Ep. 41 - Possibilities of Rebuilding Self with Ashley Rath
[00:00:00] There is a fairy tale many of us grew up with featuring three pigs and a wolf. You know the one. Each of the pigs built a house using different materials, and a big bad wolf huffed and puffed and blew the houses down. Well, not all of them. He blew the first two down, one of them made of straw and the other made of sticks.
The third one, however, was built with a rock solid foundation that took preparation, hard work and persistence to build. No matter how hard the wolf tried, the house would not come down. I could not help but think of this fable while talking with our guest Ashley Rath about the benefits of rebuilding a stronger self, both physically and mentally after the proverbial wolf has knocked down what we once considered home.
Ashley helps us understand that [00:01:00] investing in oneself during the recovery and rebuilding phases after we begin to rise from the rubble is what Builds a stronger, more resilient human. May this podcast be a catalyst for you to become the better version of you just bursting to step forward.
Kathy Washburn: Welcome, Ashley Rath. I am so excited [00:02:00] about this conversation. I'm excited, too. It's so good to see you. I normally introduce people how I know them, and this one is a little fascinating.
And, kudos to Knapsack, who built my website, and the SEO, because you found me with the World Wide Web. Thank you. And I am honored to be a coach in your program, Rebuild A. B., which we're going to find more about. But, and your bio will be attached to this, but I would love to know, is there anything else that people should know about you, what you're doing, what you're jazzed about in the world?
Kathy Washburn: Well, Ashley Rath. So I live in St. Louis. I have two daughters that are nine and 12. I have a. Dog Melba. Melba Toast. Melba Toast is what I call her. I am recently a competitive power lifter and, but my passion project is my nonprofit Rebuild A Bee. And [00:03:00] so I can't wait to talk more about that.
Yes.
Kathy Washburn: Before we jump into that, one of my favorite questions to ask clients is, would you be willing to share your high points? your low points and the turning points specifically of your cancer journey. Yeah. Yeah, of course. I might start with the low points and then we'll get to the good stuff.
So I low point was kind of getting the cancer diagnosis, right? Like that was a complete shock. I thought I was living a relatively healthy lifestyle at that time and doing a good job maintaining my stress. So, getting the diagnosis was a very low point in life, which, you know, has in turn turned into so many good things though.
So, and then just some of like the physical parts of going through cancer treatment I would consider it to be some of those low points, right? The really sad times where you're, you know, shaving your head or, just. not wanting to get out of bed or not wanting to be around [00:04:00] people that you might normally want to be around because you don't feel good or you don't feel good in your body.
And then for me, some of the other low points were just kind of like lows in relationships, personal relationships that I had going through that. And even following cancer treatment, I've found that, you know some of what cancer brought out in me didn't sit well with other people. And so just, and then the part of, Everybody shows up at the beginning and everybody shows up through treatment and then they kind of go away.
And so there's a lot of like up and down in, in that part. So I think those are probably some of like my lows, right. Just kind of going through the motions of battling cancer. But then. Through that, right? There are so many good things that come. The women that you meet, so I specifically had breast cancer and, obviously that can also impact men, but the women you meet along the way and like this almost immediate sisterhood that you build with them, [00:05:00] is just like, we, one of the women I know always calls it like her sisterhood.
her silver linings, right? And so we will say each other, like, we're each other's silver linings because it's a really worst club, best members kind of thing. And so just having that sisterhood has been one of some of those people are some of my best friends. And so just having that community, is such a high point.
The, physical act of going through treatment and like, Thinking about being at the beginning and just not knowing what to do with myself and not even really knowing how to move forward and just trying to put one foot in front of the other, but then actually going through treatment and like getting through it.
And just the high of like, I just did that like that That is such a high. a lot of what I've learned. After right, I learned that I thought that I was really taking care of myself, but through treatment and following treatment, I wasn't really prioritizing myself. Right. And so [00:06:00] I think 1 of my big, wonderful takeaways is just.
Learning how to prioritize myself and put myself first. And yes, I can still be there for my kids and other people, but if I'm not good, then my kids aren't good. So just learning how to prioritize myself, is, it's just such a big takeaway. And turning points, I mean. I mean, like, all of it, right?
It all feels like it all has continuously evolved, getting out of treatment learning how to love myself again, and learning how to love this new me again, and just evolving into this new person, but also just kind of learning that, that the person I was before cancer, she's just She's not here and that's okay.
And I think that the moment that I started to realize that I could let go of the old and just move forward into like the new was such just like a key moment for me. And it allowed me to just kind of stop looking backward and just start looking [00:07:00] forward of like what can I do now?
Stunning. And you're so young and I know your diagnosis was really young. And I, so thank you for sharing that. And I see, like, I always see when I ask clients this question, I see this merging or this understanding that Yeah, there's bad things, but they also have these gifts and opportunities, these silver linings in them.
And, understanding that we can move and change and be different versions of ourselves. And I think those of us who have gone through cancer, this podcast is not for just cancer. patients or survivors. It's really but I love interviewing cancer survivors because we, I see that we are the chosen ones in a certain light because we came this close.
Yeah. We're all going to die. We're human beings. We're going to [00:08:00] die. We don't know when, but when you come that close to it, all of a sudden we can help other people realize That these things like not putting yourself first, not prioritizing your own needs, you know, living in a way that might be incongruous to who you are, those things can be dealt with now and you can be more joyful.
I watch you on Instagram and I just, I get tickled all the time when I saw you with the power lifting, I thought. Oh my goodness. This is so remarkable to find that strength in yourself. My company name, which I don't use a lot anymore, and I should, but it's called Carved by Cancer. And I had a couple of cancer survivors that were really clear and loud about the offense they took and that, and I explained to both of them.
One, a good friend [00:09:00] of mine and the other I didn't know just came on Instagram, explained to them that it wasn't so much just being carved by the literal knife, which I was, and very changed by it. But also I was so inspired by Michael Angelo's, statues that he left unfinished, they believe, because he was trying to say that we are always carving away what we no longer need to reveal these gems underneath.
And I do believe cancer journeys are that opportunity to kind of let that stuff that Yeah, you don't need anymore. Let it go. Yeah, that's a big, that's a big, like, forced carving. You gotta let go of everything now. Exactly. We're gonna, we're gonna reduce you to rubble so that you can build from the ground back up.
Yeah.
Kathy Washburn: And along those lines, you did that. [00:10:00] From a physical standpoint and, this physical fitness within a community inspired you to stay active through your whole journey. Is that right? Yeah. And I mean, so I was pretty active before, so I was an avid CrossFitter. Ah, yes, pre cancer. So I had been doing CrossFit since I was about 30 and I was diagnosed at 39.
And so, so I was, or I knew the minute I got diagnosed, like I I got a MyChart message on a Thursday night at about 8:00 PM and that's how I found out that I had cancer. . You did not? I did. And so there was nobody to call me and tell me, and so, ugh. You know, I just, you know, broke down and, You know, I think I drank too much wine that night and finally slept.
But, but the next morning I was like, I don't know what to do. So I just went to the gym and I went to the gym and I cried and they were there and we did kind of a [00:11:00] workout. And I just knew that. For my own sanity, I just had to keep moving because fitness had become such a big part of who I am and how I find peace and balance in the world.
I just knew that I had to keep moving. So like finding a group that also thought that was really important during cancer treatment was like a bonus because it was like some automatic friendships and we can work out together and You've got this person who can help you modify workouts after you've had your ovaries taken out, right?
And so there were so many bonuses to that group, just from like the friendship aspect, And again, I was going to probably keep moving anyway, because I had a really great gym community. And I mean, there was, I think the first chemo that I was on, they were just like, you can't go to the gym.
You can't be around people for a month or whatever it was, two months. And my coach from the gym came into my house. To work out [00:12:00] with me. Ah, like amazing. They were. And so she was writing special workouts for me. And then to find this community that just prioritize that as well. Like we were just another group to like cheer you on and to like, Help you through the ups and downs of like, I used to be able to do this.
And I can't do that anymore, but I can do this. So we're getting there. And it was just like a constant reframing of like, I think I, one of the who was my mental performance coach at the time she jokes with me. Cause I remember one time I was like, I can only do one pull up. And she was just like, Ashley, you can do one pull up.
That's amazing. And so it was just a great community to like, keep you motivated, keep you moving, but also just remind you of like how far you've come. That's such a beautiful gift. And I'm also hearing in under the surface of this is this connection that you kept with your body throughout that whole process, [00:13:00] which Is so powerful because the system, this healthcare system that thought it was okay to send you a message on your chart, health chart portal.
I'm sorry that you had to experience that. That's awful. But this healthcare system that, demoralizes you as you walk into the door and continues to try to disconnect you from your body and who you are, you from the, you know, wrapping the thing around your wrists and identifying you as basically a inmate of this weird prison or, just this here's some more pills or here's some more potions to take to not feel what you're feeling.
Yeah. How crucial a time for you to find ways to connect with your body. I wish I had you as a friend when I was going through it. Would have worked out [00:14:00] together. No we joked that like we called it, because I kept hearing that. So I did AC and taxol as my chemo. And so I kept hearing that on day three, day four, like I was just going to crash and I just was like, every day I was like, I'm going to get up and I'm going to move and for some reason I just didn't crash and I don't know if it was because I kept moving, I don't know if I was chugging so much water.
Like I just, I was like, just keep moving. But I don't think I've ever been more in tune with my body than I was at that time. And. Maybe to a paranoia state at times, but I knew that when my heart was racing so fast loading a barbell and that never happened before, like, I knew we needed to get my heart checked, you know, and when my neck started to feel really weird, like I knew we were like, okay, let's check for a blood clot, you know, like, there were just things that I was like, Something feels really off and I just I had the opportunity to be really in tune with it.
Yeah. They [00:15:00] call that interception. Okay. The ability to like, let your body have that voice versus let your mind tell your body what it is or isn't doing. And it's a gift, man. You can acquire it, but there are those like you that have a spidey sense and that Already have that connection. That's, and it's such a, the I mean, the world in general is this place where as we age, our bodies change, as time passes, we are, We function differently.
I remember after, after my cancer years after, and I was having, you know, I'm back in the dating world, which I know that you're jumping into that as well. And it's so hard. It's so hard. It's like, okay, so when do I have that conversation? That [00:16:00] basically. tells this other human that I'm a little different.
Like, when do I have that? And the healthcare world was not helpful to me, in that light. But I remember, feeling like Okay, I need to do something. I want my, I want the future to be a little different. So I need to do something. So I went to this, what did they call themselves? It was finally included in the cancer world.
It's like a psycho, psychosocial world. Worker to be with the sexual issues that I was having. Okay. Yeah. And this woman kept referring must have said the word eight times until I finally just couldn't stand it anymore about my sexual dysfunction and I was like, okay. That's really weird.
Yeah. Could you, could we not use that word anymore? Could we just say that I function differently instead of that I dysfunction? Cause that feels really hurtful. [00:17:00] Oh, I know. It was this moment where I just thought, wow, this is how we talk about this. And I've been on panels and introduced, and I've actually said to, in hospitals for me to talk about sexual dysfunction.
And I said, I will talk about sex after cancer all day long, but can we not call it dysfunction? Oh my gosh. That's a, one to hurt your feelings. They're like broken. It does hurt my feelings. And I had this great speech where, I said the O my opening line was, so. For you, was sex at 20 the same as sex at 30?
40? Good point, yeah. 50? Like, we all change, our bodies change. It's just this culture that tells us this change is unacceptable. So this idea of you having such a beautiful physical connection while you were going [00:18:00] through process, do you feel like That physical connection was the door back into rebuilding your whole person.
Yeah, I mean, I think it, I think when I started to realize like physically what my body was capable of, I think it started to open my eyes to like, maybe I'm capable of a little bit more. Right. So, like, I mean, I just I surprised myself. Like, I didn't think I was going to work out all through chemo. I didn't know.
Like, I just thought that I, everybody told me I was just going to be laying in bed. And I, so I was just like, really surprised. And I was, I remember thinking like, man, if I can do that. I mean, I can try just about anything, right? Like, and so I think it just helped me mentally just realize that I'm capable of a lot more than I think I am.
And so that's probably like the biggest change. And then it also, you know, encouraged me to like, To change [00:19:00] right like in that I needed to start changing and I needed to take care of my mind and my body. I've done such a great job physically moving, but like mentally again, I remember getting out of treatment and like, I physically felt pretty good, but mentally, you just kind of went through the ringer and so I think I took some of that like energy and momentum that I had.
As long as I could. Right. And then at some point you realize, well, I only need to chalk it up and talk to a therapist and like start talking to people about what's, what just happened to me. But I think it helped drive me for some like positive, like mental change too. So that brings us to
Kathy Washburn: rebuild ab.
Is that, was that the impetus behind that is to encourage people to find that. That whole rebuild that whole person in different ways. Yeah. Yeah. That's definitely like, that's what we want to be like, we haven't made like officially coined it a tagline or anything, but like, we do [00:20:00] want to help rebuild women after cancer.
And so, it started with. Myself and 3 other breast cancer survivors. We were a part of this other kind of physical fitness nonprofit that went away. And I knew I wanted to do something right? And I knew that there were organizations offering, you know, fitness related components for cancer support and nutrition components for that.
But I found that I struggled a lot with the mental health side of things, right? Like, that was the hardest part of cancer for me. And I just really wanted to find a way to see if we could help women with that. And so it's funny because like, as we progress, so I'm 3 years out now. And as we progress, like, we find new things that we struggle with.
And so we're trying to hit on the areas that maybe. People don't talk about as much like you mentioned the sex part like we're looking we have intimacy coaching lined up for next year. And so that mental health coaching and intimacy [00:21:00] coaching and they go hand in hand and it's just, you know, baby steps to try and improve, you know, it's a weird thing, right?
To just, If you can rebuild that physical side or the mental side, right? Like, you can start to tackle some of the new things that follow and just this new life after cancer which on my end, right, has been a complete and drastic 180 from the life that I even had while I was going through treatment.
And but being able to deal with the mental aspects of going through cancer allowed me to rebuild myself into somebody who could. leave a bad relationship and put my kids first and put me first. And I don't think a lot of that would have been possible without cancer. And I don't think it would have been possible if I hadn't taken the time to, to work on myself both mentally and physically.
Thank you for sharing that, because I think that the [00:22:00] mental, especially for women, actually, and men, I think we all are, or were raised that emotions aren't, Meant to be heard, you know, as a child, you're meant to be seen, not heard, be quiet. You're told, I don't know why you're crying. You want me to give you something to cry about?
Yeah, I got that. You know, these well meaning parents and I was a well meaning parent, but I see many places where I'm sure both of my sons are on the couch at some therapist's office processing. This idea of disconnecting to our own body, like you have this interception you're really in tune with what's happening in your body.
I was so disconnected from that. I didn't have that ability. To listen to what my body was telling me. Yeah. So, instead, in fact, I [00:23:00] would numb because I, even if I did listen, I didn't feel that I had the voice to express it. Yeah. And my old relationship, especially, my, my, my, marriage. And so doing that so often you start to not really know how to feel unless you're feeling through other people like, okay, he's angry.
So I'm going to just put on the happy face and make dinner and do the thing that I need to do and make myself smaller and quiet. And yeah. I said, I always like when I look back now, I'm just like, And I, anytime I'm chatting with a friend who might have, you know, questions or just, you know, whatever they might be going through in their relationship.
And I, like, I feel like I kind of always try and bring it back to, like, how does your body feel though? Like, I don't care if you're trying to validate that someone is something or if they're not [00:24:00] something, but like, how does your body feel in that moment in that space with them? And if I Reflect back like my body was like, like constantly like on edge.
And so, I think that having that, I mean, having cancer, right. Like I started to listen to my body more and. My body was like, no, So this isn't going to work.
At some point you have to listen. Right. And there's a lot of people don't even, when I say that, you know, I'll say, where do you feel that in your body? And they give me a little like, I'm not sure what you're talking about. And then I, to close your eyes and invite somebody to look inward.
Kathy Washburn: There's this meditation that I do with people where they close, I close their eye, invite them to close their eyes and then invite them to begin just cutting off the connections to the things outside, like letting go of [00:25:00] anything, knowing that you're going to pick them up when we're finished.
Just let them go of these outside things, almost like springs where you cut them away and they just, and then turn their vision inside. Yeah. And then all of a sudden I can see their whole body just kind of melts in and then you say, so where do you feel that in your body? And all of a sudden they have an answer.
Like, oh. I feel that in my gut, like, okay, put your hand there. What's it telling you? What does it have to say? If it could have a voice, what is it asking you to do? What does it need you to do? Yeah. And they have this whole conversation. Yeah. I love that. It's a strange way to begin listening to your body.
Kathy Washburn: There's another practice, that I read recently and that I've actually done. And, I've gone through the training for the mindfulness practice. based stress reduction course. That's Jon Kabat Zinn's [00:26:00] course at the University of Massachusetts. And you do these body scans. where you're just kind of focusing the flashlight on one body part at a time.
And if your right ankle, when you're at your right ankle and your right ankle is like, Ooh, you know, I feel a little twinge or tweak or something. And right there you have this opportunity to say, Whoa, okay, that's happening. I wonder what's going on there. And it really starts to Get you to be able to feel what your body is actually trying to say.
Yeah. I love that. Yeah. I feel like I, I might've got off topic there a little bit, but no, that's okay.
Kathy Washburn: Because the emotional wellness, that's part of a well, emotional wellness, being able to regulate your own nervous system by connecting with your body. Yeah. That's, and that emotional wellness is [00:27:00] often, I don't know, or emotional health is overlooked again.
Overlooked. It really is. By, and so insidious in our whole body, if you're not emotionally well, you know, emotions are meant to be in motion. They're meant to move through us, not be stuffed. Whenever I talk about this, I think of Roadrunner, which you're probably too young to know. Do you remember? Okay. Yeah.
Roadrunner with the guy with the stick, the dynamite and he's just. Pressing it down, Well, eventually it's just going to blow because there's no place else for it to go. Yeah. You can think sometimes when people are really connected to physical exercise, they feel like, Oh, I'm kind of emoting as I'm working out.
I'm getting through the emotions. My partner said once that he's a cyclist and he said [00:28:00] once, I remember I left so much crap on the road as I was riding my bike, you know, just being emotive and letting that, just letting it go as he's exercising. And there's a really strong desire as a human to be heard.
So when you're hurt by another human and you don't share that hurt, then there creates this energy between you that is just not going to be resolved until it's brought out in the open. Yeah. Yeah.
Kathy Washburn: It's funny because I was really, well, I still am big into chiropractic care and I was, yeah. One of the things that, helped with a lot of my joint pain was getting acupuncture too.
So at the same time I would get acupuncture and chiropractic adjustment. And the very first time I met with like my most favorite chiropractor, who's now moved to Portland. I'm so sad, but, the very first appointment, we were kind of talking about [00:29:00] all of the cancer things that had happened and how I was feeling physically.
And she was the very first person. In that kind of profession that was like, but how's your mental health? And I was like, and so she actually set me on the road of like, you really need to find like a really good therapist, like a really good therapist. And so I think about like the premise of like, When you're done with cancer, you're kind of sitting in all this rubble that was like your life.
And so I'm hoping that like with Rebuild A Be, right? We can start to help piece by piece, right? Help women start to build little pieces back and mental health being one of them, like your sexual health and how you feel about your body is, those are all really important. And they're just not things that people talk about a lot.
And they, once you're in survivorship, you're kind of off the cancer radar. So it's like, okay where do I go for [00:30:00] this or who do I go to? And it really does require. people to step back into their bodies and become a participant in their health. Like it's, this is your work to be done to unravel this.
It doesn't really belong in the cancer space.
Kathy Washburn: Had this long conversation with the cancer survivorship program in San Francisco. And I said to the woman, honestly, None of us want to go back to the hospital. I, I don't, I would never have wanted to go back into the hospital as a healthy person to meet with a therapist at the, in the oncology at the place that gave you the trauma.
Exactly. I have no interest at even walking up to the building. My body would be like, Oh, okay. Okay. So, and she said, really? So you wouldn't have come back into the. And I said, well, actually there's two problems. One is when [00:31:00] I would have come back, which was right after my treatment ended. And that desperate, like, Oh my God, what is happening in my life and where do I belong?
I still wasn't in a state of mind to actually work on that part of myself. Yeah. It was, I was still in the survival mode. I think that lasted for probably a year. Yeah. At any moment you're waiting for the other shoe to drop. I couldn't possibly think of the future. I was still, I was really trying to be fully present in the everyday that I was holding on to with my sons.
Like, okay, I might not be here when they're eight. I might not be there when they're 10. So I was just in the present. So talking about the future or, you know, None of that worked. So one is the timing and two is, I just don't want to go back to that place. Yeah. I want to just walk away from it. Like have it in a different part of town, across the town.
[00:32:00] Yeah. Not connected. Not connected. And she was really confused. Because she, they were trying so hard to tie this all together. And I said, and I would love to hear your thoughts on this. What would have been really helpful is to have a therapist working with me at the very beginning.
Kathy Washburn: And I love that your name is RebuildAB.
One of the guys that I interviewed for this podcast a long time ago he introduced me to Prehab. Oh yeah. Okay. Which is now, like, one of the things they're really trying to. infiltrate the system, just like if you were going to get knee surgery. My mother went, had knee surgery and she went and had prehab.
They came, they checked out the house, they told her, you know, this is really going to suck for a while, but you got to do these exercises. And this is the reason why you're doing them. And this is what it's going to do. So her head [00:33:00] space was ready for it versus, Hey, yeah, you have cancer. And here's your journey into.
Hell. Yeah. Yeah. And you have no power here. Yeah. And we'll see you on the other side. Yeah. If somebody just sat down with me and said, so this is going to happen. Yeah. And. We're here for you and let me know, like, what are your fears? Let me allay one of the, some of those fears, but none of that was happening at the beginning.
I would have really. Yeah. I think I got like a pamphlet, right? I'm like, these are the things you're going to get. And here are the side effects of the drugs. And they didn't tell me that. You know, like, oh, yeah, by the way, it's gonna immediately put you into menopause at 39, and you're gonna have hot flashes, and you, I don't know, I did get a blood clot from chemo, and just like, and even just like, post that, when I elected to get my ovaries out, I feel like they were just so [00:34:00] concerned about it being like, risky for like, whatever, maybe heart disease, or whatever it was, to like, get your ovaries out at such a young age.
And I was like, where's the pamphlet on menopause? Where's that? Like, where's all of the, like, like a year later after I got my ovaries out, I was like hating life and I was, and I couldn't figure it out. And I finally picked up a book and I was like, and this, and I just like any sort of like.
Forewarning because it is all unknown and they're just really thinking about like the medical aspect, right? So they're yeah. So they're trying to think of the psychosocial things afterwards, but not really giving us humans. The benefit of the doubt of, like, we can handle that knowledge at the beginning.
In fact, yeah. It would be welcome and knowing that organizations like Rebuild AB where you can go and get some resources when [00:35:00] you don't know what's going on and there's a community there to hold space. Tell us more about who you serve and, how they find you or how that works.
Kathy Washburn: So it's any woman impacted by any cancer.
We know that, I mean, cancer trauma is cancer trauma and I mean, chemo is chemo and, a lot of the side effects can be the same, right? So we didn't really want to just limit it to breast cancer or ovarian cancer. Like, we wanted to hit every woman and let them know that we're here to support them. And.
So it's just rebuild a beat. org. There's an application on there. There's information on obviously coaches of which you are one. I'll be working on website updates this weekend, actually, because we just hit our funding target to add an intimacy coaching. So that will be a thing next year. And that's really about like loving your body again after trauma and like learning what makes your body happy now because it is [00:36:00] so different.
But no, I'm just I'm really excited. So it's, yeah, any woman, any cancer. Our website. We're obviously on social media. Just rebuild a B because we won't, you won't talk about what the B is, but why not bring it on? It's rebuild a bitch, right? Because the reason that we did that, and it's funny, cause, my first ex husband his old boss went through, leukemia, like the year after I went through breast cancer.
Or maybe like shortly thereafter, but he got to watch me kind of grow a little bit from that. And at one point he messaged me and said that your journey inspired me and taught me how to rebuild a bitch without an instruction manual. And he was like, by the way, rebuild a bitch. com is available. And I was like, that's an interesting name.
But I think, but I, know that a lot of people can use the word bitch and like a derogatory name, but like, we're thinking like, I just did that. I went through chemo or [00:37:00] radiation or surgery. I cut off body parts. Like I did all of the really hard things or any variation thereof. And like, I'm a bad bitch because I just did that.
So that's why we picked the term and more of like an empowering way. So I think that's amazing. And I feel that there's so much power in. just the first word, the rebuilding, I get to, and so many people look at, trauma as, okay, I'm a victim or this happened to me. And another, oh, another coach on your program, Sarah Corcoran, when I interviewed her for my podcast, she introduced me to this concept of amor fati, which is love your fate.
Interesting. Which, yeah, which is exactly what we did at the beginning of this, where you realized, okay, that cancer journey, it sucked [00:38:00] and great things have come from it. I would, you know, maybe, or maybe not, you would still be married in a difficult relationship that you were trying to break away from, or that something inside of you said run.
And then a bigger side said, we must stay and keep the peace and keep quiet and keep You know, so you have this opportunity to rebuild at any time when our house is blown down. We get to do it stronger than it was built before. Yeah. And I think that's. I think that's sometimes a hard perspective, right?
Like I even struggle with, like we just want people to know who do apply or think about applying, right. That it's okay to invest in yourself and like, you get to, like, you get to. Make yourself better. You get to recover better than you were before. Like you get to be a really [00:39:00] amazing person on the other end of this.
It might take work, you know, it might take a little bit of work. But the part about the, at the beginning, right. It's like, this really sucked, but also this, so. Right. But also, and I heard in your story and I would echo it in my own. God, if I could get through that. Yeah. Like anything else would be a little easier and being able not only you get to invest in yourself, but you are worthy of investing in.
And I heard that in your story also, like you are worthy of taking care of yourself. And in fact, if you don't, the people that are so dear to you. Cannot be taken care of. So what a beautiful gift you offer to the world. I've, again, I so enjoy watching you on Instagram. You're, I was right there with you in your powerlifting conversation, or that whole competition, and also with your daughters and their [00:40:00] cheerleading.
They're adorable. Oh gosh, we keep so busy. I, watch you and I really feel that way. I think, my goodness, I think she's cloned herself in this rebuild AB. I think she's rebuilt several versions of her that she's just got different versions that show up at different times. You got them all going at the same time.
This is such a great conversation. I have one last question for you.
Kathy Washburn: If I were to crush you up and put your essence in pill form, what effect would you have on someone taking that pill? So I thought about this, right? I was like, I am notorious for taking on too much. And so I feel like the essence for me is like, Like the innate drive to just like do more to like constantly improve to like, to just keep putting one foot in front of the other.
I hear this, like some of my friends have said this about me, like, I don't know how you did that. And I'm like, I don't know. I just kept going. [00:41:00] I just kept going. So I feel like my essence would be like that drive to like, just keep going. And so I hope that If someone took that pill, right, like they would know that.
Like you never have to settle for this current moment. You never have to settle for this current version of you. Like you can always be better. You can always do better. You can, there's always something better down the road. There's just, you can always do more . Don't do so much that you like stress yourself out, but like.
You're just, you're, everybody is just capable of so much more than they probably think they are. And I think even to myself, I've just have surprised myself and I'm proud of myself. And I just like, I've showed up for myself in ways that I never thought possible because I just kept going and putting one foot in front of the other.
Wow. And that's it's just takes one step, right? Yeah. It does. It's not a massive movement. But [00:42:00] each step leads you somewhere else. That's so beautiful. And I think that's what comes out in your Instagram and your social media. And even RebuildAB as I have, I've been a part of this and just watched it grow bigger and bigger.
You're just not going to let yourself hang out in that comfort zone. Where, yeah, not an opportunity to learn there. You're just going to keep pushing. Yeah. It's a good thing. I have a board. Cause I'm just like, let's help everybody. Let's do everything. And they're like, read it in Ashley. Read it in. I think that we have to share I'll share in the show notes because this, I'm going to share this with you right now, because I think that this is so you, as you described this essence, have you ever seen, the comfort growth model?
Visual. Let me just show it to you. Do this one. So this is you. You're constantly moving. You're this, arrow. You're like, okay, I feel safe and in [00:43:00] control, but guess what?
I'm going to go right through my fear zone. Like your fear, your orange fear zone is probably a little tinier, that band you're like, yeah, we're not doing that. When you almost die, it kind of goes down a little bit. Exactly. So you go right into the learning, into the growth zone, which is so powerful. One of my teachers said, yeah, the comfort zone, it's beautiful there, but nothing grows.
Nothing grows in there. That's so funny because even probably. A few months before I was diagnosed, somebody gave me a magnet that's still on my fridge to the, to this day. And it says life begins outside of your comfort zone. And so it didn't realize how pertinent that was going to be for me. Wow.
Kathy Washburn: Well, that's, I think we're going to end there because that is crazy powerful.
Thank you, Ashley, for your gift of time. This is such a pleasure. And we'll have all of your contact information in the notes for, and. Again, you might not have [00:44:00] cancer or experience cancer that's listening, but if you know somebody that has, this is such a gift to offer them, and it's really a really sweet, first step to begin investing in oneself, to get this help from A rebuild a B that's like going to pick you up and kind of help you move, there.
So thank you. I love it. Thank you. Thank you for all you do too. It's such a pleasure to be with you. [00:45:00]