Thriving After Trauma
Hosted by Trauma Transformation & Energy Coach, Jaci Rogash, Thriving After Trauma is a podcast about real life stories of transformation, navigating life and being able to show up in the world as your unapologetic self. We’ll talk about the ups, the downs, the ugly truths and the magical moments that we all experience, but often feel we can’t share, so we can bring to life the importance of having meaningful conversations and embracing our own journey in this crazy thing we call life.
Thriving After Trauma
Elizabeth Banks: Survivng, Healing and Thriving After Domestic Violence
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Come and join me for a really personal, honest and real conversation with the incredible Elizabeth Banks.
In this episode we talk about Elizabeth’s journey from an abusive marriage to learning to trust herself again. We talk about the cycles she had to break, the conditioning, her survival and how she rebuilt.
Elizabeth is a counsellor, speaker, and the founder of The Village Health.
She spends her days sitting with women as they rebuild themselves after trauma and abuse. She spent years before that doing the same work in her own life. Elizabeth is a victim survivor of family violence. She knows the loneliness of not being believed, and the long, unglamorous work of learning to trust yourself again.
She speaks on coercive control, the hidden reality of high-functioning survivors, parenting through trauma and the path back to yourself after abuse.
This episode does come with a trigger warning as we do talk about domestic violence, mental health and abusive families. Beyond that though, this episode is an incredibly liberating and inspiring conversation.
Join the Unveiling
https://www.jacirogash.com/unveiling
Connect with Elizabeth:
- Instagram: @elizabethbankswholehearted
- Instagram: @thevillagehealthau
- Www.tvillagehealth.com.au
Connect with me:
Transcript
00:00:01 Jaci Rogash
Come and join me for a really personal, honest and real conversation with the incredible Elizabeth Banks.
00:00:07 Jaci Rogash
In this episode, we're talking about Elizabeth's journey from an abusive marriage to learning to trust herself again.
00:00:13 Jaci Rogash
We talk about the cycle she's had to break, the conditioning, her survival and how she rebuilt from the bottom up.
00:00:20 Jaci Rogash
Elizabeth is a counsellor, speaker and the founder of The Village Health.
00:00:24 Jaci Rogash
She spends her days sitting with women as they rebuild themselves after trauma and abuse.
00:00:29 Jaci Rogash
She spent years before that doing the same work in her own life.
00:00:33 Jaci Rogash
Elizabeth is a victim survivor of family violence.
00:00:36 Jaci Rogash
She knows the loneliness of not being believed and the long, unglamorous work of learning to trust yourself again.
00:00:42 Jaci Rogash
She speaks on coercive control, the hidden reality of high-functioning survivors, parenting through trauma and the path back to yourself after abuse.
00:00:52 Jaci Rogash
This episode does come with a trigger warning as we do talk about domestic violence, mental health and abusive families.
00:00:58 Jaci Rogash
Beyond that though, this episode is an incredibly liberating and inspiring conversation that everybody needs to hear.
00:01:08 Jaci Rogash
Welcome to Thriving After Trauma, a podcast to help you move beyond surviving and support you to truly thrive in every area of your life.
00:01:16 Jaci Rogash
Sometimes it's scary to claim your big desires because of your past.
00:01:20 Jaci Rogash
This podcast will give you the courage to put yourself first and make your dreams a priority.
00:01:25 Jaci Rogash
I'm Jackie, an award-winning trauma transformation coach, breathwork facilitator and international speaker.
00:01:31 Jaci Rogash
I am so excited to bring you these deep, honest and real conversations as a way of supporting you to truly thrive after trauma.
00:01:39 Jaci Rogash
Hello, Elizabeth.
00:01:40 Jaci Rogash
How are you?
00:01:41 Elizabeth Banks
I'm great, Jackie.
00:01:42 Elizabeth Banks
I am so excited to be here.
00:01:44 Jaci Rogash
I'm so excited to be having this conversation with you.
00:01:49 Jaci Rogash
I know we obviously have crossed paths for a little while now, and you were someone to me when I first met, was like, oh, you've just got it all going on.
00:02:01 Jaci Rogash
You've got your **** together, you've got your own business, you know, you've got it, you've created an incredible community.
00:02:08 Jaci Rogash
And then the more I got to know you, the more I realized that, as is often the case, there is so much more to your story.
00:02:19 Jaci Rogash
And I guess I'd love to ask you or invite you to share, yeah, a little bit about your journey and how you got to where you are right now.
00:02:29 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah, I think there is always more than meets the eye.
00:02:33 Elizabeth Banks
And in our very survival in our society almost depends on us being able to present in a way that feels safe to us.
00:02:44 Elizabeth Banks
And I think, you know, when you met me, I had a lot of my **** together, but not all of it.
00:02:52 Elizabeth Banks
But there's certainly a story behind it.
00:02:56 Elizabeth Banks
And yeah.
00:03:01 Jaci Rogash
Yeah.
00:03:02 Jaci Rogash
And so you've navigated challenges and you've, you know, had to work through some of the most difficult things that I think any person has to.
00:03:13 Jaci Rogash
And I'd love, I guess, if you would share or mind sharing, yeah, part of your journey in relation to what you've had to work through and your trauma and yeah, that supported you to get to where you are.
00:03:25 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah, sure.
00:03:26 Elizabeth Banks
So I had a lot of trauma in my life and I've worked really hard to get to a place where that no longer defines me.
00:03:39 Elizabeth Banks
And for me, it started in my childhood home.
00:03:42 Elizabeth Banks
There was a lot of anger, a lot of abuse, a lot of mistreatment.
00:03:48 Elizabeth Banks
And I spent most of my childhood feeling really unsafe and uneasy.
00:03:59 Elizabeth Banks
I first attempted to take my life when I was 12 years old.
00:04:04 Elizabeth Banks
I just couldn't see
00:04:07 Elizabeth Banks
anything ever getting any better.
00:04:11 Elizabeth Banks
And then, like lots of people do, I left home for something that was better or seemed better at the time.
00:04:23 Elizabeth Banks
Unfortunately, what I what I left home for and moved into became an abusive marriage and an abusive relationship.
00:04:35 Elizabeth Banks
and I didn't recognize it for a really long time because of the conditioning from my childhood trauma, also the coercion and the gaslighting that was going on in my marriage.
00:04:49 Elizabeth Banks
I thought that I was the problem.
00:04:51 Elizabeth Banks
I thought that there was something wrong, fundamentally wrong with me.
00:04:56 Elizabeth Banks
I also didn't know that
00:05:00 Elizabeth Banks
there was better out there that safe relationships existed or what they looked or felt like.
00:05:06 Elizabeth Banks
So it's not like I had a comparison of a secure relationship to weigh my marriage up against and go, actually, this is not okay because it was just normal.
00:05:21 Jaci Rogash
Thank you for sharing that.
00:05:22 Jaci Rogash
And yeah, that connection between what we know
00:05:27 Jaci Rogash
and what we then call in or create, I say create, we don't often mean to create it, but what we attract is so relevant.
00:05:38 Jaci Rogash
I think that sometimes goes, we downplay that.
00:05:42 Jaci Rogash
As you said, like, if that's all you know, that's what you see a relationship to be.
00:05:47 Jaci Rogash
And unknowingly, you entered into the same thing.
00:05:54 Jaci Rogash
So what was there?
00:05:56 Jaci Rogash
a moment or what was it that kind of, I guess, brought your attention to the fact that it wasn't a healthy relationship?
00:06:07 Elizabeth Banks
I think it was my children and not in that, not them themselves, but knowing that I didn't want them to grow up with that same conditioning and that same pattern to think that this was normal.
00:06:26 Elizabeth Banks
it was a bit of a realization that if I continue in this marriage and I continue to justify and excuse and bypass what I see and what I feel, then I am teaching my children and especially my daughter to accept the same.
00:06:48 Elizabeth Banks
And I didn't want that for them.
00:06:52 Jaci Rogash
That's
00:06:53 Jaci Rogash
heartbreaking and beautiful at the same time.
00:06:57 Jaci Rogash
I think our, well, what I'm learning, children are just our biggest teachers.
00:07:02 Jaci Rogash
Like there's nowhere to hide when we have kids.
00:07:07 Jaci Rogash
And so you mentioned, you said there, what you were seeing and feeling.
00:07:14 Jaci Rogash
I'm curious around that feeling piece.
00:07:17 Jaci Rogash
How did you, because so often in coercive relationships or abusive relationships of any kind,
00:07:23 Jaci Rogash
we do like, we get convinced that we're the problem, even though it's like, oh, but I don't, like I don't think that I am and I don't feel like I am, but I must be because this is how it is.
00:07:34 Jaci Rogash
How did you, I guess, connect with and untangle that feeling piece?
00:07:43 Elizabeth Banks
I had a brilliant psychiatrist as part of my team.
00:07:50 Elizabeth Banks
There's a
00:07:51 Elizabeth Banks
a whole part of this story where I had, well, he had convinced me and I had convinced myself and therefore convinced my psychiatrist that I had some pretty severe mental illness stuff going on.
00:08:10 Elizabeth Banks
And part of that was that I was then put on an enormous amount of medication, as is, you know, sometimes required when people are very unwell.
00:08:22 Elizabeth Banks
And there was a particular incident where this really demonstrates the level of of control that was there.
00:08:31 Elizabeth Banks
I I didn't get my own medication.
00:08:35 Elizabeth Banks
My husband at the time would go and get it for me and bring it to the house.
00:08:41 Elizabeth Banks
And and he just didn't one time.
00:08:46 Elizabeth Banks
And so you can imagine being on
00:08:49 Elizabeth Banks
I think it was 17 different tablets every morning and just not having them.
00:08:56 Elizabeth Banks
And I think it was about three days and the withdrawal effects were just phenomenal.
00:09:03 Elizabeth Banks
And I don't quite remember the reason, but for some reason at that time I couldn't, I couldn't drive to the chemist to get them myself.
00:09:11 Elizabeth Banks
And I remember trying to explain this to my psychiatrist.
00:09:15 Elizabeth Banks
that, well, like, I've had this period of withdrawal and now I'm really not doing well.
00:09:19 Elizabeth Banks
And I was like, you know, I couldn't go in the car.
00:09:21 Elizabeth Banks
And she's like, well, why didn't you just get a taxi?
00:09:27 Elizabeth Banks
And this was a real aha moment for me because what the truth was and what I wanted to say was, I'm not allowed to.
00:09:36 Elizabeth Banks
But I couldn't quite let those words pass my lips.
00:09:40 Elizabeth Banks
There was, and it was that real like, whoa, I am.
00:09:45 Elizabeth Banks
a 30 something year old woman, and I'm not allowed to get in a taxi because my husband won't let me.
00:09:53 Elizabeth Banks
And there was this real, yeah, aha moment of, oh, **** something is wrong.
00:10:00 Elizabeth Banks
This is not okay.
00:10:02 Elizabeth Banks
And so at that time, I told my psychiatrist, oh, I didn't think of that.
00:10:08 Elizabeth Banks
And she organized an admission to a psychiatric unit as a result of this withdrawal period.
00:10:15 Elizabeth Banks
And she shared with me then that she really thought that there was something more going on.
00:10:20 Elizabeth Banks
And so we used that admission time and time away from my husband to just start untangling some of the conditioning and some of that web of lies and coercion.
00:10:33 Jaci Rogash
I like her.
00:10:34 Elizabeth Banks
I love her.
00:10:36 Jaci Rogash
I love her too.
00:10:40 Jaci Rogash
And it's
00:10:44 Jaci Rogash
It's not often that I'm speechless, but I'm a little bit speechless.
00:10:48 Jaci Rogash
It's so interesting when, like, seemingly small things are the trigger to much bigger things.
00:10:59 Jaci Rogash
Like, if you think about it, it's like, I'm not allowed to get a taxi.
00:11:02 Jaci Rogash
Like, in the grand scheme of everything that you experienced, I imagine that that's pretty minor.
00:11:07 Jaci Rogash
But that one question was the trigger to this whole unraveling.
00:11:14 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah, absolutely.
00:11:16 Elizabeth Banks
And I feel that that's so often the case, you know, I see a similar thing in my clients.
00:11:20 Elizabeth Banks
It's, it's not the big moments because there's something in us that knows that the bruises or the broken bones, we fundamentally know they're wrong, but we are somehow throughout probably our survival mechanisms able to accept them.
00:11:36 Elizabeth Banks
But it's those smaller moments of
00:11:44 Elizabeth Banks
you know, taking away independence and autonomy that often lead to those breakthrough moments of this is, this is abuse, this is not okay.
00:11:54 Jaci Rogash
Yeah.
00:11:55 Jaci Rogash
Yeah, I 100% agree.
00:11:57 Jaci Rogash
And I think also when we experience trauma, I know for me, like we almost attach to absolutely a trauma response, but we attach to wanting to, we choose to say the best in people because we,
00:12:11 Jaci Rogash
I believe there's part of us, like internal part of us that just wanted someone to see that in us.
00:12:18 Jaci Rogash
But then we often also attach to the fixing or the saving or, that kind of thing in my, so I was in an abusive relationship when I was 21.
00:12:29 Jaci Rogash
And I just remember, you know, some of the things are wild and, you know, there's been moments recently where I'm like, **** I was bad.
00:12:41 Jaci Rogash
That was so bad.
00:12:44 Jaci Rogash
I remember at the time being like, oh no, but when he's sober, he's really great.
00:12:47 Jaci Rogash
Like we have so much fun and we, go and do things and he buys me things and we have a really good time when he's sober.
00:12:55 Jaci Rogash
And then when he wasn't, it was, like the controlling, the coercion, the possessiveness, all of that.
00:13:04 Jaci Rogash
And even early on in that relationship, he said to me one stage,
00:13:09 Jaci Rogash
So his house was like a display home.
00:13:11 Jaci Rogash
You would walk into it and think that it was a display home.
00:13:14 Jaci Rogash
At the point, if I poured myself a cup of water from the sink and there was a drop of water in the sink, he'd be like, you haven't cleaned up after yourself.
00:13:23 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah, right.
00:13:23 Jaci Rogash
Like I had to, you know, it was like, **** don't touch anything.
00:13:27 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah.
00:13:28 Jaci Rogash
And very early on in the relationship, he said to me, he goes, I'm not in control of this relationship.
00:13:33 Jaci Rogash
And I remember saying, well, you're not meant to be.
00:13:35 Jaci Rogash
like a relationship's not about being in control of them, but I just kind of dismissed it because we had fun.
00:13:43 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah.
00:13:44 Jaci Rogash
And then, after some pretty big incidents, I was like, no, he was ultimately the reason that I left Echuca because I'm like, I can't be in this town anymore.
00:13:54 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah, right.
00:13:55 Jaci Rogash
With you here.
00:13:56 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah.
00:13:59 Jaci Rogash
And so you speak about
00:14:01 Jaci Rogash
you know, the broken bones and the bruises and that kind of thing.
00:14:04 Jaci Rogash
Was that happening when you had kids?
00:14:07 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah, so before kids, there were, there was certainly control and that a real sort of erosion of me.
00:14:21 Elizabeth Banks
But the worst of it happened after our daughter was born.
00:14:26 Elizabeth Banks
So she's our third child.
00:14:32 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah.
00:14:32 Elizabeth Banks
And that's when things really ramped up.
00:14:36 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah.
00:14:39 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah.
00:14:39 Elizabeth Banks
It was also a time where my so I suffered with really severe postnatal depression and anxiety.
00:14:48 Elizabeth Banks
And that that's where I actually met my brilliant psychiatrist.
00:14:53 Elizabeth Banks
And so that that's a part of my journey that I just see the beautiful workings of the universe in, in that
00:15:01 Elizabeth Banks
allowing that struggle in order for this person to come into my life.
00:15:05 Elizabeth Banks
She was sitting in my hospital room the day after my daughter was born.
00:15:10 Elizabeth Banks
And I remember I was out of the room for some reason and I walked back in and she was there and I just felt this sense of it's going to be okay.
00:15:19 Elizabeth Banks
Like she's got me.
00:15:22 Elizabeth Banks
Such a gift.
00:15:25 Elizabeth Banks
And then especially now in hindsight, knowing
00:15:28 Elizabeth Banks
that that was really the time where the abuse did start to become physical.
00:15:37 Elizabeth Banks
That, yeah, I needed someone like that.
00:15:40 Elizabeth Banks
I needed that solid, steady, unshakable person in my life.
00:15:45 Jaci Rogash
Yeah.
00:15:46 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah.
00:15:48 Jaci Rogash
And, you know, no one, no one should ever have to experience that, especially after having children.
00:15:58 Jaci Rogash
And also when we look at it, I guess from that, saving grace piece, that daughter, your daughter, not that daughter, your daughter, you know, like was one of the pivoting moments for you.
00:16:19 Jaci Rogash
And so we do time in the,
00:16:26 Jaci Rogash
like away from your husband with that support, doing that untangling.
00:16:31 Jaci Rogash
What does, this is, you're gonna laugh at me when I ask this question because it's like, you know, is there ever an answer?
00:16:40 Jaci Rogash
What was that healing like for you?
00:16:43 Jaci Rogash
What was the healing journey?
00:16:45 Elizabeth Banks
I, the early days of that did not feel like healing.
00:16:50 Elizabeth Banks
Like, Did they ever?
00:16:54 Elizabeth Banks
Healing is so painful.
00:16:56 Elizabeth Banks
Like when you when you actually look at the state of your life and what what things have become, what you have tolerated, allowed, being conditioned to accept.
00:17:13 Elizabeth Banks
God, that hurts.
00:17:15 Elizabeth Banks
So it really was the
00:17:22 Elizabeth Banks
I can, I remember though, within that a sense of hope, you know, where I really started to think, this is not going to be my forever.
00:17:34 Elizabeth Banks
I'm, I'm going to be ready to, to leave him soon.
00:17:42 Elizabeth Banks
He helped that along quite a bit, you know, while I was in that psychiatric facility and
00:17:52 Elizabeth Banks
And on, you know, quite close monitoring because of the deterioration of my mental health, he came in one day and just lost his shift.
00:18:07 Elizabeth Banks
And it was such a gift because he was really, really clever at keeping his public appearance as the wonderful, supportive husband and the great dad.
00:18:20 Elizabeth Banks
and all of that.
00:18:21 Elizabeth Banks
And so everything that happened was behind closed doors.
00:18:24 Elizabeth Banks
No one had seen it.
00:18:28 Elizabeth Banks
And there's actually only twice really that anyone else has seen it.
00:18:34 Elizabeth Banks
And at the time, I truly believed I needed someone else to witness it.
00:18:38 Elizabeth Banks
in order for it to be valid.
00:18:40 Elizabeth Banks
And so he the first time was that he came into the hospital and just lost his **** about how I had let him down and betrayed him and and and just was ranting and went on and on and then ended up saying, Well, why don't you just kill yourself then?
00:18:57 Elizabeth Banks
Just do us all a favor.
00:18:59 Elizabeth Banks
Of course, the staff heard that and then
00:19:03 Elizabeth Banks
you know, that information got passed on to the psychiatrist, which actually meant that I could process it in a way that was actually helpful.
00:19:13 Elizabeth Banks
And then the second was probably, probably two years later.
00:19:19 Elizabeth Banks
And I know that probably if you've not been in a DV relationship, that sounds like an enormous timeline.
00:19:27 Elizabeth Banks
But the second was actually at my son's basketball match and
00:19:34 Elizabeth Banks
Again, he just lost his **** in public and I ended up calling the police that night and had an IVO.
00:19:43 Elizabeth Banks
Well, the police put an IVO in place for me.
00:19:47 Elizabeth Banks
And what I know now that I didn't know then is that I didn't need someone else to validate it.
00:19:54 Elizabeth Banks
I didn't need, you know, a police witness or someone else to go, yeah, I see what's going on here.
00:20:01 Elizabeth Banks
This is abuse.
00:20:03 Elizabeth Banks
I already knew, but I didn't trust myself enough.
00:20:08 Elizabeth Banks
And so I think the most painful part of that healing process was realizing how little of myself I had left.
00:20:20 Elizabeth Banks
And knowing, well, realizing that there was really not a lot of me there and that I didn't know
00:20:32 Elizabeth Banks
Who I was, I didn't trust myself, I didn't trust my opinions, but also had lost access, well, had severed access by my own choice, of course, to this person who I had run everything by in my life.
00:20:50 Jaci Rogash
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00:21:41 Elizabeth Banks
And that's a really unusual dichotomy of like, who am I without them?
00:21:47 Elizabeth Banks
But actually I don't want to be around them.
00:21:50 Elizabeth Banks
Like I hate them.
00:21:52 Jaci Rogash
Yeah.
00:21:56 Jaci Rogash
there's so much in there.
00:21:57 Jaci Rogash
I've got like 30 questions running around in my head.
00:22:00 Jaci Rogash
And healing is ******* brutal.
00:22:02 Jaci Rogash
Absolutely.
00:22:04 Jaci Rogash
Like, you know, I think we all, I feel like everyone goes through a certain period of suppression or denial, you know, depending on what it is.
00:22:14 Jaci Rogash
And often, as we know, you and I know that in DV situations, often it is prolonged over such a long period of time.
00:22:25 Jaci Rogash
But it's like when you lift that veil, I kind of have this image of a cake with, those old school lace cake covers and stop the flies.
00:22:32 Jaci Rogash
I don't have this image of like lifting that off and it's just being like, holy ****.
00:22:38 Jaci Rogash
Look what is under here.
00:22:40 Jaci Rogash
Yeah, What is under here?
00:22:43 Jaci Rogash
And yeah, I actually get really annoyed when you see people talking about
00:22:49 Jaci Rogash
or promoting, come to this one thing and we'll heal all your trauma or do this or, you know, this is healing and it like looks shiny and glossy and it's like, no, it's not.
00:22:58 Jaci Rogash
It's not one part of it.
00:23:02 Elizabeth Banks
That is not how this happens.
00:23:05 Jaci Rogash
It's not how it happens.
00:23:08 Jaci Rogash
And also that point you made around feeling like you needed someone to validate what you're experiencing.
00:23:17 Jaci Rogash
I think it's so relevant because we, when we experience trauma, we lose that trust in ourselves.
00:23:23 Jaci Rogash
And I think society has a lot to, blame for that.
00:23:28 Jaci Rogash
We make it our own fault or what did I do wrong?
00:23:30 Jaci Rogash
Or maybe I should have done something different.
00:23:33 Jaci Rogash
And yeah, we don't, we don't trust ourselves.
00:23:36 Jaci Rogash
So it's like, you know, am I making this up?
00:23:39 Jaci Rogash
Like, I know this doesn't feel good, but, you know, and I just, I'm so grateful that you had,
00:23:45 Jaci Rogash
those experiences and you had those people be like, this is not okay.
00:23:50 Jaci Rogash
Not that you needed them.
00:23:52 Jaci Rogash
But as you said, like, sometimes when we're in the thick of it, has to be, it almost has to be someone external.
00:23:59 Jaci Rogash
Cause I've had a lot of friends in, you know, abusive relationships.
00:24:03 Jaci Rogash
And when you're their friend, they just, they don't listen to you.
00:24:08 Elizabeth Banks
Yes.
00:24:09 Elizabeth Banks
You know, because of what you largely, not entirely, but largely because of what you said earlier, that wanting to see the good, wanting to fix it, the if only, you know, if only he would not do this, or if only this part didn't happen, or if only I had cleaned the kitchen better, if only, you know, he didn't have that other friendship of influence.
00:24:33 Elizabeth Banks
We were really good at at the if onlys, but the other part
00:24:39 Elizabeth Banks
of, of healing is that learning to trust yourself.
00:24:46 Elizabeth Banks
And I think, you know, for a time we've got to borrow that from other people.
00:24:50 Elizabeth Banks
We have to borrow other people's sense of hope and belief and also other people's ideas about who we are.
00:25:02 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah.
00:25:03 Elizabeth Banks
But I, I think the thing that makes healing so difficult, but also
00:25:09 Elizabeth Banks
true healing so profound is that it requires us to to save ourselves, to borrow from other people along the way, borrow their hope, borrow their belief, their their ideas or their thoughts, or even their approaches to life.
00:25:34 Elizabeth Banks
But to really and truly heal
00:25:38 Elizabeth Banks
we have to show up for ourselves and, and take back that outsourcing, whether that's outsourcing to a healing event or, you know, a particular ceremony or something that looks glossy and shiny or outsourcing to the idea of another person will save us, you know, another knight will come riding in with his shining armor and, and it will all be better.
00:26:03 Elizabeth Banks
We,
00:26:04 Elizabeth Banks
we can't hand the power of our healing over to someone else.
00:26:08 Elizabeth Banks
We have to fly in, scoop ourselves up and save ourselves.
00:26:14 Elizabeth Banks
We have to be our own knights in shining other.
00:26:19 Jaci Rogash
Absolutely.
00:26:20 Jaci Rogash
Absolutely.
00:26:21 Jaci Rogash
And I, yeah, it's, we, I don't, you can't truly heal unless you can do that and be that person for yourself.
00:26:31 Jaci Rogash
And you said something else that's really fascinating.
00:26:33 Jaci Rogash
It's come up a couple of times with clients of mine in the last week.
00:26:37 Jaci Rogash
So I love that it came up here naturally, is that we can know that a relationship, whether it's with family, whether it's romantic, you know, whatever, friendship, we can know that it's toxic and unhealthy and have this attachment to it.
00:26:55 Jaci Rogash
But so often what's not spoken
00:26:57 Jaci Rogash
about is that void that comes when they're no longer there.
00:27:05 Jaci Rogash
And I think in an ideal world, obviously not in DV situations, but if we're thinking about family, we in an ideal world, we kind of think, well, maybe if I can just set some boundaries, then my nervous system can go from being heightened all the time to just being quite neutral.
00:27:25 Jaci Rogash
And that would be a lot easier than, when it doesn't go to plan and your nervous system goes from here to nothing because that person's not there anymore.
00:27:36 Jaci Rogash
And that is jolting.
00:27:40 Elizabeth Banks
Absolutely.
00:27:41 Elizabeth Banks
Absolutely.
00:27:43 Elizabeth Banks
For me, that looked like finding myself in some friendships, which were so much better, but also
00:27:54 Elizabeth Banks
conditional and overworking.
00:28:03 Elizabeth Banks
You know, I was doing, I was still working in my business as a counselor, but also was trying to, you know, get all the financial stuff together.
00:28:14 Elizabeth Banks
And banks don't really like single mums who are self-employed.
00:28:19 Elizabeth Banks
So I was working for someone else and I had
00:28:24 Elizabeth Banks
This one particular client who, so I was doing support, NDIS support work, and my client was really, really high needs.
00:28:32 Elizabeth Banks
And I was working with this person for between 60 to 70 hours a week.
00:28:41 Elizabeth Banks
Wow.
00:28:42 Elizabeth Banks
While, you know, having my kids 100% of the time.
00:28:45 Elizabeth Banks
And so, you know, it was like drop them off at before school care.
00:28:49 Elizabeth Banks
go to work, pick them up from after school care.
00:28:51 Elizabeth Banks
And then, you know, there was about an hour and a half before bedtime where I just fully immersed myself in mothering.
00:29:01 Elizabeth Banks
But that relationship that I had with that support work plan, it wasn't abusive at all, but it was so high needs that it in many ways replicated
00:29:15 Elizabeth Banks
that feeling for my nervous system, it filled that void.
00:29:18 Elizabeth Banks
And and so there were times when I can remember one time my kids were went on a school camp and I was like, I can't go home to nothing.
00:29:28 Elizabeth Banks
And so I called work and picked up an extra shift.
00:29:31 Elizabeth Banks
Like I was seeking ways to find that familiarity for my nervous system because it the familiarity of chaos
00:29:42 Elizabeth Banks
felt so much better than the calm.
00:29:46 Jaci Rogash
Oh, it's such an adjustment.
00:29:51 Jaci Rogash
Yeah, I remember when I was, I would have ended up being 18 or 19.
00:29:57 Jaci Rogash
And whenever someone was like, how are you?
00:30:00 Jaci Rogash
I'm like, yeah, I'm good.
00:30:01 Jaci Rogash
I noticed myself, I'd be like, oh, hang on.
00:30:05 Jaci Rogash
I'm good.
00:30:05 Jaci Rogash
Like that's not comfortable for me.
00:30:07 Jaci Rogash
So I would, subconsciously like create a drama or, attract something that caused that tension and that friction.
00:30:14 Jaci Rogash
And I'd be like, oh, like, I can relax now.
00:30:18 Jaci Rogash
And I look back now and as I'm sure you're all the same, you know, when there's anything that's slightly dramatic or, you know, not right, it's like, oh, no, get me like, get me.
00:30:28 Elizabeth Banks
It's repulsive.
00:30:29 Elizabeth Banks
Absolutely.
00:30:30 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah.
00:30:30 Jaci Rogash
It is.
00:30:31 Jaci Rogash
But in that moment,
00:30:33 Jaci Rogash
Yeah, that void is huge.
00:30:34 Jaci Rogash
And so is that like attachment because it's what we've known for so long.
00:30:40 Jaci Rogash
that is comfortable.
00:30:45 Jaci Rogash
Even though it's, totally harmful and unsafe and all of that, but it's like, that's what we know.
00:30:49 Jaci Rogash
So that's what we try and find.
00:30:52 Elizabeth Banks
Yes.
00:30:54 Jaci Rogash
So we've got this void and also
00:30:58 Jaci Rogash
I'm going to run a business, work full time and raise kids.
00:31:03 Jaci Rogash
Yeah.
00:31:06 Elizabeth Banks
There's a reason we're friends.
00:31:11 Jaci Rogash
I guess the rebuild.
00:31:13 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah.
00:31:14 Jaci Rogash
Like after all the mess and the **** and the like, oh, what did, what did the rebuild look like?
00:31:23 Elizabeth Banks
The rebuild, I,
00:31:26 Elizabeth Banks
I think the rebuild is incomplete.
00:31:28 Jaci Rogash
Yeah.
00:31:30 Elizabeth Banks
And I think I kind of want it to stay that way because my life is so good and so beautiful now.
00:31:38 Elizabeth Banks
And, you know, I tell myself often that I am creating the life of my dreams, but keeping that idea that I'm still rebuilding it, it helps me to know I'm not finished yet.
00:31:51 Elizabeth Banks
It gets better.
00:31:53 Elizabeth Banks
you know, and five years ago, I would have adored to step into my life now.
00:32:00 Elizabeth Banks
And I'm so I'm content and grateful, but I also know there's more.
00:32:05 Elizabeth Banks
But but getting to this point has been such it's been work because I've I've been determined to be my own knight in shining armor.
00:32:19 Elizabeth Banks
And that doesn't mean that I think I've got to do it all alone because
00:32:23 Elizabeth Banks
Um, God, I've got a village.
00:32:25 Elizabeth Banks
I have got, I mean, my, my business is called the Village Health, but me in my life, I have **** I've got a good village.
00:32:37 Elizabeth Banks
Like I have got sensational people, sensational women around me.
00:32:43 Elizabeth Banks
Um, and the rebuild looked like trusting them.
00:32:51 Elizabeth Banks
believing their version of me when I didn't see the good.
00:32:57 Elizabeth Banks
It looked like, yeah, leaning in to that, you know, I think of one particular beautiful friend who I found along this journey of building the village.
00:33:14 Elizabeth Banks
And she's someone that I have really been able to borrow
00:33:19 Elizabeth Banks
both belief from, but also perspective.
00:33:25 Elizabeth Banks
She's someone I can go to and say, the story I'm telling myself here is that this is me and I'm the problem and I'm screwing all of this up.
00:33:33 Elizabeth Banks
Is it real or not?
00:33:35 Elizabeth Banks
And to be able to have those conversations and her insights and for her to be able to offer that so freely, knowing you need the background and why it is that I'm,
00:33:48 Elizabeth Banks
questioning has helped me to to rebuild that trust in myself and also to to step into a place of of real leadership with with support and accountability and and all of those things that that we need in order to flourish while remaining remaining grounded.
00:34:17 Elizabeth Banks
You know, and that I suppose makes it that can kind of make it sound like it's a little bit of a glossy journey.
00:34:22 Elizabeth Banks
Just find a great friend.
00:34:23 Elizabeth Banks
But it is also it is also hours of work.
00:34:28 Elizabeth Banks
It is many, many tears.
00:34:30 Elizabeth Banks
It is grueling over the ideas of who I thought I was as opposed to who I really am.
00:34:39 Elizabeth Banks
And I'm taking risks on myself like
00:34:45 Elizabeth Banks
And those risks are, you know, asking the question, what if I really can do this?
00:34:51 Elizabeth Banks
What if I really am good enough?
00:34:54 Elizabeth Banks
What, what, what might, what would happen if I just went all in on this?
00:35:01 Elizabeth Banks
And taking those risks, sitting through the periods of discomfort and wrestling with myself and just
00:35:15 Elizabeth Banks
doing the next right thing.
00:35:17 Elizabeth Banks
There's a beautiful poem from Rumi, who is just one of my favorite, favorite people, favorite teachers.
00:35:26 Elizabeth Banks
And he says that as you start to walk on the way, the way appears.
00:35:33 Elizabeth Banks
And I've, I've rebuilt my life and built my business on that.
00:35:37 Elizabeth Banks
Just, just start, just do that next thing.
00:35:41 Jaci Rogash
Yeah.
00:35:41 Elizabeth Banks
And it, it takes the pressure out of, you know, thinking I have to have a five year plan or have my **** together or be totally healed in order to help and support others.
00:35:54 Elizabeth Banks
It keeps that perspective of just do the next thing.
00:35:57 Elizabeth Banks
Just take the step.
00:35:59 Jaci Rogash
Yeah.
00:36:01 Jaci Rogash
I love that.
00:36:02 Jaci Rogash
And I don't know if we're ever truly healed, are we?
00:36:05 Jaci Rogash
Yeah, I think so.
00:36:06 Jaci Rogash
Because
00:36:07 Jaci Rogash
Yeah, I don't think so either.
00:36:08 Jaci Rogash
It's like, and not in a bad way.
00:36:11 Jaci Rogash
Not in a bad way.
00:36:13 Jaci Rogash
I look back at, I have four or five significant traumas, like incidents that happened.
00:36:22 Jaci Rogash
And I would say that I've healed from those.
00:36:27 Jaci Rogash
But then every now and again, something comes up as a stem of that.
00:36:30 Jaci Rogash
But then also life happens.
00:36:33 Jaci Rogash
we grieve, we, like we don't know what's going to happen any day.
00:36:38 Jaci Rogash
And yeah, like I love that.
00:36:41 Jaci Rogash
It just like, just take that next step.
00:36:43 Jaci Rogash
And sometimes that first step is the hardest one to take.
00:36:48 Jaci Rogash
And it's the more little steps you take, the more trust in that intuition and those the more voicing.
00:36:55 Jaci Rogash
I love that you have that person when we can able, when we're able to voice what we're thinking just to get that perspective or opinion to know whether, yeah, like, is this me or is this just in my head?
00:37:09 Jaci Rogash
And having someone that's just so honest to be like, you know, either way, you know, either way.
00:37:14 Jaci Rogash
I think it's like, I'm a little bit, maybe I'm a little bit messed up, but I actually get really excited when something comes up.
00:37:22 Jaci Rogash
Like when there's,
00:37:24 Jaci Rogash
a challenge or a question or, there's a niggle about something.
00:37:28 Jaci Rogash
It's like, I used to run from it now.
00:37:30 Jaci Rogash
Whereas now I'm like, what is this?
00:37:32 Jaci Rogash
Like, where is this coming from?
00:37:33 Jaci Rogash
Like, what's, you know, I get really curious about it.
00:37:37 Jaci Rogash
And I love that my healing has given me that, like, it's given me that curiosity to explore things and be open and receive things as they are, as opposed to, you know, being critical or judgmental and that kind of thing.
00:37:53 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah.
00:37:54 Elizabeth Banks
Absolutely.
00:37:55 Elizabeth Banks
And I think a really key part of it is understanding that as humans, we have got a whole spectrum of emotions that we're capable of feeling and we're actually supposed to feel them all.
00:38:11 Elizabeth Banks
Yes.
00:38:12 Elizabeth Banks
If we, if our picture of healing is that we will never feel anguish or sadness or rage.
00:38:22 Elizabeth Banks
or pain again, then we're really gonna put ourselves up against it because I think a truer version of healing is that we can feel everything on that spectrum from gut wrenching anguish to pure ecstasy and, and all of the things in between and across and be okay and metabolize it.
00:38:48 Elizabeth Banks
I think that is a more accurate.
00:38:52 Elizabeth Banks
form or accurate description of what it means to be healed or healing within this human condition than to set ourselves the expectation that we would just never feel those more challenging emotions again.
00:39:09 Jaci Rogash
Yeah.
00:39:11 Jaci Rogash
Something I learned really on, probably not in my healing, but more so when I started my business was the removal of the word like good and bad emotions.
00:39:22 Jaci Rogash
And as I, the more I coach, I was like, I just saw it everywhere.
00:39:26 Jaci Rogash
They were like, I shouldn't feel that.
00:39:27 Jaci Rogash
It's like, well, hang on a second.
00:39:28 Jaci Rogash
Of course you should.
00:39:30 Jaci Rogash
like you can't grieve without experiencing more than one emotion.
00:39:35 Jaci Rogash
And the fact that people have this good, this is a good emotion and this is a bad emotion.
00:39:41 Jaci Rogash
Of course, whenever we feel one of those, it's like, oh, hang on.
00:39:46 Jaci Rogash
And I think also we naturally, I, well, for me, I limited
00:39:50 Jaci Rogash
how I felt.
00:39:51 Jaci Rogash
So it was like, I got to a point where I'd be depressed and I'd be like, oh, can't go any deeper.
00:39:59 Jaci Rogash
So I'd kind of like shut myself away.
00:40:02 Jaci Rogash
And in doing that, limited how good I could feel.
00:40:07 Jaci Rogash
And yeah, now I feel everything.
00:40:10 Jaci Rogash
And I think naming the emotions is such a powerful thing.
00:40:17 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah.
00:40:17 Elizabeth Banks
And validating them for yourself is really powerful.
00:40:21 Elizabeth Banks
You know, something that anger is an emotion that I really struggle with.
00:40:26 Elizabeth Banks
And I know a lot of people do.
00:40:28 Elizabeth Banks
It's a tricky one.
00:40:29 Elizabeth Banks
You know, my mum was a really angry person and I, you know, have vowed to myself to not be like her.
00:40:39 Elizabeth Banks
And so when I get angry, it, it, it's really prickly.
00:40:43 Elizabeth Banks
I'm like, oh my God, I sound like her.
00:40:47 Elizabeth Banks
You know, there, there are times where anger is the perfect emotion.
00:40:53 Elizabeth Banks
You know, there are, even recently, you know, there's been, been something that, that has come up, um, from my ex-husband that it has really, is really impacting my kids.
00:41:02 Elizabeth Banks
And I'm so angry about it.
00:41:05 Elizabeth Banks
And I felt that prickly feeling of, oh no, you're not supposed to feel angry.
00:41:10 Elizabeth Banks
But actually being able to sit with that and go.
00:41:13 Elizabeth Banks
**** this, anger is the perfect emotion.
00:41:15 Elizabeth Banks
I am furious.
00:41:18 Elizabeth Banks
And furious is what I should be.
00:41:22 Elizabeth Banks
And really validating that because there's nothing wrong with anger.
00:41:27 Elizabeth Banks
We're supposed to feel it.
00:41:29 Jaci Rogash
I love a bit of rage.
00:41:30 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah.
00:41:30 Jaci Rogash
I love a little bit of rage.
00:41:32 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah.
00:41:33 Jaci Rogash
And thank you for highlighting that because it's so true.
00:41:35 Jaci Rogash
And I see that in a lot of my clients as well where
00:41:37 Jaci Rogash
They're like, oh no, I just don't get angry.
00:41:39 Jaci Rogash
I'm like, well, what do you do when you are angry?
00:41:41 Jaci Rogash
They're like, I just avoid it.
00:41:42 Jaci Rogash
Like, interesting.
00:41:45 Jaci Rogash
And I had this, I had this conversation.
00:41:47 Jaci Rogash
Chris will be mortified that I'm sharing this on here, but with my husband.
00:41:51 Jaci Rogash
Sorry, Chris.
00:41:52 Jaci Rogash
Sorry, Chris.
00:41:53 Jaci Rogash
Sorry, not sorry.
00:41:56 Jaci Rogash
We had this, we're having this conversation around emotional regulation.
00:41:59 Jaci Rogash
And so he, we have a stepson who's 10 and we'd say he hasn't really been taught.
00:42:05 Jaci Rogash
emotional regulation.
00:42:06 Jaci Rogash
We have a four year old who's in the peak of his hormones, who has so many emotions.
00:42:11 Jaci Rogash
And I can say that Chris gets really uncomfortable when he's crying.
00:42:16 Jaci Rogash
Like he just, like, you know, you can see it almost trigger something in Chris and he's, he wants to shut it down.
00:42:23 Jaci Rogash
And so we have an argument, but not an argument about like, you need to just let him
00:42:30 Jaci Rogash
process that.
00:42:31 Jaci Rogash
Like you need to just be there for him.
00:42:33 Jaci Rogash
It's like, I don't want to hear it.
00:42:34 Jaci Rogash
Mike, it's not about you.
00:42:36 Jaci Rogash
It's not about you.
00:42:36 Jaci Rogash
We need to show him what it is to just be steady during those emotions so he can learn how to regulate his emotions.
00:42:43 Jaci Rogash
And then we're talking about emotional regulations and what I want for our kids and that kind of thing.
00:42:48 Jaci Rogash
And he goes, well, would you say that you've got good emotional regulation?
00:42:51 Jaci Rogash
I said, yeah, I reckon I've got excellent emotional regulation.
00:42:54 Jaci Rogash
He goes, you cry all the time.
00:42:56 Jaci Rogash
I went, that's emotional regulation.
00:42:59 Jaci Rogash
It's like, you can see his brain being like, it goes against everything that he's ever been taught.
00:43:04 Jaci Rogash
And for most people, and it's like, yeah, I do.
00:43:08 Jaci Rogash
And that's part of it.
00:43:10 Jaci Rogash
He's like, oh, so it's, you know, and when you have, go through the healing that we have, like your level of self-awareness for yourself and others is, you know, insane.
00:43:23 Elizabeth Banks
Yes.
00:43:24 Jaci Rogash
And then when you have those conversations, it just, I don't know, I find it a little bit refreshing, but it's also like, yeah, like, I've done the work.
00:43:32 Elizabeth Banks
Yes.
00:43:32 Elizabeth Banks
And you see yourself on the other side of it.
00:43:34 Elizabeth Banks
And I think that is such, it's such an important conversation at the moment.
00:43:39 Elizabeth Banks
And it's a conversation that seems to come up almost everywhere you look about emotional regulation.
00:43:45 Elizabeth Banks
And I think it's so important that we don't confuse being emotionally regulated with being emotionally neutral.
00:43:57 Jaci Rogash
Yes.
00:43:58 Jaci Rogash
Say that a little bit louder for the people at the back of the room.
00:44:01 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah.
00:44:02 Elizabeth Banks
You know, it is such, there is this pressure that we put on ourselves, but also so much on children to be emotionally neutral or to have muted emotions so that we can call it emotional regulation.
00:44:21 Jaci Rogash
Yeah.
00:44:21 Elizabeth Banks
But they are not the same thing.
00:44:23 Elizabeth Banks
And being emotionally neutral should never be the goal.
00:44:28 Jaci Rogash
No.
00:44:29 Jaci Rogash
I, oh, yes.
00:44:33 Jaci Rogash
I have challenges with my dad where I think he forgets what four year olds are like.
00:44:39 Jaci Rogash
And I was talking to my mum about this the other day, actually, where like some friends of ours, their kids, dad used to always come home and be like, oh, he's such a good boy.
00:44:48 Jaci Rogash
he's such a good boy.
00:44:49 Jaci Rogash
And I see that with Hunter, my four year old, where if he does what he's asked, oh, you're a good boy.
00:44:57 Jaci Rogash
Or if he gives him a hug, you're a good boy.
00:44:59 Jaci Rogash
And I say to him, I'm like, please don't say that to him.
00:45:02 Jaci Rogash
It's like, what?
00:45:03 Jaci Rogash
And so Hunter even sometimes he's like, oh, I'm naughty.
00:45:05 Jaci Rogash
I'm like, no, you're not.
00:45:07 Jaci Rogash
You're not naughty.
00:45:08 Jaci Rogash
Sometimes you do things that aren't okay, but you're not a naughty boy.
00:45:11 Jaci Rogash
And then the emotional side of it, it's
00:45:16 Jaci Rogash
Yeah, it's really interesting.
00:45:20 Jaci Rogash
Again, like I'm learning so much more watching my kids.
00:45:24 Jaci Rogash
And absolutely there are times where I'm like, overwhelmed, overstimulated, like I can't deal with this and I stop.
00:45:30 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah, of course.
00:45:31 Jaci Rogash
And Chris will be like, how's that emotional regulation?
00:45:33 Jaci Rogash
Like it's gone.
00:45:34 Elizabeth Banks
It's gone.
00:45:35 Elizabeth Banks
Absolutely.
00:45:35 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah.
00:45:35 Jaci Rogash
It's gone.
00:45:37 Elizabeth Banks
For sure.
00:45:38 Jaci Rogash
Yeah.
00:45:39 Jaci Rogash
And
00:45:40 Jaci Rogash
And I'll like, I'll have conversations with Hunter about that.
00:45:42 Jaci Rogash
Like if I do or say something that I'm like, oh, like I'll apologize to him.
00:45:47 Jaci Rogash
And, you know, there are some people that are like, we don't apologize for it.
00:45:50 Jaci Rogash
I'm like, well, of course I'm going to, because that's, I don't want him to think that that's how I want to be.
00:45:55 Jaci Rogash
And also I'm sorry for it.
00:45:56 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah, absolutely.
00:45:57 Elizabeth Banks
And we also then show our kids that we can have rupture and that we can have repair and that the relationship can withstand it.
00:46:09 Elizabeth Banks
You know, thinking back to that time when I was working those astronomical hours, I lost my **** frequently.
00:46:17 Elizabeth Banks
And, and I was, I was not the best mum that I could be in that time.
00:46:24 Elizabeth Banks
And I don't actually, I don't have, I have a sense of, you know, the mum guilt about it.
00:46:31 Elizabeth Banks
But I also know from my
00:46:34 Elizabeth Banks
wise mind, I probably couldn't have done it differently at the time.
00:46:38 Elizabeth Banks
You know, I was working, working ridiculous hours trying to run my business.
00:46:43 Elizabeth Banks
My ex-husband was trying to sell the house out from under me.
00:46:45 Elizabeth Banks
We were looking at being homeless.
00:46:47 Elizabeth Banks
We were going through family court.
00:46:48 Elizabeth Banks
We were going through the magistrates court for IVOs and all of that.
00:46:54 Elizabeth Banks
You know, he was stalking me and sending glitter bombs to my house and I actually could not have
00:47:01 Elizabeth Banks
done it any differently.
00:47:03 Elizabeth Banks
But there were times where I lost my **** and I raged at my kids and I wish I hadn't, but also apologized for it.
00:47:13 Elizabeth Banks
Also sat with them.
00:47:15 Elizabeth Banks
Also, they were losing their **** too.
00:47:18 Elizabeth Banks
You know, their world was turned upside down and
00:47:21 Elizabeth Banks
And sometimes that messiness is exactly what a family needs to be, that my emotions aren't regulated, your emotions aren't regulated.
00:47:31 Elizabeth Banks
We are just coping together.
00:47:35 Elizabeth Banks
But at the end of the day, we've got each other, right?
00:47:39 Elizabeth Banks
I've, I've got you, you know, my oldest son in particular really struggled at this time and
00:47:47 Elizabeth Banks
You know, things were said and done, but at the end of the day, he knew that I was absolutely there for him.
00:47:56 Elizabeth Banks
He knew I was going to show up.
00:47:59 Elizabeth Banks
And we now have got this, you know, our home's not perfect, but there is this harmony in it because we are so well practiced at rupture and repair.
00:48:10 Elizabeth Banks
We know the lay of the land.
00:48:13 Elizabeth Banks
You blow up.
00:48:14 Elizabeth Banks
Yep.
00:48:14 Elizabeth Banks
All right.
00:48:15 Elizabeth Banks
Go blow up.
00:48:16 Elizabeth Banks
Have you say, cool down and we'll repair it.
00:48:19 Elizabeth Banks
And we do that really, really well in our home now and our tolerance for each other to be able to have and display emotions, whether they're regulated or not, is something that is really, really good.
00:48:37 Elizabeth Banks
And that's something that my kids will take into their future relationships, that ability to
00:48:43 Elizabeth Banks
tolerate their own emotional responses to things and also their future partners, if that's what they choose, through really well practiced rupture and repair.
00:48:53 Elizabeth Banks
And I think that is such an important part of a family and of parenting.
00:48:59 Jaci Rogash
Yeah, I agree.
00:49:01 Jaci Rogash
I agree.
00:49:01 Jaci Rogash
And it also teaches them the humanness, you know, this idea that, you know, and generationally, obviously, each one's different, but there was like, like,
00:49:13 Jaci Rogash
I didn't come from a like disruptive household by any means, but like I couldn't tell you a time where my parents apologized for doing something that upset me.
00:49:25 Jaci Rogash
But I also think like in these moments, we might carry that and I'm happy to apologize, but as you said, like with that rupture and repair, he's like, he's going to remember the repair.
00:49:36 Jaci Rogash
He's going to know that I was there and you know, that's,
00:49:41 Jaci Rogash
you know, that's so important.
00:49:41 Jaci Rogash
But I also think that sometimes we like, I have this view that the best leaders in the world are people that have gone through a lot of trauma because they've done the work and they've done the healing and their ability to see the humanness and empathy and compassion makes them great leaders.
00:50:05 Jaci Rogash
And that's what I kind of take into my parenting of,
00:50:09 Jaci Rogash
You know, I've been through some **** and you're going to go through some **** but I'm here for you.
00:50:14 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah, absolutely.
00:50:15 Elizabeth Banks
Yeah.
00:50:16 Elizabeth Banks
And seeing our children, I feel like we could do a whole other podcast on children.
00:50:23 Elizabeth Banks
But seeing first and foremost, you know, making that decision as a parent to see the person beneath the behavior, you know, my
00:50:33 Elizabeth Banks
my children, all three of them, they are just beautiful, beautiful people.
00:50:37 Elizabeth Banks
And they are beautiful people who make age appropriate, silly decisions and have, you know, big emotions and wild ideas.
00:50:47 Elizabeth Banks
And and my job as their mum is to just hold the boat steady while they test all of that out.
00:50:57 Elizabeth Banks
And sometimes I hold that boat so steady and so well, and sometimes I'm the one making the waves.
00:51:02 Elizabeth Banks
But I think that's, like I said, that's a really important component of family life.
00:51:08 Jaci Rogash
Yeah, I know.
00:51:10 Jaci Rogash
I'm in the thick of like poos.
00:51:13 Jaci Rogash
Everything's about poo at the moment.
00:51:15 Jaci Rogash
It's four year olds and like that Tesla's got everything else.
00:51:18 Jaci Rogash
And then
00:51:19 Jaci Rogash
I'm like, there'll be moments where I'm like, am I doing, like, am I doing something wrong?
00:51:23 Jaci Rogash
Like, what is going on here?
00:51:24 Jaci Rogash
And then, you know, I see Hunter with little girls and they're so well behaved.
00:51:28 Jaci Rogash
And then I see little boys and I'm like, oh, thank God.
00:51:32 Elizabeth Banks
Look, my boys are 13 and 14, and I actually have a 24-year-old brother.
00:51:39 Elizabeth Banks
None of them have grown out of poo.
00:51:41 Elizabeth Banks
Poo is still funny.
00:51:43 Elizabeth Banks
Poo is still a topic at the dinner table.
00:51:46 Jaci Rogash
They're not going to grow up.
00:51:47 Elizabeth Banks
This is not a phase.
00:51:48 Elizabeth Banks
This is boys.
00:51:50 Jaci Rogash
Good to know.
00:51:52 Jaci Rogash
I know that we could talk for days and do 10 hours on this, but I'm mindful of your time.
00:51:57 Jaci Rogash
But this has been one of the most
00:52:01 Jaci Rogash
beautiful conversations.
00:52:02 Jaci Rogash
And thank you for your openness and trust in me in sharing what you have.
00:52:08 Jaci Rogash
I have one final question.
00:52:10 Jaci Rogash
And that is what does thriving after trauma mean to you?
00:52:16 Elizabeth Banks
Good question.
00:52:20 Elizabeth Banks
The thing you're asking is thriving.
00:52:22 Elizabeth Banks
And so I think it looks like joy.
00:52:27 Elizabeth Banks
It
00:52:28 Elizabeth Banks
You know, I have things in my life now that I do just because they make me happy.
00:52:34 Elizabeth Banks
That's the only reason.
00:52:36 Elizabeth Banks
I'm in the middle of renovating my office at work and I'm actually painting my desk pink.
00:52:43 Elizabeth Banks
And the sole reason is that it makes me happy.
00:52:46 Elizabeth Banks
You know, I, yeah, joy.
00:52:51 Elizabeth Banks
I do things now because
00:52:55 Elizabeth Banks
They make me happy because they make me smile.
00:52:59 Elizabeth Banks
That's what thriving feels like.
00:53:01 Elizabeth Banks
I think it's it's beyond the struggle and beyond the rebuild.
00:53:05 Elizabeth Banks
It is rebuilding life in a way that creates space and time for joy and laughter and silliness.
00:53:17 Jaci Rogash
Thank you so much.
00:53:18 Elizabeth Banks
Thanks, Jack.
00:53:20 Jaci Rogash
Perfect.
00:53:22 Jaci Rogash
Thank you so much for tuning in to Thriving After Trauma.
00:53:25 Jaci Rogash
If you like this episode, please like it, share it, subscribe to my channel, because the more people that share, the more people that talk about this, the more people that subscribe, the more people we're able to support and help to navigate this crazy life of ours as we truly do learn how to thrive after trauma.