True to Yourself

027: High Functioning Depression Signs: Understanding Perfectly Hidden Depression with Dr. Margaret Rutherford

• ananta.one • Episode 27

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Do you recognize the signs of high functioning depression in yourself or someone you love? In this powerful episode of True to Yourself, we dive deep into the hidden world of high functioning depression with renowned psychotherapist Dr. Margaret Rutherford, author of "Perfectly Hidden Depression."

Dr. Rutherford introduces her groundbreaking concept of "perfectly hidden depression" - a form of high functioning depression where emotional suppression becomes a survival strategy. Unlike traditional depression symptoms, perfectly hidden depression often goes undetected because sufferers appear successful, grateful, and put-together on the outside while struggling with deep loneliness and despair internally.

In this episode, you'll discover:

  • The key difference between perfectionism vs excellence and how destructive perfectionism fuels high functioning depression
  • Signs of emotional suppression and how hiding behind masks impacts your authentic living journey
  • Why therapy for high functioning depression requires a unique approach focused on vulnerability and emotional access
  • The connection between childhood trauma and perfectly hidden depression patterns
  • How toxic positivity and forced gratitude contribute to emotional suppression
  • Practical strategies for healing from childhood trauma while maintaining your drive for excellence
  • The role of anger management in depression recovery and why suppressed anger manifests through the body
  • How to begin your journey from people-pleasing to authentic living without losing your relationships

Whether you're struggling with high functioning depression yourself, supporting a loved one, or working in the helping professions, this episode offers practical tools for recognizing emotional suppression and moving toward authentic living.

Dr. Margaret Rutherford is a clinical psychologist with 30 years of experience, author and podcast host. Her book Perfectly Hidden Depression: How to Break Free from the Perfectionism That Masks Your Depression has reached readers worldwide. Her TEDx talk has over 2 million views, and her SelfWork Podcast is ranked among the top mental health podcasts.

Visit her website: drmargaretrutherford.com

Resources:

Begin with Wisdom: The Way of the Goddess Book
“I very highly recommend it... I think anyone can benefit from its wisdom." Dr. Deepak Chopra: a.co/crHf7Wm

Get Grounded: Free Living Liberated Newsletter
Rituals and inspiration to stay steady and radiant in your purpose: theancientway.kit.com

Know Yourself: Free Chakra Healing Guide
Discover where your energy flows and where it’s blocked with actionable insight: chakrahealingguide.com

Heal Your Gut: Free Digestion Healing Guide
theancientway.kit.com/digestive-healing

Give from a Full Cup: Circle of Life Community
Grow alongside fellow givers: theancientway.co/community

Journey Deeper: Book a Free Discovery Call
calendly.com/anantaripa/discovery-call

Disclaimer: Resources are for educational and spiritual growth purposes only and are not a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Please consult your healthcare provider for medical conce...

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Welcome, Dr. Margaret, to the True to Yourself podcast. It's so wonderful to have you. I can

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

truly say that I'm more than delighted to be here. Thank you so very much, Ananta.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Oh, thank you so much. I really enjoyed reading your book, Perfectly Hidden Depression. It was an extremely illuminating book, even though I feel like I have been on this healing journey for a long time now myself, I still found so much valuable content in it and so much insight and I can't wait to introduce our readers to it and help them to find a way to ease into the healing journey through it but before we dive into the book I would actually love to hear about a time in your life when you were true to yourself as the podcast title proudly talks about and how that impacted you

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

you know when when you you know you you sent me the questions a little bit early and i i thought about that one and immediately what came to mind um my husband and i've been married for 33 years but he was not my first husband he was my third actually my my i had two weddings marriages in my 20s both of them very chaotic and very destructive and not good and when we moved here this is a small southern town we moved from dallas and i said i'm just not going to tell anybody i mean i you know i carried still a lot of And I said, you know, I just, you know, I won't lie, but I'm not sure I will offer it, you know, as information. And at the time, Maya Angelou came to my awareness as she was poet laureate at Bill Clinton's inauguration. And I went to the bookstore and looked through her books and found a little book of essays called Wouldn't Take Nothing from My Journey Now. And in that book of essays, she told a story about herself that she had been elected or somehow had been given the honor of being like New York City's person of the week or person of the month. There's a big high honor. And she went out to celebrate with a bunch of her friends and she got absolutely snockered. She got really, really drunk. And she said she saddled up to this table of men and sat down and very sloppily questioned them about why no man would love her and how she had struggled and what was so wrong with her and her friends had to sort of drag her off and say, Maya, let's go home. And she said it was one of those moments that you wish you could change your name and move to Canada. I thought about that, Ananta, and I thought, you know, here she is, poet laureate, esteemed author, writer, very wise. And she's putting this very embarrassing moment in a book. And I put it down and I thought, I'm not going to hide. I don't want to hide. I have lived the life I've lived. I've made mistakes. I want to be more transparent than that. And I was. And I have tried to increase my ability to do that from thence forward because I was reared in a family where you just didn't air your dirty laundry and you just didn't talk about anything that was, you know, not nice. And so It was something that really changed me. This was in my late 30s, early 40s. That's the moment that came to mind when I made that decision, thanks to Maya Angelou, that I would share as much as I could that I thought would be helpful to my clients and then to my friends. It was like, okay, it's me. Here I am.

Unknown:

Yeah.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Wow. What a powerful story. That's incredible that you were able to connect with that and that she had that experience. I do remember reading that in your book and being really struck by that. Like, wow. I mean, she could have totally not shared that with the world through writing, but the fact that she did, I feel gives us all permission to have less than perfect experiences that we actually own.

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

Exactly. And I, I, why it's that particular moment. I don't know why, but that's the one that came to mind.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

It's really powerful. Thank you for sharing about that. So what exactly is perfectly hidden depression?

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

Well, the term itself is something that I pulled out of the air as I was writing a blog post, my normal weekly blog post one day. And I was thinking about these people that had come into my office. I'm a nurse. And I've been in practice for quite a while when I moved to, well, I've been in practice for seven or eight years when I wrote this. So not quite too long, but I was thinking about the people who would walk in my office and deny vehemently that they were depressed, that they would say, oh, I'm not really sure why I'm here, but you know, I'm a little anxious or there's some relationship issues or I've got some anxiety or I can't sleep or whatever. But what I noticed about all of them, Ananta, was that they could not access painful emotion. And even if they were talking about something that would be incredibly painful for most of us to talk about, they would smile or they would discount it. They would say, Oh, you know, it happened a long time ago. It's really kind of silly for me to even bring it up, but you asked something like that. And when I wrote this post, I called it the perfectly hidden depressed person. Are you one? And it went viral and all this kind of thing. And that led to the book eventually five years later. But what it is, is when destructive, there are several kinds of perfectionism, but the one I'm talking about is a destructive kind of perfectionism. When that is the camouflage that emerges as someone's survival strategy in their family, as a child, whatever, even as an adult, and that they continue living life like that where it actually begins to hide or repress or suppress actual painful traumatic memories or things that you you put away because either it's not safe enough in your family or your culture to talk about it it's not uh it's not okay to talk about i mean there you get abused for it you get chastised for it whatever it is and so you have this storage of hidden deep painful memories which you really maybe you you may not even be aware that they're stowed as entrenchedly away as they are but you are you know something's wrong because you're constantly needing to be busy you're constantly needing to be on you constantly need to feel in control and it's what I call perfectly hidden depression because it is not going to be like your typical depression it's not going to look like that it's not going to sound like that and I it's an incredibly important thing for us to talk about because certainly in the recent years perfectionism is way on the rise really amongst many cultures internationally so as is suicide so there's a correlation so that I mean it's Kind of a complicated question, but that's probably the most succinct answer I can give at this point. Hope that's helpful.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Yeah, absolutely. And speaking of the signs, what would you say are the telltale signs of perfectly hidden depression?

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

the signs of it. That's, you know, I, it is, it is a, it, what a lot of people who have identified with perfectly hidden depression, it's not a diagnosis, by the way, I call it a, I call it a syndrome, which is a group of behaviors or beliefs that are typically found together. Codependence is probably the most well-known syndrome around here. And it is a mixture of these traits and beliefs that demand a lot of perfectionism you're highly perfectionistic you you carry but but that perfectionism instead of being fueled by curiosity or generosity or whatever it's really more fueled by shame I've got to prove myself as a person I've got to I've got to make I'm afraid people will find out that I make mistakes so I've got to do things perfectly you take a lot of responsibility in fact you're uber responsible you do discount hurt and any kind of pain from the present or the past you um you're very uh helpful and loving toward other people but you don't let anybody really know you uh you i mean i can there are about 10 basic traits you're very you exude a lot of gratitude and you talk about being very grateful but at the same time it has a toxicity to it meaning that uh you don't even, I mean, you must be grateful for things rather than seeing that even things that are blessings have underbellies that can be difficult. Um, and it's, it's just a general, uh, you're often very successful. Um, and you're well-liked you're, you're, you're, you're well-known in the community. You give, you love, you care, you work hard, but at the same time at the core of that you're you're very lonely very despairing in your very quiet silent moments and unfortunately that despair can reach can reach can reach dangerous dangerous levels where suicide is an option

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

wow wow you said a lot of really important things that I want to talk to you about. It actually brought up three things in particular, so I'll just go one at a time. But how do you know when someone is pursuing excellence versus perfectionism?

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

Great question. There's absolutely nothing wrong with pursuing excellence. Absolutely nothing wrong. I mean, in fact, you know, it's something that we really admire in people, you know, the old saying, if it's worth doing, it's worth doing well. And but here's an analogy I've used in my teaching clinicians about this. Let's say you plan a hike for your family. And you really want to go see these waterfalls. And that's the purpose of the hike. And you've packed well, and you've really packed a perfect, you know, perfect hike and perfect picnic. But you know, little things happen along the way. And, you know, somebody gets poison ivy and somebody gets hungry before they're supposed to get hungry and, you know, and but it's gorgeous and you enjoy it and it's fulfilling and you still really enjoy the being togetherness of it, but you don't get to the waterfall. And so you turn around and you come back and you think, you know, that was perfect. That was exactly what it was supposed to be. That is what's turned termed a constructive perfectionist, that you try to do things in a very excellent way. You try to, but you also recognize that sometimes you can't control everything, right? Right. Destructive perfectionism is the same hiker of the same family where the trip is getting to the waterfall. It's accomplishment oriented. It's not process oriented. Constructive perfectionism is process oriented. What What am I learning from this process? Destructive perfectionism is I've got to reach the accomplishment or I will fail. Okay. And that is because, again, at the root of destructive perfectionism is this sense of typically this shame and fear of, I have to prove that wrong. You've got voices in your head all the time that are saying, if you don't make it to that waterfall, if you don't get the promotion, if you're not head of a nonprofit, and if you don't make more money for them than they've ever made, if you don't write a book, that somehow sells a certain number of copies, then you have failed. And so your fear is that you won't achieve versus the fear in constructive perfectionism is that you won't enjoy. And so it's like the motivation is different. The motivation is different.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Very interesting. It actually sounds a lot like the spiritual principle of karma yoga, where it's about training your mind to really focus on the process and let go of the attachment to the outcome of

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

what you're doing. And that has to make better work. It's not that the outcome isn't important, but you can accept that there are things that are just not in your control, that it, again, and that makes a lot of sense that you It's not that you don't try, you do try. But it's also about what you learn along the way. And a destructive perfectionist will not, they will not believe that.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Yeah, yeah, that's really important distinction, because it is important to aim for the best, you know, and to put effort into a goal, because sometimes if we're outcome oriented, and say we don't get the outcome, there could be a defeatist mentality that, oh, then I just won't even try again, you know, we're on the spiritual path. Lord Krishna has said in the ever goes to waste. And I like how you said about what did you learn from the experience? Because if you can learn something from every experience, then you are able to keep going and build that resilience to be able to apply that and to be able to still go with that same intention. Like maybe you try again to go to the same hike to see the

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

waterfall, but you remember how much you enjoyed it last time and what you've learned. And so you can kind of integrate the two and just enjoy the process again. And also remember what may help you to get to the actual waterfall. Don't take all your children, probably. You really want to get to the waterfall.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Yeah, totally, totally. So I love that. And I also wanted to ask you, how do you know if the kind of gratitude that you are feeling is toxic or if it's the kind of gratitude that all kind of research talks about uplifting your mood and helping you cope better and see more positivity where maybe you've only seen negativity before I

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

mean you know I think the the cognitive behavioral therapist would say or the positive you know activity therapist psychologist would also say you know it's a positive reframe you're you're grateful because you know it's It's, it's, you, you use, you make sure you're framing things positively and you're grateful for those positive things rather than thinking, you know, well, this is a drag or whatever. And, and I, I agree with that so much. Toxic positivity means that you cannot allow yourself to say no. this is hard. This is harder than I thought this is, well, just be grateful. You've got the opportunity, you know, or let's say, let's say you're grateful because you've always wanted a big family and you have a big family. Well, you know, you, if you, if you got four children, you saw also got four lunches to fix for homeworks to, to help with for weddings, you know, whatever for a name, that's a lot.

Unknown:

Yeah.

Speaker 02:

And

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

so sometimes you go, wow, why didn't we stop with three? And that's okay. You still want to, you're grateful for number four, but number four makes it a little more complicated. Um, and so it's being able to, um, sort of swim in both sides of the blessings and then the, some of the, you know, struggles that those blessings bring in your life. I mean, I loved writing a book. I love having a book published. It was one of the hardest things I ever did. I mean, I, you know, my husband said, how many more, how many times did you go to the doctor that year that you wrote the book? I mean, it was multiple, multiple, because I, it was hard. It was, it was hard physically for me. So, you know, you know, I was grateful for that experience, but it also inherently, you know, cause some issues in my life that were much harder to deal with. So it's, you can, you can be both, you can be grateful and you can recognize that things, you know, sometimes are hard and it's those people that just will not allow that. They'll say, you know, they will shame you for not being grateful. If you talk about something as being you know, having a hard day or we'll just count your blessings, you know, and especially in the Bible belt here in the South, you know, that's, that's very true. So for a lot of people.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Wow. Yeah. I feel like that's something that is good to be aware of is the gratitude connected with shame. Is it a punishing sort of perspective to block feeling our real feelings or acknowledging the paradox of life that the biggest blessings can also bring the biggest challenges.

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

Exactly. Exactly. And sometimes those challenges, you know, my dad, every time he would get ill again and he was, he had, he had, you know, he was glad to be alive and we loved him and he had a great attitude. But one day he said, you know, God's not supposed to give you more than you can bear, but I've got to talk to God. He's way overestimating my abilities. he was kind of saying i'm grateful and this is great but whoa what are you gonna stop

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

wow that's funny um wow yeah that's that's really helpful to be able to see these traits because it sounds like you're describing a well-adjusted person who would be happy with life's blessings and is grateful for them and always helpful to other people. But you talked about the presence of this deep loneliness within such people who seem to be well-adjusted and are even well-liked and are involved in the community. They have families, they have friends, they have lots of people around them. No

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

one really knows them. No one really knows what's going on with them,

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

right? Yeah, yeah. So can you talk a little bit about that? What's causing that? causing that deep loneliness in the midst of being around other people and how do you identify that if someone is actually really as happy as they seem or if they may be suffering inside

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

you know it's an interesting thing when I was trying to get the book published or my agent and I were some large publishing houses were very interested in it and I got all excited and thought whoa it's gonna be great and then when it got to the committee they said we don't think I think these people will buy a book on depression. They need to look perfect. Why would they buy a book on depression? And that's not a bad point. These people are very invested in looking a certain way. And until something clicks in them. In fact, I've heard some people reach out to me and say, I heard that term perfectly hidden depression. And I knew you knew what was going on with me.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

wow

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

um and it is a very difficult undoing or untangling or letting go slowly to recognize that you can talk about that that loneliness that despair and that's not going to cause you to become this person you fear becoming you you you you are also and and you are your competence and you are your vulnerabilities that self-acceptance is so important these people do not have that kind of self-acceptance the only thing they accept about themselves is that are their accomplishments and that's what they're willing but but they know their gut knows their unconscious knows that they're hiding and that there is a better basic loneliness. I cannot tell you, sadly, tragically, how many spouses have reached out to me and said, you know, my husband killed himself and, you know, it was a shock to the community or my wife did. And I didn't even know how bad it was. I had no clue. Now that I look back on it, I can see maybe that one woman, for example, told me that her husband had made some sort of financial decision years ago that had been really bad and he had had to work extremely diligently to bring the company back up he practically lost the company and she said about a year before he died by suicide that something was going wrong with his business and she believed then that something was triggered in him that he was about to go through the same experience And he, quote unquote, couldn't live through it again. And that was her best theory about why he took his life, because the shouldering, the burden of thinking, I'm about to fail, or I may look like I'm failing, was so onerous to him that he couldn't, as much as he loved her and his family, that he couldn't tolerate the idea of going through that. He didn't know how. Um, That's her best theory. And so what I'm trying to do with this book and knowing wonderful people like you and having them ask me questions about it is realizing that and helping people realize that there is a way out of that, that you are still living your life by codes and laws and rules that you learned years and years and years ago that don't have to apply. And yet, and you're drawn to that idea, but you're so afraid of what might happen if you question or confront or begin to massage those rules a little bit. Because it is, because again, I love to tell the story of a guy named Steve, or at least that's what I'm calling him. And Steve was a very successful person here locally in Northwest Arkansas. And head of a very difficult business and retired. And he and his wife actually came in at first because she was having some struggles with him with retirement. And then we got into more some of her stuff, but he kind of sat and listened. He participated some. But about four months later, he called me back and he says, can I come back by myself? And I said, sure. And he said, I want to talk to you about some things that have happened to me. I said, well, tell me about your childhood. He started laughing, Ananta, just laughing uproariously. He said, well, my mother used to throw rocks at me and scream at me that I'd never amount to anything. I proved her wrong. He said, but I don't know. I was looking forward to retirement and I don't understand what's happening to me. I'm drinking too much. I don't want to do anything. I've had this great career. And you know, what's going on? I don't understand. And I looked at him and I said, don't you have a grandson? He go, yeah. So let's get him out in the front yard. Let's go pick up some big stones and throw them at him and say, you're not going to amount to anything. Scream at him. And Steve looked at me and went, well, I would never do that. I said, why not? Because it would hurt him. I said, you are still that little boy that was screamed at. As long as you were working and getting this, all this constant affirmation, what a success you were. You could answer your mother. You could say, see, you're wrong. I did amount to something. And now with retirement, you don't have that armor anymore. And your armor is beginning to come off. And so you don't know what to do with yourself. And he kind of looked at me. I won't say he got tears in his eyes, but you could tell that something was going on. He says, I think you're right. And he began to do that work of, wow, I have been bound for years to prove my mother wrong. Now, how do I, how do I find and discover my true value? It was incredible session.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Wow. Wow, that's so powerful. Yeah, we internalize so many of these things that happen in childhood and don't even realize the power that they continue to have on us. And as I was reading through your book myself, I remember coming across reflection number 35. I love how you have all these reflection prompts in the book to help the readers go within and see their own patterns and things that had happened in childhood or things they learned. It's

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

the hardest thing about the book.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

It's the hardest thing, but it's the most powerful part of it because we can actually have a way to go make that journey within that so many of us are avoiding initially because of how much can come up. I remember when I was reading Reflection 35, though, and you were talking in there about how we need to look at any spoken or in our childhood and how they may have affected us. And I loved that story that you told about the cooking of the ham. That was hilarious where the woman was cutting off a part of the ham because she said her mother did it. And she asked her mother, why did you do it? And she said, well, because my mother did it. And so then she asks her mother, she would cut off that part of the ham. And she was like, oh, because Because the container wasn't big enough, so I just needed to cut part of it off. And it was such a hilarious story. Like, oh, there's actually a reason for it that totally doesn't apply to your context, but you're just doing it blindly because that's what you have seen modeled for you.

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

Right. That's what the rule was. When you cook a ham, you cut the

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

end off. Yeah. Yeah. It's kind of like an unspoken thing. Right. That

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

just

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

got passed down. And it made me really think about how in the spiritual tradition of Vedanta, we learn about how to develop the intellect, which is different from intelligence. It's the part of the mind that can actually reason that can think that can judge that can decide and that can also hold the mind and the emotions and be able to process it and to not be at the mercy of our mind. our emotions and it's a powerful thing to have right on the healing journey because our emotions do tend to get the better of us and the way that we're taught in Vedanta to develop the intellect is actually to not take anything for granted and to question everything which is why I love that you have all these questions in the book because I feel like so much of our progress in healing is actually about asking powerful questions. And I asked myself about that, like, oh, are there any rules that I'm still kind of going through? And it reminded me of chapter three in my book where I've talked about igniting the fire of transformation and the first time that I really looked at the denial of what all went on in my childhood and the masks that I wore as a result of it and my own eating disorders. And now I would say my own perfectly hidden depression that caused all of this and how it was so much around like childhood and eating which made sense then that I had eating disorders because I used to get punished if I didn't eat everything that was on my plate and there were certain foods that really didn't agree with me that I found out much later that Ayurveda validated are actually not good for my particular constitution like eggplant and I remember boy every time eggplant was on the menu I was just like, want to die, you know, rather than go through having to eat it because it just did not agree with me. And, and I would experience it being forced down my throat and I had to eat it because it was the rule. It wasn't even like children in India or Africa are starving. So therefore you should eat it. It was just, it's the rule and you don't question it. And it made me have a really difficult relationship with food and emotions and as I grew up. And I was able to confront that and talk to my dad. And I've shared about that story in my book, which is a really powerful experience.

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

I remember that story.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Yeah, to be able to finally, you know, take off those masks and have a much more authentic relationship with myself. And it led to a lot of healing and transformation with my dad. And I'm so grateful for that. And it was so unexpected, you know, that he would initially it was not pretty, but soon afterwards, it came around you know I think it was just that the mask was on so tight for everyone and the idea of anyone taking it off was like no way like no that's not happening like no like you've got the one who got it all wrong but then you know my mom kind of stayed in that place for a while but then my dad quickly like saw through his own stuff you know and and was able to work with me and we really transformed a lot and things have continued to improve and improve beyond even my imaginations but it was very scary to do that. And I realized even recently that I had a lot of skin issues because I went through a traumatic experience with some spiritual teachers who were not, you know, the real deal. They were like wolves in sheep's clothing and they were, you know, very manipulative and had done a lot of abuse. And I was just caught in that because I was such a keen student to want to learn these deep traditions. And it's important to learn and straight from the source you know I

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

manipulated that

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

yeah yeah exactly it happens so much right and and I feel like I experienced a lot of skin breakouts afterwards because of all the toxicity you know that was involved in that dynamic for so many years and then the stress of moving and changing my what I was going to do and just figuring out a path out of all of that and being able to start basically my life all over again because all the people I was spending time with I no longer did I moved across the country so there's a lot of anxiety provoking big changes that happened within that year and I had a breakup also of a significant relationship and so many breakups of friendships even because of that so I feel like a lot of my emotions that were probably hidden again in that particular context came out through my skin to make themselves visible and I felt like by that point I had healed enough to be able to recognize that this is something to embrace the fact that my emotions are coming out through my body and they're there to teach me something and they're there to actually help me know when I've really processed all of the trauma and all of the lessons that are meant to be learned so that I can carry forward only the pure teachings and the good truth and wisdom that I received and let go of all the rest of it and really, you know, put it behind me. And that was really the origin of my book, The Way of the Goddess and being that vulnerable because I realized not facing all the patterns in my childhood caused me to learn from people who repeated them for me to be able to kind of close that cycle, you know, and then my skin was my teacher to know where I was at in that process. And I was as I was reading your book about that rule thing, I realized, oh, wow. So I've done a lot and why is it still not going away? And then I made these small, small changes, right? Like really micro changes where I'm like, let me just pay a little more attention to when I'm actually full and not just eat because I don't want to have to deal with the hassle of having leftovers, right? Or eating the mind dulling leftovers because I know the psychology of food right and if you eat food that's left over it's going to cause more lethargy in the mind and more of a you know kind of dulling influence then I'm like okay but that's also maybe a story maybe the real culprit here is that I'm still following the rule at this really small hidden micro level where it's not a big thing I'm not an overeater I don't do those kind of binge eating patterns But I realized I let the risk of leftovers allow me to make sure I finish everything in the plate. okay but whatever I'm eating that I don't need you know that is beyond my body saying that's enough just beyond it it's still causing some disruption in my skin because the skin is the organ of digestion and I'm like whoa and that was it and then now they don't those breakouts don't come back anymore and

Speaker 02:

like

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

wow that rule thing was a big revelation wow

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

that's that's really incredible yeah Bessel van would be jumping up and down right now with the body keeps the score so he would he'd go oh yeah that's what it does all right

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

i really want to read that book it's on my list of

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

oh it's

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

wonderful but it was very illuminating so i really have to thank you for that because i thought gosh i've come so such a long way i've even written this into a book and i'm going to share more about it with people but oh okay no somewhere still there was some stuff going on. So I needed to clear that out completely. And I think there's something so powerful about the reflection questions and just asking the right questions, because maybe I wouldn't have asked myself that question about what rules am I still subscribed to? I,

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

you know, I have to thank my cognitive behavioral friends for that, because that's pretty straight out cognitive behavioral therapy, which some of some of which I do, I don't do it as as you know rigidly as a lot of people do it but um yeah and that that makes a lot of sense and then you begin to see just how intricate as you did these um rules can go and how they can seep into one level and then another level and another level so it's uh yeah it's quite interesting so yeah i'm glad you know i i shared with you there was a a review on amazon that said Yeah, I really loved the first of this book, but then those reflections began and it was like a therapy session. And I thought, well, that's not a negative review in my book. Luckily, there are other people who said, yeah, the reflections are, you know, thought provoking and take some time, but they're really worth doing so.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Totally. And that was actually another question I had for you. Often we hear that the healing journey is not a straight line path it's more of a spiral and also I would love to know about what do you tell people as far as the timing of it goes

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

That's one of the things when I interviewed you for your book that I told you that I liked so much about your book that you said, okay, you start and you go from this goddess to this goddess and then you start over again and you go from this goddess again to this goddess and then you go back. I thought that is such my experience as a person and as a therapist that is so true that we don't necessarily get quote unquote finished. So you know, some of the people wrote me and told me I couldn't do the first month. I couldn't do the first reflection because it was a mantra and I, I got stuck that it had to be the perfect mantra. And, and, and I even put that in the book. It, you know, if you get stuck with this being the perfect mantra, then just take, take a word or, but it has to be the perfect word. And so, you know, you can get stuck anywhere. It's that's part of the working of the book. And, And as far as the time is concerned, you know, I just another mistake that perfectionist especially will make is that they think, oh, this this these exercises are easy. I want to go to the harder ones. And I had a woman tell me that and she jumped to the trauma timeline.

Speaker 02:

Oh, geez.

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

And she said, oh, my gosh, it was terrible. I couldn't do it. And I looked at her as kindly as I could. And said well of course you couldn't because you hadn't it was like being on a ladder or having to jump up three stories to get on the rung you were supposed to be on you know and suppose or you might be ready for so you the exercises are designed to try to help you slowly jostle or juggle or challenge or massage i've used that word before or begin to see things i mean even from the one of the first things I say is if no one knows you, you know, you're not going to sit a friend down and say, well, okay, I need to tell you, I'm reading this book called perfectly hidden depression and I've been suicidal and I've done all this stuff. And you're not going to say that where you start is to say, I've been your friend for a long time and I know you really love me, but there are things that I don't tell you about me.

Speaker 02:

That's

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

where you start. That is a start. And they'll go, well, what is it? I'm not ready to tell you that yet. This was my beginning. Just telling you, it is not you. It is me. I just struggle to say things that are more vulnerable or more transparent. That's where you start. That's where you can start. There are many places you can start, but you start very simply. And perfectionists, of course, want to go Well, no, that's not hard enough. Well, that's, you know, that seems simple. Seeming simple. is not it's not simple um and so um you know somebody will come in my office and say well this is really silly but and i'll go wait wait just wait right there if this is a step toward you going in any direction that you feel like is healing there's nothing silly or inconsequential about it you know nothing and they'll kind of look at me and i go so what was it and And sure enough, they'll say to me, well, you know, I used to call my mother four times a day and I only call her two. Good. You know, great. Or whatever it is that they're wanting to change.

Unknown:

Wow.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

It's amazing. You know, another question I had for you, just given my own experiences, what do you feel is the role of anger in perfectly hidden depression? Would you say that a lot of people who suffer from it feel averse to feeling or expressing anger, which leads to this excessive amount of shame and a lot of suppressed emotions that end up building up so much inside that then the person's can't deal with it anymore?

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

Really good question. I don't know if anybody's ever asked it. I think probably for a lot of the people that at least I had in mind when I wrote the book, they more than likely grew up in homes where anger was not allowed. Because if they'd been able to be angry, they would have said, well, what, you know, the fact that dad drinks himself to sleep every night makes me mad or he never comes to my games or she mom you never you know you're too busy on your phone i mean it's like i feel neglected i mean whatever it is it's that's not an emotion they feel safe enough in that family or that culture and environment again it's not always it's a to express and nor probably is fear but they're probably more aware of fear so anger is something typically again with these folks now I have I have had some people tell me that in the work environment that they feel like sometimes they can be overly aggressive and so because their need for things to be to go perfectly yeah and then when they they begin to heal that anger with others, um, begins to subside because their own standards begin to not necessarily lessen, but soften. And, and they realize that, you know, you get more, what is it? You get more, what was that old phrase? You get more something with honey than you do. I don't One man, for example, told me that, I mean, he was very much identified with perfectly hidden depression and he'd been married three times and he said, you know, none of my wives knew me. Absolutely none of them knew me. I didn't let them know me. I needed to be in control. My children don't know me. And he said, I've got to do something because, and so he really worked hard and he went back to his, and people were asking to get off his team at work because he was so difficult to work with.

Speaker 02:

And

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

he asked his supervisor to retrain him, which happened. And I'll never forget, he called me and he said, Margaret, I was so afraid when I was working with you in your office, that if I became less perfectionistic, that my job would suffer.

Speaker 02:

What

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

I found is that people are asking to be on my team now.

Speaker 02:

And

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

so, yes, I mean, I'm not trying to make this into a Disney to I mean, these are actual stories of what people have said, because, you know, he began to try to get to know the people that worked for him, worked with him. And that led to a better work environment. And then he wasn't, you know, writing people so hard and writing himself so hard. So it can really, um, it can change someone. And, but as you are pointing out, and I think it's very apt to point out, this isn't a one month fix, you know, uh, This may be transformative in many ways, which is a word that I think is used too much right now, but it takes time.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Absolutely. Yeah, I totally agree with that. And I feel like I definitely had this. And I definitely was not encouraged to feel or express anger ever. And I actually was really afraid of anger. And I feel like I've had a challenging relationship with anger because seeing my dad not be able to control his anger and be on the receiving end of that as the most vulnerable person in the family you know and incidentally the smallest person in the family I really developed such a aversion to anger you know that I wouldn't even admit that I felt it ever because I thought I'm not supposed to I'm taught that I'm not supposed to in the Indian culture a woman is not supposed to have these feelings and even just as a woman I feel like we're all about nurture right and we're about caring and we have to do that whole prescribed role but then we get taken advantage of so much right that anger would be the appropriate response anger would be the thing to kind of burst through those like those layers of shame that cause you to be inactive right that that depression is like unlived life right it's like you you are just under this heavy spell of something that doesn't allow you to move forward and so I feel like for me that was really huge on my journey to give myself the permission to feel that for once and I think that's why my skin did its whole thing because it's like look we're red we're angry we're gonna just show you that we do have this emotion and we do have to deal with it because if you don't deal with it we're just gonna keep coming back you know like and they were red and they were angry and they were in my skin and it would be hot and I had to do a lot to deal with it. But what I realized so much right away was that I know what you are. You're my suppressed anger that is coming out after years of trying to run, but not really being able to hide from what's going on inside. And for me, I found a lot of relief actually in exercise and not the crazy kind of exercise I used to do when I had eating disorders as a teenager. where it was a self-punishment kind of strategy, but really like owning my physical power and being able to channel that anger into martial arts practices was really empowering for me. And it's really interesting because in the Eastern tradition, we have a system of astrology, which is different than the Western system. The Western is based on the Eastern system. It's the oldest system, but it's fascinating to kind of like see your chart and to see the influences of different elements and different planets on your mind, your body, your relationships, your work and things like that. And I always thought I'm totally a good person. I'm compassionate. I am a kind hearted person.

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

I am never angry,

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

never angry. Like I'm like, I'm just like a feminine energy, right? Like I write about goddesses. I wear pink anger doesn't have any place in all of that so sure enough you know the chart itself was a huge revelation because in the chart it kind of like shows you a blueprint of your personality and your overall sort of purpose or what sort of role you play in society and sure enough the second strongest planet after the planet of wisdom and spiritual teachings which makes sense because I'm so very much drawn to that is Mars, which is the

Speaker 02:

planet.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Adventure and anger and potentially violence. And I'm like, oh my gosh, like according to my chart, I'm like double Mars because I have a Aries moon and an Aries rising sign, which is like the leader, the fire, the warrior, right? And it says that my role is to be a warrior, that I'm not just here to spread wisdom. But the way that I even spread wisdom is by being a warrior for truth and a warrior for peace and a peaceful warrior. But that warrior part, I didn't even know I had within me until I uncovered it through leaving that situation of the crazy teachers and really owning my power. And it's so interesting because, you know, they were still my teachers and I will never not call them that because I learned so much about myself and about how to apply these teachings in dark situations from what I went through with them. But I remember that one thing one of them said that really stuck with me is that the way I would get moksha or spiritual liberation is not by continuing to develop qualities that I already had, like the humility, like the gratitude, like the selfless service, like the ability to feel compassion and empathy towards other beings but actually by owning my power and I not owning my power was the thing that was actually blocking me from being liberated and I was like whoa okay I really need to do that you know and I really need to put that anger with the wisdom and create true soul power from that and that was an equation I learned from studying that also stuck with me that when we bring anger together with wisdom, we can be a force for powerful transformation within ourselves and then be an example for other people. And so for me, it's like a whole new relationship with this fire element and this ability to burn through what doesn't serve me or other people and to be able to find that courage also that I think it takes to even get onto a path of healing and a path that can lead to growth. So I personally have felt a huge change in my life from just giving myself permission to accept that I have this and then to really channel that constructively to be able to get out of my own comfort zone to be able to take risks to be able to be vulnerable and to get myself out of this whole pattern right of pretending that everything is perfect, even though it wasn't inside. so I wonder what are some other healthy ways you might recommend other people who might relate to what I'm saying to safely connect with that anger without hurting themselves or anyone else in the process because obviously suicide I feel like that must be anger that they're directing into themselves right to hurt themselves in such a way oh

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

well

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

could be part

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

of it yeah it could be it could be and there are you know actually some of the suicides that are most associated with anger that I know about are the more impulsive suicides where they're angry and then they express that anger through dying but you know what what what I kept thinking as you were talking that if if I were trying to talk about this it would be that we we pigeonhole ourselves into thinking well I am x yeah must be x I must be selfless I must be I want to be I aspire to be giving I aspire to be you know whatever it caring. But rather than it being an or, I'm either that or I'm this, it's that and I'm angry. Or I have angry feelings. I am caring and compassionate and I can be angry. You know, that those things do not obstruct one another. They can coexist actually very beautifully. If you're only angry, then yeah, that's a problem. Yeah. You know, if everything makes you angry, if that's your sole way of expressing emotion, then that can be a problematic, kind of a characterological problem. But if you are, you know, if you're funny and you can be angry, if you're caring and you can be angry, if you're caring and you can be funny, I mean, it's just sort of this, we are complicated human beings and we don't have to pigeonhole ourselves um you know this happens a lot in families i at least in the united states i know it does that people will tell me all the time oh i was the smart kid in the family yeah it was the funny kid my sister was the spoiled kid or my sister was the whiny kid and unfortunately you get called that enough yeah and you start going okay that's who i am that's all who i am i'm just funny i'm smart i'm i'm a good athlete i'm you know that's that's That's where I need to head. That's where I'm going to get my needs met. But actually, we're all ands. So, you know, that's what came to mind when I was listening to you talk.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Yeah, yeah. And again, it's accepting that room for paradox and that

Speaker 02:

room for

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

nuances and the complexities of life and not vision-holing ourselves. Because in a way, I feel like the perfectly hidden Depression is a pigeonholing.

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

It is. A

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

role. And we have to get ourselves out of that. So would you please share about the five stages of healing from perfectly hidden depression and also how someone who's listening might take their first brave step on this journey? Because that's the hardest one, I think.

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

I have to tell you the funny story about the stages of healing first. I submitted the book. to my publisher and they said okay we really like the book but the book didn't have any treatment strategies it was just describing this syndrome I thought that was good enough thank you very much and they said no we need a treatment strategy and we need it in two weeks I was like whoa okay and so I really sat down by that time I'd been a a therapist for 24, 25 years. And I thought, what do I do with people? If there was a, if there was a compartmentalization or if there was, you know, stages of what I do with people, I don't care if they have bipolar disorder. I don't care if they have depression. I don't care if they have borderline personality disorder. I don't care if they have anxiety and eating disorder. What do I do in my own, if I had to segment it, which I don't typically do, I But if I had to segment it, so it made sense to somebody who was trying to learn it, how would I do that? And they wanted it marketable as well. So it was the five C's of treatment, you know, I hate that, but you know, that was, they said, make it marketable. I was like, oh gosh. So anyway, so I thought, you know, the first, the first route that I think is important is consciousness, especially, well, really with anything. you have to accept that something is a problem before you are willing to say or it's destructive or it's a part of you that is getting in your way you have to accept that first and see it as a problem or you're going to kind of look at someone and go well that's not a problem you know so I get angry that's not a problem so I can't leave my home that's not a problem so you know I think that kind of consciousness awareness again with mindfulness I wrote some about the book that in the book and you know that sense of paying attention to what's happening around you, not to analyze it, but to just see it and be aware of it. That's not a very good definition, but anyway. And so that's where you have to start. The second one is commitment. therapy is just like any kind of healing journey takes some commitment it takes some and and you actually that commitment can be challenged in many many ways um it can be challenged in financial ways it can be challenged in pragmatic ways it can be challenged in um time ways it can be challenged in um but but often it's often challenged by you know this is just hard and i it's scares me to do this it's you have to face your fear you have to sometimes you your family doesn't want you to change um they say i kind of like you the way you are what do you mean you're not going to do x y or z anymore

Speaker 01:

um

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

what do you mean you're going to therapy um so it can be you can get pushback you can get in you can struggle yourself and that kind of commitment is important the third one is what we were talking about a few minutes ago which was the confrontation part looking at your rules, both spoken and unspoken, and how you're following them now. And is that a good thing? I mean, are you following rules that you're glad you follow now? But what would happen if you stopped following that rule? And what are you scared would happen if you did? And if you begin risking that, what does it feel like to not live by that rule anymore? What did it feel like to say, it's okay that I don't eat all this food? And so that's the third step. The fourth step step in some ways is it's not the hardest. But if you have trauma in your lifetime, which many of these folks do, you may not be able to do this by yourself. You may need to go into a therapist to do this because it's very difficult work. And I use what's called a trauma timeline with people. That's a very specific technique about going back and recognizing in your childhood, what were the things that happened to you that affected you in a painful way? What were the things that happened? to you in a productive way and beginning to then either through your art through music through writing through journaling through talking through just looking at it you can begin to see the patterns that existed in your life and how maybe things that you had not even been aware of were traumatic actually were because you begin to say you know if that hadn't happened when I was three I probably wouldn't have chosen that when I was 23. I But that can be very difficult for people. People will say, oh, I'm just going back and blaming my parents or I'm going back. And, you know, no, you're not doing any of that. You're becoming aware and you're acknowledging. There's a huge difference between blame and acknowledgement. Fifth change is something or fifth segment or stage is something I think is very important. And a lot of therapists, you know, I don't know, some therapists is do not stress this, but I do. I think you get hope not from insight. Insight's wonderful. Lots of aha moments. That's great. But where you get hope is when you see your behavior change. And so I take each one of those 10 traits in the book, 10 traits of perfectly hidden depression, and I have you pick the easiest one to begin to say, well, what if I didn't do X anymore? What if I challenged number seven. Um, and what would that look like operationally in my life? What would it look like to, um, let's say, this is a true story. I think it's in the book of a woman who said, I'm going to choose number two because she, she was busy, busy, busy all the time because she constantly took the responsibility for getting things done. And she went to a committee meeting and she did not volunteer for one single thing to do. He said, she literally sat on hands. I think, do you remember the story in the book?

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Yeah, I remember that story.

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

And then she came into therapy and she said, I almost went back in because who was I to not, everybody in that room was busy and who was I to not take a role? And she said, I had to fight back tears because I just felt like I was disappointing in everybody. And as we talked about it, what we realized is that she had learned that, that she had she had been adopted as a child again here we're going back sort of the trauma timeline she'd been adopted as a child and her parents adopted parents had unfortunately told her all the time you wouldn't be who you are if you hadn't been adopted by us and so she had internalized that and thought i have to prove my worth And she proved her worth through constantly volunteering. And she, I remember her face in my office and she said, I don't know how to feel okay about myself if I'm not accomplishing something. And if I'm not working harder than everybody else. And yet she could see the roots of those feelings in what her adoptive parents had told her again and again. hopefully not hurtfully or on purpose, but it had been hurtful. So you go back and you try to change some of these things. And that's what you really can get this sense of almost giddy freedom from that, you know, like throwing the food in the, you know, in the, in the,

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

in the compost,

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

compost. And so it, those little changes in your behavior and no matter how inconsequential seeming are not inconsequential and you can feel your life beginning to take a deeper breath than you could have before and um but and again you you do this over and over and over all these all these stages are interwoven and interact and you know you change your belief and then all of a sudden you see something from your past differently and then you deepen your commitment or your commitment gets shaky you know and all of them in So that's it's consciousness, commitment, confrontation, uh, Connection and change.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Wow. You know, I know it's a marketing thing to have, but it actually does help to remember to have the alliteration because it's like, oh, you know, like, and then you can kind of connect with each of these steps more efficiently. You know,

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

there's a reason why people do it.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Then if it were explained a different way. So

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

yeah.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Yeah. I appreciate that. um I think a lot of times there's a fear of floodgates of emotions pouring out when they have been suppressed for so long I certainly went through that and I think it's easy to wonder if we allow ourselves to finally feel if the emotions will ever stop so how do you recommend confronting this to be able to start the process of feeling to heal

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

it's it's a it's a normal fear and it's one that um i often talk to my clients about i have a young girl right now who's a new patient and she has never looked at some of these things and my suggestion to her was well leave it here and then when you walk back in the office it will be here waiting for you so there are some mental tricks there's some emotional tricks that you can use tricks But I will say this, some people will say to me, well, if I started crying, I'd never stop. I've never seen somebody not be able to stop crying. And if they can't stop crying, then I will see them again and find out what's going on. I mean, is your grief, are you realizing something that you've never realized before? And let's talk about it. But you then I need to teach them some calming techniques. So I understand the fear, but one of the analogies I've used as well, and maybe this is not the way many other people clean out their closets, but when I clean out a closet, I pull everything out and then start putting stuff back in. When I pull everything out, I usually look down and think, oh my God, I'll never get all this stuff back in the closet. Yeah. I don't want to put all that stuff back in the closet. So I recommend that people both gear what they feel personally ready for and And they tell me, again, I'm a therapist. So I say, you know, I'm not in charge of what we talk about. You're in charge of what we talk about. If you're not ready to tell me about something, if I ask you a question, then look at me and say, I'm not ready to talk about that. Okay, fine. So you have to monitor yourself, but at the same time, suppressing it, stuffing it, whatever word we want to use, has not worked. And it's coming out, it's seeping out underneath the door and through the, you know, like those, you know, those movies you see where there's vapor coming out from some hidden, you know, storage. And it's, it's, it's, you don't want it to burst out. So if you let some of the pressure off, I begin to talk about it a little bit, then you'll probably be more in control of it. But I understand the fear. I I remember telling a therapist of mine years ago, when am I ever not going to be angry? And he said, yeah, you'll be angry for a while here because you've never been angry before. Yeah,

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

yeah, exactly. And I feel like I went through that with my skin for sure.

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

Yeah. And he said, yeah, well, just, you know, okay, you're angry. It's

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

a new thing, right? It's like, yeah, you've never allowed yourself something. You got to really be patient with it. And let

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

it seem like a long time to me, but probably wasn't all that long. I just was uncomfortable with it.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Yeah. Yeah. Same here. Same here. It takes a while to integrate like, oh, okay. I can feel this and I can deal with it and channel it into different ways, but be aware that it's there and not try to

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

deny. I want to tell you, these are really wonderful questions. You've given so much thought to these questions and I so appreciate it.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Oh, my pleasure. I loved your book. It was so insightful and amazing to read about. So, and I have more questions for you. And if we don't have time to do all of them, let's definitely do an interview with you on the blog and we can address them that way so that we can do justice to everything that to share. But I feel like, you know, we've uncovered so many amazing things and I definitely would love to have you address one of the biggest obstacles that I feel a lot of people face in making big changes in our lives is how those currently in our lives will react to that. So would you please also address this fear of what others would think or say if we start to be more vulnerable and real with them after years of hiding?

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

I had half a chapter to talk about this book. I could have written a whole book about this. I mentioned this before, but I will say, well, I didn't really mention this before, but it can be very difficult. Yeah.

Unknown:

Yeah.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

I think it's one of the most difficult things. I feel like it's one of the first resistances. But I'm married. What will my children do? And even for making Ayurveda lifestyle changes or diet changes, those are the first kind of resistances that people have to making changes. How will the rest of the people in my life fare with that? And even the guy in the job, right? Like, will I lose my job?

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

Right. Will I lose my job? Exactly.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Sick.

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

So... Everyone in your family is going to have a different response. I think that... Well, let me say this first. People in this particular category who have identified with perfectly hidden oppression may have, I don't have an exhausted list, obviously. They may have been, they may be partnered with somebody that literally for the last 12 years that they've been together have said, you know what? I don't know you any better than I knew you when I'm the day I, we started living together. We got married, whatever. And I really want to know you. So, so where are you? I mean, they, they may be, they may, divorced because of that they may say i'm still here trying to get to know you and they might write to me and go i think my wife is this person and you know what can i do how can i reach her and that has happened it's also likely however that you've either attracted someone who also is a hider also wants to avoid painful emotion and y'all just don't do that

Speaker 02:

yeah

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

you don't get angry the two of you kind of you know you look you look like you have the perfect life you people tell you we just we want to be just like you um you know and so that may be part of the problem because he or she or they isn't ready to make that change with you. And they don't like it that now all of a sudden you want to talk about things or express things that you want to introduce something into the partnership that has not been there in the past. So that can be a hurdle. The second thing is that you may have been attracted to someone who really needed you to be overly responsible, especially someone with narcissism because you you're the first one to say oh this was my fault or I should have worked harder or I should have understood this better or you're accustomed to taking a lot of responsibility to the point where it may be something even pathological in you or certainly destructive in you and the narcissist is going to say yeah this is your fault and or someone who has those kinds of traits. So you may have attracted someone like that. They also are not going to welcome a change. The third thing is that you may have attracted someone who's under responsible because you're overly responsible or you're, they are a, they, you know, they're underachieving and you're overachieving. You're the primary breadwinner or you're the, and all of a sudden you decide I'm not going to work three jobs and anymore or I'm gonna take something that's for a pay cut because I'm tired of working this many hours and they're gonna freak out so you know I that is tough it's definitely tough and uh uh, it, you know, if, if you're lucky enough to be partnered with the first kind of person, they're going to be delighted. Although you're probably going to be the one that says, oh my gosh, you know, you're, you really want me to talk to you about me being angry with you. Yes, I do. You know, um, the other three kinds are problematic. And just like when we make, like if an alcoholic gets sober, if, uh, if someone who any kind of major change, as you say, developing an Ayurveda lifestyle or even going vegan or something. I mean, we change something that, that alters our social way of being with one another or our familial structure. Then all of a sudden that that can cause problems. So it, I'm not going to try to give a glib answer here. It is definitely one of the tougher things. I think I learned this years ago. and I was a music therapist or I actually studied music therapy and one of the things we had to do was we had to shadow an ancillary therapy and I shadowed a physical therapist in the summer. This woman came in, I'll never forget, her name was Harriet. Harriet was so out of shape. It was a spinal pain clinic and her back hurt and we managed to get her on the bike and she could bear pedal like two or three cycles. By the time Harriet left that clinic, she was coming around with a towel around her neck and she was like, all right, I'm ready to work out, you know, and it was this huge, phenomenal change in her. Well, I saw it. Then she went home and I saw Harriet about six weeks later at the very end of my tenure at that job. And she was back in a wheelchair. And I said, what has happened? She said, we see this all the time. they go back to their family their family wants them to still get disability or their family says no you know you can't do that and they'll they'll because of the pressure of the family dynamics they'll go back to the way they were before so it's really tough wow

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Wow. Yeah. It's very brave, I think, to make this journey because you do take these risks where it's a lot safer, maybe feeling to stay where you are. And yet the risk of not changing means staying inauthentic with yourself and means staying stuck. And so there's kind of a high price for it.

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

And again, not to be overly dramatic but I'm not being overly dramatic when I say sometimes the price of this rigid, a perfectionistic stance. And then you get, you feel you're more despairing. You're more lonely. You're, you're, you get overwhelmed by something. The, the correlates of perfectionism and suicide are going up and they're both. So, you know, this can lead to a suicidal gesture or actually suicide. And I, That's terrible. So, and tragic.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And speaking of which, I really loved the story you shared about the maze of life. Would you please share that with our listeners?

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

You're talking about the maze that I went through? Yes. Yeah.

Unknown:

Yeah.

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

Sometimes I cry when I tell this story, so I'll see if I tear up this time. I had been at a...

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

It's a good example of being very authentic and vulnerable

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

if it does. I had gone to a residential psychiatric program. They wanted me and several other therapists to go through their program as if we were a client and to experience what they taught. They were very experiential. I did a sweat lodge and I did several other things that were really cool. The first night we were there and I was so tired and I just wanted to go back to my hotel. They blindfolded us and said, we're going to lead you into this maze. And there are several rules. One of the rules is you hang onto the rope and you can't let go of the rope and you need to find the exit to the maze. And all you have to do is, is find the exit. And if you need help, let us know. Raise your hand or something like that. I said, okay. So there were about 30 of us and I was anxious and my ego got all involved and I was trying to track in my own mind. Okay. I went to the right and then I went to the left and then I went backwards and, and, and the pressure was growing and the soft music was playing and then they would clap when somebody got out of the, found the exit. And, and I was getting more and more nervous feeling like I'm the, I'm going to be the stupid looking person with my hand on the rope, still walking around. So I raised my hand and I said something like, okay. And so the person came over and I said, so I need to just go under the rope. He said, no, you can't go under the rope. That's not the answer. And so I said, okay, that's not the exit. But I was getting more and more frustrated thinking I'm a smart person. I should be able to find this exit.

Unknown:

Okay.

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

So I raised my hand again and I said, okay, is it letting, is it breaking the rules? Is the exit breaking the rules? No, Margaret, that's not the exit. And so I kept going. And Ananta, I just remember, I stopped in my tracks and I raised my hand for the third time and I said, I need help. and they said that's the exit and i will tell you that i changed at that moment um All my, well, I hope most of my defensiveness or guard dropped. And I realized that I could only get everything out of that weekend if I kept my guard down. That I wouldn't be Dr. Margaret Rutherford from Fayetteville, Arkansas. And that I just needed to... And I don't ask for help easily, never have. And I hope I've gotten better since that experience. So it was very, very meaningful for me to include that story in the book.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

wow that's such a perfect place to close this part of our session I feel because it's really you living what you're teaching and writing about and leading other people with in the book so that's such a powerful example of what we need to do and that's the hardest thing to do it's the simplest thing to do it may seem like it's easier for other people to do but once we do it, it's really life changing.

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

It is. It is.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

That's beautiful. Thank you so, so much for

Speaker 02:

being

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

so vulnerable and authentic and sharing this message of perfectly hidden depression and how to take the brave journey to start to take off these masks. And where can people find out more about you and about your book and your podcast?

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

It's drmargaretrutherford.com. The podcast is on there, the self-work podcast, which I've done for now eight years and love doing it. The book is there. You can get the book anywhere. It's in e-book form, audio book form and then paperback. And my TEDx talk is on TEDx or you can put in TEDx. Actually, you can find it on my website too. You can subscribe to my website and you'll get a newsletter once a week, only once a week that just has my blog posts and my podcast on it and sometimes some fun things and pictures and challenges and whatever happens to come into my head. And so that's me.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Amazing. Thank you so, so much for being with us. I know our listeners are really, really going to benefit from your sharing. And I'm so excited to talk to you more about how we can collaborate to be able to join forces and helping more people. I

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

think that's just an outstanding idea.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

Thank you so much again.

Dr. Margaret Rutherford:

Okay. Thank you.

Ananta Ripa Ajmera:

We will. Go ahead and stop.

People on this episode

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Ananta Ripa Ajmera

Host
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Dr. Margaret Rutherford

Guest