Visual Description: Dylan & Leslie
Visual description: On the right, Dylan Secord, a fair-skinned man with side-swept brown hair and dressed in a black jacket, sits in a home setting. Leslie Pertz, a fair-skinned woman with dark brown shoulder length hair and dressed in a blue blouse sits in a home setting.
Image of a logo of DEAF C.A.N.! at the right bottom corner of the video.
Images of logos of Facebook and Instagram at the top of the video.
At the end of the video, images of Facebook, Instagram, and DEAF C.A.N.!. The contact information for Dylan Secord is 2111 Orchard Lake Road - Suite #101 Sylvan Lake, MI 48320, 248-636-2355, and [email protected]. The contact information for Leslie Pertz is "Patients should have a Michigan Medicine medical record number (MRN) prior to calling to schedule. Patients do not need to be a patient at Dexter Health Center, or a patient of Michigan Medicine at all. We offer brief coping and stress management counseling via video visit for anyone who uses ASL to communicate. Most insurances accepted.
If already a patient anywhere (have an MRN) at Michigan Medicine, people can call 734-426-2796(through VRS) and ask to schedule with Leslie.
If you do not already have an MRN, first call 1-866-452-9896 or 734-936-4990 to establish as a patient., then call 734-426-2796."
Image of a logo of DEAF C.A.N.! at the right bottom corner of the video.
Images of logos of Facebook and Instagram at the top of the video.
At the end of the video, images of Facebook, Instagram, and DEAF C.A.N.!. The contact information for Dylan Secord is 2111 Orchard Lake Road - Suite #101 Sylvan Lake, MI 48320, 248-636-2355, and [email protected]. The contact information for Leslie Pertz is "Patients should have a Michigan Medicine medical record number (MRN) prior to calling to schedule. Patients do not need to be a patient at Dexter Health Center, or a patient of Michigan Medicine at all. We offer brief coping and stress management counseling via video visit for anyone who uses ASL to communicate. Most insurances accepted.
If already a patient anywhere (have an MRN) at Michigan Medicine, people can call 734-426-2796(through VRS) and ask to schedule with Leslie.
If you do not already have an MRN, first call 1-866-452-9896 or 734-936-4990 to establish as a patient., then call 734-426-2796."
Transcript: Dylan & Leslie
- Hi. I'm Dylan Secord. I'm a Clinical Social Worker for DEAF C.A.N.! And we are thrilled to be able to interview a wonderful friend of mine. So if you could introduce yourself that would be great. Hi, I'm Leslie Pertz. And the same as Dylan, I'm a Clinical Social worker, but I work for Michigan Medicine. It's housed under the U of M hospital, but I do not work at the main hospital. I work at the clinic in Dexter. I work at the Dexter health clinic with two deaf doctors, Dr.Zazove and Dr. McKee. So the three of us work together in Dexter.
- Yes, I think it is absolutely wonderful that we can interview you because that clinic is a valuable resource here in Michigan. It's very rare to have a clinic with two deaf doctors plus a social worker who's fluent in sign language. It's amazing. Deaf people, deaf blind people, hard of hearing people, should take advantage of this wonderful resource here in Michigan. So if you could explain a little bit about your practice, about your background, how you became a social worker. I'm sure people wanna know about you Leslie, come on, you know it's culturally appropriate for deaf people to ask those kinds of questions.
- Yes, I have felt so fortunate. I'm a lucky person. And it just so happened, I think it's been about 20 years now. I was interpreting, but maybe 10 years ago I decided to go to graduate school, and I was interpreting and in Michigan I was interpreting and I was recognizing repeatedly that people had barriers and couldn't access appropriate mental health services. People were getting diagnosed incorrectly, over medicated, they couldn't get access at all to any services and it was horrific. So I decided to go to graduate school and things progressed and I got a job at another hospital in a different city, and one day I was looking for jobs and Michigan Medicine had a job available and I thought, Oh, why not apply for that? And sure enough I got into Michigan Medicine. It was at another clinic where I started and that's been about eight years. I worked at the Brighton Health Center and I did a variety of clinical work. And it just so happened that I met Dr.Mckee and Dr.Zazove and they were talking about starting a deaf health clinic. And I thought, well wow, I wonder if there's any way that I can help them. So we started that clinic about four years ago and it's just been thriving. We have about 150 patients, deaf patients who sign.
- Wow. That's amazing. And also it's part of the general Dexter Health Center. So it's not just deaf people at this clinic. It's the general public too. I think we have 12,000 patients in the clinic. and 150 of them are signing deaf patients. So that's my story.
- Oh, that's wonderful. Leslie. Thank you so much for letting us know about Dexter, the Dexter Health Center. From our experiences and from what we've seen and from our research, it shows that communication is so valuable in any type of relationship. So with doctors, with therapists, you have to have strong communication because when you have the strong communication, it means that you can have a positive rapport with people, a wonderful relationship and a good interaction. So a strong relationship means success and successful outcomes with mental health and with general health. So this is wonderful. Also, if you could talk a little bit about your specialty. I know that you have a specialty, so if you could talk about your expertise, that would be wonderful.
- Yes. Okay. So part of my work as a social worker, the social work field is quite broad as you know. We do all kinds of different things and people say, what does a normal day of a social worker look like? And I respond to that. There are no normal days. There's such a huge variety of what we're doing daily. But for the therapy interactive sessions, I do have a specific passion. It's E.M.D.R. So let me explain what that means. E means Eye, M is Movement, D is Desensitization and R is Reprocessing. So you don't have to memorize that. You don't have to memorize the meaning of that at all. We don't even have to discuss that any further. But that type of therapy is used with eye movement. So you know when you're sleeping, when you're in a deep sleep.
- Yes, exactly. REM sleep is happening. So when that happens, a person is sleeping and their eyes are moving, even though their eyes are closed, they're moving and it happens overnight. So a person who starts this therapy, uses that therapy, in a room. It doesn't necessarily mean that they have to sleep or that there's any type of hypnosis involved. It's not that at all. The person is wide awake during therapy, but we use eye movement to help that person dream. Sometimes you have dreams and you wake up and you think, Oh well that was an odd dream. Why did I dream that? And people don't always know, but the brain is processing just like your stomach processes food. So you eat something, you chew it, it goes down into your stomach. And then your stomach processes that to get nutrients and then it works its way out. I'm sorry to say it but when you Poop. So the same thing happens in the brain if you will. You've taken all of this information during the day and then overnight your brain has to metabolize that information and process things. So, that type of therapy uses a process during your waking hours. So, you don't have to, use your eyes only, you can right now, if the two of us were going to try to use that type of therapy, that counseling, like if something happened to you, for example, if you experienced a car accident, that's a very brief type of counseling that I would use. But I would say, " Tell me something that you saw during the accident. " and you would tell me and I would say, follow my fingers.
- Oh and then my eyes would follow your fingers?
- Yes. It's kind of hard to explain, but it happens in your brain. You start processing immediately. Until that issue was resolved. Now, it doesn't mean you forget the issue. It doesn't mean you forget what happened or that you don't care about it. It just becomes something from the accident. It might've been, something that you were really stressed about and then you process that information until a time where you reach like a peaceful place where you say, something happened to me, but I'm fine. I am Okay. So, I like to use this with deaf people because you don't have to have signing or talking. You just picture something, think about something that has happened to you. So you can process that until that issue was resolved. I would say also that this eye gaze is used, but that's not needed anymore. There's other equipment, so let me show you.
- Oh wow. I can't wait to see it.
- So there are these things.
- Wow. Does that vibrate, Leslie?
- Yes, they do. Yep. They move, they vibrate. It's the same idea as your phone, the vibration that you feel on your phone. So there's not an electrical shock, nothing like that. It's just moves. So when they're on, they sort of vibrate. Yup. So you they vibrate back and forth in your eyes. So your eyes, it's just like your eyes moving. They vibrate in each hand. So you hold one in each hand and you're sitting there or you can put them, sometimes people put them in their shoes and they vibrate on their shoes and it vibrates back and forth, and your brain has two hemispheres if you will. So and they receive stimulus from either side of the hemisphere and one side processes specific information and the other side processes other information. So I don't know exactly how many deaf people altogether. I would say probably 25 or 30 deaf people have used this specific therapy.
- Wow. Leslie
- And all of them said that it was wonderful, absolutely wonderful. Whether it was trauma or just a specific experience or whatever it was something horrific that happened to them. And all of them have said that there was a marked improvement in this distress. So it's been amazing. It's not magic. It's not a one day fix it's still a process, but, it seems like it's better than other types of therapy. There's more of an interaction, there's more of processing involved so it seems to be successful.
- Wow. Thanks Leslie. That's wonderful. I'm shocked to see that those little vibrating tools that you have. So I think you and I have met about three years ago and you showed me this with wires.
- Oh yes. We still have the wires, Dylan. We do. But the wires get so tangled so I didn't show you those. We just have these that are wireless too.
- Oh, okay. So 2.0 an upgrade.
- Yes. We also have this, which is a light. So the lights move back and forth, along this light stick and you can use your eyes and follow the lights back and forth also. So really, actually, we have found with this new technology probably just six weeks ago, that we can't have one on one sessions any longer with this pandemic. So, we didn't wanna have the barrier, so I can't give people these little vibrating tools. So I have have had them use tapping. I know I taught that to the other person, these tapping techniques because, I'm not able to meet with them face to face. They weren't able to hold onto these vibrating tools, but they have been able to use these visual tool and this tapping. So all three of these have been very successful tools to use.
- So E.M.D.R, it's very malleable if you will. It's very flexible. Like the tapping that you showed us, the vibrating tools that you showed us, the blinking light. This is amazing, Leslie. And also I want the audience to know that, in the world of therapy, there are so many different approaches. But, I think it's amazing because my personal belief is that when a person starts therapy, that person has an individual journey. And I encourage them to explore, to find the best option for them and which therapy they want. If they want a man therapist, a woman therapist, which background they want their therapist to have, they need to find a specific fit. The second part of that is, some therapy is more CBT, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy. Some is the E.D.M.R therapy, some is more talk therapy. So there's a wide variety of therapy options available. And I think that people should have the option of testing it out until they find the exact right therapy for them. So I'm happy to talk to you about E.M.D.R today, Leslie. That's amazing.
- I think that E.M.D.R is not the only option Dylan. I use it and I use many other options too for people in different kinds of therapy. What you have been talking about. So again, I like for people to find that therapy that fits. It doesn't mean when you come to see me, that there'll be trauma resolved the very first day, but we use E.M.D.R for positive support for people also. And, you can think about things, think about something. You can be calm and you can be very positive or you can think about something that you enjoy, you can envision that, and then you can think about that and use this tapping or the vibrating tools that we have. And that a lot of people have talked about the inspiration that they feel and that they feel better supported and a lot of help. So it's not only about working through traumatic situations, it's positive situations also. So really, if you wouldn't mind, I have a story to tell you about a girl, because this can be used with children too. So there was a little girl one time and it was play therapy that we were using and it just so happened, Let me see. I'm trying to remember. And with maintaining confidentiality also, but this little girl had a problem. She had a problem sleeping overnight. So she woke up repeatedly during the night and she was screaming. It was a little deaf girl, but she was screaming during the night and her mom just did not know what to do. So they came to my office, and we started just playing with dolls. And once this little girl was playing, I was using, we were playing with these specific toys and I was using this tapping. So I was tapping and I told her, I know it's kind of a funny thing. me tapping on your knee, but it's okay if you don't mind. And she said, " Sure, I'm just playing. It's okay." So I was tapping on her knee and actually, kids immediately, they're very fast to pick up on this type of therapy. So it was almost like magic because it was two times. I saw her two times. And the issue was resolved and the mom called, was a hearing mom, and she called me and she said, " What did you do?" And I said," I don't know what happened." And the mom said, " She's sleeping overnight, she's sleeping eight hours. She isn't waking up at all. This is a new kid to me." And that's what the mom said. And I said," Well, that's the point, right?" So, yay, tadaa we did it. Dylan.
- So that's amazing. I love that. And I love that pop, I wanna see them use more often in therapy, the deaf word pop. But E.M.D.R is amazing and it really makes me think how many deaf people and hearing people as well, as we're growing up, we're not taught healthy ways to face our feelings, we're not taught healthy ways to process our life trauma. And we typically just compartmentalize or just ignore what's happening. And then we have baggage to carry and we struggle with that. It can be positive, it can be negative. So it seems like E.M.D.R, is going to help a person feel more connected, to their feelings and to help them feel more confident, to feel ready to sort through their baggage or unpack, if you will, and to analyze their feelings until they can accept what has happened to them. And maybe we can't change what's happened, but I think that E.M.D.R can, help a deaf person, realize what's happened to them, process that accept how they feel. And then that situation won't be as troublesome for them the rest of their lives. Do you think that I summarize that well, Leslie?
- Oh yes. A 100% Dylan. That was perfect. And I also agree with that. And when I talk about trauma, it doesn't always mean what we think about big T trauma, like a car accident or a rape or a molestation when you're growing up. But sometimes, I don't wanna say that trauma is simple because trauma is never simple, but it's more of a small T trauma if you will. Everyday oppression, your experiences. It doesn't matter if you're deaf or that of a woman or people of color. We all experience daily oppression. And a lot of people experienced that oppression, and horrible things happen to us as we're growing up. And many people talk about the feeling of being cut off, they don't know exactly how to process the feelings. And like you said, they just sort of set those feelings aside and sometimes they don't feel anything from this trauma. They don't feel any emotion in their body. And sometimes, I ask a person, What does your body feel? And they say, " It doesn't feel anything. I don't feel anything." So, E.M.D.R can help people with the unpacking what they're holding on to. It can help them take a look at that, those feelings that they're having and process those feelings.
- Yes, I'm happy that you're talking about trauma, Leslie, because I've always believed that word trauma there are no rules associated with that, trauma can mean a lot of different things. So each person defines what trauma means to them. Because if you asked two people, who are standing side by side who experience the same situation, one person might say it was a horrific trauma and the other person might say, Oh, " It was fine. It wasn't a trauma to me." So it really depends on the individual. So it's very important for people to realize that we have to respect the individual and value their personal stories and respect their life stories as opposed to judging the person. So there has to be an open dialogue. And I think that that leads to a very healthy community.
- Yes, I agree with you Dylan. And sometimes, part of therapy is teaching a person that their experience might be trauma. And I have noticed that hearing people, when you sit down to speak with a hearing person, a deaf person might tell me their story and I would say, that might be trauma because this is just my experience. I'm not sure that it's right. But I think that the deaf community, experiences so much stigma that you don't realize that other people don't have those same experiences. There's so much oppression systematically and so many deaf people think that, everyone has that same experience and that it's normal. And sometimes I have to tell the deaf person it's not normal. I hate the word normal, but I would say it's not appropriate. It's not appropriate this experience that you had. So some counseling is teaching to tell people that their experiences are not appropriate. Not that the person is inappropriate, but that the experience was inappropriate.
- Yes. I think that that discussion leads to the word audism. Because all people try to understand what that word means. But if you asked me 10 years ago or 15 years ago what that word meant, audism I would have had a very vague answer. But with time and with experience and with my life experience, I have a whole new definition of audism. I took a deaf class and I processed that and we have been sort of colonized by hearing people with their beliefs and their medical perspective. So, we have to let go of those values and have our own values in our own cultures and we know what's right and we know what's wrong and we know how we need to address certain situations. So thank you so much Leslie, for your interview today. And before we close this wonderful interview, is there any last thoughts that you'd like to leave us with?
- Well, Dylan, I think that E.M.D.R is healing and I think that it's wonderful. So if anyone wants to come to the Dexter Health Center and talk about it, talk about anything, come on over and see me. Thanks so much for the opportunity to explain about my passion today. Thank you.
- Of course Leslie. And I courage people to contact Leslie and see if you can make an appointment with her and we'll end the interview with her direct contact information, so please give Leslie a call. Thank you so much.
- Thanks, Dylan.
- Okay. I hope you enjoyed this interview. Goodbye everybody.
- Bye.
- Yes, I think it is absolutely wonderful that we can interview you because that clinic is a valuable resource here in Michigan. It's very rare to have a clinic with two deaf doctors plus a social worker who's fluent in sign language. It's amazing. Deaf people, deaf blind people, hard of hearing people, should take advantage of this wonderful resource here in Michigan. So if you could explain a little bit about your practice, about your background, how you became a social worker. I'm sure people wanna know about you Leslie, come on, you know it's culturally appropriate for deaf people to ask those kinds of questions.
- Yes, I have felt so fortunate. I'm a lucky person. And it just so happened, I think it's been about 20 years now. I was interpreting, but maybe 10 years ago I decided to go to graduate school, and I was interpreting and in Michigan I was interpreting and I was recognizing repeatedly that people had barriers and couldn't access appropriate mental health services. People were getting diagnosed incorrectly, over medicated, they couldn't get access at all to any services and it was horrific. So I decided to go to graduate school and things progressed and I got a job at another hospital in a different city, and one day I was looking for jobs and Michigan Medicine had a job available and I thought, Oh, why not apply for that? And sure enough I got into Michigan Medicine. It was at another clinic where I started and that's been about eight years. I worked at the Brighton Health Center and I did a variety of clinical work. And it just so happened that I met Dr.Mckee and Dr.Zazove and they were talking about starting a deaf health clinic. And I thought, well wow, I wonder if there's any way that I can help them. So we started that clinic about four years ago and it's just been thriving. We have about 150 patients, deaf patients who sign.
- Wow. That's amazing. And also it's part of the general Dexter Health Center. So it's not just deaf people at this clinic. It's the general public too. I think we have 12,000 patients in the clinic. and 150 of them are signing deaf patients. So that's my story.
- Oh, that's wonderful. Leslie. Thank you so much for letting us know about Dexter, the Dexter Health Center. From our experiences and from what we've seen and from our research, it shows that communication is so valuable in any type of relationship. So with doctors, with therapists, you have to have strong communication because when you have the strong communication, it means that you can have a positive rapport with people, a wonderful relationship and a good interaction. So a strong relationship means success and successful outcomes with mental health and with general health. So this is wonderful. Also, if you could talk a little bit about your specialty. I know that you have a specialty, so if you could talk about your expertise, that would be wonderful.
- Yes. Okay. So part of my work as a social worker, the social work field is quite broad as you know. We do all kinds of different things and people say, what does a normal day of a social worker look like? And I respond to that. There are no normal days. There's such a huge variety of what we're doing daily. But for the therapy interactive sessions, I do have a specific passion. It's E.M.D.R. So let me explain what that means. E means Eye, M is Movement, D is Desensitization and R is Reprocessing. So you don't have to memorize that. You don't have to memorize the meaning of that at all. We don't even have to discuss that any further. But that type of therapy is used with eye movement. So you know when you're sleeping, when you're in a deep sleep.
- Yes, exactly. REM sleep is happening. So when that happens, a person is sleeping and their eyes are moving, even though their eyes are closed, they're moving and it happens overnight. So a person who starts this therapy, uses that therapy, in a room. It doesn't necessarily mean that they have to sleep or that there's any type of hypnosis involved. It's not that at all. The person is wide awake during therapy, but we use eye movement to help that person dream. Sometimes you have dreams and you wake up and you think, Oh well that was an odd dream. Why did I dream that? And people don't always know, but the brain is processing just like your stomach processes food. So you eat something, you chew it, it goes down into your stomach. And then your stomach processes that to get nutrients and then it works its way out. I'm sorry to say it but when you Poop. So the same thing happens in the brain if you will. You've taken all of this information during the day and then overnight your brain has to metabolize that information and process things. So, that type of therapy uses a process during your waking hours. So, you don't have to, use your eyes only, you can right now, if the two of us were going to try to use that type of therapy, that counseling, like if something happened to you, for example, if you experienced a car accident, that's a very brief type of counseling that I would use. But I would say, " Tell me something that you saw during the accident. " and you would tell me and I would say, follow my fingers.
- Oh and then my eyes would follow your fingers?
- Yes. It's kind of hard to explain, but it happens in your brain. You start processing immediately. Until that issue was resolved. Now, it doesn't mean you forget the issue. It doesn't mean you forget what happened or that you don't care about it. It just becomes something from the accident. It might've been, something that you were really stressed about and then you process that information until a time where you reach like a peaceful place where you say, something happened to me, but I'm fine. I am Okay. So, I like to use this with deaf people because you don't have to have signing or talking. You just picture something, think about something that has happened to you. So you can process that until that issue was resolved. I would say also that this eye gaze is used, but that's not needed anymore. There's other equipment, so let me show you.
- Oh wow. I can't wait to see it.
- So there are these things.
- Wow. Does that vibrate, Leslie?
- Yes, they do. Yep. They move, they vibrate. It's the same idea as your phone, the vibration that you feel on your phone. So there's not an electrical shock, nothing like that. It's just moves. So when they're on, they sort of vibrate. Yup. So you they vibrate back and forth in your eyes. So your eyes, it's just like your eyes moving. They vibrate in each hand. So you hold one in each hand and you're sitting there or you can put them, sometimes people put them in their shoes and they vibrate on their shoes and it vibrates back and forth, and your brain has two hemispheres if you will. So and they receive stimulus from either side of the hemisphere and one side processes specific information and the other side processes other information. So I don't know exactly how many deaf people altogether. I would say probably 25 or 30 deaf people have used this specific therapy.
- Wow. Leslie
- And all of them said that it was wonderful, absolutely wonderful. Whether it was trauma or just a specific experience or whatever it was something horrific that happened to them. And all of them have said that there was a marked improvement in this distress. So it's been amazing. It's not magic. It's not a one day fix it's still a process, but, it seems like it's better than other types of therapy. There's more of an interaction, there's more of processing involved so it seems to be successful.
- Wow. Thanks Leslie. That's wonderful. I'm shocked to see that those little vibrating tools that you have. So I think you and I have met about three years ago and you showed me this with wires.
- Oh yes. We still have the wires, Dylan. We do. But the wires get so tangled so I didn't show you those. We just have these that are wireless too.
- Oh, okay. So 2.0 an upgrade.
- Yes. We also have this, which is a light. So the lights move back and forth, along this light stick and you can use your eyes and follow the lights back and forth also. So really, actually, we have found with this new technology probably just six weeks ago, that we can't have one on one sessions any longer with this pandemic. So, we didn't wanna have the barrier, so I can't give people these little vibrating tools. So I have have had them use tapping. I know I taught that to the other person, these tapping techniques because, I'm not able to meet with them face to face. They weren't able to hold onto these vibrating tools, but they have been able to use these visual tool and this tapping. So all three of these have been very successful tools to use.
- So E.M.D.R, it's very malleable if you will. It's very flexible. Like the tapping that you showed us, the vibrating tools that you showed us, the blinking light. This is amazing, Leslie. And also I want the audience to know that, in the world of therapy, there are so many different approaches. But, I think it's amazing because my personal belief is that when a person starts therapy, that person has an individual journey. And I encourage them to explore, to find the best option for them and which therapy they want. If they want a man therapist, a woman therapist, which background they want their therapist to have, they need to find a specific fit. The second part of that is, some therapy is more CBT, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy. Some is the E.D.M.R therapy, some is more talk therapy. So there's a wide variety of therapy options available. And I think that people should have the option of testing it out until they find the exact right therapy for them. So I'm happy to talk to you about E.M.D.R today, Leslie. That's amazing.
- I think that E.M.D.R is not the only option Dylan. I use it and I use many other options too for people in different kinds of therapy. What you have been talking about. So again, I like for people to find that therapy that fits. It doesn't mean when you come to see me, that there'll be trauma resolved the very first day, but we use E.M.D.R for positive support for people also. And, you can think about things, think about something. You can be calm and you can be very positive or you can think about something that you enjoy, you can envision that, and then you can think about that and use this tapping or the vibrating tools that we have. And that a lot of people have talked about the inspiration that they feel and that they feel better supported and a lot of help. So it's not only about working through traumatic situations, it's positive situations also. So really, if you wouldn't mind, I have a story to tell you about a girl, because this can be used with children too. So there was a little girl one time and it was play therapy that we were using and it just so happened, Let me see. I'm trying to remember. And with maintaining confidentiality also, but this little girl had a problem. She had a problem sleeping overnight. So she woke up repeatedly during the night and she was screaming. It was a little deaf girl, but she was screaming during the night and her mom just did not know what to do. So they came to my office, and we started just playing with dolls. And once this little girl was playing, I was using, we were playing with these specific toys and I was using this tapping. So I was tapping and I told her, I know it's kind of a funny thing. me tapping on your knee, but it's okay if you don't mind. And she said, " Sure, I'm just playing. It's okay." So I was tapping on her knee and actually, kids immediately, they're very fast to pick up on this type of therapy. So it was almost like magic because it was two times. I saw her two times. And the issue was resolved and the mom called, was a hearing mom, and she called me and she said, " What did you do?" And I said," I don't know what happened." And the mom said, " She's sleeping overnight, she's sleeping eight hours. She isn't waking up at all. This is a new kid to me." And that's what the mom said. And I said," Well, that's the point, right?" So, yay, tadaa we did it. Dylan.
- So that's amazing. I love that. And I love that pop, I wanna see them use more often in therapy, the deaf word pop. But E.M.D.R is amazing and it really makes me think how many deaf people and hearing people as well, as we're growing up, we're not taught healthy ways to face our feelings, we're not taught healthy ways to process our life trauma. And we typically just compartmentalize or just ignore what's happening. And then we have baggage to carry and we struggle with that. It can be positive, it can be negative. So it seems like E.M.D.R, is going to help a person feel more connected, to their feelings and to help them feel more confident, to feel ready to sort through their baggage or unpack, if you will, and to analyze their feelings until they can accept what has happened to them. And maybe we can't change what's happened, but I think that E.M.D.R can, help a deaf person, realize what's happened to them, process that accept how they feel. And then that situation won't be as troublesome for them the rest of their lives. Do you think that I summarize that well, Leslie?
- Oh yes. A 100% Dylan. That was perfect. And I also agree with that. And when I talk about trauma, it doesn't always mean what we think about big T trauma, like a car accident or a rape or a molestation when you're growing up. But sometimes, I don't wanna say that trauma is simple because trauma is never simple, but it's more of a small T trauma if you will. Everyday oppression, your experiences. It doesn't matter if you're deaf or that of a woman or people of color. We all experience daily oppression. And a lot of people experienced that oppression, and horrible things happen to us as we're growing up. And many people talk about the feeling of being cut off, they don't know exactly how to process the feelings. And like you said, they just sort of set those feelings aside and sometimes they don't feel anything from this trauma. They don't feel any emotion in their body. And sometimes, I ask a person, What does your body feel? And they say, " It doesn't feel anything. I don't feel anything." So, E.M.D.R can help people with the unpacking what they're holding on to. It can help them take a look at that, those feelings that they're having and process those feelings.
- Yes, I'm happy that you're talking about trauma, Leslie, because I've always believed that word trauma there are no rules associated with that, trauma can mean a lot of different things. So each person defines what trauma means to them. Because if you asked two people, who are standing side by side who experience the same situation, one person might say it was a horrific trauma and the other person might say, Oh, " It was fine. It wasn't a trauma to me." So it really depends on the individual. So it's very important for people to realize that we have to respect the individual and value their personal stories and respect their life stories as opposed to judging the person. So there has to be an open dialogue. And I think that that leads to a very healthy community.
- Yes, I agree with you Dylan. And sometimes, part of therapy is teaching a person that their experience might be trauma. And I have noticed that hearing people, when you sit down to speak with a hearing person, a deaf person might tell me their story and I would say, that might be trauma because this is just my experience. I'm not sure that it's right. But I think that the deaf community, experiences so much stigma that you don't realize that other people don't have those same experiences. There's so much oppression systematically and so many deaf people think that, everyone has that same experience and that it's normal. And sometimes I have to tell the deaf person it's not normal. I hate the word normal, but I would say it's not appropriate. It's not appropriate this experience that you had. So some counseling is teaching to tell people that their experiences are not appropriate. Not that the person is inappropriate, but that the experience was inappropriate.
- Yes. I think that that discussion leads to the word audism. Because all people try to understand what that word means. But if you asked me 10 years ago or 15 years ago what that word meant, audism I would have had a very vague answer. But with time and with experience and with my life experience, I have a whole new definition of audism. I took a deaf class and I processed that and we have been sort of colonized by hearing people with their beliefs and their medical perspective. So, we have to let go of those values and have our own values in our own cultures and we know what's right and we know what's wrong and we know how we need to address certain situations. So thank you so much Leslie, for your interview today. And before we close this wonderful interview, is there any last thoughts that you'd like to leave us with?
- Well, Dylan, I think that E.M.D.R is healing and I think that it's wonderful. So if anyone wants to come to the Dexter Health Center and talk about it, talk about anything, come on over and see me. Thanks so much for the opportunity to explain about my passion today. Thank you.
- Of course Leslie. And I courage people to contact Leslie and see if you can make an appointment with her and we'll end the interview with her direct contact information, so please give Leslie a call. Thank you so much.
- Thanks, Dylan.
- Okay. I hope you enjoyed this interview. Goodbye everybody.
- Bye.