Burn-Break&Become Unstoppable B3u
“Welcome to B3U, the podcast where we will always speak our truths by Burning pains of the past, Breaking the broken mindset and Becoming Unstoppable, reclaim power all while walking into our purpose . I’m Bree and if you’re here today, you or someone you love has likely faced the dark reality of abuse. First, let me say this—you are not broken. You are not defined by what happened to you. You are here, and that means there is hope, strength, and a future waiting for you.
Here we will be diving into the journey of healing. We’ll talk about the aftermath of abuse, how to reclaim your voice, and the steps toward true freedom and find your purpose . Whether you’re just beginning to process your experience or you’re deep into your healing journey, this podcast is for you!
Burn-Break&Become Unstoppable B3u
Finding Laughter in Healing
The power of laughter as medicine comes alive in this raw, heartfelt conversation with Vernard Hines, aka "The Laugh Therapist." A 20-year military veteran who served in Iraq, Bernard takes us on his remarkable journey from the edge of suicide to finding purpose through comedy.
Vernard reveals how humor initially masked his trauma before becoming his healing pathway. "All my life I've been funny," he shares, explaining how he was the "barbecue comedian" who made everyone laugh at cookouts. Yet beneath the laughter lay unprocessed war trauma and childhood wounds that eventually brought him to a breaking point. With disarming honesty, Vernard recounts the day he contemplated taking his life—and how an attentive church bishop recognized his pain and mobilized support that saved him.
What makes this conversation truly transformative is Vernard's practical wisdom about daily life with PTSD. He introduces powerful concepts like "closing your tabs"—a metaphor comparing an overwhelmed mind to a computer with too many browser windows open—and explains how reframing his marriage from having a "caregiver" to a "partner in recovery" revolutionized his healing journey. His wife, who knew nothing about the military or PTSD when they met at a comedy club, became his strongest ally by learning about his triggers while he committed to therapy and medication.
Vernard's evolution into The Laugh Therapist happened organically when a friend asked what got him through trauma. Now serving as a veteran spokesperson for suicide awareness, he combines speaking with humor to make difficult conversations about mental health accessible. "God gives us two things: chance and choice," Vernard reflects. "He gives us a chance when we open our eyes in the morning. The choice is what we're going to do with it."
Whether you're battling PTSD, supporting someone who is, or simply interested in the healing power of humor, this conversation offers both inspiration and practical tools. Subscribe now to hear more powerful stories of resilience and transformation.
Hello everyone, Welcome to B3U. I am glad to be here with Mr Bernard Hines, the last service. Thank you so much, sir, for coming on and doing this interview with me. So just tell our viewers a little bit about yourself.
Speaker 2:Thank you for having me. Thank you for having me. Yes, my name is Bernard Hines, aka the Laugh Therapist, but as a therapist y'all, I'm not licensed, I'm just medicated. All right, I'm not licensed, I'm just medicated. I am a comedian, I'm a speaker, I'm a father, I'm a husband and I'm a 20 year seven month four day military. I'm a retired veteran.
Speaker 1:Hey man, thank you for your service.
Speaker 2:Thank you for your service.
Speaker 1:I know what it's like. Yes, yes. So how did we get that?
Speaker 2:How did you become the last therapist? Well, all my life I've been funny to. People have told me that I've been the class clown at 12 and 14. I could memorize Richard Pryor albums. I knew I was an unsupervised child so I knew I knew all Richard Pryor albums. I love comedy. I knew all Richard Pryor albums. I love comedy. I love.
Speaker 2:In the military I was the barbecue comedian. You bring me to the car, to the cookout, we're going to have a good time. But then I learned that all that was hiding my trauma. That was my way of fitting in by making folks laugh when I didn't know how any other way to fit in, when I didn't know how any other way to fit in. Then folks asked me if I wanted to do comedy and I was like no, never thought I could go on stage. Nah, I'm not going to do a comedy. No. Then came back from Iraq, going through trauma from the war, going through a trauma of moving back home and facing childhood traumas and those type things. Um, when I left oklahoma someone told me she said when you get to virginia you need to pick up comedy.
Speaker 2:I'm like man, okay so I came back came back home, came back to chesapeake, virginia well, norfolk. But I came back to chesapeake and went to a church and the pastor said well, what we're not going to do this year, we're not going to bring in a comedian. We're going to find somebody in the church. But before then I had asked God, if you want me to do comedy, show me a sign. That was a sign. Won't he do it? Won't he do it. So that was a sign. Won't he do it, won't he do it. So I went and I auditioned because they want you to audition, make sure you know what you were saying.
Speaker 2:I didn't know anything about comedy Then, no stage presence, didn't know, but I knew life. So as I was doing that, I still was dealing with my PTSD, still dealing with going through a divorce, still dealing with a lot of other things from coming straight from the war, six months retiring after that. So what really happened was I contemplated taking my life. I contemplated taking my life and I couldn't laugh anymore. Nothing was funny, nothing seemed to be going right. So someone on my job. I'll never forget it. Someone on my job. I know the person's name but I'm not gonna breach confidentiality. They they said that there's a comedy contest. I said I know they said it's a comedy class. At the funny bone in the area I said I'm broke as a joke I can't. She said me and my husband are going to show the $250 into your life for you to go to the class.
Speaker 2:Went to the class. That was a life saving moment. I got my laugh back. And a gentleman I was talking to because my name used to be Reverend Peanutbutt and Jelly yeah, see how you laughing. That's how everybody else laughed at me. They're like what Wrapping peanut butter and jelly. So I was brainstorming with a friend of mine. I was like look man, I got to change this name. This name can't go nowhere. So we sit down talking. He says so what got you through your trauma, your PTSD, to where you're at now? Of course, god, god, we knew that. Then I said well, laughter in a therapist. He said, well, why don't you call yourself the life therapist?
Speaker 2:there you go, I was like, wow, and that name can go anywhere, so it. So it has been a journey, it has been a, it has really been a journey. And from now, comedy has turned into speaking with humor, because it allows people to be able to talk about a subject of mental health or PTSD, of veterans and all that other good stuff, and add a little humor into it that make it plausible for them to really receive it. And then USA picked me up to be a veteran spokesperson as a mental health for suicide awareness. We faced a fight. They had a campaign going, so it it has been a plethora of blended family, been a plethora of divorce, been a plethora of kids, all that. And, and as I tell people, ptsd don't care about life, life don't care about PTSD, they are going to collide. Yes, and when they collide, what are you going to do then? And that's when I knew I needed some help. I needed some resources to help me in this role.
Speaker 1:And this is the month of PTSD awareness.
Speaker 2:Yes, it is yes, and we are a beat for you where I am honoring, and this is the month of PTSD awareness. Yes, it is.
Speaker 1:Yes, and we are at B3U where I am honoring, I'm making it Men's Appreciation Month along with PTSD awareness, thank you. And the purpose of these interviews and our interviews today is to be transparent with our audience, because there are many of us that are out there. We're suffering and I tell people you just don't have to, um, be a service member for ptsd correct you know people tend to think when they hear ptsd oh, that's only for people who served in the military I have a daughter who was was shot in a drive-by shooting, suffers from PTSD.
Speaker 1:So we want to get the message and push this message out here, that mental health number one is real, correct, where you have shown us how you have dealt and coped with your PTSD in the moment. You know and again it'd be so many things as veterans and and those are like we have stories for days- for days you know?
Speaker 1:I mean, we could sit here for a a good couple of hours and run down some of the things and trials and the tribulations, um, that we've been through. Is it, uh, during your a little bit deeper into your um, did you ever feel like you were pressured, like I need to hurry up and get over this so I can live my life? Was, did you feel any pressure?
Speaker 2:What was it that drove you to say well, you know what you sounds like, my therapist right there. Let's go a little. Let's go a little deeper. That was. That was her famous word. Well, let's go a little deeper, or well, let's go with that it's only because you know.
Speaker 1:You know, I'm trying there again. I'm about servicing those people in the now.
Speaker 2:Yeah, let's go deep, I'm ready.
Speaker 1:You know how people are saying. I remember when I was single with four children in the military, and I would go to church and they oh baby, wait on God.
Speaker 2:Wait on God.
Speaker 1:He's just like hey, our old baby is going to come to you. Trust, keep your faith in the Lord. But the truth is and, bernardard, I know me and you know this but when you're in that season, you really did not want to hear that that's right, and a caveat to that, a caveat to that we're gonna.
Speaker 2:The day I wanted to take my life, um, I went to church because I knew god. You, you know, I had went to church and my pastor, my bishop, didn't know me from nobody. You know, he knew I had just joined the ministry. I haven't been that long and I was going through things in my life and I I didn't want to die, but I wanted that pain to end that I was going through. So I say you know what, the only way to get this pain to end is to take my life. That's how I felt at that time. And he sits on the corner of at that time he always used to sit on the corner of the pulpit at the service and people just come up and just, you know, conversate. I came up and I told him some of the things I was going through. And if he had just told me, bruh, let's just pray about it and sent me on my way, that was my demise right then, because that was my last straw. What he did was he said hold up. He called two brothers from the church. He said hey, y'all come here, get this young man right here, give him my personal cell phone number. I want y'all to take him over there, talk to him and do not let him leave until you are sure he is okay.
Speaker 2:That is the first time I felt seen since I had been back from Iraq and I think that was like two and a half years. I have been seen that day save my life and that has been over 15 years ago. That day saved my life because I felt seen, even though he was a pastor, even though he was a bishop, even though he knew God. He knew I needed something else also. That's why I tell people you can have God and a therapist, why I tell people you can have God and a therapist. Right, you can have both. So that was a powerful moment, but I still had my struggles. I still had, but I knew what I could turn to for therapy. That's when I started going to therapy. That's when I started going to the groups. That's when I got on medications and start taking my meds.
Speaker 1:And my right.
Speaker 2:And my daughter. At the time she just graduated from Virginia Tech, but at the time she had. She says I'm scared of my dad. I heard her say that. Not that I was violent, but I was zero to a hundred. So I felt like I am taken away from their childhood. I have to go and get help so I can be productive in their life.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:And blessing is my wife. My wife married me, not knowing anything about the military. I went through a divorce and met at the comedy club. She didn't know anything about PTSD, she didn't know anything about the military, but she learned about PTSD real quick Cause you know when you dating, you're dating, you're hiding it, you're trying your best. I don't want you to see that's right, I already got kids. I don't want you to see what else is going on with it, because my grandma will always say love is blind, but marriage is an eye-opener.
Speaker 1:Yes, oh, my, I love grandma. She is so right, she is so right, all right.
Speaker 2:So you know, we went through that and going to the VA. But one thing about my wife she wanted to learn about what was making her husband tick and one day I told my family. I said I don't know why I'm ticked, why I ticked. So we all went to therapy together as a family and my therapist took a 3D model of the brain and showed my family this is where your father and your husband's brain is injured. When she said he has an injury, that changed my whole focus of what it is. Wow. And then they started learning and my wife the VA called her my caregiver.
Speaker 2:My therapist said no, change that wording. She's not your caregiver, she's your partner in recovery. Oh, what's your therapist now? Your best therapist in the world? What's the world in recovery? Oh, what's your therapist now? The best therapist in the world. She used to always tell us to change our wording. That's right. So that's going to be the name of our book Partner in Recovery, because it means I had to do something and she had to do something. She had to learn about the PTSD and my triggers. I had to continue to go to therapy. I had to continue to stay on my meds. I had to continue to, not, I had to continue to be present and not just there. So it made us do things totally different. And I'm telling you that therapist she's not in the VA now, she has her own practice somewhere in Northern Virginia. But the resources that she gave me really, really made me, say, helped me to be where I am now, because she gave me the tools to do the work. She made me have the tools to do the work.
Speaker 1:Put it that way so what can we say to a person who feels like their pain has no meaning? Yet what would you say?
Speaker 2:you have to believe that I will tell that. I didn't believe that my story or what I've been through had meaning. I didn't believe it. It's like because one of the reasons I'm gonna tell you why is because I broke down the word stigma. Because I tell folks, if you want to see stigma, because I tell folks if you want to see stigma, I be stigma.
Speaker 2:Okay, and one of the things in stigma is self stigma that we put on ourself. You know what I'm saying. I'm not good enough. Everything is negative, nothing is going good. Everything I tried, but one of the main ones is what are people going to say about me? We see, growing up, I had an uncle who was a Vietnam veteran, okay, and he used to go to the VA hospital and they used to call him crazy. They used to call him get over there, shut up, you don't know what you're talking about. Oh, every time he come around, oh, he talking crazy. So I was not going to be seen like that. So that hindered me from going to seek help and I would throw self, self stigma on myself. Man, I can't be seen as as crazy. I just retired from the military, I just moved back home and I don't know why everybody think you rich when you move back home that is the.
Speaker 1:That is the biggest myth put on veterans Like oh, military rich money, money.
Speaker 2:Commissary. Commissary, you can go to here, you can go there.
Speaker 2:But that person has to know that, first of all, they matter and, second of all, your story matters. Nobody can want your healing or you getting better, more than you do, more than you. Nobody can want your healing or your uh or you getting better, more than you, more than you. That is, nobody can want that you have to want. I had to learn that I needed to get better or seek help or get these resources for me, so that's what I would share with some. Know in yourself that you matter.
Speaker 1:That's right. How do you protect your peace today? Because every day I tell people, every day it's work for me. Every day I wake up in the morning, I'm talking to myself and I tell people don't stop listening to yourself. Stop listening to yourself. But when you listen to to yourself, that's when you're going oh man, you know, I don't, I don't want to do this, or I don't want nobody to. You know, oh, what if I die? My biggest thing, my ptsd, is fear I lost so many people in my military career.
Speaker 1:Once I left from the military, I separated from my family completely.
Speaker 2:OK.
Speaker 1:And I took my child. I was in an abusive marriage. I took my children. I was like that's it. I got to get out of Philly. I'm going to start a new life to better myself and I want it better for my children. I just, I just cut everybody. So in that time, before I went, I lost my grandmother. That was another reason why I said you know, my grandmother, she was my backbone, she was my everything, even though I was in that Houston.
Speaker 2:Oh, who is that? It's me and my granny. I keep her on my desk.
Speaker 1:I keep her on my desk.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:I have a picture of my granny as well, I keep her in the kitchen because I still hear her telling me how to make those sweet potato pies that I refuse to get a recipe up for. But you know, every when I lost her I was in that abusive marriage I said, okay, that's it. I got to get away from everything and everybody. I went in the military and during that time I've lost aunts, uncles I mean I just nieces. You know I continue to lose, you know. So it's like my biggest. I've seen to the point where some of my sisters, you know, in the military, you know we get that good brother, sister.
Speaker 1:We stick with them for life.
Speaker 2:They have more family than family. That's true.
Speaker 1:That's true so I've had sisters that actually lost children to murder, car accident and the screams and everything and the cries constantly run through my head. So what's my biggest thing now? Fear of losing one of mine okay you know so again and then, being in the military deployment, lost soldiers. So mine is fear. So, every day that I rise, every day that I lay down it's am I going to die? I'm a stroke survivor. Am I going?
Speaker 2:to die.
Speaker 1:Am I going to this, am I going to that, and so if. I keep listening. If we keep listening to those things in our head, we'll never get nowhere.
Speaker 2:Correct.
Speaker 1:The way I combat my demons, so to speak, is I talk to them like look here, okay, today is going to be a good day, I don't care. And of course, as veterans, we suffer from what Body illnesses.
Speaker 2:That's right. Knee hurts, shoulders Back. Yeah, yeah, that's right back. Yeah, top of your gum hurt. Top of your gums hurt.
Speaker 1:Top of your gums hurt my fingernails, everything everything yes, when you are dealing with mental, physical and life is continue to life, I tell people you either go and do one or two things, you either go and lay down and just give up give up right or god gives us two things chance and choice. Okay, got it. He gives us two things chance and choice.
Speaker 2:Okay, got it.
Speaker 1:He gives us a chance when we open our eyes in the morning. That's our chance right there.
Speaker 2:Correct.
Speaker 1:The choice, what we're going to do with it Correct. Are we going to lay in this bed? Are we just going to keep thinking about all the people we lost? Are we going to keep thinking about how much the pain hurts? Are we going to make the choice to get up and do something with what we're given?
Speaker 2:Correct and that, you see, and that's when you ask that question. You know, is like I tell people. I got three people in my head. I got Bernard, christian and Felix. Ok, felix, still in the military, that's the one I can't let come out all the time. Felix is the comedian. He don't care what you think, what you say. So when he says stuff it comes out kind of foul, he sends it to Christian. Christian cleans it up. Okay, he gives it to Bernard, and then Bernard is able to give it to you where you can see.
Speaker 2:So what I used to do is I would allow myself to talk to me. Now I talk to myself. Just like you said get up, let's go. Yep, you want to be depressed, but we're not going to be depressed today. So I had to learn to talk to myself because I have a saying. We have a saying in our house. I met my wife in the comedy club, so we joke 24 seven. If you want to sit in that diaper, go ahead, sit in that diaper, but you know the diaper can be changed.
Speaker 1:That's right.
Speaker 2:Now you can be clean or you can sit in that diaper. You can get diaper rash, you can scream, you can do, do. But that choice is yours and it's not as easy as I'm saying it, because it took us some time to get it takes work, it takes work and what does the bible say?
Speaker 1:the bible said faith without works is dead. Yeah it's dead. We could sit there all day and say I'm believe the god gonna do it. I'm believe the god going to do it. I don't believe the guy going to do it, when you're just sitting there and you're going to do it. You're just sitting there when the guy is going to do it. You have to do the work and sometimes people cannot see because it's too much.
Speaker 2:It is a lot.
Speaker 1:You know I still.
Speaker 2:But you got to take it in small bites. You got to take it in small Because sometimes we want to be, I want to be everything for everybody right now. Can't be, can't be. My wife has a thing. We have a thing in our house I get when I get. Uh, my wife has just learned about being overstimulated. She did not understand about me being overstimulated and now she knows. But one thing we do, we have a thing. We will walk through the house If we just looking stare starry eyed.
Speaker 2:We just said close your tabs. Cause if you think about it, when you are using a computer and you got all them tabs open up that you've been looking at, and now you got a whole lot of tabs on your, on your computer screen, it's slowing down your memory, it's slowing down the functionality of what is meant, meant to do. So you got to close them tabs. That mean close your mind. You can't change this. You can't make this person like you. You can't make this person be in your life. You can't do, you can. Only thing you really can't control is you. And we try to make.
Speaker 2:I ain't gonna say we, I'm gonna talk about me. I try to make everybody understand me. Everybody is not going to understand you, period, point blank. Once I realized I'm talking about even my children, even my mom, even my family. Okay, you can, I can't make you understand this part of me. So what I'm going to do is I still want you in my life, so we just gonna have boundaries. Certain thing we just ain't gonna deal with everything.
Speaker 2:And and to a person I have best friends they know I have ptsd, but they want me around. That's the key. They want me around. So sometimes when I'm over there just sitting in the corner, they be like let little bro go sit down. So it's not like I have to be in that circle to where I got to be. Everything for everybody. It's like no, no, no, I have PTSD, I have a disability. Whether you believe it, whether you understand it, I don't care. I'm sorry because my friends I had a friend say man, if people really knew you, they wouldn't think you had PTS. I said because I don't use the tools now to know when to separate, when to be in the location. When people say man, how can you go to a football game and all them people yelling Cause I'm yelling with them, I'm screaming, and all them people yelling because I'm yelling with them. I'm screaming, we scream, but when I leave I am hyper focused. All these people, Boom, boom, boom. Where does the exit? So that's constantly what we're doing. We're constantly on guard.
Speaker 2:Every single day, every single day.
Speaker 1:Every moment of the day.
Speaker 2:When we go out to restaurants.
Speaker 1:You know, my husband is a military veteran as well, and whenever you know and that's what you say, that's a good point that you made Nobody will understand you. I went to the rush home and I am I'm 54 now Benari, and I will tell you that I just learned who I am.
Speaker 2:OK, yeah.
Speaker 1:Maybe, maybe a year ago now, because now I learned where my trauma all came from and it was just a built up over time. So, uh, I wanted to caveat on something else you said and a woman, a good friend of mine, she told me. She said Brie, how do you? She's a pastor, moena Tucker is their pastor. And she said Brie, how do you eat an elephant? I was like, oh, that's pretty big, I just have to eat that elephant like one piece at a time. And I was like, oh, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. Oh, you know one bite.
Speaker 2:At a time.
Speaker 1:At a time, and I love the analogy of closing those tabs. I love that.
Speaker 2:I love it Look you teaching me today.
Speaker 1:I don't know if y'all getting it out there, but I am picking up everything you putting down. Like they used to say back in the day, track it like a VCR. You know what, though, to say back in the day track it like a.
Speaker 2:VCR. I'm sorry, jim. You know what, though? It's amazing when you said you just found yourself. Do you know?
Speaker 2:I have been doing comedy. I have spoke. I have been doing this for almost 12 to 13 years. The last almost I would say year is when I got comfortable with me. With me, I mean, I go, I'll do comedy, I'll speak.
Speaker 2:They were like, oh my God, and I'm like, thank you. It's like I'm not. God is giving me this gift. If God has allowed me to have PTSD and still go out here and speak and do comedy, then he got it. God, you do what you do. I'm just a vessel you're going to use, and that's what we have to look at, because I used to be like, why me? Why I got PTSD, why I had trauma. Then I had to realize you could have died in Iraq. Boy, you made it back. But you know what, though, a lot of times that I had made it back, ms Bree, I used to sit around and be like I wish I had died and I write. And you know I said that because I came back. A hero, yeah, I came back in my uniform, in the casket, and had a flag over me. Everybody would have been crying, saluting. He went to war. He died a hero, not that he retired, went to war, came back. Now he got PTSD. Now he got issues Now he divorced.
Speaker 2:Now he this, now his kids is bringing up issues that he had when he so I was like ah, yes. Why can't I just die in the war?
Speaker 1:I understand exactly what you're talking about. What people don't know, and what I didn't know upon retirement, is You're nothing, you are nobody. Now you can have your chest all backed up and you think, ok, I'm going to get out and I'm going to show them all the deployments I've done. I'm going to get out and I'm going to show them all the deployments I've done and they just look at you like okay, ms Bree, I went to my first interview.
Speaker 2:I got on a shirt and tie coat. I go to the interview. I'm sitting across the thing from a 23-year-old boy and look, he had on a T-shirt and pants and I'm like what the heck? I'm explaining to you? I didn't get that job, I had to and I just came back from the war. You sitting across here asking me what? Yeah, it is a total different mindset because you go to commanding folks in a real war to I'm sitting across the desk from you asking you caning folks in a real war to them. Sitting across the desk from you asking you can you give me a job?
Speaker 1:Right, it is, it's so weird, it's so weird.
Speaker 2:It's weird.
Speaker 1:And it's hard, it's hard, it's hard, as I was saying to you too, like, and see you're married to a civilian Right. You know, wow, totally different, totally different, and see you're married to a civilian which you know, wow, totally different. I'm married to another veteran we both crazy as hell totally different and when we go to a restaurant he has to sit with his back, he has to be facing the entrance got to me before I go. I'm like okay if something go off.
Speaker 1:I'm going that table throw it. I'm going straight into rambo mode you know, and this is what we have to do, even just going out.
Speaker 2:Yes, and see it. And it's different on my end because I'm doing the surveillance and my wife just do, do, do I had? I mean, we got in a couple of arguments because I'm like, do you have peripheral vision? And she was like what I said? I am looking at you. Then she had to realize, ok, that's his way of protecting me by making sure I know. I say, if I get up and run, you run with me.
Speaker 2:If I say don't ask me no question. And sometimes she had to tell me, though, baby, just be in the moment, just be in. But there's a way that you can talk to a person and tell them be in the moment, because they have done their work. They say what is wrong with you, my God, can't you? Oh, now we are. Now we both up here. So it was tools that we had to learn in order to continue to be married with this, because when you married with PTSD I don't care if it's war or not and you don't get to work, it start compounding. Then you become a blended family, and then that adds. So it's so much that adds on to it that if you don't go and seek help, if you don't put your family in therapy, if you don't say we need help, it'll be, you'll be a basket.
Speaker 1:And then the other thing that I want to point out is that you said that I totally agree with you.
Speaker 1:Can't expect, because when I was going through my thing, me and my husband handle trauma different, differently to, whereas when someone dies, for me you know, I'll just say, you know my own path from cancer to where my husband he'll handle it like well, babe, you know he was sick, you knew he was gonna go and you know, you know, I mean, I don't even know if this man has tear ducts, you know I'm telling you you know, like you know, just recently, you know, my daughter just went in the hospital.
Speaker 1:She, she, uh, she was in an ambulance and I got a phone call from my, my middle girl, saying she was non-responsive. Her husband and I. I'm learning now to not just because before I just correct you know when my but that's no, that that's sometimes.
Speaker 1:That's a normal mom reaction too yeah, well, yeah, yeah, but you know, I try, you know, because I've, I have five children. We're blended family, so we have, um, we have eight children all together, okay, ok, so it's like for me, you know, he, he had to teach me Correct how not to just fly.
Speaker 2:Because, before Hold on, ms Brie this is the powerful part, though you was willing to learn.
Speaker 1:Yes, you have.
Speaker 2:That's the powerful point.
Speaker 1:You have to be you. You have to, especially as strong marriage needs communication. And what I love about my husband now you know, because I want to blow his head up and he see this interview but he's a great communicator. And he will say, if he don't, ok, I agree to disagree will say, if he don't, okay, I agree to disagree. But what we're gonna do is, whatever the issue is because, again, I went into the rush home and I was so angry because he's a bike rider, he rides with rare breed, okay he loves to ride.
Speaker 1:Okay, but I needed you. My nephew just committed suicide and for my husband it's like babe, I'm sorry to hear that I'm in the hospital bit now I just had emergency surgery, and this was again. This was 2023. I had emergency surgery. A few hours after the surgery, I got the message that my nephew committed suicide. I was trying to get off the bed, bernard, I was trying to make it, the film, I get it.
Speaker 1:My husband said you ain't going nowhere. I said I ain't going to argue with him, I'm going to show him different. I'm going. I don't know what I was going, how I was going to get there, but I'm that type of person that that's my heart, you know. I person that that's my heart, you know I'm gonna. I'm gonna serve you. You know we tried to serve it. That that was my way of avoiding and masking to helping other people avoid it. I'll.
Speaker 2:I'll focus on somebody else so you was going to help him, and then they will have to help you too, so you was gonna go there in the ambulance. So you, you was gonna go there in the ambulance. But you know what, though? We need people around us who are going to sometimes sit your hind legs down.
Speaker 1:But you know, it's just. You know I was angry with him, correct, because it's like. You know, after all, that after I lost my nephew, I went to the P and then, like I said, I found out what all this stemmed from. But you know, I was angry angry, my husband, because I was suffering and because you don't act as I do or you don't understand what I'm going through now.
Speaker 1:I want to leave and my husband had told me about that before you know. He said you want to stop so if you do not leave my house because my way of handling my ptsd and anxiety now I had a 17-year abusive marriage. One thing I didn't want to do is now I'll become the abuser, so my thing is to leave Correct. I've learned that that's not good either.
Speaker 2:Correct.
Speaker 1:So it's like okay, but this you don't understand me and my therapist there. They said you can't expect everybody to know what you're. You are walking in these shoes. He's walking in his. Now he got seven deployments you know.
Speaker 2:But you know what though? It's amazing you say that because I was the same situation it's like when you was talking to your ex and you, you was expecting a fight. Oh yeah, yeah, right here, even though you know, you still expecting that fight. But when you don't get it, it's like so what do I do now? I don't get the fight, what do I? So and I heard you say talking about the tear ducts it took me. It took me a long time to get emotion back. Oh, wow, it took me a long.
Speaker 2:I'm gonna tell you one of the stories my I moved into a community and I think I had been living in the community about a year and I had just been back from iraq, probably about two and a half years didn't cry, they had no emotion. My neighbor next door we used to talk all the time he was coming home from work one night and got into a car accident and passed. As I was getting up the next morning to go to work, his wife was out in the yard and she was crying and she was like hi. I said, oh, she would tell. I said I didn't see an accident on the news. She said that was Stan. That was he died last night and my emotions from Iraq. It was like we saw so many dead people. Okay, get them, bury them, let's move on.
Speaker 2:I had to go back and apologize and say I am truly sorry if I felt cold or cold Cause that was my I couldn't get cry, I couldn't show emotions, emotions. So that's another thing that we had to learn, because my wife didn't see me cry for a long. She was like does this man have emotions? Because it's like we hide it so deep yeah, we hide it so deep to when it does come up, it has to be some really uh dramatic. But I just want you to be able just to have a good cry sometime and just it's. It's refreshing. I listen to gospel music and I just get a cry and it just feels good because I'm now I'm getting back to my emotions and, uh, I know I'm still talking, but one of the biggest I ain't gonna say arguments but one of the biggest come to Jesus moment we had every time I was in signal in the military, so in the army, so I had a cell phone when we was in war.
Speaker 2:We had radio when we was in war, so every time there was a bombing, or every time somebody or we called somebody, if they didn't answer the first thing, you think they did. So when I had my cell phone, I came back every time the phone would ring. I would pick it up on the first ring. Oh yo, what's up, man? She was like why do you do that? Let it sometimes let it go to voicemail, I don't care, sometimes we could be just in a conversation. A phone ring, hey, she had to understand. I had to go back to my therapist to find out why do I do that? And she broke it down. She said when you was in war you had all these communication tools. If somebody didn't pick up the first thing, you thought they was dead. So now in my mind, when people call me, I had to pick it up to let them know I'm alive, but I'm not in war.
Speaker 2:So that's what is the retraining of the mind. Because you have trained your mind to go to war. You have trained your mind not to trust anything because anything over there could possibly kill you. So I had to retrain. So that's some of the things that when I said we had to learn to learn, we got. You have to be willing to relearn yourself and relearn life, and some people don't want to be around to, uh, to help you do that and I'm okay with that. We have to be okay with people in our life who we used to roll with. When you walk away, they say, hey, I just can't. We have to be okay with that. Sometimes we will walk away from people because my biggest thing is, hey, I don't have the mental capacity to handle that. I can't do everything. I tried it. No.
Speaker 1:That is so awesome. Look, I am so glad to have this connection.
Speaker 2:I think yes, I got another friend, another brother.
Speaker 1:You are amazing. What, what, what's next? What's next for you? What are we doing now? Where are you at? Because I want to make sure I'm there so I could get my stuff well what I do.
Speaker 2:I'm going back. I had a podcast called ptsd processing traumatic situations differently. That was the acronym I came up with for uh, for ptsd, because people process their trauma differently. Like you said, you process yours by leaving, but you had to rethink it to process it healthy leaving sometimes, no. But I tell people, however you process it legally and ethically process you might want to plant a garden, you might want to walk, ride horses, kayak, knit, whatever mines is laughter, whatever you have the point is to find find something just don't give up just don't give up and let it take you there you go.
Speaker 2:I mean, I told a friend I said, look, if you want to grow a garden on your sidewalk, people might not, but that if that's helping you get to the next day, do it. So that is the. That's one of the things I'm gonna come back with and I just I'm doing comedy. Uh, most of my events are private events or corporate events. I don't really go to the clubs. I don't. I don't because I'm 57, I'm getting too old to be staying out all night. Uh, no, I like being, I like being home. So me and my wife, if I have a show, we'll go together. If I still go out of town, I still being home. So me and my wife, if I have a show, we'll go together. I still go out of town, I still do that. But more than what I'm doing, that is speaking, it seems like God has given me more avenues of speaking with humor in it, because people really need to laugh and really need to talk about mental health.
Speaker 1:In some ways, just talking about it is let's laugh about it, and that is so when god has something for you and I wanted to say that as well when god has something, but he uses us, us to help other people. So when god has a calling on you and you know, and I look back now I say I. Now I know my why. Yeah, god, why did you make me go through all of this? It's because he said Brie or Bridget is my real name. He says I have something for you.
Speaker 1:So, again in the military. You know I'm comfortable. I was speaking, I was doing poetry, being a leader. I always spoke to soldiers, so I had to come. After I went to the rush home, I lost my nephew and in 2024 is when I was like or 2020, the end of 2023, I built what, uh, the house of humanity that's my non-profit where I service um homeless uh homeless individuals, that's domestic violence victims and I serve a slow income.
Speaker 1:That vision was was given to me and it's like, okay, god says okay, you can do a little more Okay. So, it's like I am a servant for his people and I used to hate that. I had that heart and I used to. That's why I said well God, all these people are dying around me. What am I here for? I wanted to give up because every I have this heart heart you gave it to me, but I'm losing people and we can't save everybody and he said they used to call me mother theresa.
Speaker 1:I have had that name. All about old bridget is mother theresa. But what I have learned is, and what he has me doing is focusing. Stop focusing on a soldier that you couldn't save. Stop focusing on the soldiers that you lost due to whatever situation they had. Stop focusing on that and focus that. So he, I'm telling you and I don't know if it's like this for you, but I could see what he wants me to do is just plain as day. He puts the brick.
Speaker 1:This is why me and you are here today, right. Because, he's lining it up.
Speaker 2:Networking, that's right.
Speaker 1:He's given me the tools and the people to get the message out, because I have this thing that I, bernard, I want to save the world. I want to save the world.
Speaker 2:And you know what. You know what Jesus came to save the world and want to say I know, and you know what.
Speaker 1:You know what jesus came to save the world. People. The only one deal with him. Yes, yeah. So so you know. What I'm learning now is that you know, okay, god, I wanted to help people, but he said why? Just in your own circle? Right, I'm outside the box. So, now I'm doing the speaking, I'm doing the podcast. And it's like the audacity of me to get fearful in what. I'm doing.
Speaker 2:You know Correct.
Speaker 1:You get fearful because now you're on a broader scale and you know I don't know how it was for you. You know you have over 20,000 followers and the thing about me but you know it's, yeah, it's something it's something, and my thing is you are out here, brother, and I applaud you, and you know I never really was a comedian comic type person. I think, the only people that has been funny to me is Jim Carrey, Kevin.
Speaker 1:Hart and Cat Williams. But I like Kevin Hart and Cat Williams because they're comics that just use realness and make it funny. It ain't funny, you know what's going on, but they make it funny. But just seeing you and how God has led you and the things that God you know, I know that my time will come. I admire you. I thank you for what you are doing, because you are helping people.
Speaker 2:That's all I ever wanted to do. I keep telling folks this is my therapy Me going out speaking doing comedy is my therapy. That they get to have therapy from speaking doing comedy is my therapy that they get to have therapy from.
Speaker 1:Oh, you said that you are very good with words, and this is what my therapy is. My therapy is speaking. My therapy is getting other people to be transparent and in this month of men's appreciation month, I appreciate you coming on here and giving us the time and your time to just show somebody like you can make it. Here are the tools, the other two and I tell folks.
Speaker 2:I tell folks. The tools I have are in my rucksack and I might not need those tools every day, but when I do need them I know where they at you know where they're at.
Speaker 1:That. You know where they're at. That's the key.
Speaker 2:To know where these tools are at.
Speaker 1:That's so correct, my brother, you're my friend, we friends man. I thank you and I look forward to having you back. I will keep up with you whatever you do. I will support you in whatever you do. I thank everyone for coming on and viewing this amazing. Yet another amazing uh interview would be for you with mr bernard heinz. Yes, and we will see yes, go ahead.
Speaker 2:If people want to follow me, you can follow me on all social media at the laugh therapist on instagram and Bernard Hines on Facebook and my website, wwwthelavetherapistcom.
Speaker 1:Yes, and we're looking forward to that book it's coming, it's coming, it's coming. And the podcast is coming back.
Speaker 2:It's coming back. It's coming back. It probably start back in September.
Speaker 1:September I will be following you. I'm going to keep all my viewers up and following you, but you probably got more followers than me. But whatever I got, they're going to follow you.
Speaker 2:There you go. I'm going to do the same. I'm going to put your name out there. God bless you. God bless you.