We sit down with Shibs, a proud Wulgurukaba, Gunggandji Woman, Lived Experience worker, and passionate advocate for proactive changes for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples accessing mental health services. With warmth and honesty, she shares her journey of navigating identity, living with chronic pain, and the healing that comes from reconnecting with culture and traditional practices.
Learn more about Ngangkari: https://www.npywc.org.au/what-we-do/ngangkari-traditional-healers/
Come and listen with:
Lucy (She/Her) – A big fan of ice cream and storytelling
Rachel (She/Her) – Social Worker, Dialogical Practitioner, mad footy fan and wildly passionate about transforming the culture of mental health services to be person-led and human rights informed.
🎨 Incredible artwork @sharleencu_art
🍋 Shout out to Amplify for welcoming us into their recording studio
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT – Healing through connection
[00:00:00] Lucy: This podcast has conversations around different mental health experiences that may be distressing for some people. If that doesn’t feel like something you want to explore today, you might want to visit another podcast and come back to us another time.
[00:00:13] Rachel: discovery college acknowledges the traditional owners of country throughout Australia and recognises their continuing connection to lands, waters and community. We pay our respects to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures and to the elders, past and present. They have never ceded sovereignty.
[00:00:32] Shibs: I saw a Ngangkari, which is an Aboriginal traditional healer. When you talk about healing, that is healing on steroids. These are things that aren’t utilized and knowing how much of an impact it’s had on my life, when you also are drawing on the strength of connection with your culture as well, there’s something really beautiful and magical that happens. And I hope to see a day where there’s a medium ground where we can come into those spaces and have access to both. Traditional healing has a place and it needs to be, you know, respected and really upheld in that space as well.
[00:01:11] Lucy: I’m Lucy.
[00:01:12] Rachel: And I’m Rachel and we’re the hosts of the Extremely Human podcast.
[00:01:16] Lucy: Sometimes we move through big human experiences that others might not understand, like psychosis, grief, addiction, euphoria, or moments that feel completely unreal.
[00:01:28] Rachel: On Extremely Human, we hear from people who’ve been there and share what they’ve learned along the way. Together, we ask, how can we meet the full range of human experience with kindness and compassion?
[00:01:41] Lucy: In this episode, we sit down with Shibs, a proud Wulgurukaba, Gunggandji Woman, Lived Experience worker, and passionate advocate for proactive changes for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples accessing mental health services. With warmth and honesty, she shares her journey of navigating identity, living with chronic pain, and the healing that comes from reconnecting with culture and traditional practices.
[00:02:08] Rachel: Welcome, Shibs. Thank you to our Extremely Human podcast. We’re really great to have you here today.
[00:02:13] Shibs: Yes, thank you. I feel really grateful to have this opportunity.
[00:02:17] Rachel: Would you mind starting off by telling us a little bit about yourself?
[00:02:20] Shibs: So I’m Shibs. I’m a proud Wulgurukaba, Gunggandji woman from Far North Queensland. I have very strong kinship ties to Kalkadoon, Mitakoodi and Koa. My family is massive on my Aboriginal side, so feel like we cover the whole state of Queensland.
Rachel : Wow
[00:02:38] Lucy: We’re everywhere.
[00:02:40] Shibs: Yeah. And what about myself? I am a music lover. I think it’s always been a really healing thing for me. So I have music synesthesia, so I feel like it’s always been an escape for me.
[00:02:52] Lucy: Wait, so did you say music? Synesthesia? Yeah. What is that?
[00:02:55] Rachel: Yeah, I haven’t heard of that.
[00:02:56] Shibs: For me, it’s so. It can look very different for different people. So synesthesia can come in all shapes and forms, but for me specifically, when I hear music, it’s like I see color and textures, and it’s just like I feel it really intensely. So it’s quite often I’ll get like. Like, kind of tingles all through my body. Like, really intense songs. I think the people around me probably are impacted the most because when I find a song that hits the right brain tickles.
I will listen to it over and over again for the dopamine hit.
[00:03:28] Lucy: That’s so cool.
[00:03:29] Shibs: Yeah, but I think it’s. It’s also.
It’s kind of the escape of, like, sometimes you need the music, sometimes you need the lyrics.
[00:03:37] Lucy: Yeah.
[00:03:37] Shibs: I feel like it’s been such a gift to me, and I’m really. It’s such a beautiful space to sit in just to, like, absorb music and see it in a different light.
[00:03:46] Lucy: It’s like 4D.
[00:03:47] Shibs: Yeah, it literally is. And sometimes it’s just like, blowing my mind. So I would wonder why I got so overwhelmed and I’d start crying. Listen. Listening to music or just like, it was like this immense amount of euphoria. And I thought that’s just how everyone experienced listening to music. Yeah.
[00:04:05] Lucy: Right. You got a special ability, though. Yeah.
[00:04:08] Shibs: Feels like a superpower sometimes. Yeah.
[00:04:11] Rachel: Such a good example of how we all experience things so differently. We never know what the other’s experience is like.
[00:04:17] Shibs: Yeah. And I guess it’s not things that you necessarily sit down and talk about either, so. Yeah. So that’s, I guess, an interesting fact about me. I have a menace of a dog, Kevin Bacon, who just keeps you on your toes.
[00:04:32] Lucy: Kevin Bacon. Wow. On the last episode, we had Basil the sheep. Yeah, they’re up. They’re both up there.
[00:04:42] Shibs: Yes. I have him and he definitely keeps me and my husband on our toes. And. Yeah. Have an incredible husband who in March, I would have been married to for five years. Wow.
[00:04:54] Rachel: Congratulations.
[00:04:55] Shibs: Yeah, so that’s. You know, I think it’s like they. They are both such a big part of my life. I am a lived experience worker, and I also work in the academia space utilizing my lived experience.
And I think that drives so much of my passion and has really shaped who I am as a person.
And I think that’s really contributed to. To my healing journey. I feel like now work is such a big part of my life. But I guess the beautiful thing about it is that so much of the work I do doesn’t actually feel like work. It just feels like these really big passion projects.
[00:05:29] Lucy: That’s ideal, isn’t it?
[00:05:30] Shibs: Yes.
[00:05:31] Lucy: So good.
[00:05:32] Shibs: Definitely doesn’t work like that all the time.
[00:05:34] Lucy: No,
[00:05:36] Shibs: for the most part. For the most part.
[00:05:39] Lucy: Before we hear a little bit more about your work and your perspective and your lived experience, we have an opening question for everyone.
[00:05:48] Shibs: Yes.
[00:05:48] Lucy: Which is, what’s something ordinary that’s felt beautiful to you recently?
[00:05:54] Shibs: Yeah. So I was driving to work the other day, and I have a really close relationship with my nephew. And so he’s 11 years old and he often calls us quite a lot when we’re on. When he’s on school holidays. And he called me and it was just like this really such an insignificant moment, but he was just like, you know, what are you doing today? And he’s like, oh, how’s work been? And what have you been up to the last, like, the last week? And I. I met him, you know, he was 10 minutes Earthside. So it was just like watching him just evolve as this person and develop his own conscious. But the empathy and just the curiosity he carries, and it’s like every time I speak to him, my heart just swells up. And it was just like this beautiful moment of him showing genuine interest in what I’m doing as a person. And just like, he’s seen some of the spaces I work in, so it was like he can picture what. Where I’m going to, and he’s actually really interested. And it’s like he kind of brags about it to his friends.
So it was just such a wholesome moment of just like, oh, my gosh, you’re really this human growing into, like, this pre teen, but there’s still this. This immense amount of curiosity and care and love and genuine interest. So you always worry when kids start to grow that they’re just like. Especially when you’re an auntie of like, oh, I don’t want to you. I know I’m too cool for you now. So it’s like we’re still in that phase. So I just like, like to really absorb those moments every single time.
[00:07:27] Rachel: Oh, my goodness, I love that story. You know, why don’t you, Lucy? I have a. I have a nephew as well. And that auntie relationship is such a beautiful one, you know, and watching the. The human that emerges, it’s beautiful. Thank you for sharing that with us.
[00:07:42] Shibs: Thank you.
All right.
[00:07:44] Rachel: Well, shall we jump in?
[00:07:45] Shibs: Absolutely. Let’s go for it. Head first.
[00:07:47] Rachel: Okay. I’m really curious if you could tell us a little bit about your own journey and the experience that you feel have shaped how you understand distress and healing.
[00:07:58] Shibs: Yeah. So it’s definitely been a chaotic journey for me. I grew up in a very small country town up in far North Queensland, and I’ve always struggled with my identity.
Being an Aboriginal person, it wasn’t something that was ever hidden from me or not talked about. It was definitely something that was always at the forefront. And growing up with my dad, he was a single dad to two, two daughters, my mum was very much absent in our life.
So I guess that was a core connection to our Aboriginality. And so I think growing up essentially in a white family, there was so much that I didn’t understand.
I couldn’t make sense of the town that I lived in. It did have quite a large Aboriginal community. And also being lighter skinned, I think it was the struggle of identity, being that the community around me were darker skinned. So it was like coming in at a get go. I always felt like I didn’t belong. And it was just like that feeling of being too black or to be white in kind of these white spaces, but then also feeling too white to be black in those spaces as well. So, you know, there was a lot of racism that was very normal and it was normalized. It was.
I don’t even think it’s like I really heard the word racism growing up. So when I would refer to myself talking about my aboriginality, because I did talk about, it wasn’t something that I completely denied, but it was, I would refer to myself as a half caste and that was just a normal term that we all used. And for me it was describing, I guess in my mind the narrative that I was told was that being black is bad.
So for me, kind of saying that I was half caste was very much kind of acknowledging that, yes, I have this part of me, but it’s not all of me. I also have this white side. And so I think there was very much in my mind this split between white and black. And I was kind of just in the middle, not knowing how to, how to make meaning and sense of that. There was a lot of shame, guilt, embarrassment.
And I think you just, you saw all this racism happening around you.
You saw these slurs being said. And so it was like then me becoming, it was like getting ahead of the comments that were going to be said to you. So it was like making jokes myself. And you know, I now recognize it as a lot of internalized racism that then became outwardly racist, which I think, you know, is something I still have to work through. But it was kind of that whole laughing about it. So I think growing up in that situation definitely shaped who I was as a kid. I think I was. I had a lot of very big emotions that weren’t necessarily acknowledged. I think growing up in my family setting, it felt like chaos in my head, but. But outwardly it was just like I was this happy, go lucky, really bubbly person that didn’t necessarily show the emotions that I was feeling because I felt like I couldn’t. But it was like my friends never saw me cry until I was pretty much like we were like teenagers going into adulthood. I think it was just having. When I would show emotions, they were just kind of shut down very quickly.
[00:11:23] Lucy: Your friends or your emotions?
[00:11:25] Shibs: I think my family mostly it was just like. I think there were.
I guess I kind of came into a really naive. Because you don’t know the environment you’re growing up in until you kind of get to an older age and you’re reflecting on those experiences. So for me it just felt like this normal childhood. And I think reflecting back now, it was a really dysfunctional family being that I had two older brothers and an older sister that I didn’t grow up with.
Also not growing up without my mother. I think that really was a significant part of my journey. Not having kind of that strong cultural connection which was kind of accessed through my mother. That was a big missing part for me as well. So it was just like having it. For me, it was like normal. Not having a mother and normal for me not having relationships with my siblings. And obviously growing up in a community where, you know, people had mothers and they had, you know, families that were together and parents that were together. All of those things really shaped who I was. I think there was a lot of really positive things, I guess having big emotions, a way of me releasing that was through creativity. So I used to write a lot of poetry. I played a lot of instruments. Singing for me has always been a really therapeutic thing. So leaning into those things kind of helped me manage the distress and that I. That I felt through most of that. And I think it wasn’t until I was moving into my teenage years and that was when I guess I started self harming and that was where I was starting to recognize or trying to find an escape to let these emotions out. Like I read some of the poetry I used to write and I was like, she was going through it.
She, she, you know, accurately describes how she was feeling. But I think it was just something that wasn’t spoken about. I think as I moved into adulthood, it was just realizing all of these things and coming to the realization, okay, some of these experiences weren’t normal. There were a lot of traumatic events that did happen in our family that I think that was where the whole shutting down emotions of not being able to feel those things as they happened. And I guess as an example of that, when I was, I think I was 13, my sister OD’d after a night out with friends. Kind of having that conversation and getting told that that had happened, it was just like I always felt I didn’t have a right to feel upset at those things happening. So it was just like, it was kind of like, okay, it happened, but we’re moving on now. We’re not, we’re not acknowledging it or kind of unpacking that. And I think it was all those little kind of micro traumas that just kept building up and not being able to acknowledge them. When I look at my adulthood moving into early adulthood, it was just realizing that, oh, yeah, not having a mother, like, not having my biological mother in my life actually really impacted me, you know, due to some physical violence that was happening. And you think when you’re 13, you know it all. No, you don’t.
You look back and you’re just like, what were you thinking? Yeah. And you just think, you know, everything.
[00:14:42] Lucy: Yeah. Yeah. I don’t even know if that ever ends.
[00:14:44] Shibs: Yeah. Do we?
No, I think, yeah. You look back in your 20s and you’re just like, you had no idea. Like.
[00:14:53] Rachel: But I guess we do underestimate how much 13 year old can know.
[00:14:56] Shibs: Yeah.
[00:14:57] Rachel: You know, like, they don’t really have their perspective. Heard often.
[00:15:01] Shibs: Yeah. I mean, I functioned for, well, I wouldn’t say maybe function, but, you know, I was out of home for six, three months. I saw a family counselor during that time. That was the only time that my mental health or my distress was ever acknowledged. Growing up, I think it was just not having the education or tools or knowing what the tools were. You didn’t go to hospital for, for being unwell, mentally. You went to the hospital if you’re physically sick or you had a broken bone. It was a small country town. There wasn’t accessible services. Kind of coming into adulthood and then realizing all of those things, I was just like, what is, what is going on?
[00:15:42] Lucy: Yeah. What is it like being older now and looking back on your childhood and how you grew up and sort of making a sense of that now because it sort of sounds like you didn’t have the resources at the time, but you may be looking back on it with a different lens and more knowledge of what maybe happened for you.
[00:16:03] Shibs: Yeah. There’s so much that I reflect on now and I think in a way, even though some of those times are some of, like the hardest moments of my life, I actually wouldn’t change a thing. I think every single experience has led me to where I am right now. And I’m so, so proud of the person I am now. Like, I think going on a healing journey isn’t. They don’t tell you that it’s messy and it’s chaotic and it is just. It’s not fun at all.
[00:16:36] Lucy: Yeah. It’s not glamorous.
[00:16:37] Shibs: No, it’s. It’s not all diamonds and glitter. And so I think looking back now, I wouldn’t change a thing that’s happened. I think it’s, you know, being able to be in the lived experience workforce and do the work that I do.
So much of my experiences, to know it’s. It was kind of like a full circle moment. Stepping into that space of my story has meaning. And it wasn’t all for nothing because I can walk alongside people and speak to those things or validate someone’s experience of, like, I’ve been there, I know what that’s like. But it gets better. Yeah. I moved up to Cairns once I had finished high school. It was kind of like gaining this independence back and kind of discovering who I was again. I had no idea.
And it was.
It wasn’t until I moved to Melbourne that I actually started acknowledging what was happening for me. And I actually started realizing, like, oh, there’s the supports available and there’s help available.
My life took a major drastic turn and I was experiencing significant pain in my legs that I had been since I was a child.
And I got diagnosed with Chronic Exertional Compartment Syndrome. That’s where, like, the muscle lining around your legs don’t expand enough. And so, like, it kind of like the pressure builds up in your legs. What ended up happening, because I kept going to doctors about it because I was like, it’s not normal for your legs to go numb after you walk and to feel like all these burning pains and just significant discomfort after walking. I’m like, this is not normal. I finally found my GP that I still see now who actually took me seriously. But by that point, the pressure got so high in my Legs that I ended up with hernias that came out and essentially they were hitting the nerves and the nerve that it hit went. Goes from your toes all the way up to your hips.
[00:18:34] Rachel: Wow.
[00:18:35] Shibs: So I think for me, I was at that point I was experiencing a lot of anxiety.
And I think one of the things they often teach you when you, when you go and see a psychologist is mindfulness and finding those moments. So for me, walking was how I managed my anxiety. And so I guess I was walking so much that that’s actually what kind of escalated my legs.
And then it was like kind of being told, you can’t do that anymore. Again, naive. I was just like, I need to fix this problem. Okay, you need to have surgery.
As terrifying as it was, I got a 10 grand loan out, had the surgery three weeks later, found out that it had failed because the surgeon hadn’t made the incisions in the right parts of my legs, hadn’t addressed the nerve issues.
After a very long journey of that and essentially being gaslit by the medical field, the surgeon essentially sending me to get nerve testing done and being told, oh, have you ever seen a psychologist? And I said, yes, I have. And he’s like, maybe you need to see a psychiatrist. You know, essentially saying that the pain I was experiencing was all in my head.
So that was, I think that was the first time the healthcare system showed me. I was coming in thinking, you come into these spaces with a problem, they’re there to help you, and that’s what they do. And it’s like, how didn’t they believe me? Why didn’t they believe me? Then I was diagnosed, eventually diagnosed with complex regional pain syndrome.
So essentially, your nervous system just goes into overdrive and you feel everything really intensely. So things like the wind, having a shower were extremely painful for me.
My partner getting into bed would send me absolutely bawling. I’d be crying my eyes out because I was in so much pain.
I thought at one point I was going to end up in a wheelchair, like having to use crutches to get everywhere.
So I thought I knew what kind of depression was and what anxiety was prior to that. And I felt like, you know, when you deal with chronic pain, that just rang a whole new level. You know, I thought I knew what feeling suicidal was like, but having to, you know, my partner having to hide my medication because I was just begging him to let me take it all because I was like, I. You just don’t want me to die because you don’t want to suffer. But I can’t see a lot at the end of this tunnel. I can’t. I can’t see how this suffering, you know, that’s kind of just being selfish on your part, not actually allowing space for me to just be like, I can’t actually do this anymore. And so I think that’s. That’s really where my healing journey started.
I saw a pain psychologist. The pain psychologist, I guess, really helped me put into perspective of, you know, your central nervous system. It was changing the language, how you viewed yourself, how you viewed what was actually happening to you, understanding the biology of what was physically happening in your body. And then I met my physio, who was just like, you know, simple things like breathing.
And it was just. That was when I started reframing what.
What my experiences were. So I wasn’t trying to get better. I wasn’t trying to recover. I was actually trying to heal. Rather than telling myself, I want this pain to stop. I can’t deal with this. It was.
I’m trying to calm my central nervous system down because right now it is running in overdrive and your body is in survival mode and you need to breathe through that. I eventually got into a place where my pain was under control. I was able to come off all my medications.
I was able to find a surgeon and have a second surgery done. You know, CRPS isn’t something that goes away. You essentially have it for life, but you can go into remission, which thankfully, I am now. Yeah, having a second surgery really gave a part of my life back. It’s not always perfect. I’ll still always have issues, but I think for overall, that was definitely like, kind of adding a physical element into it just completely changed the game for me. And, you know, that was without acknowledging my cultural identity at all.
[00:22:57] Lucy: Shibs, you talked about how important it was in recovering from that physical pain and how that was sort of the beginning of your healing journey. At what point did you start to reflect or go into some of the things that had happened to you growing up?
[00:23:20] Shibs: What a great question.
I think there was a moment right before COVID hit, and it was kind of just like it was happening. I think everyone was just in a state of shock of like, what does our new life mean? What does this mean for us?
And I. It was the start of Reconciliation Week. And so that was before the Aboriginal flag was permanently up on the Westgate Bridge. And so I worked in Port Melbourne, so I had to drive over the bridge every day. And so the Aboriginal flag was flying and I was driving home from work and I’d seen the flag from our workplace and I tried to take a picture of it because one of my good friends, her partner was Aboriginal. And so I hadn’t really going through everything with my legs. I hadn’t really, like, acknowledged any of that kind of identity stuff. And so I was driving over the west gate and it was like the sun was setting and it was just. I have a picture and I have a timestamp of the moment my identity crisis hit.
And it was just of this flag of the Aboriginal flag flying, and it was like the sun was setting and it was like, you’re driving over this bridge. And I was just. It’s such a beautiful photo and it’s, like, tied to such a, like, weird, funny motion. But I’m also like, that’s. That’s now, like, something that I’m really proud of. And I went home and I went to. I sent the photo to my friend to give to her partner. I just looked at this photo and I. I sat there and cried for hours. And I was like, who am I? I don’t know who I am.
Like, I look at this flag and I know that’s a part of who I am, but I’m not proud of it. I want to be proud of it. Should I be proud of it? And obviously, you know, when you’re going through significant lockdowns and being taken away from the whole society you’re in, that was very much. Gave you time to think. And just to go back a little bit before that, a couple of months prior to that, I mentioned that I didn’t grow up with two of my older brothers. So my second eldest brother, I got a phone call to say that he had hung himself. I think no one, Nothing prepares you for that phone call. Nothing sets you up to be like, oh, yeah, cool. This is. This is happening. And at that point, when we received that phone call, we didn’t know if he was going to live. I’d been told at one point he’d passed away. And so it was just like all of these things come flooding in of, like, why didn’t I have a relationship with him? I never grew up with him. There was this massive amount of regret. And, like, you sit there and it just. Everything goes through your head in these. In these instant moments of, like, could I have done something different if I’d been a part of his life? Would that have made a difference? So when I was going over and I looked at that photo, I think that was also the Emotions that were coming up is that I almost lost a sibling. You know, thankfully he made it through. There was another attempt a couple of days after that as well. And looking at those things, it was just how, okay, what do I need to do? Because I think that was a big motivation of like, I’m now living in this cycle of all these little things happening in my life and I can now kind of fear, you know, learning, I guess about my physical health. It was learning how like little things like stress impact your body and you know, when you feel big emotions or you’re really upset, how much that actually impacts the physical aspect of how you’re coexisting in the world. And so, you know, recognizing that, it was just like, I actually need to do something. I can’t keep living in this cycle of my body, my central nervous system going into overdrive, living in this survival mode state. You know, what do I do to connect to my culture? I want to feel like, you know, will that bring me closer to my siblings? Will, you know, is will that have an impact on their well being? And you know, it’s.
I don’t want to live in a state where I’m feeling like I’m going to lose someone or every time I get a phone call, it’s something traumatic that’s happened.
Obviously Covid everything shut down. So it was like I was looking at, you know, where do I go to connect with my culture? And I was really lucky. The friend that I said that I sent the photo to, he, he was like, I think you should talk to my sister. When I spoke to her for the first time, we spoke for five hours on the phone, really.
And it was the first time I had ever felt validated, I’d ever felt heard, I’d ever actually realized that what I had experienced growing up and what I was feeling now was actually a re other people had felt that it was a normal experience.
Little did I know that that was then connecting it to like the intergenerational trauma and you know, that all flows on from colonization. So when I actually kind of had that realization, it was just like, holy, like what am I doing with my life? The government was releasing funding for cert fours and so I did a cert for mental health. I never went into it thinking, oh yeah, there’s a career out of this. Or I was like, I actually need to understand the chaos that is happening in my family.
I need to understand what’s happening to myself.
Maybe if I do this course, I will actually have a better way to Manage it. Knowing that, you know, when I was dealing with my physical health, how much, like, accessing services or supports and understanding that actually helped me reframe things for myself.
And so it was through the. Yeah. Doing the Cert 4, everything started clicking for me. And it was realizing that, oh. Oh, yeah, yeah, you, you are experiencing some deep intergenerational trauma. There’s a lot of trauma in your family. There’s a lot of dysfunction.
And finding out about lived experience, work. And I was just like, this. What? And I guess in some way it was like, you mean you can get paid for what you’ve been doing for free your whole life? Like, I kind of felt like at some points, I was very much the mediator when. When events and things would happen. That was another massive part of, like, you know what? There’s an actual role that you can play and you can share your story.
And then knowing. Reflecting back on the conversation I had with my friend’s sister. Yeah, it was like, I know how much that helped me. And that was the first point of, like, you can acknowledge your cultural identity. And so I wrote a cover letter and applied for a job.
And I was like, as a proud Aboriginal woman, and I put that on my cover letter. I was absolutely terrified.
But I realized also, going through the experience with my brother, that I.
I felt like I’d been. I’d gotten to a point where I was at least healed enough to give back, and I was in a position to give back. And so I was like, if I can come into the system and even just impact one person’s life, then this would all be. This wouldn’t be for nothing. And so it was coming in with the intent of, like, I actually genuinely want to build my own cultural identity, but I also want to help other people. Knowing now, recognizing that that’s actually a very common experience, that people often feel disconnected, that they often feel a lack of connection.
And so, yeah, I came in with the intent that I wanted to work with other Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. I wanted to work with Mob, and I really wanted to hold that space.
[00:30:46] Lucy: Before you mentioned the. When you were driving across the bridge with the flag, and you weren’t proud of that identity, so. But then by the time you’d applied for the job, you were a proud Aboriginal woman. What changed? Like, how did you get from one place to the other?
[00:31:04] Shibs: I think it’s that whole, like, fake it till you make it.
You know, I was trying to embody what I wanted to be, and so I couldn’t say I necessarily wholly felt that in every cell of my body, as I do now. I think it was like, you know, telling yourself a narrative, and it’s like, no, that’s actually who I want to be. I really actually do want to work with mob. I want to stop seeing what’s happened to my family and my siblings and myself. I want to stop seeing that happen, and I feel like I’m in a position to actually do that. And. Yeah, so I think it was just, like, not necessarily that I wholly believed it, but I was like, you know, at some level, I am proud of this now because I. I also know that the experiences I’ve gone through have actually happened to a lot of other mob growing up. So I think that was the. The validation of in. That gave me a little bit of hope.
[00:32:00] Rachel: I keep hearing the word becoming.
[00:32:02] Shibs: Yeah.
[00:32:03] Rachel: You know, becoming a proud Aboriginal woman. Like, you know, maybe we’re always becoming who we are.
[00:32:09] Lucy: Yeah.
[00:32:10] Rachel: Like, maybe we’re never there.
[00:32:12] Shibs: Oh, 100. I don’t think you’re ever just, like, you know, that everything is ever evolving. Everything is changing and growing. Yeah. I look back three, even three, four years ago, and I’m just like, who was. Who was that person?
Like, I. I have a tattoo, like, of an Aboriginal flag and a love heart. And, you know, the. When I got that done two years ago, even that was like, a reflecting moment of, like, a couple of years ago, you wouldn’t have even thought that you’d have this on you. And now, like, the pride that you feel to, like, actually show that and, you know, not have any kind of embarrassment or guilt or anything, and to be like, this is. This is a part of who I am. This is my identity. Like, I am so proud to represent that flag.
[00:32:59] Lucy: You’re definitely not faking it anymore. When I saw your keynote on decolonising mental health, like, I was crying because I could just feel your passion.
[00:33:09] Shibs: Yeah. Like, I think it’s. I think it’s also the journey of. To get to that point of, like, it was not easy. It was. You know, I didn’t grow up around my culture. I was very much disconnected from it. I had this awakening moment of, like, you know, having a connection to my mum and not having that meant that I felt like I couldn’t have a connection to my culture.
So I think that was. That was something that I felt, but I just didn’t recognize. And so once I did recognize that, it was like, you can actually have a connection to your culture without having that connection, and you can rebuild that for what it is. And so down here, finding my community and really reconnecting through that. And I think it was through coming into my role at the hospital and connecting with other mob and then again being validated of like, we’re all experiencing this, we all experience imposter syndrome. Especially when you’re lighter skinned, like, you’re constantly feeling like you have to live up to this standard of like, I am an Aboriginal, I’m, I’m real. Like, you have society saying you need a confirmation of Aboriginality. You have people saying, oh, but you’re not black, or you’re this, you’re this fake black fellow because your skin isn’t dark enough, or you have to kind of work ten times harder to, to prove yourself that, you know, and it’s just like our culture is not our trauma. But yet this society tells you this, this story of like, you’ve brought it upon yourself. This is your own kind of fault. So that kind of all ties into it as well.
[00:34:37] Rachel: Shibs, I’ve just got to say, I’m just finding this conversation so incredible. So thank you so much for sharing your words with us.
I heard you speak before about decolonization and decolonising mental health services.
Can you say what that means to you?
[00:34:56] Shibs: I think working in the system now, having seen the impacts, having a really good understanding of intergenerational trauma, when you look at all of the systems that we work on, they’re very colonial, they’re very westernised. When I look at the system, I’m just like, there are so many harms happening to our people.
When you kind of open the door and you realize what’s actually happening, when you look at the statistics, when you look at the experiences, you know, when I reflect on the experiences I had, realizing that the amount of our community that are impacted by these things is, is significantly disproportionate to other communities. And so when you start looking at like, well, what are the things in place to support, you know, working through these things? And you look at mental health and you just like, people feel big emotions, they feel distress, they don’t know, they don’t know the word healing. You know, you’re told it is about recovery, you have to get better from something. But if you’ve experienced significant trauma in your life, how can you actually, you can’t recover from that. You have to heal through it. You have to learn how to hold space for that. And systems don’t acknowledge trauma.
They say trauma informed, but they don’t acknowledge it.
And so I think decolonising it, it can happen and look so differently. I think everyone has a responsibility, but what they do is they bring in identified roles and they kind of put the load back on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people that that’s. You’re there to create that safety. And we’ve, we’ve ticked the box to say that we’re working towards this when realistically, you’re actually just adding more load because there’s no accountability tied to that.
And so I think, you know, having unpacked the word, even decolonising the last 12 months, and I think, you know, looking at the work of like, Chelsea Watego and looking at the community I surround myself with, that’s. That’s the end goal. I feel like it’s. We’re all aiming to eliminate racism. And how do you eliminate racism when it’s so deeply ingrained in these systems and the bias that comes through? So when I look at it, it’s. Sometimes it’s as simple as changing the language we’re using.
Sometimes it’s actually about changing processes. A lot of mob come into services and they’re never asked about their culture. Knowing how significant my cultural identity is to me, I can’t imagine now coming into a service and then having to deny such a big part of who I am and what my life is. So I can’t imagine when you’re. If you’re experiencing significant imposter syndrome, if you’re disconnected and then having a whole other part of you that you maybe have a yearning for, like I did, completely disregarded. Decolonising is actually one about acknowledging the harms that have happened, that are happening.
And it’s stepping into accountability that we can probably never move back to the way things were before colonization happened. But we do have to keep making a conscious effort of taking accountability, of acknowledging things when they’re happening and figuring out ways and working with community as well, like self determination. Like, I feel like so much of our knowledge from our elders, our leaders in our communities, there is so much wisdom that is just not acknowledged, not taken seriously, and it’s a big step forward. I feel like engaging with our communities. We have the answers of how to connect. You know, there’s. There’s 65,000 years worth of knowledge and wisdom and history that was strong in culture. And I think there’s so many of us that still try to carry that legacy on that, you know, despite everything and in spite of everything, it will not deter us from moving forward and fighting for the things that we’re passionate about. And if you won’t acknowledge it, we will keep calling it out. You can say it’s political, it’s not. The government and society has made it political because there was, you know, policies in place and, and laws in place to harm and create harm. Because colonization is still happening. Whether people like to acknowledge that or not, it is still happening. You know, you look at the stolen generations, we have some of the highest rates of child removal now. So it’s still happening. It just looks different, it’s labeled differently. You have a government that is happy to close their eyes or maybe turn their heads away from the reality of that and the impacts that is happening. So, you know, I feel like at some level the traumas are still happening, but. But I do. I do see a change in how we are responding to it.
[00:39:53] Rachel: You do?
[00:39:54] Shibs: Yeah. I think you have to. You have to see, even if it seems like the most insignificant small things, you have to hold on to that because that is what gives you hope. That is what gets you out of bed. Some days when you’re just like, I can’t go on social media because it’s just filled with racism. So you have to hold on to those little things. You have to draw on the strength of your community around you. Those connections are what keep you going.
[00:40:23] Lucy: What are the little things that give you hope?
[00:40:27] Shibs: I think it’s when you have allies really show up and, and not just show up for the good things. When it gets hard, when they show up in those times and moments when it’s genuine, you know, no one’s perfect. We’re. We’re all human, we’re all going to make mistakes. But when they show up and it’s things like watching someone actually have the opportunity to access mainstream services and not have a traumatizing experience or being able to connect with them and walk alongside them while they go through that and give them hope.
I think sometimes it’s like you don’t realize the impact you can have, or sometimes it’s just you may not feel strong within yourself, but being a strength for someone else. So I know the community I have around me. I have an incredible amount of staunch titters that also all work in mental health or in health care. And I think because we all experience those same barriers where, you know, we’re often banging our heads back in the wall, but coming together, being able to discuss that, but also drive each other of like, we’ve got this, we’re coming in numbers, we’re growing, we’re bringing people into this.
We’re nots shying away from it, even though it is extremely exhausting and hard at times. And so I think it’s like drawing back into those. It’s having enough supports around you that you’re not having to necessarily lean on one always. But it’s. You have multiple around you that if you know someone is, is feeling that exhaustion or that burnout or that colonial load, that there’s other spaces that can really lift you up.
[00:42:08] Rachel: Could you say something about or any advice you might have for those working in mainstream services how to approach conversations about culture?
[00:42:19] Shibs: I think it’s coming with humility.
[00:42:21] Rachel: Okay.
[00:42:22] Shibs: Humility, I think is the biggest thing of you don’t have to know all everything.
But I think it’s coming with curiosity. It’s coming in with, yeah, the humility of that you don’t know everything.
Especially with the power imbalances that happen. If you’re a clinician and you’re, and you’re supporting a consumer or a patient or whatever you want to label it as, there’s a power imbalance that comes with that. So it’s kind of like, especially if you are unwell or your well being is heavily impacted that yeah, there’s this, this power struggle of you have to go fix someone or you have to help someone or you know, you kind of hold that power of what their treatment’s like and how they interact with the service. So I think it’s taking that humility of like this person actually has a lot of knowledge and experience that you know, can actually provide a lot of insight and a lot of strength in that. And I am forever, forever grateful that so many of the people that I get to walk alongside actually give me so much back as well. And that, that’s another driving thing is that, you know, when we’re, when we’re working with community is it is again. Yeah, that two way that learning and giving and teaching and, and showing. So it’s not coming in necessarily with that I’m here to fix you or support you. And I think sometimes that can get lost in the system. And when you’re working in the system and recognizing that people who sometimes create harm are also victims in the system, they’ve been told a narrative, they’re working under these frameworks that don’t necessarily support wellbeing but rather recovery. And you have a symptom, we need to fix it. So let’s put these labels on it and you know, we’re going to fix you, tick you off and out you go. So just bringing back the humanity at the end of the day, we’re all just humans trying to exist in a world that, you know, maybe there’s. There’s some pretty terrible things happening right now, and we all just need to actually realize that’s. That’s what, who we are at the end of the day, when we’re not a discipline, we’re not a. We’re not a title, we’re just humans trying to exist and make sense of our worlds. And I think even just coming from a very human level, you can learn so much. And, you know, asking about culture can be a terrifying thing.
But I think it’s like you’re going to make mistakes along the way, whether you like to acknowledge that or not. I make mistakes all the time. You know, we’re not. None of us are perfect. So it’s just coming in with the, with the acceptance of that. But also that curiosity of like, who is this person?
You know, what does it mean to actually work and walk alongside them?
[00:44:57] Rachel: That’s a great answer. Thank you.
[00:44:59] Lucy: Shibs from the mob you talk with, what are they saying that they need more of from services, culture and community?
[00:45:09] Shibs: I think the hard thing is, is that there’s such a long way to go that it’s obviously very individualized. It’s very. It needs to. It needs to be individualized, actually. So sometimes because people have accessed a lot of services from a young age, they like, they feel like there’s no other options. So for them it’s like actually receiving proper care or, you know, sometimes it’s needing a diagnosis. Sometime for people, it’s about, I need something to describe the experience or I need, I need to put a label to something because I need to make sense of it. For some people, it’s just recognizing that there is a lot of harm. So when you. I even look in the comparison of when you look at young mob that we support, you know, and looking at my own journey as well, like, there was a lack of understanding, there wasn’t, there wasn’t words to put to the experience.
And so I think a lot of it is just trying to understand, you know, they’re navigating really difficult things as well as all the other external things happening in their life as well. So sometimes they don’t know what they want. And it’s also, they maybe have a lack of connection. And I think that’s the thing that’s probably the core of everyone is that connection, Connection for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people is so, so important. You know, when we’re looking at connection to country, connection to community, connection to our spirituality. We’re really, you know, we’re spiritual human beings. There’s a lot that all kind of interconnects connection to our family and kin. And when you, when you’ve grown up in chaotic environments or dysfunction or the significant traumas or intergenerational trauma, there’s a lot of disconnect. I think especially with, with young mob, it’s finding meaning within that or just finding connection.
And you know, whether or not that is with culture, whether or not that is with community, it’s drawing on the strengths that they need to keep them going, and it’s having all of those supports. And so sometimes the, when they’re accessing services, sometimes that’s just the gateway for us to connect with them, for then to link them in and have that connection. And it’s really about meeting the person where they’re at. Sometimes they’re not ready to kind of unpack that whole cultural identity. I for one know how messy that was for me. And you know, how even now sometimes I still struggle with that. So, you know, it’s really just being guided by them. And when you look at the older generation, when they access services, there’s a big mistrust. There’s, there’s, there’s, you know, they’ve watched loved ones go in and never come out. They’ve been impacted by the policies and, and laws that have been implemented in this country. So it’s really hard. You know, sometimes it is about just creating a sense of safety for them, of being like, we’re here, we’re in your corner, or explaining to the service of you can’t expect a person to come in and just be totally chill or like, there’s this back history to this. You know, I work in a hospital. I’m in there every day. I recently went to, I had to have a surgery on my chin, which is really random. The moment I got told I had to go into hospital, my body physically had a reaction straight away and it was going back into survival mode of like, can I identify? Is it safe to identify? I am very well aware of how the healthcare system works. This was after, you know, some events that happen in community, around racism. I was going in even though I, I couldn’t realistically tell myself it’s going to be okay because I actually knew from the people that I support, from the things that I’ve seen and witnessed as a worker that you actually can’t, you can’t say that that’s not going to happen.
So you know, for someone who is very well aware of it and you know, has worked really hard on, on establishing that for myself, even that moment of getting told I needed to go into hospital, it was just like the generations of trauma coming out of, and I had no control over it. Even now I would never go willingly go into like an emergency department if I was significantly distressed or I would never go because it’s not a safe space and I don’t think I’d ever feel safe doing that. So I can’t imagine how terrifying it is for some people coming in already at a baseline, being significantly distressed at the thought of even having to come in, let alone everything else that is happening for a person. So you definitely see some varied experiences. But overall, I think where we can build on that and where we can change that narrative is through connection.
[00:49:54] Rachel: I really appreciate the comments about connection. It’s such an important aspect of human well being, isn’t it? Is there a strong role of connection in traditional healing practices?
[00:50:07] Shibs: Absolutely. I think it’s, you know, that’s, that’s where so much of traditional healing I think is even again based on, is about connection. I saw a Ngangkari, which is an aboriginal traditional healer. They’re usually in the kind of central desert area and kind of the top of South Australia.
And I think seeing her for the first time completely, completely changed my life. It was, was such a.
Yeah. When you talk about healing, that is, I feel like healing on steroids.
It was just walking in, not knowing what to expect, but also feeling like you’re walking into a big warm hug and just instantly feeling comfortable. It was just like this. I’m exactly, I need to be here. I’m like exactly where I need to be.
And so she’s a blood healer and she explains the process to you and going through that. It was, you realize very quickly you can’t hide anything.
You can’t hide anything. And she sees things in your body that, like there was things that she spoke about to me that she saw that I had never told anyone in my life.
And so it was just kind of like, I still struggle to talk about it now. It’s just such a overwhelming.
You come out with a sense of calm. And so it was so funny because she said to me, like, she kind of taps into your energy. As, as she said, I just had this kind of chaos happening in my head and it was just like these constant thoughts. And she was like, I realized the moment you walked in your, into the door, you was you.
I was like, okay, yeah, Yep, guilty.
But walking out of there, she pulled a lot of things from my heart space and it felt like having a weight on my chest, but I actually didn’t know that it was there. And so when I sat up and it was finished, it was like when I took a big breath in, it was like I was only breathing at 50% capacity before that.
But I didn’t actually recognize that that was what was happening. When I talk about my legs, like, the amount of relief I felt, it was, you know, as I said, you go up and down. So I was currently back on some heavy medication to deal with my pain at that point.
And I. I’m now med free and I’ve been med free for going on 16 months. So.
[00:52:39] Lucy: That’s incredible.
[00:52:40] Shibs: Yeah. And it’s just like people don’t realise how powerful, you know, these aren’t just some made up voodoo things. Like, these are actually genuine. It’s genuine knowledge and practices that have been going on for thousands of years. It’s not just something that you learn. It’s when you look at, look at Ngangkari’s, they’re healers, that it’s passed down the bloodline and down family. So when I walked out of there, there were so many things happening for me. I felt an immense amount of calm, just, just this immense amount of, you know, being exactly where I needed to be. And that all of the things I’d been through in this healing journey, it all lit up until this very moment. And she said, you don’t come to me until you’re ready.
And you don’t necessarily know that you’re ready. And so I’ve now had a couple of sessions when I. When you work in such heavy spaces, sometimes your body absorbs all these kind of micro traumas and all these, all these little things in your body. And now I can recognize when my body has too much of that. And it’s kind of like when I go and see her, it’s kind of like this, this cleanse of like, you know, I’ve absorbed all of these things from people.
So now it’s time she kind of does that healing on me to let me release it. My husband also saw her and so there was a big connection for me and him as well because she could see us in each, like in each other. I came home and I tried to explain it to him, and then it was like my body just needed to release and I just cried my eyes out for hours. But it wasn’t like this, this painful, traumatic thing.
Even though these, there were Some things that came up throughout the session, it was also just. It was safe. It was such a safe space to sit in that it wasn’t overwhelming. It wasn’t. Oh, no. Like, yeah, I’m. I’m so. Like, there’s such many heavy emotions. It was just like. Like, I’m in a safe space, and this being brought up isn’t actually hurting or bringing anything up for me. It’s just being held and it’s being released. And so when I was crying, it was just like a mix of, like, just absolute, pure joy, happiness, like, sadness. It was just all of these emotions combined into one. I had all these people coming up to me after it being, like, what happened to you? Like, really, you just. You’re different.
Like, you look different, you act different. Like. And I truly believe, because me and my husband saw her, you know, she was preparing us because then we. We lost Mitch’s dad a couple of months later.
I think she was preparing us.
I think it was just, like.Just instilled this amount of, like, strength within us that I don’t think we would have gone through that and come out of it as strong as we did. And I think even just the bond between me and my husband grew so intensely, and it was like, you know, you’re going through these really hard, painful moments in your life that, you know, the. The overwhelming amount of grief that we felt through that, but the amount of strength that we were able to draw on from each other. And so it was like, even just reflecting on that whole year, it was just like. Like, we had some of the most painful things happen in our lives.
We also. I also lost my soul dog, like, a couple of months after Mitch’s dad. So it was like going through both of those, like, significant, really heavy grief, but it was still one of the best years of our lives.
You often. Sometimes when those things happen, you can really let them drown you, you know, and going and seeing her again and her being able to pick up all of that in our bodies, and, you know, obviously you do hold some grief, but to watch how we kind of transformed that, and it was just like, the strength that we were. We came from that. So, you know, Absolutely. It changed my life. It changes my life every time I see her being also this. This cultural element that we also touch on in my sessions as well. But I think it’s like these. These are things that aren’t utilised, and knowing how much of an impact it’s had on my life, people don’t understand the power of those things. And when you also are drawing on the strength of connection with your culture as well, there’s something really beautiful and magical that happens, that doesn’t. Systems refuse to see, refuse to acknowledge.
And I hope to see a day where there’s a medium ground where we can come into those spaces and have access to both. Recognizing that, you know, Western medicine does play a part in some things, but also the traditional healing has a place and it needs to be respected and really upheld in that space as well. Connection and healing and, you know, it’s, it’s all interwoven. It’s, I think in, when you look at, in Western ways, it’s. They very much separate the two.
[00:57:39] Lucy: Shibs, It’s been absolutely incredible speaking with you today. I’m learning so much and it’s been an absolute joy. You have such. You radiate warmth and our last guest we had on recommended that you come on the podcast. “You have to get Shibs on” and I now see why.
We have one closing question for everyone. Can you tell us about an act of care, big or small, that’s really stayed with you?
[00:58:06] Shibs: So thinking about an act of care, look, I think it’s looking at the small things. Sometimes the small things are the big things. So when I go to work and I have some of the most wholesome, complex conversations, when someone shows up in the space, sometimes in their most vulnerable points of their life, and they still give you a hundred percent of who they are, even if they feel like it’s not the best version of themselves.
And I think it’s sometimes not realizing the impact that you can have on their life as well. So there’s so much that I, I come back and I, you know, I’m driving home from work and I’m on the phone to my husband, and it’s just like my heart is just, just overwhelmed by the amount of joy and happiness and just wholesomeness that I feel of being able to connect with other people like that and to hold that space and to also be able to show up authentically as myself. I think, you know, the, the compassion that people I work with or walk alongside, the compassion that they hold for me as a human, it’s hard to sometimes have self love and all of those things, but to be able to hold that for someone else and to have someone hold that for you and, you know, when you look at lift, experience, work, mutuality, that’s such a big thing. So, you know, to have that and to know that that is your job is, you know, it’s, it’s not a, a big act or small act of care that I give. I think it’s the what I receive from that and that every single person I cross paths with, I take a little bit bit of, of their story or who they are into that. So I feel like, you know, they, it’s.
I think it’s just that, that transference of connection as well, really, that’s, that’s what it really is. And so I feel grateful every single day being able to do that.
[00:59:56] Lucy: I really love that. And I can see that warm radiance radiating out of you, like just going back to the memories of that happening in the. It’s really beautiful to hear about. And it also reminds me that we’re not as individuals. We think, as you said, we all take parts of each other and become part of one another. So thank you for reminding us.
[01:00:20] Shibs: No, thank you.
[01:00:22] Rachel: I think I’ve said this a few times, Shibs, but this conversation has been so incredible.
[01:00:27] Rachel: It’s altered me in ways that I’m really grateful for.
[01:00:33] Shibs: Oh, thank you. I think it’s like such a beautiful experience to even sit in this space with you both. And, you know, it’s. I think I’ve. Sometimes when you talk about it out loud, you learn things about yourself as well. So again, it’s, it’s never just a giving thing. There’s a lot I take from it as well. So thank you for giving me that space to do that.
[01:00:53] Lucy: You’re so welcome. Thank you.
[01:01:05] Rachel: discovery college acknowledges that the views shared in this podcast reflect personal experiences and are not a substitute for professional mental health advice. They do not represent the views of Alfred Health.
[01:01:17] Lucy: Thank you for listening to our podcast. If you wanted to stay in touch or learn more about discovery college, please head to our website: discovery.college.