The Cons Of Being A Strong Woman

Paula: [00:00:00] Hello and welcome to Chatting With Experts where I speak with fantastic women from Africa, from the Caribbean, and in the diaspora. They share my message and my mission, which is to educate, empower, and encourage women globally. Our show today is titled
When Strength Turns Against You. My guest says, “When strength turns against you and you are exploring the hidden costs of always being the strong one.”
She’ll share why, as a 20-year breast cancer survivor and certified naturopath, chronic stress can often hide behind capability, resilience, and responsibility. She is a [00:01:00] transformational wellness expert, speaker, certified naturopath that I just mentioned, and a 20-year breast cancer survivor, and she helps individuals and organizations understand the powerful connection between chronic stress, the nervous system, and long-term health.
With that, I want to welcome Tracye Robinson to Chatting With the Experts
Tracye: Hello, Paula
Paula: Hi. Tracye, wow. You said something that jumped out at me, strength turning against you, and that you’re exploring or you explore the hidden cost of being, the strong one, and I, I can relate to that.
Tracye: Yes.
Paula: When you, when one seems like, “Oh my gosh, you’re the one who’s always there for people,” people can [00:02:00] neglect you.
People think that you-
Tracye: Yes
Paula: … have it all together. Woo, let’s talk about that invisible burden.
Tracye: Absolutely. It’s amazing because we as strong women, we take on these roles, and they’re good roles. We are executives, entrepreneurs, mothers, daughters, and it adds up. Mm-hmm. And then we have everything associated with it that we have to be accountable for, and then we have all these people that are then relying on us for every role that we’ve taken on, and then we find ourselves saying, “Well, what about me?”
Paula: Mm-hmm.
What about me?
So it seems like there’s a story behind this, [00:03:00] Tracye. Hmm.
Tracye: There’s a little story. Mm-hmm. Yep.
Paula: Hmm. So the heaviest invisible burden Invisible.
Tracye: Hmm.
Paula: How is it invisible?
Tracye: Because nobody can see it, you know? We, we wake up, we show up, we look good, we appear to be fine, but then there could be something underlying with our health
Paula: Mm-hmm
Tracye: with the way we feel inside that we’re ignoring, but we have to keep going because we have to do what we have to do for those that are counting on us
Paula: And that doesn’t necessarily mean just family. It could be in business, right? All of
Tracye: it. All of it.
Paula: So as a certified [00:04:00] naturopath, how do you help people?
Tracye: I help women over 40 primarily that want to look at their health differently. They, they’ve tried the prescriptions and the procedures and the treatments and whatnot, but they’ve not looked at addressing the root cause of why what’s happening is happening.
So I’m able to help women by allowing them to see and explore what their bodies are telling them.
Paula: So, wow. I noticed that, we talked before this.
Tracye: Mm-hmm.
Paula: And, is there a way to figure out, okay, how chronic stress is showing up long before a diagnosis. I mean, are there signs? Are there things that we should look out for? What are those signs, if there are any?
Tracye: There are definitely signs, Paula. Mm. So just going [00:05:00] back 20 years ago-
Paula: Mm-hmm …
Tracye: and using myself as an example, I was a successful real estate broker doing everything for everyone, mother, wife, Mm … uh, lots of responsibilities.
Mm.
Tracye: Looked great to everyone.
Paula: Mm
Tracye: … on the outside. On the inside for me, I was struggling.
I had symptoms like migraine headaches and tension headaches and trouble sleeping, anxiety, digestive issues. Um, everything there is stress related. Everything there is your body saying, “Uh, ma’am, we need you to slow down. We need you to pay attention to us. We need you to listen.” But I didn’t listen. So I kept pushing through.
I kept pushing through. I was that strong one that was continuing to show up for everybody ’cause I didn’t want to let anybody down, until the day came that I [00:06:00] knew I couldn’t overlook it anymore. I started having more pain and more issues. So that day came that I had to go to the doctor, and then it led to many doctor visits and tests.
Mm. And, uh, for my time that I went in and just knew something wasn’t right and felt it, that was when I got my cancer diagnosis.
And that was the pivotal moment in my life where I realized that, okay, it took all of this for me to stop me in my tracks, you know? I didn’t have a choice because I had to have treatment, I had to have surgery, I had to have all these things, but it was that it took that much for me to get [00:07:00] to a place where I said, “I guess I need to take care of me.”
Mm. And so the story goes on.
Paula: Wow. Okay. So I know you’re a transformational wellness expert, so if I came to you and I was experiencing what you experienced, what would you tell me to do? Would you tell me, “Stop in my tracks”? Would you tell me, “All right. Take some deep breaths”? Mm-hmm. Would you tell me…
What would you tell me, Tracye?
Tracye: First, Paula, I want to let everyone know, including you, that I’m not a, a medical provider or practitioner-
Paula: Mm-hmm
Tracye: … and nothing I say is, is considered to be medical advice, and always consult your doctor when you have something. But when I am as a consultant and an advisor to my clients, I would help you [00:08:00] understand that yes, we gotta first breathe, of course.
Mm-hmm. But then I want you to know, Paula, that there’s something that you’ve been doing or not doing that made this happen. And like me, you may have known your symptoms. You may have known certain things were happening, or you may have just been totally unaware because sometimes we can get so busy and we can normalize so many things that we forget that, oh yeah, I did have this blaring headache, or, oh yeah, I did have pain in my side, or whatever it is.
So I would let you know, Paula, that today should be the pivotal point for you to realize that you’ve gotta start listening to your body, ’cause it’s always talking.
Paula: Listen to [00:09:00] your body
Tracye: Mm-hmm
Paula: Listen to your body. All right So now is there a practical way now, let’s talk about our nervous system. Is there a practical way- Yeah … to regulate our nervous system? Because that’s another thing. We can listen to our body, but then we have to know-
Tracye: What do we do, right?
Paula: Yes.
Tracye: Absolutely. So for our busy lives, there’s a stress hormone called cortisol, and cortisol is the one that we want to try to minimize. And it’s usually rising when we feel that tension, when we feel that anxiety, when we feel pressed and, you know, like we have so much going on and we’re going, going, going.
So those are the times that we want to pay attention. And throughout the day, I recommend micro resets, and micro resets are when [00:10:00] you intentionally take a few minutes, this is all it takes, to go within. And you can do this in a several different ways. I’ll mention a couple. You can decide that you’re gonna go for a walk.
You’re gonna step away from your situation. If it’s a nice day outside, that’s the best, ’cause the sunlight, you know, there’s all controversy about sun, but the sun is rejuvenating. The sun is, will lift your spirits. The sun will calm you, all kinds of things. So you can take a walk and breathe and think about good things.
Think about what makes you happy, and settle into that, and then come back, and you’ll find that you feel better. It’s a moment of really being able to step away. Even a drink of water, stopping your project, stepping away from your desk or wherever [00:11:00] you are, and drinking some water, and feeling that water go through your body, through your cells, and knowing how healing it is for you, and breathing with that as well.
These micro resets, as you do them, you’re gonna feel better and different in the moments, and you can do it as much as you need to, and it changes things. I know when I do enough of them, when I’m done for my day, I used to feel really tired, and it’s like, “Okay, I gotta go for round two, all my evening stuff.”
But with the micro resets, you will find that your evenings, you feel more at ease. You feel like you have more energy. So it’s a powerful way to bring that stress down, to calm the nervous system, and to let your body know, “I respect you, and I hear you, and I feel you,” and that’s good stuff.
Paula: Loving that [00:12:00] already. Loving that already. Mm. What about setting boundaries? Because sometimes in the evening, especially as women, we feel, okay, you know, you switched off from your professional life and now we are in our personal life, whether as mothers, partners, wives, Mm-hmm, mm-hmm … whatever it may be.
Boundaries
Tracye: Yeah. We all need them.
Paula: Kind
Tracye: of- Not, not all of us have them, but we all need them because we all have those people in our lives that, uh, you know, don’t understand that we’re just human. So, um, when you make a decision that there’s something that you don’t want to tolerate anymore or let’s say you’ve etched out some time for yourself, let’s say you said, “Okay, when I get home for an hour, I’m gonna have me time.”
Mm-hmm. And then you get that phone call, right? And it’s like, oh, [00:13:00] you gotta be able to hold that boundary. That’s a boundary. If that person is reaching out to you, if it’s not a dire emergency, you can ignore the call, right? ‘Cause they’ll be okay for an hour, or you can let them know, I’m focusing on some other things, and I’ll get back with you later.”
So many of us don’t, you know, we feel that we have to attend to the needs always whenever someone we care about says, “I need you.” But what we don’t realize is when we don’t enforce a boundary or prioritize ourselves, ’cause that’s what boundaries are all about, when we don’t enforce it, we’re hurting ourselves because we’re not giving ourselves what we need to be able to continue on to give what we want to give to others.
So it’s like filling your cup back up or, or emptying your cup- Mm-hmm … depending on who you ask. There’s two analogies around that. But- Yes, you can’t, you can’t [00:14:00] help others when your cup is all empty or running over.
Paula: Okay. I haven’t heard that one. I always have heard you can’t, well, you know, you can’t pour out of an empty cup.
Tracye: Right.
Paula: But now I’m hearing you say but if your cup is running over, you can’t pour out of that too because it’s- Right … it’s overflowing, right?
Tracye: Yep. It’s, it’s the same concept, but people can phrase it differently, um, to make it sound like, okay, so is the empty cup good or is the full cup good? Or which one is it?
So, it’s just all about knowing that when your body is talking and you need replenishment, you should honor it. So that you have room to do other things because everything happens when we start sacrificing our own health for everybody else. Then we get to a place where we’re not good for them either because now we’re sick, right?
Now we had something happen. So, yeah
Paula: So learning to say [00:15:00] no, ladies, or later. Later is a word too, right?
Tracye: Later is definitely a word.
Paula: More letters, but- So…
Tracye: Yep. Not now
Paula: Not now
Tracye: That’s another one. I’ll pass.
Paula: Mm-hmm.
Tracye: All those, yeah.
Paula: All those, yeah.
Tracye: Yeah.
Paula: May not sound as definite as a no.
Tracye: Right.
Paula: But it achieves
Tracye: the same- It’s a little softer, but…
Yeah. You graduate.
Paula: You graduate. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Tracye: Yes.
Paula: Yeah. Another thing I thought of too is, sometimes women too, you know, we talk about how men seem to be able to, especially when it comes to work or careers, you know, men seem to… I don’t want to use the word boundaries again, but they seem to be…
It, it, it seems as though it’s easier for them to-
Tracye: Yes …
Paula: to, um, know how… That they’re not [00:16:00] gonna sacrifice their ambition or, you know, when they’re taking care of themselves. We struggle a bit more with that. Mm-hmm.
Tracye: Mm-hmm.
Paula: You know? I think that comes into play with just what you talked about, when your strength is turning against you, when you’re the strong woman after all, you know.
Have you noticed that in your practice?
Tracye: Yes. Yes. As far as men go, men go, I think we’re emotional thinkers, and we’re emotional processors as women, and men are logical thinkers. So that there is the difference between feeling in my heart that I have to take care of this, because they don’t really feel in their heart.
They feel as if, does this make sense or does this not make sense, right? But I do feel like men are on the outside looking better than we are, but on the inside suffering as much as we are. Mm-hmm. [00:17:00] But they process differently. Mm-hmm. You know, we live longer than they do.
Paula: True.
Tracye: Yes. And they’re internal for the most part with processing.
They don’t want, you know, they have the ego and the pride. They don’t want you to think they can’t do this and do that, and we will cry. We will release our emotions. So I think, yeah, I think that, uh- men struggle as much as women do, but in a different way. You’ll never know it until maybe you don’t want to know it ’cause something happened or something like that.
Mm-hmm. So yeah. Mm-hmm. My thoughts, because I have a lot of clients that say, “My husband, he just, he doesn’t understand, you know, why I cry so much or why I say this or I need this, and he’s just like, ‘You just need to tough it out.'” It’s like, no, that’s not the way to do it. We need to be able to release our emotions.
We need to be able to talk through and work [00:18:00] through things, and that’s really good for the nervous system. Holding things in is a recipe for other things that we don’t want to see happen. So
Paula: What I’m hearing from you too is that there’s a connection between our health, long-term health, negative long-term health, and, um, chronic stress and our nervous system are all interrelated.
Tracye: There is. Yes, they are. This stress word is so big because I think that many of us have been conditioned, Paula, to have something happen, you know, whatever our health issue is, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes. Whatever we’re dealing with, we go in and we find out what we have, and then we take whatever it is we’re supposed to take for it, [00:19:00] and then we have the temporary feeling better.
But we haven’t really looked at the underlying reason as to why, and many people don’t know that stress is a major cause of all of our chronic illnesses. Stress alone can cause all the things we’re dealing with, that we’re being prescribed X, Y, Z for. And not saying it’s the only thing, but I’m saying that I think it’s not talked about enough that we have to calm our systems down.
We have to take care of our internal selves, and we’ll find when we do that, some of the health concerns shift And we don’t have [00:20:00] to look at it as just, you know, “This happened to me. I have to take this for the rest of my life,” or whatever it is that they tell us, because there are other answers.
And again, I’m not a practitioner. I’m basing this on what I, what I know, my education, my experience
Minimizing stress can improve your health and can give you longevity in your life. That’s not a claim, it’s a statement from me who’s experiencing it.
Paula: I think we’ll end on that note because I think it’s a powerful note to end on. Minimizing stress-
Tracye: Yes …
Paula: can improve your life
And that comes from you because you know from a fact, you’ve lived it.
Tracye: Absolutely Mm-hmm Absolutely [00:21:00]
Paula: And you’ve seen the difference when you decided otherwise
Tracye: Yes
Paula: You don’t have to live it
Tracye: Yes
Paula: Make a difference by-
Tracye: Absolutely …
Paula: minimizing and gradually removing. I mean, we can’t totally remove stress
Tracye: Right
Paula: But minimizing it
Tracye: Being aware and then doing something to bring it down
Paula: Mm-hmm ‘
Tracye: Cause it’s gonna always be a constant because we live and we have things that happen, and there are things out of our control that happen
Paula: Mm-hmm
Tracye: But being, being in a place where you can recognize it and do what you need to do for your body to get yourself back in that mode of less stress, that’s the ticket.
But it is quite the dance, and I call it a dance because none of us go through this life without having stressful events, and it’s all about how we process [00:22:00] them and how we respond.
Paula: So for someone who’s looking at this later on who is not part of the audience today, and if they’d like to get in touch with you, how can they do that?
Tracye: The best way to get in touch with me is through my website, I would say. Uh, everything is there, and divinelotusgroup.com is my website, and it’s D-I-V-I-N-E lotus, L-O-T-U-S, group.com.
And, you can contact me there. You can find out more about what I stand for and what I do, and, I am available and here.
Paula: Thank you so much. And for those of you who are listening to this on Spotify or Apple Podcast or who are viewing this on my YouTube channel, if you’d like to be a guest just like Tracye [00:23:00] has been on Chatting With The Experts, I’ll ask for you to reach out to me on my website, which is Chatting With The Experts.
I’m also on LinkedIn. My business page there is Chatting With The Experts. Or you can reach out to me on my profile there, Paula Okonneh. I’m also on Instagram. My handle there is @chat_experts_podcast,
and I am on YouTube, as I just mentioned. Um, just look for Chatting With The Experts, where you’ll listen. You can view this episode there and all the other episodes with phenomenal women just like Tracye, where they share their expertise, and there you can be encouraged, empowered, and, oh my gosh, I’m always so blown over by-[00:24:00]
what I, I learn from them. And now we will open up the floor to all who joined us so that they can ask her, that is Tracye, the questions that I forgot to ask. Thank you, Tracye. Thank you. You’ve been such a phenomenal guest. Thank you.
Tracye: Thank you.