hi guys today I have a very special
guest for you his name is Chris and his
channel is the rewired soul Chris
literally has so much energy you have to
check out his channel it's growing
really fast fast rate he's absolutely
smashing it right now he himself has
experienced addiction problems with his
mental health and he does videos on this
and we're very similar in the fact that
we talk about the problem and we focus
on the solution and you have to
subscribe to his channel I really hope
you guys enjoy this video over to Chris
what is up everybody my name is Chris
and I am from the mental health YouTube
channel
the rewired soul and I want to send a
huge huge huge thank you to Serena for
having me as a guest on her beautiful
channel recovery mom but before I get
started and talking a little bit about
me I want to give a big big big apology
to Serina
so for those of you who don't know
Serena actually came over to my channel
a few weeks ago she did a guest video it
was phenomenal you should check it out
it talked a lot about like avoiding
self-harm behaviors and like self-harm
recovery and things like that and it was
phenomenal and I was like yeah I'll do a
video for your channel and I've been
scatterbrained and busy and just being a
terrible terrible friend to Serena so
this video is very late so I apologize
Serena and hopefully I can make it up to
you with this video and maybe some other
stuff in the future anyways let's get
going so yeah I guess I'll just
introduce myself and explain a little
bit about my history so in recovery I
celebrated six years clean and sober on
June 23rd of this year so I actually got
sober on my birthday when I was 27 years
old so I want to share a little bit
about my history with addiction as well
as symptoms of borderline personality
disorder whenever I talk about symptoms
of BPD that I can relate to I want to
make it very clear I have never
officially diagnosed but I've talked to
a psychiatrist and some other people
like that
the consensus is I may have had a lot of
the symptoms but through my mental
health growth and things like that I've
managed to overcome a lot of those
symptoms so I just want to make that
clear as I go throughout my story so
basically my story starts out with I was
a son of an alcoholic mom and she now
has about 13 years clean it'll be in
November but she didn't get sober until
I was 20 years old and because of this
you know a lot of people who struggle
with symptoms of BP be exempt from
childhood right a lot of this emotional
dysregulation and this I love you I hate
you and you know all sorts of stuff like
it stems from childhood and me having
alcohol mom it really screwed me up as a
kid and I ended up hating her for it I
wouldn't talk to her for years at a time
and I hated visiting her and all sorts
of stuff because my mom was an alcoholic
I swore to myself that I was never going
to you substances but throughout my
entire childhood and even my teenage
years and stuff like I just felt intense
emotions where everybody else's school
you know they might get a little sad I
was like immensely depressed when people
get nervous I would have like anxiety
attacks I didn't just like somebody I
love them just these extreme emotions
you know what I mean so for me I didn't
start drinking or using until the end of
my senior year in high school after a
breakup a ton of emotions were just
overwhelming me from anger to depression
to anxiety and I just didn't want to
feel anything so I turned alcohol I
heard alcohol helps get it rid of
everything that you're feeling so I'm
like alright I'm gonna try it the moment
I tried it and I got drunk that first
time I was like this this is the thing
I've needed in my life it got rid of all
of these things that were going on in my
head and from then I was just hooked
like throughout that summer I didn't
just go hang out a party so I was like
where's the booze like where's the hard
stuff I need to get messed up and you
know a lot of this was masked through my
college years like everybody's drinking
and partying and stuff like that but it
really escalated as I started working
and I never just had the tools to manage
life so my drinking got worse and I
started losing job after job
after job and lack this self-awareness
to see that this was because of my
drinking it was you know you know forget
my boss you know I didn't like this job
anyways and all sorts of stuff and you
know my relationships I was going from
relationship to relationship and I
didn't understand why they weren't
working well I did you know it was all
the other person's fault but I had a lot
of you know self-sabotaging behaviors
you know I I would push people away when
they got too close I was also very needy
and all sorts of stuff and it was
destroying the relationships I got into
and eventually you know my girlfriend
got pregnant and we had my son and you
know I thought that was going to stop my
drinking and using but all that did was
it made me switch from alcohol to
prescription opiates and I was still
just never managing my emotions in a
healthy way so I was turning to the
pills and it didn't take long for me to
start mixing the pills with the alcohol
and life just got worse I started to
lose everything I lost the girlfriend I
wasn't allowed to see my son I was
losing jobs I was having health issues
and all sorts of stuff and I always said
I tried you know to get better but I
never tried anything all I did was try
to stop using but I kept relapsing over
and over and over again
my solution started to come when I found
12-step programs that's why I love
Serena and her story and this book that
she has coming out the big book of
borderline personality disorder I cannot
wait to read it and hopefully you
pre-ordered it because I think it's
gonna be phenomenal
but anyways I got introduced to 12-step
programs and that's when I really
started to work on myself you know I got
a lot of tough love from people and
people who helped me stop playing the
victim all the time you know although I
was the son of an alcoholic mom and I
had such a troubling childhood I had to
start taking responsibility like now
that I was a father it was no longer an
excuse to live the way that I was living
you know what I mean so you know 12-step
programs helped me out a lot but it
didn't really give me anything to help
manage my emotions on a day-to-day basis
as often as I needed so in this video I
really want to talk to you about the
biggest tool that I use to help manage
my emotions because they still they
still want to come up and flare up you
know what I mean and the best tool that
I found
meditation I specifically practice a
meditation called mindfulness and I like
because it's very informal right now I
could be mindfully communicating with
you right now I can be mindfully feeling
my feet on the ground like I can mindful
listen to the sounds on the street or
whatever it is and it helps bring me
back into the moment and I can embrace
my experience rather than trying to run
away from it because if you're like me
we're trying to alter the way that we
feel constantly sometimes it's with
substance abuse sometimes it's with
risky behavior sometimes it's with
self-harm sometimes it's with
relationships like we're just trying to
alter the way that we feel and what
meditation has done I'm also a big
neuroscience nerd meditation were wise
your brain do not try to run and escape
those feelings and that's helped me out
so much like as a youtuber you know I
read comments I can get defensive I can
feel these emotions but I'm able to sit
back and read these things mindful me
mindfully and ask myself like why am I
feeling this way you know what I mean
what's my experience right now and I can
start grounding myself mindfulness is
the core practice of the best therapy
for BPD which is dialectical behavioral
therapy so I highly suggest like you
start educating yourself in researching
dialectical behavioral therapy if you
have a therapist you have dialectical
behavioral therapy and mindfulness
there's some great books out there and
stuff like that if you can't afford
therapy but there's so much stuff you
can begin working on yourself like me I
just have meditation apps on my phone I
read a lot of books and all that kind of
stuff but it helps me on a day-to-day
basis regulate my emotions and calm down
all the craziness going on up here
anyways that's all I got for you if you
want to check out my channel it's all
about mental health I talk about
addiction and depression and anxiety and
BPD and trauma and all sorts of stuff go
check it out it's right there on that
sign the rewired soul I'm sure so it
shield link it down in that description
and stuff like that but again before I
leave I apologize Serena I apologize for
being so late with this video I love you
I love everything that you do and I
cannot wait for your book thank you
everybody for watching if you somehow
stumbled across this video and you are
not subscribed to where
every mom yet hit that subscribe button
and ring the notification bell alright
but anyways thanks for listening to me
I'll see you next time thank you so much
Chris and don't worry I know what it's
like life gets busy and your channel is
growing so quickly right now I know how
busy you are I really appreciate you
doing this video for my channel guys do
go and check
Chris's channel out it's the rewired so
he's put linking I will put a link in
down below that you can click on and go
to Chris is really active from social
media right now I know I'm rubbish on it
but yeah do do check him out because
there's a lot of valuable information
and he does a lot of videos on like
current affairs things are going on
right now and he links it to addiction
and mental health so it's really
fantastic content so do check it out
guys I'll be back in the week thank you
so much for watching I love your loads