Are You Burned Out or Just Numb?

Host Dr. Chris Motley welcomes Nashville family therapist Dr. Stacy Jagger back to the Ancient Health Podcast. They briefly revisit their previous conversation about the “30 Day Blackout,” Jagger’s approach of removing screens and technology to improve family connection. Jagger says she is speaking more at conferences, coaching, writing a new book, and continuing to work full time in her clinic. Her four children range from college to elementary school, so she describes her current life as large and demanding but says she has developed a greater capacity to juggle responsibilities. Her new book, Raising Sassy, begins in a mental hospital, where she wanted to take her own life. Inspired by the film Patch Adams, she decided that if his story could begin in a mental hospital, hers could too. Jagger says the book is deliberately authentic, honest, and humorous. After her mother’s death, she heard her mother’s voice singing “Fly, baby, fly,” which Jagger interpreted as a sense of freedom that allowed her to tell her story more openly. She says she wants to be not only a scientist but also a storyteller who brings humanity and art to the science.

Motley asks whether Jagger understood the trauma she was experiencing as a young person or simply adapted to it. Jagger says that by age 19, while in a hospital, she understood that trauma could either fuel her to climb a huge mountain or take her out. During her first two years of college, she tried to function while “smiling through the pain.” Through Campus Crusade for Christ, she spent a summer telling her story night after night in a music ministry program, hoping to inspire people spiritually. The problem, she explains, was that she had not processed the story herself. Repeating it without healing retraumatized her and helped lead to her hospitalization. At the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, she spent hours staring at a wall or ceiling and could not get out of bed. After telling her mother she had not attended class for six weeks, she drove herself to the hospital. Staff removed nearly everything from her, leaving her with a belt, and she later tried to use it in the shower before abandoning the attempt when it failed and going to group therapy. Jagger says that was 32 years ago and expresses gratitude that it did not work.

Jagger recalls three moments in the hospital that helped her take the next step. First, she secretly went to the kitchen, found a large pan of cookies, and ate all of them—possibly hundreds. In group therapy the next morning, a politician who had also attempted suicide asked, “Where are those cookies?” When Jagger admitted what she had done, he shed a tear. She says this was the first time she felt another person truly understood the level of pain she was in. Second, she noticed a hospital employee who had lost 100 pounds. Jagger saw “a knowing” and wisdom in the woman’s eyes and felt hope: if this woman could make such a change, perhaps anyone could. Third, a music therapist brought joy into the hospital through instruments such as triangles and small drums. Jagger’s conclusion is that people cannot predict which small act will help someone. A moment of empathy, an example of change, or an invitation into joy may give someone the ability to take the next right step. She frames healing as one day and one step at a time, eventually becoming a story that can be told 32 years later.

Jagger says distress does not always look like an obvious crisis. Some people are “numbed out” and checked out without realizing it, spending much of the day scrolling, staring at screens, drinking wine, binge eating, or living in resentment, bitterness, anger, and frustration. Others are sympathetically revved up, showing rage, road rage, or abusive behavior in relationships. She says many people eventually “hit a wall”; she hit hers at 19, while many people may not confront it until around 40. Asking for help requires courage, especially for executives who are responsible for employees and families and may not know whom to call. The conversation then turns to children’s screen use. Jagger says the statistics she has studied indicate that children spend seven to nine hours a day on screens. She distinguishes reality, where children use their five senses and experience satisfying direct contact with life, from virtual reality, which may entertain but does not meet deeper needs for belonging, autonomy, safety, self-expression, purpose, and connection. Her intervention is summarized in three questions: What can you turn off? How can you turn in and notice your internal patterns? What can you turn up instead—creativity, nature, movement, connection, or play? She describes this as a lifestyle rather than a perfectionistic rule.

Jagger explains the nervous system in simple terms. The sympathetic branch revs a person up, while the parasympathetic branch slows the person down. Within the parasympathetic system, she emphasizes the ventral branch, associated with feeling calm, creative, courageous, grounded, poised, and present. She describes a “window of tolerance,” which she calls the “window of SASS” when working with children. Inside it, a person can move between appropriate activation and rest; outside it, the person may become enraged, isolated, checked out, or numb. She recommends identifying three highest values as an organizing “why.” Jagger’s are family, running her business, and creativity. She says people often operate according to their values even when they cannot name them, and that childhood voids commonly become adult values. In a demonstration using a ball, Jagger asks Motley to name his current feelings. He says he feels excited, tired, and optimistic. When asked about tiredness, he describes pushing himself too hard, working beyond his limits, and continuing to help patients even when he needs boundaries. He identifies helping others as one of his highest values. Jagger then applies the three questions: Motley says he needs to turn off his appointment schedule at a defined time, turn in through quiet self-reflection, and turn up play through music with his band.

Jagger says movement is essential for her because working with trauma leaves a great deal of energy in her body. She dances at classes, attends Zumba, cycles, and secretly dances at 5 a.m. in her neighborhood gym bathroom, which she calls “Club Potty.” She describes exercise as non-optional: without an outlet, she may turn the energy against herself or become aggravated with her husband. Motley and Jagger characterize trauma as residue or trapped energy that can accumulate in the body and contribute to illness without the person recognizing its source. She lists breathwork, meditation, and exercise as daily ways to release some of that residue, while also mentioning EMDR, brainspotting, neurofeedback, and homeopathic approaches as additional options. She describes her medically supervised, intravenous ketamine-assisted therapy: a nurse remains present, the client listens to curated music through headphones while hearing Jagger’s voice, and they work from questions prepared before the approximately three-and-a-half-hour experience. Jagger records and transcribes the session, provides a summary and 30 days of integration directives, and says preparation accounts for roughly 10% of the work, the experience 30%, and integration 60%. She sometimes turns a client’s session into a song in real time, which the client hears upon waking and can later use as an anthem for healing.

Jagger says the central question after trauma is, “What are you going to do with your broken heart?” A person can remain resentful, bitter, angry, and hurt others, or “transmute” the pain into something meaningful while developing self-compassion and compassion for others. She describes a conversation with her friend Lisa about moving through grief and eventually asking, “How have I benefited from the trauma that I have suffered?” Jagger says challenge paired with support is the recipe for growth. She applies this to her own sexual abuse at age 10 by a stranger on a Panama City beach, saying the experience changed her life’s trajectory and that, despite its pain, she is grateful for the person she became afterward. She connects healing to nature and to the idea from her mentor Dr. Ted Claus that people are “nature turned inside out.” Seasonal change, death, and rebirth become metaphors for letting something end so that something new can be born. For people who cannot afford therapy, Jagger’s free recommendation is one trusted friend who can walk with them, listen, hold space for their story, and have no agenda. She says expressive activities such as dance, art, music, and drumming can also help children who do not need formal counseling. Finally, she calls healthy daily choices—drinking water, exercising, setting boundaries, and treating oneself kindly—a form of defiance against generational trauma. She summarizes this with, “The hard way is the shortcut.”