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Ep. 105: Teens who panic: Managing panic attacks as a teenager
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Evan Transue started suffering with panic attacks at the age of 5. He had no family history of trauma, and due to his seemingly great life, his panic attacks went misdiagnosed for over 10 years. During this time, he developed other mental health conditions, and eventually turned to substances to numb the pain. Eventually he was diagnosed with panic disorder, and had an aha moment that changed his life.
We talk about what panic attacks feel like, how they can lead to depression, and how parents can help support teenagers as they learn to deal with them. Evan now hasn’t had a panic attack in 10 years.
Who is Evan Transue?
Evan is the host of The Health Detective Podcast and owner of Bucks County Light Therapy and Functional Medicine Center. He graduated from Functional Diagnostic Nutrition (FDN) in 2017. Prior to finding FDN he and his mother had suffered with a variety of health challenges for over a decade. The FDN system transformed his and his mom's lives so profoundly that all of his work is now centered around spreading its teachings. Evan speaks professionally to middle and high school students about mental health challenges and to date has spoken to 50,000 students.
More teenage parenting from Helen Wills
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Please note that Helen Wills is not a medical expert, and nothing in the podcast should be taken as medical advice. If you're worried about yourself or a teenager, please seek support from a medical professional.
Episode produced by Michael J Cunningham
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Transcript
Introduction to Season 9 and Focus on Teenage Mental Health
00:00:02
Speaker
Welcome to season nine of the Teenage Kicks podcast. I'm your host, writer and psychotherapist, Helen Wills. Can you believe it?
00:00:13
Speaker
When I started this podcast, there was nothing much online for parents about teenage mental health, still less about how to cope with our own anxieties when our teenagers are going through difficult stuff.
00:00:27
Speaker
Since then, I've spoken to over 100 guests about struggles they had in their teenage years, how they've coped since, and the advice they'd offer to young adults and their parents today.
00:00:39
Speaker
We've talked about all the difficult things, from anxiety to being diagnosed with an illness or getting kicked out of school. Spoiler alert, it all involves a bit of anxiety.
Helen's Journey from Podcasting to Therapy
00:00:52
Speaker
And many of my guests have told me the conversations have felt like therapy. It's what led me to think about training as a therapist and I'm happy to say that I'm now a fully qualified counsellor.
00:01:05
Speaker
I help my clients with anxiety and depression, loss, grief and bereavement, chronic illness, trauma and relationship issues and especially parents who are finding the teenage years tricky.
00:01:20
Speaker
If you think counselling might help you, you can find me at HelenWills.com. That's HelenWills, W-I-L-L-S w i double ls dot com. I offer a free initial conversation to see if we're a good fit.
Overview of Season 9 Topics: Diversity in Teenage Issues
00:01:35
Speaker
Now on to series nine and I have some fantastic guests for you. We're going to talk about what it's like to grow up with a disabled sibling, the teenagers who are embracing a sober adolescence, how to support a child who's questioning their gender or sexuality and teens who are people pleasers.
00:01:56
Speaker
Yes, they might be rule breakers at home, but lots of teams feel under pressure to perform for other people. And they need our help to help them stop, says one of my guests.
Evan Tran Su's Early Struggles with Misdiagnosed Panic Attacks
00:02:09
Speaker
My guest today is going to talk to us about panic attacks as a teenager. Evan Tran Su started suffering panic attacks at the age of five. He had no family history of trauma and due to his seemingly great life, his panic attacks went misdiagnosed for over 10 years.
00:02:29
Speaker
During this time, he developed other mental health conditions and eventually turned to substances to numb the pain. Eventually he was diagnosed with panic disorder and had an aha moment that changed his life.
00:02:44
Speaker
We talk about what panic attacks feel like, how they can lead to depression and how parents can help support teenagers as they learn to deal with them.
00:02:56
Speaker
Evan now hasn't had a panic attack in 10 years. Evan, welcome to Teenage Kicks. It's great to have you here. Yeah, thanks for having me. I was telling you before we started recording, this suit could not be a more perfect type of podcast ah for me and what I like to help people with. So I'm excited for the conversation.
00:03:14
Speaker
Oh, that's so good. Because I mean, yeah, basically, um anyone that's finding teenage kicks for the very first time, we talk about things that teenagers... quite often go through, I nearly said typically, but there is no such thing as typical.
00:03:28
Speaker
ah It's just that probably the issue you're experiencing with your own teenager is not something that is only your problem. It's common to a lot of people. It's just that you don't know it because parents of teenagers don't talk about their children's problems once their children can find that stuff online.
00:03:49
Speaker
um So it suddenly becomes quite an isolating place being a parent of a teenager if there's some kind of issue going on that is worrying you. um Evan, we're going to talk to you today about anxiety. and We've talked a lot about anxiety on the podcast, um but we haven't actually talked about panic attacks specifically. And that's what you're here to tell us about, right?
00:04:11
Speaker
Sure. Yeah, it's ah it's real stuff. So to get to explain that to someone, especially if I have the privilege of getting to do it for the first time, it takes an experience that seems almost unreal if you've never dealt with it, and we can definitely ah show the reality of it.
00:04:26
Speaker
Yeah. Now, as I understand it, your first panic attacks were age five and I normally dive in by asking about your teenage years, but if it's all right with you, I'm going to start right back there at age five and get you to tell us, well, we'll we'll get to teenage years, but maybe you can- Tell me what happened.
00:04:47
Speaker
So that is ah when the panic attack started. The first one that I can remember, I was on a school bus, but my parents said that I had had ones at the house as well. Now, my parents, this is, I'm 28 now, about to be 29. So we're going back 23 years.
00:05:04
Speaker
And I want people to really think about how far we've come with mental health awareness just in the last five years. um You know, bittersweet, but mostly because of the pandemic, right? Let alone 23 years ago and where we were at then. My parents are great people.
00:05:17
Speaker
They had no idea what was going on, though. When I experienced the symptoms of a panic attack, and we'll probably break down the symptoms more when we get to the teenage years because the the childhood stuff is actually very brief.
00:05:28
Speaker
What we did is we went to a doctor to figure out what the heck all this is and like what's going on. And then at the time, the doctor who meant, well, I don't blame this person for that. We actually still know this person to this day.
00:05:40
Speaker
um They did not diagnose it as a panic attack. They told my parents that they thought I was just getting too worked up, you know, just a nervous kid, and then I was going to outgrow this.
00:05:51
Speaker
The problem is, and this is why it segues perfectly already into the teenage years, actually, is it wouldn't be for another 10 years that i actually got diagnosed with panic attacks.
00:06:02
Speaker
Because at five, those things, that's so what I called them, they only happened a few times per month. And I'm not saying it didn't suck, but... Panic attacks are relatively short lived for most people. It's a 20, 30 minute, very intense experience.
00:06:14
Speaker
um And you know, I'm five years old, short attention span. So 90, yeah, 90 minutes over the course of a month, like it did suck. But I was, I'm a kid. I'm just simple minded. Like as soon as it ended, I'm like on to my next thing. And that's just how I was used to living life. So yeah. The only reason we knew that it had to be panic attacks at five is because my parents, when I got diagnosed with panic disorder later in life, they said, this is the exact, they were a little upset at the time.
00:06:40
Speaker
They said, this these are the exact symptoms we came in for 10 years ago. And you guys said there was nothing wrong with him and that he was going to outgrow this. None of us, including my parents, hold that same resentment now. It was just, we were frustrated in the moment. Yeah, sure. But- Yeah, I mean, it was almost 10 years when before they started getting very intense and an actual diagnosis was happening.
Coping Mechanisms: Substance Use and Realization for Change
00:07:01
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, you're so right because kids just crack on with whatever comes next, don't they? you More live in the moment, whereas in the teenage years, you're starting to overthink, you're starting to worry, starting to wonder what if. You're analyzing who you are, what you're going to be anyway. so a panic attack must feel...
00:07:20
Speaker
even more scary. I've had a couple in my lifetime and ah the the second time I was fine because I knew what it was and it therefore didn't last very long. But the first time was horrific.
00:07:31
Speaker
I had people around me offering to call ambulances. I really don't know what the hell's going on here. And I'm imagining for a parent to watch that in their child, if they've never had experience of a panic attack themselves, and they don't know what it is, that must be terrifying to watch. Were you aware of your parents' responses? so I think I was pretty disconnected from it um until like way later in life. and when I say way later, I mean like late teens, 19 years old, early 20s. And I think part of the reason for that is because as the mental health issues got worse and the coping mechanisms started to become...
00:08:12
Speaker
you know, very bad drugs and alcohol and stuff. That's, I mean, now there's a relationship strain too that doesn't really deserve to be there. It has nothing to do with my parents. It's not a personal thing with me. It's just, you know, I'm scared about this stuff.
00:08:24
Speaker
I'm nervous. I'm embarrassed. Um, and I want it to go away and the ways that I used to, or chose to make it go away. And it really didn't make it go away. It just numbed it, um, are not ways that you can tell your parents about when you're 15,
00:08:36
Speaker
can't tell your parents that stuff at any age, let alone 15, 16. And your point to your point about like people are thinking about calling an ambulance around you. So if we can, let's break this down, because if if your listeners have not heard this before, that's where we really separate. What is you know a teen having a temper tantrum versus what is an actual panic attack? So just so you guys know, I'm not a Ph.D. doctor. I'm an experiencer of this stuff who hangs out with counselors and smart people all the time.
00:09:02
Speaker
yeah So that's about it. But if you look this up, this is something you can easily find. ah Any medical website will have this. Panic attacks are defined with a certain set of characteristics.
00:09:14
Speaker
And one of them is this fear of impending doom that's actually a listed symptom for a panic attack. you say, well, what the heck does that even mean? Again, if you never experienced it, that's where it's almost impossible to register. So it's like, I hope no one's ever experienced this. But if you have had something in your life where...
00:09:32
Speaker
Maybe it was a car accident. Maybe it was something else where for a split second, you're like, oh, whoa, my my you understand the fragility that we have as human beings. Like you understand i could have actually died there. Yeah.
00:09:44
Speaker
It's kind of like that feeling, except there's no oncoming car. There's no XYZ thing. It's just an internal experience where you have this feeling like I'm going to die.
00:09:56
Speaker
I'm going to die. And then you have to get this energy out somehow. And I shouldn't say that for everyone because there's the flight, fight, freeze, fawn thing. For me, I was definitely a flight person. Like I would be, i looked erratic. I was running up and down the stairs. I'd be running around outside because had much energy.
00:10:11
Speaker
adrenaline going from this fear. It's like, I just have to go do something. I have had, I've seen other people though, completely just, it's the opposite. Like they, they feel the same way, but they melt down because of it.
00:10:22
Speaker
That's what I did. Yeah. yeah So I shouldn't say that everyone feels the need to get away. That's not exactly how it works. No, I get it though. I definitely felt the need to get away. ah ah But there was something in my mind. My rational mind was still kicking in and blaming me for and going, what the hell are you doing? there isn't You're in not in any danger. You're fine. Why are you doing this?
00:10:42
Speaker
yeah And I was at the gym drying my hair. And I just remember putting the hairdryer down and putting my head between my knees, sitting on a stool. I can picture the stool now because I suppose that was the adrenaline. Every single aspect of my surroundings. And this was...
00:10:58
Speaker
25 years ago is etched into my mind with so much clarity because i ah suppose that's the physical nature of the adrenaline in your body. It's all just heightened.
00:11:10
Speaker
and think about how your body perceives that. Regardless of whether or not there was a threat, we experienced a a perceived life-threatening situation. yeah our body survival mechanism is going to say, I need to like keep this in mind because this was a threatening thing.
00:11:26
Speaker
I find it interesting that you remember that. one very well because if I went back to like the first one that set off what then became panic disorder as a teenager I can remember that vividly as well right but the subsequent ones afterwards that's where like i mean those days just become blurry in the months afterwards yeah yeah I suppose your mind just wants to block that out somehow so it becomes a defense mechanism but I'm making stuff up now according to what what I know tell us so you um
00:11:58
Speaker
i've I've sort of bypassed the question of what your teenage years were like, but I guess we're going to go there anyway. Can you tell us what that panic attack, as you as you as you got or the one you remember really well, and as you got older, how did it feel?
00:12:13
Speaker
What was happening to you? So I was in the ninth grade here in America. ah We were about to get into summer. So ninth grade would be 14, 15 years old for most of the kids. You could have some on the extremes, but most kids are 14, 15. And it must have been at least like a year, I'm guessing, since I've had a panic attack on and off. Because again, you're you're a kid, you're short or teen, even so you're still short sighted. I didn't.
00:12:37
Speaker
initially recognized the feeling, but I had had them many times before. So I'll never forget, we had all, ah my friends and I, we had all hung out that night. We hung out in the neighborhood. We're just walking around, whatever. And we get down into my friend's basement to like watch TV before everyone gets picked up. No one's old enough to drive. So a bunch of people got dropped off in the neighborhood.
00:12:56
Speaker
And we were probably an hour away from being picked up. So this is the most relaxed part of the night. This is just where we go watch something funny. And within five minutes, of sitting in that basement, the overwhelming feeling started. My heart's pounding, chest is tightening, thoughts are racing. And I would always get a feeling like I couldn't breathe. That's what set it off, which is very common with the hyperventilation. It can feel like can't catch your breath. Yeah, that's what I had. Yeah.
00:13:23
Speaker
For whatever this helps people, because it's it's still hard to remember this in the moment. If you can talk, you can definitely breathe. yeah Otherwise, you would not be able to talk. But yeah, it's still in that moment. It feels like you can't catch up. So I I mean, I sprinted past my friends, ran upstairs.
00:13:37
Speaker
I'm screaming at his mom, like saying, like, I need to go to the hospital. I'm dying. Like, um I can't breathe. And so she she's watching me think about a parent that's watching another kid. So the parents will definitely get this. You're taking full responsibility for this child's well-being while they're at your house. So she gets in the car with me, doesn't even ask questions.
00:13:56
Speaker
We're racing to the hospital. It's like ah only seven minutes away from where they lived, actually. And as we got closer to the hospital. Because remember, we already identified panic attacks often are short lived.
00:14:08
Speaker
I mean, 20 to 30 minutes would be kind of a long one, I guess. The most intense feelings are really within ah a 10 minute span. And so as we approached the hospital, I would say two or three minutes ah beforehand, I didn't share this for years.
00:14:22
Speaker
I knew I was calmed down. and Okay. Yeah. And I started to remember, I said, wait, because I still don't have a label for this, Helen. I didn't know this what a panic attack was. But I said, oh, wait, I used to get this.
00:14:34
Speaker
Oh, wait, this happened before. And so I didn't want to tell them that, though, because, oh, sorry, who did come in the car as well was... um The friend whose mom owned the house, he came as well. So the stepdad's with all the other kids now. I mean, it's a fiasco.
00:14:49
Speaker
And so I'm in front of my friend, too. And we're guys. You don't want to share this stuff. He's going in a place of concern right now. But if I say by the time we get to the hospital that, oh, yeah, sorry, dude, I've never done that in front of you. But that's actually something that's been happening on and off my whole life. And now I'm fine.
00:15:07
Speaker
That was more embarrassing. So- It's not that I was looking for attention, but I was more comfortable with the sympathy I was getting than telling the reality of, yeah, I know I'm fine and I don't know why this happens.
00:15:17
Speaker
So, of course, we go to the hospital. ah The vital signs are all good. um Now, the people don't know to identify it as a panic attack quite yet because I'm really selling this idea that something's still wrong. But the vitals are good.
00:15:30
Speaker
The heart rate elevated, but nothing crazy. you know, they do the blood oxygen, which would have been down if I couldn't breathe. And that was yeah like a 99 out of 100. um And so it was eventually the um the mom and my friend had to go and my parents ended up showing up to the hospital, of course, as soon as they got the call. But I went home that night and I just I remember taking a shower. That's why it's so funny that you said that because it is so vivid.
00:15:54
Speaker
I went in that shower and I just stood in there probably for like an hour until the hot water ran out. And I was just thinking, what is this? Why is this back? And I had no idea um that that was going to be the beginning of panic disorder.
00:16:08
Speaker
And for those that don't know the difference, a panic attack, like you said, Helen, that could happen isolated 15 years ago, 20 years ago. And that's a panic attack. yeah Panic disorder is usually defined as when it becomes so frequent and so often that now the person's life is preoccupied with creating these somewhat arbitrary things. And what I mean by arbitrary things is like...
00:16:33
Speaker
You might only stay at your house. Now, you're still having panic attacks at your house, but you're so desperate to figure out these triggers when they don't necessarily exist for a panic attack um that you're trying to just rearrange your life in such a way that you're safe. But the truth is you're never safe. It's going to happen again.
00:16:49
Speaker
And so that first panic attack in my... ninth grade school year, that led to three to four months straight of, I am not joking, daily panic attacks, if not multiple times a day. I mean, it was exhausting.
00:17:03
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. ah Oh, there's so many things I could ask you in there. I'm just minded of you with a bunch of your friends being the person that has these attacks and
00:17:22
Speaker
What did it feel like to be that guy, to live with that and try and live a normal life as well? Well, let's put it this way. that was I went from never having touched a drug in my life to once that panic attack happened, within those next three months, I'm already like ah trying multiple things, experimenting, and then a few months after that, I'm using it daily.
00:17:45
Speaker
So my the reason I'm answering in that way is because... it It stripped my identity. You know, I'm now living this double life of this person who I mean, it wasn't the most popular, but I wasn't like some person that had no friends in high school. Like I did well. I could hang out with almost anyone. And it wasn't cool.
00:18:03
Speaker
It wasn't cool to say i get these overwhelming feelings where I think I'm going to die. i don't know how to explain that to you. I don't have a label for this. And let's be honest, especially. This would have been 13 years ago.
00:18:14
Speaker
Even if I did have the label for it 13 years ago, the pandemic really has ah lowered a lot of the stigma. And I've seen that as a speaker. I know it's lowered the stigma. Back then, I could have said the words panic attack. That wouldn't have meant a dang thing to 90% of the kids.
00:18:29
Speaker
um And it wouldn't have changed the fact that The word... I'm just... I'm not saying this is true, but the word that I used in my head and the word that I would not blame them for using back then is like, this is crazy.
00:18:39
Speaker
Like, you're normal one second and then you're telling me you're going to die and then you're fine. that You're either faking it or you're crazy. That's what I would have said as a teenager. So it's... It became...
00:18:51
Speaker
like Life was just this constant stress. It was always stressful. There was not one moment of the day that I was enjoying it or calm or having fun anymore.
00:19:02
Speaker
And I also understand that there are people in life that have been through other situations that I would never wish for. So this is not a woe is me type thing. I'm just stating the reality of the answer to your question. That panic attack at my friend's house started a multi-year period where I literally do not know. I'd love to have run the lab tests that I have now. i'm like, was my cortisol just elevated the entire time all day? Because I never felt calm.
00:19:27
Speaker
And sleep for me usually came, it was either induced by drugs. Or I had like the third panic attack of the day and I am so exhausted because this is like an adrenaline experience. Yes, it's it's tiring.
00:19:38
Speaker
Yeah, I'm so exhausted that I just I end up passing out at like the butt end of that panic attack. So, yeah it yeah, it was it's hard to comprehend everything. But the first word that came to my head, actually, when you asked, it was like it was just awful.
00:19:51
Speaker
That's how it felt. Awful. o I'm imagining that it was embarrassing to to to have that happen in front of people and that in itself is enough to provoke anxiety. But then you had the increased anxiety of knowing that never knowing when this might happen, but knowing that it could at any any moment.
00:20:11
Speaker
So were you kind of self-medicating to stop the panic attacks or were you self-medicating just because of generalized anxiety? I think it was all of the above and then even more. So it was the shame, the embarrassment that you're talking about. Because you're right. I had to play off that event.
00:20:29
Speaker
If I actually did that and just said, oh, hi, guys. Sorry, I have mental health issues. Unfortunately, i mean my friends loved me to death. But guys are rough on each other, man. Like we all- And girls, teenagers in general, right? They don't want to admit anything other than perfection to their friends. Right. And we've all done that. I remember doing that too. like Yeah, it's like made fun of them as well.
00:20:47
Speaker
um So if something happened to me like that, that could have been like, you know, the difference between we're hanging out versus not. So I made up this like I'm living these convoluted stories where i'm like, because he had a dog, a German Shepherd.
00:20:59
Speaker
So I said, yeah, I think I had an allergic reaction to the dog. So I just can't go in the basement anymore. Mm Now, I never wanted to go in the basement again because now I associated that place as a trigger place. So that made total sense to 14, 15 year old guys are like, damn, dude, that's scary. And then we move on to the next thing.
00:21:15
Speaker
The issue is, though, right, it's happening in school. And now I have to take 20 minute bathroom breaks and the teacher's mad at me. thinking that I'm just screwing around. It's like you're living these lies. So the drugs came in to, yes, hide the panic attacks. Yes, hide the depression that started because ah this is very common, by the way. So those that deal with panic attacks, ah generalized anxiety, actually really any anxiety disorder are much more prone statistically to then deal with depression.
00:21:43
Speaker
And I would imagine some of that's just genetically predisposed to this stuff, but also some of it is that's how you actually feel. When you're dealing with this stuff every day and you feel like you're not getting ahead, it is literally depressing in addition to getting you know a diagnosis of something. So when all these things were just stacked on, it was the perfect storm because that age was the age when my ah friends, you know they were trying things for the first time that summer, especially between 9th and 10th grade. Sure. Um, you know, that was the first time someone pulls out pot.
00:22:13
Speaker
That was the first time someone says, Hey, you know, we have like pretty much all summer here. Our parents work all day. Hey, you know, they have vodka upstairs. Why don't we all just like take half a sip, right? It's you're starting that stuff. But I was adamantly against that from a young age. I was just a very straight edge kid. I was like, and I was a nerd. dude I was a teacher's pet. Right. And this stuff started ah creeping in and I saw all my friends, like they're doing it and they're still you know alive because i was I was so anxious. I was anxious about the drugs.
00:22:43
Speaker
course. I do illegal drugs. Yeah. um Which but you probably should be anxious about. So I'm looking at this stuff. I'm like, well, they do this all the time now and they're still alive. They look a lot happier than me. I'm not having a good time at all.
00:22:56
Speaker
And so the first time I smoked pot, to probably no one's surprise, I had an awful panic attack. no but I'm sorry to laugh. go This is funny, though, because the second time I smoked pot, I had a panic attack.
00:23:09
Speaker
The fourth time it was so bad that I called my parents and they did not know how to handle that because they promised me as a kid, if anything ever happens, please do not get yourself hurt. You call us and we'll deal with the consequences later.
00:23:21
Speaker
But your safety is number one importance. i mean you couldn't. I don't think you could have a better philosophy as a parent to let them know. Let me know that you can call me. I'm going to be pissed later. But yeah right now is about your safety. And I did call them and I thought I was an idiot. um But they also thought that since that happened, they're like, well, I guess the punishment was right there. They didn't even ground me for this. Not because they're stupid, but because they said, you're never going to touch this crap again. It was a week before I did.
00:23:45
Speaker
Right. And Helen, I think, I mean, now I'm going like almost Sigmund Freud on this, right? Because I have tried to figure out forever what was the thought process back then. And when I reflected on a therapist later in my teenage years, um he posed the idea. He's not saying this is true. He just posed the idea. He said, well, Evan, you were getting panic attacks multiple times a day anyway, right? I said, yeah.
00:24:07
Speaker
He said, so maybe that's the false sense of control. is that I'm, my life's already completely, uh, disarrayed with this. I'm getting them randomly. At least if I smoke pot, then I choose when it happens. And now I was not conscious of this at all. And he admitted, he said this to me over and over. He's like, this is a theory of like, I'm not saying that's true, but I'm like,
00:24:29
Speaker
I don't know that I have a better answer. And I've been thinking about this for a long time now. It's like, yeah, why would you do something that's enabling one of the worst feelings that you ever get? it's like, I got to choose when it happens. At least you can't just come at me ah randomly all day. Well, it makes sense because what you're talking about is, yeah yeah, coming at you randomly all day. ah It's the uncontrollable thing.
00:24:52
Speaker
yeah And you may not be able to control the thing you want to control, but anything you can control feels better than being totally out of control, even if it's the wrong thing.
00:25:04
Speaker
I've said that in a really convoluted way, but it's why people... I think why people who, who are experiencing no control, no power, complete powerlessness over aspects of their life will start to become quite controlling in other areas of their life that aren't related. It's just feeling of, okay, I can control this, but you're right. It's not some cognitive. You don't know you're doing it. You just become more controlling, but that makes complete sense to me ah that you would, that is related.
00:25:34
Speaker
You're controlling when it happened. And let's be honest, when you take a drug, especially for the first several times, you're even for the first few months with like something like weed, ah I had a panic attack.
00:25:44
Speaker
That was 20 minutes. The weed's still in my system. The high's still there for multiple hours at that point, right? So it's like once that happened, it's like, well, no, now I'm goofy and you know sleepy or hungry, just the classic symptoms that you would think about. Yeah.
00:25:59
Speaker
I know that the therapist said that this is a possibility and I think there's a reality to that. But I also think some of it too was, okay, well, once the panic attacks gone, i normally just feel like crap.
00:26:09
Speaker
Once the panic attacks on marijuana were gone, I actually just still feel high and it's just a distraction um from my day-to-day life. So that was... if I know that the um the briefing that I got for this said, you know, hopefully some teenagers listen to this. I know it's mostly parents, but hopefully some teens.
00:26:26
Speaker
I am saying this to someone that doesn't know you. It's not like I'm your parent, not like I'm your teacher that's trying to control your life. I will never see you in person. That was the dumbest decision i have ever made in my life was using drugs to cope with these symptoms.
00:26:41
Speaker
The worst decision I have ever made in my life. It's not a close second. so Tell us ah tell us why Because when you use those things as a coping mechanism, and it was the only thing that's ever provided even mild relief. Like, again, mild relief for me. It was so bad that a step up was, well, I still get a panic attack, but at least I'm, you know, feeling a little goofy afterwards. That was the only coping mechanism I'd ever developed.
00:27:07
Speaker
And that's what you go to. So the problem is, though, drugs, people don't use drugs because they don't work. And this is where I'm a realistic person because everyone will be like, oh well, drugs aren't fun. No, dude, drugs work very well for a lot of people initially. And if they didn't, they wouldn't keep using it. My story is not the normal one. I know people get panic attacks sometimes from pot.
00:27:29
Speaker
ah But the normal story actually is, no, I took this and I liked it. And that's why I kept using it. And so we need to accept that reality because otherwise we won't understand how people fall into these loops. So clearly the pros outweighed the cons to me. Otherwise I wouldn't have kept doing it because I'm risking getting caught by my parents, legal trouble, like a bunch of stuff could have happened.
00:27:49
Speaker
And so when that's your coping mechanism, you want to use it more and more because the mental health issues are still occurring. Yeah. And on top of that, While the drugs might have been a solution at one point, which they were for me, I would go as far as to say they were, they caused more solutions for me, solutions, ah more solutions than problems for probably about two or three months.
00:28:10
Speaker
Okay. Then once that two or three months was up, Drugs bring their own problems. And all you were ever doing was masking the stuff that's under it. yeah So now, this is why it was the worst decision.
00:28:21
Speaker
yeah Now you have two problems. You have mental health issues that are worsening under these drugs and being masked. And now you have to deal with a substance abuse problem, which is what I dealt with.
00:28:33
Speaker
And it's like, I think as teenagers and kids, we don't take this seriously because we've been told from a young age. I mean, at least in America, it's said all the time. I'm sure it's the same now anywhere else in the world. It's like, don't do drugs.
00:28:45
Speaker
You'll build a tolerance. You'll end up wanting to do other stuff. We're like, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's what happened to me. It started out with smoking pot. Within a year, I'm illegally taking drugs. I don't know what it would be called in Xanax, benzodiazepines, Valium. Okay.
00:29:00
Speaker
Yeah. That class of drug. So now I'm taking that because the weed's not working anymore. Uh-huh. Yeah. So it's... No matter how long I did that, one, I could have died. So that's a whole separate conversation.
00:29:12
Speaker
But two... There is going to be some day where you have to fix the problem for the drugs or you succumb to them. And that's awful. We you don't even want to talk about that. Yeah. But you're going to have to fix the problems from the drugs. And when you have to fix those problems and you're burying all that deep stuff up, you're going to realize those mental health issues never got better. They're worse than ever before. And I still have to deal with them. So that's why it was the worst decision.
00:29:35
Speaker
That makes complete sense. you though i've i've I've done some work with people in addiction previously, and we we will always ask, what is the the drug, the alcohol, whatever it is, what does it do for you? Because it's always doing something valuable.
00:29:50
Speaker
or what or something that the person feels is useful to them until it stops being valuable anymore. And that's when they have to look at the hard thing that they took the drugs in order to avoid looking at originally.
00:30:05
Speaker
So I think that's probably a really important message that that thing that you're using the drugs to escape from isn't going anywhere until you do the really hard thing and sit down with it and figure out how to make it better.
00:30:19
Speaker
Yeah. And that's, I mean, that's tough. That's tough at any age. doesn't matter if you're 15, 55, 75. um I've met people of all stages of life that have dealt with this stuff and then decided to do something productive about it.
00:30:30
Speaker
um And grant you, one of the first steps is getting accurately assessed. And I know some people aren't in love with these diagnoses and that's fine. I'm not saying a diagnosis is not an ultimatum, ah but a diagnosis is a way to figure out what the problem is though, so that we can at least start a path of solving this because I don't know what my life would have looked like had I gotten a proper diagnosis at five. Would I have ended up on prescription medications that created long-term side effects that I didn't want to deal with either? I mean, that's very possible, Helen. So there's there's always going to be...
00:31:02
Speaker
some troubles to deal with no matter what path you take. But i I do know we have to identify a problem and the causes of it before we can ever work on a solution. um So yes, some people don't, they they hate, they detest the idea of being labeled with any type of mental health issue. ah You know, you could tell them that they have like a stomach issue or whatever, and they don't like that, but they don't mind telling their family and friends that they are very embarrassed still to this day. I this all the time of saying, yeah, I have panic attacks. Yeah, I have depression. It's like,
00:31:32
Speaker
Dude, I think we need to grow out of that. And two, as someone who shares their story quite publicly, as you I mean, look at this, right? ah You would be... You would wish people would judge you for this at this point. And what I mean by that is it is so frequent how the how often this is happening to people now that every time I share my story, I get people reaching out on Facebook Messenger or Instagram DMs or whatever it is. I have not heard from these people in 10 years, and maybe since high school.
00:32:03
Speaker
And they reach out say thank you so much for sharing this. I had no idea that you went through this. I've been going through this. The last year now. So the reason you'd wish people would judge you is because if they're judging you, they don't get it. If you're getting a bunch of messages saying, hey, I relate to this, I relate to this, you're like, holy crap, how many other people are going through this too?
00:32:20
Speaker
Yeah, well, that's the that's the point i was making right at the beginning of this episode, which I make every so often. It's not just you. There's always people who are dealing with stuff. And actually, the more you talk about it, the more people will talk about it and the less alone you feel.
00:32:33
Speaker
And feeling alone with a mental health problem is is is a significant part of managing ah finding it difficult to manage that mental health condition. ah soon as you ah I mean, I work in groups sometimes and I i would say group therapy is even better than one-to-one therapy because you get to meet people who are just like you.
00:32:55
Speaker
Yeah. point. Dealing with the same challenges. So tell us how, once you figured out what was going on and once you figured out that you needed to do something about the coping strategies you were using, how did you start to get better and to manage these, the panic and the anxiety?
Turning Points and Commitments to Change
00:33:15
Speaker
Yeah, well, first, and and this is important for me to say to parents because I think they sometimes wonder, you know, what am I doing wrong? Like, what why is this not working? And there's a lot of self-blame. And listen, I'm sure we can all be better parents. We can all be better people. like that it's not slightly There's no standard where you reach like 100% level parenting, right? So it's not to say that there can't be things that are done better, but...
00:33:39
Speaker
I need to say this. the The healing journey for me started with immense pain. um I got in a four-month period at 18, or well between 17 and turning 18, I got kicked out of school.
00:33:51
Speaker
I spent my 18th birthday on house arrest. I went to juvie for a short period of time, but nonetheless, I went to freaking juvie, juvenile detention facility. And the person that I thought I was going to marry one day had finally had enough because of the stuff I was doing, which was, that was justified like two years before she left, just to be clear. So she stuck with me for a while there. um she finally left my life and I don't know if it was her.
00:34:13
Speaker
I don't know if she was the icing on the cake or if that was actually the main thing, but I needed that pain in my life to change. That's actually what started it.
00:34:24
Speaker
I, It was so bad. And there were so many things where I just remember sitting there. It's like barely into the new year. it was like 2014. It was ah January in 2014. And I'm reflecting on my life. I'm just thinking, you have lost the person that has had your back through the craziest stuff ever.
00:34:41
Speaker
Like you have finally pushed her away. You don't have a high school diploma in a school that has a 99% graduation rate. because Some schools, and I don't know what it's like in the UK. Some schools in a America, the high school graduation rate, believe it or not, can be as low as 80% at certain places. Mine was 99. You don't not graduate.
00:34:58
Speaker
I'm not even graduated from that. I live in this wonderful area that I was privileged to grow up in and I have a criminal record now. I'm like, what are you doing? And I'm talking to myself. And I'm realizing if I don't change these things,
00:35:11
Speaker
Nothing is going to get better. Like I need to take response. I didn't probably use these words, but I came to an understanding that I need to take responsibility for certain things that are not necessarily my fault because what I'm doing now is now hurting other people.
00:35:26
Speaker
Like I'm affecting my parents. I'm affecting my friends. I'm affecting this high school girlfriend. This is not okay. And so it was really that drive, Helen, that, I didn't know how to get better.
00:35:37
Speaker
I knew I needed to figure something out though, because this was not any way to live. And the reason I mentioned it that way is because there's a ah beautiful book called The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho. It's fiction, but there's cool principles in there.
00:35:50
Speaker
And it says, when you make a decision, um the universe or God conspires to help make it happen. I don't know if that's just a nice thing to say or if that's true. You can believe whatever you want. But I know when I decided...
00:36:04
Speaker
I'm going to get better without knowing how I'm just some dumb 18 year old at the time. That's when the doors started opening. And that might be as practical as when you just um you've probably ah heard of this, the reticular activating system. When you see, you know, you want to buy a red car and all of a sudden you start seeing red cars everywhere. Yeah, yeah.
00:36:22
Speaker
I think that's why goals work. So you could argue that my decision to get better was a goal. And now when you see that goal, all of a sudden you're seeing the red car everywhere. You're seeing things that could contribute to that. So I got into a better group of friends. That was the first thing. And i love I love those people from high school. Many of them actually turned out great. And I'm thankful still ah that I'm still close to them nowadays.
00:36:45
Speaker
I could not be around people anymore that thought the... ah That thought a good weekend was let's hang out at 10 a.m. m and get high until the time we have to go to bed or have to go home for our curfew because we have a real tough people, right? We have a curfew at 11 p.m.
00:37:00
Speaker
I mean, that's not a way to live. I need to get around better people. So I found those people. I was blessed to get into a group that was very focused on personal development. ah i went So in the same six-month time frame, I went from sitting in juvie and you know having to deal with the people in there to I'm reading personal development books to hang out with this new community. I mean it was the ultimate switch-up. And so I'm reading these books. um I started taking care of my health, right? That's something you know I'm hugely passionate about is the functional medicine and holistic health side.
Parental Support: Communicating and Supporting without Blame
00:37:31
Speaker
I needed to start treating my body like a temple. I needed to stop treating it like this was going to be here. forever. And that's just something that you can do whatever you want with. And it's fine.
00:37:42
Speaker
I don't care if you're a teenager or full out adult, you can't be eating candy, sugar, fast food all day and expect to have optimal mental health. That is never going to work.
00:37:53
Speaker
And no matter what caused your particular mental health issues, whether it was trauma or no trauma, there is no argument that eating that type of stuff is going to support your mental health in any way, no matter what the cause. So I started trying everything.
00:38:07
Speaker
um But I will say to your point about the group therapy, even though I was hesitant about group therapy at first, getting around people who did not judge me for my past, who only saw me for what what I was choosing to do today and where I was going in the future.
00:38:23
Speaker
I needed that. I needed people that were stopping. They were no longer anchoring me to the past about the decisions that I made, which was justified. If you go hurt people in your life, they are wise to consider what you might do in the future because you've hurt them in the past.
00:38:37
Speaker
Yeah. with That fresh start with people that said, listen, I don't care what you did six months ago. I want to know what you're doing today. I want to know where you're going six months from now. ah that That helped me reframe my identity in my mind to thinking I was a loser to, oh no, I'm a winner. I just haven't gotten there yet.
00:38:54
Speaker
And to take the steps to get there. Yeah, yeah, yeah. ah I mean, ah all such good attitude changes. what I'm interested to know what you think
00:39:06
Speaker
I'm going to rephrase this. I'm say it differently. What do you think parents who are sitting listening to this now, and maybe their child isn't at the stage you're describing, which is a, you that's great. You managed to turn your life around. We all know that's the direction you need to, you needed to go in.
00:39:28
Speaker
Their child isn't there yet. Is there anything that those parents can do given that kids do not like to be told what to do by their parents, especially the older they get, the more independent they are.
00:39:42
Speaker
Is there anything that those parents who are tearing their hair out can do to help in those moments? This is a ah frequent question, as you can imagine, that I get like when I do those parent talks in America. um that they It always comes up. And so I never want to lie on this stuff. So I'm going to give the very realistic answer that's not perfect, but at least someone's not lying to you. And then you get disappointed when you realize it's not true.
00:40:08
Speaker
A 17 or 18-year-old is not – well, 17-year-old, let's go with that – is not an adult, but they are fully capable of making their own decisions. um Guys, there are – I'm a huge science nerd. There are genetic components that not only predispose someone to mental health issues, and I'm not saying that means you have to have them. You can get your lifestyle under control, but there's genetic components that – they just make people disagreeable. They make people, they're never going to comply with any authority figure. You could be the best parents in the world and there might not be receptivity to what you're saying. And so it's not to discourage you. It's just, I think you actually go crazier as a parent feeling like I must just be missing something.
00:40:50
Speaker
And the reality is, You have raised and brought up an able-bodied human that is capable of making their own decisions. In fact, the law recognizes that they're so capable of making their own decisions that if you're talking about an 18-year-old, if they go out and do something stupid, you can't save them from that, right? There's legal consequences to that. So we know that they're that independent, that we have decided as a society that that person will have major legal consequences to stupid stuff that they do.
00:41:17
Speaker
as early as the age of 18. Now, whether that's right or wrong, I'm not, I don't know, right? Because you could say the brain's not fully developed. I have no idea, but that's the reality of the situation. So what you can do is this, and I know this can't hurt, it can only help.
00:41:30
Speaker
having parents ah in a kid's life that do not let them get away with anything, but also love them enough and are realistic enough to say, hey, you got high from weed and you had a panic attack at the freaking movie theater like a moron.
00:41:46
Speaker
You can call us and we'll deal with it tomorrow, but we're going to love you right now and get you through the situation and then we can deal with the consequences later. That's huge. um you know And that's how you prevent a lot of the scarier stuff, right?
00:41:58
Speaker
I mean, who... I'm just making this up. But like, let's say, especially nowadays with the stuff coming into America is scary because they're lacing a lot of the stuff. It's terrible. so Let's say that night it wasn't just a panic attack. Let's say I actually did smoke something that was laced.
00:42:14
Speaker
And now I'm calling my parents. And that's the difference between my life being sad. save versus, well, I can't tell them because I'm too scared. So that's definitely one thing that we can do. ah Number two is if you do not have to understand mental health, although I would assume if you're listening to something like this, you're probably already a step above the understanding of the average person. So bravo.
00:42:32
Speaker
um But let's say you don't understand something in your kid's mental health journey. I would highly not recommend...
00:42:40
Speaker
Oh, I would highly recommend not dismissing the experiences that they are going through. um My dad, wonderful person. he That dude does not understand depression at all. he I still don't think he understands it, even though he loves me and supports my group half.
00:42:57
Speaker
You know, because he thought... I couldn't be depressed because I didn't lay in bed all day. That was his idea of what the right. So this isn't a dad. There's a difference between the dads that are like, no, toughen up, whatever. He was genuinely ignorant. And so it was almost like, um, he's like, oh no, you can't be depressed. It was almost like matter of fact. It's like, oh, like, don't worry. you used You can't lay in bed all day. It's like, okay. So I knew that he didn't mean that maliciously disconnect.
00:43:23
Speaker
from your parents. You feel like anytime I bring this up, you know, you don't believe this. My mom always believed it to be clear. And my dad believed most of the stuff. But when you feel like there's even 5% that they don't believe or don't buy, it makes you shut down the 95%. That's true.
00:43:38
Speaker
You're better off talking to your kid and, you know, shaking your head and nodding for things that you don't agree with or don't understand. It's then they're talking to you, not running around doing the insane stuff I was doing behind their back. so So just in summary then, one, be realistic that this is an able-bodied human that is capable of making their own decisions.
00:44:00
Speaker
And there are certain factors, genetics, biology, environmental friends that we have that make us susceptible to making bad decisions that are not your fault as a parent at all.
00:44:10
Speaker
Two, be an open door to talk to. Firm consequences. Hey, this isn't a party house. That's not what we're saying. But we are never going to be mad at you in the moment, no matter how stupid what you do is.
00:44:22
Speaker
You call us. We figure it out tonight. We deal with the consequences tomorrow. That's great. And then three... is even if you don't understand something or don't believe in something, some people don't believe in certain stuff. That's actually fine to me. I don't care about that. But don't ah project that belief onto the kid you want them to talk to you. If you don't want them to talk to you, do that all day. But want that open line of communication, you gotta to just you got to nod and try to understand deeper.
00:44:49
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, I think that's a good piece of advice. It's something that I try to live by and fail quite frequently and then have to apologize and and and regroup and start again. But just believe what they're telling you because that is their experience. Even if you know something different is true of other people and most of the world and you know what your child needs to do, they're just not seeing it.
00:45:13
Speaker
There's real value in in believing that that is their experience and and holding yourself calm with that. And Helen, I'm sorry, i because i just they may i don't want them to think that i I worded it wrong in the sense I don't want them to think they just have to smile and nod to everything and never challenge it.
00:45:30
Speaker
um Just to be clear, the alternative that would have been useful for my dad to do instead of saying, oh, I don't think you're depressed. You don't lay in bed all day. That instantly shuts down a teenager, right? Now we're fighting or arguing or I'm running off to my room, whatever.
00:45:41
Speaker
The response that I think would have been actually really helpful is that same genuine tone. Like, Ev, you know, I thought people who were depressed, they might be people who lay in bed all day. So I'm not saying you're wrong. Like, why do you why do you think you're depressed? Yeah, exactly. Ask questions and be curious.
00:46:00
Speaker
dad, I haven't felt certain emotions in three years. You know, I feel numb. That's why i think I'm depressed. Now the conversation is starting. and And guess what? If a parent heard that, even my dad who doesn't know anything about mental health, he knows a kid's not supposed to feel that. And he's yeah no one's supposed to feel that.
00:46:18
Speaker
Now we're understanding deeper. So just get curious and ask questions. You can even still hold your beliefs. If my dad, i know for this for a fact, if my dad had said to me like, I thought depression was like when you lay in bed all day. Why do you think you're depressed? what is What's going on for you? If he said that in that genuine tone, I'm not mad at him for having that belief. It was the feeling that it was being dismissed that sucked.
00:46:37
Speaker
Yes, absolutely. Yeah. And I think, you know, I'm... I'm not with your dad. I can't put words into his mouth, but I'm imagining that the reason he was being dismissive of it was because he really didn't want it to be true. And he wanted to reassure you that it wasn't true, but there was no reassuring you because you were there.
00:46:56
Speaker
So it wasn't the right strategy. and That could have been tip number four is parents have to,
00:47:05
Speaker
If your kid got cancer, you would never say it was a failing on your part as a parent. And yet similarly, just like just like I told you, people are fine with saying they have a stomach issue, but they're not fine with saying they have mental health. This is why.
00:47:17
Speaker
yeah I cannot tell you how many parents, I mean, today, 2024, have come up to me in speeches and feel like their child's mental health issues are some type of moral failing of their own parenting.
00:47:31
Speaker
And yet they would never blame themselves if the kid had cancer. Now, ironically, both of those conditions might be contributed by lifestyle factors. So, you know, if anything, you'd be playing a role in both of them. But that's that's not how you look at this. You should not be saying that my kid's depression is a moral failing. yeah Parents, that's you falling for the same stigma that's affecting the rest of us.
00:47:52
Speaker
That's not true. It's not your fault that someone has depression. Two people could be raised in identical households and certain susceptibilities to certain conditions lead one to having depression or one's totally fine.
00:48:05
Speaker
Yeah. I also like to remind myself, because you're right, that is ah like something that every parent does. And I do it frequently, probably daily. I will think, oh, God, if only I had done that differently and played played Sleeping Beauty more nicely one more time when she was three.
00:48:20
Speaker
i it it's It's nonsense. And I like to reassure myself that um even though I got things wrong as a parent, because I definitely did, we all do,
00:48:31
Speaker
I wasn't the only influence in their lives. They went to nursery and to school and they had friends and sleepovers and teachers who also impacted them. It isn't all on me. Yeah, 100%.
00:48:46
Speaker
yeah hundred and Yeah. Yeah. And as you say, there's also genetic components and and environmental aspects who that we just don't know. We can't and begin to know.
00:48:56
Speaker
But maybe that's a good point to um ask you about some of the other things that you do for your mental health, physical health that keeps you in a really good
Evan's Journey to Recovery and Holistic Health
00:49:07
Speaker
place. Yeah.
00:49:08
Speaker
So this is probably the one that I get most excited to share just because it plants a seed of thought in people's heads that they might not have ever considered before. um And I'm not here to tell the whole spiel. So again, it's just to plant the seed.
00:49:21
Speaker
What I did not mention today is that although I had these mental health issues, 100% true, I was very physically sick as well. So by the age of 18, I had seven different doctor diagnosed conditions, both physical and mental.
00:49:37
Speaker
and That's not going to be everyone with mental health issues. It's not what I'm saying. But you look at someone like that and you start, especially after the seventh diagnosis, maybe even the sixth could have done it for some people. You start to wonder, can I just be this unlucky or is there something that I'm missing here? Because this is starting to get insulting almost. Like this is just stupid.
00:49:59
Speaker
Yeah. And I'm like, I'm 18. What's 58 going to look like? How many more I going to have? yeah And I actually, it all started with asking myself that simple question of like, does this make sense to me? And ah again, I wasn't, I was coming fresh out of juvie. It's not like I was a smart doctor or something. I just got curious and I said, does this make sense? And it didn't.
00:50:17
Speaker
And so I started doing my, um, studying, if you'll call it that, online, which was like admittedly YouTube University. And then I would read books. I'd buy them off Amazon and have them delivered. I'd just read these books on ah different causal factors for this stuff.
00:50:31
Speaker
um I was always like a nerdy kid and interested in stuff. I just, I didn't have the credentials. And so when I started reading about this, I became open to the idea that perhaps my physical and mental health issues were not as unrelated as I once thought. i always consider Not only did I consider them unrelated, each issue was siloed.
00:50:52
Speaker
Depression goes here, cystic acne goes here, Meniere's disease goes here, depression goes here. like It was different. But I started seeing the body as this holistic system. And it made particular sense for someone like me when I was reading this stuff because I grew up in a good family.
00:51:10
Speaker
Like a lot of people that have severe mental health issues, there is a trauma aspect. So you know if you have that, that's something that needs to definitely be addressed and worked on. It might even be the primary thing that needs to be addressed and worked on.
00:51:21
Speaker
But what do you do with someone when life's actually been pretty good? You've done your due diligence to know that there wasn't any secret abuse or bad situations. like They really are in a pretty decent position.
00:51:33
Speaker
Why can they experience the same stuff? And that's when I totally believe it's this biochemical issue or biochemical issues that come up from today's world. And so the the very long journey...
00:51:46
Speaker
super short was I had to change my diet and lifestyle dramatically, um, to get to the state of health where I'm at today, which is someone who has not had a panic attack in almost flippant decade now, which is amazing.
00:51:59
Speaker
I feel like breaking out into applause. Yeah. Like, it's just, it's like, this doesn't even kind of happen. It's not even like I'm almost there and then I fight it back. It's not even a thing that my body does. Um, but that required severe dietary changes. So I, I'm not,
00:52:15
Speaker
putting this diet on anyone else, I'm just saying because they're always going to want to know and I don't want to leave them on a cliffhanger. They'll be like what do you eat? What worked for you? ah If I had to label my diet, which I do not, it is a...
00:52:26
Speaker
a modified version of what you might look at as like the paleo diet. So it's like a seasonal thing. um The main thing for me is local real food. That's number one always. I want to know what is being grown on a farm near me. Now, not the scary farms that are in a lot of America. I mean like an organic, you know, farm or It doesn't have to be organic always because those labels are super expensive over here. like You have have to pay to prove that your food doesn't have this crap in it.
00:52:53
Speaker
um So sometimes you can find a farm that's actually very organic, to be clear, that didn't pay for the label. And sometimes they're the best because they're the small little mom and pop farms um where you get to know everyone on the farm. It's great. So by eating real local food, stuff without 20 ingredients in it,
00:53:11
Speaker
You know, it doesn't fix it overnight, but my body got healthier and healthier. And then I did wake up one day and I'm like, whoa, this is good to go. um And sleep was another thing, too. So kids under the age of 18 that stay up past 12 a.m., which is like every teenager ever, just a few nights week. They're 42% more likely to be diagnosed with depression.
00:53:34
Speaker
Adult early risers, so adults that wake up at 7 a.m. or earlier, are 27% less likely to be diagnosed with depression. And yes, of course, the social media thing and growing up with that, I mean, I didn't have that at five, obviously, but growing up with that in your teenage years does not help.
00:53:50
Speaker
ah We know that kids that have more than one, more than one social media platform, are three times more likely to be diagnosed with anxiety or depression. If I told you so right now that there was something that would increase your risk of cancer by three times, you would stop that tomorrow.
00:54:07
Speaker
I tell people this and they don't take it seriously. They're well, that's not the same thing. I'm like, it's not the same thing. su I don't know what your stats are over there. In America, suicide is the second leading cause of death For people in the age of 10 to 35 in America.
00:54:24
Speaker
And you say, well, you said anxiety or depression. What does that have to do with suicide? Untreated depression is the number one cause of suicide. So actually it's worse than cancer in many ways. In terms of that age group. That age group is what I mean. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Fair enough. Yeah. Good point.
00:54:37
Speaker
Um, so Evan, um, just before we finish, uh, I just want to give you an opportunity to share any places that people might like to visit after they finished, um, listening to what you had to say.
00:54:51
Speaker
Thank you. So if you guys are, um if by some chance, you know, there's a listener in America and you're connected to a school, ah selfishly, I would really appreciate if you visited evantransu.com.
00:55:04
Speaker
um Also, if you reach out to me there, there's a place to like fill out a form and leave a message. If you reach out to me at evantransu.com, I have a book that I wrote. um And I listen, I don't make any money off that. I think I make a dollar if someone buys it off Amazon. okay um If times are tough and you can't afford the book on Amazon, I'm happy to send you the ebook for free. So just reach out to me. It doesn't matter.
00:55:27
Speaker
um That book's a passion project and has been for years. It's not a profit center. um And the other thing is if you're interested in like, hey, what was that guy talking about with the diet stuff or that more stuff, then you can go to something called FDNtraining.com slash kicks like for teenage kicks.
00:55:44
Speaker
So FDNtraining.com slash kicks. That would be the other place. Okay. So to find out more about the functional medicine stuff that you were talking
Closing Remarks and Resources for Teenage Mental Health
00:55:53
Speaker
about. that Yeah. Yeah.
00:55:55
Speaker
Perfect. Okay. Thank you so much for your time. It's been really interesting to figure out a little bit more about where panic attacks come from and and strategies for dealing, what happens to you and that actually all is not lost.
00:56:09
Speaker
Just because your child goes through some of the worst things that you really wouldn't want your child to be going through as a teenager. There is hope. Yes. Thank you for having me again. this is There couldn't be a podcast that's like more perfect for the things I've experienced. And yeah, if it gives parents even a little bit of hope out there or some different insight, ah then we've done our job. So I appreciate you.
00:56:31
Speaker
Amazing. Thank you so much for listening. If you've enjoyed this episode, please give it a rating on your podcast app. And if you know someone who might benefit from listening, do share it with them.
00:56:45
Speaker
It also means a lot when you give me feedback. So if you have comments or suggestions for another episode or know someone who'd like to tell their story on the Teenage Kicks podcast, do get in touch at Helen at HelenWills.com or come and find me on my blog at chulymommy.co.uk.
00:57:05
Speaker
Head over there now for more articles on the joys, and there are many, of parenting a teenager. Bye for now.