to welcome you to the show and picks for joining us today.

Joe I’m impressed that’s awesome I’m happy to be here great intro let’s have some fun let’s do it who’s out there tell us a little bit about your background now for about 16 years or so all of that I’ve been in private practice which I just absolutely love there’s just a degree of Freedom that’s that that allows and so I have a practice here with other clinicians and some psychiatrist honestly it’s been amazing and the experience of doing therapy I honestly just feel really grateful to the community because I just had the pleasure of meeting and working with the most phenomenal people phenomenal families adults use it’s just been really really fun and I think as a result of that as a result of those 16 years of experiences which people well there’s so much it’s like anxiety and depression seem to be taking over and and you kind of have a unique experience and background I mean just from your name people recognize us a little bit about your background sure maybe I’ll start all the way at the beginning but I promise I’ll summarize because it’s maybe it’s a little bit of a long story but I was originally born in Africa in my name is I guess how you would say it in Portuguese is actually a Russian name and my mom was it was a big fan of Russian literature we’re right out of the same book so I need for my childhood and teenage years and then move to America really at the age of 15 and I’ve been here ever since no I’m so yeah it’s it’s really fun honestly I feel super fortunate that that I did get to experience a little bit of some other cultures and anyways it’s it was great to live there it’s great to be here I just am overall super happy very very grateful well counseling techniques and I’d like to the listeners to be aware of some of these awesome resources that you bring to our community it’s really just awesome to meet with people because of all over that many hours and that many individuals you end up getting a lot of ideas and being inspired as a result I’ve I’ve I’ve written a couple of books I don’t know if I would say that I specialize in depression and anxiety although I would say that a large majority of my caseload addresses that specific topic and so I do spend a lot of time talking about the brain talking about the mind and how to how to create a better interaction between the two the other thing that I do and I think that you alluded to a little bit earlier as I have this it’s something that I’ve developed I’m sure other people have tried it as well so I can’t like own it it’s not mine for sailor where is I started rock climbing pretty much right when I completed my in my program which was in 2004 and I had a good friend of mine that introduced me to climbing and bouldering and rappelling in all of these really exciting kind of Adventures and I remember when I was first beginning to build my practice I would have an hour here and now we’re there and I would go up Dixie rock and a few other places and I was just kind of starting to get into climbing a little bit and after a little while I just started to think man like I I have to bring people up here there’s what I always say is there’s magic in these rocks like there’s just matter to you really piqued my interest because I’ve often come upon a lot of a profound thoughts I think while you’re dangling on the end of a rope you recognize how that can maybe even be applied in a therapeutic way what’s a good a good amount of adolescents and teenagers and kind of early on college students and and this whole approach and not being particularly in the office which I absolutely love I would say that office therapy is is is more intense and very directive therapy that way but it can almost be a little bit intimidating and when we introduced rock climbing or bouldering or repelling to individuals it’s just such a really open experience and especially when we’re talking about adolescent fact I tell parents all the time I said look up whenever I see kids like it and I know that parents want me to see their kid and and they want me to like drop some knowledge some unbelievable like cognitive gym that they’re like oh my God that will help them to be and use the word that use resilient right to increase their emotional endurance their emotional IQ Etc but honestly adolescents have become the therapy have to leave feeling great like they have to leave feeling great to want to come back and you so nicely because the experience is really it’s just not as intense as it is in an office it’s that there’s there’s a lot of stuff to interact with at the Rock and of course it’s exciting it’s adventurous it’s fun it’s exercise it’s outside I sometimes call it it’s my it’s my three-in-one approach that mean we’re getting we’re not only doing the therapeutic were we’ll learn a new hobby and then we’re just outside in the sun exercising it’s just it’s brilliant and it’s not as fun as successive Adventure therapy Society actually say that a lot of individuals who struggle or suffer from anxiety they have what I would say is a particular brain sticky meaning sings stick and end up in the anxious brain has a difficult time shifting through information because the brain becomes very obsessed or stuck in particular thing and that’s stuck in this is not a word but I’ll just use it anyways ends up creating a lot of anxiety for the individual and then there’s lots of biological set in our brains don’t think so hot and and so here we are right these individuals who come to see me Raikou perhaps struggle with anxiety or have this that their brain you could become very fearful very quickly and I take them rock climbing right so we’re talking you know 3046t 200 feet go right where we do single or multi picture we were pal and I’ll take them like a commando-style repelling where we go forward natural experiences that happened did you overcome those those fears and yeah you see a lot of growth it’s absolutely it in so I mean generally speaking my my wife just feels terribly for these people who have to come see me and I of course you know take them to do these experiences and and for some to be honest they come in climbing is pretty natural and they come and they’re not terribly a day on a scale of 0 to 10 scale right there and it’s kind of exciting but there’s beer scale will come to about a seven or an eight or a nine and all of a sudden the experience isn’t Fun exciting anymore it’s scary and there’s literally just like there is a mental shift there’s a spaceship that happens when that kind of Panic or beauty of this experience right is is is we’re not just conceptually talking about dealing with anxiety and giving them tools is were actually number one we’re using Xposed literally we’re going to come back so people will come no climb 15 feet up and their body will just paralyzed I mean it’ll just be frozen up there you know begging you please. Just bring me down and of course I keep them stuck I’m just kidding I don’t do that I’ll bring them out of course is that we go back right is that we go back we expose that and then we utilize some Focus techniques to help them go from that 7 8 9 10 Panic place right where their body is just taking over and they’re not in control for say and then over time we watch this anxiety just come down and down and down and down and down to the point where they’re leading route multi-pitch climbs with me either going of course I mean the parallel there that you can already see is if we can do it at the Rock right it gets its transferable like so the idea is that we can transfer this type of focus this type of experience naturally into life. The story that repeats itself over and over again where individuals are just Frozen Frozen Frozen I’m going to take a quick break here but I want to hear more about this and cuz it’s so fascinating and I love climbing personally but yeah the work we do with you the young adults ages 11 to 26 years old struggling with anxiety depression mental health conditions defensive walls come down and experiencing an opportunity now to use some of these great resources that we have in the community you give us a call we do a free 15-minute phone consultation strategize with you what would be the best course of action do to help your luck on the number is 833-803-3883 or email o talking about Adventure therapy

Welcome Back to the mental health moment I’m your host Joe Newman with Life Launch Centers today were talking about Adventure therapy with URI mellow he’s a licensed clinical social worker here and has his own private practice in St George area. Thanks again for for joining us today as a rock climber personally I’ve seen a lot of what you were talking about in the first half happened in the eyes of people I climb with it and I’ve taken a lot of people climbing just through Scouts and through dates and through friends kids and all this kind of stuff and it’s it’s so fun to see what you’re talking about how Society inducing but like you said it the the stuff is so transferable to the rest of life like they realized I did some hard stuff on that rock and I can do that you know and emotional situation that’s what I mean tell me a little bit about Why adventure therapy besides like your personal love for it how do you see that apply in people’s life what is is is how we see it is I can for adolescents and young adults and really adults because I climb with some as well but it it it just becomes this for me that there’s this relationship I think between fear and anxiety and confidence and so I always kind of stop your anxiety in your fear goes down right and I think I see that not only at the Rock but individually with people I mean if they go out and expose themselves to some of these circumstances the climbing just becomes a model right that’s what climbing really becomes for them is is not only this is a little their fear and anxiety becomes a little bit lower in the idea of course that I’m trying to gently show through the experience is is whatever somebody be consistently does overtime like they become better at doing that thing not because that thing is different or because it’s become easier but because their ability to do that thing is increase managing Their Fear right our body when we experienced of high levels of anxiety that you guys are working with their life broadstairs typical response fight flight or freeze response right ahead and what at what I’m trying to teach people on the run is this fourth response of focusrite let’s learn to focus differently right in klemme allows that and it just doesn’t in a real setting and it works so great because it’s just it’s fine like it’s exciting but I also think that you’re working on a great project right now that is kind of for everybody that is a totally different format I’d tell us a little bit I think it’s called The Daily pulse tell us a little bit about that that’s what I Daily Post is a it’s a phenomenal thing it actually that the Genesis of it happened around 2017 or 2018 when I was getting a meeting with a good friend of mine here that was kind of the origination of the concept his name is Justin Kate he’s a principal at Desert Hills High School from multiple suicides and Justin reached out to me I had done some presentations there before he knew me and Justin basically said hey look you remember we’ve got to do something I feel like these things are happening in the community something that’s preventative I want something that goes out to the kids and is doing something and we discussed a variety of things connect with a good friend of mine French daily who’s a genius programmer and we talked about and we ended up creating this platform to text so where we send out we send out these weekly text to two teenagers in high school and middle school kind of assessing where they are emotionally throughout the week but then we’re providing videos and podcasts and inspirational memes and it’s coming to them on a weekly basis just basically meant to bring goodness it’s really an enrichment tool and land everyday you know you’re able to establish what what time you want this text to come and then and then these messages come from you and there really inspirational messages about you know how to make your day Greg hot what what things to focus on in life and then like you said these amazing resources that you can that you can augment those thoughts by listening to a podcast or I’m reading an article and and then there’s even like a metric system where it asks you like how are you feeling today and I mean it’s amazing confidential measuring people’s people respond as these adolescents respond they can actually see sea on a longitudinal throughout the year anxiety wise and general well-being lies and they can see that right on their phone it shows them that later on right side I think what you’re talking about Joe is us which is a spin-off we want to do this 65 Day program the better thinking feeling and be there is that through these inspirational text these inspirational Happy individuals kind of evaluate where it is that they are and then we also offer these question and answer format podcast which are honestly my very favorite weirdo providing this just to the general population and it’s so so easy to sign up for that will I highly recommend it like it was a really it’s a very valuable part of my day and so on until the listeners out there you’re a how do they get ahold of the school or the Daily Post and you absolutely go to daily puls.com you can also download the podcast it’s Spotify or iTunes podcast under Daily Post you can search for it there but if you want to sign up for the service it’s the 30 day free then if you want it you keep it but all you have to do is you just text the word start start to 435-633-9189 just text start 435-633-9189 and it begins in the you don’t have to do anything just sit back and enjoy awesome I’ll make sure to put that number and the information on the website so people can get a hold of that and as far as your private practice and Adventure therapy how do people get ahold of you there that easiest way is to text me personally that’s honestly I don’t even answer phones but but I love tax people text me all the time and they can text me at 435-319-0347 that’s the best way to reach me they can go to my website to and at your ET mellow., but my name is it’s a hard word to spell smell it first that’s fine I’ll put a description is well so I think an Innovative mind in the counseling world and you bring some really unique resources to the community and that’s really what this show is all about is trying to help people realize out there that that if your if you got anxiety or depression or any other difficult situation trauma things in your life that are overtaking you you don’t have to bear those burdens alone there people there are people out there with help and with ability to to kind of help me through these difficult thing so anyway thank you so much for joining us on the show today I appreciate being here was really fun really fun well I’m going to wrap it up here and so I hope everyone out there got some helpful ideas about how to help your kids through these difficult and unusual times I may be some some fun things that you can do right now help you know if you have any questions jump on our website and lifelong Spinners., there’s not a great free resource but this is been your mental health moment join us again next time right here on St George news radio this is Joe Newman signing off from Life on centers until next time keep those kids safe and keep your sanity.