Hearing Voices, Empath Struggles, and Healing intergenerational Trauma with Psychic Therapist Brittany Quagan
If you’ve ever felt like you’re “going crazy,” heard voices, or had strange and unusual experiences, you’re not alone. My guest today, Brittany Quagan, a therapist and psychic medium is ultra familiar with all things “spooky” - both in terms of trauma and spirituality. We discuss what it’s like to struggle as an empath, with anxiety, depression, and suicidality as a young adult. We also discuss coming out of the broom closet while working in traditional mental health systems and some pretty amazing research on how to control experiences that most of the clinical world would describe as “psychosis”.
“We call it being an empath in the spiritual world, but in the clinical world we call it trauma. Labels aside, we are in tune and there’s a reason for it. It’s protective in a lot of ways and it can be debilitating in a lot of ways if we don’t learn to have boundaries with it.”
Also in this episode:
managing & honoring deep feelings and your empathic nature even as it may be rooted in trauma responses and hypervigilence
grappling with suicidality and hearing voices
ancestral trauma passed down in our bodies
parts work and tracing the origin of unhealed wounds
cognitive dissonance as a psychologist working in the system
research on voice hearing in a spiritual vs clinical context - the importance of normalization and community
“This study that we did and data we collected showed that not only can you have voice hearing experiences and function without having a diagnosis, but you can actually have some control over them. Control in the sense that you can work with them and not feel like they are taking over.”
About Brittany Quagan:
Brittany Quagan is a licensed therapist, intuitive healer, and psychic/medium. Brittany is no stranger to the effects of trauma; the imprint it leaves in our body, how it colors the way we see the world, and the ways in which it leaves us riddled with anxiety, negative thoughts, and a heaviness that feels impossible to break free from. Her own healing journey is what brought her to do this profound healing work with her clients for over a decade now. Brittany guides her clients on an exploration of self, to understand the many parts of ourselves to help us heal, and to create a future full of empowerment.
DEPTH Work - A Holistic Mental Health Podcast
This is a space for those who love to dive into the underbelly, to revel in the mystery, question assumptions about what is normal, play in both/and, and honour the wide range of human emotions.
As a complex trauma survivor, holistic counsellor and co-founder of a mental health institute, I learned that there is immense wisdom in our pain and what we call crazy is just what we are yet not willing to understand and explore. Let’s dive in!
Resources:
Brittany’s Instagram: IG: https://www.instagram.com/brittanyquagan/
Research:
ISPS: http://www.isps.org/
It Didn’t Start With You by Mark Wolynn: https://markwolynn.com/it-didnt-start-with-you/
Control over Hearing Voices Study (Yale COPE Project Research) : https://www.spirit.research.yale.edu/_files/ugd/1c2146_518b9b207b4e4968b89ebdee509ba7f4.pdf
Psychics and the Psychosis Continuum: https://academic.oup.com/schizophreniabulletin/article/43/1/84/2511864?searchresult=1&login=false
Hearing Voices Network Global : https://www.hearing-voices.org/
Lilydale New York: https://www.lilydaleassembly.org/
