Our Dead Dads2

Imagine starting a podcast from a light-hearted joke among friends, only to find it transforming into a deeply meaningful project. That's exactly what happened to Nick Gaylord, the creator of "Our Dead Dads." Join us as we welcome Nick back to share the deeply personal story behind his podcast, which began with humorous banter among his brothers and friends who, like Nick, have lost their fathers. In this episode, Nick delves into the bittersweet memories of his father and his journey that spans across various states and a fascinating career in the pharmaceutical industry.

Grief is a multifaceted experience, particularly when it involves complex relationships with the deceased. Kathy opens up about her mix of relief and guilt following her husband's death from a brain tumor. We discuss the critical need to address grief in all its forms to prevent long-term emotional strain, reminding listeners that all emotions during grief are valid.

Contact:
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info@asiliveandgrieve.com
Facebook:  As I Live and Grieve
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To Reach Nick:
Website:  http://www.ourdeaddads.com
E-mail : ourdeaddadspodcast@gmail.com

 
Credits: 
Music by Kevin MacLeod 

Copyright 2020, by As I Live and Grieve

The views expressed by guests are their own and their appearance on the program does not imply an endorsement of them or any entity they represent. 

Transcript

Speaker 1 0:01

Welcome to as I Live and Grieve, a podcast that tells the truth about how hard this is. We're glad you joined us today. We know how hard it is to lose someone you love and how well-intentioned friends and family try so hard to comfort us. We created this podcast to provide you with comfort, knowledge and support. We are grief advocates, not professionals, not licensed therapists. We are you.

Speaker 2 0:27

Hi everyone, Welcome back again to another episode of as I Live in Grief. It seems lately we've had repeat guests. That's been the common thread over the last few episodes. But you know what? I love it because we get a chance to catch up. Sometimes we get a chance to dig a little deeper into the conversation that we had previously and sometimes we just kind of cover new things. So with me today is Nick Gaylord. You may have remembered him before from his at that time pending podcast, Our Dead Dads. He's back today. Podcast is live, so we're going to catch up, nick.

Speaker 3 1:06

Thanks so much for joining us oh goodness, kathy, thank you so much for having me back absolutely my.

Speaker 2 1:12

It's my pleasure, and kelly's with us as well. Hey, kelly. Okay. So, nick, let's start out again the same way. Can you just tell our listeners, since there may be some new that didn't hear you before, who is Nick Gaylord?

Speaker 3 1:28

This crazy guy who's just drifting through life. No, I'm kidding.

Speaker 2 1:33

I don't think you were?

Speaker 3 1:35

No, definitely not, not on the good days. Anyway, I am just a normal guy. I'm a son, a brother, a husband, a dad to a cat Not human children, but we do have a cat. I am originally from Long Island, new York. I've been married for a little over 18 years. We moved to just outside of Austin, texas, about eight and a half years ago and then about two and a half years ago we made the move to Tampa, florida, and we're here. About two and a half years ago we made the move to Tampa, florida, and we're here. Hopefully not going anywhere anytime soon because, honestly, moving is just treacherous and I really don't want to do it anytime soon.

Speaker 3 2:13

Yeah, I have been working in the pharmaceutical clinical trial medical device industry forever, it seems, closing in on 30 years Actually tomorrow just realizing that tomorrow, august 30th, is the 29th anniversary of my first job in this industry. So I have been working mostly in quality assurance and document control. I started there when I was 19. I have no idea how I ended up in this field as a career. It was not planned. I was at that point hoping to be a math teacher and it did not work out by the point that I knew that it wasn't going to. I was already years deep into this industry and what started as just a one-off job has turned into a career and I have to say I love it.

Speaker 3 2:58

I have the oldest of my dad's seven children that I know of. That's a really funny joke. I will always always say that, because we're never quite sure. I mean, man was married, divorced five times, but I, as far as we know at this point, I'm definitely the oldest I. My youngest sister is 17 and a half years younger than me. My dad passed away in may of 2021, which is actually what led to our first conversation about my podcast, our Dead Dads.

Speaker 3 3:26

And it's like a thinker for the moment, but I'm sure more will come up.

Speaker 2 3:30

Oh, I'm sure it absolutely will, because I'm going to help it along a little bit. All right, I had a feeling you would. Now your podcast is named Our Dead Dads. Yes, okay, and it's live now.

Speaker 3 3:42

It sure is. It went live officially on june 18th of this year, 2024. In case if somebody's listening, in a later year and at this point, uh, so I dropped the first three episodes on day one on june 18th, and the first three episodes were me doing basically an interview with myself or just having a conversation with everybody who's listening, telling my story of how I got here, why I'm doing a podcast, my relationship with my dad. The second episode I interviewed my three other brothers. The third episode I interviewed three of my best friends that I have known since probably junior high school, since I was about 12 or so. The seven of us have been a very tight group for a long time. That is part of how Our Dead Dads came to be. All of us have been a very tight group for a long time. That is part of how Our Dead Dads came to be. All of us have dads who are no longer here. The phrase Our Dead Dads actually started as a running joke between me and my youngest brother, michael, about two years ago. We were having a conversation about him and Michael referred to him as Our Dead Dad and he had never done that before and I thought that was just gold. We laughed like crazy over that, told the rest of the guys they loved it too, and so we just basically referred to my dads now as our dead dads. And then, as far as the podcast goes, well, that started earlier in 2024.

Speaker 3 4:58

I hadn't really ever given serious consideration to doing a podcast. It came up briefly here and there, but not about this topic. One of my friends in the group wanted to do a podcast of the seven of us, similar to the Howard Sturt Show, which I immediately shot down because I said you can't do something that's already been done. It's absurd. Everybody's going to think it's copycat. He was pretty intense about it, but I said no, it's not going to happen, it's not going to work. Needless to say, the idea went away pretty quickly. We had a couple of other conversations about maybe some of us doing a podcast, which there was some. Yeah, sure, it'd be pretty cool. At the end of the day, really nobody was that serious about it, which is fine. But when the idea came up earlier this year about me potentially doing a podcast and being serious about it, I just kind of put the pedal to the metal and went full steam with some of my ideas, and I knew early on that if I was going to do a podcast it was going to be Sarah Dirac.

Speaker 3 5:56

I know what I went through on my grief journey with my dad after he died and for anybody who may not have listened to my first episode yet, either with Kathy or from my podcast I didn't have the experience of. I was so sad and I was depressed and I was lost and all of that my feeling was anger toward my dad. Initially, when he first died, it was relief. It was relief in two ways. First one was because he was in a lot of physical pain for a very long time. That was self in two ways. First one was because he was in a lot of physical pain for a very long time. That was to get self-inflicted, but nonetheless he suffered a lot. So I was really glad that that was just done, because it was more pain than I've ever really seen anybody go through for that length of time and I was happy it was over. But also relief that everything was just over.

Speaker 3 6:40

My brothers and I basically became his caretakers for the last several years of his life and it was just not pleasant. Being his son was not pleasant. Having him as a dad was not the best experience. Not all of it was bad. There were definitely some good things. There were probably more that were not great than great.

Speaker 3 6:59

So my journey through therapy was finding out how to process that anger, how to channel it, put it in a place where it would not affect me the way it was. I am fortunate enough that my wife is the one who found out pretty quickly. She kind of figured out just from my reactions getting angry, snapping at certain people, snapping at her. She said I think you need to talk to somebody. And she was right and I did. Had a six-month journey through therapy, found a great therapist online and by the end of it I was at a place where I forgave myself for being angry at him. I forgave him for being the person that he was and I forgave him for not being the person that we all knew he could have been. He really had the potential and I haven't been angry a day since.

Speaker 3 7:46

So when I decided to do the podcast, it seemed a natural fit, not because I wanted to focus on me, but because I know that a lot of people that are dealing with grief or have dealt with grief don't have an easy time, a lot of times don't feel like they have an outlet or a position where they can talk to anyone or where they think somebody will listen. Sometimes people think that they are being a burden to somebody else by asking them to give them space, to hold space for them to just have a conversation, to just listen. It's unfortunate that people feel that way, because I've had a lot of people ask me to listen to them, have conversations about many topics and I've never once felt like they were burdening me. I felt honored that they chose me to have that conversation with them. So I really wanted to create a platform where a lot of people who wanted to talk about grief would have a platform to do so.

Speaker 3 8:41

And one of the questions that you actually asked me in our first interview was would this podcast be entirely about dads and dead dad stories? And I definitely didn't think it would at the time and I could say at this point it is not nearly all about dead dads. It has already, between the interviews that have been published and the interviews that I've done that haven't dropped yet, gone into so many things more than just dad-dad stories. There have been parents, siblings, children. One story that I really love.

Speaker 3 9:12

It was an interview that dropped last Tuesday, episode number 13. I interviewed a gentleman named Paul Rubin who was the director of a children's grief camp all along the island, and that was a gum-wrenching and an amazing interview at the same time, just to hear what these kids are going through. So the camp is designed for children ages 7 to 17 who have lost a parent or a sibling. They have two weekend camps per year, one in the spring, one in the fall and they have an entire weekend of activities for the children to help the process to grieve though, to help them to have fun, get to know each, help each other through everything they're going through, to basically give children the opportunity to grieve in ways that you and I were never allowed to do as children.

Speaker 2 9:54

Absolutely. I was told to. Just you know, get on with it.

Speaker 3 9:58

Yeah, suck it up, deal with it, don't worry about it, don't focus on it.

Speaker 2 10:02

Yeah, we have a camp similar to that here. It's called Camp Heartstrings and it's only once a year. It has a long, long waiting list, Long waiting list. But you know, Nick, you've gotten really good at this, Because in the time he's been talking you answered probably four questions I was going to ask and then left an opportunity for me to ask another. Go for it. So I want to point out first and then we'll chat about it a little bit that we all know that grief is different for everybody. Yes, we also know that most people who are grieving are somewhat quiet about it. We're very selective about who we choose to talk to about what we're going through.

Speaker 2 10:47

Very much, especially in that initial phase, and because of that you mentioned Not really feeling grief like the routine might be, that you were angry at your father, that your childhood and your relationship with your dad may not have been the best like it might be with other people, right, so that lends a certain stigma, I think, to the grief that you were experiencing. Grief that you were experiencing and I wonder if you could just talk about that a little bit more, because I'm sure there are listeners out there that are going through or have gone through something very similar, and that is grieving someone who maybe even you were happy to see die yes, I have never said that I'm sorry.

Navigating Grief and Relief

Speaker 3 11:35

I'm very funny today. I'm not quite sure what's going on. I have never once said I'm happy that my dad died, because I wasn't happy that he died, I was happy that, oh, we lost it. Okay, I was happy that he was no longer suffering, I was happy that the pain for him had ended. But I would never go me personally. Some people would say they're happy that the person actually is dead.

Speaker 2 12:02

Well, I can think maybe of one person. I would have been happy had he died One in my life. And I see Kelly with kind of a wry smile. She knows exactly the person I'm referring to, right?

Speaker 3 12:14

But certainly Grief is very complicated. There are so many levels to it. Everybody, as you said, everybody's experience is different. I have spoken with people who had horrible, abusive relationships with their dads Dads that were not present, dads that were schizophrenic drug addicts, dads that were physically abusive. I've also had people I've had people that had dads that were wonderful. They had great relationships with them all the way up to the time that they died.

Speaker 3 12:43

Just because you don't have the best relationship with a person doesn't mean that there's not grief. I have spoken to people that barely saw their dad for the last 10, 15 years of their dad's lives. Yet everything may have processed afterwards. Even at the beginning there may have been some anger, some resentment, but over time there is still grief. There's grief to everything.

Speaker 3 13:07

It doesn't have to just be about when you're sad that somebody is gone, and I definitely invite anybody who has a story. I definitely invite anybody who has a story if you think that you're, I don't know, the odd man out or the odd woman out because you're angry at somebody who passed, but yet you still feel like there's so much unprocessed there. This becomes, there is, there is a lot unprocessed. Very, very few people can just say I'm past it, I'm done, I'm never going to think about this person again. Screw them, I'm glad they did, and move on. So people can't, most of us can't. So, yeah, I would say anybody who is having anything like that that they're having feelings that they just can't explain, because you had a terrible relationship with the person. Yet there's something eating away at you. It's called grief. It happens on so many levels, doesn't have to just be for good wishes. So, yeah, reach out to me.

Speaker 2 14:03

I would love to have a conversation with you and I'm sure, kathy, you would love to have a conversation absolutely, and I think many times the grief is kind of from the perspective of you may not feel that you're really grieving the death of that person, but you are grieving the loss of the life that you never had with them, right, the relationship you never had with them, yes, that you always wanted.

Speaker 2 14:27

That at least figures into the grief. And you also mentioned the level of pain your dad was in and how you also experienced relief. Now, even though my situation with my husband was different, I too, when he finally took his last breath, I did feel relief because for eight months I had cared for him while he suffered this brain tumor and I saw the struggle, especially the last month of his life. I saw the struggle he was going through where his brain just was not working properly. But I could see the fight in his eyes that he didn't understand what was going on. I think his was more of an emotional and mental pain and anguish. So I did feel that relief. Now I felt guilty. Did you feel guilty for experiencing relief?

Speaker 3 15:22

I don't think I did. I've actually thought about, I've been asked this question a few times and I have given it some thought and I really don't think that I did.

Speaker 2 15:32

Okay, all right, yeah. And I realized afterward that the reason I felt relief, of course, was that his suffering was over, but in my mind that at that time was very stressed, obviously, because, even though I had waited for that day, when I walked in the facility that morning I knew that was going to be the day that he was going to take his last breath. I was just convinced, it was in my heart, I knew it, that this was the day I had that relief. I felt guilty. I thought my guilt was because I was being selfish. It is not so, listeners. If you experience that guilt, throw it away. You're not being selfish. You are just relieved that that phase, that stage, that traumatic event has finally occurred and you can then move on.

Speaker 3 16:25

Right. Grief is intense in every stage for everyone, anybody who is going through the process or has gone through the process of watching a loved one deteriorate and ultimately pass. Yeah, kathy, you nailed it. If anybody is having any thoughts of, or had thoughts of relief and just glad that it's over, or if you had a bad relationship and glad that you're not dealing with them anymore and then later on experienced guilt, your feelings are not wrong. They're not invalid. Your feelings are what they are. But also don't give yourself a hard time because you may have experienced relief because that person is no longer a part of your life, not because they're not suffering it. This is all part of the grieving process and this is honestly why I this is one of the billion reasons why I say every single one of us could benefit from therapy in many ways, and there's different kinds of therapy. Whether it's having a conversation like you and I are having, or having a conversation with a trained professional therapist or a complete stranger, it all is a form of therapy and it is necessary. The grieving is necessary. This therapeutic process is necessary. You have to take the first step.

Speaker 3 17:47

If you try to outrun your grief, if you try to ignore your grief or just push it out of the way or push it down and pretend it's not there. I guess, not bothering. You're in deep shit. You're going to get haunted by it. It's going to come back and bite. It may be one day, a week, a month, a year, several years before it happens, but it's going to happen. It happens. The only people it doesn't happen to are sociopaths, because they don't feel anything.

Speaker 2 18:15

They don't feel anything Right they Does it happen to or sociopaths, because they don't feel anything. They don't feel anything Right. They don't feel anything.

Speaker 3 18:18

And if you are on the human emotion scale and you feel things. Look I've talked about this so many times there's no way around. If you're going to process it, the only way to do it is throw it. It's the hard way, it's the messy way, it sucks.

Speaker 2 18:32

Right, but it's going down right right. I want to point out something else, and I'm gonna probably call in kelly for an opinion on this one. We talk a lot about men and women grieve differently yes, they do yet here, you and I have been carrying on this conversation and it sounds to me like your grief and my grief was a lot alike. Kelly, do you hear similarities in the way we both grieve? Absolutely.

Speaker 4 18:58

I feel like it's because you both experienced a loss, like a traumatic illness followed by death, right, I feel like that's why they're very similar.

Speaker 2 19:08

Yeah, now, I know there were still differences, but I think it points out for a lot of people that, even though people grieve differently, even though men certainly are likely to grieve differently than women, there are still a lot of similarities in how everyone grieves. There are certain things you're going to feel, certain phases you're going to go through, and one of my favorite phases, if you will, is that moment that you decide that you just don't want to live this way for the rest of your life and you know you need to do something about it. Is that the point, nick, where it's a good idea to figure out what might be therapeutic for you?

Speaker 3 19:45

I think that is a great point. There might be several, but that's definitely a good one. When you hit that point, you're probably going to struggle to move past that anytime soon and, if you achieve that point, probably a good idea to start thinking about what your therapy process is going to look like, what your grieving, how your grieving process is going to progress from there. Right, and it may not be something it unless if you know, I'm not even going to say unless even if you are a trained professional, it's likely not something you're going to do on your own. In fact, sometimes maybe the people who are trained professionals might be I hate to say it the worst ones equipped to deal with it. I have dealt with therapists and life coaches who themselves struggle like crazy, right, right, sometimes the helpers need to be helped.

Speaker 2 20:34

Right, and a lot of times people become grief therapists especially because of the experience, the personal experience they have had themselves.

Speaker 3 20:45

It's also not the easiest thing in the world to take care of yourself when you need to. I've heard of examples. My dad was an x-ray tech for like 35 years. He worked in hospitals. He knew what to do to take care of himself physically, did he? No, of course not. My mom was a nurse for 47 years. She largely also didn't take care of herself. I mean, she's still alive, but in a lot of ways she didn't take care of herself the way that she should have. She knew exactly what to do. She was a nurse, she nurse. She worked in a hospital for 47 years and yet when it came to dealing with herself, she wouldn't do what she would have done in many cases for any of the patients that she had over that time. We don't always treat ourselves the same way. We don't always manage our own symptoms and our own problems the same way that we would if we were helping somebody else.

Speaker 2 21:33

Right. Well, I've often heard that nurses and doctors make the worst patients. Yes, for just that reason. For just that reason, yeah, now on the lines of therapy. You say the word therapy and people immediately think I'm not going to go to any counselor or a psychologist or psychiatrist. Well, like Nick said, it doesn't have to be that.

Speaker 2 21:55

Find something therapeutic. It might be initially, once you kind of have that inkling, that feeling in your heart, in your mind, that you need to do something because enough's enough. It can be read a book initially. It can be find a close friend. If you're lucky enough to have one of those that you can just talk to. Just talk, just spill the words and cry if you need to cry. Those things are therapeutic. You may find as you go along that you need a little bit more than that, but that is a great start. And if you don't know what books to read, send me an email. I can recommend a dozen for you, but I'll certainly give you my top three with no problem. So just do something therapeutic, but you have to have an open mind and you have to be very aware of yourself, and that's the self-care that we talk about a lot too. Go ahead, nick.

Speaker 3 22:53

Yeah, sorry, you're right. You do need an open mind. If you're not going to have an open mind, you're wasting your time, you're wasting your money. I don't know how many of you listeners were ever a fan of the show the Westway. It ran back in 99 to 2006. I think it was the second or third season.

Speaker 3 23:12

After there was a shooting and attempt on President Bartlett, who was played by Mark Sheen, he ended up seeing a therapist and for two hours the initial session he basically just BS'd his way through it and the doctor knew he was, he wasn't, he was just avoiding what was really going on and like at the very end, finally they started to. Like he said President Bartlett said something and they dug into it. And then, of course, that's what he wanted to continue. And you know the doctor said no, sorry, it's double session, it's over. But before that, when he was being so difficult, the therapist said to him it's your money, it's about to be my money and, honestly, it's fine. So you're not doing this. If you're going to try to go to therapy just to screw with somebody and not be completely honest, go ahead and do it. All you're going to be doing is taking the money that you worked hard for and pushing it down the toilet. And if you're going to do that, then you might as well just take dollar bills and put it in the toilet, so at least you can get the enjoyment of watching it swirl down the tent, instead of giving it to somebody who can't do what they're hired to do because you're not helping, you're not doing your job. Honestly. It's something that you need to experience with a therapist, because they can't help you if you won't talk to them. It's just the way it is. So if you're going to go through a therapy process and I would also even say not just talking to a therapist If you're going to talk to any friend, coworker, sibling, a spouse, whatever if you're going to have a conversation, you're going to have to need to find a way to say what you need to say.

Embracing Grief and Support

Speaker 3 24:44

Don't screw around with it. Don't try to hide from the truth and put this detail out, but not put that detail out. If you want to talk to somebody, do yourself a favor and be as honest as you possibly can. And if you need to cry, then cry. And if you're a man and you think that you're too big and strong to watch you to cry. Dude, I got news for you. You're not.

Speaker 3 25:05

Men cry, men grieve. In fact, men are probably some of the worst patients because they think that they don't need therapy, they think that it's not for them, they think that they have to be strong and they can't cry and they can't break down. People, men, women, all of you. Yes, you have to be strong at certain times for your family, but if you are an emotional disaster, you are not going to be effective for yourself, for your job, for your family, for anybody. Don't let it happen.

Speaker 3 25:41

Do not get destroyed inside by your grief. I know it's going to take a minute to figure it out, but don't let it take a lifetime. There are literally people out there who are getting so crushed by their grief they go into depression and there are people who are taking their own lives because they don't know how to process it. I promise everybody who is within the sound of any of our voices there is somebody you could talk to on every single time. It doesn't have to be a profession. You don't have to pay a ton of money. I know people will say, oh, I have insurance or it's too expensive.

Speaker 3 26:17

We have a podcast here for free. We both have podcasts for free. If you want to talk to somebody you know, reach out. Yeah, you know, I'd reach Kathy. I'm sure she'll put my contact information. You have, and not just us. You have so many resources. Don't let them go by the wayside. Don't put yourself in a situation where you're not healing, where you're not grieving, because you're too proud of whatever it is that you think you're proud of. Pride doesn't matter, grief will last Absolutely.

Speaker 2 26:46

Oh, that's a perfect quote. Pride doesn't matter in grief. It shouldn't matter in grief. You have to take care of yourself. You have to be honest with yourself. Well, I think I have to kick my soapbox back under my desk because the time just flew by too fast. How does that happen, Nick? Every time we talk, even when it was before, we already did an episode together every time we talk, time flies so fast.

Speaker 3 27:13

So, as you remember, I was going to say we'll have to make a little mini series out of this and have to do a regular thing there's always that it could just morph into something where you know we're all cove, I have more oh oh, do you have a question?

Speaker 4 27:27

questions. I have a statement and a question, all right, oh, first is my question, because it might be longer. Nick did, did you feel any anger for I want to say, quote, unquote having to take care of your father despite the not great relationship you had with him?

Speaker 3 27:42

I didn't have any anger because I had to take care of him. I had anger toward him because he was being an asshole about it, because he wouldn't do what he was supposed to do. The doctors would tell him what to do, how to take care of himself, and he was always the smartest person in the room. Biggest ailment he had is he needed a hip replacement. He was in a car accident when he was 16 or 17. His car got T-boned. He went through the windshield. Car rolled over onto him. It crushed his pelvis, broke his hip. He spent a year in the hospital. This is back in like 1965. So that was bad. You want to talk about traumatic. When he got out of the hospital he was good. But even the doctor then said there's going to come a point in your life where this is going to catch up with you. And I mean he said that. The doctor said at the time I hope that there's better technology to take care of your death because you'll probably need it. The technology was available.

Speaker 3 28:31

He refused to get a hip replacement. He died at 73. The hip probably started really bugging him I want to say about mid-50s and his excuse was I'm afraid of the anesthesia. Okay, so you're going to suffer and you're going to let your quality of life degrade and deteriorate because you're afraid of the anesthesia. And then he didn't have a colonoscopy until he was 72 for the same reason. Wow, and his father died of colon cancer.

Speaker 3 28:57

Yeah, so, yeah, I mean I wasn't angry at him because I had to take care of him. I was angry at him because he didn't do what he needed to do to take care of himself. It could have been a much better process and he could have had some quality of life. He could have been overall better, possibly could even still be alive. But it's about how he takes care of himself, or took care of himself.

Speaker 3 29:18

His eating, I mean. He lived for 50 years. He lived on a very stinty diet of Coca-Cola, spaghetti, steak, rice, oreos, chocolate chip cookies, white Castles, all the things. Spaghetti I don't want to mention that all the things that are probably some of the worst things for you. But he didn't care. My stepmother, who is his last wife they've been divorced 20 years. I still call her my stepmother she tried so many times. He said I want it this way, I don't want to do this, I want to eat better. She's like fine, I'll make you whatever you want, but are you going to eat? If he's not going to be consistent, it's not going to matter. So no, I wasn't angry. I was angry because he couldn't be bothered to actually put in the effort to take care of himself.

Speaker 4 30:01

Right, he could have helped himself a long time ago. Good question, okay, my statement is this about the reaching out to people I want people to understand that you never know what someone else is going through. You hear it all the time, but with your reaching out about your grief, you could also be opening the door for the person that you're talking to, whether online or in person or on the phone, to then go oh hey, wait, I can relate to that and then they want to share their story and you could be helping them start their grief journey that they've been burying for who knows how long. Oh, absolutely, and so I think that's important to remember, because it's not. You know, they say it's not always about you, but I don't mean it in like that, right, but just as you know, just as they say their stories about you, smile to someone you know on the street and they didn't kill themselves that day because you smiled at them, right, you just never know what is behind those eyes. That's right, and I think it's important to think about that.

Speaker 3 30:57

Yeah, I know you speak to people generally. Yeah, that is such a powerful point you're. You're dead on and, yeah, anybody. We know that. We both know that there are people out there who are feeling things that we can't imagine because we've been there themselves. Look, I've been to some dark places. I've never been to a place where I thought that I wasn't going to wake up the next day. I know that there are people out there who do, and it's horrible to think that that happens Absolutely. I have known people in my life who are not here because they took their own life and it's a horrible experience just to go through Anybody. Seriously, if you have anything that is close to related to this, anywhere close to this topic, talk to us.

Speaker 3 31:38

Even though the name of my podcast is Our Dead Dads, as we've already talked about, my podcast is about so much more than just dead dads. It is about grief, trauma, loss, processing all of the crap in life that we all go through and getting past it, and it doesn't matter what the situation is. If it's a grief stricken or traumatic situation, let's getting past it. And it doesn't matter what the situation is. If it's a grief stricken or traumatic situation. Let's talk about it Absolutely, there's always space for that conversation. There is always space. There's always somebody who will listen.

Speaker 2 32:04

Yep, and I'll always make time for that person. Okay, so you remember now with my podcast, that I always turn the microphone over to my guests. So this is your chance, nick, to tell everybody where they can find. You Know that we'll put it in the contact information, in the podcast notes and everything as well. But talk to our listeners, tell them again about your podcast, how they can connect with you, et cetera. Floor is yours.

Speaker 3 32:32

Thank you. So, yes, once again, the podcast name is Our Dead dads and, as I've already said, it's what about way more than just dads, so please don't limit any conversations to that. The website is up, which was not the first time that we talked. Uh, it is up and running. It's um, I love the website, very proud of it. Our dead dadscom that section with all the episodes that we've had in the past.

Speaker 3 32:53

There is a. There's a recommended section which lists books that guests of mine have published that are now living it there in the recommended section with links to buy if you'd like. There's a recommended podcast section which this podcast is in it, and there's also I think it's called Friends of the Podcast, which are basically sponsors or other important people, like my wife's travel agent business is in there. The gentleman who built my website is in there and the ladies who designed my music and my artwork they are in there. There are contact pages. If you want to be a guest. The contact us bar is the last one. On the right side of the screen, upper right hand corner, there's a be a guest form. Fill it out a whole bunch of questions and then we will set up a 30 minute initial conversation determine if it's a good thing and, if so, which most of it usually is, we will move towards having an interview. There is another contact form for random questions, which anybody who's listened to any of my interviews knows that I always add to every interview with asking my guests a whole bunch of random questions, because it's a light way to add the conversation after talking about all the crazy stuff that we've talked about.

Speaker 3 34:04

There is a lot to the website and I definitely encourage you to take advantage of it and look through it. Like I said, plenty of ways to reach out to me. If you want to, I'd definitely be here. I have pages on Facebook, instagram, tiktok, which are probably the three that I have the most active on on social media. I also have technically, I have the accounts on Snapchat, twitter, but I haven't really been doing much of those. Facebook, instagram and TikTok are the three bait woods. You can either search for Our Dead Dads Podcast or the username is the same on all three of them. It is at Our Dead Dads Pod, so easy to find. You can also find my personal Facebook page, which is just under my name, nick Gaylord. There are several Nick Gaylords on there, so if you find the one that says host and owner of Our Dead Dads Podcast, he's got the right one. That's really it. I'm not hard to find got the right one.

Speaker 2 34:56

That's really it. I'm not hard to find. Well, of course you're not. Of course you're not because you make yourself available, and that's wonderful.

Speaker 2 35:00

So, to our listeners out there, did we get a little preachy today? Well, you know what? Maybe some of you needed it. So think about that for a minute. If you didn't need it, kudos to you. You're coming along in your grief journey and I couldn't be prouder of you. But sometimes you need a little preaching. My soapbox is back under my desk so it won't come out, at least until the next episode. One never knows.

Speaker 2 35:23

With me, I can get preachy one minute and then just be soft and sweet the next. Remember to take care of yourselves, and we talked a lot today about that self-care and how self-care, first of all, is having that open mind and knowing when you need some help. Then it's up to you to decide what help you need. I'm a big one on resources and there are so many free resources out there, but you have to be careful which ones you select. So I'm telling you right now if you go to ourdeaddadscom, you'll find some great resources. If you go to websites, for any of the guests which you'll find on our website that have been on our podcast. I can vouch for every single one of those because I vet the guests before I allow them on the episodes. Nick has one more thing to say. I do love that.

Speaker 3 36:16

Yeah, same with me. I love that. You've done all the guests. I do apologize. I just want to say one other thing. You can, if you want to listen to the episodes, you can listen to any of the previous episodes through the website or, if you prefer, the podcast platform. It's available everywhere Apple, spotify, iheart, amazon Music. It's available everywhere apple, spotify, iheart, amazon music. All it's all over the place. Like I said, not hard to find. Listen to it. Tell everybody you know I've done, I promise.

Speaker 2 36:41

Okay, not, not a problem. Done until next time, that's right. Yeah, done until next time. And you have at least 13 episodes out there, more to come.

Speaker 3 36:51

You drop new episodes every tuesday every tuesday and occasionally uh, there are sometimes some bonus episodes which would usually drop on friday. But yes, the regular drop is every tuesday, okay all right.

Sharing Grief and Connection

Speaker 2 37:03

So if you go to your favorite podcast app and check out his podcast and kind of get that little subscription or reminder whatever it is, depending on the app you use you'll find out whenever there's a new episode. Okay, I think I've said all I need to say for the moment, thinking to be sure yeah, take care of yourselves, we love you. Thanks so much, nick, thank you, kelly, and check in again next week as we all continue to live and grieve. Thanks Kelly, bye all. Thanks, kelly.

Speaker 1 37:34

Thank you so much for listening with us today. Do you have a topic that you'd like us to cover or do you have a question from one of our episodes? Please email us at info at as I live and grievecom, and let us know. We hope you will find a moment to leave a review, send an email and share with others. Join us next time as we continue to live and grieve together.