Peace & Prosperity Podcast
In the Peace & Prosperity Podcast, Jason Phillips, licensed therapist and life coach, shares personal experiences that force you to think deeply about your values, beliefs, and behaviors to ensure you achieve peace, happiness, and success in your life.
Peace & Prosperity Podcast
From Abuse To Forgiveness: Choosing Peace After Trauma with Dr. Ulanda Phillips - Episode #94
The Peace & Prosperity Podcast is a bi-weekly conversation with Jason Phillips, LCSW, licensed therapist and confidence expert in Raleigh, NC, discussing all things related to self-love and self-confidence, and how we can improve ourselves personally and professionally.
A quiet truth hides behind many “I’m fine” smiles: survival isn’t success.
Dr. Ulanda Phillips shares her journey from early marriage and domestic abuse to a life grounded in faith, boundaries, and self-worth. She opens up about red flags ignored, the cost of silence, and choosing peace over performance.
We explore how shifting from people-pleasing to self-respect transformed her life, the power of her “Feather” metaphor, and practical ways to spot patterns, set boundaries, and heal through writing and reflection.
If you’re navigating burnout, heartbreak, or trauma, this conversation offers language, tools, and hope to help you rebuild—anchored in truth and peace.
Plus, remember to join our podcast community—like, share, subscribe, and let us know what topics you want us to cover next. Engage with us, send a DM, or leave a review. Let's continue this journey towards peace and prosperity together.
To stay connected with Jason and learn about coaching, connect with Jason on social media:
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/jphillipsmsw/
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/jphillipsmsw
Visit Jason's website for a consultation:
Website -https://www.jasonlphillips.com
To book Jason to speak to your team or organization:
https://peaceprosperitycoaching.hbportal.co/public/660d8068c9d2d600253b215b/1-Inquiry
And then with the book, um, there were so many different chapters of my life. Um, there were so many things that happened that writing this book, I didn't realize that I wasn't healed and I hadn't forgiven because there were some chapters and some things that I was writing, and it broke me down.
SPEAKER_02:Welcome to the Peace and Prosperity Podcast, where we talk mental wellness, confidence, and real life tools to help high achievers thrive. I'm your host, Jason Phillips, licensed therapist, speaker, coach. I'm glad you're here. Let's get into the episode. Y'all, welcome back to another episode of the Peace and Prosperity Podcast. I got an amazing guest today. Family. My favorite cousin.
SPEAKER_00:Yes.
SPEAKER_02:We call her Pookie, but she's better known as Miss Yolanda Marie Phillips cuz.
SPEAKER_00:Hi, everybody. Hello.
SPEAKER_02:So happy, so happy. Dr. Yolanda Marie Phillips. Let me not let me not forget that, right? Because I know how it's gonna be. Introduce yourself though. Let everybody know who you are.
SPEAKER_00:I am Dr. Apostle Yolanda Phillips. I am Jason's cousin. We're our first cousins, and he's actually my favorite. So we have a lot of fun together. We talk a lot. So yeah, here I am finally on his podcast. Yeah. It's been a long time coming. So I'm excited to be here.
SPEAKER_02:I'm excited to be here too. Um, it's so funny because it's so there's so many things I can ask you, and I'm just thinking where to start. And the reason why I wanted you to come on here is because of your spirit. Oh I mean, yes, you family, you my favorite cuz, but I don't just have anybody on here. So, but your spirit is so refreshing.
SPEAKER_00:Amen. To God be the glory.
SPEAKER_02:And I think we we all want to know like how to, well, one, how were you always just peaceful, or is that something that you had to work towards?
SPEAKER_00:Listen, I was still Pooky from the block back in the day. So that had to be truly, it took a lot of work. You know, it took a lot of work for me to get to the place that things didn't bother me. It took a lot of work for me not to retaliate on things. Because trust me, sometimes people would see me and say, even my kids sometimes will say, Mom, how does, you know, how do you do that? Like, how does somebody do something to you and you don't res, and a lot of things I had to take it in prayer. I had to really focus on that, you know. And over life, you learn, you know, you live and you learn.
SPEAKER_02:And you are, you know, you have four kids. Some of my favorite cousins, too. And you've been married before too.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Yeah, I have. And they were not all. Let me just say this it was a lesson learned. They were lessons learned. My last, my latest husband, should I say, and I know that sound bad. Like, how many times you didn't mean? Anyway, young age, life just taught me. My late husband passed away. And and that was an experience within itself. So I learned how to adapt. I learned how to just exist. I learned how to take care, you know, of a husband. But what I didn't do, I didn't marry for love. And that's the biggest mistake that I think one could ever do.
SPEAKER_02:Can you expound expound on that a little bit?
SPEAKER_00:So we marry for situations sometimes. We marry for some people marry for money, some people marry for just the engagement. You know, they marry for the hype or the statistics of just being married. The vows. We hear the vows at the ceremony, but we don't always take them seriously in the in the marriage.
SPEAKER_02:Because how old were you? Let's go back a little minute. How old were you when you were telling my age married the first time?
SPEAKER_00:I was 18. What? I was 18, yes. Yes.
SPEAKER_02:Is that when y'all had on the white and the the the wedding looked clean?
SPEAKER_00:I don't know which one that was.
SPEAKER_02:So at that time, 18 getting married, I mean, that's a big deal.
SPEAKER_00:It is. It it was at that time. And I was young. I just, I think I just did it because I was listening to the older people. Oh, well, y'all need to be married. And and and besides that, I was already fresh high school pregnant. I was, and so when I got married, it was a big thing in the church, you know. Back in those days, it was like you either got married, and this was not the child's father, you know. But I learned through that. I went through a lot, you know. I went through a um, I have I've had an abusive relationship, I've had a mental abusive relationship, physical and a stressful relationship, you know. So I had to learn. I came a long way, and it wasn't by myself. The Lord did that for me.
SPEAKER_02:Now I didn't know that you were in an abusive relationship.
SPEAKER_00:I was.
SPEAKER_02:How did you get out of it or how did you stay in it? Because that's something that people, you know, I've been a therapist for almost 15 years now. And people, and maybe because I'm a man or just how what we're they're coming in for, but we rarely talk about somebody being in an abusive relationship while they're in it. So you were in it and you learned to get out of it, or can kind of walk us through the world. I was in it.
SPEAKER_00:I can honestly say being in it, I was young. I didn't have the mindset, I didn't have the resources that we have today. I didn't have the, I didn't have the people, the, the support team, the support system that I have, that we have today. And it took me a long time to get fed up wanting to be in the marriage, trying to do what's right in God's eyesight, trying to live right, trying to be that wife. And sometimes you have to get to the point that you have to say, listen, my life, my children mean more to me than just being somewhere that I'm unhappy and I'm being physically and mentally abused. What kind of message is that sending to my kids? What is the per the perception from other people? Like, I used to worry about all of those things. But one day I got tired and got fed up and said, No, I'm you will not put your hands on me again. I don't care who it is. And I and I got to that point. But again, through prayer, because God was the only person that made it easy.
SPEAKER_02:I was gonna ask, like, did people know you were in an abusive relationship?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, yeah, they knew. They knew. So I will say that it always back in the day, it's just so different from what it is now. You were wrong for walking out on your marriage, you were wrong for filing for divorce. The wife has the and and let me say this, let me clarify something. This is abuse is not a man or a woman thing. Abuse is abuse. It doesn't matter where it comes from, it's not right. So, yeah, they knew and they kind of I kind of felt belittled because I wanted to end the marriage. I wanted to get out of it, you know. And I remember talking to um a pastor that I was under back in the day, and he said, Um, if I knew this was happening, I would have told you to leave a long time ago.
SPEAKER_02:So and I kept things now your mindset seems like it's changed a lot. So kind of talk us through it. Tell me like the difference in how you think about being in a relationship now as opposed to when you were 18 in that abusive relationship.
SPEAKER_00:I think now it's to the point that I see the flags. Before I saw them and I didn't acknowledge them. So now I acknowledge the red flags.
SPEAKER_02:What were some of those flags that you would see like from back then?
SPEAKER_00:The verbal abuse, the belittling, the physical abuse, who wants to walk around with a black eye? You know, who wants to be choked, who wants to be mistreated.
SPEAKER_02:So, how did you heal from those things?
SPEAKER_00:I can tell you this. It didn't happen overnight, but I had to be consistent in praying. I had to find a support team, a support system, people that um not so not necessarily they had my back, but had my mental capacity in their mindset. In other words, listen, we're not gonna let you go down that road again. So if there were times that I wanted to turn around, well, maybe I was wrong, being persuaded, listening to other people. Sometimes you just gotta put your foot down and say, listen, I'm too good for that. I'm I'm too good for that. I don't deserve that.
SPEAKER_02:So the way you viewed yourself or view yourself has changed significantly from the 18-year-old Yolanda to the now 30-year-old.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, absolutely. I I can't even tell you. It's to the point that my kids, my daughter always teased me, she said, Mom, I they don't they worry about me today still because dating is hard, but I have zero tolerance and I don't accept, I won't sell.
SPEAKER_02:So if you were to see some of those red flags now, how would you address it?
SPEAKER_00:It's a one-shot call. If I see the first red flag, I'm out. I won't even entertain it. Because when you are a giver and when you're a person that always tries to see the bigger side of other people, sometimes they use that in against you and they take advantage of that. And so if I know that's a weakness for me, that's a trigger. And so for me, I know, up, that's it, cut it off. Because what you allow and what you accept in the beginning is more than likely it's what's gonna continue. And we're not doing that in 2024.
unknown:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:So it's not like you're gonna give this person, okay, let me give them another chance to rectify that.
SPEAKER_00:Why should I? I'm not obligated to. And I know some people say, well, that's why she's gonna stay by herself and things like that. And it's okay. I've gotten to the place that you have to be all right with being by yourself. And when you're by yourself, you know, you begin to see a lot of things, you begin to find yourself. Nobody can make you happy, only you can make yourself happy. And so a lot of times we get into relationships thinking that person is going to make us happy and we want the best wedding in the world, we want the best relationship. But sometimes we don't fix ourselves first. And so when we get into these relationships, we carry a lot of baggage and we carry a lot of the old issues, and then we bring in the old relationships with us. We can't do that anymore.
SPEAKER_02:So because you you jumped in, right? Like out the gate saying, Hey, I'm married, it wasn't for love before, and you took ownership of that.
SPEAKER_00:I did.
SPEAKER_02:How did you even get to that place? Because sometimes that take, I know that has to take work.
SPEAKER_00:It was something that just happened. I I can't even tell you how or when, but at some point in time I knew, okay, you know what? This is not, this is not for me. And even I want to say in ministry, in just regular life, you know, there are some things you go to work. There are some things that your coworkers may do or your boss may do that's not acceptable to you. Are you gonna still deal with it? Are you just gonna pacify yourself or or put it up under the the mat or the paper and just ignore it? Do you address it, or do you just decide, listen, we have to talk about this? Do you accept it? And that's the thing. We we we become so acceptable of behaviors until we don't see the damage that is causing us.
SPEAKER_02:So somebody I work with before said something really powerful as far as like addressing something. Is it an event or is it a trend?
SPEAKER_00:I think it's more of a I I guess it will be determined who is coming from.
SPEAKER_02:You know what I'm saying? Because I'm that's what I want to ask you. Like, how do you because sometimes we struggle with addressing something, especially like maybe you saw abuse growing up, or maybe you're not that person who was just really outspoken. So you want to say something in your mind, you're saying a whole lot, but in real life, you're not saying anything at all.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, we become passive aggressive, and that's what we we tolerate, you know, for a long time. I would ignore things, and I would ignore them to the point that um I no longer saw them, and that was damaging to me. I saw the cheating, I saw this, I got the phone calls, I, you know, all of this, but I didn't address it. So for me, and I know people say, oh, well, that's just this, you will not know until you've been there for a long time. I had to figure out what is it that Yolanda wants?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:What is it that Yolanda does not want? You know, some people can say, Oh, I'll do this, this, that, and I'm not gonna put up with this, and I'm not gonna. Sometimes it's easy to say when you are not in the situation and that, you know, for a long time you are, well, hello there, sir. How are you? You're just coming. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. I love snoop. Snoop is me. So I don't want to play right now. I don't want to play. But yeah, so sometimes you just have to figure out, you know, what it is that's gonna make you happy, all in all. When I say I accepted things, it wasn't because I had to. It was because I didn't know any better and I didn't know what to do. I didn't know how the outcome was gonna turn around. I didn't know that later on in in life that it was gonna affect me or it was gonna affect my children. You know, there were different things that were that played a part in all of that. I believe strongly, and there's a scripture, I can't call it right now, but it says that, you know, God will omit, he will honor those that omit offenses. And so hearing the old folks talk about that, there were certain things and certain perspectives behind that. That doesn't necessarily mean that you take the foolishness from people, you take the abuse. That does not mean that you have to settle for anything. We just don't want to wait on God. That is the main problem.
SPEAKER_02:Hey, I hope y'all listening. So, cuz I want to ask you, you know, you've seen a lot, you've been through a lot.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:I want to get into the topic of being able to forgive. Because I don't, you know, when we talk, you often are not bitter.
SPEAKER_00:No.
SPEAKER_02:Were you ever bitter about things that have happened or things that you allowed or seen?
SPEAKER_00:I think for me, more so the hurt kind of camouflaged the bitterness. The hurt is what really took me to a different place mindset. I had to really stop and think about how much time, energy, mental stress I allow to be put in being bitter, being not forgiving. That cost more time and energy in my life than just to forgive.
SPEAKER_02:So there was a time when you were bitter.
SPEAKER_00:Absolutely. Absolutely. I can remember back in the day, I told you I was pooky from the block. I would drive my little car. I literally, and I and I know people are gonna say, why is she saying this? I literally, one relationship, let me just say this.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:When I caught the person cheating in my house, all I know is they got in their car and I got in mine. And before I know it, I was on the lodge freeway. And I literally tried to run them off the road. And I know then I had lost it. And I said, never again will I allow anybody to send me to that point. And I was still young, I was still young. Nowadays, baby, I'm gonna pull over to the side and let them go on by and just let them do what they do. That's it. I can't listen, too much stress, too much energy. No, we ain't doing that.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, no, this is good. This is good. Hi, achievers. Let's be honest. Success without peace is not really success, it's survival. If you've ever found yourself smiling in boardrooms but silently battling burnout, you're not alone. You're grinding, achieving, and everyone thinks you have it all together, but behind closed doors, you're exhausted. And I've coached hundreds of leaders just like you. That's why I put together a free webinar called Five Barriers that keep high achievers from winning publicly but drain privately. And inside, I'll give you the proven tools to break the cycle of overwork, self-doubt, and burnout so you can win without losing yourself. Check the show notes for the link or DM me directly to sign up. Your next level of success should not cost you your well-being. So, yeah, we we getting into the topic of forgiveness. And the reason why, well, before I even get there, you said something earlier that I gotta go back to. You said that you I think you said you ignored stuff to the point where you didn't see it anymore. What you mean by that?
SPEAKER_00:I saw it, I didn't acknowledge it, I didn't correct it, I didn't even um think about it. So it's almost like walking past a stop sign and getting pulled over because you didn't obey the stop sign.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, like it's there, but you you've totally erased it from your memory, suppressed it.
SPEAKER_00:I didn't erase it, but yeah, like more or less suppressed. And and even at that point, it really wasn't suppressed because when they weren't around, I thought about it day and night.
SPEAKER_02:So I remember something you said to me a couple years ago. You know, sometimes people get upset with people, they may block them, they may erase them. And I actually shared this on Instagram because you said you can erase them from your, what'd you say, your phone, but they still in your head? Do you remember that? What would you do?
SPEAKER_00:No, I don't remember, but it was something like that.
SPEAKER_02:I gotta go back into my iTunes. But that was so powerful because people do, you know, we get upset, we may block somebody or we delete their number. Yeah, but the memories are still there. Absolutely. And I hear that's what you're saying, like, yeah, uh you suppressed it, but the memory was still there.
SPEAKER_00:Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. And sometimes uh when we do that, we create kind of like a path that we stay on that same path, and the same thing repeats itself because we're doing the same thing, we're taking the same action and we're still moving in that same way. Instead of, so some people say, and and and I applaud anybody that can come in or that they go through these problems and they nip it in the butt in the, you know, in order to speak right away. But for some of us, we didn't have strong support. You know, we didn't have, we saw our parents go through things, and it became like a learned behavior. And so that was a downfall along the line.
SPEAKER_02:So now we're gonna we're gonna get into forgiveness. How do you define forgiveness and what does it mean to you personally?
SPEAKER_00:Forgiveness for me is releasing it, it's becoming in such a way, or in such a way that I don't even think about it anymore. And it doesn't bother me anymore. So for me, I don't allow things to penetrate me in that manner anymore. I'm not perfect, I'm not this great person, I'm not any of that, but I decide what I allow to linger in here.
SPEAKER_02:You talked about being abused, being in abusive relationships. I know you've had, you know, husband you lost. How did you forgive what they've done to you?
SPEAKER_00:It was able, I was able to forgive them because I stay in my word. I stay um before the Lord. That's who is the one that is responsible for allowing me not to hold everything. So I know sometimes we say, okay, well, everybody don't forgive like that. And we're supposed to forgive and forget. If they look up Matthew chapter six, actually verse 15, but you can look up Matthew chapter six and it'll go through the whole act of forgiveness and showing you how to forgive. But to some people, forgiveness comes in different measures. It comes in different, different forms for them. Some people, such as myself, I can forgive you quickly. And the next time I see you, I won't even think about it. There are some people who can't forgive at all, or they forgive, but they won't forget, or they forgive and they get to a point that I forgive them, but I don't want to be around them. I don't want to do anything with them. But for me, whatever measure you need to take, if it's counseling, if it's therapy, if it's look at him, if it's just embracing a new way to not allow certain things to penetrate you, to bother you, then by all means do it.
SPEAKER_02:Now, I know you also are a big writer too. Did that help you with forgiveness?
SPEAKER_00:It did. There was one book that I was writing. I haven't finished it yet, but I started writing it, and it's called The Chambers Within the Abyss of My Heart. And so this book, it was an illustration of a heart, a giant heart, and it had the blood vessels, the, but there were chain links around each blood vessel. And each chain link represented an issue of life. And so forgiveness was the biggest thing. And so I know that I try to please God. I'm not, you know, like I said, perfect, but I do strive to do, you know, what I would think he would be pleased with. And so unforgiveness is just not an option for me. I choose that. The chain links represented so many aspects of life. The abuse, how do I get over that? And I had to take that book and I had to sit and I wrote out everything that happened in my life. There was the not only the physical abuse, the mental abuse, the psychological stress, there was rape. There were so many things that I never told anybody. I had to take it to God. There were things that I kept from my mother. I can remember one day as a child. I want to say I must have been in the ninth grade, really and truly. And this is this is one for the books because I haven't shared this. This is going to be, it's actually in the book. I just haven't finished it. I was coming home from school one day, and so I was walking down Warren, um, near Warren Connors area, but I was walking. I went to Finney High School for a season, and I was walking, and so one of my uncle's friends pulled up and he said, Hey, your mom is sick and your dad and them are at the hospital, and your uncle told me to come and pick you up. I'm so close to the house. I didn't think anything of it. And I knew this man as one of my uncle's great friends. And so I believed him because there was no other reason why I shouldn't believe him. You know, he was over at the house all the time. And so I got in the car and we started going in a different direction. And so we um ended up, he took me to there is a church on Van Dyke. I don't know the side street, but he pulled in the alley and there was a garage back there. And he made me get out the car and he dragged me in the garage and he assaulted me in the garage. And I never ever forgot it. And he took me right back and told me, don't say anything, as I'm gonna kill your mama. I never, I was in the ninth grade. I never said a word. And he dropped me right back at the same place where he picked me up at. And I carried that for years. When I say years, I never shared that because I was afraid that he was actually gonna do something to my mother, you know, and everything that I went through, I think that's what kind of helped me to, you know, I carried a lot of stuff. And I didn't know how to, how do you take things like that? And so when people think I don't understand, I understand. When people think that, um, oh, you know, I have a reputation, I honestly do. People used to call me bougie all the time. I'm like, why they calling me bougie, Lord? I'm just like everybody else. But I was one of those persons that I used to let that bother me, you know, but now I embrace it.
SPEAKER_02:I feel I gotta go back. I mean, one, um, thank you for just being so open and sharing. God man, that's that had to be a lot.
SPEAKER_00:It was.
SPEAKER_02:And just holding that and being able to work through that. Yeah, anybody from Detroit knows Warren and Connor is not the best area anyway.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:And then to experience that level of trauma by somebody who you trusted and thought was somebody who had your best interests at heart.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:And then to be able to talk about it today, yeah, that definitely speaks to forgiveness.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:But how did you get to that point?
SPEAKER_00:Well, I will say at that age, it was so much going on. I never saw him again. One, that that helped. Two, I suppressed it. You know, for years I suppressed it. And when I began to talk about it, it was later with a doctor that I talked about it. And, you know, he was really understanding. And actually, he encouraged me to talk to my mother about it. But I never talked to her. I started going to church. I started going to church. And when I tell you I laid everything at the altar, I laid everything at the altar. And then with the book, um, there were so many different chapters of my life. Um, there were so many things that happened that writing this book, I didn't realize that I wasn't healed and I hadn't forgiven because there were some chapters and some things that I was writing and it broke me down. I cried so hard. There were times that I was suicidal. I didn't tell us all. I was suicidal. I literally had driven to the, I don't know, the river walk. I think where the where the miracle round is. Right. Okay. Yeah. And so, and I'm just fast-forwarding because there are some pertinent things in this book that I had to realize, like, wow, kid, you've been through some things. And look where God has brought you from. Look how He has delivered you. Look how you begin to forgive, even forgive yourself. And that's the biggest thing we don't do. We don't forgive ourselves. And so, um, as I back up a little bit, I literally went to the river. I was so distraught with all of this stuff. I had crocodile tears that were so big that I couldn't even see. And so when I got to the rail, right, I was getting ready to jump in and I heard look, and I couldn't see. Look again. And when I looked, I could see the ripples in the water, and I could see the waves because it was a choppy day, you know, the you know, really hard waters. And I saw this feather, it was about this long, white feather. And I saw, and I began to hear the Holy Spirit say, Look, and I looked and he said, That's you. I don't care how much the water had lapped over the feather, I don't care how much the current was going, I don't care how much the water just rocked back and forth. That feather stayed on top of the water, never changed the lane, never went out of sync. It stayed in the same formation. And the Holy Spirit, like, that's you. Never ever move out of the way. Stay right where you are. That's you. And so I named one of the chapters of my book, The Feather. And so that is where I got that from because there are some things that's gonna happen to us, no matter how hard things are coming at us, no how no matter how many times I there's another thing I call the ripple effect. No matter how many times that ripple effect, the the issues of life keep coming at you and keep taking you back in a circular motion, and we keep going through the same thing over and over again. Stay in formation, just like the feather.
SPEAKER_02:So you have writing. Yeah, definitely God. Yes, the doctor was amazing. They helped you talk about things. And that was as ironic, that was a male provider, too.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Now, was he a physician or was this a therapist?
SPEAKER_00:He was a physician.
SPEAKER_02:Okay.
SPEAKER_00:He was a physician, and um, he was very kind. I was able um to talk to him. I was just going for a checkup, and nothing had happened. It was my turn to go for a checkup. I think I needed a physical or something for school. And then he said, Is there anything else? And I just said, I just need to talk to you. And he was, you know, he sat knee to knee. It was not like it is today. Well, we do still have doctors today that do, you know, we'll sit with you. But he really sat there and listened. He literally had tears in his eyes, you know, when I began to speak with him. And at a young age, he I said, My mom doesn't know. He said, Well, you know, by law, I'm supposed to, you know, talk to protective services and things like that. And I begged him. So I think he did anyway, but because they came to the school and they did talk to me, I I gave them the information about my uncle's friend, but you know, they did talk with my mom, but she never said anything to me. She just she embraced me even the more, you know, and she was very, very protective. She's very cautious, you know, with me. She, you know, it was like, listen, if you go on, I'm going with you, or you don't, you know, I didn't go anywhere by myself, you know.
SPEAKER_02:So and then knowing, you know, your dad, my uncles, if they would have known.
SPEAKER_00:I think my dad would have been running to jail right now. He literally would have. And they he was alive, you know. So I but I never talked to him. And I was a daddy's girl. I tell my daddy everything. But because of the protection for them, I kept it. But when I talked to the doctor, he did not um, he didn't make me feel bad. My mom, when when they, I guess when um protective services really um talked to her, everything was allegedly because there was no person, they couldn't find the person, it was no. You know, but they knew who it was. My uncle knew who it was.
SPEAKER_02:So if somebody were is listening and they maybe have struggled with trauma assault and they haven't shared anything, what would you how would you advise them or what would you say to that person listening?
SPEAKER_00:I would tell them to find someone that they sometimes it's hard to say find people that you trust because sometimes people that you trust um may not always be trustworthy, if that makes sense. Um I didn't want to tell another family member, you know. I told somebody that didn't know me and really didn't know my family, you know. For me, that's what I did. However they um, you know, they look at the situation, if they if they have to find somebody to talk to, two things. Let it be someone that they are comfortable with and someone that they will be able to come back and see again, you know, or they'll be able to really sit down and and really express everything, not somebody that's gonna, you know, have them feel like they're at fault or you shouldn't have did this and you should because normally I hear that. Well, nowadays these young girls doing this and doing well, they shouldn't have did this, and they don't shouldn't get in the car. Yeah. So for me, it was somebody that I was used to seeing on a regular basis. You know what I'm saying? It was somebody that I trusted. My family trusted. You understand what I'm saying? So I would just advise them to find someone that they feel comfortable. If it's the doctor, if it's a psychiatrist, if it's a therapist, um, someone in the professional field, I would I would encourage.
SPEAKER_02:Now, is therapy something that you've done and and has it been helpful or not helpful for you?
SPEAKER_00:I've never had therapy. I've never had therapy. I prayed, and when I tell you, when I gave everything to God, when I really gave him a yes and really put everything on the altar, I didn't have to go back. And sometimes you don't have to be at church to have your own altar. You can pray in your floor, you can, you know, talk to God. He's always listening. You know, I literally built up a relationship with him through all of that.
SPEAKER_02:Now I gotta ask, how come you haven't been in therapy?
SPEAKER_00:Well, there was really no need. After everything, because there was a a refreshing, right? There was such a forgiveness and there was such an openness that whenever I thought about it, whenever you know, I f I I would never feel bad anymore. I would never um get to a place that I wanted to, you know, take revenge. There are some things that if I could do differently, I would, but in learning, I had to figure out a way to help me survive here. And the only thing for me was God.
SPEAKER_02:Now I respect that. It's just we, you know, some of us are hearing that, okay, I only can pray, or that's what's gonna help, and then prayer is not working, or it's not working fast enough.
SPEAKER_00:Well, here's the thing: God moves in his own timing. So sometimes certain situations will have you um still waiting and still listening, like it's God hearing me hears. There are some times that I didn't know what to do until when the Lord did whatever he did, I knew it was him because it was, it was without a doubt. For me.
SPEAKER_01:Right.
SPEAKER_00:Now everybody does things in their own way. You know, everybody perceives things, they they they take things in their own measures, but for me, that's that's what helped me. That's what worked for me. And there's, I don't even think about things. There are some people that have done some horrible things to me. I'm not perfect, I probably have done some stuff to people too, but for me, I don't even think about it. You know what I'm saying? Like, gosh, I can't believe I went through that. Oh my God, I got over that, you know. So, and over the time, some things are not even meant for you to even dwell on it. It's just a lesson learned. Like, what did you get out of that? You know what I'm saying? Did you repeat it?
SPEAKER_02:Are there any like specific principles that you live by or go by to continue to live and love the way you do?
SPEAKER_00:I can only tell you, I have to stay in my word. I have to keep um my relationship with God. I for me, that's what works for me.
SPEAKER_02:And I hear you saying for me, is that because you want to make sure that if it doesn't work for somebody else, you're not it's not necessarily if it doesn't work for somebody else, because God's gonna do what he's gonna do regardless.
SPEAKER_00:He's God, he's almighty, he's gonna do it. Some people may not believe in God. And then there are some people that have turned to the point that they don't want to hear anything about God. So if they're not listening or they don't want to have anything to do with God, unfortunately, that's that's really unfortunate. Um, they may find other ways. Some people go to they use other measures to help them get over things, you know. Yeah, so I mean, to each its own. Um, but I would encourage them. And then I had to repent. I there were times that I had feelings and emotions and stuff that weren't natural. I had to repent. And, you know, God, I don't mean to feel, I don't want to feel like this. I don't want to, you know, I don't want to hurt them. I don't want anybody to hurt, you know, I don't want to retaliate on anybody else. And and and there were times that I had to sit back and say, listen, what are you gonna do about it? Like I said, even trying to run those people off the road during that time, I had to repent for that. Like, literally, this was some gangster stuff. Like, what am I doing?
SPEAKER_02:And even, even I'm thinking too, when you say you were at the point where you were suicidal, and then thinking, like, okay, if you jump, what does this mean for you, your family at the time?
SPEAKER_00:I didn't think about my family. I didn't think about anything. I could only think about that. I didn't want to feel this pain and I had to end this pain. I didn't want it anymore. And so some people would say, Well, where's all your prayers and stuff? Or what happens? I wasn't hearing from God because I wasn't in the mindset that I could hear from him. I wasn't in the mindset that I wanted to do what's right. I just wanted to do whatever it was gonna take to get me out of this pain. But then I had to pray. You know, I really wasn't praying. I was letting the situations overwhelm me. I became so enraged with just ending it all. I I really wasn't thinking about my family. Yeah, you know, and I had to repent about that, you know, because that's not, you know, something that we would want to do. There are people who want lives, want their lives. There are people dying from diseases every day. There are people who um have been um going through things that didn't have the option to say whether they live or die. And that wasn't fair, that wasn't right, you know.
SPEAKER_02:So, cuz what do you see as being next for you in your life?
SPEAKER_00:Well, I will say I'm moving in silence. Let me just say that. Just just keep an eye out. Relationship-wise, I will say that uh there are some things in the making. So I'm excited. Let me just say that. I'm excited.
SPEAKER_02:I can tell, I can tell. And I was gonna ask you this. I want to end on on this note because you have been through different, you know, trials, tribulations, hardships, but you don't seem like you've given up on.
SPEAKER_00:No, I have not. Love is love. I would say the right love won't let you give up.
SPEAKER_02:And I don't think we can end on a better note. And because I really appreciate having you.
SPEAKER_00:I appreciate being here. Thank you so much.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, y'all, we have wrapped up another episode of the Peace and Prosperity Podcast. Yes. And as always, be blessed.
SPEAKER_00:Be blessed.
SPEAKER_02:Peace. Good night. Thanks for tuning in to the Peace and Prosperity Podcast. If today's episode brought you clarity, encouragement, or even a moment of calm, share it with someone who needs to hear it too. Your support helps us keep these conversations going. And remember, you don't have to do it all alone. If you're navigating stress, burnout, or just need a space to reset, I'm here to support you. Connect with me at jasonlphillips.com or send me a message on social media. Until next time, protect your peace, pursue your purpose, and keep showing up for you. Be blessed.