Uncovered: Life Beyond
Join the conversations of Rebecca and Naomi, two ex-Amish Mennonite women who jumped the proverbial fence in their younger years and later experienced college as first-gen, non-traditional students. They discuss pursuing formal education while raising a family, navigating the hidden curriculum of academia, and other dimensions of reimagining a life beyond high-demand religion. Send your questions to uncoveredlifebeyond@gmail.com.
Uncovered: Life Beyond
55. From Financial Struggle to Stability: How One Family Flipped the Script (with special guest Patricia Lewis)
Patricia Lewis shares her remarkable journey from financial struggle to stability by challenging traditional gender roles and overcoming the shame of accepting public assistance. After marrying her husband who she met while teaching in Japan, they returned to the U.S. to start a family in the midst of the Great Recession. Through the birth of their five sons and many job changes, they faced years of financial hardship before finding an unconventional solution.
Key points from Tricia's story:
• Growing up Mennonite with a father who taught practical skills regardless of gender
• Becoming reacquainted with her husband online while teaching in Japan and developing a relationship built on honest communication
• Struggling through dozens of jobs, medical bills, and raising five boys born via C-sections within eight years
• Confronting the shame of accepting public assistance while living at poverty level
• Transforming their finances by flipping traditional roles – Tricia becoming the primary breadwinner while her husband drove a school bus and homeschooled their sons
• Learning to counter negative self-talk and treat ourselves with the same kindness we show others
• Practical tips for financial independence: knowing your accounts, passwords, and financial situation
• Creative ways to stretch resources like buying turkeys in bulk during sales
For women facing financial insecurity, know what your plan is going forward. Identify your networks, consider your abilities, and understand your current financial situation – including accounts, debts, and assets. Don't let shame prevent you from using available resources designed to help you reach stability.
Connect with Tricia:
https://www.facebook.com/patricia.a.lewis
https://bsky.app/profile/hopenafuture.bsky.social
Thanks for listening! Connect with us via
- Facebook: Uncovered: Life Beyond
- Instagram: @uncoveredlifebeyond
- Email: uncoveredlifebeyond@gmail.com
- Website: https://www.buzzsprout.com/2171591
Subscribe (for free) to Uncovered: Life Beyond on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Amazon Music, or wherever you get your podcasts so you'll never miss an episode!
What topics at the intersection of education, high-demand religion, career, parenting, and emotional intelligence are of interest to you? Help us plan future episodes by taking this quick listener survey. We appreciate your input very much!
This is Rebecca and this is Naomi. We're 40-something moms and first cousins who know what it's like to veer off the path assigned to us.
Speaker 3:We've juggled motherhood, marriage, college and career, as we questioned our faith traditions while exploring new identities and ways of seeing the world.
Speaker 2:Without any maps for either of us to follow. We've had to figure things out as we go and appreciate that detours and dead ends are essential to the path Along the way, we've uncovered a few insights we want to share with fellow travelers.
Speaker 3:We want to talk about the questions we didn't know who to ask and the options we didn't know we had.
Speaker 2:So, whether you're feeling stuck or already shaking things up, we are here to cheer you on and assure you that the best is yet to come. Welcome to Uncovered Life Beyond. Hello everyone, Welcome back to Uncovered Life Beyond. This is Naomi. This is Rebecca.
Speaker 1:And this is Tricia.
Speaker 3:Yay, and we have Tricia with us today too. You guys are so lucky.
Speaker 2:You are. We have another special episode here to wrap up our financial literacy. Here to wrap up our financial literacy financial autonomy series. Trisha Lewis is someone I met online. It's almost 20 years ago, right, because it was back. It was on a discussion board for people of all flavors of Mennonite-Namish association and you at the time, I think we're in Japan teaching school. You and I were both in very different parts of our lives and then, of course, we're no longer on that discussion board but have stayed in touch through Facebook and then, in the meanwhile, rebecca got to know you in real life.
Speaker 3:You know, isn't the whole I don't know circle of life, mennonite connection thing just hilarious? So we met in a Facebook group, right, that sounds right, yeah. And then figured out we live just an hour away from each other and yeah, yeah, I had some back and forth dinners, potlucks and one of these days we're going to have some writing groups.
Speaker 2:That sounds fun.
Speaker 3:Yeah, but I always have admired the perspective, the voice and the way you articulate things. I love that about you and I'm just so excited you agreed to join us.
Speaker 1:Thank you. I think I'm better at articulating things when I write them honestly, so you're in good company, rebecca.
Speaker 2:To your point, though, I want to say that that is a really good description of Tricia, because I know even though, even though, through the changes that Tricia and I have both been through since then, I'm just in you're right here, but your commitment to follow the truth where it leads, you take questions and others' perspectives seriously and you're like, okay, let's look into it. And you are genuine in that pursuit of knowing, and I really I've always appreciated that and, and I think it's well, that's one of the reasons why you're on here, because we we value your perspective.
Speaker 1:Well, thank you. Yeah, back when you and I first met if we can say that online, which I think we can yeah, I was single. I was teaching in Japan and it was actually while I was there that my husband and I and it was actually while I was there that my husband and I started our relationship. And then, yeah, since then we've gone through a lot. So we got married, we have five boys and we went through some really rough times like financially and stuff, and he was also served as a pastor for a little while. And, yeah, we did some, we did some unusual things to to kind of, I guess I would say, recover from some of the difficulties we've had financially. But we're doing a lot better now, which is really, which is really great. But, yeah, the, the, the travel, the, the journey here has been. It's been interesting and not always easy, but I'm still glad we did so now we're in this season, oh, go ahead.
Speaker 3:Oh, I was just going to say I think you all's ability to be unconventional to adjust not, and to not demand that you have to take this route or this path, but kind of lean into what makes sense is so impressive, because I wonder how often this idea that you got to follow this tight little path is actually what gets us into trouble.
Speaker 1:Yeah Well. So my husband and I, depending on our audience, we'll tell them we met at college or we met online, because it's not as well accepted by some as others. So the reality is we did meet at college. He worked for me in the kitchen and he jokes that he still works for me in the kitchen but I was a student manager and he worked in the cafeteria. So that was that's kind of a fun little, you know side note about it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it is fun. But then he continued at college and I graduated and it wasn't until I was in Japan four years later that we actually developed a relationship that was beyond you know good with the dishes, yeah. So at the time I was in Japan. He's working overnights in Ohio, so our time schedules overlapped a lot. But you know our, our location didn't I think, and I don't remember the number. It's like in the twenties we were in the same country for like 20 some days when we got married.
Speaker 2:but so that was yeah.
Speaker 1:So our relationship started out a little bit uniquely. It wasn't, like you know, the typical dating relationship or courtship relationship or any of those. We just we chatted online, we talked on the phone, we had it was hours of communication, and that, I think, is a big part of why we are where we are today, because we had to learn to communicate if we were going to have any relationship. Honesty was a big part of it, because when we first started chatting he was, he was still not really in a relationship, she'd broken up with him, but he really hoped to make like to get back together. So we were communicating and telling each other stuff that we wouldn't necessarily tell somebody, that we were trying to, you know, impress, yeah, so. So that probably helped us a lot, because then we, you know, when we did go ahead and start a relationship, we already had all the stuff out on the table and there wasn't too much hiding anything anymore.
Speaker 1:Ironically, one of the things we had to learn was to disagree effectively, because we grew up very differently. My husband did not grow up Anabaptist at all and I did, and I still like to some degree. I still have some of the mindset and some of the ideas and he, it was pretty different. So we we would have discussions and I think this and I think that, and we kind of had to figure out is this something we can, you know, work with or do we disagree too much to to continue? But we ended up yeah, obviously we ended up continuing. Ended up yeah, obviously we ended up continuing.
Speaker 1:The other thing I think that is kind of funny this is unusual, I think is that when we started a relationship, I kind of told him, I set it out in front of him and I said, hey, I want you to know if there's ever any mistreatment of kids, if we have kids, or even if it's other people's kids and there's mistreatment, I will leave you and I will not look back. And you need to know that ahead of time because I'm not going to mess around with that. I don't know, I was weird. I was like what the heck?
Speaker 3:You just gave me the chills. You just gave me the chills, Like seriously, that's amazing.
Speaker 1:But that's what I told him up front. I was like, if you can't handle this, you don't want, you know you don't want a relationship with me and I don't know. I think that was really good Because we did. We went into it, both knowing this is what like, this is what we want from each other and this is what we'll put up with, and these are things we won't.
Speaker 3:I find it so amazing. I mean and I'm assuming you had this too, but you know I was raised with this hardcore thing of oh, you take the word divorce out of the dictionary. That's not even going to be part of the conversation and you like just blew that out of your system. Like it was like yeah, guess what? Yes it is. I don't think I would have been able to have that conversation in my young 20s. I'm so impressed.
Speaker 1:The other part of it was I was looking at it as I'm going to say this up front, because if I put this out there up front he's like oh, that's the like, that's what she would do, and I don't know if I can handle that then then we don't get there and we never have to think about a divorce, because I mean, it has worked so far at least.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I just want to applaud you for having the sense of self to draw that line in the sand, because I know, like when I, when I was getting married concerns, I had that like, am I just being judgmental? Am I just being close-minded? Am I just like, is this, you know? Do I need to just loosen up? And I realize now that I didn't, because I, you know, I there was all the warnings about don't leave one fundamentalism for another, and all that. And I recognize now the importance of taking ownership of what really matters to you. Who cares if it's judgmental? Who cares? Like you're going to have to live with it? So go ahead and be judgmental. I just want to give people permission to be. You know, if that's the worry, if that's the concern in the back of their minds for making a line, it's a standard.
Speaker 1:It's not even being judgmental, it's saying this is my standard. This is what.
Speaker 2:I can live with Exactly.
Speaker 3:I agree. I agree. Isn't it funny how boundaries having a standard, whatever was called being judgmental, it was called being selfish.
Speaker 3:It was called all these things when it came from a woman, yeah, especially when it came from a woman, and we lost I lost all sense of autonomy in that, which again and I know this is something I come back to all the time this is why the process of deconstruction is so freaking important and it's a process Like it takes so long to unravel some of this stuff and yeah, it's not just an identity, not just a new identity, but it's about rethinking lots of things.
Speaker 3:It's not an identity, it is not a destination, it is not something you quickly do so you can quote, rebuild, like what the heck is that? No, and it's taking the stuff that we've been taught and letting it unravel. Like you said earlier, naomi, about Patricia, about Tricia, your ability to kind of follow the truth and be okay with where it lands or where it leads you, and I think sometimes that makes us so uncomfortable that we kind of shut down and being willing to lean into that discomfort I just think is so incredible.
Speaker 1:Well, something that I think is an advantage that I had at that point too is that I was, first of all I had graduated from with my four year degree and I was living in a foreign country. So I had a lot of. I had a lot of life experiences that aren't necessarily fairly very typical with the upbringing I had. So I think that also was part of part of my I guess part of what made me who I was. At that point I had already kind of broken out of some of the typical expectations and, yeah, so that was part of who I was too.
Speaker 3:And we're going to talk about your education actually in the next podcast. But I am so curious to know how much just getting that education gave you a sense of confidence and the ability to kind of look at information and let it be.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think at that point there was still a really weird mix of the cultural, like the submission and the you know, be meek, mild, quiet, and also which is I mean, there's some of that in my personality too, but there was also, yes, some, some level of confidence. I knew that I was capable of thought, I was capable of articulation, I was capable of figuring out and understanding both what I was thinking and also hearing from other people, without it having to, you know, take apart everything that I was or had. So that, yeah, that was really helpful. I think it's an important part of you know where I ended up too.
Speaker 2:So, tricia, could you tell us a little bit about how you grew up, just for context for the rest of your story?
Speaker 1:Sure, sure. So yeah, I mentioned that a little bit before. I grew up in a moderately conservative Mennonite family. It wasn't, it wasn't real extreme either way. I mean we had. I was wore skirts until I went to college. Actually, a couple years into college, which none of my kids knew until recently, my husband told them that and they're like what my mom, so that was kind of fun. Them that and they're like what my mom, so that was kind of fun. Um, I actually, when we you know the podcast talks about life uncovered, I actually wore my head covering um all the way through college, I think, and it had, um, it was. It was different because I went to a Baptist college. This wasn't, like you know, a midnight college where they would necessarily expect to have that, so that was unusual. I had a lot of people who, okay, why do you do this? And you know, explained it.
Speaker 2:Okay, and then you know, of course I had yeah, can you describe it, because that's the right, like what kind of head covering? Because, like, I wore the beachy Amish head covering, like some people call them ice cream buckets, and Rebecca, you wore a variety of them, but Tricia, oh, I'm sorry, here, I had my microphone up here, Okay, but Tricia, yeah, I'd like to hear about, I'm curious about yours.
Speaker 1:So when I first yeah, well, we went through a little bit of, we went through some different churches which, yeah, we did so originally, so that changes yes, it changes what you, what you wear.
Speaker 1:So first I wore the what I've heard referred to as the coffee filter head coverings okay they weren't as as big, but it was the white netting and, you know, starched and stiffed and all that. So I wore those for quite a while and then we ended up. We ended up in a different church which is now, I believe, maybe the BMA variety, if, if, for those, you know, listeners who might be familiar with some of the current varieties or flavors of Mennonite. But I started wearing a hanging veil then, so it was like a black oh, what would that be?
Speaker 3:I can't even think of the type of material it was called Kind of like a soft net, almost, yeah, like lacy.
Speaker 2:Was it a doily? The ones we had weren't lace.
Speaker 1:Okay, so it wasn't the doily. I ended up wearing that later. That was husband, was was pastor, because nobody else in church wore one. But I did wear one Um, so that's yeah. I ended up wearing it again later, but that's yeah, sure, no. So I've been in and out Um, but the hanging veil is what I wore and I wore that through um until I stopped wearing it in college. So, yeah, and then, yes, the the doily. I did wear a hanging veil occasionally, but mostly it was the doily version. What was it? Somebody said that it's the Victorian secret head covering. So I mean, there's all these like in jokes about you know different kinds of head coverings.
Speaker 3:You know what's funny, tricia, and your story kind of reminds me of this. If you go to the Behalt, they have like different coverings, like I don't know. Is there 12, 15 of them?
Speaker 2:Oh, or more. So many. Yeah, I would say it's more like 20 or 25 varieties. I mean, I feel like I've probably worn, not.
Speaker 3:Okay, saying I've worn half of them is exaggerating, but I've worn a lot of them and it's just kind of funny how, yeah, it's funny seeing that yeah you and.
Speaker 1:I should you and?
Speaker 1:I should play a game of competition there sometime maybe I think you would win, because it's basically three for me I did. I did do something unusual, which was and this was partly because I wasn't actually attending a Mennonite church at the time but I took my hanging veil and I attached it to a headband. It was a cloth headband and I just that's how I would wear it. It was so, so easy to put on and off that way and I didn't have all of those pins and stuff every time. It was unconventional.
Speaker 3:You started the headband Maybe.
Speaker 2:Is this a trend? Is this a trend you?
Speaker 3:started the headband trend? That was you Probably not completely you trust better, um, naomi, um around here, people who are kind of sort of thinking about leaving but not leaving, um literally wear a headband for their head, covering for their head, okay, yeah, so instead of to attach their head covering to it, they wear it instead, but yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, okay.
Speaker 1:Well, if you get it wide enough.
Speaker 2:You get a little bit of coverage.
Speaker 3:Oh honey honey, these are Nike headbands. I look at it. I remind myself every day to look at it with curiosity, not judgment.
Speaker 2:Well, okay, and in the same spirit, I'm going to guess.
Speaker 3:these are the these would have been the same folks wearing t-shirts over cape dresses? No, probably sometimes yeah, but again to be fair, but to be fair, let's judge the environment.
Speaker 2:That, oh absolutely absolutely this yeah, there's men, there's men there's men who are making the rules for these women.
Speaker 3:So let's and that's kind of where I come back to Right, you know, I agree it's. It's just difficult sometimes because some of the same people might have judged, you know, pretty harshly when you, when I was in the middle of, you know, figuring it all out. But that's okay, we've all done that, we've all been in that judgment. So let's lean into curiosity.
Speaker 2:I agree and I applaud, I mean when I absolutely, in light of the environment, I applaud them for exploring their individuality, you know, and however they have access to it. So yeah, absolutely yeah, the judgment is not toward them, the judgment is toward the environment that gives them such a narrow range for expressing themselves.
Speaker 3:Well, and I have friends who talk about you know their churches having a men's meeting to discuss the head covering and I'm like I have so many thoughts and none of them are thoughts I should probably say here. So you know, what if the headband works for you? Wear it. But back to you, tricia. Quite the trendsetter, so you. That's actually quite brilliant, which is kind of what nuns do too, right.
Speaker 2:Like, don't they kind of the nuns that still dress in the traditional habit? Yeah, the nuns around here don't. But yeah, when I've been in Italy or that places like that, yeah, they still exist. They're just not. I think most don't, most don't wear the habit, but yeah, I think it is something like that. And, trisha, you were probably a young mom by that point. Were you a young mom? Because then, like, when you're dealing with kids, you don't need all the bobby pins and straight pins and all that stuff.
Speaker 1:No, that was actually when I was in college. Oh, okay, okay, yeah, for convenience in college. Well, that works too, and then, yeah. So there's one other thing that I'll mention about my growing up years, that, especially since we're talking financial literacy stuff, the other thing that I would probably bring out was, first of all, that I was in a family. I had six sisters and a brother, and my dad owned a restaurant, and we all worked at the restaurant. The one thing I would mention is that my dad did not, he was not real restrictive about like gender roles. He said every one of us girls needed to learn to do things like change our oil, manage our finances. You know we needed if we didn't get married. He wanted us to be able to live independently and know what we were doing and not make a lot of mistakes because, well, you know, you're a girl. I didn't teach you that, so that was something that really it helped me when it came to figuring out.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I didn't teach you that, so that was something that really it. It helped me when it came to figuring out. Yeah, it helped me a lot when it came to figuring out college stuff. It helped me a lot when it came to, I mean, even when we got married and anyway. So that was super, super helpful. And then, of course, the the working which there's all kinds of. We could. I know that Rebecca and I could have a whole conversation about that whole working in the family business and all of that. But it there were advantages that it gave me and disadvantages, and I mean I saved up money, but I also the rate I got paid was pretty low. So, yeah, but it gave me, it did. It gave me a start. It gave me.
Speaker 1:I started out with some savings because my dad wasn't one of those who you work for me and I provide you a house and food. There was. You know, if you worked, you got a little bit. So I learned to save. That was super, super helpful and to live on what I was making, even though it wasn't necessarily a lot, it was enough. I also kind of started my yeah, the whole practice of learning, I guess, is in there, but I think we're going to get to that later.
Speaker 1:So those were a couple of the key things, just that whole. He didn't stick with gender roles at all. I mean, we grew up in a house where my mom stayed home and homeschooled us and he worked, but all of us girls worked and we learned this stuff. So that was yeah, that was actually really key. And it was important to when Randy and I got married too, because I actually ended up knowing more about finances than he did when we got married.
Speaker 1:So that might have been like the first part of that whole not necessarily sticking to or conforming to gender roles, but there were some others too. He liked to shop, which I thought was weird because I never enjoyed shopping, but I I also I like to do things like hunting and like hiking and being outdoors. We actually joked that we had. We had a marriage where we flipped like gender stereotypes from the very beginning, but we both like, we liked each other. We thought it was cool that you know, we each had our own. And then there's things that are fairly typical because I can, I tend to be able to cook better than he does, and he is way more into sports than I am. So there's also, you know, stereotypical things about us too. We're not just, you know, breaking everything just to break it. We're able to be ourselves.
Speaker 2:And I think that's key. You're able to be yourselves and it's like you do compliment each other right. But it's just that, like complementarianism says, you have to compliment each other in this very rigid way, specific ways in very specific ways. You all are just being yourselves, and in being yourselves you compliment each other.
Speaker 3:So that's right. Yeah, so that's great. Insecurities make the other person feel confident.
Speaker 3:And I feel like the most beautiful thing to see is when a person is allowed to live and thrive and be and perform in the roles they excel at, and those roles are supported and applauded and no one feels insecure from them. And it doesn't matter gender, it doesn't really matter, you know whatever it's just it's your natural gifting and, instead of feeling insecure about it, you're able to empower the other person. And I think you guys exemplify that so well. Yeah, and it's something I think about often.
Speaker 1:Well, thank you, rebecca. Yeah, it took us a while to get here. I know it was. It was not always easy, because so I was in Japan when we got married. I was teaching and he actually came over and joined me for a bit, but that was.
Speaker 1:That was a whole thing in itself. We had a steep learning curve because when he moved over he was changing. I mean, he was moving his whole location to a whole new country. He was changing his relationship status from single to married, the language that was being spoken. It was a huge change for him, and what we have learned since is that he didn't feel stressed, but his body took the stress, that he was basically unable and didn't know how to feel, and it came out in physical maladies. That, yeah, it stressed our marriage. We've actually since talked about it. That that was kind of it was trained into him. He would say that he was raised in a high control environment and part of that was he wasn't allowed to be stressed. He had to do the right things and he had to be there. So, yeah, that was something we actually still had conversations on recently and he's been still kind of processing some of those things that he learned. So that was one way that it came out was he was. He was physically not well.
Speaker 3:Wow.
Speaker 1:And then, to complicate things, about three months into our marriage we got pregnant, which we were in our late twenties before we got married, and some of his sisters had trouble with having children and we wanted children. So we kind of said you know, we're, we're old enough and we're at a place if we have children, that would be great. But it did result in us kind of getting a our our time in Japan got cut short and we came back to the United States right in the middle of an economic recession and so he got part no, he got full-time employment for about eight months and then he strung together a part-time work while I had babies for several years. Yeah, so that was rough. That whole economic insecurity was hard.
Speaker 1:And of course, at that point you mentioned the complementarian thing earlier and at that point that's kind of the model that we were working on was the husband provides and the mom stays home, takes care of the kids. And practically speaking, I was having, I had C-sections, so I was with having babies I had. They're roughly two years apart and I have five of them, which is quite a few. So that was. That was also physically really tough and demanding.
Speaker 2:So we went through just for clarification. Been demanding, so we went through, just for clarification. Five C-sections yes, you've had five C-sections.
Speaker 1:Wow. In 10 years Wow 10 years, actually eight, because, if you think about it, the first one to the last one is just over eight years.
Speaker 1:Wow, that's incredible. So yeah, I mean, at the time we were kind of it was very much that we were still very much in that that religious idea of having children is, you know, a blessing from God and don't stop God's blessings. And so when we were dating, we were talking about how many kids we wanted. And I'm I'm being very practical, I'm like I'm in my late twenties, so I mean I'm thinking I can probably have around five kids. That's probably a reasonable amount. And I asked him how many he wanted. He said he wanted a dozen. Well, I kind of paused and I said well, I think you're dating the wrong sister, because all of my siblings are younger and so if you want more, if you went to a dozen children, you better marry somebody younger than me. Apparently he still wanted me enough to choose me. So, yeah, that was that was my response when he said he wanted a dozen. So anyway, by the time we got to the fifth one, I mean I could tell you a story. This isn't a you know, a mom or a birth podcast or whatever. This isn't a mom or a birth podcast or whatever.
Speaker 1:But we had some really rough ones because all of that time we had all of those financial insecurities. For the first one we had insurance through his job that he'd had for eight months. But all of the prenatal visits we paid for because the insurance kicked in I think it was two days before he was due. So his was covered, it was paid for. He was a little overdue. So you know, we had insurance for like two weeks before he was born, but still yeah, so there was that one but then he got laid off like three months later. So the next one, I think we actually ended up on the state medical and I and that's, and that covered it a lot. So then we get to.
Speaker 1:If we're talking financial stuff, if there was something that I would change, the next section of of how we handled the payment is what I would probably change. I would have just stuck with that medical, but we were on it because we were at a point where we literally didn't. I think we made maybe what 13,000 that year for a family of three expecting a fourth. It was. It was crazy. So that medical, that medical coverage, was really, really needed. But then we went ahead and went off of it because Randy got a job. It was not enough to kick us off of it. But we went off because he had full-time work and there was a, you know, there was shame that I associated with that. Can we talk about?
Speaker 3:that a little bit more we can.
Speaker 1:Because I think it's an important.
Speaker 3:I think it's such an important conversation. I have talked to numerous moms and let me just backtrack and say I get the shame. I lived in a space of time where I was hungry, like I was literally hungry. I would show up at a meal once a week. That was filled with animosity, dislike, a disdain for me, but I showed up once a week because I was hungry, like literally I was hungry.
Speaker 3:So so but, but, but. But I would have. I would have starved to death before I ever left everyone. Anyone know how hungry I was and and for the first time and only time in my life, people complimented me on how thin I was, which I always think about with other people, Like we need to be careful about that. But I think we need to talk about this whole shame thing. When I talk to moms who are struggling, I've been surprised at how often, if I say, figure out food stamps, figure out food pantries, I don't care if you feel shame, it is like a job.
Speaker 3:You're figuring out how to support your family and the way we have criticized families who are trying to make ends meet in a world where insurance is such a crapshoot. It is such a crapshoot. It is when the economic situation, even in good times, is a crapshoot, why we are shaming the moms and the families who are simply trying to provide for their families instead of these systems. What is wrong with us? So I would love to hear about how you process that shame and kind of what. What can we do to make it less shameful and easier for other?
Speaker 1:people. I think to some degree that's something each person's going to have to figure out. I don't know that we can, you know, make like, tell anybody something that's going to convince them. If it's OK, I'll kind of continue my story and explain why and how I changed my mind and how that's kind of worked out. Because for the next couple, for the next three of the boys, we did a medical sharing plan, so we would pay and it was hundreds of dollars a month and then when we would get bills we would pay as much. You know, we'd pay it and then they'd reimburse us as much as possible. And sometimes it was kind of a fun balancing act of I'll pay as much as I can and then submit the bills to the sharing and then they send us money and we pay the bills off. But it was a struggle and there's always, you know, a percentage that we have to pay and we're talking, you know, surgical births are expensive. So for the first couple after that, so the, my third and fourth son, they because we were paying cash, they had discounts and stuff. So here's the really ironic thing for the, for that last baby that we had, when we said, you know, we're paying cash. We don't have insurance. The response was well, we can't give a discount if you don't apply for the medical aid, like for the state medical. Well, at that point I'm like but we have this other, so I shouldn't be applying, because then you know we have something to cover this.
Speaker 1:We paid for his birth, like we ended up making payments on his birth for I think it was a couple of years and, to be fair, I think we were paying for it even after I finally gave in and applied for the medical and I don't recall I can't tell you exactly what changed my mind about it. Remembered we were I mean, we were newly unemployed when we'd gone on it before and we kind of looked at it as it's a temporary thing while we're, you know, while we're unemployed, it's fine, and that didn't feel so shameful because it was temporary. And I think I got to the point where I was looking at this bill that I'm paying. You know I'm paying a small amount, but I'm paying an amount every month and I'm like how are we ever going to get ahead when we are so far behind? This doesn't make sense. What makes more sense is use that, because all of this money that I've been paying could have been going to pay for, like to get us stuff we need, and we could actually be potentially getting back off of that medical sooner if we had. If I just hadn't been so dang proud, if I hadn't been too too proud to to admit that we needed help because we did. To be fair, that's how we ended up not being on it now is we admitted we needed help and we used it and we got to a point where we didn't need it. And I think maybe, maybe that's what people need to hear that it doesn't have to be just because you've used it doesn't have to be.
Speaker 1:I'm that person who is on medical assistance. It'll it'll end. Use the you know, use the resources that you have available and don't be embarrassed about using the resources that are there. It's okay, because we all we all need people. We all need people to help us and sometimes some of us need medical help. Sometimes we need help getting food, sometimes we need help getting education who knows what it is, but it's okay. And then we get to a place where we can go and we can offer that help to others and that's the beautiful part of it. So there's no shame. There shouldn't be shame. There is shame. I know that We've kind of put that there, but there shouldn't be shame in it, because that's how we get to the point where we can help others too.
Speaker 3:I was afraid if I asked for help. Part of the problem was I was afraid I would be told that it's evidence that I wasn't following Jesus correctly, Because obviously if I would be doing God's will, so my suffering was evidence of God's punishment. In fact, I had internalized the message that probably it would get worse until God brought me to the end of myself and I was I would have died before I would have asked for help, because that, for me, that like took everything up a notch. Did you have any of that type of concerns, worries? Did you have any of that type of concerns, worries, mental conversations? And I hate that we do that to each other. I hate it. I hate it. We are Anabaptists, for God's sake. We talk about community, Like why is it so difficult to live it? I don't know.
Speaker 1:And, to be fair, I mean, during this time was when my husband was an assistant pastor, and no, I'm going to be honest that the thought never crossed my mind. That, oh, it's evidence. I and I don't know if it has to do with where I was in my theology at the time. It might have been simply the, because my, my way of looking at it is sometimes things happen because people make choices and they affect other people, and that's what we're dealing with, like, we're dealing with the effects of the choices that people make and how they affect other people. So it doesn't. I mean, yeah, my choices can affect what happens to me, but it's not only my choices that affect me.
Speaker 1:Like the people around me. Their choices affect me. People in authority, like in government positions, those things that affect me, their choices affect me. People in authority, like in government positions, those things affect me, like all of the choices that people make affect each other, which is, I mean, that's kind of the flip side of we all need each other's help. We also affect other people with the choices we make. So, yeah, I think that's the other part of it is. No, I didn't tend to look at it as this is God's judgment on me, specifically because I kind of had the idea that maybe, maybe a little bit more broadly, some I'm not the only one in this situation and maybe those most things that are happening are happening to everybody because of choices that you know everybody is making, that you know there's a lot bigger things going on Well and you were in two different places.
Speaker 2:So I mean it makes sense to me. You know I mean, rebecca, you were in a very vulnerable place at that point in your life and Tricia you're. There was a vulnerability in terms of being a mom, a lot of young children, and you know financial precarity, but I would imagine the moral support of your husband and your relationship must have given you a lot of confidence. Isn't the word I want, but like solidity, security, yeah, I would imagine yeah, well, yes and no, okay.
Speaker 1:Okay, because at the same time, go ahead. Well, you had a question.
Speaker 2:No, go ahead. Finish your thought, because I do. I do want to speak to the shame thing, but go ahead and so hopeless.
Speaker 1:And I mean, I'm home, I've had, you know, five children and I had I had a weird thing which was the prepartum depression. I actually got more depressed before the babies were born and right up until the last one. And what happened with the last one, which we knew it was the last one, so maybe that was part of it, but it just kind of kept going with all the others. I used to say about two weeks after the babies were born the world turned color again instead of gray. But with him it just kind of went on and on and it was just gray and it stayed and I was like, oh, my goodness, what do I do? But that was a complicating factor in all of that too. That made it really hard. The finances were hard and the depression was hard. But you are 100% correct, naomi, that we each had each other. We still considered each other to be. You know, we were on the same team and we were working together. There were rough spots, but it made a huge difference, right, right, I'm sure.
Speaker 2:I think it's interesting how a sense of shame about all kinds of things, but in this case using public assistance or, you know, food bank, whatever that is, whatever's needed how that shame again and again traps people and blocks off options, again and again traps people and blocks off options. And I think you know when, when we grow up in a environment that I mean for all our talk of community, there's also this very fierce independence right, a fierce independent streak in our Anabaptist background too, where you don't, you don't want to show.
Speaker 2:You know, just like you said, rebecca, like admitting that you were in such difficult straits would have been interpreted as God's judgment, and so and I think of that kind of thing, that dynamic showing up in so many, I mean, since I was a little kid having nightmares, like I didn't want to talk to an adult about it because I knew that if I were right with God, I wouldn't be afraid of whatever the nightmare was. You know, there have been times in my life where I stayed in situations way too long because I was trying to disprove, like, maybe not consciously, but at some level, I was trying to disprove things that others had said about me, you know, and what really transformed things for me was when I realized, oh wait, no, if somebody's trying to control your behavior and this could be interpersonal or it could be much broader, you know, like in terms of public policy, but limiting options is how you're going to control their behavior. And also you shame the one avenue you know their one route to, to autonomy you know to to doing what they you know to, to to acting outside of of the what you want them to do, of what you want them to do. So you know, you, what I think I'm hearing you saying as you reflect back is that if you hadn't let that shame, which we all share and we all have shared anyway, many of us if you had let that, if you hadn't let that keep you from staying on that insurance or the medical assistance, it could have put you ahead so much further financially to be saving for your kid's college or you know whatever else, or or maybe you know, maybe just buying bunk beds, but but, like I guess what I'm saying is, it's just been really transformative for me and I just want to share that liberation with anyone who's listening.
Speaker 2:That sense of the possibility of liberation from that shame to realize, like no, when we feel a sense of shame about something, using that as a motivation is often blinding us to something that's really important. The shame is a distraction so often and that identifying that and recognizing it as that can be very liberating. And one other little soapbox, and then I'll stop. But let's also look on another level. Why do we have this resistance to accepting assistance like that, like public assistance? I know during the pandemic, because of the schools that my children were going to they. The poverty rate is high enough in those schools that everybody gets assistance, and so I was taking these EBT cards to Aldi. You know, like a of all that made a huge difference for us.
Speaker 2:And B, I had to deal with the shame of it too, because I felt like, I felt self-conscious, like are they? Are they judging me? Like, do they think I'm a deadbeat mom? Like like I'm a socialist? And I'm having these thoughts and I guess I just I think sometimes we, especially when we come out of like these high demand religious circles, settings where and it's not just religion, but just settings that have this story of our exclusivity and what makes us special and different, and if part of that is we don't use state assistance, I think when we start interrogating some of those stories that we tell ourselves, we might find out that they don't line up with the values that we aspire to, the values we really do want to hold, and that there's probably something really healthy about realizing we're just as effed up as everybody else. It's at that point when we can really start to feel a sense of community with people around us who haven't grown up just the way we have, you know.
Speaker 3:Well, and isn't it funny how often we project our own shit onto other people? Yeah, yeah, funny how often we project our own shit onto other people. Yeah, yeah, like it's like. All along, it wasn't about them, it was about my own crap that I'm just projecting onto others. And I think about that when I see and hear judgment or when I give judgment. It's not, it's often about the person executing the judgment not always, but often, yeah so true.
Speaker 2:So I don't want to. I don't want to um read into your story but um trisha.
Speaker 3:But I you're giving us so many soapbox moments.
Speaker 2:I love it so, um, okay, so the one thing you would change would be accepting public assistance.
Speaker 1:Yeah, or your children? I don't think yeah, because again, I think it would have. It would have helped us get where we are sooner. I mean, part of me is like, oh, I don't want to change. You know the whole our story because there is, you know there's growth and change that it. You know, that it shows. But at the same time I think that would have been a healthier thing. I would you know if I wouldn't. If I'm going to look back and give somebody advice, don't, don't feel shame about it. It really is supposed to help. You know, the idea is to help you get to a better place. It's not a, it's not a division of this. You know this person is, is less than that person because they're using it. It's this person needed some help. That doesn't mean that's where you are and it doesn't mean that's where you stay and that's kind of right. Yeah, you have this idea. It makes you know that, it marks you and it doesn't.
Speaker 2:Right, and I think there's been. Politicians have, for decades now, have been spreading the story about generational poverty. Generational poverty and they, they, they make it sound like, if you get on that you are on the fast track to staying in poverty. And the reality is, and I know, like I've read about this, like, statistically, the number of Americans who dip into poverty and and and and and qualify for those benefits is is way larger than we think, but it's. But they don't necessarily stay there and that's the thing. It's not a permanent thing, it doesn't have to.
Speaker 3:The other thing that I think is important to point out from my experience oftentimes people don't know how to get the help and how to get the assistance, and there's a fear of asking those questions and from my experience when you start asking questions. People are so kind and are so helpful and will do everything in their power to get you the resources you need. I don't know how to say this and say it kindly, but within the system the judgment isn't there like it is within the church system.
Speaker 1:Does that make sense?
Speaker 3:Yes, it lines up with my experience. Yeah, and I think there's this fear of starting to ask questions in the public world and asking how do I get help? Because I think we think we're going to get the same judgment we might receive in the church system and it's so different Like I have been in situations helping others where the kindness that they offer. I was in line at a food pantry and I realized they treated me with the exact same courtesy that they would have given me if I was giving them $2,000 cash. It was the same and I just sat and I cried.
Speaker 3:I was like this is the kindness, this is the community that we talk about, but the church is so slow in offering, so if you're thinking you might need assistance, so slow in offering, so if you're thinking you might need assistance, oh and for the other, the other thing I need to say here is we are in a situation where the government is actively taking away a lot of these support systems and I don't really care how the heck you voted. This is the time to show up for people and we need to fill in the gaps. It is not fair that we need to fill in the gaps, but we darn better would, and we better drop the judgment, because we don't know when it's gonna be our turn asking for help or someone you love asking for help and do everything you can to advocate for other people.
Speaker 2:This is not the time to pretend the world is all good and fine, and people aren't struggling, telling itself the story it's been telling itself, and I think we're going to see just how much we depend on each other and just how much those who claim they've done it all by themselves have been depending on not help outside of themselves. Yes, it just got to them really early and they have already forgotten about it, but it's, yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. I'm going to go ahead and just add in here that the other thing to keep in mind if you do use assistance, is that there's not a division between those who use it and those who give it, always Because the other part of it is my husband well, actually it was my kids and I, because my husband was working but my kids and I actually helped at one of those food banks. We helped hand out the food and then we took some home afterward. And so the other thing to keep in mind is it doesn't mean you can't help just because you're getting help, Like that's part of that's part of the whole thing is you know we can, we can all be part of it.
Speaker 1:Even even when we're in need of help, we may have something else that somebody else needs. I know for me, because I'm a teacher, I could do some tutoring and things, and I could do it like in exchange for something instead of for money, for people who needed help but couldn't afford a tutor. So I guess my point is like don't be afraid to offer what you've got, even if you are getting help, Because just because you're getting help doesn't make you any less valuable. It doesn't make your services and your abilities and talents any less, and that's something we need to remember too. I think that's part of that shame we feel like if we use those things, that makes us less but it doesn't 100%.
Speaker 2:That's beautiful actually.
Speaker 1:So should I go ahead and pivot? Yeah, so then, what Then? What happened? So after and to be fair, I don't remember exactly the number I think my husband went through if I remember right, it was around 15 different jobs in about eight to 10 years. Maybe it was even 12, but it was. Was that that whole thing?
Speaker 1:When you have a job, it's easier to find a job. But what would happen is he'd get a job and it would be like they'd do layoffs because they didn't have a lot of work. So he'd find another job, and then so many times he would get calls back but well, I have this other job. Well, he didn't work very long at that job and you know, he was the first one to get cut, or it was just so many things happened. But he finally ended up.
Speaker 1:And I promise I'm not going to go off on this too much because my husband says I could talk for hours on the issue of subcontracting, but my husband ended up in go for it. Yeah, well, I don't want to overtake your whole podcast, but you may, you may. So my husband ended up in two different jobs in which the job was subcontracted and I mean, I'm the kind of person who finds the legal stuff interesting. So I could. I could talk about that, but, simply put, both of those situations were not appropriately called subcontracting, but by calling it that they were able to pass the risks on to the worker rather than taking the risks on as a larger corporation. Both of them were fairly large corporations and they subcontracted at least specific parts of the jobs, which meant in the one case, randy was supposedly his own boss, but he didn't set his hours, he didn't set his rate. That in itself is a violation of what a subcontractor is supposed to be, and they had some things in place that made it a I don't know, would you say a verbal acquiescence.
Speaker 1:He called them on it at one point because there was something they said that he would do and he said I will not. That is a like, that is a problem. It causes risks I'm not willing to take, including to your own customers. And they said but you have to. And he said am I a subcontractor? Well, yeah, then I don't have to, I do get to set my own.
Speaker 1:And I guess he ended up getting moved around on the phone conversation to different people and finally they said actually I don't know if the phone conversation concluded well, but the person at the local branch where he was working said you know what? We're going to fix this, and they made an agreement with him that they worked it out. So that was one, and then the next one. He ended up being a manager for a subcontractor. And then the next one. He ended up being a manager for a subcontractor and being in management. He got a salary and he didn't get a penny more, even if he was, you know, working, whether he was working 40 hours or 70 hours. So, without going into too much detail although I'd love to, you know name, names and stuff.
Speaker 2:I don't want to get me or you in trouble. Let's just say these practices are way more common than they should be.
Speaker 1:Oh, yes, yes, and I guarantee you know of at least one of the or both of the companies that my husband worked for. Having said that, he was working at that point he was in management. He was working this is, you know, 70 ish hours a week. It varied some, but he was supposed to have benefits like vacation time, which there were world circumstances going on this is during COVID and so he was not getting his time.
Speaker 1:So one of the decisions we made through the years that I would definitely 100% say was a smart one was I kept up my teaching license. I'd been doing that the whole time, even though I wasn't teaching in a school, I wasn't using the license for anything other than tutoring, but we only half jokingly said that. That is that the money that I put into my teaching license was our life insurance policy, because most of the most of the time we didn't have much, if any, life insurance. But if something happened to him, the idea was I have a teaching license and I can get a job and I can manage and to survive.
Speaker 1:So that's what I did. Well, at this point, having been renewing my license for however many years, I basically was super close to finishing up a degree. So I finished up my master's degree while he was doing this. So he's working all these hours I'm at home homeschooling and getting my own master's degree. And it was I think it was around Christmas time, because Christmas was really busy. As you know, many, many things are around that time. It was super busy. It was, I think it was right after Christmas.
Speaker 1:And what I said to my husband at that time? I said I kind of feel like I'm a single mom and you sleep here and pay child support. And I said, in addition to that, I also said you know, I'm finishing up my master's degree and if I were to get a job teaching I would get paid more than you're getting and I have summers off. What do you think? And I just kind of left it. I was like at that point, both of us had I mean I said earlier we started out complementarian. At this point we both have gone, come a long way away from that. I was probably a lot more egalitarian in the way I approached marriage and at this point he has he's gotten there too, which he always had great respect for me and treated me like you know, a full person, not just a you know somebody that he could use. Yeah, I was more than just a tool for him but, like, even the way that we interacted has changed and, to my great shock, he was like that's a good idea, wow. So we flipped. I great shock. He was like that's a good idea, wow. So we flipped.
Speaker 1:And I had originally thought that he could just stay home and homeschool the boys, because some of them still wanted to, and with the yeah, just with with what they were wanting, cause at that point they all said, yes, I would, I'd like to keep homeschooling. He said, I don't, I think that would drive me a little bit crazy to be, you know, to flip from full-time work to home. So he actually was. He actually drove a bus, so he'd get up early in the morning, drive kids to school, come home and school with the boys, and then he'd go and drive kids home from school. So he was full-time school. But we did that for about three years and that, honestly, is when we flipped from basically poverty level to we don't. We don't even qualify for most of those things that were helping us get there, you got out of survival mode.
Speaker 1:We did it, was it, and it has been a life changer for us, for our boys. It's been great, but it took. It took a willingness to go, yeah, to go a completely different way and I can't say that everybody has loved it. Some pushback, a little bit. Yeah, we've been told that there's at least one family member who was praying for me to be back home where I belong, and yeah, but that's. That's a whole other, whole other thing. That clearly, where we came from our complementarian leanings at the beginning, we're taught to us, yeah, but yeah, that's what we did for three years.
Speaker 2:I just yeah it just I don't know why it boggles my mind. It shouldn't. This is old news by now, but like, and yet you know for so many of us. And yet what people are willing to sacrifice on the altar of these ideals, and I'm not, I mean, I guess, in their mind, their principles, and they're being very principled and wanting to stick to it, but without recognition of the harm or the, in your case, the opportunities that you'd be missing if you just stuck with that. I don't have anything profound to say, other than what is it with people?
Speaker 3:It's those with power and resources who are setting these standards for how people should live. It is easy, when you have a huge family business, to decide that, yes, women should stay at home. That makes sense. The woman is now supporting her husband that makes sense. But they would rather push the agenda, even to the detriment of someone's mental health, of someone's financial situation, that somehow a woman has to stay at home, which is madness. It is absolute insanity. And we don't get to make those calls for other people, like what is wrong with us. And then we set this up to be some kind of godly and Righteous yes, like it's madness.
Speaker 2:Well, and I and I just want to like, and overlooking the obvious benefit that it that it it turned out as as you expected it to right, like I mean, after all you had been through and here you have this opportunity to just, I mean, I've, and as you're saying this, I, having lived um quite a few years in the bible belt, I know situations like this too, where there was, I think the wife was an accountant and and the husband worked a retail job, as in retail, at a storefront I don't know what what he's getting getting paid, but not much and but so that she could homeschool the kids, and this was more important than their financial security. You know people should do if that's, if they were happy that way, fine. I would just hate for anyone to stay stuck in that situation and and and experience all that vulnerability that comes with it and all the insecurity that comes with it for some kind of ideal that really does not give them, that really doesn't compensate them for all the sacrifices they're making, and it actually just perpetuates the system.
Speaker 3:Yeah, keeps them in poverty. Yeah, yeah, and it keeps the wealthy wealthy too, it's true yeah, so, yeah, so that's what.
Speaker 1:That was what we did, and I worked, and I I mean teaching, as I'm sure Naomi does. It can be very consuming at times, oh my goodness well, and you were teaching.
Speaker 2:What were you teaching? What level? I was teaching eighth grade, oh my it was eighth grade, yeah, oh my goodness, I that's they were awesome.
Speaker 1:I enjoyed it so much but it was hard.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's both oh, every time that I like at conferences and they're talking with my children's teachers, I'm just like I'm just bowled over at at all that there was teachers manage.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, yeah, so we did that. It was three years, and then what ended up happening? I mean, we flipped back. We're back to the like the more conventional I'm home with the kids when I'm home. That's a whole other conversation.
Speaker 1:But my husband found a job that he loves and is better compensated, and he is actually making more than I was making and he was making together last the last couple of years. So, essentially, what happened? I mean, because he would never have had time or ability to look for the job he has now, when he was working in that managerial position where he was, you know, 70 hours a week, it was essential, even if it was just a transitory time for us, which I I mean at this point that's what it looks like it was, but, um, it may have led to other things in the future too. So it still it was needed in order to to make the changes and move and change our situation. So, yeah, that was, that was great. Yeah, there's nothing about it that I regret.
Speaker 1:I kind of it makes me sad that some of the reactions we've gotten were so negative, but I also would yeah, I would highly recommend for women and even when they're married and even when their husbands are working and providing. Like have know what you're doing if something happens, because you know if if something happens to your husband, then I mean sure you might be able to rely on your community, but what? What happens if not? What happens if something falls through? Or like just know what your plan is going forward. That was kind of the mindset that I had and, like I said, my dad my dad taught me that way and he wanted me to be able to be independent. But I think it's really helpful for others too.
Speaker 2:So couldn't you talk about what a few of those things might be? I mean, we've talked about, like you know, identifying food pantries or you know that kind of thing, but like which which is important, and I know every situation is so different, it's hard to say, but like which which is important, and I know every situation is so different, it's hard to say. But like so to someone who is a stay at home parent and has never planned to be independent and say they've got young kids, kids, you know, elementary age and down. What can they do to take steps? And because maybe that's all they can do is take steps toward independence, even if independence is far away off, what are some things they could do to at least, I guess, minimize the harm of a?
Speaker 1:vulnerable situation. Sure, one of the things is identify your networks. Who do you know? And it can be in the community you already have, it can be outside the community you already have, it can be outside of that community and then maybe consider what, what abilities do you have?
Speaker 1:And I can give you a couple of ideas, for, you know, stay at home moms, because one of the things that I did during those times of unemployment was I would do some extra things to kind of help out and bring in a little extra. You know, grocery money, and I did have a teaching license, but that wasn't always what I did. One of the things that I did. There was a working mom and she needed after school care for kids. So I was already home, my kids did their schoolwork earlier in the day and so then after school the kids would come and they actually just hung out and played with my kids and she paid me to watch her kids after school and it was a cheaper option than a licensed thing. But it also gave my kids a chance to play with some other kids and it gave me a chance to bring in a little extra. So something like that might be something that a mom with younger kids can do to bring in a little extra if she's in that situation.
Speaker 2:I think that's such an awesome idea, especially in light of our kind of national child care situation. I making those initial connections might be difficult at first from my perspective, like working with, you know, having colleagues who are, you know, young parents and are trying to figure this all out. I just, I just think there are more people out there than we might realize who would love that kind of thing, like people in our own neighborhoods even. And, rami, rebecca, you, you're involved in something a little bit like this.
Speaker 3:Yeah, if I can just speak to that real quick, my neighbor kid needed a babysitter over the summer. Real quick, my neighbor kid needed a babysitter over the summer and I think it's been the past three or four summers my son has actually been the primary child care provider. That was kind of his gig for the summer. I mean, he was supervised early on, like you know, he wasn't always alone, but it was a wonderful way for him to a learn how to work with other kids but also earn extra money. And I think just being creative and figuring out ways for even kids to take ownership of some of that is so amazing. And childcare is a real need. And let me just say this too be willing to do childcare even if the mom can't afford it, afford paying for it. Like be willing to do that too.
Speaker 1:And especially when you don't need income, when that's not your primary thing, you can make connections with people. By doing those things, you can offer services to help people get where they you know where they're trying to go, in ways that you know. People who aren't home may not have that opportunity.
Speaker 2:Given the chunk that child care can take out of a parent's salary. You know if you you have to be making a lot of money for that to not be a major chunk. So I agree, doing that for someone else, paid or unpaid, can be so necessary, so needed.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and then I think I mentioned that I did some tutoring. That was that was specific to my skills. But then another thing I did and I was not in a great place for it because there were lots of Amish around who did it too, but I did some baking and I just I had it in Ohio. It's pretty easy to set up. You have to, you know, stay on it that you made it at home and it's not a professional or licensed facility. But you can make baked goods and stuff, as long as they don't need to be refrigerated, and sell those.
Speaker 1:And so there was a point in time when we didn't have a. Actually there was a point in time we didn't even have a vehicle. We were using a borrowed vehicle for a while for Randy to get to work and I was like I want to be able to do something to help, so I would bake and I sold it off of our porch and it wasn't a lot, but it paid for all of the ingredients, including the ones that we used for us to eat too. So it was kind of one of those. The boys asked me why did we not do this anymore? The stuff you made was so good. And I told them like we can afford, we can afford to eat now. It took a lot of time and effort, but it made a. It was a way to help.
Speaker 1:So there's some things like that. But there's some other things. One of them is you should know what your financial situation is. You should know what accounts you have. If there's a retirement account, if you own the house that you are in or you're paying rent, what's your rent? What are the? You know what are the costs.
Speaker 1:Whose names?
Speaker 3:and whose names are on the rental, whose names are on the house?
Speaker 1:Sorry, no, no, that's fine, those are. That's a very good point. You should know those things. You should know how to contact people if you need to. And that's important for me and my husband because I had I think I mentioned I had had more training in that regard and I had more knowledge there when we got married, and so it was actually important for me to kind of communicate those things to him because I would get things going. But he needed to know too, and I know that's not conventional, but still it's important for both to know.
Speaker 1:Something that can be helpful. And this is maybe a random tidbit, but we have all of our vehicles either in my name or both of our name, but we have something called a survivorship so that if something did happen to me, since they're all in my name or whatever, that the survivorship title goes to him. So there's not, it doesn't have to go through probate before it's legally his to use or sell or whatever. You know, whatever the situation is. So there's there's things like that that are really helpful and important.
Speaker 1:And I'm going to I'm going to say something that might come across a little judgmental and I don't mean it this way, but if your husband's taking care of things, then he should be doing those things for you. But if he's not, or you don't know it, that might be something to ask. Ask about what are the? You know, what are the bills that we're paying monthly, what are the debts that we have, what do we owe and what happens to our? You know our assets and some people have more than others, but if you're if you're in a situation like I was, where we didn't have a lot, everything, like if something had happened to Randy, everything mattered, and I think it's important to even ask what are the passwords for the accounts?
Speaker 3:Where are the accounts, how would I get into them? And if you're met with any kind of resistance, you need to start asking more questions.
Speaker 2:Agree. Yeah, you know kind of with all these things whether it's asking for help or looking for odd jobs or asking about this like the more resistance you get, the more questions you ask. I mean everyone has a right to any of these things. I mean everyone has a right to any of these things and maybe, if you get resistance, you maybe you need to ask someone else, maybe you need to talk to someone else about it, but it's not an unreasonable ask. It's it's a, it's a responsible ask. It's it's an adult ask and there's no shame in any of it or or or insubordinationordination or whatever judgmental word we want to apply. It's just a good way, it's just part of being an adult. And keep asking the questions. Maybe you need to ask a different person, but keep asking.
Speaker 3:Something else that I've watched you and Randy do which is kind of fascinating.
Speaker 3:It kind of mimics Matt and I with this, but for years we, right after Thanksgiving, would buy surplus turkeys. Sometimes we didn't have the emotional energy to do anything, so we would throw them in the freezer and they'd sit there for a few months and then we'd pull them out and debone them and cook broth or whatever we would do with it. But there's ways like that and I think sometimes I forget to credit and be grateful for my upbringing that I have the resources and the knowledge to do this. But I also want to speak to how helpful it is when your partner supports you in that it doesn't rest all on my shoulders to do that and you have to give us the numbers. You guys do like 17 turkeys or something like that one year. Yes, yes, okay, 17, the right number?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it is, it is. Oh, my goodness. So it started. It started when I kind of realized that turkeys were super cheap right At Thanksgiving usually. Sometimes it was if you spend $20, you get the turkey for 29 cents a pound. This is, you know, when I started or even free sometimes.
Speaker 1:Yeah, sometimes, yeah, and that was sometimes limited. You know one per customer and then after that you know anyway. So that's what it started with. So I noticed that and I started just I'd buy whatever I could fit in our freezer. And I that's what I started with. I started with buying them, sticking them in the freezer and then I would just pull them out every month or two. I think it started with three. We had a smaller family at the time too. Basically, we found a way to make it that A we really really like and B really freezes up. Well, that's what it started with.
Speaker 2:What's your secret to preserving the turkeys?
Speaker 1:well, so that's what it started with. So what's your secret to preserving the turkeys? So what we do now is we cook them and then pull them off the bone and then cook the meat again in broth, and it makes it super tender and you know you don't get that dry turkey and it also freezes super well. And then there's broth, of course, because you cooked it in broth and it's got lots of quality nutrition in it. I think we started freezing it and it was enough that I just started canning it then. So, yeah, so now we can it, which, of course, that takes the resources to do the canning. Yes, so that is one of those things Rebecca mentioned.
Speaker 3:Because you have to have a pressure cooker. You have to know how to yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but I had started doing that. And then the then the year no, it wasn't even the first year I was teaching, I was the second year I was teaching um, basically, randy kind of said, well, the boys really like this, and we ran out of turkey like in January last year, so I'm gonna do more. And he, he did, he did 17 of them over like two weeks. It was crazy, you had like a little factory going on. He did, yeah, and he did a lot of it, and then I'd can, in the evening, when I got home from school, we ended up doing I think it was 13 this year and we have two extras in the freezer, which that's Ray was going to have some friends over and the friends ended up not coming. So we just ended up with the trickies, which was fine, but yeah, we did. We did a few less this year because we ended up with extra, but it's, it's one of the ways we do.
Speaker 2:Kind of meat is expensive when you have a family with five boys and they're most teenagers now. So, yeah, that's a lot of food. Yeah, yeah, I bought several turkey breasts at Thanksgiving just because I didn't have the energy for the whole thing. But I got several of the inexpensive turkey breasts and they're in my freezer and I've been kind of pulling them out one at a time. But I think that would be great, because that's the thing If I don't brine them, then it does turn out more dry.
Speaker 2:And I have to, yeah, figure that out. But I've made Thanksgiving turkey that way, like where you cook it, where you you roast it and then debone it and then bake it in the broth, and I know that was delicious, so all right, that's.
Speaker 3:That was years ago, so thank you for that tip I'm gonna do that what's even better, and it's so fattening, but it so good. Make a gravy and bake it in the gravy. Oh yeah, it is so yummy.
Speaker 2:Oh, that sounds great.
Speaker 1:When it comes to like things like the turkeys and stuff that's, it's great and I'm really glad we do it. But I wanted to say that we do that and I don't want anybody to feel like, oh well, we should do this too, because what you need to do is you need to know what your family like, what's going to work for your family. For our family, that was great because our boys love turkey and it also made for easy meals to pull out and heat up for us. But you know, if you're in a situation where you don't have the time to do those, that's okay. Don't spend a bunch of money on turkey that you're not going to actually cook, because then you're just, you know, you're just wasting your money and and then you you put expectations on yourself that you can't even follow through on, because that's not where you are.
Speaker 1:I guess the big thing was cheap Isn't cheap if it isn't useful. So, like our family, we don't. There's certain things we eat and we don't eat. So when things are on sale, I don't buy it if it's not something that we're going to use, because, yeah, it's cheap and it might even be really healthy, but if I'm not going to cook it and we're not going to eat it, it's just going to sit, being healthy, on the shelf. So I guess the big thing is don't feel like you have to do something that you heard somebody else does if it doesn't work for you. We all have our own different situations and abilities and like the knowledge that we have and I guess the way I would put it is, cheap isn't better if it doesn't work Absolutely. So there's some things that I spend extra money on, even though I could do it cheaper, because I know this is what works for me.
Speaker 2:So Right, and would you say along with that that you know to someone who is really struggling, no amount of turkeys in the freezer using that metaphorically is going to pay the bills.
Speaker 2:you know is going to pay the housing is going to pay the medical debt, like it might make things easier. I mean, it's like you know, a hack For food. Yeah, yeah, that might make things easier in one sense, but I think sometimes those kinds of frugal tips get passed along, as here is why we have financial freedom. Right, it's not? Yeah, it's not. It might help survive, might help you survive, but it's not going to change, it's not going to get you out of poverty.
Speaker 1:Right, right, right. And poverty is this. I think this is what hit me so hard when we were living there. It is so expensive to be poor. Yes, I don't, I don't even. Yeah, it kind of blew me away because I grew up we would buy things in bulk and we'd get things cheaper. And I was like anybody can do this. Right where we have a roof leaking and we don't have money to fix that roof, we could fix the roof maybe for a couple hundred dollars now, or we can replace the entire roof later. But if you don't have $500 now, you're going to end up having to replace that whole thing later.
Speaker 1:I mean, I have an example from when I was in college. I had no extra money and my power steering went out on my car and when I finally collected money later and took it in, it actually cost I don't I don't remember like what it was back then, but it was hundreds of dollars. And the guy was like, well, how long has it been like this? And I told him well, it stopped. You know, it stopped having the power steering thing. You know, however long ago he was like if you'd have brought it in then I probably could have picked it and fixed it for under $100. And I was like I didn't have $100. So, anyway, it kind of hit me just how expensive being poor can be, because you can't afford to. You know to fix the things before they get big.
Speaker 3:Well and even health wise, if you don't have insurance to do checkups, if you don't have insurance to do dental work, dental work can affect, to do dental work, dental work can affect. And then all of that leads to financial issues and financial drains leads to depression. I mean it's just this horrible cycle that it's so easy to get into and when you're barely treading water, it's just so difficult barely treading water.
Speaker 2:It's just so difficult. And how much of that depression is about? Well, A, just the insecurity of it, right? I mean the fear of our basic needs not being met, and on top of that, then the common story that we tell ourselves that it's our fault, we made poor choices. I mean, then you're isolated in that, you know, and that's like that's a recipe. That's a recipe for a mental breakdown, just because of how that gets at both, you know, like the human body's programming to survive, right, you know, gets triggered there, because it feels like A, you're separate from your tribe, separate from your group, you don't have that support of a community and also, yeah, you're afraid of what this means for your family, for survival.
Speaker 3:Well, and I just think the whole narrative like every time I hear a Christian business owner leader whatever credit his success to quote taking God as a business partner I just want to throw up. I think sometimes it is said in humility, but it is so. I tried to take God as my business partner and that did not make ensure abuse wouldn't happen, that didn't ensure that I wasn't hungry and and setting that as a you know, take God as your business partner and he's going to take care of you is just bullshit. We're here to take care of each other. We're here for community and I think we need to be really careful about the language we use around that the implication is that wealth is a result of God's favor, a result of God's approval.
Speaker 2:Yeah, blessing, blessing, yeah yeah. And so if you don't have it, you must be doing something wrong. How often does this come around to shame, being a way of cutting us off from getting help we legit need, or like reassurance, or like some kind of basic need met?
Speaker 3:It's shame cuts us off from our humanity.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and sometimes we do it to ourselves.
Speaker 2:Absolutely.
Speaker 1:That's actually kind of my story, because I had mentioned earlier that I had depression that went on after the birth of my last one and I actually started counseling after we got the medical assistance because that covered it. But there's actually a precipitating event that made me realize how much I needed to change how I thought about things, and it was. I'm going to be honest, I don't remember now what the actual situation was, but it was something that happened with my kids and I kind of lost my temper and I yelled at them and caught myself and I went in the bathroom and closed the door and took a minute and as I was sitting there in the bathroom, I was talking to myself and I was not being kind. I was telling myself what a terrible mother I was and how I'd lost it and I'd been such an awful and I don't know what it was in that moment. But it was like I was hearing myself in a way I had never heard myself before and I realized in that moment I would never let my kids talk to any other person like that. That is not an acceptable way to talk to themselves, to talk to other people. And here I was in the privacy of my own quiet space. I was doing it to myself and, I'll admit, I stood up and looked in the mirror and I looked at myself and I said, well, you wouldn't care if you were a bad mom, you're a good mom and you're going to learn from this. And I did that to myself and I said, well, you wouldn't care if you were a bad mom, you're a good mom and you're going to learn from this. And I did that to myself and I was like I need to do this. Every time I catch myself saying those things, I have got to tell myself the truth. And that's what I framed it as to myself. I've got to tell myself the truth. Like I said, it also led to me going and getting some counseling and helping me deal with some other situations that I was also dealing with. But that was kind of that was kind of a tipping point for me and I can look back at that and be like that was. That was like the time I realized what I was doing and what it was doing to me. So I like I like to, you know finish that incident with the story of what happened, but it was roughly a year later.
Speaker 1:I had the boys enrolled in a class and they needed sneakers. And my son had had a ball game and he'd hung out with his cousin the night before. He left his sneakers at his cousin's house. So we hadn't realized it. So we looked around, we were trying to find his sneakers at home. We could not find them and I finally asked him well, when did you have them last? And he's like well, you know, I was with my cousin the other day and we had them. So I called my sister and I said hey, are his sneakers there? Yes, so I looked at him and I said okay, they're at, they're at your cousin's house. We're going to be late. We need to do better taking care of our stuff in the future.
Speaker 1:But everybody, we're good to go. Let's get in the vehicle. We're going to go get him. And we got there and I got in the vehicle and we were on the way and I caught myself talking to myself again. But this time I said man, you nailed it. He's learning a lesson from his own actions. You handled it with grace. Everybody was like everybody's good and and we like you've got this. And I was like oh man, like it changed and that's kind of. Anyway, it was kind of cool. I like to say that it just because you catch yourself in those situations when you realize that things can change. It's not a you know, this isn't how you have to be. You can. You might need help to change, but you can get there.
Speaker 2:So that was my whole story. That's beautiful. I've got goosebumps Because there's so many layers. I am sure that are there that you haven't even mentioned in that I mean me as a mom who can, who can relate to that, Like there's so many layers there and I just, I just applaud you and celebrate with you like that, that the dynamic can change, you know and I know yeah.
Speaker 2:I know, and there've been situations in my family too where they're, yeah, there've been some real challenges and I was like you know what's this kid going to be like when he's 12, you know, and, and, and he's 12 now, and there was a lot of growth on my part there between then and now. But, yes, things can change. Yes, and it's, it's so worth pursuing that change. Yeah, but, if I can addendum with kindness to ourselves, it's not beating ourselves up that's going to get us there.
Speaker 3:Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah there's. I would tell myself things I would never say to anyone else, and I remember the times to, or the time that I finally realized you're not allowed to do that anymore, like you cannot say things to yourself and, to be fair, I think some of those things we say to ourselves often are things that were told to us.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that that was one of the things as a parent that really stuck with me was that and I don't remember the like years, but the voices that we hear inside our heads as teens and 20 year olds are the things our parents said to us and that stuck with me so hard. I'm like what am I telling my kids? Because if that's what they're going to be hearing, I want to tell them stuff. I want them to hear Right, Right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 3:Well, thank you so much.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much for sharing this, Tricia, because I know, talking about any of these topics related to finances, marriage, mental health, like children, like all these things, these are such deeply personal topics and it takes a lot of courage to share those things you know, especially if you're not, you know, a public figure who has been sharing these things. I mean, yeah, I mean, I mean I just I just want to honor your, your, your willingness to be vulnerable, and I know that comes from a confidence that you have about who you are and I applaud that and I hope that our listeners find it as inspiring as I do. Thank you.
Speaker 3:You are an amazing woman and an amazing friend and the world is lucky to have you. Do you blog anywhere or anything? Not currently. No, If you ever decide you want to let us know and we'll hook you up. Oh, okay.
Speaker 2:So right now, it's just your Facebook friends that get to see your insights. Okay, okay, so a lucky few of us. Are you open to it? If someone wants to reach out to you, sure, maybe with a question, or maybe someone who can identify with some part of your, your story, would you be open to? To?
Speaker 1:that? Yeah, that would be fine. I'm trying to think of the best way to do that.
Speaker 2:Well, do you want to just send me links afterwards, sure. Like to your Facebook or whatever, whatever you're open to and then so we'll put your socials in the show notes then.
Speaker 3:Okay, and then folks can find you there.
Speaker 2:All right, all right. Well, thank you everyone for joining us for this conversation, and we'll talk to you next time.
Speaker 3:Thank you for spending time with us today. The resources and materials we've mentioned are linked in the show notes and on Facebook at Uncovered Life Beyond what?
Speaker 2:are your thoughts about college and recovery from high demand religion. We know you have your own questions and experiences and we want to talk about the topics that matter to you. Share them with us at uncoveredlifebeyond at gmailcom. That's uncoveredlifebeyond at gmailcom.
Speaker 3:If you enjoyed today's show and found value in it, please rate and review it on your favorite podcast app. This helps others find the show While you're there. Subscribe to our podcast so you never miss an episode Until next time.
Speaker 2:stay brave, stay bold, stay awkward. Thank you,
