S3/E28- Special Guest: Sheila Johnson Wilson

My guest, Sheila Johnson Wilson, a writer, musician, and professional coordinator, has endured the loss of more than 20 loved ones, including 17 in just five years. Through deep personal work, she’s found healing and now shares her story to inspire others with courage to heal, support one another, and dream again.

Contact information for Sheila and William Wood are:

ohohsheilaonline@gmail.com

William Wood: william.wood@northernutahhypnosis.com

Transcript

Bruce: 0:34

Welcome to Don't Forget to Breathe. I'm your host, Bruce Barker. My guest today is Sheila Johnson Wilson, a writer, musician, and professional coordinator who has endured the heartbreaking loss of more than 20 loved ones, including 17 within just a five-year period. Grief has become a constant companion she never asked for, but through deep personal work, Sheila has found healing and now shares her story to inspire others with courage to heal, support one another, and dream again. Sheila is currently writing a book centered on grief therapy, and I'm honored she agreed to join me on the podcast to open her heart and her story. Let's step into the conversation. Alright, Sheila, so you're writing a book. Yes. The working title, it's Grief Therapy, Heartbreak is Real and Healing Is Possible. Did I get that right? Yes. What inspired you or prompted you or drove you, directed you to write the book?

Sheila: 1:42

What drove me to write the book was a business coach. I was creating music, producing, on my way to finishing a project, but I've had losses. And when I was telling my business coach my story, my experience of the 17 loved ones that I lost back to back within five years that then continued in different time frames, which then included my mother in 2016, and then my baby shortly after my mom in 2016, and then one of my close uncles later in 2016. And then fast forward to 2020, the year that we all, or most of us, I should say, experienced COVID, one of my uncles committed suicide. And that was one of my mom's brothers. And so once I told my business coach that, she said, Oh, Sheila, you need to tell your story. Give your emotions a voice. And she gave me the courage to do it because she wrote her book about her story of surviving breast cancer. And so that's the beginning of me writing my book and having the courage to do it. And to say that I started it is one thing. To finish it is another thing. And I didn't know that when I started, I would go through all these emotions to the point where I needed therapy again. And again.

Bruce: 3:16

Yep. Been there.

Sheila: 3:17

And so that helped to heal a lot more. And now I'm at the point where I'm ready to finish it and be a blessing, is the way I like to see it, to those who need it, need to hear my story.

Bruce: 3:32

That absolutely resonates with me. And listeners who have followed this podcast from the beginning know about that three-year break that I took. And that's part of why I took that break. There were things in doing the podcast and doing the work that uh really stirred up a lot of emotions and holding up that mirror and going, okay, you gotta do some more work. And because I want to be present in doing this podcast and not fake it. So I know I need to be in a good place. And that was taking that break, getting into some more therapy, doing a lot more work, to then be, as you say, ready for the next step. And that was me being ready to relaunch the podcast. So that absolutely resonates with me, and I think it will for other listeners, and and also give them the the okay. You're not gonna necessarily do therapy and you're done. You might need to revisit as more and more things come up and more and more things are discovered.

Sheila: 4:38

Exactly. Yes, exactly. And I will say that finding the right therapist was an interesting journey or part of the journey, I should say. There's one thing to say, I'm going to my therapy session. It's another thing to say, I'm going to a grief therapist. Uh, there are therapists now that make sure they have that listed in their credentials, that they do focus on grief. Those who don't may be able to help, but not so much. That's my experience because I did have therapists who who did not have grief included in their credentials. Right. That was one thing I do, I did want to mention.

Bruce: 5:16

Yeah. No, I've I've heard that from other people, people that I work with in in group sessions, the same thing where it's finding the connection. So it's almost like in these um grief groups that I facilitate, the biggest thing that I hear from everyone that's in there is I'm just with a group of people that get it. And I think, as you mentioned, finding that therapist that you one you have that you need to connect with to be your most vulnerable in an undescribable for parents, you know, we this is our worst, worst possible thing that could happen. And to be safe in doing that is to be with a therapist that gets it. That's really it. And just gets you. There can be a lot of training, there can be a lot of a lot of that that's gone on, and to be a licensed therapist, which is um absolutely wonderful, and I encourage anyone to seek a licensed therapist. As I say in the in the podcast, I'm not a licensed therapist, just a dad. You're not a licensed therapist, right?

Sheila: 6:19

I'm not, I was looking forward to saying that too, just to be clear. I'm not a licensed therapist either.

Bruce: 6:23

We're just giving our experiences and where where things have taken us and what we've learned in the grief journey and the healing journey.

Sheila: 6:34

Mm-hmm. Exactly.

Bruce: 6:35

Yeah.

Sheila: 6:35

Yeah. I want to also mention that the therapist that was really instrumental in my healing after my uncle committed suicide. Now that, mind you, is 2020. Okay, so 2016, my mom, my baby, my uncle, 2020, my uncle, that really made it rougher for me. The therapist who helped me the most at that time is considered a hypnotherapist. Now I've heard of it. I've heard of hypnosis. I've been in the presence of artists that I worked with who experienced it and spoke highly of it. I kept it in the back of my head. When I met the hypnotherapist, it was in a business conference situation. So it wasn't about therapy. But when we talked personally about what I was trying to accomplish in business, that's when I learned more about how he could potentially help me with the therapy part. So yes, William Wood, hypnotherapist. We can leave his information later where you give information to your listeners. But what he did was took me through a journey of identifying where I was hurt, how I was feeling that particular day. And then he, as the professional and expert in this area, took me through a series of exercises, a combination of closing my eyes and him saying things to me and me responding with my eyes closed to what he was doing. Mind you, this was through Zoom because it was during the time of COVID. And he did a series of exercises that made me feel better. But then he also recommended a few books for me to read. One was more about understanding my feelings and having the courage to aim to feel a little bit better every single day. And then he he also introduced me to tapping, tapping exercises. Have you heard of that?

Bruce: 8:34

Like EMDR?

Sheila: 8:35

Yes. And little did I know that would be what my nervous system specifically needed. So I've heard reviews, uh, I've I've heard testimonies. There are people who shared that they were able to live life a little bit better because of how the tapping exercise helped them heal. So I wanted to just make sure I got that out really. Tapping exercise beyond the hypnotherapy was where I landed as what I need to practice every single day, if not every single week.

Bruce: 9:11

Yeah, I did I did EMDR uh with someone that and that is what they specialized in. And again, I at the time I'm going in skeptical, but once I allowed myself to let go and then starting with all of it, and then I felt a physical change and you know, and then after the first session, and she she's like, So what do you think? I'm like, Okay, all right, yeah, I get it. Well and then would go obviously go back for more. And it's just to someone who hasn't done it, it would seem like really you're just gonna you're gonna tap. But actually, but doing it. And so there's so many things obviously that I don't understand about how everything works body, mind, soul, all of it. I I I don't, but as part of that healing journey, I you're willing I'm willing to try anything. Once I was ready. Right. Again, for me, it was years before I was really ready to do the work. Once I started that, then yes, I'm willing to try. Try whatever's ever's gonna help. And knowing I'm feeling bad maybe during a session, after a session, because we're going places that I didn't want to go, right, and my conscious, but actually getting there and doing the work and doing the healing, um, the things that hurt. Right. And the books, so the other books that you had read, you had all these books, but you decided you wanted to write your own.

Sheila: 10:50

Yes.

Bruce: 10:51

Why is that?

Sheila: 10:51

I'm glad you asked. Why? The books that I read were suggested out of a good place. So I went into reading the books open, but I was hurting when I was reading the books, and it felt like something was missing from what I was reading. Yes, I needed to know the phases of grief. Yes, I needed to know the clinical part of what that process is like to grieve and identify I'm angry, or identify I'm guilty, or I identify I'm just really sad right now, or I just want to be by myself. But there were experiences I started to have that no one talked about. And one of those is where I saw a gentleman walking down the street. I was in my apartment looking out the window, and the gentleman looked just like my dad. My dad had passed away more than four years before that. So intellectually, in my mind, I knew that wasn't my dad. Spiritually, though, or or just this sensation I had in my body made me feel like that was my dad, almost as if it were I was in a movie and that was an angel and it was my dad. That's what that moment was like. And I was like, hold on, what do I do with this? Because I'm feeling like crying my eyes out right now. I really don't know what this is. And so none of the books that I read touched on that. And my book will touch on that because I've experienced it more than once. And I know other people now personally who have experienced it as well. And I'm so happy to know that, you know, you because you and I had a brief conversation about it, that's not foreign to you either. No, and so if it's not foreign to us, it's not foreign to other people who are just not writing about it yet, or I haven't read their book yet, or people haven't talked about it yet. Either way, it's like, let's talk about it, let's let's touch that part in our soul that could heal a little bit more because we relate to that. And and then so when it happens again to me, I'm not feeling so lost or detached from the human body, if that makes sense.

Bruce: 13:10

Yeah. So you can be more in the moment and and exactly and aware and accept and celebrate, I guess, if you will. And and I say that only from my personal experience that I shared. That I mean, yes, I've had dreams where Kristen has is there, she's still 20, but it's present time. But we're having conversations about present time, like things that are going on. And and I, you know, again, everybody's got their own beliefs and their own thoughts. And I just take them as as little presents, as little visits. And so again, it could be psychoanalyzing it and say, oh no, you're just imagining things. I don't really care. It works for me. Right. Right. And I think it, I think those kind of moments work for other parents. But one in particular I know that I shared with you was being at the airport, you know, over work. And I happened to be coming back in and was on the train, um, get off the train in the terminal and go up these really long escalators to get up. And I could see toward the top someone in the there's two escalators side by side, someone in the escalator just to the left of me that looked just like Kristen from behind.

Speaker 2: 14:22

Right.

Bruce: 14:22

Same little deal. And as, I mean, yes, there was an emotional moment. There was it was that little bit of a flutter. Right. Right. And then I see her just at the top. She reached with her finger and kind of pulled hair behind her ears the same way Kristen would do as she's at the top of the escalator and steps and turns to the right, but she looks directly at me, and I'm halfway down the escalator on the other side, looks directly at me and walks away. I mean, turned and looked directly at me and then walked away, and of course, gone by the time I could get to the top of the escalator. So it's moments that's that's why I I um I related to what you were saying. It was like, okay, does the intellectual say no? It wasn't Christian? Does the spirit side go? Could it have been a little, I don't know, can't explain it. I don't need to explain it. I don't feel the need to for me to go, let me break this down. I just accepted it because I'd had and then and just it was emotional, but just smiled. But in a pop, and but and again, that's part of I think where I am in the healing process and where I am where I can say I am healed from this, but carrying all the scars doesn't mean I'm not healed, it just means there's scars. The same with any physical wound on our on our bodies. You can heal from a surgery, from an accident, from a cut, from a break, and there's scars, and that's what it is with me. So I was able to accept it and then smile and go, okay, that was cool. Thanks. Right. And just accept that moment. So you're right. I think we can't be the only two.

Sheila: 16:07

No, we can't be. And I want to say the fact that you were able to say, oh, that was cool, is an indication that you are definitely healed, right? I couldn't say that was cool. Yeah. I couldn't. And then when it happened again when I saw someone that looked like my uncle, one of my uncles that passed away after my dad, it happened again when I saw someone who looked like my godmother. After this is all about after they passed away, when I saw someone who looked like the person I love deeply who passed away. So let's say 2003, my dad passed away. Within five years, 17 people passed away, literally back to back. So I could not ever within those five years say, oh, that was cool. And that was the challenge. That was the challenge for me. So fast forward to 2020, I'm writing all this music or composing, producing all this music. And my business coach says, okay, now you you need to tell your story. It's at that point when I still didn't know I could say cool, but I was able to feel like this has happened enough. Something is about this, and I want to feel good about it. I want to feel good about it. So I heard the late and great Natalie Cole share on TV that her and her siblings, and I believe her mother at the time, who was still alive at the time, share how they were in a store, heard her dad, Nat King Cole's Christmas song, one of the songs. Yeah. And how that at that moment they saw each other, they were different racks, but still in sight of each other, and looked at each other and nodded, yeah, that's him. I was like, that's what I want. That's what I feel like I need. I need someone to be on the same page with me about this moment where I'm either hearing something that is exactly the person, or I'm seeing someone who looks exactly like the person I just lost. Right. And it was after I saw that interview that I was like, I need that. I need something like that. And I believe you're probably only the second person, literally, that we where I was able to feel like I just connected with someone who knows exactly what I'm talking about. And um more courageous, you know, to to finish the process of writing the book because it still is painful.

Speaker 3: 18:31

Oh, yeah.

Sheila: 18:32

It still is painful. But I want to say something that you mentioned about scars. There's something in the scriptures, and I'll I'll have it in my book that talks about how when we have gone through pain and suffering, there's still something for us to be able to give. And that's the part of helping other people who are going through the same pain and sufferings. We we can be better when we help other people going through the same pain and sufferings. That part is for me where the scar is not ugly. It's not, you know, it's not a bad thing. The scar can be used for something better or good for someone else, you know, to help someone else. That's the best way I can put it right now. But that's something that I'm definitely sharing, you know, in my book as well. When I when I complete it, I look forward to to hearing how many people can relate to that.

Bruce: 19:31

The thing with scars, I mean, I know that I guess as a kid or just growing up or whatever, you you hear about scars or you see scars initially and it's scary. Right. And then, all right, so we'll fast forward to a scene from Jaws where they're comparing their scars and their battle stories and laughing, and and because they they tell a story. And then I think to transition to the scars that we feel and the scars that I have is yes, I can tell the story. I can tell the story of the unimaginable loss, and I can tell the story of terribly hard work and pain in the healing process. And then to get to the scars, and well, you might look at them and go, they're not, that's not a beautiful thing. Says who.

Speaker 2: 20:27

Right.

Bruce: 20:27

Right? It shows that you've been through something, but you're on the other side. You've you've healed. It's not, again, that same, it's not that old phrase, oh, I'm over it. No, it's not that. It's you have gone through it.

Speaker 2: 20:40

Right.

Bruce: 20:40

Right? You didn't go over it. You're through it and you are healed, but the scars are there. There's those reminders. You don't forget.

Speaker 2: 20:48

Right.

Bruce: 20:49

You don't forget what they look like, you don't forget what they sound like. You know, all of those things that I know I feared, and other people that I've talked to that feared, I'm afraid I'm gonna forget how they sounded or what that parents have said, and and all I can say is no, you never will.

Speaker 2: 21:03

Right.

Bruce: 21:04

And I can hear her voice pop in my head right now as a uh four-year-old, three-year, four-year-old, young adult. Whatever, it's there, it's not gonna go away. But that's part of the healing. But it is the it's the scary in between. Right. It's sort of the way I look at it, what's between the shadow and the light, like what's in that space. And that's that's where we are. Right. And and we learn, and it hurts. The same as if you've had a surgery or or whatever it is. When it's healing, it's sore and it hurts. The worse the surgery, or the worse, whatever, the harder and the more pain that you feel. And I example, and I and I may have referred to this um in a previous podcast. I'm not sure, but this this pottery piece that I made to break that gave a little depiction of of my life, Kristen's life, because I did all these phases on her birthdays, um, to be very intentional about it. And I know when you put it back together with Kinzuki, and you have to hold the pieces till they set. And I remember holding the first two pieces, and I could feel a pinch in my palm and didn't think that much about it. I figured, oh, it's a sharp, there's a sharp edge. And then when it was set enough to pull it apart, and then I look, and then my inside of my palm is just bleeding because it had pushed, it was sharp enough that it cut and it was cutting, but I was still holding it even though there was pain. And then I looked at it, and again, I'm at the stage now where I can laugh and go, okay, all right, I get it. Yeah. That there's pain and it's slow when you're putting the pieces back one by one. And every parent that steps into that vulnerability and has the courage to heal and to do the work. Like I commend everyone for that and encourage everyone for that. It's easy to just um as some say that they feel they're stuck. That's easy. It's easy not to do something. It's really hard to do this because you gotta get in it. Right. So the same as like writing the book, but you're back in it, right? Everything that you're writing, and it's painful.

Sheila: 23:20

Yes. And I like the way you said it. It's slow healing. But it is healing. And there's a couple of things you just mentioned. I wanted to uh bring up loss of baby, I guess, right now, because everyone's situation is definitely different. And I I'm I commend you for saying, you know, everyone has their way of doing it, and commend everyone who is willing and courageous to do the work. My situation was unexpected, and it was during the time my mom was, my mom was told that she had something that could be cancer, wasn't exactly cancer, and I made the sacrifice to go and help take care of her. So I was living in New York City where I'm from originally and lived about 30 to 40 minutes away from her by car. And I was willing and able to help. I was living by myself, working a good job. And so at the moment when we realized it wasn't good for my mom, it just became stressful. She was looking forward to eating healthier and not working. I needed to step away for a business conference because I was pursuing my dream, you know. And when I got back home from the conference, she was different. Uh I asked her what happened. What did you what did you think? Or what were you thinking? What were your thoughts while I was gone because something's different. And she wasn't able to make the juices for herself anymore. She didn't have the fight, I think is the word, in her. And when we went to the hospital for another scare, she asked me, What do you think I should do? She's like, I'm ready to go home and be with the Lord. And I understood her when she said it to me, but I wasn't ready for that. And I had to step away and cry my eyes out. I don't know, probably for an hour outside of the hospital. And I called one of my holistic doctors that helped me talk it through. Like, what should I do? How can I be of support for my mom after she's saying this to me? That was the beginning of more stress that I never knew I would have emotionally. So I agreed to just keep praying through it for my own well-being, but then being whatever my mom needed. And it got to the point where she let me know she doesn't want to be here if she can't take care of herself. She doesn't want to rely on someone else to take care of her. And yes, we talked about how she wanted things to be done. She didn't want anyone to come visit her at the hospital. Once she got to the point of being in the hospice, that made it even more challenging. But I say all this to say that was just a little piece of what stresses I was going through before I learned I was pregnant. And what is also interesting though, my husband, who was here in uh Denver, came to visit. Let's just give a little timeline. My mom found out June 2015, something was off about her liver. October 2015 is when I went to the business conference. I got back and she learned that I met my future husband. And we met actually in August. We got married in November. She wanted to be there when we got married. We got married in November 2015 in New York City. But at that point, she was already not feeling well. She was already told she might have cancer. She was already starting to look a little different. She was losing weight, not at her choice. And her appetite was not the same. After my husband and I came back from the honeymoon, she's like, go ahead. I want you to go ahead and live your life. If I need you, I want you to say you will come back and help take care of me. So I agreed to that. That was November 2015. I literally get into Denver November 30, 2015. March 2016, my mom gave me the call. Now, mind you, we've talked between November and March. Sure. But March 2016 is when she said, Sheila, I need you. Can you come back? Can you stay here with me? And the agreement was to be there until she passed away. So my husband came to New York to visit in April 2016 for a little bit because he was working. He went back home to Denver and agreed he'll come back if he needed to. So between April and June 2016, my mom said, Are you pregnant? I was like, No. It almost doesn't make sense to think I'm pregnant because I did take a pregnancy test in March 2016 before I went to New York. It came back negative. So I'm thinking I'm not pregnant. My aunt, one of my aunts, who was very instrumental in helping my mom, I have to shout out my aunt Kathy. Um, she had asked me at one point, Shill are you pregnant? I was like, no. And mind you, I'm kind of clueless to what women go through who don't know that they're pregnant. I've I've heard stories, but I always thought in the back of my head, I don't think I'll be that. I think I'll know when I'm pregnant. That was not the case. So, long story short, my mom passed away in June 2016. And I did have two pains in my stomach, like May 2016, but I didn't think that was a sign of anything. And so then my husband and I went on a retreat so we could heal from this loss. And we were in the Idaho hot springs, I think is what it's called in the mountains in Colorado. And uh got back home and I felt like I couldn't breathe. He was off to work, he worked uh overnight shift, and I let him know. I was like, I feel like I can't breathe, I can't sleep, I don't, I don't know what's going on. So it was like two something in the morning. He drove me to the hospital emergency room. They let me know that after taking their tests, not only did I have way high blood pressure, but I was pregnant and I was 21 weeks pregnant. Wow. That was um, I guess the end of July 2016. So, of course, you can imagine we're like, okay, um, we went to the gynecologist, went to whatever appointments we needed to go to, and we had three weeks of being pregnant together and it being almost exciting, kind of not knowing exactly what to do in this situation. But unfortunately, when we went for the checkup three weeks after finding out that I was pregnant, then the doctor let us know the heart had stopped. And it was up to me to decide to go that night to uh go into labor or the next day, I was like, I don't want to wait. So we went that night and I was Went into labor and it was almost like the experiences you hear other women talk about. Epidural is what I had to take to go through that process. But what was different and more um, I don't know what the word is, uncomfortable is all I can think of right now. Is my husband realized then he was not gonna be able to stay in the room when the baby was gonna going to come out of my body because he was not over losing his grandbaby from his previous marriage. And I was okay with him not being in the room because I wanted my husband to be what I need him to be for me later after this was done. Um I'm sharing this to say that the loss of a baby is an experience I had, but it wasn't till that moment when I was giving birth I realized, well, this is deeper than I thought it was gonna be because I felt like I had to keep my eyes closed. There were tears, but I kept my eyes closed. So when my baby came out of my body and the nurses said she's beautiful, I couldn't look. I couldn't open my eyes. And they offered to take pictures and all of that, and I still couldn't look. And gratefully, the uh rep at the baby center of the hospital said that she would hold on to this until I'm ready to see the pictures. And even though that was the agreement, I found out I think it was three to five years later, I felt like I was able to. I was like, not sure. I prayed. I was like, if I can't handle this, then don't let the pictures be available. So when I finally connected to someone at the center, the baby center, they let me know that rep was no longer there. They looked in their files to see if anything was still there for me and the files, the pictures were no longer there. And then for me, that meant I would not have been able to handle it. And that's just a part of my experience. That's a part of my story. It's uh, it doesn't feel great, but what I do have are my baby's ashes. And I didn't know at the time that jewelry was an option for ashes of your loved ones. So I'm not sure when I'll be ready, but I have the ashes of my mom and I have the ashes of my baby. And I like the idea of using the ashes in jewelry and that being something that can stay within my family. Yeah. Or and or share some of the ashes with my siblings or whoever else in the family may want a jewelry piece as well. But that that I wanted to to share before I forgot.

Bruce: 33:04

Yeah. Well, thank you for sharing that. Yeah. That's that's a hard place to go. Yeah. And and to bring back up and um and to share. So I'm assuming that that is in your book. Oh, yes.

Sheila: 33:16

It is in the book, and I don't know, I don't know where I will cut myself off, you know, as far as how much I share, but sure, uh, I know now after the experience that millions, if not billions, of women around the world relate to the loss of a baby. Some may not have given birth like I did, but because of Instagram and hashtags, I now know that's the case.

Bruce: 33:44

Yeah.

Sheila: 33:44

So that's that's a topic I definitely will share.

Bruce: 33:47

I think that women all over the world will appreciate that and just that, just acknowledging and recognizing that this is this is child loss. Miscarriage is child loss, recognizing that and acknowledging it. And as I've said, one of the goals of this podcast is normalize the conversation around grief. And so that this is something to have that real conversation, people, and not walk away from it and not pretend it didn't that it's not real loss or not pretend that this is not a conversation to have. It's a conversation to have when someone wants to have that conversation. Indeed. So I uh um I applaud you for putting that and sharing that in your book because I believe that will help a lot of people. Thanks.

Sheila: 34:32

I want to leave the listeners with identifying what might be a problem, a challenge that they would like help with. It could be anxiety from just the topic of who they lost. It could be more than one person. But let's just say, for example, it's baby or loss of a child or miscarriage. If there's anxiety of that, there's anxiety from the picture of someone's baby. It could be an interruption of sleep. If there's a constant challenge with that, I want you to consider it might be a symptom of PTSD, post-traumatic stress disorder. I wanted to mention it because I did not know I had PTSD after my dad passed away. Well, it's more than after my dad. My dad passed away in 2003. It wasn't until 2005 that I learned that I had PTSD. And there were several people who passed away right after my dad. So before I learned I had PTSD, there were several people that passed away. But I wanted to share that it wasn't until I learned I had symptoms of PTSD that I then sought out a therapist who specialized in helping clients with PTSD. It was one of the most important pieces of information I needed to know about my body, what I was going through. So that now going into using the tapping exercises, that's connected to my nervous system. That's also stemming from what my body goes through from being anxious or if I'm not able to sleep. So if anyone has symptoms of PTSD, please get help or consider getting more help if you've already started to get help. And also please consider looking into the tapping exercise, which I will touch on with my book because of how it's helped me. And I look forward to having a reading event in the future when my book is released so that people can meet in small little groups and meet the hypnotherapist that helped me learn about tapping exercise.

Bruce: 36:36

Awesome. That's so cool. Now, your musician is one of the things. So, did you mention, I think you mentioned me that there's gonna be a some sort of like how you're weaving music into the book? Okay, how's tell me about that? How's that working?

Sheila: 36:54

So, what I'm excited about is when my business coach shared this strong feeling of me writing my story, giving my emotions a voice, she knew that I wrote and performed music for the some of the people that had passed away. So I had wrote a few songs with my dad in mind at the time that we were grieving, and I performed one of them at his funeral. Then one of my great aunts, his aunts, had passed away within those five years. I created a song and performed it at her funeral. So, with that in mind, my business coach thought, okay, well, why not release your book, have an audiobook, and let the audiobook include some of the music that you compose and and performed at the funerals. And if anything more and new comes from music that you create, then you can, of course, at your choice, choose to release that music with that audiobook as well. So that's the idea, that's the plan. I'm looking forward to it. I have written more music, of course, since then. And um as a result, there's poetry now too.

Bruce: 38:03

Oh, so all right. I got a little bit to unpack there. So audiobook is really gonna be the that's gonna be the thing. Yes, right, because so that's where you're gonna get the experience of you speaking your book. I'm assuming you're gonna, the author will speak, yes, and have the music there as well. I think that's fascinating. The way I see it and feel it is for because for me, the emotion in music, and and I had a friend write this down for me and wrote it on a piece of notebook paper, and I've literally got it framed, that the emotion in music is my love language to feel the emotion. So whether that's heavy or light or whatever it is, like, and then most of the time, unless it's just background music, but it most of the time if I'm listening to a song, I can have a and I will have an emotional response to that song or to the music, whatever that is. So what I feel in this is the power of this of the story that you are sharing on the grief journey and the healing along with the power of the music. I'm ready. Let's go. Like, let's get this thing done and get it out because I want to hear this um for sure. And I'm sure our listeners will as well, and we'll we'll get that information to them somehow. But the you mentioned an ebook. Yes.

Sheila: 39:31

Tell me about the poetry, like yes, so it's interesting that lyrics for a song can sometimes be a poem by itself, and some of the songs that I've written are that I was asked to write a poem for Black History Month, where in a position that I used to be in. And I wrote it. I didn't know that it would affect people in such a powerful way. For me, it was like writing a song. So I I performed it. I performed the poem, I presented it as a poet would. And after that one experience, there were a handful, handful of people that said, Sheila, do you have a poetry book? You should have one. And then my husband listened to my poem, and he's like, Yeah, you should definitely write a book of poetry. So, fast forward to a combination of healing and then growing in my own business efforts, I was like, okay, great. I'm going to write a poetry book, or I'm going to put together, I will say, because I I I've written since I was nine years old, right? But as a as an adult healing from this grief journey, grief therapy journey, I realized, oh, okay, so this is healing that I've written lots of lyrics that were meant to be with music, but I wasn't exactly sure if it needed to be sung. And then when I recited it as a poem, I was like, well, well, that's that's it. So fast forward to last year, I realized, okay, yes, it is a book. And then this year I decided it will be an ebook. So it can easily be in people's computers or phones right away. And yeah, so I do look forward to releasing that. It's focused on healing and there will be a spiritual base to it.

Bruce: 41:24

Okay, cool. And how will we get this? The ebook.

Sheila: 41:28

I'm glad you asked.

Bruce: 41:30

Yeah, because I'm interested. I want this.

Sheila: 41:33

My best answer right now is to ask people to send an email with the word reader in the subject. Okay. And my email address. And I know that you'll be able to have it somewhere. So they can spell it right. OOSheila online at gmail.com. So think of the song O'Sheila. That's something that people will usually say, sing to me, no matter what country I've been. I've I've experienced that. So I have to give credit to someone that I worked with who said, Oh, you should do O-O-Sheila. So O-H O H S H E I L A online. So O Sheila Online at gmail.com, put reader in the subject, and then I will email in response. Nice. And then, of course, when it's released and published, then there's my Instagram profile, OO Sheila Online.

Bruce: 42:29

Okay. That is awesome. Thanks. And then I'm gonna put you on the spot. Sure. When do you think a timeline for again working title, yes, grief therapy, heartbreak is real, and healing is possible, when can we look for that?

Sheila: 42:50

We can look for that at the end of December of this year, 2025. Wow. My goal is my dad's birthday because I, of course, had to choose what matters to me is is it gonna be something that I celebrate? Yeah. So in order for me to celebrate my dad's birthday, heavenly birthday at this point is December 17. So, but I say the end of December because my birthday is December 29th. So it's one of those two.

Bruce: 43:17

Okay. And is that gonna be the book or the but because the audiobook comes later, right? Isn't that how the audiobook will come shortly after? Yes. Okay.

Sheila: 43:23

But the book, uh the actual book, Brief Therapy, is the end of this year, December 2025.

Bruce: 43:30

Awesome. Yes. All right. Well, um, to our listeners, so you've you have Sheila's email address if you want to reach out directly to her, if you want to reach out to me, my email follows this podcast. Feel free to reach out, feel feel free to share this podcast because I'm sure you know people that will benefit from the ebook, the poetry, and then the book itself when it comes out. Thanks. Well, thank you for coming on the podcast. Thank you, thank you. This has been this has been wonderful and and powerful, and I am so looking forward to the book release. Thank you, the audiobook, and the ebook of poetry. Yes, thanks, Sheila. I want to thank Sheila for joining me on the podcast and for opening her heart to share her experience with grief. I'm excited for the release of her upcoming book at the end of this year. The current working title is Grief Therapy. Heartbreak is Real and Healing is Possible. If you'd like to connect with Sheila directly, you can email her at O-H O H S H E I L A Online at Gmail.com. That's O O Sheilaonline at gmail.com. And type reader, that's R-E-A-D-E-R, in the subject line to receive her ebook once it's released. Also, as Sheila mentioned, the contact information for the hypnotherapist is William Wood. And William Wood's email address is really simple, William.wood at northern utah hypnosis.com. That's William.wood at N-O-R-T-H-E-R N-U-T-A-H-H-Y-P-N-O-S-I-S.com. I know that's a mouthful. William.wood at northern Utahhypnosis.com. You can also find this information in the description of this episode wherever you listen. As always, thank you for listening. Be gentle with yourself and take care.