Supernaut
Supernaut is a podcast about spirituality, sobriety, and the spectrum of self. Hosted by Beth Kelling, this show explores what it means to seek clarity, connection, and personal truth in a world that rarely slows down.
Since beginning her sobriety journey in 2020, Beth has been diving deeper into spiritual practices, emotional honesty, and all the beautiful, messy layers of identity.
Each episode opens the door to conversations about healing, growth, creativity, intuition, and everything in between — because who we are isn’t fixed, it’s a spectrum.
Beth will be joined by guests who share their own stories, perspectives, and spiritual paths — offering insight, inspiration, and the occasional cosmic detour.
Whether you’re sober-curious, spiritually inclined, or just looking to feel a little more human, you’re in the right place
Supernaut
Sibling Psychology: Life Lessons from a Therapist
What if the hard times in your life weren't just obstacles to overcome, but essential elements in shaping who you've become? In this soul-stirring conversation with therapist Jen Peterson, we peel back the layers of that universal human experience we all share but rarely discuss with such honesty—navigating life's difficulties.
Jen brings twenty years of therapeutic wisdom and her own personal vulnerability to this discussion about resilience, growth, and finding meaning in suffering. "I had this belief that there were people who got pardoned from hard times, and now I know better," she shares, setting the tone for a candid exploration of how we all face challenges, regardless of how put-together someone might appear on the surface.
We dive into the fascinating psychology of being "the baby" of the family (a position we both share), and how those early family dynamics continue to shape our adult relationships and self-perception. Our conversation winds through the unexpected strengths of ADHD minds, the double-edged sword of perfectionism, and the profound impact of giving yourself permission to fail. Jen offers remarkable insight when she notes, "I will encourage people to fail, because you probably didn't fail a lot. Even if you did, it was probably really cute or adorable."
The most powerful moments come as we discuss parenting, legacy, and what we hope for the next generation. Can we spare our children from the hard times we've endured? Should we even try? As Jen beautifully puts it: "I want my kids to surpass me in kindness, outweigh me in love for others, and outdo me in generosity. I don't want to be the ceiling to their potential; I want to be their floor."
Whether you're navigating your own difficult season, supporting someone through theirs, or simply trying to make sense of past challenges, this conversation offers both comfort and clarity. Subscribe now to join our journey of self-discovery and connection through life's most meaningful moments.
This episode was with my friend, jen Peterson. She's a therapist and I'm so glad that she went into that profession because she is one of the most gentle, kind, loving people that I know. I have a blast every time I'm with her. We get so deep, think about so many things. Today we talked about sibling psychology and following the signs and being parents a lot of things so it was really great. I hope you enjoy it. Thanks, hi Jen, I'm so excited you're here. Hey Beth, I'm excited to be here. What song did you just have us listen to that?
Speaker 2:was Paramore Hard Times and I don't know. I just recently refounded again and I go on like music binges and this was my music binge for a couple of weeks and just so loud because I mean, who doesn't have hard times, Right? And then when they're over, you're like how did I do that? You know, how did I get through that? Why did I think it was so hard? Or it was so hard. And now I'm on the other side of that. Yeah, don't worry. Like I'll hit the ground, like we'll figure it out again. And then I think just the nature of the work I do every day is, honestly, you probably don't come to my office if you don't have hard times Right. And I think when I was young I had this belief that there were people who got pardoned from hard times, and now I know better.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's probably a belief I had as well.
Speaker 2:It was really nice back then in my brain.
Speaker 1:I had never heard it before, but I was feeling it because I was just telling you with the podcasting it's hard. Yeah, Like why am I doing it? How did the lyrics go Hard times?
Speaker 2:Hard times going to let you. It's basically like, how are you going to get through them? Are you going like, walk around with a little rain cloud over your head all the time and then all you need to know is eventually you will so tell my friends like that I'm coming down, like, and that basically they just need to be there while you're walking through it. Yeah, that's always like the fun part, because friends are just kind of what get you through hard times sometimes sometimes the only thing that can get you through hell yeah um, and it's just got this.
Speaker 2:It's like this juxtaposition of this upbeat song about this sort of like shitty thing, like hard times yeah, so it feels good to jam out to something that just feels real, like that yeah yeah, I just really put that on loop for a couple days. So I was looking through my YouTube and be like, what do I listen to? All the time I was like, oh, that's not appropriate, none of that's appropriate.
Speaker 1:That's absolutely.
Speaker 2:There's not even a message there, that's just little Wayne saying that he is. I really wanted to play a rap song, but they're somewhat meaningless at like, a bit at times like there was no deep message coming meaningless is fine too. Yeah, next time, just to get us on the same wavelength yeah, so today was my first day back at work after a week off, so I'm saw like a ton of clients today, but I don't feel like I did so.
Speaker 1:That's also because it went so fast.
Speaker 2:Yeah, oh, that's awesome, you just had so much to hear from like some like some big intense sessions today, but it was fun because I knew I didn't have to go to work tomorrow.
Speaker 1:That's hardcore after a week off.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was Like a couple like surprise things that yeah. I work with an older population, so sometimes they're like getting really sick or getting bad news, Mm-hmm, Having hard times.
Speaker 1:So what do you do for work?
Speaker 2:I'm a therapist, just a plain old, regular psychotherapist. I'm a social work master's and then I do therapy Awesome. Yeah, it's my favorite job ever.
Speaker 1:What do you love about it?
Speaker 2:Everything I think I love that I spent 20 years in hospital social work, which is really was great for young me. It was intense, it was problem solving all day, every day, like never stop moving. And now that I'm getting you know, into a later age, I can actually sit down and, instead of being like in the room for people's hardest day, I'm in a room while they talk about their hardest day, but I'm not in that room. Um, so it's kind of nice to be on the side where you're. You know you're helping people like make meaning out of bad days instead of just getting them through the bad day.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:It's a very different like view. Yeah, I feel like this is something I can do until I'm old. That is the other job. No, there's no way. It's exhausting.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, I told you I wanted to talk about signs, like following the signs and following intuition, but a couple of days ago I heard somebody say you don't have to follow the signs, you just need permission, self-permission.
Speaker 2:And.
Speaker 1:I was like, oh my God, self-permission, that's lovely.
Speaker 2:I literally just talked about this in the session today. I think the person is very self-aware. I believe we were talking about intuition, like the whole idea that if you have it and you follow it, it's really obvious. Like think about someone that you believe always follows.
Speaker 1:Like somebody that just has confidence maybe.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think it can like look like confidence. I think it can look like sometimes it can probably look stubborn, because I think those people are always going to do what they feel is the right thing to do, even if it doesn't necessarily look on the outside like the right thing. And sometimes your intuition is rude, like when you decided that you were going to start this podcast, and this sort of like wraps into what you were saying earlier about that. It's really hard sometimes, but like you can't stop doing it not yet, obviously, maybe someday. But right now you're just like this is really hard and I don't know like how I'm going to keep doing this, but I also like can't stop doing this right, right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm stubborn like that yeah, and that's probably just like following your like value, and that's probably just like following your like value and intuition. So have you given yourself permission to do that?
Speaker 1:I don't know. I'll have to think about that more oh it's like not real.
Speaker 1:Yeah, maybe, yeah. So I was just telling somebody that I think when you set boundaries, that can come off as rude too, because, like I'm really good at saying no, I have to with my job and my social life, like I have to take time for myself or I won't be able to handle anything. So, like on the fair board, I say no to so many things because it's like what I'm capable. I know what I'm capable of doing and I'm not going to take on more, because then I'm just going to get burnt out faster. It's like burnout wasn't even a thing a couple years ago and now it's like everywhere. So I hate saying it, but I had extreme burnout, so I get it. Yeah, when your nervous system and your cortisol levels are up to here and you just can't anymore.
Speaker 2:Oh my goodness, me too, you know. Thinking back on like having absolutely terrible boundaries being, you know, but having all the energy to do all the things I was saying yes to, versus getting older, because maybe you just like don't know, you're like the boundaries are gonna keep you more they change content. And yeah sure, yeah, yeah, also like when yep hit a serious wall and that was wild.
Speaker 2:Made some, made some choices, hit some walls. Uh, but maybe with better boundaries earlier on, that wouldn't have been quite the thing yeah, well, we're learning hard, yeah I wish I could go back and like rewind to like 35. I would know so much more now.
Speaker 1:Yeah I don't even think I want to be in my 20s anymore, but 30 35 would be okay loved. I loved my 30s yeah, I used to always think I wish I could go back to like 16 and just like knowing everything I know now. Oh my gosh, it'd be so crazy.
Speaker 2:Right, that would be so like it would be cheating, because I think life experience is how we got here.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I was thinking this in relation to my youngest daughter when we were in New York last week. I thought, wow, she, I feel like, is like 10 years ahead of where I was at that age.
Speaker 1:And.
Speaker 2:I don't know if that's just because things have moved that quickly. She was talking about the colleges she's gonna apply to. She wasn't talking specifically about which ones. But she said you know I have three reach choices. I have three, you know I want to go their choices. Then I have three like I'll take that if I have to. And I thought I'm pretty sure zero guidance counselors ever taught me any kind of theory about applying for college. I just knew I had to go somewhere and probably should be like in close to home or like Minnesota yeah, the counselors were not helpful in high school, absolutely not, and maybe they'd have you take a test, a personality test, and that was like it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, but yeah, they didn't have any info on what the schools were like.
Speaker 2:No, and in my family we were first-generation college goers, so my parents were just like, yeah, figure it out.
Speaker 1:And that's what we did. What I wish my mom had brought up when I was in high school is the military. I never thought about it, never considered it. I don't know if I would have gone. She just thought about it, never considered it like I don't know if I would have gone. She just wanted me to be a missionary. She wanted all four of us kids. That was her big dream. Is that one of her kids would be a missionary, missionary like you, try you travel. I try. You like travel, you like bring.
Speaker 2:I don't help people great ideas, I mean you do. And you travel, so maybe that's missionary yeah a different version of missionary.
Speaker 1:I'll take it. Sorry, Mom. Yeah, I'll work on that.
Speaker 2:I think my mom just wanted me to like not I don't know what the hell she wanted. She probably just wanted me to like reach my potential and not dick around, drive too fast and smoke cigarettes.
Speaker 1:One of my brother's wives said that the first time she went to my brother's house growing up, I was really young, you know, so I would have been like five, they were like 18, 19. And literally the only thing my mom said to her was Steve's going to be a missionary, He'll be leaving soon. She's like wasn't true at all.
Speaker 2:She's sorry, you're too late. Jesus has him. Yeah, jesus took him.
Speaker 1:Yeah, he's already pledged yeah, yeah, speaking of siblings, so you and I are both the babies and I am obsessed with sibling psychology. I saw my dad dad interacting with his siblings when I was like 20 and it like hit me really hard, like those are the people that were around him when he was little and, growing up, like what is the psychology here? So I've just like always been fascinated with it. So my question I have about being the baby is do you feel like you're always treated like the baby? Because I, I do. Sometimes there's people in my family that I'm like do you feel like you're always treated like the baby? Because I, I do. Sometimes there's people in my family that I'm like do you guys not realize that I'm almost 40 years old, but I do take it to my advantage sometimes?
Speaker 2:too like.
Speaker 1:I'm just a baby like what do you mean?
Speaker 2:like I don't know how you make me go to work every day, literally, yeah like you can't put me in control of that no, I don't like. Yeah, I still. If I pick up a knife in the kitchen, my sisters will be like you're going to, we're going to let her use that. You guys, seriously, I've raised three kids. You bunch of bitches.
Speaker 1:Yeah right, Like I have a mortgage, I've raised a successful child. I have a dog and a cat.
Speaker 2:In fact, after I had my first baby, my oldest sister and I and she's 11 years older than me and then my middle sister and then me. We had baby at the same time and Jake and I went we're at a family wedding and my oldest sister and her partner and my parents took all the babies home and we were like literally gonna stay like another hour, but we were all nursing our kids.
Speaker 2:Well, we probably stayed two hours because we were 30. No, no, no, I was 24 at the time. My sister was like 40 and we get home and she's just kind of being a bees about like how long it took us to get there and I was like I was going to nurse Lily. I'm like, listen, mitch, a, you were not going to nurse my baby and B, why are you being so bossy? I'm going to throw my baby at you. Like stop it, I have kids.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Um. But even that did not always give me the validity that I needed as an adult.
Speaker 1:Were you the bossy one, Cause I'm supposedly the bossy one.
Speaker 2:I was not but you have all brothers. Um no, no, no.
Speaker 1:And you have all sisters. I do.
Speaker 2:That's so wild, not bossy, but I was, you know know, I was raised kind of in my own, like they were gone by the time I was in third grade.
Speaker 1:so so you were not on purpose the same as me, or?
Speaker 2:no, supposedly like. The kind of joke, I think, is that my parents probably had a rocky beginning of their marriage and my mom so they had my two sisters young and um in her early twenties and then, by the time she was 30, she's like, well, what the hell I'm still here, let's go another one. I'm only 30. Let's do it. And I'm sure they wanted a boy. Yeah, sorry. Okay, here I am. Uh, so I kind of grew up in like a different house than my siblings grew up in.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, I totally did too. My parents were exhausted. They had raised three boys. So dare and worked their asses off. I talked about in the first episode with Steve that I was and he explained how my dad went to Hull Drug to get birth control for my mom and three months later they're like well, it didn't work.
Speaker 2:We're having another baby. Were your brothers so mad.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I always heard a story that he kept saying I'm not going to hold her, I'm never going to hold her, and then cause he was 15, but then he supposedly pushed Ed out of the way and had to hold me first. I don't know if that's a true story or not, but it sounds kind of true.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was born on Christmas Eve. My sisters to this day um will give me flack about how they had to stay at oh, you ruined their christmas.
Speaker 1:Do you celebrate your half birthday so that you get your own?
Speaker 2:I did one time I had friends who threw me a half birthday once my brother, mike, celebrates even his quarter birthday. He does great yeah, really really smart um does he have a christmas birthday.
Speaker 1:No, just June.
Speaker 2:I like my birthday Really, yeah, but was he like the baby? Yes, definitely.
Speaker 1:How's that go?
Speaker 2:Maybe that's why, we've had some ups and downs, yeah clearly, every single picture of me as a baby has my middle sister's face in front of me. As a baby she is kind of a princess. Lisa, we all know you're a princess.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You're listening. I mean you're a queen, whatever. The funny part is, a lot of my life has been spent with youngest. So Shannon, my bestie, we met we were like 19 and she had almost the same like kind of family makeup, right. So we're these babies. Our friend Crystal's a baby.
Speaker 1:Katie Jaws is a baby, is she?
Speaker 2:Jake's a baby. Our friend back then, harry Kent, was a baby. Timmy was a baby, like all the people that we hung out with in our young life all babies, yeah.
Speaker 1:That is wild.
Speaker 2:It was crazy Like we didn't have any friends that weren't babies, so I don't know who was like planning things. Except for that we were all really very good hippies. And like leading into the, if we lead to the type B, yeah, like definitely C or D or E.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Not A.
Speaker 1:Yeah, not a lot of.
Speaker 2:A's in the building.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I told you that I'm fascinated with the idea that type A people have type B problems and type B people have type A problems.
Speaker 2:Oh no, I've never heard this. Tell me more Like.
Speaker 1:So if you're type A, um, you're like always going, going, going and you don't know how to rest and relax, so you need so your problems are that you need to be more B type and be more casual and type, and so type A people might look more successful on the outside, but type B people are more content, you know like. So I had a huge breakthrough last week Cause I've been trying to be more type B, cause I'm like I hate that. I am like mad. I get mad at people if they're not like orderly or timely, like I want to be.
Speaker 1:So I've been working on this for a while and I had a breakthrough last week where I was supposed to be on a Zoom call and forgot about it, and I got so excited, I was so proud of myself because usually I haven't missed a meeting or a Zoom call in 20 years because, like all day I'll be like you have this going on, this going on this at this time. It's five minutes till time, two minutes till time, you know, and this person didn't care that. I knew he wouldn't care, so I was like super excited. I'm like.
Speaker 2:Look at me making progress and missing a meeting. Like that's, that's that is no joke, that is growth. For me, that's real growth. So in my practice, if I am encountering someone with really high perfecting order, all of those tendencies, I will encourage them to fail, because you probably didn't fail a lot. Even if you did, it was probably really cute or adorable.
Speaker 1:It's just so cute and bad at things.
Speaker 2:But really so always encouraging those people to just not show up yeah just say no, yeah, like, don't do the thing if you don't want to do the thing so that's what I mean by the I have an internal task master that makes my type b-ness present, front facing. But my type b-ness is very much inside okay, so.
Speaker 1:So, your mind is going crazy and but on the outside everybody's like, oh, she's fine, she's chill, she's so chill.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:That's yeah. That makes sense.
Speaker 2:I've had some intensity for sure throughout. I mean, I don't think I don't know how people would describe my intensity, but I think I mask it pretty well and that just really is because I probably was like an undiagnosed ADHD in my whole life.
Speaker 1:Duh, 100%. I remember getting pretty annoyed a few years ago that everybody's going on ADHD medication. Everybody has ADHD and I'm, like it's called just being human. You need to just relax your brain. But I get it so hard now. I mean in grade school and high school I could not pay attention, had horrible grades and it's just gotten worse. I mean in grade school and high school I could not pay attention, had horrible grades and it's just gotten worse. And I mean especially the last couple of years and listening to Mel Robbins talk about it like the female on older onset of it.
Speaker 2:It's just like cause.
Speaker 1:I've taken so many tests too. Um, like, in the last couple of years, I always get like 65, 70% likely that you have ADHD. But now it's like the spectrum of both questions, Like if you answer no to something and you answer yes to something, both can mean that you have ADHD. Like I can't think of an example right now, but you know what I mean?
Speaker 2:Like well, and then there's like seven domains of executive function and so you might be completely put together in one domain and completely not put together in another. So it affects everyone a little bit differently. So classic high-performing girls a lot of times they don't have the H, they just have the ADD, so it looks dreamy and spacey and they're usually super smart but they can't find their shoes, so it presents differently.
Speaker 1:You would never think that girl had ADD, the way it was typically looked at for years. And see like I've never lost my cell phone or my shoes, like knock on wood.
Speaker 2:wear some wood, Because you always put them in the same spot.
Speaker 1:Do you have a place?
Speaker 1:Kind of yeah, kind of or like I would never leave a place without my phone. I can't imagine doing that and I always thought that was from being a young mother Like I just always needed to. I'm the only one responsible for this child. Like I, I'm the only one responsible for this child. Like I need to know where my phone is at all times. But I get jealous of other people who, like leave their phones places or don't answer things right away because, like I have to answer a text message instantly or I don't feel complete and that's exhausting. So but like I can't pay attention to what people are saying unless it's something I'm interested in. So like talking to friends, talking about the things I'm interested in, like I'm tuned in. But like, if you're talking about like man stuff, like building and construction, like I'm a construction coordinator, project coordinator.
Speaker 2:You could like give a crap.
Speaker 1:So I'm like most of the time faking it, but it works out because I'm so good at being organized.
Speaker 2:And another, like ADHD, superpower is that you didn't have to listen to all that. You didn't need all those details because you probably already arrived at the answer from the beginning.
Speaker 1:Yes, oh my gosh. I'm so glad you say that, because I'm like am I just full of shit that I think that Because when people are telling me things, I'm like I literally don't need to.
Speaker 2:You just talked exactly about why self-worth and ADHD are so intertwined.
Speaker 2:Because, you've spent your entire life being able to circumvent systems and probably in classes you didn't need all of the lecture. You probably could get the answers by reading three paragraphs and then you were done. But the rest of it would have just clogged up your brain and then you went to figure it out. But it ends up making you feel like an imposter, because and I'll just use a personal example in my master's program, wow, there were some really intense girls and I was. They terrified me because I was like, oh my God, this is so hard, this is obviously going to be so hard, right, like I'm never going to survive this. These guys are like so put together and everybody's like doing reading all their work and doing all their notes. Well, guess fucking what it wasn't that fucking hard.
Speaker 2:And I would wait until Thursday night, just like I always did write my paper. My 10 page paper read exactly what I needed to read to get like my stuff done, but essentially it'd be like I always feeling like I have to be doing something wrong. If I'm not, I don't need to start this project until like the week before I sue, and these guys have been working on it for a month what in the hell? But I think it's actually kind of like the beauty of your mind.
Speaker 1:Yeah, like maybe your mind can find patterns easier than people or just put things together. Yeah, that's the whole.
Speaker 2:That's a lot of the talk with like self-worth and especially women in ADHD. A lot of the talk with like self-worth and especially women in ADHD. The other small example is that when I first had my first baby, um, I I couldn't put words to this for a long time. But there is a woman that went to our church who I love dearly and we could not have been more opposite. She could not have looked more put together.
Speaker 2:I could you know I felt so unput together. I don't know if it was as evident on the together. I could you know I felt so unput together. I don't know if it was as evident on the outside as I felt on the inside. But later I was like this is why I used to feel like some moms had a rule book that I didn't have. I was like, holy shit, why are they all signing their kids up for freaking swim lessons in February? It's not even until June Like it made no sense. So I felt a lot of times like I didn't know, like the rules of life, like we're doing what right now?
Speaker 2:Okay, like I probably would have done that like last next year sometime, but I guess we plan things now. Okay, thanks for your help. Neurotypical Open my van door, the life of us would fall out.
Speaker 1:And some people just trigger that insecurity when they seem put together, but they probably feel the same way. Yes, she did. I mean, that's what social media and podcasting, I think has proven to us is that we're all really similar and we all have the same insecurities.
Speaker 2:Do you remember a time before social media? I'm really super no.
Speaker 1:And it's funny, my mom with cell phones, like she will say, I mean she's 77 years old and like five or more years ago she was saying that she can't remember a time before cell phones. She can't remember not having a map on her cell phone, she can't remember only having the house phone, having to get back to your messages Like so yeah, I mean, I feel like I was at a good spot for it.
Speaker 1:I remember sending my first text message my senior year and being like this is lame, I'm not going to get into it. You know, and now I'm like please don't call me. Who has time for phone calls? Text me.
Speaker 2:My dear friend Sam does love the phone and I. It is fun to have like a straight up girly conversation with her, like at least once or twice a week. Yeah, that's awesome, she likes to chat and I used to be a huge phone chatter.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I've been like sending more like videos.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I send you a lot of videos, so it's kind of like we talk on the phone. Yeah, I do. I do like stamp videos.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Because then it's like on your own time you can write back and stuff you know because but that's great, that you and Sam have long conversations like that.
Speaker 2:I love that. We do she's, I think, my whole, though once in a while I can catch Shannon and make her talk to me, cause that's how we maintained a friendship for like all the years she was gone.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I suppose, just like hours on the phone, yeah, um, but when I? But I am I don't know if I'm thankful or not thankful that I didn't have social media when my kids were like I don't think I got a cell phone until my youngest was almost four. So there was a lot of child rearing years without like knowing what everybody else was doing. And it I literally don't have a child right now, a little one, but I am overwhelmed by all the things those moms are doing. Like, was I doing all those things? I don't think so.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think they're exhausting themselves trying to be too perfect, like there was no one month, two months, three months pictures. There was no like baby reveal parties and I don't know. I just, I love the socialness of being social. I just don't know if I would have felt like I could do it.
Speaker 1:No, I am glad social media wasn't around when I was a kid, and you know what I always think? I'm really excited that wasn't around when I was in high school, because that was the worst. I was like the naughtiest kid ever yeah, videos for sure. But also when I was like 25, I heard about how kids were soaking tampons in vodka and then putting them in.
Speaker 1:And I was like if this would have been a thing when I was 15, I would have done it and I probably would have died. Because the thing was like, when the paramedics were coming, like they couldn't smell alcohol in their breath, so they didn't know that it was alcohol. And I'm like, by the time I was 25, I was like oh my God, that's horrible.
Speaker 2:But I knew at 15, I would have been like, let's try it, because I was a psychopath, because you had ADHD, so you're from a low age, you didn't have one yet. And then B, if you did, it wouldn't have worked that well Because nobody in school.
Speaker 1:Let me like figure out anything Like. When I started getting my confidence was when I would realize that I could like put things together, not like a puzzle, but I could figure things out pretty quick.
Speaker 1:Like one time for a job we went out and, um, we're picking up garbage in a ditch and like the leader is like okay, we're going to start here and I'll walk this way. And I was like, okay, or to get done twice as fast, how about you drop us over here? You do this half, we do that half, then we switch and then go like this, and everybody's like that's a great idea. And I'm like why didn't anybody else think of this? And then I realized I could. Like I'm really lazy, so I love finding the most productive, fastest way to do things. I think that's why I'm so. Is that an ADHD thing?
Speaker 2:Because that is like my whole life. It's not being lazy, it's like finding, always finding the most efficient way to get something done.
Speaker 1:I can't stand when things aren't done efficiently. I can't either Like this particular lady.
Speaker 2:I was talking about at my church. Like this is one of the ways we were. The same is that we would produce the most efficient way to do almost anything. Like we like if we were making a like a play date plan, um, we'd start like okay, let's meet on Tuesday at noon. Okay, nobody had this. So then, like Thursday at three, and like we would hone like our plans down, or like if we were planning something at church, we would have a way of like making it the most efficient, the less stressful. But I think that that's your ADHD brain going like nothing extraneous can happen or I will not get done If there are 50 steps to this, not doing it. So this has to be efficient. Like there will not be extra trips, we will not be going up and down and back and around. No, why would you do that?
Speaker 1:Yeah, so that's wonderful that you guys had such similar brains in that way. But you felt so different. Do you think it was just your insecurities, that you felt like you weren't put together, um, and we just had really different backgrounds. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Does she treat you like? No, so kindly Love Like. She is Jesus embodied in the world and you know I was probably coming in as the devil back then a little bit, but I grew up on the Iron Range that's a different beast right and I think she probably grew up in like more of the North Metro and like how many people were in your graduating class? 136.
Speaker 1:That was about the same as me. Yeah, it's similar, but do you think it was just more secluded up there than it was here? I think it's really similar to Mora. Because maybe people had to travel? Was there less schools around where people had to travel from all over?
Speaker 2:So we have all these little communities. So there's towns like Coleraine, beauvais, la Prairie, taconite, calumet, marble, lawrence Lake.
Speaker 1:That's how you all came together, but each of you lived in like your own little borough, basically like I lived in Lawrence Lake but like my best friend lived in Marple how far away was that like 15 minutes, so it's just like all along yeah, none of my friends that I went to high school with lived more than 15 minutes, I bet, because more is like just kind of small, you're just more of like, yeah, that would be like if we were just Coleraine, but we weren't.
Speaker 2:We were like Coleraine Bovila Prairie, like there was like 10 little areas that I came together to form my school did you ever think about raising your kids there?
Speaker 2:um, we thought about moving back. We had some really super close friends up there that we would probably have loved to have lived by, but no, and that's why, because the range has like a really I don't know, let's just so. It's just like a ton of like, and this I mean Jake worked in blue collar work anyways, it didn't really matter but just a different culture lots of drinking, lots of kind of like hard living. I don't know, you definitely drive a truck and you do a lot of like outdoor recreation, which is fine, like I love my lake. I don't know, it's just I wouldn't have sent my kids to the school that I went to. I would have wanted them to go to the school in town. And yeah, I mean, we talked about it, we thought about it yeah, who knows how different they would be?
Speaker 1:yeah, so we were just talking about how that generation isn't drinking much in general, though, like my son is 20, yeah, and it's not really a thing girls don't love it.
Speaker 2:I mean they've all, I mean they've all tried it. But it's just not what. What I think they're gonna to be like geared towards they enjoy, like learning and doing, and being Well.
Speaker 1:I also wonder, I mean, I don't think James saw me too out of control too many times A couple for sure where I'm embarrassed that he saw me at that level. But I mean, and I drank every day, he knew that. I mean at night I was drinking a glass. I mean, and I drink every day, you know that. I mean if he at night I was drinking a glass of wine every night and everything but um, I wonder if have our kids looked at us and been like, well, I don't really want to do that.
Speaker 2:Probably not as much recently, but in the five years before that. I went through hard times and drinking was a big part of that and my kids hadn't really seen that my dad is an alcoholic and they also, interestingly, were like I don't think we've really ever seen grandpa drunk and I'm like what, that's crazy, you're serious. They're like, yeah, like we know he drinks beer, but so no, yeah, and they have seen me like too drunk a few times. They don't like it. They're super judgy. I love them, but a friend and I always joke that we kind of have ever seen Absolutely Fabulous oh my gosh. It's like these two like just ridiculous middle-aged women from England and then the one that has a daughter and her daughter is just like super studious, like always irritated with how annoying, like so they like back her back and forth and she's just like very smart and like you, bunch of dopes like like she's just way above them.
Speaker 2:It's super funny and I feel like that a lot Like my kids are out moating me very quickly, quickly well, that's the goal.
Speaker 1:Right is we want them to be better than us and do better than us, which isn't true for everybody, but yeah, and that's too bad, is what that is.
Speaker 2:Let me just read this, too, because I just sent it to my girls I want my kids to surpass me in kindness, outweigh me in love for others and out me in generosity. I don't want to be the ceiling to their potential, I want to be their floor, and that is true, and I think that my kids, I am the floor, and they are going to honestly surpass anything I've ever wanted to do or be Just really good humans, and I like them a lot.
Speaker 1:Yeah, what did I pray for? For James, I wanted him to be kind and something else, hard working, I think, and he is the kindest, most hard working.
Speaker 2:Ken, you could ever meet. How sweet is that. I wonder where he got it.
Speaker 1:I don't know he was like a kind of baby, like I remember him being like six, seven years old and other parents were like we love when he's over because he's nice to the other kids too, not just the friend he's there to see, like he's kind to the other kids, like he lets the little kids play.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, I think a lot of who we are is, you know, psychology wise, like how we got you know we're born this way a lot of it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, nature versus nurture is always we develop a whole bunch of coping and we get like all kinds of messages from society and but I think a large portion of us is just like exactly how we got delivered here. Have you ever gone to a class reunion and you're like, oh, you're exactly the same. That's crazy. Like I'm sure not a million minuscule things for them. Inside their themselves have changed, but like from the outside I just see the same kid I went to third grade with yeah, mostly yeah, so I don't know if that's like depressing do you think people see you in the same?
Speaker 2:encouraging thought what's that?
Speaker 1:do you think people see you?
Speaker 2:the same too um, probably like encouraging thought. What's that? Do you think people see you? The same too, probably.
Speaker 1:Like I'm sure parts of me are very much who I've always been. Yeah, I was a lot more fun in high school.
Speaker 2:So I hope people think that's that wild fun person because I'm not very fun anymore or maybe it's like sort of the you know, if you know someone and you see them, you just see them as you've always known them.
Speaker 1:Well, that's another thing I'm fascinated with is how every single person in your life sees you differently. So, like your three girls see you as a complete different person. Like even twins would see you as different because they'd see you from a different angle. They'd see you sneak the cookie or pay, pay the bill with whatever you know, um. So, where the other kid might not see that and plus, their own brains are so different that they're going to see you differently, you might do the exact same thing, but one kid's going to interpret it differently than the other kids. So, like to think that every single person that I work with, that I'm friends with, like thinks of me in a completely different way, is really wild, and I think that's why, like, talking bad about people, um, is the one of the worst things that you can do, because you shouldn't change other people's perception of somebody because it's just yours.
Speaker 2:I love that. I think that that's really a nice way to enter life. I feel really thankful that I was raised by two people who were not critical of other people and did not really allow it in our house, like if my sisters and I would start like kibitzing and bitching about people or like whatever. My dad, and from his chair, I can tell you exactly how this goes. He's watching TV, but we're over here. It's like Ken pecking somebody and he'll just do this to this day 'll do it, don't you think that's enough?
Speaker 2:okay, and we're all just like yep, yeah, like we weren't allowed to like bad mouth, teachers, we weren't allowed to like bad mouth. You know, people, that we loved yeah uh, my mom did not talk shit. Like I remember my best friend's mom used to come over to pick her up. She was at our house a lot and she loved to talk about people and I just always saw my mom as like elevated because she wouldn't sit there and like get in the muck with her. I'm like that's just mean, that's just gross.
Speaker 1:My parents were the exact same way. I love that. Like I realized it probably in my mid-20s. Like wow, I've never heard either of my parents talk about anybody else. Yeah, and definitely not talk negatively, right. I mean they might say facts like, oh, this person did this right, but never any judgment interestingly, my kids will.
Speaker 2:Maya especially will catch me on like any like. If she hears me like just being like using judgment for no good reason, she'll be like did you need to say that?
Speaker 2:and I'll be like no, awesome. Yeah, nope, did not need to say that and I will. Like I think it's probably pretty widely known, I'm a social worker and I'm pretty, I'm fairly liberal, so I clearly don't love trump and, uh, sometimes, like in the early days of his presidency, she listens to the news all the time and I just be like just straight bitching, you know, like just pissed off and she's like, um, let's just like stay with the facts.
Speaker 1:I'm like, oh my gosh, yeah, and it is helpful to not get all fired up and create a bunch of unnecessary drama okay it was my birthday last week and they put my picture up on all the TVs like, oh, we're going to throw a party for you. And it was literally getting me depressed and I'm like, and then everybody kept thinking that I was throwing myself a party, which is totally something I would do, like I've thrown myself a million birthday parties, but like not at work, like that's weird. And everybody's like what time is the party? I'm like I don't know, I'm not throwing it, I don't even know who it is?
Speaker 1:Is it actually a party and it's like yeah, oh, okay, but I'm like. I know I seem like somebody that would want my face plastered on the TV because I'm doing a podcast with video, but I literally do not. Yeah.
Speaker 2:I literally don't want to be anything of my face.
Speaker 1:I don't want to be in the spotlight, anything of my face I don't like. But these ideas are just coming to me and there's nothing I can do to stop them. I've tried really hard to just be like I'm not going to do this. I don't want to, but Sorry about your intuition.
Speaker 2:Like.
Speaker 1:sorry about your Following the signs and the self permission. It's like maybe I do want to do it, but I'm not giving myself self permission. Talk more about that Cause I want to understand that concept better.
Speaker 2:I don't know Um like what if your intuition is telling you like yes, yes, this is all yeses. What? What are you not permitting? Like what is? Where does the self permission come?
Speaker 1:in, or is like self, self.
Speaker 2:I'm trying to think of this word. Is there like some compassion that you need to offer yourself? Maybe, maybe, like my younger self, oh maybe you need to like allow it to be more of what it is instead of what you are wanting it to be.
Speaker 1:So if it's Well, I don't know what I want it to be. I'm just like I just keep Generating ideas Like going with the flow and people keep coming into my life that are helping the progression of it, and they're just like falling into my lap, so I am just going with it.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Does it give you like? Are you anxious about it? Does it make you feel Not?
Speaker 1:unless I'm about to record and then I'm like can, can't, feel normal. But Cody keeps saying it takes 100 episodes. So to feel normal, yeah, that's long in front of the camera.
Speaker 2:Oh, I just supposed to keep swearing you're doing so good um, this makes me think of the times when you kind of pull the trigger on things that you know are going to be hard, right, so times in your life that you took on something that you weren't sure about it's like stepping onto, like that piece of like Well, everything has led up to this.
Speaker 1:I mean with hard things and people not really being excited about it, cause you know, when I tell people I'm podcasting, they're like, oh, and then they like change the subject, yeah. Or they're like, oh, I would never do that. And I'm like I get that, I didn't think I ever would either, but it's kind of just happening, but like, so you've been top two or three people that have been supportive about it. So I thank you so much for that. But, yeah, my whole life leading up to it because, like just having a baby early, got pregnant when I was 18.
Speaker 1:So I just had to do the hard things and then I had all this intuition to move. So I moved to. I wanted to move to like New Mexico, but I got too scared. So I moved to Chicago and that was only for a few months. I mean, I planned to be there for years but ran out of money and couldn't find a job and pay for daycare. Daycare was three times as much as it was here. So I moved back. But that was like nobody was supportive in my life except Katie Hanstrom and my brother Steve, Not that other people were unsupportive, but they were just they would either change the subject or be like don't you think it's bad timing with a young child, or like it's winter time, or like they'd be like it's winter timing with a young child, or like it's winter time, or like they'd be like it's winter time.
Speaker 1:Are you sure you're gonna move in winter? And I'm like what? Yeah, it's fine so, and then moving back and everybody being like oh well, you failed, you know, and I just refused to let it bother me, because I'm like at least I left. The thing that got me to leave for Chicago was, or decide to do it was a year from now. Do I want to say that I went or that I didn't go Right and I guess that's what I'm doing with the podcasting too is just like a year from now. Do I want to say I tried it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, do you want to take this big pile of ideas and just throw it in a closet? And we do? Enough of that. I think in our lives like yeah, that's out of reach. Like just this is such a minuscule. Like in the last four years I haven't run very much and I ran forever like loved running hundreds of miles and then I just started telling myself like I didn't really like it anymore and almost like took it off the plate that I would ever run again. And now I'm running again. I really love it and you don't really love it.
Speaker 1:I do, I do. Why did you take? Why did you convince yourself that you don't like it? I think I just burned out.
Speaker 2:I think I just truly ran for so long that I just I don't know, it wasn't exciting anymore. Something. I just lost some love for it and now I get to find like a new way to love it again. That is not like it used to be, it won't ever be, but I kind of convinced myself that I didn't like it anymore. That's not true at all, that's not true at all.
Speaker 1:That's interesting. It's like the dark side, the evil side, trying to convince you of that.
Speaker 2:I think it was like the punishing, self-punishing side of me had to find a new way to do it, like it couldn't be that I'm running 13 miles before work in the morning and then getting three kids off to school and then working all day and coming home and doing all the night stuff and then whipping around Like I can't.
Speaker 2:I don't like that. That's crazy. No, that's serious burnout like crazy town you needed. Yeah, you were just doing too much, yes. So then you know, just like hit a patch of hard times that were way harder than any of that, and I think I'm emerging, maybe on the other side, which is lovely, so exciting. Yeah, I did have this beautiful belief that I would never had hard times, and when we talk about things I don't want for my kids or my grandkids, I don't want them to have hard times.
Speaker 2:I want them to have good times.
Speaker 1:So when you had that belief that some people don't have hard times, you believed that could be true for yourself. Oh, yeah, oh, because for me it was opposite. I thought that there was people out there who didn't have hard times, but I thought that there was people out there who didn't have hard times, but I thought that I would, and I've always been waiting. So where's the what? I literally need to knock on wood, but I haven't had anybody super close to me pass away. Yeah, and I remember at my church, when I was like 10 or 12, a little boy passed away from cancer and he was like 4 or 5, and I think I had babysat him with his older cousin that I was friends with one time. So I was like, you know, he was the cutest little kid and I'm watching his parents and I couldn't understand why that would happen to them, and I guess I've just been waiting for it to happen to me since then Like the hard times.
Speaker 1:Like death, like somebody close to me dying, because I don't know how to deal with death at all and so I don't know how to be there for people when they are dealing with death. Yeah, I haven't had any close pets even die, like a lot of my dogs got ran over when I was growing up because I lived on a busy highway but, and so that was hard back then, of course, and then I said I was never going to get an animal again because, like, why get an animal when you know it's going to die?
Speaker 1:yeah um, like, at least kids you can hope that they're not going to die in your lifetime. But then my ex gave me a puppy for mother's day one year, mostly just to keep me compliant because I was laid off of work. And so I think he he knew, like, because I worked at like some pines like heating assistant, so I had the summers off Nobody needs heat in the summers, no right. And so like he knew I was just going to party.
Speaker 1:So he gave me like the responsibility of a dog. Here's your job, here's your Mother's Day present. Like an actual child to take care of, but now. Actual child to take care of, but now I will never not have an animal again, but I don't know what it's going to be like when I lose her. You know it would be terrible, but I don't know what the point of all that was.
Speaker 2:I think just hard things hard times like believing that you will or won't go through them. No, I definitely didn't think I was gonna have you know my little like midlife, whatever fucking day that was.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:I had a little nightmare in the middle, um, and there was a time where I don't I really don't think anything. I don't think anyone in my life would have thought that that was going to happen. But also, now that I've been through it, I understand a lot of the whys of why it happened and, um, I'm actually thankful, I guess, that I had hard times, because I would not be able the therapist that I am I would not be able to sit with people in their hardest. I had death figured out. That was my hospital life, right, and I did a lot of that. So I still do a lot of that.
Speaker 2:But I didn't have like relationship loss and, you know, being the cause of other people's pain, which I was, especially the people I love the most. So, like that just brings me to this whole. Like what do I never want for my grandkids? I never want them to have pain, but they're going to. So then I would like them to have some like great people around them and some tools, and then I would like all the lessons that we have all like learned together to be implanted into their little brains and then all of the people around them to know how to support them.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I think it's better coping mechanisms. But I just don't think that's possible. I think like when you come here to have this life experience, this human experience like the, you have to go through hard things or you're never going to grow. I mean, obviously, but it's. And I think when you put yourself in hard situations, like running and ice baths and stuff like that, then maybe less bad things happen to you because the universe is like oh, you already did something hard, you're already growing, so I don't have to put things in your way to make you grow more. You know, but like I haven't iced bath in weeks because it's so hard. It's so hard but like I know my life would be better if I was.
Speaker 2:I know it and you know what the other thing of that is like. I have sat with so many people who go through hard times and there's absolutely no fucking reason they should have had to like the whole idea that there's any kind of fairness in the universe for hard times or good times or bad fuck that I have decided that's a bunch of bullshit. You don't like get like all like lined up and then everyone's like you get two hard times and you get three. And here's why. Because you did this or you didn't do that.
Speaker 1:No, Well, I think you pick before you come down here, like which hard things you want to go through, and then your mind is like erased and you have to figure out the signs, you have to follow the signs to see what you can learn from it. I thought you were going to say there's people that have these hard times and don't learn anything from it, and I'm like I think, even if you don't realize that you're learning from it, you do, because I also can't think of anything that's been hard in my life that I didn't learn from or would take back.
Speaker 2:And I've heard that that's true, that even when people lose children, they don't regret it later on because what their life has turned into because of it, like literally call it meaning making, and it's a way that you survive things that are hard like you have to make meaning out of hard things, probably to survive, right, because I mean you can. You can absolutely not also make meaning out of hard things. You can just learn that hard things happen and they're not fair because I suppose people with brains that just give up um and then, if they, just give
Speaker 1:up, put themselves in danger or they take their own lives, then they're not passing on their genes. So the people who do find a way to cope and find meaning are staying alive longer and producing more offspring.
Speaker 2:There's so many different takes on that whole idea. Like I would love to just take human suffering out of the, I wouldn't have a job.
Speaker 1:Of course. Which would be fine, because then I guess I'd just so if there was a little pill for everybody to take that just makes them happy all the time and they're never going to learn anything or grow like you think you would be supportive of that.
Speaker 2:I don't know, I would like to, just I think I would just like to not have to know how hard people struggle. Yeah, you know, like.
Speaker 1:I mean, and that comes with your job, you have to see it more than anybody.
Speaker 2:You say it all day long, I do see it a lot, yeah, yeah, and this is why you have a really good you know, you take time off and you fly out to New York and there's just humanity everywhere. That's the thing.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I definitely. I'm sure that the dudes I saw pissing in the subway have had some hard times. I mean, there's just I don't have a therapist, but yeah, yeah, so I don't know. I would love to have put my kids in a bubble and not have them ever experience anything like my oldest daughter was talking about, like her insurance premium the other day, and I was like I think it's awful that she has to pay for insurance, like she should not have to pay that you're so cute, I'm opposite.
Speaker 1:On James's 18th birthday, he sent me a picture of him filling out paperwork to renew his license for being 18. Yeah, he's like oh, this sucks. And I was like this is your whole life now being an adult. There's nothing else to it, Right? It's just filling out paperwork, Right? Like, get used to it. It's pretty lame. I think he and I've always wondered the balance of like what hard things should I purposely put him through to help him grow? But you wonder the balance of like what hard things should I purposely put him through to help him grow.
Speaker 2:But you didn't do that with your girls. You know, I think they had sort of a built-in like ability to choose the hardest thing. They're kind of like goats, like they do, like, like you know, like literally, because they climb mountains. I'll think of it, right, they would love that if they heard me say it definitely tell lily that later. But they have this kind of inborn trait of choosing hard things for themselves.
Speaker 1:They always have so cool?
Speaker 2:I don't know sometimes I'm like stop it.
Speaker 1:It's so self-punishing, you really don't have to but that's why they're so strong and they're such good girls and they have so much happening for them. Right now, yeah, where I'm just like sometimes I I'm like go do drugs.
Speaker 2:Just like lay down smoke some weed. Yeah, yeah, but I think that's like in general when I see people push themselves, I have sort of a aversion to watching people torture themselves.
Speaker 1:But they probably, so they didn't learn it from you. Yes, they might've, they totally, I mean, cause, yeah, you were doing all the things you were running three girls around you were doing the church stuff, doing the sports stuff, like doing all of the activities they did.
Speaker 2:And then I think it's like the part where I hit the wall that I don't ever want them to do. Like the part where I remember how exhausting that felt. And when I see other people, and especially young moms, I'm always like, oh my word, we love you no matter what. Stop doing all those things, please. Stop it, please, please. And like humans in general like when I think about how easy it is for you to be hard on yourself about success, or like how hard you work, or if it's enough, like that is probably the message that I really would love for people to take more seriously is like you are like super loved anyways, no matter what were we saying about the babies too?
Speaker 1:of like, always trying to prove ourselves um work? Why is where we? Were you saying work-wise, or?
Speaker 2:like I remember in my 20s, jake, always having to say, like you realize your sisters are like a decade older than you, you are racing to this finish, like I don't know what the finish line is, but you slowed it, like slow down. We bought a house when we were like 19. I got my undergrad and got my master's right away, got the same job that I have to this very day. Uh started having babies. Like I looked like someone who was like speeding through some kind of like finish line.
Speaker 1:I don't know so how was your body feeling before you had your? What did you call it? I would like where I like sort of hit my wall yeah um it's, it wasn't feeling anything it was numb yeah and so you needed you had worked yourself into numbness, and then you needed to feel something again.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it came in the form of an ex abusive boyfriend, which was a really poor choice and blew up my family and, for whatever reason, like I mean, I continue to do all the mom things but in the you know shattered life of ours and watched, you know, watched everybody go through that and just trying to kept, you know, just trying to keep acting like everything was going to stay the same and be normal. And like now, years later, recognizing like how much trauma we were all going through together and like there's this like weird bond that our family has. And we're super weird. And jake has been weird, like I don't know why he didn't just punch me in the face and walk away, but we still brought our kids to church, we still went to all the same. For in the beginning we tried not to sit together at things and then by I mean by the end, whatever. So I think everyone in this town is always like what are those two doing? We're like we don't fucking know.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Maya said the other day I go does it bother you?
Speaker 2:She's like no, I just mostly if people ask I'm like I don't know, it's like they're just like who they are. So it's a little bit like tricky to do things the way that we do right now. I don't know, mostly I don't give a fuck, okay, but I I made mistakes like I wish I had not been through those experiences. They both they ended up being really awful like both of those partners were super abusive drunks in the end, and mostly because they were drunk, uh, but that's like unhealed me kind of stuff that you know I was just busy helping everybody else, so I finally started going to therapy and had some really not, you know, not my favorite kinds of downfalls.
Speaker 1:And yeah Well, I think it's interesting that you felt numb before. Yes, I did. And then you felt all of these extreme emotions with the ups and downs with those guys I mean that was extreme.
Speaker 2:So it was like it was extreme and, like recently, I really reflected on the first partner and this other one was just like whatever. But he, you know, he'd been abusive. I'd been with him for like four years in high school and when I first told my sisters they were like Jenny, he pushed you down a flight of stairs and I was like what? Like I don't think that happened. They're like the fuck. It didn't happen.
Speaker 1:Wow, you blocked it out.
Speaker 2:Totally. And so, like last summer, we were at a wedding. Jake and the kids and I were at a wedding of my best friend's daughter, who's my goddaughter, and I walked out the door of the reception hall and across the street was the apartment building that he threw me down the stairs because my best friend's brother lived there and they were best friends, and so I walked over and I opened the door and I looked up and I was like, oh my God, I remembered everything.
Speaker 1:And you hadn't remembered until that moment.
Speaker 2:No, wow, I knew I was like, oh my god, I remembered everything and you hadn't remembered until that moment. I knew it was like a long set of stairway I didn't know where, but I had remembered that I fell to the bottom of the door was at my head. I'm like those stairs are too tall. And I opened the door and there's like two. It was like a land. There was a landing after the first, like six stairs, and I remember him like pushing me down those, not pushing me down, like we were like kind of rustling, and then we get to the landing and then he pushes me and I fall down the second step.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, I mean super like in, you know, like domestic violence, understanding he was really good at it. He was super manipulative. I had already been groomed by him, you know that was took me years to get over that in the first place. And then I met the kindest, most magnanimous human who never acted upon my will, which is the kind of partner that I have to have in this world, because I'm a stubborn brat. And yeah, and I just made the worst decision ever and again, it was like not a normal kind of like leaving your husband. It was like a tornado, an explosion, a hurricane, and it literally like shocked everyone, everybody, I can say we did not know each other that well, but all of your close friends were completely shocked.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was wrecked Like yeah, it was terrible. I remember driving down the road with Shannon, my best friend, who'd been in the throes of the worst postpartum depression. So we had just kind of like you know it wasn't abnormal, that we had kind of I don't know seemed real. And then you know like at the time, part of what I had to learn was that I did have to do things for myself. That felt right and it was awful. I wish it wouldn't have been that, but I gained confidence and kind of like an attitude of like I can literally not just spend my entire life taking care of everyone else and I just wish I had fucking done that in so many other ways before. I did it like that.
Speaker 1:I mean. And so now you're that much better of a therapist because of it? Because instead of judging the girls that talk to you about how they can't leave like, you understand that you can literally shut part of your brain off on accident and not remember being pushed down the stairs, which is so intense. And I've wondered, too, like I found things out that I did um in high school or younger, that I'm like I did not know that I did that or I didn't remember, and so then I think that I remember, I'm like maybe I have memories of that, but so I wonder how many other things there are that I've blacked out, and that's why I think alcohol gave me such bad anxiety or like you know, when you blacked out the night before and you don't everybody's like, no, you're fine, nothing bad happened, but you just still feel like I know I'm not good at remembering everything, so like what did I do?
Speaker 1:Worst feeling ever.
Speaker 2:But Worst anxiety ever and there will be a point where I will really hopefully like what's that other want? I don't want my grandkids to drink. I really don't. I want them to never have alcohol be like something that they love, and I love it, I love, hate it.
Speaker 1:Or there would be like some worse drug out there. You know, yeah, I mean gambling, sex addiction.
Speaker 2:there's so many things that can be equally as bad gambling, sex addiction there's so many things that can be equally as bad and hopefully they had like less trauma, but I managed to give them some of that. Um, we talk about trauma humor in my little family Like we're pretty fucking funny.
Speaker 1:Well, I wonder if you guys in a past life were trauma bonded and that's why like this, now that you're trauma bonding together, it's like you want it, like you all craved it.
Speaker 2:Maybe I don't pretty sure nobody but me was doing that at the time. Pretty sure nobody wanted that to happen. I would love to think that, but I take all the responsibility for that so would you change anything?
Speaker 1:do you regret?
Speaker 2:I used to say no and now I say absolutely would change it all. I would never, ever, ever go through that again. I think that there was a lot of ways to learn how to heal those parts of me without going through what I did, but it happened.
Speaker 1:So, like.
Speaker 2:At this point I also have to figure out how you find like the self-compassion to not just literally hate yourself and not, you know, still believe that you have worth and that it is not just all tied to like how well you did everything, or you know, still believe that you have worth and that it is not just all tied to like how well you did everything, or you know that you did everything so great in life, just like turn the fuck out. So that's probably my struggle now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's like in the future, if we could just make it so that the kids understood all of the things we went through, so we could evolve. But that's just over and over again, you hear that that's just not. I mean, kids are never going to they believe that they have to experience it themselves. I know, but yeah, I wonder why. I mean, what's the point? Why come here to?
Speaker 1:go through all this burner when we did it for you yeah, I guess I think we're just like our spirits are up there in the cloud, just like I want to go down there and experience it all, even the bad parts, but like I don't remember signing up for all this because it's tough not so sure I did recently.
Speaker 2:One of the things that's heavy in my work is so there's, you know, probably 16 years ago we started hearing about acs, which is like, uh, adult something, childhood trauma experiences, whatever. It's like this number that you get for like all of the things that happened to you as like as a child, and you sort of like come up with this like we could call it like a trauma number, and I I knew that it was valuable information. I knew that there was like I mean, you couldn't be in the psychology or psychiatry or the social work world without knowing that this study was very important and it was tied to like chronic illness and life expectancy and like mortality and addiction, all these things Right, and I agreed, like I really understood it. But sometimes now, like when I am sitting with it, I'm sitting in a room like doing someone's. You know life history and and you know like it starts out and maybe it has a bunch of really hard things in it and then it continues to be hard.
Speaker 2:It's. It's hard not to think you didn't have a chance, there was not a chance for you to have a life that was going to go. Probably any could have gone differently, but not like so much of this wasn't, it wasn't your fault, right? It was like the setup was there and I wish that we did a better job, like with early intervention, and we like figured this out sooner so we didn't have to like keep experiencing such hard things, so hard times. It's been a little bit defeating lately in my mind.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it goes back to the song it does like if I do a DA that I barely have to like, write anything, like there's a good chance they had a less hard times kind of life. There are some people that you know they're just like self-worth, suffers and like and all the things about them. They're dealing with addiction or they're dealing with loss and poverty. I just want them all to know it wasn't their fault.
Speaker 1:It was set up all along. Yes, if, when we were born, we could just be injected with the belief that all the bad things aren't our fault, just let us have our self-worth, you're gonna have the bad things happen, but don't like oh, I miss a zoom call and I feel like I'm a failure.
Speaker 2:Right, or whatever you know scale right, like let's give it, let's have a scale of like heinous crimes and horrible things, and then, like I missed a zoom call, like why can't our brains and this is like about in some other podcasts we should definitely talk about like cognitive restructuring and, you know, cognitive distortions, like the things that really make our brains believe really ridiculous, and things like life was supposed to be fair somehow. No, probably not. And if you, if that's like your underlying belief, you're disappointed all the time and people are always disappointed in you, you know. Or like I have to be perfect all the time, like that's just a setup for defeat, so, but it's also really hard and it seems like every single person struggles with self-worth.
Speaker 1:So I don't, I just don't get it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I just hide it in different ways yeah.
Speaker 1:A lot of people might not realize that they struggle with it, but it comes out in all these other ways.
Speaker 2:They're the worst insufferable bastards are the ones who do not know that they struggle, because then they just put it on everybody else. They're my least favorite.
Speaker 1:Or they're narcissists. Yep, they're my least favorite or they're narcissists? Yep, it's pretty much the definition of them. Yeah, so you said you don't want your kids to drink alcohol.
Speaker 2:I don't want anyone to struggle with struggle. Yeah, I don't want any. No, what do you hope that they do do that you do? Um, I hope they know that the world is like really open to them, that this you know, like going on that trip with Maya to New York and just watching her own it, it's like, yeah, there's absolutely no reason that this can't be your life yeah, you texted me.
Speaker 1:You were like I am blown away by, yeah, the audacity. She has to just be amazing there. Yeah, amazing, I love I love it.
Speaker 2:Or, like you know, our middle daughter is, she's just the kindest, sweetest thing and she's always she's coming up with these like new, like sort of niche, like interests that I didn't know she had.
Speaker 2:And like her world is like expanding in a way that I didn't know would happen. So's so fun. That's what I like for people. Yeah, I really like for my kids especially, just for them to feel safe. But I want them all to know they have the opportunities to be whatever. I did not know that. I grew up in a place where you owned your own business or you worked in the mines and the rich kids lived in the other town, Like their parents, were like doctors and dentists, and we didn't know how to be any of those things. Not because we weren't smart enough. We just did not have the same sort of like pathway.
Speaker 1:So so be it, yeah, interesting.
Speaker 2:When do you think you will have grandkids? Uh like, whenever baby. I am always thankful that I made it through to. Like you know, I think our youngest is 17, so she's almost three girls. No babies, like when. They didn't want them. Great, have them all have now, I don't care go for it, hit it up, perfect.
Speaker 2:I don't care, go for it, hit it up, perfect you. I don't know what they'll do, I have no idea, but I want to be called grandma straight up. I do not want to be a nana or a no-no.
Speaker 1:I want to be meemaw.
Speaker 2:Meemaw Like a southern meemaw. Yeah, I yeah just grams, yeah. And then we do this terrible thing to like all our grandmas, where we're like g-nan and g-bex and like gb and nobody gets to actually go out there. Real nice. So, yeah, whenever that is all will be really nice it is. It terrifies me the thought of my girls having babies. I I don't really think about it.
Speaker 1:I'm excited. I mean, james is only 20, so I hope he waits a few years for him, but I'll be ready.
Speaker 2:I just remember my mom standing at the end of my bed like this, like with this look on her face, and I was like someone needs to make her leave because she is scaring me Like. I feel like something's happening.
Speaker 1:When, what? When I'm in labor with Lily.
Speaker 2:She because she is scaring me Like, I feel like something's happening. When, what? When I'm in labor with Lily, she's just like standing in the door, like, and I'm like okay, that's stressful. Like she's got to go, crystal and Shannon can come in, jay can stay. My mom you got to go. Like you make me feel like I'm probably dying and I don't know it.
Speaker 1:Oh you're going to love this. So Katie Jo was there like all day, but she had her first night of school and it was like James was born at 6.07. So I think she left at 5.30 right when they started letting me push, because I think I pushed for 30 minutes but my mom was here and James' dad was here, but I was like hurting her neck too bad that they like made me switch her out with the nurse and then my dad's like in the back of the room, just like cheering me on.
Speaker 2:What kind of cheers did he say?
Speaker 1:She's like you got it, beth, you can do it. And I would like scream at the nurses, but then or like not at them. I would like scream, but then apologize, and my mom's like you don't have to apologize, you know, you can just yell and I'm like oh, that's a good mom.
Speaker 1:But I remember my very first thought after he was born was thank God, there's not two in there. And then my second thought was I could do that again. After, like I believed for hours of my life. I believed without certainty I would never have sex again. There was no way it would ever be worth it to have this pain. And my very first thought was God, there's not two. In. Second thought, I could do this again, whatever.
Speaker 2:Like that rush, rush, that epiphany. Or like the the feeling you get afterwards when you know you don't have to anymore on crack cocaine for weeks after I had my kids. Every time I was like best day ever. Yeah, I didn't die. I got this cute baby like there was no postpartum depression for me. I was like elated that I didn't die. Yeah, that's awesome yeah, I was naming every country we could adopt a baby from. When I was pushing Lily out A through.
Speaker 1:Z. I'm never doing this again, Argentina.
Speaker 2:Bolivia, chile.
Speaker 1:Denmark. Hey, that's smart, I don't keep you distracted, I was trying, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:It was wild. That is a whole experience I'd never want twice anymore.
Speaker 1:Imagine if experience I'd never want twice anymore imagine, if you like, would you?
Speaker 2:would you still have a baby me at my age?
Speaker 1:yeah, if you like met somebody. They're like Beth, let's have a baby, I had my tubes removed a few years ago so that I wouldn't have to make that sorry, hard decision, odie that came, it was literally because of my drink. Like I drank every day and I was like I'm never gonna want a baby and now that I don't drink, I do wish I would have had a baby.
Speaker 1:A baby, yeah, and COVID, like so COVID's where I stopped drinking pretty much, and that's also when I was like I want more kids, like James is downstairs playing video games won't come hang out with me and I can't go see my nieces and nephews like that was a big reason why I got my tubes removed, because I was like I'm just gonna like give all this extra love to Devin's kids oh you and Isaac's kids, my grand nephews and nieces, and then with COVID, I couldn't see them like. They were really strict for quite a few months at least, you know. So that's when I was like I, I'm not drinking anymore, I don't have more kids to play with, you know. So I'm fine, I'm like content with it now.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's tricky, but in the moment, because I remember going into the doctor to get my tubes tied and I asked them should I get them tied or removed or what? And they're like removed because then that reduces your risk of cervical cancer by 30% and you can't have a two ball pregnancy, which is really hard on you and the baby. So I was like awesome, but they're like you have to like like have a notary and think about it for a month and blah, blah, blah. So I remember Kylie, who I worked with. She was like go in there like like wearing your best outfit, like look as sophisticated as possible and be like I'm certain I want to make this decision, you know, otherwise they're like going to question you and not let you do this. I mean, I was 30, 33.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Maybe, but my doctor was really cool. She's like I believe you are an adult enough to make this decision, but it's funny. Oh yeah, just a couple of years later I was like you can probably figure out if he really needs you.
Speaker 2:I could still like artificial insemination, but right yeah, I'm gonna let the next generation bring the babies yeah, for sure I feel like I would like. I would not even my third baby. I had her when I was 30. My body felt totally like, different than when.
Speaker 1:I had my first baby.
Speaker 2:I was like okay.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, their hormones could change it, and your age and all the things I suppose.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was definitely harder than the beginning.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:I got old, I'm not old.
Speaker 1:Cool, All right. Well, I hope that you come on all the time.
Speaker 2:Let me know. Let me know when you want me, if you need a little fill-in.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:It's kind of fun.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it is I kind of like it. Love you.
Speaker 2:Thanks for coming on, thanks for having me.
Speaker 1:Not comes from the Greek word sailor and means voyager or traveler. Like Voyager or traveler. Like an astronaut searching the stars. A supernaut is one searching the inner and outer worlds of self, navigating life, consciousness and reality, striving for betterment. The paradox is that seeking and striving can create more unrest and more unhappiness. So, while calm seas may not make great sailors, I plan to explore the idea of light rescuing darkness instead of fighting it.