Chitty Chats with Stacy

Chelle Taylor
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Hello. Yes, we did it! Hi! Are good to see you again.

Oh, there are so many things I'm excited about and thank you for scheduling the time and making the time difference work and all the things. So, uh, I, my heart is like.

So I'm here today for those of you who are listening with my, I'm a dear friend from the past, Ms. Shel Taylor. So I feel so honored and blessed to have this time with you because I know you are a busy woman.

A little bit.

Yeah, so, okay, I'm going to tell the audience a little bit about how we know each other, and then we're going to let you [00:01:00] introduce yourself in all the ways that you do, and then we're going to chat about what we do.

So, I don't even know how long it's been. We met each other probably 2014 to 2015. And Dr. Bruce Perry, who many of our listeners have heard of, uh, brought us together. We were part of that first cohort of individual clinicians who went through in the NeuroSequential Model. And then we put together a presentation.

And I still am like blown away that four of us all across the world put together this presentation and then came together in Canada and presented that and that was in 2016. So that was

eight years ago. Yeah, wow. Yeah, because that's how they linked the four of us up, didn't they? And then internationally we connected and then presented together at the first NMT symposium in Banff.

[00:02:00] And. We've kind of maintained a friendship and connection from that all the way along. Yeah.

And so let's just talk about you and who you are. Who are you? What do you do? What,

what's your bio? So I'm a, um, trained as a clinical psychologist, um, nearly 30 years out now. Um, and I co direct a small private practice.

for infants, children, adolescents and families in regional Victoria and a little town called Ballarat. We're about an hour, hour west, hour and a half west of Melbourne, which is where Taylor Swift performed it just a couple of days ago. Were you there? I didn't get tickets, but I've become a Swiftie in the last little bit.

I like the astute businesswoman that she is. Yeah. Um, so yeah, anyway, so we're about an hour, hour and a half west of Melbourne. [00:03:00] Um, I grew up, um, about an hour from here. Um, I have always worked kind of rural and regionally, um, throughout my career. Um, Yeah, so NMT trained now for, do you know, I was thinking about it with, um, Dr.

Brandt and some others the other week, next year I will have been linked with the neuro sequential network for, for 20 years because it 2005 when I was introduced to NMT. Yeah. And I

was introduced in 2006 and it's remarkable. Right. So that's part of why I wanted to talk to you about today because. I think that, well, first of all, what draws you to the NMT?

What draws you to the Neurosequential Model? How are you using it as a clinician? How do you use it in your own life?

Alrighty, wow. Um. I'll tell you a [00:04:00] story, probably, in terms of how I got introduced to it, and it's not a story that Dr. Perry's not unaware of, so I'm happy to talk about it publicly, because I was a busy clinical team leader of a regional, um, intensive therapeutic program here in Victoria, in Ballarat, um, at the time, and they pulled us all offline to go and do the entire whole system, and I uh, program statewide was going to go down to Melbourne for a week, five days of intensive training with Dr.

Perry. And we were, you know, and I had no idea who this guy was. I hadn't heard about him, knew nothing about him. And I had two, a brand new graduate and a pretty early career clinician in my team and a lot of really complex cases that I had to hold, um, or really closely supervise. So I was busy. I didn't have time to be online for five days.

The nerves! And about six months prior, they also pulled us offline to do some trauma [00:05:00] focused CBT training. And the work that I was doing in that program was so at the cutting edge and the raw, raw face of trauma, that CB, um, trauma focused CBT was something that we would do down the line. It wasn't something we could do in that moment.

So when I went down to that training, I was like, Oh, this is, you know, what are we going to do with this? Um, and so the idea of then having to go and see Bruce was a bit the same. I was like, not, not interested. So I threw an adult tantrum. Um, and I was like, well, if that's what you want me to do, I'm going to take all my case notes and I'm just going to bring my case notes up to date while I'm, you know, listening to this dude.

Um,

get some work done, multitask.

The adult tantrum got even worse, Stacey. Because I was like, actually, no, if you're going to pull me offline, I'm going to do nothing. I'm going to knit. I'm going to knit for the week. I'm not even going to listen. I'm just going to sit there and knit because that's one of my favorite hot pastimes and Got down there with my [00:06:00] knitting, sat in the big auditorium.

Dr. Perry comes out And as Dr. Perry does, he started talking and I didn't knit a stitch for five days. Yeah, although if you

had been knitting, it would have been pattern repetitive activity. We know that, right?

Correct. Absolutely. We know that now. But from the moment he opened his mouth I don't even, I can't even remember the words, but I felt like the jigsaw puzzle piece that had been missing to theoretically explain what I've been doing all my career that came straight from my gut and felt right.

All of a sudden I had a theoretical framework I could put around it. I love that. And so it was like a missing jigsaw piece. And then as I've gone along with the Neurosequential Network and my work alongside them, with them, um, and as a mentor for, for the, for the, for them, um, what I've discovered is that it's introduced me to so many other ways of working and ways of being and different types of [00:07:00] work.

So, you know, like I've done the NAPA Infant Parent Mental Health Fellowship as a result, the Neurosequential Model, um, of Reflective Supervision. Um, I did NME, obviously, when we first came out, I was, I helped Steve with that original, originally. Um, you know, and then I've just, I'm in the process of finishing up the Reflective Supervision Academy with NAPA, and I've just started as a Reflective Supervision Academy mentor.

So, it's. Absolutely, completely, would you want to say changed? It's both changed, but also consolidated the way that I kind of worked. And it really gave a, it's provided a really sound base on which to kind of grow from. That's, that's the professional part. The, the, the contribution that it gives to the work with families like.

My, I'd always, relationships were always important. I remember when I graduated, I went to, so I moved to Western Australia, which is about 3000 kilometers away from where I live, [00:08:00] um, and, or where I grew up. And, um, my parents were, you know, they struggled, they, they, they worked really hard to put me through university and I was doing my master's degree over there.

And I came home on holidays and I said to my dad, um, who was, you know, working infinite hours to pay for my education. And I said to him, you know, I've had all these skills. Mum and you taught me all the skills that I needed to be able to be a really good therapist. Like mum collects relationships and that's what this is about.

And she's taught me how to form relationships, make relationships, maintain relationships, care for people, be kind, be compassionate. What I'm learning at university is really just the icing on the cake and he's like, well, what are we spending all this money for?

Um, we get those letters behind your name,

Absolutely right. And so for me, relationships have always been important. But again, NMT as, uh, and, and the neurobiology, [00:09:00] the, the way that Bruce kind of pulls all that together just really brings home how and why relationships are so important. Mm-Hmm. . And so. As a practitioner, you then lean into pushing the boundaries a little bit around evidence based treatments and, and prioritising relationships and being able to stand firm and, and have, have a voice back in the system around, actually, no, this is what this kid needs right now.

Um, and forcing a treatment on them will actually mean they'll either, one, never come back to therapy, they'll leave and never come back, um, or two, we're just not going to get the benefits that we want to see and that we need to take the time to build the connection, build the relationship, um, all of that kind of stuff.

So relationships have been a really big component of it too. And then the international collegial networks that I've made, like I've got friendships around the world because of NMT. Yeah,

well, I was just going to say that one of the relationships I most value is the one [00:10:00] I've had with you because even though we don't get to speak, we don't speak, we don't, we're on Facebook, we see each other on social, we know that there's another soul in the world that is doing this work.

And I know really early on, that was super important to me as a private practitioner. Like, how does this model work? One hour a week with our clients and, and how do we build it into their homes and their families? How do we build it into school systems? How do we build it so that we're not, we're the facilitator of it.

We're not the deliverer of it. And it, to me, it's been remarkable to see how much it's grown, how many people are on board. Right. And so in some areas of my life, I'm like, yes, I'm with some seasoned pioneers and veterans. We've been doing this 20 years. 20 years you're saying next year, right? I remember I was pregnant with my daughter, 2006, I was absorbing everything I could, [00:11:00] and I'm like, oh my gosh, this is life changing.

And then I find that now, all these years later, There's such a massive amount of people that still don't know and understand everything we're doing, right? And I remember one of the most important conversations I had with you in Canada was about health insurance and billing and diagnosing and all of those pieces that in America we're up against that look a little different in Australia.

And I want you to just speak a little bit to that. What does mental health practice look

like? where you're at. Okay. Yeah. So in Australia, um, so first and foremost, we have a Medicare system, a healthcare system. Um, so as taxpayers, we pay a Medicare levy as part of our tax on our tax blinker. And then that goes into a federal budget that affords.

Um, all Australians, Medicare rebates on all of their health care. So if I go to [00:12:00] the doctor and I'm paying for my just general consult, I will get a proportion of that money back from the government. Um, so that I maintain my health because then obviously the long term costs to the government are less. Um, and so every Australian.

Um, who is a citizen, has a Medicare card and has access to that. So from a mental health perspective, um, as a private practitioner, um, mental health social workers, and who have done the required training, and psychologists, um, all Australians can get access to 10. Medicare rebated mental health sessions per year, per calendar year.

So it's not enough. It's nowhere near enough. Any year isn't going to cut the mustard with the frequency we know that people need to be seen. Throughout the pandemic, for two, two and a bit years during the pandemic, they increased that to 20 sessions per year because of [00:13:00] the Mental health crisis during the pandemic.

There wasn't a lot of, um, without wanting to sound critical about government, there wasn't a lot of forethought given to the post pandemic mental health crisis that we're now in, um, and we're back to 10 sessions and people really struggling and then, of course, the inflation and cost of living and, and the like.

Um, so everybody gets 10 Medicare rebated sessions, um, and then obviously we've got private health insurance so they can get additional sessions on that where their private health insurance will fund some of that as well. We also have a really, um, easy, easily accessible public health, mental health system.

So we have, um, a youth and infant, youth and child, sorry, infant and child mental health. Um, and then we also have a youth mental health service that goes through until 25. So public access to mental health treatment, um, time limited, you know, KPI based, um, but readily available. You can be a frequent flyer through the, [00:14:00] the mental health system.

Um, yeah. I love that. And I just think

it's

important to talk about that because we're always trying to solve these problems. And I'm like, but there are also. Other ways we're doing it and I think it's important. I know for me, one of the barriers we're always up against is insurance and sessions and the barriers to that.

And, you know, speaking in your line of work where you're at, do you have long waiting lists? Do you have people that are, right? Like there's not enough.

It's not enough and we can't employ like we're really struggling to get bodies to fill seats in the practice. Um, you know, the wait list is always long.

It's always a stressor. Um, and the work that we do is not throughput work. Um, You know, the other thing that we've had, and this is, um, so I specialize obviously in the treatment of trauma, and particularly now I only see zero to five, so pregnant families and children up to five. So I do a lot of [00:15:00] preventative work during pregnancy.

Um, getting parents ready to be able to regulate their babies if the pregnancy's been a bit difficult or, um, challenged by, you know, environmental circumstances or mental health circumstances. Um, and Uh, so do a lot of work in that kind of arena. But because I do a lot of work in the trawler world, I also, so the other thing that we have on top of the 10 sessions, so for a lot of the kids I see, I see them quite long term because our Child Protection Service will fund the additional sessions to allow those little ones to have fortnightly work.

For the young teenage mums that are at risk of losing their babies to the Child Protection System, now that they're aware of the work that I'm doing in that. arena, I'm getting more and more funding agreements and contracts with the Child Protection Services to prevent, um, their coming in and removing children and allowing these young [00:16:00] women, teenage mums, with their own trauma histories to, as one of the girls put it, this stops with me.

This doesn't happen to my baby. This doesn't cycle on again.

That gives me goosebumps, Chell. I think that one of the, I know one of my takeaways that early on when I was following and listening and doing all the things with Dr. Perry was really how much money we spend doing intervention versus prevention.

And I want to know for you as a clinician, how is that Adding value to your work. Does it feel different doing more prevention versus intervention? Is it a different, I mean, is it heavier? Is it harder? Is it harder in different ways? What does that look like for you?

I think it's harder in different ways.

It's um, I've always specialized in under 10s, but I've really pulled it right back. It's so incredibly rewarding because Well, you know, right? So the brain is most rapidly organizing in the first six years [00:17:00] of life. It's easier to change your brain that was organizing than it is to change one that's organized.

So we have, I have this incredibly luxurious position now of being able to affect with families or support families because I'm not doing it. They're doing it in effecting change in their baby's regulation and stress response. Very early, very quickly, and kind of bringing it to whatever normal levels are, right?

So I'll give you an example. I was working with a mum, um, had a miscarriage. Highly anxious mum, prior to the miscarriage. Miscarriage, of course, made her ridiculously anxious when she became pregnant again. Um, so we just spent the whole pregnancy going, well, it doesn't matter. We know. your baby's going to come out pretty wired, like it's going to be pretty active.

She's not going to feed well. She's going to have trouble sleeping. We know that we're going to have all of these difficulties. So let's stop stressing about that. Let's just concentrate on getting her here, getting her [00:18:00] earthside, and then we'll do what we need to do to regulate that in the first couple of months.

And that's what she did. And I'm Little over September last year the baby turned one and a week later I was on a home visit and that one year old child was stacking two by two blocks on top of themselves, taller than she was. Not only is she regulated, she's developmentally advanced. I'm not saying all kids would become developmentally advanced because of early intervention, but what I'm, what I'm saying is if we can get in early enough, we prevent that pointy end intervention later on when kids are older and much harder to change.

And this is what Dr. Perry has been saying for years. Yeah. And

your work with Dr. Brandt has been, has reinforced all of that. Will you talk a little bit about that and what that looks like?

Yeah. So it took me a little while. I wasn't able to have my own children, so I had to do a whole heap of my own work around infertility and, and my fertility journey.

Um, and I always knew I wanted to work with [00:19:00] mums and mums and dads and babies, but I also knew that I couldn't do that until I'd done my stuff. Um. And in 2014, so 2013, I secured a grant, a fellowship it's called over here, um, to, um, to come over to the States for nine weeks and have a look at NMT informed interventions.

So I was still working at the organization that I worked at at the time and we were kind of looking at, well, yes, Dr. Perry talks about all these somatosensory based interventions, but he doesn't say what they are, because as we know, you know, NMT doesn't endorse any specific intervention and rightly so.

Um, but recommends a wide range of activities, um, or suggests the exploration of a wide range of activities. And so, I, um, came over to the States for nine weeks and traveled all around, visited a whole heap of the, um, the certified sites, and, [00:20:00] um, had a look at what they were doing, how they were implementing NMT.

And one of the things I did was I visited Um, two of the CTA fellows at the time, so it used to be called the Trial Trauma Academy. Um, so I went and visited, um, Dr. Rick Gaskell out in Kansas and then I had a weekend with Dr. Brandt, or actually I had a week with Dr. Brandt. in Napa and it fell on one of the Napa fellowship weekends.

So in 2014, it was actually Dr. Perry's weekend. So I got to see the Napa fellowship in action and I came home feeling really despondent about well lit up because I was going to get a therapy dog and I was going to do all that sort of stuff as well. And all the NMT stuff was going to be amazing. But really despondent that I couldn't afford to fly to Napa once a month to do the fellowship.

Um, and my business partner, Jess and I, we'd always talked about, you know, how could we make this happen? And I'm like, we would have to come up with like 3, 000 plus a month. Like it's just 3, 000 in [00:21:00] flights. um, to get to LA, like to San Francisco, and then out to Napa, and then there's accommodation and food, and then I've got to come back, and then it'll be jet lag, like it's just, and so we, but we, we brainstormed this every other year until the pandemic, and um, Dr.

Brandt bought the Napa Fellowship online. Ah. And I was like, first in line, put me in, I am there. Yeah. And how water, I'm gonna find the money to fund that.

Yeah. And what time of day were you watching these videos and logging into these sessions? Right? Because that's a piece that I just think is so important in your journey.

I know how many times we met, 'cause when we were getting ready for our presentation, we met every month, the four of us. And it was always at weird different times, and sometimes it was the middle of the night for you. And so I'm guessing even though it was online, it was still the middle

of the night.

Yeah, so, um, online and live. Um, so in summer, it was [00:22:00] a 3am up for a 4am start. So that's when you guys are not on Daylight Savings and Moyar. And then in winter, it was a 1am get up for a 2am start. And I've been doing that now for three years. So I'm rolling into my third year of that. Wow. Um, but the NAPA fellowship is just, it's by far probably state of the art infant mental health training, infant parent mental health training.

And again, you know, coming back to the importance of relationship, that's what it focuses on. The client, It's not the baby. It's not the parents. It's the relationship that lives between the two of them. Incredibly grounded in NMT. Incredibly grounded in Dr. Brazelton's touch points. You know, led by luminaries, like, you know, the world's best infant mental health and practitioners around, you know, in the United States.

Um, Stephen Saligman, John Hollenstein, Serena Weider, you know, Connie Lillis. Like you've got these incredible people [00:23:00] and then trained in the newborn behavioral observation, trained in the um, Parent Relationship Center out of the University of Washington, the Barnard Center's feeding scales, um, PCI feeding scales.

Like it's just, so you know, not only do you come out of it with the NAPA fellowship and hours and hours of CEUs as you guys have them, but Um, you come out with all of these other little qualifications or little, little things that you can do. It's mind blowing, um, and completely shifted. It turned my work 180.

So, um, like I always felt like I was pretty solid, but this really created a whole new level of depth. And not just to my work with littles, to the way that I look at relationships with parents to how I practice as a practitioner. So for me, it's really important to know. I was trained and actually I'm writing a paper on this at the moment for one of my capstone [00:24:00] projects.

I was trained to be an expert. I was taught to be perfectionistic, um, and that there was a right way to do things. And all of that, as far as I'm concerned, stands in the face of good practice. Because good practice with families who are struggling is to acknowledge the fact that they're the experts in their children, stand alongside them in a relationship and be with them, not have all the answers, show up imperfect, imperfectly perfect, show up with humility.

Authenticity. Like, these are the things that, that's 90, that, like I said to my dad, right, this is 90 percent of what is therapy. It's how you be with a person. Like Jaree Paul said, it's, um, you know, how you are is as important as what you do.

Let me ask this very controversial question. Do you

love your clients?

100%. Yeah. Without hesitation, I can answer that. [00:25:00] Yeah, I, I,

you know, I've been having this ongoing conversation in several of these Chitty Chats about how love really is the intervention, love really is the strategy, and we are taught not to talk about it. We're not supposed to fall in love with our clients.

We're not supposed to show love to our clients. That's a very, and I know I have found in my own journey, that gets in the way. Yeah. Right? Those things that we learn about what is right do get in the way. And what a meaningful connection you create with your, your humans when you show up in relationship with them, not to judge the

relationship.

Yeah. And you can love them with boundaries. Of course! You can love them with professional boundaries and limitations. And they want that. They don't want you to love them the way you love your own kids. That's too much. That's way too intense. Sure. But, you know, and Yeah, it's, I don't even know, words. It's so [00:26:00] incredibly powerful and it's with, yeah, without hesitation and I get met with a lot of, um, you know, other professionals who are maybe a little more anxious about getting it right or being expert will challenge me and say things like, you've got no boundaries, you've got, you're boundary less.

Um, you know, I remember one weekend when I rang up to try and get one of my young adults admitted. Because she was going to take her life and I, and I knew that we were on danger zone, um, and I would never have called them if I didn't think that that was the case, um, and they said to me, I heard myself say to the worker, she was in the room.

And I heard myself say, so what you're telling me is that you're not going to do anything. And now I'm going to have to have my mobile on all weekend to keep her alive. Is that correct? Am I, are we on the same page here? And he said to me, if you choose to have no boundaries, go ahead, knock yourself out.

And she's still in the room. And I said to him, let's see what the coroner thinks about that. [00:27:00] It's

so true. You and I have been, I have this, I do a lot of support with the military and I'm sort of on call and people are like, how do you feel like that? I'm like, I've been in private practice for almost 20 years.

We're on call all the time. And we're on call because they may not get admitted, right? Someone may not see it the same. And we know our people. Yeah. And I

don't do that for every client. Not every client has my mobile number and not, you know, and I have a separate phone for work. Um, and this client, in fact, the two that do it, we contract when I'm going to have it on.

And very rarely do they use it because just knowing that it's on and that they can get me. Is enough to get him through. Regulated.

Love that. Alright, my last question for you. I could talk to you for days, as you know. Here's my last question. You brought up something that I think is so important that I don't want to gloss over.

And you talked about doing your own work. And one of the things [00:28:00] that has kind of come up in all these chitty chats are professionals who were kind of just peeling back the, the curtain to say we are human in here too. And so I just want to, I just want you to speak to that level of like, how does doing your own work impact you

as a clinician?

I was really fortunate to do my master's degree. One of the units was our own therapy. So to pass the unit, you had to submit your receipts from therapy. You know, it's just a receipt that you've attended and paid. Um, so from a very early age, obviously very early in my career, I have been doing my own work and, you know, when my mum passed, I tapped into that again.

When I went through some relationship difficulties, I tapped into that again, um, obviously the fertility stuff. And what it does is, and even again last year while I was doing the Reflective Supervision Academy, because it meant that I really had to come up and brush up against my imposter, [00:29:00] um, and make friends with her, um, the, you know, the voice that is my imposter syndrome, my inner critic, um, and the kind of notion of perfectionism and where that come from, and I really had to unpack that therapeutically.

What it means is that it allows me to one, know my buttons, know my triggers. But more importantly, it allows me to show up authentically because, and, and it really restricts or not restricts, it helps me be aware of what my implicit biases, biases. So, you know, in that dual processing that we do as therapists, the thought can pop up and I can be like, Oh, hang on a second.

What's that about? And because I've done a bit of my own work, excuse me, I live near an airport, so there's a helicopter going over. Um, there's, um, because I've done my own work, I can kind of sit there and go, okay, that's about this. That's my stuff. Let's just let that sit there. Or I wonder why I'm feeling compelled to come take this direction with the client.

And I can do all of that in the moment. [00:30:00] Um, But it also means that I can go, hang on a second, that's weird. I don't know what that is. I might need to look at that. I might need to dip back into therapy and check that stuff out. Um, but most importantly for me, it allows me to show up authentically in relationship with other.

And if you don't know and love yourself, and that's a therapeutic journey, then how on earth can you be with? another, genuinely, and not let yourself get in the way. Love that,

love that. Shel, it is such a grand, like it's so grand to see you. I could, I could just like reach out the phone and hug you and please send Jess my love.

I will. Cut those puppers, do all the things. Thank you for spending time with us. Evening my time, daytime your time. Thank you so much for making the time. I appreciate you

greatly. Likewise, Stacey, and thank you so much for the [00:31:00] opportunity to connect again. It was amazing. It's

so good. I appreciate you so much.

Thank you.

Likewise. See ya.

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