01x11 - Dr. Bruce Perry

[bunniefuu]

Hey, everybody.

Thanks for joining me here on Apple TV+.

I know we're all watching the global death toll rise

and seeing it recede in some places,

and I--my concern is, how do we all get through this

and not let it become

one of the most traumatic experiences of our lives?

I thought to have a conversation

with one of the world's leading trauma experts

could be helpful to us today.

Let me introduce you to Dr. Bruce Perry.

I've known him for quite a long time, over 25 years.

He's a senior fellow of the Child Trauma Academy

in Houston.

He's worked with children who've endured

some of the most high-profile tragedies of our time,

like the Waco m*ssacre

and the Columbine and Sandy Hook school shootings.

And he is a person who knows

probably more about trauma

than almost anybody else in the world--

Dr. Bruce Perry.

So you and I have done a lot of talk over the years

about trauma and its impact on children,

its impact on adults,

and how it forms and shapes what happened to us,

and what happened to us determines

how we then behave in the world.

You speak a lot about regulation,

and you say it is important

for us to keep ourselves regulated right now,

And that means what, regulated?

Because I think when people don't know what to do

with their emotions, they do irregular things.

Right.

So, you know, every system in our body,

whether it's our bones, our muscles, our lungs,

in our brain,

we have these systems

that are taxed by everyday living.

And so when you get up and walk,

you're sort of taxing your cardiovascular system.

And when you are doing a jigsaw puzzle,

you might be taxing parts of your brain.

And so the key is that when these systems get taxed

and pushed to the l--

they get pushed in a moderate way,

and then we sort of-- we step back,

and so the ability to kind of get back

to your baseline

is being regulated.

And so part of what we have to figure out

in our own lives is,

how can we make some of this manageable?

How do I actually bring

a little bit of predictability,

a little bit of regulation into my day

so that this is not as overwhelming

as it otherwise would be?

I think it's so important--

Stedman just said this the other day.

We're all noticing that if you don't--

he just said, "I got to get a routine.

I got to start working out; I got to do something."

Otherwise the day just completely slips away

and melts into the next day,

and you don't even know what day it is.

Exactly.

And the days that-- they do merge together,

and one of the real risks here

is that without that structure and those routines,

we're letting the world determine how we get...

Oh, yeah.

As opposed to us controlling

our day-to-day activity.

So things as simple as

trying to get up at the same time every day--

try to have meals at the same time every day.

Try to make sure that you are active

or exercise a little bit a couple times a day.

You know, I was talking to nurses the other day

from New York and also in Detroit and Louisiana,

and one nurse in New York, Idara, who's--

all the nurses are heroes now,

but one nurse said something so moving.

She said,

"Yes, I'm afraid,

but I've learned to start taking my fear

and channeling it into courage,"

which I thought was so powerful,

and I know a lot of people are afraid right now

or feeling anxious, feeling confused,

feeling like, "When is this gonna be over?"

How can we learn to do what Idara said?

How do we take that fear

and literally channel it into courage?

Well, you know, I think that the key to that

is not letting yourself get in a loop of anxiety.

And so the first step in really moving to courage

is regulating yourself.

Is doing exactly what you just said.

-Right. -Yeah.

And once you're regulated,

you're able to actually use the top part of your brain,

and you can do a whole bunch of very reassuring things.

You can say, "All right, this is going to end.

There are people, there are things I can control.

I can control who I call.

I can control who I connect with.

I can control my body movements.

I can control when I eat, when I sleep."

These are controllable things.

And if I start to bring some structure

to my day,

I'm gonna be in a much better position

to continue to be hopeful, be future-oriented,

be reflective--

reflect on the past-- past times when,

"Man, I did get through some hard times."

Yeah.

And basically stay more centered.

How is this lockdown, do you think--

I know you've done so much work

with people who are mentally ill,

children who've been traumatized

and therefore developed mental illnesses.

How is this lockdown going to affect people

who are mentally ill?

Well, you know, it's one of the hardest parts about this,

is that, you know, that those of us

who sort of have our "cup runneth over"--

we have a place to live,

we have a number of people to connect with

that help us stay regulated,

we have jobs that are gonna be there when this finishes,

so there's--we're pretty lucky.

And so this is gonna tap out our--

you know, our cup is gonna get drained a little bit.

Yeah.

But if you start out with an empty cup--

if you have four people living in one apartment,

and three of them are struggling with, you know,

impulsivity and attention problems,

and you've got an overwhelmed parent

who lost her job

and who has to take care of these three kids

and homeschool on top of it,

that's gonna tap out this poor mother.

And that's gonna lead to a whole bunchy of challenges

that will make it very hard for them to recover.

-Yeah. -And so I--

I think what is interesting--

you and I were talking about this the other night.

People who are marginalized in instances such as this

when a crisis come

are going to be even more marginalized.

We're gonna see rates of suffering

like we never imagined before.

And part of that suffering is--

you were saying so many people aren't gonna even see it

because kids who are being abused are not at school

so that people can see that black eye.

Women who are experiencing domestic violence

aren't at work so people can see those bruises,

and so what do we do?

You know, there are people

that work in those fields that have tried

to create opportunities

for people in crisis to reach out and get some help,

but even that is gonna be inadequate.

I think the big problem is gonna be

after this phase of this crisis rolls through,

there will be--

we're really gonna have to have an intentional effort

to reach out and reconnect

with families and marginalized folks.

Yeah, you feel that-- and I also too--

that we have a moral obligation, each of us.

Absolutely.

I know everybody's pulling together

and doing songs and parties and all this virtual activity

that's really great, supporting each other right now.

-Yeah. -But the real test is gonna come

once we get through this.

-Absolutely. -And the moral obligation

that we all have

to help others

who are less fortunate, who are marginalized,

who are gonna be suffering even more

than they were before this pandemic.

Absolutely, there's just no doubt about it.

The real work for all of us is after this is done.

Now, you know, something you once told me

long before this pandemic resonated with me.

You were talking about how we as a society

are relationally impoverished

and that we get through anything--

any crisis in our life, any trauma in our life--

because of our relationships with other people.

How does this moment impact that?

At the very time that we're as a--

basically as a society under duress,

we're asking people to be physically separate.

And so in this moment, it's really important

that we stay emotionally connected

by using modern technologies to the degree that we can.

But again, when this is over,

I think we're gonna have to spend a lot of time

thinking about-- intentionally about,

how do we re-weave social fabric?

How do we really create community?

How do we bring people together in really positive, healthy ways

that will help buffer some of what's gonna happen

and really over time heal what's--

you know, the impact of this experience?

You say we should stay physically--

obviously, physically separate but emotionally connected.

And now's the time.

The other night I was watching

something called "Our Country"

with all these country music stars

who were singing from their home on CBS.

I thought that was so cool,

and I thought--

literally during the whole thing,

I was just saying, "God bless you, Steve Jobs,

wherever you are-- you're watching."

And all these stars are being connected.

These country music singers were being connected.

Their wives and their children are filming them on iPads.

So I think the technology

has really helped us during this time.

-Absolutely. -I mean, where would we be

without this?

There's no doubt about it. I mean, exactly.

God bless you, Steve Jobs.

And I think if we're intentional about that,

we can really use modern technologies

to connect us in ways that are unique and pretty powerful.

What is the most important thing you want to say to this audience

about this moment in time?

Be hopeful.

You know, this--

humankind has gotten through all manner of challenges,

and humankind will get through this again.

And--but those of us who have-- our cups runneth over,

those of us who have resources and--

You're talking about privileged people.

Privileged people.

This is where the privileged versus the non-privileged

-really comes into play. -Exactly.

Those of us who are privileged, yeah.

There's no time in my life where I've realized

that I'm so privileged.

You know, I've known it before,

but to see it play out like this is overwhelming.

-Yeah. -And this is where I think

the moral obligation that we have--

those of us who have things, it's our--

we have to keep in the forefront of our minds

the need to share with others, to be kind to others,

to be patient with others,

to take our gifts, and be generous with them

to the degree that we can, and--

Yeah, this is an opportunity, I think, Dr. Perry,

for our entire country

to reset itself, don't you think?

Absolutely, I think that's absolutely true.

You know, one of the-- I always hate to say it.

There's a nice thing about something like this.

But there is something that's very positive

about making families spend time with each other.

You know, some families it's a struggle,

but some families, you know, we talk the talk.

We talk about how much we care about our kids,

but we don't spend time with them.

We talk the talk about how much we value our partner,

but we don't really spend time just sitting quietly with them,

learning how to be with them just in silence.

And our life is so busy, so frenetic,

so overscheduled, so...

externally focused that I think this is an opportunity

for many of us--

those of us, again, mostly, who are privileged enough

to not worry about all of this stuff,

to sort of think about, what are our values?

I mean, what is-- what do we really value in life?

What's important in life?

Is it important that I get this memo done for work?

Or is it important that I go play Legos with my son?

-Yeah. -You know, that's--

those things, I think--

we'll be forced to have a lot of little decisions like that

for the next few weeks.

For the next few weeks, but as you've said to me before,

it's not the next few weeks; it's the next few decades...

Exactly.

That's gonna determine what happens to the people

who are the most marginalized right now,

because those people sink even further.

Yeah.

Well, and again,

you and I have been involved in this movement

to try and help people understand the impact of trauma.

-Mm-hmm. -And I think because of this

global experience with stress, distress, and trauma,

I think that the ability to move that dialogue forward

is going to be even more powerful

and more important.

-Mm-hmm. -I think more people will listen

to what you and I have to say about this in the future

because they'll have their own personal reference to it.

Yes.

And I think that that is a hopeful--

that that's a hopeful observation.

Yes, 'cause one of the things that I've learned

is that when a child shows up in classroom--

in the classroom, and he's misbehaving or acting out,

the question should not be, "What's wrong with this child?"

but "What happened to this child?"

And that's not just for that child;

that's for all of us because what happened to us

in the past, trauma or not--

whatever the level of trauma was--

determines how we behave now and into the future.

Absolutely, and it influences, you know--

when you can actually step back a little bit

and be more generous in your view of another person,

you know, if you really knew their story,

you'd be much more empathic with them.

So your most important message for us

is that those of us who are privileged,

this is the time to step up and use that privilege

'cause you're gonna-- it's gonna be needed

in ways unimaginable...

-Absolutely. -As we move forward.

And not just now.

You see these wonderful things in crisis of--

you see the best of humanity and you kind of see the worst.

And so, again,

part of what we have to figure out how to--

how to, what to do is to take some of this

awareness, generosity, and empathy,

and help people extend it past the current crisis.

You know, I mean your generosity,

for example, of giving a bunch of money to help

all of the different organizations.

And what I'm specifically doing

is looking for marginalized communities,

looking how I can give back

and how that money can go directly to the people.

You know, during so many hurricanes and disasters,

I've literally found people on the news

and just, you know, gotten their names

and gone to them and individually given money.

That's harder to do now

because this is so massive,

but that's exactly what I'm trying to do,

is trying to use my resources

and philanthropy

to speak directly to, to help and support directly,

to marginalized communities.

Which I think is absolutely a great model for all--

And everybody has to figure out how to do that in their own way.

Absolutely, and you know,

if you, you know--

if it's not financial, it can be time, you know.

-Yes. -Volunteering time later on.

I mean, there's no greater gift than a relationship,

and so if you mentor a kid,

you know, after this all sort of falls through

and you're in the retired population,

and you're wondering what you can do,

go mentor a student at a high school or a junior--

I think there's no better message that you can give us:

finding ways to use your privilege to serve others.

-Absolutely. -Thanks, Dr. Bruce Perry.

-You bet. -Thank you so much.

Thanks, Oprah.