Shows
Minding Your Amygdala - A Brain, Body, Behavior PodcastWe Gotta Talk About Kanye: Understanding Bipolar DisorderSend us a textJoin us for an enlightening conversation on Minding Your Amygdala: A Brain, Body, Behavior Podcast! In this episode, we take a closer look at what Bipolar Disorder can look like through the lens of Kanye West’s publicly shared experiences. Remember, this is for educational purposes only—but it can help spark a deeper understanding of mood disorders.We’ll walk through the DSM-5 criteria for Bipolar Disorder, exploring the highs (mania) and lows (depression), and wrap up by discussing a range of effective interventions and treatments. If you or someone you lo...2025-03-2938 min
Minding Your Amygdala - A Brain, Body, Behavior PodcastMental Health: The Final FrontierSend us a textIn this powerful episode of Minding Your Amygdala, we confront the last great frontier of human health: mental well-being. Despite monumental progress in social justice—challenging racism, gender inequality, and systemic abuse—mental health remains stigmatized, hidden behind layers of cultural, religious, and societal resistance. But why??!Join us as we explore the numbers behind the mental health crisis, revealing its global impact and the economic toll of untreated conditions. Then, we dive into the primitive tribal mind, uncovering how human history—from ancient survival instincts to modern-day polarization—has shaped our unde...2025-03-2036 min
Your nEXt ChapterEpisode 20: Do You Know What Today Is? It's My (un)Anniversary!Send us a textLife is full of unexpected turns, and sometimes those turns lead us down paths we never imagined. They may shake us, but they don’t have to break us. Instead, they can refine us, reshape us, and remind us of our strength. The path forward might look different than we originally planned, but that doesn’t mean it’s any less beautiful.In this episode, I’m celebrating an unexpected milestone—what would have been my 30th wedding anniversary. While many might find it unusual to acknowledge this date after divorce, for me it’...2025-03-1732 min
Your nEXt ChapterEpisode 19: Best Friend: Girl Talk with my BFF (w/ Tonya)Send us a textFriendship is one of the most precious gifts in life. A true friend is someone who stands by you in every season, whether you are happy, sad, winning, or losing. Real friendship is not about being the same but about understanding and appreciating each other’s differences.In this episode, I’m joined by my best friend of over 40 years, Tonya, for a heartfelt and hilarious conversation about the power of true friendship. We talk about showing up for friends, speaking the truth with love, and navigating life with people who trul...2025-03-1039 min
Your nEXt ChapterEpisode 10: What’s Going On? Managing the Trauma of Divorce (w/ Dr. Alauna Curry)Send us a textDivorce is a traumatic experience that shakes our beliefs about ourselves, our relationships, and our future. But with empathy, we begin to heal and rebuild, moving forward not as victims, but as empowered individuals who can redefine our lives.In this episode with Dr. Alauna, we dive into the powerful impact of trauma, especially in the context of divorce. Dr. Alauna shares how trauma shapes our emotions, thoughts, and relationships. We explore how our brain processes emotions and the role of empathy in healing. Join us as we explore how to...2025-01-0636 min
Minding Your Amygdala - A Brain, Body, Behavior PodcastIntroducing The Trauma Toolbox : 7 Proven Tools to Cope with TraumaSend us a textIn this episode, Dr. Alauna discusses the mission of DA-TRI.org to offer mental health education and trauma recovery in the form of a Skills Over Pills approach to self healing AND why your support is so important! For Giving Tuesday 2024 (and beyond), we offer the gift of mental health! Today, we explore the new Trauma Toolbox: 7 Proven Tools for Coping with Trauma E-Book! So often, we've been shown negative coping skills like drinking, smoking, shopping, eating and um, doing other things (LOL) LONG before we are introduced to hea...2024-12-0431 min
Minding Your Amygdala - A Brain, Body, Behavior PodcastWTH was that!!? Aging Brains and the Presidential DebateSend us a textIn this episode, Dr. Alauna reflects on America's most recent Presidential Debate between Former President Donald Trump and Current President Joe Biden on June 27, 2024. The stakes for our country are extremely high, and watching this as a trauma psychiatrist, I realized that we HAVE to talk about the aging brain! Both candidates have clearly observable challenges, but without mental health awareness and education, these concerning symptoms may not be obvious. Over the next few episodes, we will explore the various presentations of the aging brain, including addressing different types of dementias, personality disorders, and...2024-07-0928 min
Minding Your Amygdala - A Brain, Body, Behavior PodcastHow Confirmation Bias is Dividing SocietySend us a textHave you noticed that society seems more divided than ever? How can so many people be living in the same world, yet experiencing such different realities? Enter our brain and biology! While some have become aware of the importance of understanding implicit and explicit bias, I believe the strongest human bias is confirmation bias, the tendency to believe in our own "rightness" and therefore our brain gives greater weight to information that reinforces our own perspective and downgrades evidence to the contrary (even if it is more grounded in evidence or acc...2024-06-2332 min
Voices of NEXUSHealing & Recovering From PTSThough post-traumatic stress (PTS) can feel insurmountable, recovery is possible. To make the complex journey of healing from PTS more approachable, board-certified psychiatrists Dr. Napoleon Higgins and Dr. Alauna Curry break down the anatomy of trauma, offer their approaches to treatment, and share their methods for radical self-care. Listen to learn how to incorporate these approaches into your PTS healing process. Guests: Dr. Napoleon Higgins and Dr. Alauna CurryHosted by Gabe Howard, Bipolar Speaker & Podcast Host gabe@gabehoward.comhttps://www.gabehoward.com/2023-04-2744 min
Good Things from LemonadaRevisiting How Do I Stop Beating Myself Up? With Alauna CurryDr. Alauna Curry is like every other therapist out there – a regular person with struggles and pain just like the rest of us. And in 2017, when her marriage, finances, and health all came crashing down, she was reminded that everyone has trauma – but not all of us know how it affects us or the empathy with which we view the world. This episode's practice is about understanding our traumas, and using our brains to learn practical skills that will help us heal them. Want to connect? Join the New Day Facebook Group! https://www.facebook.com/gro...2023-02-0336 min
Minding Your Amygdala - A Brain, Body, Behavior PodcastSecondary Trauma - How to Cope when you Witness TragedySend us a textWe are absorbing an INCREDIBLE amount of trauma lately. From the very public medical emergency of Damar Hamlin, to the release of brutal footage of police beating Tyre Nichols, we find ourselves in the space to again, be a witness. According to dictionary.com, to be a witness is to "be present, personally see or perceive a thing; a beholder, spectator, or eyewitness."This episode of MYA is centered on the importance of building our individual trauma resilience skills. There is no "right" or "wrong" way to feel about these eve...2023-02-0232 min
Minding Your Amygdala - A Brain, Body, Behavior PodcastParenting Traumatized Humans : A Look at ACEs (Adverse Childhood Events)Send us a textWe are seeing the numbers of children struggling with emotions skyrocketing, and as a trauma psychiatrist, it makes sense to me. Traumas create predictable patterns in our psychological and biological health. The pandemic was/IS a shared, global trauma that all humans experienced, and if a large number of "adults" are struggling with "post-" traumatic mental health effects, then of course, the children are suffering, too. In this episode, we will dive into 3 common challenges for children who have experienced ACES: Tantrums, Trouble-making and Trust-issues, and address how Empathy (LOVE) can help them hea...2023-01-1937 min
Minding Your Amygdala - A Brain, Body, Behavior PodcastThe Humans are Gangbanging!Send us a textWhy does it seem like humanity is gang-banging right now? How we achieve Unity in such a Divided Society? We're called the "United States" but it seems we are more divided than ever. I haven't heard anyone say that they think humans are doing OK. "Mass global mental health crisis" is a term we hear more and more. There aren't even enough mental health practitioners, especially who are FULLY trauma trained to even manage the number of people struggling emotionally. What do we need? Mass education. A huge RESE...2023-01-0534 min
Minding Your Amygdala - A Brain, Body, Behavior PodcastAre We Truly "Aware" of Mental Illness?Send us a textIn October, we observed Mental Illness Awareness Week. In that time I asked myself, as a society, Are we TRULY AWARE of mental illness? (Spoiler: NOOOOooo!)This month, we take the time to acknowledge and raise awareness of many different conditions we call “mental illness” like Depression, Schizophrenia, ADHD, PTSD, Dementia, Bipolar Disorder and more. However, as I listen to society debate the many pressing issues of our current society, the widespread violence and chaos, or hypothesizing about “what’s wrong with Ye?” it strikes me that we do not even have th...2022-10-2833 min
Minding Your Amygdala - A Brain, Body, Behavior PodcastSOS: Saving Our Selves from SuicideSend us a textSuicide, or intentionally taking one’s own life, is complex; it involves psychological, social, biological, cultural, and environmental factors. Join us this week for an important conversation about one of the most preventable public health emergencies in our society today: suicide. Talking about it can save a life.Some statistics about suicide:Globally, there is one suicide about every 40 seconds. In the U.S., there is a suicide every 13.7 minutes. Suicide is the 10th leading cause of death for Americans. Suici...2022-09-3035 min
Ms. Wanda's Full Circle RadioEp. 2227 - Deanna Vestal, Lauren Keeler & Dr. Alauna Curry - The Trauma CUREThis episode of Full Circle was enlightening in so many ways! If you missed or want to hear it again, it’s ready for your listening ears and hearts! My guests were Deanna Vestal, Lauren Keeler and Dr. Alauna Curry, who is the world’s only Trauma Psychiatrist. Dr. Curry is the founder of the Trauma Recovery Institute and creator of the Empathy Skills Practice™ a methodology she created to help all of us retrain our brains in order to heal from traumas we’ve experienced in our lives.
To learn more about her work or start your own...2022-09-271h 24
Minding Your Amygdala - A Brain, Body, Behavior PodcastLet's Talk About Sex!Send us a textNew Season Alert!!! Minding Your Amygdala : A Brain, Body & Behavior Podcast is Back!Sex! What a loaded word! It can mean so many different things to so many people, yet it is one of the hardest things to talk about! Which means our amygdalas have a LOT to do with the human experience of SEX!In this episode of Minding Your Amygdala, we will dive into some key elements of sex: why it's so difficult to discuss in a healthy way, why there is so much disagreement and dissatisfaction when...2022-09-0831 min
Minding Your Amygdala - A Brain, Body, Behavior PodcastTreating America's Addiction to ViolenceSend us a textDear friend, I'm sorry to have to tell you, but we, human beings, allaus, unfortunately, are struggling with an addiction to violence. It's not your fault, because of the way our global society has evolved, now in 2022, we are all caught up in a devastating cycle of trauma and addiction, fueled by one important, powerful (but short lasting) pleasure chemical, Dopamine. American society is uniquely addicted to violence, because aggression and force has been a core principle that defined power and "right", through the entire history of our cou...2022-06-0932 min