Child Loss, Death/Dying, Grieving Voices Guest, Grieving Voices Podcast, Parenting, Podcast |
Kasey Carmona | 6 Days of Dying and a Masterpiece of Life
SHOW NOTES SUMMARY:
Warning: This episode contains a mother’s account of her son, CJ’s, final days of life. This may be difficult for some listeners to hear, particularly those who have lost a child.
99 Days. How much life can you squeeze out of 99 precious newborn days? Especially when 84 of those are spent in the hospital?
Kabuki, a major theatrical form in Japan for four centuries, became less of a theatrical experience and more of a grieving one.
Kabuki Syndrome (a rare genetic syndrome), named in part after facial art depicted in Kabuki theatre, expresses itself with distinct facial features including large eyes and long lashes.
CJ would not only fight to stay alive with Kabuki, but due to Kabuki, he was also born with half a heart (hypoplastic left heart syndrome), 3 kidneys, and a cleft palate. The odds were stacked against CJ and his family.
Kasey and her husband did whatever they could for their son. However, when it became clear that they were going to have to have procedures done to CJ, that was their sign that they weren’t honoring CJ’s spirit or his life. They came to accept the truth of their son’s young life and decided to take him home with oxygen support only.
Kasey could have never anticipated that the day they took CJ home on hospice care would be the first day he would truly be living. For six days, they loved as they had never loved. And, they found peace in their sorrow; believing that the gift of CJ’s life was to highlight the abundance in the present moment.
We often torture ourselves with questions we will never know the answer to. And, with odds of .032% of this diagnosis, “Why?” is a question with no answer. Scientifically, it comes down to one tiny missing gene. In the contrast, we can recognize the fragility of life and its magnificence, too.
“Part of living the abundance of life is experiencing loss.”
– Kasey Carmona in a Valentine’s letter to CJ
RESOURCES:
NOT MENTIONED BUT HELPFUL:
CONNECT WITH KASEY:
______
NEED HELP?
If you or anyone you know is struggling with grief, substance use disorders, or a mental health challenge, free resources are available HERE and HERE.
Are you enjoying the podcast? Check out my bi-weekly newsletter, The Unleashed Letters.
CONNECT WITH VICTORIA:
Victoria Volk 0:00
Hi 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 grievers and non grievers alike spread hope and inspire compassion towards those hurting. Lastly, by providing my heart with yours. In thid 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, my guest is Kasey Carmona. She is a former performing arts teacher turned full time mom to two boys. When her second son was born with a life threatening critical illness. Kasey was forced to surrender herself and her son into the great big hands of love. Kasey, and her adorable family live in Atlanta, Georgia. Thank you so much for being here.
Kasey Carmona 1:24
Hi, thank you, Victoria, I appreciate it.
Victoria Volk 1:28
And I just off the bat before we started recording, this is a relatively new loss for you. And so so thank you for having the courage because it does take courage to share your story on a platform like this, whether it be mine or anyone else’s. So I honor that courage in you. And I thank you for sharing your story with me and the listeners.
Kasey Carmona 1:51
Oh, thank you. There’s something about this podcast to have grieving voices. The grief journey is long, but necessary, is what I what I share often. And I know I’m new on it. And I’m sure that I know I have a long way to go. But where I am now that I do, I do want to share where I am in this moment, and it will change and then months and years to come. But where I am, feels important too.
Victoria Volk 2:23
So what brings you to grieving voices?
Kasey Carmona 2:25
It’s, It’s love. It’s love my son, CJ. As you shared, he actually his first birthday would be next month. And he was born with a congenital heart disease called hypoplastic left heart syndrome. Essentially, it means that he was growing in me with only half a heart. We thought that that was the worst of it. But the night that he was born, we learned that it was much more. And pretty much every major body system was affected by something months later, we would learn that it was because of a single gene deletion. It was a rare genetic syndrome called Kabuki syndrome that caused a multiple abnormalities in his body. And and I just say like the poor baby had a lot going on. That’s what I always say. And he had a lot going on. And we loved him through it. And we loved we loved every bit of him. And that that’s what brings me here is is I think grief is figuring out what to do with all the love and CJ story is worth being shared. I just told somebody it’s it’s both both CJs life and death were beautiful. But there was so much life in His death. That really is the part that I want to talk about. We did something pretty wild I would say I quickly learned that the best way to love my son in the hospital was to advocate and I I advocated on every little thing if he was crying too much we didn’t need to do a temperature check. Just look at look at him. Oh but but the reason why is because they told me if he cried for longer than five minutes it was bad because because he only had half a heart right and so so we couldn’t have him even cry. He’s a baby though babies cry like but the the the amount of suffering that we saw In the hospital, CJ, at three days of life had a 10 hour open heart reconstructive surgery three day old. He was on ECMO, the heart were the machine that pumps your heart for you for longer than most babies. But he just never quite recovered from that surgery. And it’s because of so many things. He had three kidneys, he had a cleft palate, so he wasn’t able to take feeds. But even still, because of Kabuki, he created so much mucus that he wasn’t able to even swallow anything into his stomach, everything went into his intestines. What we had to put a tube into his intestines. Later, it wasn’t until we made a pretty critical choice that I’ll tell you about. We learned that his his brain nor his body grew, I knew he was having trouble gaining weight, but I didn’t realize his brain never grew. And just think about what that the implications of that especially we know that children’s brains have to grow and unfussy. Essentially, as I started advocating of my child needs this, my son needs this, we’re going to do every test every scan with him in my arms, because he cries, if you if you are trying to poke and prod and get what you need, and you’re gonna get a better reading with me holding him, you’ve never done it before. Well, first time for everything, you know, like, we just I did everything that I could. And in early May, we got the diagnosis of Kabuki syndrome, and that that syndrome on top of his severity of hypoplastic, left heart syndrome. It just, it just didn’t. It didn’t sit well with my husband and myself. At that point, we had seen so much in the hospital, and so much suffering, that it was hard for us to, to imagine this to keep going. And at some point, and this is a wild thing for a parent to say and I hope no parent makes this choice. But I believe that there are parents out there that question it at some point, death is better than suffering.
Kasey Carmona 2:27
And that’s a good that’s a really challenging thing to say out loud as a parent to decide that the hope heaven offers will be so much better for my son than what we’re doing to him here. And essentially, we had already been working with the palliative care team at the hospital and the Children’s Hospital. We were at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, Eggleston and the team is fantastic. They they are wonderful people. There was a doctor that CJ had a really bad episode I learned later it was his first death contraction. And the cardiologist that was on staff just didn’t know what to do. cardiologists switched out every week, the new cardiologist came in and she said, Listen, I don’t know what to tell you. I don’t know what to do, I guess. But we need to do something. So I guess we’ll intubate him and put him under for a Cath. And we’ll do that procedure. And the language that the PACT team gave us was, we will do things for our son CJ, but we will not do things to our son. And when that doctor said, I don’t know what else to do. So let’s do this. That that was the red flag of we’re doing something to him, not necessarily for him. And and so we worked with the Pac’s team, and we brought in hospice care. And we said we’re done. i We advocated so strongly, we said we’re bringing this baby home on pediatric hospice care. And let me just tell you, for our family, obviously, the hardest, most tragic decision a family could ever make. But it was so beautiful, because our son came home. And I also have Teddy, who at the time was only 1415 months old. And so CJ got to be with Teddy. And they they were pretty much together while CJ was in utero. I mean, it was so sweet the boys. Teddy would climb on my tummy and CJ would kick and like the the boys had this connection, but then to come home and to watch it play out was was just so beautiful. And for us Even though my son was at home to die, court and I believe that CJ is life started when he came home, he spent 84 days in the hospital. But those were the days of suffering. There was a freedom that happened when he came home. And it was so beautiful. I mean, the things that as mothers, we might take for granted with healthy children, just, just even, just even being able to take a walk outside. He at this point, he was still hooked up to his life supports. But I wasn’t able to do that in the hospital, he was connected to a wall. Or because of COVID Our family wasn’t able to see him. And so within two days of him bringing, bringing brought home, we had people come from Florida to California, to Atlanta, Georgia, to say hello to our son. And we had this beautiful welcome home party and we had food and we had ice cream cake and and all the cousins were there. And
Kaseu Carmona 11:18
Everybody got to say hello. And one of the most incredible gifts that somebody gave us was a photographer and she just sat in a corner and took these beautiful candids of CJ. And his it was really the family that came to support us. Not not all of our aunts and uncles were able to make it but but those that came to support us while CJ was in the hospital, we invited back and and most of those weren’t able to meet him. So so they were able to meet him for the first time. And it was it was raining that day. But but I just remember it being so bright like i We live in a 1920s school house. And we have these beautiful 10 foot windows and we just sat we put we put the baby recliner and rocker right by the window and I don’t remember raining I just remember it feeling so beautiful and so lovely and so warm in the house that day. And it just felt so good for us all to be together. I think that this is a familiar feeling. For those that are have loved ones at hospice or loved ones that are going to die or have died. There definitely was a sense of denial. Probably the first time that experienced denial. I mean, because my baby was home like for the for the first time he was home, like how great and I just thought things. How could things go wrong? You know, I mean, this is everything that you could have hoped for granted. He was he was a sick, he was a sick baby. He was a sick baby and it just didn’t feel like that cash. My hospice nurse her name is Lenny’s short talent she she’s also a grief educator and she she is one of those angels on earth. I mean just just a walking saint who just who just tears a woman so close and dear to my heart. And she kept saying where are the giraffe where the giraffes that are looking ahead and there was one day where she she had to look ahead and say all right, I think CJ took a took a bit of a turn. At this point we were only a weekend to our time on hospice and CT was at work I told CT to come home and at that point we we made plans we did a family photo shoot and and we got all dressed up and all my boys are in white shirts and I borrowed a dress from a girlfriend that was gorgeous and I had a friend come and she did my hair and makeup for me so I felt really good and that was such a weird day because I was like I can’t I I’m spending time getting ready and feeling pretty well. I only have minutes left with my son I only have moments left I only have hours left I only have days left like this This feels so weird and and the photographer that took the candid photos Her name is Joy she came back she she was so kindly came back to take these photos and both joy and my dear friend Emily were there and they just were like know what this is you’ll want these for the rest of your life take take the 30 minutes you’re okay you’re still a good mom to put some makeup on and you know put a comb through your hair. But I but I do remember that of like, this feels very vain to me and I actually today my son Teddy went to go point at one of the photos that we took from that day and and I did just think to myself today and this is a vain thought but but but goes along with what I’m saying here of like, gosh, I looked so pretty that day and And I’m just so grateful for other people to speak in and say, take a moment for yourself here and it’s okay. Anyways, we took these photos and they are they, they represent they represent so much of the life that CJ had and their smiling faces and my son he looks so beautiful, he’s his cheeks are full and he’s got his little curly hair because we I wet it before we took the photo so those hair had those perfect black ringlets and, and we, we took photos throughout our beautiful property that we live on and and it was a good morning. It took a nap after because it was a it was tiring. And then after CJs nap, something changed. And it’s it’s a little too painful to even go into it all and I won’t because of the trauma that is still there. But I will say that the hospice team came in and essentially said today’s the day Today’s the day it’s time to take your son off life support.
Kasey Carmona 16:13
It’s time to take them off for CJ it was oxygen and he had that NG tube so I was was exclusively pumping which is amazing. So my breast milk was going straight to his intestines. And and this is This to me is where life and death are on this wonderful continuum. And sometimes it’s hard to see it as a black and white thing. Because this this is really where we started to see all that we can do and CJ is life when you know you have at this point minutes hours left. So what you do what you do when you have one potentially one last night with the person that you love and for us we we made a family masterpiece we got out the paint we got out a big a big canvas board we went outside it was May and it was gorgeous. And we we put different colored paints on on a piece of paper or I think it was a paper plate my son Teddy had blue paint I had the green paint court had gray and little CJ had read and we just stamped with our feet on this canvas and together we made we made our family masterpiece it’s the most beautiful thing hanging up in our home because it’s the thing that we can point to and say we were all together this is the time of our life where we all shared we were all present This Is us This Is us This is where love combined it was
Kasey Carmona 18:27
A beautiful moment we have a meal together and and and then that’s when we that’s when we
Kasey Carmona 18:50
We put Teddy to sleep we brought we had Teddy kisses brother Good night and and then we we took CJ off of his life supports
Kasey Carmona 19:04
That night was was the dark night. You You don’t want to go to sleep because you don’t know what’s gonna happen.
Kasey Carmona 19:17
My husband laid on one side of the bed I laid in the other and CJ was it a one of those? swaddle me it’s like a little a little baby nest. He’s sleeping right next to us. And you know, you just put your head right next to his and and you keep your eyes open even though they’re they’re fluttering shut. You just gotta stay awake, but at some point you can’t. And so so we fell asleep. That next morning, Miracle miracles that baby was still alive. He was still alive. We couldn’t believe it. Um, but At this point he he wasn’t looking good, right? Like, I mean, sweet boy. It was It was wild and, and His breathing was so shallow and and it was hard that that morning we courts aren’t Auntie Helen, Teddy and CJ called her OMA OMO was living with us. And we had OMA take Teddy, we just were like Teddy needs to. You guys can’t see this. This is too, too sad to dark. We stayed actually, in this bedroom right here and too much. Hospice finally came, I mean, talk about an intimate moment. For your hospice doctor and Lenny’s the hospice nurse. That’s the angel to sit on your bed with you and your dying son. That is intimate. And, and they said, Yeah, it’s it’s tonight. It’s tonight. And I just at that point was like, I if you don’t realize that death is going to be so difficult. And so I’m like, you just want him to die as fast as possible at that point. And it was just so hard to watch. A breath, no breath. I mean, it was wild. It was wild. And, and Looney said, I know you want to protect Teddy on this. But I just think Teddy needs his brother, CJ. And CJ needs his brother Teddy. And I think Teddy needs to say another goodbye. And I think they need to be together. I was like how do you let a little baby see this? How do you let a baby see this? This is gonna be wild. But But I believe it. I believe it. I hear you. I believe it. And so. So we call back Oman said come back. We all need to be together. We need to be together. And but we kept CJ in the back room. At that point, CT and I had said our goodbyes. We had made our peace. We had sang songs. CT is an incredibly musician. So brought out the guitar play the piano. I mean, we were doing I had read oversee Jay, I mean, just we set our prayers. I mean just had done everything. So we made our peace. And oh my God came and made her peace to we go to bed that night. Same thing of like, you don’t want to go to bed. But at some point you do. And the next morning this baby was still alive.
Kasey Carmona 22:52
And so I told court I said Thursday that Thursday was CJ is what I call his dying day where he’s we had him in the back room. But we’re not going to do that anymore. Like it’s too sad. It’s not our son, our son is a child of life and love. And so we brought him out into the living room. And this, this is where life and death swirled in my living room. And I am here to tell you this is where CJ is life was absolutely beautiful because at this point, we really didn’t know if every breath was going to be his last and so we really cherished every minute and because he was off his oxygen support. This is where we got to have fun. So we we put both boys and strollers and we went outside and did stroller races. And we we had Teddy push his brother around in a stroller because that’s what you do with a normal baby. And we got out the kiddie pool and we see Jay wasn’t going to be able to be in a pool but but he was able to watch his brother be in a pool and splash around and and we were able to have dance parties where wires didn’t get in the way. And court was able to hold CJ without the wires and play piano with one hand. And we were able to bring CJ in to the bathroom for for bath time and just all the really wonderful normal stuff that once again moms and young moms and dads take for granted or get frustrated because they have multiple children in here. We were so grateful. For every moment that we were we would hold CJ and Teddy would coming climb into our laps to give CJ kisses on the forehead and and this is this is heaven on earth. This is heaven on earth. I’ve experienced it I’ve lived it. My son is live that my son loved it so much that he was he we were told he was going to go Friday, but he didn’t go on Friday. He didn’t go on Saturday. He didn’t die on Sunday. He didn’t die on Monday. We had these and total six days of glorious life. And but it was wild. My son’s organs started shutting down. And and he would he was smelling he was decaying. He rigor mortis, set it on his tongue. I mean, like it was, you’re holding, you’re holding a mostly dead baby, I joked around. I’m a big fan of The Princess Bride. And there’s the scene where where the man and Black is dead. And Billy Crystal says you thought he was dead, but he’s only mostly dead. And my son was only mostly dead. Because there was a part of him that just kept living. He was only taking two breaths every five minutes. And he did that for six days. Because we had set our peace, because we were in this fullness and richness of life and death. That anxiety that I think we feel, I think it’s natural to feel when a loved one is going to die is dying. I didn’t experience it because I was so focused on the present. And that is what the present can do for us is that when we’re so focused on the present moment, and the life that we have in that present moment, it’s just like, everything goes away, everything goes away. And that is a gift that we we do not have to have somebody who is dying to tap into. But but it does take practice to be present. And it is one of the gifts that my son has given me. Tuesday morning came along, and then the energy changed. The energy changed it, it. It felt like that was the day. It felt like we were kind of living on this bonus time. And and it was it was finally time and I did something that I hadn’t done before. And when CJ was growing on me, I felt this compelling sense to journal. And that morning, I read through essentially these love letters to my son.
Kasey Carmona 28:00
It took an hour. But I read every single one to him chronicling out the love that I’ve had from him since really, the beginning but But I started the journal, I got his diagnosis at 22 weeks, and I just wanted him to know like, I have loved you. I do love you and I will always love you. And if there’s one thing that I’m for sure of, I have to have faith that there’s a heaven I have to have faith that I’ll see my son but I do know without without a doubt that love never ends. And wherever my sin is now he is in love. He’s in the hands of love. And that I know that I know cuz I was his hands of love. And then I let it go. And my son finally did take his last breath. It was Tuesday May 25. It had all worked out. We had just just put Teddy down for his nap. He got to say goodnight to his brother. And just 1020 minutes after that. CJ did take his last breath you know I said this earlier in the podcast Your love has to go somewhere. And a love for my son was was so selfless. so vast, so deep. It kept it kept going and going. And it’s something that I I’m not sure I can take credit for i i believe If that the source of love for me, that’s God was the great well, that sprung up on a moment by moment basis for me to get out of myself. And to truly, but everything I have into the life and the death of my son. And so now I’m, I’m coming to terms with with what I did. And that’s a process in itself. And it’s a good one. It’s a good one. But it is long. And at times difficult. It’s one that I, I don’t regret, and I would do over and over again to
Victoria Volk 30:53
Y’all can’t see me. But I have been crying this whole time. So sorry,
Kasey Carmona 31:03
Thank you. It’s tragic. But every death is tragic. It’s all tragic. Every loss is tragic.
Victoria Volk 31:10
So tragic. Highlight something you said. But I gotta grab more tissues.
Victoria Volk 31:27
It takes, It takes courage to share your story. But it takes courage to face death, but embracing it not shutting it in the back room. And if there’s anyone listening to this right now, there is such a gift in facing and embracing death in an opportunity that could be missed when you shut it out. And if there’s anything that my death doula training taught me, and in watching my own father die, is that giving yourself and your loved ones, like little boy, the opportunity to grieve with you, that was such a gift you gave him? So I’m so glad that you had that mentor there in that guide to share that with you because that is a moment. And people might say he won’t remember that. He will. And I will say that he will.
Kasey Carmona 32:30
Okay, well, I will I it’s gonna live in his body. And I’ve sweet Teddy struggled a lot this summer. So did I Right. And, and there’s there’s organizations here in Atlanta, Georgia, that we’ve already tapped into, and his pediatrician knows the story and will watch Teddy for his whole life. And because I it was a beautiful death, he still saw death at a young age, but, but to your point, my hope is that it’s not a scary thing, that that’s so many of us believe it to be. And rightfully so. I mean, there are aspects of it that are scary, but but by embracing CJs death, we recreated this beautiful death. And I, I there was so much life and his death. But but that was CJ like CJ just kept saying, like, he brought the life and so
Victoria Volk 33:39
You answered his call. It was like, coming to look at these legacy projects and end of life doula training, when we’d work with a family, on hospice, it’s the idea of involving the whole family to create a legacy project. That’s what you’ve done. That’s what you did. And you have this beautiful Memento and kudos to that for that friend who got the photographer. I used to be a photographer, Julie now what a gift what a thoughtful gift. So if you are listening to this, and you’re like, I don’t know what to do, I don’t know how to help you. You’re listening to ideas today, like hear this? You know? This wasn’t the first loss for you. Was it? No. It wasn’t the last. So what has that experience? What has CJ taught you about grief? And about life and you know that
Kasey Carmona 34:44
It is I’ve allowed myself to feel every single thing I need to feel if something bubbles up. I don’t push it down. I don’t say I’ll get to it later. I just let it come Lenny’s the grief Decatur shared emotion is you gotta move it through. And so I, I am choosing to move it all through. And so I, I am grateful for those that are willing to sit in the side with me. But also, we can have some good moments together. And I think learning about learning about my own grief, I am somebody who’s pretty external. And so writing has been helpful, talk therapy has been helpful. Sharing CJ story has been helpful. These things have have really given me insight, more insight into to who I am, and, and also but, but how how see Jay’s life has affected more people than what I realize. And yeah, I think before CJ was born, it was Valentine’s Day, and I wrote a letter to him. And there’s a line in that letter that I’ve been thinking about a lot recently. And I wrote, part of living, the abundance of life is experiencing loss. We choose to tap into that abundant life. And that’s it. That’s just the thing. It’s abundant. And when it’s growing, and it’s so much and it’s so full, of course, of course there’s going to be loss for me was how quickly did I accept that loss is for me, I’ve learned the sooner that I can accept a loss, the faster I can get on with the grieving process. That’s that’s how it has worked for me. And because when you wrestle with the why, when you wrestle with some of these existential questions that you might not ever get answers, I found you’re just delaying the inevitable of the accepting. And then this healing process can begin. When we realize when we choosing to tap into this abundant life, there’s going to be loss, but loss, a loss is always going to be hard. But because something is hard, doesn’t mean that it has to be bad, there can be good, doesn’t mean that it is good, but there can be good in it. And that’s a perspective, that’s a choice to make. It is not good that I lost my son, that is tragic. And it is so sad. But we found good in the loss. And I think it’s because we accepted what was happening. And it allowed us the freedom to just be present and to feel all the fields. And at that moment when my those six days while my son was mostly dead. I will I will say I buried everything pretty deep. But I but I purposely did that because I I wanted my son to have the absolute best. And and I think that’s also something that we do as mothers we, we regulate, we choose when when to be vulnerable, and when to show what we need to show and that wasn’t the right time. And I’m proud of that choice. I’m proud that I made that choice. But now as Teddy is watching me grieve, he watches me cry. And he watches me struggle. And I just say mommy sad I missed your brother, because I want him to know I want him to know that. This is part of living the abundant life that we’re in court and i weakly say, we have such a good life. I think that there’s probably people out there that would say Woe is me. And I hate to say to you, but there’s still so much good out there that you just have eyes to see it. A heart to believe it. I think that’s what grief has taught me more than anything else is that there’s still so much good despite the hard
Victoria Volk 39:28
What kind of question says Teddy asked are things that he well,
Kasey Carmona 39:35
Yeah, not too many. He’s he’s going to be too. Oh, gosh, this month. So so he’s, he hasn’t really asked questions, but he’ll point he’ll point to CJ a lot. We have pictures of him up and we have our masterpiece painting hanging up and so he’ll point to that every night before we go. As we talk to Teddy n, as we say, nightie night and we love you, we go like this, we put our hand over our hearts and we say CJ is in our hearts. So if you if you asked Teddy where CJ he would go like this, he’d put his hand over his heart. And I’m sure the time will come will he’ll start asking Lenny’s suggested the book, the invisible string. And so we read that regularly. And there’s a part where it says, There talks about the uncle in heaven, and we, we say, CJ and heaven. And so we are an open family about it, and I am. I’m really thankful for that. And I use the D word I use die. Because I also think that’s important too, especially for, for sweet Teddy, who, you know, children take things so literally, and so if we, if we use certain language, I want Teddy to, to not be afraid of sleeping or loss, but but knowing like this is this is death.
Victoria Volk 41:09
Well, and not only that, but if you don’t share the truth, they make up their own stories. And as they will make up their own stories, wow. So it’s very important that you be honest and truthful, to the, to the extent that in language they can understand at the time.
Kasey Carmona 41:35
Okay, that’s good to know,
Victoria Volk 41:37
What gives you the most hope for the future?
Kasey Carmona 41:41
I’ve been feeling that the spirit of CJ is the spirit of generosity. And his life gave so much to so many. And I hope that we can be generous with the help of our friends and family and do some kind deeds, especially for the Children’s Hospital here in Atlanta, and memory and an honor CJ, that that gives me hope.
Victoria Volk 42:09
Do you want to share a little bit about because for those that may not be familiar with Kabuki because I’m not right, is that what?
Kasey Carmona 42:16
Yeah, commemorate, yes.
Victoria Volk 42:19
How rare is it? Is it genetic?
Kasey Carmona 42:22
It’s a genetic syndrome. Yes. And it, it’s genetic syndrome. It was de novo. And CJ, which means new to him. However, if somebody does have Kabuki syndrome, and maybe it’s a mild case, they don’t realize it, that it can of course be passed along. It is very rare. It’s, I think, point zero 32% chance of a child getting it and it was a fluke accident. I was it was unlucky as what doctors say. And it caused this one genetic gene deletion caused a slew of issues in my son, and it’s just wild to think about one tiny gene was missing. And it just, it just makes you pause and reflect on the miracle of humans, childbirth, babies. I mean, there’s just so much like, gosh, so anyways, the the syndrome itself, it’s called Kabuki because the children typically have these big eyes that kind of are slanted a little bit. And these big, beautiful eyelashes, and it was named from Japanese doctors who thought these children looked like an art form a theater form in Japan called Kabuki and so it’s named after this, this theater tradition that the traditional makeup is big eyes and big eyelashes. And so, so CJ had the big eyelashes. But actually, it’s a it’s a Carmilla future too. So that’s so funny. There was so much we were like, is that Carmona or, or is it just Kabuki you know? It’s hard to hard to know. Anyways. So it is very rare. And one of the things that helped us make our decision is in literature and medical literature. The cardiologist that also dealt with genetics could only find 12 cases and all of medical literature history of children that had both hypoplastic left heart syndrome and kabuki 12. I’m sure there’s more out there. But but only 12 had been written up, the odds were not good for us it was. It was essentially, five, did what we’ve ultimately chose to do. And said, We’re done with palliative care surgeries. Seven, did not live. And then three tried to do the next round of surgery, but but also the end, I guess, had lived but maybe didn’t live up until, like eight. And so that that helped inform our decision. And because it was just so rare for the to Kabuki syndrome can cause heart defects. But hypoplastic left heart syndrome is the most I know most is it is one of the top in severity of, of heart defects. And so that that is kind of the mack daddy of the mall. For this case of a genetic abnormality of the heart. And anyways, so. So there are several families out there, I’m in a kabuki parent support group, there are several families out there that that have children that are, are
Kasey Carmona 46:38
That are doing as well as they can with Kabuki I, I personally look at those families. And I see how hard it is. And that there is a part of me that, that is grateful that we did not keep our son alive, just to keep him alive. That is a very difficult statement. And I know that is incredibly controversial. And it’s just for our family, we chose quality over quantity. And I think the hospital would have kept CJ Alive for a long time. And I look at some of these children. And you know, CJ wasn’t having seizures just quite yet. But the seizures, we’re going to start and there’s just so hard, I just and you know, he would never be able to eat. I mean, just like, and with his brain not growing. He, he would obviously have some severe challenges to do any normal, quote unquote, normal, functioning. thing. So yeah, i My heart goes out to those families. Because it is it is a it’s so hard, and it’s worthwhile. But it’s worthwhile. Like it’s so it’s beautiful. And it’s I know that they’re doing the best that they can. And there’s this like, there’s just I think, I think for me, it’s just hard to watch children suffer. It’s just hard to watch children suffer.
Victoria Volk 48:16
Dr. Chris Kerr was on my podcast a while back and he’s a hospice doctor, physician and has researched and have life experience when those in hospice care and he was talked very openly about how medical community medicalize dying, and how society overall medicalized is dying. So that made me think of you sharing that. And I had that question in my thought in my mind, and you went right to it in and in your story, and ultimately ended up bringing them home, to have a good death, really. And that’s what he talked about in that episode in how, again, there are opportunities to really embrace that process rather than medicalizing it and having an experience of separation. And, like you said, denial, trying to throw everything but the kitchen sink at something that is inevitable. In the medical field, too. It’s like you’re not supposed to do harm. And I think as human beings, the spirit within us, it’s really hard to ask ourselves in those moments, like what would I want? And then do that for your loved one. Right? Yeah. So what would you like to scream to the world? You got a microphone and had
Kasey Carmona 49:45
Oh, man, I think you just said it. For me. It’s, it’s if you are in a place where just things are not going right. And you can see the writing on the wall, no one told us to bring that baby home No one, no one in the hospital told us to do that. It’s what we felt CJ needed to have that beautiful death. And because we were tired of throwing everything but the kitchen sink at at my son’s life and not getting anywhere, and then just seeing him more, more hurt, more poked and prodded and tested and, and our 15 days at home, were so beautiful. And I, I wish, if there are families that, that are wanting that or thinking that they can do that, too, but But it requires acceptance of really what’s coming, it requires a good team around you that you can trust and talk through. I mean, for us that palliative care team at the hospital was really important. And and it requires this very selfless love, to put all your feelings on hold, and to give trusting that deep well is going to supply what you need. And it will, that’s what love does. So I I really, I really hope that there are there are people out there that that might be afraid of death or afraid of the inevitable or, or afraid of what’s to come. But I’m practicing the present and being joyful in the moment because that is what we have right now. There is beauty. And there is good. And the now is all we have really to embrace it fully. Is that abundance of life.
Victoria Volk 51:45
Beautiful message. Is there anything else that you would like to share about any other losses that you’ve had been shaped by this experience? Maybe that were different or anything about CJ, you’d like to share? Anything?
Kasey Carmona 52:07
You know, I think for today, I think this is what I needed to share for today. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you.
Victoria Volk 52:17
Thank you for sharing, beautiful story of life and loss of CJ. But as you shared, he lives on in your hearts, and no one can ever take that. Again. Thank you so much for sharing your story today. I think it might need to take a walk and be in the present moment for a little while. You beautiful shares. Thank you so much. And where can people reach you if they would like to find me? Yeah, well, you connect.
Kasey Carmona 52:54
I I’m on Instagram right now. It’s just my first and last name and are on Facebook to its Kasey Carmona. Both of those would be great.
Victoria Volk 53:06
Okay, I will put the link in the show notes. Okay. Thanks. 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.
Addiction, Grieving Voices Podcast, Mental Health, Mind/Body Wellness, Podcast, Takeaways and Reflections |
Takeaways & Reflections | The Energy of Addiction
SHOW NOTES SUMMARY:
Addiction isn’t just applicable to a substance use disorder. Often the anxiousness of learning to live life as a griever can lead to overdoing, busyness, workaholism, etc. We can become addicted to being busy in an effort to avoid feeling our feelings. “Keeping Busy” is actually one of the 6 Myths of Grief.
In this week’s Takeaways & Reflections episode, I reflect on alcohol and the other ways addiction may be impacting life as a griever. I also dig deeper into the energetics of addiction and emotions; sharing about a healing modality in which I recently got trained, too.
Shame and guilt are often two emotions associated with addictions of any kind. Participating in behaviors that are used in an effort to avoid only exasperating the guilt and shame that already existed. This cycle continues and makes it that much more difficult to get out of the pattern of addiction.
Of course, addiction can become a mental health disorder; however, an important question to ask anyone who is struggling with addiction of any kind is: “What happened to you?” The origin of addiction often can be traced to something that happened, a circumstance, or a situation the person was exposed to long-term. And for so many, memories of pain often stem from childhood.
To break the patterns and cycle of addiction, one must be honest with themselves and others, expose the shame and guilt for what it is so the emotion loses its power and grip, and take positive action with support.
If you are struggling with addiction, substance use disorder, or another mental health challenge, I’ve recently added a “Mental Health” resources tab on my website. If you are a Military, Veteran, or First Responder, there’s a section just for you as well.
RESOURCES:
______
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 or anyone you know is struggling with grief, substance use disorders, or a mental health challenge, free resources are available HERE and HERE.
Are you enjoying the podcast? Check out my bi-weekly newsletter, The Unleashed Letters.
💛 Would you like to Learn Your Energy Type? Free Quiz ➡️ HERE! ⬅️
SUPPORT THE SHOW:
CONNECT WITH VICTORIA:
The Energy of Addiction
Looking at using alcohol in my early 20s as a way to cope and numb out and band-aid my emotional pain. But we don’t typically connect the dots of our present-day experience, to grief and to trauma, and things that we’ve experienced, likely as children, we really don’t think about either the environment that we grew up in as being the catalyst for our behavior as adults, which our childhood environments directly impact our belief system and how we cope with adult life. And we learned from our parents how to do that. And it can be unhealthy, or it can be healthy. But for the mass majority of us, our parents did not receive healthy coping skills, either. And so these patterns and the cycles of unhealthy coping continue through the ages, through lineages through generations. Today, I’m also going to dig deeper into the energy aspect of addiction. And that will be the focus of today because it’s really important that we look at our emotional and physical bodies as it pertains to energy as an energetic beings we are energetic beings.
Healing Modality Training “Biofield Tuning”
Recently, I completed a new healing modality training called biofield tuning. And so this episode is very timely in what I’ve been learning about energy, and particularly are biofield or the energy that extends five to six feet all the way around us. And it’s like this toroidal shape. So if you were to slice an apple in half that is what our energy fields are biofield looks like. And we have this earth energy that’s below our feet that helps us to stay grounded and feel grounded and connected to the earth energy. And we have this energy center at the top of our crown that connects us to the sun’s energy and is all about our relationship to time in nature. And connecting to this power source, the positive power source, whereas you the earth energy is this negative terminal. And so if we think about ourselves like a battery, that’s essentially what I’m saying here is that we are like a battery. And just like you plug in an electric car or any device to charge, or you have to charge your battery on your car, there’s a positive and negative terminal.
Our bodies are energetic bodies or act in the same way. And so if we are not grounded and are not centered, this energy flow that goes all the way down the center of our bodies that down our spine are meridian. And if this is all new or unfamiliar to you, I’ll just briefly explain what these points are down in Meridian and they’re called the chakras and at the Root Chakra. That is where the base of our spine is the root chakra. Moving up, the next point is the sacral chakra, which is a few fingers below the navel. The next chakra up is just a few fingers above the navel is the solar chakra or the solar plexus. The next chakra up is the heart chakra, then the throat chakra. The third eye chakra is above the brow, and then the crown chakra is above your head. And so we have these chakra points all the way down in Meridian, but we also have chakras in our hands. And our feet are like her ankles, knees. In other points, we call them half steps in biofield tuning. And so that’s what we are looking at and addressing when we are giving a biofield tuning session.
What is Biofield Tuning?
The term biofield actually refers to our body’s electrical system in its entirety. So as I kind of described earlier, it’s both the electrical current that runs through our bodies and also the magnetic field that surrounds it, that toroidal shape that I had mentioned biofield tuning. It’s a sound therapy method that works directly with the system as it’s connected with our conscious and subconscious minds, including our memories, and the theory of it is that our memories aren’t actually stored in our minds. They’re stored in our biofield and the biofield informs the body and the body informs the biofield. So all physical, mental, and emotional disorders can be perceived as dissonance in our electrical system.
Biofield tuning is able to locate, diminish and resolve this dissonance and in doing so alleviate and even eradicate the corresponding physical, mental, and or emotional symptoms like Reiki energy healing. Biofield tuning sessions can also be conducted from a distance. So during a session, if it’s in person or otherwise, the client is fully clothed on a treatment table or comfortably in their bed or in their chair. And the practitioner activates a tuning fork and scans the biofield slowly beginning from about six feet away because as I mentioned, our biofields extend five to six feet out from our physical bodies, what we’re actually listening for or feeling for is this resistance or turbulence in the biofield we’re listening for a change in the overtones and undertones of the tuning for and when we encounter a turbulent area, we continue to activate the tuning fork and hold it in that specific spot. And research suggests that the body’s organizing intelligence uses the steady coherent vibrational frequency of the tuning fork to literally tune itself just as we tune a piano or tune a guitar. So the dissonance resolves in the sense of resistance gives way. And this appears to correspond to the release of tension within the body. So people relax, they breathe more freely in the body enters into an increased flow state and that’s where the energy is actually flowing and moving where the body can function at its optimum.
As a result, clients often report that they have they feel lighter, they’re able to breathe more freely, and have a diminishment or resolution of their symptoms. If you’re familiar with other energy work or other healing modalities this might sound like it’s somewhat of a targeted nervous system, biofeedback, and the founder Eileen McKusick has come to see this process as consciousness hacking. It’s almost like a side door entry into the psyche working with what has been hidden in plain view, which assists people in making changes they otherwise could not on their own. Some conditions do respond very well to biofield tuning and others do not so much. But with these tools in our toolbox and practitioners who are sharing this with clients, we are increasing our voltage. We are increasing our body’s voltage as we do this work and as we address our energetic bodies, and so if we can clear that dissonance in our bio-field which informs the physical body, imagine how much better you can feel. Imagine the problems that you can solve just by laying on a bed or on a practitioner’s table. So I do encourage you to look into this more I will put a link to it in the show notes. I don’t have this just yet as of this recording on my website, but I do offer Reiki energy healing, I will be offering this soon to the masses. So stay on the lookout on my website if you are interested or reach out and I can connect with you once I get everything up and running. I do highly recommend the book tuning in the human biofield. It’s written by Eileen day, McKusick, the founder of biofield tuning.
The Energy of Addiction and Emotion
When we speak to the energy of addiction and emotion, any emotion we repress will suck a lot of juice out of us depleting energy from our body systems. And there is the energy of the emotion itself. And then there is the energy required to keep it repressed, right, it takes a lot of work to repress our emotions. And we often create these energetic walls, which appear to be like these high energy frequency barriers that block the perception of the conscious mind, from even going to that place, going to that emotional place. And so when we use sound, to deconstruct those constructs, and to free up that energy, and then we give it back to the system as a whole, we suddenly have reserves of energy that we didn’t have before to get things done. This is where often so many clients will report feeling not just lighter but have more energy, some people can experience some detox-like symptoms, like headaches or fatigue initially, and things like that in the first day or two. But that’s a good thing. Because detoxing is is good, it’s out rather than in we, you know, we want that stuff to come out rather than staying in.
And so once we’re moving that energy, and it’s coming out, that’s a good sign. That means the energies moving we’re getting clearing up those dissonances in our biofields. And so with substance use disorders and alcohol and things like that guilt and shame are often a huge aspect of addiction. The right side of the second chakra, which is the sacral chakra speaks of guilt and shame, guilt and shame are similar, but they are different. And the simplest distinction is reflected for guilt is I did something bad. Whereas shame says, I am bad. There’s a psychiatrist named David Hawkins. And in his book power versus force, he says that of all the possible human emotions shame is the heaviest and it’s the lowest on the frequency scale. Shame is a very difficult emotion to feel because it feels so terrible.
And so what a lot of people do instead of feeling that is we repress it, and then we displace it onto others through finger-pointing and blaming and blaming other people instead of feeling shame is a very common phenomenon, particularly among alcoholics. And there tends to be a lot of repressed emotions in that sacral chakra that second chakra, and it’s not uncommon to be jam-packed with a lot of stuff. But the root chakra and the second chakra are very much connected, everything is connected, but they tend to couple each other. So the result is either guilt and shame, driven, overdoing or frustrated nondoing, or a pattern of going back and forth between the two. Either way, people generally accumulate heavy imbalances in these parts of their biofield and these energy centers and because everything is connected, we can’t ignore the third chakra or the solar plexus when it comes to substance use.
Eileen’s Book Tuning the Human Biofield
‘I’m going to read a little excerpt from Eileen’s book tuning the human biofield because I think there is a very important aspect here and maybe, particularly for men but not always, but the right side of the third chakra relates to the father and one’s relationship with father and also to the emotion of anger and the liver stores and metabolizes anger. So many people who have had or still have a difficult relationship with their fathers, whether they’re a stepfather adopted father, or grandfather have a tendency to repress the difficult feelings associated with this by engaging in the consumption of what Eileen calls liver, pacifiers, such as sugar, excessive amounts of carbs, alcohol, chocolate, and dense dairy products, such as ice cream or cheese. And obviously, in small amounts, these substances are fine, but in excess, they have the effect of dampening or even eliminating our experience of anger, the angry drunk she calls it would be an exception to this. Eileen had discovered that there seemed to have been more father issues with clients than mother issues, and a lot of the fathers had been alcoholics or rageaholics or workaholics, emotionally unavailable in prison, or just not around or otherwise present to their child’s needs, and she adds the fundamental things that people seem to need from their fathers. acknowledgment, approval, and affection are rarely if ever received and this seems to give rise to some real problems for people now she’s not talking about she’s talking about people seeking help and dealing with issues not necessarily the population at large.
But in the absence of the reflection of our own inner brilliance that a healthy relationship with one’s father can provide. Many people end up unconsciously seeking to get these needs met as they go through their lives engaging in guilt-driven overdoing, experiencing feelings of low self-worth seeking approval, and routinely putting others’ needs ahead of their own. She adds that in Chinese medicine, the liver is seen as the general in the army, that is the body is responsible for overseeing all operations and pays attention to digestion, respiration, circulation, subtle energy flow, elimination, the immune function, and probably more also in Chinese medicine. It is said that the liver opens to the eyes and we say that the eyes are the windows to the soul. It is also the organ of discernment, it decides what in the self needs to be recycled, and what is to be disposed of. In her book, she also speaks of a term she coined purple washing, describing the tendency people have to gloss over, repress or deny uncomfortable emotions, usually by spiritualizing the situation or by being nice about it, and that’s an air quote. I’m going to read an excerpt from her book, where she describes what emotion is, and she says it’s an electoral chemical event in any emotion that is repressed or denied is repression and denial of one’s life force.
Neurologist Candace Pert has shown that different emotions have different chemical compositions. And when we experience any of these emotions, their vibrational and chemical counterparts are generated and circulate in our body. When any emotion goes unexpressed or unrecognized the body does not digest or recycle it, it stores it or as part says, emotions are buried alive, and never die, emotions always find a way of expressing themselves. What this means is that the energy of our emotions is always trying to be heard and expressed in some way, like anything buried alive might, if we don’t recognize them for what they are and find healthy ways to express them, they will find a way to express themselves anyway, in sickness or disease, tumultuous life situations, or eventual mental or emotional breakdowns, and quote, and I speak a lot to this in Grief Recovery.
We talk a lot about this we call them stirpes, short-term energy relieving behaviors, and we speak to the energy of the feelings that we hold in and repress and bury Grief Recovery is all about giving those emotions and those feelings of voice and biofield tuning is really addressing the event itself in an energetic level. And so I really feel like biofield tuning along with Grief Recovery, man, it’s transformational. And it has been transformational for me. Biofield tuning has helped me to understand the energy that is really stored in my own field when you see someone or you’re around someone, and you just feel like they give you a vibe like you just get maybe icky vibes from that person, your energy field, your biofield is kind of bumping up against if your antenna is sharp, and you’re tuned in to your antenna, you will pick up on what that person’s energy is trying to tell your energy, it’s your energy field, reading their energy field, we just don’t pay attention to that our antennas up but it’s discombobulated. And it’s got this film of yucky stuff on it. Because we are so disconnected and disassociated from our own bodies. We’re not even in our own bodies, because we’re so overwhelmed with emotion. And we’re using coping skills that are harmful, such as alcohol or other substances, and behaviors that only lead to more shame and guilt and all those in more emotions that just really exasperate and repeat the cycle. This is why it’s so difficult to get out of these patterns of behavior of addiction because the cycle just repeats itself over and over and over until you address the emotion itself. Read it, get it from the root and pull it out. That’s the only way the only way is it out is through just like the buffalo in a store.
A Lot of Things Can Be An Addiction
You can gambling shopping, again, refers back to the STERBS (short-term energy relieving behaviors) and I’m gonna link to the show notes in that episode where I talk about that but you can also have an addiction to doing this is probably more like me in different phases of my life where I’m overworking over busyness, which can be an addiction and it looks good. Right from the outside. It looks really good. You’re getting things done. You’re impressing people, and you’re keeping up with them but it’s I’m also handy because you don’t even need any substance, right? You don’t have to have wine or chocolate in the house, there’s no end to the ways that you can go off the rails with busyness I’m particularly prone to like I have a busy mind, I have a very busy mind. And I like the stimulation of the mind. And so it’s not a challenge for me to like, stop and pause. I meditate every morning and can really have swathes of inner peace, like noticeable feelings of inner peace within me, but my energy comes in bursts as well. But for someone who is doing in constantly doing it in order to not address their emotion, not to feel what they’re avoiding to feel that’s addiction. And when you’re so busy doing for everyone else, you’re not doing the things that matter, you’re not going to get your art or your music or your poetry is written your walks in nature, or even launched with your friends in liens, another book, Electric Body Electric House, she talks a lot about this, if you’re avoiding doing things that you enjoy, because you’re busy, because you’re busy doing other things you’re busy doing for everybody else, you get into this martyr, drudgery. She calls it the drone of must get everything done. And we don’t ask for help. And she calls this the doing virus and it has this isolating effect that makes it difficult for us to connect, and receive and especially in grief.
Actually, that’s one of the myths of grief is to keep busy. That’s so unhelpful when if you know someone grieving, don’t tell them to keep busy, that is not helpful. That is not doing them any favors. This ties into exactly what I’m talking about. It’s that propensity to keep busy in order to avoid the strong emotion that doesn’t serve someone from moving forward in their lives. Some people use alcohol, some people use food, but a lot of people in our culture use motion. We keep going so that our emotions never have a chance to settle. She goes on to say as long as you’re listening to the voice in your head and manically trying to make your way through the bottomless to-do lists. You don’t have to listen to the sound of your own pain. She adds a hyperactive mental body overrides the emotional body. This is a huge part of why people spin out in their heads. Many bodyworkers have noted a correlation between the right hip and the left shoulder the right hip imbalances of overthinking and overdoing are often the counterpoint to the issues of the left side of the heart chakra, which is where we hold unprocessed sadness, loss, and grief. She goes on to say when you start to quiet the mind and slow the busyness down, the feelings you’ve been avoiding will come up. And that’s a good thing. Because those emotions are stuck energy that’s creating resistance and drag in your field, your mind, and your life. It can be uncomfortable, and it does take a little time to settle back to neutral. But as you move through your own emotional backlog, you liberate a huge amount of your own potential you free up energy to be expressed in creative and fun and pleasurable ways you start to return to the juiciness and magic and depth of the moment that you are you were missing out on when you had the right side of your field all scrunched up in a bunch and quote, I absolutely love that because it really does truly speak to everything that we talk about. I talk about when it comes to Grief Recovery when it comes to our emotions and the energy that we contain within us that is stuck. That’s not going anywhere. It’s not being utilized. It’s stagnant.
When I Saw My Own Potential
And when I talk about my personal story about when I had finally addressed my grief when I addressed my emotional body and I addressed it and released it and that energy started to flow man I saw the potential I saw my own potential. I speak about that a lot at you see opportunity where you instead of lab you see your own potential where you would before say I can’t do that I don’t want to do that that resistance would come up so much resistance and I can spot my own resistance a mile away right now. In fact, my next newsletter is all about resistance because I’ve been resisting something. And that’s a video and I’m hoping to I mean I have a challenge right now to change that to show up on video more but we have to address our emotional bodies. And this is the thing if this message today gives you anything I hope it gives you hope itself that once you look at yourself as an electrical being there is nothing you cannot do or accomplish in your life. If you address your emotional body and the electrical stagnancy the stuck energy that is in your field and within your body because when we untangle that and clear up that dissonance it’s an amazing feeling.
My friend, I’ve personally experienced it I’m seeing my clients experiencing it. I’ve had to do a lot of I’ve done a lot of sessions with biofield tuning, incorporating Reiki and biofield tuning. As I’ve been learning and growing in this new modality I’m bringing to my clients and they’ve all loved it. They appreciate it so much because I don’t think I’ve had a client yet that hasn’t said they haven’t had more energy than I was actually using, there’s a new fork that I have that Eileen just recently came out with.
The 144 hertz
It’s the 144 hertz and its kind of like our belt sander of tuning forks, it gets to the nitty-gritty, and it digs deep. It’s the emotional grinder, and I was using it on my husband, which it should not be used if you’ve only had, shouldn’t be used on your first session. And it wasn’t but she calls it also the spring cleaning tuning fork and I kid you not the next morning after I used it the night before and my husband the next morning, the very next morning, I got out of bed at eight o’clock in the morning, I am not sitting on the couch, enjoying a cup of coffee and watching CBS Sunday Morning like I normally would. That’s been my routine for years. Like that’s my time I am cleaning, I put on some hip hop music and 90s Hip Hop 80s music and I started cleaning and I clean for the next seven hours straight and I’m talking deep cleaning, I scrub down like the kitchen cupboards, I went to town on deep cleaning my house, that has never happened, especially on a Sunday morning.
So it really truly is the spring cleaning fork. And I’m not the only person that’s reported that after using this fork, she said that herself. And actually, I was like halfway around my kitchen cupboards, scrubbing them down. And I thought I think she mentioned that this is the spring cleaning fork. And I actually had to go look for that where she said that. And she had shared that actually in our Facebook group, because I thought it was in the fork description, but it’s not she had shared it in the Facebook group. And I thought well, I’ll be darned. So this is amazing work, this energy work that is available to you. If you are struggling today, I encourage you to find a biofield tuning practitioner near you or reach out to me and we can set something up. But I’ve seen such fantastic results with this modality and I have no doubts, it will help you no doubts, you know, a lot of people are not ready for the really, really deep emotional stuff that comes with Grief Recovery. And I get that but with biofield tuning. It’s almost like this baby step. It’s just a baby step. And when you’re ready to really dig deep, then you can go into Grief Recovery. So I’m really excited to bring biofield tuning as another tool in my toolbox to my clients, whether it be addiction or trauma or just needing a reset to our adrenals because that’s actually something I can do as well.
P.S It’s there’s something called an adrenal rhythm reset, which is all about your adrenals because in our society today in our Western culture, it’s always like doo doo doo doo doo right and our adrenals get burned out and fried, which affects our thyroid, which no surprise thyroid medication is the number one prescribed medication in the United States today. Why is that? Because we are burning out we have so many things coming into our biofields, our systems from external influence, social media, the news, and so many toxins that are coming at us every single day in the homes in which we live neighborhoods or the environments. it’s really fascinating work again, checkout islands book, I’m going to put both books I’m going to put the links in the show notes and check out biofield tuning and reach out to me through my website.
If you want to hop on a session when I finally get it up, I can let you know. And check out episode 101 with Drew because we both talk about how our grief in childhood really did lead us down a path of using alcohol to cope. So whether it’s alcohol or shopping, or it’s food for you. I think this episode will be helpful and I hope this one was so please hold on to hope. Hold on to hope it’s there. And your actions today will determine what your future looks like. So I encourage you to take action today just a small action read her book checkout biofield tuning do something today to learn more about your energy field learn more about your emotional energy body and what your emotions are trying to tell you there is an alert system. Thank you so much for listening. I hope you found this helpful. And if you did, please share it subscribe, or leave a review. And remember when you unleash your heart you unleash your life much love.
Addiction, Grieving Voices Guest, Grieving Voices Podcast, Mental Health, Podcast |
Dru Jaeger + Victoria | The Grief + Alcohol Club
SHOW NOTES SUMMARY:
This week’s episode is a collaboration with my friend, Dru Jaeger, co-founder of Club Soda and author of How to Be a Mindful Drinker: Cut Down, Take a Break, or Quit.
Dru woke up one morning a happy child with two parents and went to bed that night without a mother. She died suddenly and unexpectedly of a massive brain hemorrhage. Within six months, his father would relocate their family to another country.
Like many of us, Dru learned that you suppress it, distract yourself, keep yourself busy, and pretend that the trauma did not happen to you when it comes to grief.
Dru shares how his grief changed and manifested over the years. Also, how only in the last several years has he found peace within where he’s learned to live with himself (and his grief) well.
Enjoy this week’s episode as we both share how parent loss in childhood shaped our adult lives, particularly our relationships with alcohol, and learn if alcohol has become a way for you to cope with your grief. And, to be clear, if you think this episode isn’t for you, you don’t have to be a daily drinker for alcohol to be a “problem-solving band-aid” in your life.
RESOURCES:
CONNECT:
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 or anyone you know is struggling with grief, free resources are available HERE.
Are you enjoying the podcast? Check out my bi-weekly newsletter, The Unleashed Letters.
💛 Would you like to Learn Your Energy Type? Free Quiz ➡️ HERE! ⬅️
SUPPORT THE SHOW:
CONNECT WITH VICTORIA:
Victoria Volk 0:00
Hi 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 in Advanced Grief Recovery Methods Specialist, I know how badly the conversation around grief needs to change. Through this podcast, I aim to educate grievers and non grievers like spread hope and inspire compassion towards those hurting. Lastly, by providing my heart with yours. In 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. Hey, good morning. Good afternoon. Good evening, wherever you’re listening from. I’m your host, Victoria Volk, and this is another episode of grieving voices. And I’m thrilled to share this episode because it only happened because I had an idea. And I followed through with the inspired idea by sending an email and reaching out. And this episode is collaboration with Dru from joinclubsoda.com Dru’s professional background is as a writer and researcher. And along the way, he is trained as a facilitator, coach, NLP practitioner and mindfulness teacher, day to day and club soda Dru designs and delivers courses and workshops to help people cut down, take a break from alcohol or stop drinking for good. He also writes regularly about alcohol and mindful drinking, and hosts the club soda podcast, do now drinks rarely. And as a passionate advocate for a world in which people drink more mindfully and live well. Club Soda is a community for people who want to either give up alcohol or drinking, cut back, or just really changed their relationship with alcohol. It’s a very supportive community. And I was thrilled when I got a yes to do this. And we recorded and it was an amazing recording. I hope you enjoy it. And we do plan to do this again. So if there is something about this episode that you would like us to dig deeper into as in terms of grief and alcohol and the topics that come up during the conversation, please reach out either to dru@joinclubssoda or myself at [email protected]. And we’ll make it happen. Because I think we are both enthusiastically excited about, I don’t know, enthusiastically excited, I think we’re both really excited to have this conversation, and more importantly, to share it and to share what we both have learned over the years about alcohol and our relationship to it because it really truly is indeed a relationship. And so enjoy this episode. And if it helps you, please share it with someone else who may be struggling with their relationship with alcohol. Or leave a review for Dru and myself on both of our podcasts because it is on their podcast as well. And I will put the link in the show notes if you would like to leave a review. Thank you so much for listening and enjoy.
Dru Jaeger 3:37
We thought it’d be good for myself and Victoria to share a bit about our own experiences of alcohol and grief and how those two stories have been woven together through our lives. And then I’ve got some questions for Victoria, which will be gonna be I hopeful, super useful for people listening to the club soda podcast, and then you’ve got some questions for me. So that’s where we go. And I guess for me, I guess one of the things that I was reflecting on as I came to preparing for this, is that when I was drinking and my most heavily through my 30s I don’t think I would ever have reflected that that was in any way connected to my experiences of childhood loss. But looking back at it now that is such an unavoidable conclusion. But I wonder how it ever is that I could have imagined I was doing anything else is such a glaring thing for me now. recognizing all of these ways in which I wanted to transcend my experience escape the emotional pressure that I felt inside me feeling this sense of disconnection of not belonging, all of these different things which are going on when I was drinking and taking a lot of drugs, which I partied really hard in my 30s A lot of what was going on then. I wouldn’t couldn’t have articulated it that way, but it really was about My experience of childhood loss my mum died when I was nine years old, she died very suddenly, I, she died of a massive brain hemorrhage. And I literally woke up one morning as a nine year old, and have a mother and went to bed that night and didn’t. And, you know, it utterly pulled my life apart, not just in the experience of grief, and that gaping void in my life that suddenly opened up. But actually in all the consequences of what happened. As a result of that, within the course of about six months, my family had relocated, I’d lost contact with my childhood friends, I was living in a different country. And so many of the messages that I heard as a nine year old, this is almost 40 years ago, but so many messages that I heard as a nine year old, were, you just have to kind of grin and bear it and get through the next few days. And it’s all going to be fine. And I was taught very much a model of dealing with grief, which is that you suppress it, you put it away somewhere else, you might occasionally be upset, but you distract yourself, you keep yourself busy. And you throw yourself into this new exciting life that you have. And we pretend that this traumatic experience that you’ve been through, is not something which happened to you at all. And I, you know, I can only have the life that I have, you know, I can’t, one of the things that I want to talk to you about is this urge that I have to fix my grief. But of course, I can’t go back, you know, I can’t change the experiences that I had as a nine year old, I can learn to live better with them. And I can learn to be compassionate and forgiving as far as I’m able to the other people who were implicated in that story. I tell you a little story about how that’s come up recently, but But you know, I can I can, I can do the work now to live as well as I can. But one of the things which I am really very aware of now in my in my approaching life forces, but I will say that quite yet. No, really, I’m 48, late 40s is that this story of loss is always going to be with me. I, you know, there isn’t a moment in my life that’s going to come where I will ever put this behind me where it will ever stop being an issue. And I guess if I were thinking about the loss that I carry, it’s not like that raw, confused, terrible, painful experience that I went through as a nine year old. It’s very different now. But it doesn’t go away, you know, my life has grown and expanded around it, you know, I’m able to contextualize it, I’m able to see the effect that grief has had on me and continues to have on me, but it never goes away. It’s like this
Dru Jaeger 8:20
Thing that I carry with me all of the time. And sometimes, you know, we have this conversation on the on the on our podcast, just before Christmas coming up to Christmas, inevitably, I will cry every Christmas at some point. Because I miss my mom. You know, I have been doing that every year for the past decades, I will continue to do that until I’m in my 70s Hopefully eight years, you know, however long I live, that experience will always be with me. There are there are moments still when grief surprises me when it comes out of nowhere when I find myself crying for no particular reason and a very obvious reason. And it all gets mixed up together. So you know, I I feel like I’m somebody who is now almost 40 years on finally learning at some level to live with myself and this experience that I had, and all of the impacts of it. And yet one of the ways in which I tried to effectively deal with this experience and all of the things that flowed from it in my 30s was that I threw myself into living life as hard as I could, you know if there was an experience of life that I could get, I was going to throw myself at it. I want it to consume all of the alcohol and take all of the drugs and become a person other than myself and I tried really hard and I had you know I had actually had an amazing time. I’m not gonna deny that I do had, I had I had an extraordinary period of my life, I made some great friends, I lost some friends, I, you know, it was a it was a transformative experience for me. But in the end, it ended up doing more damage than I was able to sustain. And, you know, my abiding memory by the time I got to my early 40s, my abiding memory of my 40th birthday is not the amazing party that I put together and all of the people from different parts of my life that came to celebrate with me, it was being on my own, late at night, hugging a toilet, and formatting because that’s where my drinking had led me to. And I didn’t know how else to be with and celebrate with all of these people who were important to me apart from getting out of my face on alcohol. So yeah, and so over the past, I guess, decade, I’ve been in this journey of a learning to live well with myself and learning to live with my mental health and all of the impacts of grief and that have had, and trauma that I continue to carry. But recognizing alcohol and drugs on solving these problems for me, I’ve tried, I tried, you know, I tried escaping into religion in my 20s, I tried escaping into alcohol and drugs in my 30s These solutions are going to in the end cause me more damage than they are going to solve for me. And I need to find better ways to live. And so for me, that’s meant that I’ve really kind of over the past few years pretty fundamentally reshaped my relationship with alcohol. I do drink, but vanishingly rarely. And now my relationship with alcohol is actually thinking does this drink and value to life, as opposed to what problem is this drink going to solve for me. And that has been such a fundamental shift that I’m, I’m basically alcohol free by default, most of the time. But that’s been really important, because actually, it’s given me space, and build some emotional resilience. And it’s let me learn to approach the difficult feelings that I carry around in a more respectful way. I guess I’m not, you know, pouring fuel on them. I’m listening to that sadness. And I’m listening to that loss. And I’m, hopefully in a better relationship with my nine year old self, and his experiences of pain than I have been ever in my life. So far. That’s really where I am on this whole journey of alcohol and grief. How are you?
Victoria Volk 12:47
Wow, I thank you so much for sharing that I saw me writing as you were speaking not to. I was really, truly listening. But there are so many things that I want to circle back to. And I will. In a nutshell, my experience was my dad died when I was eight. But he was sick for two years, almost 16 months, but he was given two to three months to live. But he lived for almost 16 months. But he was gone much of that time because he was doctoring, and it was like three hours away to the VA hospital. And so I was bounced around from house to house between age of six and eight until he passed away. And it really, you know, that year that passed away, it was really traumatic, not just losing my father, but also my sister who was like a second mom to me, join the Air Force. She graduated from high school two months later, and she was gone. So I lost her. And when my dad passed away, eventually we lost. I lost relationship with all of his family. So I not only lost my dad, but I lost an entire family. I grew up in a very, I mean, it was just my brother, my mom and myself, and then she remarried about two years later. And it wasn’t a healthy relationship. And so I was surrounded by arguing and, and alcohol was very much a part of our home. And that led me to, you know, and my brother was five years older than me, so I kind of grew up by myself and a lot of ways because he was doing his own thing. He was a teenager. And by the time I was while in high school, I really I drank and I went to parties and things but it wasn’t I almost knew like right from wrong like I had still this sense of I don’t you know I didn’t want to
Victoria Volk 14:52
I had it was like a consciously was choosing to not go down this path that I saw other people in my life going down due to other reasons and other circumstances in their life, by the time I was 21, I, on my 21st birthday, I hadn’t even been to a bar didn’t even go to a bar. And it wasn’t until a friend, she’s like, you’ve never been to a bar. And I said no. And but a lot of loss happened in the meantime, too. I ended up joining the military. And when I was gone at my training, my mom sold her house, she got a divorce. And so when I came back from my training, my childhood home was essentially not my home anymore, I had nowhere to go, but to this new city where I knew no one, and to live with my mom. And so that was a huge transition, partially why I hadn’t been to a bar, because I didn’t know anybody. But that one ask. And starting to go to the bar is what really set me up for a downward spiral. And I knew every drink special every night of the week, and my license was nearly suspended. I had so many fender benders and speeding tickets, I should have been fired from my job. I can’t believe they didn’t fire me, they probably saw that I was kind of a train wreck. And I had been taught to but no one was holding me accountable or responsible. And I certainly wasn’t doing that for myself. But by the grace of God, they didn’t. But maybe that would have snapped me out of my mess sooner, I don’t know. But I ended up getting myself in a lot of not a lot of but several dangerous situations, being a female, and going to bars and, you know, meeting people that I didn’t know. And it was really a really transformative time for me, and not a good way. And it’s what really changed was that I ended up toxic relationship that kind of set me on a downward spiral until my husband came into the picture. And we had been friends for seven years before we even started dating. But he just I don’t know, he was like the knight in shining armor, I suppose. And that’s really what turned my life around in the in that in that timeframe. And so, my drinking Eska escapade, although it was a good year and a half, I really made up for lost time during that time. But alcohol didn’t just go away. And it didn’t really creep in again, until I became a parent. Until I had three kids in four years. My husband was gone a lot. He commuted for his job. And so he’d be gone, sometimes a week at a time. And I was raising these kids and isolated because we had moved and I didn’t really have any friends. And then I started to meet people on things. And it was through alcohol, how I met people. And that’s how bonds kind of formed. And so that’s when alcohol became this social, a way for me to come out of myself, because I didn’t feel comfortable with myself in my own skin. And so to feel like I would fit in or to feel like I was fun. I thought I needed to drink. And so that’s really, and I found myself just like you in front of the toilet many times, my kids becoming teenagers and seeing their mom and and feeling the shame and the guilt around that.
Victoria Volk 18:43
We know what kind of example was I setting for my kids. And I don’t believe that you have to be a daily drinker to have a problem with alcohol. If alcohol is causing you to become someone you’re not because you’re not comfortable with who you are. Or you’re drinking to avoid feeling a certain way or to avoid addressing certain emotions, then it’s a problem. Whether it’s binge drinking on the weekends, or binge drinking on a Wednesday night and a Tuesday night or whatever it is, or you’re having four drinks every single day. If it’s a problem, it’s not going to look the same for everybody, I don’t believe and so I had a bender one night and I woke up the next day feeling like I always did like crap. And I would I would get sick every time it didn’t matter what I drank or how much I just would get sick. And I’d be a pile of crap for a day or two and useless to my family and to myself and and finally I just woke up that next day and there was a conversation I’d had or someone had shared something with me they were kind of going through the own thing with alcohol On this shirt, you know, why do I need this? And that one question she posed, I asked myself, and I didn’t have a good answer. Why do I need? Why do I think I need this? And that day, I decided I’m done and done, cold turkey. And I applied what I knew in Grief Recovery, what I learned the tools, and I applied that to my relationship with alcohol. And it really helped me sustain my sobriety for 638 days, I think it was, until a weekend with friends, I consciously decided I was going to share in a toast. And I did drink that weekend. And then I felt like it was something that I had control of, like, I decided this, it’s not that I alcohol decided this for me, like, I didn’t feel like I had to do it. But boy, for two, it took about two weeks. And then it really hit me like, What did I do? What did I do? There I go again, you know, and then the guilt and the shame. And my kids Oh, I thought you quit drinking? And people would say I thought you quit drinking? And? And to answer that question. You know, it was really, it still really takes me aback. And I don’t know how to answer it. Sometimes, but ever since then it’s really become this. It really is about self discovery. Like every time I drink or every time I go into a situation where there’s going to be drinking, I’m having this dialogue in my head. If people could see my, my thought bubbles above my head, as I’m contemplating like, my relationship with alcohol and, for example, met with someone not that long ago and a family member and you know, just in my daughter, was there my youngest. And she’s like, well, let me buy you a birthday drink. It was my birthday. And I’m like, Yeah, I suppose. And I thought, I’m going to have a pop. And then I said, Well, are you going to have something? And she said, Yeah, I’ll get my, my usual or whatever. And she doesn’t drink that often. But and then I get up to the counter, and I’m ordering. And I’m like, I even told her a pop. I said what kind of pop in and then I changed my mind. But this dialogue is continuing in my head, like, Should I do it? Should I not do it? Like, what does this say about me? What does this say about you know, like, it was like, ridiculous like that I was torturing myself in this way. And I just thought, you know what, she’s buying me a birthday drink, it’s my birthday. I can drink, have a drink with my family member, and the world isn’t going to collapse around me, I am not a lesser person because of it. But I am consciously choosing to make this decision right now in this moment to share in a drink with my family member. And I’m gonna let that be okay.
Victoria Volk 23:10
And it’s just this continuous evolve of in conversation and dialogue with yourself to, to because I don’t want to go back to that to what that was right. And I’ve been in situations since you know, where I’m going out with friends and things and, and I have my limit now. Like, this is my limit. And I keep track I like you know, save the tabs, and I’m keeping track and I don’t want to lose my sense of agency. Because when I lose my sense of agency, it’s not me anymore. It’s not me anymore. And I want to be okay with me. And I want to show the world me, not who I am when I have five, six or seven. And I’m embarrassing myself and they’re getting a good laugh. Or I’m obnoxious or I’m funny, I get really funny, but sometimes stupid funny. You know, it’s it really is we become a different character. And I think we just need to get really comfortable with the character of of who we are. First and foremost. And so that’s been quite the journey for me. Yeah, that’s been kind of my experience with alcohol.
Dru Jaeger 24:31
Yeah, thank you. Thank you for sharing. Likewise, I’ve scribbled some things down, which I wanted to come back to. One of the things which struck me and it’s something which I’ve reflected on is how your how the experience of childhood loss isn’t just about the loss of that individual, but about all of the subsequent consequent loss of family and that feeling of family that He comes along with it. And some of that being, you know, natural change a sibling going away to college or going away to start a job somewhere else. But you know, life continues to change. But that, when that’s all framed from a childhood experience of I’ve, I’ve, I’ve lost something and I can’t control this, you do end up with a feeling that your family is falling apart around you. And then that sense of isolation that comes from that I’m the only person in this experience. But the thing that struck me so much about your experience of, of drinking and meeting people, my experience in my early 30s, of going out in London, and partying was this was all about rebuilding a sense of connection and wanting to feel a sense of belonging. And I really wrestled with the extent to when I continue to think about this, the extent to which my experience of childhood loss makes me different. I feel like I’m an outsider, you know, I looked in envy, people in their 40s Complaining about both of their parents. I’m like, I wish I had two parents to complain about only have one, drink is lovely. But you know, I, I feel different, I continue to hold that, that sense of feeling different, feeling isolated, feeling outside. And actually then, yeah, drinking became a way to create community and a sense of belonging around myself. And I, you know, even in this conversation, I’m beginning to see how much that has driven from this kind of core sense of isolation that I carried from my experience as a nine year old.
Victoria Volk 26:41
Now, what happens though, and I even wrote this down is that alcohol is then also very isolating. It is because within ourselves, right within ourselves, like we isolate, it’s, it becomes this block to intimacy. Because you can’t become have intimate conversations, and you can’t have deep content. I mean, you could, but they’re not going to be rich, and and you’re not going to remember them. Right? It becomes this block to enter intimacy. So it’s a false sense of community, I think, in a lot of ways.
Dru Jaeger 27:15
Yeah. I mean, I do say this to people, you know, when you think about alcohols, physiological effects on you, you know, the rush of warmth to your face, the feeling of looseness in your body, perhaps you kind of lean in more to others, you know, you get a bit louder, you get a bit, one of these kinds of things. Actually, our experience of drinking feels quite a lot like love, it’s hardly surprising that it gets wrapped up in the way that we create relationships, because many of the feelings that it gives us are exactly the feelings of intimacy that we want with others. But you’re absolutely right. You know, certainly, you know, that experience of hugging the toilet late at night, or even late earlier in the evening. You know, I noticed this now, when I’m out with people, and I’m not drinking, and they are, I begin to notice two or three drinks in, but conversations keep going around in circles. And I’m like, Tell me Tell me again, you told me like literally half an hour ago, but it’s still important to you. So I’ll listen once again. But you know, that kind of sense of I like my social connection is closing in on itself, and I am getting stuck. And I lose my sense of empathy. For others. I don’t, I’m not present for other people. I’m not really hearing them. I’m not building this conversation in a good way. I’m just repeating these little patterns over and over again to myself until I pass out. How is that building a sense of belonging? I mean, I thought that it was but you know, experience 10 years on, I see that it really doesn’t work that way.
Victoria Volk 28:47
Well, and again, it just highlights for people listening to. So when you meet someone in a bar, and you’re both intoxicated, and you think you’ve fallen in love. That’s why, you know, when the alcohol isn’t in the equation, oh, it’s really different than like different people. Right? Like it’s a different situation and different experience, because that level there is it’s a false sense of intimacy.
Dru Jaeger 29:14
Yeah. How do you find it now? If you are in social settings, and you are not drinking alcohol, how do you find the business of making connection and getting that sense of belonging with others.
Victoria Volk 29:27
I miss the connection. I miss it. I miss, you know, I still have fun, I can dance the night away and I don’t have to drink and that’s been many times but I find that there isn’t this sense of, of true connection, right of like you said, it’s like these looping conversations and and yeah, it doesn’t move. It doesn’t progress relationship forward. So if that’s the only time you’re with those people You know, it really is, again, false intimacy, in friendships and marriage if alcohol is a huge part of your marriage, you know, it’s Yeah, I have a bottle of wine in my fridge, I bought a bottle wine for New Year’s. And to for HUD, my husband and I to share and I’ve poured half a glass, the bottle is still in there. That’s how I know that I’ve transformed my relationship with alcohol because that thing would have been gone that night.
Dru Jaeger 30:38
Yeah, my my mid 30s Drinking self would be in utter wonder, the fact that somebody can keep an eye local bottle of wine in their house overnight. How and why would you do that? That seems the only
Victoria Volk 30:56
It’s possible. And what we were talking about before and I wanted to, this is what I want to circle back to is I want to ask you, and I want to get back to your story, too. But what are your thoughts on this all or nothing approach to being in a, you know, addiction recovery, like recovering in addiction and alcohol? And I don’t want to minimize or dismiss that people truly do lose their lives due to alcoholism. But yeah, what can you share? For my listeners, and yours, too, I suppose you know, your thoughts on that, because it’s come to my attention recently. And just really, I feel like it’s doing a disservice to a lot of people.
Dru Jaeger 31:39
Yeah, I suppose where I’d want to start is by being clear about a few things. One is, addiction is real. It is possible to find yourself in a compulsive out of control relationship with a substance which becomes all consuming to the point that you don’t know how to do anything else. Apart from Pursue your relationship with that substance. That’s a real phenomenon. It is also, however, a really complex phenomenon. It has my logical components, it’s got social components, it’s got psychological components, it’s a whole mixture of different things. It’s not one thing, and removing the substance doesn’t solve the problem. You know, if you are the kind of person who is has a compulsive relationship towards alcohol, it’s just happened for alcohol got in the way, when you were bringing all of those life challenges to the world. And alcohol helps solve some of those for you in a way which has got really messy and difficult and complicated. You found alcohol, another person might have found cocaine, or meth, or compulsive shopping, or dangerous compulsive sex or losing themselves in Facebook for days on end, or intensive gaming, there are all sorts of behaviors that we adopt as ways of soothing ourselves as well as a way to think better about themselves. For some of us, we’ve ended up wrestling with alcohol. Now, it’s important to say that alcohol has some properties, which means that we can become physically dependent on alcohol, alcohol withdrawal symptoms are unpleasant, at best, actively dangerous at worst. Alcohol is the only substance that can kill us. As we withdraw from it, you know, many other substances are deeply unpleasant to withdrawal from alcohol withdrawal can be fatal. If we experience fear, alcohol withdrawal symptoms. It’s really important that people don’t stop drinking suddenly, without medical support, if they think they may be dependent on alcohol physically dependent. So it’s got these two components. We’ve got this all this psychological stuff with all this physical stuff. And it is complicated. One of the other things that we know, though, and we know this from the research, is that the story that we’ve heard, that once you’re in that relationship with alcohol, the only thing that you can safely do is to stop forever. What we actually know is that that isn’t true. It’s a really it is a solution. For some people, I need to be completely clear about that there will be some people, particularly if you have a history of severe mental ill health. If you have been significantly physically dependent on alcohol, and have needed support to stop, it’s probably safest that you just don’t drink. You can build a very happy life that doesn’t center on alcohol at all, where you just push it out of the picture, but that’s not going to be true for everyone. There are very few long term studies about what happens to people’s drinking habits over time. But the one which I think is really interesting in this regard, it’s called the Birmingham untreated heavy drinkers. As project, it’s a bit of research that was conducted in the UK in the early 2000s, where basically, a group of 500 people who were drinking very heavily were followed for a decade untreated, with no intervention, just to see what happened. At the end of those 10 years, they had kept in touch with about 250 people. And they found something really interesting. So about 70% of those people were still drinking at dangerous and damaging levels. That should be unsurprising, right? People who are wrestling with alcohol, a decade on are still going to be in that same position. 10% of people had found their ways, just through their own effort to being completely alcohol free, they had decided that life beyond alcohol was going to work for them, and they’d stopped drinking completely 20% of those people were drinking within safe limits 20%, they were twice as likely to find a way to moderation than they were to complete abstinence. And the reality is that that is if that’s true, just through the natural progression of our relationship with alcohol, it puts puts paid to a couple of myths. One is that alcoholism is progressive, that it only gets worse, we know that that’s not true for 30% of that group, they found a way a decade on to find a relationship where alcohol was only marginally present or wasn’t present at all. It didn’t necessarily get worse. But it also gets paid to the idea that abstinence is the only answer 20% of those people have found a way to moderate consumption of alcohol with no intervention and no support at all. That’s where they ended up. So I think that’s a really, I think that’s really hopeful for people actually, because one of the things I know from my work with individuals is that people can become overwhelmed by two things. One is the idea that I can never drink. And the idea is that I can never drink again, at all forever, the forever thing and the not at all things can be really scary for people. Now, it might be that that is the right thing for you, and you should push towards that. But it also might not be the right thing for you. I’m a real believer in helping people find a relationship with alcohol, that works for them. Not what anyone else says is the right thing to do. You know, so if your relationship with alcohol looks like having an occasional celebratory toast, because a member of your family wants to buy you a drink and include you in that moment. And you can do that from a place of conscious intention. And that isn’t going to then lead into a spiral and continuing to drink. I think, go for it. You know, you may have had a troubled relationship with this substance in the past, but your past doesn’t have to define your future. You know, that’s as much as we know, from the world of grief as anything else, you know, I have these experiences that lead me to this moment, I can begin to make conscious decisions about how my life plays out from this point. So yeah, does that answer the question? Now? I can go on on this subject for literally hours, so probably best to cut me off.
Victoria Volk 38:10
No, I know, I it was perfect. I absolutely love that. And, you know, I think to what I guess what I’m wondering too is, or what I want to share too is how the grief evolved for both of us. Right? And how we, because I think childhood grief, obviously, as a child, and you experienced grief or trauma because I was also molested after my father passed away. It wasn’t just that one grief experience. And then, you know, your life becomes a train wreck later, it’s you, I’m assuming to you had many grief experiences along the way, because grief is cumulative. And it’s cumulatively negative and just what you were saying how so many of us resort to these behaviors to feel better. We call them in Grief Recovery to call them disturbs short term energy relieving behaviors. So whether it is shopping or gambling or, or alcohol. We find ourselves trying to replace something within us with that thing, so that we can feel better. Yeah, and I know what’s true for me is you can look back, right because I’m I’m in my early 40s It’s I’m 35 years out from my loss, but it you can look back and see how that grief evolves with you over through the years and over time. It’s it is something that you take with you. It’s not something you just put in a shoe box and put it on the shelf and forget about it. You can try you can try. And so my question for you is what what was that like to unpack all of that grief in that moment of awareness that you had what when was that and what what led to that Out of all this is my grief that’s really at the heart of all of this.
Dru Jaeger 40:05
I don’t think that has been one moment. I think it’s been an evolving conversation with myself. I remember, I was reflecting on this earlier, I remember this moment when I was around 18 years old, and I suddenly realized that I had been alive for longer. Without my mom that I had been with my mom, that was a moment for me. You know, there was a moment when I became the age that she was when she died. There was an age when my son turned nine years old. You know, these big kind of transitional life moments, I’m living through one of those right now. Actually, my, my dad, who’s in his late 70s, is downsizing from big house into a one bedroom apartment. Just really good for him. It’s exactly what he needs. new lease of life, you know, big house has gone out of control. But one of the things that’s come up through that is, I came across in helping him clear out, I came across a couple of drawers of my mom’s belongings, things that she’d held on to I found my weight record, from my first year of life. Whether health visitor wrote down, I was a big baby, write down how big I was, you know, her jewelry box, her little collection of clay figurines, even her wedding dress and veil, these belongings left behind. And I had this conversation with my dad. And I asked him about these things, you know, we had a conversation, and I said to him, you put these away because you didn’t know what to do with them. Did anyone know? I didn’t know. But I didn’t want to throw them away. And you know, so now, that’s an active problem that I have now inherited, you know, the, there are these belongings, there are these things which belong to my mom, which are, you know, tangible connections with her life. And now, what do I do with them? You know, how do I how do I honor these keepsakes? How do I you know, it feels like, you know, bits of a shipwreck washing up on the shore of my life. And now my job is what do I make of this, you know, I don’t want it to drift back into the sea and be forgotten, I want to make something of, of these things which have come to me, one of the things which has come to me is actually all of the letters of condolence that my dad received in the wake of my mom’s death. And that feels like the most extraordinary gift because I’m in a kind of a historical way, I’ve now got all of this third party evidence of the kind of person that my mom was, you know, one of the things which I’ve really felt, as this sense of loss through my life, is that when my mom died, I was nine years old, she was a bigger person who gave me hugs and was talking to me and cooked dinner. But she wasn’t a human being yet. So I don’t have any connection with my mom as I would with another adult, I don’t know who she was, you know, I don’t know what she was interested in, or the kinds of things that motivated her or what her personality was like, or all of these kinds of things. And now I’ve got this treasure trove of third party witness of who she was the impact that she had on people and that feels like an extraordinary gift. And then I got other things, what do I do with a wedding dress? You know, I see what I do with a wedding dresses. Now I look at it, I go, my mother was tiny. You know, I in my head, of course, nine year old self, she was an enormous human being. And her shoulder width is less than two thirds of mine, you know, she was a small person, it’s given me this whole new perspective on areas. So as a human so it’s not. It’s there’s not been one moment it’s been it’s an ongoing thing. You know, and, and this business of bringing my mom’s possessions from my dad’s house has been really hard. I’ve cried a lot about this whole situation over the past few months. It’s really difficult, but I’ve also then got to have conversations with my sister to say, look at these things, which I’ve found. What are we going to do now? You know, and that’s been a really good thing, as well
Victoria Volk 44:46
As an open up a dialogue between your father and yourself.
Dru Jaeger 44:50
It has in a way I think it’s I it has in a way you know, he’s never we’re never going to be able to have that conversation, you know, the conversation that I would long to have. I’ve tried, you know, I’ve tried it, it’s never going to happen. But actually, being able to acknowledge this is our shared experience. These are things that you’ve been holding, because you didn’t know what to do with them. And now I can do my best for care for those things. I can talk to you about what I’m doing with these things, you know, that that’s something you know, and I that’s so far, you know, it seems like such a small thing. But it’s such a massive step on from where we have been in our lives of not being able to have that dialogue at all, I’m actually really, I’m actually really grateful for just that little bit of conversation that we’re able to have.
Victoria Volk 45:49
Well, and I imagine too, that your relationship with alcohol has been transformed. And it is what it is today, because had you still been in that in that phase of your life of using alcohol being this big part? You wouldn’t have the same feelings about these things. You may not even want to look at them.
Dru Jaeger 46:10
No, no, absolutely, I wouldn’t have the capacity to do it. I mean, for me, what what absolutely prompted my reflection that I needed to do something about my relationship with substances is that I had an experience at the end of my 30s of significant mental ill health. And in my recovery from that, I suddenly began to realize the extent to which alcohol and drugs didn’t help me, didn’t help me live well didn’t help me live with the complexity of my mental ill health I live with. I think you might politely say a wider range of emotional experience is typical. And, yeah, alcohol and alcohol and drugs, absolutely. Don’t help me be in good relationship with myself and with other people. And when I drink and take drugs, I can act in ways which are actively damaging to myself and to others. And I don’t want to perpetuate that. I want to, I want to learn to be okay with being me, even in those moments when I’m not okay. And so yeah, absolutely. You know, I’ve had long periods of not drinking at all. I do you drink very occasionally. But literally months can go by drinking is not part of my everyday experience at all it is I’ve become, you know, the you know, the grandmother who has a glass of sherry at Christmas, I’ve become her that’s that’s my drinking style. Now, you know, it’s high days and holidays. Anyway, ways which enhance life and add value and meaning to specific situations, not because I love what you said about, it’s not, when it’s not you that makes the choice, but alcohol that makes a choice for you. And that is very much my experience of drinking. Now, it is always me that makes the choice, you know, and it’s always about drinking slowly enough, so I can appreciate and savor this situation not plowing on to the next drink, because I haven’t given myself time to feel the effects of the drink that I’ve already drunk. So now it’s very occasional, you know, my my story that I tell, you know that the moment where I chose to have a drink was actually my son’s 21st birthday. I went to the pub with my son and my brother. And I definitely always said I had two alcohol free drinks. My first round I bought, I bought myself something alcohol free, my brother bought me an alcohol free beer. And then my son on his 21st birthday, offered to buy me a drink. And I had a pint of Chandi. And you know, I had a tiny amount of alcohol. And I got a little bit giggly because I got zero tolerance for alcohol these days. So what happens when he stopped drinking, and we had a really lovely evening and it added value. And it’s something that I, I really treasure that memory, hell, it was really special and special. For me, it was special for him to be able to share that with me, and it made that situation better. And I am not going to feel the made to feel guilty about that. It was a good thing that happened. And I think, particularly for those of us who have a moderate relationship with alcohol. In fact, somebody challenged me about this a little while ago I was I was wrestling with a particular situation in which I drunk and I told them the whole story and they said to me, so what you’re telling me is you had a very clear intention about how you were going to be in a particular situation. You made some decisions and plans in advance about what your alcohol consumption was going to look like. You stuck to that you revise those plans as you were going along. You looked after yourself. You came out on under experience the following morning, having an added value to that situation waking up without a hangover. What on earth do you have to feel guilty about? Yeah, you’re absolutely right. This is a situation these are not stories about things which have gone wrong. These are stories about things which have gone right. And we should celebrate them.
Victoria Volk 50:11
I love that reframe. I love that I just I love how you said, I love that. Yeah, I’m not going to forget that truly, you know, because what can happen is when people say something to you, when they believe that, you know, you, you committed to not drinking and you weren’t going to quit, or you were going to quit cold turkey or whatever it’s been however many days or months or weeks, whatever. And then you have a drink. It’s like, Oh, I thought You thought you quit? And then you feel that guilt or that shame within you. Right? And so I think if it’s just exactly what you said, there is no guilt or shame if it’s coming from a conscious awareness and intention.
Dru Jaeger 50:47
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Can I ask you some grief related questions? Because at least you know, for people listening to this on the club side podcast, as you know, some basics around grief that I think would be really helpful for people to hear, you know, I’ve talked about my own experience, I’m almost 40 years on from the death of my mom. And realizing grief doesn’t get fixed. You know, it’s not I can’t go back in time and make these things which happened to me not have happened, I have to live with the consequences of that loss long term. And I wonder what practical tips and suggestions if you got either for somebody in a situation like mine, when you’re coming into a fresh awareness of loss earlier in life, or if you are in the midst of experiencing grief right now? How can people care for themselves through this?
Victoria Volk 51:45
Well, you bring up a good point in what you said earlier, you have an urge to fix your grief. And my I would challenge that and say was it to fix your grief or to fix yourself? Because often when we feel like we are out of control in our grief, or once we have an awareness, first of all, I think you have to have an awareness that the really deep rooted issue is your grief or trauma from especially in childhood because Childhood Adulthood is childhood reenactments. So if we had, would have developed a relationship, like let me backpedal. If you’ve had grief or trauma as a child, and it was never communicated to you, and it wasn’t emulated for you what healthy grieving was, you will create your own method, you will create your own stories. And you’ll those stories and those patterns and those ways to cope with what you’re feeling. Become your beliefs about how to process or not process your grief. And so we carry those lessons, whether they’re self created, because we’re children, we’re imaginary, right? We have wonderful imaginations, those will follow us into adulthood will will rely on what we know. And what we know. And what we learn often are those things that you said, keep busy and to grieve alone. Don’t talk about your feelings, because it upsets me, right? You know, if you would have talked about your mother around your father, would he have gotten upset well, then you learn why don’t want to upset dads, I’m just not going to talk about it. Because when I do, it makes him sad. And I don’t want to make him sad. And so as children, we just That’s how, why so many children appear to be okay. That’s why so many people say children are resilient, because they see these children and they outwardly, especially if they are the type of child who became like myself a wallflower, who didn’t speak unless spoken to who was very shy, who’s very much in their own head. And that’s just how I’m wired. I’m more in my head. Or you can be a child that really is just craving love and attention and you act out or you, you know, are an angry child. And so you act out. It can look like many different things in children grief. So I think it is first addressing that grief is the issue. And then surrounding yourself with people who are not where you’re at. Because you’re not going to move forward, you’re not going to see that there’s hope. You’re not going to feel like you’re progressing. If you’re surrounding yourself with people who are stuck in their own misery. Neil they say misery loves company. Surround yourself with people who are going to who are proponents of growth who are moving along and in their own personal development and who’ve maybe experienced similar losses as you doesn’t have to be But can bring a different perspective of, of loss from their experience, because I think too, and sharing stories with each other, we learned so much. And it’s a lot of why the reason why I started my podcast, I wanted people to have an understanding that grief just isn’t about death. And the reason why it feels like a shipwreck, and you’re feeling all these feelings is because it was the loss of hopes, dreams and expectations. For many years, you didn’t have your mom, it’s things that you wish would have been different, better or more. And so that’s grief. That’s just this reminder of what you didn’t have. And so it’s we kind of feel crazy. As we’re going through all of this as children into adulthood, and it makes you feel grief, just it’s you feel like you’re on a different planet. And especially as children, I think you’ve that’s where you kind of feel different, right? Because I didn’t know anybody who was going through what I was going through, and nobody knew what to say or do. So they did nothing. And so it’s also that indifference that again, I created my own stories. I pees in the ground, he’s, he’s dead. There’s nothing else. Nobody talked to me and said, You know what, you can still talk to him, you can still keep this relationship going in a healthy way and have it feel that connection. It was like, Nope, he’s gone. That’s it.
Dru Jaeger 56:33
Yeah and so powerful that you say that because my experience was, it wasn’t until I was 31 years old. And a very good friend supported me to go to the public records office to see my mother’s death certificate. It wasn’t until I was 31 years old, that I let go of the idea that she was coming back. I mean, I look back at that. And I’m just, yeah, I’m just in wonder that I held on to that hope for as long as I did, I just wasn’t reconciled to a very fundamental fact of death for so long. But what you say about, you know, people not knowing what to do, and doing nothing. I absolutely lived through that, you know, that making up my own stories about what had happened. And I’m gonna make sense of this experience the best way that I can. One of the other things which I reflect on as well as I had experienced couple of years ago, when my father was really unwell, he was admitted to hospital quite suddenly. And I found myself in the car park sitting in my sitting in my van outside, how will end with tears, because I didn’t have another way of expressing my fear of loss. And my fear of grief, it was just it was I was reenacting my nine year old self. And that, you know, actually came as a massive shock to me to go, okay, there is this fundamental core here, of this grief that I’m carrying around that I need to be in better relationship with, I need to understand better I need to find different ways to confront the reality and my fear of death. And do that in ways which helped me live life well, rather than being in retreat from it all the time.
Victoria Volk 58:36
Yeah. I think too, like just looking at, you know, looking when we’re thinking about, like, the practical things of dealing with grief, I think it’s looking at your behaviors, and asking yourself to that question, like, Am I doing this to avoid? Am I doing this to distract myself? Am I doing this? Because, you know, whether it’s keeping busy or replacing the loss, that’s another myth of grief is you know, so often, as children, we’re often taught, you know, if you lose a pet, that’s okay, we’ll go get another one. And you do you get another pet and never really addressing the loss of the first pet. That’s generally speaking, the first loss that many children experience and that’s an opportunity for parents to really show and emulate what it’s how to grieve and that it’s okay to not be okay. You know, you don’t have to mask and say you’re I’m fine you know, that’s so many people say that I’m fine. How are you? I’m fine. And in Grief Recovery, say fine as feelings inside not expressed. And so like you just said you didn’t know how to express it. You didn’t have the tools to know what to do with all of that. And it can be so overwhelming. It just feels so overwhelming. And so like you said to have compassion With yourself to know that it’s not going to happen overnight to be patient with yourself. My personal personal development journey started in 2014. And it was five years of me trying to fix myself. Because I felt so screwed up. And there was nothing wrong with me, there was nothing that it needed to be fixed with me, I was just, I, all of that grief was just coming to the forefront, and I didn’t know what to do with it. You know, we’re taught how to acquire things and people, but we’re not taught what to do when we lose them.
Dru Jaeger 1:00:34
Yeah, Yeah, it’s so interesting to say about that, you know, that spending time trying to fix yourself. And then realizing this is really much more about self acceptance. I mean, to be completely clear in the context of alcohol or changing a relationship with a substance, there are things to learn, you know, learning how to say no learning how to stop learning how to socialize without alcohol, learning how to be in relationship with others. Without alcohol, there are real practical skills to learn. But those skills are not the same as addressing what is the core reasons which are driving me to using alcohol as a way of solving the solving these problems in the first place. There will be a moment and most people will experience this when you’re changing your relationship with alcohol or another substance, where it suddenly gets a lot worse, all of a sudden, because you’re suddenly confronted by some of the reasons that you were drinking in the first place. And being brave at that moment, reaching out for support, beginning to talk about these are the things which have hurt me, this is the pain that I’m carrying, this is the challenge that I’m facing, I would have used alcohol to mask this or numbers or try and make it go away. But I want to find other ways of coping other ways of living? Well, I think as a really, there are these moments of realization where you go, I have to find a different way of being in the world, which doesn’t revolve around a substance which shuts everything up, but actually is about listening to myself and all of my experience and honoring.
Victoria Volk 1:02:07
Yeah, and finding those people that you resonate with that will be in with you through to the end, right? Because you’re gonna lose people along the way. And that’s more grief, right? You’re gonna lose people, and that’s more grief. So you really do need support in that way and being and have the discernment of, it’s not just going to be anybody, like not just anybody can. Because what happens is too, like in relationship, we all bring our stuff to the relationship. And so it’s having that discernment of, you know, maybe surrounding yourself with people who are a little further along than you. They don’t have to be at the end game. But just a little bit further than you.
Dru Jaeger 1:02:52
Yeah, absolutely. It’s one of the reasons that the club soda community exists to be frank is that, you know, creating that space for people to make connections with other people who are going through the process of change, just like they are. And you know, it’s your right doesn’t need to be somebody. In fact, in some ways, somebody who’s 10 years on and has got everything sorted out, is such an unattainable ideal of a person that you may feel no connection with them at all, somebody who’s three or four steps ahead of you who can go, don’t trip over that route in the path, you know, don’t trip over that crack in the pavement, because they’ve just missed it themselves. That person can have real value to your journey of change. I wonder whether we can kind of shift into a last little bit of conversation, which is to talk about how people can connect with us if they want to do that. If they want to carry on these conversations either about grief or about alcohol. Why don’t you go first, Victoria, tell us about where people can connect with you.
Victoria Volk 1:03:53
Yeah, my website has all the links to all the things theunleashedheart.com. My podcast link is on there grieving voices, it’s everywhere podcasts are available. And I have a program called do grief differently. And it’s 12 weeks, working one on one with me and we deep dive into I mean, we didn’t even get into values and how people dishonor their values. And like there’s so so much we could talk about Oh, so much. We could talk for two more hours, I’m sure but because I have a lot to say on the topic of grief. But But yeah, there’s I free resources on there as well. So energy quiz. I’m a Reiki Master. So I also offer Reiki and kind of dabble in several different things, but all in the sphere of grief and energy healing, so
Dru Jaeger 1:04:42
fabulous. From my perspective, joinclubsoda.com is the starting point entry point into Class loader world. We’ve got advice on choosing alcohol free drinks. We’re all about helping you create and sustain change. So we’ve got two in depth programs that can help one called How to Drink mindfully and one called how to stop drinking, they come with lessons that you can work through your own pace. But really importantly, they come with a supportive community of people who are going through the process alongside you, I run weekly face to face workshops. So we talk about all sorts of different things. And then we’re about creating connections. So we’ve got a big Facebook group, we’ve a little telegram group around our courses, we run real world events, festivals, other ways to meet other people who are shifting and changing their relationship with alcohol, whether they are taking a break or cutting down or stopping completely. We are all in this together. That’s a really important thing for us that we don’t do black and white thinking about alcohol. If you are interested in changing a relationship with alcohol, even drinking one drink less, then there is space for you in the club soda community. So yeah, join Club Soda calm, is where all the good stuff happens. Love it. Thank you so much for this conversation, I have learned so much I have so many notes to go and reflect on and so many things to think about, but really, really so insightful and useful. And thank you for sharing your story. So honestly, and for the work that you do, in supporting people to live well with the grief that they carry. It matters so much. I really appreciate it.
Victoria Volk 1:06:16
Likewise, Dru, I think what you’re doing for just the example of it’s not all or nothing for everybody in that there’s a space for people who just want to bring some more mindfulness to their relationship with alcohol and it is it is a relationship. So thank you for the work that you’re doing to
Dru Jaeger 1:06:34
Mutual love first. Shares thanks so much.
Victoria Volk 1:06:39
Thank you, 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.
Grieving Voices Podcast, Podcast, Takeaways and Reflections |
Takeaways & Reflections | Self-Love Through Grief
SHOW NOTES SUMMARY:
When you’re in a place of self-loathing, self-love likely won’t come naturally and will be challenging to prioritize and do. However, when grieving, self-love must be a non-negotiable aspect of grieving to grieve well.
In this week’s episode, I cover the eight dimensions of wellness courtesy of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMH), which collectively address our whole well-being. These aren’t areas that need to be addressed all at the same time. However, small shifts can equal significant gains by integrating even small changes into your life. And, over time, these small shifts will be cumulative (just as grief is cumulative) and progressively move you in a positive direction and create momentum that way.
Grief impacts every area and aspect of our lives; our ability to make money, physical health, regulate emotionally, spirituality, intellectual capacities, social interactions, home, and work environments, and how we view and function in our occupations. It behooves us to look at these areas more closely and see what small steps we can take to improve the situation and, in turn, our lives.
By taking steps to shift our lives in these eight areas, we are demonstrating the best kind of love we can give ourselves during grief experiences and other challenging times – love of self. Because when we make ourselves (and these aspects of ourselves) a priority, everyone wins.
RESOURCES:
______
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 or anyone you know is struggling with grief, free resources are available HERE.
Are you enjoying the podcast? Check out my bi-weekly newsletter, The Unleashed Letters.
💛 Would you like to Learn Your Energy Type? Free Quiz ➡️ HERE! ⬅️
SUPPORT THE SHOW:
CONNECT WITH VICTORIA:
Grieving Voices 100th Episode
Today is a very special episode because this is my 100th episode. And that’s not including the trailer. Thank you so much for being a part of this journey with me if you’ve been listening for a while. And if you’re new to the podcast, I hope you stick around. I just had in the last week, I think seven or eight applications beyond March 2023. I can go into June, y’all. I mean, this has been the most fun experience. I’m so glad I started this podcast. I’ve connected with so many people, amazing people with sometimes heart-wrenching stories, oftentimes heart-wrenching stories, but also stories of underdogs who have somehow picked themselves up and made a choice in a decision to forge ahead. Onward and upward. I’ve always loved underdog stories. I’m you know Steve Hartman. Have you ever listened and listened to this you have caused me so many tears over the years, his stories just seem to like pull at my heartstrings. And so to the stories of my guests, and so 100 episodes, thank you, thank you to the guests. Thank you to your listeners. And I am more driven to continue with this podcast than I’ve ever been. If I could do two episodes a week, which I know I easily would have the content to do so. And the guest to do so. I would but at this time in my life, that’s not an option for me. Perhaps someday it would be or perhaps if I monetize or get this podcast, monetized, that may be an option. But for now, that is not the case. So anyway, 100 episodes, thank you for being here. It’s been a journey. And if you’re a podcaster out there listening to this, you know how difficult and how challenging it can be to get to 100 episodes, it takes conviction, it takes consistency.
And for most of us who are doing this out of a labor of love, it really just takes devotion and love. And every week I pour my love into this. I call it a project that really is a project of my life. And I’m very much enjoying this really I do truly enjoy this podcast. Otherwise, we won’t be here. 100 episodes and right. This is an extra special episode because it is also my son’s 17th birthday. His name is Xavier and my only son. I do have two daughters as well younger than him but he is my only son. And it’s a very special birthday because there was an episode A while back and I can put it in the show notes where I shared how things were pretty scary there for a while for us and our son because he had had an accident, weightlifting and we’re just so very grateful and thankful and blessed that the things that happened happen the way they did and he’s still here with us and we can celebrate his birthday and really, truly celebrate his life and just even picking out his card in the aisle of the card aisle, I was moved to tears because knowing that there was that possibility that we may not have been celebrating his birthday. And so if you are a parent, squeeze those little ones are the big ones, like my husband tells our kids, even when you’re 50 years old, you still want a hug from you. So you’re just never too old for hugs. That’s how what my husband says. But I digress. This is a celebratory episode. And I think a perfect theme as well is that and I didn’t plan this.
And so this is why it’s a little different to this week is there’s actually two episodes back to back with guests, which is what I used to do. And then I just felt like each episode needed its own takeaways and reflections because there are often very different topics and things that are shared and talked about that I’d like to dive deeper into. And I was just finding it was really difficult to do that between two episodes into one. So I switched up the format. And now I do a guest episode followed by takeaways. But if I had done that, then as takeaways episode wouldn’t have been the 100 and the 100th. And I wanted it to be the 100th episode. So I did switch it up this time, because it’s my podcast, and I can do that. But I didn’t plan this.
Takeaways from Episode 98 Amy Metcalf and Episode 99 Wayne Forrest
And what I didn’t plan was that both Amy Metcalf from Episode 98 Don’t abandon me shared the same sentiments as Wayne Forrest from Episode 99. That is what their grief taught them. And both of them said, my grief taught me to love myself. Now, I can probably say the same thing to be honest, because I first really worked through my grief within the last three years. It’s still very fresh in my memory, how I was feeling before I addressed my grief. And I am daily reminded of how different I feel today than I did more than three years ago, I really do think that when we’re deep in grief and fear feeling sorrowful, and incomplete emotionally, with relationships in our lives, whether the person is dead or alive, there isn’t room for love for ourselves. There isn’t room for that love. And for many children growing up in homes of chaos grief and trauma and just a lot of disruption and negativity and lack and victim mindset and all of those things. There isn’t room for self-love in those environments either. And so what I’m really finding is that most people, and I could probably dig up a lot of the notes that I’ve taken for the guests over the past over. Well, June will be oh my gosh, yeah, next month will be two years I’ve been doing this podcast, and I can guarantee you most people have shared that loving themselves was a challenge. They just didn’t know how but when you neglect yourself and you’re just kind of living, not really thriving. And you one day realize that that’s not what you want for the rest of your life. It really does take radical self-love to climb yourself out of that pit and think about self-love and what I wanted to share in this episode today.
It goes deeper than just taking bubble baths or a walk in nature or even just taking time for yourself. It’s more than that. It’s so much deeper than that. And you know, when you’re in a place of self-loathing, self-love can be really challenging. It can be overwhelming to you even the thought of what that even looks like and when you feel like you’re just your life is kind of going off the rails where do you even begin? And so I really wanted to provide some tangible things that you can do and look at in your life when it comes to self-love. And these are things that I found myself doing over time. And not all at once. And so when I was thinking about what I wanted to share about self-love, what came to mind were was The eight dimensions of wellness essentially called The Wheel of Life, The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, or SAMHSA for short, have a wellness initiative that pledges to promote wellness for those with behavioral health conditions by motivating individuals, organizations and communities to take action, and work toward improved quality of life, heart health and increased years of life. Now, when I read that promoting wellness, for those with behavioral health conditions embodies a whole lot of things. But I would say that grief really falls into that because grief impacts our behaviors, grief impacts our health, and it actually impacts all of these eight dimensions of wellness, that SAMHSA talks about. And so I really want to dive into each of these ones by one, because I think they’re important. And I truly believe that this information is a good starting point for someone who doesn’t know where to start. And so when we focus on the certain areas and then focus even further on each of those are something that we can do today, what we feel is aligned with who we are in each of these different dimensions, we can start to see progress and we can start to climb out of that pit. Let’s dive in. And the first one I’m going to tackle is not well actually I’m gonna list them all first.
The Eight Dimensions of Wellness or The Wheel of Life
- Emotional Wellness– it’s the ability to cope effectively with life and create satisfying relationships. Emotional wellness, involves being able to cope effectively with the difficulties of life, grief included and being emotionally aware, and having healthy relationships with yourself and others. And people with healthy emotional wellness are confident, have control over their feelings and behavior, and have good coping mechanisms for dealing with difficult situations, such as grief, and also building resiliency allows us to overcome the hurdles in life. Again, grief included, and so emotional wellness includes having healthy relationships, being able to ask for help, and being resilient, which is a word that kind of rubs me the wrong way a little bit because we don’t choose resiliency, I think resiliency is something we become being aware of your feelings, expressing your feelings to people you trust, seeking support with upsetting emotions, learning your strengths, working on things you want to improve the ability to express a wide range of emotion, emotions, such as happiness, sadness, anger, joy, fear, frustration, gratitude, and developing assertiveness and having a positive self-image. Now, I will say that the Grief Recovery method for me personally addressed all of these, every single one of these things that I mentioned, helped me to understand myself better and ultimately, really gain emotional control of the emotional disturbances in my life, I became more emotionally. What’s the word aware? I suppose in a lot of ways, yes. I just feel like my personal experience. I just didn’t understand the highs and the lows. And I think sometimes too, we can mistake these highs and these lows, especially the lows for depression when really, it’s grief. It’s grief that’s been unaddressed and it’s cumulative. And it’s years and years of grief that’s just been swept under the rug. And so I think for a lot of people that can appear like depression, and we can have bouts of depression. I’m not dismissing that and there’s also clinical depression too. However, I think that if we nip it in the bud, you If we can catch those symptoms early, the earlier the better, of course, but I will say that it’s never too late either.
- Spiritual Wellness – And it’s about having a sense of purpose and meaning in life that revolves around your personal beliefs and values. spiritual health can involve a connection with nature, self-reflection, meditation, prayer, and being spiritual, healthy means you have strong values, a feeling of inner peace, and meaning in life. spiritual wellness includes making time for activities that enhance your sense of connection to yourself, nature, and others. And one thing I’ll say about making time for activities that enhance your connection to yourself in grief, we are often so disconnected, that we become disconnected from ourselves. And we also become disconnected from others because of that disconnection from ourselves. And so spirituality can really be a gateway into moving through your grief. And that was actually my personal experience. Having a relationship, healthy relationship with nature, discovering your values, principles, and beliefs. I mentioned that being part of a like-minded community, helping those who are in need, accepting others for who they are having a greater purpose, exploring your personal values, searching for meaning for your life, and being aware of how your values may differ from others, religious or otherwise spiritual activities and practices, taking time for yourself and embracing silence and solitude. And it’s really difficult in grief, to embrace the silence and the solitude sometimes, because often when we are alone with our thoughts and our feelings, it can be very overwhelming and very uncomfortable. And so that’s why we often well, deep in grief, or any other strong emotion, that is deemed as negative, and I’ll put that in air quotes because even anger is a valid emotion, we try to numb out or dismiss or kind of forget that we’re having those feelings and so we distract ourselves
- Intellectual Wellness – which is about exercising the mind, learning new things, and expanding upon one’s knowledge and skills, being intellectually healthy can help you with mental growth, which helps with your concentration, memory, and critical thinking skills. And anyone who is grieving can tell you, that those things pretty much go out the window. So this is not something that you’re going to tackle. Everyone’s timeline is different, right? But this is not something that you’ll likely tackle. In the first few years even after a loss, a devastating loss, or a grief experience. I think this is something that naturally will develop over time, and likely, when you first start to honestly I think there’s sometimes people a lot of griever say, it’s like, you wake up one day, and you just feel like the sun has come out. And you might have some of those here and there. But when you can wake up and you feel like the sun is truly out, you’ve kind of gotten to the lighter, the lighter side where things don’t feel as heavy, where you can talk about what happened, or about the person or the loss and it’s not debilitating you it doesn’t take you back to the pain of the experience of the pain of the relationship. And that really is the difference that you know when you’re starting to heal is you can talk about it not like it’s a recipe card. That’s really dismissive that’s an I get a sense of dismissing when I hear people talk about things like it’s a recipe, it really is, sharing the story, but connecting with the feeling of it. Yeah, I felt like that at that time. But you know what, I’m feeling really good. I feel healthy in all kinds of ways. If you’re articulating it differently than how you used to, then you know, you’re making real progress in that intellectual wellness area. And so intellectual wellness includes using your creative abilities, exercising critical thinking skills, being a lifetime learner, and engaging in books, articles, or other content that interests you. Exploring public or community events, focusing on your skills and learning new ones, being able to develop analyze problem-solving more, and challenging yourself mentally with games, puzzles, or even learning a new instrument can be one of those, and also having a positive self-image which often in grief goes out the window, you feel like a hot mess, you probably look like one too, and your confidence is just kind of down the toilet. Again. I just I mentioned that because grief just takes over every aspect of our lives, including our self-image.
- Physical Wellness – which involves eating a healthy diet getting enough sleep during your regular physical activity, and preventing and managing illness and health conditions not being physically healthy can lead to numerous health problems and diseases. We all know this and developing a healthy lifestyle and making healthy choices will improve your overall wellness. Obviously healthy behaviors that we all know are getting regular exercise, feeling comfortable with your body, seeing your doctor regularly, keeping your blood pressure at the optimal level, eating healthy food, and being aware of how sleep and stress affect you. That’s including grief, making your own choice about your physical health, stress reduction, developing healthy habits, seeking medical care when appropriate, being responsible with alcohol, cigarettes, and other substances, taking any medications prescribed by your doctor, and understanding how your body works. And again, like in grief, you probably will need a lot more sleep than you used to. Because grief is exhausting. It’s taxing on the body, both mind and spirit in all of these areas, it’s taxing on the body. So it’s giving yourself that grace, which is self-love. Accept where you are that day. And it is often day by day, one day you might feel like going to a yoga class, and then the next you might feel like just taking a nap both are okay, like that you don’t need anyone’s permission to take a nap. I personally don’t nap I never have. But I have noticed because I know when I’m paying attention to my body. Now when I’m pushing, pushing, pushing, and I can forget when enough is enough I can I have actually taken a nap in the past three months, there was one day where I just succumbed to the nap, which I never do. But when you become more in tune with your body and how your body operates and what it needs, honor that, listen to that intuition, and give that to your body that is self-love. And you know, often with caregivers and caretakers, this is a really difficult hurdle, because where is the time? Where do you take the time for yourself? And then when you do get that time, which is maybe not a lot? How do you want to spend it? Do you want to spend it exercising? Most people may not. But you can actually combine several of these things. If you go walk by the river, you’re out in nature, you’re that’s feeding your spiritual body if you’re listening to a podcast that inspires and uplifts you, or teaches you something new that’s working your intellectual health, and you’re working your physical health by walking. So you can actually tackle many of these areas at one time just by thinking a little bit creatively about what will serve you the most if you do have just a little bit of time.
- Environmental Wellness– which refers to being in a nurturing and healthy environment, as well as having awareness and respect for the environment around us the environment around you can greatly impact how you feel, I always say quite often, actually, that we are products of our environment as children. And it really truly is important as adults to recognize how those environments have impacted us have formed the beliefs that we have. And by challenging those beliefs, you find your truth by creating an environment as an adult, that is one of support that feels good to be in is going to serve you greatly when the challenges do come. And when grief does enter the room because it will it just it will. It’s inevitable. And so the environment around you can greatly impact how you feel. For example, people who live in countries that have a lot of rain and cloudy days might suffer from seasonal depression, which affects their emotional health and social health, spiritual health possibly even more. I live in North Dakota, which is what do we have like? It starts snowing in October, and November, often we’ve had snow for Halloween so and it’s usually pretty cold. But the clouds start to settle in November for sure. Usually, and it doesn’t end until probably April. So almost half the year we are in bitter cold temps, cloudy days and it is stuck indoors. I mean, you’re not stuck indoors. I mean you can go outside and we do have some sunny days in the winter. But it’s not uncommon for people in this area to have vitamin D deficiency. You know, people in the northern hemisphere often have vitamin D deficiency. And what I’ve learned is that vitamin D deficiency is actually linked to pancreatic cancer and people of European descent do have higher rates of pancreatic cancer. And they found that it’s linked to vitamin D deficiency. So it’s very important to think about your environment and where you live and how it is impacting your health and well-being. I personally cannot wait until I am a snowbird when my kids are all gone, and we can go south somewhere warmer for the winter. That is definitely my goal in my life. So environmental wellness includes making sure your home is decluttered spending time outside, maybe if it includes using eco-friendly products or recycling, if that’s in your area, having a peaceful home environment, involvement in the community, and being aware of how you might contribute to pollution. For some people, that’s a huge factor or a deep concern for environmental awareness, and being aware of climate change and how human beings impact the environment.
- Financial Wellness – refers to being financially literate in charge of your finances and responsible with your money, struggling with finances, and having an unsettled financial situation is a problem that can cause a lot of stress to you in the family grief. I mean, how often do losses occur and the person didn’t have the financial means to even pay for their own funeral or didn’t have life insurance. These are things that impact everybody. Because if you don’t have that nest egg or that life insurance to cover your expenses someone’s paying for that really, I mean in grief impacts our financial situation anyway, because if you’re a caregiver, you got medical bills, terminal illness, like all of that is a huge stressor for people sometimes, because grief impacts our productivity in our work, many places only offer like, say a week of vacation time that you can take when someone dies, let’s say it was your spouse and your spouse was the breadwinner, but you did work. And so you have to, you’re almost expected to return back to work and be as productive as you were before the loss occurred. And that’s just not realistic. And so I think companies need to be more supportive and aware of grief and loss, and the impact that it has on their employees and on the company as a whole. Because globally, grief impacts our economy by the billions of dollars. And so this is an important issue not just for the individual and their family, but also the community and when in where they work in the business that they are in, in the business itself and the businesses that those businesses are in business with this trickles down. So maintaining a budget and monitoring your spending, seeking out professional financial help if needed, exploring ways to save money, being financially responsible paying bills on time reviewing credit reports and bank statements being financially literate, as I mentioned, are things that probably won’t be happening right out of the gate, especially when a loss occurs. But you can prepare for challenges in life by doing these things today, I use Credit Karma. It’s free. It’s an app that helps you keep track of your credit score, it alerts you to things that might not be of your doing, you can kind of pinpoint well if a credit card was opened, and I know I didn’t open it, I can see that, you know, my credit card, credit score, dip, suddenly, that’s something to look into. And so it’s an easy way to track your financial health, as your credit health. So that’s one thing I use the auto deduction for savings, you can set up an auto deduct to put a certain amount even if it’s just 25 bucks a pay period to put into a little nest egg. There are all sorts of tips. I mean, you can probably Google financial tips, and you’ll find dozens and dozens of them. But it can be really difficult in grief to get a handle on this area of your life. But it’s really important because it does add stress.
- Occupational Wellness – involves having a fulfilling and enriching occupation, whether that be professional work or academic and a common cause of stress for many Americans and grief is that their jobs and the demands that come with them or that they’re in the wrong occupation altogether. Having a work-life balance is extremely important to overall health and wellness. So achieving this by having a job that you enjoy and are passionate about is very important. And it’s also important to have a positive work environment and be surrounded by people who support you and your goals. So taking personal satisfaction in your occupation, work-life balance, learning to communicate effectively with other people developing good work habits, exploring career opportunities, or volunteer opportunities that you’re passionate about setting career goals, learning mistakes, and moving forward, challenging societal expectations and fighting against barriers, especially, for example, barriers for women in the workplace, that can be a huge area of grief for a lot of women. I’ve recently had a couple of conversations with women whose podcast episodes won’t be airing for a while. But this was a topic of discussion. And especially if you’re a woman of color, which one of my guesses was and so it’s another facet of grief that is often not talked about but can have a huge impact on our lives. And when we’ve gone through a devastating loss or grief experience, we often are faced with our own mortality. And so we ask ourselves those questions like what do I want to be doing with my life? How do I want to spend the rest of my days on this earth and so often, we start questioning what we are doing with our lives, it is self-love to pursue, what that can look like for you to pursue what alignment looks like for you, I could do a whole episode just on alignment, I feel so aligned, sitting here recording this podcast right now. It feels good. It feels like it’s serving my soul and my spirit, it’s fulfilling to me, I feel like I’m giving something that can help people, and can have an impact and a positive impact. And I know that oftentimes, my episodes probably shake something up within the listener. And that’s good, too, because it opens you up to asking those deeper, bigger questions. And it’s in asking the questions that we discover deeper answers. And once you have an answer to something, once you know something, you can’t unknow it. And when that’s about yourself, the only thing left to do is to take action.
- Social Wellness – And that involves having a strong support network feeling connected to other people and having a sense of belonging, feeling isolated, lonely, or disconnected from others can lead to negative physical and mental health outcomes. This is where grief can be very isolating, and we don’t heal on an island. A lot of these that I’ve talked about already involve other people, we can’t do grief alone, you can but you’re not going to be very successful at overcoming the challenges that come with it, it’s going to be harder, longer, more challenging road and path for you. And so by addressing and looking at these various areas of wellness, little by little you can impact your own life and make these little changes, healthy relationships we make with family and friends are essential to our well-being. And so some of these things that you can do might include taking part in a club or a social group or volunteer group focus on maintaining social connections by keeping in touch and staying connected with others, being able to interact with a diverse group of people being aware of your impact in your community, understanding sex and gender roles and stereotypes surrounding them. Being able to draw boundaries with yourself and others having a strong support network of family, friends, coworkers, and peers, developing positive relationships, having good communication skills, and being able to reach out to others for support and ask for help when needed. And often in grief. When you’re looking for that person, to be your person, your heart with yours, it can be really difficult to have that be family or even sometimes close friends. It depends on the relationship, of course. But one of the things we talk about in Grief Recovery is typically that person that can be your heart with yours is someone that doesn’t have any skin in your game, someone that’s not going to be impacted by what you have to share. Because if you can’t share openly with that person, then they might not be the best person to share your grief with and so that’s if you can’t be open and honest about what you’re feeling and experiencing completely, even if that does involve that person that’s where it might be helpful to have almost like an outsider. And that is where therapy or seeking support in a different fashion is beneficial for people because those people don’t know you from Adam and have no skin in your game. They’ve got nothing to lose. And that’s what they’re trained to do is to be a heart with yours like myself.
Those are the eight dimensions of wellness, also known as the wheel of life, when I think when you don’t know what to do, and you don’t know where to start, this gives you exactly what to look at in your life, the areas of life that may be causing some more additional grief for you, and seeing how you can turn that around seeing where you can focus even just a little bit on each of those areas, and start seeing that the change that you want to see and happening in your life. I think it’s really important that we think about self-love and not just the things that are often mentioned like the bubble bath and self-care type of things. This is like self-love, to me really is about embodying the best aspects of yourself and outwardly expressing that but also nurturing that from the inside out. And so it really is inside job self-love is an inside job. And I had a lot of issues with self-loathing, I am my own worst critic, this did not come naturally to me, there are still areas that I have challenges within these different dimensions of wellness, that is life. And everything that comes up that rubs us the wrong way or that bumps up against our energy is just an indicator of something that it should be curious about that why is that? Why is that, you know, upsetting me? Or why is that causing this reaction within me?
So it’s really just taking a step back. And the more you do this stuff, the more that you work on these areas, the more you’re able to do that to take a pause, to step back, be an observer and less, less reactionary and more deliberate and intentional with a response. And this happens over time. It’s not an overnight thing. But you can get there, every ounce of me believes that you can get there, you just have to decide, just take a look. Just be an excavator of your own life experience and start digging, stay curious and be your own best advocate. And boundaries have a lot to do with that. And like I said, I learned a lot about boundaries, going through my own experience with grief and addressing it. Learning where I didn’t have them, I wouldn’t have known a boundary. If it slapped me in the face. We learn these things as we start digging, but you won’t, unless you start digging. So when it comes to grief, make self-love your priority. And look at these various areas and see where you can make the changes that can propel you into your best higher self into the version 2.0 of you that is standing triumphant in spite of the grief, the loss, and the trauma or whatever it is that you’ve experienced, where you can be your own hero.
P.S I hope this was helpful. I wish you all of the best in the week ahead. And I thank you so much for listening. If you did find this helpful, please share it with someone and leave a review. If you care to maybe even a couple of lines, I would like I read every single one. It makes me feel like this is really having an impact when I hear from the listeners. And if you’re interested in diving into these areas Through Grief Recovery and my program it does grief differently where we’ve looked at your values. And that’s a lot of having to do with boundaries as we identify your values. And we do that in the work that I do with clients. And so if you’re interested in that head to my website, theunleashedheart.com, and remember, when you unleash your heart you unleash your life. Much love.
Grieving Voices Guest, Grieving Voices Podcast, Mental Health, Podcast |
Amy Medcalf | Don’t Abandon Me
SHOW NOTES SUMMARY:
Agoraphobia is a mental and behavioral disorder, specifically an anxiety disorder characterized by anxiety symptoms in situations where the person perceives their environment to be unsafe with no easy way to escape. These situations can include open spaces, public transit, shopping centers, or simply being outside their home.
Amy’s mom died suddenly and unexpectedly when she was 11 of a massive heart attack. They were the best of friends a mother and daughter could be. As an only child of a single mom, it was just the two of them – until they weren’t.
Amy found herself living with her Godmother and her Godmother’s family. However, one day a series of events led to Amy being forced to turn over her key to safety and security and trade it for loneliness, homelessness, and insecurity. But that’s not the whole story.
After years of bouncing around from shelter to shelter, Amy would later turn her life around. Without the support of family and only that of a few friends, Amy got her G.E.D., overcame agoraphobia, learned life skills for the first time, and discovered a path of service as a social worker.
Our conversation went to many places, including raising/mentoring/teaching kids, mental health challenges, and the fact that family isn’t always blood – sometimes it’s the people you choose.
RESOURCES:
CONNECT:
______
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 or anyone you know is struggling with grief due to any of the 40+ losses, free resources are available HERE.
Are you enjoying the podcast? Check out my bi-weekly newsletter, The Unleashed Letters.
💛 Would you like to Learn Your Energy Type? Free Quiz ➡️ HERE! ⬅️
SUPPORT THE SHOW:
CONNECT WITH VICTORIA:
Victoria Volk 0:00
Hi this is Victoria of the unleashedheart.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 gravers like spread hope and inspire compassion towards 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. Again, if this is your second, third, fourth, fifth time, welcome. And if this is your first time, thank you for being here. today. My guest is Amy Metcalf. She is one of two members in her podcast once upon a nightmare, who deals with her loss and grief through humor and spooky things. She is new to the podcasting world and working her way through to find peace of mind as daily life can be hard. keeping busy helps, and especially when it’s something that you’re interested in, like your podcast. And so let’s thank you for being here. Thank you for having me. So let’s start with your podcast once upon a nightmare, and what was the prompting for you to create that?
Amy Medcalf 1:44
So I’ve always like kind of wanted to do a podcast. It’s been on my mind for the past few years. But it’s like, what do I want to do? Like, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to do things that were part of my job. But like, even then it’s like, you got to kind of back away from that. Because like if you get too much into your job when you’re a social worker and you’re working with like, vulnerable people, it’s it, you tend to kinda burn out really fast. And I didn’t want to kind of like get into something like that. And I really like spooky things like I’m an October Baby. So I hold October and spooky like near and dear to my heart and my friend she is very into spooky stuff as well. I like true crime, I like all that kind of stuff. And it kind of makes me happy in it. It allows me to kind of express myself in a different way than what a lot of people who know me see on a daily kind of so.
Victoria Volk 2:48
I connect with what you’re saying. I actually just shared a news my actually my most recent newsletter was about being in a way addicted to sadness.
Amy Medcalf 2:59
Yeah, it’s very much true. Like I find if I am alone and in my head a little too much i i Can I can make myself I can hurt my own feelings and make myself cry. Like I always felt like you’ve always had things happen to you especially like, with loss and whether that’s with a death or breaking of a relationship, like a friendship or whatever. You tend to kind of get in your head and all this stuff. And it’s like, why do people keep leaving me? Why am I always alone? And why do like, Why does everything always happen to me? And it kind of it’s kind of like a security blanket kind of and it’s like, and a lot of people use that to not get close to people. Right? So I that’s definitely a thing where you can be addicted to sadness. So
Victoria Volk 3:56
Well, because I’ve just been really investigating this for myself, because I love true crime always. Like I was reading Patricia Cornwell. You know, when I was a teenager and love true crime then and my some of my favorite podcasts are true crime podcasts. And so what do you think? In your social worker? Correct? Yeah, yeah. So what do you think it is? Well, I have so many questions now. Because I think for me a little bit of it is that I feel a connection to the sadness that victims feel. Oh, yeah. Survivors, or, you know, connecting to that on the base of loss. Right. Yeah. And, and it can be it’s very traumatic for families. Oh, yeah. Through stuff like that. And but do you think like this connection to other people, and their sadness is kind of what led you and your own personal experience, of course, led you to be a social worker,
Amy Medcalf 4:58
Kind of at the time I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do, like, I was on my own at 16. So I didn’t finish high school, I ended up getting my GED. And I was, I had like a really great sense of empathy. And I liked helping people and all other stuff. And especially when it came to like, understanding them on that deeper level, like when they’re going through loss, or they’re going through being on their own for the first time. And they’re very young, and because they got kicked out, or they had a really bad family dynamic and all that stuff. And I think that was part of the reason like part of it. And I didn’t kind of want to leave the town that I was in, and the college in the town. It was very, very small. It was held in our arena. And there was only like a handful of classes. And they just came in with like a social work program. And somebody mentioned it to me. So I applied and I got in and yeah,
Victoria Volk 6:10
It’s amazing. So how many years have you been doing this work?
Amy Medcalf 6:14
So I graduated in 2013. And I started before I graduated, I started working at kind of like a group home setting for adults with autism and anything else, because with autism comes a plethora of other lots of things. Like so yeah, it’s just a lot of the times I worked with, like them. And then I worked in group homes for Teen Girls, which a lot of them I still talk to now that they’re older and everything and they’re and they still come to me for advice. Sometimes they’re like, Amy, like, I need help. And so it’s just like, I really liked working with youth the most I think because that’s where I felt my loss the most. So right now I live in Montreal, I’m not bilingual so I’m nannying. But I also did daycare and all that stuff. So it’s just I didn’t mind the group home, like, the group home was very, like, kept you on the go all the time. So do you miss that work? Sometimes. But they tend to like you tend to get really overworked and like, burned out so fast. And because there’s so much turnover because people don’t realize like how hard it is like, it’s heartbreaking. Like, I remember when the one of the group homes I was working for was getting shut down. And like, the kids were crying, they were upset. They didn’t want to like leave like, probably wasn’t the greatest one. But like, it was better than most so I can like, yeah, yeah, so the kids
Victoria Volk 8:04
Yeah. You know, because that’s their can ask their family, right? For,
Amy Medcalf 8:09
Like, as much as they fight with all the other girls, they love each other in systole kind of way. And they I know a lot of them are still like, talking with each other and like being there for each other in a certain way. And even though they still talk badly about each other sometimes and it’s like, oh my god, girls, like, you guys haven’t changed. But, um, no, they do become a family even with like, the staff, like the ones that stay. And it’s hard when staff leaving, come and go and because they always come and go, and if they’re there for a long time. And it’s like, they feel like they don’t really have a home but like, they tried to make the best of it.
Victoria Volk 8:57
Well, right, because they come from instability. And so when there’s no instability on where they’re stuck. Yeah, because they’re children, and they don’t have really much of a choice unless they try and go out on the streets. Yeah, so was that you? Were you a child in a group home then at 16 or youth group.
Amy Medcalf 9:19
Um, when I was at on my own, I ended up in the shelter, like a youth shelter, on and off and but I like I never really like lived fully on the streets. I couldn’t live without a shower. So I always opted for the for the shelter if I could, and I had some places on my own, but like, it’s hard when you’re 16 and you’re on your own and you don’t have those life skills. Like I’m still paying for some of my lack of life skills. Like I had a credit card at 18 and I didn’t like use it properly and it affected my credit. Although I’m like what Working on that even at 33. Like, if I could go back younger me would do things a lot differently, I would hope. But um, it is yeah, I was more in group home, not group homes, shelters, then group homes. So CHS didn’t come in when I was on my own.
Victoria Volk 10:24
And you speak to the importance of support and having that support system, just learning life skills, because, like, look at the the impact that you’re living now. And I had a little bit of that too, like you, you just if you’re not taught, you just don’t know.
Amy Medcalf 10:40
That’s exactly it. Like, when my mom passed away, I was 11 years old. And I went to go live with my godparents, and my godmother did a lot of my stuff. So she’s like, Yeah, I would clean my room and all that other stuff. But like, a lot of the time, she would clean my room, she would do my laundry, like, I knew how to do laundry. Because my mom made me do laundry. Sometimes, when I was younger, to teach me like my mom tried. And I had such really bad depression, that cleaning wasn’t a priority in my life. And like, when you are super depressed, those things tend to go unnoticed. And like you don’t like usually bite people in like, you don’t like hanging out with anybody, because you’re like, My place is a mess. Or if you do invite somebody, like I remember I would invite like, somebody would like, oh, let’s hang out. I’m like, okay, and I would be up all night cleaning my little apartment, because it was such, it was so hard to get up and do things. And I also dealt with anxiety as well, which I still kind of deal with. And I like, I probably had anxiety prior to. And with the death of my mom, like I have anxiety when it comes to death and dying because it was so young. And then there was other people that died in my life at the time. So it definitely is very, very hard to deal with. And I’ve learned that sometimes you don’t have to be blood related to be family. I’ve chosen a lot of friends who have become in my love become my family. And they are probably the best things in my life. And so I always tried to keep a contact with my godmother until she died four years ago. So a lot of people that I consider family are definitely not blood related for sure. But yeah.
Victoria Volk 12:47
May I ask what happened with the relationship with the godmother that you were with her from 11. And then what happened when you left at 16.
Amy Medcalf 12:56
So I didn’t like leave. My God, like her daughter was living with us. And she’s 17 years older than me.
Amy Medcalf 13:09
And her and my grandmother went to the cottage for the weekend. And I didn’t want to go. And I snuck on the computer when I was grounded from the computer. So when they got back, they found out I was on the computer, I got grounded again. And my I call her my godsister. She came into my room, she was a big girl too. And like I’m a big girl. And I was looking for my belt. I was supposed to be cleaning my room. And she’s like, What are you doing? And I’m like looking for my belt. And she’s like, it probably wouldn’t fit you anyway, I’m like, basically saying that I’m too big for it or whatever. And I was like, so I found it, I put it on. I’m like, look at that. It’s on the last hole like, like, not the first one like the last one. And it was like, and she just kept teasing me. And I was like, You know what, I don’t want to deal with you. It was more I didn’t want to deal with my sister. So I went out and I was like I tend to. I’m like a very, I don’t like conflict. So I tried to like leave it as much as possible. And I went out to go see my friend. And as I was leaving my godmother said that if I left then don’t come back. But she was saying it, hoping that I just wouldn’t leave. And I went out and my friend took me around and I went and found somebody I could stay with for the night until things cooled down. And I saw my godmother driving by when I was in the other town because we lived in to like in a very small town and the two towns were very connected. When I went back to get my clothes she wasn’t there. But my God sister and my godfather were and my boss was there had this dog it was a Dr. Russell and he was so vicious. Anyway, she had him in his arm. And she’s like, give me your key. And I’m like, no, like, I’m not giving you my key. I’m just getting closed for the night. And she follows me up to my room. And she’s telling me to give her my key. And I’m like, no, like, no, no, no, she grabs me by the back of my neck, pins me to my bed. And it’s trying to get the key and I’m screaming, my godfather comes in, tells her to get off me, but then tells me to give her my key. And for years, I thought that it was all of their doing. But like, I realized that my godmother did not know any of this. And to the day that she died, she died believing that I left on my own because like, I wouldn’t talk about it much. Because like, every time we would talk about it, she get upset, like I would try to like say like, No, this is what happened. She get upset. And like, I didn’t really want to upset her. She was like an old, like, she was born in 40 fours, and she was older. And it was like, she was having a lot of health problems. And I didn’t want to like, so I never got that closure with her. And it was like, really, really heartbreaking. But I’m, I’m working on getting that closure for myself kind of and getting it out there because I don’t want it like, like I told my god brother, the story. And I told my told their cousin. So she’s kind of like my cousin too. And I’m like, just so you know, I’m not this bad person. Like, because I thought they were all kicking me out. There was a little bit of animosity when I was trying to like get some more of my stuff so that I had clothes and everything to wear. And it was a big thing. So it was it was really hard.
Victoria Volk 16:47
I imagine. Yeah. And you speak to what I talk a lot about and what we share in Grief Recovery. Is this incomplete emotionally being this feeling of being emotionally incomplete with people? Yeah. And that’s almost tormenting to us.
Amy Medcalf 17:05
Yeah, it’s almost worse. Like, it’s not like she’s still alive. And I can like be like, Hey, let’s talk about it. Now that I’m older, and I kind of understand how to talk about it with somebody, especially because I went to school for it. But like, and because of like working in my field, like you tend you tend to kind of like build these things. As you get older, whether you’re in the field or not, you tend to build, like a little more clarity of like, how you should deal with things like, I don’t know, if you do this or any like I well, I know a lot of people do this, but like, I sit there and I’ll like have conversations in my head and I’m like, Okay, this is how this conversation is gonna go and never goes the way I want it to. But I’m like, all go back and I’ll like, think of a great comeback. And then I’m like, Oh, I wish I knew that before I like ended that conversation. But yeah, like, I wish I could sit her down and talk to her like, and be like, Hey, I didn’t leave. I didn’t want to leave. I was young. I was scared. Like, I’ve never, like felt more alone at that time. You know, and it’s, it’s a scary thing when you’re 16
Victoria Volk 18:15
Since you’re into spooky things, do you believe in the afterlife?
Amy Medcalf 18:20
Oh, totally. So I believe now like, if she could she would tell me that. She now knows because like, I’m sure in the afterlife, she would know. Especially like if there if you do connect with people in your past, so like she would have had that connection with my mom or whoever else. Right? And it’s like, the communication and finding out what really goes on and I had a friend who while I have she’s still my friend her and her mom do taro and like, I think she can’t like she she also has like a connection with people in the other side and it’s like and she said that she used to feel sick every time she looked at my room because of what happened and and everything and she’s like, she didn’t realize that that’s what went down and blah blah and I believe it on a on a note but like my friend also kind of knew so like it’s kind of like is that her picking up that or is that her picking up? What she also knows at the same time right? Although she forgot the most of it. It’s it’s definitely a huge belief of mine. I do believe in psychics, the right kind of psychics, and because there are some people who will say that they’re psychic and just not because it’s good. Scam money, I guess. But yeah, so I definitely believe in the afterlife and ghost.
Victoria Volk 20:01
You might be interested in listening to my episode with Siri Bernsen. She’s a certified psychic medium. Oh, really? Yeah. But she’s also a grief recovery specialist like me, so. Oh, cool. Yeah. Look at that good lesson because it helps. She also helps people to understand how to connect to their loved ones to in that episode. Yeah. So I would recommend that. So with your mom, I know you mentioned this emotionally incomplete feeling with your godmother. But how about your mom? Like, was that a good relationship?
Amy Medcalf 20:34
Oh, yeah, my mom was a single parent, I was an only child, every child says about their mom, but my mom was the greatest. She, from what I can remember, she was, she was tough, but she was good. Like, she was a very good person, she was very helpful to a lot of people. Like, I remember, she would help her friends by taking their kids who were a little a little rough on the edges. And she would help them kind of like be like, hey, like, you can’t be like this, or she would take in, like, I know, my cousin came to stay with us, because he didn’t have anywhere else to go at a point. And all this other stuff. So it’s like, my mom was very helpful to a lot of people. And I feel like she also kind of like, put others before herself. But we had a really good relationship. I loved her. She was like, my best friend, as much of a kid as, like, as much as I can say, as a kid, like, I wish I kind of have known been able to know her as an adult, and be an actual friend with her and know more about her life than what a child knows about their mom at the time. You know? So it’s like, no, like, I feel like I got robbed of that. And it’s, it’s always been my biggest thing is like, I wish I had known her more as an adult. So,
Victoria Volk 21:57
Do have other family of hers that you’ve been able to. I mean, I know you mentioned you don’t have much family, but did she have siblings and things that you could learn about her from?
Amy Medcalf 22:10
My family life is so she has friends that I can kind of like hit up and be like, hey, like, but a lot of them are just like, she just loved you so much. Like, that’s usually all like, I get like, she just adored you. She just like, you were her life. You are her universe, basically. And it’s like, that’s basically. And I try not to delve into it because they also go through the loss. And I kind of haven’t like wanted to kind of know too to too much yet. And I don’t know the right questions to ask like what I want to know, like, my mom was adopted. And my Nana and Papa also adopted another kid. And so that was my Uncle Chris. And after my Nana died, my Uncle Chris went missing. He went MIA, but he always went MIA even when my mom and my Nana were alive. And my mom was the one who kind of like, went knocking on his door because he was an alcoholic. And he had his problems. And so she would go knocking on his door and she’d be like, No, you need to get back in there and you need to get your help and all this other stuff. And my Nana died not long after my mom. So and then my papa died a few years back, but I stopped talking to him when I was like 18 I think maybe before that way before that. And my uncle Chris’s son, my cousin Peter, him and I stopped talking. So and it’s not that I wanted to stop talking to them. It’s just things happen. So like when I was on my own, my cousin Peter was like, Hey, let’s go to Papa’s for Thanksgiving. And that’s usually like my birthday weekend. And I had just gotten this job at a restaurant and I’m like, Oh, hey, like, I would love to but I have to work. And he got mad at me saying like, I put work for my family. And then he stopped me never talked to me ever since. And we live in the same town and I would see him all the time. And yeah, that one was, but he has his own issues. And I I do kind of I am kind of thankful that I don’t share blood with some of these because like, even my papa like I didn’t find out he had a brother until my Nana’s funeral. And I was 12 at the time because like she died around my trunk. She died the day before the day after my 12th birthday. So a lot of his life was very secretive. And then he started and then he was also kind of abusive to me in his own way like he came over for Christmas to my god pair Since I was 15 years old, and he looks at me, he’s like, you could find a nice boy if you lost some weight. And it’s like, who says that to a 15 year old child. And he started dating this other woman who apparently he ended up marrying. I didn’t know that until I saw his obituary because I was trying to like, find my mom’s obituary, and I stumbled upon it. So he got together with this woman, and my godmother made me go visit him and her. And I didn’t want to because like one, I didn’t really know her. They also weren’t living in the home that I grew up in anymore. So it was just awkward for me. And when I went there, I went to help with the dishes, because I was a polite kid. And I did do a lot of stuff. And so I went to help with the dishes. And she’s like, Oh, no, no, no, no, you just sit there, you relax, and all this other stuff. And she would do that. And like, they lived in like, a tobacco. So like Toronto, and Ontario. So not the safest place. So I wouldn’t even leave. I didn’t go anywhere. And like, I’d be home alone most of the time. And yeah, so like, then when they sent me home, she gives my godparents a letter, which I read. And they’re basically saying that I’m lazy, I don’t do anything. I need to do more chores. And all this stuff. I’m like, Who are you? Like, even my godmother was like, This is ridiculous. I did my chores. She knows that. And so like, after that I just kind of like, was iffy about them. And then I was even more iffy, because I was homeless. And they wouldn’t help me.
Amy Medcalf 26:56
They let me stay in a shelter at 16, even though they had a two bedroom, just because, and I kind of get it but I also kind of don’t. But because her granddaughter who was like, severely autistic would come and stay and she can get and like, some people on the spectrum, they tend to be a little bit like violent, depending on their communication level. And she was nonverbal. So when she couldn’t communicate, she tended to lash out, right? And it’s like, I get it. But if that’s only like every now and then, why can’t I come and have a home? So it was very hard on me that he did that and didn’t stand up for me and be like, hey, like, let me help you.
Victoria Volk 27:39
So you kind of felt like you were on an island, right? Yeah, that’s my people who are illustration of for the my podcast illustrates is you feel like you’re on an island often.
Amy Medcalf 27:52
Yeah, Uber. Yeah, it’s exactly it. And like, sometimes, you sit there and you’re like, be these people who are supposed to love me and care for me, are doing nothing. And they’re letting me drown. Like, this island is like starting to flood at this point. It’s becoming Atlantis, and you’re, I’m like going down with it. And it was only me that has brought myself out of it. I’ve had to rely on myself a lot. And I’ve had to rely heavily on a lot of my friends who were very supportive and very helpful. And a lot of them who are still helpful in my life. I don’t know where I would be if I didn’t have that determination to stay afloat, which sometimes I sunk eventually, I did get back up. That is how life is like, there are gonna be times where you feel like you’re sinking, but you can’t let yourself drown. Like, you know, you have to figure out your ways, like, everybody has their own ways of dealing with their anxiety, their depression, their grief, and it’s all about finding your niche. And sometimes you need to find more than one because like, you can’t consistently rely on the one but like for me like feeling anxious, I can call a friend or try to like I have like a few friends like on standby. So if one doesn’t answer, I can call this person and it’s like, that’s helped me a lot. And also, music is another thing for me. When I’m feeling anxious This is more like when I’m out because like with my anxiety I developed a core phobia so for the longest time I couldn’t go places without feeling like I’m going to die. And because my mom died of a massive heart attack i and the anxiety symptoms that you tend to get so like the heart palpitations, the meaning of the heart, like not being able to breathe, I’m like, oh my god, I’m gonna die. So that was a lot of my life where sometimes I couldn’t even get off the couch. And it’s not easy. It’s so not easy, but I got to a point now where, yeah, sometimes I have really hard days or it’s hard for me to go from point A to point B. But I can now drive to my work, which is a 40 minute drive and on the highway, which I’d never, like driving on, because I had very bad anxiety back in the day, I go from point A to point B, and like, I don’t break down. And it’s because I’ve learned to develop, like, what I need to get there and do that, like, sometimes I’ll be in my head, I’m like, Okay, there’s so many people around, if something happens, like, they’ll help you, you know, like, or at least one of the 20 people that are around here will help you know, and it’s like being in my head and doing that. Whereas like, whenever I would go and talk to somebody their advice, when you have an anxiety attack, a lot of the times I don’t know if it’s changed, because like, every time I now go in, I’m like the counting. Five things, I can taste, touch, hear and everything that doesn’t work. Like, it doesn’t need to talk it out. I know what I can do when I’m feeling anxious at the time. But I think when I get to the level of holding things in which I do a lot, still I need somebody non biased to talk to you. That’s all I needed somebody non biased that I can talk to, and let it all out. Because my boyfriend, I’m sure he’s sick of hearing things. Like he’s like, okay, I get it, but he’s biased. And he will always be on my side in every single case. And so all my friends and like, or they’ll be like, or they just don’t understand. And even when you talk to a professional, they might not understand in your case, but they understand how to talk to you when it comes to those moments. You know, and that I that I found was a really great thing. And I tell my friends all the time, I’m like you need to talk to like, I can talk to you as much as possible. And I can give you the greatest advice ever. And I get it. I’m a social worker, but I’m also biased and like you’re my friend, you have to talk to somebody who’s not who doesn’t know you.
Victoria Volk 32:04
That’s great advice. Yeah. And you bring up a good point. And I I just want to say this too, because you didn’t lead with when you contacted me to be on the podcast, you didn’t leave with the fact that you are a social worker, though. And I find that interesting. And not because you’re not doing that work right now. But I just find that interesting. And I say that because you’re coming on here to share your story, right? But not from a place of expertise. You’re an expert in your story. Of course we all are, are an expert in our story. No one knows it like we do. But I, I bring that up. Because even though you’ve had this training in this education, you are still a Griever you are still processing your own stuff. And as a social worker, you too, need somebody you can’t heal alone on an island. No, no, I just wanted to bring that up. So thank you for sharing all of that.
Amy Medcalf 33:05
Yeah, no worries. And that’s exactly it like, and I tell people this all the time. And I feel like people use my not well, they don’t use it, but like, they’re like, Oh, my God, like Amy like would be a better person to give advice. And I’m like, Okay, I don’t mind giving you advice, but I’m not gonna sit down with you once a week. And like, because that’s not part of like what I do anyways, as a person and a professional or whatever. And it’s like, and even then, like, what I’ve been through, and even what I’ve learned in my training, and everything is not black and white. It’s not what’s written down in the books, you have to read outside of those lines all the time, because everybody deals with grief or any situation that’s traumatic in so many different ways. And because everybody’s brain, if I think of the brain, like a fingerprint, they are so unique. They are so powerful. And like, I could be sitting there. And all of a sudden, I’m remembering something I did when I was like six years old or something. And I get embarrassed. And I’m like, oh my god, like why are we thinking about my past like this? Like, I just wanted to watch my Netflix show, you know? But yeah, like, everybody’s brain is so different. And everybody deals with grief differently. Like, even if it was the exact same situation like, say you and I share the situation. Your mom died the same year. You were the same age as me in the same way and all this other stuff like it could be the exact situation. But because you and I are totally two different people with two different brains. You’re going to grieve a lot differently than what I’m going to grieve.
Victoria Volk 34:54
Well, only that our relationships with our mothers are very different. Exactly, exactly. It’s that brain, the brain connection with that person, that relationship with that person.
Amy Medcalf 35:07
Yeah, that’s exactly it. And like, when I was young, after my mom died, I denied going to see a psychologist, which I’ve really regret. As I got older, I did go through bereavement counseling through school, like, every single year through school. But as I got older, I remember talking to a social worker or somebody. And they asked me like what I used to do, when I was younger, and I was breathing. Now, there, I had some positive, but I also had some negative, because of my anxiety, I would also stay up in lane as I could, because I was afraid I was gonna die in my sleep, and I wouldn’t like and I stayed up until I passed out. So it didn’t get a lot of sleep when I was younger. But when I was really upset, like I had a bad day, or I had a fight with my godparents, I would write in a journal to her. And I, like, ask her questions, I’d be like, How’s heaven, like, I hope you’re okay, and all this other stuff and tell her like, I wish he was still here and all this stuff. And then as I got older, when I was allowed to just sit outside at night, like at midnight, and cry, I would look up at stars, and I would talk to her, and all this other stuff. So it’s the when I spoke to the social worker, and I told them that they’re like, basically, you found your own ways of coping in a healthy way. And that’s how I coped with it when I was younger. And it did help me a lot and because like, I, but when I was younger, I was very creative, I like to write I like to draw, I still like to, I just never had the time to. So those were my outlets. And that’s how I coped with it. And as I got older, said, I loved looking at the stars. And I remember when I was younger, as well, after she died, somebody showed me the stars, and they’re like, the first star you see, is always your mom shining down on you. And I always will look up and the first star I see is the one that I always talk to. And it doesn’t always have to be the brightest star. But it’s very, it’s very helpful in a in a way. But, again, what was helpful for me might not be helpful for the next person. It’s always just finding your niche. Well, and it changes over time, too, right? Yeah, I don’t do that as much anymore.
Victoria Volk 37:43
Well, and especially considering our frontal lobes aren’t fully developed until we’re 25 to right 625, something like that, you know, so we don’t have the cognitive ability in a lot of ways to emotionally process some things until we are actually getting that’s why the midlife crisis is what it is, I think, because it takes so long for our brain to fully develop. Yeah, you know, that, you know, everything that but here’s the fascinating thing too about it is that everything that you learn, and how to cope with challenges in life, are developed by the age of three or 470 5%, of how you will cope with challenges as an adult, are formed and developed in your, in your beliefs, like what you know, by the age of three, or 470 5%. And then the rest is like 1516.
Amy Medcalf 38:44
And it’s so crazy, because like, we don’t realize a lot of people don’t realize that and it, it’s how you nurture and deal with situations when you’re talking to your children who are at that age and older and all that stuff. And your how you treat the situations at that time, is how they’re going to figure out how to treat it in the future. And it could not be in the right way. And not that parenting is easy, and it’s not perfect. And sometimes we’re going to do things the wrong way. I’m not a parent, but like I’m talking about other people who are parents and I have friends who struggle and they’re like, I think I’m failing and I’m like you’re not failing. There’s no book written about being a perfect parent, and there’s no perfect parent, you’re, you’re fine. Or your kids eating or they do have a shelter over their head. Do they have a bed to sleep in at night? You’re doing great. Like and that’s exactly it. And I tell my friends all the time, like my one friend, she needs a break and I’m like, take that break, tell your partner. Next time you’re off. I’m going and she’s like, I don’t even know myself anymore. I’m like, you don’t have to know yourself. And I’m like, go get a coffee and go sit by the water somewhere or go into the woods and scream like you don’t have to Go to the spa or go to the movies. Like it’s not about that it’s about channeling who you are. And like getting deeper into your self and having that quiet and alone time sometimes because you have children or whatever at you all the time. It’s totally not what we’re talking about when it comes to grief. But like, it is a kind of grief, though. Because mothers who are there for their kids all the time, feel like they lost themselves. And that’s another part of grief and when, and especially with postpartum, and that being a big thing, you got to understand that you have to take that break, you have to go, and it’s okay to cry. And I tell this to everybody, no matter what it is, if it hurts you enough. It’s okay to cry. Crying releases that chemical in your brain that helps you feel good. I find if I have a nice big cry, I’m good. I’m tired, and I’m ready to go to bed. I take that time to cry sometimes. And if I really don’t want to I try not to look at animal videos, you got to understand that to help yourself. It’s not always about having to go out and do something where you’re spending a whole ton of money. Like, just go to the coffee shop, get a $2 coffee and just go sit in your car, cry, scream, or just watch and meditate like it’s you don’t have to do anything super extreme. To kind of like get that chemical release in your brain that says okay, you’re okay.
Victoria Volk 41:35
To everything you just said that was like my life. That was me and motherhood it was my youngest went to kindergarten I had this midlife crisis like that was my identity. I did have a business at the time to which I also closed at around the same time. I knew I was going to close it. And so I lost that baby. And I lost my other my other baby. And it was a really difficult time. And that’s really what opened me up to wanting to feel better to wanting to discover myself who I was before them who I was before grief even because that really opened up a lot of old wounds to right. Oh, yeah, I mean, children will do that. And I mean, that’s what happens. They reflect back to us what we need to really work on in ourselves. And I say this to on this podcast a lot. If you’re a parent and you’re listening, the best thing you can ever do for your kids is to work on yourself. Yeah, bar none. That’s exactly the greatest gift you can give them.
Amy Medcalf 42:39
Like, I find a lot of mothers tend to put their all into the household and making sure, like 24/7. And it’s even like with my job when I was working in group homes, I’d be at that group home and I just go home and I’d sleep in and come back. And I never took time to care for myself. And when you don’t take that time you tend to burnout. And burnout can look like depression, it can look like anxiety, it can look like a multitude of other things. Like you just don’t want to do anything. You don’t want to shower, you don’t want to eat you don’t like or you forget to eat. And you got to understand that you can’t do it all by yourself. You have if you have a partner, or if you have somebody like a friend to come be like, Hey, can you come watch my kids for an hour, I need to go and I need some time to myself. Or tell your partner like, hey, I want to take the day, you get your time. I want my time. You know, like, You got to be demanding like you’re not failing as a parent. Because you need a break from your kids.
Victoria Volk 43:50
That’s the greatest example you can give your kids exactly caring for yourself. Exactly. And that’s it. Grab a pen and paper and go somewhere. And that’s how you discover yourself. Ask yourself some deeper, better questions.
Amy Medcalf 44:03
Exactly. And it also teaches them that you have boundaries yourself. Because I value yourself. Exactly. Because like as a mom, I’m sure like, you go to the bathroom and Hello, there’s a child there watching you, you know, like are asking you Hey, can I have a snack? Well, Dad’s out in the living room, or near the kitchen is like, go ask him I’m peeing. Right? So like, I also read this thing that was really, really great. It was this couple and each of them had one day in the week, where at a certain time they got to go do whatever they needed to, and they would take care of the kids. So say and there was this one example that they put where the mom it was her time to have her day and she went into her room to into well their room and Have her time. And he gave her that. And one of the children kept saying, I want to ask mommy something I want to and he’s like, No, you can wait. If you need something you can ask me. And like, she got upset and everything and but the whole time he had he kept his foot down. He’s like, if you need something you can ask me. Until then you can wait until the morning. So as it usually is, it’s usually minuscule. Like, I need a snack. But, um, and the next morning, he’s like, she, because I think he explained it to me. He’s like, sometimes Mommy needs a break. And right now she’s taking her break, and you need to deal with me. So the next morning, she even asked like, mom, her mom, like, how was your time? Like, I think she kind of got it. But like, you have to be very consistent with children when it comes to stuff like that. Because like, you need to teach them like, hey, like, it’s something that you don’t like. So like, if I were to do this to you, how would you feel? And like they are at the level where they can understand that. And it’s like, I remember. And I take that back to like, when I was a kid, I was out with my mom, we were at like a restaurant. And I bet my mom for some reason, I wasn’t being malicious. I was just like, Oh, I wonder what happens if I do this. And my mom put me back, and I didn’t like it. And trust me, I never bit after that. Like, like, parents nowadays, like I get it. Like, they’d be like, Oh my god, like, why would you? Why would she bite you? I’m like, well, it taught me that I didn’t like it. And that I probably shouldn’t do it ever again. And now I kind of like do it jokingly, like with my boyfriend be like, Oh, I’m gonna bite you like, but like, I don’t like bite hard. And like I did when I was a kid. And it’s like, you kind of take things like that. And you have to kind of give them natural consequences to like, what they do. And I think a lot of people protect their kids from that.
Victoria Volk 47:12
Well, and I just shut up just to that point, it’s let them sit in their uncomfortable feelings for a little bit.
Amy Medcalf 47:19
That’s exactly it. Right? And
Victoria Volk 47:22
they don’t learn how to manage their emotions, if they’re constantly if their emotions are
Amy Medcalf 47:27
in that band aid. Yeah, that’s exactly it, they, you need to give them that band aid. You can’t keep giving them that band aid. Sometimes they need to realize like, hey, I need to give myself that band aid. Because I’m old enough to do so.
Victoria Volk 47:42
And when they see that they went through this uncomfortable feeling. I couldn’t talk to my mom, it was uncomfortable. I didn’t like it. And the next day, well, it was okay. Yes, fine. It wasn’t that big of a deal. Next are connecting those dots, and they make that connection, connection themselves.
Amy Medcalf 47:59
And then they, when they get older, they’re gonna be like, Man, my parents aren’t alone now. Mom, I need my space, like, you know, so like, but it’s all always about give and take, and you need to you need to put those boundaries and teach your kids these boundaries, right? So I don’t even know how we got on this topic.
Victoria Volk 48:23
Not sure either. One. And that’s a lot of grief. I mean, it is it’s parenting is going to have a lot of grief, it’s going to carry a lot of grief with it. Because you will feel like you’re failing a lot. And you do what you know best. But if you can work through your own stuff, so that whenever your children are doing something and projecting their feelings, and it’s reminding you of something from your childhood, and then all of a sudden, it’s really emotionally fueled, and you know, all of that it’s, you can’t I know me personally, I dealt with a lot of I had a lot of pent up anger from my child and my, my dad passed away when I was eight, just a lot of anger. Just a lot of anger from my childhood. And I didn’t I stuffed it down and for like, you talked about, like the things that you use to cope. And for me, it was writing. I had a journal and then tell my mom read it. And parenting is ever changing. You constantly every day is an opportunity to learn something, but you have to be an observer. You have to be kind of step back from the situation and just observe like, why is this like, stirring me up? Like why is this making me upset? Yeah, and usually it’s, it’s not the child that’s intentionally doing it. It’s that feeling you get that you feel provoked, right? You just feel provoked. So yeah, Especially how to work through but anyway, yeah,
Amy Medcalf 50:02
Oh, yeah, no, no. And children. They, they, they know how to push buttons
Victoria Volk 50:09
While in your nanny, um, yeah, you’re not a parent or a nanny, I used to watch that show Supernanny, when I was feeling kind of crazy as a parent, it’s easier for her.
Amy Medcalf 50:18
Yeah. And it, it’s crazy, like you see, like these families where these kids are like running the show, and it’s like, you got to parent first and friend later. Because if you’re teaching your kids like, yes, you want to be their friend, yes, you want to have that relationship. And it’s, it’s hard to kind of like, build from how you were brought up. But there’s different ways of parenting from the way you were brought up. Because a lot of people are very, I didn’t like how my mom raised me, like, I didn’t like being grounded, I didn’t like this or whatever. And like, you get it. And, but kids need structure kids need that, hey, like, if I do something that’s not appropriate, I’m gonna get in trouble for it. In real world, if somebody does something bad, they’re either gonna get fined, they’re gonna go to jail, they’re gonna get fired, all that other stuff. And if we’re saying, like, Hey, it’s okay, like you did this, like I understand your feelings, I do understand your feelings, like, you can still talk to them as the adult, but you need to put those pieces down where it’s like, hey, you know what, like, this is a natural consequence. And you’re gonna have to sit in your room, I get it, these are your big feelings. This is how your, how you deal with it. But natural consequences is you need to sit in your room, and you don’t get electronics. Because in real world, you can’t be like, going out there and saying, like, and screaming and yelling, or whatever the cases, and I can’t think of a situation right now.
Victoria Volk 51:52
I think like what you’re saying, it comes down to accountability,
Amy Medcalf 51:55
it does, it definitely comes down to accountability and keeping that structure in keeping in line with what you say. And kids are going to be all on you and like begging and it’s like, you have to keep your foot down, you have to because like, they’re not going to be able to get this in real life where they’re going to have a boss, they’re gonna have a professor like, oh, like, I think I deserve a b like, sometimes, yes, you probably are in a yes, sometimes you probably did, you can get it double checked in college, but like, sometimes you didn’t put enough work in. And it’s like you have to, they have to kind of like develop those skills where they can learn how to manage their time and their and manage how they react to certain things. And it’s like, but they can’t, like we talked about, like how they develop that cognitive part where they deal with certain things at four years old. And it’s like, they’re learning how to deal with that. And if we’re dealing that for them, they’re not going to learn how to deal with that later on in life.
Victoria Volk 53:01
Right? I think it circles back to your own personal experience, right? Like, exactly, basically learning how you had to reparent yourself.
Amy Medcalf 53:10
Exactly. And like, when I was younger, I, I know, my mom put those things in place where I learned that, like, I was scared to be like a little rebel, you know, like, I didn’t want to put my foot out of line because I didn’t want to get into a lot of trouble and lose out on a lot of things that I wanted to do in life. Because sometimes that’s what what’s happened, what happens when you get older. That’s another type of loss that kids go through because like, wanting to go to a certain college because they didn’t put all their effort into it or whatever, or they didn’t put all their ducks in a row because they weren’t taught how to, they tend to lose out on the things that they want in life. And it’s it’s hard and like, yeah, there are other options. But some times, and I a lot of things do happen for reasons and it at that point, it’s going to teach them like, hey, if I really want to do this, then I have to start doing it now. Like it’s never too late to change. And they got to realize that it’s never too late to change. But start the work. You know, like you got to learn how to start the work, you have to learn how to do things for yourself. And some people are gonna be better than you and some people are and you’re gonna be better than some other people and it’s not about everybody winning. It’s about you getting to where you need.
Victoria Volk 54:33
So what would you like to scream to the world in the past or recently in wish people knew about your grief?
Amy Medcalf 54:40
Who, when it came to my grief, that was my anxiety. I had really bad anxiety and I I will need people to be with me. So a lot of my agoraphobia part where I needed I would need somebody to be with me a lot of the time. And some of my friends get it now because they have anxiety already, a couple of them have apologized to me. But it’s like, with my grief, Don’t abandon me. Like, I wish I could tell everybody Don’t abandon me. I’m dealing with a lot of stuff. I’m, I’m still learning how to process it. And with grief, you always learn every single day, that you have to process it in a different way. Because your brain is constantly changing. It’s constantly doing different things. And you’re always going to be doing something different. And the way you develop your grief, and the way you deal with your grief can change consistently and mine has. And sometimes it’s put me in a place where people are like, hey, like, You’re so different, or whatever. And it’s like, listen, like, I can’t help it. I’m trying. Don’t leave me right now, because I need you the most.
Victoria Volk 55:54
Well, and to that point, you could say, but that other person when they say that to you, like, Wow, you’re really different. Like, yeah, you know, if we all stayed the same. Yeah, you know, if I would have been, if I’d be I was when I’m 21. Boy, man, if I only knew at 21 what I know now. Yeah, exactly. That’s the blessing of age is, is wisdom. Yeah. You know, so it’s a good thing. We don’t stay the same. No good thing. I think we need to embrace that. Yeah, embrace the change, embrace change. That’s the only death taxes and change are the only sure things in life. So what is one tip that you would give another hurting heart today, maybe specifically, I want to say specifically a teenager that just might so happen to stumble upon this episode today. And maybe the parent of that child or the caretaker of that child.
Amy Medcalf 56:55
Number one, it’s okay to cry, you’re not weak, because you’re crying. It’s, it shows strength, it shows that you care, and it shows. And again, crying is so helpful to your psyche, it helps build that chemical balance that you need to kind of deal with the situation and release the build up inside of you. And to a parent who sees this.
Amy Medcalf 57:27
Just sit there,
Amy Medcalf 57:28
Hold them. Tell them it’s okay. Tell them it’s okay to cry. Never say stop being a baby. Like I was a big crybaby I get it like, it’s a lot like if your kid is a crier, depending on the situation.
Amy Medcalf 57:46
Also, just
Amy Medcalf 57:47
Never ever call them a baby. Don’t be a baby. Be like, I understand you’re having some emotions. Offer them the do you need me to sit with you? Would you like me to hold you and rub your back? Do you need some space? Like, don’t overload it? But like, be simple? Like, do you want me to be here? Or do you want some alone time? And then they’ll let you know. Because like, when I was having my emotions, I just wanted somebody to hold me and rub my back. I still do. Like I because like, I remember being sick and like really sick, I had pneumonia and I was crying and my mom sat there and she rubbed my back. And that was my that was my love language, My Love Languages touch. And like just rubbing my back and it was soothing. And it and that’s what it reminds me of and that’s why I feel I need that and some people just don’t some people need the space because they that’s not their love language. Or learn what your child’s love languages and show them that you’re there and that you care and give them what they need. Always be there.
Victoria Volk 59:02
So very good point. I wonder if there’s a love language book for kids.
Amy Medcalf 59:07
I you know what, that I didn’t know learn about love language until I was like maybe like five years ago. And it’s like, so I don’t know. I wonder if there is because people need to learn that. It’s okay to love this but you gotta realize that some people don’t like that. Like my boyfriend’s not Pachi His Love Languages food.
Victoria Volk 59:29
So I don’t know if that’s a love languages.
Amy Medcalf 59:32
It can be it’s like one of them. Or something I can’t remember there’s seven of them. There’s Oh service. Yeah, service. Yeah. Service gifts. Touch.
Victoria Volk 59:42
I can’t remember the rest of mine. Mine is words of affirmation and words of affirmation is touch.
Amy Medcalf 59:49
See I like a mix of everything but touches my biggest one. Next to that is a word of affirmation. Because I I feel like I always need like somebody be like, Hey, you’re doing Good. That’s another thing.
Victoria Volk 1:00:02
Well and this is there’s two more points I just want I thought of is that. So I was called a cry baby too. And so if you have a sensitive child understand that, that they’re not crying just because yeah, some children are just more sensitive.
Amy Medcalf 1:00:17
I also learned recently that females, like myself, that could be a sign of ADHD is crying all the time, especially if they daydream a lot. And they’re kind of like, Oh, I’d rather sit in the corner and read a book type thing. And that was me. And I’m currently in the process process of trying to kind of like, figure out if that’s what I have. And because like, that can also be a very big difference of like, how you treat your anxiety in that, right.
Victoria Volk 1:00:53
So well, and I just learned about, let’s come across my severe recently is complex PTSD, which is common in children who’ve experienced trauma. And so yeah, I don’t know if you’ve heard anything about this or read anything on that. I kind of its kind i or thing.
Amy Medcalf 1:01:18
I know, pts. Like, I had PTSD. And I still do, depending on the situation, because like, I, right now my PTSD is more about like the dog that I had, and he got run over in front of me and like, that’s my PTSD now, but I had PTSD from like when my mom had died, but like, sometimes PTSD can kind of go away eventually, once you start kind of like, being like, okay, I’m okay with this situation that and like, you’ve kind of like got a little bit closure. Or it just kind of like lessons and kind of like goes into the backburner, especially as you age. I’ve never heard of the complex PTSD. I gotta look it up, though. I’m going,
Victoria Volk 1:02:02
I’m gonna ask your opinion on something too, in a question, because you have anxiety said, and you’re wondering if you have ADHD, and just listening to what you’re saying. And one thing to that? I mean, whether it’s addiction, ADHD, anxiety disorders, things like that, do you think or believe, because a part of me really believes that the root of it is grief?
Amy Medcalf 1:02:28
Oh yeah, I think, um, a lot of kids, a lot of kids can deal with a lot of grief in the beginning, especially depending on how their childhood is because a lot of kids go through divorce parents, a lot of kids go through like some sort of abuse, like even if they have like, the perfect parents, there’s somebody out there, like, they go to school and they get bullied. That’s a type of grief, that’s a type of trauma, which gives people anxiety about dealing with people in social anxiety, and all that other stuff. So a lot of grief and trauma can definitely be a trigger for a lot of things like, you could also somewhat have something and then it’d be triggered by certain other things, whether it be drugs, whether it be grief, whether it be trauma, in general, or abuse, anything, like a lot of things can just be triggered, when you’ve already kind of have it in your, in your brain. And it’s, it’s almost like an on and off switch, that it just turns on, and it never goes away.
Victoria Volk 1:03:37
But what I would love to like really deep dive into and research is, you know, following people over decades of their life into older age. And really, if you address the grief, get to the root of it, and you address the grief itself. Yeah, whether it would help does everything else kind of level off? Because I have heard many times, even people I’ve talked to on this podcast, who were on ADHD medication as children. Yeah, who had traumatic experiences, who sexual identity issues, things like that, who are now off of medication, like ADHD just went away, like, the medication like they just don’t need it anymore. It did. Because he dealt with the grief with the therapist. Oh, yeah. You know what I mean? So I think I that’s just a something I want people to consider and take away from, is that
Amy Medcalf 1:04:36
There’s other ways of dealing with certain things like you you have your medication, you have your your people that help you you have there’s so many different treatment options to a lot of things like with the person who has ADHD, they might have needed the medication more when they were a kid, because it’s harder to kind of get around that and like it’s easier to kind of sit a kid down when they’re calm and be like, Hey, here’s what we can do to kind of help when you’re angry or when you’re feeling like you need to jump around and all that other stuff like my, my boyfriend has ADHD, he was diagnosed as a child and he was medicated as a child. He’s not really on the medication, because he would lose so much weight when he was on the medication. But when he, he talks to somebody he’s he has, and he has people who are there for him, when he needs them the most, he’s able to deal with it a lot better, he still has the hyper part where he has the pace a lot of the time, like, so if he’s on the phone, he’s like pacing back and forth. He keeps his attention the most when he games. So it’s all about finding your focus and finding out where you need to place that focus and, and dealing with it in healthy ways. Again, it’s all about healthy ways.
Victoria Volk 1:05:55
I would just ask them in that instance, in your boyfriend’s example, you don’t have to share on the show. But was there something in his childhood that triggered the ADHD response? Like Did he have any trauma? That’s what I had a lot of trauma. That’s what I’m getting at like is, is are these diagnosis is that people are getting for ADHD, anxiety disorders, things like that. Is it as a result of grief and trauma and if we dealt with the grief and trauma,
Amy Medcalf 1:06:27
And don’t forget, you also had generational trauma that each generation deals with, because that’s how it is like. So a lot of people who say, their generational trauma was like they don’t, they live on very low income and the drugs or alcohol, and that was their life. And sometimes it’s hard to break out of that some people do like nowadays, it’s a little easier, because there’s more resources out there, especially for women, that they are able to break out of this generational trauma of abuse and all this other stuff, and flourish for themselves. And it’s all about finding again, it’s always about finding your niche and finding what works for you.
Victoria Volk 1:07:15
And it comes down to access. Yeah. In open to help. Yeah. And having an awareness that you need help. Exactly, exactly. It’s yeah, it’s not. I’m by no means saying, well, we just dealt with all
Amy Medcalf 1:07:29
Agree. It is not easy. No, it’s
Victoria Volk 1:07:32
Not. But it starts with us as individuals first, right? Yeah, that’s really where we’re it has to start.
Amy Medcalf 1:07:39
Yeah, cuz like with how things are nowadays, too. It’s all about having the time to do these things as well, because you, you have to work, especially with how high the living cost is nowadays, compared to like 20 years ago, it’s the cost of living is so high for a lot of people like even dual, like people on dual incomes, it makes it hard. So
Victoria Volk 1:08:03
I do have one thing to say on that, though, is because we do have some responsibility in that because we do do WE ARE WE gluttonous in some areas of our lives where we think we need certain things totally us and make us happy. And therefore we have these expenses that we probably could live without.
Amy Medcalf 1:08:23
Oh, definitely like, but I we only have like Netflix and like Disney plus, we don’t have like cable or anything. So we don’t pay like $150 for internet and cable, I just pay for internet and then to like a couple of streaming services. So there’s that and there’s always that media and there’s always those commercials like Oh, come get a new TV or come get this new console for gaming and all this other stuff and and that that is what triggers kids nowadays. And you have YouTube and you have tick tock and they’re like, Oh, look at this new toy. Because like YouTube is very big for this where you have people opening up new toys and just playing them and kids are just like, Oh my God, I need all of that. And it’s it’s something that we’ve even dealt with when we were younger when we had commercials of like, what was it like Furby or something? And
Victoria Volk 1:09:24
I’m a little bit older than you.
Amy Medcalf 1:09:27
Well, for me it was like Furby it was like, I can’t even remember what
Victoria Volk 1:09:31
I’m rainbow bright days. So
Amy Medcalf 1:09:36
What’s her name? Strawberry Shortcake.
Victoria Volk 1:09:39
shortcake cabbage. signworks I had to Yes, yeah.
Amy Medcalf 1:09:43
Foldables Yeah, like, there’s always these things because people just want like, these companies just want to make money and they just like advertise all these things. And we think that we need them because they tell us we need them.
Victoria Volk 1:09:55
People want to feel better. Yeah. And like in Grief Recovery, we be called These things STURMS short term energy relieving behaviors, we think if we get these things that will feel better.
Amy Medcalf 1:10:05
And it’s a lot easier to get these things with Amazon and all this other stuff, you just click a button, then it comes to your door, you don’t even have to get up and get it anymore.
Victoria Volk 1:10:14
And you don’t have to necessarily pay for it right away either. Right when it comes to like what you said about credit? And if you don’t understand that, and yeah, and then you get more grief because of that, because you have shame then and yeah, it’s a cycle.
Amy Medcalf 1:10:28
It’s, it definitely is it definitely is. And it’s hard to break out of that cycle. So don’t like, don’t ever feel bad because like, I still do it sometimes. And I spend money. And I’m like, Oh, why did I do this? And like, we all do it. It’s it’s a part of life and it but it’s all about making your choices and learning from them.
Victoria Volk 1:10:49
And maybe living with a little bit more intention. Yeah, yeah,
Amy Medcalf 1:10:54
Being more aware of like your surroundings, I feel like a lot of us just walk through life in a fog. Because if we’re like zombies, we go from point A to point B, because we’re told we just need to do that. And it’s like, gotta be more aware of what we’re doing in our daily day to day life
Victoria Volk 1:11:11
And especially when you’re in the fog of grief. Exactly. So what is your grief taught
Amy Medcalf 1:11:16
you? My grief has taught me to love myself. Sometimes, because sometimes you’re not going to get that love from other people that you need. And you need to learn to love yourself.
Victoria Volk 1:11:29
I’m writing that down. That is audible. Perfect. That’s the best answer. I think. I mean, I love all my guests. But that’s by far the best answer, because that really resonates with me, too. Yeah, I love that. And it’s very hard to love yourself. So is it is especially when you weren’t really that really wasn’t emulated for yourself, right. And that comes down to as mothers, that’s the best gift too, that we can show our daughters and our sons like loving ourselves so that they don’t need somebody else to fulfill that for them. They don’t look to somebody else to fulfill that. Or they don’t look to food, or they don’t look to alcohol, or they don’t look to drugs to fulfill that in them.
Amy Medcalf 1:12:10
Exactly, exactly.
Victoria Volk 1:12:13
So is there anything else you would like to share?
Amy Medcalf 1:12:15
I think that’s it.
Victoria Volk 1:12:17
And where can people find you if they would love to reach out to you?
Amy Medcalf 1:12:20
So you can always find me on Instagram? I do have my own personal one. It’s autumn Lily ADA. I really have to. It’s my old one. But you can also find me at our podcast link which is or on Instagram, which is once upon a nightmare. I think there’s an underscore at the end of that because it was taken. But if you look us up, you’ll see, you’ll see us.
Victoria Volk 1:12:55
All right. Well, thank you so much for sharing your story today. And we went in a lot of directions. But I think it was everything
Amy Medcalf 1:13:03
Grief is not in grief is not singular.
Victoria Volk 1:13:06
So it’s messy. It’s very messy. It touches every area of our life. So I think it’s every area. It is perfect. Yes. That’s another quotable. Like glitter. It is it truly is. Yeah, it’s naive to think that just because you had a loss, like that’s just all you’re dealing with, it is impacting your money. It is impacting your parenting, it is impacting your friendships, your marriage, every aspect of your life. And I think if we pluck it like a weed and address it and really address it, and get complete with what is emotionally incomplete, which is possible. It is possible. We can live fulfilling and joyful lives.
Amy Medcalf 1:13:52
Yeah, that’s definitely it.
Victoria Volk 1:13:54
Right. Well thank you again. 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.
Grieving Voices Guest, Grieving Voices Podcast, Mental Health, Mind/Body Wellness, Pespective, Podcast |
Wayne Forrest | Waking Up a C4 Quadreplegic: My Catalyst to Becoming
SHOW NOTES SUMMARY:
“Bang, I made a mistake!”
Those were the words, my guest, Wayne Forrest, described the moment that changed his life forever.
It was a chance happening (or was it?) that Wayne had some teammates out injured from his rugby team, and he filled in to play the game he loved.
One play during that game would have him waking up in a hospital bed five days later to realize he could not only move his legs but he couldn’t move his arms or hands. In an instant, Wayne became a statistic and a C4 quadriplegic.
I’ve always loved under-dog stories – always. It seems the people who have endured the most unfathomable circumstances often find a way a dig deep within themselves and turn a tragedy into gold.
Wayne is now a motivational speaker, coach, and TEDx speaker and has done more in his life while in a wheelchair than many of us who have full use of our limbs.
This is one of those stories I know I will come back to and play again when I doubt myself, feel like a Debbie Downer, or just need to realize how freaking blessed I am.
No matter what you’ve gone through in your life or are going through, I hope you listen to Wayne’s story. He shares three things that helped him get through his “dark night of the soul” and how he’s no one special – we are all capable of turning our lives around at any given point. It does, however, come down to deciding to do so; only then will you see yourself becoming – who you were always meant to be.
“Do something that scares you every day.” – Wayne Forrest
RESOURCES:
CONNECT:
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 or anyone you know is struggling with grief, free resources are available HERE.
Are you enjoying the podcast? Check out my bi-weekly newsletter, The Unleashed Letters.
💛 Would you like to Learn Your Energy Type? Free Quiz ➡️ HERE! ⬅️
SUPPORT THE SHOW:
CONNECT WITH VICTORIA:
Victoria Volk 0:00
Hi 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 gravers like spread hope and inspire compassion towards 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. Good morning, good afternoon, and good evening, whatever time it is and wherever you’re listening from. Thank you for tuning in. And you might be wondering if you’ve been following my podcast for a while. Why this is not a takeaways and reflections episode this week after last week’s AMI Metcalf’s episode. And it is because I’m approaching episode 100. And I really wanted that episode to be a takeaways and reflections and just how my schedule when it didn’t work out that way. So I am putting Amy’s and Wayne’s episodes into one takeaways and reflections episode that’ll come out next week. And so in the meantime, this week’s episode is a treat. I absolutely love my conversation with Wayne. And it’s so inspiring even though it’s months later that it’s going live. I’m just as inspired by him and I can’t wait for you to listen. So without further ado, let’s get into this week’s episode. My guest today is Wayne forest. He is an international transformational speaker and Life Mastery consultant, certified by the brave thinking Institute in LA. He grew up in the community on the east coast of Hawke’s Bay, New Zealand, where he farmed for 25 years with 15 of these from a wheelchair. And he now lives more inland with his wife, Kathy on a small block. He has four children and three grandchildren. And he says that his sporting accident in 1995, leaving him a C five quadriplegic was the catalyst for his ongoing journey into personal development, which has given him the incredible life that he loves, and is very grateful for. Thank you so much for being here.
Wayne Forrest 2:41
It’s a pleasure, Victoria is an absolute pleasure.
Victoria Volk 2:45
It’s my honor to have you I absolutely love connecting with people in this way, one on one and diving deep into grief and hearing the ins and outs of other people’s stories of in your case transformation, which I am very excited to share with my listeners and hear more about. And so can you please take us back to that day when your life changed?
Wayne Forrest 3:10
Yes. It was rather a dramatic change. I was grew up in that physical world of farming. Right from an early age I was on on the front of my grandfather’s horse, out on the farm, immersing myself into it. And then one day I was told to go to school, which I didn’t really think was much chop at all. But school head sport so you know, very physical background. And as I grew up, I immersed myself into those kind of businesses even shearing sheep before my accident and had a couple of businesses going. And I was married and had two beautiful twin daughters of 16 months. And I played rugby for my local club. And we had a few members away and injured that week. And I was a senior member and I played a lot of rugby and making some rip sides that I have kept and before so it wasn’t unusual for me to be a leader of the team. And the game was just a typical tough physical game that we have here in New Zealand. It can be very physical, and we’ve we’re losing and with the lovely little move on as a team with the ball and I ended up receiving that ball and took it into contact with two of the opposition. And bang. I made a mistake. I ended up with my head under my shoulder rolling over onto my neck, which dislocated my neck, I couldn’t breathe. The pain was absolutely incredible. felt like someone was sticking a hot poker right into my neck. And it took about an hour or more for the emergency helicopter to arrive. And he asked me if I’d had any pain relief, I said, No, he gave me some medicine. And I passed out, I woke up five days later, in a hospital bed, honestly, I thought I was in the middle of a dream. And I couldn’t move. And I couldn’t move my hands or couldn’t move my arms, or my legs. And so I went from physical to not having any movement, physical movement are all so you imagine the shock and being a shy country boy and having to have nurses take me to the toilet, you know, do my toileting and feed me and things like that? It was terrible. And there was shame, there was a lot of emotions going around inside me and a lot of thoughts that were creating. You mentioned fear, and anxiety and all those emotions.
Victoria Volk 6:33
I can’t even imagine. I don’t know that anyone really can. But do you recall any conscious thoughts or, or like an experience of almost imagine it would be like this out of body? Like you’re looking at yourself? And like, like, do you recall that moment in that hour? After until you passed out? Or when you were starting to regain consciousness? Do you recall any aspect of that?
Wayne Forrest 6:59
Differently? That bad dream, you know, like, feeling like you’d wake up in a cold sweat afterwards, with a shock through the system of Ah, shit. I’m having a bad dream in your wake up? Oh, hell, no. It’s not a pipe dream. I’m actually in this. And you kind of wanted the wake up, you know, from from this experience and go, Oh, sure. That didn’t happen. But it did. And so you hit that kind of feeling. It’s quite interesting, because I had a friend staying with me that weekend that I’d met overseas a few years earlier, and his partner, and we were just having a quiet drink that night before. And an accident was shown on TV of a young fella who, out of 26 kids was one of two survivors. And he broke every bone in his body falling off platform overlooking a river out we’ve got beautiful country, and it was out in the, in the wilderness. And so about 23 Young people died, that are on that platform. And the sham follow was one of the only survivors. Now my friend visited me a couple of weeks later in hospital. And he said, Can you remember the conversation that we had that night? About the sham follow up? And I said no. And he said, Well, you said that you would rather be dead then have every bone in your body broken. And then this happens to the next day. Coincidence, I don’t know. But synchronicities. I ended up sharing the room with the same guy. And that thought never occurred to me until he brought it up. It’s quite funny. There’s something and that’s that strives not wants to die. I have that feeling of oh my god, I’d rather be dead. There was life seeking through me once I had my accident. Yes, a few of those thoughts came in later down the track where where, you know, you might have been going through a dark patch or a dark moment and this experience of like, talking months or even years later, and no because it’s now 26 years since my accident. So I’m kind of talking about the first five and Not once. In that first few weeks, did that thought come into my mind? It was about survival. It was about getting better. It was about how can I, you know, survive this. So it’s really interesting how you know, the conscious mind can say something the day before you have an accident that you’d rather be dead, then totally forget about that. And just concentrate on on survival. Interesting experience to go through.
Victoria Volk 10:36
Have you connected with that man since or did you stay connected with him? I’m just curious of the friend, the man that was in that shared the hospital room with you the gentleman that had that accident?
Wayne Forrest 10:50
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I have. I haven’t been in touch the last few years, he ended up with more movement than I did. Which is quite ironic. And I quite often, that’s my sense, humor. I laugh about these things. But it’s quite interesting how this journey seems to have fight or the synchronicities that are tied into the experience.
Victoria Volk 11:26
I absolutely believe in synchronicities for sure. I imagine with your children being so young, can you speak to that the grief of the family unit moving forward, and when did it feel like it was starting to maybe lift where you felt like you are more in control of your mindset around it?
Wayne Forrest 11:52
Might, that’s a big one. The twins, they now have been so young to and being your first children and having twins, you can imagine that I had no choice I had to be a full on dead and being physical. And being on the farm and outdoors, I often took one of them species, one that was a little bit more difficult with me. Anyone who’s had twins knows that they have their turns that been difficult, especially when they’re little. So I used to take one in particular with me out on the farm and out on jobs. So she spent a lot of time with dad. And then it was a good month, nearly three weeks to a month before she saw me again in that hospital bed because I was so far away from home, I remember her reaction, she saw me in the bed and pack the biggest wobbly, you could and lay down on the floor of the hospital kicking and screaming. And I knew exactly what you wanted me to
Wayne Forrest 13:12
Do, and I know the listeners might be able to see that I’ve got really emotional because it still hit me right in the guts. Because she wanted me to pick her up and out could wasn’t until she left that room with my family. I just broke down really, really hit me hard. And, you know, I know now that that’s part of the lesson. It’s part of a part of growing me from inside out. But But at that moment, that was gut wrenching. It really hit me home that my life has changed. Because I would pick her up, I would take her away from the situation. I would have, you know, soothed her in that way as a dad. And yeah, I couldn’t. And of course, you know, my first marriage, my wife had her own inner demons and you know, me not having that control. I always saw myself as a bit of a white knight on a horse. I know it’s a bit egotistical before my accident where I could control control and help people and my wife drank quite heavily. And so, you know, all of a sudden, I couldn’t control that anymore physically. And so there was a lot of that feelings of, of hopelessness of, of vulnerability of, to the point where at times, if she’d been drinking, I felt at a fear of my own life, you know, it wasn’t always the case. But I had those thoughts. So it took to answer your question, it took probably a good three years to five years for me to start really creating that physical control again, and control of my environment. And of course, in that process, our marriage didn’t survive, I knew enough that I wanted to create a strong relationship with and you can imagine nasty separations, she didn’t really want to be separated from me, but didn’t want to be with me. So I forced their shoes. So it did get a little bit messy, you know, and, sadly, kids got caught in the middle, I knew enough to make sure that I didn’t blame her for the separation, and I tried to keep tried to be the ground, and that, that relationship for them. And now, I’ve got a fantastic relationship, that 28 years old, they’re both kids have their own marriage, you know, so, and we’re very tight as a family. And as time has gone over, you know, the relationship with my ex wife has healed and, and, and we’ve created a bridge for them. So we know, so we can work for me is so they can have a life and not worry about mom and dad been in the same room.
Victoria Volk 17:18
That’s a beautiful gift to give them. A lot of ego having to be put aside and to work on daily to do that to imagine.
Wayne Forrest 17:29
Why ego no ego, put me in the position of broke my neck or dislocated my neck. Ego, you can imagine coming from that farming, sport, rugby, booed, man, no, drank too much party to hide background. And then having to there was a lot of ego even in my healing, there was a lot of ego. And that’s one thing that I’ve, I’ve learned just in recent years with my study around, there’s spiritual laws and, and principles of transformation, that recognizing that ego and the true us the soul or the love, and us, and I’ve done a lot of healing inward on that I’m good enough. Because that same paradigm put me in this position that I made that mistake and dislocated my neck. And I believe this no accidents.
Victoria Volk 18:54
What do you feel was the biggest catalyst in your healing, biggest nurturer of your healing? Maybe it was a resource or a person or what was the biggest? I think you know what I’m trying to say?
Wayne Forrest 19:11
That’s great question. Really great question. And there was a number of things, because it’s been a journey. Right? It was it just didn’t just happen. What I look back now and with my knowledge and what I teach and learn, and I practice these principles every day, and I look back now I think it’s having a vision, having a vision of what would I love, and I knew I wanted to go back to the farm because that was my first love. So I accidentally created a vision and that helped pull me into the becoming and of course I got better physically as well because I had a clear vision of what I wanted to be able to achieve. When I had my accent, I couldn’t move my arms and enhance, like I can now write. And so I worked diligently or hard. In other words, I don’t like that word has worked constantly getting stronger in those early days. And because I had a clear vision, things fell into place, like the right people, I lived in the watts or on a dirt road out in the middle of nowhere on the coast, yet one of the people that has passed now, but she came and helped me with getting up and making as a carer and she was a qualified physio, before she got married to a local farmer. And she was brilliant. She, I put down a lot of what I got back in those early years to her, because of her knowledge, her skill level, she kept me going, you know, and the rehab and, and kept me just inching forward. And I believe in that synchronicity, as we’re talking about before, that was because I had a clear vision of what I wanted to do. And I achieved that I ended up getting strong enough to drive again, within a couple of years that gave me freedom. It gave me independence, that also came in the ability to get something adapted for the farm. So I could get around the farm and start managing net again. And once I achieved that, all of a sudden, it was like, Wow. I want another call. And of course, be very careful listeners, what you asked for. Because, you know, I asked for something that was gonna challenge me. That was going to make me stretch again, just about the next day, I get a email from someone who had started up a pilot course of doing extreme outdoor activities for people with disabilities. No way. No way. All right. And I was like, Oh, shit, that’s scary. Because then we’re going to do and sailing, paragliding scuba diving. And I’m like, how the beep beep beep am I gonna do that? I’m a teacher pledge it with no balance. I’ve got no hands. How am I gonna climb a rope or, or get down a cliff or, you know, be underwater and be able to do these things. And it was perfect. And so I put my name down and in our and I’m a big scaredy cat, or not someone who really looks for danger or for things that are going to scare them. But Dave is aremy. So I did it. And I learned a lot from doing that. I ended up doing water skiing and London here and lake just out of London. I’ve I’ve done paragliding I’ve done scuba diving with the sharks and the Napier aquarium of paragliders off blimmin Cliff, you know, not on my own. But I’ve experienced all these sounds. Because of putting down that first vision. And if this vision then took me on a road of discovery, and you know, where my road was hitting before.
Wayne Forrest 24:07
We don’t know where that would have gone to before my accident. And where I am today. Oh my god, the polarity is so different. No, it’s just so hard to describe because it’s so different from where I was before my accident where I am today. And I’m more confident, I’m more happier with myself healed that I’m a not enough I’m still working on it. As we know. It takes time. But I have four kids now. I’ve got three grandchildren, you know, life is good, even from a wheelchair. And I’d so to answer your question that and this is what I teach quite often in workshops and stuff also is the power of having a great vision, and then deciding for that vision, you know, sometimes life gets difficult, it gets really tough. And I had to keep deciding for that vision when it was tough. When I didn’t feel like getting out a bit, when I wanted to just hide away from life, really, I had to decide and get up, get out and do what I had to do to help me create that next step into my vision. And the third one is sourcing that support. We’re not meant to do it on our own. Quite often our ego tells us that we have to do it on our own. But you know, without that support of that physio that was ended, was my neighbor, or the support of my now wife, that was the girl that came and helped me on the farm. You know, the support of the physios, the doctors, the occupational therapists, all those people, the coaches along the way. So they are three secrets, or three main secrets, I believe, is that clear vision of what you would love decision and creating that support system, finding and sourcing people that have already done it, or have the knowledge to help you achieve. Yes, sometimes you have to pay for that. But maybe it’s well worth every cent.
Victoria Volk 26:51
I love that. That is wonderful advice for anything that people are struggling with. And there’s tips there there’s advice, there’s ways that others supported you. You allow yourself to be supported. I think that’s often hard for people to is to allow themselves to be supported. Like to feel like you were worthy enough worthy of someone’s time and energy and effort putting being put into you. Now it takes a lot of inner work, I think to even get to that point to I remember there’s one podcast interview I did with someone a Griever. And she said something and I I’ve never forgotten it. She said, when you lay you decay, and you chose not to decay and get up every day, even when it was hard. And I imagine you did have days where you did just lay and you did have your pity party and feel down on yourself. And I mean, obviously it’s you’re gonna have days like that, right?
Wayne Forrest 27:51
Oh, totally. No, I was lucky. I had a family that was like, you know, they wouldn’t allow that to happen. They would like just hurry up and get out of bed. Come on. Get on with it. Typical farming folk, you know. Yeah, my father came up and it was just about snowing outside. And it comes in for a cup of coffee a cup of coffee, which he did it most mornings. And I it turns around to me this is whatever you move the ship yet. I’m like, dead. It’s bloody cold outside. But I know moving. Yeah. I’m gonna go once I warm up, okay. It was just like, come on. They they never saw me any different. You know what I mean? It was like, Don’t give me that crap that you’re in a wheelchair. Get out there and bloody dirt. We’re. So I grew up in that kind of attitude. And I think that helped. Helps in those dark days, because I knew I wasn’t gonna get any sympathy that you know, it was like, Come on, get out a bit. Or get moving, you know? So I forced myself to get out of bed before I was told if that makes sense.
Victoria Volk 29:16
I think what they gave you was love because they didn’t enable you to give up on yourself. Right?
Wayne Forrest 29:25
Yeah. Right from an early age right from day dot you know from Ben. young fella was Come on. You got this. All right. Get out. Go and do it. That’s right, that scab off you know. And
Victoria Volk 29:44
It served you Yeah, because look at all the adventures and different things you’ve probably just listening to you you’ve had more like adventurous fun experiences of you know, the parasailing and all of that stuff. I’ve never done any Have that you’ve done more? Even in a wheelchair than I’m I have as an able bodied person like I have fully functioning limbs in, what am I doing here? Right?
Wayne Forrest 30:13
As a quote that I actually found early on. And I can’t remember who said it, but it was like, do something that scares you every day. And no, because we’ve got this fear system that is ancient. It stems back to the caveman days when there was saber toothed Tigers that were about to pounce on us. So we had to be ready to run. And we call this the flight fright. Freeze syndrome, right? And we still have that same system, and our bodies, but we don’t have the saber toothed Tiger now, instead, we’ve got what does the neighbors say about us all? What does my family say? Or, you know, that is our fear system? Or what is that person in the office saying about me or whatever? Yeah, the ego of that, right? That’s our survival now is worried about what everyone else is, is thinking about us. And that fear isn’t often real. And we’ve learned in society these days are believed to, to live in their fear of what’s coming on time. And, you know, we’ve seen it in the media, we seen it in advertising. They know how our brain works. So that’s shoveling a whole lot of stress and fear, to get us to do what we need to do for society and their plan. Right. And we get manipulated by this idea of how our brain works through society. So, you know, we can look at something that seems to be Geary, and know that as a truth, is my life really in danger in this moment? If it’s not really in danger, then why can I step into it? And as we know, you know, going through a trauma like this, we’re talking about it earlier. This here, heaps of fear of the unknown. And that’s what all that’s what it is, it’s just fear of the unknown, because we haven’t experienced it before. And I love I think there’s a video of Will Smith jumping out of a plane and how, you know, he talked himself, just about out of that all night in a cold sweat, and then right to the next day, right up until he was about jump out. And, you know, he wanted to hang on, and when it didn’t want to do it, but he pushed himself through it. And as soon as he left that, that plane, he was calm, the fear gone. Because he was in the experience, and that’s when he should have had the fear because he was falling towards the earth, right. But the fear gone. So what does that tell us about our brain and how it works, you know, we allow our dreams to pass us by, because we’re scared of the unknown, of stepping into their dream, yes. Our dark nights or breaking my neck or, or whatever you’re going through that, that disease that you’ve got, or that whatever, you know, we have to face up to them. We have to, we can’t, can’t hope they’re gonna go away. We have to actually look at it. But we can also create a real clear vision of what we would love out of this experience. And start stepping into there with that fear.
Victoria Volk 34:32
And let me ask you about that vision. Because did you envision yourself doing the work that you’re doing today? Because I seriously just like, we’re done folks. Like, here’s Wayne forest, his TED talk. I mean, this is very inspirational to me. You’re very inspirational. I just feel it just out of your just through the screen. I can just feel your voice, the passion. I imagine it wasn’t always that way. And so What was the vision? Is it even better than you imagined?
Wayne Forrest 35:05
Maisie my own kind of brilliant life from a wheelchair. How does that work? And I, when I have my accident, I thought my life was over. Right? Because the one I knew up until that point was over, physically, you know, and so cracky How do I ask that question? It’s a great question. The first dream was to go back to their physical life, have fun, but once I achieved that, and you have to remember that farming was might love it was really, it still is I love farming. But once I achieved it, it was the journey of who I become, that created a new vision. And then, you know, I didn’t I wasn’t really clear like I am today. But that’s come with the journey and understanding that if I get really clear on what I would love, then wow. Those synchronicities when you start to get in alignment with who’s that is that your becoming? There’s a Hanton that for your listeners if they listen to that piece real Clifford. It’s who we become. We have to be who we become now, even though we haven’t become it. But when we do, our my golly, gosh, those synchronicities, really start to fall into place. And you end up having conversations like this one, that is just so bloody good. And that is the synchronicity I’ve been of just enjoying the journey and learning on the way by having a clear vision. Because once you achieve that vision, or that dream is always something even greater still, never settle. Never Settle.
Victoria Volk 37:06
I’m going to ask you a question. And I think anyone listening can apply it to them voice like, especially in grief that you know, there’s the event, this certain event, and I want my listeners if you’re listening to this think of an event in your life where that changed you significantly. Now I want to ask you Wayne, what would you say to version 1.0? Wayne 1.0. Knowing what you know now and I want my listeners to think of what what they would like to say to themselves because maybe this maybe an incident just took place for someone maybe they just had a loss that’s totally flipped their lives upside down. What do you want to say to yourself about your future? If you’re listening to this, and I want to ask you Wayne, what would you say to yourself? The Wayne version 1.0 being the version you are now today?
Wayne Forrest 38:12
it’s a beautiful question. And what comes to me is with a love loving heart and love I would give myself a huge hug and say you’ve gotten this you’ve gotten this each one of us has the same Bala that’s breathing us. I don’t care what you think. Or what you’re feeling. I know you’ve got this.
Victoria Volk 39:00
Think this is the most I’ve ever cried wipe tears away during a podcast interview. Oh says so much about your heart. Thank you so much for sharing. What has your grief taught you?
Wayne Forrest 39:19
To love myself more that grief is only there because there’s a part of you as her no one else has hurt you. It’s it’s it comes from a deep, painful scar. Have a young mind while young experience no other way It’s, we’re talking about the child in us. Their pain comes from an experience that we’ve had. And if you give that part of yourself more love you will start to heal that grief.
Victoria Volk 40:25
Do you still have bad days?
Wayne Forrest 40:28
Oh, I’ve totally man, I’m human. You know, I made a joke of that for the talk that I did a couple of days ago. You know, raise your hand. If you’ve had a challenge in life. If you’ve had a bad day in life, or half the crowd go put their hand up and ask them, Are you human? Raise your hand. Yeah, I knew there was a few that weren’t from this world, right? A few human going to have some bad days, as part of it. It’s not meant to be clean. Clinical, it’s meant to be messy, is meant to be messy. It’s, you know, where we’re all meant to do it messy. That’s the way we learn. Now, we’re all meant to fail. It’s as part of the process, they learn a lot from failure, you don’t learn a lot from success. As the failures you ask anybody that’s had incredible success in life. They’ve learned from their failures. And they’ve taken it on and keep failing until they’ve got it. Right. And it’s the same with trauma. It’s kind of be missing. Just step into it. Step into their miss, face up to it. Keep stepping into that unknown. keep stepping into it, because you’ve got a vision of heal, heal, that should be your vision of healing. What would that look like? What would that love look like for you? Create that strong, powerful vision and step into the unknown? Do it messy, do it ugly? Do it with tears. Do it with laughter do it with crying with yelling, do it with if you but do it.
Victoria Volk 42:41
So what does your work look like today?
Wayne Forrest 42:44
My this is what I teach. I love it. There’s nothing better than helping people heal and connect to their true self. I believe that each one of us is born genius. Each one of us has a skill sets something to give to this experience. And what I do is I help people get in touch in alignment with that, and start loving and to that and create a journey of a life that they can look back on and go. God I love my life. God, thank God for this journey.
Victoria Volk 43:30
Bless it right, bless ya. What gives you the most joy and hope for your future?
Wayne Forrest 43:41
Understanding now and that I have this incredible potential, and possibility I’ve got an incredible potential. Just like each age. So walking this earth, I’ve got incredible potential. That excites me, because my there’s a possibility of any thing could happen.
Victoria Volk 44:18
What is your vision look like now for the future? Do you want to share a goal of yours?
Wayne Forrest 44:26
Yeah yeah. What’s the latest one was the TEDx talk. And that was last year. This goal is to speak my truth to more people. And I and I don’t mind sharing this, but I want to speak to 1000s of people at one time, and I want people to to hear the message of my truth of that. You all have that same potential and possibility of having lives that you love. So I want to spread that message as big and wide as far and I believe it’s one that’s needed in this very crazy environment of fear leading us. I want people to, to create lives, they love, because I think that will help humanity go in a direction that we all want.
Victoria Volk 45:34
Never question for you. And I believe I already know the answer. But I want to hear how you answer it. If I had a magic wand, and I can reverse that day, and you would be that day would have happened like any other day, would you want me to reverse that day to change what happened?
Wayne Forrest 45:57
The ego does. With the level of awareness I have now I know that it’s even possible today for me to create
Wayne Forrest 46:12
That possibility, right? We know and quantum physics is possible. So don’t answer your question. I wouldn’t want to give up what I’ve learned. Because I know that now it’s possible that I can actually have have that miracle, or have that have that magic wand, as you said,
Victoria Volk 46:39
Oh, look at me putting limitations on you. Right. Right. Exactly. Yeah, that’s, that’s me asking you does, right?
Wayne Forrest 46:49
Yeah, but it’s also give me the witness? Well, no, actually, I don’t need that limitation, you know. So you can’t put any limitation on me. Right. So so it’s not about the question or that limitation? Because none of us have, we’re only limited by the way we think. And I know there’s more in that. And there’s probably a whole new podcast for that that subject. But I know that I have that awareness of that consciousness now, then that I’m only limited by the possibility that I think. So if I expand that thinking, and that possibility, then there’s so much more potential.
Victoria Volk 47:40
I just want to give people this idea to this thought to think about this. You don’t have to have a tragic accident, right? To, to have a life that you love to have become the best version of yourself to step into fear and to step into failure and to do all the things and accomplish all the things that you’ve have. Because of that accident. That didn’t have to happen for you to be who you are today. But it did. And rather than laying and decaying, you’ve gotten up and transformed your life, despite of it. But yeah, so what are your closing thoughts on that?
Wayne Forrest 48:30
Well, I think that’s beautiful. The Divide? No, take on what you’ve heard today, and love it. And to do that my closing thoughts would be look for the magic in life, you know, stay curious question every belief, because our belief system is what is limiting us. And our potential belief is a crazy thing that separates as well. So, you know, question, any belief, because if you question your beliefs, you’re going to find your truth.
Victoria Volk 49:12
Do you have any resource that you could share leave people with today?
Wayne Forrest 49:18
Well, I’ve got I’ve got a Facebook group, a private group that I’ve created just recently, and I’ve got a few challenges happening in that. I’ve got one coming out. But that depends when this is aired, but you can always join that it’s called Turning disability into a life of possibility and reach out on Facebook. When first Instagram went first in Zed. And look, you know, on most I, I’ve been growing my platforms, but I’m around
Victoria Volk 49:55
In the shownotes. I’ll have all your links. But I do want to mention, do you still have the resource on Your website the dream life blueprint?
Wayne Forrest 50:02
Yes, I do. That’s also another result. Another one, it’s a 15 minute recording, where I recommend, you know, just couple of times a day, morning and night. It’s a fantastic. It’s a beautiful little, if you like my voice, well, you know, it’s meditation of sorts, but it’s got the three elements. And there’s the vision, and that forgiveness, and that decision.
Victoria Volk 50:32
I love it. Anything else you would like to share?
Wayne Forrest 50:36
My night? I think we’ve, we’ve given so much, but just know that you have genius in you. And step into the unknown.
Victoria Volk 50:53
I love it. Thank you so much for your time today. You’ve inspired me, You’ve left me better than I was before I sat in this chair. So thank you. 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.
