The Weight We Carry

In this episode Sherri discusses some parts of her history that have led to her carry deep, painful, and misplaced shame.

Yvon Attia Link

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Transcript

SPEAKER_05 0:00

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to Divine and Most Unlikely. You're spending some time with us, Sherry Conran and Nathan. Last time we discussed some information about internal family systems and identifying parts of self, how those parts of self might show up in people who have survived through some trauma, and then how to acknowledge, interact with, and integrate those parts of self so that we can be happier, healthier versions of ourself that that show up more fully to be more fully ourselves. As we were discussing this, we had identified that internal family systems was one of the things that we wanted to talk about.

SPEAKER_00 0:54

Right.

SPEAKER_05 0:55

And as we got a little closer, Sherry, you felt led to share another part of your story that is very, very tender, very intimate, uh, and and I am honored that you chose to have me be a part of this conversation.

SPEAKER_03 1:18

Thanks, Nathan. I don't know that I could have any better battle buddy, right? You're gonna come. You've been I've gone in your cave.

SPEAKER_05 1:28

You certainly have.

SPEAKER_03 1:29

I've gone in your cave. Even though my helmet wasn't strapped on, it was a little crooked.

SPEAKER_04 1:35

It right was. According to him, you guys.

SPEAKER_03 1:41

What he doesn't know is I always have the full armor of God on. Yeah. Right? And you can't always see that, right? Um, but yeah, I've helped you go into your cave and all the things the Lord is doing in this relationship. And the word of the year, as you know, the word of the year that the Lord gave me is threshold. And you and I have walked through many thresholds together.

SPEAKER_05 2:08

We have, right?

SPEAKER_03 2:09

Yeah, we walked through the threshold of naming and identifying your cave, what was in your cave, where it was at, helping you see the enemy. We and and you've come along beside me in beautiful ways. We talked about last time. Oh, you guys, we talked about last time Nathan. Nathan has a huge desire to help me love to cook. And I don't know who it is. And in me, I I don't know which part it is in me. It's probably the adolescent. She's pretty feisty, you guys. She's pretty angry that I really don't want to cook. And he's like, Sherry, that's how you love people. You love people with food. And I'm like, Nathan, whatever. There's other ways I can love people, okay? I can hug them, love them, counsel them, sit with them, cry with them, all the things. But I don't always want to cook for them. But anyway, he gave me just a sweet little little baby lesson this morning. Not this morning, but it at the last episode that we did. Um, yeah, so um I would choose no other battle buddy, Nathan.

SPEAKER_05 3:14

Well, I'm honored and I say the same for you.

SPEAKER_03 3:16

There's no one else that I would yeah, and yes, this is a very intimate, personal, it's been a very shameful part of myself. And the really hard thing is, you know, you can maybe hang on.

SPEAKER_05 3:41

Take your time. Song of my people.

SPEAKER_03 3:50

Our people, our people. You, Nathan, can maybe hide some parts of yourself, right? You can maybe you can maybe hide the little boy part, or you can hide the parentified part, maybe, but I can't hide this part of myself.

SPEAKER_05 4:06

Yeah. And before you get into that, just one thing I want to say is because you you used a really, really, really, really powerful word, and that word was shameful.

SPEAKER_00 4:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 4:15

And I think we've talked about this before. In case we haven't, I just want to reiterate it.

SPEAKER_02 4:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 4:20

That word, I want to make sure that we understand the power and the meaning in that word. So there's a difference between shame and guilt.

SPEAKER_00 4:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 4:29

Guilt is I did a bad thing. Shame is I am bad.

SPEAKER_03 4:36

Yes, yes.

SPEAKER_05 4:38

And both those things, guilt and shame, can be the consequence of trauma.

SPEAKER_00 4:44

For sure.

SPEAKER_05 4:45

And many, many times those things are built around a mistaken belief that gets internalized at a subconscious level because of trauma.

SPEAKER_03 4:58

Yeah, Nathan, you're definitely hitting the nail on the head. Yep. This part of myself definitely was born out of trauma, but it's taken me years to realize that because I've had a lot of self-hatred, a lot of shame. And let me tell you, I could keep you here the rest of the day. We could have, we could have a Sean Ryan length of podcast, right? Three to five hours.

SPEAKER_04 5:21

And we both love Sean Ryan. By the way, there's no affiliation there. Just love the dude.

SPEAKER_03 5:25

Nope, love the dude for sure. Love all his guests that he has on. But but when I say that, I mean he has like five-hour podcasts. I could keep you here for five hours, maybe telling you about all the shame that people have placed on me with this part of self. And and so this part of self, you guys, is the part of me that's overweight. And I started, I think I started getting overweight um when I got pregnant with the girls. Both girls, okay. I was pretty rail thin most of my life. Um, and you know, you've heard the stories of my dad being obsessed with food and body image, his parents being obsessed with food and body image. Thus, my mother, my brother, my sister, and myself, we've all just really wrestled. My mom wrestled, my dad wrestled. Literally, Nathan, up until the day my dad died. He was he would pat his belly and he'd say, Doc says I need to get rid of this, you know. And, you know, what message does that send to me, right? And there were times, trust me, I've I've thankfully set boundaries around this, but there were times when I was an adult, I think in my 30s or 40s, where he would literally call. I don't, I don't think I let him do this very much for very long, but he would literally call and say, How much are you weighing right now?

SPEAKER_05 6:50

That I right?

SPEAKER_03 6:52

Yep, yep.

SPEAKER_05 6:53

That I can't makes me want to cuss, right?

SPEAKER_03 6:56

Yeah, yep. And I did somewhere along the way set boundaries and say, if you ask me that one more time, we won't be having any more conversations, right?

SPEAKER_00 7:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 7:06

Um, so I, you know, there's a lot, a lot of pieces to this puzzle. So with each child, and I with my first husband, my first husband really didn't want to have children. I had to kind of talk him into it, and which was so wrong, you guys. Don't do that. Don't do that. It's not helpful. He never wanted to be a father, and he never was a father. I talked him into it, and one of the reasons I think he didn't want me to have children is because he didn't want me to gain weight.

SPEAKER_00 7:39

Okay. Right? Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 7:40

And so this, I think you've heard this a little bit in my uh in my my the other podcast with some of my stories. Um, I was dating a 17-year-old. I think he was 16 or 17 when I was 13. At 13, he was talking to me about not getting fat. And Nathan, I don't know what I weighed back then, but again, I was rail thin. Rail thin, right? Um, so it started with him at 13. And then as I like, I stayed thin throughout my adolescent years, and then with the first pregnancy, you know, I'm eating for two. That's what I thought. Um, I wasn't, I wasn't raised with a lot of life skills. I didn't know how to manage my emotions. I certainly didn't know how to eat healthy. We grew up in the south and everything was fried.

SPEAKER_05 8:27

Fried green tomatoes, fried chicken, fried chicken fried steak. Chicken fried steak.

SPEAKER_03 8:34

Oh, I did make good chicken fried steak back then back in the day. I did make good chicken fried steak. Um, couldn't make the gravy though.

SPEAKER_05 8:45

You're that you're 50% of the way to be.

SPEAKER_03 8:48

The gravy was usually store-bought. But I couldn't make the chicken fried steak. Okay, so with that first child, like I talked him into having a baby and then he changed his mind. But I was already pregnant. So with that first child, I truly had the attitude, hey, I'm eating for two, you know? And I don't remember. I'm I'm thinking I gained 50 or 60 pounds with that child. And after I had her, which I gave birth to her at the ripe old age, I got pregnant at age 18, gave birth at age 19.

SPEAKER_00 9:22

Wow.

SPEAKER_03 9:22

Yeah, yeah. Um, here comes this mama with no life skills, no, yeah, not a lot of wisdom, not a lot of oh, all the things a mama needs. Um with that pregnancy, I think I went when she was born, I lost quite a chunk, but I think I kept at least 20 pounds. Okay. And that was in the first marriage. That first marriage, 17, probably I got married at 17, and then I think we got divorced. She was around two when we got divorced. Again, I don't do the math. We were married for four to five years, something like that. So um got divorced and then went through life, got remarried again at the age of 26, I think I was. And so when I got married the second time, my daughter was five years old, and um we thought we wanted to have like, he wanted to have like, I don't know, seven kids or something.

SPEAKER_05 10:21

Dad is a lot of kids.

SPEAKER_03 10:23

I know, right? And naive me, I was just like, okay, cool, whatever.

SPEAKER_00 10:31

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 10:32

Okay, yeah. Thank God he changed his mind. Um, but we only had one child. So that's my second daughter was born after when my first daughter was seven years old. So I think I must have had her like a year or two in the marriage again. I don't do math. Um, so there comes the second child, same thing. Eight for two, put on probably the 50 pounds and lost. Lost all but like 20 pounds. But so two babies, 20 extra pounds, 40 extra pounds. Um, you know, that's not a lot, but it's it's 40 pounds. So, oh Nathan, and I hate to confess this, but I've shared this a lot. This is how I this is this is a good example of how I did not have wisdom. And this was back in the day, my oldest daughter was born in the 80s, my youngest was born in the 90s. I smoked, Nathan. I smoked through both pregnancies. Smoke through both pregnancies, and when I look back on that, I'm like, what the actual heck was going on, right? Like, really, like you didn't know better to not smoke. I did not know better to not smoke. I, you know, I didn't have any life skills, and we talked about parts of self, right? Yes, that was survival skills. Smoking was a way that I managed my emotions. I would get close to coming out of the window of tolerance, and I knew none of that language, none of that language in either marriages. But I would get close to coming out of my window of tolerance and I would light up a cigarette every time, light up a cigarette every time. I probably smoked through the years from 13 to 27. I probably smoked a pack and a half to two packs a day. Wow. Yep, yep. And Nathan, not to give my age away, but you guys know how old I am. But cigarettes, you guys, were 50 cents to 75 cents a pack back then.

SPEAKER_05 12:27

Wow.

SPEAKER_03 12:27

And I don't go into gas stations very often because I get gas at Costco. But when I've had to go into a gas station for a bottle of water or for a bathroom, um, um, cigarettes are 15, I think they're 15, between 15 and $20 a pack.

SPEAKER_00 12:44

Oh.

SPEAKER_03 12:45

A pack. Now, back in the day, I used to buy them by the carton. And I think a carton back in the day was was $10 or $15, right?

SPEAKER_00 12:55

Wow.

SPEAKER_03 12:55

Yeah. And as I shared in the last podcast, after I came to know the Lord at age, I think I was 27, um, like two days after I surrendered my heart to him, you guys, he delivered me supernaturally, delivered this girl from smoking. Like, boom, done. I was out on the porch smoking a cigarette. I can see it. I can replay this. My memory's not great of things from the past, but I can see it just exactly as it played out. My pastor from Sangary Baptist Church came to visit me because I'd accepted the Lord that weekend, and he came to visit me and I was out on the porch smoking my cigarette. I'm like, oh my god, there's the pastor. I gotta get my cigarette, put it out. Like, he didn't see me do all that. I was on the front porch. But after that, you guys, the Lord took it away from me, and I would I would dream about it, I would do all the things, but I would, I didn't, I never smoked another cigarette again.

SPEAKER_05 13:48

That is amazing.

SPEAKER_03 13:49

But guess what I did?

SPEAKER_05 13:50

What'd you do? Did you eat instead?

SPEAKER_03 13:53

I ate instead. Because if you guys think about it, that hand motion, right? That hand motion with the cigarette going back and forth. Uh my funny brain wants to say, unl unlike Clinton, I inhaled. Oh man. I can also vividly picture this. Um, so my daughter, my oldest daughter probably be nine by this time. And after I quit smoking, you guys, I could look up at the ceiling in my house because I smoked in my house, Nathan. My ceiling was very gross yellow, right? Really gross. And I also vividly remember this. I don't remember the timeline, but not long after that, my dad came to visit. I think it might have been, I was in college at this time, and I think it might have been for a graduation. He came to visit, and he was smoking. Nathan, he started Mr. Party, Mr. Party guy back in the day. He started smoking. Thank God it didn't last long, but he started smoking in his 40s. I think he was, yeah, I think he was in his 40s, maybe 50s, trying to impress the women, I'm sure. But he came in my house and he smoked, and I was like, oh, this is awful. And my oldest daughter looked at me and said, see, see what it was like for us. And man, that stuck to me. That stuck with me. Like, can you imagine being a little kid and mom smoking and you're grossing out by it and all the things? And my mother, Nathan, was a lifelong smoker. You want to talk about survival skills? That's all that woman did was smoke. And part of me believes, this is so sad, but part of me believes so my mother had a surgery, and the um the level of anesthesia they gave her, and just I think it generally, anesthesia in general for older people is not wise. And this was a volunteer surgery that she did, it wasn't something she really needed to have done. But they gave her the anesthesia, she went into like dementia, Alzheimer's statements, and never came out of it. And she had to be on oxygen. So, guess what? Lifelong smoker, age 76, the woman couldn't smoke anymore. And I I really believe that to some degree my mom willed herself to die because she talked about no life skills. So, anyway, she smoked throughout her life, and I believe that that was part of how she ended up passing away. But pictures are coming to mind, you know, of how her skin looked when she passed, and just uh nicotine is awful. And my husband, my then husband, I don't think I can't remember if my first husband smoked, but my second husband did not. And to think about kissing a smoker today, it's like no way, no how. I can't even don't even come close to me if you're smoking, because you can I can smell smokers from a mile away. And um, yeah, gross. I don't know how he put up with that. And I have visions of me feeding my babies with freaking cigarette hanging out of my mouth or putting my babies in a car seat with a cigarette hanging out of my mouth. So you kind of hear a little judgment. Maybe I need to make a note of some areas of self-forgiveness still there, because loving those parts of self, even though that girl, 26, 27, 28, um gosh, was I yeah, seven years later. No, yeah, seven, no. I was probably still in my late 20s. See, I'm trying to do math again, Nathan. Nathan, why are you letting me do math? Um, anyway, I'm seeing lots of pictures of those events. So I'll I'll make a note of that and go back and do some forgiveness work because we just talked about the importance of loving the parts of self, but um it wasn't one meal that did this, it wasn't five meals that did this, it was 61. Now 62, because God just gave me a glorious birthday with a glorious celebration. Now 62 years of trauma and the influence of trauma that brought on all of this excess weight. And I also have a vivid memory. My mom was always, you know, a little fluffy, and with all the talk about from the boyfriends to the husbands of not wanting me to get fat, I became fearful of getting fat. And after my first child, guess what? I couldn't fit back in my clothes. Most women can't fit back in their clothes. I have conversations on the regular, even with clients today, coaching clients, of the distress of not being able to fit back in your clothes and you feel frumpy and you don't feel like you want to be intimate with your husband, and all the things that that brings, all the depression that that brings, and anxiety because your body man, Nathan, when you're you don't know because you can't get pregnant, right?

SPEAKER_05 18:48

Well, not not only that, but I'm not a woman. I know there's there's a whole different layer there.

SPEAKER_03 18:53

Yeah, you know, we're creating a human in our body. We are creating a human in our body, and growing it, and growing it, and feeding it, and carrying it, and all the things. And I've heard over and over again, I ate for two, I ate for two, I ate for two, because you think that's what you're supposed to do. Um, yeah, so your body, honestly, a woman's body is never gonna be totally the same after they give birth. It might be size-wise, some blessed women, some really blessed women get right back into their skinny jeans and right back into the bikini, bikini. I was not, mm-hmm, I didn't receive that blessing, but that blessing, not bikini. I don't have the goal for bikini, but the that blessing is gonna come back as so you guys hear this story. Um, but I was not one of those people. I kept on the 20 pounds and then it turned into 40 pounds. And then in my 40s, I was diagnosed with hypothyroidism. Yep. So freaking that didn't help anything.

SPEAKER_05 20:02

No, that's a significant contributor because your thyroid has a lot to do with regulating your metabolic rate.

SPEAKER_03 20:07

Right.

SPEAKER_05 20:08

And that's the rate you burn calories at. So if that if that gets turned down, that's gonna affect yeah.

SPEAKER_03 20:16

And I think, Nathan, I've think I've told you this story before, okay. Um, I was a I was a new Christian at this time, but as I was getting heavier, and you guys, the Bible says we can either speak life or death over ourselves. So when you hear this part of my story, you'll know, if you know me, you'll know why I'm on you quick. If you say should, if you say sorry too often, if you apologize too often, that kind of stuff. You'll know why I'm on you quick because you don't want to, you don't want to speak death over yourself. Um, because it matters, you're speaking death to your very cells, to your very organs. When you are saying negative words, you are speaking death to yourself. So, what did I do? Late 30s, early 40s, I was like, well, I really wished I had an excuse for all this extra weight. And I know some of you might question this, but I think words are powerful. Words are powerful, and that was me speaking death over myself, and not long after that, I got that diagnosis of hypothyroidism. So after learning about speaking life or death, I definitely stopped that now. And I've I've I've worked hard with my words to reverse the curse, right?

SPEAKER_05 21:27

With hypothyroidism, do you think that it is possible that that was a physical manifestation of the trauma that you survived?

SPEAKER_03 21:37

A thousand percent, Nathan. A thousand percent. Because autoimmune diseases now I have Hashimoto's when I moved very again another time when I drug my heels, right? Another time. Jesus ended my job in Missouri. I don't know if it was Jesus that ended the job, but he definitely brought me back here. But in 2018, my job with the military ended because they changed their rules about license. Little did I know it was a gift from the Lord that he he ended my and I do say okay yeah he ended my time there because it was right before COVID and after COVID all the stuff came in about you can be a male you can be a female you can be whoever you decide you are and the military fully embraced that and this girl this girl would not have done well with that so the Lord took me out of working with the military at that time and Nathan I'm from Texas where it don't snow and when it does snow the town shuts down. Yeah there's no snow plows there's no nothing on the roads no salt I know right I know right the town shuts down so we lived here this was my husband's last he was in the Navy and this was my ex-husband's last duty station and um we came here early 2000s and I think we left here 2012 I never expected to come back here because I was not a snow girl um lots of stories about plowing the driveway and then the snow plows would come and block the driveway again and we'd have to I I think I had a Mini Cooper at some point in that house and I would rev that little dude up and jump that that little and jump that little heel my driveway was fairly long. So I'd rev that little dude up and jump that little heel of uh snow that the snow plows left but anyway I didn't want to move I didn't want to come back here but um because of the year that I got licensed I couldn't work anywhere else with my licensed marriage and family therapist um certification so long story short I got a job at a clinic um in Minnesota and it was a beautiful clinic it was decorated by interior decorators I mean it was it was amazing so I got a job here came back here loved my time there long story with all that that we don't need to talk about today but God brought me back here again dragging my heels and oh boy oh boy Nathan if I would have known what I know today I would not have been dragging my heels if I would have known the purpose that he had for me here and where my life is today I'd have been on the first plane coming back today right all the spiritual children being in private practice just all the victories that he's given me and all the pleasures that he's brought to my life and all the healing honestly and this is where I became a trauma therapist right and Nathan we wouldn't have met we would never have been battle buddies we would not have been battle buddies yep I wouldn't have any of my amazing beautiful spiritual children I wouldn't have had man just all the things he's done in my life since coming back to Minnesota all right so fast forward that's that was 2018 fast forward to my birthday June 8th 2026 which was just a few days ago I mean from the get-go of that day you guys first of all from the get-go one of my friends who didn't know it was my birthday she's fairly prophetic she left me a text and said I just really feel led to tell you that you're gonna get re refreshed today and re-fired today and I just thought oh God's so good and I texted her and I said thank you it's my birthday you know she wished me happy birthday and as I often do in the morning when I'm eating breakfast I put on um a message from an evangelist a pastor whoever whoever I feel led to and this day I started out with Ivana Tia and we are gonna work on if I don't forget Nathan linking that into the podcast notes so that you can go see it because you guys it was a powerful word very powerful she was talking about the Battle of Jericho in the book of Joshua and she talked about how to win the battle they had to go around I think it was around the city and they went around seven times before they got the vic their victory and I tell you you guys have heard me talk about how God's going to pour out his glory in these days and she said we're in this season where when you're in the seventh round of the battle you're never gonna have to march around that wall again because that seventh round is going to bring the walls down. And I was like whoa and I just got really struck in the spirit really encouraged and then she had a lot of decor declarations at the end so I re-listened to the I paused the sermon to write down all the declarations I sent the deck I sent the sermon and declarations out probably to I don't know four or five people because I love I'm a resource freak um I might overwhelm Nathan sometimes with my resources. I don't know like Nathan you gotta watch this Nathan you gotta see this and I do that with all my spiritual kids but okay so seven you guys seven has become my heavenly number when since my dad died so my dad died August 2025 on that day I was floating down a river in a city in Minnesota oh man it was the most was the most amazing time with a very dear sweet friend and the whole journey was a three hour float down the river the whole journey eagles were flying over us and Nathan at the very end of the journey there were seven eagles over us and I was just like wow I did math that day I did math that day guys I can count to seven so I was I was blown away seven eagles at the end of that day come home as you can imagine I was I mean I don't know being out in the sun all day I was tired came home showered got in bed ready for bed get a call from my brother my dad's having heart issues come to find out he had a heart attack and um took that journey and my dad's life ended that night and the Lord told me this was in August of 2025 and the Lord told me in January that I was going to lose him soon. So God graciously prepared me for that loss so I went to Texas um I don't know one or two days after he passed and I've always Nathan we talked about parts of self right especially like parts of self and getting triggered when I would go back to Texas. And the Lord taught me along the way the Lord taught me to always have intercessors when I'd go to Texas and turn I I started with six intercessors and when one of my now spiritual daughters found out that my dad died she was like I want to be part of the intercessory group so she made number seven of intercessors and you and I were barely barely starting to be friends. Yes barely when my dad died and you didn't even I don't even know I don't think I told you that he died I think I just had to cancel your appointment and say you know I'll be back probably in two weeks and you you so sweetly just sent me a text let me know if there's anything I can do to help. Yeah and that was so sweet. So seven intercessors seven eagles at the end of the float trip and I was there for seven days and seven is the number of like divine completion like it was the end of my dad's life and um I just am now thinking about this but yesterday I had a conversation with an artist from a painting that I'm purchasing and I told her a little bit of this story and she's like Sherry eight is new beginnings eight is new beginnings and she said your dad passing is allowing you to have a new begin a new beginning so that was that was interesting and a powerful conversation so lots of sevens that's why seven is a really special number for me um so okay back to the birthday day okay so battle of Jericho march around the wall seventh time is the final round next thing on my agenda the day of my birthday is I went to an I I'm an identity exchange coach Nathan you know that and I went to an identity exchange meeting it was a very intimate small group of of six people and they led a beautiful listening prayer based on Matthew 11 28 through 30 and that is the scripture God gave me when I was in the midst when he asked me to give up my LMFT license right um one of my spiritual daughters gave me that scripture very powerful. So I did a listening listening prayer around that and he spoke to me so Ivana Tia when I listened to her God started speaking to me about my battle with my weight um at the identity exchange the listening prayer God spoke to me about my weight he's like it's time you guys I'm sorry but sometimes he says this to me and you're gonna not like it that's okay I'm okay with that he says it's time to kick this issue in the ass is what he told me and I said okay here we go again and it's like nope not here we go again here's the last round the last round of this battle um and so that was at the um identity exchange meeting and then um I was talking to Kristen my daughter who's a life coach um about this struggle and she connected me with this amazing nutritionist that is also a nurse and Nathan for I don't know how long I don't know for how long you've been saying Sherry you eat like a bird.

SPEAKER_05 31:24

Yes right yes yeah and Nathan said Sherry it's got to be metabolic issues yeah I mean I I just and again look I'm not uh I'm no expert in really anything but to me you know I think about there's the calories that you take in through what you eat there's the calories that you expend through your metabolic activity whether that's just you know living your basal metabolic rate and then the activity you engage in during the day and so if if you're intaking very little and you're not losing weight despite the energy expenditure then to me it at least raises a question like hey what what else is going on here? Because the variables in that equation are not adding up to the sum.

SPEAKER_03 32:15

Right, right. So I had a fabulous conversation this is a spirit filled believer this nutritionist and nurse and had a fabulous convers conversation about me hiring her for the next six months um and she's gonna kickstart this health journey again the final round the seventh round right um and I have a lot of confidence I went from like not a lot of confidence because you guys I literally have done it all I've done weight watchers I've done um oh gosh long time ago oh I used to do overeaters anonymous and it was all about like alcoholics anonymous like I'm an alcoholic hi my name is Sherry and I'm an al no we said hi my name is Sherry and I'm a sugar addict oh so so of course I think I lost 60 pounds while I went to that program but guess what happened do you know did you gain it back when the program was over yeah I gained it back when the program was over and here's what I've learned over the years and I really really want you guys to hear me okay I really want you guys to hear me I believe this in my heart of hearts and maybe I'm wrong maybe I'm not but I believe it in my heart of hearts if you don't get to the root of the issue it's gonna come back every time so if we keep if we keep addressing the superficial symptoms and we don't address the root cause. Yep yep so superficial symptoms you wouldn't think the pounds are the superficial symptoms but you guys they are just like the alcoholism just like the battle with for alcoholics superficial symptoms right they might get overwhelmed they might have big emotions they don't know what to do with and so they're drinking because of whatever emotions or whatever pain they're experiencing but they're not going after the trauma right and Nathan I for 25 years of being a therapist I've carried shame because I teach people and talk to people about getting free and I've carried shame because I've carried the weight yeah right I've carried the weight and I have believed the biggest lie ever the biggest lie ever that I'm not lovable that I'm not lovable. Yep and many of my spiritual children you know have rebuked that lie so lovingly and so kind.

SPEAKER_05 34:40

But to some degree I still believe that and you we we we talked about this recently and I'd really like for you to share the why behind that. So you you told me that there's a disconnect. Yep where where's the disconnect?

SPEAKER_03 34:54

The disconnect is for sure between my head my heart.

SPEAKER_05 34:57

So your head thinks one thing maybe knows one thing and the heart feels another yeah I know that I'm lovable.

SPEAKER_03 35:06

I know my character my qualities my compassion my love I know that and my head but my heart doesn't believe it because lots and lots of evidence if you get years and years and years and years I've had people walk up to me in a restaurant like when being single I'll sometimes order a big meal because I know I'm gonna take half of it home to eat later right I almost always take leftovers. I very rarely unless like yesterday I'm really hungry I ate the whole burger but usually even when I get a burger I bring half the burger and half the fries home this time I ate all the burger um but I very rare I very rarely eat everything so I've had people strangers walk by and say you're not really gonna eat all that are you geez right yeah right and I've I had a man at church I these are the things these are the things that stick in the memory not the good things not the good things Nathan they don't stick but a guy I used to go to church with we were cleaning something up and he randomly said to me and I he was trying to be kind one of one like do tell well I already told about my dad right and him saying how much you're weighing lately right yeah and the alcoholism that was present in both of my marriages um and then here's another man like Sherry I don't understand how you're overweight you're always moving and going and doing now he meant that to be kind I have no doubt he was a nice guy but it was another another knife in my heart because what does that say to me do you know do you know what that comment says to me about how people see me what does it say to you it says Nathan's like I guess it's in this case he's like I'm gonna sit over here and I'm gonna be real quiet during this one it says to me that everybody sees me for my weight yeah that's what that said to me.

SPEAKER_05 37:20

And you you once sent something to me that I thought I had never heard it before and it went as soon as you as soon as I read it I was like oh my gosh not only have I like I immediately thought of times when I had done it but I had also it also brought to mind times when I've witnessed other people do it. And what you sent to me was a quote and I'm not sure the attribution and the quote was wounded people they don't listen with their ears. Oh yeah Nathan they listen with their triggers. Yep and so even if we say something that we mean in the best way a wounded person might hear that in a very different way.

SPEAKER_03 38:04

That's not not your fault not their fault not about fault but just to yeah and Nathan a good example of that is my dad right my dad I really don't think you guys even though I feel like you know the wounded part of me feels like that was all on purpose and he was a jerk and he was this and he was that the therapist part of me knows that he did not mean harm but man he caused a lot of harm.

SPEAKER_05 38:30

Yeah and he didn't mean he didn't mean to cause that pain.

SPEAKER_03 38:33

Nope he did not mean to cause the pain and you guys I think I shared this already maybe in the last episode but shortly like a day or two after he died I got the strongest sense two days in a row that he was in the he was in heaven with Jesus and he was so repentant because he was able to see clearly right when everything's removed we can see clearly and he was able to see clearly the damage he caused yeah and I wished I would have written down the song but I got this the strong sense he was so repentant and he was so sad and then Nathan we danced we danced oh gosh I I I wished I could remember the name of the song it was like a 70s song really good song and we danced two days in a row together because he loved music and he I think he he taught me he taught me he taught me a lot of good things you know he taught me a lot of good things somewhere between January and August when he died the Lord woke me up in the middle of the night and gave me his eulogy pages and pages you guys it just poured out of me I spent most of my life hating him for the harm that he caused and in this eulogy that I I wrote that that I spent most of my life hating him and you guys have heard us laugh and joke but it's not a joke I hated men I kind of wonder why two marriages didn't work huh um they both had their stuff right yeah of course but I brought that stuff and they added especially the second one added to why I hated men because I didn't feel safe I I I go ahead just at an elemental level that's what you're learning men equal not safe.

SPEAKER_05 40:52

Yep yep yeah yeah so yeah we don't like things that make us feel like we're in danger.

SPEAKER_03 40:59

Yeah okay so the Lord woke me up in the middle of the night with his eulogy and it's so so beautiful I I didn't think I oh I kind of feel like I should read it but I don't know if I can pull it up quick enough but we can we can pause this okay we don't we don't have to literally pause okay let me see let me see how quickly I can pull it up a race take your time okay thank you you guys Nathan is expert at um gosh just telling me all the time if if we're trying to plan a time to talk and a time for conversations all the time he says take your time Sherry we're we're on island time is what he tells me um yeah constantly tells me to not be in a hurry and that kind of stuff now pages is trying to show me something on my phone let's see if I can get it to stop that.

SPEAKER_05 42:00

One of the things that I think is so valuable about this and at least now I'm on the outside but but listening what I hear is I hear a an interference and a twisting up between weight and worth oh Nathan you nailed it weight and worth they definitely went together for me very very much I think there's a lot of people I don't think I'm the only one either.

SPEAKER_03 42:29

I know I've got good friends that have struggled with weight and their their spouses you know have abused them with words uh I know I'm not the only one I know that I know that I know I'm not the only one you guys oh I'm gonna read the eulogy and then I'm gonna say a few more things um okay the eulogy's a little it's a little long you think it's okay it's it is okay it's gonna be a great thing okay so this podcast might be a little longer you guys so hang on but man the words the Lord gave me this was all the Lord it was all the Lord just like a beautiful sparkling multifaceted diamond there were 360 facets of my dad it was recently spoken over me that I too am like a sparkling multifaceted diamond the Lord has recently been showing me the positive ways that I'm like my father remember I spent years hating him and not wanting to be like him this has been a miraculous gift to me because for much of my life I didn't want to be anything like my dad. However today and over the years God has brought forth a lot of redemption in my life and in the life of my father. My dad, myself and my family grew up in a family with generations of mental health issues, alcoholism, physical violence and emotional abuse. My dad's childhood was incredibly difficult one that I cannot imagine. Well I sort of can My dad learned how to be tough from a young age. He also learned how to fight for his life in truly creative ways. My dad's response against the unseen and unspoken enemy of severe and chronic childhood trauma are the ways that I did not want to be like him. Trust me, both consciously and unconsciously. I tried hard not to be like him in that way as I was raising my own children, but I wasn't completely successful. I repeated the generational trauma patterns in a different but yet harmful way. One of the ways that I'm like my dad is that I am incredibly resilient and I have a strong ability to persevere through hard things. I've never met someone as tough as my dad. More than once he was told that he would be in prison by the time he was 21 years old. Words matter. Another reason another reason, Nathan, that I'm so um that I that words are so important to me. Those words of death spoken over my father had a different impact than what was intended. Instead of destroying my dad, these words literally propelled him forward in his life. From a young age, my dad had an entrepreneurial spirit and drive. He was the hardest working man that I've ever known. If you knew him well, you knew that he was very creative in the ways that he made money. Even up to the end of his 82 years of life, he was making deals and starting businesses. Marsha and I joked that he would probably buy his roommate at the rehabilitation center a car and start a business with him. We're not kidding. I think she probably had to, she probably had to keep a close eye on him. Um so he wouldn't do that, right? Um, I don't remember a lot of my childhood, but I do remember that my dad was a strong provider because he was incredibly determined to break the curses that were spoken over him at a young age and break those curses he did. I vaguely remember the first house I lived in with my family on Keystone Street. Okay, guys, how are no that the names of my house, that the names of the streets that my houses were on, but I don't remember any of any of my childhood, except for bits and pieces. I remember this house being a very small home when I was approximately in the first grade. We upgraded. We upgraded to a home on West 26th Street. I vividly remember that house on the west side of town for many reasons. After that, gotta put in a little humor. After that, just like the Jeffersons, we were moving on up to the east side. You like that? Yeah, you know your mama can't go along without laughing. After that, lost my place now. We were moving on up to the east side, just like the Jeffersons, to Blossom Lane, where each of us had our own bedroom and we even had a game room out back. Some very important things were missing in my childhood, but financial provision was never one of them. And you guys, we know money, we have to have money to live, right? And my dad was that's how he knew, that's how he knew how to love people and and and take care of people. And he ended up, you know, being moderately wealthy at the in the later years of his life. Um, my dad's unbelievable, unbelievable ability to provide for us and his strong desire to work hard propelled his life, no, my life, in a positive direction. Throughout my life, due to my dad's generosity and my own drive to work hard, I've never had to go without anything. And that has been an incredible gift. Nathan, the house that we sit in right now, recording the podcast, my dad helped me get this house because you know, I left a 28-year marriage without a whole lot of money, and I needed help getting this house, and my dad did not hesitate. And when I opened my practice in 20, I was in private practice as a therapist for five years again, not doing the math. But my dad's like, How much money do you need? And I'm like, Dad, I really don't think I need any money. You guys, it just was opening up an LLC, getting an office, and didn't I had to buy a couch and a chair and anything? The couch and the chair was the couch and the chair were purchased by my dad. But I didn't really need any money. And he's like, name your price, name your price. How much do you need? And I'm like, okay, well, if you're gonna insist, you know, so I named my price, and that money, it was just like a gift for me because I didn't really need it. So when I wrote this, I was still a therapist. Like my dad, I now have a thriving business that I love. God created me to be a joyful extirpator, which means that as a trauma therapist, I get the absolute privilege, Nathan, to sit with people like Nathan and go after the destructive roots and lies that the enemy has planted in their life. And I partner with God to help set them free. And you guys, I'm partnering with God to help set myself completely free. One of my life verses for my work back then and still is John 10 10. The thief comes to steal, kill, and destroy. But I have come that they may have life and have it to the full. Romans 8 28 has also been a theme in my life, and it says, and we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and who are called according to his purposes for them. God has greatly used my traumatic childhood experiences to raise me up to become who I was created to be. Now, guys, at the time, I thought I was just created, no just in it, but I thought I was created, I thought I was gonna be a trauma therapist all my life. Don't think you know the Lord's plans because you cannot know the Lord's plans. Nathan was nowhere in, I say all the time to him. Back in 2007, I got prophetic words of what I was gonna do, and Nathan was not mentioned in those words. So when Nathan came around, I was like, dude, it's like, dude, you're not you're not on my blueprint. You're not on my blueprint. But guess what? God created my blueprint, and God created his blueprint, just like you've heard the story of Nathan think not knowing that he was gonna have. Nathan did not know he was gonna have a female battle buddy and a mama, a mama battle buddy. He thought, he thought, who? Who was gonna be your battle buddy?

SPEAKER_04 51:04

I thought it was gonna be Arnold, man.

SPEAKER_03 51:05

Yeah, tell me about Arnold.

SPEAKER_04 51:06

You know, I think get to the job.

SPEAKER_05 51:09

No, why?

SPEAKER_03 51:12

Over the that's who he thought he was getting for a battle buddy, but he got mm wa. Okay. Many years ago, oh, God is so good at how this is all fitting in together. Many years ago when I brought my niece to live with us in Minnesota. I vividly remember sitting in the guest room of my dad's house on Tanglewood. Oh, when God gave me Joel 225. And the paraphrase of this verse is that he will restore what the look what has been stolen from us. You guys, at this time, I thought I was living, and I was, I was living that out. I said he's in the process of doing that in my life and in the lives of many of you. He is such a faithful, good, and merciful God. Little did I know what was coming. Little did I know what was coming. Nathan, as you've heard, has been a big part of that restoration process. And um I'll circle back in a minute to what happened this morning that just solidified everything the Lord has been talking to me about. But let me let me finish the eulogy. Another way that I'm like my dad is that I'm generous. I have never known someone as generous as my dad. Again, if you know my dad, you would know that he's sometimes too generous, but generous nonetheless. He would sometimes go into business with drug addicts and all kinds of people that didn't follow through with things. Um Nathan, Nathan can attest. I'm also funny and filled with joy, like my dad. He loved to have a good time. There's a picture of him dancing on the stage at some event we went to. Looks like, you know, I would do that. I would jump up on a stage with somebody, no doubt. Um, oftentimes he was a party waiting to happen, and people have said the very same thing to me. I didn't get to know this side of my dad until after my parents divorced when I was 11 or 12 years old. After they divorced, he bought a motorhome and took us on a lot of trips. Yes, even as young kids, he took us to his beloved city of Las Vegas. If you knew my dad, you know that he loved Las Vegas. Before God brought him home, he got in one last trip to his beloved city of Vegas with people that he loved. While I was working through generational trauma, I put physical and emotional distance between myself and my dad at a boatload of anger and all of the emotions that go with it to work to work through. Thankfully, on my last trip to Texas in January, I was able to thank my dad for never giving up on our relationship. We surfed some really big waves over the years, but praise God, we landed on the same shore. My life versus Ephesians 3.20. For God is able to do exceedingly abundantly above, more than we could ever expect or imagine. God has made this verse come alive throughout my life. I can assure you that it had it not been for the miraculous day at the age of 26 in a small church in South Carolina when I finally surrendered. I can't see through my tears. Hold on. I wish you guys could have seen Nathan tiptoe into the living room. Tiptoe into the living room to get the tissue box.

SPEAKER_00 54:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 54:43

Like the little junior therapist that he is. He put the tissues right beside me. And you know how sometimes when you pull one out, the other one doesn't come up. He went over and he pulled the other one up, and he's like, we gotta be prepared, Sheriff. So I'm appreciating his population right now.

SPEAKER_04 55:05

Yeah, you can hear the appreciation, right?

SPEAKER_03 55:10

However, this time he's not making me cry, I'm making my own self cry.

SPEAKER_04 55:20

Oh yeah, not making her cry this time.

SPEAKER_00 55:28

Kind of like, kind of like I make my own self laugh.

SPEAKER_04 55:35

You guys, okay, I gotta tell you this. I gotta tell you this, because you don't know this and you wouldn't have no way of knowing this.

SPEAKER_05 55:43

I'm not joking. This is the honest to God truth. Sherry will send me an audio message, or sometimes she'll listen to the podcast. And I kid you not, she will be listening to herself laugh, and then she will start laughing, listening to herself laugh. And for me, it is absolutely one of the purest pleasures in life to watch her crack up, listening to herself crack up. So that sometimes she does make her own self laugh.

SPEAKER_03 56:23

This maybe this is maybe one of the first times I've made myself cry. Oh crap, because you know I don't like to cry, but you know, it's good stuff to cry to Nathan, right?

SPEAKER_05 56:37

Crying's okay, it's good. Yeah, for other people for other people.

SPEAKER_03 56:43

Okay. I know. I know.

SPEAKER_05 56:55

Okay, she pulled she pulled that one out because that's what I do. She will she will very gently ask me a question that she already knows the answer to. And she already knows that I know the answer to it. And she'll go, you know, do you do practicing curiosity? There was an eye roll there, people.

SPEAKER_03 57:18

She'll go, do you almost also just knock him almost off and she did?

SPEAKER_04 57:23

It was pretty funny. But she pulled me back. That's the key thing. Although it would have been funny if I fell. That would have been really funny.

SPEAKER_03 57:32

But he's not gonna let you fall. Go ahead.

SPEAKER_05 57:35

Well, she'll go, do you Do you do you think that maybe you need to forgive him too?

SPEAKER_00 57:42

I know it.

SPEAKER_04 57:45

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 57:48

That is the best response. And then in the gentle moment, I'm trying not to roar. But man, when he says that, I'm like, oh, don't laugh, don't laugh, don't laugh, don't laugh. He's in a painful moment. Don't laugh, don't laugh.

SPEAKER_00 58:02

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 58:04

Okay, here we go. As a trauma therapist, I can attest that none of us go through life experiencing some form of trauma. Don't wait a minute longer to find your full healing from the one who died on a cross so that you can be healed and set free. In closing, I want to say that I'm incredibly grateful for all of you that have come to celebrate my dad's life with us. I know that there are many of you here that have walked with my dad throughout many years of his life. Just like he was a steadfast father. He was also a steadfast friend and brother. I know that many of you have some wild and amazing memories with him, and most likely some stories that you do not dare tell. In my dad's mid to later years, he was also a steadfast husband. And his wife, Marsha, has been a steadfast wife. She's endured much good and some bad throughout their time together. I'm thankful that Jovember finally happened for them. My dad, for years, you guys, I think they lived together. Probably 15 or 20 years, and he would always say, We'll get married in Jovember. And we used to ask, is Jovember coming? And I will also never forget this. We were stationed in Italy, and I think I um where's the city where they have the canals and the gondolas? Yep, I was in Venice, and I get a call from my ex-husband. He's like, You're not gonna believe this. Your dad just got married. And I was like, What? Could not believe it. I was in shock. But yeah, they were together. He got together with Marcia when my daughter was born. And uh yeah, they were together over a little over 40 years. Um, I want to thank her from the bottom of my heart for her ability to persevere through life and for the care and love that she has given to my dad, especially for the intensive care she provided during the last years of his life. One of my favorite phrases that I've heard her say throughout my life is calm down, tiger. In fact, I've heard that phrase several times in the past week as we were all getting together trying to plan my dad's services and choosing pictures and that kind of stuff. Things could get a little, we could get a little riled up sitting in the living room. In fact, nope, I already said that. If you know my family, then you know that we have all had a need to calm down. There's no doubt in my mind that dad was like a tiger when they first met, and she definitely helped to calm him down. And then I just said thank you for giving me time to share from my heart, and again, thank you for coming to celebrate my dad's wild, redemptive, and joyful life with us. So, Nathan, there's a there's like he was he was he was a lot of fun in his later years, and he did bring joy to me. And man, the journey of healing has been so complex because he was generous, he was kind. I never went without. I never went without things. Yeah, I've got all the things you you you mmm she just made a face and then pointed to the bedroom where there's all the jewelry, all the shoes, all the clothes, all the purses, things. I've I've I've accumulated a lot of things. Things things are things. Things do not they bring you joy, but very in very limited ways do they bring you joy. Don't get me wrong, I still like my bling. Pointing at my very sparkly shirt I'm wearing. I still like my bling, but that Jesus, you are so good. Isn't he good, Nathan?

SPEAKER_00 1:01:49

Very good.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:50

That is not my source of joy, you guys. It is not my source of joy. All right, to bring this full circle over the years, Jesus has talked to me about food being a false comforter. Yep. Food's a false comforter. What else is a false comforter? Oh my little firefighter.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:14

Women.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:15

Yep, women, false comforters.

SPEAKER_05 1:02:17

Can absolutely be false comforters. Rescuing can be a false comforter. Yeah. Yep, taking control can be a false comforter.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:26

Oh good, Nathan. Good. Um being a perfectionist.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:31

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:32

Yeah. Um, we do so many things. We do so many things, man, to comfort ourselves. Okay, full full circle moment.

SPEAKER_05 1:02:44

Good job, breathing.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:45

Thank you. And I hurt my little thumb.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:59

Oh boy. Okay, yep.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:02

Full circ, full, full circle. Okay. I was preparing for um recently preparing for this podcast, and I got a text from my other spiritual son who lives out of state. Oh, you guys. Um can't make it up. You cannot make it up. Okay. Right before I got a text from him, I was listening to a sermon from Tim Sheets in Ohio, and they were talking about. Okay, you you guys know Nathan is my Isaac, and they were talking about Abraham, Sarah, and Isaac, and Isaac was fully grown in this example, and I think it's still in the book of Genesis, where there were all these wells, and these wells uh got stopped up in different ways, and they could they stopped producing. I kid you not, and I'm gonna put some context around this, but I kid you not, they said it was Isaac's job to unblock the wells. That what's the what's the word they use though?

SPEAKER_05 1:04:03

Not unblock, but I I don't remember exactly, but it was something like remove the obstructions.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:07

The obstructions, remove the obstructions of the well. You guys, we had. I always say they're these conversations he and I have, I with with with they're never hard for him because he's never been the chair, but me being the chair, it makes it really, really hard for me. But okay, he is a pilot, as most of you know. And um we've we he he he hasn't taken me flying yet, but he's gonna take me for a flight soon. And two two people have said, Sherry, will you will you go with me if he takes me? And another person is like, Well, when he takes you, can I come? And he looks at me very lovingly and he said, Yes, but Sherry, what do you say to me?

SPEAKER_05 1:04:51

I say we've got to do a weight and balance. And that's for me, it's just a rule that I've always had where in the aircraft that I fly, I know I know that I can absolutely fly two adults, no problem. It's not gonna make any difference. So I don't even ask if it's just two adults. Yeah. But if it's three adults, what I've learned is then we're possibly getting to a point where I need to be mindful about what that overall weight is to make sure that we're in the weight and balance limits of the aircraft. And you know, for me, it's truly just like a very it's a very technical uh computation thing. It there's there's literally no uh no no judgment there.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:27

Right. There's no judgment because you guys, commercial planes have to do that too. They ask people if there's not enough, if the plane's not full, they will shift you around to balance the weight. I don't know how they figure that out. Nathan probably does. But he so this has come up multiple times, and he he just looks at me kindly and he's like, Sherry, I'd have to know your weight to in order if somebody else joins us. And I was like, Nope, nope, never ever, nope, nope, nope. And so, okay, my birthday, June 8th, the Lord's been talking to me ever since then about. This is the time, this is the season, you're gonna get free. So part of the freedom is it was funny, not funny, but part of the freedom yesterday was um me sharing with Nathan that I felt the Lord leading me to do this podcast with you guys. Because I do know this is gonna set other people free. And I don't know if you can see it right now, but it's setting me free just to it's setting me more free just to talk about it. So I just wanted to talk to him in advance to let him know that I felt like I was supposed to talk to this, talk about this today on the podcast, because we if he feels led to do something, we discuss it and then we do it. And if I feel led, we discuss it and we do it. Um, very amenable in that way. And I I just felt led that he needed to know the number. And so, and I was like, Nathan, I feel like you need to know the number of the scale. And he's like, Well, do you do you want to text it to me? And I was like, No, I don't want any record of it. And then I just said, I'm gonna say the number. I'm gonna just we're just gonna hang up. I envisioned lots of eye rolls. Um, but you guys, when I say I wouldn't want anybody else to be my battle buddy other than him, and I wouldn't, he's looking at me right now like make me cram and I he's looking at me very compassionately. Um, and so I shared the number with him, and I'm gonna share the number with you because I want to set you free. I want to set you, the listener, free. Um, because it I think it can bring freedom in a multitude of ways. I think it will normalize whatever your number is. It's gonna, it's gonna let you know that your situations are never hopeless because the Lord wants you to go around six times and free you on the seventh as well. We are in this season where that is gonna happen. And um, okay, so now and I just want to say that when it comes to people being able to sort of free themselves from those shackles, yeah.

SPEAKER_05 1:08:09

What I just want to say is it may not be a number. Maybe it is a number, and maybe the number is weight, but maybe it's not weight, and maybe it's not a number, maybe it's an event, maybe it's a thing, maybe it's a time, maybe it's a word.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:24

That's really good, Nathan. Yeah, maybe it's alcohol, maybe it's drugs, maybe it's a lot of things. Right, maybe it's the number of drinks you've had this week.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:33

There you go.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:33

Maybe it's the number of joints you've smoked this week. People do a lot of things to comfort themselves. I got the shoes to prove it, I got the purses to prove it, I got the jewelry to prove it, all the things. I've done a lot of things to comfort myself.

SPEAKER_05 1:08:48

There's a lot of different ways to self-medicate.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:50

Yeah, for sure, for sure. Even healthy ways to self-medicate.

SPEAKER_05 1:08:54

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:55

Overworking out.

SPEAKER_05 1:08:56

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:57

Over over-dieting, overly restricting your food.

SPEAKER_05 1:09:01

That's a that's a great one because then you you're kind of folding in the societal lens because some of those things that you mentioned are less societally acceptable. Yep. And some are viewed as being more societally acceptable. That's right.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:15

That's right. And guess what is really not societally acceptable?

SPEAKER_05 1:09:20

Tell me.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:21

Being overweight. Being overweight, being overweight. And whether you're a stranger that I pass and you look at me a certain way, whether you're thinking this or not, I'm making up the story about what you're saying. And the story is not a kind one, right? And maybe, I don't know, maybe eight times out of ten it's not true. I I don't know the statistics with that. Um, I've asked a lot of friends, you know, if they if they see me, of course they see me because they got eyes. One friend said, We've got eyes, you know. We see that you're overweight, but they they they say that they they don't that doesn't limit their love for me, or that doesn't limit all the things, yeah, right?

SPEAKER_00 1:10:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:02

And maybe it doesn't limit people's love for me, but it's limited my love for me, right? And the Lord, the Lord is calling us to great and amazing things, and to do the great and amazing things. First of all, I just want to glorify him with my body, and I feel like I I can't necessarily glorify him with my body right now because of the amount of excess weight that I have, but he also is calling me to things where I'm gonna need stamina, I'm gonna need energy, right? All the things. Well, you guys, maybe one day we'll talk about all the things he's calling me to do, um, which is amazing. I don't, again, I stopped. I'm gonna I stopped guessing how it's all gonna play out because I he blows my freaking mind all the time. And I was starting to say my other son, um um, I was praying over him and with him this morning, and and he prophesied over me, and I was like, wait, what, wait, what did you say? Um, he said more stuff that I had no clue about. And you guys, you guys, it's all from the yeses. It's all from the yeses, Nathan. Did you know that? From the moment, age 26, I gave him the first very reluctant yes. I cannot even tell you what he's doing with all the yeses. Then I gave him the yes of giving up the license, and then I gave him the yes to have a Nithana's about money. You guys, if you're a therapist, you can, you know, you know. And if you're a therapist, you're like, oh my god, you should be in so much trouble for breaking all the rules. Well, guess what? I don't know. I'm not gonna tell, yeah, I don't know. You get to have that opinion, but I've never been happier after breaking all the rules, right? I've though I have an awesome battle buddy, I have an awesome two spiritual sons, however many spiritual daughters. Again, don't do the math. Um, but lots of love, lots of love going on. Okay, so I'm learning how to more deeply love myself. I'm learning how to practice what I preach. And here's the number because I want you guys as accountability, because this is going to come up in future podcasts as to how I'm doing. I'm just barely starting this journey, this time in my life. I've got to reconnect with a nutritionist, and she's a nurse, I told you. She really gets all the numbers and she orders blood tests and all the things. So for many, many years, many years, I didn't move from 250 pounds. I was 250 for many years. I've lost, I've lost 50 pounds. Can't even tell you how many times, time and time again. When I got divorced in 2016, I was, man, I was on the press precipice of the ones, you guys. I was at I was at like 205.

unknown 1:12:47

Wow.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:48

Yeah. But Nathan?

SPEAKER_05 1:12:50

But let that let's also not like minimize that.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:53

50 pounds is a the I I know, but Nathan, guess how I got there? I got there by some magical drops that were $60 a bottle. That who knows what that did to my body to make my body lose weight. And I'm so glad this came up. I'm not a doctor. Don't play one on TV. And I have friends that are on the GLP one. I've had at least one doctor that passionately wanted me to get on it. You guys, another doctor that I went to see. He offered me a GLP one, or he offered me other drugs, and he straight up said they're speed. Or he he offered me the GLP one, some drug that was speed, and another drug. And he was going back and forth about the negative, the negative um side effects on each one. And I was sitting there going, you're literally offering me speed. No, no, so I can't remember, Nathan, if I said this. If you, yeah, I did say it. If you don't address the underlying issues, it's not gonna work. It is not gonna work. And I have spent years, I'm not I've not arrived in addressing all the issues, but I've spent years addressing the underlying issues. And I just know that you have to choose to move your body and you have to choose what you put on your plate. I'm not gonna say you have to choose good food, I'm gonna say you have to choose healthy food.

SPEAKER_05 1:14:30

And nutritious food.

SPEAKER_03 1:14:31

And nutritious food. Because food is not good or bad, right? Because you know, do you know what happens if you call food good or bad?

SPEAKER_05 1:14:38

Tell me.

SPEAKER_03 1:14:39

Then you're bad. Oh, if you eat bad food, if I eat bread with freaking cinnamon honey butter that someone taught me how to make, and I think of that as bad, then I'm bad, right? So I try not to call food good or bad. I try to call food, I don't usually say nutritious, but I'll I'll try to pick up that word, Nathan. Um, but but yeah, I call food good or bad. Like, oh, I got out of the grocery store and I didn't buy any bad food, right? Um, yeah, that's a setup for failure, you guys. That's a setup for failure. Um, so I was at 250 back and forth for a long time. Not too long ago, there was this really cool plan that I followed. I lost 18 pounds, I think 15 to 18 pounds, six weeks. I lost 15 to 18 pounds and 17 inches. The inches just fell off of me. They fell off of me. Now that wasn't as unhealthy of a plan, but it wasn't something I could sustain. Um, and guess what? I got down to I don't remember. I I lost, I don't remember the numbers, but I got down to quite a ways. But guess what? After I stopped the plan, came back plus some, right? Then I was put on um oh progesterone, trying to help me sleep. Guess what? Bada bing, bada boom, 10 more pounds from that freaking drug. So as soon as I realized that, I stopped taking that. And then somewhere in between, lost my mom in 2020, in 2020, and dad in 2025. Somewhere in between those losses, about 20 or 30 pounds came on. So that leaves me at the number of 280. Look, no tears. Look, um, so 280. Never in my freaking fracking life did I think I would be at that number on the scale, but here I am. Here I am. And many of you are saying, Well, look, Sherry, listen to your story, right? My really good friend that's probably a size zero, said to me, because I've talked to her about how I'm judgmental towards myself, and if you're overweight, I'm judgmental towards you, right? I share that judgment, which is not good. But she said to me, Sherry, when I see people who are overweight, I think of trauma. And that has really stuck in my mind. You guys, there's so much trauma on the earth today, lots and lots of trauma. So I'm gonna invite you to do what I'm gonna invite myself to do is I'm gonna invite you to be compassionate towards yourself, like we talked about earlier, and I'm gonna invite you to be compassionate towards other people. Everybody has a story, and no one that I know is choosing to be 280 pounds. Did I choose it by by eating some food? Yeah, maybe, but as we talked about earlier, it's also very metabolically base for me. Now, guess how that metabolic problem shop probably showed up? Because French fries, french fries at the age of 15, um, became one of my favorite foods, my favorite comforting foods. Um, so did I consciously choose to um love carbohydrates? Nope, not not consciously. And I think there's something with women um and some men for sure, that they love carbohydrates. They they are carbs are just comfort foods, right?

SPEAKER_05 1:18:09

And it can it can help decrease cortisol. And so if you're feeling there you go, yeah, if you're feeling stressed and your cortisol levels are high, and then you have something that lowers the cortisol, self-medication.

SPEAKER_03 1:18:22

See, Nathan, I didn't know that. I didn't know that. So that explains a lot too, right? So not only eating for comfort, um, but there's that the scientific things that happen in your body when you do that with carbs. So that's my story, that's my journey.

SPEAKER_05 1:18:40

And I think one of the reasons that Sherry felt led to do this is that we want to invite you to have a curious, gentle, for sure, loving conversation with yourself. Yeah, and just ask yourself what is the thing or what are the things that are holding me back from fully loving myself.

SPEAKER_03 1:19:03

So good, so good. And the message that I heard this morning was not an accident, you guys, when it talked about Isaac unblocking the well, and Nathan has said to me, Sherry, when you shed those excess pounds, and it's not about how I look, it's about the extra weight as in burdens that the that the weight represents. About it's about the extra burden that it represents. And he's just said, Sherry, you're gonna be more of of who you truly are when you lose the weight. And he said, You're gonna be able to feel more safe, you're gonna be able to love better because right now I still have an anxious, an anxious love, right? Like, I'm like, really? Are you sure that's how you feel? Like, are you sure I'm not a burden? Are you sure all the things? Right? Because so many times, and some of my spiritual children are like, I'm a burden, I can't ask for this, I can't ask for that. And I'm like, oh, I so feel that, and I so understand that. I don't want to be an anxious spiritual mother. I was an anxious, and that's part of the reason my kids and I have struggled in our relationship. It's part of the reason, I think it's a big part of the reason one of my youngest daughters left the family, or my youngest daughter left the family. So I'm sharing this story to encourage you to normalize your struggles and your journey, and I'm all I'm also sharing to ask for prayer. I I would love your prayer support along the way. Even if you don't know me, I would love your prayer support along the way. And invite you in whatever area of life you're in where you feel stuck, like Nathan said, if it's drugs or alcohol or shopping, working out too much, overeating, too healthy. What's the term? Do you know the term for like working out, like being too hyper-focused on what you're eating and overworking out too much? There's a term for it.

SPEAKER_05 1:20:58

I I know what you're talking about. The term does not come to my mind.

SPEAKER_03 1:21:01

Okay, mine either. That's okay. But there we can struggle, we can even struggle on the good side of things. We can we can do too much of a good thing. You you guys have heard me say on a scale of zero to 10, if you overcorrect your life at a 10, that is unhealthy. We don't want to overcorrect, and I've tried for 20 plus years, more than 20, so whatever the age, I started gaining weight when I quit smoking at 28, and it steadily increased over the years. With divorce, with a child leaving the family, with transitions, with um having I came back to Minnesota and I had to live in a friend's basement. Man, a lot of shame with that when I was 54 years old, living in someone's basement. Nothing is too hard for your heavenly father, you guys. Nothing is too hard for your heavenly father. He has your back, or as Nathan likes to say, he has your sixth.

SPEAKER_00 1:21:55

Right.

SPEAKER_03 1:21:55

Right? Um, and he sends battle buddies. He has sent me battle buddies all of my life. And Nathan, Nathan is definitely my battle buddy, but Karen is my I tell I tell Karen and Nathan like I ping and pong off of them because they're both seriously my battle buddies. And praise God for battle buddies that do people that do life with you. And I tell Nathan all the time, man, I love doing life with you. We talk throughout the day, and I'm like, Nathan, where have you seen God today? He's like, Sherry, oh my god, I just saw this, and this just happened. Oh my god. And then I'm like, Nathan, oh my god, this just happened to me. Yeah, right? Because he's showing up and showing off in really, really big ways these days.

SPEAKER_05 1:22:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:22:35

Okay.

SPEAKER_05 1:22:36

Well, Sherry.

SPEAKER_03 1:22:37

Well, Nathan.

SPEAKER_05 1:22:38

Is this a good place for us to wrap up?

SPEAKER_03 1:22:40

This is a good place for us to wrap up.

SPEAKER_05 1:22:42

Okay, let's close with gratitude, and I'm gonna go first.

SPEAKER_00 1:22:44

Okay.

SPEAKER_05 1:22:45

I am grateful to you. Oh I'm gonna do it. Yep, yep. I'm grateful to you.

SPEAKER_03 1:22:54

I might push you off the stool with you.

SPEAKER_05 1:22:55

That's fine. That's fine. I'll get back up. Fall down seven times, get up eight.

SPEAKER_03 1:23:00

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_05 1:23:01

I'm grateful to you for modeling courage, for modeling vulnerability.

SPEAKER_00 1:23:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_05 1:23:09

And really what both of those come down to is love. Love is what love is what drives us to be vulnerable and to be courageous. And courage isn't something we feel, it's something that we do. We do something when we're afraid.

SPEAKER_03 1:23:27

Kind of like feel feel the fear and do it anyway.

SPEAKER_05 1:23:30

And do it anyway.

SPEAKER_03 1:23:30

Like I did yesterday with that crazy phone call with you.

SPEAKER_05 1:23:33

Yeah, absolutely. And fear is contagious. So too is courage. And we have to choose what we want to spread. You've chosen what you want to spread today, and I'm grateful that you chose you chose to pour out from your heart, and you chose to pour out love and vulnerability and courage. Thank you. Thank you.

SPEAKER_03 1:23:52

You're welcome. You're welcome. And you guys, it's not it's not easy. It's not easy to choose, it's not easy to make that choice. But I choose it. You know why I choose it, Nathan?

SPEAKER_05 1:24:04

Why do you choose it?

SPEAKER_03 1:24:05

Because it heals other people.

SPEAKER_05 1:24:07

It does.

SPEAKER_03 1:24:08

It helps other people all along your journey.

SPEAKER_05 1:24:12

And it it it lessens their burden all of a sudden, they because you you have this tendency to think it's just me, and there's something wrong with me, and I'm bad because of this, and then all of a sudden you hear it from someone else, and you're like, Yeah, yeah. You you do you too? Yeah, you I mean, but you sound so and you and you look so and you you seem so. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:24:33

Exactly, exactly. Yep, yep. Yeah, so that's why I do it because when you're vulnerable, it gives other people permission to be vulnerable. And along your way in your healing journey, I've been vulnerable with you the whole time. When you would say something, I would say, me too.

SPEAKER_00 1:24:50

Yeah, right?

SPEAKER_03 1:24:51

Yeah, you would say something else, and I would say, hmm, I know that well, right? So that helps people heal. And so thanks for thanks for all the words. You guys, he has all the words, he has all the words. I I couldn't have asked for a better battle buddy, a better Nathan, or a better Isaac. And who but God? Who but God? I tell you guys to look out for the Lord and where where he's at, and he's in people. He's he's he's and I see I see God's hand and bringing Nathan and I together. I totally see God's hand in it for such a time as this, right? I have to say Esther 414 for such a time as this. All right, well, sort of similar but different. I am extremely grateful for my spiritual children, which you are one of. Um I wouldn't want to do life with anybody else than my spiritual children. Yes, my my natural children too, but my my natural children, one is not in the family and one lives far away. Um and yeah, there's nobody else that I would rather do life with. And I was talking to one of my daughters about this podcast about I think I talked to her, oh, oh, because she's one that um wanted um to maybe meet have me fly in the plane with her, yeah with you, right? So I had to kind of have this conversation with her because at the time it was like I um yeah, I don't want to tell him. I don't want him to know how much I weigh so much shame around that number. And she just said, Sherry, I would love you if you were 500 pounds. And she actually said, Sherry, I like that you're a little heavy because when I hug you, it's really comforting.

SPEAKER_02 1:26:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:26:44

And it was just so sweet. So I'm so thankful. All of my spiritual children, I call them children, they are children to me, but you know, they're in their 40s, they're in their 20s, they're they're not children. Um, but I'm super thankful for them because each one of them, no matter where they're at in their faith, even if they're barely, barely in their faith or if they're not in their faith yet, I love each of them. I love them, oh, for so many different reasons because they're all different people and they were all created so differently because none of us are created like the other. But no matter where they're in their faith, where they're at in their faith, where they're at in their life, whatever their age, I've got, I think my youngest is 21, and my oldest, my oldest is my boy, who lives. When we first met, he's like, You're not old enough to be my mom. I think I'm older than you. And I said, That doesn't matter. Um, I think I'm a barely a year older than him. So yeah, you guys, when it's when you're a spiritual mama, the age, the age is not a it doesn't matter. Um so I'm very, very, very grateful for my spiritual children. And um of my spiritual children, one in particular, even though they're very like rail thin, they've experienced abuse around weight too. It's crazy. Some of the industries and stuff that you know that overemphasize weight. I'm not gonna start that conversation because that's a whole just kind of a whole other topic. Not another topic, but yeah. So I'm grateful for you guys, Nathan. Really, really grateful for each of you.

SPEAKER_05 1:28:17

And we are, as always, grateful that you have chosen to spend some of your very valuable and finite time with us. And we hope you'll join us again on Divine and Most Unlikely.