Embracing Adoption and Differences: A Journey with Author Sasha Saidman part 2

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This is part two with children's author Sasha Sedman.

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We will explore her books and talk adoption, living with dyslexia and differences, and her books that even deal with just everyday moments.

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I just love Sasha's unique storytelling and her ability to reach adults and kids with her storytelling.

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She has allowed parents and kids to reach adults and kids with her storytelling.

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She has allowed parents and kids to create their own narratives within her pages.

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The beautiful illustrations allow kids to see themselves in the pages.

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Don't miss our conversation as we talk parenting, living with disabilities, adoption and even being a parent of biological children.

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Make sure you check out part one on Real Talk with Tina and Ann.

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But here is part two Because I'm really into like American Idol and when the Olympics were on and those stories were, and they always go into these backstories of adoptions and I owe my life to this person who took me in and raised me as their own and they really are the most beautiful stories.

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So, and I really connect with them.

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And you know, talk about the smile my dad and I have.

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We had a picture of me and a picture of him and we had the exact same smile.

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Oh, I love that we both had like this, you know one-sided smile and it was both on the same side.

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So I still keep them together because it just means so much to me that, even though he was gone when I was 11 years old, so much of him still lives inside of me.

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Oh, definitely, yeah, that's so special and I love that.

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Like it's like you said, like hearing adoption stories, hearing success, family stories, creating bigger families.

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I follow these people that foster to adopt on social media and I'm just like so, like I'm like, oh my gosh, like it's so beautiful.

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They have like three different Santas to make sure that each of their children's races are represented within.

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And I'm just like, oh my gosh, like they're just thinking so deeply about what their children need and want and even if their children aren't asking for it, they're just they're thinking so deeply about like, what can I do to connect with my child so that they feel connected with me?

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And I'm like, oh yes, like that's so awesome it is, it's, it's beautiful.

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How do we do that?

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Like it's and we're all trying to figure it out.

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Like you said, we could be doing it all wrong, but it's like we're trying our best, you know, and that's all we can do, and I absolutely love that.

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And even just like on social media with my books, like just being out in the world, putting that positivity, putting those stories out there, their stories saying that adoption is these terrible things and it is terrible what these people go through and there is a light and a dark.

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There is a bad and a good.

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There's always bad people in the world, there's always bad things happening, but there's also good and it's a good love.

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It's good to make families and I see stories of 16, 17 year olds about to age out and your heart just breaks because you're like who are they going to go home to?

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Like who are what's going to like?

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You just start having all these thoughts like as an adoptee.

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I ended up having some at my house for Christmas and things like that.

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I mean it was a really great experience, but I felt really bad for them.

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And one of them showed up on my doorstep when he did age out.

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I mean he was 18.

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He had nowhere to go.

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I mean, lots of times back then and it might be different now, I'm not really sure, but you know, the shelter door opens, you're 18.

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Bye, really sure.

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But you know, the shelter door opens, you're 18, bye, and they still don't have anywhere to go.

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So there were a lot of gaps back then and I hope that they have more services now for kids that because they have no skills a lot of them and most people rely on their parents to help them to that next step.

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You know we all do.

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Oh yeah, college tuition jobs, helping even write a resume, getting a resume, planning for that, having internships.

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I worked at my mom's job.

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Over the summer I'd help file paperwork at my dad's.

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I mean these are little things, but they prepared me for the workforce.

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They prepared me, boosted my resume, spell check.

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All those little things, all those little things that end up being the big things that create home and create families.

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And when a child doesn't have that and they age out, it's an unimaginable loss for people who do not have the family to come home to the mom to call when they're having a hard day, the dad to lean on.

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That's it.

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That's it, yeah.

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I mean I know they have each other and I know I've seen a lot of these children who do age out.

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They really stay connected to their foster siblings and to other children and they just they band together and that is their family and I mean they've created that their own family.

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They deserve that mother-father figure, that mom figure, dad, aunt, uncles I mean, every child deserves that.

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They deserve to be tucked in at night, they deserve to know where home is.

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I say all the time family is not blood, it's not.

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Oh my gosh, if it was, I mean then oops.

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I want to talk a little bit about my kids just for a couple minutes.

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I mean, I knew the moment that I held my youngest son that he was mine.

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Before he was mine officially, I knew he was.

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It was just this innate feeling and there is nothing like seeing your child and knowing.

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This child is mine.

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You know, no matter how old they are really, and I don't think that you can explain it if you've never experienced it.

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I say that because I say all of this, because he was born and handed to me.

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I didn't get him until he was two months, handed to me.

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I didn't get him until he was two months.

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I still really just knew that this was going to happen.

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That bond was just established like right there.

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Now my older ones they took time because four and three, and then my other one was 18 months, months and my other one was a nonverbal, almost four year old, and you have to be a lot more cautious in how you handle the child that is being adopted and coming into your home.

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I can remember and this is really funny my now 29-year-old, the one that I'm mom and that's it.

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She was so funny.

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We had just gotten her and she was playing in the other room and I was in the kitchen, she runs up to me and she says you took me without saying please.

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And I said well, will you please live with us, will you please let me be your mom?

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And she just went, yep, and then she ran off and played.

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It was so funny.

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I love that.

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Have you seen the movie Instant Family with Mark Wahlberg?

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No, I have not.

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Okay, this is something that I'm going to recommend to any adoptee adopter, adopt, adoptive family connect um it is about.

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It is a true story about a couple who adopted three children out of foster care a teenager and two younger children and it you know, you had this mom moment.

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I remember you were saying with your dad, and they had that depicted in the movie, where the little girl walks up to her, her foster father, and says can you help me with my dolly?

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My dolly needs help.

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And he helped her and she says thanks, daddy.

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And both parents looked at each other and the mom followed her and said I want some of that, do you need any of it?

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And it's just, it's so real.

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I showed my mom and my mom's like eyes were watering the whole movie where she's like, it's's so real, the issues you have, like you know, an older child wanting to paint their room black.

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It's like, okay, not what I would have thought, but that's you Like, whatever works.

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It's like the first time disciplining your child, especially when they're a little older.

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It's like I don't want them to hate me, but also I need to discipline them because that's my job as their parent is to teach them right and wrong.

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And I have to do these things and it's hard and you have self-doubt.

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And my mom told me one time that parents of a child came in and he was 13 and they said our child hates us.

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He says he wished he was never adopted.

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What do we do?

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And she said I was not adopted and I always told my parents that I wish I was.

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That's awesome.

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She said some days your teenager is not going to like you and that's okay.

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It's true, that's normal parenting.

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He's like I did not like my parents and my parents were not my adopted parents.

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She goes that's normal.

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It's normal for your child to have questions and to use buttons that they have, and his button is the adoption button, so that's going to be used some days when he's really mad because he doesn't want to do his homework or clean his room or he's grounded from playing video games.

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It's okay and it's like it's validating that feeling of it's okay to be scared and you're his mom and dad.

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It's okay.

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Like this is, you have a very normal mother-son relationship.

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And some days it's really hard yeah.

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I mean, I've heard the words from one of my kids older kids well, you know, you're not my mom, you know, and those are words that really sting.

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I knew I was, so that was a me thing that I had to work out and I had to be secure enough to really, you know, take it, because there were going to be days that were hard for you and you were young and you had big emotions and big words and I, to this day, I'm still in awe that she took those because they were such blows, I know, to her and to my dad.

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And I had a lot of issues like you were saying, like similarly, where I dropped out of high school, I took random paths that weren't safe.

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I did bad things.

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I did all the stuff.

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I lived a very full young life and I'm very grateful that I came out of the other side safely and healthy, without a rap sheet came out of the other side safely and healthy without a rap sheet.

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I say that too, and I did all the twists and turns and went on a lot of roads I should not have and I don't know, do you?

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This is an interesting conversation, actually, because I know a lot of adoptive it doesn't matter when you've been adopted of adoptive feeling it doesn't matter when you've been adopted.

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I wonder if there is like this little thing that we feel, that disconnect, connection, that little gap that happened in our life that takes us down that avenue.

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I'm not sure.

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I'm not sure.

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I have friends who are adopted who've definitely done very straight narrow what the kind of expectation of adolescence was.

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But I've also seen a lot of individuals who really are eccentric with their choices of young life and I don't know.

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I'm kind of I don't know what to expect with my own children.

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I'm assuming they're going to kind of run wild, similarly to my husband and I, and I don't know if that's biological or if they're just being nurtured by people who did that.

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But I think that, no matter what, when you're being raised, whether it's your biological parents or your adoptive parents, I think there's always this feeling of have I been doing what they want me to do or am I doing what I want to do?

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And so sometimes, especially with adoption, we have that I wonder who I would have been, I wonder what would have happened.

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I need to find myself a little bit more and go off the deep end occasionally.

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But again, having those parents who are in your corner, having your mom, having your dad in your corner, unlike those children that age out to be there as your safety net, you know, and almost knowing that it's like I can only explain it as like you're just testing boundaries, where you're like do you still love me if I do this?

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Will you still be my parents if I do that?

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And having that almost reassurance, and then getting through it, you're like, okay, I can literally do just about anything and I can still come home because you're mom and dad, and so maybe it's that it's another level of finding ourselves.

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I think, and I think with the adoption process, you know, we are trying to find ourselves and there is an identity and all those things that come with it and who am I?

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But yeah, I think that that adds a different, a more complex level.

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I guess you can say on trying to find ourselves, and it also depends on when you were adopted.

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Yeah.

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So, the experience you had before your adoption, absolutely the baggage you bring with you, the stories, the connections I have.

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I know people who were adopted a little bit older and they have foster siblings that they still are connected with today and they're adults and they were adopted by different families.

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They had different situations but they stayed pen pals, video chats, I mean.

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They were for lack of a better word siblings their entire life, just raised by different parents at that point, because they had such a strong connection as young children in foster care.

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So when you sat down, I mean what made you just say you know what?

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I am going to write this book for the masses with your such?

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You have such a beautiful adoption story.

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So what made you want to do that and spread this for all?

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Because one of my favorite parts is that you do get to write your own story.

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In fact, I think I'm going to do that with my kids.

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Actually, we've added 10 more pages to that, so it's much.

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Oh, because I didn't, once I got the first copy, I'm like, oh, we need to add like at least 10 more, so it's much longer now.

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I my first book I wrote was First Night and it was about my connection to my biological children and that was really special to me and it was a connection that I had with my daughter while she was sleeping on my chest and my mom was actually here and my daughter would not settle for her and I was trying to do dishes or anything else not baby related, because I was burnt out and I remember walking in the room, picking her up from my mom and she immediately settled and my mom said oh, she knows your heartbeat, she just that's what she knows.

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She knows you, your mom and I remember thinking to myself did my mom have that experience, or you know, because she was mom from day one, but did I?

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Was that a fear that she had?

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That she wouldn't be enough even for the infant, that the smell wouldn't be the same, that the heartbeat, you know, were those thoughts that she had.

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I wrote First Night.

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I knew that I wanted to write another book that depicted my story, but I was an adopted parent, so I sent this out.

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It probably took me.

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Over this whole year I've been doing research and connecting with people and figuring out the art, and originally the cover was going to be three hands of different races making the adoption symbol, and I was talking to my artist about it and actually the front cover was on the internal pages and when we came up with the sketches and she sent me the first copy of everything, I said, oh, this needs to be the cover, that's the cover.

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And so we completely changed it because I said I want children to see this book and say that's me, that's me, that's my sister, that's my brother, that's what mommy looks like, that's what daddy looks like, and I really wanted that to encompass every child, not just three different skin tones or three different age groups to figure out a way.

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How do I do this?

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How do I make it so that more stories are spoken for, are said, are advocated for?

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And this was how.

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And I remember talking to my mom and we talked about the journeys that she went through and how they had a very short journey but they were trying to adopt from Asia at the time and they had said there was a five-year waiting list, so they were prepared for that.

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And so I remember dyslexic, so I'm very visual, and so I remember visualizing this path where the forest is just full of clocks because you have no idea and you're kind of going into this, going down this path where you have no idea where it's going to take you.

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It maybe feels a little bit scary and it's just there's no amount of time, you never know.

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Like you said, you held your baby and then it was two months and then it took eight years and it's hard and it's this path that's traveled and so everything really allowed for analogies, where there's a boat and a plane and hiking and a train and it's like you know some people.

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It's just flying down to Florida to meet an olive garden, other people.

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It's flying around the world and taking buses through unknown areas that they've never been to meet their children, and so allowing for those stories and to create those analogies and I remember the handprint one was really difficult for me because I said how do I and how do I create an imagery that is a more perfect laugh, like, how do I visualize a laugh?

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And it's like what do you do with your kids about laughing?

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You're doing art with them, you're playing with them, you're getting dirty and muddy and getting fingerprints everywhere.

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And so we had that page of kids can see their hands and it again allows just for any child of any age, because every parent I know has taken their kids' handprints, has done their footprints, have done fingerprinting, and it's just, it's as universal as we could do on a paperback book from Amazon, but I have so many Very beautifully illustrated.

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Yeah, I absolutely love my artist.

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I've used her for five out of my six books and we're continuing to work together on other books and she's just.

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We visualize each other so well and we can just really bounce off of each other and she has a special connection to adoption and so it really was a special book for both of us.

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Well, it is very special because I think I think adopted kids are very special and I mean come on.

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We are, we're chosen.

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Yeah, this is really funny a little bit about choosing, because our caseworker sat down with us and painted this absolute worst case scenario.

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You know, we're sitting in front for the first time wanting to be parents, and they have you go to parenting classes and all these things.

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And they have you go to parenting classes and all these things.

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And it almost feels like they're trying to talk you out of it in a way, because they're like well, you could end up with kids who are you know, and just the worst, and they could have alcoholism in their background and all these different things.

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And I'm just sitting there and I'm okay, okay, all right.

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And then she says are you still sure that you want to do this?

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And I'm like, well, if they were born for me, they would have the same background.

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So what's the difference?

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I know that's like the craziest thing is like I've asked people where I'm like are you what your parents wanted you to be?

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And you're biological Like I know I know plenty of people who are biological children and they are not at all.

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You know dad's a lawyer and now child is an artist and dad doesn't approve and it's like you don't know.

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You never know what you're going to get at all.

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Like there's no, you might get them a little bit older, but you don't know.

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You have no idea.

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I I love my children and I can only hope.

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I always say that I want them to live a life worth living and I have no idea what that looks like right now.

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A life worth living to my children are dinosaurs and hulk, and that is their, that is what they love, and oh, if life could always be like that exactly, if it could only ever be that simple, and ibuprofen for all of the ear infections.

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But you know, it's that's all I could want for them.

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So it's like you know, do you hope they do this?

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Do you want them to do this?

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It's like I hope they're happy, I hope they're completed, I hope they find love.

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I hope they love themselves.

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All the things.

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All the things Like if they want to do.

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Whatever.

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I hope they're safe, I hope they're loved, I hope they're living this amazing life that they love and I will be proud of them honestly because he struggles so much.

00:21:24.353 --> 00:21:28.656
But we believe in exposure, just everything.

00:21:28.656 --> 00:21:32.911
And he's 11, but he's emotionally probably like five.

00:21:32.911 --> 00:21:46.921
But he can drum and he just performed last weekend with the quads and he's up there just bam, bam, bam, bam and I am the biggest, proudest mama.

00:21:46.921 --> 00:21:56.544
You know, I am just so happy for him because he said to me he said the words it makes me feel important.

00:21:56.544 --> 00:22:20.138
There it is, that's it, that's all you want for your books.

00:22:20.138 --> 00:22:26.007
And actually I sat with them for a while because they hit me so deeply.

00:22:26.007 --> 00:22:31.057
And plus, I love children's books and I actually gravitate to them when I'm in a bookstore.

00:22:31.057 --> 00:22:37.959
There's nothing like the pictures and the storytelling in childlike form, for me anyway.

00:22:53.432 --> 00:22:56.494
And I think a lot of adults could admit that too, because I love reading to my kids.

00:22:56.494 --> 00:22:58.115
I just love the children's books.

00:22:58.115 --> 00:23:02.317
I was scribbling down things that I was seeing while I was cleaning up.

00:23:02.498 --> 00:23:03.219
Saw that.

00:23:03.558 --> 00:23:05.880
I just was like this is what they see.

00:23:05.880 --> 00:23:11.163
And it's like, how do we create this mundane thing like picking up after our kids at night when everyone's asleep?

00:23:11.163 --> 00:23:15.737
And we start thinking like do they see like this huge tugboat in the kitchen?

00:23:15.737 --> 00:23:19.133
Do they see a cow with socks flopping over their ears?

00:23:19.133 --> 00:23:20.978
Because there's a cow in the laundry basket?

00:23:21.085 --> 00:23:23.829
You know, I remember as a kid with my dollhouse.

00:23:23.829 --> 00:23:30.971
I mean, I thought of my dollhouse as this huge thing that was like was different stories and each room was different.

00:23:30.971 --> 00:23:38.718
And now, looking at like these dollhouses, I'm like, oh, they're like this big, like they're so tiny, but as a kid, they're life size.

00:23:38.718 --> 00:23:38.958
They're.

00:23:38.958 --> 00:23:42.018
You know, there's worlds going on that we don't see as adults.

00:23:42.018 --> 00:23:48.386
And so, appreciating that imagination and then also talking to your kids and making it into fun of like well, what do you see?

00:23:48.386 --> 00:23:48.950
What is there?

00:23:48.950 --> 00:23:50.939
Is there a shark in our bathtub right now?

00:23:50.939 --> 00:23:52.566
Like is it taking a bubble bath with you?

00:23:52.566 --> 00:23:54.932
Do you have a full-size shark hanging out with you?

00:23:54.932 --> 00:23:56.536
Is there a scuba diver going on?

00:23:56.536 --> 00:23:59.413
Like are they searching for lost treasure under the bubbles?

00:23:59.512 --> 00:24:05.048
like that's so cool that you're trying to see it from their perspective and talking about a boat.

00:24:05.048 --> 00:24:06.852
In the kitchen we clean up.

00:24:06.852 --> 00:24:10.365
I've never looked at it that beautifully or that much.

00:24:10.365 --> 00:24:14.094
You just put it on paper so cool.

00:24:14.094 --> 00:24:17.946
It's like you're really experiencing it in a completely different way.

00:24:17.946 --> 00:24:24.338
I think because of that book I will clean up and look at it differently.

00:24:25.566 --> 00:24:39.598
It's really fun because we have an elf in our house right now named Opie, and so I like to remember how my children see him and what he's doing and all of the mischief that he gets into in our house.

00:24:39.598 --> 00:24:42.278
And it really does kind of put us into a little child role of like remembering this little magic that happens in our house.

00:24:42.278 --> 00:24:46.951
And it really does kind of put us into a little child role of like remembering this little magic that happens in our house.

00:24:46.951 --> 00:24:54.307
And so sometimes, you know, you get exhausted, you get overwhelmed, you get overstimulated and that's really like the all out of ducks book.

00:24:54.307 --> 00:24:58.837
But you just you remember like, okay, like they're seeing this whole world.

00:24:59.265 --> 00:25:16.656
So when they want to play, it's not, they want to play with this little stuffed animal, they want to play with a donkey and they want you to eat all like a donkey and they want you to neigh like a horse, because you are the horse and they have a farm in their bedroom and we live, you know, on a ranch and that's what we're doing right now.

00:25:16.656 --> 00:25:19.705
And to them that is the playtime, that is the world.

00:25:19.705 --> 00:25:24.452
We're not sitting here in our three-day-old sweatpants with our five-day-old unwashed hair.

00:25:24.452 --> 00:25:27.777
We are the animals that we're playing.

00:25:27.777 --> 00:25:44.436
And so how do we try and remember that on the exhaustion days, on the days that are just overstimulating, and just like your son saying that he felt important when he was drumming, it's like he was center stage with his drums, it's like that.

00:25:44.436 --> 00:25:46.432
That's a core memory right there.

00:25:46.432 --> 00:25:54.554
He's going to have that the rest of his life and it's like larger than life moments and they can happen in your kitchen, apparently.

00:25:54.855 --> 00:26:03.625
Yeah, because I've honestly never looked at some of the things that you have looked at in such a childlike way, so that was so well done.

00:26:03.625 --> 00:26:06.250
I want to talk about Melanade.

00:26:06.250 --> 00:26:25.277
It is so good and I'm dyslexic you say that you have dyslexia so thank you for this book, because Melanade is a beautiful story of how our differences can be our superpowers, and I talk about that all the time here.

00:26:25.277 --> 00:26:37.525
We talk about superpowers I think it's an autism thing, I'm not sure but how you can just take all of our differences and make them our strengths.

00:26:37.525 --> 00:26:44.635
And this is a picture book to support each young reader in their own journey to self-confidence, pride and compassion.

00:26:44.635 --> 00:26:51.877
I read your blog on SashaSedmancom and you write a letter to yourself.

00:26:52.519 --> 00:26:52.778
I do.

00:26:54.205 --> 00:27:03.740
And you say, as I've been discussing my most recent book, melanade, a lot of memories and big emotions have come back to me from my childhood.

00:27:03.740 --> 00:27:07.113
So I wanted to write a little note to my younger self.

00:27:07.113 --> 00:27:17.719
Dear younger self which I think is amazing by the way that you did this you just love taking the road less traveled, don't you?

00:27:17.719 --> 00:27:25.605
You're strong-willed, you're kind, you're compassionate, you're artistic and you're going to be okay.

00:27:25.605 --> 00:27:40.160
When I read that, I sat in that for a minute or more, because what I would have done, what I'd need to do, is go back to that 11-year-old and say you know what?

00:27:40.560 --> 00:27:46.366
you're going to be okay and say you know what you're going to be okay.

00:27:46.366 --> 00:27:47.548
I think a lot of us need that and would benefit from that.

00:27:47.548 --> 00:28:19.810
And I think that if we can take those moments when they feel really heavy and look at the really big picture of how far we've come and everything we've been through and try and look at it as a half full moment of every trauma, every hard moment, every completely heart-wrenching moment is something that taught us, something that gave us strength, that made us dig ourselves out of these holes that sometimes we dug for ourselves and sometimes we fell miles into, I think is is really.

00:28:19.810 --> 00:28:41.855
And so, talking to my younger self and being like we made it, we're okay, like it's okay that we went through these things, because that's how we became the person we are today and that's how we're able to parent and how we're able to be a friend and a partner and a spouse, and those experience really made us.

00:28:41.875 --> 00:28:44.338
That's the again, the nurture part.

00:28:44.338 --> 00:28:53.413
You know, our life, our world that has been created around us created us today, and we can look at ourselves today and say I'm really proud of who we are.

00:28:53.413 --> 00:28:59.657
I'm really proud of the family that we're creating and the life that we're creating for our family and ourselves.

00:28:59.657 --> 00:29:23.417
You know that's a really powerful thing and so, remembering that and being like it's okay, it's okay that all the spells, all the, all the times that you feel like it's just too heavy and too much, like okay, like you're going to have those and there's also going to be these really beautiful moments, like when you hold your son for the first time or you watch your son on stage drumming and feeling full, like those are, it's worth it.

00:29:23.417 --> 00:29:27.635
Like it's so hard to say when you're in those moments, but it is worth it.

00:29:27.635 --> 00:29:36.477
I wish I could have been there just to give myself a hug and, you know, just be like it's cool, like we're we got this, like you're so strong yeah, you got this.

00:29:36.765 --> 00:29:51.705
Like you're so strong-willed Probably won't believe me, but yeah, when you're talking about the adoption story and you have the pages that are blank, it really doesn't matter how you start it.

00:29:51.705 --> 00:30:03.996
Really you know it's a beautiful story, but even if we're adopted or if we're not adopted and we're going to be okay, when we're older, we can rewrite those pages.

00:30:03.996 --> 00:30:19.714
You know it's all about rewriting and we can become whatever we want to be, and I think adoption gives us such a great chance in life.

00:30:19.714 --> 00:30:33.858
It can I mean, not for everybody, but it can and I always call them mile markers where something in our life has drastically changed, good or bad, but we're not going back.

00:30:33.858 --> 00:30:39.596
This is who we are now and we're moving forward, and that space and time is marked.

00:30:39.596 --> 00:30:41.627
And now what are we going to do with it?

00:30:41.627 --> 00:30:42.932
What are we going to become?

00:30:49.404 --> 00:30:54.195
You've been given this opportunity, so you know, I look at it as opportunity and one of the things that you also wrote in your blog.

00:30:54.195 --> 00:31:06.019
When you're sitting in those reading circles with little plastic chairs and a round table with a book full of stories that your brain cannot dissect, you'll be okay.

00:31:06.019 --> 00:31:23.695
Your word count may feel like the biggest deal right now and it will get better, a lot better, but there is so much more to you than how efficiently you read a sentence and that's, you know, that's your person with disabilities, with differences.

00:31:23.695 --> 00:31:30.135
However you want to say it, that's talking right there and you want to like go back and say you know what you got this.

00:31:30.135 --> 00:31:31.269
That's so cool.

00:31:32.265 --> 00:31:32.805
It's so.

00:31:32.805 --> 00:31:40.930
It needs to be said more often because you know it's the education system, parents, everyone in children's lives.

00:31:40.930 --> 00:31:49.815
You know we all have these ideas of what success is supposed to look like, where we're supposed to be, you know markers we're supposed to be hitting, at what age and at what grade level.

00:31:49.815 --> 00:31:51.915
And it puts so much pressure.

00:31:51.915 --> 00:31:59.980
Even if it's unknown, even if we're saying it's okay, there's still this kind of invisible force, field of like I'm not where I'm supposed to be.

00:31:59.980 --> 00:32:04.083
The other students are doing this and I'm not like, and so I did that.

00:32:04.083 --> 00:32:05.624
Oh yeah, we.

00:32:05.624 --> 00:32:25.464
I think that children with dyslexia, with learning differences, like it's, it's something that we do, that we're just constantly holding ourself to a standard that we might not be able to reach, but we have so many things that are our strengths and so talking about those strengths and figuring them out, like for me it's visual and being like this is how I learn and this is how I learn best.

00:32:25.464 --> 00:32:29.316
So going into college, going into my careers, it's saying like I'm visual.

00:32:29.424 --> 00:32:33.454
If you hand me a book and tell me to read it, I will not understand the context.

00:32:33.454 --> 00:32:38.517
I can read, I can read much better, but I will not understand and I will not intake that.

00:32:38.517 --> 00:32:48.594
If you have a tape, if you have a video, if there's a YouTube, I can do an oil change.

00:32:48.594 --> 00:32:48.994
No problem, I got it.

00:32:48.994 --> 00:32:49.434
I am woman.

00:32:49.434 --> 00:32:51.759
Hear me, roar, I will take care of myself.

00:32:51.759 --> 00:32:55.333
I will Google how to change my tire real fast and I will figure it out.

00:32:55.333 --> 00:32:57.076
You give me the manual on the car.

00:32:57.076 --> 00:32:58.527
Not a hope in the world.

00:32:58.527 --> 00:33:00.230
I will not.

00:33:00.230 --> 00:33:03.194
Unless there's pictures, then another story.

00:33:04.076 --> 00:33:17.238
Well, when I was a kid and I knew, my kindergarten teacher went to my parents and said something's not right, just something's not right, and yeah, I wasn't learning like the other kids, and things like that.

00:33:17.325 --> 00:33:25.887
And then the neurologists and everything and they're like, yeah, no, she probably won't graduate high school is what we heard.

00:33:25.887 --> 00:33:48.355
And you know, when you hear things like that and I think my parents did a good job of this too I mean you just don't let educators and medical people define your path and let you know hey, I mean you got a GED, which is absolutely amazing, and your path was a little different, but I think that that is so great that you did that.

00:33:48.355 --> 00:33:58.519
I mean that really touched me and it's an amazing feat that you took on being a writer, by the way, with dyslexia.

00:33:58.519 --> 00:34:09.715
And it is so interesting because I had someone on my podcast recently and she said that our hard things become our heart things, and that is so true.

00:34:09.715 --> 00:34:53.547
The things I have struggled through the most are the very things that I use now to help me and others go through life's journeys no-transcript superpower and one of them one of those is one word and one of them is two, and I said well, they're both correct.

00:34:54.610 --> 00:34:59.007
So that's just a little dyslexic moment where I didn't have them completely perfect.

00:34:59.007 --> 00:35:01.072
They both are spelled correctly.

00:35:01.072 --> 00:35:03.338
One is just together and one is not.

00:35:03.338 --> 00:35:06.610
But we will just leave.

00:35:06.650 --> 00:35:23.751
No, I think that that's great because I'm a writer and Tina and I often you know well, we work together a lot of times on the podcast, of course, but she'll send me, I'll put something out and she'll say, well, do you know that this was wrong?

00:35:23.751 --> 00:35:24.271
Or this was?

00:35:24.271 --> 00:35:59.976
And I'm like well, there you go, I'm allowed to have these mess ups and I, as you are, I'm sure, very proud of where I am and if I have a word or two wrong, I did amazing and I am proud that because I mean, I put together all these amazing things, as you have, and we have all these neurological differences that really do stand in our way, but we created this tool belt of things to be able to figure it out.

00:36:00.416 --> 00:36:08.782
Exactly, yeah, and it is such an accomplishment to be able to say I did this, we're doing it Like this is awesome, it's something that I never thought I would do.

00:36:08.782 --> 00:36:12.548
I sent it to my English teacher, my 10th grade English teacher.

00:36:12.548 --> 00:36:14.260
Oh, that's great.

00:36:14.260 --> 00:36:27.865
And so I actually reconnected with my high school, who I previously did not have the greatest you know adios with when I was in 11th grade, but we're now on great terms and they actually have the book in their library.

00:36:27.865 --> 00:36:30.282
Oh, that's so awesome.

00:36:30.282 --> 00:36:31.548
I was so excited about it.

00:36:31.954 --> 00:36:47.905
Yes and I also had a sixth grade teacher who works at a completely different school, and I actually made a video responding to her students about my dyslexia for them, about my book with dyslexia, and it was such a full circle moment with education.

00:36:47.905 --> 00:36:48.567
That's so great.

00:36:48.567 --> 00:36:53.842
You know, I wasn't voted to be, you know know, an author or the next president of the united states.

00:36:53.842 --> 00:37:00.802
I was voted for a lot less and, uh, I was grateful that I overcame those things.

00:37:00.802 --> 00:37:10.465
But also it was a little bit of like a look at me now, like absolutely don't underestimate ever, and I don't know if you ever watch Miss Rachel.

00:37:11.967 --> 00:37:12.409
I don't.

00:37:19.474 --> 00:37:24.186
She's a mother, she has a YouTube, she had a child who was speech delayed and she's recently where she said never underestimate a mother trying to help their children.

00:37:24.186 --> 00:37:27.318
And I was like oh, love that.

00:37:27.860 --> 00:37:31.085
Never underestimate a mother in general, like we will.

00:37:31.085 --> 00:37:37.844
You know my kids, my husband was undiagnosed but he's ADHD and most likely dyslexic.

00:37:37.844 --> 00:37:48.824
And I'm dyslexic and biologically that means that my children have almost a 100% chance of being dyslexic, because with one parent it's 55% and with two it's almost a hundred.

00:37:48.824 --> 00:37:53.418
So I was like, well parent, it's 55% and with two it's almost 100.

00:37:53.418 --> 00:38:03.476
So I was like, well, I guess we need to write a book for my children Because, you know, even if they're the smartest little Alex and they don't have dyslexia, I'm sure they will have friends that are dyslexic and their mom and dad are probably dyslexic.

00:38:03.476 --> 00:38:06.601
So we need to spread awareness.

00:38:06.922 --> 00:38:24.268
And I think, again, that goes back to adoption, where if you make something normal in your house, it's normal, and so if you talk about learning differences, if you talk about big emotions, if you talk about adoption, it's normal, it's not this crazy, weird afterthought, you know.

00:38:24.268 --> 00:38:43.907
And so I think, as parents, that's our job is to make these things normal for our children, so that even if you're raising biological children, if you talk about adoption with them, when they have a friend that's adopted in school or they meet someone at the park, they know and they're like, oh, that's your mom and dad, because I had so many friends ask me well, do you know your real mom and dad?

00:38:44.650 --> 00:38:46.518
I'm like that is my real mom and dad.

00:38:46.798 --> 00:38:48.081
My biological parents.

00:38:48.081 --> 00:38:51.708
Yes, I know them, but that's my real mom and dad.

00:38:51.708 --> 00:39:03.567
So it's like just talking about them and letting them know, even at a young age, being like, hey, like you know, mom's biological mom or she lives here and this is mom, this is grandma.

00:39:03.567 --> 00:39:07.637
But it's like making it normal and it's like having these normal conversations.

00:39:07.637 --> 00:39:11.342
It's dust bunnies, it's hey, we clean up, we're going to find the dust bunnies.

00:39:11.342 --> 00:39:12.903
It's boats in the kitchen.

00:39:12.903 --> 00:39:15.306
It's postpartum depression it's.

00:39:15.385 --> 00:39:21.032
You know, mommies and daddies are superheroes and superheroes have big feelings sometimes and that's OK.

00:39:21.032 --> 00:39:35.960
And you have big feelings sometimes and nothing will ever like make it so I don't love you or I don't accept you, or that I'm not your mom, and that's, you know, a universal thing for adoptive parents, for biological parents, it's just I'm your mom.

00:39:35.960 --> 00:39:38.992
You can do nothing that makes me that I'm not your mom anymore.

00:39:38.992 --> 00:39:51.288
There'll be times when mommy is angry, there's times when mommy is sad, but I am your mom and you are mine and I love you and I am here and I'm holding your hand as we walk through the door and nothing will change that.

00:39:51.288 --> 00:39:56.375
So feel all the feels, ask all the questions like I'm here.

00:39:56.454 --> 00:40:03.387
You might be dyslexic, but you speak very eloquently and you put your words together very well.

00:40:03.969 --> 00:40:04.449
Thank you.

00:40:04.449 --> 00:40:10.103
I had a lot of therapy when I was younger, so I think that has a lot to do with it.

00:40:10.103 --> 00:40:25.505
My parents were very concerned about my emotional growth so they had me in DBT therapy, which gave me a lot of skills that I've taken into adulthood and have also shared with my husband, and whether he says he'll use them or not, he is using them regularly.

00:40:27.056 --> 00:40:38.708
But I think that that's great, that you have all those skills and you can tell that you do Thank you, and it sounds like your parents did an amazing job, that they're really beautiful people.

00:40:39.315 --> 00:40:39.755
They are.

00:40:39.755 --> 00:40:49.400
They are really really great, really selfless people and I just they did their best, just like you are, and that's all I can ask of them.

00:40:49.400 --> 00:40:51.722
And I can look back and say that they did their best.

00:40:51.722 --> 00:40:56.003
And there are things that we talk about today that my mom says I wish I would have done better with this.

00:40:56.003 --> 00:41:07.590
Or I wish I said well, you didn't know what I was going to do, you didn't know how I was going to turn out, you didn't know that a trip to DC would alter my you know way to college.

00:41:07.590 --> 00:41:13.556
You know Right, if there was a manual, I'm sure we would all buy it, but there's not.

00:41:13.657 --> 00:41:15.460
Yeah, I mean, we just do our best.

00:41:15.460 --> 00:41:19.409
We do so and I do really love that.

00:41:19.409 --> 00:41:22.842
You don't know what the path is going to be.

00:41:22.842 --> 00:41:24.126
You know what it is.

00:41:24.126 --> 00:41:30.579
It's our path to make and we might mess up along the way, but here we are and everything is a stepping stone to where we're going.

00:41:30.579 --> 00:41:39.304
I say that all the time and they told me that I wouldn't be able, like I said, to learn, and I can remember my 10th grade teacher.

00:41:39.304 --> 00:41:40.625
When you were talking about teachers.

00:41:40.625 --> 00:41:44.588
I remember my 10th grade teacher telling me she stopped me.

00:41:44.588 --> 00:41:46.489
She's like Ann, wait a second.

00:41:46.489 --> 00:41:49.590
So I stood there before I left the classroom.

00:41:49.590 --> 00:41:58.144
She's like why does everybody in the classroom take notes, but you and I'm just like I don't know.

00:41:58.144 --> 00:42:00.929
But I didn't know at the time.

00:42:00.929 --> 00:42:11.623
You know, in hindsight I really understand everything that I became in school and why I was so complicated and why I didn't have it.

00:42:11.623 --> 00:42:18.106
I had a teacher at a reunion show up decades later and I was like, oh hi.

00:42:18.106 --> 00:42:24.445
And they said, oh yeah, you had a lot of problems.

00:42:26.835 --> 00:42:27.338
Thanks.

00:42:28.842 --> 00:42:29.224
I know.

00:42:29.224 --> 00:42:31.822
I'm so glad that I could be that memory for you.

00:42:32.121 --> 00:42:55.760
I know I'm so happy but you know it, he wasn't wrong and I had a really bad relationship with a lot, with my education system, I guess you could say and speaking of what we want for our kids, because I know my kids too, you know, are on a different path and I'm glad that I had that.

00:42:55.760 --> 00:43:14.099
I'm glad that I had that Because now I know what it feels like to be that kid in that system and to be lost, not understand what's going on in the classroom, having to look around to understand even the basic directions and not understanding the text on the page.

00:43:14.099 --> 00:43:19.206
And I'm not doing it on purpose, no.

00:43:19.206 --> 00:43:35.626
And I want my kids to have that freedom, to be able to advocate for themselves, be able to say, look, I don't get it, I need more helps here, or whatever, and that we get to, as parents come to the table with these meetings, with these educators, and now we get to advocate for them.

00:43:36.414 --> 00:44:02.342
Yeah, and it's so true and there's so many things that we learn from our own experiences, like for me, audio books were really big, so I'm already in my head like okay, instead of, you know, watching a movie or TV or whatever while mom makes dinner, we're going to listen to your book, because that's how we're going to intake information and, if that's what you need to do, we're going to read these stories together and we're going to listen to them and we have conversations.

00:44:02.342 --> 00:44:11.509
Where they really stay and like that's what I used to do in college is I would listen to my books to and from school, and I even took a class at a farther location.

00:44:11.509 --> 00:44:15.306
It was like 45 minutes for me versus the 20 minute, because it gave me more time to listen.

00:44:15.306 --> 00:44:16.717
See what we do.

00:44:17.177 --> 00:44:32.597
Because I would get a tape recorder, read into it, listen to it, take notes from what I was hearing, and because I needed all the things I needed to see it, hear it, write it in order for me to be able to comprehend.

00:44:32.597 --> 00:44:38.918
And it would take me hours to do what my roommates and you know, friends, it would take them an hour to do.

00:44:38.918 --> 00:44:42.867
But I, just I was willing to do it because it was really important.

00:44:43.594 --> 00:44:45.539
It was, and that's all we can do.

00:44:45.539 --> 00:44:50.378
Is we figure out those ways around of how to figure it out and figure out what works best for us?

00:44:50.378 --> 00:44:52.483
I mean, I know the education system is working.

00:44:52.483 --> 00:44:58.992
You know, to be better and better every single year to accommodate and to have better accommodation services and have classrooms.

00:44:58.992 --> 00:45:03.123
But I mean teachers are just exhausted.

00:45:03.123 --> 00:45:05.146
I have so much respect for teachers.

00:45:05.146 --> 00:45:08.762
I mean they're with our children 30 plus hours a week.

00:45:08.762 --> 00:45:11.027
I mean, could not ask for more.

00:45:11.414 --> 00:45:21.630
And our school system opened a school within the public school just for kids in the gap, like my kids, wow.

00:45:21.630 --> 00:45:29.927
So two of my kids go to this school where there's like three teachers, six kids per classroom.

00:45:30.369 --> 00:45:31.090
That's phenomenal.

00:45:31.295 --> 00:45:39.461
And they are working on that with them one-on-one, because they don't want them to get lost in a bigger environment, and I so appreciate that.

00:45:40.003 --> 00:45:46.922
Yeah, I went to the Lab School of Washington, which is specifically for dyslexia, and so we had very small classrooms as well.

00:45:46.922 --> 00:45:52.677
Oh, like nine to 12 students per two teachers, you know, teacher and a teacher's aide.

00:45:52.677 --> 00:45:58.293
But they are extraordinary with visuals and with learning differences.

00:45:58.293 --> 00:46:21.326
I remember in history, instead of learning about the Mona Lisa, we painted it, and that's such a memory because I don't exactly remember every single detail about him, but I remember painting the Mona Lisa and I remember dressing up, like they would dress up in their cloaks and in their robes, and I just think if I had read that in a book I would have no idea.

00:46:21.326 --> 00:46:28.103
But because I physically did it and it's so much fun, I would love to paint the Mona Lisa with my kids when they get older.

00:46:28.195 --> 00:46:30.302
I would love to do that versus reading a history book.

00:46:30.302 --> 00:46:32.996
It just sounds so much more enjoyable.

00:46:32.996 --> 00:46:43.018
It's like, instead of learning what measurements are on a piece of paper, it's like let's bake a cake, let's measure that, let's do things for memories.

00:46:43.018 --> 00:46:45.880
And then let's put a half cup scoop in each cupcake.

00:46:45.880 --> 00:46:47.199
And what happens if we put a cup?

00:46:47.199 --> 00:46:48.699
What happens if we put a fourth cup?

00:46:48.699 --> 00:46:50.420
And it's like what does that look like?

00:46:50.420 --> 00:46:51.481
And now we can eat cupcakes.

00:46:51.481 --> 00:47:00.704
Like, yeah, yeah, ways to learn, and there are things we can do, and educators, and but as their parents, we're just advocating for them as best as we can.

00:47:00.704 --> 00:47:05.746
And you know, even in with your children's school, I'm sure there's so much advocating.

00:47:07.226 --> 00:47:16.688
We went to 16 states this summer and we, you know, I want my kids to go into the museums.

00:47:16.688 --> 00:47:18.668
I want that we took them to NASA.

00:47:18.668 --> 00:47:24.010
They got in the rockets, they saw all the launching pad firsthand.

00:47:24.010 --> 00:47:46.576
You know, I mean we do all the things because my kids are very visual, they are very hands-on learning and we went to this one museum where and we have one here locally, but this was really something where they go and there was like a fake restaurant and there's a fake kitchen and there's a fake fire truck and there's a and.

00:47:46.576 --> 00:47:48.277
But I mean they're real.

00:47:48.277 --> 00:47:59.605
You know, it's as real as real could be for them and they're making the food and we're sitting there and they're serving us and they're, like you know, going in the fire truck and all that stuff.

00:47:59.605 --> 00:48:08.490
So and going in the supermarket and they're going shopping and checking out, and I mean it's just so fun.

00:48:08.690 --> 00:48:13.914
And those are the things that they're going to remember out and I mean it's just so fun and those are the things that they're going to remember.

00:48:13.914 --> 00:48:17.099
Oh, definitely, yeah, we did trips this summer.

00:48:17.099 --> 00:48:18.342
We drove from Virginia to Vermont, we went to North Carolina.

00:48:18.342 --> 00:48:19.427
We drove all the way through, you know, museums.

00:48:19.427 --> 00:48:32.027
There were like boats that were on land that we were able to walk around, that were from the early 1900s, that had all of the gold and you know you could steer the ship and go to the aquarium with the huge shark teeth.

00:48:32.027 --> 00:48:34.320
You know my son was in awe at the sharks.

00:48:34.320 --> 00:48:36.347
I mean nothing else.

00:48:36.347 --> 00:48:41.219
It's being like tactile learners where they can really get into.

00:48:41.219 --> 00:48:59.360
It is just, it's so crazy because you know, when you hear these stories of children and even like myself, I don't know if you experience it where you just feel stupid or you feel dumb, like like you can't learn, and most of my life children that have these thoughts, or that the teachers are coming at you like with, oh well, maybe they're not going to graduate, maybe they're not.

00:48:59.681 --> 00:49:10.940
But then you see them in these other environments where they're intaking so much knowledge and they're so smart and they, oh, this is this, this is this, this is this type of dirt, this is sedimentary, like this is.

00:49:10.940 --> 00:49:14.344
These are where the work and it's like how did you just learn all that?

00:49:14.344 --> 00:49:16.487
They're just they're smart.

00:49:16.487 --> 00:49:21.030
And it's like just because you learn in a different way, in a different environment does not mean anything.

00:49:26.755 --> 00:49:27.335
Well, I homeschool my one.

00:49:27.335 --> 00:49:29.900
I homeschool one of my kids because this is just what he needs and that's what we have to do is meet them where they are.

00:49:29.900 --> 00:49:31.822
But I mean his favorite thing is the Titanic.

00:49:31.822 --> 00:49:46.885
So we went to the Titanic Museum and we've been to three, actually, but the one especially where he got to steer the ship and you try to avoid the iceberg and you know they do all the things, but you just can't have a regular conversation with this kid.

00:49:46.885 --> 00:49:57.965
I mean he would not make it in the school system, but he can have a very adult conversation with any adult and he can tell you all the facts about everything.

00:49:57.965 --> 00:50:01.177
So I mean, yeah, it's so fun.

00:50:01.918 --> 00:50:02.438
I love that.

00:50:02.438 --> 00:50:10.739
Yeah, every child I've met with a learning disability or disability of some kind always have like their thing that they're so good at.

00:50:10.739 --> 00:50:17.523
And I love talking to parents about their children's thing because people who aren't as exposed are sometimes unaware.

00:50:17.523 --> 00:50:26.579
So I've met people at the playground and my son's been playing with a child who is clearly either on the spectrum and you know they'll come up to me and they'll say, oh well, they're nonverbal.

00:50:26.579 --> 00:50:28.945
I'm like, oh well, what's like their thing they're great at.

00:50:28.945 --> 00:50:42.865
And they're like, oh well, they really love history and then they'll just get into it and it's like you see them light up because their child is being heard and their needs are being met and it's like that's okay, like thank you for for letting me know.

00:50:42.885 --> 00:50:46.780
I'll make sure my son knows that he might not verbally respond, but like they're playing, they're.

00:50:46.780 --> 00:50:47.623
They're playing in the sandbox.

00:50:47.623 --> 00:50:47.925
They got boats.

00:50:47.925 --> 00:50:48.547
They're playing.

00:50:48.547 --> 00:50:49.389
They're playing in the sandbox.

00:50:49.389 --> 00:50:50.172
They got boats.

00:50:50.172 --> 00:50:53.623
They're hanging out Like they're having a grand old time.

00:50:53.623 --> 00:50:58.744
Like love it, like exposure, make it normal, make it, yeah, make it normal.

00:50:58.954 --> 00:51:03.139
You said that earlier and I love that If you make it normal.

00:51:03.139 --> 00:51:04.505
I mean it's just normal.

00:51:04.956 --> 00:51:05.456
It's just normal.

00:51:05.456 --> 00:51:06.280
It's just the world.

00:51:06.280 --> 00:51:07.103
People are different.

00:51:07.103 --> 00:51:09.498
People look different, sound different, act act different.

00:51:09.498 --> 00:51:12.322
Some people need wheelchair, some people don't have a leg.

00:51:12.322 --> 00:51:13.764
It's like you know.

00:51:14.326 --> 00:51:27.570
It's okay like it's there's nothing wrong you know, it's what was it um, there's a quote that says you could be the juiciest peach in the world, and there's someone out there that doesn't like peaches, but it's like it's.

00:51:27.570 --> 00:51:30.677
There's no perfect, there's no, there's no normal.

00:51:30.677 --> 00:51:32.398
It's we're all.

00:51:32.398 --> 00:51:39.782
We're all different and that's what's normal, that we're different and that's beautiful, and that all families are different and that's beautiful.

00:51:39.782 --> 00:51:50.510
Like some people have a nice house with their one dog and their one cat and their gerbil and two kids, and a fence white picket fence yard, and you don't know what's going on inside that house.

00:51:50.510 --> 00:51:57.384
You have no idea what mom does, what dad does, what's going on, how they got the relationship, the raves that mom went to, the corporate events.

00:51:57.384 --> 00:52:01.585
You have no idea and it's like stop trying to act like everyone else.

00:52:01.585 --> 00:52:02.217
Just be you.

00:52:02.217 --> 00:52:03.722
Do you be unique?

00:52:03.722 --> 00:52:04.324
Be cool.

00:52:04.324 --> 00:52:06.824
The world needs more of it and make it normal.

00:52:09.356 --> 00:52:09.996
I love that.

00:52:09.996 --> 00:52:12.481
I love your words, with everything that you say.

00:52:12.481 --> 00:52:15.628
Do you have anything else coming up?

00:52:15.628 --> 00:52:18.255
How can?

00:52:18.275 --> 00:52:18.956
people contact you.

00:52:18.956 --> 00:52:19.936
Yeah, I am.

00:52:19.936 --> 00:52:22.557
I'm currently working on a book actually about divorce.

00:52:22.557 --> 00:52:31.402
I'm a child of divorce and I think that it's another important topic that I want to talk about, as well as like advocating for children.

00:52:31.402 --> 00:52:54.172
So I'm writing a book that has a child that has parents going through a divorce in different situations, but at the end of the book it has questions that that child has, that your child might have, so that it can prompt conversations that parents might not be thinking about or that can open up communication with their children during the adoption process or during the divorce process.

00:52:58.815 --> 00:53:08.815
And my hope is that both families would have the book because it ends with saying goodnight to their other parents so that when they're separated from them, there's this unified front of it's okay to talk about your other parent, just like in adoption.

00:53:08.876 --> 00:53:13.525
It's okay Like just because we didn't work out doesn't mean that they're not your mom and not your dad anymore.

00:53:13.525 --> 00:53:14.927
It's okay.

00:53:14.927 --> 00:53:21.856
And so it's been difficult because it is such a heavy, hard topic and it is a little bit more of a glass half empty.

00:53:21.856 --> 00:53:33.942
So it's been a struggle to make it a half full with while still allowing for those difficult emotions to be represented, and that it is a difficult situation but that will be coming out in 2025.

00:53:33.942 --> 00:53:36.824
And so I'm looking forward to it.

00:53:36.824 --> 00:53:58.688
It's been hard, but I have, again, a lot of input from my family, from friends who are, you know, children of divorce, who are divorced themselves with children, and so I just I want to make it normal, I want to make the conversations normal in households, and if I can help start those conversations, then that's all I could ask for, and so that's what I'm doing next year.

00:53:58.688 --> 00:53:59.891
That's the beginning.

00:54:25.295 --> 00:54:29.882
And so I loved how you put it together and just like with the divorce thing or with being adopted you know there's so much shame and blame that goes around's going to be animals.

00:54:29.882 --> 00:54:41.905
That way different family dynamics can be represented, that way it can tell a story of these animals going through this divorce but it, you know, anyone can see themselves in them.

00:54:41.905 --> 00:54:46.655
So again can be a little bit more of a universal thing with universal situations.

00:54:46.655 --> 00:54:48.884
And I have gotten input because I have siblings.

00:54:48.884 --> 00:54:49.918
I have a.

00:54:50.282 --> 00:55:00.617
My dad biologically had children before him and my mom adopted me, and so I've talked to them about their experience, which was very different from mine, with their divorce with their mom and dad and the divorce of my mom and dad.

00:55:00.617 --> 00:55:16.166
So it's really a beautiful thing that I've been given the gift to be able to experience other people's experiences, because it really has opened up my world as well, where I was aware of other people's situations.

00:55:16.166 --> 00:55:28.137
But it's connected me more with my siblings, seeing where they came from and seeing how our father maybe wasn't present with them but was with me and how that made them feel as his biological children.

00:55:28.137 --> 00:55:32.327
And even though there was an awareness, I had never heard it from them.

00:55:32.327 --> 00:55:34.188
So I think that's been a really powerful thing.

00:55:34.188 --> 00:55:45.240
That's come from writing these books and hearing other people's stories and meeting you and hearing your stories and your children, and I think it's just, it's a really beautiful gift that these books have given me.

00:55:46.996 --> 00:55:52.777
Yeah, I think it's great that you're so open to everybody where they are.

00:55:52.777 --> 00:55:56.300
You're just okay with it and that's.

00:55:56.300 --> 00:56:14.501
I think that that's a huge message in this podcast and speaking with you is just how beautifully you're able to meet with everybody right where they are and you're okay, and you don't need them to change to be something else to be able to have a connection with them.

00:56:14.501 --> 00:56:18.047
You're just okay with them being them.

00:56:18.047 --> 00:56:19.297
That is so great.

00:56:19.297 --> 00:56:22.025
What a great message that we could all have right now, right.

00:56:22.534 --> 00:56:22.856
It is.

00:56:22.856 --> 00:56:27.947
It's so great and it's also that it's okay if the world doesn't love you.

00:56:27.947 --> 00:56:29.818
You know the people in your life love you.

00:56:29.818 --> 00:56:30.561
You love yourself.

00:56:30.561 --> 00:56:32.166
You have to be really secure with yourself.

00:56:32.166 --> 00:56:35.623
There'll be days that you're not, but it's okay to let go of relationships.

00:56:35.623 --> 00:56:44.715
It's okay to have new relationships, it's okay to outgrow ones or grow in a different direction with people, and it is a loss and you can feel that loss, but that's part of growing.

00:56:44.715 --> 00:56:49.398
You know, I know there are people in my life who have come into my life and then left it.

00:56:49.398 --> 00:56:52.739
But they left their mark, they left part of their journey with me.

00:56:52.760 --> 00:56:58.882
I'm grateful for that and I think that that's something that, like you said, it's accepting people where they're at.

00:56:58.882 --> 00:57:15.431
That's an acknowledgement where I want people to meet me where I'm at, and so that means that I have to be able to do the same and that's like a reflection in of you know, if I'm having a hard day, I need to acknowledge that to my husband, to my friends of right now.

00:57:15.431 --> 00:57:23.896
I'm here and I'm sorry, it's not about you, this is a me thing, but I'm letting you know.00:57:23.896 --> 00:57:24.315


This is where I am.00:57:24.315 --> 00:57:26.175


And so today, this is I'm at a, I'm at a 20, I'm not at a hundred.00:57:26.175 --> 00:57:30.978


And then the next day, okay, I'm at an 80 and maybe you're at a 30, and I'm going to meet you where you are and I got you.00:57:31.798 --> 00:57:34.920


And it's acknowledging that and being aware of that.00:57:34.920 --> 00:57:49.925


And then, if people aren't, it's okay to say, okay, well, I understand you can't meet me where I'm at, but that's what I need in my life right now, because I'm a mom and I'm working and I'm exhausted and I'm doing all these things, and that's okay, and you're going to have your life and I'm going to have mine, and that's okay.00:57:49.925 --> 00:57:52.726


There's no ill will, there's no anything.00:57:52.726 --> 00:58:00.510


It's just we have two different lives that don't seem to intermesh the way our lives need to right now, and maybe they will one day and maybe they won't, and that's okay.00:58:00.929 --> 00:58:08.632


It's okay, we have full lives and you don't have to be a people pleaser all the time.00:58:08.632 --> 00:58:24.503


You can do what's best for you and your family and the people that are meant to be a part of that journey fall into place and you'll put the work in where other people put the work in, and you'll meet each other where you need to, and so forth, giving yourself permission, you know.00:58:24.663 --> 00:58:25.746


I mean I think that's so great.00:58:25.746 --> 00:58:35.543


I don't think that that little girl that sat in those circles, not being able to read the way everybody else could in the classroom, could see herself doing these things today.00:58:35.543 --> 00:58:53.030


So I just think, you know that is a testament to, and that should allow any other kid that is out there right now, or even an adult who's having some of the same struggles that look you can do it too, who's having some of the same struggles that look you can do it too.00:58:53.030 --> 00:58:59.438


Look what Sasha has done and you're doing absolutely amazing.00:58:59.438 --> 00:59:00.161


So thank you so absolutely much.00:59:00.161 --> 00:59:01.226


Can anybody get in contact?00:59:01.246 --> 00:59:02.431


with you on your website, or how would you like people?00:59:02.431 --> 00:59:03.454


Yeah, my website, sashasedmancom.00:59:03.454 --> 00:59:09.679


And then I have an Instagram, facebook and TikTok that are all under Sasha Sedman, so people can always message me there.00:59:09.679 --> 00:59:19.204


My email is Sasha at SashaSedmancom, so people can always email me there and we can chat, we can connect, we can, you know, meet each other where we're at.00:59:20.456 --> 00:59:21.400


That's so beautiful.00:59:21.400 --> 00:59:22.960


Well, thank you so much.00:59:22.960 --> 00:59:26.103


I've really enjoyed this conversation with you, Sasha.00:59:26.684 --> 00:59:27.204


Thank you.00:59:27.204 --> 00:59:28.007


No, this was great.00:59:28.007 --> 00:59:30.643


I had such a great time hearing your story and sharing mine.00:59:36.655 --> 00:59:37.237


And for our listeners.00:59:37.237 --> 00:59:38.503


Thank you so much for joining us and listening to her story.00:59:38.503 --> 00:59:45.224


And I get out there and read her books because they are absolutely amazing and the illustrations are, so they're put together so beautifully with this story.00:59:45.224 --> 00:59:49.117


So, anyway, thank you so much for listening and we will see you next time.