Authentically You: What it takes to be you, Boo! With Carole West

In this episode, I sit down with Carole West for a powerful conversation about growth, release, and becoming authentically yourself. Carole shares how learning to let her children grow through life on their own opened the door for her own healing, freedom, and a new sense of purpose. This episode is honest, empowering, and full of wisdom for anyone navigating transition and rediscovering who they are.

If this conversation resonated with you or someone you love, these resources may be helpful:

• Carole West Executive Coaching: https://www.carolewest.com/

• Families Anonymous: https://familiesanonymous.org/

• SAMHSA National Helpline: https://www.samhsa.gov/

Disclaimer:

The content shared on the Bernitha Rena Relates Podcast is for informational and inspirational purposes only. It is not intended to be professional advice—legal, financial, medical, or otherwise. Any actions taken based on this content are at the listener’s own discretion and risk. We assume no liability. Always consult with a qualified professional before making decisions that may impact your health, life or wellbeing. 

Welcome to Bernitha Rena Relates, a faith centered podcast where real stories meet purpose. I sit down with authors, leaders, entrepreneurs, and everyday people to share honest conversations that inspire growth, healing, and transformation.
Each episode will encourage you to renew your mind, strengthen your faith, and walk confidently in your purpose. If you are navigating life transitions or seeking clarity, this space is for you.
Subscribe and join the journey. Your next breakthrough could be one conversation away.
🔗 Stay Connected:
🌐 Website: https://bernitharenarelatespodcast.com/
✨ Join the Sunlit Sisterhood: https://bernitharenarelatespodcast.com/join-our-community/
📘 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/BernithaRenaRelates
📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/4bernitharenarelates/
🎵 TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@bernitharenarelates
🎙 Want to be a guest on the podcast? Apply here: https://www.joinpodmatch.com/bernitharenarelates

#FaithBasedPodcast, #ChristianPodcast, #PersonalGrowth, #HealingJourney, #WomenOfFaith, #PurposeDrivenLife, #MentalWellness, #Inspiration, #BernithaRenaRelates

Transcript

SPEAKER_04 0:01

Welcome to the Bernita Renee Relates Podcast. I'm your host, Bernita Renee. Our guest today is Carol West, and she doesn't believe in shrinking or playing it safe. In this conversation, she opens up about motherhood, release, self-discovery, and the freedom that comes from being authentically you. Miss Carol, welcome, welcome, welcome to the podcast.

SPEAKER_00 0:28

Thank you for having me. I really appreciate it.

SPEAKER_04 0:30

You're so welcome. We're so excited to have you here today. So, Miss Carol West, can you do me a favor and just introduce yourself to our listeners in your own words? Who is Carol West today and what is the divine purpose that God has placed in your life in this season?

SPEAKER_00 0:50

You know, when I think about the little girl who's grown up into the grown woman I am today, there are so many different complexities that make up who I am today. I am a transformational coach. I am a leader. I am a lifetime developer of people. I am a mother. I am a friend. I am a sister. I'm an employer. I am a vessel of the Most High with a purpose to pour into the development of others. When I think about what God has called me to do, it's to operate in an authentic space of sharing my story, telling my stories to others, to let them know that regardless of the obstacle, regardless of the barriers, the value that God has placed on your life far exceeds what you may see yourself and to keep pushing. That is my purpose and that is who I am.

SPEAKER_04 1:50

Carol, you created a movement around saying effort. What does that truly mean to you?

SPEAKER_00 1:56

Let me tell you, effort, you know, it carries a shock value to it. And a lot of people think, oh gosh, there's profanity with it. But the reality is effort really means learning to let things go. It is about releasing the limiting beliefs. It is about breaking free of the boxes that people try to place you in. And my personal transformation, it was a life journey, reflecting on my life and the challenges that I had. And I was telling myself a narrative that wasn't generating results for my life that I actually wanted. And so I had this epiphany when I was on my 50th birthday vacation in Puquet, Thailand. And it was like God just came to my spirit and said, you need to start writing. 50 years to effort, just letting things go.

SPEAKER_04 2:45

That's amazing. You speak so boldly, Carol, and just so authentically. And, you know, you tell so much truth. I'm trying to understand where all this came from. So can you take us back to your upbringing, your home life? How did you evolve into the person that you are today?

SPEAKER_00 3:06

You know, I'm still evolving and it's still a transformation because I'm a lifelong learner. And if I go back to the very beginning, I was placed up for adoption. And when my biological mother placed me up for adoption, she felt like she could not be an unwed mother. She was 21 years old. She was white, having a biracial baby. And in the 70s, her parents did struggle with inclusion. And so being placed up for adoption, I don't think many people realize the level of rejection that an individual feels. I was talking to somebody not too long ago, and they said, well, this happened to someone when they were two years old, and it was a significant death. And most people don't realize that separation, even at two years old, can impact a baby, whether they can verbally articulate it or not. And so I was adopted by a white family and I'm biracial. And I will tell you, so I'm half black, half white, I felt invisible most of my life. And when I think about the feeling of being invisible, like I didn't fit in with the white crowd, I didn't fit in with the black crowd. My whole life has been this constant pursuit to become visible. And when I think about the transformation that God has allowed me to go through, I recently realized that it wasn't that I was invisible to others, I was invisible to myself. And that is the true transformation that I'm experiencing. Learning to embrace myself, learning to understand that I'm free to be me, that I am free to let go of the resentment, the anger, the frustration that I felt towards my birth parents as well as my adoptive parents. Life isn't easy for anyone. And all of the traumatic experiences that God allowed me to survive made me into this force of authenticity and audacity to boldly show up as myself to say, I'm free to be me. I'm free to own my message and speak my truth because I know the altruism that that resonates within me is truly to help somebody navigate through their own trauma and their own life crises.

SPEAKER_04 5:48

It is. And what you say is so important. You know what? You just opened my eyes to something that I hadn't realized about myself when you talk about invisible to yourself. I can relate to what you said on so many levels. I was not adopted, but I did grow up in an environment where I was very different. I called myself the girl in the middle because I was in an not all, but mostly white school I grew up in, and one of the few black people growing up most of my years, the few black people that were around for whatever reason, they didn't really like me. And so most of my friends growing up were white, but to matriculate through that system, you kind of become like what's around you, right? And so, yeah, for so much of my life, I was always sort of that girl in the middle, not quite fitting in here, but definitely not fitting in there. So I can absolutely relate to that and realizing that not that I was invisible to them, but I was invisible to myself, not understanding truly who I was now as a middle-aged woman, that because I accept all of who I am, and that even those experiences in my younger years taught me something. Like I can be in all kinds of different crowds and be unbothered. White people, crowdful black people, crowdful Hispanic people of who members and be comfortable in my own skin. Right. So you can take the good and the bad with everything. What you said was just so profound and it sparked something in me. Didn't even really know it was there.

SPEAKER_00 7:21

It was a recent epiphany. I also had someone ask me the other day, like, what is the main message of your book? And you know, it's not effort, right? Like effort truly is a shock value. And yes, it's a catchy phrase and it's a movement. I had to process through that because, again, internally I think something, but what is someone on the outside going to capture from this? And I had a really good friend say, Well, you know, it's about human development and it's about your human development, and it's about seeing things from a different lens. And, you know, you growing up as a minority in a predominantly white community, or me being a biracial in a predominantly white environment, we all want to fit in. I don't think that there's any human walking this earth that doesn't want to fit in with some sort of group or another. Whether you are interested in sci-fi or you're interested in science or medicine or technology or engineering or athletics, everybody wants to fit in. But when you're dealing with the emotional trauma of rejection or various factors that influence children and young people growing up, you don't have the mental capacity to navigate through what you're feeling at that time. And so oftentimes it manifests in adverse behavior, adverse displays or academic performance in school. You're acting out. Many people may be labeled with, you know, ADHD or, you know, something. We try to put people in boxes. Our communities are designed to put people in boxes. You're born, you go on a daycare, then you go into school, and you go to school for 12 years. And if you're blessed and fortunate, you go to another school for another four years to eight to 12 years, depending on your profession. And then you go work eight to five, nine to five, you go build a house, get a white picket fence and a dog named spot and a significant other. You pop out children. And it's like this vicious cycle where we're never slowing down enough to understand who we are on the inside and what motivates us, and how can we celebrate the uniqueness of us? Our environment, unfortunately, at least here in the United States, is not set up for us to cultivate that individuality. And it's important for all of us to pause and take a moment and look in that mirror and say, who am I really? Who do I really enjoy?

SPEAKER_04 9:52

You're just blowing my mind in so many ways, Carol. I'm gonna go back to a personal experience and something you just spoke on that, just really you're opening my mind to so many things. And when I think about, like you said, how our society is set up in the community that I grew up in, I didn't necessarily think I had ADHD, but I did think that I was less than. I was definitely afraid to be smart because I learned, not even realizing it, but I learned that the teachers, for example, because I had all white teachers, they were kinder to me. They accepted me more if I did not get good grades, because they wanted me to fit within a certain box of because you're a minority, you cannot be an all-eight student. I did not even realize that's what I was doing. But in order to quote unquote sort of please them, and because I saw what happened when I stepped out of that box, they were very cruel to me. And as long as I stayed in that box and I was not the smart kid, then I was safe. It was not until I got out into the world and got into corporate America, and I was like, wow, I didn't know I was capable, didn't know I was smart, I didn't know all these things about me because I was required to stay in a certain box through all of my youth. And let me be clear, of course, as a grown woman, I understand that, yes, there are many, many kind, loving, caring, committed teachers of all races and of all backgrounds. Yes, I know that and I've experienced that as well. I was just reflecting on the perceptions that I formed as like a third grader trying to navigate life and how those perceptions stayed with me for many years. Isn't it so interesting how we perform and we don't even know we're doing it?

SPEAKER_00 11:44

Yes. Yes, yeah. You know, it's the it is the putting on a mask. It's like you're wearing a mask and a masquerade. Lauren Dijkel, she sings a song and talks about, you know, putting on the mask and the masquerade. And many of us do that. And in the course of self-discovery and exploration, I realized that it's not just our environmental factors as far as our family and our upbringing or, you know, the education environment, but it's also our epigenetics and it's what is in our DNA. And I've had to realize that, oh wow, there's deeper layers that I need to dig into to better understand where this characteristic came from. And I'm not somebody who is a profound person on history or any of that stuff, like, oh, check your facts, whatever it may be. But when you start looking into some of the history of what makes us as an African-American community, many of us born in the United States are descendants of slaves. And when you think about 400 years ago that women were raped and you could not read, and the men were belittled, and the women that they loved were raped in front of them and birthing children for other people, the physical and the emotional abuse that translates into generations to come. I was listening to, I think it was Dr. Anita Phillips one time. There's another book that Oprah was talking about. It didn't start with you, is another book. And they they talk about how when a woman is born, so a little baby girl born, she is born with the number of embryos she will have for all of her life. As that little girl grows up, the embryos that are in her body experience physiological reactions to the experiences she has. So any child she births is affected by the experiences she had. And the same thing goes on and on for generation to generation. And so oftentimes we don't stop to know ourselves, and we surely don't stop to say, Mama, what made you the way that you are? Daddy, what made you the way that you are? And so, unless we start digging and exploring, we're walking around blind, just trying to navigate this chaotic world. We don't know how to address our emotions, we don't know how to slow down to even realize what emotions we're feeling. And it really takes a conscious effort to be able to get out of that cyclical nature of just living life, just day to day.

SPEAKER_04 14:21

It sounds like you've done that work, Carol.

SPEAKER_00 14:24

I mean, it's a work in progress. Every day I'm learning something new about myself, about the narrative that I told myself for so many years that I was invisible. And something as simple, Bernitia, as the colors you choose to wear. My favorite color is natural. Like you'll see in my background, that's kind of a natural color. This shirt is actually natural. It's not white. I love natural tones. Look at my nail polish, it's natural. And I realize that in wearing muted colors, I'm subconsciously muting myself as well. And I realize that when I put on a vibrant color, when I wear green or I wear bright blue, or I wear yellow, I feel different. And so it's a process of learning and understanding how do you show up in this world? And how are you showing up to yourself? And what is the story you're telling to yourself, even subconsciously, as it relates to the colors that you like and you're attracted to?

SPEAKER_04 15:20

Wow, that's wild. I don't know what it means that I'm obsessed with purple. I gotta look into that.

SPEAKER_00 15:26

Baby, you are loyalty. That's what that is.

SPEAKER_04 15:30

Oh, that's what that is. I gotta dig deeper. That is very interesting. So, Carol, can you walk us through what life was like before you learned to unmute, as you mentioned? And what were some of the things that you and your family endured along the way?

SPEAKER_00 15:47

You know, I've been a single parent. I was married for a period of time, but um, even during the marriage, I always felt like I was still a single parent and the responsibilities were on me. And I know that with a purpose that is greater than my own life, meaning to pour into the development of others, there's always been kind of this attack on me. And I always feel like the enemy could never get to me because I compartmentalize, and I think that's a self-preservation tactic, feeling rejected or wanting to feel loved and all of those things I grew up with. I just compartmentalized and kind of put things in boxes. I figured if Jesus died and rose in 72 hours, then Carol could pick it up and pop back up in three days, too. And so if I got upset, I'd cry four minutes, not cry, whatever it may be, but get back up because you got life to live and things to do. And so I had a lot of personal attacks on me emotionally because I was trying to discover who I was as a parent raising children. But then the attacks started affecting my children. It was medical attacks. My middle child was diagnosed when he was three with febrile seizures. To see a three-year-old baby just seizing, you don't know what in the world is happening. And it happened like clockwork. Every 30 days, he was having a seizure. He even had a seizure at the doctor's office during a checkup and fell off the doctor's table. And that went on for a couple of years. And then he got out of that, but then he went into a lot of behavioral issues. And he was probably just living out what I traumatized my parents with. He was traumatizing me with. Then my oldest daughter turned 18 and she developed epilepsy. So now she's off in college and she starts having seizures. Then my youngest daughter started experiencing night terrors where she was having freezes in the middle of the night and panic attacks after an attempted kidnapping. She was coming out of school, somebody was following her. And so the enemy was always attacking my children.

SPEAKER_03 17:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:55

And throughout life, I was still maintaining. One of my girlfriends says, Carol, you're like a freaking cat. No matter what life throws at you, plop, you land on your feet. And I always say that's because God designed me like this, and God created me to take a lick and keep on ticking. And just because he attacked me, he's not going to get me. He's not going to get my hope. He's not going to get my faith. You can attack my children, but my heavenly father is going to protect my children too. And so I would say 2018 was one of the toughest years for me. My mother, who raised me, suffered a major life-altering stroke. The man I was married to, we were getting a divorce, and my son was arrested for a violent felony. And I was transitioning jobs at the time. And I just felt like, what in the world is happening? Right. And I threw money at my son. I threw money at my mom. I'm like trying to navigate everything. And about maybe about 10 or 11 months later, but my son was ultimately sentenced to prison. It broke me because you do everything as a parent to try to prevent them from experiencing the negative things. But God had to sit me down and say, no matter how smart you are, no matter how much money you have, you can't save him. It's my responsibility to do that. And I had to turn over my son. Now I didn't stop loving him or talking to him or putting money on his books because that's what we do. We try to protect our babies as much as we can. And so I start with that story in 2018 because it was traumatizing. It was devastating. My youngest daughter's best friend was just snatched. I mean, they were like two peas in a pod. And he was so jovial and so fun. And that energy was out of our household. And he was 21 years old, 22 years old, like he was still a baby. And I was trying to fight for him. Like his brain isn't fully developed. He has mental illness. He has addiction issues. It didn't matter. God had a different plan. So I'm going to fast forward to this journey because even at that point in time, I went to church all the time. God has been the constant in my life since I was probably about 16 years old. But I didn't stop to look within. I was still trying to solve everything on the outside of me. So fast forward to 2024, and I was in Pukai, Thailand for my 50th birthday. And I was with a girlfriend. And I was so grateful for this girlfriend because who's going to pick up and fly 17 hours from LA to a whole other country because your girlfriend wants to have a big 50th party, you know, for herself, right? And so I'm sitting in the resort and I'm looking at one of the most beautiful sunsets that I've ever seen. Like it's bright orange, yellow, red, the hues. And down below, there is this couple that is sitting there just texting on their phones. And they're not talking to each other. And then there's families playing, there's all these things. And I said to myself, if I were with the guy I was with at that time, that's what we'd be doing. We'd be on our phone. We wouldn't be embracing it. And God told me right then and there, get up and start writing. And so I've written my whole life. Like I have put little things out there. I've always known that God wanted me to pour into others and to speak and to do all of these things. But he told me to start writing. So I started writing. And the original title was 50 years to fuck it. And then I got feedback from my youngest daughter who said, no, you need to add a little bit more. But anyway, I wrote the book. And over the next couple of months, I was feverishly adding this and putting this, putting this. So it was the end. It was the end of 2024, started having people editing it. And it was May of 2024 that my son was getting out of prison. And here we are seven years later, you know, that's completion, right?

SPEAKER_03 22:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:12

And I'm sitting there going, my baby is coming home. I can't wait to hug on him. Because for COVID, I wasn't able to see him for years. And I'm like, my son is coming home. I can't wait. And we all go down to the federal prison and we go to pick him up, and everything is great for the first week. And we set him up with an Airbnb and we leave him with money and we leave him with a car. And we're like, you know, go get a job. And next thing you know, the shit hit the fan. He started getting paranoid because he was in a house and he was hearing noises. I'm sure he probably got, you know, connected with something because marijuana's legal in that state. And next thing you know, I'm getting phone calls sporadically in the middle of the night because he's scared, because he thinks somebody's trying to kill him and that there's somebody out in the back alley of the Airbnb with like a gun who's trying to kill him. And I'm getting all of these phone calls, and I'm just like, God, what is happening? And I'm in this situation with a significant other that was going through some traumatic experiences, and I was feeling empty, and he couldn't pour into me, and I couldn't pour into anyone. The eight weeks of my son transitioning from prison to getting him here in Texas caused me to almost lose my own mind.

SPEAKER_04 23:37

How so?

SPEAKER_00 23:38

I was paralyzed with fear that my son was gonna die. He was living in a state that I couldn't be there for him because I needed to be here in order to work. I felt like when I reached out to him, I got resistance and pushback because he was in a state of psychosis. And if you ever had a loved one with mental health or mental illness or addiction, you don't know what is triggering what, but you know that the person you're dealing with is not the person you know when they are in a healthy and healed state of mind.

SPEAKER_03 24:16

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 24:17

And it went from this joyous occasion to living in straight fear. And so I had to take a leave of absence from my job. I got on a plane, I flew to where he was. And when I tell you, the two weeks that I was with him trying to stabilize him, he scared the living daylights out of me.

SPEAKER_04 24:35

Oh my God, I was just about to ask you that.

SPEAKER_00 24:38

He's my only son and my baby. And he always loved Long John Silvers. Yeah. And so he was like, Can we go to Long John Silver's mom? And I was like, Yeah. And then we ate, and he was paranoid, and he was looking around and he was like, You gonna let me drive? And you want him to feel a level of normal, even though you feel like things aren't normal. Yeah, Prenez, yeah. I got in the car with him, and I made the mistake of letting him drive. And I was terrified. We were in Phoenix, Arizona, in North Phoenix, and as soon as he got in the car, it's a B8. The vehicle I had is a B eight. So the power, he gets in the car and he floors it. And I'm like, slow down. And he's like, You think I'm gonna kill you? You think I'm gonna hurt you? You think I'm gonna kill you? What do you mean? What do you mean? You don't trust me, you don't trust me? And he's like in my face. And for the next 30 minutes, he's weaving in and out of traffic, going 50, 60, 70 miles an hour, testing me. And it was the most terrifying experience. Somebody called me when I was in the car with them, and they're like, Are you okay? And I had to lie because I knew if I would have said something, I thought he was on a suicide mission to take us out.

SPEAKER_04 26:01

Oh my goodness.

SPEAKER_00 26:03

But for the grace of God. And yet there was another time the next week or the few days later, we're at the mall, and you need to get off the phone. You need to hang up the phone right now. They're lit. I was terrified, bawling on FaceTime. We're trying to have family intervention. And I was so depleted by trying to give to him. We got the Interstate Compact agreement. We got him here, which we believed would be safety because he was by himself over there. And remember, the book was written. And I sent out the book because by this time I'm finding a publisher, I'm getting proofs made, all kinds of things, but I'm still working and I'm on this leave of absence. And I'm just like, if I don't take care of myself, I can't take care of somebody else. Right. And it just so happened that, and it didn't just so happen, God absolutely knew what he was doing. A very dear friend of mine um was friends with a woman who she reached out to and said, Hey, could you talk to Carol? I think that she might need some advice. Because Miss Betty talked about how people will teach you how to parent children, but they don't teach you how to parent adults. And there's a different way we need to show up with adult children than how we show up with parenting young children. And when you have a child who has suffered trauma, and you know, as a parent, you contributed to that trauma unintentionally, there's a level of guilt, and you feel like you need to fix things. And so here I have a 29-year-old son who I'm treating like a 10-year-old boy.

SPEAKER_04 27:58

Right.

SPEAKER_00 27:59

There it is. I wanted to save him again.

SPEAKER_04 28:02

There it is.

SPEAKER_00 28:02

I wanted to fix things. And in talking to Miss Betty that day, just the epiphany, and again, going back to being a lifelong learner, I will absorb knowledge from whoever God sends to just plant a seed in me. And Miss Betty said, You got a parent differently. And she said, Have you ever heard of Families Anonymous? And I was like, Well, absolutely not. And she said, Well, everybody hears about Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous, but there's a group called Family Anonymous. I want you to look them up. And I instantaneously Googled them. And that night I went to Families Anonymous. I was also seeing two to three therapists a week at that point in time. But I will tell you, walking into the Family Anonymous meeting, they were talking about guilt. They were talking about codependency. They were talking about letting go. And I thought I had mastered those things. But I had accountability partners around me who were willing to tell me the truth to say, no, you're not letting go. You're still trying to rescue. You are still trying to take care of an adult child. You've got to learn to let go. You have got to learn to turn him over to the father because he ultimately is an adult. And what I heard that night at Families Anonymous was you are thwarting your child's ability to learn and grow when you try to solve their problems.

SPEAKER_04 29:40

Ooh, Lord, that's a word.

SPEAKER_00 29:43

That was it for me. Because I'm a lifelong learner. I don't want to hurt my baby by trying to save him, by trying to rescue him. And so that night, I'm getting the phone call from the mental institution. I'm getting the phone call from actually that time he was in jail. He had gotten arrested with some girl hopping somebody's fence in somebody's house. Again, when I tell you in and out of jail, I think he had five mental health stints, one stint, it was involuntary commitment, all within like an eight-week period. Like it was chaotic from the end of May when he got out of prison to the end of July, August when he got out here. It was ridiculous.

SPEAKER_04 30:27

So all this is happening like fast, fast, fast. Eight weeks. Wow.

SPEAKER_00 30:32

Yes. In addition to the job I was working, my boss, they brought in somebody above my boss, kind of snatched all of her responsibilities away, started bringing in a new crew. So, you know, the writing's on the wall. You're about to get some exit papers too.

SPEAKER_03 30:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:47

And I'm thinking I'm the primary breadwinner for my family. I'm about to lose health insurance. I've got a kid in college. I've got a kid in mental health crisis. I was losing my shit. Of course. And I found myself just sitting in the bed and just sitting in the bed. And I didn't know how to move. Somebody told me about psychology today. So I found some therapists. Again, if Jesus was down for 72 hours, I can pick it up too. But it was so heavy. Everything that I was feeling was so, so heavy that it forced me to look within. And so when I think about the transformational work, and everything has transpired very rapidly over the last year, but it was 100% birthed out of the depths and pit of so much pain. So much pain, so much feeling of isolation, but a level of hope as well. My Heavenly Father goes before me, with me, and after me. And while I knew it in my mind and I knew it in my spirit, I couldn't manifest and allow things to really like sync up because my behavior was still telling myself a narrative that wasn't producing the results. I still had a victim mentality or an invisible mentality. And so then let's fast forward to the spring of 2025, and I'm ready to release my book, and I print it and I sent it out to a couple of beta readers. And one of those beta readers was my oldest daughter. Now, my oldest daughter, she had the worst version of me as a mother. I was 15 when I got pregnant, and 16 when I had her. My brain wasn't fully developed either. I was a baby trying to raise a baby and thought everything she did was funny, or got ultra conservative from a religious standpoint, and said, no, you can't experience Halloween like everybody else, or you have to sit in the hallway because the class is reading Harry Potter and that's demonic. Like I was an absolutely extra special parent. And so my oldest daughter has felt a lot of resentment and frustration and pain from having an unhealed baby raising her into becoming a woman. And when she read the book, she was like, Mom, you need to change this, this, this. There's not enough emotion here. She's a lawyer today. She's a criminal defense attorney.

SPEAKER_04 33:28

Isn't that interesting?

SPEAKER_00 33:29

Right. I am like so proud of my baby. She's like a radical Black Panther. She is power to the people, and she is killing it down in Houston. But, you know, her feedback was constructive because as a lawyer, you see things very objectively. Yeah. I had to take some of her feedback and some of it I had to throw out the door. But I took her feedback because I value my children's opinion because in many cases they know me better than I know myself.

SPEAKER_04 33:56

There you go.

SPEAKER_00 33:57

And that feedback helped me reframe some things that also caused me to do more work and digging in and doing shadow work and understanding hey, this is reality, but this is the story you've told yourself.

SPEAKER_04 34:12

Is that what shadow work is, Miss Carroll?

SPEAKER_00 34:14

Yeah. So shadow work is really digging deep within. So here you see me in the physical. This is my physical body, but there's a whole nother person of me that lives in the shadows. Somebody you don't see. Therapists will give you work. And it's literally questions to dig into the shadow of who you are. And that was a very, very powerful, repetitive exercise because you can't just take the questionnaire and just start answering questions because you have to pause, you have to think, you have to go deep within. And oftentimes our conscious will block things out. And some people who know me know I don't remember my childhood before the age of 10. I don't know why, but I can see pictures and say, I know I played softball, I played the violin, I was an athlete. But when I started doing the shadow work, I realized, because I used to say that my parents were not deliberate developers of me. But then when I started doing the shadow work, literally after writing the book, I was like, dang, my parents taught me how to play the violin, they taught me how to dance, they taught me how to play basketball and softball. We used to go on camping trips, they taught me how to water ski. They took us to Disneyland, they took us to New York, they took us to the Grand Canyons. And I'm sitting there going through all of these things only because the question prompted me to think differently.

SPEAKER_04 35:50

Why do you think you were seeing your parents in that other way?

SPEAKER_00 35:54

Because I told myself the narrative that I was invisible my entire life, that my white parents, now did they do everything perfect? Absolutely not. But then I felt like they never saw me, they never understood me. And it was more so geared towards my mom versus my dad, because I was my daddy's favorite, period, point blank. And we still talk about that today and laugh about that. He's 86 years old and I'm still his favorite. Um, but I think what I wanted in development as a child, I didn't get. Therefore, I resented them. And I told myself the story that they were not effective parents, that they were not good parents. But they did the best they could with what they had. And it wasn't until I started reflecting on my own parenting cycle and journey, as well as those books that didn't start with you. I had to realize that parents are people too.

SPEAKER_04 36:54

Right. And we need to understand their story.

SPEAKER_00 36:57

Absolutely. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_04 36:58

So, Carol, for someone who they hear you, but they don't even know what the first step is to start the process of doing the inner work to heal. What would you say to that person?

SPEAKER_00 37:13

Number one, go out to psychology today and find a therapist. Find somebody that you can work with. Psychology today allows you to put in certain criteria to connect with someone who maybe has similar values or beliefs that you do. And I would encourage you to interview your therapist, spend some time with them, get to know them, see if the feel is a good feel, and know that you have the right to change your mind and you can choose to see somebody else. Psychology today is really good for those individuals who have commercial insurance as well as state-funded insurance. But then for those individuals who don't have insurance, who are trying to figure out, well, then how do I get help if I don't have the resources? There are organizations in every community where you can get pro bono therapy. I know there's an organization here in Dallas that don't remember it off the top of my head, but anybody who is in this situation, they will scholarship you for like 10 to 15 sessions. Mental health and mental health awareness is so critical for personal growth and development. And I'm so grateful that many celebrities and people have started speaking out and utilizing their platform to talk about that. Because in our community, oftentimes we use religion as a resource to help, you know, get that person better. You've heard probably that person's touch, that person's special, or, you know, they got a spirit. Well, the bottom line is God created individuals to study our brain and study our behavioral systems to help us navigate that. Sometimes wires are misfiring in our brains and it requires medication to reset. Sometimes trauma can be so drastic on a person's development that it absolutely alters the wiring in the brain. So, number one, find a therapist. Number two, think about your social circle and the people you surround yourselves with. You have the right to change your mind about who your friends are and what family members you communicate with, assuming you are an adult and living an independent life, right? Children, you still need to respect your parents. But if your parents aren't a positive influence to your personal development and growth, feel free to cut the cord because God is going to send somebody into your life that will feed into you and will help you. All you have to do is ask, have the courage to ask. There are so many people who have a desire to help others, but sometimes they don't know who needs the help. And so just reach out and ask for help, but change your social circle to make sure you have people who will tell you the truth, that they will be authentic and bold enough to tell you the truth. I've got a couple of people around me who are just my checkers. And they'll be like, no, you acting like a baby mama. You acting like that special one. Like, stop, don't do that. Let's think about that. Think about the consequences. And so you've got to have an accountability circle, not just people to go kick it with and go have fun and go eat brunch. Are you sharpening each other? Are you helping each other be better? And if they're not, go find new friends.

SPEAKER_04 40:36

Powerful, Carol. And you talked about some of your friends telling you, I think you ought to do some things different as it relates to your son.

SPEAKER_00 40:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 40:44

What did you do different? And what changes did you see in him? If any, but more than that, what changes did you see in your own life?

SPEAKER_00 40:52

In my own life, I experienced a level of freedom because I was taking everybody else's problems on as my own. My 29-year-old son's solutions were not mine to solve. Because if I solved his problems, I took the growth opportunity away from him. And here I was, you know, in my mind, my son's coming out of prison. I just relocated to Dallas. Let me go buy a house. Let me get a three or four-bedroom house. And one of my friends was like, You do know your grown-ass kids ain't coming to live with you, right? I love a friend like that. Everybody needs a friend like that. Right. And I had to stop in my tracks. And, you know, because I've always had a five-bedroom, six-bedroom house. Like all the kids come over here. I have big furniture. I have stuff for family. I got too many kitchen gadgets. My children are 35, 30, and 23. She was like, you know, your baby's not leaving New York to come live with you. Are you kidding me? And with lawyers not coming back. And even though your son's in transition right now, he's a grown-ass man. And so I was like, oh my God. So I felt freedom. I felt freedom as in not being responsible to solve his problems. And then what I saw manifest in my son is him navigating the situations on his own. I didn't bail him out of jail that day when I came home from Families Anonymous. When he got kicked out of his sober living home, I didn't find another one for him. I let him find another one for him. Did it turn out perfect? Absolutely not. He got kicked out of the next one and 5150 into a mental institution, but I didn't solve his problem. But when he was released and I knew he was going to be homeless, I did step in and provide shelter. But it was relief. And when he got here, there was still agitation, irritation. I've been cussed out from here to kingdom. I did so much throughout the years of hundreds of thousands of dollars of like legal support trying to save him over the years. And I was like, let it go. Let God. All right, God. And my son is, and this is a blessing because even when he was in Arizona, he was trying to apply for college and he was trying to apply for music school and apply for jobs. And with a felony, it's hard. And he was getting rejected from everywhere. His father leveraged a connection. He got his application submitted to Paul Queen College. And I am pleased to say that my son is entering his second semester at Paul Quinn. Praise the Lord. He wants to like mess with numbers and be an actuary. And I'm like, all right, young man. I'm like, Claude, you go do your thing. In addition, he's got a job. He's working at a fast food restaurant. But the fact that an HBCU was willing to make an exception for a young man who is truly gifted and talented. He's extremely smart, but he's also extremely traumatized. And he goes to therapy. So I in some I said, for every therapy appointment you go to, I'll give you$20. I know money motivates him. And so sure enough, he'd be like, I went to therapy. And I'm like, let me cash up him 20. What did you learn from him, son? And he was like, it's really good. My son is very eclectic. He's got dreadlocks, half pink, half red, half black, half, you know, blonde. He found himself an older white man that he can relate to. And again, we're all in this space of transformation and the transformation has begun because we're all going to experience life. We're all going to experience challenges. They're going to show up and manifest differently, but we have to know that we do have the power within us to seek resources from above from our Heavenly Father, as well as the external resources that understand human development, human behavior, the impact of trauma, and how to transform that.

SPEAKER_04 44:53

Wow. Beautiful. Just beautiful. And I'm so proud of your son. I'm proud of him like he's my son. I'm like, well done, son. Well done. Yes. But how hard is that? I certainly have a lot of people in my life where it has been very difficult to cut that cord and let them fail. Let them fail on their own. Because we have to. Who would we be?

unknown 45:16

Right.

SPEAKER_04 45:16

Should we not have the opportunity to fail? So we got to give our kids and the people that we love the opportunity to do so. And I know it's hard to watch. It's hard to watch. But isn't it interesting that a lot of times you can't even really hear the Lord until you're in a desperate place? Like you got to get to that point of desperation. And then you're like, okay, this is what you've been trying to tell me all along.

SPEAKER_00 45:38

And sometimes I have this conversation with God.

SPEAKER_04 45:40

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 45:41

And I'm like, God, you gave me this brain and you gave me the ability to navigate creatively and to be resourceful. And so anytime something would come at me, I always felt like I know a way out. I can see a way out. I can see a way out. And so, yes, he does come to us in those dark, deep times or what have you. But I also think that it's a struggle for people who are very resourceful, very creative, and very solution-oriented because we think we have the capacity to accomplish anything. And so we're trying to solve it. And so when I think about the relationship with the spirit and the Holy Spirit and having a relationship with God, it's really a matter of faith when it comes to a loved one. Okay. Because I am not in control. I may have birthed this baby, but his life experiences are so far out of my control. If I think about the seizures that he experienced when he was three years old, I couldn't control them. I could get ibuprofen if his fever spiked up, but I couldn't control it. And so realizing if you have a loved one with addiction or mental illness, the only thing you can do is go to your heavenly father because we are not in control. We are not in control of any of that. And I had to trust that the God that I serve had a calling far greater than my son to live in a perpetual state of psychosis, that it was better than that, that it was bigger than that. And I had to let go.

SPEAKER_04 47:19

Oh my goodness, that's so deep. I gotta give myself a minute to absorb it because it's faith. That's what it comes down to. Even if you are someone who, as you said, is very resourceful. And yeah, God gives you all those different gifts, but he also still wants your faith. That he gave you. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 47:44

Yeah. Like I can physically go give someone a hug, but I can't transform their mind. The Bible says to be transformed by the renewing of your mind. And so I can't renew someone's mind. God gives us free will and choice. And so it really is that individual person's choice. Now, I'm not saying you don't have an intervention and you shouldn't intervene in certain things because yes, safety is paramount and you want to make sure that they're safe where that no one else is in harm's way. But everybody has a unique purpose and calling in their life. When you think about the embryo that's in that baby, that's in that little girl when she's first born, there is something explicit, unique about her DNA and her or his purpose in this life that is unlike no other. And the Bible talks about I knew you before you were formed in the womb. And when you think about that, he already knows everything you were going to go through. So if he knew us before we were formed in the womb, then by golly, he knows what we're gonna go through today. He knows what we're gonna go through tomorrow and the next day and the next day, and only he knows the day that he's gonna call us home. So we have to put our radical trust, our bold trust, because faith without works is dead.

SPEAKER_04 49:08

It's dead.

SPEAKER_00 49:08

And we have to trust him.

SPEAKER_04 49:10

Yes, you're doing so much to help others. I love to see it. So beautiful. As we close, Carol, what is next for you? What do you have coming up? What are you excited about? What do you hope and see and expect for the future?

SPEAKER_00 49:28

I hope that the words that I speak, the words that I have written, and the many messages that God has on the inside can inspire just one person. Just one person. Because if I can bless one to have a better life, to have a better perspective or a fresh perspective on life, I feel like God's gonna say, Well done, my good and faithful servant. My purpose is to pour into others. And if I can just help one, I'm gonna continue to open my mouth and be an advocate for what God has done in me and through me. And I'm gonna be bold with it and I'm gonna cuss along the way because it's a catchy saying, and I'm gonna do it having fun because life is hard. Life is not fun and it's not easy, but people just wanna be loved and people want to have a good time and people want to grow. And I just want to continue to connect with beautiful women like yourself and beautiful women from her next chapter and from Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Incorporated and connect with my SARAs and my fellow alumni at UAPP to just pour into one another, to sharpen one another, to encourage one another every single day of our lives. That's what I want to do, and to make sure that God gets the glory for this little girl who was birthed out of a whole lot of pain.

SPEAKER_04 50:50

Just amazing. And let me just tell you, you've accomplished your goal already because I'm leaving this conversation changed, blessed. My mind has been renewed. And you know what? I learned so much today. I really have, truly, that I'm gonna use as I walk into the next few weeks of my life. So just beautiful. I thank you so, so much for blessing us with your presence. So excited. Everybody, run out and go get this amazing book, Don't Wait 50 Years to say eff it, because it's just that great. And I say eff it, but it's actually spelled P-H U C C It's a heart.

SPEAKER_00 51:30

It's a heart. Yeah, and so let me let me tell you about that real quick because the heart is in place of the you. Okay, because your heart is in the center of all that you do. So when you are out there saying, fuck it, do it with your whole heart.

SPEAKER_04 51:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 51:46

Do it with your whole art. And the pH honors Pu K Thailand, where I started writing the book, and it also gives those who are a little more conservative the opportunity to spell it out instead of sounding it out, I guess.

SPEAKER_04 52:00

Yeah, I'm just saying effort for my mama because she listened to all these podcasts.

SPEAKER_00 52:04

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_04 52:04

But when I'm talking to my sister, I'm saying the whole word. Your mom's gonna hear that. Your mama's gonna hear that. She'd be like, no, not my baby. Look, my mama knows when she's talking to her sister, she's saying the whole word.

SPEAKER_00 52:17

So that part because you know what? You are free to be you.

SPEAKER_04 52:21

That's right. That's right. Well, I thank you so much for being you and being here with us today. You have been beyond a blessing. I'm so grateful. I'm so appreciative. I'm running out and getting this book and getting it for everybody I know because I know they're going to really enjoy it. So I appreciate you so much. Thank you so much for being here today.

SPEAKER_00 52:41

Thank you. Have a great day.

SPEAKER_04 52:43

You're welcome. This conversation with Carol was a reminder that growth often begins with release. Carol stopped trying to control every outcome, which made room for God to transform her and use her story to help someone else. If this discussion helped you or someone you love, please remember to follow me on Instagram at for Bernita Renee Relates and Facebook, YouTube, and TikTok at Bernita Rene Relates. And of course, like, subscribe, and share this podcast anywhere you listen to your podcast. Thank you so much for listening. I love you for it. We'll talk soon.

SPEAKER_02 53:29

What's been done is done again.

SPEAKER_01 53:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 54:19

Let's put a plate. Let's give up.