CTP (S3EAprSpecial8) Purpose After Loss

CTP (S3EAprSpecial8) Purpose After Loss
Exploring more of the fascinating intersection of Activism, Community Engagement, Faith / Religion, Human Nature, Politics, Social Issues, and beyond   
I sit down with Val Cleppen to talk about what happens to your faith, your identity, and your daily life after stillbirth and deep loss. We trace the messy middle of grief and the slow, surprising way God can rebuild purpose through Scripture, community, and a new calling. 
• Val’s upbringing and the life she swore she would never live 
• how loss shatters “the plan” and forces a new definition of purpose 
• stillbirth and the shock of hearing there is no heartbeat 
• the quiet of the delivery room and sensing God’s presence 
• guilt, shame, and feeling like a failure as a mother 
• why humor matters when life gets unbearable 
• the funeral and the brutal finality of a tiny casket 
• grief stages and why grief is cyclical 
• “I need my pain” and why fixing is not helping 
• anger with God and learning to channel anger without sin 
• Psalm 139 as a turning point toward God’s comfort 
• rejecting meaningless work and rebuilding family life with intention 
• the nudge to start a podcast and creating The Motherhood Experience 
• where to find Val and join her email list 
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A Short Story: A Lasting Legacy? book Trailer

Transcript

Welcome, Name Mixups, And Beans

SPEAKER_03 0:08

Hello, welcome to another episode of Pristitutionalist Podcast. I am your host, Joseph M. Werner, that's L-E-N-A-R-D at the French Knowledge Wonderful Valentino. Thank you for tuning in. As Bram North used to say on his show. Let's get on with the show! Joining me today, and good thing I verified your name before hitting record is Val. Say it again, I've already forgotten. Cleppin. Clep, like an E, but it's an A. K-L-A-P-P-E-N, but it sounds like an E in there, yes?

SPEAKER_00 0:58

Well, it's actually K-L-E-P-P-E-N. So yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:02

Oh, did I?

SPEAKER_00 1:03

You know what? You know what? I've been called so much worse. This is this is great.

SPEAKER_03 1:09

I wrote it down larger because on my notes, it's like I can't read that. And it's too small a print, even with my glasses. I think I need a new pair. And then when I transpose it bigger, I wrote it down wrong. All is forgiven. So yeah, if I'd have written it down right, I'd have pronounced it right. And before we get in on anything, the first important question is how did the beans turn out?

SPEAKER_00 1:49

Well, hopefully, fine. I tasked my husband with uh manning them from this point, but all he has to do is turn off the burner when the timer dings.

SPEAKER_03 1:58

So okay, yeah. So we don't know yet. Fingers are still crossed.

SPEAKER_00 2:05

I don't know. Canning beans, though, is usually pretty simple. So hopefully I I dotted all my I's and crossed all my T's there.

Val’s Background And Life Moves

SPEAKER_03 2:14

Uh-huh. And you left him with it. Hopefully, he doesn't blow up the house. Right, exactly. Stay tuned, folks. Stay tuned. Oh goodness. If there's a big explosion during the record, we know what it is. And it's coming from the kitchen. Yes. Yes. So at any rate, finding purpose after loss. I've had a few people on, but as I said to you through Podmatch, which was where we found each other, can't talk about it enough, I don't think. But before we get into finding purpose after loss, let's do the it's a Christian show. So the obvious joke, the proverbial, but um bum first question: where were you born? Where were you raised? Where are you now? Any significant places you've been to between? Did you learn how to make the beans while serving time in prison?

SPEAKER_00 3:23

So we're doing testimonials with what we're doing right now. So I actually was born on the West Coast in California and grew up.

SPEAKER_03 3:32

My condolences.

SPEAKER_00 3:33

Yeah. Yeah. I try not to start with that, but you kind of put me on the spot. Eventually, my family moved to Wyoming. So I just grew up right outside of Yellowstone, and that is where I consider home.

SPEAKER_03 3:48

So you know Liz Cheney well then.

SPEAKER_00 3:51

Yeah, we're besties, she and I.

SPEAKER_03 3:54

Um I couldn't resist. I'm sorry, go on.

SPEAKER_00 4:02

It's okay. And so I uh met my husband. He's a North Dakota boy, and I swore I would never live in North Dakota. And uh we moved there January of 2006, and then I swore I would never live in Minnesota. We moved there in 2017. I now live in South Dakota, which I have wanted to live in South Dakota.

SPEAKER_03 4:25

I also swore your best buds were Christy Nome then.

SPEAKER_00 4:29

I have so many besties in the political realm. Yeah. Uh I swear I would never homeschool. We are in our eighth year of homeschooling.

SPEAKER_03 4:40

Oh, the disaster the public schools are. I'm glad you are.

SPEAKER_00 4:45

Right. And so now I'm swearing I'll never be a millionaire, and we're just gonna see what the Lord did with that, with that, with that.

SPEAKER_03 4:53

Challenge made! Jesus, it's it's in your court. Yeah. For the benefit of the transcript, we're rolling on the floor laughing almost literally. This is a fun start. The audio, even not video, they'll hear us laughing. But transcript, if somebody's reading, unfortunately, you gotta spell it out for them. You kind of did the born and raised you are now and significant places you've been between. You haven't owned up to how much time you spent for what crime, though.

SPEAKER_00 5:36

Yeah. Well, my parole officer says I'm not free to talk about that yet. But uh once all the dust has all the dust has settled, we uh we'll be free to talk about that.

SPEAKER_03 5:52

Finding purpose, one of the big points of this Christitutionalist podcast, and even tougher at times after loss, because it's part of life. We all at some point experience it. We we all begin dying the day we're born. We're all going to die. Unfortunately, some do sooner than others. And in fact, one of my books, A Short Story, a lasting legacy. It's really a novelette, but it's called a short story because of someone dying before a normal life expectancy would suggest they would. Finding purpose after loss.

SPEAKER_00 6:44

Starts with just thinking that you are that you have your plans figured out and then learning one day, it doesn't work that way.

SPEAKER_03 6:55

And so that was there's our plans, and then there's God's plans, and then there's also Satan's meddling plans.

SPEAKER_00 7:04

Right, right. And so that was kind of my story. I was climbing a corporate ladder in a job I didn't love, but thought that's what I had to do, and got pregnant with our oldest, and she was born by emergency cesarean uh two months premature. Oh boy. And was I was on bed rest before she was born and then recovering after she was born, and and um that was kind of a different world, certainly different from how we had planned it.

SPEAKER_03 7:35

How's she doing now?

SPEAKER_00 7:37

She will be 16, Joe.

SPEAKER_03 7:39

She will be 16 and uh and no major lasting effects due to the prematurity.

The Conversation That Foreshadowed Loss

SPEAKER_00 7:46

No, she's she's always been a big girl in a in a petite little girl's body, and uh that's yeah, she is a real blessing. And then I got pregnant again a couple of years later, and I remember this is the craziest thing. I was sitting in my office and a co-worker who would come in and visit with me often, and you know, just we would talk about different things going on in life and um in our community, and he came in and said that his wife had gone to the YMCA to work out that day, and she saw this little boy and knew that his mom was pregnant, and so she bent down and said, Hey, um, how's your mom? Has she had the baby yet? And the little boy said, The baby died. And I remember looking at him as I was I was very pregnant with our second and saying, Can you imagine going through your entire pregnancy just to have your baby die? And he said, No, I can't. And I was like, Yeah, I can't either. Little did I know two months later, that would be exactly what happened in in our life.

SPEAKER_03 9:04

Oh my I lost out on a would-be uncle. My grandmother Josephine, my mother's mother. Oh, yeah, she lost a brother the day after birth. So our family has dealt with that throughout, also. My uncle would be Uncle Norman, that wasn't to be, and that's that affects the family for generations.

SPEAKER_00 9:33

Yeah, my husband as well lost an uncle, as did I, in that same fashion. And I mean, regardless of how small your circle is, you know someone who has experienced pregnancy or infant loss. It happens that often.

SPEAKER_03 9:51

It's just not talked about.

SPEAKER_00 9:53

It is not talked about. And it's not, even though he and I had had that conversation in my office, it's almost like your brain won't let you reconcile that those types of things happen or are possible. And so Denial.

SPEAKER_03 10:08

A degree of denial.

SPEAKER_00 10:10

Yeah, and I think also self-preservation, just because it's such a heavy reality that that you don't know, you don't know how to carry it or deal with it.

SPEAKER_03 10:22

Right, right. Well, there's the general stages of grief, shock, denial, anger, acceptance. And in those cases, the denial lands up being a uh a stage most people end up stuck in. Yeah. Or or is the anger. So the the denial is almost better than the anger of the why, why did this happen to to me, to us? Why?

No Heartbeat And The Quiet Room

SPEAKER_00 10:55

And that that was my primary prayer. That was the only prayer I could pray after it happened was God, why? Why? And um I think so. I went into labor with her. I made it to term. They told me I had a beautiful pregnancy, you know, even though I was high risk, uh nothing was high risk about it, uh, until I went into the hospital and they found no heartbeat, and I delivered her in four pushes. And I remember when they told us Joseph that there was no heartbeat. My husband looked at me with just devastation on his face, but I was so confused because here I was in labor thinking I was about to give birth to our baby, and uh, babies aren't supposed to die, babies don't she's safe inside of me. Like, I don't understand. How are you going to get her heart beating again? Like that was uh that was my initial response, and I was kind of frustrated. Like, why is my husband so devastated right now? Everything's gonna be fine again. You just self-preservation.

SPEAKER_03 12:03

Right, yeah. Why, why can't there be little paddles? Why can't there be an injection of an adrenaline shot?

SPEAKER_00 12:12

But yeah, yeah, yeah, anything, anything. And so when I delivered her and they put her on my chest, and she was just this beautiful, full-term baby girl, but there were there was no sound in the room, and that's what really got me. That how quiet it was. She wasn't crying, she wasn't moving. Um, you know, the doctor and the nurses were just they were just doing their work, but not uh saying anything. It was just so quiet.

SPEAKER_03 12:44

And um a somber grieving mood, yeah, about all involved.

SPEAKER_00 12:53

Right. And I I remember the Lord being in that room with us. I could feel him, and I often I often do this, put my left hand up by my head when I say that because that's where I felt him right next to me. You felt the presence there on your shoulder, right next to me, and I felt him grieving with us, and and the moment, in that moment, it brought me so much comfort. But later on, I was thinking, you know, wouldn't you have rather been celebrating with us? You know, you were the only one who could have stopped.

SPEAKER_03 13:24

And you were there. How did you not intervene with a miracle? But uh here's where I've got to interject. Uh, God gave us all free will. This is a fallen world. Bad things happen to good people all the time. God does not spend all day, every day meddling in the affairs of humanity. Uh bad things happen, unfortunately.

Guilt, Purpose, And Humor As Relief

SPEAKER_00 13:51

Yeah. And on her headstone, we have the verse John 16, 33. Um, so I've told you, in the world you will have trouble, but take heart, for I have overcome the world. And that was really a verse that kind of got us through those darkest moments following, but also I've felt like such a failure. Our first child was born too much premature because I was so sick and nearly died. Our second child was stillborn. Like, I felt like I the one thing I was designed to do to bring life into this world, I was failing at. And so I I lost all sense of purpose. Like, why am I here when I can't even do the basics? The things that I'm not supposed to like have to perform to do, right? Uh uh life is just this natural thing, this natural process that happens, and I can't even do that. So why am I here? And it was such a dark, dark.

SPEAKER_03 14:56

We we come to take it for granted that I mean, so there are nearly 8 billion people on the planet now, so uh procreation and births have uh become such a uh norm to think how simple and basic it should be. But I think we fail to realize the miracle it really is, and it's amazing it doesn't go wrong more often than it does.

SPEAKER_00 15:28

That's so true, that's so true. Because it the every single step that has to happen successfully for any of us to get here is an incredible feat. And so the fact that there are so many people and the fact that we're all you know healthy and vibrant and make it to you know 40, 50, 80 years and beyond is an absolute miracle. You're right, it is something we take for granted.

SPEAKER_03 16:56

Yep, yeah. Now, before we go back to the serious subject, I can people not watching on video will have no idea, but I see over your right shoulder, from my vantage point, it looks like Rod Serling. What what who is that?

SPEAKER_00 17:14

What is that? That is uh Michael Scott from The Office. Oh it says, would I rather be loved or feared? Easy both. I want people to fear how much they love me. Yes.

SPEAKER_03 17:32

Okay, well, I'm glad I asked. I like that. That's good.

SPEAKER_00 17:37

That is my husband's contribution to our decor, don't you know?

Funeral Images And Living After Loss

SPEAKER_03 17:43

You wanted to add a little levity to the uh and I say that all the time. We're dealing in very serious stuff here, but even in my terror strikes coming soon to a city near you book, there's a comic relief chapter to make that point. No matter how serious everything is, we'll go crazy if we don't maintain a sense of humor. I just recorded with someone earlier in the day, too, and brought up like the old Cypress Hill song, Insane in the Membrane. If we don't keep a sense of humor, none of us would be lucid at all. We'd all be locked up in straitjackets.

SPEAKER_00 18:30

Yeah, yeah, and I think it is a real gift um from the Lord. I think the Lord has a sense of humor as well. And I remember uh my sister showing me a video of my nephew shortly after, I think after Harlan's funeral, after we had buried our daughter, and I laughed so hard, and it was such a juxtaposition because how could my heart be so broken? But I still find this so funny. But it was such a gift in that moment. I needed that uh is it oxytocin?

SPEAKER_03 19:03

I needed that release and that yes, that that dopamine, yeah, yes, for sure.

SPEAKER_00 19:11

Yeah, so it was um it was months and months of just uh the darkest grief. You can't imagine, you know, here we were planning for her life, her first birthday, her wedding, her college graduation, you know, all these things that would now never be, and instead we had to pick out a teeny tiny coffin and this buy a buy a burial plot at the cemetery, and it was it was cheap.

SPEAKER_03 19:42

I think that excuse me, frog in my throat. Yeah, every time uh my I our parents, I only have my sister left. Our parents have passed too, so you know, going to the cemetery, our parents are buried uh only a few feet from where the Keeler family plot was, and little Norman, yeah, set off to the side of the main big headstone around the full graves. There's the one little plot where the cough the the head the uh the headstone itself is as big as the coffin was.

SPEAKER_00 20:24

Yeah, yeah. It uh no one prepared me, and I'm not sure if you can prepare for walking into that room and seeing how small the caskets are. I mean, it I my knees buckled, I collapsed, my husband caught me as I just wept staring at them. And I'll never forget the moment at the funeral when uh my husband went to pick up her casket and carry it to the hearse and just let out this guttural cry as he lifted her casket, and everyone in the auditorium heard it, you know, and it was just it was just silence after this wail that he let out, but then he placed this teeny tiny casket in the back of this hearse, and there was just so much room in the back of the hearse that's immediately what I envisioned too.

SPEAKER_03 21:19

It's like uh a speck of sand on the beach, it's it's lost there, it's so out of place.

SPEAKER_00 21:28

Yeah, yeah, that's a good way to put it. There was such a stark contrast, and um, we took her to the cemetery, and I remember not wanting to leave because the finality of that was just um.

SPEAKER_03 21:44

But yet all life has to go on around you, you have to continue to be part of it, you can't completely surrender to that moment and completely fall apart.

SPEAKER_00 21:59

Absolutely. I still had a three-year-old who needed her mama, and I remember riding in the car one day, and she she said, Mama, is your heart broken? And of course, I just started weeping right then, and I was like, Well, yeah, I yes, it is You're gonna make me cry right now. Yeah, it was it it was such a dark time, and also now I I just want to say, like looking back, I never could have seen the Bible says to uh give thanks in all circumstances, and I never could have seen how that was possible, and it doesn't say give thanks for all circumstances, praise God, but I now we're almost 13 years um past when she died, and I can look back, I can turn around and look back and see as you're walking forward on that path, it's so dark, you can't see anything except one step in front of you. But as I can turn around and look back over the last 13 years, I there are. Flowers all along that dark path, and a lot of them were watered by my tears, but a lot of them were watered by the care we received and the love we received from other people. And it took a long time for me to be able to see that and for me to be able to say that.

SPEAKER_03 23:24

I love what you said and how you said it. It reminds me the old footprints in the sand poem. And yeah, why, Lord, did you abandon me? I didn't abandon you where you see that one set of footprints. That's where I carried you.

SPEAKER_02 23:42

Yeah.

Cyclical Grief And Needing The Pain

SPEAKER_03 23:42

Right? And again, you so eloquently put it, looking back, the flowers that were watered by the good that somehow comes out of the bad. And it's sometimes difficult to recognize that because we're so consumed and saddened and in a way almost wired to dwell upon the why me. In fact, it was just this afternoon I was recording with someone, the why me uh or no, that was a couple days ago. It became blur at times. But yeah, the there's the two why me, Lord, like Richard Lynch I recorded with and aired in January. Uh, why me, Lord? Why am I getting these blessings? And then there's the other tonal different, why me? Why does this bad stuff keep happening? Right? It's the same verbiage, but the context completely different.

SPEAKER_00 24:59

Yeah, absolutely. And it's it's so hard to reconcile either of those when you're in the moment, but it takes, you know, I I tell uh other bereaved parents, especially, the only way through to the other side is walking through that messy middle. You have to walk through it. There's no way around it, over it, under it. You have to go through it.

SPEAKER_03 25:23

No magic way to skip over it. It's the the stages of great shock, denial, anger, acceptance. It's kind of the unfortunate mental reality, you've gotta go through the phases, or you can't come out the other side of the tunnel.

SPEAKER_00 25:43

Yeah, and I think it's also important to just uh remind people and to validate this for some, even that grief is very cyclical. And so uh just because you are no longer in denial or you're no longer angry, and you're in this other phase of grief doesn't mean you're not ever going to be in denial or ever going to be angry again.

SPEAKER_03 26:07

You can regress, yeah. You will have we're human, we have our bad moments that we fall backwards, yes.

SPEAKER_00 26:15

Yeah, and and it becomes uh it becomes familiar and is almost it goes from hurting so much to be in any stage of grief to almost being comforted because at least you know kind of what to expect, or that okay, this is this is grieving now. And for a long time my grief was the only tangible thing I had of my daughter, and so people would say, like, oh, I wish I could take your hurt away, or I wish I could make this not be so bad for you, and I would say, Don't you dare, because this is the only thing I have of her right now.

SPEAKER_03 26:53

Oh, thank you. Thank you. The minute you started saying that, I immediately went back to I think it's Star Trek V, the movie. People think of the Star Trek series and especially the movies as this funny, irreverent, sci-fi dream of the future, but there's a lot of real here and now human condition plot points. Star Trek V, I think if I get it right, is the one where we discover Spock's long-lost half-brother that we didn't know existed for four decades. But that aside, that ridiculousness of the plot point. But yeah, like with bones, I I let me take away your pain. And Kirk saying, No, I need my pain. And the bad things that happen to us help build our character, make us who we are. The old native uh uh uh adage, what doesn't kill us makes us stronger. That is it doesn't make us happy, it can make us miserable, but it does build a stronger character.

SPEAKER_00 28:16

Yeah, and I think I mean people are very well intentioned in saying those things, and I I think a lot of it is because they're uncomfortable because they know you're hurting and they just want to fix it, and but you can't. I mean, the one thing I wanted was my daughter back, and no one could have given me that or helped me with that, and so it's it's okay to be uncomfortable. Like that is that is one lesson I learned over and over again. It's okay to be uncomfortable, and it's okay to let other people be uncomfortable too. For a while, I felt like even though I was grieving, I had to offer comfort and understanding to other people because they didn't know what to do or say or how to act or feel. And it I got to the point where I was like, this is this is bogus. I'm the one who buried my daughter, and I'm just gonna feel what I feel when I feel it. It's okay for that.

Anger With God And Psalms Turning Point

SPEAKER_03 29:12

And you are entitled, yeah. You are entitled to feel all those negative, almost I I did a show with Leslie Hall, our animal side. We can't deny that exists because we are supposedly the most sentient being on the planet. Uh comparatively, we're still primitive animals, no matter how much we've progressed technologically.

SPEAKER_00 30:28

Yeah, sure. Yeah, I mean, there is something carnal about the depths of the grief that we experienced. And yeah, it is it is and can be primitive, but also, you know, we are human and just giving us grace, like even Jesus wept when he knew he was gonna raise Lazarus from the dead. You know, it's okay to feel things, like that is absolutely okay. And I kept him at an arm's length tether for a long time because I wanted to see my daughter again, but I was mad and I was confused. And so I talked to him kind of because I had to, not really because I wanted to.

SPEAKER_03 31:15

Yeah, oh, I hear you, amen. And uh I'm grabbing one of my books. It's at this is a Christitutionalist politics three based on the show, but it's actually CTP4 that's available on Kindle version only, uh Kindle exclusive, where I go into anger. Jesus never said anger is a sin. Pridefulness, hubris is a sin. Anger is not, it can be a sin if we channel our anger into negative other things like destructiveness and lashing out and harming another. Then it becomes a sin. But anger as a raw human emotion is not a sin.

SPEAKER_00 32:07

Yeah, yeah. It says the letter says, do not sin in your anger, meaning you're gonna be angry, but you better watch it when you are. Yeah. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 32:16

How you channel it is what matters in your character and what you will be judged on, not that you got angry. That's to be expected.

SPEAKER_00 32:28

Yeah. And I was angry, and I think I handled it just by pouting and really kind of um metaphorically throwing these mental tantrums. You know, I didn't I didn't want to read my Bible, I didn't want to pray, I didn't want to fellowship with other believers, I didn't want to be encouraged. Like, you know, I just I just wanted to sit in my pain for a moment. And I remember um I was leading support groups at the time for other bereaved families and just really giving my all to encourage them. And then there was a woman from church who called me one day and she was going through something that I would have considered incredibly benign given the fact that I just put my daughter in the ground. Like what she was going to felt so minimal.

SPEAKER_03 33:24

Perspective though, yes.

Redefining Family Life And Work

SPEAKER_00 33:26

Yes, yes, but for her it was a big deal and she was really struggling. And she called me and said, I know you're a prayer warrior, and I really want you to pray for me. And Joseph, I was so offended when she said that to me because I sat there thinking, my only prayer for the last seven months has been God, why? And you're calling that a warrior? Like, of course, she wasn't. She was saying it was like beef life before Harlan and life after Harlan and life before Harlan. Man, I was all about praying for people all the time. She needed my prayer then, and I wanted her off the phone. And so I said a prayer, an actual prayer, and as I was praying, something shifted. I could feel it physically, I could sense it.

SPEAKER_03 34:13

You needed that to shake you.

SPEAKER_00 34:16

Yeah, yeah. And I started reading the psalms because for a long time I thought I thought David was probably bipolar because his psalms were way up in manic and then way down.

SPEAKER_03 34:34

But then yeah, bipolar before bipolar was cool, huh?

Starting A Podcast After A Nudge

SPEAKER_00 34:39

Exactly, exactly, exactly. But then my daughter died, and I understood David on a whole different level at that point. So I started reading the Psalms, and I got to Psalm 139, and especially where it says, You hem me in before and behind, and I could just picture the Lord's hands just encasing me, and something shifted, and so gradually I crawled, I crawled back um into his presence, and he started to reveal so many different paths for me than I thought. Um and what I thought was my purpose, which was just to get up, go to work, you know, drop my daughter off here, take my husband to work over here, and all of us are split up across town. Um it became something so different, and my perspective shifted. I'll never forget getting a phone call at work, and it was a man who had a few different trust accounts, and he wanted to take assets from one trust account and transfer them to another so that he could make his boat payment. And I remember thinking, this is the most pointless, unimportant responsibility I could possibly have that this man could make his boat payment. What am I doing here? My daughter is in the ground across town, my other daughter is in a daycare across town in someone else's care. Like my husband is on the opposite side of town. What are we doing? I don't feel like this is God's design for family. I don't feel like this is God's design for my life. And so I really started asking him, like, what are we supposed to do here? Because I don't think this is it. And that's that's really kind of when it started. It he put us on these different paths, and now I, gosh, my son is gonna be 12. So for almost 13 years now, I've been working from home, part-time, you know, earning an income, homeschooling my kids, which I never thought I would do. Uh you know, those homeschool families, they're weird, and that's what I thought.

SPEAKER_03 36:56

Yeah, uh that's the well, that's the perception that the indoctrination families or factories want of those weird Christian sandal wearing freaks only do it, right?

SPEAKER_00 37:13

Yeah, yeah. And I I've been humbled in that so many times, and so many homeschool families are way cooler than I could ever hope to be. So but yeah, I and I think that just really the Lord opened uh a lane for me in where all the times that I was encouraged in those dark, dark days, and since he really heightened my empathy for other people, and now I am encouraging not only bereaved parents and bereaved mothers, but just mothers in general. And it was two years ago, just over two years ago, that I I was sick with the most random sore throat I'd ever had. And I was listening to podcasts, which I did not do.

SPEAKER_03 38:09

And here you're on them now, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:12

I remember thinking like this would be so fun to host a podcast, but just because I can talk about anything doesn't mean I should, probably.

SPEAKER_03 38:20

Well, you need my podcasting quick start guide.

SPEAKER_00 38:24

There you go. Is there any book you don't have, Joseph?

SPEAKER_03 38:29

No, or or you need to I need you to write a book about it. I'm my how to write a book and get it published guide. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:39

Check we're checking them off. So I remember waking up the next morning after having a dream about hosting a podcast. And I thought, okay, Lord, if this is you, I'm listening. But like if I just had some bad pizza or something, you know, who knows?

SPEAKER_03 38:57

Wait, how do you distinguish? Right, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 39:00

Yeah, and so I prayed about it, right? When I because I I was like, I had that thought, and then I had that dream, and that's just too coincidental. I don't believe in coincidences. So I prayed about it, and immediately upon praying, I kind of downloaded this business plan, and so I'm typing it out, and I um I was quarantined in my bedroom, and so I emailed this plan to my husband as an idea, and my husband is um he's the guy who you'll understand this as an IT guy, Joseph. He's the guy who finds problems and tells me why things won't work.

SPEAKER_03 39:40

Ah. So when I run things, he tries to find the holes in the plan, which is good because then you know how to fill the hole.

SPEAKER_00 39:50

Yeah, that's what I keep telling myself. And so he he replied after reading it and said, I love this and I want to hear more. Which coming from him was a really, really big deal. That was all that was like a borderline raving review compliment.

Psalm 139, God’s Nature, And Where To Find Val

SPEAKER_03 40:08

Who are you? What did you do with my real husband, right?

SPEAKER_00 40:11

Exactly. So after that, I was like, Okay, Lord, like this is I'm listening. So Brent and I, my husband, we were trying to come up with titles for it, looking for websites, looking for you know, social media handles. Ugh, social media. Ugh. Anyway. So he was coming up with all of these names and they were awful. They were just terrible. And I thought to myself, you know, I'm smiling on the outside, trying to be supportive of his ideas, but just thinking on the inside, why is he trying to name a podcast about motherhood? He has no experience. And then I thought, oh, that's it. It's a motherhood experience, that's it. And so he was like, Hey, that domain is available, these social handles are available. Should I buy it? And I hemmed and hawed because I didn't know, like it all was happening so fast, and I didn't want to get before the Lord on it, and I certainly didn't want to make war work for myself if I didn't have to. And I told him, I said, Okay, yeah, go ahead and buy it. And as soon as he clicked purchase, my sore throat in a way. And so now here we are. Yes, yes, and so I was like, okay, so this is I love it's the most fun assignment I've ever been given, but I still hold it with an open hand. At any time the Lord can say, your your assignment's done, you fulfilled it, and but man, I'm having fun.

SPEAKER_03 41:53

Yeah, I want to start to wrap things up, but I want to go back to what you said about Psalms. It's important to understand because uh my show, I deal in the whole Bible in full context, and that's part of the problem. People want to pick and choose something and ignore the whole thing. And indeed, as you discovered, as you portrayed, you didn't need psalms before then, it didn't apply to you before then. Different parts apply at different parts of our walk with Christ in life.

SPEAKER_00 42:35

Yeah, yeah. And also, I mean, I will be the first to admit prior to that I was a little arrogant in my Bible reading, you know, thinking that I didn't need it or it didn't apply to me. But Psalm 139, it talks about three very important characteristics of God, his omniscience, his omnipresence, and his omnipotence. And it it really breaks it up beautifully into those three sections, but the whole chapter is encouraging. I mean, except for maybe the slay all my enemies part at the end. But even that has its day and time, right?

SPEAKER_03 43:15

For everything there was a season, yes, so true.

SPEAKER_00 43:19

So, but that that chapter really ministered to me, and also knowing that you know, I went from thinking that David was this, you know, mentally ill, you know, he'll go and fight giants or you know, whatever the case, but also just his his heart and his willingness to feel things as he felt them and to share those in written form is I think an encouragement to all of us. And we all should not shy away from, rather embrace just acknowledging that the Lord can work through those.

SPEAKER_03 44:02

Yeah. I I hear you, right? There's an unbeatable giant. Oh, let me at him. Yeah, that's not a generally sane kind of a thought.

SPEAKER_00 44:16

I do appreciate that spirit though, and I think even I think a younger Val probably would have had the same zeal, but but yeah, I I agree with you in taking things in context.

SPEAKER_03 44:28

Yeah, and I'm glad you said your name again because I haven't repeated it enough. You need as a podcast or so that the podcastees, as I call them, the listeners or the viewers, have it sink in. As someone involved in politics, I know you need to touch a person seven times, seven ways for things to stick.

SPEAKER_00 44:53

Yeah, so so once again, constitutionalist uh task listeners, I am Joe's favorite guest, Val Cleppen.

SPEAKER_03 45:03

No A in there, no A, two E's, spell it right. I will spell it right in post when I put it on the scroll. Yeah, Val Cleppen, K-L-E-P-P-E, and two Ps in there. So do you have a well, we know you have the website. You said you got a domain. What is it?

Welcome To Michigan Song Outro

SPEAKER_00 45:27

That's right. You can find me at the motherhood experience dot com, and that will have links to the current episode or the most recent episodes. It will have links for contacting me. If you go to the motherhood experience.com forward slash learn more, that's how you can join my email list. We've got lots of fun things going on.

SPEAKER_03 46:51

Thank you again for coming back. I appreciate it.

SPEAKER_00 46:54

Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_03 46:56

Thank you for gonna bless you.

Final Thanks And Subscribe Request

SPEAKER_01 47:22

We're gone to Michigan. All four seasons in a day. Scrape the frost off your windshield. Then you're sweating by the bay. When a storm watch, middle of May. Mother nature shrugs her shoulders. Doesn't care what you gotta say. Welcome to Michigan. Sunburn boots and a hoodie on. Sky keeps changing its mind. We all just play along. Tailgate in the freeze and rain. Seasonal affective disorder. But we're laughing through the Lake Effect headlines. Phone bus, no day in June. Big trees, green lawn, same street, same afternoon. We keep a coat in the back seat. Sunglasses on the deck. We land a whole weekend around the big lake. Sunburn boots and a hoodie on. Keep changing its mind. We all just play along. Tailway in the freezer rain. Season all effective disorder. But we're dancing in the strange. Yeah, yeah, we're pale. Yeah, we're tired, yeah. We still go out and stay. Cause the sun hits just a second and we're all okay. Okay, oh yeah. Welcome to Michigan. All four seasons in a day. We joke that we might move someday, but you know, we're here to stay. Coffee and mood, laughing, as the skies rearrange. Seasonal, affective disorder. It's just the Michiganian way. Welcome to Michigan. All four seasons, all in one day. Absolutely the Michiganian way. Winter storm, watch middle of May. Mother nature don't care what you got to say. Seasonal affective disorder. All year long, supposed to be sunny. What went wrong? Just greak the ice off my windshield and flip-flops, shorts and shades. Sunburn on my left arm, right side freezing in the sleep. Real smoking in the driveway, snowflakes in the lemonade. Forecast said, it's fine today. Yes, that's just another chill. Welcome to this again. All four seasons in a day. Sky can't make up its mind. Changes every mile. You drive away. Windowstone watch in the middle of late Mother nature shrugs and says, I don't care what you got to say. Hey, hey, welcome to Michigan. We live on weather roulette. Soft stains on my sneakers, pumpkin spice in late July. Mosquitoes in the flurry geeks confused up in the sky. Boot swings with the barometer. Blue light through my blinds at noon. Coffee cup and a therapy lamp. Tryna outshine in the blue. Welcome to Michigan. Four seasons in a day. Sky can't make up its mind. Changes every mile you drive away. Windstorm watching the middle of night. The nature shrugs and says, I don't care what you got to say. Hey, welcome to Michigan. We laugh so we don't forget. Yeah, we joke through the break, but it gets heavy in the long, long days. Seasonal sadness in the real view glass. Still we stay, we stay, we stay. Welcome to Michigan. All four seasons in a day. We keep driving through the drifting rain, chasing any little break of grain. A windowstone watch on your graduation day. Mother nature smirks and says, I don't care what you got to say. Welcome to Michigan. Yeah, we love it anyway. Welcome to Michigan. Well, we love it anyway.

SPEAKER_02 52:39

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SPEAKER_03 52:47

We need your help. Thank you for having tuned into another Christitutionalist podcast show. I really appreciate that you stop by. Again, please like, share, subscribe. We need you to help spread the constitutionalist movement. Thank you again. Take care. God bless. Love you all.