Crushing Doubt Podcast by Dr Dan Ratner PsyD

Dr Dan Ratner is a pain psychologist based in New York. His YouTube podcast - Crushing Doubt - is relatively new on the scene but is already killing it with crucial mind-body healing information, interviews and simplified detailed instructions and real-life recovery journies.

As the name would suggest, Dan's message is heavily weighted by how doubt plays a massively influential role in TMS recovery. Disbelief and lack of clarity about a mind-body diagnosis can be completely hindering your recovery in itself. His message is so clear and straightforward, organised and delivered in a way that is really easy to understand with a lot of the all-important kindness and encouragement along the way. I think you're going to love it!

Check out my recent interview on his podcast here.

And I also interviewed him in my Your Stories series, check that out here.

Dr Dan Ratner's Mind-body Recovery Plan

He delivers a "3-column" approach to recovering from TMS / mind-body symptoms / chronic pain. Splitting up the delivery of his method in this way really breaks down the main core elements of anyone's recovery, no matter the symptoms, the length of time suffering or the individual being treated.

This simplified approach allows us to not only have a great overview of our life story and our recovery but also gives you clear answers as to why you have your symptoms, how they develop into chronic conditions and how you might be plateauing along your journey. It's brilliantly simple. It's literally like a map of what's going on, why it's happening and how to reduce your chronic symptoms from there. His approach is organised in such a way that you can really start to learn and notice your triggers, figure out exactly what pushes your nervous system to keep firing the symptoms and what to do about them.

Dan Ratner's three columns framework

Each of these elements have a hand in causing and keeping mind-body symptoms firing. For some people just one theme of one of the columns may apply to them the most, some people have all three columns kicking off at once. At first glance, Dan's approach seems quite different to other modalities that I've researched and tried myself, but the more I watched and learned the more I saw that the underlying lessons are very similar. Nicole Sachs teaches around the themes of 'belief, emotional work and patience/kindness for self' for example fits in snugly with Dan's three columns approach for example. Each teaching in their own unique way, but drawing from the same truths. It also fits in snugly with my own Recovery Journey Roadmap, if you want to read the steps I took to recover completely from chronic back pain.

These three columns encapsulate the full picture of what is happening in the mind-body experience. Figuring out which themes apply to you the most in each column will really help you see how to move forwards with your recovery.

Emotions

What feelings are going on that are kicking off your symptoms, what are the root beliefs that we carry that brought us here? Developing themes of what we feel about our experience. Specific themes that lead to the onset and uptake of symptoms. Recognising the emotional triggers as they happen can help you eradicate symptoms.

Doubt

Any aspects of this experience that you have a lack of certainty about tend to cause chronic pain. Is this mind-body, or is your issue structural? Will this work for you? Is this even real, is it curable? Will I ever be strong enough to do this? Unanswered questions equal doubt, giving the mind-body issue even more fuel to fire. Confusion, contradictions all have a hand in TMS. Fear, as we know, is an enormous fuel for symptoms, it is the emotional form of doubt and can lead to the most powerful symptoms. 

Power

If you are out of power, confidence in the process, self-worth, self-esteem, empathy for yourself, you can feel desperate. Lack of power and confidence in this process can hinder recovery. 

The video embedded and linked above is a great introduction to this framework and Dan's approach. But I also highly recommend watching the 4-part series where he's helping a patient live on air. It clarifies the approach perfectly with hands-on examples. Here's the link to the first part of those videos.

Subscribe to Dr Dan Ratner's Crushing Doubt Podcast on YouTube

This is such a brilliant resource, be sure to visit his YouTube channel and subscribe. And as always, I'd love to know what you think of the resources I share here. Let's continue the conversation over on social, links below! 

Check out my Recovery Journey Roadmap if you would like more details about exactly how I became pain-free! Follow me on Facebook or Instagram for daily TMS recovery inspiration more resources and updates on everything chronic recovery.