Embracing New Beginnings Amidst Grief and Loss

Speaker 1: 0:08

Welcome to Real Talk. I am Tina.

Speaker 2: 0:11

And I am Ann. We just finished a two-part series on grief. Tina's dog, georgie, had passed away. And well, how are you doing, tina?

Speaker 1: 0:23

You know I've been asked that a few times. First I'm sick, so apologize for my foolish, but it's not even an easy question to answer anymore and you can tell I'm already getting emotional about it. I'm sorry. I'm glad you asked. It's not bad. It's just that it changes from day to day. Sometimes within the day I am missing both of my dogs like crazy. We had my very best friend. His name was Cooper. My other dog passed away over two years ago and I'm just I'm missing both of their presence, their comfort. I literally last night I couldn't sleep well because I'm not feeling well and literally sobbed in a ball on the couch last night.

Speaker 2: 1:11

Isn't that crazy that you know we're sad that our pet has passed away, but they're the very one that we need in order to comfort us, to help us feel better. Yeah, I just came across a picture of my best friend, Daisy, who I rescued a few years ago. She had passed away and you know it. Just, it still hurts. It still hurts just as much. I'm sorry that you're hurting. You know, the loss of a pet is so deep because I think we can love them deeper, because we can bear all with them, with no hesitation.

Speaker 1: 1:50

That gets me right in the heart. You're so, you're so right about that. It's really just that unconditional love it really is. There's nothing like a dog.

Speaker 2: 2:03

No, there really isn't. And my cats and my dogs and I even had a bird at one time and I felt the same way about him. I know Just when you look at them you can see their soul and it's just, it's just really special. Anyway, I guess that we need to get talking about this episode. Just had a pretty amazing thing happen to me this week and I came to a crossroads where I said to myself if you want this, you have to go get it.

Speaker 1: 2:37

Oh, I can't wait to hear about it. What is it?

Speaker 2: 2:40

Well, my life has been on hold for the last few years. Since COVID. I used to have a real job, but life took its turns and here I am and, yeah, my life has been different than it's ever been in my life. Actually, most of my time has been appointments and taking care of kids. This is the first year that all three of my kids are in school, with them all being special needs, though. There's been lots of appointments and I still am not ready or able to do a regular, you know brick and mortar, like nine to five or, but I've never stopped working. Plus, I'm always writing, podcasting, youtube being, you know, working on my photography, and I'm always looking for ways to create. I just let doors open and see where things take me. So I just stay open and get my brand out there as much as I can, if that's what you want to call it, but I'm always excited for that next chapter, whatever it might be. I've always had this mentality, even all day. I just do things. That I'm constantly telling myself just do something to move forward in all of your goals, whatever that is. If I'm doing something, just make sure you're moving forward in that. As long as I'm changing and evolving. I'm always becoming.

Speaker 1: 4:03

You definitely are gifted in this way. I truly and I mean this I don't know how you do all of that you do daily. You run circles around me and I thought I was someone who could do a lot in a day. But I've heard the saying imperfect progress is still progress and I always try to remember that.

Speaker 2: 4:25

You know I really love that, and I want to say that you are gifted as well, and I'm not sure about me running circles around you, because I know your schedule. It's pretty crazy. You do a lot.

Speaker 1: 4:38

I'm a lot of mom schedules crazy.

Speaker 2: 4:40

Yeah, I think that that's just part of it. So there are two things that have hit me this week. One is I've been given opportunities to start speaking again and they came to me, so I'm excited to have some monetary gigs again. But the other thing that hit me was in you've been here before and what has held you back so, honestly, some things I couldn't help at all have happened and I think we all have real life events that causes to prioritize and put ourselves and our goals on hold. But I first got this mindset very young and I think this has shaped me after my dad died and my mom gave my sister into the system, which I've covered in other episodes. But my aunt had said to me some thing along the lines of me taking care of my mom after my dad had passed away, and I used to remember the exact quote. I don't remember it now, but I knew what she was trying to say and I never forgot that message. I don't think she meant it the way that she did, but I did feel that obligation. You know, if you say something to a child that really puts a lot on them, you really have to think about that because they might not be able to handle it at the time and it really I could feel that weight. It was just myself and my adopted my mom Shortly after my dad died and she fell and she broke her arm and I was probably 12 at the time and I remember the ambulance and the people surrounding her. And there was another time where, shortly after that, she got pneumonia and I had to stay with her friends overnight and these were people that I barely knew. And then I had to stay with my aunts a couple of times because she was in the hospital. When she got home I just felt this sense of having to take care of her and I became the one who mowed the lawn and I did all the outside stuff. I just had to always be home to take care of her when my friends and people you know my peers were doing other things. So I gave up following my dream of going to school outside of state because I needed to stay close. I've always wondered if I chose my path or if it was chosen for me. You know.

Speaker 1: 7:07

Yeah, that's a hard question to ponder, but I wonder if you know off air we were talking about how you have trouble just sitting back and relaxing and I wonder if it goes back to these times with your mom.

Speaker 2: 7:23

You know maybe I'm not really sure I have always felt a strong sense of obligation to her until her last breath, and it could be because of some of that and why I stay busy, I don't know. But I had to take care of her regardless of anything else, and I moved my family we were living where I had gone to college, we moved out there and but she started having a bunch of health issues. I moved my entire family back to my childhood area. When she got older and she had unfortunately gotten remarried which lasted a minute, which robbed her of my dad's navy pension and her social security. So she didn't have an income really. I mean, she did buy a house and she sold her business, but she had gotten herself into a situation where she had minimal income with no savings. So she was in a bad situation and also sick. She had broken her knee and her surgery caused a stab infection which went into her blood. So I had to, two times a day, give her you know medicine in her pick line, and that went on for several months and they trained me how to do it. So I was the only one that could do it at that time and she couldn't even buy her own medicine. So it got to the point where I was like, if I want to be with my family too, I have to move them here with me and give up my life where I was living in order to take care of her. And it changed our lives forever and I'm not sure I made the right choice. But again, I put my life on hold for her. I still worked, I worked in the jails and I got my master's and I wrote a book and I was a journalist for eight years. So I mean, I had a life, but I changed course for her because of my obligation. I'm not saying what I did was right or wrong, but it is what I did. And life takes us on our journeys and you don't realize how decisions really do take you down different paths.

Speaker 1: 9:41

Yeah, so much truth there. And my mom was diagnosed three years ago, at the age of 59, with early onset Alzheimer's and to say that it has shattered me is an understatement Absolutely my worst nightmare for her. For me, it just I don't know anyone who's like, yay, it's just Alzheimer's. You know what I mean and I live with the thought in the back of my mind every day if this is going to happen to me too. So I am my mom's secondary caregiver and she lives 45 minutes from me. I do have a day job, a part time job, monday through Friday, and I do juggle two different school schedules. Plus I have a toddler, and I've had to learn, through counseling multiple counselors, what I can do and what I need to let go of. I've had to learn, and I'm still learning, healthy boundaries and then how to manage my guilt from them, because at the end of the day, I do need to care for the people that live in my home first. It doesn't mean that I don't love and care for my mom, but it means that I was told by both of my counselors that it's very hard to be daughter and caregiver. What they're saying to me is that rarely works out because, yes, of course you can help out with caregiving sometimes, but really what my mom needs is me to be daughter. I don't want to be the one fighting with her to take medicine or we need to do this or that. I want to be there for the love that family means to her, if that's making sense. It's been something I've struggled with a little bit, because whenever you set boundaries you will have to manage guilt. But it has also been a really good thing for me and for my family to see that I'm doing both. But I'm not going to give up my life, and my mom would not want me to do that. She would not want me to give up my life and the time with my precious young boys. As much as there is part of me that just wants to quit everything and care for her, it's really not what she would want. I'm really trying hard to remember that and still see her, but also still be here.

Speaker 2: 12:03

I really cherish you and the decisions that you have made are just admirable really. I wish that I would have had that in me more than I did. I mean, my older two were pretty young when I had to move my family like that and it was decisions that I made and I tried really hard to and that's why I moved them there, because I felt that pull. I didn't have anybody else to take care of her. I didn't have any other family to do that, so it was me or nobody was going to do that. So I had to figure out some kind of a balance and I hope that I did that. Plus, my kids got to be there with her in those later years, which was important too. So I don't know.

Speaker 1: 13:01

I think it plays out the way it's supposed to. That's really how I feel.

Speaker 2: 13:06

You're right. That's a really good point, tina. Everybody's story is different and everybody's situation is what it needs to be. That's a really good point, thank you.

Speaker 1: 13:21

Even with my sickness, I can come up with something every now and again.

Speaker 2: 13:24

I am sorry about your mom and, yes, I wish I would have found more of a balance for myself along the way. But it is admirable that you have done this at your age and realized you have to take care of your family and you and you still are taking care of your mom. You've just found that balance. I know that you have always worked hard to get where you are on the radio and in everything else in your life, but I have to be honest. I can say it two different ways. Either I could have gotten here sooner, because when I was a kid, all I did was write, draw. I was in acting, all I wanted to do was create content and it was my dream. And here I am doing the dream and I'm finally here. It just took a long time because I allowed other things to get in my way or chose to take care of other things which deterred me from getting here sooner, or I could say this was just God's timing.

Speaker 1: 14:22

Yeah, that's what I believe, and you know, whether you believe in God or not, I just think that timing I don't find it to be coincidental, so I think it's with the purpose, the time that we do things or don't do things, or are able to handle things or not. You know, I tell myself, and sometimes I've said this to my boys there's nothing that can deter you from the path that God wants you to take. You know, there are going to be bumps in the road, there are going to be people who are jealous, who want to be you, who want you to not succeed, but at the end of the day, I don't think even they can get in the path of what the plan is. Maybe it does take you a little longer, but I do think you get there. And you're right, life has never been just handed to me, that's for sure, and while it's been hard sometimes, I'm really proud to say that I am self-made. I've really worked my butt off for all the things that I'm blessed to have, and I do think that it's all in good timing.

Speaker 2: 15:28

Yeah, and I just want to touch on what you said about the jealousy thing. I mean, you know, everybody has their thing and they're amazing whatever they're amazing in, and they have a different path and a different journey than anybody else. So nobody should compare or be jealous of anybody else. And it's all about hard work, you know. It's about what you put into it. So I am really proud of you and I look at everything as a stepping stone or what I always call it, a mile marker. I've always taken my time getting to where I am and I had a lot to do with my past and just being ready. So, yes, I could have gotten here sooner, and I've been here before, but I allow God's timing too, and I really feel that this is different. It just feels different to me. Everything we go through gets us to where we are going. No, in some sense I held myself back because of fear, maybe because of associations to success. It wasn't all life's circumstances. For example, I had just had my youngest adult child move out of my house when, less than a year later, I got the phone call from Children's Services that they had removed my now adopted grandkids because I adopted them, but they had been removed by police and I had to meet the police at Children's Services immediately to come get them. I mean, I didn't have anything, I didn't have any preparation. That was a life changing event that then, for the next six years, kept my dreams on hold. But then again I think but did it? Yes, my life had been focused on them, but also, I cannot let my fears and associations of success hold me back when I have opportunities.

Speaker 1: 17:18

Well, I love that, I love all that you've done for your grandkids, who are actually your children now. And you know maybe it did and maybe it was in the cards all along, but I think it goes back to what we just spoke of a few moments ago that I'm just a firm believer in timing and, in particular, the right timing.

Speaker 2: 17:39

You know, my dad's death really stopped me in my tracks when I was at the height of my swimming, and my aunt's death kept my family from coming to my graduation party. So I didn't have one. Now there's a there's a point to all of this. My fear stopped me from graduating from college one class short, until I had a teacher say the right thing to me and I finally took that last class and got that degree. But I watched my class graduate and get their diplomas and I sat in the audience and I watched them. I wouldn't go up there. I had many other examples of this, but I'll skip them and just say that, um, I used to speak. I wrote a book which led to a lot of speaking engagements. I used to be a journalist, which led to some awards, which led to some speaking. And I used to speak as an autism advocate, even at the state level, in front of hundreds, and here I am starting over again. So during that time I had even been asked to be on a county board as the autism representative. And you know why I didn't do it? I'm going to guess fear. Well, let me just back up a little bit. Because you know, yes, fear, because I had made associations of good things happening and I had stopped short of every single time which we had talked about before. But let me go back to when I got my bachelors. Finishing my bachelors was such a success to me that I know now that I was stopping short of that and I know how that. Getting up on that stage to get my diploma was the same as getting that trophy the first time I got first in swimming. So after my dad I didn't go up there and get that award. So it was an association that I had made, a fear association that I had made also later in my life. I was working for someone and that's what I'm talking about now and I had an amazing opportunity and because my boss discouraged me, I didn't do it and I felt a fear. I felt that fear and I allowed someone else in this situation not myself, but I did allow someone else To keep me from choosing something good for me. And you know, when I had this particular recent opportunity to start speaking again, this was how my mind went and I thought of things that could or would hold me back, the obstacles, but I asked myself what I used to ask the women in the jail. How bad do you want this? Since even this offer to speak, I have had some things fall in place and I feel that block. It's like this literal block that I can feel myself pushing myself through. How?

Speaker 1: 20:44

you describe that so beautifully, and I think the best part is that you inspire people to push through. Not everybody would, and, on the same token, I feel like I should also say not every door is meant to be open, so being able to decipher that, I think, is a gift as well. I read something this morning that I loved and made me think of you. It said don't talk yourself out of wanting something just because you haven't figured out how to get it yet.

Speaker 2: 21:15

I really love that and it's true, yeah, it's so true, and it is words to live by, whether it be my disabilities block or my trauma block or my loss block. You know, tina, I have mentioned some things for my childhood but it comes down to work and I learned really, really young for my biological mom and I know I've talked about her some, but you know she let me feel like I wasn't worth anything and that has stayed with me. She was a woman of the streets and she was wise and ways that most moms are not, and she had been through it and I had been a product of rape, which I talked about honestly. You know she, until her death, didn't let me forget that. And she let me know that even her front teeth were knocked out because my dad had found out that she was pregnant with me and beat her and not her teeth out because of it. And she looked right at me, pointed at her teeth, and said this is because of you. And she also let me know that I was not wanted. When she, she said you know, one of her things was she would say to me you were a dry birth, you were a pain in the ass from the beginning. So I had a lot of worth feelings and that has really held me back from being. That is a crazy thing to say, but my feelings of unworthiness kept me back from being from thriving. This is something I regret and you know, I still have to remind myself that I am worth something. I don't want to do that anymore. It is crazy how things like this can hold us back from being our best selves Our entire lives, and you know, words are so important.

Speaker 1: 23:07

Yeah, they are. We talk to ourselves the most of anyone else and so it matters how we talk to ourselves. So we need to be kind to ourselves. You know you wouldn't tell me that, oh, you're worthless, because you feel a certain way, and we shouldn't be telling ourselves that what we say to ourselves in the privacy of our own minds matters, and I feel like this is a good time to Really relate to you on worth you just kind of like? Well, yeah, I felt that the unworthiness before many times, but in particular it hit me in my early twenties when I confronted my biological dad and said why did you give me up when I was younger? Why did you let another person adopt me? Yeah, I said to me, because you asked. He said what was I supposed to do? And I looked at him and I said, dad, I was six years old and all I knew is that I wanted a dad and I'll never forget him. Laughing at me right then and there, and said well, maybe if you would have told me this, like when you were a lot younger, maybe I would have cared. Yeah, right to my face, my now husband was there. I'll never forget it. It was in my apartment and it was. He was over giving christmas gifts and I remember I took everything he just brought, I threw it over the balcony and I kicked him out of my apartment and I Not talking to him so that I could heal. And if you want to know the good news, we have a probably the best relationship we've ever had. Best meaning that's that he and I have ever had doesn't mean that it's Great, but we do frequently. Text, I should say, is how we usually choose to communicate, but I've healed from it. But I can totally relate to the feelings of unworthiness.

Speaker 2: 25:09

And there's a lot about you, tina, that you've allowed him back in your life to the degree that you are willing to let him in and you know you still keep that balance. You still keep the distance that is healthy enough for you and you're, you know, still can maintain somewhat of a relationship with him. I mean, that really is amazing.

Speaker 1: 25:32

It's taken a lot, a lot, a lot of hard work, because that's only the tip of the iceberg with him.

Speaker 2: 25:39

Yeah, and I'm so sorry. I mean, I just don't understand why people like you.

Speaker 1: 25:45

I don't understand how you know a mother could say that, but my one of my favorite go-tos is hurt people, hurt people, yeah, and I'm staying there when someone is hurt, like deeply hurt. They hurt other people, either intentionally or not knowing.

Speaker 2: 26:04

You know I just heard this thing today that most people do not work through their trauma.

Speaker 1: 26:10

Most people don't. I totally agree with that. But I am on a mission. I am not most people just like you. That's what I think is so great about us and truly, and those listening, I feel like we don't want to be in that statistic, right.

Speaker 2: 26:27

Right and I, when I was listening to this lady, I was like, yeah, I mean, this is a great episode on becoming, because we are becoming and we're not allowing that stuff to define us and, you know, hold us back and control us like it has in the past and, you know, even when we were kind of sitting in it for a minute, it is getting us to where we are today, and so that's why I'm really grateful that I think that we aren't the statistic we are working through.

Speaker 1: 27:03

So absolutely determined to. I mean, I am currently in trauma therapy and I'm just. I want to give myself and my family my very, very best chance.

Speaker 2: 27:16

Well, it's taken me years and years and years to get to the point where I am, and I like me actually, and I don't let others define me, even if they did give birth to me, to not let others words about my worth become my beliefs.

Speaker 1: 27:34

You really tiered me up right there. How powerful to be able to say I like me, that's so good and that's so good. And I think it's a challenge for a lot of people, including myself at times.

Speaker 2: 27:51

Well, here is a favorite quote on becoming. It was given to me from my counselor friend. We actually she started as a counselor and then we became friends. She put a message in the book to me from the Velveteen rabbit. When she gave me the book that said to the one who likes things real because that is me, I like things real, but do you want to read it, tina?

Speaker 1: 28:14

I do. Real isn't how you are made, said the skin horse. It's a thing that happens to you when a child loves you for a long, long time not just to play with, but really loves you Then you become real. Does it hurt, ask the rabbit. Sometimes, said the skin horse, for he was always truthful. When you are real, you don't mind being hurt. Does it happen all at once, like being wound up, he asked, or bit by bit? It doesn't happen all at once. Of the skin horse you become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily or have sharp edges or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are real, most of your hair has been loved off and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all because once you are real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand.

Speaker 2: 29:12

It's beautiful. That gets me every single time.

Speaker 1: 29:17

Oh, it's so good. I remember that exact quote from the Velveteen rabbit jumping out at me when I was a young girl. It is so beautiful, absolutely. Thank you all for joining us this week as we become and continue becoming.