Episode 20-Finding Hope in the Healing Journey with Cassandra Armstrong

From the National Religious Broadcasters Convention, Aliza Prokop sits down with Cassandra Armstrong, author of Growth in the Grief, to discuss the lasting impact of trauma and loss. Through deeply personal experiences—including the loss of loved ones and surviving assault—Cassandra shares both the struggles and victories that shaped her healing journey. Together, Aliza and Cassandra have an honest conversation about the realities of grief, depression, anxiety, and trauma, while emphasizing the hope, resilience, and healing that can be found through faith in Christ, counseling, and community. Though scars may remain, this conversation is a powerful reminder that healing and restoration are possible.

Resources: 

• Suicide and Crisis Hotline: 988
• Growth in the Grief
• National Religious Broadcasters
• Cassandra Armstrong
• AMP Counseling
• Follow Aliza on:
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Hashtags: #TheAMPcast #AlizaProkop #ChristianRadio #Christian #Faith #Healing #Trauma #Therapy #Counseling #Podcast #Podcasting #PodcastCommunity #PFCAudioVideo #SexualAssualtAwareness #Grief #TraumaTherapy 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Good evening. We begin tonight with an issue that continues to affect millions long after the original events have passed. Trauma. Mental health experts say trauma from earlier life experiences often resurfaces years later, influencing emotional responses, physical health, and relationships. While the incidents may be in the past, the body and brain can remain in a heightened state of survival.

SPEAKER_07 0:33

I wish I could just forget about everything that happened to me so long ago. But these memories haunt me.

SPEAKER_01 0:43

I know it's over. But it doesn't feel over. I need help, but I'm afraid to open up about my past.

SPEAKER_05 1:44

I met one today, and she agreed to be on the podcast, and her name is Cassandra Armstrong. She wrote the book Growth in the Grief, which just got in 2025 the Christ Lit Book Award. It says so right on the cover in big gold letters. And I'm very impressed. And it is so nice to have you here. She has a lot of information to bring to talk about her healing. And of course, this is a trauma-slanted podcast because everything we talk about kind of stems from trauma. And I think this is spot on for what you've been through. So welcome and thank you for being here. Thank you so much for having me. So Growth in the Grief was born from what? Can you start us from the beginning and give us an overview, the listeners who are listening?

SPEAKER_04 2:35

Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_05 2:36

Tell us about how this got started and what we're talking about. What grief are we talking about for you?

SPEAKER_04 2:42

We are talking about all kinds of grief, but the book was birthed from losing my mother and realizing I'm not very good at grieving. It's a skill. It's a yeah, I thought I was very good at grieving, and it turned out I was actually just holding it all in from all of the other traumas I had been through in life to try to cope. Okay. So in her loss, I finally fully broke down and um started to question how I had managed all of the things I had been through. And so it covers a loss of my daughter to SIDS, um, a sexual assault many years prior. Um my other daughter had leukemia. She is healed now, and she is fully, she is 13 years old, and she was three when she had leukemia. But um I had masked a lot, and even the small things that we don't really consider when we're younger, loss of a pet. I went through my parents divorced, and things that you learn to just deal with because that's what you're taught to do. Just suck it up, just keep suck it up, keep moving, right. And I very much was a part of a family that had been through a lot of trauma themselves, right? So I just thought that was what we do. And that's not to say you don't keep moving, of course. Right. But um, and instead of really grieving and giving it to God, which I was taught to do, um, instead I you know would pour a gin in tonic and then work on my master's degree and cover it up with trying to climb a corporate ladder or whatever it was that I I thought I was supposed to do.

SPEAKER_05 4:18

So where did it take you? Let's let's go back. So you were in the military. Yes. And what years would that have been? You were in the Navy, was it?

SPEAKER_04 4:26

Yes, I was in the Navy from 2006 to 2017.

SPEAKER_05 4:30

And what was your position there? What did you do? I was in IT. So I worked on computers and were you aboard vessels that went overseas? Yep.

SPEAKER_04 4:41

I was on the USS Gunston Hall. Uh deployed with them. And then from there, as as I had children, I stayed on shore duty to have my children. Right. And got married, got divorced. Okay. That does happen sometimes.

SPEAKER_05 4:56

Do you think the trauma had something to do with that?

SPEAKER_04 4:58

I think it certainly does. Yes. Um when I when I first joined the military, I had m married my high school sweetheart. Okay. That did not work. I went on deployment and um didn't he he he found someone else. Okay. So and that was okay. And I I took it hard at the time, but um it was a good learning experience. Um and from there, I think I I just moved too fast too soon.

SPEAKER_05 5:25

You wanted to cover up that pain and got another relationship, maybe? Right. Okay.

SPEAKER_04 5:29

And um, so then with my next husband, I had two children. Okay. And I thought that was it. And he had sat me down one day and said, Hey, I don't think that this is working. And I was pretty upset. And once he had said that, it started to ring in my head. And so I did. I moved out for a while, and um from there the the end of the marriage just kind of continued, and um we separated for a really long time. I met someone, we broke up, we got back together, I'm married to him now.

SPEAKER_05 6:02

But it worked out in the end.

SPEAKER_04 6:04

It did, it did work out in the end, and um, I don't recommend dating people while you're separated and not legally divorced, so that's not a good part of the lesson. And him and I have been through quite a bit together, and I think that that's you know, part of the suffering we had to endure as two people who knew God and weren't serving him, but got together anyway. Anyway, somehow we were equally yoked in our lack of serving God while knowing we should be, if that makes any sense.

SPEAKER_05 6:35

So it was a calling that was always there, you finally answered it.

SPEAKER_04 6:38

Yes. I I grew up in a Christian school in a very Christian home, and I I think I just I ran.

SPEAKER_05 6:44

Okay. All right. So if we go back to the traumas that you had, what sort of symptoms, what sort of things, what was life like for you? You say that there was a sexual assault that took place that you openly discuss in this book. So this isn't something that I'm bringing up because I want to talk about it. You discuss it in this book.

SPEAKER_04 7:03

Yes.

SPEAKER_05 7:04

That was not your first trauma, or was that your first trauma?

SPEAKER_04 7:09

I'd say it's my first life-changing trauma. There's certainly many grief moments throughout my life. But that's the first thing that changed me so deeply that I didn't realize it ahead.

SPEAKER_07 7:26

Okay.

SPEAKER_04 7:27

I'm I changed who I was. I went from being an extrovert who was class president to being someone who didn't want to answer the door for the UPS man. Um to this day I still don't get MRIs past my mid-chest. I can't function well. Being here, my husband said, suffocating to you. Yes. He said, Hey, I'm proud of you for being here. I know this is a lot for you.

SPEAKER_05 7:48

Was it really hard for you having a large crowd? This is a huge crowd here.

SPEAKER_04 7:53

Yeah. It's um it's work.

SPEAKER_05 7:55

How are you doing?

SPEAKER_04 7:56

Um, I'm better than I thought I would be. Okay. And I think it's the good company. You know, if I'm at like a state fair, a little less comfortable.

SPEAKER_05 8:04

Well, I don't like going to state fair. I think that can turn into a mess, just excuse me, excuse me, excuse me, you know, people everywhere.

SPEAKER_04 8:11

It's anxiety. Right. City. And I I feel much more healed than I used to be. But it's it's every day. It's it's certainly not, you know, this book being published doesn't mean, well, I'm I'm perfect now. I no longer feel anything about any trauma that happened. Right. It's a it's a daily reminder still. It's still something that I have to remember to not say absolutes about in my day-to-day. I can go and get whatever package showed up from UPS or answer the door to pizza or whatever the case may be, as long as I go, okay, you're fine. This is a trauma response. It is. This is not real.

unknown 8:49

Right.

SPEAKER_04 8:49

Now it's real for you, but you're not minimizing it. I'm not minimizing it. And it's not like I think the UPS guy is going to do anything. That's not it's interacting with people at all that I don't actually.

SPEAKER_05 8:59

Well, it's a trigger. Your brain, you know, has that memory of the event.

SPEAKER_04 9:04

Right.

SPEAKER_05 9:05

And so that trigger response and that trauma response in your brain can be reprogrammed. You said that you went through, did you go through some therapy to get I did. Okay.

SPEAKER_04 9:15

That was how I learned that it had affected me. Right.

SPEAKER_05 9:18

And so what form of did they give you a description of what it was or what kind of therapy did you have?

SPEAKER_04 9:24

I did cognitive processing therapy, okay. CBT, and I did it through the VA.

SPEAKER_05 9:28

Very good.

SPEAKER_04 9:29

Um and it was in trauma.

SPEAKER_05 9:31

Trauma slanted, like a minus TF CBT. So there's CBT and then there's trauma focused. So I'm assuming you got the trauma focused. Must have been because they gave you some education and they taught you that it was um, you know, sitting with the feeling and stopping the thought and getting the coping skills and all of those things. Are those kind of what you did? Okay.

SPEAKER_04 9:54

Yeah. And it's it's recognizing that it had changed. I started the therapy because I was depressed, didn't want to get out of bed about my mother passing.

SPEAKER_05 10:04

It's understandable.

SPEAKER_04 10:05

And after talking and talking and talking, it slowly led back to how I cope with all of my trauma. And she said, has there been anything that has happened to you that isn't a death necessarily? And so I said, Well, that that's the only thing, but I mean, I was fine. I'm okay. And she said, Can we talk about it just a little bit more?

SPEAKER_05 10:23

Let's dive into that because are you fine? Were you fine?

SPEAKER_04 10:27

I was not fine. You were not fine. I was not fine.

SPEAKER_05 10:30

And then, you know, also when we see people who've gone through things like this, it's not always, gee, you know, I'm fine, I'm gonna shove it down. And and I I use this in in a lot of my podcasts, talk about the vacuum cleaner. My producer, have you heard about the vacuum cleaner response? He's shaking his head, no. The listeners have, but I'll I'll say this to you and then you tell me if this resonates because we've never discussed this, so we'll see if this is an accurate depiction. So, what kind of vacuum cleaner do you have?

SPEAKER_04 11:00

Dyson.

SPEAKER_05 11:01

Okay. I want you to use it for five years and never empty it.

SPEAKER_04 11:05

It won't work very well. Right.

SPEAKER_05 11:07

What will happen?

SPEAKER_04 11:09

It will clogged.

SPEAKER_05 11:12

It'll stop working or explode.

SPEAKER_04 11:14

Or that I've never considered for five years.

SPEAKER_05 11:17

I want you to just vacuum away.

SPEAKER_04 11:19

Yeah, and so it's probably gonna bust, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 11:22

In reality, that's kind of what you were doing. You were shutting down because you hadn't expelled all of those things that were bouncing around with somebody that knew how to process it with you. It wasn't your fault.

SPEAKER_04 11:37

Right.

SPEAKER_05 11:38

Did you ever feel it was any of this was your fault?

SPEAKER_04 11:41

Yes. Oh, absolutely.

SPEAKER_05 11:43

Tell me more about that.

SPEAKER_04 11:44

I had been drinking at the event in which it occurred. Okay. And I actually was exhausted and um I went to bed. So And how's that your fault? I had been drinking. And so my thought was, well, if you weren't drinking, you would have been so tired, you wouldn't have gone to bed, you would have been aware, or you would have been in a different place. And it took a lot of the cognitive processing therapy to unbelieve those things. And um, I I know now, obviously. And I I I knew then as well when I would have moments of ah, I just I could have prevented this. Well, yeah, sure, okay, but also no one but the person who assaulted you made that decision that day.

SPEAKER_05 12:25

That's right. So and nobody has a right to do that to anyone ever, right, no matter what condition that individual's in. Right.

unknown 12:34

Right.

SPEAKER_05 12:35

If anything, when you're in that condition, somebody should be more caring and concerned for you. So that's that's also something that I think it sounds like your therapist did a really good job with helping you get through.

SPEAKER_04 12:50

She was phenomenal and she was integral in the book. Is she in the book too? She is not personally mentioned by name or anything, but um this the CPT that I went through is is mentioned. Um and a a small bit of trying to explain how it works without going and turning the book into a therapy book. Nobody wants a textbook, right? Right, right, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 13:14

Yeah, I try to watch that I don't turn into a you know just a teacher with a chalkboard or something up here, but but it's important. I think one of the turning points is when, and this is something, again, tell me if I'm right or wrong, but one of the first parts of TFCBT is psychoeducation, teaching the person, you know, what happens to the brain. Like there are things that happen to the way your thought process was that wasn't your fault. Right. And so once you go, oh, or the way you react to everyday stimuli might be different than someone who hasn't gone through a trauma. Oh, you mean that's because I went through the XYZ trauma? Yeah, that's why. That's why you're afraid to answer the door. That's why you have a startle response if someone comes in the room and do you have a startle response?

SPEAKER_04 14:06

Oh yeah. Uh silly things too.

SPEAKER_05 14:09

What other things do you notice? Um if you would want to share.

SPEAKER_04 14:13

Being willing to hold conversations at all with anyone I don't know. I mean, even as as a waitress comes to the room. You don't know me. Right?

SPEAKER_05 14:22

This is Is this hard for you?

SPEAKER_04 14:25

Saying yes to it was I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_05 14:28

I didn't know.

SPEAKER_04 14:28

I did some praying before I sat down.

SPEAKER_05 14:30

I'm so sorry. That's the last thing I would ever want to do is put someone through a trigger. So I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_04 14:36

I don't I don't I appreciate that it's it this is how God works for me. Okay, He puts things in my lap that are uncomfortable so that I can overcome them. And I'm aware now that that is my step forward. Every day it's a new step forward, whether it's holding a longer conversation with somebody at the checkout at a grocery store or talking to you today. Um, and I you know, I I I do a podcast with my husband and we've talked to other guests. We've we have done that. And every time I have to take a breath and go, okay, you are fine.

SPEAKER_05 15:12

Or you take your hand. I always tell my clients, take your hand, put it on your chest, tell yourself I am safe. Yep, I am safe. I am safe. You repeat that to yourself.

SPEAKER_04 15:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 15:22

So, well, thank you for agreeing because I didn't realize. I mean, my assumption was wow, she wrote a book. Right. She's been through something, but wow, she wrote a book and she's she's okay to talk about this. So that that was kind of an assumption, so I'm sorry about that.

SPEAKER_04 15:40

Well, no need to apologize. Okay. I am okay to talk about this. Okay, good.

SPEAKER_05 15:43

I hope I'm not too scary.

SPEAKER_04 15:44

Not not even a little.

SPEAKER_05 15:46

I'm the girl from Ohio. It's doesn't get much more vanilla than that.

SPEAKER_04 15:52

I don't know, I'm in Maine. So oh yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 15:54

It's pretty vanilla. I went up there with my husband, and and it was like blueberry, uh, I don't know what, blueberry something we had, and he ate lobster. Like they just pulled it out of the water and yep.

SPEAKER_04 16:08

And blueberries, lobster, red hot dogs, moxie. How about covers it?

SPEAKER_05 16:13

Brown bread. I love Maine. I love Maine. So, okay, getting off off subject. So one of the other things that I want to point out is just because you've gone through trauma therapy, and you're an example of that, or just because you have been able to process this, it's not a once and done. This is never a once and done thing. I think that's a misnomer, and I think people get that attitude, well, I've been through therapy, so I should be good to go. Right? Right? I mean, you're good to go, but that doesn't mean there's not going to be a trigger. It doesn't mean that you coming into that hall of how many, what, thousand people in there today wouldn't have maybe triggered you.

SPEAKER_04 16:52

Right.

SPEAKER_05 16:53

So would you agree that it isn't once and done for you? You have to kind of renew your mind every day and deal with the triggers?

SPEAKER_04 17:01

Absolutely. The the therapy allowed me to put tools in my toolbox to utilize when I know I'm having some sort of trauma response, or I'm even about to. Oh, I can now start to gauge. Okay, I see a sea of people. How are you feeling? Do you need a minute? Right. You know, and I'll go to the bathroom and just you know take a breathe. Right. I think it's a lot like a scar, right? I I have a massive scar on my left knee from breaking my tibial plateau into 15 pieces at one point. And was that a military thing? No, it was my daughter mopping when she was seven. It was great. No. Oh my.

SPEAKER_05 17:39

I'm thinking it's in the Navy.

SPEAKER_04 17:41

You fell on a ship or something. I it would be a better story. Okay. Okay. I wish I wish it was. Dog on it. Yep. Bless her heart. Yeah. But um, the scar's not gone. Right. It's still there. I still feel it. The knee still hurts. It's rebuilt, but it's rebuilt with new pieces. Right. And there were tools used. And you are too. And I am too. And God is doing it every day. Yeah, yeah. Every single day there's a new piece that's added. And the scar is still there. But now I get to see the next person who is maybe dealing with the loss of their mother or their child or mom has cancer, or maybe a teenager who says, Oh, my parents are going through divorce, this stinks, you know? And I can say, Hey, I got this scar. Let me tell you about it. I promise the scar is gonna be there, but you're gonna know how to walk with it pretty soon. Yes. Yes.

SPEAKER_05 18:32

So you went through therapy, you had the the loss of your daughter at nine days old? Was it eight days old from SIDS, you said?

SPEAKER_04 18:40

Yep.

SPEAKER_05 18:41

And so take me there. So you went through that, and how was working through that after all the trauma you'd been through?

SPEAKER_04 18:49

It honestly felt like a punishment. Um when I was younger, I had had an abortion, and I don't believe in abortion. Right. And I knew it was wrong, and I did it anyway because I didn't want to stifle college and all of the plans and all of every selfish reason you can think of that I had, I that was it, right? Okay. And so when she passed at the same exact time, my other daughter wasn't even home. She was in the hospital getting chemotherapy. She was staying.

SPEAKER_05 19:20

So you had a daughter getting chemotherapy for leukemia. You had a for leukemia. You had a daughter that had passed away from SIDS. Yeah. You had an assault in your past. How many years prior was the assault? The assault was nine years prior. So this decade of trauma that you went through.

SPEAKER_04 19:37

Yeah, and that's and it was a decade where I was learning to cope the wrong way and cover things up, and then that happened, and I I just kept blaming myself some more, right? Shoved it down. And shoved it down. And um the crying that took place was in the shower. You know, it was I didn't and my husband, uh well, he we weren't even married yet at the time. He was blaming God. He was running farther. So there's a part of me that didn't want that to happen, and so I tried to not exacerbate the situation any further with his trauma because he already dealt with anxiety and depression on his own on a regular basis to panic attacks that led him to a point where he was having what he thought was a heart attack. Oh wow. And um, I didn't want to make that worse for him. So I was I was suppressing a lot for my coping mechanism, right? And for the sake of not making his hurt any worse, right?

SPEAKER_05 20:38

So you go, trudge through. I mean, you're a military person, you learned that too, right? And you trudge through, and then the turning point when you finally decided I needed to get outside assistance was when your mother passed.

SPEAKER_04 20:54

Yep. Yep.

SPEAKER_05 20:55

Can you bring us to that?

SPEAKER_04 20:56

A few years later, um, at this time my mother was going through chemotherapy when my daughter passed. And um they had put her in a trial for CAR T cell therapy for multiple myeloma in 2021. Okay. And then um she had the CAR T cell therapy attack her brain, and they did a double craniotomy on September 11th, 2021, and they prepped us for her to die right there. And they let my children, and this is in the height of COVID, right? And so they let my children in. So you knew it was bad if they're letting children in. Right. And they said, okay, we're gonna let them say goodbye to her because we don't think she's gonna make it. And they pulled the tubes out, they and she came out of this coma. And it was this it it felt like a miracle. Yes. And she relearned how to walk. She sh sh she essentially was almost better, and the cancer wasn't fully gone.

SPEAKER_07 21:51

Okay.

SPEAKER_04 21:51

But um, it had attacked her brain, her heart, her liver, you name it. The CAR T cells were attacking wherever the cancer was, and the cancer had spread. Um so they sent her home with a pacemaker, but it hadn't been calibrated yet. And um November 9th, 2021, which was also my wedding anniversary. Oh my um, I was supposed to fly there back to see her that day. And I got a call from my aunt and said she's gone.

SPEAKER_03 22:20

Oh really?

SPEAKER_04 22:21

So I didn't get to see her again. Um and I was pretty angry at God because what felt like a miracle all of a sudden was taken from us was the opposite, right?

SPEAKER_05 22:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 22:30

And um it took me a long time to realize the blessing that she got to go home, and we got to see her as much as we did, and you know, that she wasn't gone on September 11th, 2021. You know, we got almost a couple months more with her. Yeah. So and then all of the things that she had taught me growing up just started to resound louder. Like they clicked now. Yes. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 22:54

All of the I'm so sorry you went through that. Yeah, that's part of life. It is, but you listen to now things were coming back to you, and you were starting to hear her messages, yeah, her her lessons, yeah, and then take me through that. So after the lessons, now your mom is gone.

SPEAKER_04 23:17

Yep.

SPEAKER_05 23:18

And you decide what?

SPEAKER_04 23:22

I decide that I'm going to shut down and grieve big, I think. And um, I stopped working as much as I should have been. And I at the time was working on my doctorate, and I ended up getting kicked out of Liberty University for not doing all the things I should have been doing. And um they let me back in, by the way. So I'm grieving at it again. That's great. Yep, but I just shut down, and in shutting down, I started to write. I got fired from my job. Okay. Every piece of my life was falling apart, and I thought, how is this possible that my daughter died and I get a master's degree and I get a promotion, but my mother dies and I can't get out of bed. I can't, I can't continue.

SPEAKER_05 24:09

Why do you think that was?

SPEAKER_04 24:10

I think there was a mixture of hearing her words in my head and the way she has taught me to deal with things in life and to give them to God, and she would usually be the person I call. I certainly can't call my mom about her own passing, right? Right. So it got to a point where I finally gave it to God and I started to write. And it's funny too, because as a child, as a teenager, I wrote a lot, and she used to say, Cass, someday you're gonna write. You're gonna really write. You're gonna write a book.

SPEAKER_05 24:43

You did, and I did, and I'm looking at it and it has a a a fall leaf on the the cover. Yes.

SPEAKER_04 24:50

Um my mother and I used to go for walks all year round, but in the fall, it was our favorite time. Living in New England, of course, and the leaves are just tremendous. And um my daughter, actually, while I was journaling, had brought me a leaf from outside while I was writing, and it just triggered all of this information. Right. It really, and I just kept writing and writing and writing. And got this book. And I got this book.

SPEAKER_05 25:18

And that is what this book is born from. So it's your writings, but you've added more to it. It looks like it's a um, there's places to for the person to write. Yes, yes. Tell us about that. So, how would it help someone? Oh, look at this. You've got uh places for them to give that opportunity to get that out, to get this out, which is what you didn't do. So you're you're offering that to them in this book.

SPEAKER_04 25:43

The hope is that they go through, even if it's just one chapter that resonates with them, and when they start to feel an emotion or a reminder, and they see how God is in this story truly, they can also just start to write. It's it's not just a memoir, it's also a devotional and that they can see, you know, just like the book of Romans tells us, you know, suffering produces perseverance, you know, and perseverance character and character hope. And it really is my greatest story in my entire life, even though it's the saddest.

SPEAKER_05 26:20

It is. And so if you had to not that your life or any of our lives could be boiled down to a sentence or two, right, but if you had to put this into a few sentences or a sentence to say to a person that's listening who has trauma, whether it's an assault, grieving over a death, a divorce, an estranged child, whatever it may be, drug addiction, alcohol addiction, a spouse that's an addict, what would you say that this would provide them?

SPEAKER_04 26:53

This will provide them hopefully the ability to see like God's plan with any trauma, no matter what the world might measure it as, as a a piece of hope for what his plan is for you and how you might be able to help others.

SPEAKER_05 27:12

Yes.

SPEAKER_04 27:13

And the the lessons that you can't even fathom that you might be able to learn. And while the pain is immense, yeah, life wouldn't be as joyful if we didn't also have pain to compare it with. And at the end of the day, we all are born and we do end. All right, yeah. At some point we die. And that's part of everyone's story. Being able to take that and use it to help other people has been a bigger blessing in my life than a trauma.

SPEAKER_05 27:45

Absolutely. Like it's a phoenix rising from the ashes.

SPEAKER_03 27:49

Right.

SPEAKER_05 27:49

And this is a tool they can use to get that out. Yes. As a therapist, one of the things that, and we just discussed it, one of the things we need is a place, a safe place to be able to get it out. Right. That's what you've given them here. Plus your story, which says you don't have to stay where you are.

SPEAKER_04 28:08

Exactly.

SPEAKER_05 28:09

Right? You don't have to stay stuck, and then there's no shame and blame, like you're drinking, you're you know, promiscuous, you are this, you are that. It's not about making a person feel bad. Right. It's about saying you're doing some of maybe some of these things because of your pain.

SPEAKER_04 28:28

Right. Right? That's exactly it. We were we make choices day in and day out.

SPEAKER_05 28:33

Based on our pain. So let's get the pain out so that we can be part of life and really enjoy it. Right. And it seems like you are now, so tell us about today before we close. How are you now?

SPEAKER_04 28:44

I am much better now. I like I said, have moments, right? But um I am here at NRB talking to strangers and talking to you, and thank you for having me, by the way. Of course, of course. Handing out my book and talking to people about their grief and getting to experience other people's version of how God has blessed them and used them in the bigger plan, and how all of us have a ripple that runs into each other, you know?

SPEAKER_05 29:10

And you have some really awesome tattoos on your arm.

SPEAKER_04 29:12

Yes, the military is so kind. Is that what that is? Wow. A lot of them. Owl and yes, and my children.

SPEAKER_05 29:20

Oh, that's cool. Well, I appreciate it very, very much for you being here. And how can people get in touch with you or find your book? Talk to us about how they can reach out or what you have. You have a podcast.

SPEAKER_04 29:32

I have a podcast. It's uh called Rooted Podcast by Rooted Productions. My husband and I. We talk all things Christian, marriage, parenting, the tough stuff, the fun stuff, uh, military, veteran life, um, anxiety, depression, you name it. Um I'm on www.cassandraarmstrongbooks.com and there's links to multiple ways to get my book. Social media on there. Social media. Okay. Yep. You can find me at Cassandra Armstrong on Facebook. I'm writer cass on TikTok. Oh, I'll look you up there too.

SPEAKER_05 30:04

Okay. Okay. Yeah, I'm gonna be in touch with you for sure. Um, great, thank you. So reach out to her if you want to get some more information, listen to her podcast, follow her. And unfortunately, that's all the time we have today because I think we've been talking for quite a while. I'm not sure, but I think we have. Um, I am very grateful for this. I'm going to read the book myself, and I'm going to actually use it because I do, I just lost my mother in October. I'm sorry. Yeah, she was 97 and a half. Wow. Biggie. That's amazing. We called her, her name was Elaine, is Elaine. We called her Big E, and she um lived a huge life. But it still hurts, you know. It it you think, well, I've had people say, well, she was ninety-seven and a half.

SPEAKER_04 30:48

It doesn't take it away.

SPEAKER_05 30:50

Yeah. You still want to tell her, hey, I'm at the NRB and I've interviewed 14 people. Right. But you can't.

unknown 30:56

No.

SPEAKER_05 30:56

So I met Cassandra instead. And isn't it really something that when they opened those doors this morning and I went into that ginormous I I mean, I was just like, oh, you know, all of the people there and famous people. And I made a beeline for your booth.

SPEAKER_04 31:15

Yeah. It's even stranger because I wasn't supposed to be there at that time initially. I was supposed to be here tomorrow at 10 instead. And my son's hockey team is doing so wonderfully. Glow, go gladiators black. Um God. But they've made states. So I can't miss the states. No, you cannot. So I am leaving early, and so I traded with somebody for their time slot. Are you serious? Yes, and then you walked up, and I thought, well, this is a God moment.

SPEAKER_05 31:46

There have been so many of them. It's like I said, my God muscles tired. Like I'm just like, please, God, I just want to eat a pizza and watch, you know, investigative discovery tonight. You know, that's what I want to do in my sweats, my purple sweats with my husband. But it was a God thing for sure. And I'm gonna use this in my practice. I'm gonna definitely recommend this. Oh, I for sure will. So thank you very much. That's it for us. I'm Aliza Prokop. This is the AmpCast. You can find me at AmpCounseling, ampcounseling.com. We would appreciate if you would share this episode. This especially is an episode that I think could help someone who has had grief, any kind of assault, loss of a child, uh, loss of a parent. Just any of those things, if they resonate, give this a share, give it a like, uh, follow and subscribe, and then also you can find me on on social media, Facebook, TikTok, and Instagram. Appreciate it very much, Elisa Pro Cop. And that's it. So thanks for joining us. We'll see you again next time. Have a good week.

SPEAKER_02 32:56

You've been listening to the Amp Cast with Aliza Marie Procop. To find out more, go to Ampcounseling.com. You can discover more information about all our services that we offer. Be sure to follow our social media platforms using the icons at the bottom of the page. Don't forget to check out our show notes for today's episode, where we will have links and contact info for today's guests. Well, that's all the time we have for this episode. Thanks for joining us, and we will see you next time for another edition of the Amp Cast with Elisa Marie Pro Cop Dealing and Healing from Trauma.