S1 E17 Shit2TalkAbout Healing Trauma with Janine Wirth
Transcript was AI generated, if there are mistakes, please let me know! Thank you in advance! Jenn Junod
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Jenn Junod
Hey, Janine. Thank you for joining. Shit. You don't want to talk about. Could you please introduce yourself and let us know what shit you want to talk about today?
Janine Wirth
Yeah. Hi Jane. Thanks so much for having me on. So my name is Janine. WW. I not wo and I am a psychotherapist clinical hypnotherapist and coach and I specialize in trauma or painful life events is another way to say it. And I have a virtual practice working with women all over the world.
I think we're at about 20 different countries now. And basically I help especially female entrepreneurs to heal and then build businesses and lives that are based on fun and freedom and so many questions on there.
Jenn Junod
The first one that pops up is what is hypnotherapy, like I've heard of it and we've had a guest before that just kind of, he touched on it. But, and it's been a while. So I don't know if he fully went to it. What is, what are all the type of therapies you do? But specifically questions about hypnotherapy.
Janine Wirth
Yeah. So I like to take a very holistic approach. back in the day when I had therapy, it was more like talk based therapy, which is great. I'm not knocking it. We did the best at that time with what we had. But I like to use a lot of different modalities depending on what the client wants. Working with me is a very client oriented experience, meaning that I adjusted to that person.
It's not a cookie cutter approach. So I like to use EFT tapping. I like to use some N LP. There are so many different things that you can use and I do clinical hypnotherapy. So what that basically means is you're using hypnotherapy for a medical or clinical purpose. It is not what people see on TV. You know, in the movies where someone's in Vegas and they clucking like a chicken on stage.
That is not the same thing, right? A lot of people like I'm I, you're going to control my mind. I'm like, no, thank you, Hollywood Hip. The thera is actually a very scientific modality where we use alpha brainwaves to, if you think of your mind, you can think that you have two computers. The front one, the logical one is the one that helps you decide.
What are you gonna wear today? What are you gonna make for lunch when the back part is like this giant vault, the subconscious mind. And in there are these files of all your memories, all your experiences and I can put your logical mind to sleep and go into the vault and go and look at files and see why you behave in a certain way or why you believe certain things that perhaps aren't true.
Because the thing is, once the subconscious mind holds on to a belief, it makes decisions from that place. And when it's a negative or a wounded belief that's based in emotional baggage, you can imagine that the decisions and the choices coming from that place don't really serve you. So I wanna go in and look at the truth because when I ask you a question, your logical mind wants to jump in and give me an answer for the sake of giving me an answer.
So I can ask you. Well, Jen, what did you think about it? Why do you think? And we can talk about it until the cows come home? That's why some people are in therapy for 10 years without getting results, you know. But when I go and look at what your subconscious mind is holding on to because you can imagine. I hear the worst of the worst stories being a trauma specialist. But what people don't realize is regardless of what happens to your physical body, broken bones, heal, cuts, bruises,
everything heals. The problem is that your mind is holding onto unprocessed emotion and it's attached to those events and when you don't take care of that, it doesn't go away. It doesn't just magically disappear great. If it did, you know, then I wouldn't need to do this work, but it doesn't, it just piles up. So you can imagine when, by the time you get to 3040 that mountain is quite high now.
Jenn Junod
And, and for our listeners real quick, I'm over here laughing awkwardly because everything you're talking about, Janine is just so on point with my experiences. So I'm not laughing about what you do. It's going, oh, shit. That's real. Yeah, that's real. Yep. Yep. I've been through that.
Janine Wirth
I get that quite a lot.
Jenn Junod
So, how many podcasts have you been on so far? Because you have your own podcast? But how many have you been a guest on so far?
Janine Wirth
I actually don't know. At this point, I think it's somewhere in the sixties or seventies. I've been doing it since I've been going on podcast since I think 2019.
Speaker 4, Janine Wirth
So it's been a while.
Janine Wirth
my own podcast, I've, today, the sixth episode went live because, I had it on my to do list in January 2020. And then life came and said, oh, really? And yeah, when I, I mean, I have three Children and then my husband was at home as well for several months because here in Germany we had more than one lockdown where everyone, even the schools were closed, everyone was at
home. And then it's just impossible. There's so much noise, so much going on that, it just got a bit delayed. And then this year I was like, right now we're gonna do the thing.
Jenn Junod
Congratulations. And I, I love the fact that even though it was delayed, you still got it done.
Janine Wirth
Yeah, definitely. I mean, I'm a f believer in flexible structure. So I teach my clients, you know, we wanna have these goals but, and we wanna know what direction we're going in, but we wanna stay flexible. So when life throws us, these curveballs or someone in your family gets ill or whatever happens, you can still get stuff done. But in a way where everything your business is basically centered around your life, not the other way around.
Jenn Junod
I really like that. And I, I've used the term myself, organized chaos just in, in the fact that it's my life especially. I've been clinically diagnosed as a DH D PTSD bipolar type two and anxiety and depression. And I also just in my own life have noticed I'm not one to keep structure and the way I've always handled it is I put people that are like my pillars around me, they're very structured people.
So I end up being more structured just because they are. And it, and it's nice in the fact that I feel like I can get delayed on things yet. I'm not, you know, getting so far behind where it was a dream that never happened, such as launching this podcast. Now, what, what got you into going into psychotherapy and you know, hypnotherapy. How did, how did you get to this point?
Janine Wirth
Well, it started with a personal experience which I think is true for a lot of people, especially coaches. And I myself had a traumatic childhood. I was parented, I use that word very likely in this context, by someone who experienced trauma back back then, unfortunately, didn't get the necessary help. And then I grew up in South Africa and then you get your driver's license at the age of 18.
And on the very day that I got my driver's license that night, I went out to go and celebrate the fact. Yay, this big milestone, you know, independence. I just finished school and I never got to the restaurant to meet my friends because I then became involved in a hijacking a kidnapping and attempted rape at gun point. So that experience and I thought I was fine.
Obviously, it was not a great experience and I thought, ok, I need to process that, but about a week after that, I, because the police had a shootout, they got my car back about a week after that, I was in my car waiting to pick my sister up and a friend who didn't know what had happened to me, wanted to prank me and crept up on my car and slammed his head down on my driver window.
No, which usually I, I love pranks. I'm like the biggest prankster in our family. But that at that moment in time was just, yeah, I, I immediately in my body, you know, I could feel that I was getting heart palpitations. It felt like I couldn't breathe. I had this rush of fear and I thought to myself, wow, what is going on here? This is not normal.
And I decided to go and see a therapist and speak about this because I was just about to start my adult life. I didn't want to live, you know, like a hermit and not be able to go out or have these things happen to me and in that first appointment because they obviously say, ok, why are you here? And I told my story, my therapist said something really amazing to me that changed my whole perspective.
And he said, Janine, I think if you had had this picture perfect childhood, we probably wouldn't be here having this conversation because the way that that experience went down, you probably would be dead. It's because of the resilience. You're forced to, get from these experiences, you know, being able to rely on yourself that you actually fought back because I told the guy you'll have to shoot me first.
You know, and that wasn't the reaction he was expecting. You know, if someone puts a gun to your head and tells you take your clothes off, they expect you to cry, to beg to plead, maybe to comply even. But for me, it was like this rage, I'd never felt such rage in all my life. You know, I'd gotten to the point where I was finally about to embark on this independence and live my own life. And then that happens and I just lost it, like really lost it. And I said to him, you will have to shoot me
first. And then I, because he had dragged me up a a sand dune. I was looking down at his accomplice and then started negotiating with him saying take my car, you've already got, you know, back in the day, it was this huge nokia you knew immediately it was in your handbag or not. You've got my phone, you've got my jewelry, you've got everything, just take the car, you know. And when they actually left the one that had dragged me up the dune, he said to me, you're a crazy bitch.
Jenn Junod
That's like the best compliment ever.
Janine Wirth
And I thought to myself, really, really, after what you've just done, you wanna start throwing insults around, you know. And he said to me, if I hadn't, if I'd had this picture perfect childhood, I wouldn't tell a guy with a gun to my head. Shoot me first. I, I would have reacted completely differently, you know, and that was the first moment in my life that I felt any sort of gratitude for any experience that I had had.
And from that moment I basically fell in love with trauma and started reading anything I could put my hands on. You know, because I'd experienced it in a traumatic event like that and experience being parented by someone who was traumatized. And I just knew that if it had such an effect on me, I don't want it to affect my Children one day, I don't want to give my Children a childhood they need to recover from.
And I just started, I'm a real research nerd. Like if something interests me, I will become a walking encyclopedia on the topic. And I just started studying trauma. And then one of my best friends, excuse me, one of my best friends, got cancer out of nowhere and he was on his deathbed and he said to me, make sure you love what you're doing because I thought I would have more time.
Oh, damn. Yeah. And at that point I had because I'd been in the meantime, make my German husband move to Germany, learned the language, started my corporate career. Over from scratch. Gotten to the point where I was doing really well. But I noticed the higher up I was going, the more unhappy I was becoming, which when people look from the outside, that doesn't make sense.
It's like you've made it, you've moved countries, you've learned a language from scratch, you've made it in this huge industry. And I was like, this is not making me happy. So luckily I have a very supportive husband and he's like, I just want you to be happy and my Children were a bit bigger then they didn't need me as much. And I started from scratch. Decided, right.
Let's make it official. I want to be a therapist. I wanna specialize in trauma and I wanna work with women because as women, you know, we always put ourselves lost. We are trained from kindergarten age to always think of the people around us to make sure everyone around us is happy and very often that doesn't work out for us because we end up putting ourselves lost.
Jenn Junod
How, how is that experience? So you've restarted multiple times and that is something so many men and women and and so many people in general are so scared of doing this. Starting from scratch. I have a similar experience of, I've started from scratch multiple times. I decided that I wanted to be a videographer at one point to and decided to intern as videographer and learned that is not my cup of tea yet going through. That experience helps me so much in my day job. It helps me with
the podcast. It helps me with everything, but definitely don't like being behind, like actually being out with the camera. I'm like, this is not, no, this just does not make sense to me, but so many people are afraid of starting over and especially from your experience. Is it the trauma that you've seen that people are afraid of starting over? Or is that just inherently we're just, you know, as humankind, we're afraid of change. What's your opinion there?
Janine Wirth
I think it's a combination of a few different things. So, first of all resilience, you know, if you are someone who hasn't had a fantastic childhood, you are probably going to be quite resilient. It's a personality trait as well. I am someone who's very competitive. I'm a recovering perfectionist because that perfectionism is actually very intricately linked to trauma,
which I didn't know until a few years ago. And a lot of people pride themselves on being perfectionist. And I think it's also, I don't know if you know about human design a bit.
Jenn Junod
Could you explain that for the audience?
Janine Wirth
Yeah. So human design is basically where they use your birthday and time to get your chart. So there are different profiles and I'm a manifesting generator and a manifesting generator is the person who has multiple interests and can basically create a career out of any of their interests.
Jenn Junod
That's really cool. I mean, I'm, I'm looking up something too because I don't, I promise everyone and promise you, Janine. I am not just looking at my phone to be super rude. Please continue and I have something that I I want to tell you about as well.
Janine Wirth
Ok. So it's quite common for people with the manifesting generator profile to change direction a few times in their life. So these are the multi passionate people, you know. So I love sales. I was in a corporate career training sales people. I love therapy. So I became a therapist. I love coaching. So I've added coaching to my thing. I, when I came to Germany, I taught at different universities because we were in the middle of the huge crash in 2008.
So I like to think of manifesting generators as you know, the people that you can put them anywhere and they will survive, they will come up with an idea and make money from it. So I think it's especially in my case, a combination of all of those things. I'm not saying people who aren't manifesting generators can't do it. But if that is your inclination, it might be natural or feel normal to you. You know, to me, I realize, ok, moving countries learning a language starting over from
scratch, it's a lot of big things, but it felt normal to me so other people look at that and think, oh my God, I'd never be able to do that. And I'm like, yeah, you don't have to. My journey is my journey. You don't have to compare yourself with me. Do what makes you happy. But this is how it worked out for me. And so far it's working out quite well.
Jenn Junod
That is, that is so true because you mentioned it. And I'm like, dude, that's so cool. And yet I even, even my, my partner Tyler, he would be like, and like, we both share an office together and it is very hard for him when I have recording if he can't go into the actual office, if we have to share an office and I have recording that day, he has to work from the dining room table and it like throws off his entire day where if he has, if I'm not on a recording that day, I'll work from bed, I'll work
from the table, I'll work from the couch, I'll work from wherever I don't care. And it's, it's that complete difference of, you know, just being up and moving and, and where he is very much like a pillar and needs to that steadiness. And I have done my, my human design. What I was trying to, I didn't want to forget to ask you is, have you ever heard of I might be saying this wrong but jois, readings. It's jyotish.
Janine Wirth
I actually haven't.
Jenn Junod
It's really cool and I've heard it's very similar to human design. you actually have to have somebody read your chart and I, it's something that I found so interesting as I am a very creative and logical person. a lot of people will lean from my experience. a lot of people will lean one way and afraid to go the other way. I do my best to kind of like force myself to go back and forth.
And to me these type of like human design or this yo breeding is some people may call it a little too woo woo or fru fru or all those type of terms. And I'm like, this is something that piques my interest so much and supports so much of what I'm doing that it, it lands in the world of spiritual for me of there's more than where we're at right now and you spoke of manifesting as well, just like in general, not even just your human design.
And how does that show up in therapy? I, I asked because there was a point in my life where workshop that I did wanted me to visualize, they're like, cool, visualize where you know, something you wanna do in your life, picture yourself in there. And my, I was just like, everybody's doing it, everybody's talking about it.
Cool. I'm just gonna be happy if I live till tomorrow, you know, like it was completely blank. I was just like, I don't know. And how, how do you talk about that with your clients? And how do you bring that up? Especially if they have that emptiness, I guess of their future.
Janine Wirth
OK. So the part of the brain that gets affected by trauma is actually actively involved in visualization. Oh, yeah. So when people, you know, when I work with clients, they sometimes find that it's easier to do it afterwards because they can use that part of their brain a lot easier. However, when people don't understand with manifesting, you have specific and unspecific manifesto.
So I'm a specific manifesto meaning that to me the details that are important, I need to include them, right? Where I'll give an example of one of my friends. She's unspecific, you know, this, we both bought cars this year and I couldn't decide between three cars and I couldn't go and test drive these cars because we just couldn't because of the situation in Germany and lockdown and all of that.
So I was trying to decide and I just couldn't, the minute I decided I wanted a BMW two weeks later, my car was on my parking lot. Whereas my friend, she's unspecific for her choosing a specific brand and make did not feel good to her. She felt into what would it feel like? What would it smell like? You know, it didn't have to go into detail where I was very specific. It had to, you know, be this color, it had to have these features and that's the way that I because I'm a specific manifesto
that helps me to get there. So just feeling into it is not enough, I need to know what kind if I'm trying to, you know, do a holiday house, where is it gonna be? Is it gonna be a single story? Is it gonna be a double story? Must it have a balcony? What is the view? Is it mountains? Is it the beach? Those kind of things? So you don't have to know every single detail, but at least the details that are important to you.
Jenn Junod
I, that is so cool. I remember the first time that I worked with a coach. I and I, I haven't mentioned this too much on the podcast. I, in my mid twenties, I quit my corporate job in sales and moved across country to ha try to have a better relationship with my father, which that's a story for another day. Not worth going into today yet. While I was there, I was, I went from Arizona to Indiana and I was the only job I could really get was a cocktail server and cool whatever.
I, within two years I moved back to Arizona and somebody posted about, hey, get free sessions for, you know, coaching because they're a live coach. And they need to have certain hours. And I met with her and she's like, well, what type of job do you want? And it's so cool because she asked me specific. She's like, well, where do you think you're looking at?
Like, what type of environment is it? Are you sitting or standing? Is it indoor or outdoor? And it was, that was the first time I was really able to have that type of saying it out loud. And what I described what I worked at a, cell phone company that I was standing for 8 to 10 hours a day. And which after seven years of doing that, I was absolutely miserable.
And so I said, I really want to still talk to people. I just really wanna make sure I'm sitting down and that I can make enough money to pay off my debt and that it's a fun environment and I have room to grow. And within a month I restarted my career and was able to work at an internet company call center. And that's the job that within three years took me international.
And it's, it's interesting to me how asking those questions even of ourselves can really help with working on that visualization. And I love your call out of you can, you can do it both ways. You don't have to be as specific, like the way she was asking me these questions, I became more specific. See if I can talk specific. it, it is. And, you know, sometimes I like to see the ocean instead of pacific, you know, it matters on the day.
And it's just so cool of that call out because it, having that goal in life. That's kind of how I've also wrapped my head around. It is, it's a goal. Not necessarily just a manifestation or behind the book of a secret or a vision because in my logical brain, if I say it's a goal, it makes more sense. And then in my you know, creative spiritual brain, I'm like, yeah, it's, you know, a vision, a manifestation and, and it makes the two sides work together.
And, and talking about the brain a bit. And I, I'm curious how this, if you've worked with anybody like this is my trauma that I grew up with, which is on a very, very high level. You and I talked about this during our intro call is physical abuse, emotional abuse, sexual abuse, rape, blah blah, blah. And I'm very good at, at saying it as bullet points still working through therapy, which is
Janine Wirth
and the, the, the blah blah blah part that gave you.
Speaker 4
Yeah.
Jenn Junod
Yeah. Not my favorite thing to work through. Yet so worth it is I, I thought I was over it all. I never went to therapy. My outlet was looking at personal development courses like I've been a person personal development junkie. And what happened is last year in 2020 I guess by the time your episode comes out it'll be 2022. Which is crazy to me to think. in November 2020 I had to have a craniotomy and where the craniotomy was, it was on my right temple.
And there hasn't been a lot of research in this, that, that's where all your long term memories are stored And so that re triggered everything. And I'm grateful in the fact that that got me to finally launch the podcast and, and, and make this happen yet. Does that not just from surgery? But does that re resurgence of memories pop up for people like later on where they thought they were totally fine.
Janine Wirth
It depends, it depends on the type of therapy that they're doing and it depends on how skilled the practitioner is because this is why. And I can be a bit of a, a grinch about it. I feel that there are people working in trauma that should not be working in trauma, reading a book on trauma does not make you qualified to work in trauma, right? And if you are not careful, you can re traumatize people.
And I've had quite a few people come to me and say I went to so and so I wanted to kill myself afterwards, help me and we never want to our clients off worse than when they came to us. Right. So that's why I'm, I'm a bit of a stickler on people. You know, I love the fact that people want to do the work but do the due diligence and find someone who has experience, who's qualified, who knows what to do and can hold that space for you.
Because there are so many people and I get, I, I totally understand that they wanna do good in the world. But if you end up hurting people, you're not doing good in the world. No. So very turn. I mean, you wouldn't take your car to a bakery for a service, right?
Janine Wirth, Jenn Junod
So make sure that when it comes to and trauma is such a personal topic, make sure that you have chosen someone that you feel a connection with that is qualified and that you trust and that, I've mentioned before on the podcast that finding a therapist or even I would say a coach because you definitely use each for different reasons.
Jenn Junod
Yet. Finding a therapist is such a unique experience and can be very hard to find a therapist that you vibe well with. And my therapist, we, our first meeting was virtual and just her presence is what I vibed with. And I told her point blank at the beginning and I was like, I can't know anything about you. because I'm amazing at getting to know my therapist better than my therapist knows me.
And that's totally a defense mechanism. And she's like, ok, cool and out over the, oh gosh, I've been seeing her for seven months now. We're working through E MD R. and yes, I, I'm currently stuck at the moment of a memory that I have feelings for, but I can't remember it. And so she's helping giving me like, even though I'm very stuck of helping me break it down and being very patient with me.
And the reason that I mentioned this is there's been only a couple instances that she said Jen, I'm pushing you because I've been through something like this and I know you can get through it and by pushing, she'll just be like, she'll let me talk for about because we signed up for an hour and a half sessions instead of like the normal 50 minute sessions.
And the reason is, is because I have to feel like I can talk everything out currently before I can go to the past. So when we're talking about everything currently, she'll give me those like, what the fuck Jen? Like, why do you think you're thinking like that? You know, and she makes me think about these things and she calls me out of my shit yet when we go into the, you know, we start doing the eye movement stuff. She would never in a million years do that. She's very OK. What do you feel
now? How are you feeling? Let's dive deeper there and that dynamic is something that I've looked for in a therapist for 20 years and have never been able to find. And it's so important to have that trust and figure out what you need from a therapist too, which I think is easier said than done because I thought I could go to any therapist and I've had many therapists that messed me up more than before I got there. Yeah. And what would you suggest to people looking for therapists?
Janine Wirth
I think that you should be honest with yourself in what kind of personality you do best with? I am known as the no bullshit therapist and coach. I am not the Kumbaya, let's cry tales. Hanky's type of person. It's not my personality. And you know, when I became a therapist, I thought to myself, well, I'm going to be listening to people's stories and very often I am honored that I'm the first person to
hear people's stories. And for me, I had to think about, well, who am I? And how am I going to be perceived? Because there's a very fine line between empowering and mothering.
Jenn Junod
Oh, wow. That is such a good call out.
Janine Wirth
And I'm not here to mother. There are three people on this planet that I need to mother and they are not my clients, right? I'm there to empower and I have a lot of my clients tell me I have warrior energy. They like pick that up from me. I'm like, I'm here for it. Let's slay the dragons. Let's do that. And not everyone will enjoy that. You know, if they're looking for the kumbaya la hanky vibe, that's not me.
Jenn Junod
Can you give us an example of, mothering versus empowering and, you can use me as a guinea pig on this of I'm telling you that I'm having a really bad week and I got into a car crash and just like shit hit the fan. I'm just not doing well. What is a mothering response to that?
Janine Wirth
Are you OK? My angel can, are you OK to go to work? Have you been to the doctor? Do you think that we need to call someone? You know, it's not empowering, empowering would be, have you got medical attention? We want to make sure that our clients are physically safe and then say, ok, how did you get into this situation?
How can we find a way to reframe this, that it is actually working for you? Mothering your clients is and I see this especially when people do coaching as well. Like I do, it's doing things for our clients instead of teaching them how to do it for themselves.
Jenn Junod
I, I even in just regular work and not coaching, I've seen that and the fact that I'm like, oh, it'll just be easier for me to do it. Let me just do it and, and the mothering versus empowering as well in friendships or in relationships as well. Not even just clients. So thank you for, for showing us those differences. I think that's a very, very clear way yet. I'm like, oh shit, I've totally done that to people. My bad.
Janine Wirth, Jenn Junod
How do you go ahead with, with mothering?
Janine Wirth
We are protecting and we are making decisions for the person. If my child gets hurt, I'm going to make those decisions for him or her, depending which child. We're empowering, I'm helping you to make your own decision and what feels good for you because I might make a different decision in that situation because we have different ideas of happiness or success or goals, whatever, but we need to provide the
information, provide different perspectives and lead you through the process of coming to a decision. That is right for you not telling you what is right for you. That's mothering.
Janine Wirth, Jenn Junod
I tell my child it's called outside, put a jacket on, I'll tell my client this could happen, this could happen, this could happen what feels right for you and, and I see that even in the jacket situation of it's cold outside, you might want a jacket, you know, compared to your kids.
Jenn Junod
it's called I put on a jacket and when you're talking to your clients, especially those coaching others, how do you get them to break the cycle? Because is it something that they learn to do with, with their clients? Or is it something that came naturally to them?
Janine Wirth
I think it's a combination of things, you know, some people have a very mothering kind of personality, you know, where they always want to look after people and they want to make sure everyone's happy and, and that's a good thing in other parts of your life. Yeah. And I think that some people, you know, even your childhood, the way you grew up could influence that.
I've from a very young age, looked after myself. So and I'm very independent and I like to make my own decisions. I do not like to be told what to do. So that obviously, I think that other people must feel that way. If someone was dictating to me, it would never work because I'm not someone that likes to be dictated to, you know, so when we go into these relationships, we need to look at the personalities and the dynamics of it and decide what inspires you and what holds you accountable.
You know, I have a client that says to me, she basically knows what she wants to do in her business. But she works with me specifically because I lovingly kick her ass when I say we set, you know, a goal together. By the time when we get there, she needs to produce something, you know, and I'm not, she said to me she can't even make stupid excuses to me because she feels like so this is not gonna work here.
Jenn Junod
Yeah. And, and that's something we, back in December, we did launch an episode about getting over excuses and where these excuses come from. It's a lot of what I'm hearing too. And in my own experience is I ended up getting divorced because I was mothering so much and, and I say that because I, I literally would just cuddle him and, well, that didn't help me feel any better.
And that like in the long run just, it wasn't in a good relationship yet. My, my current partner and is phenomenal at that in the fact that if I need him, he'll be there. Like I'm still going through a lot of my trauma, like working through it. And yet if I'm, you know, just being I'll say lazy or, you know, something, he's like you're a bad bitch, go get it or he's like you're independent, you go do it.
And it, it's so cool to have that relationship because it pushes me to be, is still a very independent to go after my goals yet feel so close to him because I'm able to have those two dynamics. And when you mention that about a partner, it, I feel that from you, I don't know if you have a very similar experience, but it, it's very energizing, I guess I could say is the best way to say that.
Janine Wirth
Thank you. I have a friend who's a very well known relationship coach. And she teaches her clients that mothering your partner. And I'm talking about women who are in relationships with men. The minute you cuddle and mother a man and he, if he's a masculine man, you are killing the passion because that mother energy is not sexy. Men do not want to sleep with their mothers.
Jenn Junod
Yeah. Yeah. For listeners that are not watching on youtube. I'm giving her a scratchy face right now. No.
Janine Wirth
And when she said it, I just laughed and I thought it's so true. It is so true and powerful, masculine, high value men. They don't need you to mother them. They wanna feel like they've got you. And that's very difficult if you're playing mommy to them.
Jenn Junod
Yes. Yes. And, and my partner, it was, he was the first guy that I naturally started wanting to mother him and he was like, I got a mom. You don't need to and he would call me out on it and he'd be like, Jen, I get you wanna control the situation back off. And it was that type that really taught me what the difference was and to learn to trust him as well because I can be a leader and yet allow like, trust him to lead. And that was something that was a huge change for myself.
And did you have those type of experiences with your husband? And how did that trauma like show up in your relationship? Because you worked through a lot of it and at least in my relationship, Tyler's been there for it and has helped quite a bit yet. I know many people they've already worked through it before a relationship or they're working on it through their relationship. Like, how does that show up for you?
Janine Wirth
Well, for me, I always have to step on the brakes in the sense that in my life I am so used to leading, I lead my clients. I lead my business that I have to remind myself that I don't lead my husband. And if he ever, because he has a wonderful mother and she was really terrific. If he ever gets into the place where I feel he's being needy, all that and tell him I could do that for you.
But then you would be my princess and that would just kill any ideas of sleeping with you. I'm very direct, you know, and that just like is a nice way to remind him you're the man, you're big enough, you're old enough, go do it kind of thing. Obviously, I support him in things where he needs help. But I want him to feel empowered and being my princess is not empowered.
It's not empowered for me, I think and it's not empowering for him, you know. So for me, it's been interesting to see that self-awareness kicking myself where I notice in the moment shit, I'm trying to control him or I'm trying he's not my employee or I need to take a step back and think, ok, he's got the information, let's see what he does with it, you know, and give him that space to actually go into it and do it his way because I know what my way is and his way is usually a different way.
And sometimes, you know, because we both have strong personalities and he's a CEO we do sometimes get into a bit of a, a power struggle. And then I ask myself, is this worth it? Is this worth it? Is it worth having this fight or this conversation? Am I supposed to be leading this? What is my role in this ami the pilot or the copilot in some cases?
I am the pilot. And then I have to remind him that he's the copilot in that specific situation. So it takes a lot of self-awareness from both people being prepared to call each other out in a nice way and choosing your battles.
Jenn Junod
I really connect with that. And in the fact specifically in the part that you said, there's times that you need to be the pilot and he's the copilot and vice versa. There's times where he's the pilot and you need to be the copilot that is really powerful to think. And what I've seen my relationship as well is that does happen too where we both take turns and I will say he definitely takes care of our family. So well. And that allows me the freedom to be able to work both jobs, the podcast
and my real job and do this other work. And I also have found that I need a lot of rest to recover to re put out all this energy. And he's so patient with me that it's, it's definitely that dynamic of both did, especially when you two started dating was in and then became married. Is it something that your past trauma from the parenting experience or from the hijacking or anything like that? Have those experiences come up and in your relationship?
Janine Wirth
Not really because I met my husband when I was 27 and that happened to me when I was 18, there was a lot of time that I've been doing the work and in between that I had been married and gotten divorce. So I, it was my first time at the rodeo, you know, so that didn't really come up. Obviously, he knows about it and he loves the fact that I do this work. It was at that point in my life more like a fact like the grass is green skies blue.
This is what happened. This is the work that I've done on it. I was very secure in myself. And by the time I met him, I was divorced, I had a really high flying corporate job and I, he came to South Africa for two years on a project and I met him through some friends, some German friends. And when he phoned to ask me out, I said to him, you're gonna go home eventually.
I'm, I'm divorced. I've got two Children. I've got a very demanding job. Find yourself a barbie have your fun. And I'm not the person for you like shit is real on my side here. It's not, I'm not here for your fun times, your happy memories of your time. And so I'm not available for that shit. And his answer sealed the deal. He said to me, do you want to eat or not?
I love that. Yeah. So I thought, OK, this guy might be a bit different because from my perspective, you know, he'd never been married, he'd never even lived with a woman, never been even engaged. And I was already divorced. He didn't have any Children. And I was like, dude, I'm not the one for you. You're like level zero and I'm at level 200. I don't think this is gonna work and he was very confident in himself and he's like, well, do you want to eat or not?
It's like I'm not proposing, it's lunch, you know, which was great because we had two dates in one day. He invited me for lunch. I went, we went back to work. We, we work for different companies. He invited me to cocktails. I went, he had a business dinner. He said, if he didn't have that business dinner, he would have invited me for dinner.
And I was like, I would have said no, on principle, just not to make it too easy for him, you know, and long story short, he proposed after six months, we were engaged for 22 hours and on Valentine's Day, we've been, we will be married for 14 years already.
Jenn Junod
Congratulations. Thank you and happy early anniversary. Thank you.
Janine Wirth, Jenn Junod
Yeah, so you need that very unique.
Janine Wirth
You need that dynamic. And yeah, I said to him, well, because my hus it took him nine months to choose a new couch. So my husband is not someone that is very spontaneous or very impulsive. If it takes the guy nine months to choose a new couch. I said to him, how did you propose within six months?
And he said I only did it because I knew if I didn't, someone else would notice how great you are and I wouldn't have a chance. I had to seal that deal, lock it in and I was like, good man, time management, dude, I'm busy.
Jenn Junod
That is wonderful. And it going back to, I know we keep switching from your husband to your clients. and last question with your, with your clients, does that ever trigger anything? And or when you're talking to coaches and they're working with clients, does how do you walk them through if they're triggered on anything.
Janine Wirth
I don't get triggered very often. And I'm very grateful for that because I know that a lot of people do. I think you can be compassionate without going to the point where you're living your client story. For me, the, the most important thing is knowing that when I show up and use my skills, that person is going to leave better off. I help them slay the dragons but I don't take the dragons home. Right. So if my clients get triggered by their own clients, then we need to look at that because
that is shining a spotlight on. Hey, here's something that needs your attention. This is something that you haven't quite healed completely or maybe they weren't even aware that that's a trigger for them. I always say that we need to look at these triggers as gifts because it's showing us what we need to focus on next.
Jenn Junod
That is a powerful way to think of it. And I dy dynamic shift that I feel many of us myself included of thinking of a trigger as a gift. I have personally just get really frustrated at them and then go because I have to work through that and, and it's, and more of an annoyance and I, I love that shift of it's a gift. It teaches us what we need to work through.
Janine Wirth
I mean, if your goal is to keep becoming the next best version of yourself these triggers are helping you get there faster. Why would you not be appreciative of that?
Speaker 4
That is true.
Jenn Junod
That is true. And thinking of trauma the same way of, I know that my trauma has made me who I am and it is something that if I didn't go through what I have and may go through something in the future that it does make me deal with things a lot better now. And it's taken me a long time to not listen to the outside people of when they're like, but you've been through so much. So I, I would always go, oh, I guess I shouldn't be grateful for it.
And now I'm like, ok, everybody shut up like I am grateful for what I've gone through. I am now who I am and can show up for others because I went through all of that. And that is definitely something that is, is difficult sometimes to explain when others haven't gone through those type of traumatic experiences.
Janine Wirth
Yeah. You know, my whole theory on this or my whole goal of the work that I do is to help women become who they were always meant to be regardless of what has happened to them, regardless where they start out in life. Because you get two kinds of people, you get the person who makes these traumatic, painful life events, one page of this story and you get other people who
make it the entire book. It becomes so part of their identity that they cannot see themselves as anything else than a victim. I work with survivors. I don't work with victims.
Jenn Junod
That is, it's interesting because it makes me think of that dynamic between a therapist and a coach. A therapist many times is someone that will work with a victim to help them get through it, to become a survivor. A coach is someone that normally will work with them after they work through that trauma.
Janine Wirth, Jenn Junod
So I love that you are, you are a bit of both and yet you focus more on when they're on the tail end to become a survivor and work to from even surviving to thriving the way I see it is every single person who experiences trauma chooses who they're going to be regardless of the work that they do.
Janine Wirth
It is the active decision of saying this has happened to me, but I'm still going to become who I'm meant to be or this has happened to me. My life is over. That is a choice.
Jenn Junod
That is a choice. That is a choice. And I think that's something that many, many people don't realize that it is a choice and I know we're getting close on time. Is, is there anything that you wanted to talk about that we didn't talk about yet?
Janine Wirth
I think the only thing is that I think often people don't really understand what trauma really is and how it affects the mind, you know, it's again that Hollywood example of the war veteran, you know, and having this PTSD, you know, flashbacks and this really thanks for great movie watching. But they think that, ok, that is what it is, but trauma is anything where the mind feels, it cannot cope, it can be being bullied as a child, it can be having parents that are emotionally not
available to you. So they give you your clothing and your food and that, but they're not there to emotionally support you. They don't clap when you win, they don't, you know, try and build you up or anything like that. So if you have that experience and you feel that you're not good enough, that's obviously going to affect the trajectory of your life and the decisions that you make.
So I can very confidently say I've not met a person yet who has not experienced trauma. They maybe just don't perceive it as trauma because they think, well, I was bullied for 10 years. But I mean, so many people are bullied. It's like so normal. I'm not going to go on about that.
Jenn Junod
I think that is a great call out of because there's I've seen in so many people where they talk about in detail what they've been through and they know my story already and they'll be like, but it's nothing compared to you. And I'm like, this isn't a competition like it's not who's been through the worst shit.
Yeah. No one's gonna, yeah, exactly. No one's gonna win a prize for going through more shit. And trauma is trauma and it affects all of us differently. Yeah. And I love your call out on that is almost everyone has been through trauma.
Janine Wirth
Yeah. I'm yet to meet someone who has not been traumatized in some way, whether it was a teacher at school saying you're never going to amount to anything or a parent or grandparent or there's so many, especially as Children, we like sponges, picking up all this information and this forms the ideas that we have about ourselves and the way we think about ourselves. So don't compare yourself. You know, society teaches us to rate and compare.
Don't do that. Give yourself the respect and the space you've earned that trauma. You know, you went through that now you deserve to get help regardless of where it falls on someone's imaginary scale. You know. No, because I also often hear that, well, I was bullied for 10 years, but at least I was never raped. Who are you? You know, are you trying to impress me? Are you not trying to impress me? What is the deal?
Speaker 4
Yeah.
Jenn Junod
Wow. Yeah, that is, it's crazy of how dismissive we are or can be about our own experiences. Yeah.
Speaker 4
And ourselves.
Janine Wirth
Yeah, you've gone through that. I think that often we are the most judgmental on ourselves because we're scared of what people are gonna think, what are they gonna say? How are, how are they gonna perceive us if they know this about us? And I would encourage anyone that feels like that to stop worrying about what other people are thinking you're here for your journey.
Focus on yourself. Do what you need to do, get the help that you need so that you can have a happy and fulfilling life. Nobody else cares. They don't have a say in your journey.
Jenn Junod
Yeah, that is a very, very good call out. And as we wrap up any words of wisdom for our audience,
Janine Wirth
I would say if you are someone who wants to start or embark on this healing journey, keep in mind that it's your journey and you get to decide the pace, you get to decide the when the where and the how don't try and rush things go at your own pace. I always set the intention and it's a belief that I've had since I started my business is that the right people will find me at the right time, meaning that they are ready to do the work with me
specifically, just be open. And when you feel cold to have found someone that is part of your healing journey, take that action, take yourself seriously, give that to yourself.
Jenn Junod
Agreed. Agreed. And what is something that you're grateful for?
Janine Wirth
I'm grateful for the internet and I know that a lot of people are like, oh, social media is so awful. I'm not talking about that part. I'm grateful for the internet because it allows me to work with so many different women in so many different locations. Without it. I wouldn't be able to have this conversation with you. You know, it has allowed me to give women care, mental health care in such an easy way because all of my stuff is online on Zoom where women don't have to take time off
work. Nobody even knows that they're getting help. You know, they don't have to get a babysitter if they put their kids to bed and we have the call afterwards. It has allowed me to make it so much easier for the people that need it 100%.
Jenn Junod
And II I will mention something else I'm grateful for. But to start, it's amazing what the internet can do considering that when we first started our call, it was 7 a.m. my time and 3 p.m. Your time. It's lovely that the internet is allowing us to connect. And something that I'm grateful for is the fact that we are all on different journeys and we meet each other at a time where we all need to meet someone.
And it may be a life lesson. It may be somebody that's going to be there forever. It may be a stranger passing yet it's all woven together that it will help us become who we're meant to be.
Janine Wirth
Yeah, I love that. I totally agree with that. You know, some people, each person that we meet has a different role and oftentimes they're not meant to accompany you the entire way. And that's ok.
Jenn Junod
I, it took me a long time to learn that and I'm very, very grateful for my two best, like I call them sisters because I've known one literally since I was born and one since I was 11 or 12. And they, they definitely set the bar for anybody that's gonna be a, a lifelong someone because they, we have been through a lot of shit together.
Janine Wirth
That's wonderful. You're very lucky to have them. You should hold on to that. I always tell people the people who clap when you win with no, and they have no agenda. Those are the people you need to have in your inner circle.
Jenn Junod
Agreed. Agreed. Well, thank you so much, Janine for joining the podcast today and talk soon.
Janine Wirth
Thank you so much for having me. It was awesome.
Jenn Junod
OK, cool. How do you end your podcast? Because I always say, thank you for joining. And then I feel like I have to say something else. I guess I could just say thank you for joining.
Janine Wirth
And just like on my podcast, I usually ask the people where can people find you online? And then they will say it. Then I say, well, thank you so much for your time and then I play an out,
Jenn Junod
I think I'm just gonna leave this all in the podcast now and say, where can people find you online? Because I have the most awkward endings on every episode. So, how do people find you?
Janine Wirth
That's a nice way to end it off, you know, and I think that people who connect with the guests, that would be the logical next question. Obviously, in the show notes, I put links in that, but it's just a nice way to end it, I think because it, it can be a bit awkward.
Jenn Junod
Well, how do people find you so that way? I make sure it's in the podcast.
Janine Wirth
Well, on the Instagram, I'm therapist underscore Janine Worth W I RT H and my website is Janine worth.com on all my social media. I'm therapist, Janine Worth.
Jenn Junod
Awesome. Thank you. And please everyone because this is a better outro and saying goodbye. Please. Everyone. Please check out Janine, definitely follow her and keep up on what she's working on and definitely reach out to her for coaching too.
Janine Wirth
Thank you.
Jenn Junod
We appreciate you listening to the episode. Please like follow and share on our social media at Shit2TalkAbout. That is shit. The number two talk about stay tuned on Wednesdays and Fridays for new episodes. This episode was made possible by production manager Tron Nan, business manager, Bill Powell and your host, Jen
