Grief, Grief Stories, Grieving Voices Guest, Grieving Voices Podcast, Podcast, season 5 |
SHOW NOTES SUMMARY:
This week, I sit down with Katie Prentiss, a filmmaker, actress, and caregiver who transformed her most profound loss into a powerful creative mission. Katie shares her raw and inspiring journey of caring for her mother through frontotemporal dementia (FTD), a challenging form of dementia that impacts personality and communication far differently than traditional memory-loss conditions.
At the age of 62, Katie’s mother, Maggie, passed away from FTD. Through our conversation, we follow Maggie’s transition from caregiver to actress and the filmmaking of her debut film, “Wake Up Maggie,” hoping to raise awareness about dementia and caregiving.
Katie beautifully describes grief as a “slow goodbye.” She shares transformative perspectives, saying that grief doesn’t have to have the final word and that facing fear can become a pathway to clarity and purpose. And, my favorite: the sun is always shining above the clouds, even when we can’t see it.
Katie has had to learn how to embrace life fully, knowing the genetic uncertainty of FTD, following the diagnosis of another family member. But she’s already learned how creative expression is a healing outlet and the importance of viewing midlife as an unraveling.
Key Takeaways:
- Understanding the unique challenges of frontotemporal dementia.
- The emotional landscape of caregiving for a parent with a progressive illness.
- How grief can be a catalyst for personal transformation.
- The power of creative expression in processing loss.
RESOURCES:
CONNECT WITH KATIE:
Turning Grief into Purpose: Katie Prentiss on Caregiving, Loss, and Creativity
Grief has a way of reshaping our lives, often in ways we never expected. In this episode of Grieving Voices, we had the privilege of speaking with Katie Prentiss, a woman whose journey through loss led her to an entirely new path—one filled with purpose, creativity, and advocacy.
A Caregiver’s Heart
Katie’s story is one of love, resilience, and transformation. When her mother was diagnosed with Frontotemporal Dementia (FTD), Katie became her caregiver, navigating the challenges of watching a loved one change in ways she never imagined. As many caregivers can relate, the journey was heartbreaking yet deeply meaningful. It was a season of grief that began long before her mother’s passing—a slow goodbye filled with love, frustration, and moments of bittersweet connection.
The Unexpected Path to Filmmaking
While immersed in caregiving, Katie found solace in creativity. She soon realized that sharing stories—especially those of caregivers—was a powerful way to bring awareness and healing to others. This led her to a surprising new direction: filmmaking.
Her short film, Front Porches, captures the raw and emotional experience of caregiving, giving voice to the silent struggles that so many face. The film has received recognition and praise, serving as a beacon of hope for those feeling unseen in their caregiving journey. Now, with her upcoming project, Wake Up Maggie, Katie continues to use storytelling as a means of shedding light on the complexities of dementia and the deep love that endures through it all.
Finding Purpose Through Grief
Katie’s journey is a testament to the resilience of the human spirit. Grief, while heavy and painful, can also be a catalyst for change. It can open doors we never anticipated, guiding us toward healing in ways we never imagined.
Through her work, Katie not only honors her mother’s legacy but also creates a space for others to feel understood and validated. Her story is a reminder that even in loss, there is room for new beginnings.
Listen to the Full Episode
If you or someone you know has been touched by dementia or the challenges of caregiving, this episode is a must-listen. Katie’s words will inspire you to find healing in unexpected places and remind you that your grief has a purpose.
🎧 Tune in now to Grieving Voices and hear Katie’s powerful story. Let her journey encourage you to embrace your own path of healing and transformation.
Episode Transcription:
Victoria: Hello. Hello. Welcome to Grieving Voices. Today, my guest is Katie Prentiss. She is the mother of four who was running a successful photography business when her mother was diagnosed with frontal temporal dementia, and she became her full time caregiver. Seeing firsthand how short life truly can be, Katie embarked on a mid life career pivot into acting, Katie’s second career began on the fast track by landing the first role She auditioned for in a feature film. Since that amazing opportunity, she added writer, director, and producer to her growing creative resume with the creation of her first award winning short film front porches. Acting has been a life changing occupation for Katie, allowing her to dive more deeply into the stories of others with empathy and understanding. Katie was has written a feature length film called Wakeup Meggie, a coming of age film written as a love letter to caregivers raising Dementia Awareness. Wake up Maggie is currently in preproduction and is being created by a female led production team in film crew. Katie has been featured on remember me, second act actors and more. Thank you so much for being my guests today.
Victoria: And thank you for sharing me, sharing an aspect of grief that hasn’t been talked about. I might have had one other guest who spoke on dementia, but not the frontal lobe dementia, which tends to my own understanding just because someone within my community was diagnosed very young in early fifties. Yeah. And so I believe it tends to develop at a younger age. Is that correct?
Katie: That is correct. It is the most common form of dementia under the age of sixty five.
Victoria: And so how old was your mom? Well, first of all, let’s was her name?
Katie: Maggie Maggie Hanson? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. My mom
Victoria: was when she was diagnosed then.
Katie: Yeah. My mom was sixty two when we officially got the diagnosis. The tricky thing with front or temporal dementia, FTD is that it can often take an average of three and a half years to get an accurate diagnosis. So often people are showing symptoms like early signs without the family knowing or without anyone knowing what it is or what’s going on. So I look back and think she definitely have symptoms like in her fifties.
For sure.
Victoria: Can you share what some of those things that were that you noticed as a family?
Katie: Sure. Well, I should say that frontotemporal dementia definitely affects someone’s personality. It’s less of a memory type of dementia, and it’s more of like personality, compulsion control. For my mom, in particular, it was speech, like language. She had primary progressive aphasias that she lost her ability to to communicate. But early on, it was my mom definitely had some shifts in personality, but we we also had a lot of life stuff happened with her. She had a massive car wreck when I was in college. She my parents went through a divorce when right about within those few years. So there was a lot of circumstantial change in her life, and it was easy to rationalize everything we saw as, oh, this is just mom now that she lives alone. Like, no one’s telling her to, like, stop obsessively recycling things. You know? Like, my mom would have just recycling containers stacked up really high. She also, like, was compulsively order like, ordering and clothing online, like, way more than one person could use. She was definitely felt victim to, like, some scams. Like, she signed up for, like, a phone and alarm system in her home. She definitely, like, had some color saying that they wanted to marry her and she fell into this like scam relationship where she sent someone money. But the biggest clue for us was that she started having delusions. And at first, the delusions felt somewhat based in reality, like, very explainable for us. Like, so she said, oh, there is a man and a son in my backyard. And I’m like, well, who? But, you know, in your rational mind, you’re thinking, oh, there’s probably like a child that that got away from their parents or something and they just went in the backyard and then left. But the delusions started getting more extreme and less realistic. So we knew that something was up at that point.
Victoria: And you’re also a mother of four.
Katie: Yeah.
Victoria: So and and I’m I’m also curious if you have siblings because I know you you became her caregiver No. But were your children young? Yeah. That was all that?
Katie: Yeah. It was a journey. So I am the middle child of three. I have an older brother and a younger sister, and they’re both wonderful humans like involved. And my extended my family all lived in Georgia at this point and my personal family was living in Oregon and we still are. When this was going on, again, like, there were signs and things going on with mom that we’d be like, that’s crazy. Like, she got lost going home. That’s that’s wild. Like but then once her delusions or her visions of things that she saw or felt were happening became more crazy. Like, she gave a story about a man and a woman who climbed up onto her roof and dug a hole in her roof. Like, she really believed they were, like, going into her attic through her roof. And it was so sad because I just want, like, it just sounds like she’s scared to live alone. Like, she thinks, like, everyone’s coming to her house. But but anyways, at that point, I talked to my sister and I said, I feel like maybe something’s wrong with her meds or like something’s off. Like, she’s just sharing some crazy stories. And we decided my sister took her to a psychiatrist. To see if there was something some sort of answer they could give us. And the psychiatrist appointment, they basically said, okay, your mom has a delusional disorder. She cannot drive and she cannot live alone. Like starting now. And so we were just like, wait, what? All of us had young kids at this point in our thirties. So my sister being closer in location to my mom. I mean, we were both like, well, she can come with us. It’s great. Like, in a way, it was like, well, mom’s really helpful to have around and, you know, she’s a grandma and, like, she’ll it is kinda nice to have an extra set of adult hands. And so my sister and I kinda joked about, like, I’ll take her. No. I’ll take her. And then she ended up moving in with my sister and her family.
And this was, like, late fall of that year. And my I remember saying to my sister, like, let’s just get through the holidays, like, just have mom for an extended visit through the holidays, and then we can talk about what we wanna do, like, in a more permanent way. But they they settled in with mom. She lived there almost three years with them. If I if I do the math right, I think it was right around three and she was living there her symptoms and and disease was progressing and she was getting more tricky to manage. I wasn’t, you know, in the weeds with them. They were handling so much stuff like, you know, moving her out of her house, selling her house eventually, like, all of those logistics of caring for someone. And then they got to their end of feeling able to maintain her care needs And at that point, I felt like I can’t tolerate having my mom go into a nursing home in Georgia, like across the country from me. So I felt like I wanted her to come live with us and talked with my husband and we made the decision to make we’re out to Oregon. And so mom lived here her last two and a half, almost three years of her life with us. So she lived with us in our home for about less than a year and then we had to put her into a nursing home and then a memory care home to be able to handle her needs because it was so advanced. So it was a journey. It was a long journey of trying to figure out how to care for her well. In those years.
Victoria: I think that’s probably I mean, I I’ve just seen it. Mhmm. And so and working I worked in a nursing home, had a memory care, but it is and it can be a very long disease.
Katie: Yeah.
Victoria: And I think that is probably one of would you say that create one of the aspects of it that creates a lot of complicated feelings
Katie: Absolutely. Absolutely because it’s like you’re mourning your person that’s right in front of you. You know that they’re on their decline and that death is going to come for them through this it’s usually secondary causes through this case, which is super frustrating. But I remember feeling really afraid of how long mom might live with this. Because you just you start to project out and envision the future, and it’s it’s this, like, rapid decline of them losing well, for us, it was all her personality, all her ability to talk. She became, like, The only way I can describe it is like it would be like a severely autistic person where the ability to communicate is just gone and you’re like, know that they’re in there, but you want to be able to reach in and have some sort of semblance of interaction with them, found myself envious of people with Alzheimer’s because I thought, yeah, they’re repeating their story and they don’t remember you, but, like, at least they can talk to you. Like, I felt like I just would have given anything to talk to her. To just, like, hear her say something or tell me the same story or, you know, let’s let’s, you know, have that conversation about who I am not to, like, diminish anyone else’s suffering or pain with that. But it is very complicated. It’s complicated and that you don’t want it to last a really long time. It’s complicated that you feel like you’re grieving them while they’re still there in front of you. I called it the slow goodbye. I know people call it the long goodbye. But yeah, it’s just it’s yeah. It’s just a a difficult walk for sure.
Victoria: How did you explain this to your kids? I mean, because you’re a caregiver to children too Yeah. Managing their emotions. Yeah. And bringing a parent into the home, I imagine has a different impact on your marriage too.
And Absolutely. A lot of layers.
Katie: Yeah. Absolutely. I mean, our kids I would say, I’m trying to remember exactly how old they were. I think our oldest was, like, maybe just started middle school and then our youngest was in kindergarten, first grade. I can’t remember.
And I would say for the youngest, it was, like, easy because I found him to be the easiest to bring around mom because he would just hug her and, you know, bop away and then come back and hug her again and just like how children can be so present. And and and what is and not, you know, given to, like, the fear, the imagination of what could be. And then the odor we get, the more we live in those spaces of not being present and you know, constantly fearing the worst and stuff. But my older kids I mean, it’s it’s funny because I think I was in such crisis management mode. I don’t know if I did a very good job of explaining anything to them. But I was trying to do my best to model love and care and acceptance like this is what we do. We take care of family. We love the person in front of us. Even though they’re difficult, but I probably was naive in what I assumed they were absorbing. It’s so easy to assume kids aren’t. Absorbing as much and they always are. They’re so much smarter than we give them credit for. Mister Rogers was so good at that. Right? Like acknowledging that in children. But I remember my kids would have, like, writing assignments and they’d they’d bring them home and it would be, like, a poem and it would be about my mom, about Mimi living with us. And I thought, oh my gosh, wow. They’re so deeply processing. So I think that they I definitely felt my children’s attention and care toward me. Is their mom watching me, like, be in this grief? And we just did our very best to, like, support mom, but also, like, give our family time in nurture. And that was the hardest challenge is, like, doing both, like, having just our family time and not feeling guilty about that. And then also trying to take care of mom. So it was a lot like having her in our home. Her needs were really even in the very beginning of her moving in.
Her needs were probably more advanced in what we could handle and we tried. So what did you learn about grief or know about grief?
Victoria: I mean, because you had experienced your parents’ divorce Mhmm. And But had grief been a topic that was talked about growing up? And how do you feel how how do you feel this experience has changed? How you look at grief now? And how you parent.
Katie: Yeah. I grief. Wow. I don’t know. I definitely had a taste of grief with the divorce for sure that such I remember just feeling like, wow, that really, like, shifted my identity in a way that, like it’s like everything I’ve known myself to be and known myself to be a part of down feels like fragmented. And Even in that, I notice, like, oh, people who have been through it, get it, and know that it’s hard. Whereas grief is so tricky, like, when you haven’t experienced a like grief, it’s harder to enter in with people’s suffering or pain or hold space for that because you just feel like I think, especially, okay, going back to the divorce, I think it’s such commonplace almost and in our culture that people are like, oh, sorry. You know, it’s kinda like, oh, that’s hard. Okay. Sorry. And whereas I was, like, processing this whole, like, identity and how do I deal with all of this stuff? I think the thing with mom I you know, that was the most obviously, it’s the most profound grief I’ve ever been through in my life. I think when I was in it, I felt very isolated from people really understanding what it was like because so like we even talked about earlier in this podcast, I think so many people understand Alzheimer’s or some type of dementia, but I felt so young and so confused by mom’s behaviors in the way she was exhibiting symptoms. I felt misunderstood in a lot of ways I remember, periodically, I would post something on social media and share, like, a couple sentences about losing her as a person and dementia sucks. And then I would find someone whose loved one also had a t d or who were going through something similar and I remember feeling like, wow, why does this feel so helpful even though it changes nothing? It just feels so helpful to know that you’re actually not alone in the exact scenario you’re in. So I learned that in that in those moments, I learned that sharing our story is incredibly powerful and that even though we can feel so isolated and alone, that can really help with with some of those feelings. And then, obviously, with the grief, like, the deeper grief of of her actual death and that loss, I learned so much. I learned that we all experience our grief so differently from each other. And I think the really interesting thing is that even in a sibling group or even when you’re grieving the exact same person that you feel like you know in a very similar or same ish way, you will process it differently. And I notice very early on that sometimes the people you think you’ll be able to have, like, intimacy and grieving with, you might not be able to have that. And I also notice how easy it is to compare your grief to other people, vice versa, and how unhelpful that is. So if someone’s sobbing and you feel like stone cold like dried up, it’s easy for one to think the other is silly or whatever, but it’s not helpful. So that was those lessons were incredibly profound in the early stages of losing mom of, like, oh, we’re all gonna do this differently. It does nothing to compare. It does nothing to serve us to compare or contrast. And, you know, you may not be able to share your grief with people who you think you might be able to share your grief with. The other thing that I realized that I think a lot of people probably know of experience grief is that it shows up when it wants to show up. It’s a non invited guest. I I’m always like, this is now my lifelong companion. Don’t really wanna walk with her, but I will be. And it’s something that I just have to let, like, show up and move through. And and yeah. And just it does change through years, but it’s not that loss is always there. The loss of a person that you love or the loss of a dream that you had or yeah, that loss of future that you expected. It’s just it’s like always gonna be there. So and I’m still learning. I I think the other lesson now I’m like eight years out of losing my mom. And I always I think a lot about how it doesn’t have to end with grief. Like, grief doesn’t get to have the final word. And that’s the other thing I’ve learned. It’s like, yes. The impact is profound. It might stop you in your tracks. You might have to spend a lot of years, like, what I call cocooning. Like, cocoon and heal and contract. And, like, take that comfort and space however you can survive, but know that it doesn’t have to be the final say that, like, the clouds can lift and I always say the sun is always shining above the clouds just because you can’t see it doesn’t mean it’s not there. And that brings me so much comfort just knowing like I might be like walking around and just gray clouds feeling so thick. Like, I’ll never see anything else besides that, but the sun is shining. And if you’ve ever taken a flight, you know what that feels like to fly through the clouds and then it’s glorious.
Right? It’s like the sky is just lit up or you know, maybe you get a sunrise or a sunset in there, see other beautiful things, but like that’s existing all the time on a different plane and is accessible to us, at least in our minds.
Victoria: Beautiful.
Katie: Thank you.
Victoria: What was the thing do you think that helped you the most to create a forward momentum of healing?
Katie: I think for me, losing mom at a young age made me realize the contrast is like, yes, death can happen at any time. We don’t know. Like, we can’t predict our future, that makes me want to, like, live. It doesn’t serve anyone for us to just curl up in a ball and be dead ourselves, you know. And so for me, it’s like, well, okay.
Now I know so profoundly that life is short. And I want to, like, live big. I want to live as big as I can and love as big as I can. And I feel like just that thought alone helps me. Just like I think it’s probably inevitable to compare your life to, like, especially when you lose a parent, when you lose a parent at a certain age, you start thinking like, well, that’s what’s gonna happen to me. You know? So it’s easy for me to be like, oh, sixty two sixty two like in my mind. I only have till sixty two and that is really like not a lot of time. And so even though I don’t wanna believe that or predict that for myself, it comes in, and then I have to say, okay, well, what if it was true? Like, what would you do? And I’m like, let’s go. Let’s go do some things that make me feel alive. And so I actually use that as a barometer a lot. It’s like, what makes me feel really alive? And it’s not comfort food and TV and social media scrolling and all the things I do all the time. I’m not judging any of these things, but those don’t make me feel really live. Those things make me feel more numb. What makes me feel more alive is truly connecting with people, is taking risks, is doing something new, getting out of my comfort zone. So when I say I really want to be alive, I use that as a measure. What makes me feel alive? Oh, like, learning a different style of dance, even though I’m not good at dancing. Like, I just I’m like, that’s so fun. So I try to do those things and I my kids are now at the age where they’re graduating from high school and heading to college, etcetera. And I think, like, that even more so, that’s a different kind of grief. And in of itself, like, identity and family dynamic shift, and and whatnot. But I think about that a lot too. I’m like, okay, they’re going out to have their adventure and I can’t, too. Like, this this is We’re getting some time back in our lives. And so I don’t wanna just waste that away. I wanna I wanna do things that yeah. That feel like yeah. I don’t wanna just settle and, like, move into, like, a comfort zone. I want to move into, like, something new and and have an adventure.
Victoria: And be reminded that you are alive. Right?
Katie: Yes. Exactly. Exactly.
Victoria: I lost my dad. He was forty four. Oh. And so that’s one thing people don’t really talk about, right, is you wait for that year to come around. Like, oh, I’ve made it past. My dad’s age now. Okay. Well, I can cross that off the list, you know. So that’s something people who really don’t talk about. Mhmm. One thing I’m curious too, because I’ve I’ve had this awareness just for myself in the last year or so is that I could never I never had my dad’s birthday on my calendar, but I always had the day he died. Wow. Were you the same? Or I, you know, like, I could never celebrate the day of his birth. Right? Which seems really no. I I I was eight when he passed. So I didn’t have a very long time. Right? But I don’t even remember I think there’s a picture of it was his birthday one time, but Yeah. I just think people don’t really talk about that part of
Katie: Yeah. Dates. I can see as an eight year old in only having experienced him for those years how his death date would be way more profound for you than his birthday. Just thinking about that. Like, I’m thinking, yeah, I can’t imagine as an eight year old processing that. And then every year, like, feeling the impact of that in such a profound way, it doesn’t surprise me that that would be your experience. I think that for me, my mom was like, such a birthday accelerator. And I’m like such a birthday. I it’s like I’m a little spazzy about it. I just love celebrating birthdays.
I tease about having a birthday month, and I’m a little bit of a diva about it, and I love celebrating my kids’ birthdays. I’ve created little monsters with them about birthdays. So I think because of that, it’s easy for me to, like, gravitate towards my mom’s birthday and want to do things for her then. There was a couple a year in there where I was, like, oh, like, her day of death, like, pass without me even noticing. And I was like, oh, weird. Like, I almost felt bad for not thinking about it. But I was like, well, it’s fine. You know, like, that’s Anyway, Yeah. I I do think that it’s something I thought about as far as, like, the catching up with your parents’ age. My dad lost his father when he was twenty one. So my dad was twenty one when his dad died. And he I definitely watched him go, oh, I’m getting to the age. I can’t remember how old his dad was, but he he definitely had that in his mind. And I watched him contemplate that. And then, for me, it was just a really profound reality of, like, oh, okay. Like, oh, no. My mom my mom, you know, started her decline in her fifties. That’s not good. And then she died when she was sixty eight, diagnosed when she was sixty two. So I’m like, that’s not good. But even I don’t know. I just think it’s it’s kind of I don’t know how it feels for you, but, like, I almost feel like watching someone die is a little bit like experiencing a car accident and how that, like, just like imprints on your body, like, imprints in your memory and in your DNA away or something. This is all science based. But, like, I think, like, the way you viscerally feel a car wreck, a car wreck, even when you, like sometimes even just say car wreck, like, we can put ourselves back in that space and time so quickly. I think that watching someone’s decline and death it’s not a shocking, but if you are able if you are able to see someone’s processor decline there’s a knowing that happens that you can’t know any other way.
Victoria: Has it made you paranoid about your own health?
Katie: So Yes. So part of my journey, especially in in my film making career at this point, is to raise awareness around FTD, caregiving, like this whole thing. But one of the things I realized in in the moment when we got mom’s diagnosis of FTD, I just heard dementia. And I I heard dementia and I was like, okay, it’s some type of dementia and it’s in her frontal temporal lobes. So those lobes are like, this part of us and And I kind of I’m I I think that I was in so much crisis that I couldn’t even tolerate researching and finding more information. It felt like it would really stress me out even more. It was more like a survival survival. Since then, lost my mom in twenty sixteen. I made my first film in twenty twenty, which was also about dementia, like those early signs of dementia. And in that process, like, got connected with FTD community and more people in this world and started learning more just in my own journey in healing and stuff. And one of the things I learned was that FTD can be genetic. There can be like a genetic strain, like ALS or Huntington’s or one of those things. So that doesn’t feel really good in a child’s mind of someone with dementia or with FTD. But so one so I realized there’s a genetic component and I still was, like, okay, but I can, like, deny this away. Jeff can make sure, you know, oh, well, mom had the car wreck and all these other things, so it’s probably related to that and not really related to any kind of genetics.
But then a number of years ago, her younger brother got diagnosed with a TD. So that was like a a heart soft for me. And there is testing available, which I could partake in. I don’t know if we have. I don’t know. I haven’t done the research on how that works or what we need to be able to find out. And it is something I want to explore just to even contribute to research. Even if I don’t find out whether I have it or not, it would contribute to the research of FTD, which is important to me. But all of that to say is I’m on this journey. I’m making my first feature film.
It is to raise awareness on caregiving and dementia’s in general, but specifically diagnosis with FTD. And as I’m writing the film, I’m, like, preparing, I just feel like there’s this, like, fear monster over my shoulder, like, you have it. You probably have it. Every time I stumble on my words or, like, you know, my handwriting gets wonky or whatever I think, oh my god. Like, this is early signs.
I can probably have it. So that fear is palpable. Like, it’s in my life. It’s present. It’s attached to the grief. It’s attached to the work that I’m doing currently in my life. I was working and moving through it just feeling like, you know, it’s over there. I’m like, just wanting to shoe it away, like go away, go away. And then and then I stop for a second and I think I’m like, okay, instead of trying to ignore this and act as if it’s not here with me, what if I face it. And so I had this moment where I thought, I need to just turn around and look at in the face. And so for me, that means instead of, like, being afraid of it. Why don’t I just embrace it as if it is? And, you know, fear is just our imagination, and we can use it for our good, and we can use it for our demise. And I I feel like For me, this is how it sounded. Okay. Instead of like always being afraid every time little clubs happen or whatever, I’m gonna say, what if I knew for sure? That I had FTD. What if I knew for sure that I am gonna have this thing, it’s coming, this is the way I’m gonna this is the way my life is gonna end? What would you do? And asking myself that just gives so much clarity because I realize even if I knew I had it, I would have to move into acceptance just like we have to with our grief at some point. Why not do it now? And think about this like if I had FTD, I would live my life as fully as possible. I would love my family, my friends, I would try to say present with them, I would try to pursue the healthiest life that I could. You know, obviously, like, we’re all gonna sit on the couch and eat a bag of chips or whatever, but it’s like I would choose healthy food, I would choose outdoor time, I would choose friend time, being present with people, And the other really point of clarity for me was and I would make this movie. And this movie would be like my contribution. And so asking that question and facing that beer monster dead on was such a moment of clarity for me in that I know I’m doing what I want to be doing with my life. I’m being very intentional. And now this movie is not just a good idea or something really fun and cool that I get to try to do, but it now is my mission. And the greatest part about that is I think one thousand percent I’m going to make this movie and it’s going to impact people in these spaces, no matter what. Like, no matter what. My hope is that it’s gonna just soar to the to outer space with success. And My dream is that it’ll be my first of many movies that I have all these other movies that I get to make. I have some really amazing stories already in my mind that I that I cannot wait to get on paper and then on the camera and etcetera. But no matter what, I’m gonna make this one. And if I got FCD and that was the only movie I got to make, so be it.
Like, this is a great one to choose. And probably, I won’t die that way and something else will happen and I’ll get to make a whole other movies, but it just gave me so much peace just to, like, assume that it was that it was rather than fear that it might be. And that peace allowed me to have clarity with knowing that I’m doing what I wanna be doing with my time. In my life. So that that question is so huge for me of, like, what if I got it? And and answering that straight on was really helpful.
Victoria: It’s a powerful reframe. Mhmm. Then there’s probably a camp of people, like, no. You’re like, manifesting it.
Katie: I know. I know. People are like, don’t say that, but I I think I agree. I I do I do agree, like, that can, like, you know, the way we imagine and spend our time and our energy in our minds thinking is is impactful to our lives, but I also have to be compassionate towards myself and be like, of course, you’re afraid of this. Like, it was the most traumatizing thing you ever been through.
So, like, we can’t we can’t have these fears, have this grief, and then also make ourselves feel terrible for being afraid of it, you know, with the manifestation camp. I mean, I love manifesting things and, like, spending my energy for good, but I also have to be honest about what I’m
Victoria: And who’s the thing about that too? As I was thinking about, and as I said that, the other aspect of it, Elo, is yes, there might be people who think you’re manifesting it, but it’s not like you’re dwelling on the fact that I’m I have this. It’s You’re dwelling on the fact that if this is a possibility, I’m going to take action. So it’s almost like it’s you reverse engineering it and your focus isn’t on the dwelling Yeah. That this is, oh my gosh, this is gonna happen to me and it’s oh my gosh.
If this were true, It’s propelling you to take action. Yeah. Inspired action.
Katie: Right? Thank you.
Victoria: How has it changed? Has this movie changed the Like, do you have support from your family? Has this whole experience brought you closer with your siblings? Yes. Absolutely.
Shifted.
Katie: It’s been phenomenal. So here’s where we are right now at the recording time of this podcast. We have I’ve spent, like, years writing this script. I’ve spent the full last year fundraising and growing support for the film where fiscally sponsored and under a nonprofit. For our filmmaking, which is just such a huge it’s something I’m really thankful and proud of. The support has been phenomenal. And when I start thinking about it, I like it emotional. I have so much gratitude I’m doing something that really scares me. Like, this film feels like a really big deal. It’s it’s a big endeavor to do what I’m trying to do with, like, I’m acting and directing and producing the same. And I know it’s like taking a big old bite out of the film making world. But from the get go, the amount of support in people that have rallied to see this film come to fruition has has truly been phenomenal. And you asked about my siblings. And one of one of the ideas I had in this fundraising journey, and I think of it as more than fundraising. It’s not just getting money for film. It’s also growing an audience and growing a community around this. That really what my hope is is the more people that follow along and join us as we’re creating this thing that then we’ll get to, like, launch screenings and theaters around the country and, like, people will be able to come out and watch. But one of my ideas was what if we what if we did some happy hours and different places that I’ve lived and, like, have people host parties and we can share about the movie and and gather our community. And of course, one of those people was my sister in Georgia, and I was like, hey, what do you think about hosting one of these? And she’s so good at hosting parties. She’s amazing. She’s like, I’m in. Let’s go. Let’s do this. And then my brother has a band that he plays in called holy smokes.
And they do cover music and their band donated their time and we had this big old party and it was just such a meaningful event to join with my brother and sister and feel so supported about us taking this journey and, like, them supporting just the creating of wake up Maggie was just phenomenal. But, you know, it’s so touching. Like, I have people who have donated, like, ten dollars and people who have donated, like, thirty five thousand dollars. So it’s, to me, money is energy and time. And it’s all, like, coming from the same bucket. And so I don’t get super fixated on the money. I really love to fixate on the energy and, like, what what are we growing and what are we building and what are we doing? It’s more of a movement. So I have been absolutely floored by the by the people that come along and say, okay, let’s get this movie made. Like, how can I support you?
What are we gonna do? Let’s go. And I’m just gonna say, like, it’s so many women that have done that for me, and I’m like, women are so powerful. It’s just amazing. It’s not all women, but, like, it’s just Yeah. I think I think this is a film. I call it a coming of middle aged film, which I personally love because we have so many coming of age films of, like, you know, the transition of teenagers and I love that genre, but I feel like there’s a different there’s a different transition, a different like a second puberty of sorts that happen in our midlife, and I think that if we let it affect us, it can change us for so much good and so much of it is centered on grief. So much of it is I think sometimes people in their twenties have gone through midlife because they face something deep and profound. You in their life and it’s like a grief and impacts them to the point where they say, I Okay. I’m going to like have this perspective on life and and what I wanna do and know how I wanna live. That’s what midlife is to me. It’s this unraveling of pretense. And and, like, coming into our own and, like, feeling more solid in in our life and our humanity. And that’s something huge to celebrate. And I think getting to see it on the big screen is gonna be a really profound experience for all of us, and I can’t wait for everyone to see it.
Victoria: Well, I definitely will put the link in the show notes.
Katie: Please Yeah.
Victoria: To your page for people to support your mission and your cause. Thank how would you describe the Katie you were before your mother’s own list and the Katie sitting before me now?
Katie: Yeah. That’s great question. So much of my journey definitely is integral with acting. So I started acting after I lost my mom. And I would say before I lost my mom, I was a heavy people pleaser. Lots of personal denial, lots of ignoring of my own needs, ignoring of myself, body awareness. Like, all that was just, like, not really a part of my life. And then the healing journey along walking parallel and my healing journey with grief and then also deepening acting, I feel like my journey with acting has helped me become more fully human. It’s helped me to acknowledge and deal with like emotions that I often would wanna pretend don’t exist inside me. It’s helped me to connect my mind with my body and my nervous system in a deep way, like, oh, I actually need to notice when I’m like, I can look really calm on the outside. I can tend to be, like, a more people often say, oh, you’re so quiet and soothing. And I’m like, funny. Because, you know you know if you’re feeling like this spending or churning inside
Victoria: like a horse and a horse race.
Katie: Right? It’s just this like, yes, you feel that inside and and I think I think my journey with acting has helped me to say, oh, that that’s happening right now. And like, what can I do to support myself? And what can I do to support my nervous system? And how can I experience what I’m experiencing?
But also like not let it stop me in my tracks. So it’s been so profound. It’s been so profound. I think like coming to acceptance with my mom’s disease, coming to acceptance with my mom’s death, and then moving into a life that I I just want to be so intentional and present and just filled with gratitude. It’s just it’s it’s like, yeah, it does feel like an unraveling. I think, Berné Brown has a quote that I love that she talks about, midlife isn’t a crisis because a crisis is one event. Midlife is more of an unraveling. And I think we think of the word, like, being unraveled as, like, a negative thing, like, someone’s frazzled or something. But but I feel it as, like, peeling back for me, it’s an appealing back of the layers that no longer serve me, the layers that I hid behind and and, you know, coming into my own space and in place in this world and, like, owning who I am without trying to constantly please and put everyone else first and like their opinions first. So I think it’s also been a journey of exposing myself in that way too of, like, people pleasers can often blend in so well. And then, acting and filmmaking is like one of the most public art forms you could possibly choose. And so it does a number on me because I think, oh, no, everyone’s blah blah blah blah blah. And I’m like, no, they’re not. They’re completely preoccupied with themselves, but I think just just doing that type of exposure helps me, like, care less. About my imagination towards what other people might be thinking. So, yeah, so I feel like I am obviously, I think we have these core parts of us that are always true to who we are, but I think What’s happened is for me in this process of losing mom and moving forward with my life is that I’m more raw and more real and less hidden in it.
Victoria: I think we almost get as we allow ourselves to be cracked open and
Katie: Yeah.
Victoria: Expose ourselves and do things out of out of our comfort zones and challenge ourselves. We become more like children. Right? One of women and children and we get back to I think that child, like, essence within us that we stuffed away and put away because it’s not acceptable
Katie: Yeah.
Victoria: To have you and and creative expression is is fufu and it’s for it’s like a luxury. And I what I’ve learned in all of these interviews I’ve done in over four years and my own experience is that when you lean into creative expression, and out of your comfort zone, doing things out of your comfort zone. That’s when you really discover who you were always meant to be, I think.
Katie: Yes. I’d love that. Yeah. It really is coming into a sense of play. And you can’t you can’t play unless you’re, like, really present. Mhmm. And our adult minds love to, like, fixate on the past or the future and not, like, right now. So I love that you’re saying that. Yeah.
Victoria: Well, in using the past as your creative fuel. Right? So it is looking at it. Mhmm. You’re not having to look at it. It’s not a stuffing and a tucking away just like and that’s what we do with our grief, and I think that’s what so many griefers find themselves stuck in mid life is that they haven’t allowed themselves to fully express themselves. Yeah.
Katie: No, I totally get what you’re saying about looking at it. I think that writing Even though I’m writing fiction and I’m writing the script and the story that’s not it’s not my story, but it is so much of my story that it has been a really healing journey of of It’s like exploring the past and what happened, but also in a playful way of storytelling. Yeah.
Victoria: Mhmm. Is there anything else that you would like to share that you didn’t feel you got to?
Katie: That’s a nice question. I feel really good. I I just yeah. I I love what you’re doing in the world and and that you’re helping grivers feel heard and seen and understood. And I think it’s such an important thing for all of us because so often grief hits and we’ve not ever thought about it until we’re in it. I think if I could just leave people with anything. It’s just the imagery of the sun shining above the clouds. Think if if nothing else, if you just close your eyes and know that what you feel isn’t the only truth of existence right now. It’s okay to feel it and it’s and it’s also really helpful to know that there’s, like, light and warmth above that you will access.
Victoria: Beautiful words. Thank you. Where can people reach you if they would like to learn more about you? Wake up Maggie, your work, all of them? Where can they connect with you?
Katie: Thank you. For asking that, I try to make it as easy as possible. All of my social media is Katie Prentiss, so pretty easy to find. My website is kady prentiss dot com. And wake up Maggie is all under wake up Maggie movie.
Wake up maggie movie dot com and on Facebook and Instagram is wake up maggie movie. So we’d love for you to follow along and and be a part of our journey. So try to share it all.
Victoria: Do you have a goal date?
Katie: Yes. We’re filming in February of twenty twenty five. Yeah. Oh, awesome. Yes.
Yes. So we’re right in the middle of working so hard to get everything ready for filming. So we’re in pre production production right now. And then we’ll shoot for about three weeks in February, and then we’ll be in postproduction, which is all the editing and sound and all the all the design work that happens on the backside of of shooting the film. So if I don’t know exactly when we’ll be released, but this is why it’s so good for you to follow us on social media or come to our website.
We even have an email list you can sign up for. And we’ll keep you posted. That way, we really love for people to join us and be a part of it. So then when we do screen in theaters, hopefully we can have everyone come out.
Victoria: I’m just curious. Do you have, like, are you, like, one of those people with numbers. Like, numbers are important. Or do you do you have, like, a specific date? Like, you know, your mom’s birthday maybe
Katie: Oh.
Victoria: Something like that where you plan to even if it’s done, you’re not gonna launch until
Katie: Oh, I love that. I haven’t thought about that with mom. I will say I lost mom. We lost her on February twelfth, twenty sixteen, and we’re shooting in February, which is interesting to me. And then I definitely tossed her birth date.
Into the film as a birth date of one of the characters. Obviously, it’s called Waco Maggi after her, but I haven’t thought about the release date. That would be really special if it was on some sort of special date, but I haven’t thought about that.
Victoria: Okay. I’m just curious.
Katie: Yeah.
Victoria: It’ll be really special. I’m sure. Thank you. Amazing way to honor your mom and her memory. Filming in February.
Katie: So Yeah. Beautiful.
Victoria: How that worked out? Yeah.
Katie: Yes. I agree.
Victoria: Alright. Well, thank you so much for your time today. I appreciate you sharing your story and and your mission. And being a part of my mission to talk about grief like we talk about the weather and and it’s, you know, it’s not all doom and gloom. Right?
Katie: Right. Exactly. Yeah. No. Thank you so much for having me.
It’s really no longer to be with you. And all of your listeners and just to be able to share my stories a gift. So thank you.
Victoria: Thank you. And remember, when you unleash your heart, you unleash your life. Much love.
Cancer Thriver, Childhood Grief, Grief Stories, Grieving Voices Guest, Mind/Body Wellness, Parent Loss, Pespective, Pet Loss |
SHOW NOTES SUMMARY:
In this heartfelt episode of Grieving Voices, I’m joined by the remarkable Kris Carr, a multiple New York Times bestselling author, wellness activist, and cancer thriver. Known as a force of nature and recognized as one of Oprah’s Super Soul 100 influential thought leaders, Kris shares insights from her latest book “I’m Not a Morning Person,” which delves into the raw emotions that surface when life falls apart unexpectedly.
Kris discusses navigating through loss and grief with humor and hope while providing readers with strategies to move forward. She opens up about her personal journey living with stage 4 cancer for over two decades and how it has shaped her approach to health advocacy.
The conversation touches on profound topics such as:
- The unexpected grief journey sparked by the death of her father.
- How old wounds resurfaced during this period.
- The importance of emotional literacy in healing.
- Tools she developed to manage anxiety related to ongoing cancer scans.
- Her transition from trying to cure herself to focusing on healing.
Listeners will learn how Kris transformed fear into proactive self-care measures that millions now embrace. She also emphasizes the power of naming our emotions as a step toward understanding them better.
Kris’s story isn’t just about survival; it’s an inspiring testament to thriving amid adversity by harnessing love, acceptance, and resilience. Join us for an episode that promises deep reflection and practical wisdom for anyone grappling with their own grieving process or supporting others through theirs.
RESOURCES:
CONNECT:
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NEED HELP?
- National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
- Crisis Text Line provides free, 24/7 support via text message. Text HOME to 741741 to connect with a trained Crisis Counselor
If you are struggling with grief due to any of the 40+ losses, free resources are available HERE.
CONNECT WITH VICTORIA:
Navigating the Tumultuous Seas of Grief: Insights from Kris Carr
Grief is like an unpredictable storm; it can hit us with ferocity when we least expect it, leaving us to navigate through its tumultuous waves. In today’s blog post, we dive deep into the insights shared by Kris Carr – a beacon of hope and resilience in the face of life’s most challenging moments.
Kris Carr isn’t just another voice in the wellness community; she is a testament to living vibrantly even amid adversity. Her journey began with a stage 4 cancer diagnosis that would forever change her trajectory. But rather than allowing this diagnosis to dictate her life’s story, Kris turned it into an opportunity for profound self-discovery and healing.
Her latest literary offering, *I’m Not a Mourning Person: Braving Loss, Grief, and the Big Messy Emotions That Happen When Life Falls Apart*, isn’t just about coping mechanisms but also about embracing our vulnerabilities as sources of strength. It’s about finding humor amidst pain and discovering hope when all seems lost.
One crucial takeaway from Kris’ philosophy is understanding that **self-care is non-negotiable**. Whether facing illness or loss, prioritizing oneself isn’t selfish—it’s essential for survival and growth. This means acknowledging our emotions fully without judgment or suppression.
In particular, emotions like anxiety and fear often get a bad rap as being purely negative forces within us. However, as Kris illustrates through her own experiences dealing with these powerful feelings constructively can lead to personal empowerment instead of paralysis.
Moreover, anger—a frequently misunderstood emotion—can be constructive if we view it correctly. Anger signals something deeper at play beneath our surface reactions; injustice felt or pain endured demands attention so healing can occur.
Another poignant aspect discussed by Kris is how society has historically viewed grief—and especially women expressing grief—as unbecoming or taboo. Yet openly discussing such emotions paves the way toward wholeness and recovery—a message particularly resonant in times where mental health awareness is gaining much-needed recognition.
For those who find themselves in caregiver roles—often overlooked heroes—the reminder comes loud and clear: care must flow both ways for sustainability’s sake.
The act of writing itself serves dual purposes for someone like Kris —it becomes both cathartic release and personal reflection tool while simultaneously offering solace guidance others traversing similar paths.
Perhaps one most compelling points made during her interview was regarding language used around illnesses such cancer – traditionally framed battles waged against enemy within ourselves body seen battlefield casualties inevitable consequence warlike mindset approach disease aggression compassion holistic perspective needed here one treats their body ally need tender loving care opposed adversary conquered defeated at all costs
This shift viewpoint not only changes how individuals experience their illness but also affects societal perceptions surrounding diseases overall thus promoting more empathetic inclusive dialogue
Lastly let’s touch upon interesting tidbit revealed by herself – past involvement Budweiser Super Bowl commercials showcases versatility breadth career spanned beyond realms health activism authorship Indeed professional background advertising gives unique lens which view cultural phenomena such annual spectacle Super Bowl ads yet choice refrain watching year underscores commitment staying true authentic self regardless external expectations trends
As wrap up thoughts on enlightening conversation had between Grieving Voices host inspirational figurehead wellness movement encourage readers seek out additional resources provided kriscarr.com follow along Instagram @crazysexykris delve further into book available wherever books sold. Remember whether you’re bracing yourself against storms grief learning sail smoothly calmer waters wisdom gleaned voices experienced navigators invaluable compass guiding towards brighter horizons ahead.
Episode Transcription:
Victoria Volk
00:00:00 – 00:00:15
Hello. Hello. Thank you for tuning into Grieving Voices. Today, I’m excited to share my guests, Kris Carr, with you, my listeners. She is a multiple New York times bestselling author, wellness activist, and cancer thriver.
Victoria Volk
00:00:15 – 00:00:44
She’s been called a force of nature by o magazine and was named a new role model by the New York Times. Kris is also a member of Oprah’s Super Soul 100, a group of the most influential thought leaders today. Her latest book, I’m not a mourning person, braving loss, grief, and the big messy emotions that happen when life falls apart, shares what to expect when you’re not expecting your world to fall apart. It’s raw and inspiring, but has joy, humor, and hope too. This book gives readers tips and strategies to move forward and start living again.
Victoria Volk
00:00:44 – 00:01:04
Kris has helped millions of people take charge of their health and live like they mean it through her award winning books, blog, online courses, and membership communities. Thank you so much for being here and taking your time to share with my listeners. And I just gotta say, I loved the book. The movie we recommend.
Kris Carr
00:01:04 – 00:01:05
Sorry. You can’t really see it.
Victoria Volk
00:01:05 – 00:01:20
I loved it. I do have one question because I wanna make sure I ask this because I just I don’t remember reading the acknowledgments the first time., And so I just kind of peeked through now. What book on grief were you given by your friend, Jeanette?
Kris Carr
00:01:21 – 00:01:24
Oh, well, that’s Julia Samuel’s book.
Victoria Volk
00:01:25 – 00:01:26
Julia Samuel’s book. Okay.
Kris Carr
00:01:27 – 00:02:13
Yeah. And, one of her books, and that was my introduction to a world that I was resistant to enter. And then once I entered it, I realized, actually, this is the conversation that not only do I need for myself, but I wanna have with other people because it’s the most meaningful conversation that I could have. And I didn’t realize up until my most recent life kick just how grief was woven into, the nooks and crannies of my heart, my history, and how it was really something I was so afraid to touch, and yet it was holding me back.
Victoria Volk
00:02:13 – 00:03:00
In reading the book, I resonated with so many aspects of your story of re I, like, reconnected with parts of myself where, like, I was like, I could imagine myself back in time and feeling those similar emotions. And I have, like, a 1000000 and 1 questions, it feels like on my paper. But what you’re here to talk about though is the death of your father, which seems to have been the catalyst for you to explore grief in a way a deeper and more meaningful way than you ever had despite all of like, despite a stage 4 cancer diagnosis that you’ve been living with and all of that, like because there’s a lot of grief in that. And so to not really touch it until until recently. Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:03:00 – 00:03:04
It’s a very timely book, I’m thinking, for you.
Kris Carr
00:03:05 – 00:03:16
Oh, definitely for me. And I you know, it wasn’t the book that I set out to write. It I’ve written 7 books. This is my 7th book. And you know, there comes a time when your publishers are like, Sue, we need to write another book.
Kris Carr
00:03:17 – 00:03:47
And it had been a minute, and there was this idea that I should write something that’s more mass market, more appealing. I’ve written books for cancer patients. I’ve written books about plant based living. Apparently, I like to tackle difficult topics, vegetables and disease. And so anyway, there was these conversations about me writing something for a wider audience, and I initially went to that.
Kris Carr
00:03:47 – 00:04:09
You know, what’s that self help, aspirational, inspirational book that I could write? Which at some point, I will probably write. But everything in my body and in my being and in my heart was like, I can’t write that book now. I don’t feel that way. I’m not inspired by that conversation.
Kris Carr
00:04:09 – 00:04:49
I am hurting. And so this was my father was diagnosed with cancer in 2016, and he lived for about four and a half years with stage 4 pancreatic cancer. And during that time, you know, obviously, it’s a big life change for the whole family. But I was approaching my milestone of living with my own stage 4 cancer for 20 years. My we were in the middle of a global pandemic, so each and every one of us was hurting in a whole new way and losing people left and right, losing our jobs, losing our former sense of selves, losing our sense of safety and security.
Kris Carr
00:04:49 – 00:05:37
And my business was struggling because I had taken the steps to pull back so that I could be more present with my family. And what I realized is I hadn’t life proofed my business to allow me to do that. And so I was going through a very difficult time. And my initial response, even though I’ve been doing been in the wellness world for 20 years, and so I’ve done a lot of my own personal work and I’ve coached a lot of people in 20 years. Even though I thought I had done this kind of deep healing work when it comes to our mental health and heart tending, it was a big blind spot for me because my go to is to hustle, is to solve, is to fix, is to get the job done.
Kris Carr
00:05:38 – 00:06:09
And I was in a time and place where there wasn’t a way to get the job done. Right? It was a much deeper, more spiritual, more impactful journey that I would have to go on. I couldn’t check a box or get something behind me, much like living with cancer. And so instead of trying to push the river or hold back the ocean because I was afraid it would devour me, I decided to go through it.
Kris Carr
00:06:09 – 00:06:37
You know? And I remember the moment I write about in the introduction when the dam broke when I was sitting in a parking lot at CVS and my mother had asked me to go get more insured because it was the only thing my dad could tolerate. And I am at the aisle not knowing how many to get because I don’t know how much time he has to live and I’m not consciously choosing those thoughts. But here they come. And it was that moment of pushing it down and working harder and all the things that I do to avoid pain where I couldn’t hold it back anymore.
Kris Carr
00:06:37 – 00:06:53
And I was running through the CVS to get back to my car so that nobody would see me cry. And I get in, I break down all of the emotions coming out. And afterwards, I feel this quiet in the storm. I start to feel a little bit better. I feel a break from the fever.
Kris Carr
00:06:54 – 00:07:13
And I think to myself, where are other areas of where are the other areas of my life that I am holding back the opportunity to feel better by just allowing myself to be with the emotion. And that truly was the turning point for me to say, oh, I have to look at this.
Victoria Volk
00:07:14 – 00:07:19
One of my mottos is allowing myself to feel is allowing myself to heal.
Kris Carr
00:07:19 – 00:07:20
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:07:20 – 00:07:30
Pretty much embodies what you just shared. I think the importance of just allowing ourselves to feel what we have to feel, even if it’s to go into our car and have an ugly cry.
Kris Carr
00:07:31 – 00:07:44
You’re so right. And for many of us, we’ve never allowed ourselves to do that. Maybe we don’t even know what we’re feeling. We just know that there’s some sort of disturbance in the force. We’re feeling off.
Kris Carr
00:07:44 – 00:08:19
We’re feeling unsettled. And perhaps that’s old stuff. Like, when we were kids and we didn’t have the words to describe what pain we were experiencing, what discomfort we were experiencing, we may not also have those words as adults. And so it’s an incredible exploration process to even say, what if I just start by trying to identify and articulate what feeling is up for me right now? I don’t have to fix it.
Kris Carr
00:08:19 – 00:08:23
Maybe I could just give it a name and start it there.
Victoria Volk
00:08:23 – 00:08:34
On your Instagram, I saw you had a picture of yourself as a little girl, which prompted me to read the caption. Can you share a little bit about that for our listeners?
Kris Carr
00:08:36 – 00:08:38
About being a little girl?
Victoria Volk
00:08:38 – 00:08:38
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:08:39 – 00:08:41
Having what you the exercise of taking your a picture of yourself
Kris Carr
00:08:42 – 00:08:42
Yeah
Victoria Volk
00:08:43 – 00:08:44
as a little as a child?
Kris Carr
00:08:44 – 00:09:17
You know, sometimes when we don’t know how to self-soothe, we weren’t given those tools. Many of us and our parents weren’t given those tools either. And certainly, we find ourselves in a time of mourning. Then if we don’t know what to give to ourself, I like to have that picture, and then it is the picture that I use up on my desk, or it’s, like, in my bathroom or it’s in my closet where I’m getting dressed. And to just check-in with her and ask her what she needs.
Kris Carr
00:09:17 – 00:09:40
And to allow her to say, what I really need is a little break. I actually need to play a little bit. I need to give myself more unstructured time, you know, because she’s still there. But all of the way that I put on masks or you know, I remember when my mantra was suck it up buttercup. Like, what a terrible mantra.
Kris Carr
00:09:41 – 00:09:51
Right? But it was one I followed. And if I’m willing to tend to her and say, I love you. I’m here for you. What do you need?
Kris Carr
00:09:51 – 00:10:04
I’ve got you. I can re-parent you. Then inevitably, I, adult Kris, start to experience the healing that comes from that.
Victoria Volk
00:10:04 – 00:10:31
Because in your book, you share how being a child of anxious parents. And because you mentioned it just briefly there a little bit, how that shaped you into adult life being a child of anxious parents. Because I have this theory that and reading your book, I’m like, okay. Well, that makes sense. Because I have the theory that a lot of children are carrying anxiety and fears that aren’t even theirs.
Kris Carr
00:10:34 – 00:10:34
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:10:34 – 00:10:37
That of their parents. And then I read that in your book and I’m like, okay. That’s kind of affirming.
Kris Carr
00:10:39 – 00:10:52
Yeah. I mean, we are these blank slates, and we pick up vibes. We pick up energy. We pick up behaviors. I think we come here, and we are then domesticated.
Kris Carr
00:10:53 – 00:11:28
And so much of what our job is in this lifetime is to unlearn and to come back to the original source, which is that self-love, love for self, love for others, love for life. And so naturally, if we’re raised by parents who are anxious, then anxiety is gonna maybe even go be one of our go to responses to things. So we’re kind of moving through life fearful. And anxiety really is a rumination about what may or may not happen. Right?
Kris Carr
00:11:28 – 00:11:42
It’s kind of taking fear and saying, I’m thinking ahead. I gotta cover my bases. I gotta have my own back. The world is unsafe. How can I get ahead of this situation so I can make sure I stay safe?
Kris Carr
00:11:43 – 00:12:14
And fear and anxiety serve a purpose. Right? I would say in the book and often try to remind myself that we can’t amputate any of our emotions and expect to be whole. So oftentimes, I think in our very black-and-white society, certain emotions we deem positive and emotions that we should strive to have and show, and other emotions we deem negative as if therefore, there’s something deficient about us for having them. And it’s sort of like saying, here are all the crayons in the crayon box.
Kris Carr
00:12:15 – 00:12:45
But, Victoria, you can only use blue, green, and red because all the other colors are bad. And if you use those colors, you’re bad. And you may be like, but secretly, I love yellow. You know? And so I think when we get a little curious about these emotions and what they’re here to teach us and show us, which we can talk about, then we can follow the breadcrumbs and understand how they work and why our brain uses them.
Kris Carr
00:12:45 – 00:13:00
Why did why are we designed to experience anxiety from time to time? How is it a benefit to us? How does it truly keep us safe? And how does it go awry? Right?
Kris Carr
00:13:00 – 00:13:18
What do I need to do when I’m finding myself spinning out, let’s say, before a CAT scan? I get checked every 5 years. There’s always gonna be some anxiety before I go in for my scan. This is the moment, 21 years later, when my doctor says, oh, it turned on. It’s finally aggressive.
Kris Carr
00:13:18 – 00:13:43
This is what we’ve been waiting for. And I’m I’m gonna have some anxiety, but I can develop some tools to soothe that anxiety. I can develop some tools to make sure that that anxiety doesn’t become a rumination that’s out of control that can even become almost like an addiction, like a hot spot that I’ll just go to. It’s almost like we’re going to the mental gym when we’re dealing with some of this stuff.
Victoria Volk
00:13:44 – 00:14:19
Those that may not be familiar with you and never heard of you, can you just briefly share? Because I know we’ve mentioned it, but we haven’t really said about your diagnosis. And then I’d like to move into how that anxiety and that fear played a role through your diagnosis and how that transitioned to when you became then a caregiver for your father. And then the moment that you realized, you know, the P there’s like 3, I have a note here. There’s 3 spiritual or 3 pivotal moments that led you to writing the book.
Victoria Volk
00:14:19 – 00:14:23
And so can we rewind and then fast forward a little bit?
Kris Carr
00:14:24 – 00:14:47
Yes. So, I was in a very different career and had very different hopes and thoughts and dreams for my life. And then on Valentine’s Day in 2003, I was diagnosed with a rare and incurable stage 4 cancer. And so the first doctor that I met with suggested a triple organ transplant. The next doctor gave me 10 years to live.
Kris Carr
00:14:47 – 00:15:30
The doctor after that suggested radical treatments that wouldn’t do anything. And it was that moment where I realized I had to become my own advocate, and I had to become, as I like to call, the CEO of my health. So as a CEO, the leader of our lives, it’s like, okay. I’m responsible for putting together the team, for hiring, for firing, for finding my second in command because the doctors work for me. And I was lucky, or actually just hardworking to find a great oncologist who knew the most about my very rare disease, who had his finger on the pulse of research, and who also had a wonderful bedside manner.
Kris Carr
00:15:30 – 00:15:46
So I was very surprised when he said, sometimes your disease can be slow growing. It can become aggressive. We just don’t know. We have to watch and wait. And while we’re doing that, we want you to watch and live.
Kris Carr
00:15:46 – 00:16:34
And I didn’t really know how to do that. So the first place I went afterwards was the grocery store because I figured vegetables were good, even though I hated them. And what I was truly looking for was some sort of control, some place to put my energy so that I could feel like I was participating in my well-being as opposed to participating in my disease. And that’s what started the work that I do first and foremost for cancer patients when I began and then later for people who are interested in not becoming patients, because I truly believe that self-care is health care and that we have more power than we think. And, again, it was this career is not something that I went into saying this is what I wanna do.
Kris Carr
00:16:34 – 00:17:05
But I think for many of us, our lives change in sometimes miraculous ways because of these warning signs or wake up calls that we have. And this is what I chose to do with my wake up call because, again, I live with stage 4 cancer. This is a marathon for me. And I’m very, very inspired to live every moment like it is my first, and I can’t wait to have another. And so where are we going after this?
Kris Carr
00:17:06 – 00:17:10
Where would you like me to take you after this? You had a 3 part question.
Victoria Volk
00:17:10 – 00:17:12
I did. I know. I’m I tend to do that.
Kris Carr
00:17:12 – 00:17:14
It’s okay.
Victoria Volk
00:17:15 – 00:17:26
Try to squeeze it all in. Just the anxiety of that.
Kris Carr
00:17:19 – 00:17:19
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:17:19 – 00:17:26
Diagnosis and the experience of going through that and then being hit with another rupture, as you call it in your book, of your father?
Kris Carr
00:17:27 – 00:17:53
So for me, like I said earlier, I am the person that’s going to pretty much try to put a plan in place. And I think it’s very helpful to do that. It’s one of the reasons why my work has helped a lot of people is because I help people and people who don’t wanna be patients just put that wellness plan together. But a lot of that came from my fear, and a lot of that came from my anxiety. So isn’t that wonderful, though?
Kris Carr
00:17:53 – 00:18:39
So fear and anxiety helped me out in a big way. The problem is when they take over and they shut you down, they paralyze you. They make it so that the only thing that you feel like you can do to cope is to numb because they’re just too big. And so that’s when all of our self-care principles and practices, the toolkits that many of us go through life trying to build, we wanna open the box and lean on a few of them, whether it’s through breath work, whether it’s with a therapist or a counselor, like, hey, these emotions are too big for me to hold on my own. Oftentimes there may be other things tied into them, past traumas, past grieves.
Kris Carr
00:18:40 – 00:18:59
One of the things that my therapist talked about and I wrote about in the book is she says, when the grief train pulls into the station, it brings all the carbs.
Victoria Volk
00:18:49 – 00:18:49
Mmm
Kris Carr
00:18:49 – 00:18:59
The stuff you thought you were over is behind you, and you’re just totally sideswiped. Brings up trauma. It brings up anxiety. It brings up shame.
Kris Carr
00:18:59 – 00:19:10
It brings up rage. For me, I went through a period where, you know, my number one emotion I was experiencing was not grief. It was rage. I’m like, where is all this hot energy coming from? Well, it’s old stuff.
Kris Carr
00:19:12 – 00:19:37
And so learning to live with stage 4 cancer for me is more of a mental game than physical game. It’s about learning how to work with my fear and anxiety as opposed to be overwhelmed by it because that those moments are going to come. I was talking to a patient the other day, and you know, I’ll go to, okay. I’m having this anxious moment. Let me get in my body.
Kris Carr
00:19:37 – 00:19:51
Because sometimes when I’m in a anxious spiraling out place, I’m having kind of an out of body experience. Right? So I could jump on my bike or jump in the water. You know what I mean? Like, right now, I’m in Florida.
Kris Carr
00:19:51 – 00:20:03
The ocean’s nearby. Like, why don’t you just go for a quick swim? And it’s gonna change the channel. It’s almost like we’re dogs with in brain rot, licking, licking, licking a hot spot. You know?
Kris Carr
00:20:03 – 00:20:13
What if the scan’s worse? And what if this and what if that? Well, in this moment, none of that is true. I like to say it’s not something until it’s something. So why don’t you get back to living?
Kris Carr
00:20:13 – 00:20:28
Or it’s been 21 years since I’ve been dealing with this. I know I’m gonna feel anxious. I’m gonna allow myself that day or the day before to go there. But before then, why am I wasting time? Now is it as easy as that?
Kris Carr
00:20:28 – 00:20:33
No. But for me, I’ve been able to work with my brain.
Victoria Volk
00:20:35 – 00:20:36
You’ve had a lot of time to practice.
Kris Carr
00:20:37 – 00:20:43
I’ve had a lot of time to practice. I’m like, come on. Let’s go for a bike ride. In this moment, how are you feeling? Pretty good.
Kris Carr
00:20:43 – 00:20:44
Let’s focus there.
Victoria Volk
00:20:45 – 00:21:07
So when there was kind of training ground for you, when this happened with your father, I imagine that you had to lean on a lot of those tools that have supported you in getting through your own diagnosis and the spiraling thoughts and all of that. And what did you learn about yourself through the process. And how did that change you?
Kris Carr
00:21:07 – 00:21:08
Thought
Victoria Volk
00:21:08 – 00:21:09
Your perspective, maybe of a lot of things.
Kris Carr
00:21:09 – 00:21:38
Very beautiful question. I mean, I think I’m still learning it. And, I think that it was all well and good for me to work with my own palate, which is me. But then when it come came to working with, you know, the potential of losing someone that I love very dearly, he’s my chosen father, so he adopted me. And that was really hard for me because what was coming up, what I didn’t realize was a lot of the old abandonment wounds.
Kris Carr
00:21:38 – 00:22:06
The core, you know, father wound was highly activated, the idea of losing him. Because whether I was conscious of it or not, what I was feeling was that he was leaving me. And that’s what happened the first time with my biological father. And that’s when you go, oh, I have an opportunity here to work with some really old stuff because he’s not leaving me. He’s dying.
Kris Carr
00:22:07 – 00:22:28
And I want to spend as much good time with him as I can. So because of that, it was inspiring to do the work and to go back into therapy. And and to initially, I was like, oh, no. Cancer’s not on my watch. You know, there’s one thing I know.
Kris Carr
00:22:28 – 00:22:55
It’s navigating cancer, and it’s not taking you. I got pissed and angry and called everybody I knew, and I got some wonderful people in my address book. The problem was is that he didn’t wanna do any of it. So the treatments that he was undergoing were really hard. So we could do enough to, you know, keep him as well as possible, but he wasn’t gonna do a full on lifestyle, save my ass technologies Kris Carr plan.
Kris Carr
00:22:55 – 00:23:38
And so I had to make peace with that and say, the best medicine that I can deploy right now is love and making sure that when I enter the room, love is leading the way and that the time that I have with him is filled with it. And so there’s a lot of gin rummy. There’s a lot of really wonderful times that we had. And I learned how to let go of more control, which was very anxiety provoking for me. And just to continue to show up with love even though my heart was breaking and breaking wide open too.
Victoria Volk
00:23:39 – 00:23:48
In this book, you really do speak the language of the work that I do in grief recovery, the grief recovery method. And you talk about how grief manifests in our lives and in our bodies and talk about keeping busy.
Victoria Volk
00:23:48 – 00:24:37
You essentially addressed the sense of grief and you essentially addressed them all like including stirbs or short-term energy relieving behaviors and these things that we do to occupy ourselves and distract ourselves from our feelings. And, and you’ve had so many years of sitting with and working through your grief before writing this book. Who were the people or the resources that have supported you and provided the information that gave you that new perspective. And I know you mentioned that book, on grief, but kind of even before that earlier in your, like, when you were diagnosed and as you were going through that journey, what were the things that helped you shift your perspective from, you know, woe is me to the self-driven mission?
Victoria Volk
00:24:37 – 00:24:43
Or was it just did perfectionism take over? Because I know you talk a lot about perfectionism in your book too a little bit.
Kris Carr
00:24:43 – 00:25:01
I don’t know. Maybe sometimes. Oh, maybe sometimes. But I think so I practice what I call the 5 pillars of wellness. So they are basically being mindful of optimizing what you’re eating, drinking, thinking, and how you’re resting and renewing.
Kris Carr
00:25:02 – 00:25:32
And all of that sits on a foundation of stress management because we know that stress is really the number one killer. And stress comes in all sorts of ways, including heartache. And so that’s the basis of the lifestyle practice that I teach in my books and in my community. And that all came from all of my research as a first and foremost, as a cancer patient, what can I do to extend my life? Is there any way I can participate and help my longevity, help my odds?
Kris Carr
00:25:33 – 00:25:59
And it’s really the basis of lifestyle medicine, which has been around for a very long time. You know? And so all of that work for 20 years now has certainly taught me a lot about myself and my body. The big turning point for me, I think, emotionally was on my 10 year cancer versary when, you know, one of the doctors had originally given me 10 years to live. And here I am making it to the 10 year mark.
Kris Carr
00:26:01 – 00:26:21
And everybody was so thrilled except for me because I didn’t think that unless it was behind me, I could really live my life. So I was very frustrated, very angry. And so I was trying to cure myself since the doctors couldn’t cure me. You know? And it wasn’t happening.
Kris Carr
00:26:22 – 00:26:54
But I also wasn’t my disease wasn’t progressing either. And so it was just something that I was having to learn to live with. And there are many things for everybody that we might not want, but we have to learn to live with. And for me, it’s cancer. And so I remember thinking in that moment when everybody’s celebrating but me that I have to come up with a better way because I could live my whole life with this disease and I could waste it all.
Kris Carr
00:26:55 – 00:27:10
Because I wasn’t truly living unless it was behind me on paper. I got that stamp of approval. You’re in remission. And what if I lived? A whole lot of years healthy and happy, you know, if I allowed myself to be.
Kris Carr
00:27:11 – 00:27:25
But I didn’t get that stamp of approval. And that’s when I started to think about the difference between healing and curing. And that curing may or may not happen. You know, it happens in the physical body. It happens for some of us.
Kris Carr
00:27:25 – 00:27:49
Doesn’t happen for all of us. There are a lot of people out there who are living really big, abundant, wonderful lives with chronic illnesses, chronic shit pickles, just chronic stuff. And that’s okay. But healing can happen for each and every one of us. There is no timeline, and it can happen even beyond our physical form.
Kris Carr
00:27:49 – 00:28:09
And so I started to move more in the direction of aspiring to be on a healing path and to be loving and patient and caring with myself. And that, to me, when you say, okay. Where’d you learn this? What are the most inspirational resources or what not? It was actually that mental shift that changed everything.
Kris Carr
00:28:10 – 00:28:30
There are incredible grief resources out there. Right? You’re one of those incredible resources. And it was a world I wasn’t very familiar with. And then when we get interested, when we get curious, when we start to, you know, do the research, buy the books, follow the breadcrumbs, we start to find the voices that resonate for us.
Kris Carr
00:28:31 – 00:28:54
But the principles are still universal. You know, and that is that or at least I believe they’re universal, that our emotions are energy, we can’t amputate them, we need to allow them to flow. When energy is stagnant, it’s not good for your physical body. It’s not good for your mental health. And emotions are also filled with information.
Kris Carr
00:28:54 – 00:29:10
So if we can become a little bit more emotionally literate and curious, then we can start to learn how to tend to these crayons, these parts of ourselves that make up the whole beautiful picture that is us.
Victoria Volk
00:29:12 – 00:29:30
I’d love to talk about anger a little bit. You talked about a lot about emotions, but and you mentioned anger, and you mentioned anger quite a bit in your book too. And I didn’t address my grief until 2019. And that was at that point over 30 years. So I had a lot of time to build up a lot of anger and resentment.
Victoria Volk
00:29:31 – 00:30:12
And so to allow those floodgates to open, it was like, you know, if we imagine ourselves like a tea kettle and this pressure just keeps building and building and building, and if we don’t release that pressure, it like, we literally are dying from the inside very, you know, slowly and just deteriorates our bodies. And like you said, it’s stress. It’s physical stress, emotional stress, mental stress. Imagine that as is your body like a tea kettle. So allowing that rupture in that way, a good rupture, that’s a good rupture, you know, but you have, there’s a part I wrote here and we act out instead of crying out because anger feels powerful while grief feels powerless.
Victoria Volk
00:30:14 – 00:30:25
And you talk about caring for your anger and your grandmother had a motto, don’t cure the darkness, light a candle.
Kris Carr
00:30:25 – 00:30:25
Mmm
Victoria Volk
00:30:26 – 00:30:34
And I absolutely love that. But in talking about anger and the wisdom that anger has for us, what has anger taught you?
Kris Carr
00:30:36 – 00:31:13
My anger is very powerful, and my anger helps me to be a fighter when I need to fight. And it has protected me. It has inspired me. There have been so many moments, even as a female entrepreneur, when somebody has told me, you know, pipe down, ambition is not appropriate for women, Be satisfied with what you’re getting, even though I know other people are being paid more for the same work, where I relied on the wisdom of anger to say no. Right?
Kris Carr
00:31:13 – 00:31:41
And so I don’t want to vilify it. And yet, I definitely need to learn more about it because it’ll be a go to emotion for me if I’m not careful, thoughtful, inquisitive. My grandmother also used to say that emotions like anger and grief specifically were unbecoming for women. And she came from a very different time. Right?
Kris Carr
00:31:41 – 00:32:14
And so the chapter on anger is called Becoming, Unbecoming. And when I started to explore it more, and I have in my own therapy for many years, but actually starting to explore the mechanics of anger, almost like, you know, you’re approaching a research project, is that many people say that it’s a signaling emotion. Right? And it’s signaling to something else. It’s like the tip of the iceberg is what you see, but underneath of the iceberg is so much bigger.
Kris Carr
00:32:15 – 00:32:30
And so what is it signaling? What is it trying to point out to us? Sometimes it can be injustice. Sometimes it can be extreme pain. Like anger is saying, oh, this is not okay.
Kris Carr
00:32:31 – 00:33:10
And anger is also very protective. And so for me, if grief was something that felt so scary and so destabilizing. You know, there’s a reason why we go into fights, light, or freeze because it’s like a physical manifestation of us protecting ourselves. If an emotion like grief feels so unstabilizing to many of us because, again, we don’t necessarily have the tools for this, especially because we live in a grief-phobic society. Right.
Kris Carr
00:33:10 – 00:33:29
So few of us know how to talk about these things or want to talk about these things because we’re afraid of how people will react. Then an emotion like anger is going can easily step in and help you out. You know, like, oh, I’m starting to feel these emotions. I’m starting to feel out of control. I start to feel so uncomfortable.
Kris Carr
00:33:30 – 00:33:42
And then all of the stuff that can bubble up as a result of that, people will judge me. People won’t like me. People won’t wanna hang out with me because I’m a big downer. Boom. I got you, buttercup.
Victoria Volk
00:33:44 – 00:34:05
There was one part too where you where you talk about making yourself small. I can’t remember exactly how, how it went, but just to the, what you were just saying, how we make ourselves small, especially when we’re trying to express anger and then we’re told you’re too much or you’re too loud or, you know, be seen and not heard and all of these messages that we receive more commonly as little girls. Right?
Kris Carr
00:34:06 – 00:34:06
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:34:07 – 00:34:25
Do you see yourself as I mean, would you describe yourself as a child and like a free spirit, kind of wild, kind of like a poking the bear questioner, initiator of things, maybe initiator of other people? Do you just would you describe yourself like that?
Kris Carr
00:34:26 – 00:34:58
I think as a child, there was definitely a free spirit and a very creative little soul, and very imaginative, very caring. Somebody who’s I hopefully still have those traits. Very connected to animals in nature. And I don’t think I was a bear poker because I think I was very shy and very kind of like, I gotta figure out feel my way because the world isn’t safe. It wasn’t until much later in life that I became a bear poker.
Victoria Volk
00:34:59 – 00:35:17
Yes. Okay. That’s what I was gonna get to because when you start coming into your own. Right? Because you had a lot of grief in your childhood. So I just I saw myself in your story, and that’s why I asked that because, yeah, I just I felt like we’re kindred spirits in a way.
Kris Carr
00:35:17 – 00:35:41
Yeah. Oh, well, that’s wonderful. I mean, I think the more we don’t know if you feel this way, but the more work that I’ve done to heal my heart and befriend myself and really, like who I am. And I think one of the greatest things that you can ever experience in this life is the joy of your own company.
Victoria Volk
00:35:39 – 00:35:39
Mhmm.
Kris Carr
00:35:39 – 00:35:41
And I really wanna park on that for a minute because people don’t talk about it enough.
Kris Carr
00:35:42 – 00:35:53
I mean, getting to a point where you enjoy your own company is so big. We come here alone. We leave her alone. And we live in an epidemic of loneliness. We do need each other.
Kris Carr
00:35:53 – 00:36:00
We need community. We need support. We need our people and our true blues. But, damn, we need ourselves.
Victoria Volk
00:36:00 – 00:36:04
I think it goes back to what you said about self-soothing,
Kris Carr
00:36:03 – 00:36:03
Yeah
Victoria Volk
00:36:03 – 00:36:04
our ability to do that.
Kris Carr
00:36:05 – 00:36:30
I don’t think any of that matters unless we can do that, because all of it was temporary. You’re always gonna reach outside of yourself.
Victoria Volk
00:36:11 – 00:36:11
Mhmm.
Kris Carr
00:36:11 – 00:36:30
And then when a relationship ends, it’s gonna be so destabilizing. Because you never had that relationship connection with yourself first and foremost. And so to go back to your question, when did it when did I start to come into my own?
Kris Carr
00:36:30 – 00:36:49
It was more so when I said, I don’t really care what other people think about me. I don’t wanna be a jerk. And but I’m less interested in what other people think about me and more interested in that relationship and what I think about me and my ability to enjoy my own company.
Victoria Volk
00:36:49 – 00:36:56
I actually I’m glad you said that because I actually had, are you someone who enjoys alone time?
Kris Carr
00:36:56 – 00:36:57
Why?
Victoria Volk
00:36:57 – 00:37:18
Maybe you even need it, because that was actually one thing I wrote on there because I love my alone time. I need it. I love my own company. But this is a great segue into having more 4 legged friends than 2 legged friends.
Kris Carr
00:37:19 -00:37:19
Mmm..
Victoria Volk
00:37:19 – 00:37:22
And the fact that you, don’t have children, but you had you know, buddy or dog, you talk about losing buddy your dog.
Victoria Volk
00:37:22 – 00:37:33
And I just kinda wanna talk about if you are open to sharing about the importance of the importance that animals played a role in your healing and as you were grieving.
Kris Carr
00:37:34 – 00:37:54
Yeah, they always will. They’re so a big a big part of my life. And I’ve had a lot of fur children. And you’ve you know this because you are in this world. And so I remember the first time that I got the concept that the other side of grief is love.
Victoria Volk
00:37:54 – 00:37:54
Mmm
Kris Carr
00:37:55 – 00:38:23
And the more that we love, the more we’re gonna grieve. But who wants to go through life saying, oh, no love for me because I don’t wanna feel that pain? So taking on all these incredible companion animals, you know that at some point, you’re gonna have to say goodbye to them. And several of my fur children were very instrumental at certain points in my healing. My first my cat.
Kris Carr
00:38:23 – 00:38:33
My dedicated my second book to my cat. My cat was the first person I told I had cancer, Kristal, I’ve got cancer. What are we gonna do? Right?
Kris Carr
00:38:33 – 00:39:00
And so she was a big part of that early journey. And then Buddy was a big part of making peace with not having children. And then here comes this big old hound dog who is, you know, near death, emaciated, we found on the side of a mountain while we were hiking and nursing him back to health. And thinking, wow, there’s love all around if I just choose to open to it. It might not be in the form that I think.
Kris Carr
00:39:01 – 00:39:21
And it’s in this case, it’s a big old hound dog. But boy, do I love him. And life is still good. And, then most recently, my dog, Lola, who is probably my number one soulmate. And so she was there throughout my dad’s journey and she passed after.
Kris Carr
00:39:21 – 00:39:45
And I think she stuck around because she knew that it would be so big for me. And I couldn’t lose them both at the same time. So we have all these opportunities. And the reason why I write about pet loss in the book is because I was actually shocked by a lot of the grief books and grief literature that didn’t either include it or dealt it dealt with pet loss in a way that felt very diminishing?
Victoria Volk
00:39:46 – 00:39:58
I actually just developed a pet loss program.
Kris Carr
00:39:50 – 00:39:50
Oh.
Victoria Volk
00:39:51 – 00:39:58
But it hasn’t launched yet. And, because I’ve had clients that I’ve worked with where they were seeing, it was a single woman. She didn’t have children.
Victoria Volk
00:39:58 – 00:40:17
She didn’t have a spouse. Her family were in another country. Like she came here with knowing nobody and that her dog was her everything. And so people don’t understand or even think about grief when it comes to pets. But it’s like, we can just go out and get another pet and the things people say.
Victoria Volk
00:40:17 – 00:40:29
Right? And it just yeah. It’s so this is why I started this podcast so people can learn. Right? So people can learn through people’s stories of the import of all the different ways we grieve.
Victoria Volk
00:40:29 – 00:40:39
But even if you’re listening to this and you, for whatever reason, can’t have a pet, get a plant.
Kris Carr
00:40:40 – 00:40:40
Mhmm.
Victoria Volk
00:40:41 – 00:40:44
I see a plant in your background. I have one right on my shelf here. I started actually, that was one of the things I think naturally came up for me.
Victoria Volk
00:40:44 – 00:40:52
And as I was starting my healing was I just started accumulating plants left and right. Like, you know, it’s nurturing something.
Kris Carr
00:40:52 – 00:40:53
Uh-huh.
Victoria Volk
00:40:53 – 00:40:55
You know, I think get a plant.
Kris Carr
00:40:55 – 00:40:55
Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:40:56 – 00:41:00
Think of yourself as a plant. Like, what does a plant need? It needs water.
Victoria Volk
00:41:00 – 00:41:13
It needs sunlight. It needs I think it goes back to what is that, doctor Emoto with the water and the rice, the rice experiment where you talk to it. And, I mean, you could talk to your plants. You talk to your pets. Right?
Kris Carr
00:41:13 – 00:41:14
Oh, yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:41:14 – 00:41:41
But none of those things, like, judge, analyze, or criticize you. So you can say whatever you want. And I think that’s the different dynamic of that relationship is that and why the bond is so deep for so many people with their pets is that they feel like you said in your book, it’s like it’s like Christmas morning. Every morning, every day that you your dog sees you, it’s like you could be gone 3 minutes. Like, I can leave and be gone for 3 minutes.
Victoria Volk
00:41:41 – 00:41:51
And my dog, it’s like Christmas morning. I was perfectly how you said that. So, yeah, it’s I think it’s one of the most minimized losses, and so it is something that I’m looking to address. And
Kris Carr
00:41:51 – 00:41:53
I’m so happy to hear that.
Speaker 1
00:41:53 – 00:42:00
So I’m glad we talked about that. Let me look on time. Okay. So I’m just gonna can I just do, like, a quick run through of questions?
Kris Carr
00:42:00 – 00:42:02
Oh, yeah. Of course.
Victoria Volk
00:42:03 – 00:42:11
Okay. Maybe these aren’t gonna be quick answers. I don’t know. Let’s see. I loved how you said life is a terminal condition. We’re all going to die.
Victoria Volk
00:42:12 – 00:42:24
But how many of us truly live? And acceptance helps get you there. And I think you’ve really touched on that quite a bit, not as much of the acceptance piece, but I guess I’ll ask you this. What does acceptance mean to you?
Kris Carr
00:42:25 – 00:42:48
Acceptance for me means that I accept who I am and what my needs are, and then I have my back. I’m not trying to be somebody I’m not. I’m not putting myself into a box that was not made for me. And, that’s a piece of it, but also accepting when I’m going through a difficult time that this is what’s happening. I’m not sugarcoating it.
Kris Carr
00:42:48 – 00:43:08
I’m not trying to slap on an affirmation, even though I think affirmations are very helpful. I’m accepting that this is where I am so that I can do the healing work. That perhaps some of that healing work will help me get to another place. But if not, I’m giving myself which exactly what I need, which is some heart tending.
Victoria Volk
00:43:09 – 00:43:14
And even if just for that moment, you feel better, I mean,
Kris Carr
00:43:12 – 00:43:12
Yeah
Victoria Volk
00:43:12 – 00:43:14
that’s a win.
Kris Carr
00:43:14 – 00:43:15
It’s huge win.
Victoria Volk
00:43:16 – 00:43:49
As your dad was going through his cancer treatment, I’m just curious on this because I just I spoke with another end of I’m trained in the end of life doula. And I spoke to another gentleman just recently. And the big conversation was having your affairs in order and just preparing and all of that. And so I imagine, like, when you got your diagnosis and when your father received his, was that something that had you already is that something that you’d, like, made a mission to take care of, like, get your affairs in order? Is that something that your dad made a priority when you first diagnosed?
Kris Carr
00:43:50 – 00:44:14
When I was first diagnosed, I didn’t wanna get my affairs in order. And I had there was a lot of frustration around my unwillingness to get my affairs in order. And it’s one of the reasons why my biological father left my life again.
Victoria Volk
00:44:09 – 00:44:09
Mmm
Kris Carr
00:44:10 – 00:44:14
So I met him when I was 18, and he split again when I was not long after I was diagnosed. And so and I was partly around that.
Kris Carr
00:44:15 – 00:44:33
And so for me, it was like I will do this on my own timeline when I’m ready. I’m not ready to talk about this. And I’m not going to have it forced upon me. So, but, you know, obviously it’s helpful to have these things in place. It’s something that I’m working on now.
Kris Carr
00:44:34 – 00:44:55
I’m 52, and I really wasn’t ready to do it. And for me, it was a psychological block. And now it feels like, you know, my husband and I get on a turbulent plane, and we own our business together, and we run everything together. And it’s sort of like, jeez. Still a little stressed out that we don’t have.
Kris Carr
00:44:56 – 00:45:29
I mean so it’s like, let’s Just take care of some of these things, especially because it makes whether you realize it or not, it brings you more peace and clarity and what not. It’s also really important as our life does become shorter, because dying is a big job. It’s a big job. And we, as a culture, we are the first to throw the big parties and get all the gear and the showers and what not, for when a baby comes into this planet. And it’s a wonderful celebratory event.
Kris Carr
00:45:30 – 00:46:07
But dying is very complicated it takes a lot of energy and it leaves a lot of tentacles and yet it’s so scary for many of us that we don’t have somebody to walk through it with. And that’s when a lot of stuff can happen, I think, in families too. A lot of undue stress and tension and discord and even, you know, estrangements and whatnot. So my dad and I talked about it a lot. At first, it was hard to talk about though, and I wasn’t sure if he wanted to talk about it.
Kris Carr
00:46:07 – 00:46:24
And so I approached it very delicately. Is this something you’d like to talk about? And the answer was yes. And I worked on it with my therapist because I was afraid that I would fall apart and make things worse. And I said, I am willing to talk about these things.
Kris Carr
00:46:25 – 00:46:34
I might not always keep it together. There will be tissues. I might say the wrong thing, but I’m willing to show up. And he was grateful for it. And so we did talk about that.
Kris Carr
00:46:34 – 00:46:55
We did talk about his fears. We did talk about his wishes. And we talked about what he wanted at his celebration of life. There were absolute tears. When hospice came, they told us with him in the room, you know that this is not curative.
Kris Carr
00:46:56 – 00:47:11
We are making you comfortable. Here are the stages of what will happen. This is what will happen as your body starts to shut down. This family is what we’re teaching you and how to support. I’d never had candid conversations like that before.
Kris Carr
00:47:11 – 00:47:34
It was terrifying. I was grateful that we were in the middle of the pandemic because I had a mask on, and I would just pull it up really high. So that nobody could see that I was like, my lips were quivering and I was crying under the mask and whatnot. Because I was so scared to have that conversation. And I know people who, you know, whose loved ones have said, I’d really like to talk about what I want you to have.
Kris Carr
00:47:34 – 00:47:43
And they shut the loved one down and say, I don’t wanna talk about this. This isn’t positive. Oh, don’t worry about it. You’ve got plenty of time. La la la.
Kris Carr
00:47:43 – 00:48:07
That’s all coming from that person’s own discomfort, which I honor. But for the person who’s dying or struggling with mortality that you know, may have less time than you, it can be very isolating, create a lot more loneliness and a lot more discomfort. So it’s these opportunities that we have to really, like, grow up and show up.
Victoria Volk
00:48:08 – 00:48:11
Grow up and show up. Suck it up, buttercup.
Kris Carr
00:48:14 – 00:48:22
You know, you don’t want to. Like, I didn’t I really didn’t wanna put on my, like, big grown up panties, but I was like, I can do it now. When are you gonna do it?
Victoria Volk
00:48:23 – 00:48:32
But it is. It’s it’s the ability to okay. These are my emotions. I’m just gonna park them to the side before I walk in the store so that I can be fully present and give my loved one what they need.
Kris Carr
00:48:33 – 00:48:33
Yeah
Victoria Volk
00:48:34 – 00:48:36
And so that they feel heard.
Victoria Volk
00:48:36 – 00:49:09
And that is very difficult to do. And I think when you save those conversations for the death bed, that time could be spent having rich, meaningful conversations. And so I think it’s the importance of us planning for ourselves ahead of time so that we can have those deeper conversations and we’re not worried about the logistics after we’re gone. I think that’s the biggest service we can give our loved ones that we have power to do, I think.
Kris Carr
00:49:09 – 00:49:25
Yeah. The second intention so I wanna just I’ll remind that you’ve when everyone listening, the first intention that was helpful for me, I throw it out if it’s gonna be helpful for anyone else, is to lead with love. You know, like, I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what to say. I don’t know how to show up.
Kris Carr
00:49:25 – 00:49:50
What would love do? What would love say? What does leading with love look like? And then just do that. And then the second thing is an intention that I set for myself, and this really helped me in the difficult conversations that I thought I would literally implode or come undone or just like, evaporate in my chair because they were so scary and big and hard in my mind was, how do I minimize my regrets?
Victoria Volk
00:49:51 – 00:49:51
Mmm
Kris Carr
00:49:53 – 00:50:11
What’s it gonna take for me to minimize my regrets? Am I gonna regret that I didn’t have the courage to have this conversation when my loved one wanted to have it? Yes. I am gonna regret that. Is that fear of that regret bigger than my lack of courage right now?
Kris Carr
00:50:11 – 00:50:14
Yes. There’s your answer.
Victoria Volk
00:50:16 – 00:50:19
The answers are in the deeper questions, really.
Kris Carr
00:50:19 – 00:50:20
Not easy.
Victoria Volk
00:50:21 – 00:51:03
You talk about caregiving and giving versus receiving, and being I loved how you said this, but being a giver you felt like nothing could ever be taken away from me. And you said, listen to the whispers before they become roars. And so just the act of like caregiving versus giving. And, you know, I think just in reading your story, reading the book, which I highly recommend everybody does because there’s so many layers to yours to your book that I would love to cover all of those in this podcast. But can you just speak to a little bit for those who are in the caregiving role and people who have always been the giver, giver, giver, giver, giver, giver, and then they find themselves in the giving role.
Victoria Volk
00:51:03 – 00:51:24
And then like yourself where you’re diagnosed and then you’re having to receive and the challenge of that. And then you’re having you’re you’re needing like, not needing support, but being faced with this grief of a different kind of grief right, with your chosen father. Again, here, I’m asking like, 3 questions in 1. Can you just speak to that giving versus receiving a little bit?
Kris Carr
00:51:25 – 00:51:42
Yeah. I think it’s helpful for each of us if we struggle with receiving, to really get to the nugget of the why. Because the nugget of the why has freedom for us. And for me, it was actually really as a result of writing this book. Because when you write, you have to figure shit out.
Victoria Volk
00:51:43 – 00:51:43
uh-huh mmm.
Kris Carr
00:51:43 – 00:51:57
You have to be able to articulate it. You have to be able to understand it. It’s not just an esoteric feeling or vibe that you have. And for me, I was like, wow. It wasn’t until I wrote that sentence that pieces of me came together.
Kris Carr
00:51:58 – 00:52:15
Yeah. And I knew that somewhere, but I didn’t really understand it. And it goes back to that core trauma of loss, of abandonment. So if I’m the giver, nothing can be taken from me. If I receive, something can be taken from me.
Kris Carr
00:52:16 – 00:52:32
So what does that hit? Big core wound for me. So if we if not everybody struggles with this, but if you do, you know, like, get to the heart of the tootsie roll pop. And you’d be surprised what’s there. And the oh, I can spend some time with this.
Kris Carr
00:52:32 – 00:53:00
And then it becomes easier to receive because we need to receive when we’re going through these difficult times. We need self-care practices. We need to keep our well not full because that’s not possible. But not running on empty that you’re going into burnout and then, you know, adrenal issues and physical illness and all the stuff that comes with it. So we’re not looking for perfection here.
Kris Carr
00:53:00 – 00:53:41
I have the full tank, and I’m all spiffy, and I’ve just had a lifestyle makeover, and I’m living my best life. It’s, like, not gonna happen when we’re going through a difficult time. But, boy, do those difficult times make us grow and evolve and become people we really wanna be. I think just to button up self-care, understanding why we might have resistance around receiving, and then as caregivers, making sure that we’re putting our masks on and we’re taking care of ourselves so that we can be as resilient as possible, as stress hardy as possible, because it’s a roller coaster. And I always encourage people to come to the day with as much as they possibly can.
Kris Carr
00:53:42 – 00:53:44
And we can’t do that when we’re on empty.
Victoria Volk
00:53:45 – 00:54:10
You talk about having 2 intentions for the book, like, for the audience, those reading it and for you to normalize conversations around the different emotions so that people feel less alone and crazy and that to heal the deeper parts of yourself as a result of this writing. And you kind of touched on one of those. But what did you learn about and heal for yourself while you’re writing it and since the book has been out?
Kris Carr
00:54:12 – 00:55:20
You know, you write the book and then you think it’s one thing, and then you talk about the book and it becomes something else.
Victoria Volk
00:54:20 – 00:54:20
Mmm..
Kris Carr
00:54:21 – 00:55:04
And, so the whole process is very illuminating. And I’d say my biggest growth edge has been my willingness to talk about really difficult things, even more difficult things than my own diagnosis. And you read that vulnerability is a strength, and it can be a meme and a TED Talk and all the things. But then I think for me, until I really allow myself to go to a more vulnerable place, And I did push myself in the book to tell the stories the way they were and not a polished version that would be more appropriate for Instagram, that I did find a real strength in that.
Kris Carr
00:55:04 – 00:55:17
And the strength in that vulnerability isn’t a hard strength. It’s a soft strength. That strength and that softness of vulnerability, something I’m still exploring and experiencing but really enjoying.
Victoria Volk
00:55:19 – 00:55:21
Do you have any regrets?
Kris Carr
00:55:24 – 00:55:51
My dad wanted to have a celebration of life on Zoom while he was still alive, in addition to the celebration of life that he had and we had when he was gone, and I couldn’t do it. And I said, I can’t do that. I can’t do that. No. And it didn’t happen, and I regret that.
Victoria Volk
00:55:55 – 00:56:01
Is there anything else you would like to share, or do you have a little bit of time where I can ask a few more questions?
Kris Carr
00:56:02 – 00:56:06
Yeah. I can definitely do a little more time? Yeah.
Victoria Volk
00:56:07 – 00:56:07
Okay.
Kris Carr
00:56:08 – 00:56:09
Maybe 5 minutes or so.
Victoria Volk
00:56:09 – 00:56:18
Okay. Let me just look here. I wanna make sure I’m picking the one I wanted to pick. Oh, yeah. This is one thing you hear a lot.
Victoria Volk
00:56:18 – 00:56:34
Like, especially after people pass away. They lost their battle to cancer or they’re losing the battle. Did you have moments that you felt this or was this outside messaging? And what do you think about this messaging?
Kris Carr
00:56:36 – 00:56:58
I think every patient is different. It is not my preferred messaging for myself because I live with cancer, so I don’t see that I’m warring with my body. I think that I have cancer in my liver and both of my lungs. Those organs need more support. Those organs are struggling.
Kris Carr
00:56:58 – 00:57:16
Why am I gonna beat them up? Why you know what I mean? I wanna learn more about them so I can care for them and see what they like and what they don’t like. And, again, going back to that part of, like, amputating parts of ourselves. I was worrying with my body way before cancer
Victoria Volk
00:57:16 – 00:57:16
Mmm..
Kris Carr
00:57:17 – 00:57:20
of you know, other things I didn’t like about myself or my weight or whatever it was at the time.
Kris Carr
00:57:21 – 00:57:36
Just always in a fight with my body. And it’s like, gosh, this body does so much on a daily basis to keep me alive. Things I could never even wrap my mind around. It’s a miracle. It’s like I wanna be on the side of my body, not fighting against it.
Kris Carr
00:57:36 – 00:58:07
So that, again, does not work for me. I think my biggest pet peeve is when people who don’t have cancer use cancer metaphors. Like, I don’t get triggered by a lot of things. I’m not a you know, I’m not a I don’t really walk on eggshells or things like this, but it does bother me when people use cancer metaphors of like, that behavior is a cancer or that person is a metastasis or you know, a lot of folks use that. And so I would say, don’t do that.
Victoria Volk
00:58:08 – 00:58:08
Mhmm.
Kris Carr
00:58:09 – 00:58:13
Doesn’t feel good for people who actually have cancer.
Victoria Volk
00:58:13 – 00:58:23
Right. Thank you for sharing that. What is something about you that many people don’t know? It’s not in the books. You haven’t said it before.
Victoria Volk
00:58:23 – 00:58:28
I guess you answered maybe the one regret. Maybe I have I don’t know if you’ve said that before, but
Kris Carr
00:58:28 – 00:58:43
No. I’ve never said that before. People don’t know about me. Well, I have said a lot of things about me because I do use my stories. My teaching method, I like to teach through stories.
Kris Carr
00:58:44 – 00:59:02
Well, I have been into Budweiser Super Bowl commercials.
Victoria Volk
00:58:47 – 00:58:47
What?
Kris Carr
00:58:47 – 00:59:02
In my previous career as an actor, and as somebody who did a lot of TV commercials and a lot of advertising, I was into Budweiser Super Bowl, bowl commercials.
Victoria Volk
00:59:03 – 00:59:04
That’s pretty cool.
Kris Carr
00:59:06 – 00:59:07
That’s cool.
Victoria Volk
00:59:09 – 00:59:17
Too bad it couldn’t have been, well, the Budweiser well, it was I thought the best one this past Super Bowl was the Dunkings. Dunkings.
Kris Carr
00:59:18 – 00:59:27
That’s amazing. Yeah. Yeah. I usually watch the commercials because it was just, like, a very big part of my career but I didn’t watch them this year. But this really is kinda like the Oscars of advertising.
Victoria Volk
00:59:27 – 00:59:27
Yeah.
Kris Carr
00:59:28 – 00:59:28
So
Victoria Volk
00:59:29 – 00:59:39
that’s that’s very cool. Okay. Well, I will leave it there. I think that’s a fun. We’ll leave it on a fun note.
Kris Carr
00:59:39 – 00:59:39
Yeah
Victoria Volk
00:59:39 – 00:59:53
And, because if I ask another question, it’s gonna be a deep run, probably. So you just have to read the book, my friends, because all the questions I’d probably ask her in the book. Anything else you would like to share, though?
Kris Carr
00:59:54 – 01:00:08
No. Thank you so much. This is a beautiful interview, and I’m so appreciative of the places that you took it. I really love having these transparent, honest conversations. Again, going back to how have you grown?
Kris Carr
01:00:08 – 01:00:16
What have you learned? And these are the conversations I wanna have. So thank you for allowing me to have one with you and with your community.
Victoria Volk
01:00:17 – 01:00:26
Thank you. I purposefully did not watch any of your other podcast interviews or listened to anything else because I just wanted to stay in my own lane
Kris Carr
01:00:26 – 01:00:26
Yeey!
Victoria Volk
01:00:27 – 01:00:29
because I can’t let’s see. Like, I have so much did you see the highlight?
Kris Carr
01:00:29 – 01:00:31
Oh my gosh.
Victoria Volk
01:00:31 – 01:00:59
I don’t know why I do that screen like that, but there’s so many. I’ve highlights and doggy ears, and it just really I really enjoyed the book. If people are uncomfortable with grief, I think it’s a wonderful story. You again, like you said, you I think teaching through story is the best way to share information. It’s something I think I personally need to do more of.
Victoria Volk
01:00:59 – 01:01:20
And so thank you for writing this book. I think it’s wonderful for people who are going through something that can maybe see a different perspective through a lens of someone who’s been living it for so long in so many different ways.
Kris Carr
01:01:17 – 01:01:17
Mmm
Victoria Volk
01:00:17 – 01:01:20
It’s a great example of grief and the many faces of it. So thank you.
Kris Carr
01:01:20 – 01:01:21
Thanks, Victoria.
Victoria Volk
01:01:22 – 01:01:24
And where can people find you?
Kris Carr
01:01:24 – 01:01:34
You can find me at kriscarr.com. You can find me on Instagram at @crazysexykris, and the book is available anywhere books are sold.
Victoria Volk
01:01:34 – 01:01:42
And I will put links in the show notes. Remember, when you unleash your heart, you unleash your life. Much love.
Educational, Grief, Grief Stories, Grief Tips, Personal, Pespective |
Recently, I was recording with a podcast host and was asked to share one thing listeners could do after listening to the episode. It could be something helpful, a tip, etc. Rather than sharing a tip, two questions came to mind that, in a nutshell, help us to name areas of grief in our lives and those were:
- What do you wish (about your life) would be different, better, or more?
- Where in your life do you have a loss of hopes, dreams, or expectations?
As I have been reflecting on that conversation, there is another way I would challenge you to ask those questions.
What breaks my heart?
What breaks my heart lately is knowing how fleeting time truly is.
Time was also an aspect of the conversation with the host that has gotten me thinking about my relationship with time.
The first question the host asked me was how I felt at that moment, which was unexpected. All the same, I appreciated the question. My response was that I was feeling overwhelmed.
I know the next eight weeks of my life will feel like a time warp; I already feel like I’m in some time machine. Time is moving so fast that it’s challenging to get my bearings, to feel grounded and centered, and amid the excitement, joy, grief, and feelings of overwhelm, there’s a strong desire to make it all come to a complete stop. However, there is no stopping it.
Many events are happening between now and mid-May, when our oldest child will graduate from high school. And I think it’s all starting to hit us. And what’s breaking my heart the most these days is that our family dynamics will soon change. One of our “pack” will leave to start a new chapter of life, shaking up our sense of “home.” And, I think to myself…”My God, if this is what it feels like when one leaves the next, how will I ever deal with the last one leaving the nest?”
Parenthood brings up all of the childhood junk we’ve yet to address in our hearts, and what comes up for us changes with the tides of parenting life. And what if you never had the opportunity to be a parent? Or, what if you had the opportunity to be a parent but, because of any number of scenarios, the child passed away before being allowed to see them leave the nest and spread their wings?
There is grief – no matter which way you dice it.
So what’s been breaking my heart?
Knowing that my family is approaching change and what will that change mean? How will that change affect each of us individually? I can say that I’ve already noticed small shifts – in a good way. I feel as though communication has improved. We are almost trying to squeeze the juice of each day a little more. These are good things. However, is my heart still breaking? Of course.
I know change is a necessary part of life. Without change, we would remain stagnant; growth would be a foreign concept. Changes that bring challenges are an opportunity to look within ourselves.
It’s a poignant question to dig deep into yourself today. Give yourself an intentional 15 minutes, and immerse yourself in the gift of time to uncover something simmering below the surface emotionally.
Break the habit of thinking that the solution to your problems is to rearrange things outside. The only permanment solution to your problems is to go inside and let go of the part of you that seems to have so many problesm with reality. – From The Untethered Soul
Cancer, Cancer Thriver, Chronic Illness, Grief Stories, Grieving Voices Guest, Grieving Voices Podcast, Podcast |
Anne Jacobs | 17 Years +++ Metastatic Checkin 2
SHOW NOTES SUMMARY:
Imagine being told you have cancer. But then imagine being told you have cancer for which there was no cure. At that moment, in an instant, life is forever changed. And, although many people hear the words “You have cancer” every single day, fewer hear that the type of cancer they have will, without a doubt, kill them. That is unless a cure is found.
Anne shares, in this follow-up, what hearing those words was like and the thoughts that raced through her mind. We talk about what life has been like since we last recorded, and how she’s doing now.
Anne also shares about what her first distance reiki session was like that she had with me.
I encourage you to listen to her first episode. We dig into different areas of her cancer journey in this episode and, as always, Anne brings lightness to her experience and wisdom to those listening.
If you could only plan your life 2 months at a time, how differently do you think you would plan your days?
RESOURCES:
CONNECT WITH ANNE:
Victoria Volk 0:08
This is Victoria of theunleashedheart.com, and you’re listening to grieving voices, a podcast for hurting hearts who desire to be heard. Or anyone who wants to learn how to better support loved ones experiencing loss. As a 30 plus year griever and advanced Grief Recovery Method specialist, I know how badly the conversation around grief needs to change. Through this podcast, I aim to educate gravers and non Grievers alike, spread hope and inspire compassion toward those hurting. Lastly, by providing my heart with yours and this platform, Grievers had the opportunity to share their wisdom and stories of loss and resiliency. How about we talk about grief, like we talked about the weather. Let’s get started. Hello, and welcome, again to grieving voices if you’ve been here before, and if this is your first time listening, thank you for being here. Today, my guest is and Jacobs. And this is actually a follow up episode to just check in and see how she is doing. We had originally recorded in early February of 2020, kind of at the start of COVID-19. And that episode actually didn’t air until April 6. And that episode is called The Road Less Traveled 17 years with triple positive metastatic breast cancer, which Anne has. And so Anne, thank you again for letting me follow up with you in sharing your follow up with my listeners. Thank you for being here.
Anne Jacobs 1:52
Oh, you’re welcome. Again, my honor. To be part of it.
Victoria Volk 1:58
So lots changed for a lot of people since we originally recorded and what I want to give you an opportunity to share really is how COVID impacted you on top of having cancer. And we’ll get into all sorts of good stuff, I’m sure but what is the update that you would like to share?
Anne Jacobs 2:26
Um, well, the the update, which is is good news is that the the current drug that I’m on, it’s called it’s a fairly new drug, it’s called an her to E n h e r t u is is working, which means it’s either keeping my cancer stable or best case scenario is what we call no evidence of disease or no evidence of active disease. And the last PET scan I had showed the cancer that’s in my right lung is stable, which I’m thrilled with because it’s a little bit currently is a little bit more active than my lower spine and my lower spine is is no evidence of active disease, which means the cancer is still there. But when the but the PET scan doesn’t pick up enough uptake to like if you if you went in had a PET scan and you got the same uptake as I did be normal. They you know, they wouldn’t consider anyone else having cancer so, so right now I’m I’m stable, which is wonderful. I always get nervous before my next PET scan, which I’m going to have in August. They call that scan scan xiety Because sometimes you have or sometimes I have a false sense of security that in between scans, oh everything’s okay. And then as you get closer to the next scan, you start to wonder, okay, well what is really going on? And what will the PET scan show? And is the cancer actually more active than than the prior scan? So that it can be a very extreme anxiety or it can be low level nervousness, but either way most I usually experience it so that so cancer wise I’m I’m doing well, I’ve been on treatment every three weeks for the cancer drug and then I also get immunotherapy to help boost my immune system about one to two weeks after my my cancer treatment. So that’s that’s a really good thing. And I’ll stay on in her two as long as it is keeping the cancer Bay. Thankfully, I’ve been here for 17 years doing this, but eventually the drug will stop working and then I’ll get on a new treatment. So that’s sort of another fear is that okay, well What’s next in the pipeline? I’ll probably ask my oncologist at my next appointment, if my next PET scan shows increase, you know, what do you it’s not, you know, a solid decision. But you know, what else is out there? What are my, my options? So, but for right now it’s it’s all it’s good.
Victoria Volk 5:23
It’s so good to hear. So glad for you and your family. I’m sure it’s like a party every time. Good results come back, I’m sure.
Anne Jacobs 5:33
Yeah, it’s, um, well, when I do get the PET scan results, I get them in my online health portal. And actually, I have my husband, read them, I can’t I don’t read them anymore. I used to just, you know, go can’t wait to get the results, read them. And let’s see what it is. But for I’d say for the past two years, I’ll just tell him, okay, the results are in you read them and tell me what they are. Because I’ve asked my oncologist to send them as soon as she gets them. And because I could ask her not to put them in my portal and just wait till my next appointment. But so he’ll read them. And if they’re good, it’s okay. You know, I physically feel myself relax. If they’re not then like, okay, you know, I usually I’ll have a physical reaction one way or the other. And then we’ll tell my kids, and they will react to them. And they’ve been doing it for 17 years as well. And they will be relieved and pumped up. If it’s good news. And if it’s not, then they say, Okay, well, Mom’s gonna go see your oncologist. And they’ll come up with a new plan. And, you know, we’ll go from their, I don’t know, probably someday, I hope it’s not for a long time, might have to have the conversation of well, we’ve done all we can, but I don’t think about that. And I am sure they have it in the back of their mind. But because who wouldn’t, but it’s not something that we we focus on. So it’s kind of like when the PET scan results. Give us like a wave like a wave. It’s not like a big high, high low, kind of in the middle of, okay, yes, it’s good, or no, it’s not. And then, you know, either path, you take either path to, okay, I’m going this way to the left, or going this way to the right.
Victoria Volk 7:33
So you get these wonderful results in the middle of a pandemic. And I’m curious how the pandemic has impacted, really probably your mindset in a lot of ways, I’m sure, or, yeah, I guess, in what ways has the pandemic affected you
Anne Jacobs 7:54
In the in the beginning, I’m not too much, because I have to be careful. Anyway, because my immune systems compromised. So I was wearing masks on airplanes. Before the pandemic, I was washing my hands like crazy. Before the pandemic, I was, you know, doing all that picking and choosing who I could be around when I could be around people, and that kind of thing. But as time went on, I kind of probably joined the rest of the world who wasn’t used to living like that, because I really resented having to wear a mask. I just like as soon as I would walk out of a store, I’d rip the thing off. I didn’t wear my mask outside. Because with my, I have half of a right lung that work. So if I had it on too long, it just affected my breathing. So as soon as I get outside, I just rip the thing off because I just resented another rule that I had to follow that I had no control over. So in that it was a balancing act. Things in our house kind of were the same. My husband is a he works for himself. So he and his assistant works out there their routine, you know, at work, but he got up every day and went to work. So it felt inside the house, it felt normal, but then when I’m home alone, I could I could go out and walk I’d be outside with the dogs, but if I wanted to go anywhere, you know, maybe I couldn’t the things that you know, if I wanted to go lose myself in TJ Maxx, you know, for an hour just looking at stuff. I couldn’t do that. I couldn’t do the things that I would normally use to escape to get back to doing things that maybe regular people do. So that that became pretty hard. And then I finally saw my mom laugh earlier this month and seen her body A year and a half, that was pretty hard. We talked every day, but not being able to know that she could fly out or I could go see her that was actually really hard. Because that was part of my life. She we would see each other 234 times a year, depending on my health and her health. So in some respects, I felt like I was holding my breath, probably like everybody else, and you hunker down and you do what you have to do in other respects. I’m sure. It was like another added layer two of constriction. And so I, I resented that end, I had to figure out, like another way, or a way to deal with another restriction, another thing that I had to conform to health wise, that became a little challenging for me.
Victoria Volk 10:51
Well, unfortunately, things have opened up a little bit. Yes. But it’s this time of recording. And towards the end of June here, it’s kind of sounding ominous, again, a little bit with this other variant. And, yeah, so I guess we’ll all see. Right?
Anne Jacobs 11:12
Yeah. Yeah. And I think, you know, if, you know, if you’ve been through something, you kind of know what, you know, what your experience was, and how you eventually made it, through it, that experience and so you can rely on that information to, you know, prepare you for hopefully, you know, we won’t go through this again. But if we have to, at some level, whether you’re working from home, or you have you know, little little kids at home, or retired or you’ve got parents in a nursing facility, you can lean back on the experience you had and hopefully not make or make life a little bit easier. I guess, you know, we’ll see. But yeah, for for right now. It was when I when I was back in Michigan, they I live in California was back in Michigan, they had lifted the requirement to wear a mask, if you were fully vaccinated. So as soon as I got out of the airport, you have to wear an airport, because it’s the federal regulations and all that and then was with my mom and a doctor’s appointment, you wear it in the common areas, and then in the exam room, you can take it off. But other than that, it was nobody really was wearing a mask, it was just this wonderful, like joyous feeling of awe. You know, we just felt normal again. And then I, when I got back here, just a couple days there to California, is just a couple days later, when they lifted the mask requirement that you know, you’re fully vaccinated. I’ve noticed there’s more people where I live, will wear the mask than than they were in Michigan. But either way, you have the choice, you can wear it or not, you don’t have to. So I don’t.
Victoria Volk 12:58
So what have you found that has been helpful to you living with cancer during a pandemic,
Anne Jacobs 13:05
The thing that kept popping up for me, which, or I should say, percolating to the surface, which means I’ve been thinking about it, or it’s been, I’ve been pushing it down and and then it kind of keeps coming up and up and up is and I felt this for a long time I have, I tend to minimize for myself. Like the smaller losses, which what I consider, I’ll explain in a minute, what I consider to be smaller losses in my life, have three friends whose their, their sons have died to way too early. And one from cancer, one by suicide and one by accidental overmedicating. And that to me, is just admire these women so much. I just don’t know how they go on. But you know, they do. And I look at them, and I say, Okay, well, and just because you, you, you know, your legs hurt today and you can’t walk or all you can do is brush your teeth and go back to bed. But your kids are here, you know, my three sons are here. And so I use that as a as a benchmark. But what I found is that the more that I don’t deal with sometimes I’m even embarrassed to say like, I consider them to be insignificant because the loss of a child I just can’t even imagine. So the rest of it I think, okay, I should be able to deal with this. Because I think God forbid what if I lost a child? Then I would say I would give anything back Yes, I will live with neuropathy in my like from my feet up to my You know, hip bone, I’ll live with that. No problem, I just want my son back, I will live with the fact that, you know, I’m in bed for five days, or, you know, I’m in the hospital for five days with double pneumonia. Like, I could do anything, or I would do anything. And I know they would, too. So it’s this. I don’t know, if you call a push pony, but I had to realize that it’s okay for me to grieve what I consider the smaller losses, like to pay attention to them, and recognize them, they all pile up, and then I become, I’m tired, because I’m not sleeping well. So I have low energy, but at the same time, I’m like, lethargic, I don’t feel like doing anything, I’ll, I can’t concentrate. And if I do concentrate, it takes I have to just pull everything out of me to sit, you know, to do a task, when I get anxious or nervous or depressed. I, I don’t, some people I know, eat my responses not eating. If I allow all these little, what I consider to be little things to pile up, then it becomes this big, huge mess. And then I don’t know where to start. It’s all this stuff in a pot, I pull it out, it’s stuck to everything else. So where do you start and it becomes a little overwhelming. And then I might, you know, react or to emotion when it doesn’t warrant it, like I might become too sad or too angry. And then I know, okay, something else is going on. I really, I have to allow myself to, to pay attention to these little things along the way recognize them into me knowing that they’re they’re not going to go away. And I’ll probably feel the same thing, you know, next month, but if I don’t allow myself that ability to, to touch them to feel them these and I’m talking about the losses, and that’s what it feels like to me. You know, pick it up, hold it right, again, because if they’re like unwanted houseguests, okay, I can’t, this is what I can’t do. But what can I do? That’s sort of been my motto, but sometimes that doesn’t work. And then I know I have to do a little bit more paid more attention to what’s actually happening with me. Instead of saying, Hi, energy, I’m going to do this today. And I’m going to be grateful, I’m going to focus on the joy, I’m going to do something one thing that makes me happy, whether it’s for myself or someone else, you know, I go through my checklist, but then if that doesn’t work, then I know, okay, I’ve really got to, I’ve got to dig a little deeper and allow myself to do that. And it’s my own. I don’t know, comparisons not the right word, but to allow myself to to feel sad or angry that I’m in this situation. And my kids are are okay, and my husband’s Okay. And you know, my family’s. Okay. So that actually has been popping up quite often for the last I would say six months.
Victoria Volk 18:01
I can’t remember when. But it was after we recorded. I offered you a Reiki session. Yeah, you took part in and it was a distance Reiki session, obviously, because you’re in California, and I’m in North Dakota. And what came of that is you had shared with me after that you feel like you need to well, actually what came up during the session, and I told you was that. You need to start painting? Yes. Not knowing that you were a painter. Well, one time you painted that.
Anne Jacobs 18:34
Yeah, yeah. Like today. You look around with it. Yeah.
Victoria Volk 18:37
So have you been painting?
Anne Jacobs 18:40
I did. Actually. I went out and I bought this little, some little watercolors. I just mess around with it. I am not a painter. But so I did. I went out and bought that. And I did for probably about a month and a half. And then life started happening. And yes, that was something that came from the Reiki session. And it felt right. You know, it feels good. I have my I have it all downstairs for I keep some of my craft things. And but I have not done it for the last. I think January maybe because it’s the new year. But I haven’t done it for the last few months. But that does. And I know I’m not saying anything new here because but just to have the brush and you know, stick in the paint, whatever. I don’t even think I just start. It can be just movements of my hand on the paper or, and that’s usually actually what it is. And then I’ll look at it and say okay, well, this looks kind of angry or this looks peaceful. Or I recognize exactly what’s going on. And it’s a way to get it out of my system.
Victoria Volk 19:47
That’s where I was going. Yeah, that’s exactly where I was going to get there. Yeah. No, but that’s where I was going that i You didn’t hadn’t told me that part, but that’s what I was suspecting in what you were saying to about what you were sharing about minimizing. And in just these other losses, these smaller losses that are not small, I’m not minimizing them at all those were your words, but when you’re feeling that way, that might be a wonderful thing to pull out when you’re feeling that way. And maybe even take them outside you know.
Anne Jacobs 20:21
Yeah, that that would be a, that, that would be a good thing. And I was actually I’m headed back to to Michigan for about three weeks. And I was thinking, well, I could, I could take it with me and just have them out, you know, and just walk by, but I can do that at home as well. But yeah, it’s, it’s a good way to, to just either consciously or subconsciously get the feelings out. And I used to, I used to do it a lot. So it was the Reiki session was very sort of eye opening, that you had picked up on that when we had never talked about it before.
Victoria Volk 21:05
Do you like to share more about your experience with that Reiki session?
Anne Jacobs 21:10
Sure. So I had thought about doing one here. Years ago, I had done some research, and I’d found someone and then probably, you know, cancer gotten away, and I couldn’t do it. And then I stopped thinking about so I thought, Okay, we’ll give it a try. And truthfully, like, about how’s this gonna work? Because you’re a nurse, Dakota, I’m here. And, you know, how does the energy you’re not here in the room with me? How does the energy flow? How does this even work? So I was not skeptical, but curious. That will, okay, we’ll just, we’ll see how it goes. But I found that listening to the music, and, you know, knowing you were on the other end, because we didn’t talk for what, like, an hour hour, that that sort of mindful connection, it made a difference. So I kind of in a way I picked I had my eyes closed, you know, as laying down, and I thought, well, Victoria is in North Dakota, but what if she was like right here, and I have my eyes closed, because it’s something you when I get MRI, seguela, when I get MRIs, I close my eyes in the machine, and I just picture okay, my eyes are closed, I’ll just pretend that you know, I’m by a lake or I’m in the river in, you know, near river, it’s usually water. So I do this visualization. So I thought well, alright, yeah, I’ll just pretend you’re here in the room and what how would I be feeling what would that you know, look like anyway. So doing that made for me made this the, I guess, the energy connection. And then afterwards, I was, I felt more focused or in tune to what was, you know, going on with me, I felt a little more, I felt more at peace, a little more energized. Because I felt at peace, I didn’t have the heavyweight of my anxiety or dread, do feel that like as a weight on me, so it felt freeing. So open, and I kept that feeling, probably for a month and a half. And then, you know, real life happens and just kind of piled on again. But I, I found it I thought, Okay, well, this would be a good tool to I have to consciously add this into and make time for this because it was it was more effective, honestly, than I thought it was going to be. But I also realized that the long distance, I had to, like I said, I had to maybe work a little bit harder to make that connection. Because when someone’s in the room with you, you know, you feel their energy, you feel their presence and all that. So I had to just coordinate that with what was happening. And after I did that it, you know, it wasn’t that hard. Because, again, you’re I’m laying down and listening to the music and I’m, I’m kind of doing my work and you were doing your work somewhere between North Dakota and California. They connect him.
Victoria Volk 24:14
Well, that just speaks to the power of the mind. Right. And our intention, and in a Reiki session, there is nothing that anyone needs to do the clients like you there was nothing you would have had to do. Right be open to receive. Right. So you just took it one step further for your own intention. Yeah, but your own intention into it. And that’s, again, I’m just saying like that speaks to the power of intention. And so we can bring that in all areas of our lives.
Anne Jacobs 24:47
Yes, yeah. Yeah, we can because for me to live with intention. It’s a gift because I can’t do it fully as I would like to, but I can do it and Little People So just because of, again, you know, my energy level how I’m feeling and, you know, the other living with this unwanted houseguest have to deal with. And so that I guess, also is part of, you know, when I call some of my smaller losses is to say, Oh, I’d love to do this, but I can’t, I like literally, I can’t physically finish something that I might want to pursue. So I have to do it in little bits and pieces, knowing that I’ll never get to the end result that I might, that I might be able to if I didn’t have cancer, again, it’s and that has actually, that’s, you know, popped up these last few months, because I’ll see people around me doing these wonderful things, you know, you with your, your podcast of the year amazing guests and other friends who are, or they are living with intention. And I know they have their bad days. And I mean, everybody does, but they’re seen through and I know that can’t see something all the way through, I can go partway and enjoy what I can, but then I have to recognize, okay, well, you know, if I can’t, I can’t even think, you know, if I can’t do what XYZ but I can pull up my watercolors and I can, you know just kind of mess around with that for you know, an hour, or I can I can write or I can sit down and write for 15 minutes, which is a participated in a podcast writing with a nonprofit, they help cancer patients and, and, and the woman said, you know, you just for 15 minutes, and you know, she gave us different prompts. And she told us the best way to do it. This is just take 15 minutes, just you know, sit down and write this and come back to it. So I can do these little things in pieces. Would I ever be able to write a book? Yeah, probably not. But I have a real, you know, paint, learn how to really paint, you know, probably not, but this is what I can do. So it’s that balance of recognizing the losses. And then also, I can’t do that, and allow myself the time to grieve it. But yes, I can do this. And so I can live with intention. Not the way I’d love to. But I still can live with intention.
Victoria Volk 27:20
I disagree on that. I disagree on the book writing part of very much disagree on that.
Anne Jacobs 27:25
I don’t know.
Victoria Volk 27:26
I very much disagree. Now speaking of writing, because when we last recorded, we had a came up about writing your children letters. Yeah. Have you gotten back into that? Because I You had said that you had started doing that?
Anne Jacobs 27:42
I did and so I have been I haven’t gotten to the point where I’m writing, you know, life time, you know, I should probably well anyway, I’m sorry. Yes, I’ve been, I’ve been sending them cards, I’ll find a card that I like and then I’ll, I’ll write a note in it. And in I’ll mail it and I don’t do it. Like I could probably do it every day. Maybe like mommy’s lost it so but I’ll even you know, our youngest is he’s in transition for he’s been home for the year for for COVID. Now he’s looking to go back to school. So he’s been loving this as well. I’ll put a letter in the mailbox for him. That just turns around and comes right back. But it’s always fun to get something in the mail. So I have I have been doing that. And then I’ve also been sending them, you know, little texts, here and there. They’re so busy, that the texts have to be super short. I love you or I think you’re amazing, those kinds of things. But I haven’t gotten down to actually do that writing that we’ve that we were talking about where it’s more of a
Victoria Volk 28:50
Lessons from mom.
Anne Jacobs 28:52
Yeah, thank you. Yeah, yeah.
Victoria Volk 28:56
So don’t say I never told you so.
Anne Jacobs 28:59
Yeah. Yeah.
Victoria Volk 29:04
What do you look forward to, for the rest of 2021?
Anne Jacobs 29:08
Well, I take it in, you know, little snapshots. So I leave mid July. And I’ll go back to Michigan for about three weeks. And we have a cottage in northern Michigan. And so Chris and the boys and, and one of my son’s girlfriends, they’re going to come out for the last the last week, I’ll, I’ll be there. They come out maybe four or five, four days after and they stay for a week and then I’ll stay for like another week or so. So I’m looking forward to that and then then we come back and and I get my pet scan. And then you know have the results of that. And that that’s sort of is a go that far out. But beyond that we’re hoping to either go have a family trip to Yosemite or the Grand Canyon. So that’s, you know, out there and then my one of my brothers Is, is doing the Half Ironman back in Michigan. So in September, so I would actually like to, if I can, I’d like to go back for that, again, everything beyond the PET scan is possibilities, I’ve lived with that. So that’s not, you know, for the, thankfully again for the last 17 years, so it’s, that’s not a new feeling. And that’s not a new way of living. For us, it’s like, well, if, you know, if I’m feeling good, then we’ll, we’ll do this, if I’m not, then you know, then we won’t. So we’ve either postponed or had to cross off, you know, many different things to do as a family, but I’m hoping, because I am, I mean, I am feeling pretty good. But um, I’m hoping that we can get those participate in those things. And then comes, you know, Thanksgiving, which is a big boy, you know, they love Thanksgiving, and then there’s Christmas, and, you know, everything in between. So, I always look forward to those times, because I know they’re going to be home, my mom might be able to, to come out. So I have the fissures, the possibilities, and then the maybes, you know, the dangling ones. So that kind of keeps me going. And as you get closer to each one, as soon as I get the PET scan results, then I’ll know what the rest of the year can look like, for me. So it’s like, living in two or three months chunks at a time. I don’t really have the luxury of I can plan, but I don’t know if it’s going to happen, you know, past August, but then again, it goes back to getting myself to the point where I’m okay, you know, focus on my, I know I have to deal with because they keep coming up these these losses, and then, okay, I feel like I’ve got my head above water a little bit and then get back on track with the things that, you know, I can find joy and things I find hopeful. And, and the things I have have gratitude for. So it’s a it’s a little slower process this time around.
Victoria Volk 32:06
Do you know of other women in your area that have that are living with metastatic breast cancer?
Anne Jacobs 32:12
No, not right now. I know women who are living with either currently going through treatment or have gone through treatment that they’re not staged for, they might be one, two or three, but I’m in a Facebook group with metastatic breast cancer Facebook group. And that that is that is, is pretty helpful. Because I can if I’m when I need to get on and read I can, I can comment I can interact, or I can just sit back and read other people’s comments, that seems to that helps a lot everyone posts on there, you know, good news, bad news and in between, and you will get so much support. And it’s you know, it’s heartfelt support that you can feel through, you know, the computer like you can with the Reiki, you feel that through the, you know, the headphones, and that. So that, to me is pretty helpful. And you’re talking with women who are going through the same thing, they might not have the same cancer characteristics, and they might be on different drugs, but the issues are usually the same.
Victoria Volk 33:20
Yeah, I was just wondering if there was anyone close to you? Maybe even in that group?
Anne Jacobs 33:26
Um, there probably is. In the past, I’ve said, Yeah, let’s meet for coffee or something that didn’t happen. So right now, I don’t feel a strong need. But it might be in the future. You know, I never never say never to make that connection. I know, it’s I know, it’s there course there’s gonna there’s going to be women, you know, around me or within like, an hour two hour drive, that, you know, you could go meet the Bay Area. There’s a gal I know, she’s, she’s been dealing with metastatic cancer, she lives in Southern California, she’s very active. And I used to see her more often, just because of different things would bring us together. Now. I you know, you interact through the Facebook group, but you know, if I needed to, I could pick up the phone and call or you know, and talk. So that’s always available.
Victoria Volk 34:20
And I think there’s just I mean, it’s a good thing to have people who really get what you’re going through. Right. And so just that you have that support there. Yeah, of people who really do get it. Yeah, he’s I can’t I still can’t wrap my head around 17 years like I When is your 18th anniversary
Anne Jacobs 34:44
Next year. So it was actually July of 2004. And my kids were little, my youngest was had just turned four. We were in at our cottage in Michigan and my back started hurting, I thought, oh, you know, I’m running around in the water and I’m picking kids up and moving and you know, all that. So I tweaked my back. So I got a massage. And it seemed to help but the pain didn’t really go away. And then it became pretty acute. So, you know, I ended up, I came back and I asked my oncologist, you know, told him what’s going on? And he said, Oh, it’s probably sciatic nerve. So he, we got an x ray system, like, right below, you know, my lower spine and off to the right. It came back clear. And then probably a month or so went by, and I called my primary care physician and said, you know, had this backache, it’s not going away. So he x rayed from my waist down, and you know, boom, that’s the cancer showed up in my lower spine and in my left hip, and so I didn’t get officially diagnosed, you know, for months, probably till October. And then I didn’t start treatment until maybe November, December. But I look back on I know, the cancer was there in July. It just, I hadn’t got it diagnosed yet. So I was used. July is my the month. So 18 years will be next year in July. Wow, that’s examinable. Maybe I can be I’ll come back and in July of next year, and we will see how it’s gone.
Victoria Volk 36:31
I would love to have you. That’d be great.
Anne Jacobs 36:36
Yeah, and it’s, you know, I wouldn’t, I would never expect anyone I would never expect you to, it’s too hard to wrap your head around, like, what does it look like to look to live with this? Or, you know, any sort of cancer? You know, what is the day? What do you do through the every day?
Victoria Volk 36:53
Ride the roller coaster?
Anne Jacobs 36:55
Yeah, yeah And it’s, um, it is pretty hard to understand. Unless you live through it. And I wouldn’t want anyone to have to understand it. But 1000s of women who are, you know, doing this every day, you know, you wake up one morning, just what you have, you know, you have cancer, okay. And it’s not never going away. Oh, okay. And, you know, depending on your life experiences and what you’ve how you’ve handled things in the past that will influence you moving forward. And when I got diagnosed, initially, I had this alright, let’s, you know, stage three, we’ll beat it, we’ll go through chemo, there’s a start, and there’s an end date, I’ve got this. And then you get the call. No, it spread, you know, I had no comprehension, I didn’t know where to put my feet down. This was something that I had never encountered before. So I had a friend help me sort of navigate and get get a second opinion. And you go from that to a third opinion. Go back to your oncologist, you make a plan. So it’s just like moving forward without a map doing the best you can. So that’s led me to here. I’ve learned a lot along the way. But pretty amazing. I’m pretty grateful, very humbled by the fact that I’m still here. Very, very grateful.
Victoria Volk 38:15
I love that you’re here. And I love that our paths have crossed, and we will continue to do these follow ups. As long as appreciate it long as my podcast exists.
Anne Jacobs 38:28
Well, you’ve had like, lived to earlier, you’ve had some pretty amazing guests. I was thinking, Why? Why is Victoria want to talk to me? These other people are just there. I haven’t gotten through all of your podcasts yet. Because I’ll sometimes I’ll go back and I’ll re listen to, you know, some of them. Oh, what did he or she say? But just you’ve had some really? Some really impactful conversations.
Victoria Volk 38:55
Oh, there’s so many more to come. I bet. Yeah. I bet. Is there anything else you’d like to share today?
Anne Jacobs 39:03
I can’t think of anything, except I guess to reiterate, what I’m I’m learning or I’m allowing myself to just deal with the, again, what I consider the smaller losses so that I can have a more peaceful existence to do find what works for you and allow yourself you know, if you have that should I should do this, or I should do that. When those shoulds come up too much. I need to really pay attention because then I’m not doing what is best for me to be the best version of myself and allow myself to push the shoulds away and the judgment therefore I have on myself and just focus on if I do this, I’m going to feel better. I’ll be a better version. I’ll be a better mom, wife, friend. I’ll be a better and be a better person for myself too.
Victoria Volk 39:54
That’s perfect. And we will end it there because I think that’s perfect.
Anne Jacobs 39:57
Thank you. Thank you again Victoria,
Victoria Volk 40:01
Thank you for being here and for being you and sharing all that you’re learning along the way. I appreciate you, folks. And remember, when you unleash your heart, you unleash your life. Much love from my heart to yours. Thank you for listening. If you liked this episode, please share it because sharing is caring. And until next time, give and share compassion by being hurt with yours. And if you’re hurting, know that what you’re feeling is normal and natural. Much love my friend.
Grief Stories, Grieving Voices Guest, Grieving Voices Podcast, Podcast, Suicide |
Emma G Rose | His Name Is Nicky
SHOW NOTES SUMMARY:
The ripples of loss reach far and wide within a family unit; often in ways, we don’t expect. Emma shares the impact the death of her cousin to suicide has had on her life and that of her family.
Emma has found solace in writing her grief in the thirteen years since her cousin Nicky’s death, publishing three books since that time.
Suicide leaves those left behind having to navigate the displaced anger this type of loss often leaves in its wake. Emma shares how her family grieved together and how this loss, which left a gaping hole in their lives, has somehow managed to bring them, as a whole, more together. They talk about the hard issues and what matters to them as if they’re talking about the weather. Which, as the creator of this podcast, is my hope for all of us – that, as a society, we can begin to talk about grief like we talk about the weather.
Reach out to someone you know or love today and, as Emma shares, if they need to, they will reach back. It often takes someone to extend the hand of compassion first. Will that be you?
RESOURCES:
CONNECT:
Victoria Volk 0:08
This is Victoria of theunleashedheart.com, and you’re listening to grieving voices, a podcast for hurting hearts who desire to be heard. Or anyone who wants to learn how to better support loved ones experiencing loss. As a 30 plus year griever and advanced Grief Recovery methods specialist, I know how badly the conversation around grief needs to change. Through this podcast, I aim to educate gravers and non Grievers alike, spread hope and inspire compassion toward those hurting. Lastly, by providing my heart with yours and this platform, grievers had the opportunity to share their wisdom and stories of loss and resiliency. How about we talk about grief, like we talked about the weather? Let’s get started. Thank you for tuning in to grieving voices. Today’s guest is Emma G Rose. She is an author, publisher and host of the indie book talk podcast, she started writing her first novel as a way to cope with her cousin’s death by suicide. Today, she’s getting ready to publish her third contemporary fantasy novel about people living through difficult situations, including near death experiences, suicide and grief. Thank you so much for being here. Happy to have you. Yeah, no problem. Let’s start with your grief writing journey. And where that begins,
Emma G Rose 1:34
I guess, to really tell this I have to go back to before the grief incident. So I’d always wanted to be a writer my whole life. As soon as I figured out that books were a thing that people wrote, they weren’t just magically created. I wanted to be a writer. And so I was that kid who was always scribbling in a notebook, I was reading all the time. And I started a bunch of different drafts of books as a as a kid in like middle school in high school age. But I’d never finished anything, to a degree that I felt like it was ready to be sent out into the world. And then I was 20. And I got a phone call that my 17 year old cousin, had died by suicide. And of all of the people I knew in my life, if I had had to list, the people who were at least likely for that to happen to, he would have been right at the top of that list. Like it just was completely out of the blue to in my,
Emma G Rose 2:34
in my experience of it, it just you know, it wasn’t like, we saw signs, you know, people talk about, Oh, I saw this and that. And of course, in retrospect, there were a few things. But it’s hard to tell, sometimes as a teenager, like the difference between normal teenage angst and like there’s something really wrong here. So as his cousin who lives in a different state, I didn’t see it. And it completely shocked me. And started kicked off probably the hardest week of my life, which was flying, to be with the family and be it the week and the funeral and all of that stuff. And that all of that process that ritual, helps to helps you to kind of cope in the short term. But it’s just the very beginning of this long journey of dealing with a situation. And my situation was a little complicated in that I this was this happened in March, in the fall, I was scheduled to move to Japan. So very quickly, after this loss, I moved to the literal other side of the planet, and was as far as I could possibly be and still be on planet Earth, away from my family. So I did kind of fell back on old habits and started writing a lot. And at one point this, this scene kind of popped into my head this, these two characters talking to each other, and they were teenagers. And this is where it gets it actually gets a little lighter. There’s these two teenagers and they’re arguing about whether or not they’re dead. And I don’t know where this came from. Exactly. It was just like one of those scenes that sort of falls into your head all at once. And I knew that they were that they were dead, but that they weren’t sure. And that they were arguing that’s what they were arguing about. And I got up from the book I was reading and I went and I wrote down this scene. And it sort of evolved from there into a story. I eventually wrote my cousin into the story, the whole that whole first novel deals with a journey through the afterlife. And so I was able to write him post suicide. And as a person dealing with this decision that he had made, he was both incredibly challenged. and comforting to write that because it was a way of saying he’s not gone forever, right? He’s just kind of in a different place. And for me and for my family, when I share the story with them, it was really comforting to know that like, there was another place, I made a home for him. And this is where he was. And we all knew where he was, he’s in this afterlife place. And he’s okay. And so when I wrote this, and it was, again, you know, very challenging, there were many drafts, I removed the scene, I put it back, you know, there was a lot of that happening. But when I shared it with family, people who have known Him, they kept saying, to me, this is really comforting, this made me feel better. This, you know, somehow changed the way I thought about this so that I could feel like, okay, I can move, I don’t want to say move on, because that’s never real, but to move forward in this feeling, and not just be kind of stuck in this place. So hearing that, I knew that this story needed a wider audience, because we weren’t the only one. Sadly, we’re not the only people who have dealt with this situation. We’re not the only people who have lost someone to young, we’re not the only people who have lost someone to suicide. We’re not the only people to be struggling months and years later with the ramifications of this act. So I wanted to put it out into the world. And even knowing that that was true, knowing there were people out there who needed it, I still sort of dragged my feet for years. Because first of all, there’s all the complication of getting something published, you know, it’s not a super simple process, always. And depending on which avenue you choose, I originally went with the traditional publishing route, I was querying agents I was sending out, you know, cover letters saying like, this is what the books about and do you think you can sell this? And most people said, No, we don’t think we can sell this. A few said, this is incredibly intriguing. But I don’t know where to put it. It was just it was it was a weird story. It bothered people that the whole thing happened in the afterlife. It bothered people that like it was funny. It’s a legitimately funny book, because they’re teenagers and teenagers are hilarious. But it was also dealing with these really heavy issues. So that was this weird balance. And I finally ended up independently publishing it, starting my own publishing imprint, putting the book out into the world. And it took me 10 years from the time of my cousin’s death to the publication of the book, but I think it was a well spent 10 years and learning how to deal with all of this. And the process of publishing the process of getting it out into the world has helped my grieving process. And as I continue to write, I continue to, to find layers of this grief. So the most recent novel, The one that’s coming out in July, is assembling Ella, and that is a story of somebody who 11 years later is dealing with the loss of her brother. So it was it enabled me to look at some of the things that people don’t understand about long term grief. And the times when, you know, I mentioned my cousin, and people go, and they kind of cringe, and they don’t know what to say next. And or they’re like, why are you still upset about that, which is my favorite response, because I’m still upset about that, because he’s still gone. And it’s still awful. But I found myself kind of telling myself the story that I should be better, where even it was a few months before the final draft of this book. So I had sent it out to beta readers, which is like the first readers who kind of give you feedback, and I had sent it out to them. And so I was kind of in this place where I didn’t have anything to do right this second. And it happened to fall during the anniversary of my cousin’s death. And I found myself thinking I should be I should feel better than this. I shouldn’t be so sad about this. Still, it’s been this many years. How am I still so upset? How am I How was it still await? You know, March, as soon as the month of March starts. It’s like I’m holding my breath. And I actually called my mother and I said, Why am I still so upset, and she said something that actually sort of it was true, but it was also kind of devastating to hear, which was, The anticipation is worse than the day because you know what’s going to happen, you know, that this awful thing is going to happen, and there’s nothing you can do about it. And so every year, like the week, the few days before, is really, really hard. And I’m learning to reach out to people, you know, to talk to my uncle, who has been amazing, you know, he lost his son, and he’s just, he’s found ways to turn that grief and that loss into connection. In many ways. He’s a role model, too. You know, we do different things. We do it in different ways. But ultimately, we’re both trying to say you are not alone. And this should never happen to anyone else ever again. And whatever we can do to save people from that or to You know, bring them forward just a little bit to know like, you’re not alone. You’re okay. And there’s all these people that be really upset if you left, that, that outreach that, you know, remembering that you’re not by yourself is like the biggest thing. It’s, it’s everything in this. And that’s why I write books, not only to remind other people that they’re not alone, but to remind me, because people come out of the woodwork. When I when I share these books, and I share these stories. I get emails, I get direct messages on Twitter, I get, you know, these log messages on Instagram saying, I read this book, it changed the way I think. I read this book, I realized someone else gets it. I heard you speak. They haven’t even read the book. I heard you speak. And I understood. You know, I felt something. That’s why I do it. I don’t think there will ever be a time when I’m over it. I don’t think you ever get over grief. You’ve lived with it and you live through it. And it’s okay to not be over it. It’s expected because you never don’t love that person. You never are happy they’re gone. So you’re always grieving in some way or another extend you a hug. Thank you.
Victoria Volk 11:06
Thank you for sharing. I think your mom had it right? Because it is it’s the anticipation that is almost worse. And all the work that I’ve been doing and podcast episodes I’ve recorded with Grievers. It is a similar story of the week of the month of the day before the day of even days after it’s it’s when self care is really superduper important, and especially in grief. That is that’s your hope, especially maybe early on. So what did help you? And when did this happen?
Emma G Rose 11:40
This was 2008. So it’s been 13 years.
Victoria Volk 11:46
Yeah. And it’s been 13 years, friends. Yeah, there’s no timeline, right? 30 plus years, my dad’s been gone. There’s no timeline, the chairs still empty. My son’s gonna graduate in two years, I’ll probably think about my dad and how I wish he would be there, right, like life events keep going on and that person is still gone. That doesn’t change. So the grief changes, but the missing doesn’t. Right. And I heard the same thing. Well, she you should be over by now. Yeah, well, I’m not a stuffer like you. Because the people who are saying that are stuffing their emotions, excuse me, they’re stuffers. They’re either turning to the bottle turning to relationships, turning to Facebook or reality TV or something that makes them feel better for a time. And they’re not really addressing what’s going on. And it catches up with people. Eventually, it does. So what helped you I’m circling back to the question now, what helped you and is continually helping you, other than writing because not everybody’s a writer, right? When the time gets closer, and when March because March is my month too. So
Emma G Rose 13:02
I mean, writing is like my primary coping mechanism for most things, but outside of that, reaching out to family members, and just saying like, I’m not okay, you know, sometimes I send my uncle just like a heart emoji. I did on my cousin’s birthday this year, like the day before his birthday, I just sent that. And it’s that little moment of connection. And when you’re grieving, it’s really hard to connect with people, because you want to sort of call yourself inward and protect, you know, you want to protect that thing that’s hurting, which is you. But it really does help to reach out and just say I’m not okay, and to acknowledge that out loud and not feel like you have to be smiley and fine when you’re not. That’s huge. For me, one of the kind of sweet things that my uncle did, he took some of Nikki’s old T shirts, and he cut them up, and he wrote his name and his birth and death dates on them. And Nick had always wanted to travel. So we took the t shirt of pieces of T shirts to just random places. I was in Japan. So he sent me one and I left it in a temple in Japan. And, you know, my my family went out to camp that a camp that they’ve been to several years in a row and they like tied onto a rock and dropped it into the lake. And it was all those things that remind you that the person is not here with you, but that they were and that they’re still part of what you’re doing. We still talk about him regularly. You know, it’s not there’s no taboo against bringing him up. My uncle will joyfully tell stories about the hilarious and ridiculous things that my cousin did. He was, you know, the class clown, the funny kid who was always getting up to something and those stories are told and that I think makes a huge difference to and not not avoiding because yes, it makes us sad, but it also makes us happy because my favorite author Terry Pratchett has a quote. Do you not know that a man is not dead? Well, his name is still spoken. And I think that continuing to speak someone’s name is not only a confirmation that your grief is valid, and that this, you know, it’s not like this bad feeling that came from nowhere it had an origin. And that origin was the love of someone, you don’t grieve someone that you didn’t have some sort of feeling for there. That’s just you know, a name on a paper somewhere, but somebody that you grieve as someone that you loved, or sometimes didn’t get along with really well and had complicated emotions around, or they evoke something in you. And so what you’re grieving is not just the person, but also everything around them, the you that you are, when they’re around and the way that they fit into your relationships in your world. We are eight cousins, a boy and a girl and each family. And Nikki is a part of that, even though he’s not present with us anymore. And so he comes up and we talk about him. And that makes a huge difference.
Victoria Volk 15:55
I think your uncle sounds like a really good mentor. And he’s leading by example. I love that story with the T shirts. It’s beautiful.
Emma G Rose 16:04
Yeah he’s done a lot to both remember Nikki as an individual person, but also to help other people who might be going through similar struggles. So he started in Nicky’s remembrance, he started the Nicholas wind Fernandez Scholarship Fund, which gives a scholarship it’s not a huge scholarship. You know, we’re not millionaires here, but it’s a scholarship to kids who went to the vocational school that Nicky was attending. So that exists. But we also did the out of the darkness walks, which are fundraising events for the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. And my uncle got really involved in suicide prevention programs in the state of Massachusetts, which is where they’re from, he worked actually with the select the state legislature to get suicide awareness training into schools, which was interesting, because when he started, they asked him to talk at what would have been Nikki’s graduating class. And just before he went on stage, they said, Oh, don’t say the word suicide. And so that, don’t say that word that comes back to the same thing of don’t speak their name, because you’ll make someone’s that Don’t say that word, because you’ll put it in their heads. You’re not putting that idea into anyone’s head. They already have the idea. But when you bring something out into the open, you demystify it, you take away some of the some of that feeling of no one understands no one’s ever been where I am, no one gets what I’m feeling, all of that is connected, the grief, the suicide, all of that is something you have to talk about, and mental health as a stigma. Those are things we have to talk about, and we’re getting better now he can go into a school and give a talk specifically about suicide prevention. And no one thinks that’s weird, but 13 years ago, don’t mention the word.
Victoria Volk 17:49
Tell us about Nikki and the impact he had on you.
Emma G Rose 17:52
He was the the youngest of my cousins, and only my little brother is younger than him. So he’s the youngest of my cousins. And he always had sweaty hands. Some people just do and he always did. Oh, he always wanted to hug you. So get this, this stereotype that like a 1314 year old boy is not going to come hug his female cousin when she walked out the door. Nikki was not he you know, yeah, your hair, give you a big hug. He loved to play video games. He loved to play sports. He did baseball and football and all of that stuff. And he was very much that the life of the party, the class clown kid, the one who came up with the funny prank. He was also he takes after my uncle, he was a bit of a daredevil, you’d have to stop him from doing things like can I jump off the trampoline into the pool? You know, he was that kid? Yeah, to be on watch, because he would get into trouble. But he was just the sweetest person. You know, he was legitimately wanted people around him to be happy and joyful. And he he was that himself for the most part. And I associate the color green with him because he wore it a lot. And so we all wore green for a long time afterwards, their particular shade of green. Yeah, it was my baby cousin. And in some ways, you know, I don’t didn’t know him as well, as I wish I did. You don’t realize until somebody has gone that. Like all the things I wish I knew. I couldn’t tell you what his favorite song was, you know, or my uncle had to tell me some of the things he hoped and dreamed about? What did you want to be when he grew up? And you know, where did he want to travel? All of those things. Like I didn’t necessarily know that because I was 20 and he was 17. And you know, the younger you are the the more those ages matter. And he’s changed our lives since then. I think certain members of our family are much closer than they would have been otherwise. We make more of an effort to be present for things because we’re all very aware that you never know when the last time you’ll see someone will be so you know say I love you go to the event even if it’s boring. Don’t make the effort to do something even if it can only be, you can only go for 30 minutes before work. Okay? It’s better than nothing. Yeah, he was just a really happy kid. I’m so sorry. Thank you
Victoria Volk 20:16
Was the family I was so open and vocal with each other before this happened to?
Emma G Rose 20:23
We’re, we’re pretty good at talking about hard things. I think we got better about it. I think, again, it’s sometimes it’s hard, you know, I was 20. So, the world you live in when you’re a teenager or a young adult, isn’t always 100% reality. But I do think that we were pretty good at being open and vocal, you know, we always said, I love you, we took pictures together, you know, but I just think that we’re much more willing to talk about hard things now. You know, it’s not uncommon for someone to say, Oh, I went to my doctor, and I now want anxiety medicine, and I feel so much better, you know, those sorts of things that maybe we wouldn’t have necessarily shared with everyone, you know, with the whole family. And I think my, my nuclear family, my parents and my brother, we are exceptionally good at talking about things like death, you know, we’ve had very open and honest conversations about what do I want to happen when I die? What, you know, who Who do I want making decisions for me? What do I want to happen to my to my body after I die, all of those things, that, again, people sometimes really struggle to talk about our I don’t want to say comfortable, but they’re not uncomfortable topics. They’re the they’re just as likely to come up well, cooking dinner, as you know, oh, did you see that thing on TV? Or what I’m planning to do next weekend? It’s, it’s becomes a very normal thing to discuss.
Victoria Volk 21:56
That’s very important. Do you think that I mean, was Nikki privately struggling? Did Nikki not communicate some things? Was there any indication that he was,
Emma G Rose 22:06
I think he communicated better, or more, more openly with his father, my uncle, and maybe even to a certain extent, my grandparents who live very close by, I think that I was more removed from it because I was further away. You know, we live in Maine, and third, Massachusetts, we see each other at special events and things and he was definitely struggling. He, you know, he’d had some diagnosis of some sort of depression or something like that. And, you know, and I don’t know all of the details, I know that he was sort of struggling and in the end, and but I, again, it’s so hard. And I think I want to acknowledge this because people who are beating themselves up about this, it’s so hard to tell when you’re when you’re outside someone’s head. Whether this thing that they’re dealing with right now, is this a end of their world sort of thing? Or is this I just feel bad right now, it’s really hard to tell. And sometimes inside your own head, you can’t really tell. So we did that. We did that. Like, well, what if we done this? And what if we’d said this, and if only we’d come home sooner if only you know, this hadn’t happened if only somebody had said this, that or the other thing. But I mean, you could have only all the way back to my uncle never met, who Nicky’s mother, and therefore, Nikki was never born. But I don’t want that. I’ll take this over that.
Victoria Volk 23:28
I’m curious and you don’t have to share. But I’m, you know, just for the sake of those listening, what I know about grief, as a grief recovery specialist is that it’s not just one experience that happens to us. It’s usually accumulation of experiences that takes us over the edge or we either implode or explode. What was Nikki’s life prior to this? Like had he experienced a lot of grief in his life?
Emma G Rose 24:00
I don’t know that I’m qualified to say, I know that he had, in some ways a difficult relationship with his mother. My, my uncle and his mother were divorced. And there was, you know, there was some tension there that we all knew about again, I mean, I don’t know the inside of his head. So I don’t know what thing you know what? Something that can be life shattering for one person might be a Tuesday for someone else. So I can’t say for sure. I do know that. My uncle and my grandparents were always present and loving and supportive. And yeah, they thought about stuff because everybody does. But ultimately, we have always known that they were there for us. And I can’t imagine that Nikki didn’t know that. But sometimes what’s going on inside your head just doesn’t No amount of outside support is enough, you know, you got to find that inside yourself to some degree. So that’s really, I guess the best answer I can give to that.
Victoria Volk 25:09
I just wanted to just highlight though that exactly what you said is that an event can happen to one person, and it can feel like a Tuesday. And it can be an absolutely soul crushing thing to somebody else. And the divorce rate is quite high. And usually children are the collateral damage of that. And this is why too, I’m passionate about the helping children with loss program. It’s for the adults, especially with young children younger, even doesn’t matter the age really, but this is why I’m to I’m so passionate about the education of it, because when we as parents, Are you a parent, as a parent, and I have teenagers, I have three teenagers now it is I have learned the value of cleaning up my own shit. Really, I’m now gonna have to mark this explicit. But it’s the truth, it is the truth, because my junk impacts my parenting, therefore, will impact my children. And I don’t want my junk to interfere with their future. And so if you’re listening to this, and you are maybe getting a divorce, you already are divorced. And if that isn’t even your situation, maybe you’re estranged from the biological, other parent, whatever the situation is, maybe you’re adopt, you know, maybe you adopted children in your divorce, whatever, it doesn’t matter. This is why this is so important. Because when we start to clean up and sweep our doorstep, it ripples in our lives. Your uncle has started, he cleaned up his doorstep, he started, you know, and he’s making ripples in other people’s lives. Look at the influence he’s had on you and the impact and your grief, just by him leading by example, not just in the basics of life, but when it really matters. And when that when it comes to grief, because we don’t know what people are struggling with. But if you can’t allow yourself to ask the tough questions, because you’re afraid of the answer, where you can’t handle the answer. That’s your indicator that you’ve got some personal work to do. I’m getting off my soapbox now. I didn’t expect that. But it’s heartbreaking for me to hear these stories like this. And not just Nikki, it’s just one like it even you know that. We just never know what impact our actions have on others. Not that this is by any means your uncle’s fault. I am not saying that, or his mother’s fault. I’m not saying that. I’m just saying, what do you have to lose by addressing your stuff. And that potential is really high to be a lot, your future, your own future, your own potential, we sacrifice when you when you don’t address the stuff within you, you are sacrificing little bits of yourself. So what has your grief taught you? Because that’s that’s I mean, I’ve learned a lot. So what have you learned in your group?
Emma G Rose 28:29
How do I narrow this down? It has taught me that I am not alone have never been alone cannot be alone. Because there are there’s always another person in the world who has experienced something like what you’re experiencing. And if you reach out, they’ll reach back. That’s I mean, I’ve my whole writing career around that idea that if I reach out the people who need to, will reach back. And I don’t think I would have known that. If I hadn’t had this experience. I think it’s also taught me that life is more complicated than you think. So no single experience is like, Okay, this is everything or network, even something that feels like the ripples of an individual experience spread out through your life. When Nicky died, my brother, my brother’s much younger than me, my brother was 12 and a teacher at his school who also happened to have grief professional training, said that children will grieve as they grow. And I remember as a as a 20 year old I said, That’s stupid. He’s going to grieve and then he’ll just go on with his life, right? Because of course, I’d never had this level of experience. And I have learned that people do in fact grieve as they grow and sometimes they don’t realize that’s what’s happening. And so sometimes that and in some ways, this is what assembling Ella is about sometimes reaching a milestone. Everyone around you is like, Yay, we’re seniors. Isn’t that exciting? And you’re going my brother never got to be a senior. Why do I get To surpass him, my cousin never will get to be 21 years old, he’ll never get to have that ridiculous party that everybody has. And, you know, get into trouble. He missed that. And knowing that no single experience is all happier, all sad, nothing you experience in your life is all good, or all bad. It’s this balance of things. I don’t believe everything happens for a reason. I don’t believe that their fates out there making the world BS. But I do believe, and this has taught me that you can find lessons and and guiding principles out of even the worst things. And that if those terrible things happen, the best thing you can do is look for the lesson in them. Because you might as well learn something, if you have to go through this horrible thing, you might as well let it make you a better person, you might as well let let it connect you more to people, because the alternative is to let it break you down. And I don’t want to do that
Victoria Volk 30:58
I had a podcast guest once say I said in grief, and she had lost a child. And she said, when you lay you decay. Yeah. And I like to say that you’re already suffering, you might as well be suffering and moving your feet, taking action, baby steps, whatever you have to do to I had a podcast guest Yes, the who is living with metastatic breast cancer. And sometimes it’s just your goal is just to get out of bed. That’s it, just to get out of bed, and because when you lay you decay, I’ve just never forgotten it throughout your grief experience, which I totally identify with what you said, grieve as you grow, because I was eight. So that’s why I say I’m pretty much a lifelong Griever. But in your grief, experience, what has given you the most joy and hope for the future.
Emma G Rose 31:48
I mean, I’d have to say that the stories I get back from people, when I put when I share my grief experience, and people reach back and say, I understand I feel this, you made me feel better, you made me think about this differently like that, that’s the joy that comes out of this is that I experienced this. And it made us more empathetic people, it made us comfortable people for someone to reach out to if they’re hurting, because they know we’ve we’ve hurt they know that it’s safe to talk to us about these things. And as sad as it is when someone comes to you with a grief it, it’s also it’s also a relief to know that they have someone you know, they’re not having to navigate this, by themselves, sadly, have been there and have kind of blazed a trail and you can walk in those footsteps. So that’s been I don’t know what I would have done if I hadn’t written books like I don’t know how I would have dealt with it. This was my way. And I think other people are going to have other ways. You know, you could paint tour start a charity, or I don’t know, lay on the floor and cry. I mean, there there are lots of ways there are paths that aren’t this one. But for me, this was the only way forward. And if I had not written this the first book and not continued to write, I don’t know where I would be. It would not be here. Certainly, I don’t know where I would be
Victoria Volk 33:10
Writing gave you hope. It sounds like you’re not the first Griever to that found solace in writing. I’m sure to have one of them too. What else would you like to share today?
Emma G Rose 33:21
I think I just want people to know that I hope this has come across. But I will say it more explicitly. I want people to know that your grief is not wrong. And there’s nothing wrong with you. This is hard, it sucks. It’s sad. It’s feels meaningless and stupid. And why should anyone have to do this and whatever weird cocktail of emotions you get out of that, whether it’s anger or sadness, or any permutation of that, that’s okay. It’s okay, fighting those feelings saying I shouldn’t feel this way I should feel better, I should do this, that that is not going to help you. So it’s really okay to be sad. It’s really okay to not be okay. It’s really okay to block out three days of the month and say, I’m not working because I’m, I can’t because this is my observance. This is what I’m doing. That’s totally okay.
Victoria Volk 34:11
I like how you called it days day of observance, even like days of observance. It’s really observing how you’re feeling. It’s observing, you know, what would you have done with that person if they were here and maybe doing that thing? I like that, like I said that I did think of another question, because I know that the loss of your cousin wasn’t the only loss you had. But I’m also curious if you had grief yourself experiences prior to losing your cousin,
Emma G Rose 34:39
The only person I had ever lost before. Nikki was my great grandmother, which is a very different experience. She had been in a nursing home for many years, she’d had a stroke. She wasn’t herself and she knew she wasn’t herself. And so when when she died, it felt More of a relief almost to say like she’s not she had a full and beautiful life. And now she’s left us. And that’s very sad. And we were, of course, all very sad. But it wasn’t the same. There was no anger. With Nikki, there was a lot of anger. And it’s hard because it was a kind of displaced anger, like who am I mad at not really mad at him. I’m not I’m not mad at anyone. I’m just like mad that this is even a thing. I’m mad that this is possible in the world. I’m mad that somebody who had his his wake was like, there were people out in the driveway, waiting in line for like an hour to walk by the receiving line. His childhood orthodontist was there like that somebody who could have that big of an impact could choose to leave was very upsetting. And I was kind of angry at him. Let’s be honest. I was I remember sitting on the floor during the week with my little brother leaning against me and just being so angry at Nikki like, if he could see what’s happening right now. He would undo what he did. And so it’s very different. But the year Dickie died was actually really hard. Because it was the year everyone died, we lost Nikki and March, a close family friend a few months later, my aunt in law, I guess you’d call her died, complications related to her cancer, which she had fought breast cancer in one, but the treatments have weakened her heart and she died. So my last weekend before I moved to Japan, I went to a funeral. And then in December, my paternal grandfather who granted I wasn’t super close to he died as well. And it was just like that culmination. It was just saying after thing after thing, everyone died. And then I moved to the other side of the planet. And yeah, so Nikki is the he’s, he’s the focal point of my grief often. But there’s more than that, you know, it’s it spreads. And I don’t know, grief feeds on itself, right? You get into this like, like any other mental habit, when I’m sad, eventually, that’s where my thoughts go. And I think it was a very well ingrained mental habit by the end of that year, to grieve. To a certain extent, I think people are grieving now. I think everyone is grieving more or less right now, and may not be the loss of a person though. For some people, it absolutely is. But the loss of experience, the loss of a year or more of our lives in in the world that we thought we were going to have. Because ultimately, grief is about the experiences you miss. It’s the the relationships that didn’t happen. The the tribute didn’t go on. All of that is grief. And we’re all feeling that right now. So I think in some ways, this is the exact right time to be talking about grief. We need it really badly. We need these conversations. And we need them to be open and honest. And things we can talk about and acknowledge
Victoria Volk 37:42
I say too grief was our pandemic long before COVID was a pandemic. To be honest, grief has always been there in the fact is, is for example, two years ago, I attended a VA mental health summit, Veterans Administration mental health summit in I was in a room full of social workers. And I’m not dogging social workers, but I’m just stating a fact here and in aroma soldiers. And there was two soldiers that shared their experiences of coming really close to ending their lives and the social workers that spoke and in the breakout rooms where I attended other speakers not a once in the entire day was the word grief used not a once and that is the problem, because we’re not even addressing the elephant in the room. People I feel like yes, there are mental illnesses diagnosed, yes, that require medication that do require, you know, forms of psychosis, there’s all these things right, that medically can be legitimized on paper, and whatever. But where do these things begin? And how do they get to the point that they get to and knowing what I know about grief, trauma and Childhood Adulthood is childhood reenactments. I’ve said this several times on the podcast I’ll keep saying because when you’ve experienced trauma in childhood, and especially when you are a soldier and you go and deploy, that changes you trauma and childhood changes you It’s proven on a cellular level, it changes your brain chemistry completely. So grief is the pandemic and we just don’t want to talk about it. Like you said, talk about what you want with your body when you die. Like it’s like you’re talking about sweet potatoes for supper, right? Talk about how sad you’re feeling today because your loved ones birthdays coming up and they’re not here. Like it’s a recipe for mac and cheese. Like it’s the weather. Let’s talk about grief. Like we’re talking about the weather, make it normal conversation, because it’s normal and natural to grieve. Yeah. So thank you for the work that you’re putting out the conversations you’re having with people sharing your story, inspiring them and given them hope. Thank you for being here today.
Emma G Rose 39:58
Thank you for having me and giving me another place to connect with people
Victoria Volk 40:01
And where can people connect with you? If they want to find you.
Emma G Rose 40:04
You can find me at Emmagauthor.com. There’s all of my social media and everything there. So I am on a lot of the social media. And if you message me, send me a note. I will absolutely respond. So feel free to reach out. I love that. It’s why I do this work. Tell me your story. Just say hi. Hey, I heard you on the podcast, emmagauthor.com. And then, if you feel so inclined, and have any interest in publishing, you can check out the indie book talk podcast.
Victoria Volk 40:32
And I will put all of that stuff in the show notes. And thank you again for being here. And remember, when you unleash your heart, you unleash your life. Much love. From my heart to yours. Thank you for listening. If you liked this episode, please share it because sharing is caring. And until next time, give and share compassion by being hurt with yours. And if you’re hurting know that what you’re feeling is normal and natural. Much love my friend
Grief Stories, Grieving Voices Guest, Grieving Voices Podcast, Podcast, Widowhood |
Kristine Carlson | Heartbroken Open: A Widows’ Work of Unmasking Sorrow
SHOW NOTES SUMMARY:
When Kristine’s husband, Richard, suddenly died of a pulmonary embolism while descending on a flight, she had no idea how much she would rely on the tools and insights she had gained while writing several of the books contained in the “Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff” series.
It was the teachings, many years of personal development work, writing, and support of others that gave her the means to process the grief from, what had been at that point, the most profound loss of her life.
Kristine shares what those first years looked like, as well as takes us through what life has been like beyond, and how the loss of her late husband and most recently her soul-sister friend since age 14, Melanie.
Grief brings with it gaping wounds, but if we resolve, as Kristine says, to not allow ourselves to become a victim of our circumstances, a beautiful life with joy can unfold – if we only surrender.
Learn, through this episode, ways to cope that helped Kristine get through the darkest days and lean into joy again.
RESOURCES:
CONNECT:
Victoria Volk 0:00
Thank you for tuning in to grieving voices. I’m your host Victoria of the Unleashed heart. And today my guest is Kristine Carlson. She is the co author with her late husband, Dr. Richard Carlson of The New York Times best selling, don’t sweat the small stuff books, she is featured this fall as the subject of a biopic Lifetime movie based on her book, heartbroken, open a true story of coming alive again, after profound loss. Thank you so much for being here.
Kristine Carlson 0:31
Hi, Victoria. It’s so good to be here with you. You have such a calming voice.
Victoria Volk 0:36
People say that. That’s good.
Kristine Carlson 0:38
Yeah that’s really good.
Victoria Volk 0:39
So I mean, I could start in a lot of places, but I really want to start with why you wanted to come on the podcast today and share your story. And really, it’s your grieving voice. Because all the work that you’re doing right now is as a result of a devastating loss. Right?
Kristine Carlson 1:01
Yeah, absolutely. I, you know, just want to be clear that I’m a long ways out, then most people from my loss, well, at least the the profound loss that I write about, and I speak about in heartbroken open. I’ve just recently gone through a very another profound loss with which is one of my soulmate, Sister friends that I grew up with, just passed from cancer about three weeks ago. So I’m reminded again, just about this grieving process, in such a, you know, raw sort of way, my loss happened 15 years ago, from the love of my life, he was only 45. And I was 43. And he was traveling to New York, buy a plane, and on the descent of the flight, have a pulmonary embolism, which took his life instantly. And, you know, it wasn’t something that we expected at all, Richard was an incredibly vibrant man doing his work in the world. And my kids were 14 and 17 at the time. So, you know, we were just really in what you would think of as the peak of our lives, not the end of life. And so it was southern loss, you know, very sudden catapulted us, of course, into deep grief and, and then you know, just how to traverse that territory at that age, without a lot of widows around or knowing you know, how to go through that process. From me about all four of our parents were still alive. You know, I just, I just didn’t really have any experience. But what I found really interesting about how I decided to do it, in a lot of ways I was very prepared in the sense of I have a lot of tools, like I had a lot of emotional tools from studying with Richard, the form of psychology that he wrote about in the don’t sweat, the small stuff, book series, living a very, very healthy and happy life, but not living a life that really knew how to encompass grief. So I began to just really put all those tools to work. And also I was really supported, had a lot of great friends. And I had a great community of of healers around me too. And one of the reasons why I write about loss and I have really used my story to help others is because I remember feeling so blessed that I had the support that I had and the encouragement and the community around me to help me and people like John Walsh Owens who wrote awakening from grief, or Richard’s best friends, I had great friends that knew a lot about how to grieve so they they really helped me and I thought, I don’t know how a normal average person goes through such a devastating loss without their heart just completely shutting down and stopping from heartbreak. And so I felt very compelled. As I witnessed myself go through this process of healing to journal which I find for every person is incredibly healing to journal, I started to realize I needed to empty out grief, that it was not too unlike what natural childbirth felt like to me, where those contractions of pain came in waves. But grief lasted a lot longer than, you know, six to 10 hours.
Kristine Carlson 4:49 Grief is a longer process, but very similar, very painful, but also there’s reprieves and, and there’s an opening that happens and I became very clear To me, that as I was going through this process, what I was really processing was that I was birthing a new life. And I think that’s the hardest thing, that people who lose their spouse or lose a child, which are the two most profound losses that we go through is that we realize we have to let go of the life that we have planned and let go of the life that we had, in order to step into the life that’s ahead of us and step into our future from the present moment. And that is the most difficult part is to, is to do that a lot of people understandably get stuck. Because they don’t want to do that they cannot reconcile this loss of a dream that they had for their lives, they cannot reconcile that they cannot go back. And that’s the hardest, I think that’s the hardest thing to do is in grief is allow grief to help you heal. And recognize that.
Victoria Volk 6:10
Yeah, I like to think of it as you become a version 2.0 You become a different version of yourself, and you really have a lot of choice and what that can look like. But when you’ve had a profound loss like that, which can be from a less than loving relationship to it’s the the secondary losses that often happen that kind of even impacted even more, you can lose friendships, and did you experience or can you reflect on any secondary losses that you experienced or, and then also being a parent and trying to navigate, help them navigate, especially the teen years? Helping them to try and navigate that loss for them as well, while still maintaining your own? Truth about how you are feeling? Can you speak to? There’s like three questions in there. I’m sorry.
Kristine Carlson 7:06
Yeah no no no, yeah. What What’s interesting is that, I felt like as a family, we did a dance with our grief. As a mother, I think my kids were what got me up every day, I was mostly concerned with them, that, you know, we got we were going through just incredibly painful time ourselves, but then to know our kids are longing and missing for the life they had with their father and the dreading the future moments that they won’t have him there in, in form with them. You know, not having the spiritual understanding that maybe I had to because I’ve always had this deep spiritual knowing that we don’t really die a That’s my belief is we don’t really die. And so I while I was super attached, and I wanted my husband in my bed and warming me up and the early morning hours and laughing with me and drinking coffee with me and going on hikes with me and doing all the things we did. I still knew that he was with me and my kids, though, you know, they, they felt certain times that he was with them, but they didn’t have that spiritual depth that I’d spent a lifetime building. And they were still building on that. And so I felt like sometimes I probably looked a little stoic for them. But I but I would grieve when they went to school because I didn’t want you know, for one thing, like as an adult, we have so much more control over our lives. When we have children. They’re going through very deep grief, but they they have this need for normalcy. And also they have this, they have to go back to school or they don’t have to I gave my kids the option. Right away, I immediately started to look into how I could lighten their load and give them space to grieve. I didn’t expect them to do anything that didn’t resonate with them. But my kids wanted normalcy. My daughter kind of wanted to keep playing soccer. My daughter jazz wanted to go back to school so I just did what I could to lighten their load. And then when they went to school, I fell apart and I allowed myself to fall apart. I allowed myself to go through you know deep moments of grief that was building in my body if I didn’t I could feel these feelings build in my body just this morning. You know, I woke up with a horrible stomach ache because I realized I’m having a difficult time processing. My friend Melanie, her her physical death because she doesn’t live near me and you know, we talked every couple of weeks and you know we’re close since the time are 14 years old, but I’m still having a difficult time processing it. And so I think, you know, the body has this innate intelligence. And the body will tell you, when you’re not grieving enough by how it feels, and all you have to do is tune in and say, Okay, how is my body feeling what’s going on in my body. And when I get a stomach ache, for example, I know, I’m not crying enough, I know, I’m not allowing myself to sit and really empty out tears, and be in that space. And so with kids, you know, I think it really was a dance as a family to figure out how to support them, and how to also take care of myself, because I realize now I’m the only parent, and there’s only one life vest in the sea for all three of us, and it’s me. So that’s, that’s the way I looked at it, the secondary losses, you know, I wasn’t as tuned into those I was, but I know they exist. For a lot of a lot of widows, I probably chose my friends more carefully after loss, it was interesting to the women that I spent the most time with were neat neonatal nurses in their early careers. And what that meant is they would spend a lot of time in the ICU holding babies that would potentially die. And so I found that very interesting that my friends that I felt most comfortable with, where those that could really hold me rather than trying to fix me, the ones that I felt least comfortable with, were the ones that were very uncomfortable with grief, you know, that they might come into my house and, and not be judgmental, but sort of like why why is, you know, why is kind of in her bedroom? Why don’t you get her up, you know, get her out of bed, like she needs to get out of out of bed, you know, and I’d be like, no, she needs to be where she feels safe and held and where she can comfort herself, if that’s what she wants, you know, so I was very acutely aware that as individuals, but my daughters and I, that we were there to support each other, but also to allow, you know, allow ourselves to go through our loss in our own way, because we’re very, all very unique that way. And, and so that there were times where I wouldn’t say I had a loss of a friendship because I didn’t, I really made it a point not to make definitive decisions during that first year. I just was going through
Kristine Carlson 12:45 intuitively, my process of what I felt I needed every moment. And, and again, I liken it to childbirth, especially national natural childbirth, because you’ve never, you see women in natural childbirth, and they know exactly what they need, like, there’s no doubt in their minds what they need the next. And it’s like that when you’re dealing with a loss and you’re in grief is if you’re tuned in, and you’re very present to what you need, you know what you need and, and I would just constantly do that for myself and give myself that gift, even if I had a dental appointment. And, and I you know, I remember one time I just called it i There’s just no way I could sit in the dental chair that day, I was in grief. And I just call this I’m very sorry, I cannot make it today I’m in grief. And, and I would just say that and, and it felt so good to take care of myself in those moments, where I would just know that this is what I needed to do with stay home,
Victoria Volk 13:49
You make a very clear distinction there in in what you prioritized was your what you needed. giving, giving yourself permission to do that. And I think so often in when we want to people, please we dishonor our own needs to please others. And so I’m curious how that sense of knowing or, you know, because so many, I think I mean, I can speak to me personally, it took me a very long time to really understand intuition and tap into my own intuition. Was that something that’s always been something you embraced? Or was that something that you grew into over time? Or?
Kristine Carlson 14:33
Well, I think you know, having been a writer and having been a leader in the personal growth world helped a lot because of course I’d evaluated what intuition was. And I mean, Richard and I started meditating when we were very young. I was 20 years old when I started meditating. So meditation is such an incredible tool for grounding for centering for knowing yourself for being able to witness and be mindful of so many things. And so when I, when I, when I say really did have tools, I really did have tools. I, you know, the other thing is, you know, I’m very attuned to fear to and what fear means. And so for me, I immediately noticed that without Richard present, I was afraid and because, you know, there’s this sense of protection that comes from your husband, and from having a man in the home. And, and I thought that was really wow, I’m like, I haven’t felt fear in like, 25 years. And now I feel fear. So it’s very tuned into that. What, what that felt like, and also, I would go to what I know about fear, and I would say, well, if it’s emotional fear, then, you know, I needed to breathe into it. And I just needed to allow it to, you know, dissipate in the moment, like, go to the present moment, breathe into it. And then also, fears of my future I would lean into, I would say, the fear of the future is something that indicates where you need to go, not where you need to back away from, which is also very unusual. So I remember, for example, Richards, Assistant, early assistant, was best assistant, Nicole had asked me, if I would marry she and her husband, and it was four months after Richard died. And I, because she would have asked Richard to marry them. And she said, then it suddenly occurred to me, I should ask you, Chris, and I mean, I really didn’t want to I mean, I can you imagine I was like, Oh, my God, how could I do that? It’s, I’m in such raw grief. I and I thought that’s just the worst thing in the whole world I could think of is setting a new couple out on their marriage, while mine is just ended, through loss, you know, and, but but because of that, I felt this push in a way to lean into that and say, Yes, because I knew that my ego, which was very low, was was telling me no, don’t go toward that. That’s scary. That’s, you know, putting yourself out there, you know, in a way that’s very vulnerable. And, but that there was something inside me that’s that pushed forward and said, Yes, I’ll do that. And so I did that. And I looked at it, like everything I did like that, because we had, of course, that first year is really, I mean, it’s brutal with all those firsts that you have. And then, you know, topple that with, I had jazz graduating from high school. I had, you know, can I was a freshman. I mean, so there was all the graduation there was like, you know, prom for jazz, there was, you know, all these things. Rich’s birthday, it all kind of came back to back and then that wedding came to and I just kind of have this time period where it was just I was being pounded in a way but I looked at that, like, I looked at that, like every trigger that happened, allowed me to empty more and more and more and, and then I just knew intuitively that as my grief emptied, I was opening myself up for something more joyful, and bigger. Of course, I didn’t know it in that moment, I was still very, very sad and very full of sorrow. But I kept going to that quote from Cahill Gebran, in the profit that says, Your greatest joy is your sorrow unmasked. And so I thought to myself, Wow, well, if that’s true, I’m gonna have a lot of joy. Love, joy is coming my way, because I have a great sorrow happening right now.
Kristine Carlson 19:05 I think that’s what it feels like you’re going through the dark night of the soul. And we and it’s a journey through and it feels really icky and feels like it’s never going to end. And then I tell people like something somebody told me, who was ahead of me by four years, she said, You know what, one day you’re gonna wake up and you’re just gonna feel different. And sure enough, one day about, you know, two years, two and a half, three years in, I woke up on Richard’s side of the bed. I come in and I’ve never slept on his side of the bed. And I don’t even remember getting my clothes off and getting into bed on his side, but I had when I woke up in the morning, I felt different. I wasn’t completely out of grief because I was still, you know, I would still cry still feel sad when big momentous occasions came like grandchildren that were born. and weddings that happen. Those kinds of things. I mean, Richard’s birthday, the anniversary time, there were times where I still was in grief. But it wasn’t the same. It wasn’t the dark night of the soul grief, it was manageable grief, it was, it was these times that would be triggers that I would just feel sad. And then I would be, I’d pop back out again, pretty quickly. So. And I think that’s the other thing, if we just don’t resist our feelings so much, you know, if we don’t resist those moments, as painful as they can be that they will pass and they will turn into something else, because that’s what our emotions do. We, our emotions are like the weather, it’s like, they go up and down and up and down. And I think the fear for everyone a great fear is that if they allow themselves, their emotion, if they allow themselves, their sadness, they’ll be like, sucked down underneath a whirlpool of sadness, and they’ll never come out. Whereas it’s really not like that, yeah, you’re sucked down for a moment that you come up just in time to get the next breath. And you always will. Because that’s what we do as human beings, we survive. And that’s what we do. And we are very, very knowledgeable about how to survive. You look at infants, they know how to survive. And as adults, we get in our own way, so much of the time, because of what we think we should do, or how we think we should do it, or what people tell us how to do it, you know, whereas if we just check in with ourselves and say, What do I need today? What is it that my body needs? What is it my spirit needs, what do I need today, and that is at the very core of mindfulness is to really acknowledge and with intent, acknowledge what it is you’re feeling on the inside. And then allow yourself to be in the present moment with that. That’s a very different kind of experience than what we’re taught about how to go through grief or how to busy ourselves, or let’s just get busy. So you don’t think about it. But that’s just not that’s not a possibility when you’re missing, and longing for somebody in your household.
Victoria Volk 22:18
That is one of the myths of grief is keep busy. Sure. Every recovery. Yeah, I have a few things I want to like, just reflect back because one, I just want to share again, reiterate that, did you intentionally give yourself a year to make no big decisions was that like something you consciously like a conscious decision, or that’s just how things unfolded?
Kristine Carlson 22:42
I did. I just sort of knew based on just talking to people like and feeling like I knew that the first year was going to be so raw, and that my mind, you know, I mean, you’ve got a lot of fog, like brain fog, and you’re just, you know, I just, you’re just not yourself in any capacity that first year or so I just didn’t think like, it was the time to make any decisions that didn’t need to be made. Now that said, I mean, there’s still decisions you have to make on daily basis, especially when you have children. And, and I of course, did those. So, you know, I did what I had to do, but not more than I had to do. And, you know, it’s just really trying to survive like anyone else. It’s, it’s really is just survival every time I would go in and change something or go in and write down on a social security document surviving spouse in my head, I’d be like, Jesus, you’re not kidding. surviving spouse. That’s that. And I never had thought about it like that. I just wouldn’t have known to think about it like that. But yeah, you know, you it’s just such a huge, you’re surviving for a while. And so you have to give yourself that space, just survive, and and to do to take care of yourself in a way, whatever way that is, without rules without shoulds and, and have tos and just be in a space of what do I need today? What do I need to survive this? How do I get through this day
Victoria Volk 24:10
So that eventually you can write thriving?
Kristine Carlson 24:14
Right, exactly.
Victoria Volk 24:16
So you mentioned how we’re not really taught how to grieve as kids and I would wholeheartedly agree unless it’s been emulated in a healthy way from our parents, right? Because those beliefs and those things are passed down to us. Can you touch on that a little bit? How grief was emulated for you growing up?
Kristine Carlson 24:34
Well, I I didn’t really have em grief emulated for me growing up because I mean, my parents had normal losses, you know, they had like their parents passed away when I was, you know, growing up and so forth. And, of course, they cried and, and they were sad and but I can’t say that’s really where I learned how to grieve. I mean, I come from a very, kind of a very stoic quick background actually, Swedish background you know, Swedes are very known for stiff upper lip. And German. Yeah. And also the German I have German me as well. So very German matriarch mother, and, you know, so I’m not sure that emotions were really like, well emulated for me, but again, I’ll I’ll say that my work with people like rich and avant Dutra St. John of challenge day, I was sat on their board for several years, and I went to all their workshops, you know, I did shadow process with Debbie Ford, I spent most of my adult life either writing about or doing personal growth workshops myself. So I mean, I knew how to sit on the ground and scream, you know, but this time, I really had something to cry about. So I remember, you know, I didn’t know how to cry when before I was in grief, I used to think in my head, wow, if I can’t be happy, nobody can because I had everything. And then after Richard died, I was like, Well, I know how to cry. I really, really know how to cry. Now. I think that’s a beautiful thing is to learn how to be in the emotions that you’re in without resistance, I do believe we have a choice and how we journey through our losses. And I certainly knew that I did not want to be a victim of my circumstances. I knew that wasn’t the way that said, did I feel some self pity? Of course, I felt self pity. Sometimes I missed my husband, I would say why did this happen to us all the questions that everyone asks, Why me? Why him? Why now? And then there are certain answers that will never come. And you have to just accept that those are the questions that you may always have, and they will not have complete answers to them. Because the life that we have is very mysterious. And that’s the mystery is, we don’t know when we’re gonna die, you know, we don’t know when our last moment will be. What I love so much about the way Richard lived was that he lived as if he could die at any moment. And he actually like left this column around our house, which is if tomorrow never comes, I published it in a little book called an hour to live in our to love. But he left this poem around the house. And, and it was really essentially, it’s it was it was in honor of 911 for those people that went out the door and went to work that day, and then never returned, you know, and that that could happen to any of us at any time. So, you know, I? Well, Richard wasn’t ill, I think he had a sense that his clock was shortening, that his time here on Earth was not going to be long, long time. Maybe he was being called to greater service from the other side. I don’t I don’t know, I sense that I sense that he’s not been in a rest in peace mission. I sense that he was called back home. And early, you know, early, you know, I think about like that there’s always a message in the mess, you know, that, you know, I would not necessarily have discovered my own message in the mass, nor that I was a leader in the personal transformational field, if my husband was alive. And that’s not to say that I wouldn’t have but I’m, I’m it was like a very direct conduit for me, because I am a writer to have this gift from him of expression, and to have this gift of understanding and compassion for other people and deep empathy for people who are going through loss. And I’m just one that I don’t know that I would have that sense of deep compassion. Of course, I felt compassion for people going through loss, but not to the point at which I know how devastating it is, you know, until you go through it yourself, I don’t think you really can know how truly devastating that kind of loss is,
Victoria Volk 29:13
Well we can’t know how it is for anyone really, regardless of the loss because every relationship is unique. Even people in the same household, you know, their, their relationship is unique to them, even with your daughters. Each one of them had a different relationship with their father. And that’s why we all grieve differently, because our relationships are different. So our process reflects that oftentimes, we can have one child that might be very angry and resentful, and all these things because maybe there was conflict in the relationship and maybe the other one was felt really loved and held and supported. And you know, I’m curious, have you felt signs or things that throughout the years that you know that he that You feel his presence?
Kristine Carlson 30:01
Oh, yeah, I mean, I have to say more. So in the very beginning and the first couple of years, I just felt like he was all around us. I mean, we had some pretty wild science actually, like he was, I was like, well, he really knows how to do a lot of light, a lot of light, leaving balls of light flashing around the house, like just a lot of lights flashing, even today, like all I know, is always around when the lights are flickering and flashing. And then as I have to send sometimes just walking across the street, that he’s with me, like, almost like he’s holding me as I walk across the street. Yeah, yeah. And I, you know, I, I’m one that has a lot of conversations with him daily. So I, I think that we can keep our love alive, and also keep that relationship alive the same way we would in life. But we have to be the ones to open the door and ask and to, and to just keep talking, you know, either via our thinking, or via our words to our loved one, and, and just saying, Good morning, and I love you and, and, you know, thank you for being present. And all of those things, you know that I’ve always said that we don’t move on. From those we love, we just move forward carrying them with us. And we don’t have to move on. And that’s one of the great other great myths of griefs, you tell people, they have to move on. And that’s like, you’re going to hit a wall, nobody wants to move on. Like, they don’t want to do that. So instead, just think of it like, you’re living for both of you, now you’re moving forward carrying that person with you. And that when you speak of them, you look at a sunset and you think of them, they’re with you and they’re feeling the same thing. They’re seeing the sunset with you, through your eyes, through your feelings through you’re bringing them into the present moment with you.
Victoria Volk 31:58
I’m a grief recovery specialist, but in Grief Recovery, it’s about moving on from the pain. Yeah, you know, like you’ve expressed it’s, it’s not like after two and a half years or so it was for you that you know that pain or those feelings you felt weren’t debilitating, like they were, you know, wouldn’t take you down for days or hours or, you know, like they used to or maybe even weeks.
Kristine Carlson 32:22
Yeah, maybe that’s what I’m experiencing now with Melanie’s I’m having a hard time going back to the pain. You know, like, because I moved, you know, I think that we do that we we want to be out of pain. And and then I think it’s, it’s, it’s hard to go back into that again.
Victoria Volk 32:42
So curious also to have you found love again. Do you want to find love again? If you haven’t,
Kristine Carlson 32:49
I found love again, for sure. Not in the same sense of the love of partnership that I had with my husband? Yeah, I think we’re like, you know, we’re creatures that are meant to explore love and explore relationship. And I’ve had many relationships since my husband say last about two to four, one last one lasted a long time as a different kind of relationship. Fact, I’m still in relationship with him. It’s just not a physical relationship. It’s a we’re very spiritually soul connected. But I dated him for many, many, many years. And then he was my transitional person. He was the person that helped me and the worst part of my grief. And yeah, but I you know, it’s weird because I have always had this sense that Richard was my person, like, my person to partner with. And in many ways, I’m still partnering with him today. So I look at it more like what is it that I need as a woman? And what are my emotional needs and then I if I need a man that I feel is a good man when that I’m attracted to one that I feel I can have a connection with and I’m willing to explore that I’m very open to exploring that but then a lot of times it just doesn’t something peters out or you know, I have a very fulfilling fulfilled life and very full life with my career with my five grandkids now I’ve got a couple houses that I maintain and visit and and I’ve got aging parents so I’m in that sandwich generation where I needed by my daughters and I needed by my parents so and then I have a lot of friends I have a lot of single women friends that I hang out with I lead retreats for women all over the world. I have, you know, I’m I’m with people a lot so my needs are lower, and if it doesn’t, it’s I start to realize that if I’m not really nourished in the relationship, or it’s just sort of like companionship, I Do you have to think well, would I rather be with my girlfriend on a Friday night? Or do I want to be with him? And then if it’s the girlfriend wins, I know I’m in the wrong relationship.
Victoria Volk 35:09
Hey, there you go, that’s a great tip.
Kristine Carlson 35:12
I’m like, okay, if I’m not missing him, he’s a great guy. He’s just not mine guy. You know? And, and so the answer to that is very loaded. It’s, I’m very open to meeting men and to exploring was a really, really high quality good man. And I’m very specific about that, what I how I define that for myself. And a lot of it is just, I’m looking for a man that has a wide range of emotion, who has a depth to him who’s passionate about his work, who has, you know, created a good, solid, complete life for himself. And that’s what I have. So I’m looking for somebody like that, you know, and I meet men like that, but then there might be a couple things that are off, you know, so over a period of two years, usually takes about two years. And I’m like, Okay, this is run its course. You know, what it’s done about life? You know, it’s kind of it’s really not about life. It’s, it’s, it’s a little bit hard on the heart, because you have to kind of, you know, I don’t like to hurt people, and I hate breakups. I hate going through. I’m terrible at breakups. I’m awful at them. And so I kind of always just hope, oh, hope this just fizzles out, you know. So there’s so that we can be friends without it, you know. So when it becomes very obvious to both people, then you usually can part with friendship, and, and it’s like, I really love you. I think you’re amazing. And we’re not moving forward. So let’s, you know, let’s put the brakes on where we’re at. And let’s regroup. You know, and that’s usually what happens for me, as I do that, with most of the men that I’ve dated, kind of on the more serious side,
Victoria Volk 36:57
Is this something that you address and kind of help women navigate with at your retreats and things like that?
Kristine Carlson 37:02
It is yeah, we do. We talk a lot about what it means to be single Love, the stories come out, it’s a lot more fun than my work. Like, I don’t go into that so much of my work. But yeah, just being single is it’s a great topic for women on retreat, especially women that most of the women that come on my retreats are either in a long marriage, and they’re just yearning for, you know, female company, or they’re single, widowed, divorced, you know, and in that place of wondering, like, how do I navigate this? And, yeah, I would love to write a book about that at some point, just because it is, it is such a, it’s murky water for most people. And, and it doesn’t have to be, you know, you can put some clear boundaries on how you do it as an adult woman, you know, and how, and move through it pretty, you know, it doesn’t have to be so difficult.
Victoria Volk 38:02
I know, society has a lot of opinions about women and remarriage and, and all of that, and, you know, too soon and not too soon, and why are you waiting, and you know, all these things on and out
Kristine Carlson 38:18
Really honest, they they take a lover pretty early, because it’s an alive experience, and they’re looking to live. So I especially, you know, kind of depends on I think when you’re widowed to like, if you’re younger or older, you know what I mean? Like, because if you’re younger, your hormones are raging, and then a lot of times grief and post traumatic stress can make your hormones rage even more. So you have to take that into consideration. You know, I mean, it’s, it’s so when you’re in your, you know, like where I’m at now I’m in my late 50s I don’t you know, I’m like sex. I’m like, I like it, it’s great, but I don’t have to have it like I did when I was in my early 40s. I mean, that was a horrible time for my husband to die. I was basically in the peak of my sexual hurrah, you know, and I’m like, I need to have sex. So the, but the other part about that is just learning as a woman how to be comfortable with your own body, you know, and, and taking care of yourself that way. And, you know, again, like, there are these society rules and expectations, but I think I think that people know, that we have needs, you know, I definitely felt my husband pushing on me to have a lover if that’s what I needed, because I needed to live and, and again, I’ll just reiterate, sex is a very alive, very engaging part of life and so it’s okay. If you’re a widow to find a safe, a safe companion lover if that’s what you need, you know, it’s okay. Hey, now that said, I mean you’re very raw and open, and you have to be careful because, you know, you don’t want to just, you don’t want to just fill that hole with something just to fill it. I mean, I would I mean, whole i That sounded really terrible. I mean, that way I read the whole of loss. So oh my god that’s really love this conversation. Whoa, sorry about that did not mean it like that. But anyways, you just don’t want to bring place the loss, yeah, replace a loss or try to replace that because that again is not going to allow for your grieving process to really happen. But Can somebody hold you in grief? Yes, absolutely. And then maybe you just don’t put expectation on that being the relationship that is gonna replace the one that you lost, you just you allow that to be the kind of relationship that it is, I think that’s the hard part for women is that we get very attached, and especially to those relationships where it has a sexual connection, we can’t help ourselves, it’s just what we do, because it’s a different experience having sex for a man and a woman. You know, he enters you and penetrates you, and then he leaves and you know, and he’s entered you and penetrated to so there’s a totally different experience for a woman that way. And that’s why the attachment is so much greater. So we have to be careful with our emotions and our feelings. And probably for a lot of women, the first year is probably not a good time to take on a lover for that reason, because you are so raw and open and vulnerable.
Victoria Volk 41:43
I’m glad you circled back to that, because I was actually going to say that I think there’s a lot that you could unpack there in your work with women because you didn’t have the tools like you did. And you weren’t as tapped into your own intuition and your own knowing and really did feel like I don’t know what I need. Because I didn’t, maybe perhaps they got into that relationship of the person they lost. Maybe they got into that relationship. And maybe that person was someone who was filling something up for them that they did not fill within themselves. Oh, yeah. So that piece is gone. And now they don’t even know who they are.
Kristine Carlson 42:20
Well, that is so true. And I don’t think we do know who we are after the loss of a long term. Partner. I mean, I knew I didn’t I was I kind of got dropped back to being that 19 year old girl that I was when I met him. And so a lot of the fears, the insecurities I felt, were masked. And I think that happens in our relationship, it masks a lot of the things that we may have thought up until that time. Now that said, you kind of go through an accelerated growth process pretty quick if you’re if you’re open to it. And you know that and you start to realize, Oh, these are old fears, these are these are old fears resurfacing, because he’s not here, he’s not masking them anymore. There’s like not there’s it was like the paper was just over it. And now the papers ripped off. And now those those qualities and attributes are present again. But I think if you realize that, then you can you can address them, acknowledge them. And, and look at that, for what it is. It’s just, it’s just fear, you know, it’s just emotional fear. I have a program called what now and I, I love this program, because I actually designed it for women and for women who are really trying to retrieve themselves because they don’t We don’t know who we are, after we go through any kind of loss of our identity. And let’s face it, I mean, loss of a spouse is loss of an identity, because you are no longer that married woman, and you’re no longer partnered. And that’s a huge identity crisis that women go through, of course, so they can happen the same. through divorce, it can happen. When women go through the empty nest, some women go through incredible loss when their kids are finally out of the house because they don’t know who they are anymore because they were a mom, and they were so identified with that. So so there is this whole process that you need to redefine what it is you value at this point in your life, you know, what is it that you value is a huge question. And then how can you align your actions with what it is you value because that’s what integrity is. That’s what self integrity is, is aligning our actions with what matters in our heart. And that just takes an inquiry, you know, that takes the sole work of really going inside and asking those questions of yourself because we do all have the answers. We all have the answers whether or not we’re honest with ourselves or not. That’s that’s another thing and that’s on each of us to be honest and in integrity with ourselves. And so, you know, my webinar program talks a lot about all of these things, intention, integrity, what we value, how to get back to what we value, how to align our actions with our values, and it’s so important for the whole journey of life, you know, if you want to get back to living a vibrant life, you’ve got to begin to see yourself in life and begin to visualize a new dream for your life. And that’s hard. It took me years to do that I could not ever dream of what my life would be like, without my husband in it. And then suddenly I started to, I was able to start to see things and create goals for myself and, and look at the things I wanted to do. And you know, and I filled my life up with meaningful things, you know, because I did value spending time with women I value travel as value helping others and serving others. So I write books, I do all these different things that honor my purpose here.
Victoria Volk 46:01
That’s huge. When we honor our own values. Yeah, there it is. So let’s talk about your work. The retreats, the book, the movie, lifetime movie that came out.
Kristine Carlson 46:12
Yeah, thank you. Um, well, my book heartbroken, open. A true story of coming alive again, after profound loss was actually my book, heartbroken open a memoir, through loss to self discovery that I wrote two years after my husband died. And it really came right out of my journal from those first two years. So I got the rights back a couple years after I published it, because they asked me to write a how to grieve book and I was like, well, this isn’t that this is a memoir. So I wasn’t ready to write a how to grieve book, my how to grieve book is called from heartbreak to wholeness, the hero’s journey to joy. And it has a lot of the things that we talked about just a moment ago about really going into the sole inquiry of who you are now, after this profound change that you’ve gone through whether it be a health crisis or a huge loss. And so those two books are my, my contribution, you know, to the grieving and the wholeness, you know, how to how to heal from grief. And then I have programs to 21 days of healing or grieving with grace with Christine Carlson. That’s a program I just designed so that you could get a video of me in your inbox every day talking about how to inspire yourself today and how to heal and grieve with grace that and then there’s a journal that goes with that. And that’s only $21 $1 a day for 21 days. So that’s on my website at Christine carlson.com. And then I have retreats, I have the wet now program on retreat, which is really my my favorite of all my work that I do. It’s, it’s what I call my great work, because I feel that’s where I make the most difference in women’s lives is really helping them in that rediscovery process, and how to inspire them to dream a new dream for their lives. And then the retreats are just a blast. I mean, they really are just a huge celebration of life. I mean, I do my retreat, my webinar retreat is at Sea Ranch, California. And I do an Italy retreat, and I do I’ve done Bali, and I probably do Morocco, but you know, I’m really like, love to travel and create amazing experiences for women to travel together and have a bit of a transformational personal growth process in that that deep connection, like very deep connection with women and circle together. So yeah, that’s my work.
Victoria Volk 48:48
Can I ask what your promises like when people come to your retreat, how they come and how they leave? What are some things that people have said,
Kristine Carlson 48:56
Yeah I mean, my promise is that I’m going to be present for them and I’m going to facilitate an amazing container for them to experience pretty much all of it you know, deep connection, joy, whatever emotions come up on that retreat, but they’re with a like minded group of women. I interview every woman that comes on a retreat. So I you know, I’ve definitely turned some women and said to them that I don’t think this is the right retreat for you when I feel like it’s just not the right fit. And my retreats are small, they’re intimate, they’re going to have a great time. I mean, honestly, like I travel in a lot of styles, so I only go to really cool places and really beautiful places. And so that’s my promise for my retreats. And then it was it was really exciting year because lifetime did come out with a movie based on heartbroken open and it’s the don’t sweat the small stuff story because again, like I really wrote books in that brand as well. I’ve don’t sweat the small stuff for women. Don’t sweat the small stuff in love. And don’t sweat the small stuff for mom. So I, I wrote three books in that series. And there’s nine books in the series. And it’s just it was beautiful. It was interesting. It’s, it happened at the 14th year of grief, that’s kind of a pivotal time for a lot of widows. I didn’t intend it for it to happen, then it just did. And I think that the story is really beautifully done so that it’s inspirational. It’s, it’s a sad story, but it’s inspirational for people and meant to be that during these times where we’ve gone through so much loss due to COVID. And due to the state of the world, really, I mean, I mean, the world is is a lot of turmoil right now. So I think stories like this are very powerful and and we have such an amazing love story where that is very present in that movie.
Victoria Volk 50:49
Can I ask what you why you think the 14 years? Is it just like the seven year cycle idea?
Kristine Carlson 50:55
Yeah, I just heard research, modern widows Club does a lot of research on widows. And they they say that there’s something something that happens for widow, she she enters into a different phase of her journey after 14 years, feels more complete. And I started to feel very completed 10. But now I’m in past that four years. So I’m really I’m living in a lot more service. Now. My work is getting more and more about serving others. And in that sense of in a in a bigger way. You know, I think that’s why the movie happened is I was ready for it. I was maybe my kids weren’t but they were like kind of like, wow, really okay. But they were very supportive. But it was it was a little hard, harder for them than I thought it would be. They’re grown women now. They’re, they’re 30 and 32. But it still was a difficult time in our lives for them to revisit that the movie is beautiful. And they acknowledge that it’s a beautiful movie. And they were both portrayed very beautifully. So they you know, it wasn’t as messy in the movie as it actually it was in life. Somebody asked me, they said, Well, was it hard to watch and go? No, it was really hard to live through. It wasn’t as hard to watch.
Victoria Volk 52:09
Yeah, that’s, that would be a good point to make.
Kristine Carlson 52:13
Really hard to live for, though.
Victoria Volk 52:16
Well, thank you so much for sharing all that you’ve shared today. I do want to be mindful of your time. But is there anything you would like to leave the listeners with today, a tip or piece of advice, or what grief has taught you maybe kind of a little bit of all of that. I mean, you’ve shared a lot of great advice and tips. But
Kristine Carlson 52:32
I would just say that when you’re in grief, I know it’s so hard, and it’s so painful. But I also remind you that you’re in very fertile ground, for the ground for your growth, and who you become and how you become after your loss. And just to be aware that this is a time where everything is going to be in a heightened awareness if you’re open, and you have the opportunity in grief to become a better person than you were before grief. And I always say like when we’re in grief and loss, and we’re living the big stuff, we’re definitely not sweating, the small stuff. You know, small stuff isn’t even on our radar, and you have an opportunity to really know yourself, to really know yourself that one of the things my husband said a lot was that the circumstances of life, don’t make or break you, but they will reveal you. And so how you are in this process is being revealed to you is who you really are. And that’s a person that’s growing. And so be compassionate, be gentle. Be kind to yourself during this process. It’s a hard process, but you will if you take your steps forward, every day, you will heal, and you will move into a feeling of wholeness and joy again, I promise you that. But you do have to allow yourself to heal. That’s the main, the main thing.
Victoria Volk 54:07
And you believe that is possible healing is possible.
Kristine Carlson 54:10
Absolutely. I believe that it absolutely we are geared toward healing that we can get in our own way. But if we surrender to the process, we’re going to receive all that we need and we’re going to receive it with grace. But the surrender piece is huge. You have to surrender to the process.
Victoria Volk 54:29
So it gives you the most hope for the future. Your future.
Kristine Carlson 54:33
I think just when I wake up and I’m just feeling so full of joy, for the most part, except for like this morning when I woke up was that was super joyful, but I feel joy now so you know, I just do my best to stay grounded and peaceful and in my own lane and help others and I think what what I love so much about life is that there’s A sense of community that you can draw on for support and that you can offer yourself to. And. And yeah, I think that’s what gives me hope is that there’s a lot of really good people in this world. And it doesn’t really matter. Like, if you’re Democrat or Republican, you know, you’re a good person, if you’re a good person, you’re entitled to your belief, whatever they are. And I think that people, we need to hold on to, you know, the values that make us good people. And that’s kindness, that’s compassion. It’s doing random acts of kindness every day for somebody else without receiving anything. It’s that kind of stuff. And I think there’s a lot of people like that still left in the world. And I and I hope to inspire more people to be like that.
Victoria Volk 55:46
I do want to give you an opportunity, if you do have a little bit of time, like, yeah, so you shared a lot about Richard and, and really just the essence of who he was. And I want to give you an opportunity to to share the essence of your friend, and what maybe she has taught you.
Kristine Carlson 56:01
Oh, well, it’s gonna make me cry. Oh, my God. No, me was an is the sweetest human, just a wonderful, wonderful woman, you know, add courage and grace and beauty and kindness. And she was really, somebody I always admired and looked up to, she was just a year, year and a half, two years older than me, but I always looked up to her. And what I’m gonna miss so much about her is that just having her in my corner here, knowing that she was, you know, like a godmother to my children and in my corner, and somebody that I would also grow old with beautiful, beautiful soul. And I know she’s, well I know, she’s at peace. I feel it. But I’m just gonna miss growing old with her and laughing with her. We were very much alike in a lot of ways. We both would laugh when we get together because we like looking at each other and, and even our laugh was very similar. And we just, we just, we would just melt into each other. And I’m going to miss that beautiful reflection that that she was of a real soul sister.
Victoria Volk 57:16
Thank you for sharing it.
Kristine Carlson 57:19
That’s great. You helped me access my pain. Thank you very. Thank you for that. No, I’m glad I needed to. I needed to go there. So it’s good. Maybe it can stay there a little while longer today.
Victoria Volk 57:31
You’re welcome. I have some soul sister friends and I, you never imagined that you would grow old with them. So my heart goes out to you.
Kristine Carlson 57:40
Thank you. She’s with Richard. I’m a little jealous about. Love her. Thank you very much for asking.
Victoria Volk 57:53
You’re welcome. We have a lot of love around you. I imagine some. Thank you. Thank you. That’ll get you through anything else you’d like to share?
Kristine Carlson 58:01
No, I feel very complete. Thank you so much for doing this podcast. I can see it’s going to be a great service to others. I can’t wait to share it with my community as well. So thank you, Victoria. You have a wonderful demeanor and presence. And now I’m sure you’re doing beautiful work with people. So lucky to have you.
Victoria Volk 58:18
Thank you. Thank you for that. And thank you for your time today and for sharing. Also, of course. And remember when you unleash your heart, you unleash your life. Much love
