Episode #21-Rebecca Mullaney

In this episode, we are joined by Rebecca Mullaney, a licensed psychotherapist from North Carolina. Rebecca shares her deeply personal grief journey following the loss of her husband, Captain Ian Morrison, who died by suicide on March 21, 2012. At the time, Rebecca was just 24, and Ian was 26.

She opens up about the early days of her loss—pouring her love and energy into her dog, Daisy, and committing to daily counseling and group therapy throughout the first year. Rebecca speaks candidly about the depth of her depression and the intentional work it took to begin climbing out of that dark place—work she continues to this day, 14 years later.

Rebecca also shares how life has grown around her grief. She is now remarried to Brennan, and together they have a three-year-old son, Harrison Samuel.

She leaves us with a powerful reminder: the importance of setting “loose goals” in grief—allowing space for flexibility, while taking small, steady steps forward. Rebecca encourages listeners to discover what truly helps them on their own path and to honor that journey in their own way.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Welcome to this episode of Turn Grief into Growth, The Journey of Transformation. This is a podcast that's hosted by Greg Jacobs and Don Lipstein. Well, good day, folks. We're here for another episode of our podcast. Don, did you notice I didn't say good morning? Because good morning, good evening, good night. We have no idea where our listeners are around the world or what time they're actually listening to this podcast. But we're here for another episode of Turning Grief into Growth, The Journey of Transformation. And I just wanted to kind of call out at the beginning, if you can, stop what you're doing. Like the podcast, share the podcast, subscribe to the podcast. Don and I have sensitive feelings. We have no idea if anybody is even listening to this podcast, if we're just talking to the wind out there. So uh we'd love feedback. There is a click here on most of the platforms that uh you might be uh listening or watching this on, where you can go ahead and leave a comment. Uh, but we ask you to subscribe because these drop every Thursday morning at 5 a.m. Eastern time here in the United States. And uh we would love for you to get an alert on that to be able to know when it actually drops and uh comes out. And hopefully these are being beneficial for you. We've had all kinds of different guests on, and we've got another one this morning that I'm gonna turn over to Don and let him uh introduce Rebecca to us.

SPEAKER_03 1:20

Thank you, Greg. And hello, Rebecca. Good day, good day, and and uh I have had a great day. I just got back from walking our dog and the birds are singing. I love this time of year, it's spring, and the birds are just singing to us as we're walking. It was beautiful.

SPEAKER_01 1:43

I got my windows open now listening to them chirp outside.

SPEAKER_03 1:46

Yeah, it's awesome. Um, you know, Rebecca, I could talk about Rebecca all day long. Um, but because of that, and I know that we only have a short amount of time with her, I'm gonna read something. Um and uh and it just touches on the special kind of person that she is. Uh Rebecca serves and Rebecca Mullaney serves as mental wellness specialist at the Elizabeth Dole Foundation. She co-led the development of the mental wellness framework and facilitates the caregiver netal wellness workshops, care groups, and book clubs. In addition to her work with EDF, Rebecca owns and operates Stable Ground Counseling, where she offers both traditional and ECON assisted mental health services and specializes in trauma recovery. Prior to becoming a therapist, Rebecca was a second-grade teacher and later elementary school counselor at Fort Hood, Texas. In March of 2012, Rebecca lost her husband, U.S. Army Captain Ian Morrison. Rebecca's healing journey inspired a desire to live fully and work tirelessly to prevent and care for those impacted by suicide. Rebecca uses her experience, education, and expertise to help build resilient individuals, organizations, and communities. She has worked extensively in the veteran and military caregiver space with clients that include Team Rubicon, Team Red, White and Blue, and the mission continues. You know, um Rebecca, uh there's a lot of that that I could have left out, but at the same time, I felt like all of it was really important to just kind of give a uh a little synopsis about who Rebecca is. So I'm gonna let you do some talking and share a little bit, Rebecca. But welcome to the the Turning Grief into Growth podcast.

SPEAKER_00 4:02

Yeah, thank you, fellas, for having me. Don, I've never heard that read out loud and it kind of got me choked up. Um well, thanks for having me and for for dedicating at least an hour a week to helping folks recover from from loss and and validating their experience because it's just not a not that often that you hear that in our culture. So it's beautiful. Um, you asked me to tell you a little bit about myself. Um, like Dawn read, I um am a surviving spouse, and that's how I met Dawn 14 years ago, um, advocating for um the mental health needs of our our troops and um specifically around suicide loss and um the loss of my late husband, you know, uh I was actually already in graduate school to be a therapist when he passed. I had just taken my final exam for it and um was leading uh group therapy uh when he when he died actually. Um so I didn't I didn't go right into that field and my bio reflects lots of different things that I've done. But um Don and I found each other uh with Through Taps, which is a great organization for surviving families, and uh later worked there, uh moved to DC and worked there and um managing communications with the media around suicide loss because it was uh an area that I was pretty significantly damaged by and early on, you know, the media doesn't always respect families, and I felt pretty impassioned about doing that for people. Um and and uh through taps, I actually um moved it from Texas to DC and was at an event a couple years later that's called Carry the Load, and it goes from uh the walk that goes from West Point to Dallas. And then when I had met when I met Ian initially, he was at West Point, and I was living close to Dallas in East Texas where I was from. And um, so it was felt really important for me to go. So me and several of the other staff members went. And as I was walking up to um the Lincoln Memorial, the group that was meeting us, it's a it's a relay, or not really relay, but a you walk different legs, and the group that was walking up was led by this beast of a man holding an American flag wearing combat boots, and I said, Wow, I like that a lot. And um went over later and introduced myself, and that is my husband now. Oh wow. Um, and together we our two groups walked to Arlington Cemetery, and so we like to joke that our first you know hangout was at a cemetery, there's a dog walking by at a cemetery. Um, it's kind of fitting for you know how um deep our relationship, you know, there it's it's not surface level. Um and that is uh, you know, current life is with Brennan, my now husband. We've been married for um almost nine years. I had to count. And we have a little boy who's three and a half, and his name is Harrison Samuel. He's named after my late husband, Ian Samuel. And um yeah, I am consulting, have been consulting for the Elizabeth Doll Foundation for I think seven years doing uh, and I love it. I love leading the groups, I love helping with mental wellness and health policies for organizations. Um, and I just picked up working with the Veteran Spouse Network, which is another wonderful organization. They're um based out of uh UT, Austin, but they're national and they do all kinds of virtual support groups and trainings and one-on-one support for veteran for military spouses of any status. Um and then I have my private practice and I also somehow am a mom the majority of the time. Uh I have 12 hours of childcare, so we're using one right now. Um and in my private practice, I I don't see that many people in you know, 10 max a week. But I um love uh I get a weird high from helping people recover from trauma. And so um I, you know, definitely utilize the horses for that and for relationship building. Um we can talk more about that, um, but repairing relationships with yourself even after trauma. The horses are great for that. And then I am trained in cognitive processing therapy, which is uh uh hugely effective uh therapy for specifically for PTSD recovery. Um and it's brief, it's 15 sessions and people's lives get people get their lives back. I went through it myself. And um, you know, I'm I kind of like bounce around during the day after I have you would think after you sit with folks who are you know rape survivors or suicide loss survivors or whatever trauma we're sitting with. It's not it's not light, it's heavy stuff. I think feel really weighed down, but um it it just feels so good to help people move through this, not pass it around it or over it, but through it.

SPEAKER_01 9:09

Um, Rebecca, we were chatting a little bit before we hit the record button. And as soon as we hit record and Don read your bio, I saw a little different demeanor in you in the fact that uh it was surreal uh for you. One, just kind of the recap of what you have done and accomplished, but two, I was thinking about the term surviving spouse. Um, here in America, we're we're really not uh that familiar with the term uh survivor when I mentioned that. They think that, well, you must have attempted suicide at one time and survived, or you were a cancer patient and you survived, but they don't think about the effect of loss on the loved one. Um I went out to dinner last night locally here in Kentucky. There were four of us dads and uh that have lost children. And I received a text this morning. I was reading it just before we came on this podcast, and one of the guys had said, you know something, um, you're always putting on a good face. It wasn't obvious. Um, you're always leading us, but I could tell that you're you're carrying a heavy burden uh right now in your life and what's going on. And it's life circumstances, and it's it's tough because a lot of times people aren't aware of the work that we do. We get behind the camera, but we also are going through things. We also sometimes walk through a very dark zip code of helping other people out uh through their trauma. Take me back uh to you in 2012, uh, when Ian passed. Um, I mean, did you immediately see all this hope and all this growth? What did that look like for you?

SPEAKER_00 10:52

No, yeah. Um I will say I was um yeah, let's go back into that. Um, so I I had the horrible whatever of finding Ian after he took his life. And so I have had uh extensive post-traumatic stress. And um, you know, uh loved ones, people that lose someone to suicide are three to five times more likely to take their own lives. And I was definitely on the five times uh area, and that's not anything I'd ever thought of before. It you know, I um you know, was 25 almost, hadn't really struggled with a ton of mental health issues. I was seemingly just doing okay. Um and then was suddenly not um, you know, without hurting other people with my story. I was in a really interesting state. I couldn't eat or clean myself, or um, I couldn't stop screaming. I was like clawing at my skin and my eyes and shaking and you know, just not even flashbacks, just a constant flashback for weeks. Um I think I was medicated at some point to try to get me through the funeral and the service and or the military service and um the unique thing, and I probably will cry when I talk about this, is that the day after we buried Ian, and we buried him at our farm in East Texas, it backs up to uh to a cemetery that my grandfather years ago had donated the land to the cemetery. Um I it's funny, I I I think he probably would have wanted to be buried at Arlington. Um, but I was like, when am I ever gonna go to DC?

unknown 12:40

Then I moved there.

SPEAKER_00 12:41

But I'm also grateful I he wasn't at Arlington because I don't think I could drive by him every day to go to work. I think it could have just I needed separation from you know, like the actual space of the trauma. It was too much, the zip code, literally. Um but uh so we buried him at our farm, and uh I had just kind of had enough of you know, even in that state, I'm sure similar for y'all, I was still trying to be a counselor. I sat at his um casket and I remember telling people my condolences to them, just you know, just totally out of my mind. And um it's hard to switch hats. I just didn't know what to do. Yeah, it was a baby. And by the time um, I also was really protective of his body. I didn't want anybody to say anything ugly or you know, I want to be with him as much as I could. Uh and also I think it's important to to note, you know, if there's folks that are that never listen that have lost someone to suicide, it was really reparative for me to see him in a in a safe, uh looking safe afterwards, you know, repaired. And and I think that could be um I would encourage people to think about that because it did something to me. It helped me in a way. But anyways, after the funeral, we had like a reception or something at a cousin's house who lives on the property, and I just said, um, Don, can I cuss? Yes, absolutely. And I said, I had enough of this shit. I've had enough of this shit. And I had like this dress on that a friend had given me. I couldn't even, you know, put some black dress on. And I went into the field and I caught a horse, one of our horses that I hadn't read forever, and I just took off. And I was like, basically, fuck this, I can't do it anymore. And I just took off. We have 400 acres, and um one of my friends, Jenny, um, told me years later, she said, When I saw you do that, I knew you were gonna be okay. And it was like maybe my first moment for advocating for myself. I didn't even know what I was doing, I just knew I had to get on a horse one, which is you know very true for me, and I had to get some space. And I think that um even now, you know, um uh that's that's what I need, you know. If I if I'm struggling, I need to see a horse and get outside and get some space. Um, so yeah, my recovery from that was um I went to intensive trauma therapy every single day for a year, like every single day of the week. I spent most of the life insurance money on therapy because I was determined not to kill myself. I didn't want to bring more pain. Um and then I that was March, and then in August, I decided I would go back to teaching because I needed something to do. And so I taught third grade in in all in uh Dallas, and those kids really pulled me through having a reason and a purpose, all these things that we know people need.

SPEAKER_03 15:49

Yeah, you know, thank you for for sharing that. And I know it's you know it can be hard to to go back. Um I I I met you during that time. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:04

And three months after, I believe, right?

SPEAKER_03 16:06

Yep, three months after. And an interesting fact, uh Ian uh was from Delaware.

SPEAKER_02 16:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 16:15

And and Joshua was from Delaware. Joshua married an East Texas woman, and so did Ian. So what what I have to say is those Delaware boys are pretty damn smart. Um but uh you you brought up so much, and uh I've seen witnessed so much growth uh in both of us, but but you in particular. Um and uh I feel like one of the things that I've noticed about you and I've always admired about you is what you just described, that you got on the horse and and rode off in your black dress. And like you almost inherently know what to do for yourself. I do, right?

SPEAKER_00 17:15

I don't know how I know that. But that's what I that's that's it, Don. That's what I'm trying to teach people in my groups, um, with the dole or with um how to care group here and in therapy. Like that probably sound like a broken record, but um, you know, my therapist, she's fantastic, she's in Texas. Her research is in the back of the manual, the diagnostic manual for mental health. Like she's she's a trauma expert, and she forced me to remember who I was before Ian died. And there wasn't a lot of, you know, I was only 25, so it wasn't a lot a ton, but I've always been really passionate about certain things and really spicy, and you know, like I've had my I've known myself and she I didn't after he died, I was just kind of a blob or whatever you become after loss of shell. And she made me go every day and do something that I would have liked before, or um, we would even Google a list like what do people do for fun? And I distinctly remember going to like a ice cream, like a cold stone or something, because that was one of the things I was like, well, I used to like ice cream, and I would sit in the ice cream shop and like glare at the people with their happy families and their kids and their husbands. Yeah, and then you know, there was a time, you know, I don't know, a year or so later, when I went there and I was smiling at the kids and the families, and I was just shocked. Oh my gosh, what is happening? Am I you know? I also got a puppy the day after the funeral, and we don't have time to describe the way that Daisy came into my life, but um she I had dog, I had we had two dogs, but um, we were leaving the funeral and I told my mom that I needed to go to Walmart in East Texas because my dog was there and she thought I was having a delusion or something. And uh she was like, okay, let's just go. And so we went and we drove in in Texas, it's a real country thing, but they'll people like give away dogs in the back of a Walmart parking lot. And as we pulled up, this man was lifting a little black and white puppy out of the back of a truck, and I said, That's my dog. And I took her home and I knew I had seen that dog before, and I like her face was so familiar. And Ian was an artist, and I went home and I to their house, and I was like rifling through whatever papers we had grabbed from my house, and I found a card he had given me on Valentine's Day with that dog drawn on the front of it. Wow, and we just she was a reason to live, she would sleep on my chest. I had to take her out potty, I had and I enrolled her in puppy school, and it was the one place where nobody knew what had happened to me, and it was just um, you know, you need that, you need to remember that you're a human. And uh we lost Daisy this year, but she was a good friend for almost 14 years.

SPEAKER_01 20:12

Um you know, Rebecca, you had made a comment um that you you don't know how you know uh what you need, but you just do. I I kind of look at it, uh, it's like give into the magnetized field. You know, you've got these magnets uh that are attracting each other. And you know, that might like for yesterday for me, for example, I was magnetized to go to the cemetery. I go down there quite frequently, not as often as I used to, where David's buried. And you know, I walked for two and a half miles because I love it. It's like a park uh to me. So I do my walking down there, and then I took my chair, my book, and I ended up falling asleep, um, but then ended up waking up reading my book for a bit. And I I like to call it uh getting out and rubbing some nature on you, you know, and it's different, it's different for everybody. Um, like you were saying for the ice cream, you know, place for me. I I Googled uh hobbies because everybody was telling me you need a hobby, like after David died. And I'm like, man, I don't know what I need. I'm glad you do. And you know, I came up with all this stuff like whittling or you know, flying a kite or whatever it might be. And I was like, man, that's not what I need. What do I need? What is going on? And I've gotten into you know collecting, I've got water in this, but I've gotten into collecting like you know, 120, 140-year-old German vintage beer steins, Rookwood pottery, uh, just different things. I'll go to antique stores with my wife or by myself and just you know, look at stuff. And it's all part of self care. It's all part of what I need that day. I would say to our listeners that that changes, uh, morphs with time. It's not something that is always a given as far as what you need. Um, you know, there's just, I don't know, there's just so much power and just yielding. Uh to what it's drawing you to. And I did want to call out, I I felt it. This is a raw podcast, Don. Wouldn't you agree? I mean, we we just let it go. And I want to call out the cussing aspect.

SPEAKER_00 22:14

Sorry. No, no, no, no.

SPEAKER_01 22:16

I don't want you to apologize. That's that's my point.

SPEAKER_00 22:19

There is a therapy, too.

SPEAKER_01 22:21

Well, that's so I cuss. Yeah. And I think that um there's a difference in society as far as social norms. You're just going about your day, you're just cussing this and that, versus this is a very shitty experience that we had to go through. This is messed up. And um my verbiage went south a lot during my early grief journey. And I learned to stop apologizing for that. I shocked a lot of people because here was this deacon over men's ministry for 30-something years, Southern Baptist, you know, whatever. And, you know, everybody thought I just totally gone off the deep end. I'm like, man, I'm finally getting in touch. Yeah. And I'm not really concerned about what they think. Um, it's not that I'm not um etiquette, you know, or you know, kosher concerned about what they, you know, uh think about me, but I'm not a man pleaser. And I don't want to be caught up into, you know, what, oh my gosh, they said a wordy dirty, you know, whatever. So um I just want our listeners to hear that because I think there's a lot of people out there that might have a wall up and they just need to let it rip. They just need to let loose, whether it's screaming, whether it's going out and kicking a dirt pile. Hopefully it's not filled with fire ants, uh, even though it feels like that most days. Um, but uh there is a there is an essence of just expressing yourself. Wouldn't you agree, Don?

SPEAKER_03 23:46

Absolutely agree. Absolutely. And and I I just had a discussion with my daughter and my granddaughter. My daughter claims that I cussed when they were growing up, and I said, I didn't. Your your mother did, I didn't, because I didn't want you to. But my daughter cusses like anything in front of her kids. Oh no, and and I'm like, okay, whatever, you know. But um, you know, it's something else that uh that I think about when I think about Rebecca. Um we sat on a panel together, uh, and Ben last week uh was on that panel as well. Um and you know, we talked to about a thousand, I think, or more.

SPEAKER_00 24:39

Um I blacked out, I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 24:41

Yeah, like we were just talking. Um, but anyway, we got done and it was like very emotional. That that evening, um, we sat at the bar and laughed, all of us laughed, just non-stop hysterical about anything. And I think like that was a healthy release for us as well. Yeah, um, and of course, Rebecca has made, I don't think there's anyone on the planet other than you, Greg. You've made me laugh pretty hard too. But but Rebecca, uh, there's something about her humor that I just can't I can't help myself but just crack up laughing.

SPEAKER_00 25:27

My life goal would be if I wasn't so such a scaredy cat, I'd love to be a stand-up comedian. It's my dream for my son.

SPEAKER_01 25:33

Nice. You know, I think laughter is the best medicine. It's it's interesting because uh earlier on I formed this group called Your Dad Forever locally, and there's about seven of us. We get together, you know, monthly or whatever, go to dinner, bowling, whatever it might be. And I remember um at the beginning, we all felt very conscientious about laughing. We're like, are we allowed to do this? Is this is this okay? And last night there was four of us out in the parking lot, and I know he's gonna listen to this because he was on this podcast as one of our guests, but he was talking about how um this bourbon distillery came in our town and they actually had to tunnel under the road for the utilities under the highway. He goes, Well, tunnel's not the right word. It was actually uh burrow. And we were laughing because we're like, that's the exact same word. It's the exact same, and we just laughing. And I looked back at the restaurant and they had an outdoor patio, and people were watching us, like, what in the world is wrong with these fools? And it just felt so good. And we were like totally oblivious to the world or really even caring. And I just really I've I encourage you to find your tribe, find your group where you can do that. If if you haven't been able to laugh and have some mirth in your life, uh it's absolutely essential to the healing journey.

SPEAKER_00 26:52

So I have a um a story about that, Mike.

SPEAKER_01 26:55

Yeah, please share it.

SPEAKER_00 26:56

Very beloved friend Ashley. We met at the Taps Memorial Day event. Um is not good because I was pretending that the um I was on we were on the metro and I was pretending, you know, with the pole, whatever. Just being stupid. And she was like, Oh, I want to be her friend. We and so we became really good friends, and she was my maid of honor in my wedding to Brennan. And anyways, the one thing that I did, um, in addition to a hell of a lot of therapy, was travel. And I love to travel, and I traveled by myself. I went to England and Amsterdam and Cambodia and all different other parts of the country, and just um, you know, tried to get out and see other people's experiences and just do something different. But anyways, Ashley and I went somewhere, uh some beach town one time, and we were sitting at the bar, and we were newly grieving, you know, within a year, and her her fiance died in a helicopter crash in Afghanistan. Um so she was you know equally as messed up. And we were sitting at the bar at this restaurant, and we weren't drunk or anything, we were just cackling about probably death, I don't know. And this woman came up to us and she goes, I'm sorry, I have to know what is so funny. Like you two look like the happiest people I've ever seen in my life, and we about fell over death, I don't know, like something traumatizing, you know. But it uh, you know, it's been a a thread. I I had a group, I had a family session with a client and her family last night, and she lost her boyfriend in September. So just tragic, horrible. They're young, 21. And we were cracking up. I mean, just laughing about him, laughing about the stupid, you know, cat that kept running around. Um, and when I first met Brennan, my now husband, we were living in DC, and all of my friends were widows because I was working at taps, and we'd all move there together to do this same. So all young widows or orphans, you know, just horrible things. And um I remember the first time he came out with us and our humor was, you know, vile. And he would just sit there and go, ha ha ha, like he didn't know what he could do. And then one day he like several months in, he cracked a horrible joke and then waited. And we all just were like, You've made it!

SPEAKER_01 29:21

Well I I get accused of dark humor all the time, and it's like I'm fear of heart before that. I've never been accused of that before until David died, and it's like, oh my gosh, that's dark. And what did it can I laugh at that? What's you know? I'm like, hey man, that's that's you know what I do now.

SPEAKER_00 29:36

But that was one of my reviews. Someone wrote a review for the workshop I lead it. Dull, we send out a survey afterwards every time, and so on. I was like, you know, it was nice. It was like they liked how I led the group or whatever, and they said Rebecca's extremely dark humor really helps us to function. Yeah, extremely there.

SPEAKER_01 29:55

There was there were two comments that you made. I just wanted to kind of point out. The first was that you didn't want to be around people that knew of your circumstance and you wanted to find just to kind of uh to blend into the crowd. And then the other aspect is you and your friends sitting at the bar. And I could totally relate with both of those because it's like I've got my group of dads who have lost children that I get together with, and there's like a hundred and ten percent empathy there. And then I've got other people that don't know me, don't know my circumstance that I also feel comfortable blending in. It's that middle ground of friends and family that you've known pre-death. I call it pre-David, you know, it's like BC AD, it's you know, before David died, after David died. And that that makes you a little uncomfortable sometimes that you have to work through.

SPEAKER_00 30:42

Yeah. I uh I don't know that I have a ton of people in my life right now that actually knew Ian, which is I was explaining that to the family last night that I sometimes feel like the keeper of him and his stories and his presence. Um, but when I do get to connect with um like his friends from our friends from service, it's it's really nice. Um yeah, they're just you know, we all live all over the world and his family and I don't it's not a good relationship. So I wish them well, but that's something that I'm looking forward to. Yeah, yeah, it is, I think that you have to dip your therapist a long time ago told me to time and schedule my pity parties. So I would have because I was just not breathing, you know, I was not coming up for air. And so she said, set a timer for 20, 30 minutes and just squall and lose your mind, whatever. And then when it goes off, get up and do something that you used to like or that reminds you of you. And so I would, I would, and you can have as many as you want during the day, but that kind of like dipping my toe and coming out was maybe the training ground that I could do this, you know, that you can go all in. I could go into a certain closet in my house and open a box and you know, smell a sweatshirt that's been in a bag for 14 years. Um, but but I I can't do that and then be a mom at the same time. I have to dip my toe and come back in.

SPEAKER_03 32:12

It's uh Dr. Wolfelt, I believe, um calls that dosing. Yeah. It's kind of like a dosingrage just yeah, do you do it a little bit and and come back out?

SPEAKER_00 32:24

Yeah, I mean his uh his death anniversary was this past Saturday, and um I didn't dose. Like I didn't I mean I not like I didn't think about him, I think about him all the time, but um we took my son to a little horse show with his pony and it was just you know happiness and joy and fun. And I didn't you know, we went down to dinner to kind of honor Ian and we we talk about him to our son, we call him Uncle Ian, and he knows he's named after him and he knows he's in heaven, and he knows he flew helicopters, all this stuff. And we had a uh drink, you know, but we didn't usually all have like a a de Serono and Coke, which is like his old man drink of choice, or light a candle, or do something, and I just didn't. I don't know if I didn't have time or whatever, and I had nightmares all night. Graphic, horrible nightmares, which I haven't had in years, and it was kind of a reminder to myself that I still need to to have some ceremony around this.

SPEAKER_01 33:19

Rebecca, I think it's a good point to call out. Um, we had a guest on our podcast recently who had lost his dad and his two brothers, and he was saying that the last death really affected him hard, and it's not a linear path where you think that, okay, I've already gone through these two deaths, therefore it's just gonna be a cakewalk in the third. Um, there's nothing there's nothing straight line about our grief. So for you to say that it it really hurt and it was really hard and you had these nightmares, grief is not a continual pattern up where we see the growth. Uh well, I shouldn't say grief. Growth is not a continual pattern up in our grief journey where we're continually getting better every single day. There are these, you know, waves that crash against the shore, unexpected, that we don't realize. You know, I was I was listening to a podcast yesterday with Joe Rogan uh interviewing Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who's uh Secretary of Health and Human Services now. And he had mentioned uh got a lot of respect for that guy, but he was talking about how he, I believe, I don't want to misquote this, but I believe he said he is uh clean uh 43 years from being an addict. And uh he's done a lot with his life, but he said every single day I go to a meeting. And um I was thinking about what you said earlier on about you went to a meeting for just your PTSD aspect every single day for a year.

SPEAKER_00 34:47

And just how therapy, and then I went to group therapy, and then I went to TAPS events, and I went to survivors of suicide loss therapy, and I went to church, I had meetings with my pastor, I mean, I did everything.

SPEAKER_01 35:00

So, so that right there, whenever I tell people it's important to put the work in, that's the definition.

SPEAKER_00 35:06

You have to work through grief.

SPEAKER_01 35:07

That is it, it has to be active.

SPEAKER_00 35:10

You know, um sometimes so so not that any grief is um more awful than others, I just had the traumatic aspect of mine, the the the you know, I I had my grief, I had my loss of the end, and then I also had eyewitnessed something horrific, something that nobody should ever see, and I couldn't unsee it and I couldn't get it out of my head, and I couldn't even brush my teeth, you know. And so to even get to the point where I could begin to grieve him, I had to work on the trauma of his death and how it happened. And um, you know, it kind of brings up a you know, I'm a big supporter or believer in this cognitive processing therapy that I do. And it um I always tell people, you know, at the end of this, it's usually 15 weeks, at the end of this, you're actually gonna feel more sad because right now your PTSD, your trauma symptoms are protecting you from the emotion behind this. And and not to say that I wasn't sad, but I was so just straight traumatized I couldn't function. So as people's as people heal and they assimilate and they start to accept what happened and the PTSD symptoms go down, the avoidance, the triggers, that kind of stuff, they're left with the grief. And then the question is, well, now I'm sad, what do I do with this? And that kind of has been protecting me. And I said, Well, now you get to you get to grieve, you know, you get to love that person and and think about how you're gonna love them for the rest of your life and what that looks like, and how you're gonna include them in your life and what that looks like.

SPEAKER_03 36:47

You know, the other day somebody who listens to our podcast asked me, uh he says, I hear you talk about you know the work of grief. And he says, What does that mean?

SPEAKER_00 36:58

And I I'm so happy you don't know.

SPEAKER_03 37:02

Yeah, well, he he does know uh because he he did he lost his son, but he wasn't sure exactly how to define it. And I said, I said, you know, you have to embrace your grief, you have to you have to face it, welcome it, and and embrace it and and then there you are, my dear friend. Learn from it, learn from it and grow in it. Um and I feel like you know the three of us have done that and are continuing to do that, right? It's not it's not over.

SPEAKER_00 37:39

No, and it and it and it comes up in every like you're talking about every other loss, like when my the dog that I got, the you know, Daisy when I got her, she passed away this year, and that kind of you know, that wrecked me. It's like another phase of the relationship, you know. Yeah and I know Dawn has I've told Dawn a little bit about my current husband's had significant mental health struggles, and that brings the grief and the trauma right back to front, and walking with him through that, and thankfully I think we may be on the other side of it, but it all is all still in there, you know, and you have to address it or else things happen to your body, which is what happens to me, you know.

SPEAKER_01 38:17

You know, when you're talking about yeah, when you're talking about your dog passing away, that's what got you through at the very beginning. That's what you clung to.

SPEAKER_00 38:25

That's what she poured that love into.

SPEAKER_01 38:28

My my daughter and I are very close. And um, the a few well, it's I don't know, six, eight months after David died, she went off to college. And like a traditional dad dropping his daughter off of college, like my boys, I just kind of like booted them out. I'm like, here you go, you know, type thing. But for a daughter, it's totally different. But it wasn't the traditional, like, oh, I'm gonna miss my daughter. I cried for two hours straight driving home. I didn't want to leave the campus. And emotionally, I knew what was happening. She was my rock. I love my wife, she's my support uh best friend. But there was just something my daughter and I share a lot of similar personality. We love watching TV shows together. And I was like, how am I going to survive with her gone? Um, so there's these different things, different cycles in life we go through that we just have to kind of work through and deal with.

SPEAKER_02 39:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 39:23

Rebecca, we can't thank you enough uh for coming on. Uh this has been very insightful for me. I know it will be for our listeners. Um, do you have any last comments you want to leave?

SPEAKER_03 39:35

I I I'd love to, yeah, if there's something, some nugget that you can give to our uh our listeners.

SPEAKER_00 39:43

Um let me think about that. I always like to imagine I'm being Brene Brown. She thinks very slowly before she speaks. And she goes, hmm, let me think about that. I'm trying to incorporate that. She is very wise. Um I think that if you're in the pit of grieving or in the in the middle of it or wherever, you're hurting. Um some people tell you, like, oh, you know, it's gonna get better. And we we are evidence that it can get better. And that, you know, just take it one day at a time. But um for me, uh it has been helpful to take it one minute at a time sometimes. And um back to the this is the the Daisy podcast, I guess, but back to the dog, like I remember getting her and saying, like, alright, if I can get her to her six-month checkup like think how think how I was like measuring time in how old Daisy was. She was right at you know about the same age as when he passed. And I thought, I'll never make it to her six-month checkup. But I had these little markers that I was like challenging myself almost, and some days it was minute by minute and um literally picking myself off the floor and you know, walking away from things that would hurt me. And then some days I was like, oh, what her three-month thing, right? You know, having having measures and goals for me was helpful, loose, but accepting that it didn't have to look a certain way, I didn't have to perform, I could just lay on the floor and get up, and that could be a victory the next day. You know, every minute it could be a victory. And then it's amazing. She she grew up, you know, it's like the grief grew up with her, and um and and even with my child, like you know, having a toddler is not easy. And I use that same mentality, this probably won't last for 10 minutes. You know, he he needs to just scream and feel what he's gotta feel and we can move through it. And I try really hard, not all the time successful, to give myself, all right, we're just gonna make it through this minute and see what it looks like on the other side. And that if that was my life motto, if I had a motto, it'd probably let's just try to make it love it.

SPEAKER_03 42:10

Yeah, that's that's a great nugget. Thank you, Rebecca. Thank you so much. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 42:15

Dawn, do you have any last comments?

SPEAKER_03 42:17

Just very grateful uh that that you're here with us and that uh our our paths continue to walk side by side.

SPEAKER_00 42:28

It's cool. One of the biggest blessings of my life meeting you.

SPEAKER_01 42:31

Well, I'm absolutely a better man uh meeting you, Rebecca. And um, your last nugget of uh wisdom there, I think, is very important to call out because um in the grief world, we tend to acknowledge two milestones, and that is the milestone of our loved ones' date of birth and date of death. And I think it's important for us to have milestones, as we pointed out at the very beginning with surviving, whether it's you know, that breathe for the next minute, whether it's six months down the road. And I love what you said about keep them loose, because if they're so rigid, then they're not gonna be flexible with you as you grieve and as you grow uh with that. So um I again I want to reiterate thank you so much for coming on. I also want to ask our listeners to like, share, and subscribe to this podcast. Um, and look, you know, there's things that we're gonna say uh that you might disagree with. There's things you might not be able to relate with. It might be the cussing, it might be the suicide topic, there might be an activation of dogs. Yeah, exactly. And maybe there's some cat listeners on here that are just keeping. Oh I don't. I have two of them, but that's a that's a whole different story. My daughter loves them. So um, but but I would just say that um understand that everybody is unique and everybody is different. And um let's just continue to show grace and uh let's all of us grow together. So thank you so much until next time. Thank you so much for taking time out of your day to listen. We hope turning grief into growth spoke to your heart and becomes a part of your own journey of healing and transformation. If you know someone who could use a little hope, please share this episode with them. And don't forget to follow, like, or subscribe on your favorite platform so you don't miss what's coming next. Don and I can't wait to share more conversations to help you keep turning your grief into growth. Until next time.