Ep #203: Weight Loss Success Story Update: Shannon Weinstein, DO

Katrina Ubell:      You are listening to the Weight Loss for Busy Physicians podcast with Katrina Ubell, MD, episode number 203.

Welcome to Weight Loss for Busy Physicians, the podcast where busy doctors like you get the practical solutions and support you need to permanently lose the weight, so you can feel better and have the life you want. If you're looking to overcome your stress eating and exhaustion and move into freedom around food, you're in the right place.

Well, hello there, my friend. How are you. Welcome back to the podcast. Super glad to have you here today. I've got another success story follow-up for you. And this is airing literally almost exactly a year after I had Shannon Weinstein on the podcast last year. So many of you loved her story. She is near and dear to my heart. And so we're going to follow up on all the things that happen in a year of your life. Isn't it so funny when you think like, well, what happened the last year? Really nothing. And then you start really laying it all out, and it's like that's a lot of stuff. It's a lot, a lot of things. And she's going to be such an inspiration to so many of you. Also she talks about her story with pregnancy loss, and it's just a really, really great episode. So I'm excited for you to hear our conversation.

But before we launch into that, I wanted to let you know that your opportunity to sign up for the January Weight Loss for Doctors Only group starts next week on Thursday, December 10th. So if you're listening to this the day it goes live, it's a week from Thursday. And so I'm starting it off, kicking it off with a free training called How to Know if You're Ready to Lose Weight. We're slowing down here. 2020 is finally going to end. I mean, what the heck? Right? It's finally ending, and so we've got to sort ourselves out, right? We've got to figure out what we're doing. We've got to turn over a new leaf in 2021. And I'm telling you, if you've been on the fence thinking about signing up for Weight Loss for Doctors Only, this is your wake-up call. If you're waiting for a sign, here's your sign, okay? So to join me on that free training, go to katrinaubellmd.com/ready, R-E-A-D-Y. What you'll find is that you'll leave that call knowing if you are ready to put 2020 to rest and actually start tackling the overeating problem, the coping with your life by using food and possibly alcohol problem, or if you're not. And so that's what we're going to be covering.

I'll also be offering you some really awesome, amazing bonuses for coming to the call live and hearing about it first thing. So you're going to want to make sure that you come live if possible. If you can't come live, then definitely still register because you will get the recording and still have a chance to get some of those bonuses. So go to katrinaubellmd.com/ready, R-E-A-D-Y, to register. And you'll have all the information about the upcoming Weight Loss for Doctors Only program. It's so great. I mean, Shannon is another great example of the amazing results that you can create when you get the coaching help that you need. So let me just briefly introduce you to Shannon one more time. Shannon is an emergency medicine doctor in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. She is going to tell you more about herself and all of her progress, but she's lost a whole bunch of weight, struggled with her weight really her whole life. She came on in episode 151. So if you want to go listen to that one first and then listen to the update, you are welcome to do that. And she's just really a great example of what's possible when you keep sticking with the work.

And I was telling her after we were done, I was like, “I'm just so happy for you because I know that what we offer is amazing,” but she actually took us up on that offer. She actually did the work and applied it to her life and is reaping the massive rewards from having done that. I'm just so happy for her that she just keeps showing up for herself. It's so great. So I can't wait for you to hear all about Shannon's story. So please enjoy, and I'll talk to you next week. Take care. Bye-bye.

Hey, Shannon. Thank you so much for coming back on the podcast.

Shannon Weinstein:     Thank you so much for having me back.

Katrina Ubell:      I am super excited. I know you were excited when I asked you, because you also like to hear how are people doing? What's the follow-up on that?

Shannon Weinstein:     I love these episodes, yeah, yeah.

Katrina Ubell:      They're so fun, right? So good. Okay. So for anybody who is listening, who wants the first rundown of what we talked about, everything, your whole weight struggle as a kid and your family and everything leading up to that, that was episode 151. And so this is going live a year later. So fun. So give us an update from last year to now because a lot has happened.

Shannon Weinstein:     A lot has happened. Yes, yeah. So I basically got down to goal weight. Some events happened where I kind of went back to my old ways, but didn't stay in them for very long and got-

Katrina Ubell:      We're going to dig into that in a minute.

Shannon Weinstein:     Right back on track, yeah, so almost down to goal weight again, trying to get back there again, but that's really pretty much in the bag. I have what I do, and that's pretty much streamline. And now I'm just working as an ER doctor during COVID times, which is always interesting. I bought a house. I had an ectopic pregnancy.

Katrina Ubell:      Life has happened for you in the last year.

Shannon Weinstein:     Life has happened, but with all of that said, life is essentially good right now, which is very weird to say in the midst of everything that's happening, but for us, life is good. And we're trying to pay it forward, but yeah.

Katrina Ubell:      Yeah, totally. Awesome. Okay, so we're going to dig into each of those things you all talked about. We're going to dig into those things for sure. So let's just start with talking about working in an ER, a busy ER during COVID times. So that was like the world was shutting down, but not for you.

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah, not for me.

Katrina Ubell:      The world was ramping up for you in March and April.

Shannon Weinstein:     Oh my gosh.

Katrina Ubell:      And there was lot going on. So talk us through-

Shannon Weinstein:     So much mind management.

Katrina Ubell:      How all of that went.

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah. So basically, I work in Fort Lauderdale, and so we were a hotspot for a little while and really did get a good bit of surge where every day I was going in, and the whole board was full of COVID, multiple codes a day, just very sick people, wearing my protective gear for eight to 12 hours at a time, just like nothing I've ever practiced before. It was very stressful. And luckily, I had this program to lean on and the tools I developed in the past year to lean on to get me through, because, I mean, some of my colleagues were really struggling. Others didn't seem to struggle as much, and you look at them, and you're like why didn't they struggle? And they lived their life kind of through like the model, even if they don't realize they're doing it or not. And I think I probably would've been one of those other people that was totally struggling if I didn't know about this. And so, yeah, I mean, I really-

Katrina Ubell:      And your interpretation of everything was what was bringing the emotions.

Shannon Weinstein:     And me worrying that I'm going to get COVID every second is going to lead me likely to make a mistake and get COVID, mistake with my PPE or whatever. And if I just try to keep myself calm and have reasonable expectations of myself and make a plan… I had to kind of revamp my eating plan, my sleeping plan, everything just because on those shifts where I was wearing my PPE eight to 12 hours at a time, I guess I could've, but the risk outweighed the benefit of me taking it off. So I would just drink a bunch of water before I went in. I would eat before I go in and drink a bunch of water and eat after. But during my shift, it was on the whole time because I was basically seeing patients and not wanting to don and doff a million times during the shift. So I really had to work it out for me how it would be most useful to me and most beneficial to me mentally.

Katrina Ubell:      Yeah, I'm so glad that you brought that up, though, because last time we talked about how you really had to figure out a whole way of eating that worked with all the different kinds of shifts that you work and nighttime and all these different things and that you really just dug in and tried a bunch of things, practiced it, figured out what was going to work with your experimentation. And you really were in a good place. And then everything-

Shannon Weinstein:     COVID.

Katrina Ubell:      Surprise, right? Then you got COVID. And so the cool thing is, though, you're like I know how to do this.

Shannon Weinstein:     I was so adaptable.

Katrina Ubell:      I've done this before. I'm just going to figure out the new version of doing this versus screw it all to hell. It's over. This is over.

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah. I identified with being someone that rolled with the punches. I never identified as somebody like that before. And I was like oh, I'm one of those people who can just kind of change things up. And it was kind of cool to be that person, like okay, I'm going to do this. I'm going to figure this out. Everything is figureoutable. I forget who says that, but-

Katrina Ubell:      Yes, Marie Forleo.

Shannon Weinstein:     That was me during that time. It was like I'm shocked.

Katrina Ubell:      Yeah. Right. Isn't it kind of fun when you're like who am I right now?

Shannon Weinstein:     Right, right, right.

Katrina Ubell:      I'm like one of “those people.”

Shannon Weinstein:     Right, right.

Katrina Ubell:      And for anybody who doesn't remember that episode, I mean, you had really, really struggled before coaching with your job.

Shannon Weinstein:     Oh yes.

Katrina Ubell:      You really wanted out.

Shannon Weinstein:     Oh yes.

Katrina Ubell:      You were burnt out and done and over it.

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah, burnt out.

Katrina Ubell:      And before COVID hit had done tons of work, genuinely were loving your job again, loving taking care of patients. And so were you ever worried like oh, this is going to kind of threaten this mindset that I have?

Shannon Weinstein:     I always have those, like you call them, thought errors. I would be like oh, I hope this doesn't undo all the work I did. And then immediately I'd be like no, it won't because this is it. This is how I think about my job now. And it never once got to the point where I even gave that a second thought. It popped into my head a few times. When shifts were hard, when I'd have multiple codes, I'm like oh gosh, is this going to really unravel everything? But I mean, I got coaching on it throughout the time when we were really intense in COVID, and I kept coaching on it, and it was never an issue, which, I mean, was amazing because with the way I was before, if I was still practicing the way I was before I would've been done. I probably would when COVID hit.

Katrina Ubell:      Yeah. I mean, it's just such a testament to the power of coaching cause it's not even like oh, I can change my thinking so that it's much more tolerable and I actually like it again when things are going well. But when you can still like it when there's a-

Shannon Weinstein:     In a pandemic.

Katrina Ubell:      Worldwide pandemic-

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Katrina Ubell:      That's when you're testing it. You're like oh, okay.

Shannon Weinstein:     Right, right.

Katrina Ubell:      This is going to stick, I think, this time.

Shannon Weinstein:     Right, right.

Katrina Ubell:      Yeah. That's so cool. So you also, though, have been helping to shape a new residency program, which is a pretty new thing, right?

Shannon Weinstein:     Yes. We haven't started yet. And I asked to be core faculty when they were taking applications, and I'm on core faculty now. And I have a little position on core faculty. And that's been really interesting for my management too and just thinking about how I'm going to approach the residents when they do get there. We have residents now that come through for other programs, but we don't have VR yet. They're going to start next summer supposedly. But it's been really interesting thinking about my own experience at residency and how I want to approach dealing with residents and dealing with myself when they do arrive, because it makes me nervous, somebody practicing under me, and am I going to be teaching them the right way? And am I going to show up for that… Kind of like having a kid. Am I going to show up in the best way possible? That sort of thing. So I've been exploring what my thoughts are, beliefs are about that, how I want to show up for them and myself.

Katrina Ubell:      Interestingly, it's kind of like we have those concerns before we have a baby. And then what do we do? We rise to the occasion, because here they are, and they need us. And then we're like well, let's figure it out. So it's all kind of cool to even look at it that way and just be like well, we're going to do it one way or the other.

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah, this is happening.

Katrina Ubell:      This is going to happen, which is super cool. And I think it's also awesome to be able to be core faculty and be able to approach the residents with this new filter, right?

Shannon Weinstein:     Yes.

Katrina Ubell:      How many of us are like I never could think of anybody that I interacted with who had a positive mindset or could teach me anything like this. Exactly. And so you being able to be that person, even if you're the only person, that's going to change their lives. That's so cool. That's so awesome.

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah, I'm really excited about it.

Katrina Ubell:      That's so great. All right. Now let's talk about your house. So you bought a new house. You fixed it up, and you sold a house. And that's a lot. I mean, I know very, very highly-trained, skilled coaches who are like, “I'm going to move, and I'm committing myself to not being stressed about this,” and it still was a super stressful interaction. So let's talk about that.

Shannon Weinstein:     My other house, we're in contracted, so we're closing any day now. We moved out in May, and we put it on the market in August. We did some things to it, like updated it, not updated, painted, random things that when you are living in a house, you just kind of want to make it nice and shiny or whatever. But we originally fixed a bunch when we moved into that original house. So we didn't have much to do. It was a great house for somebody to just move into. Yeah, we bought her a new house in May, and actually our new house had a lot of problems that we weren't aware of, even with inspections and stuff. Just all of a sudden you move in, and everything breaks. Like what?

Katrina Ubell:      It always works like that.

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah. So we had a period where apparently our duct work was from the original house in like the 50s. And so we needed to do all new duct work. We needed to get a new AC. The sprinkler system needed to be dug up in some parts. I was just talking to Lynn about this. There was like a million and one things, because she did the move. I was like, “So if you need to know about any of these things, I'm here.” Our washer and dryer, there was a problem, just literally everything. But overall, the house was amazing. It just had all of these problems. So I was able to coach myself through it. The old me would've been like oh my God. This was such a bad decision. We made the worst decision. We got into this house, and now everything's wrong. We're spending a bunch of money. And I was really just able to take a step back and look at it like this is our house that we love. It's a great situation for us. The layout's perfect. We love everything about it, except it has a few of these issues, which any house would. But the old me would've been like oh, there's a more perfect house out there, and we didn't find it.

So I had to really work on loving this house and actually did the work on the old house too. We didn't actually move out of it. I ended up loving it when we were moving, out and it was actually sad to move out of it, whereas the whole process started because I was hating living in it. And you always say you got to get yourself to neutral or loving a thing before you move on from it. And so it was bittersweet for me because I'm like we left our old house that I loved now for this house that has so many problems, but they're actually going to do work on both houses.

Katrina Ubell:      Yeah. It's so funny because it's like the same thing as a relationship or a job, right?

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah.

Katrina Ubell:      It's literally the same thing. You love your job, then you're like why would I leave if I love it? Well, because you just want to do something else.

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah, yeah. You want something that's a little bit more-

Katrina Ubell:      Yeah, something different.

Shannon Weinstein:     We wanted to go from two stories to one, so now we're in a one story, and yeah, yeah.

Katrina Ubell:      Yeah, exactly. And that can just be a good enough reason, yeah.

Shannon Weinstein:     Right, right.

Katrina Ubell:      But you really do have to get your brain around that, right?

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah.

Katrina Ubell:      You're like I'm leaving this thing I'm loving. Okay, so you really did do a lot of relationship work. So this is all going to kind of blend together here. Actually, let's start it off with the ectopic. So just to kind of give everybody the background story, so your first pregnancy was an ectopic pregnancy, right?

Shannon Weinstein:     Yes.

Katrina Ubell:      And so you almost died, yeah? Could we say?

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah, yep. Yeah, I bled out, and yeah, it was emergency, yeah-

Katrina Ubell:      It's was legit.

Shannon Weinstein:     Emergency surgery, yeah.

Katrina Ubell:      The real deal, that one?

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Katrina Ubell:      Okay. And then you were telling me that you did not do well after that mentally.

Shannon Weinstein:     No.

Katrina Ubell:      This was before you had-

Shannon Weinstein:     Mentally.

Katrina Ubell:      Coaching or anything?

Shannon Weinstein:     Yes, yeah, yeah. Mentally was very challenging, very challenging for me. I was never diagnosed, but I could definitely see myself in like a depressive state. I just went to work and came home and went to work and came home. And before that, I had a pretty active social life and an active life. So for a while, it was not a good situation.

Katrina Ubell:      And you were saying that your husband even at that time was like, “I don't know if we should even try to have a baby after this”?

Shannon Weinstein:     Yes, yeah. The both of us were, yeah, very scared to try again. And that's something… I mean, I've known my husband for years since we were teenagers, and it's always something we talked about. We wanted kids, so it was something we really wanted it, but we were also scared. And this situation was just so devastating. And I think I added to the suffering of already losing a pregnancy, and then with how I would think about it and think about the future and think about the past and blame myself and be worried about the future, it just made it like a situation where why would I want to try for a pregnancy when I'm just thinking about everything in a depressive way? There's nothing positive going forward. So that's the mindset we were in.

And then slowly, I started coming around, and I was feeling better physically, which helped me mentally. And then we tried for a second kid, and I got pregnant, and I had my daughter, but that was also a very difficult pregnancy. I had a lot of pain, and I bled through it and had a large fibroid that was pressing on things and just some other things that happened that it just made it for a difficult pregnancy. But then I had her, and that was fine. And then I found your program, and I lost the weight. And things were actually improving in my life because of how I was thinking about things and my personal life and my husband and just work. And I was loving work again and everything. So I was like I've got this. I'm on top of the world. Let's have a second kid. And then it was like whomp, whomp. My husband was like, “No, I think our family's good now.” And I was devastated. I really-

Katrina Ubell:      Yeah, I remember coaching on that several times actually.

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah, lots of coaching on that.

Katrina Ubell:      That was a lot of the first work that you did, really was.

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah was getting to be okay with not having a second kid and really getting to be okay with it. And I was actually imagining my life with the one kid, and now she's growing up. So we're going to start traveling again, or we're going to do all these fun things. And I was really excited about it. I'm like okay, one kid's cool. We'll save a bunch of money. We'll have more money to do whatever we want with. Totally fine. I went from being so depressed about it, and it really being a thing in our relationship with me and my husband. So then coaching through it and getting okay with it and even being for it. And then my husband, things were so good, that he was like, “Oh, things are so good, let's try for another kid.” And the little emoji where you're mind blows up. You're like what? What is happening?

Katrina Ubell:      Yes. Right, right.

Shannon Weinstein:     And then, my brain was like well, if you were going to say yes when everything was great, I would've just tried to make everything great months ago, faked it, so you would say yes months ago.

Katrina Ubell:      Because you really thought he was done. He was like that was the end.

Shannon Weinstein:     For certain. We made a plan. We're done. It was so funny. It was so funny. And then that led to us getting pregnant, and then-.

Katrina Ubell:      And you got pregnant on purpose during COVID times?

Shannon Weinstein:     Yes.

Katrina Ubell:      I remember you kind of announcing it, right?

Shannon Weinstein:     Which took a lot of mind management. Yeah.

Katrina Ubell:      Yeah, and started saying, “Yeah, a lot of people are probably going to judge me for this, being in the ER and all of that.” And you're like screw it. Let's do it.

Shannon Weinstein:     Right, right.

Katrina Ubell:      Right. Okay. So then-

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah, that's right. I got coaching on that too.

Katrina Ubell:      Yes.

Shannon Weinstein:     I remember it now.

Katrina Ubell:      Yeah, and we're going to talk about that. So then what happened with this one? Tell everyone what happened.

Shannon Weinstein:     I had another ectopic.

Katrina Ubell:      Yes, yes.

Shannon Weinstein:     Oh my gosh. I was devastated. I mean, now I can look back and it's okay and I can talk about it without bursting into tears and being super depressed about it, but it was devastating. And I actually apparently had a worst ectopic than the first because it was a cornual. And I thought I was having a normal pregnancy because I got so far along, but apparently, they grow larger because they're in the part of the uterus-

Katrina Ubell:      More space there.

Shannon Weinstein:     Where it kind of stretches a little bit, but apparently, you're more at risk with those. So they found it, and I was able to safely be done with it.

Katrina Ubell:      Treat it.

Shannon Weinstein:     But it was devastating. It was truly devastating. So I had to coach on that again.

Katrina Ubell:      I mean, I don't think you had that… That was not on your radar as something to expect, right?

Shannon Weinstein:     No, no. I was like I can't be that lucky twice. Come on, yeah.

Katrina Ubell:      Yeah. So, yeah, so that happened. I think it's really good to just be clear. It's not like you were like oh, I'm having an ectopic. I just coached myself, and it didn't bother me. And I was like a little sad about it.

Shannon Weinstein:     Absolutely not.

Katrina Ubell:      That's not what happened.

Shannon Weinstein:     No.

Katrina Ubell:      So let's just be clear.

Shannon Weinstein:     Let's be real.

Katrina Ubell:      What happened, yeah.

Shannon Weinstein:     I was absolutely devastated. I went back to my old eating ways, my old sit in front of the TV and do nothing. My poor daughter lost a mom during that time because I was just checked out. I was just barely doing only the things I needed to do to survive, so again, just work at home and doing nothing at home, barely getting by at work, eating all the things. I'm not a big drinker, but even alcohol chatter was in my mind. Alcohol will make this feel better.

Katrina Ubell:      Right. I'm mean, it's when we feel that bad-

Shannon Weinstein:     You just want all of the-

Katrina Ubell:      It's like food isn't cutting it. We've already tried that. What else you got.

Shannon Weinstein:     Food, Netflix, yeah. Alcohol. let me buy these things, anything I could do to not be with myself in the pain and then just adding more pain to my pain because I'm not willing to, at that point, was willing to really feel the devastating pain. And then slowly I started coaching on it, and it didn't last as long as my first one. I went months with my first ectopic just in a very depressive state.

Katrina Ubell:      My memory is-

Shannon Weinstein:     And I guess probably not clinical depression because I was fully functional, but I was bare minimum functioning.

Katrina Ubell:      My memory… And I could be wrong, but my memory is that we first coached on it like three weeks out.

Shannon Weinstein:     Probably. You're probably right.

Katrina Ubell:      Which I think is amazing, I think, that you were even in a place to even want to coach, to even be open to the idea of thinking differently. And I remember you just being like, “And I'm doing all these things, and I know I'm making it worse.” You had so much awareness around I know this isn't helping, but I don't know what else to do. Whereas before you know this or could've done this, you're like well, what the heck else am I supposed to do? Of course I'm going to do that.

Shannon Weinstein:     Right. This is how I'm supposed to act. Right.

Katrina Ubell:      Yes. Right. Exactly.

Shannon Weinstein:     And then our crazy brains. I even judged myself for wanting to coach on it so early. I was like I'm going to just change my thoughts three weeks out? That's all I give myself. I really truly was ready to feel something different because I was just adding… I had the awareness. I knew I was just adding more pain to my suffering. I didn't want to feel gay about having a ectopic pregnancy, but I certainly didn't want to feel double negative-

Katrina Ubell:      Right, exactly.

Shannon Weinstein:     With all the stuff I was doing. Yeah.

Katrina Ubell:      Well, and it's like I think that where coaching helps there is how can I actually feel my emotions? Because, of course, all the Netflix and the food and the alcohol and the shopping is all in an effort to avoid it, right?

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah.

Katrina Ubell:      And we're like it's so bad that I can't feel it, so I'm going to do all these other things, which actually makes it even more insurmountable. And so having some awareness around that, at least you can be like I mean, I just want-

Shannon Weinstein:     This is the most loving thing I can do for myself.

Katrina Ubell:      Yes. Exactly. Exactly. It doesn't make any sense for me to continually make this worse and worse when I can at least start practicing feeling what's happening right here and then going from there. and I always look at it like same thing with the baby that I lost. It's like I'm never going to be like oh, no big deal or like oh, whatever. It's never going to be like that, but being able to get some resolution, some kind of incorporation of it into your story where you can talk about it and think about it without it rendering you a puddle of tears, getting to that place. It's always going to be a part of you, but then you move on. Just like anything that is-

Shannon Weinstein:     Hard.

Katrina Ubell:      Painful in your life, right?

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah.

Katrina Ubell:      Any kind of difficult loss or disappointment or things like that. So, yeah. Thank you for sharing that, first of all.

Shannon Weinstein:     Of course.

Katrina Ubell:      As I told you, I just think people don't talk about this stuff enough.

Shannon Weinstein:     I agree. I agree. You already feel so isolated, and then when people don't talk about it, yeah, it just compounds.

Katrina Ubell:      Exactly. You're really like no, I'm the one who's broken. And even as doctors, we know this happens to other people. We're like, yeah, but-

Shannon Weinstein:     Right. I should've known better. I should've done something about it.

Katrina Ubell:      There's was just bad luck. Mine was because there's this thing that wrong-

Shannon Weinstein:     Yes, something wrong with me, yeah.

Katrina Ubell:      Yes. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. So through all of that, and just through all your work with coaching, your relationship with your husband has completely blossomed, not that it was bad before.

Shannon Weinstein:     Oh my God. Not that it was bad before. I mean, we've been soulmates since way back. We knew each other as, I wouldn't say kids, but teenagers, and we've been together for a long time. We've been married for 11 years, but even together before that 10 years. And so we've always been super solid, just open, honest, great communication. But coaching is taking it to another level. I feel like we're unstoppable. We're just like power couple of 2020, which we're not, but that's in my mind how I think about us.

Katrina Ubell:      There's nothing wrong with you thinking about yourself that way.

Shannon Weinstein:     Right, right.

Katrina Ubell:      It's amazing. It's so great. That could just be true.

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah, yeah. And I think it's funny because our relationship was so amazing before, and the way I took him not wanting to have another kid in stride and coached through and got myself to a good place, and then along the way, our intimate relationship is better, and us around the house is great. And we're not having disagreements about many things because I dropped the manual for him. And I think that's what led him to wanting to try for a second kid again, which is so funny. Everything's just getting so good, and then yeah, it just worked out that I think he just saw that everything was so great, we can take on whatever life throws at us, whether it's an ectopic or a sick relative or whatever the case may be.

Katrina Ubell:      Yeah. Well, and it's like he's a lawyer, right?

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah.

Katrina Ubell:      So he's like very logical. I'm sure he's just really analyzing and like is it prudent to bring another child into this situation?

Shannon Weinstein:     Right, right. A hundred percent, yeah, yeah.

Katrina Ubell:      Thinking about it that way. Yeah, that's totally awesome. And then as far as mothering goes too, I know you've really done a lot of work on yourself as a mom and your relationship with your daughter and wanting to be more present and engaged with her. So can you speak to that?

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah. I mean, we talk about mothering in the WhatsApp group all the time. And it's a big thing for all mothers. I don't think I've ever met a single mother that was like mothering is easy. No big deal.

Katrina Ubell:      I've got this.

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah. It's always a challenge. It's the number one thing that I identify with being. I am a mother. And so like if it's that number one thing in my life, there's always challenges that come up with it. And so there's always self-coaching every single day. I don't work every single day, so I don't have to coach myself every single day about work or whatever other else in my life. But I'm a mother every single day. So there's constantly something to coach on in my head about how I'm mothering or how I'm showing up for her and also realizing that she's her own person. Even though she's only… Well, she'll be five on Christmas, but she's going to do what she's going to do. I can guide her. I can help her. I can show up as the best mother I can be. But in the end it's going to be all her decisions. I just got to show up for her the best I can.

But in the moment it's very hard when she's flipping out about the Zoom school call or she's like yelling at her friend because they don't want to share. I go in my head, I'm like oh my God. She's going to be a crazy human being. She can't share. What is wrong with her? What is wrong with me? Why can't I teach her to share? Oh my God. I do self-coaching in my head about mothering every single day throughout the day. Yeah, it's the number one thing.

Katrina Ubell:      Yeah, it grounds you. It brings you back to what can I actually control?

Shannon Weinstein:     Yes. And like you say, she's my best teacher. I actually originally did the work with my brother. My brother and I had a little strained relationship. And he's the initial person I did the work on. I can only show for him as the best sister I can. His outcomes are his own outcomes. I can just love him for who he is. And really helped me with my relationship with my daughter. Even though I am the parent, I can set boundaries, I can do things to guide her, she can disagree with every single boundary that I ever set and go against them. And then there's consequences and whatever. And maybe every single day of my life I'm going to have to be giving out consequences. Or maybe I'm not. Maybe it's going to be easy. But either way, she's going to do what she's going to want to do.

Katrina Ubell:      Exactly. I think we like to think that we have so much more control than we really do. And even the way we talk about it, we're like oh, that mom, she needs to learn how to control her kid, as though that's possible.

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah, there's no controlling. There's no controlling anybody else but yourself. And sometimes it's hard to control yourself. I have to remind myself the only person that I'm in control of is me, and I'm a work in progress.

Katrina Ubell:      Yeah, exactly.

Shannon Weinstein:     Sometimes I'm out of control.

Katrina Ubell:      Half the time I'm going to screw that up.

Shannon Weinstein:     Right, right.

Katrina Ubell:      Exactly. I think some people hear that, and they're like well, then, what's the point? Why are we even trying? I look at it more like no, this is like offering yourself compassion. All of us are trying our hardest. When we see someone else who's struggling, rather than being so quick to judge and thinking that we have all the answers and we know how to live their life better than they do, which is how pretty much everybody is about kids when they don't have kids, right?

Shannon Weinstein:     Right. Right.

Katrina Ubell:      So we all were the most amazing parents before we had children.

Shannon Weinstein:     Absolutely. Oh my God. Yeah, yeah.

Katrina Ubell:      When you can find that compassion for everybody else around you and offer to yourself, then you just… We're all just trying to figure this out. We're all swinging it. And some days we do a good job. I sometimes think too, I'm like if the kids do well, it's kind of despite our parenting, I mean, not because of our parenting.

Shannon Weinstein:     Absolutely.

Katrina Ubell:      I look at my ninth grader and in some of the ways that he's excelling, and I'm like, I mean, that's all him. I'm giving him all the credit for that. He's created that solely for himself.

Shannon Weinstein:     They have to be internally motivated. I mean, even if you sat down with him every single day and was like, “Do this, this, this, this, this, this,” he has to want to do it himself, or else he's going to be nah, that's not happening.

Katrina Ubell:      Exactly. And the cool thing is that it's not like I've never had a concern about him.

Shannon Weinstein:     Sure.

Katrina Ubell:      I mean, I totally when he was younger worried about this and worried about that and worried about the other thing. And is this okay? And is that okay? Is the other thing okay? And all the normal mom stuff. And it's like whether you worry or don't worry, they still bake themselves. They come out on the other end. So we really can just dial back the worrying. I don't know that it's totally possible to turn it off, but dial it back.

Shannon Weinstein:     No, definitely not, but definitely dialing it back and checking myself.

Katrina Ubell:      Right. Right, right. Exactly. And just even having the awareness this is what I'm doing. This is why I'm acting this way or approaching this in this certain way, yeah. So good. So one thing that you've said recently that I thought was really good is you were saying that you kind of feel like you're at a rest period in your life. And so I would love it if you could explain to everyone listening what you mean by that.

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah. It's not an easy period.

Katrina Ubell:      It sounds like it should be.

Shannon Weinstein:     We talk about people are internally motivated to do things. I've been internally motivated my whole life. I in high school wanted to go to college. I wanted to go to medical school. I wanted to get a residency and be a good resident. And I was chief resident and just accomplish, accomplish, accomplish, accomplish, get married, get a good house, have a child. We have a dog, all these accomplishments, check, check, check, check, check, and not because I didn't want to do those things. I wanted to do those things, but also you kind of get into this rhythm of okay, accomplish this. What next? Accomplish this. What next? I kind of got, I don't know, just into the accomplishments. So finally, I'm at a great place in my life where I love my job. I love my husband. I love my life. I'm loving everything, and I'm pulled to be like okay, what next? What is this next accomplishment? And I haven't ever really had a period where I'm just like I'm enjoying life and I'm just-

Katrina Ubell:      Enjoying what you created, what you spent all of those years creating for yourself, yeah.

Shannon Weinstein:     Yeah. And so I'm in that period right now, and I have to remind myself because when you connect in this group with these women doctors, I mean, there's so many amazing people there. And sometimes I'm like I want to do more. You hear about all these women doing these fabulous things. And they're like the leaders of this and they're doing that. And they're going to be coaches or they're going to be CEOs or they're running their hospital system or whatever they're doing. And all of a sudden, I'm like, I want to do that. I need to do that. Where's my next accomplishment? I got to use this coaching for something good. Obviously, I need to coach to get to the next place. And what I found is no. I want to enjoy what I've created right now. It doesn't mean that I don't want to be ambitious in a little bit, but I'm 30 something years old. I haven't had a period where I'm just like enjoying life.

And so I want to do that, and I have to remind myself every day that I want to do that, because every little email that I get, like would you like to do this opportunity? Or would you like—I'm like a dog with a squirrel. I'm like, “Squirrel, squirrel.”

Katrina Ubell:      Yeah, right. That's what I should do.

Shannon Weinstein:     I want to jump right into the next opportunity. I have to slow down and remind myself no, you're in a period of rest. This is what you want. This is good for you and good for your family and what you want right now. But it sounds easy. Oh, your period of rest, it should be so easy.

Katrina Ubell:      Should be like vacation all the time.

Shannon Weinstein:     You're just hanging out. Right, right. It's like actually-

Katrina Ubell:      It's not, though.

Shannon Weinstein:     Pretty difficult when you're so stimulated all the time.

Katrina Ubell:      Yes. Yeah, it's like a reset. I don't know if you've heard about some of these people now who are doing dopamine fasts where they're basically denying themselves of all of the pleasures in their life for like several days to try to reset their brains because we are constantly bombarded with dopamine hits like crazy. And they're like, yeah, is it uncomfortable? Of course it is. And in a way what you're doing is you're saying hey, you've been getting all these dopamine hits from accomplishing things. And instead, how about we get some dopamine hits from being present in our lives?

Shannon Weinstein:     Enjoying and being present, yeah.

Katrina Ubell:      And actually figuring out how to create joy that isn't tied to accomplishment.

Shannon Weinstein:     Yes. And it's hard.

Katrina Ubell:      And that's really what it is. It's hard because you've never practiced that before because your whole life, it's been all accomplishment-based and achievement-based, yeah. So I just think you're a great example of that. It's like you know you're like I'm getting pulled to that. Nope. I'm coming back.

Shannon Weinstein:     I'm coming back. Right.

Katrina Ubell:      I'm just staying where I am right now. And I think learning to be in the discomfort of that is so useful for you to just go like no, could I do anything I wanted? Of course. But right now I'm going to choose this because-

Shannon Weinstein:     This is what I'm choosing. I want to do this, yeah.

Katrina Ubell:      The effects of doing that, which is so cool. Awesome. I love it. Okay. Do you have anything else that you would like to share or-

Shannon Weinstein:     That is a lot, right? I mean, I think we covered everything.

Katrina Ubell:      Coaching, it works.

Shannon Weinstein:     It works.

Katrina Ubell:      We could sum it up with coaching works.

Shannon Weinstein:     Yes, I'm proof.

Katrina Ubell:      Awesome. Well, Shannon, thank you. Thank you so much for coming on a year later, giving us the whole update. It's so great to hear what's going on for people and to hear, yeah, just to hear the whole update. So thanks for coming on to share.

Shannon Weinstein:     Thank you so much. It's been an absolute pleasure.

Katrina Ubell:      Did you know that you can find a lot more help from me on my website? Go to katrinaubellmd.com and click on free resources.