Ep. 1 - From Surviving to Thriving in the Present Moment

In this deeply personal and heartfelt first episode of The Present Moment Project, host Jill Bershad opens up about her journey from unimaginable loss to healing. After losing her husband Adam to suicide, Jill chooses to honor his legacy by continuing the podcast he began—carrying forward his vision of helping others live fully in the now. With honesty, vulnerability, and grace, she shares what it means to find light after darkness, to rediscover joy through grief, and to hold space for both pain and presence. This episode is a tribute to love, resilience, and the healing power of living each moment as a gift.

Contact Jill K. Bershad, LMHC, CAP

• Email: jill@jillbershad.com 
• Website: jillbershad.com
• Instagram: @jillkbershad.lmhc
• Facebook: jillkbershad

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:04

Hi friends, I am Jill Burshad, and this is the Present Moment Project. Come with me on a journey of healing, transformation, and curiosity. I'm a licensed mental health counselor, a Reiki master, hypnotherapist, a sound healer, and an EMDR trauma therapist who also is a widow. I have learned how to move through life with grace in the aftermath of tragedy. I have learned how to use these modalities through my own healing journey. I hope you're listening, and I know this podcast will help you on your healing journey as well. It's not always easy, so you too can laugh again. I look forward to having you along this wild ride with me. So here we go. Let's get started. Hi there. I am Jill Bershad, and this is the Present Moment Project. I am so incredibly excited to be here. I'm so, so happy this has been in the works for such a long, long time. And I never thought I was gonna do a podcast. I actually had a uh fear of public speaking, and now the whole world is gonna have an opportunity to listen to me speak. So this is very exciting. And at first I wanted to do this in my home because it's unscripted. I wanted to be very authentic, just me, raw, honest, have a conversation. And being that I am not techie at all, that was too complicated. And I was introduced to my producer, Janine, who's just amazing, felt right, and this the deal was sealed. The sealed, what's dealed? Anywho, I want to talk about why I decided to do a podcast. Um, and then why I'm calling it the present moment project. I was asked um several months after my husband passed away, which was a little over three years ago. I was asked by my friend Eric Bricker, who I trust. And I had been asked to be on podcasts in the past, but I just never had a desire. It wasn't ever something I thought about. Um, remember that fear of public speaking. Well, that's over with. That's long gone. So it was just an immediate yes. I didn't have to think about it. And Eric had me on to talk about how a therapist deal with such a tragedy? And it was a wonderful, positive experience. It was very organic, it was very authentic. And I had never thought to myself, will somebody watch this? Is anybody even gonna see this? That was never a concern of mine. Um but what did happen was that after the podcast aired, I got a lot of people reaching out to me. And it was really beautiful, not something I had expected at all. Um people were saying to me, I I helped them get out of bed that morning, and they had the courage to go on because they could see how I was navigating life after such a big, unexpected tragedy. And I love to help people. I'm a therapist, that's my my nature. And when I was getting these calls and these texts and these emails, it just if it can save one life, that's why I'm doing it. And I also want to have fun. And that's what we're gonna do here. We're gonna learn, we're gonna cry, we're gonna laugh. Who knows? So let's talk about why it's called the present moment project. I actually was going to call it surviving to thriving. Um, I had done another podcast after Eric's, and um, it just sort of organically became the name of the podcast, and I liked it because that's what I've done. I've survived and now I'm thriving. And I've been surviving for a very long time, um, not just when my husband passed away, but for a long time. So I was gonna call it surviving to thriving. And one day, just maybe a month ago, I was sitting in my house, my family room, with my daughter and a friend, and I was telling them about the podcast. And my friend asked me what it was gonna be called. And my daughter, my 17-year-old daughter, who is so amazing and so brilliant, she said to me, Mom, oh my gosh, you should call your podcast the present moment project. And the reason for this is because I think it was a few months maybe before my husband passed away, he had started a podcast and it was called the present moment project. And I wanted to carry on his mission. I wanted to do this uh in honor of him, in his memory, and I didn't even have to think about it. It just felt so right. So it's called the Present Moment Project, surviving to thriving. And that's what you all are gonna hear about in this podcast. I stumbled not that long ago across my husband's trailer for his podcast. He only got through the trailer, he never was able to record uh the first episode. And I would like to share it here with you today. And this may be upsetting to some people, but I feel like it's really important. It's powerful, and it's just a very, again, powerful reminder of how fragile our lives are and how things can change in just a moment, and how important it is to live our lives to the fullest as best as we can every single day and in every single present moment. So I'm gonna ask Janine, my producer now, to play his trailer. It's just about three minutes, and you will also see a photo of my husband, and that's Adam. And I'm really excited to share with my viewers just a little piece of my husband.

SPEAKER_01 6:53

Join us on an exploration of how to live life in this moment without distraction by our past or future. We're finding those truly present and sharing their stories and working to use presence to help make humanity a better experience for us all. Welcome to the present moment project. Hey everybody, welcome to the present moment project. So here's how it all started. After 51 years of life, I got my first taste of being in the present moment, and now I never want to let it go. A few months ago, the doctor called. Adam, your MRI results are in, and you have a brain tumor. The call stopped me dead in my tracks, and I have not been the same since. As I hung up the phone, overwhelmed with emotion, I experienced a mental shift. I wasn't even thinking about the tumor. In that instant, I realized that I had no control over life and that I was going to die, and that all I really had was this one moment. Time instantly became the most valuable thing, and in that moment, there was no room for my past traumas or my fears of the future. Okay, so I've been digging, and here's what I know so far. Being in the present moment or the here and now means that we are aware and mindful of what is happening in this very moment. We are not distracted by ruminations on the past or worries about the future. The present moment is the only thing where there is literally no time. It is the point between past and future. I also know that attainment of true and pure present moment awareness is highly sought after. Monks work their whole life towards presence. Gurus and yogis stretch the limits of their minds and their bodies in search. Religious leaders preach countless biblical anecdotes to the present moment. All of this to try to figure it out and spread the word. But then there is that small population who experience an instant and unexpected and a permanent shift, a quantum leap of sorts into the present moment. Tends to happen through an extreme and typically negative life-altering experience where the outcome of death is imminent and probable. In that instant, they have a newfound appreciation for the value of life and time. These shifts can occur in extreme military situations, with crime or accident survivors, or in someone confronted with an unexpected life or death illness like cancer, or in my case, with a brain tumor. My name is Adam Bershad, and I founded the Present Moment Project to help build energy around keeping me present and around understanding what presence is really made of, why we lose it, and how we can regain it. We're going to explore. We're going to find those truly present and share their stories. We're going to learn from others who are further down the path. But most importantly, we're going to give it a go to figure out what others haven't yet, which is how everyone can make the shift into the present moment so humanity can be a better experience for us all. So this launches it, and here we go. And I invite you to join us as we explore obtaining life in the present moment.

SPEAKER_00 10:38

And we went from best friends to married to three kids to two dogs to a home. And we did a lot of wonderful things together. I don't want people to wait until something bad happens in their lives to say, that's it. I'm changing my life. I'm living it fully. And then what happens is that slowly fades away. And then sometimes bad things happen. So let's try to live in the present moment while we can. Now I want to go back and I want to talk a little bit, just I want you to know who you're watching. I was born in Miami. I was born to two parents who were both from Miami. So that was very unusual. And I thought I was having a great childhood. And I very interesting, my parents got divorced when I was nine years old. And in the same year, I was diagnosed with Crohn's disease. That's not shocking. Crohn's disease is an autoimmune disorder that often we develop autoimmune disorders when uh experiencing trauma. And at that time, this was in the 70s, nobody knew what Crohn's disease was. And my mother would take me from doctor to doctor, and we were told this is all in my head, and we should go see a psychiatrist. And obviously that was not the case. Having Crohn's as a child made things hard. My teachers would follow me into the bathroom to make sure that I was not uh engaging in disordered eating behaviors, um, vomiting. And it was difficult for me to drive with friends, and it was difficult for me to get to school on time or to even get to school. So that was tough. I had a father who um wasn't around a ton, um, and I had a mother who was very anxious. She was very anxious, um introverted, and suffered a lot with migraine headaches. And I somewhat became her caretaker as a young child. One nice thing that happened uh that doesn't happen in a lot of families is it was important for my parents to get along, to be friends for the sake of my brother and I. I have one brother, he's one year older. And unfortunately, we don't really have a relationship. So that too has been difficult. So my parents were together a lot. My mother would always come to my father's family for the holidays. They would travel together to our graduations, and it was nice. My mom wasn't the most maternal, there was not a lot of nurturing. And thank God uh there were a couple of women in my life who were very maternal and nurturing. And I actually realized uh as I got older that I would gravitate to friends that had a maternal side to them. Um and I still am very close and still talk to them today. One of them was my aunt, and that I I feel blessed. I think I thank God for her every single day. So I went through school, I was I went to a private school in Miami, and I had to end up leaving there my junior year because um they were not working with me in terms of my medical issues. So I was there uh till the middle of, I believe, 11th grade. And I unfortunately had to switch to public school where I got lost in the crowd. Nobody knew me there. If I was late, that was okay. If I didn't show up, that was okay. I do wish I could have gotten through my last year or two in that same private school with the same kids that I had grown up with. So fast forward, I I went to junior high and I was in high school, and I became friends with a boy who ended up in treatment, in substance abuse treatment. And I would visit him in his treatment center, and that was really my first um, my first glimpse of addiction. My parents didn't drink, they didn't smoke, I wasn't allowed to curse in the house where there was big trouble. And then I went to college. I went to Florida State, though not right away. A lot of people may not know that about me. I started at the community college in Miami, and I had to, I had no choice. I was too sick to leave. And I went to Florida State after that. I became a knoll. I graduated with top honors. Um, I was salutatorian um from Florida State. And then I moved to New York City, and that was wonderful. And I had always wanted to move to New York, and I didn't really know anybody there. I was always very independent, and I found a couple of roommates, and it was wonderful. It was really a wonderful time in my life. But unfortunately, I ended up again very sick with my worst flare-up ever with my Crohn's disease. And I ended up after a year having to be wheeled out of New York City by my mom. And I did some, I worked a little bit, I was trying to figure out what I wanted to do. And eventually, a couple years later, I went to Tampa and I got my master's degree in real rehabilitation counseling. And I I finished that program. I did an internship at the Washington Institute in New York City, an addiction and outpatient addiction treatment center. And Adam became my boyfriend when I was in Tampa getting my master's. And we had plans to move to New York City together. And a day before we were moving, my husband's mother had a massive stroke and he wasn't able to join me, and I was not able to fulfill my dream of living in New York City. So now, side note, my son Jack, I have three children. I was gonna get there. My son Jack now lives in the city, and I hope to one day be able to call New York City my home, at least partially, because I can't take the summers in Florida anymore. Although New York City is pretty hot too, but I'll I'll get over that. Um so again, I couldn't move to New York, and I came home and I worked at a place called Spectrum. Spectrum uh was um a treatment center addiction and dual diagnosis with federally mandated clients, and it was very interesting, and I learned a lot. And I got pregnant while I was working there with my first child, uh, Jessica. And as soon as I finished that, I had a longtime family friend who I had met when I was, I think about six years old, who was a big criminal attorney in Miami, who used to call me and still does to this day at 55 years old, um calls me kid, and I always called him boy. And he called me and he said, Hey, kid, can you do this evaluation for me? I have a client who got a DUI, he needs an evaluation by a licensed mental health counselor. And um I said, sure. And that's really what led me to starting a private practice, doing evaluations, doing counseling that are mandated for the clients. And I worked and I worked and I worked, and then we lived in Boston for five years, and then we came back. I had a third child, my my daughter Jolie, who's so wonderful. I have to say, I'm very lucky. All three of my children are pretty spectacular, if I do say so myself. So let's fast forward to um, I believe it was uh October of 2021. And my husband, as you heard on the recording, uh was diagnosed with a brain tumor. And he was in surgery just maybe a week later, and they removed the tumor, and we thought everything was gonna be a-okay. And what ended up happening was he was building a lot of scar tissue around his brain, which was causing him seizures all day long. And he couldn't work, he couldn't drive, he couldn't do a lot of things. And eventually he chose. Well, I don't know if he chose to take his life from in this form from us on this plane. And I say I don't know if it was a choice because he was on medication that could have affected his decision. His brain had an injury, so that I'm sure affected his decision. But at the end of the day, I'm grateful that he is no longer suffering and in pain. And I know that our souls crossed paths on this journey for a reason. And whatever he's doing now, I know it's big, I know it's powerful, I know he's making sure everybody knows about it. And um, and that's how I feel. And at the same time, right after my husband passed away, my mother, who I always had had a contentious relationship with, stopped talking to me and my children. And while it was probably for the best, I know that my mother, as everybody whose path I've crossed in this lifetime, I know that our souls came together on this journey for a reason. And I thank my mother for all the lessons that came out of it. I am grateful. And because my mother stopped talking to me that very week that my husband passed away. And she didn't immediately talk to my children either. My children have chosen not to have contact with their mother, with sorry, with their grandmother. Not because I'm telling them not to. They're grown. That is their choice. They're their own people. They have agency to make those decisions, but they have chosen no contact or minimal contact, one of my children. He's the peacekeeper. One of the beautiful, beautiful blessings that came out of all of this is I finally had a real, honest, beautiful, special, cherished, spectacular relationship with my father, who is now 87 years old. Sorry, dad. And he looks great. And he plays golf every day. And I'm so happy that I have this relationship with him now. I'm grateful. So that's my story. I wanted to share it with everybody. I'm going to have some great guests on. I have uh some great guests lined up. I want to talk about resilience. That's really the theme here is resilience and um living our best lives while we can, while we have the opportunity. Time is our greatest commodity. And I have learned not to waste it, not one bit. So I want you to come along on this journey with me. I hope you learn and you become more resilient and you grow and you laugh with me. I want this to be a community. I want people to email me, comment on social medias. I want feedback. I want questions, thoughts, the things that really resonate with you. So I'm excited. Come along this journey with me. Let's do this together. Until next time. And remember, folks, the Present Moment Project is intended for informational and inspirational purposes only. The views and opinions shared by the host and guests are their own and do not constitute medical, legal, or professional advice. Please consult a qualified healthcare professional before making any medical or wellness decisions. This podcast is not a substitute for professional care, no matter how wise we may sound in this present moment.