Reclaiming Your Hue: A Podcast for Women Rediscovering Themselves in Motherhood & Entrepreneurship
Motherhood and entrepreneurship are powerful journeys—but they can also leave women feeling drained, unseen, or lost. Like flamingos who fade while nurturing their young, women often put everyone else first and lose their own hue. Reclaiming Your Hue is about the moment when women remember their brilliance, reclaim their vibrancy, and step into who they were always meant to be. Hosted by Kelly Kirk, this podcast shares faith-led encouragement, inspiring guest stories, and practical strategies for harmonizing life, family, and business.
Why Listen / What You’ll Gain
- Inspiring stories of women who found themselves again after seasons of loss or overwhelm
- Practical tips for building businesses without sacrificing your sense of self
- Honest conversations about the challenges and beauty of motherhood + entrepreneurship
- Encouragement rooted in faith while welcoming diverse women’s voices
Listen In For: mompreneur journeys · reclaiming identity · harmonizing life & work · authentic entrepreneurship stories
Reclaiming Your Hue: A Podcast for Women Rediscovering Themselves in Motherhood & Entrepreneurship
Ep. 57 with Laurie Healy | Founder, Laurie Healy - Recovery Coaching & Education
Breaking Generational Addiction Cycles
When life throws us sideways, we can either break or be broken open. For Laurie Healy, losing her brother to addiction became the catalyst for profound transformation—both personally and professionally.
In this deeply moving conversation, Laurie shares her evolution from technology startup executive to addiction recovery coach. After her brother's accidental overdose in 2017, she confronted difficult questions: How had her family navigated his 30-year struggle? What resources had they missed? Could the outcome have been different? Through her grief, Laurie discovered her calling—helping families navigate addiction with evidence-based approaches rooted in compassion rather than shame.
Laurie reveals how motherhood reshaped her values and boundaries, prompting her to design work that honored both her professional ambitions and family priorities. She discusses the powerful influence of women leaders who modeled bringing their full selves to work and the importance of defining personal values as a foundation for meaningful decision-making. Her journey illustrates how unexpected career disruptions—like job loss—can create space for intentional reflection about our next chapter.
What sets Laurie's approach apart is her recognition that families are "first responders" in addiction situations, often lacking the tools they need. Unlike other diseases where communities rally with support, addiction often leaves families navigating treatment decisions in isolation. Laurie equips families with strategies to maintain relationships with loved ones struggling with addiction while setting healthy boundaries, replacing harmful narratives with evidence-based approaches that work.
For women considering entrepreneurship, Laurie offers transformative advice: approach it with an abundance mindset. Rather than fixating on potential failures, ask "What's the best that could happen?" This perspective shift opens possibilities beyond what we might imagine.
Ready to learn how your deepest pain might become your most powerful purpose? Listen to Laurie's story of turning grief into healing—not just for herself, but for countless families breaking generational cycles of addiction.
Connect with Laurie:
- Website: lauriehealy.com
- LinkedIn: Laurie Healy
Contact the Host, Kelly Kirk:
- Email: info.ryh7@gmail.com
Get Connected/Follow:
- IG: @ryh_pod & @thekelly.tanke.kirk
- Facebook: Reclaiming Your Hue Facebook Page
- YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/@RYHReclaimingYourHue
Credits:
- Editor: Joseph Kirk
- Music: Kristofer Tanke
Thanks for listening & cheers to Reclaiming Your Hue!
Good morning Lori. How are you?
Speaker 2:I'm well. Good morning, glad to be here.
Speaker 1:I am so glad that you're here too, and I was. I just have to make a quick note of this. When we spoke gosh, it was like months ago. You were here locally in the Twin Cities and because of schedules we decided that we wanted to do this via Zoom. But we've had the fun and unique opportunity to meet one another in person. But I was mentioning to my husband he's like hey, what's it look like for your interview today? Are you like having in-person or is it Zoom? And I was like it's Zoom. He's like, oh funny, and I'm like she's actually here in the twin cities. He's like I had a feeling that it wasn't in person. You're not cleaning up just uniformly too. But yeah, I was joking with him too, because you're the you're the first local person that I've actually done zoom with, rather than in person, but truly just because of schedules. And so I always the people who are here locally in person, if we can make that happen, and I'm sad that we can't make it happen. Maybe that's what I'm trying to get at here.
Speaker 1:But I will find another time We'll find a time in the future to reconnect.
Speaker 2:And, like you said, I will find another time. We'll find a time in the future to reconnect and, like you said, we met in person. Um, like that's how we met. We met in person and um for the first time. It's actually a perfect segue.
Speaker 1:Let's let's share with the listeners how it is that we got connected. I can imagine that's probably one of the next times we might see one another as well, but let's share with them how we know one another.
Speaker 2:Yes. So for many months I've had people in my network ask me hey, have you been to one of the Amplify networking events and have you gone to Amplify? I'm like, what's this Amplify, what's this Amplify? And I started looking into it and then would notice that all sorts of people I knew were going to this Amplify event. So of course, this natural curiosity made me want to check this out. So I went to the event in January and I don't know if your listeners know, and you probably do a much better job at explaining what Amplify is, but it's obviously a platform for faith-based nonprofits to tell their story and then be surrounded with lots of smart, curious, business-minded people to help them figure out their challenges and problem solve. Is that right?
Speaker 1:It is. I like to also I also like to equate it to like it's like shark tank for those faith-based like nonprofits or missionaries. I want to say I like that much better. Well, and I love how you kind of added into that there's all of these wildly amazing creative ideation thinkers in that room to be able to provide feedback for these two specific nonprofits that are highlighted at that meeting, and so that's where we met.
Speaker 2:That's where we met, and we not only just met there, but we were sitting at the same table, elbow to elbow, elbow to elbow.
Speaker 1:Yes, and it's just, it's so funny so we haven't even really known each other for that long period of time. Yet there was a connection that was made. And because I host this podcast and got to know you in that short period of time, there at the meeting, I was like Laura, you've got to be on the podcast. You got to be, you got to share your story. I love that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so here we are, here we are.
Speaker 1:Here we are. Thank you for the invitation. You're so welcome. Let's go ahead and dive in and get to the meat and potatoes. So can you share with the listeners what came first for you? Was it entrepreneurship or was it motherhood?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I actually don't really think about this one and I'll tell you why, but it both came. I feel like I'm a little late bloomer to both these games. So I had my son at 37 and motherhood did come first for me. However, I had been in a field in the startup technology realm where I was surrounded by entrepreneurs, so I felt like I had been living in this entrepreneurial world for a while, but yet it was never my own venture. Entrepreneurial world for a while, but yet it was never my own venture. So I had my son that was in 2008 and was doing my thing. I did the typical.
Speaker 2:After three months, I went back to work, working for a startup company, and my story there is that this startup unfortunately wasn't doing very well and had to make quite a few cuts across the board. So, within that downsizing, my job was eliminated and I remember I had been in the office and it happened on Zoom and I called my husband up to the office and I was in tears and I just said I just lost my job and I'm not sure what to do and for anybody that's ever lost their job before, for whatever reason, it's just it's hard, it's a really like and it can be very sudden, and so I was just really not sure what to do. And he just said isn't this, isn't this kind of what you wanted? This opportunity to like create your own thing or think about how you can like be. This month it was May, I remember it was May, so summer was coming, and so so, yeah. So I turned that into like, okay, what am I going to do next?
Speaker 2:And really intentionally spent that summer with my son, who was younger, but then realized that when people found out that I was no longer employed by this company, they were coming to me saying, hey, would you have any time to maybe help me with a side project? Because, again, I was surrounded by a lot of people in the entrepreneurial field, so they were used to hiring people to maybe help with a side project or, you know, a 10 hour a week opportunity. So I said, oh, yeah. So I started working with a couple of people that I knew and that grew into my own PR and marketing consultancy, which so I guess that was officially my first entrepreneurial venture that I launched that time, and that was in 2011. So that was my first foray into the entrepreneurial world where I was doing my own thing with my own business. Oh, that is.
Speaker 1:I feel a lot of parallels, one I just want to share as well. I was in my, I'm going to be turning 40 this year and my daughter just turned two. So I'm right there in the mix with you, like later on in my late 30s, having my first child. But then also the other thing too is you know. But then also the other thing too is, you know, going from having a position to not having a position and that timeframe where you, you spent some quality time, like very, very similar to to my story as well, and I love that you got real intentional with going.
Speaker 1:Well, what is it? What is it that I want to do? Instead of just going, I'm going to jump to the next thing. I am actually going to take some time, consciously, think through this, marinate in what is it, and you like you kind of set this foundation to let something come to you, to receive what it is exactly would kind of set the the groundwork for you to be able to go in the direction that you need it to, and I'm so, so curious of how the rest of this story unveils I also. I also just want to ask this question, which is so 2008 is when your son arrived correct, and so he was, you know, just a just a few years old when you decided to go into entrepreneurship, and so that's really exciting. But also, I'm sure it didn't come without its own challenges as well.
Speaker 2:Exactly, and you're right, it was, it was I. I did create that space to be intentional and that was really challenging for me because from the moment I graduated from college like I wanted to work. I have always loved to work. I have loved to be, you know, productive, I've loved working with teams. And then to have that moment of oh wow, what do I do now? Was scary at first. That was the first thing, like what am I going to do? And then to be able to turn that into oh what, what am I going to do? And to be able to give myself permission and also had had and have such a supportive husband who also allowed me to do that to be able to figure out this stage of my life with, I think, our son at the time would have been about two and a half and just figure out, like, where are we going from here?
Speaker 2:So I think the thing that was really important to me at that point was to be able to put some of my values first in terms of how do I want to create a business that honors this desire to work because that was really important to me and to be able to support, help support our family, but also how do I be able to show up intentionally with my son and for our family and what does that look like? And that was probably one of the first times that I had really truly started putting boundaries into place surrounding my work time, because before my son, I was like, I'm available, sure, I can be in the office at 7 am and, yeah, I can stay till 9. Like we can do a working dinner. That's no, but you know, great, let's do it.
Speaker 2:And I was probably even still somewhat in that mentality even when I went back from maternity leave, because that was just what I knew and what was expected of me. So this break was really a blessing to allow me to say, oh, I have this whole opportunity to architect what works for me professionally, what I think works for me personally, and that really felt like a gift, because I know that's not everybody's reality, but when you step into the space of entrepreneurship, I do believe that's one of the gifts like high risk, high reward in some ways, as it relates to being able to do that.
Speaker 1:Totally. I do want to just take a step back, because you had made mention of being in kind of this world or ecosystem of individuals who were playing in that entrepreneurial space, and so I'm sure that didn't come without some a little bit of osmosis, right Like you had this osmosis happening and being able to see how individuals were handling specific aspects of their business, how they operated it, how they were setting their boundaries, how they were sitting there intentionally setting core values. So do you feel like you played off of some of that in order to be able to then go okay, I'm going to have some intentional time here and I'm also going to establish what are my values through this.
Speaker 2:What are my values through this?
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's a really good, insightful question, because I saw extremes in the entrepreneur world, like, make no mistake, when somebody goes to launch their own business, they're putting it all out there on the line, financially, relationally, I mean.
Speaker 2:There's so many dynamics to it and they're some of the hardest people, or hardest working people that I've seen be able to do what they do, and so I saw a lot of the risk that needed to be taken. I also saw the fast-paced environment and the energy, especially in the technology space where things move so quickly. So maybe at the time I didn't know it, but looking back, like really observing what were the characteristics, what were the trends that I was seeing with these entrepreneurs, and I also had the really amazing opportunity to see not only in the obviously the tech space at that time it was really dominated by men, and that's changed over time but I was also really fortunate to have a lot of work with a lot of founders that were women and to see the different values that played out in the workplace. Because of that and I think that was crucial in my decision to step into the entrepreneurial space, because I had really strong mentors and role models that were mothers that showed me how that could be done.
Speaker 1:How incredible because I mean, frankly, a lot of the individuals who I've had on the podcast I don't know if they could speak to something like that and like you can, and I would love to dive into this, like what you observed and how, like how that became a takeaway for you, into how you then set the foundation for your business.
Speaker 1:Let's let's dive into this a little bit more, cause I think that this is really cool and can also be an opportunity to set the tone for other women who are listening the importance of who you're surrounding yourself with and then, potentially, are carefully selecting for, for guidance and mentorship as well.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I, you know, when I my very first startup was, I was the the first, I was the second hire, but this company had been percolating, if you will, at the University of Minnesota. So it was a bunch of very smart software engineer guys that were just coming out of school that launched this company. So when we started, it was me and like 13 male engineers and I had no, this was my first step into technology and I really had no idea what it was doing. But it was pretty amazing because they taught me a lot in terms of what we were building and it was my job to go out and market and sell it and brand it and everything like that. But that was a very, very new environment for me and it was very different, and most of the people that I work were working with in that environment were men, and it was very different and most of the people that I work were working with in that environment were men, and so that was my first experience with a technology startup, and after I, after we built that one, we built it. About three and a half years later we were, we sold the company, and so I thought that was a lot of fun. Let's go on to build the next thing.
Speaker 2:Like I want, I want to do another startup, and that's when I landed in my next one, which was a women founded and women run organization, and the dynamics were I mean, there were a lot of similar dynamics. Like I mentioned before, there's a lot of risk. It's very fast paced. You really need to be able to carry a lot on your plate and deliver, but yet there was also there was a different sense of sometimes compassion, if that, if that's the right word.
Speaker 2:Even in some of my you know conversations, especially with the, with the female founders, which was really helpful, I also saw that they were probably better at setting boundaries in terms of what needed to happen in the workplace versus what was happening on the home front too. So that was something that was modeled for me. So, again, all my experiences actually in the startup and entrepreneurial space have been very positive. Even that first startup, where it was largely male dominated, I had a really, really positive experience. Otherwise, I don't think I would have gone on to do more startups, but I definitely I guess, as a woman and as a mom, had this found this deeper connection with the women that were running this company to see how they would be doing it differently and to see how their decisions were informed by, just you know, their role as moms, their role as leaders in the organization.
Speaker 1:What were your takeaways from that? I would love to just learn a little bit more about that.
Speaker 2:You know, I think that too I realize.
Speaker 2:No, that's okay. I mean, when I think of one of the individuals in particular again, really really smart, very dedicated to her work, you know entrepreneurs, this is just not a job for them. This is their life, like this is their baby. I can't remember how many times I've heard entrepreneurs talk about their you know company as their baby and the care and the nurture that it takes. I saw this. I saw a lot of the same values, like when she would talk about her daughter. I, you know, she would just kind of rim with you know excitement and love talking about her daughter. And sometimes when she talked about her company, like in front of investors or in front of an audience, she would have that same kind of like excitement and I, I just I thought that was interesting. I'm really not even sure if there's a connection there, but, um, she like she was consistent in in her being like.
Speaker 2:She like when she showed up, like she was showing up as multiple, multiple roles, cause we, I think we bring multiple roles to our you know who we are and she wasn't this type that said like okay, I'm like leaving my mom hat at home and I'm coming in with my business hat and then I'm leaving my business hat and going like she brought her full self as all of her roles into into work, which is where I mainly saw her and that, I think, has really stuck with me as like I've got on to build my own thing too. It's like even sometimes if I'm on a Zoom call and my son walks through the door, you know, and I'm like hey, bud, and I'm just saying hi to my son he just got home. You know, I think we can actually wrap that like show people that we are, like there's all these dimensions to us, there's all these roles, and she I think she did a really good job with that for me.
Speaker 1:As you were talking through it, lori. Here's what I started to think about is a couple of different things that come to mind are if you think about the process of having a physical baby, right, your child you're, you go through this process of you know, from conception up until labor and delivery, and then so on and so forth through the rest of the seasons of life with your children, right, with your children, right. The same is very true with a business and your business. There's a, there's a conceiving period that happens, right, and then there's this growing of that. You know that, a nine month period, whatever, whatever that time period it takes for you to finally come to like, the, the delivery of what your business is right, like.
Speaker 1:There's so many commonalities, and we've we've talked about it many times here on the podcast. But here's the thing I think about another commonality, right. So like from for me personally, I have such a passion for my child, I have such a passion for my bonus children, I have a passion for the two little paw children behind me too, which was the foundation of, like, caring and nurturing for something other than myself, right, but like when you find something other than that that you are so dang passionate about it's. That's it right there. Like you're pointing in the right direction. Either way. You cut this rug for like being a mother and then also for your business. And if you're aiming in that right direction, how can you not like see that passion fold through in the conversations that you're having with people around you? It's just so cool. I'm sure you can like that's some of the connection points that are that are happening but that's some.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you touched on a lot of feelings there. That yeah, that I absolutely resonate with yeah, and you just you throw your whole being into it. There's no question, right? I mean, you're obviously looking to make wise decisions and you're wearing pros and cons and things like that, but you're all in like you are all in with that, with that child, with that that business, if it's your entrepreneurial venture you are all in absolutely.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. I was thinking last night the things that come to mind sometimes, like when you're just doing the most random things like washing dishes I was like I there's, I can't just give up on being a mother. I can't just do that. And to your point, lori, like if you are so stinking passionate about what it is that you're like your mission, for what your business is you're, you're going to have some of those commonalities of like I just can't give up on this, I'm so passionate about it. I see, I see the light at the end of the tunnel. I understand how this is going to have an impact, so why would I want to give up on it?
Speaker 2:That's my time, right, right, and you're right, exactly, I get back to the all in or that, like with the, with the mom, when you were talking. Like the mom is the title we will have for our whole entire life. It's probably the only title we will have for our whole entire life, if you think about it maybe, maybe there's others that I haven't thought of, but that's come to mind for me recently.
Speaker 2:I think, too, another interesting parallel is to take a look at, like long-term, you know where your child goes or where your business might go, and there is this eventual okay, there's different changes, there's different stages. There's essentially a release at some point, even if that entrepreneur you know, in the entrepreneurial venture that could be, it eventually gets sold to somebody, or it eventually partners with somebody, or eventually gets shut down, or whatever that is. So I think, like acknowledging these different stages that we go through, as you know, as entrepreneurs, like there can be some similar stages that we even see with our children.
Speaker 1:Oh my gosh, it'd be really fascinating to like have kind of like a group conversation with other mompreneurs about that very thing that you just talked about.
Speaker 1:It would be the different seasons that you go through, and so we'll just throw it out there. Anybody who's right now that wants to round table with Lori about this very thing, let's. Let's get this going, let's get the conversation going, but to keep everything on track and just honor your time, lori, I want to continue to delve more into your story, and so you had mentioned that the PR consulting was really kind of your first initial like kickstart into entrepreneurship and it was probably around that what two and a half going on, almost three year mark for your son on almost three year mark for um, for your son. And so let's, let's kind of step back in time and talk through what were some of the peaks and valleys that you experienced at that time in that particular season of life, um, for yourself personally and then as a mother as well.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think, you know, during that time it was, this is the first time I had built my own business, so it was obviously a little scary, like how am I supposed to do this? Am I doing this right? And, and what you know, lessons can I take from what I knew in the, from the startup field? But I was building kind of a different, you know, type of business. We weren't creating, I wasn't creating software, it was creating more of a service, a marketing service. So I think just the learning curve of that and knowing that I had really good mentors and people that I could lean on, I think one of the highlights for me too is I've always enjoyed, I guess, networking. Like I'm one of those people I can walk into a room full of people and I enjoy that challenge. So I know for a lot of people that is their worst nightmare. So I had a really strong network too.
Speaker 2:So I was able to ramp up that business pretty quickly in terms of, just, you know, clients and the work and things like that. And I think, too, the things that were, you know, would be challenging as I was trying to figure out. Okay, you know, financially, when I had a full-time job, I was able to kind of forecast like, all right, what does our you know income look like coming in and all the things that felt secure. I was trying to figure that out, like how long is this client going to be with me and how much should I charge for my services and all of those things that I wasn't. I didn't know how to navigate that upfront, and so that felt hard and, and I think that's where sometimes the um, those questions creep in as like oh, you don't, you don't know what you're doing, like, you're not, you're not, you're not qualified to do this right, that whole imposter syndrome that I think a lot of people struggle with. Um, so, if anything, that was the and then the well, gosh, lori, could you have if you hadn't gone back to work, you could be home full time with your son.
Speaker 2:So I think there was a lot of that mom guilt too that thought, gosh, well, should I, should I be at home with him? And like why, if I even have the choice there, would I like, why would I not stay home with him? So there, I think that was the real struggle for me, especially at that age, and yet it was. Again, one of my top values is doing meaningful work, and so I know that that is also an important component of like who I am and how I'm wired. So it was both trying to honor that as well as how do I show up and be really present for my son. So when he was in, you know, kindergarten or those early ages like I would, I would plan my work day like I work when he's at school and when he's home, I am home with him and I again. That's one of the joys I think of entrepreneurship is if depending on the work you're doing and what you're doing. But I was intentional about crafting my schedule that way.
Speaker 1:How do you feel that had an impact either positively, positively or perhaps I don't want to use the word negatively, but let's just say you know like not in the way that you thought it was going to go for the business. How do you feel like setting those intentional boundaries on that timeframe? How do you feel it impacted your business?
Speaker 2:on that timeframe. How do you feel it impacted your business? I think, oh, I definitely think that I could do more. I probably could have had more clients, I probably could have made more money, you know. So there was that.
Speaker 2:And yet I knew that if I went back into that mindset of working you know, 12 hour days, 14 hour days sometimes, which I was doing before that that would negatively impact my, my, just my role as a mom and my role as a wife and our family. And I didn't, I didn't want to do that. I think, because even before we had our son and I was working those crazy hours, that was taken away, I think, time from just even, you know, the early days of our marriage. And so, again, it was one of those things where I had to just be.
Speaker 2:I've always had a hard I don't have a hard time saying no anymore, I'm pretty good at that but I had a hard time then to be able, because I didn't want to disappoint people. It's like, well, I know I can do the work and I'm capable and this would really help them, so why wouldn't I say, why wouldn't I say yes? And then I had to go like, okay, wait a minute. If I'm saying yes to this, I'm having to say no to these things, and these things that I would have to say no to are too important in the long term.
Speaker 1:So you knocked it out of the park, right there, holy moly, and I think you really just kind of lumped in like a a bunch of different like, let's say, triggers for individuals, right, like we could talk about burning the candle at both ends, right, like one. That's not good for you as as Lori, or as mother or just as an individual person, right, but it's not going to be of service to the family that is around you, right. And so, like you, you hit the nail on the head and it's all about, like, if I'm saying yes to something over here, what does that mean I'm saying no to over here, and does that yes outweigh the no or vice versa, right. And so having the discernment of what that actually looks like for you, which I think kind of boils down to what are your values as a person, and so I am curious if you are open to sharing, like, what are you? You mentioned one of them, but can you go through what those values are for you personally?
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely so. My first one and these are not in any particular order, but the first one is just speaking with honesty, and sometimes people are like, well, what does that mean? You'd be a dishonest person if you didn't speak with honesty. And I think it's no. It's more like if you know, sometimes in a certain situation, maybe we don't feel like telling the whole truth, maybe we'll just tell them just enough what they need to know and then like, keep them guessing or you know. So it's like really being. It's more of an open, a vulnerable, like how do I open myself up for vulnerability? Because we really know that's where connection happens. I think the other thing, too is and I've I've struggled with this, which is why this is one of my top values that I try to aspire to is, if I'm maybe I'm in a sour, don't want to talk, and my husband will come and say, hey, you know, is anything wrong? No, I'm fine, I'm fine, right, don't talk about it. Well, that's not being honest, it's really not. And so that I'm not being honest with myself, I'm not being honest with him, and that it just over time, those little character decisions you're making add up, and so a lot of my values. It's like the truth, you know, the truth will always come out. That's kind of one of the values in our family Like the truth will always come out. So speak with honesty, you know, be be honest about it. So that's one.
Speaker 2:Um, spending time with family is a big one. So just spending meaningful time and just being intentional about what that looks like. So that is, you know, in our family it's like we go to church together on the weekend. That is, you know, in our family it's like we go to church together on the weekend. We make sure that we have. Our son is growing now so he's got more independence, he's 16. So we're not sitting down probably every night for dinner, but trying to be intentional about like, hey, based on everything that's going on this week, let's spend this time together. We also love to travel together. So being intentional about spending time, that's, you know, my core family, and then, of course, with my extended family, with my parents, with my sister, and just like, how are we spending meaningful time together?
Speaker 2:Keeping a faith forward mindset, you know, and that's a big one for me, especially in the work I do now, is being, you know, spiritually, physically and emotionally well, and so making sure that I am, you know, bringing my concerns before God and spending time in prayer and spending time in devotionals, so keeping that faith forward mindset, seeking out adventure. This is a big one for me. And so I know sometimes, when I say that people say like, oh, where are you traveling to next and what does that look like? And yes, that's a part of it, and I'm like constantly looking for that, even in, like my own proverbial backyard, like where I live now, like what are? What adventure can I seek out? What's like a new little cafe I can find, or just finding those simple pleasures that feel adventurous for me. So that's a big one.
Speaker 2:And then the final is doing meaningful work, and that has progressed over time. But I like to, and I'm sure we'll get to this, but I am truly in a place where I'm doing that meaningful work. It's very purpose-driven and I feel really good about what I'm doing to help other people. So those are my five top values. Like I said, I don't I probably don't live them out every single day. We do a lot of value work with my clients and sometimes we find ourselves in difficult situations. That, gosh, maybe I didn't speak with honesty, or boy. This was a week where I didn't spend a lot of time with family. We call it a value violation, and so, but the more that we can keep those values front of mind, like how do we keep moving forward on these fronts? This is what helps me say yes to the things that matter most and say no to the things that maybe aren't important for the long-term, if that makes sense.
Speaker 1:A hundred percent.
Speaker 1:It a hundred percent makes so much sense and there's been a lot of reigning themes that I have kind of connected the dots with in terms of all of the guests that have been on the podcast thus far.
Speaker 1:And it's really like, at the essence of this is understanding, like, what are what's important to me, what are my guiding principles, be it you know faith in a Christian setting or just like the universe or you know, spiritually gifted in some way, shape or form, like what are your core values?
Speaker 1:And I think a lot of us as mothers have this like turning point. When we do become mothers, that shifts. That really really ends up shifting and maybe we carry over some of those core values that were really important to us when we were, you know, our independent selves, as I like to say, like my independent self, free, meeting my husband and my bonus boys and now having a daughter. But there's something that fundamentally shifts with us as women to when we become mothers and then we go what, what is actually important for me, like this is important, like family is of utmost important, and so how, how does the value shift around that? Did you find that some of your values had kind of made the shift when you become a, when you became a mother, yeah, yeah, um, definitely.
Speaker 2:I mean, I think you know, one of the big ones that always comes to mind to me is like the value of safety how do I keep my kids safe? And that, like I think, before we have kids, we have a different value of what safety looks like, because we're so focused in on, like our safety as individuals and then all of a sudden I have this child to care for through all of these life stages. So that was like a big one for me. Not, I didn't, I didn't. Obviously safety is not one of my top values.
Speaker 2:But talking about values in general, how they shift, I think that there is this defining point of where you have to kind of reevaluate like, oh, yeah, what, like you said, what is important to me right now? Or really getting clear, like before, I think before I even, you know, did a lot of this, this the work, and what I do now, or even before coming to mother, like I was, I think I was living a pretty good life, I was making wise decisions and things like that. But when I really did this work to be like, what am I going to stand for? How do I be in use the word really intentional, like I think that that one has really come up for me quite a bit. Like, how are we intentional about parenting? How am I being intentional in the way that I show up for my family and friends? How am I being intentional about the work that I do?
Speaker 2:Because I used to probably operate especially into this high, you know, fast-paced environment like just go, go, go, go, go, produce, produce, produce, produce, get as much done as you possibly can in the hours that you have in the day, and that, like that, worked for me in an environment where that was valued, that was valued. But now, like I have a different environment in which I value and I know it's really important for Lori Healy to feel whole and I probably, as I was going through like my 20s and 30s and building my career which, again, I love my career, I was good at it, it was successful, but I don't know if I truly was tapped into what was most important to me and if that if that is, if you're aligning with that it's just, I think, part of the aging process too.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I am. You know, I'm turning 40 this year and I do feel like there's just these shifts that are starting to happen, and I don't know if it's just in continuing to have these absolutely incredible conversations with other women in varying stages of life. By the way, like it's, it's just all. Like I'm I'm on the call it the elder millennials edge. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:It isn't just like everybody who's around the same age as me, like I am interviewing women who are in their twenties, in their thirties, in their forties, in their fifties, in their sixties and, dare I even say it, in their seventies too, like the wisdom, like you can just feel the shifts and I, I mean I'm not going to discount some of the gals who are younger than me, because there is some incredibly, incredibly wise, like just out of this world wise gals who, you know, maybe are older than you actually appears, but I love that you share that.
Speaker 1:Like maybe just with time, I've come to understand like this is just these, just these shifts start to happen and evolve and it's it's also very fun. I, by the way, am like so excited to like let go of my 30s and step into my 40s. I know, not everybody who's listening right now is like would be as excited as I am, but I'm like I know what comes with that and it comes with more wisdom and more knowledge and more understanding and just like kind of like a fine wine, like it's just aging over time.
Speaker 1:Yeah no I.
Speaker 2:I I love my forties I mean I'm I'm 53 and I love my twenties, my thirties, like I feel really fortunate that I've had a really like really good life and I've been happy and I value that a lot, like I'm really grateful for that, because I know that's not everybody's story. The other thing I think I love that you're talking to like all these different women that are in these different ages and stages. Sometimes I look back like I think I've had to, had to learn through like just my experiences of being in the workplace. You know, I launched my workplace or my, my career back in the nineties and I think it's a very different place today and sometimes I look at these younger women.
Speaker 2:I'm like oh, you're so lucky, like you have these really strong role models and you know you're, you're like really in tune with what's important to you and have done a lot of this work, that I feel like, oh gosh, I didn't even do that until I got to my 40s and so it's really amazing to see too, like how culturally that's shifted and just even you know, openness, that we're talking about our mental health and and our, our physical well-being, like all of that I think is is so important so but like the eighties and the nineties, like it was like let's, let's work hard, let's, you know, you know, grindstone mentality At least that was my experience is, I think, especially being in in a, in a startup environment.
Speaker 1:But it's an interesting perspective and point of view and I don't, I'm, I am, I don't think that there's any way that we could discount that right. But, like, I think that you bring up a valid point just about how there's been an energy shift with like awareness right, the awareness of self, the awareness of acknowledgement of like these are realities of which are happening to people on a day-to-day basis and an hour-to-hour basis, and we cannot discount that there's struggles that people are going through and so awareness from that is just so much more prevalent now. And I think that you're bringing up this valid point of like back. You just didn't see it as much and and so it's, it's nice to see that shift, that that has happened and how that can impact future generations too.
Speaker 2:cross fingers and do you find that you're seeing that in the interviews you're having like with some of these younger women? It sounds like it um in terms of like the impact or just the aware, the, the awareness that they have just around, like intentional decision making and just all of that absolutely, abs, absolutely, and I do.
Speaker 1:I, I have a strong sense that. You know it's because we have so much exposure to things there's so much more exposure now. Um, social media is, you know it's because we have so much exposure to things there's so much more exposure now. Social media is. It's a, it's a blessing, it truly is, but it's also a bit of a.
Speaker 1:You know, on the other side of that occurs, it's a catch 22, in my humble opinion, I've got my love-hate relationship with social media, but the exposure that we have to so many different like resources and all that encompasses each kind of the wheel of wellness right. That's, and I think you've said that it's incredible. That's, and I think you've said that it's incredible we have we literally at in a second you can research something and have it at your fingertips. And so I think because of that, people are are not turning away from like asking some of these deep rooted questions to be able to kind of fast track what that wisdom looks like for you. Knowledge, I should say knowledge, because I think we start off having a foundation of knowledge and as we continue to work through our years, that's when the wisdom really comes into place. So I I had heard you a couple different times, you one I know what you had been doing before is not what you're doing now and I thought that I might have caught that you've. You've got kids plural correct.
Speaker 2:Well, I have one true human child and then and I have a dog he's kind of my fur kid but yeah, but one one, I have an only okay, okay all right, gotcha.
Speaker 1:Um. So let's, let's talk through some of what you were experiencing for your your first business baby and then transition to what we're doing now and share, share with the listeners um, how you got from where you were with your first baby business to where you're at with second baby business.
Speaker 2:Yes, Um, and I'll try to keep that transition short, Cause I I really want to talk about the second baby business but, after I did this PR and consult he did it for about four years.
Speaker 2:My dream job kind of came calling, which is not what I'm doing now, but this dream job and excuse me, the short of it is I went back into the workplace. But I went back to work for a co-working company as the head of marketing and I loved it because so marketing has always been in the field that I've been in and it was largely technology. And then I stepped into a space, this co-working space, which for people that I'm sure most people, if your listeners know what a co-working space is. But it's usually a membership, membership based organization that allows you access to really beautiful, amazing workspaces where you're surrounded by other people and other companies. So I found myself in a place where I was responsible for connecting with other individuals, letting them know about this space and building a community of people that were working on their dreams. So it was all entrepreneurs of all different types of businesses. We had nonprofits, we had tech companies, we had service-based businesses, we had coaches, consultants. It was awesome, I loved it. Had service-based businesses, we had coaches, consultants. It was awesome, I loved it. And so the way that my story kind of unfolded is.
Speaker 2:I went back but yet again I was very intentional and I remember I sat down with the individual that became my boss and I told him I said I, if I, you know, in this job, I will work really, really hard for you. I said I also have the time I think a seven-year-old at home so if he gets sick, like I need to leave it, whatever time I need to leave or I need to be able to have the flexibility. So it was that time he said the flexibility is the number one thing to me. I said and if I can't figure out a way to make that work, this can't happen for me. And he was amazing. He's like absolutely, we'll make it work. And we, I think, had an amazing working relationship. I brought my whole being to that job because I loved it, like I felt like I was wired for that, and so I was kind of feeling like I was firing all cylinders. I had this great job like family life's going well with my son and my husband, like we were really enjoying life. So I know that I've kind of talked this whole time about like, oh, I've had a really good life and been happy. And yes, that is true.
Speaker 2:And there was something else going on within our family that at the time we didn't really talk about it because there was a lot of shame and stigma. And that was with my younger brother and the story there is that he had struggled with addiction starting in his teenage years and I was the older sister and I also have a younger sister, so he's a middle child and in spite of him trying to get help and you know my parents trying to help him as best they could it was just this, this disease, but it was this thing. We just did not know how to navigate. So our coping mechanism was to kind of not really talk about it and kind of go on like life, life is just going to keep going forward and he's struggling and but hopefully he'll get better. And we didn't really understand that disease. We really didn't. And again, this was back in the eighties and nineties where addiction was still largely seen as a moral failure, and so there was just all this shame and stigma that was covering that up. So as I was building my career, this was kind of going on with our family and it was when I was at this co-working space that things were really going really well for me, professionally and with my own new family that my brother's addiction was really spiraling and he was not well at all, and, unfortunately, in 2017, we actually lost him to an accidental overdose, and that was part of my story. That was unfolding and obviously horrible experience, and what it did, though, is at the time, I didn't know it it started sparking something in me that would eventually become this business that I've now created.
Speaker 2:So, as part of, I'm sure, as part of, like, my grief process, when I got to that moment and I looked at what had happened and I thought, how did we, as a family, for 30 years kind of step through this and not get the help that something like this needed, cause we didn't know where to go? We did, like I said, we didn't know how to navigate it, so we just we tried to survive and we just tried to hope. We hope that things would get better, and, um, and he even tried to go to you know treatment, and, in spite of him being able to seek help, he still wasn't able to, um, escape his disease and find that long-term recovery. So that was really eating me up inside, like, could we have done something different? This is where all the couldas, the wouldas and the shouldas come up and if you don't work through those, they keep you stuck.
Speaker 2:And I was starting to realize, like in my grief that was pulling me down and I thought I need to focus more on not what could have and what should have been, but like how do I move through this stage to get to more of a hopeful state? And through that process, like there was the seed planted in me that that I was starting to be called to do this work with families and I was kind of like, yeah, god, I don't, I don't know what you're doing here, but it was like I've just spent 30 years trying to understand this disease in my own family and look how that ended and now you want me to go kind of do this work. But there really truly was, I think, in my grief process and in my wrestling there was this concept of being like broken open and said there's one of my favorite books. It's called the second mountain and the author, david Brooks, talks about like in our lives we will have things that that come at us, and sometimes we'll be on mountain peaks and sometimes we'll be in the Valley, but sometimes, when life comes at a sideways, it throws us into the Valley. And he said there's two types of people. They can either be broken or they can be broke open.
Speaker 2:And I think in that moment, like I was kind of broken open, didn't know what that looked like, didn't know what that was. But in my in those stages, like I wanted to find out, like there's got to be a better way for people to navigate through this and people that can help families and that's not to say there weren't solutions out there, but they just went for whatever reason, weren't being presented to us, they weren't in front of us as a logical solution. So I kind of went looking for that and I started to find people that were doing this work. I started to learn about evidence-based ways that were helping families have better outcomes, and at the heart of it all was love and compassion. And I think in our experience we had been taught like you have to kind of just keep your arms distance, you need to just wait until they're ready to get help. And those were very harmful narratives. Those were actually preventing me from being in relationship with my brother, but I didn't know any other way.
Speaker 2:And so when I started finding about about these principles and I started talking to people and sharing my story, like there was a sense of being on fire about it, like the more I actually finally opened up and shared my story, it allowed me to connect with other people in their pain, like in their moment of, like I have a mother or I have a brother or I have a sister, like I get it. And so I think I'm sure a lot of people like listening to this know that when we, when we connect with somebody in our pain and struggle, it bonds us, like we get it. And so I just kind of followed that energy. And I've always had a mentor that's just follow, follow the excitement, follow the energy. And I started following that and I realized like, oh, my goodness, I think this is the work that I meant to do.
Speaker 2:But then again all that stuff came in like well, you don't know what you're doing and you didn't go to school for this and you're not a therapist, you know all of the things and um, but yet still I just I got some really wise teaching from one of my mentors that said look into this work, go back and get these certifications, you know, do the work, cause it was very important to me.
Speaker 2:Yes, I had the lived experience and that allows me to speak from that perspective and connect with people.
Speaker 2:But in this work, like we are literally, you know, life and death, like addiction, is a progressive and fatal disease. People die from this daily, and so it was really important for me to go back and get the credentials and certifications in order to do this work. So I started doing that and I was still working at the co-working space, but I love, but I said like I think I have to go. I think I have to go do this work and actually my last day of work with them was like February 28th 2020. And then we know what happened right A couple of weeks later, we walked into a pandemic and I launched my, officially launched my business in April 2020. And I mean, if you, if I look back at that now, I kind of think that was really again an opportunity to start to be able to connect with people and start to coach them through really difficult situations. And we saw the rates of addiction skyrocketed during COVID, like we saw the rates of mental health just skyrocket.
Speaker 1:So, looking back at actually You're isolating people right Like you're isolated in your own space. You're not able to get out, You're not able to get sunshine, right.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:All the stuff that we were not accessible to, it had completely been cut off from yes, and so it's no wonder that you saw this increase in spike and people turning to specific addictions to overcome, yeah to like, yeah, be, and, and. For a lot of us, like for me at that time in life, it was just me and the dogs, just me and the dogs, yeah.
Speaker 2:There's so much isolation, and we know that. We know that addiction thrives in isolation, which is why we saw that. So so what I've done is um, it was really important to me to speak to the family members and the friends, the people that have a loved one that's struggling. To provide room for the family, a way to learn about this disease, to navigate it with love and compassion, to use evidence-based tactics that show they work, to get rid of the harmful narratives that keep us from being in relationship with our loved one. You know, there's a lot of work that needs to be done in terms of setting healthy boundaries, because we can't we can't not look at the harmful behaviors that we have to protect ourselves to back to this concept of emotionally safe and a lot of cases for people dealing with addiction, physically safe. So so, yeah, that was the time I launched my coaching and consulting company, and now I've been doing that for five years actually hit my five-year mark in April, oh, my.
Speaker 2:God, I know, and I am like, wow, god, like this is amazing. You know, it's all his work for me and I just like he keeps bringing me the families, like families that need to heal, and I won't lie, it's hard work. Like there are days, I think, you know, when you start to question am I, am I really cut out for this Right, like this is this hard stuff and I need to stay well emotionally, well for myself and my own family, and so it really is a balance. And yet that's, I think, where the work that I've been able to do like set my own values, set my boundaries, say yes to the right things, no to the right things have really helped me navigate this stage of my life.
Speaker 1:Lori, I am speechless right now. Like when you were sharing that, I, I don't. I wasn't quite sure what to expect when you were going to start talking about your transition from one baby business to the other baby business, and I'm floored seriously. Like I, I, I found myself like one, getting very emotional, thinking about just the trauma that that must have, like, just all of a sudden spurred for you, for your family. Like it's wild, it really is.
Speaker 1:But out of that came this absolutely beautiful business of yours to be able to, through your faith as well, serve in such an incredible way. And I hate to say it, but because of where we're at in life and going back to what we were talking about before, the exposure that we have to social media and what people put out on social media versus the realities of what's actually happening behind the cell phone or behind the camera, right, your service is needed desperately and I don't think it's going to go away for a very, very, very long time, unfortunately. But I'm sure a mission of yours is I think you're yeah to ensure that, like you, can stop things from unraveling so much so, or for the ball to like roll so fastly down the hill that it can't even stop and it crashes right, and so it's so yeah yeah, go ahead.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's, you're right. No, it's all about how do you step in and be able to maintain that relationship with your loved one, cause I'll tell a lot of my family members like if the worst thing were to happen in this disease one of the worst things is death. Could you look back and know that you loved him or her as best as you possibly could and not to have the regrets? And I think that you know that was part of my story. Unfortunately, my brother and I were not in a good place when he regrets, and I think that was part of my story. Unfortunately, my brother and I were not in a good place when he passed, and so a big part of my grieving process was having to come to terms with how I showed up or didn't show up. And again, that ties back into was I living in the values that were important to me? Had I taken the time to really figure out what those were? And part of my coping behavior was to like ignore and walk away. And yet I realize now, I know now, based on the work that I do with families and the research I've done and the training I've done, is that when we can find that space where we can honor our own values and show up for somebody that we love and set those healthy boundaries, like there is a way forward through that we don't have to like, like you said, sit back and just wait for things to come, you know, and and and crash down and in some cases they might like that's the reality of this messy world that we live in, and there's a lot of people carrying a lot of trauma and a lot of grief, and so it is.
Speaker 2:It is something that I think is needed, will be needed, and you know, it's kind of funny when people ask me you know how's business? And I always say, well, good news, bad news. You know, I've come up working with a lot of people, which is great for my business, but also it's sad because we have a lot of families that are in need. Great for my business, but also it's sad because we have a lot of families that are in need and yet I think it is one of the things that I've seen just in this family recovery space is it is growing, and I love that, and I also serve on the board of a local nonprofit here called Thrive, family Recovery Resources, and they're doing amazing work in this space for families that need the mentorship and they need support groups and we need to help people in these families navigate ethical treatment, like there's so many components of managing this disease and and you know, we have this in place for all the other diseases we know how to navigate and manage cancer and there's support groups and we do this for heart disease and diabetes and all of these things.
Speaker 2:But one of the things that people say in the addiction and recovery circles is that when somebody has addiction, nobody shows up on your doorstep with a hot dish right or nobody sets up a caring bridge to help you figure out how you're going to get somebody to their intensive outpatient treatment. It's usually done within the family because the families, like we're the first responders. They're either living with us or we're connected with them on a regular basis. So we as families really need to know how to manage that in a way that helps our person and that also helps us like keeps us sane and keeps us safe. Wow.
Speaker 1:The first responder thing to me is just it's it's like mission critical, right, and so like if, if you as the first responder, are equipped in the right way and the undertow of that is leading with love and compassion, think about the possibilities and I mean that in like a heartfelt way, like imagine the possibilities of like shifting narrative. Oh, my word.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:My word.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Seriously, you mentioned something that I think is is important, that I'm I'm pretty sure the people who are listening right now are curious about this too. You're in this space. That is just this space. That is just. It's tough, like for lack of better words. It's so tough and you, I'm sure, take on this mental load of what is being shared to you. How do you?
Speaker 2:how, like, how do you care for yourself and nurture yourself through all of that? Yeah, yes, um. So thankfully, I've recognized that I have to do that. Um cause there's a pretty high burnout, I think, in this work. Um like, first of all, it is knowing that I have to take care of myself spiritually, emotionally and physically. So what that means for me, you know. Physically, I am making sure I'm getting lots of movement throughout my week. I am eating well as much as I can. Just, you know all of those things throughout the day. Am I drinking enough water? No, probably not. I need to do better with that. But just making sure, like I'm taking care of myself, I'm going to my doctor's appointments when I need to go to my doctor's appointments, like I speak about all this stuff to my clients. So I better be practicing what I'm so physically well is really important, um, emotionally, like I have my own therapist, I have my own, you know. Um, I'm working with a business coach right now so that I can be like emotionally well in my business mindset. That's very important to me.
Speaker 2:I do a lot, a lot of reading. I do listen to a lot of podcasts, but then I sometimes I just give myself space to. One of the things that I'm trying to practice right now is like pausing before I go to the next thing, because, like I mentioned earlier, I've always been this high productive how much can I get done? Go, go, go, go to the next thing. And so now I intentionally, will carve out space in my day to make that transition, and maybe it's only a couple of minutes. So maybe after we get off this call, I'm just sitting here, I'm taking a couple of breaths and I'm like having great gratitude for this amazing conversation that we just had before I move on to the next thing. So that's one of the ways that I'm keeping myself emotionally well and then spiritually, I mean, goodness, if anything, this work has really refined my faith and it's really, um, like in a good way, forced me into a deeper relationship, um, with Jesus, because, like I couldn't, I couldn't do this work, I don't think, if I didn't have that for me personally.
Speaker 2:So you know it's my morning devotional time, it's being in a Bible study with other believers, it is pulling in those girlfriends that I know are my like 2 am friends that I can call with anything, and so I'm very intentional about it because I think I have to be because, yeah, there are the days where I'm like gosh, I don't like, am I the imposter syndrome right? Like am I equipped to do this work? And it feels really heavy. And yet I know in my core like this is what I'm supposed to be doing and I will keep doing this as long as you know it. That's what I'm supposed to do. But, yeah, it's. But I love it too, like it lights me. I love it Like when I I talked with a family earlier this week and they just were like you know, not because we had that information and knowledge about how to step through this Like we were.
Speaker 2:The trust wasn't broken in the family and we were able to get back on track when this happened. And it just like that that matters the most to me to see that these families are being restored, generational curses are being broken. They truly are, and that's pretty. Um. Again, it's like it's not about me. This is about the work that's being done in these families and the families are doing all the work. I'm just kind of helping guide them through it you're the facilitator, you're like the moderator the facilitator.
Speaker 2:That's right, I do. I do a lot of moderation.
Speaker 1:You're like all right, okay, we gotta we're gonna get you know, just kind of keep like this. All right, and on to the next part. I gotta do.
Speaker 2:I have to do a lot of that. Yes, definitely. So, you know, and I'm I'm really I'm so grateful for, like all the people and the partners that I work with, like I work closely with a lot of therapists and interventionists, and like it's a it's a whole team of people like this. There's all these people out there that we didn't know about as a family, and so I want to make sure that families anybody listening like that has somebody who's been impacted by addiction or if they're going through like those first stages of recovery. There are so many amazing resources out there, um, to help.
Speaker 1:So, in in the context of what you're doing, are you kind of covering all bases then with what diseases look like addiction, you know, alcohol, drugs, narcotics, like. So my knowledge goes.
Speaker 2:My knowledge goes deep with, like, the substances, because a lot of these principles that I know can also be applied to mental health behaviors. They can be applied to other addictions such as, you know, gambling, hoarding, shopping, all those you know, eating disorders, all those kind of process addictions. But my, my knowledge, educational knowledge, goes deeper into the substance space, because so that's a really important part of knowing, like, okay, is your person struggling with alcohol versus fentanyl versus heroin or marijuana, all those things? And then my focus really is kind of a couple of things. One it's when somebody is struggling in an active addiction, okay, how can their family, whether it's their spouse, their kids, what they don't, partner whatever, come alongside them in a way that is intervening with love and compassion and boundaries? And so, to put it more simply, how do you help the family member stop the nagging, the shaming, the pleading and the guilting and step into a different mind space which is going to have probably a better impact on the relationship, which ultimately hopefully allows that person to accept an invitation to get support. It also helps with the family member's own wellbeing, because a big part of this work is not just getting your person help. That's a huge part of it.
Speaker 2:But also, how do I going back to the values, how do I show up in a way that's important for me, that's important to the other people in my family, that's important to my friends and and you know, people at work, like we need to be, we need to become whole in this process too.
Speaker 2:So everybody's kind of on the on a similar journey. So I focus on that part and then, once somebody is has found some treatment. So I do a lot of work with a women's sober home here in St Paul called Lion House, brownstone, and we have people come into that place. I'm doing a lot of family work, and so a large part of the work that I do, not only with them but also through my coaching practice and other families, is helping people navigate that first year of recovery, because the first year of recovery has the highest chance of recurrence, and so we want to make sure that we are managing that, we are walking through that, we are reimagining what family celebrations look like. We are, you know, making sure that we're restoring connections and communications and navigating through that first year. So that's it. Those are kind of the two main focuses of how I work.
Speaker 1:It's incredible. It really is Now in terms of your family dynamic. Like you, your husband and your son, as you were making the transition into this space. What did that look like for some of the ebbs and flows with the family dynamic, for all of you?
Speaker 2:with the family dynamic for all of you. Yeah Well, my husband has always been 110% support of whatever I do, so he was like, yeah, his, his biggest thing is like one of the questions you have, like, how do you, how do you keep doing this work Like, is this triggering, like? But you know, just, I think, watching out for my own wellbeing, because he's the one who sees, you know, what I, you know, am carrying or what I'm stepping through, and so I think that's probably his biggest concern. But he's like so supportive in that. And my son heard to know he's a 16 year old teenage boy, so he's got his own things. But no, him too.
Speaker 2:I mean, he knows, he knows about the work I I do and, um, I think like it's you know, it's been part of his story too. Like he knows that we have this history of substance use in the family and we know that. You know, there's no gene that passes this on, but there's genetic predispositions, so that a lot of the work I do with families is like let's take a look at your family tree, let's take a look at generationally what's happened here, because usually it doesn't, it doesn't start with, like, the person sitting in front of you. This has been generations of problematic behavior, and so a lot of that can be learned. A lot of that is passed down.
Speaker 1:Wow, wow, wow, wow. It's so interesting to hear that, because the narrative that I have always otherwise had in my head is that there's sort specific things within our genes that might carry from one generation to the next, where this, this, could become a prevalent circumstance, and in that yeah. Yeah, wow.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. So I think if anything you know, it's really on this topic alone. Allows us to be kind of open and honest about, you know, just the, the reality of the world we live in and the, just the awareness around mental health. And we see, you know, we see a lot of you know, co-occurring disorders with substance use and mental health. So just being able to have like those open and honest conversations and, um, you know, it's part of our part of our family story, is part of a lot of family stories. But how do you recognize the work that maybe needs to be done to, to, to break, to break that, that cycle and to step into a new place of um, new, new patterns and behaviors that are really going to serve your current generation and future generations as well?
Speaker 1:Hmm, so we've. We've talked about some of the ebbs and flows that you have had through your first baby business and your, your now your second baby business, and the impact that you're making. I'm curious it doesn't come like I talk a lot about peaks and valleys that we experience, and I'm curious if you may have already shared what, like your darkest moment, had been through all of this. But if you haven't, are you willing to step into that space and share a little bit more and then how you worked through it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, I think that losing my brother was absolutely the darkest moment, but there were multiple moments leading up to that, um, and I think some of the even some of the the darkest moments even came after he passed, like having to reflect back on, oh, that day that I should have gone over there and I didn't because I was angry at him, or the conversation that erupted into a huge fight where we didn't talk for a few weeks. Those are the things that I can never go back and address with him. At least right, thank goodness for therapy with him. At least right, thank goodness for therapy. But, um, those, I think, were the really hard things that I knew I couldn't say stay stuck in. And I see these these are like very real things that I see in other people's relationships too. So I mean, working through that was was a lot of therapy, because up to the point, like up until the point that we had him, I wasn't processing that with anybody. I was maybe talking about my struggles with my, my husband and, you know, once in a while we would talk about it as a family. But, looking back from my perspectives, probably not as much as we could have or should have, but again giving herself grace there, cause we didn't know any better, we did not know how to step through that.
Speaker 2:So, um, I think that it was really important for me to acknowledge that the trauma that I went through and you know, I say this to all families if you've ever had addiction in your family, you have experienced trauma, and that can look different for different people. Like we know that trauma impacts people differently. What's like really traumatic for one person may not be as bad as the other, but on some level, when you've stepped through that in your family, it impacts you and it impacts your relationships in many different ways. And so if you're not getting the help for that that's one thing I always encourage people please, at least you know, go talk to somebody. It doesn't have to be a therapist, but maybe just even a good friend or another family member to process through some of that. Finding the set, finding the safe space, finding those those safe people that you know you can process with, I think is a really big part of it.
Speaker 1:Lori, oh, it's a heavy. It's a heavy topic, it really is, and I'm just florida at your capability to one go. This is what. What is happening here isn't happening to me directly anymore, right like I've I've had my experience which is why I'm doing what I'm doing right now.
Speaker 1:I want to ensure that other families don't go through the experiences that we had gone through as a family, and I'm just the thing that keeps coming to mind for me is how you have set a tone and boundary for yourself.
Speaker 1:Like I understand that I can't go to my husband or my son and talk through some of these things, like that's where the therapy comes in, and having the, the couple of go-to girlfriends as well as sort of that safe space to be able to go. Okay, I, spiritually speaking, like these are the people I need right now to just kind of work through some of the stuff that otherwise might be coming up and having conversations with other families, other families that are going through this. It's I can't even imagine that like tug and pull that happens for you, but how you literally are like nope, I understand how important it is for me to have therapy, to to know moving my body and, um, how, how I'm taking care of my body is so important in all of this mentally, physically vital, if I'm going to be able to show up in the best way possible and serve the people that are in front of me. Practicing what you preach is so cool.
Speaker 1:That's so cool and, like you, know, in some ways, like a role model for the people who are sitting in front of you.
Speaker 1:It's so cool people who are sitting in front of you, it's so cool, and so I mean it's like it's cool, it's it's humbling, it's sad, it's all of those different like adjectives, so to speak, but I'm very, very thankful for you sharing all that you've gone through the work and the mission that you have to continue to serve families, who who have individuals in their lives that are going through addiction. It's so incredible and I would have never thought like thank you, yeah, that there wasn't like true, good, proper resources out there and how. Also, another thing that's coming to mind is that you're going I I can't do this work solely by myself. I understand that I've got to have people and kind of go to resources in my tool belt to go okay, here is how I can truly support you, but I also know that having a conversation with this person and this person and this person are going to help set you in the right trajectory. It's that village of support is so crucial.
Speaker 2:That has been crucial for me. That has been crucial for me and I think too just to go back to the resources, because I think this is a really important point there is no one size fits all model out there for in terms of like, how we as individuals get support and help, and what I was finding is that the things that that were out there one either. I didn't know about them. That was a big part of it. So I've always said, like there's a marketing problem here with with these solutions, like we didn't know about them, didn't know where to go and, honestly, our shame and stigma kept us hidden.
Speaker 2:So there were resources out there. I mean, there's been counselors and therapists that have been around for a long time. We probably knew that, but you know, in our hesitancy, we're maybe scared to to step into that. But there are support groups, there are resources, and I think it's so important for people that are on this journey to find the ones that work for you and to make sure that these solutions are rooted in, you know, evidence-based practices, research that has proven that these methodologies are useful, and then they're like learning the tools and skills in order to know how to do that. So I think that that's really important. So it can be really helpful to find somebody you trust like whether it's a coach like me, whether it's a therapist, whether it's an interventionist or people you know, treatment centers that work in the space to say here are the things that exist, and then allowing people the permission to figure out what works for them.
Speaker 1:Some people.
Speaker 2:Some family members will go to three meetings a week, and that's perfectly okay for them. Other family members are like I don't want to do any meetings, I just want to go talk one-on-one with somebody, because that's what works for them. So I really honor that. In my practice, too, is I'll offer up here's like all the solutions that I know and I've learned about and that I trust and that I recommend. Now the work that you have to do is go figure out what's going to make most sense for you. I mean, it's just like a wellness program. What I do to stay well is probably different than what you do to stay well.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:And that's great because we're accomplishing what we need to accomplish for ourselves, and so I very much see the family recovery journey playing out that same way.
Speaker 1:So, lori, when in my previous life, as I like to call it which I'm not far removed from that, but just bear with me as I kind of talk through this and this will be like my next question for you so in my previous life I was in mortgage lending, in having, in having my daughter, that it was like my mini version of trauma and going something is not working here, like something with what I'm doing and trying to harmonize that with being a new mom. Something isn't working right. So I decided to pivot and go a different direction and you know you and I can talk off air about the rest of that. But when I was in the practice of doing mortgage, that was my business right, I had. There was this. There was sort of this trajectory of how everything went right, like a linear thing, like first, first, first the client would typically get connected with a realtor, right, and then they would.
Speaker 1:Really it should have been the other way around, in my humble opinion like figure out what your finances are first. Then you go and look at the home, because you understand what your parameters are, put an offer in on the house. The next additional resource in all of that is you. You get everything underwritten, you link up with an insurance agent to have insurance on the property and you have title clearance as well. So you have all of these game players in this mix, right, and so trying to do it backwards for a client isn't going to make sense. What I'm getting at in the context of what you do is can you give us sort of like this lineage of what it would look like for a family, like, would they have a conversation with you first? Are you sort of like that first runner up in what the lineage of conversations are? Does that make sense? Because you?
Speaker 2:yeah, a lot about the resources and how there's.
Speaker 1:You know there's a couple different components to what all of this can look like in order to kind of come around to the other side of this. But I'm trying to like set the listeners up for success in where you fit in the grand scheme of all of it.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So here's what happens is usually, when people come to me, they have been walking this path for a while, and when I say a while, I mean literally decades. I mean I've. When people come to me, they have been walking this path for a while, and when I say a while, I mean literally decades. I mean I've seen people come to me like my person's struggling for 20 years, and they're usually at a place where they're pretty dysregulated themselves. So they're they're coming to me saying I need to help my person. I need to help my person, I need to help my person, yes, and we gotta got to help you too, because I am the supporter, the cheerleader, the encourager, the hope giver for that person to say like, yes, we're going to get there, but we've got to get you well first. Like you're so emotionally dysregulated You're probably not working. You know a wellness plan that is serving you. So a big part of that is helping people understand like you have to take care of you first and then we're going to move on and start this work. That's not to say that we're going to be like here's some resources for your person and I have to evaluate the situation, like, is this a situation where there's, you know, maybe are we dealing with. If this person doesn't stop using, or if they're using, really dangerous drugs they could die. Then that might be a situation where you know we have an intervention and go through that process and we speak differently about interventions because I know that conjures up a lot of different images for a lot of different people. But the approach I take is very, very invitational, no surprises, very compassionate, like how do we restore the whole family? But so there's that. But then there are people that are like I just don't know how to do this anymore. I don't know how to show up, I don't know how to communicate with them, or communication feels strained. So that's where I can start working with somebody to help them with that.
Speaker 2:And this is one of my favorite stories. But a lot of people will say well, I'm not even talking to my person. I was once working with a mom who came to me and her person was living on the streets and using some really dangerous drugs. And what happened is that she was working with me and she said because if I do see my person again, I want to be able to be in a better place with communication than I have been in the past. So this mom knew that she had to change her way of behavior if she even had a chance to be interacting with her person. So what happened is her person got pulled into jail and they were able to then start communicating. And this was quite a few years ago. But now to this date, that person has found recovery and is living a really amazing life.
Speaker 2:And it was because that mom had the foresight to think like how do I need to show up differently, realizing like I can't, you know, we know, we know like the the philosophies of you didn't, didn't cure it, you know, or didn't cause it, can't control it, can't cure it, but we can control our own behaviors. And so that's a big part of like when people, if people are interested in understanding that they have to look at their own behaviors and figure out like I've probably in some ways shown up in ways that haven't been helpful or supportive or I just don't know how to do that. That's the work that we start embarking on. So that's one big piece, I think the other is and I mentioned this already for people that have somebody who have found treatment but they're still looking for some support, kind of that longer. Like okay, what's the trajectory of where our family is going? Because often the first thing is like sometimes and we mistakenly thought this like oh, our person's going to go to treatment and then they're going to be great, wonderful, we're going to get our person back, everything's going to be okay.
Speaker 2:And the reality is is like treatment is kind of just the first, first start, and we also know that sometimes people have to go to multiple treatments before they find that long-term recovery. And so this is a journey. This, you know, addiction is a lifelong disease. It's progressive and fatal disease. So showing up as a family to say, like how are we going to manage this in a way that keeps us stable and in relationship with one another? What are the hard things we got to talk about, like that's how I can help the families. To like keep, keep our family from fragmenting.
Speaker 1:Um, past a point of you know, wow, I guess yeah, no, that's, it's so good and and thank you for putting that into context um, for the listeners to just understand, like, where is it that you kind of interject or inject, is probably the the best way to like inject what your knowledge and expertise is and how you can best serve serve families who are going through these crises.
Speaker 1:So thank you. That was super helpful for me. Something that came to mind and and maybe we can do some kind of riffing on this but do you find ties between, like, what you're doing in serving families and then how you operate your business and then how you show up in your household as well?
Speaker 2:Ooh, that's a big question. Um, okay, let me try to break that down in terms of the ties. Well, yes, and so here's what's really interesting is and I kind of sometimes joke with this about my husband, but with my husband, like I'm sitting all day talking to families about positive communication skills and how do we set healthy boundaries and practicing the pause and like all these really great tools to help them with their communications within their families, and then in my own humanness, I'll get upset or triggered by something and maybe I'll say something that you know maybe didn't have the right tone to it, or I'll shut down or all of these behaviors that I'm trying to fix in other families. I always say it's hardest in your own, but this, I also think this work has been really good for me as a parent. Like I all the all this, this work that I do with families, like I can look at that and say how do I, how can I use this approach or this communication skill to interact better with my husband or with my parents or with my son? I mean, all of these things I'm practicing, I'm like I'm I'm learning too right, we're all human, and so I have realized and learned that over time.
Speaker 2:I always like to say practice doesn't make perfect, practice makes permanent, and so I have realized that as I've done this work. I think maybe they would disagree, but I think it's made me a better communicator as a wife, as a mother, as a sister and as a daughter, um to as we kind of navigate through this messy life. So that's been kind of fun for me. But then I'm also kind of hard on myself, like, oh, I didn't use that skill or I messed it up. But then that's where the grace comes in. That's another thing that I say to my clients, like we have to find grace for one another and we have to find grace for ourselves and know that each day we've got a new day to try this and and to just keep going. So I use a lot of, a lot of my coaching on myself and with my family, whether or not they like that. But I think that's probably been one of the strongest connections that I've seen.
Speaker 1:Yes, that humanism part of it You've mentioned that a couple times like we're all human in this and it doesn't come without its mistakes. And if we want to take it a step further, just both of us being, um, you know faith as a foundation and christian women, like we can try our absolute best to like live by how jesus did right, like love, like always through love. Um, but because we are humans and and this is just the reality, like we are, we're gonna fail. We're gonna fail, we're gonna say we're gonna have our hiccups, we're gonna hit our speed bumps, sometimes big, sometimes small, but to allow ourself grace and and I think something that's kind of important too is like, how do we, how do we just allow the grace to happen but also go? How can I, just in my personal life, ensure that this isn't a repetitive circumstance that is happening right?
Speaker 1:Um, practice practice makes perfect versus practice makes permanent is like one of my like I've had so many gold nuggets, lori, but like that's one of my like, oh, I'm taking that one and I'm putting it in my pocket and we're gonna use that with the kiddos and how they show up in what sports and every activities. All of that looks like, oh my gosh, that is so, so good, lori. We're not quite done yet, but we're going to start to land the plane. As I like to say, and almost all of us are going to start to land the plane, I could literally talk to you for hours, but for everybody who's listening, we'll just we'll start to land the plane. So what is a piece of advice that you would give a younger version of yourself, knowing all that you know here and now?
Speaker 2:version of yourself, knowing all that you know here and now. Also, maybe I'll sound repetitive and it comes no surprise, but it really is like defining your values, just taking the time to go through that exercise and figure out, like, what is it that I want to stand for? When people think of Lori Healy, what are the things that I want them to remember about me? I think that's really important. One of the one of the just a quick thing that exercises I'll do with people is imagine your 90th birthday party and you have all your family and friends there and what are the words that you'd want them to say about you? You know.
Speaker 2:So when I go back to my value list, like I want people to say like, oh, she was, like she loved adventure, she loved doing different things, she loved taking risk. Or you know what? She was always present with her family. She made sure that was really important to her. And like, the work she did was really important and it helped you know other family, those are the things I want people to say. So I think defining your values early on in life, especially as people are launching, into adulthood.
Speaker 1:I think is super important. Curious if that advice carries through into my next question, which is what's a piece of advice that you would give a woman who's listening right now, who's teetering or maybe nibbling on the edges of entrepreneurship? What is the advice that you would give them?
Speaker 2:I think I would say approach it from an abundance mindset. So I think we can get caught up in our own stories of like, oh, what's this is going to happen, and what if that happens, and what if I fail, and we create these barriers for ourselves when we haven't even started. So I would say, flip it and ask yourself the question what's the best that could happen? What's the best that could happen? And operate from that place, knowing that you're going to have to obviously manage the what ifs. That's just the reality. But to be open to that, what could be exciting about this risk that I take? What are the things that could happen that I haven't even imagined yet?
Speaker 1:Lori, if you had a microphone there. I would tell you to do the mic drop, because that was so good.
Speaker 2:You're funny. That's what I'd say, though I think it's true. Like we our mindset, we get, we tell ourselves these stories that aren't even true, and usually they're fatalistic and horrible. And I don't know, I think maybe that's part of like a mom protective measure, like we just imagine the worst, because if we think, if that actually happens, then I'll be prepared to deal with it, but I think that I just don't think that does us a service. I think we have, to like operate from a place of abundance, and I'm I'm learning to do that more and more too.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you and I both were. We're all many of us are kind of rolling in the same boat, same direction, right In terms of that? Yeah, I think that that's just absolutely beautiful advice. A couple more questions and then we can wrap up. So who would be a good connection for you in this current moment?
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know I was thinking about that. Um, maybe this is going to sound right, but I feel like I'd want to flip it and be like who can I be a good connection for? Because I really truly do want to help those people. That kind of feel like if you're somebody who is just like I don't know what to do next, Like that's who I want to connect with, Cause I just want to get them on the right path, Even if it's not working with me. Like I want to say, like here's some of my favorite books, or go check this out or talk with this person. Um, I think that's probably most meaningful to me right now. Like I feel pretty. I feel pretty well resourced.
Speaker 1:Yeah, amazing, what an incredible answer. So nice. Well, how can people get connected to you then, if that is um?
Speaker 2:yeah, I mean my website's, lauriehealycom. I do a 30 minute consult with people to just get them on their next path and um figure out what that looks like, so that's probably the very best way to find me. I'm on LinkedIn too. People are on LinkedIn. That's usually the platform I spend the most amount of time on. I know you mentioned Instagram was yours, but I like LinkedIn, Um, yeah.
Speaker 1:Wonderful. I will be sure to drop all of that information into the show notes. There were a couple other resources that you had thrown out and through our interview, so I'm going to make sure to drop those into the show notes for the individuals who are listening as well. Lori, thank you from the bottom of my heart.
Speaker 1:Yeah, thank you this was so incredible. Thank you for sharing your story. Thank you for um all of the work and how you are serving families in a in a very, very vulnerable and tough place. It's just incredible to hear how, how you got to that, and then the work and the mission that you have. It's incredible, truly.
Speaker 2:Oh, thank you. Thank you. I thought of one connections. Here's the, here's the thing truly Like, I think if there are people that want to do this work and don't know how or don't know where to start because I think there's a lot of people just like me who have lived out this story and are looking for more purpose-driven I hear that a lot. I have a lot of people reach out to me and be like how did you make this change? Like you went from startup technology into this, and so if there are people that want to truly do this work, like I'd love to connect with them, because we need more people doing this work we really do. That's a big one.
Speaker 1:I'm so glad that you caught that. You caught it Just remembered Yep caught that. You caught it, just remembered, yep, before we hung up. Yeah, I'll be sure to add that into the show notes as well. Lori, I hope that you have an amazing day. Thank you for all that you do, so glad that I got to see you again and just hear more of your story and share that with the listeners. You are incredible oh, thank you thank you, thank you.
Speaker 2:Thanks for making the space for us to do this. I think it's really important.
Speaker 1:Oh, my, my pleasure, and you want to talk about, you know, lighting. Lighting a fire within like this is something I'm so passionate about is like kind of reaching the edges of motherhood and entrepreneurship and then how they overlap. It's the edges of motherhood and entrepreneurship and then how they overlap it's. It's not a fun place to be in sometimes, but it's also comes with really incredible connections, just like this one, and how we can expand that too. So that's what the mission is.
Speaker 2:Absolutely.
Speaker 1:Thank you. I hope you have a great day Well thank you, kelly.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I hope I get to see you in person again soon. We will, lori.
Speaker 1:We will have a great day.
Speaker 2:All right, thanks, bye-bye.
