Episode 40: Jennifer Mullan, PsyD
*Information shared on is for informational and educational services only.
Transcript:
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD:[0:00] I suppose that this book is for those individuals that are always feeling that, how do I want to say this, that they're always hard on themselves, and that no table works for them, and that they're not allowed at the table. And it's like for those that are like, wait, I need to create a new one.
Jessica Fowler:[0:20] Welcome back to What Your Therapist Is Reading. I'm your host, Jessica Fowler. Today, we are speaking with Dr. Jennifer Mullan about her national bestselling book, Decolonizing Therapy: Oppression, Historical Trauma, and Politicizing Your Practice. Dr. Jennifer Mullen is a major disruptor in the mental health industrial complex. Her work is an urgent call to dive into the root of global and generational trauma to unlock the wisdom of our sacred rage. After today's episode, make sure you head on over to social media at Therapy Books Podcast so you can follow along about the latest giveaway. And make sure you're up to date as we take a little break before season five comes out. We will have giveaways and other information to share. And as always, the information shared in this podcast is for informational and educational purposes only.
Welcome Dr. Jennifer Mullan. I am so excited to have you on the podcast today. I cannot wait to talk to you about this book.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Yay, I am so glad to be here. Thank you for the invitation and your podcast in this world.
Jessica Fowler: Thank you. And so we kind of chatted before, and I wanted to start with this question that I love asking, is what is a memory of how reading has impacted you?
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: [1:38] Wow, well... As far as I can remember, reading has been my safe space and a respite. I think I might have been prior to reading age. I read pretty early. I read before going to kindergarten. And that was all because of my mom. And I would make up stories when I couldn't officially read. Yeah, I might be like three years old, literally, like my little baby brother's just being born and I my mother would always read this like Grover Sesame Street story to me and she would do it in Grover's voice and I was like don't turn the page don't know the page like you know this whole, this whole thing and um I tried to read that same book to like my little cousins and my brother and even if I couldn't read it I would like off memory kind of read it air quotes and like make it up as I went along. So, I think that's still reading. And I think that that helps children put together images and word recognition and memory. And I think I always enjoyed a little bit of a performance too with reading. I loved reading out loud. And so, I would say as far young as I can remember, my mother read to me. And then I went on reading to anyone that I could. And um I also went on to like do a little acting in like elementary school and high school and and i think that that is somehow connected to reading um I was a kid eating breakfast cereal with one of my Sweet Valley High or Babysitter novels that was me um I was punished, because I was punished often. I was in trouble often as a kid. But as long as they didn't take away my books, and I usually got away with keeping my books, because it was like reading and intelligent and like my parents didn't quite get the fiction and the nonfiction and the, right, so no one took away my books. But literally, maybe a few years ago, I found like piles and piles and piles of like Sweet Valley High, Babysitter's Club, Nancy Drew, I was a late 70s kid so there wasn't a whole lot of you know like different outsiders uh Lord of the Flies I read more times than I can remember um I don't know there's something about that book that really changed me along with The Outsiders um I really loved a vampire series prior to the television show I heard there's a television show uh Vampire Diaries it's called yeah yeah I read that series Inside Out. There was also Goosebumps series. Yeah, yeah.
Jessica Fowler: A new show just came out. I was just talking to somebody else about that. Like a new 2023.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Yeah. So, I would say that like my privilege of reading, that was one thing like we were definitely like working class, working poor, my family. But when we had like the troll, what is that called? We called it troll books. So, like they would come with a little magazine and you get to pick which books you can order. I don't know if it was called something else. Some people, I think it had a Scholastic. Ours were called Troll, I don't know why. And I loved it and I would get excited and they were like, okay, we'll get you these books because they're books. Right. I have tons of books on my bookshelf behind me. I mean, it's not, it's, I would say it's part of who I am and probably part of why writing feels like second nature to me.
Jessica Fowler: That makes a lot of sense. And I just want to say, and this might just be you in general, but you light up when you were talking about those memories of reading and how it's like you've been reading basically your entire life and now you're an author.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Yeah, I guess I am. Not a guess. I am.
Jessica Fowler: You are an author. I'm an author.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Yeah. Yes.
Jessica Fowler: So, I'm curious, right? So, reading has really impacted you. What is your hope that this book will have on others that read it?
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: [5:47] Well, my hope originally was that I could like sort of give a little honoring and homage to the ways that I've had every version of myself, every version of therapist self that had to learn and unlearn how I was taught to do therapy is quite different than how I did or engaged in therapy. Yeah. I don't know if that makes any sense.
Jessica Fowler: Yep.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: I would say that as both person receiving services and providing services at different points in my life, that I have been disappointed and harmed on both ends. Right. And I probably have disappointed and harmed as a practitioner as well when I didn't know a little better. Right. And have a better re-education. So, I would say prior to the book coming out, my hope was to honor aspects of me, right? And I thought like a handful of people out there, maybe a hundred, you know, in my mind originally, you know, that could identify with this work and knew that like the decolonial root of things was more important than what we were letting on. And now when I'm getting messages constantly and just like people like pictures with their book or like, oh my gosh, this book is changing me. It feels a little surreal.
[7:16] And my hope is that it starts to be required in every course that is social work, doctoral programs, counseling programs, marriage and family therapy programs, even if certain chapters are utilized for internal family systems or this one or that one, right? The hope is that it is constantly and consistently being utilized to an extent where people are like, oh, this is basic. This is average. I hope in 10, 20 years that it feels like the norm for what therapy is and how we come to understand it. Yeah.
Jessica Fowler: [8:00] That's an amazing hope. And I hope very much that that is where it goes, that it is at minimum mandatory reading for students, you know, others pick it up.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Yeah um the reality is even if universities still have the resistance to picking up content they do a lot of professors are trying to bring it in and their students are reading it and so lately I've been thinking about what that looks like to create my own path of unlearning and education yeah um to really shift the field because I don't think I can rely on these like western systems to really give us what we need or they'll take things and distort it and like throw it apart it really won't understand it so that's part of what I'm hoping for is that this change in the way we understand how any of us see, do and engage with therapy.
Jessica Fowler: Can we can you share what decolonizing therapy is for those who don't know?
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: [9:05] Yeah. Decolonizing therapy. And let me just say, I'm honored that so many folks now are talking about this, right? Like, oh, this is decolonizing therapy. And I suppose when I came on the scene and started doing this related to my dissertation back in like 2012, and then little by little engaging in these ways and sort of living into it. Um so I think that folks have different understandings of what it means for me it is the cousin and the companion to land decolonization, right, in other words how do we really give back the land to the indigenous natural stewards of the land for the people that can say hey we're not gonna put pipelines here hey we're not going to kind of pull these trees up in order to make more housing and gentrify this area, right? So ,there's that decolonial aspect, right? Where we're no longer taking what's not ours as a society. So decolonizing therapy is about pulling up the mental health industrial complex at its roots.
[10:14] Investigating what works, who does it work for? How, how does this show up in me, and providing new yet ancestral and older ways of doing therapy yeah of healing and so instead of treating we're interested in helping. Instead of treating we're interested in care work. Instead of treating we're interested in healing yeah and so the decolonization aspect of it is pulling things up at its root, right? Rather than just, not that there's anything wrong with some of this, looking at childhood, but also looking at systems, structures, culture, historical trauma, generational trauma, and how history, the colonization have an impact on us in present day, yeah so how this impacts the people that are clients are being served as well as how we do the serving . Hope that makes sense and we're pulling it at it like the root like we're pulling up a root and we're saying oh wait separation from land, separation from ways of sharing, separation from how we understand separation from body to land, from spirituality for some of us to land and to ourselves has not only been harmful, it has perhaps been violent and not allowed us to truly find healing.
Jessica Fowler: [11:42] So that is a lot. How do you work that into the book? So, what does that look like for someone who's reading this book?
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Yeah, that looks like starting with investigating self-awareness. That looks like investigating why we go into this field, licensure, licensing boards, who are we ethical to, what language we're using if we're practitioners, right?
[12:17] As well as really investigating how unconsciously we may have signed on to being a part of these mental health systems that are really medicalizing, pathologizing, and perhaps for many individuals, I don't like to speak for everyone, harming and actually reenacting more trauma situations than we would probably want to. I think many of us get into to this to like, hey, I want to help. I want to listen. I want to uplift.
[12:50] And so the realization for me is that I wasn't always doing that. I was creating more separation in the work that I was doing. I was creating more spaces of blaming an individual rather than looking at systems and structures that also were impacting them. And so I suppose if someone is reading this that is a client that is receiving care that is just interested in decolonization and what does this mean to decolonize therapy but every day yeah person I would say what I want them to get out of it is the ability to ask for what they need, to realize that not all therapists and therapy are created equal, to realize that perhaps history and global history cultural familial, ancestral history has a larger impact on who they are how they form relationship how they feel about themselves right and what they do in this world than they think um and that perhaps and perhaps with a wink right that um their thoughts and feelings are not the problem that those are healthy expressions of living in quite a overwhelming, violent, and capitalistic colonial world. Yeah.
Jessica Fowler: [14:12] I like that you just said expression because you talk about this in the book instead of you know symptoms, right? You talk about the idea of language, right? Some of the language that we use is maybe not the best, not always appropriate for the way that even as therapists that we talk and so symptoms, I love the idea of changing our language. I think our language is super important. And using something as expressions, right? Because a lot of this is normal expressions that we have because of what has happened.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Yeah.
Jessica Fowler: Right? Yeah. And not... I don't know, whatever. It's normal to have rage. It's normal to be angry if stuff like this has happened.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. So, for example, majority of my career, I was working with youth and adolescents, whether in residentials, partial hospitalization programs, outpatient, community mental health. And then I worked with university students of all ages. Yeah. And one of the things that I noticed the most is that, yes, there was this release that, oh, other people experience these symptoms or expressions as well. I'm not alone in this. Okay. But then there was this over-identification with like, well, I'm depressed. I'm a depressed person, or I live with blank, right? Rather than, I'm sorry, rather than saying I live with these symptoms, I am.
[15:43] And that wasn't just because of what I was saying. It was like what the rest of the world was telling them. It was like what they were hearing in their community. It was like, oh, you're depressed. You're depressed. You're depressed. So even with younger children, I would notice in adolescence that sometimes they're being sort of forced or voluntold into counseling from their parents, guiding counselors, teachers.
[16:11] And kids would often feel like, yeah, you know, the teacher speaks to me and they're picking up on subtle cues. That's what trauma does, as we know, right? Allows us to be extra hypervigilant to stay safe, right? And so oftentimes what would happen or students would come and say, my teacher doesn't like me. And I would hear many counselors and guidance counselors that I would supervise, like, that's not true. And I would immediately stop them. Like, we don't know that. We don't know if they're not picking up on subtle cues. We don't. We're automatically siding with the adult ageism. We're automatically siding with those that have more power. Right? And not always. We also might be automatically siding with those that are closer and have closer proximity to whiteness. or are wu9te? Not only, but often, right? And sol what would it be like to sit with, well, tell me about why you think this, right? Tell me about how you know that your teacher doesn't like you. Tell me how you know that now if it's 18 teachers and none of them like you. Interesting. I'm holding that in the back of my head, but we, right, we would be so surprised by how many professionals, right? Again, questioning that word, immediately make assumptions, right? And we know that rejection is real, right? We know that youth that get out of their chair a little bit more, that are seen as, quote unquote, at risk, that are perhaps darker skinned, bigger, disabled, consciously or not, that there's tons of projection and oftentimes micro and macro or aggressions, right? They're thrown their way. And so, one situation that I think of often, because this has happened eight different ways since Sunday, in eight different scenarios, right? Where I remember this young man saying, yeah, my math teacher really hates me. And I had that instinct to be like, no, you're adorable. Why were that? And I slowed down and I was, tell me, tell me why, where do you get this from? Oh yeah. Cause every time so-and-so speaks, they light up, their shoulders go back, very astute, right? Shoulders go back, their head goes back, they smile. And even if they're wrong, the student is, other student is wrong. They say, it's okay. Thanks for trying.
[18:36] Right? Looks small, but, and when I get called on and I'm like, oh, you know, do you not raise your hand? Oh no, I stopped doing that. I'm generally really not going to get called on. So, as you're listening and hearing what happens when you get called on, there's a little bit of a frown. My teacher has a tendency to sit back, but there's not a smile. They don't really smile when they talk to me. I don't feel like they enjoy me. And that doesn't make me feel good enough. And so if we could see that with bosses or adults, if we could see that when it comes to college students and universities, we could see that's just one example of how it shows up. And so, we tone police, right? We make decisions on who gets in and out of juvenile detention centers, out of prisons, right? We do needs assessments. Whose needs, right? Who’s assessing? Are they involved in the assessment process? Are we of the same culture or identity? Do we have any idea of what it's like for them to be them living where they live, doing what they do, right? We have any idea what they have gone through, as well as, of course, looking at the good old DSM.
[19:50] I would be remiss, back then, I thought the DSM was like, oh, right? We were taught, know the DSM, know these codes, this and that, study this. I mean, I had a whole psychopathology class for three semesters, right? But I had one multicultural counseling for one semester, and it was a pretty much cookbook. We're looking at all Asian people do this, and all Black people prefer this, but it wasn't really looking at intersections. It really wasn't getting into spirit and culture, and it wasn't always getting into colonization and historical trauma in the land. And we weren't getting into political strife. We weren't getting into accessibility. We weren't really getting into truly racism. A little bit about racial trauma, I think, these days comes up in programs. But in my day, oh, no, no, no, no. In 2000s and early, early, early 2000s, that was not a conversation. It was still being debated. Yeah. That was a lot.
Jessica Fowler: It was all good. But a lot of things that I want to say and follow up on. But one of the things that I wanted to say about this book is, right, like you just shared a lot and you gave such a good example of how to utilize this and what to do differently. And this book is, it's a large book. It's like 400 pages. And this topic can appear to be overwhelming if you don't understand it. But this book is not overwhelming and the way that you write it and give practical things that people can do to bring this into their practice into their life is practical like it's not this thing where I all of a sudden have to totally change the way that i practice and I can't ever do x y and z . It's here you could just ask this question differently or just be aware that it exists and create space for it or you talk a lot at the end I really liked the chapter on energy just noticing that or having that person explore you know have give them the opportunity to explore what their family has gone through and how you know generationally this may have impacted them.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Yeah.
Jessica Fowler: Even though it seems like oh all of this thing it's really I don't know if that's a I don't it's I don't know I think it's not overwhelming. And I say that because I want people to read it.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Yeah. Yeah.
Jessica Fowler: I don't want them to be intimidated by it.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Yeah. Yeah. Um, thank you. I appreciate that. And I suppose that there's a part of me that, um, is used to people feeling intimidated. Does that make sense? And I'm getting It's a little deep here, right? But not just by me, but like I remember being a grad student and just like raising my hand like, yeah, but I have a question about this. And what does that mean? And then there would be this like.
[23:00] I could see a little bit of intimidation of like, this is beyond our scope here in this class. And I would get disappointed. Yeah. Does that make sense? And then there would be a professor and the same thing. And I'd work somewhere. I'm like, but why? Why? Just because they missed two sessions, don't they have the opportunity to be in another session? And why not this? And why not that? And so, I suppose that this book is for those individuals that are always feeling , um, that, how do I want to say this? That they're always hard on themselves and that no table works for them and that they're not allowed at the table. And it's like, for those that are like, wait, I need to create a new one and maybe not even a table, or maybe I'm going to create this floating hexagon in the sky. Right.
[23:50] Yeah. And so, yeah. So it's like, yeah, it's like for those people that always have felt like too much and not enough at the same time, for those of us that have known like yeah I care about my field I'm a lover of our fields and a critical lover right I think it's like a healthy relationship you don't just blindly I hate that word sorry like so evil this but we don't want to just like close our eyes and be like oh I just love this person and there's nothing wrong with them and there's nothing that has to be changed and fixed and worked on and no I love you and I care for the fabric and the core of this and there are many things that do not work because now we're in 2024 and things have changed. So, I love what you're saying you know I love what you're saying that like yeah books don't need to be intimidated and if people are feeling a little bit intimidated I would say go to that growing edge you know like go to that growing edge as you're saying and dive in and start chewing.
[24:48] And I think that was part of my struggle in writing it is, is it too basic for people that are reading like Franz Fanon and like Paulo Fiori, right? Like, you know, is it too basic? Perhaps, right? And is it too hard for individuals that have like no context of like, wait, what on earth does colonization have to do with therapy and mental health? Right? So, I tried to find that middle ground.
Jessica Fowler: So, I'm glad that you said that because I love history. And you start with that. This book is in three sections, right? So, it's the history, the now, and the future.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Yeah.
Jessica Fowler: And you explain how a lot of this, well, it is, right, tied into our history when we look at our history and our fields and where things come from. And just having that understanding.
And here we are today. And here are things that you can do that can, you know, give you a different, even if it's like what you just said, just challenging yourself, just growing yourself a little bit, even just by picking up the book.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Yes. Yeah.
Jessica Fowler: That's a step towards, okay, can I do something? Can I do this?
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Yes. Yes, absolutely.
[25:56] Because, you know, I think things are changing. We know that. Things are changing so drastically. I don't know if we're going to be online or in offices doing 45-minute sessions with folks anymore in 5, 10 years. I really, really, really think that there's going to be a shifting as a whole of our understanding of mental health in this model. And for me, people are like, what is it? Tell me what it is. I'm like, I don't think that that's something that just Dr. Jen is going to figure out, right? I think that this is a slow movement and a process towards how do we make this better? How do we change from just putting like flesh-colored band-aids on wounds that are old, old, old and how do we start bringing in this futurism of understanding that we don't want to be connected to like prison systems and how we care for folks, we don't want to be connected to like racism and sexism and you know all of that we want to do it different. So, that has to to start with us that has to start with how we treat each other that has to start with whether or not we're looking at our own ancestral traumas and histories, right? That has to start with our poop first and that's the invitation that if we're not well there's no way that we can engage in real healing and wellness with the people that we're serving.
Jessica Fowler: Absolutely.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Yeah.
Jessica Fowler: That was said very nicely.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Thank you.
Jessica Fowler: I'm curious what made you decide to write the book?
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: [27:29] Well let me see. More than doing anything that little kids dream of when they're younger it was like to be an author. I was an English major and a journalism major for a majority of my life until I encountered a peer education program that was run by a psychologist that shifted me and then I fell in love with group work. So I suppose though that's a kind of deeper layer but on a more present layer. We were in the midst of 2020. I had just left my job at the university. Yeah. And what started to really happen were lots of murders of Black people across what is now known as the United States. There was a great deal of understandable rage, disgust, fear, grief.
[28:26] And told you so energy, right? Like, yes, we've been feeling this. We've been knowing this. We've been experiencing this, unfortunately, but fortunately we're all at home and we have no choice but to look at what's happening. Yeah, what's been happening and how violent and cruel it is. And so more than ever, I felt that the state of what we understand should be therapy and mental health needed to shift, needed to change and needed to look at those that are frequently discarded, invisibilized or marginalized. Yeah.
Jessica Fowler: And who is the book for?
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: [29:07] You know, I wouldn't say everyone, but I also am aware that maybe not everyone is there. Maybe not everyone, you know, has access to reading and comfort in the same way, although it's on Audible as well. But predominantly, it is for practitioners of all sorts, right? Therapists, helpers, space holders, social workers, psychologists, psychiatrists, advanced practice nurses, some coaching. I would even say some teachers and helpers. I think everyone can read it and everyone will get something from it. But I'm hearing so many therapists and practitioners say, oh my goodness, thank you. This feels like a love letter to us. And I think that so many of us give and give and care and hold space. And we often don't have things that are just for us. Isn't that interesting? And we're used to it. We're used to kind of the crumbs.
[30:07] I'm generalizing, but I think it's a lot of them that are used to helping and holding for others and kind of accepting like the bare minimum. And so ultimately, this book is for those that are on this journey to be therapists and to hold spaces, but I think lots of other folks can enjoy it, can receive it, and receive a shift in perspective from it.
Jessica Fowler: I totally agree. Anyone who really works with people who could read this and just take something, just even if it's just to have them pause for a second before they do something or say something, right? When you think about how you talked about your language.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Yes.
Jessica Fowler: To give them framework of, oh, this could be different.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Yeah. yeah and the energy piece I think is really important too like the last two chapters I'm like you know I had a really like fight to get that chapter in there um because you know this is like kind of an educational book right it's meant for for universities and yet at the same time universities are having the hardest time bringing it on. Of course they are right because it's like like basically trembling the whole root and the foundation and shaking it and saying, are we willing to do this different?
[31:32] You know, are we going to continue to uphold this world of over-pathologizing and calling people, you know, oppositional and antisocial and borderline? And do we still want to uphold the medical model in all that we do? Is this still the route we want to go? We can shift and change. We can do it different, you know? And so, I think that looking at energy starts to invite in and open the conversation to a bunch of other individuals and cultures that are like, oh, energy is a normal conversation in my life. This isn't so far off. So, yeah, maybe there's 10, 15% of the population that is like, what? Excuse me, this is hokey.
[32:19] Right? But there's the rest of us that are like, no, this is as old as my great grandmother and older. Like, no, what do you mean? This is the roots of mental health and what therapy is and what we understand. It started with clergy, with shamans, with healers, helpers, curanderos, right? So, for me, it was much more of a have to, like a homage. Like, if I'm going to talk about the violent history and the co-op thing, right, from many Indigenous cultures across the globe, right, then I have to also talk about how it impacts us as practitioners to constantly listen to violence, trauma, Pain. I don't want to be here anymore, right? I think I might hurt someone. I think I might hurt myself. I just, anxiety. So not that we can't or don't want to, but then how, what are one of the ways that we flush this out of our system? How do we metabolize listening to all this secondary trauma?
Have we ever been taught to metabolize, release, alchemize, digest other people's traumas, right and that's a skill set that we could possibly teach people once we learn it so that they're not holding it when they're talking to their best friend or their family members, right? Like so this isn't just about us when we learn things and we shift the way our whole worldview rocks then we're also giving that skill set and teaching that skill set to our clients.
Jessica Fowler: So that's so interesting that you said that about that chapter because that chapter was my favorite it. I loved that chapter. And like you talk a lot about in that chapter, right? So how energy has been used in different cultures and how this is really important, but also in the therapy room, like what you were just saying. And as therapists, we need support and it needs to be more than you need to go get supervision or your own therapy because that therapist or that supervisor needs to know how to help you work through that energy. Because in therapy, there is an exchange of energy. You can call it woo-woo, but there's something happening within the room, and I would call that energy. And so, I just loved that chapter.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Thank you.
Jessica Fowler: That should not be a reason that people don't read the book.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: [34:46] You know what's so funny um if I may say so I love that you love that and I love hearing I was gonna be one of my questions what chapter is most precious to people right because everyone has their own place and oftentimes I tell people just open the book up and see where it leads. You like even for folks I’m a person that I'll read a whole book but generally unless it's fiction or one of my like sci-fi youth, you know, wizards and wolves. I'm like reading chapters all out of joint, right? Like that's just sort of part of my brain and how I work and my energy systems work. And one of the things that I love are being able to just like open up to a place that is calling me at that moment. And the energy chapter, it was the last one I wrote, right? Believe it or not.
[35:37] Other than the acknowledgements. And I'm very tapped into like my spiritual team and my ancestors, right? I would not have written this book without that connection. That's a massive reason and a massive pouring through me. But I would often be very exhausted. And that's one of the reasons I had to leave one-to-one therapy. Because even though I was releasing and shielding and all of these things and taking care of myself and doing this kind of work and tapping and, exercising and drinking plenty of water, I still, still was carrying that trauma and that heaviness with me. Yeah. And I wasn't really being taught how to alchemize it and how to not feel it and absorb it so that folks were leaving my office feeling like, thank you. I haven't felt this light in ages meanwhile back on the ranch I am without realizing it prior to understanding like absorbing it and taking it and trying to transmute it for them without realizing it, right. So I think it is irresponsible of many of our programs not to include an aspect for those of us that are highly sensitive, neurodivergent, right empath clairsentient, clairvoyant, claire codman, claire arden, pick something, right? We know that this all exists, right?
[37:07] There's tons of research and books. And so that's why I've also included books written by psychiatrists and psychologists that also had a highly energetic and spiritual energy as well. Many Lives, Many Masters, right? Second Sight. I could keep going. Right? Like Clarissa Pinkola-Eftes, you know, Women Who Run With Wolves, right? Like there's so many books that also are supportive of various cultures and ways in which our bodies sometimes absorb and that it is essential for us to learn how to utilize what we've been given and why we're good at what we're good at. We all have a certain good, if you know what I mean, right? A certain area where we're like, oh, this is natural. I didn't read any books to kind of know how to help someone do this. I just know how to do it.
Jessica Fowler: You definitely gave me a huge reading list from this book. I will say that I was constantly like taking photos of a book or like putting it in my cart to know that this is something I want to read. But I wanted to say too about that idea of therapists that I don't think people realize how much we take on and then especially new therapists going into community mental health that they're expected to see these enormous caseloads.
[38:22] Enormous and do that all day and they don't even have time to take care of themselves or get full supervision or on the fly supervision if something happens and so that idea you know we're talking about energy but the idea of taking care of therapists, right like there's a huge need, but this is my call for people to take care of therapists and to train them effectively. So they can continue to do the work because nobody can seek like 40 clients a week for 40 hours and be okay.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Yes.
Jessica Fowler: That's why people are leaving the field or going into private practice because it's not sustainable.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD:
It's not sustainable and it's killing us. Like many of us end up hospitalized. As I've written in the book, I had a colleague that had a heart attack at her desk in between clients. I was like, no, I have to see this person, then I'll go to the hospital. And we're like, are we doing? And I realized my boss afterwards I remember crying thinking my boss was crying and says to me I've co-created this this environment. I am part of why she thinks she can't cancel that client and go to the hospital and I was like yeah yeah yeah ,I do the great to great amazing and understanding but also sometimes when we talk about this client-centeredness we dehumanize ourselves and it's like both end like we we need to humanize ourselves and humanize our clients and center them and how beautiful when they can see us as a full human as well and I remember telling that colleague, like a we need you alive and so does the person you're working with and I think that they would be really pissed and hurt if they knew that you just suffered a heart attack heck or you're still suffering one I'm not sure like you know a doctor in that way you know and you still just want to get in and see them. Like if they knew that I think that that would feel really icky and gross and um not healthy. That's not role modeling something healthy to them and she's like oh my gosh you're right. What are we doing and like one of my prior students uh she got written up for not seeing three people out of her 78 people every two weeks she needs to see in community mental health.
She's the only person, the only clinician and outpatient. She's not licensed. She's not getting supervised. Sometimes she's asked to supervise partial care. Okay? All true. This is all still happening a year later.
Jessica Fowler: Oh, sure.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: And she got written up for seeing 71 or 72 people because those people were sick and she didn't get on Zoom with that. I'm just sitting there. And she's all English speaking and the population is predominantly migrant and Spanish speaking. So, she has to get interpreters constantly on the phone. Like, not that we don't make it work, but it's like, what's happening? And they don't have the budget to hire anyone else. And the wait list is over 200 people.
[41:35] So, you know, it makes us wonder, like, if these models, if this framework, is it adequate? Right? And so, some folks that are in private practice will say, like, sure, because I get to make my own rules. But I imagine that many of these rules are also fitting for people that can pay a fuller rate generally, generally right so I just think we need to be honest about that that like when people are saying oh no it works for me is it work because we're predominantly working with people of a higher socioeconomic bracket, right and who are those people generally, right? And are they getting the brunt the most of our expertise and so it's like right well then how do I help these folks right that are at or below poverty level or they're taking three buses to see me or like how do I make space for them and also sustain myself, right? And so so folks are like what do, how do we do this, and one of the things that I will share that I'm working with three small group practices that are actually starting to work we're starting to see a shift in a movement, um are where they're asking their folks that are able to pay full free full fee you know um, like we would like to take either they increase their rate by maybe $50 or they say we're going to take $50 from your, I'm making this up, $400 an hour rate, you know, your fee. We're going to take $100 of that. We're putting this into this fund to also fund the therapy of individuals that cannot pay even $200 for an hour. Right. And we want to let you, we want to ask your consent if you'd like to be part of this pipeline, this healthy pipeline, this nexus. Right. And we'll tell you how many sessions, not the people, how many sessions you're allotting for this individual. And if they consent, we can give demographics if they consent. And some people are like, we'd like to meet them both ways. I'd like to meet this person that's donating if they're open to it. And it's persons like they are. Great. And sometimes we're watching friendships happen. Sometimes we're watching like, hey, I'm going to pay for the year. That's not a problem up front. This is for their therapy. Right so we're starting to watch and I’m getting goosebumps, mutual aid occur from people that would normally like oh I don't do mutual aid. I'm not a I don't, I'm not a liberal ,I don't, I don't do this work, where it's it's not always easy and it's not always easy to broach but how beautiful that therapists can start being this sort of meaty intermediary which we are in ways anyway with community with health with right with education and we're starting to bridge together. Individuals that may have lots of access right and they're just learning about their privilege or learning about how they contribute to white supremacy whether or not they're white, right and individuals that are needing right now right now, maybe they won't always or maybe they haven't always, but right now they need. And then that way it also takes care of and supports fiscally because that's our energetic exchange right now. The therapist right there or the psychologist or the social worker. I hope that makes sense.
Jessica Fowler: Yeah. It does make sense because I see that a lot with trainings now too, where there's like the standard fee and you can donate a little more or they have a lower fee if you can't afford it and that helps cover the costs. So, it's like that idea, but it's such a way to, you know, as therapists, we're trying to figure this out, this larger problem, right? It's a very large problem. But how as individual therapists, they can make it work and still serve more people who may not be able to access their care. Because that's true, right? Many private therapy therapists have the time and the money to afford these more advanced trainings that somebody who's right out of school or is seeing, you know, 35, 40 clients a week can't even take time, right? Because then they don't meet their quota. It's like a whole thing that I don't think people fully understand.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: No.
[46:12] But again, that just brings me back this book, that it is just such a beautiful way to say like here are the little things that you can do, that aren’t little, um, that aren’t overwhelming, I am gonna use that word that are not, even if you pick one or two that are not overwhelming, that you can help as a starting point to do things differently. I just, I just want to thank you for writing this book, I read a lot of books, I feel like this impacted me, I took a lot out of this book. Changes that I can do ,that I can work on.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Thank you.
Jessica Fowler: I'm going to suggest it to my therapy book club people.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Thank you. Yeah. We just created a discussion guide. We just created a discussion guide for book club groups, as well as individuals just interested in chewing on it while I'm working on a workbook. Um, and I'm working on a yearlong unlearning training on training. I don't have a title for it yet but um the DT method right, this methodology will be much clearer and much more like kind of parsed out and at the same time it's not meant as I said in the book to like check off kind of doing this. I'm doing that. Like part of what I'm inviting practitioners of all sorts to do is to step away from this like like, manualized form of treatment, right? And not that you don't have that skill set of, oh, well, I've been trained really deeply in psychodynamics. Great, great. Then that's a foundation. Great. We don't have to throw that out, but we do have to investigate it. We do have to get curious, you know, what this has to do with all, how this relates to all different cultures and relationship to dreams, aggression, sex. What about genders? What about identity? You get what I'm saying, right? So yes, we do investigate it. We don't throw out this amazing skill set we have but we add right like like when we're trying to change our diet air quotes right that doesn't mean we have to restrict that's not healthy ,right? We don't pull away what we're great at what we love what excites us what draws us into food and our connection to food but maybe we need to add more water maybe, we need to add more greens, right? I'm just using that as an example right. I think all of us could drink more water. All of us can probably eat or drink our greens a little bit more. So that's the invitation with this as well. What can we add? What can we learn about that will allow every single one of us as humans and any kind of teacher, EMT, practitioner, nurse, psychiatrist, what can you pull from the book, as you were saying, that would allow you to be less harmful, more accountable, more in community and be willing to learn and unlearn a little bit, and more excited and present in the work that we do, that we're not just a robot or a cog, that we are part of something really big and beautiful, and we're not just sitting back and saying, well, this is how I was trained, this is how it's done. Research says, because what Dr. Jen is going to say is, what research? Who did it? What was the N sample? Who was in the N sample? Who was in the end sample? What about the qualitative, if we want to call it that, research? What about people's stories? What about storytelling? What about old medicine? And what about the colonial wound? And how do we use the master's tools in healing the colonial wound?
[49:11] Is that possible? Including for people that are healing from having family members that colonized. So how do all of us unhook from the shame and the guilt and the grief and the smallness of it all and like, I don't want to talk about this. And how do we step into, hey, I have these skills. How do I help? How can I help? How can I give this to you rather than give it to you for this many thousand dollars? Right and I try to do that I think on my instagram page um that doesn't always help my pockets and my bills but laughing laughing laughing but um I find that all the gatekeeping is just another colonial weapon too right. Like there's some things that no if you want to work with me for this many months yes compensate me in this way but generally also may we start understanding colonial western psychology and understanding where we come in and how we can do it different.
Jessica Fowler: You talk about that. I feel like I could talk about this book forever and it's probably the last thing I'll say, but I could talk about it forever. But you talk about that idea of gatekeeping. And I thought that that was really helpful because I think that does happen in our field where you have to be trained, you have to do this. And then looking at a lot of these things that we do came from other cultures or centuries ago, and it's just been changed. And so, it was It was just such a great way to look at that and to remember, hey, others were doing this first.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Yes.
Jessica Fowler: [50:41] That was okay. And it is okay. And it doesn't always have to be the therapist who's had X, Y, and Z training.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And we can bring in other kinds of helpers and coaches and healers with the consent of the person we're working with and create more of a team approach. Right. I remember being trained that like, no, you can't see two therapists at the same time. But I remember going through my divorce and having my main general therapist and saying, I think I need to work with someone with the EMDR. Here's why and her being like yeah let's do that right and having them talk to each other. Having three of us talk to each other. Having her being involved in a session, right like yeah it doesn't mean that everything is just like our way, it means that we do need to like be open to other ways the same way folks were coming to see me and they might be part of santeria or they're muslim or they're part of voodoo and this is their religion or spirituality, and maybe I'm not that practitioner to help them, or maybe I don't have capacity to help them, or maybe it is not culturally appropriate for me to help them. But I can connect with their practitioners, right? And we can talk about with consent, what are you seeing? What are you noticing? Oh, so there's a generational thing here. I can help with that. Here's what I do related to generational trauma and wisdom, right? And this is when we start oh oh this doesn't all have to be on my shoulders.
Jessica Fowler: Yeah.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: If I actually included other people maybe this person can also realize that they don't also just have to get really stuck in therapy, attached to me and for some people that's a threat, as we know right like let me become codependent on our field and like what we do.
Jessica Fowler: Right. Isn't it interesting how there's certain things that we can feel like that, but then other things we don't like, oh, you know, you struggle with substance abuse. You should go to AA, right? You're a new parent. You should really get into a mommy and me baby class, right? That there's such a difference, but because of what it is. And I think this is what this book does. It gets you to stop and question, right? Why is that thing? Okay. But this other thing you're like, are you sure that that's really the right choice? Or I don't know, whatever you would say. Or you would even just notice it in yourself and not say anything, but there are things that we seem to be, or I, I don't know, you seem to be okay with and encouraged, but other things maybe we're like..
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Yeah. No, absolutely. Thank you for saying that. It's important. And I suppose I'd love to like wrap up with this. I think I talked about the babies in the water story in the book and I just want to really highlight it because I think it really brings it home for those of us that are in fields of helping and working, you said working with people, working with others. And I just want to like say it out loud for some reason. I feel like it's really important. Would that be okay with you?
Jessica Fowler: Absolutely.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Okay. And so, I just want to say that this very story was highlighted by two trainers at People's Institute for Survival and Beyond. I attended many, many trainings throughout the years, I would say from 2010 to maybe 2020. And there was never enough learning. So, I highly recommend anyone to get to an Undoing Racism training. Even if you you know all about racism, even if you're tired of talking about racism, I think they do a beautiful job of setting up an analysis of why are people poor, right? And I think that that's essential for therapists or helpers of any sort to be really clear, like, hey, what's my analysis of why poverty occurs? Why are people poor? So, I just want to give that caveat that this isn't Dr. Jen's story. I think it's important to share where we get things from, right? And I also want to share that the way they set this up is like, so imagine being on a riverbank and you're with friends, you're in the sun, you're frolicking, you're having fun. Maybe there's four, five or six of you. And suddenly you hear a splash in the river and you see a baby like trying to swim and float along. So perhaps myself as a swimmer and I'm closest to the bank, there's a baby in the water and you jump in and you grab that baby in the water and you come out. And so immediately maybe I would we'd be making sure they're breathing.
[55:02] Right? That's my job. I'm like, I'm crisis mood. I'm triage, like grabbing them. I'm all wet, breathing heavy, right? Fight, flight, freeze response is all kicked in. Nervous system is going, right? Pupils dilated. I have all this adrenaline and the person next to me goes, look, we hear a little cry. There was another baby in the water. So, I'm already wet. My pupils are dilated. I'm already on go. I'm good at this. Air quotes, right? I'm good at this. At this crisis work, I hand the baby over to the person next to me. They swaddle the baby. They make sure the baby is warm, right? Maybe they're taking vitals. Maybe they're a nurse, EMT, right? They're just great at making sure everything is there. They're well. I jump in. I grab that baby. Wait there's another baby in the water right and so my friend passes that swaddled baby down. Maybe they grab they have some food or formula they're a parent right they work in maternal health, I don't know right you decide, right. They have some formula and they're starting to feed the baby. The second friend swaddling that second baby with a t-shirt. I jump in and I grab that other baby because this is what we do we're used to it but not only are we used to it we're good at it.
There's a rhythm. And then there's another baby that comes down. And maybe that next person is in charge of, I don't know, what do we do with babies? What do we do with this baby? Where do I place them? Maybe I need to put them in a car seat or we're going to call somebody to try to get them placed. They're a social worker or a case manager, right? Another baby and another baby, baby and another baby and another baby. And I just imagine the line just keeps going and going and going. And for as long as you could imagine on a daily basis, we do what we do because we're good at it because we think we have a system down because I kind of know who's next to me, but I don't have to talk about what I need anymore.
Right? I'm in this flow state. And at the same time, I'm tired. My limbs are tired. I'm overwhelmed. But guess what? There's more babies in the water. I feel like I'm really needed. I don't know who else is going to tap out. There's limited resources and people. I could keep going on here if you get where I'm going, right?
Right? And any of us that are in health care, teaching, you know, therapy. We understand this very, very well. Any care work. We understand that there's always, almost always limited resources. We almost always understand that there's a wait list of some sort and a need, a real need, a human need. Yeah. We're not just doing taxes here. We're talking about people's lives, babies' lives, kids, adults that are babies he's inside, right? And always and always and always, even if we're tired, we keep showing on and keep pushing over. Maybe we'll take a day off. Maybe we'll call it sick one day, but we got to get back in there and keep going and going and going. And what we find are that often, more often than not, none of us are really asking this main big question, right? We're too tired to ask this main big question. And we're such a cog in this mental health industrial complex or this educational industrial complex or this whatever industrial complex that we never really stop to say or stop to go upstream and say, why are there so many flipping babies in the water? Who's putting all these flipping babies in the water? This is dangerous. And you're killing not not only almost them or some of them might be at risk or not making it, but you're killing us.
So this doesn't really work. This system doesn't really work for the babies, hypothetically, and their parents, and it doesn't work for the human service workers that are under-resourced. Probably underpaid, undervalued, and told, well, you're not doing physical manual labor. And it's like excuse me, right, listen you know it just really brings home how emotional labor is not honored and it really brings up often not always because we do have male identified people non-binary you know but like how sexist also it is when we think of emotional labor and historically women identified and femme people. Yeah and also brings up when you think about it deeper like for for those of us that are of African descent or have been part, or people have been part of the slave trade, right? How it also brings up that kind of like free labor and mammying and caring for everybody. And it being like a literal energetic pull, an ancestral generational pull to care for everyone with the exception of self because we're expendable on some deep underground unconscious level. And so that's why I wanted to bring up the story, because I think that that story is what shifted my perspective, right? And I think as a human service worker for 25 years, 25 plus years, I was able to put my own spin on it and add all the ways that access isn't given to us, right? And we also are hit with this sort of martyr complex, but I'm needed. But especially interns, right? Like I can't take off. What do you mean?
Right? Especially when you're quote unquote lower on the hierarchy pole, right? I can't afford it. Or my supervisor will notice that I was out three times this month, right? So that's why I share this because our people need more services, more accessible services, higher quality and caliber, no matter how much they can afford. Perhaps it needs to get out of the therapy room whatever that looks like, right for certain people perhaps it needs to involve more of the community because we can't shouldn't do this alone. Perhaps it needs to involve more peer support and pods support, and perhaps if we really want to be interested in the work of healing we need to look deeper than childhood, you know. And we need to look at environment and history and ancestry and where people have been ripped from and where people have been ripping from and how that has had an indelible mark on our souls and spirits and personalities.
Jessica Fowler: Well, thank you.
[1:01:44] Beautiful. I'm just, again, I thank you for this book. It was so helpful to me. And so, I hope people hear that and they hear that they can pick this up and they can make some changes. So, thank you.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Thank you, Jessica. I appreciate you.
Jessica Fowler: Where is the best place for our listeners to connect with you?
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Yes, um you can go to Instagram, linkedin, twitter, ig is definitely where I'm most present at decolonizing therapy as well as sign up for our newsletter for all these great treats and stories and discounts and upcoming retreats um at decolonizingtherapy.com. Signing up for our newsletter is the best way to kind of keep afloat and abreast of everything thing that's happening. We also have a variety of very low cost as well as sliding scale courses on the energetics of the parent wound, on rage, on sacred grief, on boundaries. As well as a politicizing your practice series that it's at a higher price point for organizations and group practices, nonprofits, grassroots organizations. So, we try to serve in all ways that we can and make it as accessible as possible.
Jessica Fowler: Wonderful. Well, thank you.
Jennifer Mullan, PsyD: Thank you.
Jessica Fowler: Thank you for listening to this week's episode of What Your Therapist Is Reading. Make sure you head on over to the website or social media to find out about the latest giveaway. The information provided in this program is for educational and informational purposes only. And although I'm a social worker licensed in the state of New York, This program is not intended to provide mental health treatment and does not constitute a patient-therapist relationship.
[1:03:31] Music.
About the author
Dr. Jennifer Mullan birthed Decolonizing Therapy®, a psychological evolution that weaves together political, ancestral, therapeutic, and global well-being. She is also the creator of the popular Instagram account @decolonizingtherapy and recipient of Essence magazine’s 2020 Essential Hero Award in the category of mental health. Dr. Jennifer Mullan is the author of “Decolonizing Therapy: Oppression, Historical Trauma & Politicizing Your Practice” which has ignited a fervent wave of acclaim and community support as a National Best Seller.
You can connect with Dr. Jennifer Mullen on instagram, on x @drjennyjennm, YT: @decolonizingtherapy LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/decolonizing-therapy-llc/about/