Heal & Grow with Nickie
Join your host, Nickie Kromminga Hill, and her guests on a journey of personal stories and insights into healing and growth from past and current trauma. The focus is on fostering true connections through conversations centered around vulnerability and authenticity. The goal is to collectively heal and find opportunities for growth, promoting a sense of togetherness.
Heal & Grow with Nickie
49: Missing Person
Nickie’s return to the podcast unveils her struggles with chronic illness, isolation, and grief. Through vulnerability and reflection, she explores themes of support, identity, and the redefinition of success during dark times.
• Acknowledging months of hiding and isolation
• The impact of chronic illness on work and self-worth
• The sudden loss of a family member and its emotional toll
• Navigating the process of applying for disability
• The importance of community support during challenging times
• Reflecting on how grief reshapes our desires to live fully
Connect!
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/healandgrowwithnickie/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/healandgrowwithnickie/
Join the mailing list here: http://eepurl.com/g5hikj
Support!
Purchase Nickie's book! "Things I'm Thinking About; A Daughter's Thoughts on the Loss of Her Mom" https://www.amazon.com/Things-Im-Thinking-About-daughters/dp/165731958X
Buy Nickie a coffee! https://buymeacoffee.com/nickiekh
Grab something from Nickie & Paul's store, The Pretty Great Merch Co. https://www.redbubble.com/people/PrettyGreatMerc/shop?asc=u&ref=account-nav-dropdown
Purchase from Nickie's "Painting Supplies Wish List" https://www.amazon.com/hz/wishlist/ls/JF7B5OWWZD0R?ref_=wl_share
Select a book from Nickie's Bookshop! https://bookshop.org/shop/NKH
For speaking inquiries or for questions/comments on the podcast, contact healandgrowwithnickiepodcast@gmail.com
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Hello everyone. Welcome to Season 2 of the Heal and Grow with Nikki podcast. Let's get going. Hello and welcome to Heal and Grow with Nikki. I'm your host, nikki Kraminga-Hill. And welcome to Heal and Grow with Nikki. I'm your host, nikki Kraminga-Hill. Here we explore anything and everything that might support us on the journey to mental wellness, from hope to grief, possibilities to challenges, joy to heartache. Nothing is off limits. Let's reflect on our lives and discover ways to heal and grow together.
Speaker 1:I'm so glad you're here with me. Oh, my goodness, it's been a while, friends, almost six months. I am really happy to be back here with you. If you are a new listener, welcome. I'm glad that you are here and look forward to learning more about you. If you listen at all in season one, welcome back.
Speaker 1:I've missed you all quite a bit, but for reasons I still don't completely understand myself, I went into hiding and I think I'm coming out of hiding now. I don't really know. Before we move forward, I have decided that this does not need to be a weekly podcast. I will podcast when I'm able, which I'm hoping is at least a couple of times a month, maybe more, maybe less and I'll upload the episode whenever I feel like it. In season one I tried to upload every Tuesday and that's not necessarily working with my life right now, so I will upload when I'm able.
Speaker 1:Where to start? I've been hiding. I've six months. I have frequently and purposely isolated myself from my friends and my family, which includes my husband, paul. I have been in bed. I've been in bed. I have been sad and lonely and depressed. I have been sad and lonely and depressed and I have not reached out and I have not been available to those who have reached out to me. I stopped going to therapy, although by the time you listen to this, I will have already gone back. I have stopped doing things that bring me joy, including podcasting.
Speaker 1:It first started, I think I think it first started in late July or early August 2024. I was doing a couple of out-of-town choreography gigs back-to-back, which is something I can't really do with my ME CFS, and if you'd like to learn more about my health, go ahead and listen to season one, episode 20. So it was the second day of the second back-to-back choreography gig and I was too sick to get out of bed, to go to work, to go to camp, and it's happened pretty often that I'm unable to get out of bed. I'm just, I have no energy due to my ME-CFS. So this happens kind of a lot, but it's never happened in a situation when I'm working out of town, so I missed an entire day of camp. I was the choreographer for this camp. I also was the camp director, so I'm supposed to be there to oversee everything and I just I couldn't do it.
Speaker 1:Shout out to the peeps that took them for the team and covered for me. I will never forget it. I know you love to give unique gifts and my husband, paul, and I have just the solution for you Introducing the Pretty Great Merch Company. And I have just the solution for you Introducing the Pretty Great Merch Company. Paul and I have an online store and we're selling merch. That's pretty great, if I do say so myself. We've got t-shirts, sweatshirts, hats, bags, shower curtains, mugs, stickers so much great stuff Unique designs, quality gear and goods that let you stand out. Let our Pretty Great Merch show off your style. Check us out on Instagram and Facebook at the Pretty Great Merch Co. Or check out the link in the show notes of this episode.
Speaker 1:So that was a Tuesday Literally slept all day. The next day I woke up and I still wasn't feeling well, but I was feeling well enough to go to camp. And I get out of bed and I just I'm not walking very well this particular morning and luckily I had brought a walking stick that my father-in-law had made for me Really cool. I don't know what wood it's made out of, but it's a super cool walking stick that my father-in-law had made for me Really cool. I don't know what wood it's made out of, it's a super cool walking stick that he made for me. And I had it in the back of my car. And so I used the cane that day. Well, maybe like only the first half of the day, but I used the cane that day to teach and that was a very humbling experience.
Speaker 1:I realized that people use canes all of the time, but this was the first time that I had let other people see me like this, let other people see me use a walking cane like as an actual cane. When I got home from these two back-to-back gigs, I well, first I crashed and second I went out and I bought a couple of canes. So now I have, like this, super sassy, cute, sparkly fancy cane Should I ever need a sparkly fancy cane and I have like just like a regular fold up black one and I think I've only used the black one once since August. I don't use it very often, but I do need to have it around. So when I came back from the two back to back gigs, I had like two days off and then I had to start another choreography gig, which wasn't I don't know that I would call it an out of town gig, but it was 35 to 40 minutes away and they had already started rehearsals. I was coming in late because I had been at these other gigs and I got through the first week of rehearsal and the second week I just crashed and I started being like. I started saying I'm so sorry I can't come in today and I felt horrible and I quit. I quit the gig halfway through, which I absolutely needed to do for myself, but felt and still sort of feels horrible. Luckily they they had an incredible choreographer that was already in the show and so he took over and he did an incredible job and this is, I'm going to say, late August.
Speaker 1:I decided to apply for disability. It was something that was sort of on my radar for a year or two, but honestly, I just thought I'm not sick enough to to get disability or to use disability. I don't want to be looked at as like one of those people that you know messes with the system, who's not really sick enough but just wants their paycheck. And I finally realized that I had quit five choreography jobs in two years, which is absolutely not how I want to be running my business. I feel like I've burned some bridges and although all of the jobs that I've quit, they've known that it's due to health reasons, I still feel horrible. And when I realized that I had missed that much work in two years, I was like I need to apply for disability and I'll do a whole nother podcast probably about how disability works. But you can only make a certain level of income to qualify for disability and my part-time job at Alive and Kickin you can hear all about them in season one my part-time job at Alive and Kickin would have me making too much money to qualify for disability money to qualify for disability.
Speaker 1:So I put in my month notice and I told the cast on the first day of rehearsal and my plan was to be there for the next three weeks, four weeks to finish out my contract and instead I got incredibly sick and never went back. I never went back. Luckily that was another organization that was really kind with me, but I never went back, which made me feel even more horrible. It turns out I had mono at the time, one of the issues with my ME-CFS. I don't even really understand how it happens, but I cycle in and out of mono. So but I'm not. This is just interesting side fact. I'm not contagious unless I have a fever. But I didn't have a fever then. I just couldn't get out of bed anyway.
Speaker 1:So I sort of, you know, gave my notice at the beginning of September and then I never got to go back because I was sick, which means that I lost that community instantly. Instantly they were gone. These are people that part of my job with them was communicating with them multiple times a week. So to go from communicating with them multiple times a week to nothing was really devastating to me and, to be fair, I didn't really reach out to anybody either. But they didn't reach out to me and I was just down, really, really down. And in the meantime I got my application in for disability and I was told I already have a lawyer. It's not necessary for me to have a lawyer at this point in my process, but I do already have a lawyer, which is great because she's been able to give me some advice. She said that it's going to take at least a year at least a year for me to get approved for disability benefits, which is heartbreaking. But also I really appreciated her honesty with me, which means that I can only make the cap just changed at the new year, but I can only make like $1,500, $1,600 a month.
Speaker 1:So we are primarily living off of my husband's salary. My husband, paul, is a freelance musician. He's an excellent, excellent percussionist. But freelance work is challenging. You don't always know when you're going to be working and you don't always know when you're going to get paid. So to have him be the sole breadwinner in our family right now is incredibly challenging. And you know, back a few months ago I thought like, oh, is he going to leave me? And honestly, I didn't. I didn't really think that he would leave me, but I thought that he would start to resent me and if you know Paul, of course he's not ever going to do that, but that was, that was definitely a fear of mine.
Speaker 1:I dislike not working. I enjoy work and I do have some things that have been going on, some choreography stuff that has happened during the fall and is coming up. So I do have some work, but I'm barely bringing in any money. I'm barely bringing in any money and I realized that I've been measuring my success, my personal success, by my productivity and my ability to make or not make money, which is probably another podcast. But it was a horrible August through, well, november, just on my end, trying to get used to this new life and trying to focus on all of the things that I can do. I've really started loving, loving, loving acrylic abstract paintings, so I've been doing that anyway. So things weren't good. I I also didn't feel like I was able to pick myself up and dust myself off, and that's something that I can do a lot of times but I just oh, snowball's saying hi, if you you need to listen to I don't know what episode. It was all about Snowball, our dog, she's the best and she's barking and that's all there is to it. So things were pretty bad, very, very, very dark, dark time. I struggle with depression and anxiety and I'm just learning about my ADHD right now and having a couple of chronic illnesses just has been kicking my ass.
Speaker 1:Do you love reading as much as I do? Then you will love Bookshop. Bookshop is an online book marketplace with the mission to financially support local independent bookstores. Here's how it works you purchase a book off of bookshoporg and, instead of your order going through a big box store, your order will come from an indie bookshop in your area. You can even pick the specific bookstore you'd like it to ship from. If you use the link I've provided in this episode's show notes, you can find books that I recommend. If you purchase one of the books on my list, not only will you be giving business to a local indie bookseller, but I'll get a tiny cut as well. Bookshop has raised over $35 million for local bookstores. Don't you want to be a part of? The? Goodness has been kicking my ass.
Speaker 1:And then and then on November 27th which, in 2024 was the day before Thanksgiving, my husband Paul's dad died unexpectedly. We're still not entirely sure exactly what happened. I'm not sure that we will ever know exactly what happened, but he went from standing to falling face first on the ground in their house on a hardwood floor, and he got a head injury, and we are pretty sure he died upon impact. We think he possibly had a heart attack and that's what caused him to fall, or a stroke or something, but we're not sure. Now this is a Wednesday and Paul's grandmother has not been doing well for a while. She's in respite care. She's 96, 97. I can't remember. She's an incredible woman, but she has not been doing well and, to be honest with you, we've been waiting for the call that she was going to pass and the Friday before Archie passed, paul and I and his dad, archie and his mom, sally, all met at Grandma Helen's care facility and just hung out with her for like 20-30 minutes. She was doing great, it was so fun to be there.
Speaker 1:And then the four of us decided to go out to lunch, which isn't something that's happened for a while just the four of us. So we went to this cute little greasy spoon in Colby, wisconsin, and Archie looked so good. He had like this purple flannel on and he's got this long, long beard that looks like Santa Claus, and he had a stormy chromer hat on and he had just gotten dentures. So he looked great and I said, archie, you look so handsome today, handsome today, which is I've never said that to him before because I don't know, do you tell your father-in-law that he looks handsome? But I'm glad I did. And he said, thank you.
Speaker 1:He had been in some poor health the year prior fall of 2023. He was in and out of the VA hospital here in Minneapolis with some heart issues and that Friday that we had seen him and I said you look handsome, handsome. I can't say handsome, handsome, handsome. It's easy for you to say Handsome, thank you. I got a call from the va this morning and they said everything's looking good, we're, we're feeling like you know, you're good, you're better, you're healthier and you know, let us know if you need anything. Otherwise, you know, this can be, this can be. The end of this care plan is how I understood what he said. So from Friday to Wednesday he dies, you know, five days. Um, yeah, so on top of a really, really shitty time, archie dies, which just was not on the radar.
Speaker 1:I was in bed. It was about 10 o'clock in the morning, I was getting ready to, you know, get up for the day and Paul rushed upstairs. I heard him talking on the phone. I just, by the way, I heard his voice. I knew he was talking to his mom, but I didn't know anything bad had happened. And he just he came upstairs, he kind of ran to the bed and he said I've got bad news. He said, um, dad was standing in the hallway and somehow he fell down and he's dead. And somehow he fell down and he's dead. And I was then and I still am completely shocked.
Speaker 1:We packed our bags immediately. We got the dog all packed up and we went to his mom's house and in the meantime Paul's two siblings also came. One lives in Phoenix and another one lives like three hours away. So we were all together for like five or six nights, which was very nice that we could be together. But so strange. But something happened to me. I mean nothing happened. What I mean is like, figuratively, something happened while we were at the house. So we were all together. Figuratively, something happened while we were at the house. We were all together.
Speaker 1:I just thought I'm so tired of the way that I've been living and I want to live better. I want to live better Because I don't know how much longer I have on this earth and part of the issue for me personally is that with my ME-CFS, I'm not really supposed to push myself I'm not supposed to, or what I think the question is for me right now is how do I push myself to move forward when I'm not supposed to push myself at all? How do I push myself to move forward, to move ahead to live the life I want to lead, when I'm not supposed to push myself at all? And I don't know the answer to that? I will say that, even though January was also a shit show and like 19 years long, it was also a better month for me because I spent some time thinking about what are the things that I love. That's how I got into painting. I got to spend a lot of time with Paul because we got COVID for the very first time.
Speaker 1:But how do I and you know, this is the million dollar question for everybody, right Like, how do I live the life that I want to live? How do I live free, freely For me? How can I be my most creative self? And then, how do I make money off of that so that we're not broke? That was a lot. That was a lot to come back into after six months, but I appreciate you sticking with me and loving me. Even when I was missing, I truly felt like I was missing. I can't find myself, I don't recognize myself at all, and now I'm in a different spot, a different spot, and it's so much better here. Different spot, a different spot, and it's so much better here.
Speaker 1:Hey, if you are interested in being a guest, will you reach out? Will you let me know? I'm looking for people that are willing and open to sharing a personal story or stories of hardship, of tough times, of how things weren't going the way that you had planned at all and how did you, or how are you healing and growing through that. I would love to chat with you about that. You can find me on social. I'm on Instagram and Facebook, at Nikki Krumminga Hill, which is N-I-C-K-I-E podcast.
Speaker 1:At gmailcom, if you'd like to support my work, I've already. We already had a couple of commercials thrown in here today, so you can support me those ways. You can buy my book, which is called Things I'm Thinking About A Daughter's Thoughts on the Loss of Her Mom. That is linked in the show notes here. You could buy me a coffee, which is also shared in the link excuse me, which is also linked in the show notes. Here you can share my work. You could say hey, I just heard this podcast the other day. You could go back and listen to season one. Really, all of that really, really, really helps independent freelance artists like me. So great to talk to you today. I'll be back soon. Super duper love you and, as always, thanks for healing and growing with me. Bye, this podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be considered legal, health or professional advice. I am not responsible for any losses, damages or liabilities that may arise from the use of this podcast. This podcast is not intended to replace professional medical advice.
