The Profound Influence of Trauma

Speaker 1: 0:08

Welcome to Real Talk with Tina and Anne. Next week we will be back with our usual episodes, but we are taking one more week to revisit our beginnings. We will be listening to episode two, stuck on Success. This was a tough one for me, as I shared about the passing of my dad and what happened with my sister, but we share these things. To be real and honest, we do this to help others. I was talking with someone who listened to our podcast tonight and she told me that what Tina and I are doing is a mission. That's probably the best compliment that someone could give us, because when Tina and I started the mission that's the word we used. We always wanted to take our content and even if it just helped one person, it had purpose. There is purpose to the pain and hope in the journey. That's what we often say. Speaking of pain and hope, tina had recently been in Hawaii, not too far away from the devastating fire, and our thoughts and prayers are with the people there. We are greatly saddened by the devastating loss. Many, many hugs and prayers are being sent your way. Well, let's get back to the episode. Here is episode two, and what's the most interesting thing about this episode is that it shares where Tina was before her Hawaii trip and it ties in with her recent transformation. We will join you next week for an all-new episode. Thank you so much for listening. Welcome to Real Talk with Tina and Ann. I am Ann.

Speaker 2: 1:44

I am Tina. Thanks for joining us on our second episode.

Speaker 1: 1:49

Hey, tina, you know this week I don't know about you, but I know that I have really gone through it this week. We've had a pretty tough time. How about you? Yeah?

Speaker 2: 2:00

it's definitely been a week of struggle. Over here. I'm on the struggle bus. As I say, the past few days for sure have been challenging in a variety of ways, for myself, for my family. Learning things about yourself, at least for me, isn't always easy. I'm currently in therapy and healing is hard and messy and I feel like I'm in the exhausting phase of it right now. I really feel like I need a break, honestly, from trying so hard to heal. That makes sense.

Speaker 1: 2:38

Yeah, it really does. Sometimes the healing is it is exhausting. I have had times in my life where I feel like you've run a marathon and you just can't go any further. So it's tough stuff. We've had some similar things going on here, with some healing, some new things too, that are going on. We had a lot of meetings this week. Balance has also been hard with me and I really need balance in order to keep sane. As you know, I have three kids and sometimes it's hard to find that balance. Meetings right now about my daughter have been a little frustrating right now, with some things going on at school. Don't get me wrong, I love the school, but we are just a little frustrated. I know that they're trying and I got to give them that.

Speaker 2: 3:39

You know, kids in school and then juggling everything in between and each specific need of each child, sometimes I feel like it just can be too much. And as for needing balance, goodness, I could use some balance and I definitely need time to myself, and I just sometimes don't get that either, and it just I feel like it makes me all out of whack for longer than I'd like to be Exactly. But what is going on with your daughter's school? Do you want to talk about it?

Speaker 1: 4:13

I can. I mean, I don't want to talk anything negative about the school district because I genuinely love the people. Everybody has worked so hard to be to help all three of my kids. But right now my daughter's hit a wall, I guess you could say, and she's scared. She's only eight years old, so she's trying to. She trying to get her to move forward without traumatizing her is going to be hard in the situation that's going on right now. She has this big event she has to read this nonfiction book that she wrote for all the parents coming up and she has been shutting down. She's only in second grade and this is a big thing to ask. I mean, that's just my personal opinion, I don't know, maybe that is hard for anyone right.

Speaker 2: 5:09

Yeah, Essentially that's what that is.

Speaker 1: 5:12

Exactly. She is petrified. Her shutting down right now is looking like she's refusing, and that's how the school is taking it that she's refusing. So I keep trying to talk to the school and explain to them. That is not what's going on. So right now we are just stuck and I'm not really sure how to handle it. So we're trying to figure it out here. Plus, on top of that, we have a family member that has a really big surgery going on in a couple weeks and all she's doing is thinking about the surgery, while she's also trying to prepare this for this event. So they're kind of getting intertwined together, where she's making this association between this book and the surgery. So she is forming this association which, being autistic, that's what she's probably going to hold on to. So there's that.

Speaker 2: 6:22

That's a lot, your sweet daughter. That's a lot for anyone to handle when being so young. I know that you're such a gift to your children and that you will stop at nothing to figure out what works for her and how you will handle this together as a family. I wish I had some magic words that would say, oh, do this, or oh, you could try this. But I just don't, and sometimes I feel like that's part of life is trial and error. We're given these things and we have to figure out how to navigate them.

Speaker 1: 7:04

You know, I had the magic words for her. I don't. All I'm trying to do is let her know that she feels validated in her, and then I'm trying to be her voice with the teachers. So sometimes and like I said, I don't want to say anything negative about them, but she is a very special needs kid in a gen ed classroom and so I feel like I have to speak up for her a lot of times and help them understand her, because she really does have a difficult time getting across to anybody really what's going on inside. So you know, we're just trying to work through this the best that we can, and what we're trying to do here is put one foot in front of the other, because you know that's what we have to do, I think that's such good advice, and I heard a coach say it once just a local coach where we live and who was a friend of ours your best is enough, you know it has to start there and I haven't had this exact type of shutdown happen, but I have been unable to put one foot forward out of fear or self-doubt or plain old overwhelmed anxiety, exhaustion, whatever you want to call it.

Speaker 2: 8:28

So my heart breaks because when you feel stuck it, is hard to move.

Speaker 1: 8:36

Yeah, it's that stuck. I mean, you know, when I was a kid, I can remember the day, my T and I can remember it vividly. I don't know why, but I was leaving the classroom and my teacher said to, she stopped me and she said you know, anna, wanna talk to you for a second? And I said yeah. And she said why are you the only one not taking notes? And I said I don't know and I really didn't know. Now my adult self, now that I know you know, looking this many years back, I can say why, but my 15 year old self didn't know. I really had no idea. I was not trying to refuse to do the work and that's what I'm trying to say about what's going on with my daughter. But I have autism as well and some executive functioning issues and I was not able to listen, retain, take the notes and put it all down correctly. So this was very hard for me to do all at the same time. I wasn't refusing, but I couldn't word it that way to my teacher for her to understand what was going on with me at the time.

Speaker 2: 9:51

Wow, you know hindsight is 2020, right, you know, to be able to now. You know you know, have that fun. I can totally relate. So I get this overwhelmed feeling. I don't know if anyone else gets like this, but large group texts instantly drain me. In fact, I had a sports team that my son will be on. The coach said, hey, do you want to be a part of this group text? And I said no. And I said I'm sorry, it overwhelms me. Can my husband be a part of it instead? And she didn't respect my boundary and added me to this group text and I can't get out of it. I tried. I don't have the option and I know it might sound like so it's just ignored and I do. I have it muted. But there were 45 alerts on my phone from that message and all it made me do is immediately shut down. I didn't even go back and look at them, I just immediately shut down. It was just too much. So maybe I can relate a little bit to you, know what you're talking about. It wasn't that I'm refusing to answer the message, but I don't want to be a part of something that overwhelms me so much and I don't even know why it does. I don't know if it's because if I don't start I can't keep up and I don't know. But I just can't handle that type of thing.

Speaker 1: 11:26

And the thing is is that it should be okay for you not to be able to handle it and you say that you don't want to be a part of it, and they should listen to that, they should respect how you feel. So I mean, it's not okay that they aren't.

Speaker 2: 11:40

And I appreciate that, because that's how I felt too, and I thought maybe I'm taking it too much to heart. But then, when I even said privately that this group message really overwhelms me if I don't respond in a timely manner and you need something from me, please feel free to reach out to myself or my husband and the response that I got I don't think was meant in the way that I interpreted it, but it was something along the line of well, I have to send an additional, just singular message to another mom who had brain surgery, so I'll send it to you too. And I thought, huh, well, I didn't have brain surgery, but it still overwhelms me. So there came another piece of I don't know if you would call it self doubt. What that did to me was like oh well, you know she made me feel less than because I didn't have this issue. I still find it to be overwhelming. Yeah yeah, does that make sense?

Speaker 1: 12:44

It does, and people just need to respect what we're saying. Now I know that my daughter is only eight years old and the job of the teachers is to get her to stay on track as well as the job of my teachers back then, and they're just asking a question. But there comes a time where you really do have to realize that there is a difference between refusal and shutting down and there could be, and you know what, it could just be a boundary that you're putting up and we have to respect that boundary.

Speaker 2: 13:26

Yeah, you're, you're so right. Just Little things that start to add up to be big things, because I put the boundary up and I feel like it was crossed and now I Feel like we're we're playing a game of chicken, if you will. It's like I don't know where to go and I feel so bad for your daughter because I can only imagine you know my adult self versus her. You know child self. Yeah, I'm struggling with it. So I can only imagine how it's impacting her. So it makes me feel bad because teachers have such a hard job, no doubt about it. But it does take a village and everybody does learn differently and and they're trying in the classroom and I think there just needs to be so much more grace.

Speaker 1: 14:17

Yeah, and you know what we're talking about with the association that she could be making now as a child and it. It just really bothers me because when we're talking about getting Stuff before success here and this particular episode Associations that we can make really as a kid or as an adult but I want to talk about something that happened to me when I was a kid and it's still a huge Association that still stays with me today that I fight. When I was 11 years old. First of all, I say that I Was probably one of the best swimmers in the area. Not to brag or anything, because I'm not that good now, so I'm just saying, but back in the day I was pretty good. I was a I. I swam all over this state that I live in and some surrounding states and even traveled pretty far, and it swimming was my life. I would get up super early and everything that I did and my Dad was my biggest cheerleader. He was just everything to me and you know, when you're a kid, your parents are One of the the biggest part of your world really, and I was only 11 years old and he traveled with me everywhere. He was right at the end of my block every single time I would get out and when he was right there to wrap my towel around me and he was just so proud of me. So one day I was at swim practice and A neighbor picked me up instead of my mom and I was like what's going on? That's kind of strange. And they're like, oh well, your dad's just. You know, he had to have some tests done at the hospital and, long story short, you know I had to go to their house instead of my house and then a phone call rang. I can still remember that. You know I'm aging myself, but I was watching happy days at the time on a Tuesday night at 8 o'clock. That's how a specific and vivid it is within me still to this day. And the phone rang and then they said, okay, you can go home now. And they drove me up and dropped me off and I go into the house and there's lots of cars and you know all these people are crying and they just look at me and just all these eyes were staring at me and my mom said something about my dad and I'm like, well, is he sick? And she said yeah. And I said, could he die? And I don't even know why I went there right away. I guess I was reading the room and she said yes. And I said, well, did he? And she said yes. Now I don't remember anything after that, except for they said that I threw a book. I don't have any memory of that. But from that Moment because you know life is just supposed to pick up and you're just supposed to Keep going, and I call it mile markers, or at times in your life where just your entire life goes off course and ends up taking a different direction, and that person in me, that was a winning person. I mean, what I knew was how to get in that pool and win. The first time I won, after my dad died, I Refused to go up and get my medal and then after that I would Purposefully lose. I don't know why it just I would slow down before I hit that wall and I would let everybody hit that wall before me. I mean, that's stopping myself from winning was then spread Throughout my life. I cannot tell you how many times I have stopped myself right before success. Still, the fear just overtakes me to the point where I Cannot do that thing anymore. And at that point I didn't even know I was doing it or know that there had been an association made. So it's like if you swim and your favorite person dies, then you just don't want to get in that pool anymore. And I just kept trying. But I just couldn't do it because I related everything To my dad's death. That turned out to be anything that was good. Anything good just became Well, my dad could die, or you know, he had already died, but something really bad else could happen. So the rest of my young adult life was changed. My smile went away. I went from a lot of friends to only a couple friends. When I was a kid and my best friend left. My sister was given to the system by my mom because Having two kids was too much. I mean, it was just a horrible time.

Speaker 2: 19:34

Oh, I don't have any dry eyes over here and and I'm really speechless. Really that's hard to do. You know, my mom told me no, you know it.

Speaker 1: 19:50

it was so much trauma in a very short period of time and the thing of it was that we really never dealt with it. My dad died in the November of you know that year and then, by that summer of the following year, my mom told me that my sister was just gonna be given to the system. And she pulled me aside and I can still remember it that she told me that she was gonna put her in the system because she was bad, was her words, and she just couldn't handle two kids and I wasn't allowed to tell her that she was leaving. So my sister was so excited that day. She was just all bubbly and smiles because she thought that she was going to my aunt's house to visit but then what ended up happening was I watched her walk out that door, happy, and I knew that she was never coming back, and it was something that I could never shake, because I owned what the adults were doing. I owned it, and it's still something that still bothers me today.

Speaker 2: 21:05

Oh, that's a lot, Anne. That's just a lot of heavy and something that should never been placed on your shoulders, you know.

Speaker 1: 21:17

Yeah, I don't really know and you know I've talked to my sister now we do. She's never been able to figure out life and she's not doing very well in any kind of a way, but we have had some discussions with each other since all of that had occurred. And you know, for some reason she blames me as well and I really don't know why, because I was 11 and she was eight, but I did blame my dad's death and my sister being put through all of that on myself and sometimes, you know, I still find myself doing that. But I do wanna say this that from a young adult and even till now, I have, for some reason, just I dig down, I dig my heels down and I just figure it out and I try to flip that switch and the script that's going on in my head and I just try to talk to myself differently.

Speaker 2: 22:28

Yeah, you do such a great job with that, while encouraging other people like friends, like me even, and still taking care of your family. Goodness, that is so much to unpack and process and then add being so young on top of it. And neither of those things were your fault. You know, I am currently doing IFS therapy, which is internal family systems, and I know that you're just learning about it. But the neat thing is you already do so much of it. That is kind of intuitive to you, if you will, because IFS is not intuitive to me and I'm sort of stuck with it right now. I feel like my brain doesn't quite believe it. But it's also because I know that I have a very strong inner critic and I didn't know there was even a name for it. Honestly, until just this week I just didn't know, and now that I am seeing, oh, there's a name for it, I think I'm frustrated. Well, how did it get there? And you know, I understand this therapy in part and yet I don't at the same time, and my brain is struggling to believe that it will help me because it feels counterintuitive to me right now. But I do know to feel better and to stop my OCD thought patterns, which cause anxiety, and to be able to combat the childhood trauma that is coming out right now. I have to try something and my therapist believes there is a time and a place for everything. So I'm at a place where I can handle and I'm ready to learn and grow through my discomfort, if you will. My past and I know that our bodies have this incredible way that they just wanna heal, like our bodies are designed for that. So I know I want to live a full and healthy life, mental wellness. What I would do to consistently have that and not have to work so hard, especially because, like you, like so many other people, we didn't ask for what happened to us. No, yet we're spending this makes me emotional a good deal of our lives dealing with it, because we want to be better for ourselves and for the people that we love. I wanna show my kids that this strength, that weakness, but I can't tell you how often it feels weak.

Speaker 1: 25:14

Well, that is absolutely strength and what you're doing is you're going into the fire, and that's hard to do. You are also showing your kids that crying is strength, hurting moves you forward. Facing trauma is brave and you know how adults handle trauma and crisis can either help their kids or hurt their kids. More than there is something tough, the family. When there is something tough that the family is facing. My family didn't handle our crisis very well at all when my dad died. I was ignored, I was never talked to about it and life just went on. In fact, the day after he died I got ready for school and my aunt said what are you doing? And I said I'm going to school and everyone laughed at me and said your dad just died, you're not going to school. I remember a lot of time alone back then and I lost my voice. I can remember at the funeral home I felt so alone. I don't think I've ever felt more alone in my life than that day. And I was at the funeral home surrounded by all the adults, and I kept just sitting there watching my dad and that casket and I swore that he was breathing. So I kept going up to the adults and saying Can you see his chest is moving up and down? And then they'd kind of just shrug me off. And then I went up to another adult he's breathing. They would ignore me because they just thought, oh yeah, this just little kid, you know she thinks her, but nobody took the time to sit down with me and really talk to me. And so for an entire year after that I had the same dream over and over that he was my dad, was trying to get me because I let him be buried in the ground while he was still alive. So it's so crucial that adults really pay attention to the kids in the room when there's trauma and crisis.

Speaker 2: 27:23

Absolutely and in talk, talk, talk. You know, everybody heals differently. And this reminds me when I was in fifth grade, my grandpa died my mom's dad and at the time she would have had to be in her mid thirties and at that time, being a fifth grader, I didn't. Yes, I realized the significance that that was her dad that died, but not to the extent that would impact her and really for the rest of her life. Only you know, being an adult am I able to look back and say, wow, that was one of those milestone moments, as you refer to them. And I remember I went to school, but I went to school because I didn't wanna face the pain and I didn't wanna see my mom in so much pain. And I remember her saying she felt so alone, so alone when he passed, because she was young and nobody understood. And I think a lot of the time people tend to not do something because they don't know what to do and it makes the other people who need something feel so alone. So I guess what I'm saying is, if you know someone that's going through a hard time or experiencing anything, it could be addiction, it could be a loss, it could be a sickness, it could just be a hard place. Do something, because I truly believe doing nothing is the wrong answer.

Speaker 1: 29:00

Yeah, I mean right now, my daughter keeps associating, like I said earlier, with this person's surgery that we have coming up and we found out last night we didn't know it, but we didn't know that she had gone to the point in her head where she has this family member passing away in surgery. And so if we wouldn't have kept trying to talk with her about it, we wouldn't have even known that this was going on in her head and we might have missed it. And it was so critical that we continued to talk to her to help her through this and not be like, oh, that's just so silly, that's not gonna happen, and just kind of ignore what she's thinking, but really pay attention to what she's thinking and feeling during critical, this critical time. So, yeah, how we handle this is going to affect her in her future. So I think it's really important that we pay attention to the kids in the room and really anybody in the room that's going through something very serious, because they might not be expressing what is going on inside of them because they might not be able to. But sometimes and I always said, when people have wanted to get to know me, I always say, well, just sit down next to me. Sometimes we can just sit down in silence and that's all I need, just having somebody sit down next to me. Through this, it doesn't have to be the right words or any words. Just being there is what's important.

Speaker 2: 30:45

Yeah, I think people need to start to be okay with silence. I think that that can sometimes just be sitting next to someone. Your presence is enough.

Speaker 1: 30:55

That's everything, just knowing. Yeah, this has been really heavy, I know, I mean and we'll be coming back next week and talk more about this and the scripts that we play in our minds or that other people have put in our heads but I did wanna wrap this up and I have a couple quotes and a couple of them are a little heavy, but it really struck me actually when I was-.

Speaker 2: 31:23

It's kind of about perspective, though, Ann, I know because I know what quote you're gonna say and it's like, but I think maybe it would fuel the other way to do something.

Speaker 1: 31:35

Yeah, this is really stuck with me and I found it yesterday and it's most of us die before we are fully born and it really hit that 11 year old and I wanna cry, oh my gosh. It really hit that 11 year old inside of me that has really fought being able to move forward whenever I feel that success in front of me. You know, I haven't really been fully living until since I got my last these kids and I've adopted my grandkids and I have said that this is my third childhood and this has been the time where I feel like I am fully woken up, like I am fully living and my life is so full and it's really the first time in my life that I have felt that way.

Speaker 2: 32:39

That's beautiful.

Speaker 1: 32:40

Ann, yeah, yeah, when I was in treatment for you know, after I had gone through a lot with my dad and everything, so I was constantly trying to numb and so people thought that I needed to go into treatment. So I did. I don't think that I am an alcoholic, I just think that I was trying to numb. But one of the things that I learned was do anything but use and I have used that in other parts of my life about being stuck do anything but be stuck.

Speaker 2: 33:13

Do something.

Speaker 1: 33:14

It doesn't matter, just do something.

Speaker 2: 33:17

I like that. Yeah, I think a lot of life is about taking that first step for sure.

Speaker 1: 33:27

Yeah, the other one that resonated with me. If I had to choose between pain and death, I would choose pain, and that spoke to me in that, no matter how much pain I feel and this healing and what, even what we're doing here, you know it's not easy and no matter how hard Things have been. It's just about moving forward, and I am. It's a one day at a time, one second at a time, and it's just doing anything again. It's the same thing, just doing anything to move forward Next week yeah, and life has made you so Full of wisdom.

Speaker 2: 34:15

you know, I I've read this somewhere and I can't remember where, and I like to Source where I get information from, but I truly can't remember where, but it was. You know, if you were given the choice to Go back and change your script, so undo the bad that's happened, but you lose what you gained from it, would you do it? Mm-hmm, and most people say no because what they learned through the hard, through the messy, hard place, was something Valuable to keep them, hey, moving forward. Yeah, so you know I am, I'm feeling like I want to heal faster, and what I'm realizing is that this is gonna be a slow journey, and goodness look how long it's already taken me Just to be able to see what new areas need healed. This doesn't even count the work I've already done, and so I'm Trying to grasp the fact that we shouldn't be disappointed that our growth takes time, and I read something recently too, that said what if we were transparent about our own failures? Not as some kind of performative vulnerability, but as an invitation to collectively destigmatize the messy process of lifelong learning, and I've really been trying to think about that. I know that's that's a lot, but basically, the mountain isn't always gonna be moved, but day by day, I think we're given the strength and tools to climb it and Working to heal our battle wounds throughout life, while parenting is hard and it is noble and it is exhausting.

Speaker 1: 36:04

Yes.

Speaker 2: 36:05

It is worth it. Yes, and those are some things that have released it out to me. And so give yourself a shout out for enduring all of the Necessary changes within you for the sake of the next generation. And you know I'm gonna start with me. My therapist told me, literally say to yourself with compassion that you're proud of yourself or it will be okay. And she said you know you can tap your heart and and just say okay, it's okay, and say hello to the feeling that you're feeling and try to figure out what it wants to tell you and then go from there.

Speaker 1: 36:41

Yeah, I just want to touch on you, saying that it was. It's a, you know, a long journey of healing and it's a lifelong journey. I don't think that we're ever gonna be done Healing until we take that last breath and I'm just thankful and grateful for every moment that we are in the healing, because it's it really, honestly, it doesn't have to be in it and it is painful, but it's also beautiful at the same time, if that makes sense.

Speaker 2: 37:11

Yeah it does and I Think I'm on the opposite end of that right now, as I'm frustrated that there's still more work to do. You know like it's hard. I want to just be in a place where I Can be happy With who I am and what I've accomplished and been able to do through healing or through you know, whatever it may be. So I think I'm just frustrated that I'm realizing this is Going to be quite a journey and it will be worth it. But it is also a balance. Like I don't think that I can just continually Focus on just healing because I think that it gets me. I'm a type 5 personality, the overthinker, and I think that I get wrapped up in my thoughts that take me away from being present with my family.

Speaker 1: 38:03

Well, you're one of the most resilient, hard-working people that I know With your journey. So you know I don't need to cry three times during. Tina, you really are. I mean, and you have shown me just how resilient you are and over these years that I've known you and and you know I, there's been times and I just want to say that there's been times where I have been flat on my back and don't even know if I can get up. So it hasn't always Been where I, and that's part of the journey to Sometimes you just have to be still and be flat on your back for a little while before you're ready to move on to the next.

Speaker 2: 38:52

So you give me such inspiration to know that I can get you know to this Better place, if you will, that the hard work does pay off.

Speaker 1: 39:04

Yeah, it does. But no, even if you're in that period where you just can't move, you're still moving. So, uh, yeah, I mean that's really important to know that sometimes being stuck on that mile marker that little bit of time where you're just kind of sitting there in it, it's okay, it really is okay, sometimes you need to just enjoy the view and then know that the strength will come to finish the climb.

Speaker 2: 39:32

Oh Goodness, and so much so much. So much hard but so much healing, and we want to thank you for listening to us today.

Speaker 1: 39:44

Thanks for listening, god bless.