Grief & Loss

In this episode we discuss:

1. A check-in on the weight loss journey.
2. Some of the things we grieve.
3. The influence of expectations and control.
4. Allowing the difficult emotions to pass through us without holding on to them.

If you feel triggered by any information in this podcast, or if you feel led to start your own therapeutic healing journey, please visit psychologytoday.com to find a mental health therapist in your area.

If you are having suicidal thoughts, please call 911 or 988 for support. You can also visit 988lifeline.org for more resources, and information.

Remember.....YOU MATTER!

To schedule a discovery session with Sherri, please go to Elevatetoabundantlife.com. 

The information provided in this podcast is for educational and informational purposes only and is not intended as medical advice. We are not responsible for any losses, damages, or liabilities that may arise from the use of this podcast. This podcast is not intended to replace professional medical advice.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Welcome back to Divine and Most Unlikely. You're spending some time with us, Sherry Conran and Nathan. We are recording this particular episode, June 21st, 2026, which happens to be Father's Day. We just want to acknowledge that the role that fathers play in all of our lives and how important they are to making happy, whole, strong, well-rounded humans. And yeah, we just we need we need good fathers. If you can keep your head about you when all are losing theirs and blaming it on you, if you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, but make allowance for their doubting too. If you can wait and not be tired by waiting, or being lied about, don't deal in lies. Or being hated, don't give way to hating. And yet, don't look too good nor talk too wise. If you can dream and not make dreams your master, if you can think and not make thoughts your aim. If you can meet with triumph and disaster and treat those two impostors just the same. If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools, or watch the things you gave your life to broken, and stoop and build em up with worn-out tools. If you can make one heap of all your winnings and risk it on one turn of pitch and toss, and lose and start again at your beginnings, and never breathe a word about your loss. If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew to serve your turn long after they are gone, and so hold on when there is nothing in you except the will which says to them, hold on. If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue, or walk with kings, nor lose the common touch. If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you, if all men count with you, but none too much, if you can fill the unforgiving minute with 60 seconds worth of distance run, yours is the earth and everything that's in it. And, which is more, you'll be a man, my son. Sherry, you spent a little time on one of our last podcasts sharing some really deeply held intimate information about yourself.

SPEAKER_03 3:02

I did.

SPEAKER_01 3:04

And one of the things that you wanted to do is just to do a check-in as we progress throughout your journey. And that has everything to do, in fact, even just you sharing what you shared, it was a little about you, but it was a lot about other people.

SPEAKER_03 3:23

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 3:24

Because a lot of people share the same or similar struggles.

SPEAKER_04 3:28

For sure, they do. Either way, right? You can have a struggle of struggling with anorexia or struggling with obesity, right? Because there's a spectrum with body image issues.

SPEAKER_01 3:41

Yeah. So I want to just check in and ask, how's that going? How's the process?

SPEAKER_04 3:50

The process is just beginning. I think I had my first session with my lovely um nutritionist on Tuesday. And I've been having a little trouble logging into some things that I need to log into. So still working on that. And I don't know. I I think the main thing that came up during this first week is like a fear of failure.

SPEAKER_00 4:13

Oh.

SPEAKER_04 4:14

Yeah. Because I've done this so many times. I think I talked about that a little bit in the last podcast. I've done this, I've taken this journey so many times, but this time around, I just want to remind everybody, in case you didn't hear the last podcast, this time around, the Lord said, like the battle in the book of Joshua, the battle for Jericho, they had to march around the mountain seven times. And the Lord told me that this seventh time will be the final time. And so I'm working to believe that. Because when you've done it so much in the past that hasn't felt successful, um, I'm working to believe that this time will work, will be the final round, right? Yeah. And you and I talked not in this uh, not necessarily about weight loss, but you and I talked a little bit recently about um the word failure.

SPEAKER_01 5:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 5:08

What'd you tell me, Nathan?

SPEAKER_01 5:09

Well, it's something that I I've had to think about a lot, probably a lot more in the last 10 years. And I think I my previous concept of failure was something like, you know, if I had a goal of uh making a certain grade on a test, right? And then I didn't make it, that was failure.

SPEAKER_06 5:25

Right.

SPEAKER_01 5:26

And what I have started to recognize, especially in the last 10 years, where I'm at now, is really the only way to fail is not to or to stop trying. And I don't mean that in like the motivational rah-rah type way. I mean really, if you have a goal in mind, whatever that goal is, and you don't achieve the goal, as long as you are continuing to work at that goal and progress toward it, right? You have not failed yet. You haven't failed if you haven't stopped. And we learn lessons along the way. If if I didn't achieve a certain goal, okay, yeah, does that bum me out? Yeah, it bums me out. But take a step back for a second and start to think about well, what did I learn? I learned some things that work and I learned some things that didn't. And instead of saying, Well, I'm an idiot because I use these things that didn't work, how about just going, I here are some tools I tried.

SPEAKER_06 6:27

Right.

SPEAKER_01 6:28

I know that for this particular task, these tools didn't work. I'm not gonna use them again.

SPEAKER_06 6:32

Right.

SPEAKER_01 6:32

I also learned that these tools do work, and I'm gonna utilize those. And by the way, there might be some other tools that I could use to be more effective next time. And that that mindset of I have failed, I think is a lie that we tell ourselves, and it is nothing but discouragement. And when we are setting out on these difficult, lofty goals, these significant challenges, right? There is no effort without error. We're gonna make a mistake.

SPEAKER_03 7:06

Yes, we will. Yes, we will.

SPEAKER_01 7:08

That shouldn't stop us from stepping up to the line and taking the shot.

SPEAKER_03 7:11

Right, right.

SPEAKER_01 7:12

But let's learn from it and grow and get better. We don't need to judge ourselves when we miss the mark.

SPEAKER_04 7:18

Yes, yep. I can definitely be um judgmental towards myself, right? As most of us can. Yes, absolutely. Because, yeah, go ahead.

SPEAKER_01 7:29

Well, I was just gonna say one of the things that that's interesting is it's in stark contrast to the way that you are toward others. You're so non-judgmental toward others, so open and curious and welcoming and loving toward others.

SPEAKER_04 7:46

Right. I think we could say the same thing about both of us, right? Because I see you being the same way, so loving, welcoming, and opening towards others. And you just read me a text from a friend of a friend validating that very fact of how you've been so loving and supportive and kind to them and helped them um along the way. So I think we're the same in that way, and I think we're also the same in that we can be our own worst critics.

SPEAKER_01 8:12

Oh, yes, right?

SPEAKER_04 8:13

Yeah, and I don't think that's just you and me.

SPEAKER_01 8:15

No, I absolutely don't. I think that's a lot, a lot, a lot of people.

SPEAKER_04 8:19

Yeah, and who is the number one critic that can show up? Who is the number one for you?

SPEAKER_01 8:26

The number one critic. I I that's probably some version of like an adolescent me or maybe a young adult me that is just like it's supposed to be this way, and if it's not this way, then it is bad. Right, you know, right? And but I will also say that in the last three years, that it's not completely gone, but it's like 85%, 90%. Yeah, it's a lot better. That's awesome. It is a lot better.

SPEAKER_04 8:57

That's awesome. So my number one critic is probably the enemy of my soul, right? Because he comes, as you all know, John 10, 10 is one of my favorite verses. He comes to still, kill, and destroy. And I think when we are children of God as we are, and we've been given holy identities in the kingdom of God, he wants to come and steal, kill, and destroy those identities.

SPEAKER_00 9:21

Yes.

SPEAKER_04 9:22

So we want to be in the word, we want to be encouraged, and we want to not believe the lies that start to come our way.

SPEAKER_01 9:30

And I do think that a part of that is about awareness. It's simply recognizing, and one of the things that you had taught me to just ask myself sometimes is do you think that comes from God? That being whatever my thought is. Do you do I think that comes from God?

SPEAKER_03 9:45

That's good.

SPEAKER_01 9:46

And then some of those very hyper-critical, cruel, judgmental things. It's like, well, no, that's not. I don't know. I don't think that comes from him. Yep.

SPEAKER_04 9:54

You know, and and this is where battle buddies, you guys, really come in. And we want to encourage you to find your tribe, find your battle buddy, find your people, because we so need each other. When I was struggling with the the critical voice in my head, and for me, my little girl part I think shows up because she gets so frightened so easily because she didn't have a lot of support. Um, so she shows up pretty often. So between the enemy and the little girl part, it's a pretty big battle, right? And so, um, did you want to say something?

SPEAKER_01 10:31

Well, we we just talked about this in one of our recent podcasts, and I'm really glad that you brought that up. When she shows up, just just one, just one, but when she shows up, what does she need from you?

SPEAKER_04 10:44

Nathan. Oh, she needs she needs for me to love her, and she needs for me to let her know that she's safe and that it's okay for her to be present. And as easy as it is for me to love you, for me to love my other spiritual children, my friends, my family, it's not always easy for me to love those parts of self. And I'm still working on that, right? And you helped you helped point that out to me with with when we were in my cave this time, right? Yeah, yeah. I think it was yesterday. We were in my cave yesterday, and um, yeah, you helped point that out, like Sherry. How can you love yourself through this, right? And Nathan, when you said just a minute ago that on the various parts of the journey, we learned we learned tools, we we learned good things, and I have learned so many good things along the way when it comes to healthy eating, when it comes to exercising. I've learned a ton of good things along the way, but you know what? I have not fully implemented what's that loving myself.

SPEAKER_01 11:59

That I I think that that is so that is so powerful. Yeah, and it it's not just powerful for you, which it is, that's a really powerful realization to have. Yep, but also how many other humans does that apply to?

SPEAKER_04 12:19

It it applies to all of us. I think it applies to all of us, absolutely, and I think from miles away, when I meet someone who doesn't love themselves, I see it from miles away. Probably because it's so familiar to me. Yes, because of the therapist part of me too, but um, I see that from miles away. And so I just want to encourage everyone listening, whether you're a man or a woman, it is so important to love all parts of you, all parts of you, whether it is your little girl part, little boy part, adolescent part, you guys, even the critical part. Now, I'm not telling you to love the enemy, because I feel like the enemy is my critic sometimes, but that whoever is playing the role of the critic, like Nathan, I think you mentioned your adolescent part, whoever's playing the role of the critic, they need love and acceptance too.

SPEAKER_01 13:11

And one of the things that you've pointed out is that critic is a survival skill, just like an ice axe would be. And so that critic became to be, started functioning at a time when that helped you to survive.

SPEAKER_04 13:28

Yes, yeah. And Nathan, I just had a revelation while we're talking. I think that little girl part gets so scared to be present because she wasn't allowed to be heard.

SPEAKER_01 13:42

I did not have a ver a voice as a little girl, and and she very likely didn't feel unconditional love or safety.

SPEAKER_04 13:50

No, yeah, no, no, because of the dynamics that my battle weary parents um grew up in themselves.

SPEAKER_03 13:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 13:58

So yeah, so yeah. So I don't want to stay on that topic. I just wanted to do a quick check-in, and I just want to encourage you, whether you're working on weight loss, whether you're working on sobriety, whether you're working on um shifting anything else in your life, know that it really all, I think it has to be the root, don't you, Nathan? I think self-love has to be the root of whatever we do, because if we don't love ourselves, we are gonna sabotage ourselves.

SPEAKER_01 14:26

Yeah, I mean, you I like that you use the the image of the root because if we are a tree and if we don't love our, if we hate ourselves, if we don't love ourselves, if we're mean toward ourselves, right, then that tree has that in it, and then whatever fruit it bears has some of that in it.

SPEAKER_03 14:48

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 14:48

And and maybe, maybe the fruit is good, you know, overall, but the there's that the bitterness that comes from hate and anger and lack of self-love. Or if we get closer to that place where we truly love and appreciate and enjoy ourselves, the fruit we bear is the sweeter for it.

SPEAKER_04 15:06

Right, right. And when we don't have self-love, it contaminates the soil.

SPEAKER_03 15:11

Sure.

SPEAKER_04 15:11

Right. Absolutely. We talk about that a lot. It contaminates the soil. So, guys, we want to have good soil. Whatever you're working on, if you want to advance in your career, if you want to become a better parent, a better spouse, if you want to lose weight, we got to have the good soil as the as the as the base of that. And as believers, our our good soil is planted and rooted in Christ and all that he did on the cross for us. And he truly loves us, regardless of our actions, which is also that's a that could be a whole other topic. I I know I say that all the time. That could be a podcast. That could be a podcast topic. Um, but it truly could. So, yep, just the importance of loving yourself. So, yeah, thanks for letting me do the check-in, Nathan. I appreciate it.

SPEAKER_01 15:58

Well, thank you for for being so vulnerable and courageous. Yeah, that is really, really important.

SPEAKER_06 16:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:05

We wanted to talk a little bit about grief and loss today. And I, when I think about grief and loss, I think back to 20 some years ago when I was in school, and I had to read, I was actually taking a class, had to take a class called Grief and Loss. And I just want to tell you at the time I thought this is boring. And uh then we had to read a book, and the book was written by Elizabeth Kubler-Ross, if I recall that correctly. And the main thing that I remember taking away from that, but at an academic level, not at a heart level, at a brain level, was oh, okay, there's so there's these five stages of grief and loss. Right. You know, there's denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and then acceptance. And I do vaguely remember that uh that is not necessarily linear and that you can kind of transition between one and the other. But that's sort of the limit of what I remember from that particular class.

SPEAKER_04 17:02

Yeah. And so I just want to say about they do bounce back and forth. Um, you can be at one, you can be at four, three, five, one, two. So people do kind of expect it to be linear. Yes, of course. And it's it's uh how how do I want to say that? It can really catch you off guard because you can think, okay, well, I'm feeling really angry about this loss. And again, we're gonna talk about the different losses we can have, but you can you can feel angry about a loss, and then you get through that and you okay, I'm on to stage two now, and then maybe after you've gotten down to stage three or four, you know, boom, I'm angry again.

SPEAKER_01 17:45

Right. And that that can feel like you can get frustrated with yourself because it feels like you just made a retrograde movement. Like I was I was here yesterday. Exactly. And now I'm here today. What the heck is going on?

SPEAKER_02 17:57

Nathan, that's how I feel about that's how I feel about parts of self.

SPEAKER_01 18:01

Is it?

SPEAKER_02 18:02

Yes, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 18:03

Well, I gotta tell you, you know, just since you brought that up again, I gotta tell you when it's it's definitely important for people to first recognize those parts of self.

SPEAKER_06 18:13

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 18:14

Um, but I also think that to get to know them, like you would get to know a new person, shake their hand, be open, be warm, be compassionate, be curious about them. And and I just I think that that's so important. But one of the things that you mentioned is sometimes you have a hard time with some of those parts of self. And what is so crazy to me, now I'm on the outside, I'm on the outside, but on the outside, all of the parts of yourself that I have met, I love and adore, and they're just uh they're so lovable.

SPEAKER_04 18:45

So it's it's you can't see me, but I'm rolling my high. And yeah, of course, I would say the same thing about Nathan's parts of self when they show up. Yeah, right? Uh, I love all of your parts, and you guys, it's easier to love the parts of self for somebody else. Yeah, it feels easier anyway than it is to love the parts of ourself. So yeah, let's get back to it. Let's get back to that. Let's get back to grief.

SPEAKER_01 19:13

Okay, so when I think about grief, I am primarily, or what comes to my mind primarily is death. Now, part of that just has to do with that I've experienced a lot of that. But I also recognize that death is not the only thing that we grieve in life.

SPEAKER_04 19:32

So true, so true.

SPEAKER_01 19:34

Grief is a normal part of life.

SPEAKER_04 19:37

It is.

SPEAKER_01 19:38

Uh, I think that it's one of those parts of life that when we if we choose to fight hard to avoid that, it's just gonna, it's just gonna come back at us a little bit harder.

SPEAKER_00 19:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:48

Um, but Sherry, do you have any thoughts about or examples of some of the other things that we might grieve in life that are not related to death?

SPEAKER_04 19:59

Absolutely. Um, how about a grief over loss of expectations?

SPEAKER_00 20:05

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 20:06

Yeah. Have you ever made a plan? How is it that just the word plan makes us laugh? Have you ever made a plan for your life and it didn't go quite the way you thought it was gonna go?

SPEAKER_01 20:21

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_04 20:22

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:23

Absolutely. Let me tell you, the plan I had when I was 18 years old didn't look like this.

SPEAKER_04 20:28

I know. None of the plans along the way in my life look like what I'm living right now, that is for sure. And even as Nathan and I, again, we don't talk too in depth about what we're gonna talk about. We'll bullet point some stuff, and then right before we talk, we're like, okay, Lord, which ones do you want us to talk about? Um, and and I'm like, and then we'll get going deeper in the conversation, and I'm like, stop. Nope, that we're not gonna do A, B, C, D, E. Not that he wants to, but we both kind of go a little back and forth with that. And I'm like, nope, nope, we're gonna let the Lord like lead and guide because I don't know, because I I want us to get used to the Lord leading and guiding and us not making a plan because when you make plans about anything, it's like you telling the Lord what's on your blueprint.

SPEAKER_00 21:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 21:19

And he already knows what's on your blueprint, and we want to He might have even been the one to design it. You what?

SPEAKER_00 21:25

He might have even been the one to design it. I think so.

SPEAKER_04 21:27

Yeah, I think so. And we don't want to go against what the designer has planned for us. Yeah, and and we do though, we can all the time go against it because if we think like if your 18 year old self made a plan for your life and you're like going towards an opposite direction of what you planned, then you're gonna try to course correct according to your own blueprint that you designed, and it might not be what God has for you.

SPEAKER_01 21:57

Yeah, and when you when you create that plan, I I think Think that most of us we're not creating a plan that deliberately brings us, you know, pain and suffering and misfortune and all that. When we create the plan, we have this idea in mind that it's gonna be happily ever after. Oh, oh, don't get me going on Cinderella and Prince Charlie. I kind of do. Have you said that on this yet? Because if you haven't, that's a good one.

SPEAKER_04 22:21

We did we did talk about that. Yeah, we talked about I I go back and forth on who dies. So today, as we're talking about grief and loss.

SPEAKER_05 22:33

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_04 22:34

When we make plans specifically for relationships that we're in, and you know, America has taught us to has taught the men to look for Cinderella, and they've taught the women to look for their prince charming. And um, oh, by the way.

SPEAKER_01 22:53

I don't know where she's going, but this can be funny.

SPEAKER_04 22:57

By the way, a lot of people see Nathan as a Prince Charming. And I'm laughing because he he he definitely is like a Prince Charming, but he's like, Sherry, they only know one part of me. That's right. He doesn't want to hear anything about it. I'm like, Nathan, the women love you, and he's like, yeah, he just rolls his eyes. Yeah. Okay, so back to my metaphor. Uh, so today Cinderella's gonna die. No, no murder, no murder, no murder.

SPEAKER_01 23:36

No, it's just gonna happen. She's like cherry's like one of those cats in the nursing home that goes and curls up by the next person that's gonna die. Cinderella today.

SPEAKER_04 23:54

The boy frequently renders me uh speechless. Okay, so what I usually say when we when we have all these dreams about what marriage is gonna look like, you know, the the prince charming husband or the Cinderella kind of wife with the white picket fence and 2.5 kids. Um, I tell I tell people Cinderella is dead and Prince Charming is in rehab. That's what I say. Because those idealistic expectations typically don't happen. Sometimes, sometimes um they do like, yeah, sometimes people marry their high school sweethearts and they stay deeply in love for a long time, and then other times that is just not the case, right?

SPEAKER_01 24:41

Yeah, and I think that you hit on something that's really powerful, which is the power of expectations. So if you take expectations and remove them from the equation, there's really just a thing that happened. And it it is really neither bad nor good. It's because you've pulled the expectation out of it. So if we go into a situation with an expectation, and then something happens that is better, then we're like, wow, that was great. That was so much better than I expected. Yes. But if it was less than our expectations, then we're like, oh right. Man, like that just that really sucked. That's not what I want, you know. But I think the power is in us becoming aware of our own expectations.

SPEAKER_03 25:29

Oh, for sure.

SPEAKER_01 25:30

And I'm not talking about lowering them. I'm just suggesting what if we removed them? What if we became aware and removed them? Yeah. And instead of measuring as if with a litmus strip, whether the situation compares to our expectations, what if we just experience the situation?

SPEAKER_04 25:51

Yeah, imagine that. And if we didn't go into it with all these control elements, and I think help us not to get sidetracked. Help us not to get sidetracked because I think expectations arise in order to for us to feel like we have some control. Right?

SPEAKER_06 26:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 26:15

If you're if you as Prince Charming are looking for your Cinderella, then you have this, you get this idea in your mind. And the idea usually when it comes to Prince Charming and Cinderella is pretty fairy fairy tale-based.

SPEAKER_06 26:29

Yep.

SPEAKER_04 26:30

And so you're gonna try to create this this fairy tale thing, as some people, you know, I've definitely experienced clients in the past that have done that, and it doesn't work because fairy tales don't really exist.

SPEAKER_01 26:43

Well, yeah, and and also whether you're on the the Prince Charming side or the Cinderella side, that other person is gonna have a really hard, if not an impossible time living up to an unrealistic set of expectations. One of the things that is particularly, I think, uh maybe poisonous is the word about the expectation is sometimes when we have an expectation and a person doesn't live up to it, what we think of them is oh, you're bad or not good or whatever, but we miss all the good that they bring because they didn't bring the thing that we wanted them to bring.

SPEAKER_04 27:23

Nathan that's powerful, that's really powerful. Because when we're focused on that one thing that we think is coming, and then and then, yep, you I think that that's very accurate. And we are putting God in a box when we do that, because we're focusing on the one thing, and let me just say this God is not a boxable God.

SPEAKER_01 27:50

You sound like you're saying that from experience.

SPEAKER_04 27:53

Oh, Nathan. It um as you guys know, I I got a call to ministry in 2007. It took like many years for it to come to fruition, and there was no Nathan in the call when I when I got the call. I totally had God in a box. I thought this is what it's gonna look like, this is what I'm gonna do, this is how I'm gonna maybe maybe do it. Oh yeah. And and Nathan's example that he used of when you um have these certain set of expectations. Sometimes expectations are greatly exceeded and sometimes they fall short. Let me tell you, with what God is doing, my goodness, my expectations have been abundantly exceeded. Yeah, abundantly is my word, right? Um, God has it, he's exceeded my expectations abundantly. But let's talk about um other ways besides death.

SPEAKER_01 28:51

So we said expectations.

SPEAKER_04 28:52

Yep, yep. And then we said we said death, and we said expectations. Um with our children, that's another thing that we can sometimes have grief around many times. I thankfully don't think I did this, but I I I don't think I did it because I was being healthy. I think I did it because I was just so stuck in my own loss and grief and trauma that I I didn't think about it. But I didn't project onto my kids like, hey, I had two daughters, um, and they're both very successful in the world, but I didn't project onto them, hey, I want you to go be a doctor, I want you to go be a teacher. I didn't project that on them. Um, but a lot of parents do, right? A lot of parents do project that. And so if a parent develops an expectation about how their children are gonna be, um, and then the kids grow up and they do this thing called walking into their own blueprint from God. Yeah, yep, yep, and it's not a blueprint I got to create.

SPEAKER_01 29:56

You didn't get consulted in the design, please.

SPEAKER_04 29:58

I did not get consulted in the design, Nathan. Um so uh, and we teach our kids, hopefully, we're teaching our kids. I do think I taught my kids this, how to be ethical, responsible, independent human beings, and and then they grow up and they be the ethical responsible independent. We can have some grief around that. Yeah. I literally, when my youngest daughter, now my kids were seven years apart because there were two marriages, but when my youngest daughter became an adult, wow, that was hard because she was the baby. I think it's harder. It's really on both ends the firstborn and the baby, and for me, that's all I had. So both were hard, right? Both were hard to release into the world, but um, I had to take my youngest daughter's pictures, the little girl pictures off the wall because I was grieving so much. And I will never forget her telling me this. She was, I don't know, she might have been 17 or 18. Um, because ah, I had a lot of grief around her growing up, not who she became, but just around like my parenting of children. And I use air quotes with that, it's done, right? So there's a grief around that feeling. Um, but literally she told me, like when I would, I was, I was like, Well, you're my little girl. And one day she said to me, That little girl is dead.

SPEAKER_06 31:27

Wow.

SPEAKER_04 31:27

I know.

SPEAKER_01 31:28

I was like, I hear echoes of the Cinderella and Prince Charming, though.

SPEAKER_04 31:41

You're not kidding. Nope. And there there was probably not a probably, there was some codependence in that relationship. There was um, yeah, just some overconnected in that relationship because I think because of the kind of marriage that I was in and um addiction being present in that marriage, and yeah, and so we we had to work through all of those things, and yeah.

SPEAKER_01 32:05

So that I think that is one way, and it seems like there's there's more there. So the the one way basically to me what I heard was the that stage where a child makes the subtle but significant transition between truly being a child and then to being an adult.

SPEAKER_03 32:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 32:27

Do you think that within that, like even before that transition, are there other maybe gates or thresholds within that child's life that a parent might grieve for totally, Nathan.

SPEAKER_04 32:39

Totally. You and I just had a very dear friend go through one of these stages with um their child, and um she realized, like, oh, I'm not gonna get to experience this again. And it brought some sadness. Um, and it reminded me of my daughter when she graduated, I think it was kindergarten. I was telling Nathan this earlier as we were talking about grief. She uh I'll just never forget this. There's a lot of things my brain doesn't hold on to, but there's many things it does hold on to. And this was one of them when she graduated. She we were driving down the road. Um, hopefully she was buckled in well. I don't know. She but she stuck her head out the window of the car and said, Hey everybody, I graduated, I graduated. And interestingly enough, when our friend was going through this stage out of transitioning into maybe toddler, going from toddlerhood to a little bit older, you know, child, um, I was actually in South Carolina visiting one of my good friends, and that good friend was my date, my my daughter's kindergarten teacher. And I thought, wow, such full circle, such full circle moments because my oldest is 37 now. So, yeah, so those memories, you know, fond memories. And hard, they can be hard because they do go through the phases that they go through. And, you know, man, mamas, we gotta let go as soon as they come out of the womb because independence starts the moment they're born. Yeah, it literally does because they're no longer they they still depend on us for food, but not like they did in the womb, right? Um, and we go from we go from bottle to baby food to regular milk to regular food, and every step is a step towards independence. That's right. So every step is a step towards losing, losing the little baby and the toddler, and uh, and then um the elementary school years and then the fun adolescent years. Um I went through some interesting times with my youngest daughter in her adolescence. I think, I think, you know, I don't, Nathan, I don't know if you ever heard this, but my dad used to always say, You're paying for your raisin, you're paying for your raisin. Uh and yeah, yeah, I did pay for my raisin with my second one.

SPEAKER_01 35:16

I never heard that, but what I heard a lot when I was a kid, specifically from my grandmother, was something like, I hope that when you grow up, you have kids that are just like me. And I was like, that would be awesome. And now as an adult, I'm like, I don't think that would have been awesome. That would have been a challenge. That was a challenge. I heard a guy on a different podcast, I don't, I don't remember him, otherwise, I absolutely would give him credit. But he said something that really like uh rattled me uh that I'd never thought about before. He said something like, I realized I have 18 summers with my kids.

SPEAKER_04 35:54

Oh man, we were talking about that too just ago. 18 summers.

SPEAKER_01 35:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 36:00

Okay, moms and dads, we don't want to depress you. No, but we want to emphasize, invest, invest well in those years. Yeah. And you look listen, many times mom and dad has to work, has to make a living, especially in this crazy, absolutely crazy economy we live in today. So no judgment there, moms and dads, that that have to be at work. We do the best we can. I I I told Nathan when my that same youngest daughter, when she was a baby, um, and I was working and going to school, and my the daycare provider told me that she called her mama. And I'm like, all right, well, she's getting out of daycare now. I'm quitting work or I'm cutting back on work because that's not acceptable. Yeah, but those things happen because we do, we do have to make a living and we do have to do all the things. And I did my things backwards. I I did my things very backwards. I got married at a young age, had kids at a young age, worked in various careers, and then I went to school. So it was very backwards, but I made it work.

SPEAKER_05 37:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 37:10

Right? So we do, mamas and daddies, we do what we have to do to make things work. Single mamas, kudos to you on this Father's Day. Um, those even mamas who are married but kind of are still single mamas, or dads who are married but are single dads, or or I do want to give credit, Nathan, for this because I don't think guys get acknowledged very often. Sometimes when guys get divorced or widowed, they raise the kids that's true by themselves. And I don't think those guys get enough credit because we don't see that maybe very often. But I have seen some examples of where guys absolutely rocked being mom and dad. Yeah, you know, so I want to give credit to them too on Father on this Father's Day, even though you'll be hearing this a little later than Father's Day. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, okay, so we've talked about death, we've talked about grieving the different stages of children, yeah, death of the loss of expectations. Can you think of any more? I'm sure there's some more.

SPEAKER_01 38:12

I want to talk about one. Okay. Um, and this is kind of loss of a significant relationship.

SPEAKER_03 38:18

Oh, for sure.

SPEAKER_01 38:19

Yeah, yeah. Yes, so that that can look differently, you know. It it might be a romantic relationship, it might be a friendship, it might be the loss of a teacher because you're moving to a different stage in life. It might be losing a mentor as you move jobs, it might be grieving a job as you, you know, totally, yeah, totally, because all of those are big transitions. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_04 38:45

Whether it's a teacher, a job, a friendship. Yeah, yeah. Who, who or what, Nathan, comes to mind when you think about that.

SPEAKER_01 38:53

Well, there are two things that come to my mind. One is uh some romantic relationships. Now, you know, romantic relationships end and they have different degrees of impact. Some have had greater impact on me than others. And uh those for me have been, I think, maybe more impactful than they had been had I been a healed version of myself, because that was tied to things like self-worth and being worthy of being loved and you know, all that stuff.

SPEAKER_03 39:23

Like yeah.

SPEAKER_01 39:24

Well, if if you know, if if they don't want to be with me, then I'm not worth being with, you know. And then the sucky part about that is I'm stuck with me all the time. Don't know if you have that problem, but I am everywhere I go, there I am.

SPEAKER_04 39:36

Yeah, Nathan, I think it's so fascinating because I think as women, we don't think guys experience that, like leaning into other people to help them feel loved and lovable. Yeah, and that is a natural thing that comes from a relationship, but we cannot. And you and I have both done it. You and I have both done it in relationships with others. We have put our identity in our partners, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 40:02

And I think it's it's not like again, not black and white thinking, not the light switch, but more of a dial. Yeah, you know, yeah. So there's there's on that dial, there's like an appropriate, healthy level that's totally natural. And then there's a level above that where it's maybe a little less.

SPEAKER_04 40:18

Like if you were married or I was married, when somebody said, you know, tell me about yourself, I'd probably say, I'm married, I got two kids, you know, I live here, work there, do this, all that. That's that's an appropriate level of identity to me when you're when when we're married. Um but giving your partner, your spouse, complete control and complete, not just control, but oh my goodness, responsibility. Complete control and responsibility over your good enoughness is a recipe for disaster. It's a recipe for disaster. So when when the relationship ends under under those um circumstances, yep, thank you. Yep, under those circumstances, it's gonna be definitely a lot of great because your identity is going out the window with that relationship.

SPEAKER_01 41:10

Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_04 41:11

So tell me more about what you're referring to.

SPEAKER_01 41:14

Well, I remember there was there was a time in my life where my uncle had just died, and my uncle is just without question the most impactful, you know, male presence, especially in that my young and my young adult life, and just a wonderful, kind, loving, gentle man. And he died, and then around that same time I had a significant uh romantic relationship end. And my uncle was just an incredibly wise and intelligent man, and he was a reader, and that doesn't surprise me because uh you you were born out of his tree, right?

SPEAKER_04 42:02

You know, right? You didn't and the apple didn't fall far from the tree, so that doesn't surprise me.

SPEAKER_01 42:07

He among the many things he read, he was a very spiritual man, and he read quite a bit of TikNathan, who is uh a Buddhist and uh monk, writer, very deep thinker, and I always had in my mind that I wanted to at some point read some TikNat Han and then talk to my uncle about that. And um I I'm gonna tell this part because this is definitely a God thing. A friend of mine said, Hey, let's go to a bookstore, and I'm like, I I'm in the this just deep dark pit. I don't want to go anywhere, I don't want to be around anything, I just want to lay there and die. And but I but she talked me into it. I was like, fine, we'll go to the stupid bookstore. And so we go to the bookstore, and I honestly made a straight line as if I knew where I was going, and I didn't. I'd never been here before. But to the back left corner of the bookstore, and where I ended up was in front of this bookshelf that was labeled philosophy. And at the very part where that bookshelf met the wall at exactly eye level were three books right in front of me, and they were fear, love, and anger.

SPEAKER_04 43:21

I remember you telling me about this, yeah. And they were all feeling some of all of that.

SPEAKER_01 43:26

Some of all of that, yeah. And they were all by TikTok Han. And I was like, okay, this I'm not the brightest bulb, but this is like Ray Charles would have seen this sign. So I decided I'm buying these three books.

SPEAKER_03 43:41

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 43:42

And so one of the things that I found for me in that awful grief is I needed to be outside. Uh being inside was not good for me. And being near a body of water really helped me.

SPEAKER_04 43:54

Yes, we have that in common. Yes. Love of water, right?

SPEAKER_01 43:57

So I went out near a local. That um that my mom used to bring us to when we were kids, so it had some special sentimental value and it felt like a safe place. And I took one of those books and I I decided that the first one that I was gonna read was Fear, and I decided that because it felt to me that the root of a lot of my really difficult emotions what came from fear. And so I was reading the book, and and I he writes in such a substantial way. You can't read it, or at least I couldn't read it like a novel. It I needed to take little bites and then take some time to chew and swallow and digest before I would read more. And so I set the book down, and I remember looking to my right down the path, and I remember thinking to myself, this is how people become angry and bitter and resentful. This is how. Totally because you get hurt and then you decide not only will I never allow anyone to hurt me this way again, I am gonna insulate myself, I am gonna armor myself, I am gonna arm myself with weapons, and this will never happen again.

SPEAKER_04 45:12

Absolutely. Well, you and you were kind of headed in that direction?

SPEAKER_01 45:15

I wasn't headed in the direction, but I remember thinking that is how it happens. Now I understand. And I didn't know it before, but then I understood. But I also recognized that I didn't have to choose that, that that was a choice. And I realized that the other side of that path, or the the other side of that fork in the road, Yogi Bearra said, when you get to a fork in the road, take it. So I did, but the other tying on that fork was you can allow that to make you more compassionate, more understanding, more patient, really good, more loving.

SPEAKER_03 45:56

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 45:56

And you can use it to help you be more deliberate in your decisions so that your decisions don't spread that hurt to others the way that you have been hurt.

SPEAKER_06 46:07

Right.

SPEAKER_01 46:07

And I think that that's one of the one of the lessons that significant grief can teach us is it can actually make us a better version of ourselves if we make the choice and if we are willing to co-create in that process.

SPEAKER_04 46:23

Yes, absolutely. That's where you and I differ a little bit, right? Because I, especially after divorce number two, I didn't do it intentionally, um, but I do think I did put up the walls.

SPEAKER_03 46:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 46:37

First of all, I made a vow to the Lord to not be in another relationship until deep healing happened.

SPEAKER_00 46:43

Wow.

SPEAKER_04 46:44

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 46:45

But that is significant.

SPEAKER_04 46:46

So I think the the there were some walls that came up in order for me to honor that vow with the Lord, um, if you will. Um yeah, and it's uh it's time to take down those walls, right? I'm in the process of taking down those walls. So um I didn't land where you landed when when your relationship unexpectedly ended, you had, you know, you decided to uh embrace the love and the fear, and what was the other one? Anger.

SPEAKER_01 47:19

Anger, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 47:19

Yeah, anger, love, and fear. I I embraced it kind of in a different way. I took time to put a pause on relationships, ended up putting up some walls. But in those, I think it's been 11 years since we got divorced, I I did so much work on uh I did work on the anger and the fear and not the love. Yeah, not the love.

SPEAKER_01 47:45

But two of three, that's good progress.

SPEAKER_04 47:47

It's good progress, Nathan. Um, but now Nathan's helping me work on the love. Spiritual children are helping me work on the love piece, and the Lord is helping me. There goes our people.

SPEAKER_01 48:00

Yep, our people in the background. If you guys can't hear it, that's fire engine.

SPEAKER_04 48:04

Yep. So in Jesus' name, we just ask that you go and be with them and keep them safe and keep the people that they're helping safe. And help for them to have clothes on. A little uh allusion to our last podcast or our next two podcasts to go, I think. Um, this is gonna get released today, as a matter of fact. But yeah, you're gonna hear this one after that. So anyway, a little inside joke. But if you heard the other podcast, you'll know what we're talking about.

SPEAKER_01 48:38

You'll know.

SPEAKER_04 48:38

Yeah, yeah. Um, so yeah, I yeah, I'm working on um learning how to love and learning what healthy love is, even healthy love of myself, healthy love with others. Because when you when you're not given that as an example, you just truly don't know. You truly don't know, right? And um, yeah, so it's uh man, it's an intense journey, but a deeply healing journey, but for sure intense.

SPEAKER_01 49:10

And I think with grief, one of the things that I've learned, and this is like this is through this is through doing things the wrong way, is what I guess I'm trying to say. But when you fight against that, which for me is the natural instinct, it's I want to fight that negative feeling. And by the way, I don't think that there are negative feelings, I'm just saying that's how I characterize that as being a negative feeling because it doesn't feel good.

SPEAKER_04 49:35

Right. Well, I think we do classify them as negative feelings, negative emotions like sadness and fear and hurt. Yeah, Nathan. We naturally don't want to lean into that because we don't want to feel the pain of it.

SPEAKER_05 49:52

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 49:52

But there's no you can't heal if you don't feel so true.

SPEAKER_01 50:03

You should make a bumper sticker that says that.

SPEAKER_04 50:05

I've had a lot of bumper stickers. I tell Nathan all the time. I've got bumper stickers in my head, and I've tattooed myself like a mil, I don't have me, I have, you know, a handful of tattoos, but I've tattooed myself a million times with different phrases, thankfully only in my head.

SPEAKER_01 50:21

Um But I I think that one of the key things with grief is A, when you fight it, you make it worse. It gets bigger, it gets louder, and it hurts more.

SPEAKER_04 50:34

Yes, yes, and yes.

SPEAKER_01 50:36

And so instead of choosing to fight that grief, turn and face it, but do it not with a protective stance, but with open arms and walk into it.

SPEAKER_03 50:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 50:49

With and it's just like you talked about, you know, i in the past, it's there's a wave. And it's an ocean, by the way, so it's not just one wave.

SPEAKER_04 50:59

You ain't kidding, Nathan.

SPEAKER_01 51:01

And this is you being at the beach, but your back is to the ocean, so you don't know when the waves are gonna come. They're not predictable.

SPEAKER_04 51:07

That's right.

SPEAKER_01 51:08

But when you feel that wave come, so good, jump up and surf the wave. That's right. And it will bring you up, but it's also gonna bring you back down to the sand again.

SPEAKER_04 51:18

Yeah, and you might swallow a little bit of water in the midst of garbage.

SPEAKER_01 51:23

It might roll you up the beach and you might get sand in places you didn't even know you had, but it's okay. You can go and shake that off.

SPEAKER_04 51:32

Josie, Josie, there's a nod for you. Um, Nathan, yeah. Oh, that's such a good, like I can I saw the picture of that as what while you were talking, right? Yeah. So what are some emotions that we might need to surf the wave of with grief and loss?

SPEAKER_01 51:53

Anger is definitely one of them. Disbelief.

SPEAKER_04 51:57

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 51:58

Um, just that pain of loss. The that sadness? Yeah. Sadness. That feeling of being completely out of control, and there's whatever that loss is, you can't get that thing back, no matter what you do.

SPEAKER_04 52:14

Yeah, whether it's your child's kindergarten years, yes, whether it's the loss of your uncle. Yeah, the loss of expectations, loss of expectations, loss of a relationship. Yeah, sometimes we don't want those back, though, right?

SPEAKER_01 52:27

Sometimes we don't want those back, but it takes us a little while to realize we don't want those back. We might want them back in the beginning, though.

SPEAKER_02 52:35

I'm seeing Nathan and I not too long ago.

SPEAKER_04 52:46

I, you know, I thought I knew Nathan pretty well. And then he introduced me to this different part of himself.

SPEAKER_01 52:55

Crap, which part is this?

SPEAKER_02 52:58

And I think I just saw it surface again. It's the pirate part.

SPEAKER_01 53:03

Oh, yeah, there's definitely a pirate part.

SPEAKER_04 53:05

I think I just saw the pirate face as he was processing like all the, yeah, all the waves we have to ride. Yeah. Yes, but here's the deal. The key words that Nathan said uh about riding the waves is they're gonna, you're gonna uh when if your back is against the ocean and the wave comes but you don't know it, you're gonna, it's gonna pick you up a little bit and then it's gonna put you back down. And we have to tell ourselves, I can I can do this. I can do this for 30 minutes, I can do this for a couple of hours. Now, a natural wave in the ocean is way quicker than that, but sometimes emotional waves. Nathan just helped me walk through a little emotional wave in my first week of of all things like um making my my body healthy again. Um and I I can't remember if you said this, but I know we said this with our good friend, this is not the end point. Yeah, right? This is not the end point.

SPEAKER_01 54:07

And I think that's one of the big challenges is you you get in this bad place, yeah, whatever it is. Yes, and then you get convinced that the way it is now, it's always gonna be the same.

SPEAKER_02 54:19

Only because it feels that way. Yeah, because it feels that way.

SPEAKER_01 54:22

Of course it does, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 54:24

And so if you're in that place, you guys, or if you've been in that place, you know what we're talking about. But that is not gonna last forever. Riding, surfing that wave is not gonna last forever. It feels like it is, but it's not, right? Like grief can certainly feel like it's gonna last for a long time. Watching your kids grow up and go in a certain direction feels like it's gonna last forever. Um, I had some challenges with my youngest one as an adolescent, and and it that felt like it might last forever, right? And um, but things things don't things don't last forever. The emotions, the whether negative emotions or even positive emotions, yeah, they don't last forever.

SPEAKER_01 55:07

And Emma, Emma McAdam, this is someone that you and I both respect. By the way, no we have no relationship, there's no connection, but yeah.

SPEAKER_04 55:14

But she's a therapist.

SPEAKER_01 55:15

She is, and I I've learned a lot from her, and one of the things that she actually encouraged is not to label things as either negative or positive emotions. True. And I never thought about that. And even in the beginning, I was like, wait, what? No, that's of course it's negative. I don't like it, it doesn't feel good. But what her point was is that when you do that, you actually kind of give the thing a little bit more power.

SPEAKER_04 55:38

Oh, that makes a lot of sense.

SPEAKER_01 55:39

And if instead of treating it as labeling it either negative or positive, just name what it is you're feeling, right? But do it without judgment.

SPEAKER_04 55:49

Nathan! Yeah, that's the hardest thing. Very hard to do it without judgment. But you guys, if we could get to that place, right? Like my little girl part recently showed up. She was fearful of being abandoned and rejected and left alone because that's that's what she knew. And I was judging her, and I was judging her because the adult part of me was like, get your crap together already, right? Because she shows up all the time. And before my dad died, I thought she was healed and gone and done and all things, and then she came back in full force, and I didn't welcome her back because I wanted her to be done, I wanted her to be healed, yeah, because she makes the adult in me, I think probably especially the therapist part of me, because you guys, I want to speak to those of you that are professionals because you know that word physician heal thyself, right? Or words, um, physician heal thyself. Um, I think as a therapist, when I was a therapist, I have to say, because I am no longer, but as a former therapist, still funny to say, um, we know all the things, not all the things, but we know things. We know things. I could tell you the things all day long, night and day. I could tell your neighbor, your mother, your brother, all the people things that to do. And whenever, like, I met some new friends of a daughter last night, and we were talking about all the things, and I was like, engaging them in some of the things. But when it comes to me, I have high, oh man, Lord. Say it again.

SPEAKER_06 57:37

Say it.

SPEAKER_04 57:39

The Lord is so good, you guys, because this is the beauty of not putting God in a box. We don't script these podcasts, and he, I get revelations. I think you do too sometimes. I get re I get revelations. I'm laughing because I just have to cover his eyes, you guys, because he looks at me so sweetly sometimes when I'm talking about that poor little girl. And I don't want to cry.

SPEAKER_01 58:11

So I just gotta tell you, I love that little girl so much. If, and by the way, any any of you guys would feel the same thing. You just want to pick her up and wrap her up in your arms, and it is so yeah, and I'm mean to her. Sometimes. Sometimes, yeah, and that's that's okay. That's it's normal, yeah, but it's work in progress.

SPEAKER_04 58:37

And that's hard for a former therapist to accept because I feel like I know all the things and I don't do all the things, but you guys, you know what? My mother was a smoker, and she had a flipping cardiologist that was a smoker.

SPEAKER_01 58:52

Do you know what it means if you're if you know all the things and you don't necessarily do all the things?

SPEAKER_04 58:58

I know what you're gonna say.

SPEAKER_01 58:59

It means you're a human.

SPEAKER_04 59:00

I know, yeah, but my mother had a flipping cardiologist that was a smoker and she could smell it on him, so she knew, and he never talked to her about her smoking. Because he did it too. Right, right? Yeah, and so again, he was just human too. Yeah, right. Um, but when you are a person with knowledge and you struggle with applying the knowledge that you have, I think there's just naturally a lot of judgment. And so that's my revelation, I think, that I'm getting right now with all of this is that sometimes I judge myself because I do know some things, but I've told clients for years, so I need to tell myself this too, is that people come to see me and they're like, oh, Sherry, how did you know? How do you see? How do you this? How do you that? And to me, the stuff I know just seems so generic, but it's not generic. But um the reason that I that I can be so helpful to people is because I'm not a tree in their forest, right? Yeah, Nathan is helpful to me in my forest because he's not one of my trees.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:08

That's right, right?

SPEAKER_04 1:00:09

Um, and when I say that I mean um he's not family, he's not, I mean, he's he's and I'm not sherry, sherry sherry. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I hope not. Um, but yeah, he's not part of my trees, so he can help me see my forest. I am not part of his forest, so I can help him see the trees in his forest, right?

SPEAKER_01 1:00:37

Yeah, and that judgment thing, I think one of the the antidotes to judgment then is curiosity and love.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:47

Curiosity and love.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:49

Yep, yep. That's really, really good, Nathan. So whether you're dealing with grief around death, grief around your children, and and releasing them into the world to be the independent, high-functioning adults that they're meant to be, or grief around expectations, loss of significant relationships, the healing comes with curiosity, love, compassion, right? All of those things.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:20

So one of the things that we want to ask you is gently is right now, is there any grief that you're carrying? Is there any grief that you haven't worked through? Is there any grief that you want to work through?

SPEAKER_04 1:01:40

That's really good.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:41

And I certainly don't know, I can't, you know, you always say normal's a setting on a hairdryer.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:49

Because it is. There's really no such thing as normal, you guys.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:53

So when I think about some of the the biggest grief that I carry, it has to do with, you know, people that I've loved and who have died over the years. And I remember when my grandmother died, I remember sort of thinking that this was very much like I fell down and I skinned my knee. It hurt then, it was bleeding then. Wash that stuff off, put a band-aid on it, it'll be uncomfortable for a couple days, and then a week two later it's gonna heal.

SPEAKER_06 1:02:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:21

And I don't know what other people's experience of major losses like that is like, but what I where I'm at now is the cutting blade of that grief is less sharp over the years, yeah, but it still hurts.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:35

Absolutely, absolutely. When you lose someone that played such a significant role in your life as your grandmother did, a grief will always be there. I used to use uh a picture of a mason jar, and when someone first died, the grief would be a ball that would consume the mason jar, and then over time the grief would shrink in the mason jar, but it was always present, always present. Because we are always to some degree or another, I think, gonna grieve the loss of someone that we loved. Yeah, so and you greatly loved your grandmother and you greatly loved your uncle, and that those were blessings, those people, those people, God God blessed you. Yes, he did, he blessed you with those relationships, Nathan, and those two significant people shaped who you are today, very shaped who you are today as a man, who you were as a boy, who you were as an adolescent, how you think, who you read, yeah, all the things they shaped all of that in you, right? So, how can you not carry some grief around those folks? That's right, right? How can you not?

SPEAKER_05 1:03:49

That's right, right?

SPEAKER_04 1:03:51

And I just want to say to you guys, I wanna, I I wanna just, even though normal's a setting on the hairdryer, I wanna normalize because I had a friend, and I will never, ever, ever forget this. Um, I had a friend that suddenly lost her nine-year-old child to a brain tumor.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:11

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:12

We were out to dinner one night, and I just recently heard from this friend after not hearing, you know, time moved on and I moved and all the things, but I heard from her recently, which was really sweet. But um we were out to dinner and he was just starving. He was starving, he kept eating and he ate a lot, and that turned out being a symptom of having a brain tumor. Wow, and um and he was diagnosed and passed away very quickly, and um she still remembers him and carries him in her heart and posts pictures, and people had the audacity, and I didn't know this woman's, I mean we were friends, I didn't know she we weren't best friends, but people had the audacity to tell her that she needed to move on. Yeah, I think that is a really that's not something we plan to talk about, but it's something we need to mention because please, please, please, please don't say, don't say that to anyone who has lost someone. I honestly, I I honestly, especially to a parent who's lost a child because that is such an unnatural occurrence. Our children are not supposed to die before we die as a parent.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:37

And just as importantly, when it comes to setting your own expectations about working through the grief process, don't set your expectations that you are going to get over it. Yes, yeah, and that the grief is going to go to a zero, and then it's just gonna be sunshines and meadow larks.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:57

Yeah, and I think you probably know gather. Over it are some of my least favorite words, right? And I tell people, I tell clients, clients people have had some very unkind things spoken over them when they've been going through grief. If you don't know what to say to someone who has experienced grief, please don't say anything.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:21

Yeah, and one of the things that I have learned through the example of someone who's a much who's a better man is that sometimes when someone is in that really wretched, fetid, dark place, they don't need you to say anything.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:39

Anything. They just need for you to be present, right?

SPEAKER_01 1:06:41

They need you to come along beside them and sit with them and walk with them or lie down next to them in their grief. Be a battle buddy, that's right.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:54

Um, and for for us as believers, we like to say this because it seems comforting, but to say they're in a better place.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:03

Oh, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:05

I mean, that sounds polite, it sounds good, and and I'm not saying it's all bad, but when we lose someone we love, we want them in this place. We don't want them in that place. Even though they may be free of all of their ailments and all of their things.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:23

Yeah, sometimes you just want a hug from them.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:25

That's right. We want them here present with us. So yeah, amen. We want them in the better place with Jesus having the best life, eating all the food, not gaining anywhere. May I point out in heaven, praise the Lord. I'm gonna get to eat whatever I want to eat. It's not gonna matter.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:49

Oh, well, Sherry, is that a good place to wrap up?

SPEAKER_02 1:07:55

As he puts both hands on his hips.

SPEAKER_04 1:07:58

Oh, Nathan, I think so. I don't, I don't, if I'm sure we've missed a ton of things. I do want to just acknowledge that there are some sometimes some people say there's seven stages of grief, but I think we just stick, we're sticking today to the five stages of grief, but I just want to acknowledge the seven stages. And I don't have them right in front of me, but I just want to acknowledge that two have been added. Um just know it's a process, yeah, right?

SPEAKER_01 1:08:25

It's a process, and it's not linear, it's not linear, and it's okay to move back and forth between them. That's not that's not retrograde movement, you're not regressing, yep, you're progressing at your pace through your own process.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:37

Absolutely, absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:40

All right, should we close with some gratitude?

SPEAKER_04 1:08:42

We should. And Nathan, this morning, earlier this morning, I was like, Sherry, get your gratitudes ready. And then, of course, as things do slip through my mind, but then as we were sitting here, I was I was thinking about it a little bit. So I'm gonna start first if that's okay. Um, and I've I've already I've already kind of said this, but I'm gonna say it a little differently because it it feels a little differently. I'm thankful for my battle buddy that I have and Nathan. Um, I have other battle buddies for sure. Karen is my other main battle buddy. I bounce back and forth between my best friend Karen and um Nathan as my battle buddies. And even he was my battle buddy yesterday, and I called her after I called him. Um, just because sometimes I need them both. But um is a battle buddy because he he is able to love those parts of me that I don't love as is Karen. She's able, and I'm her battle buddy all the time too. But I'm really thankful, Nathan, that you're teaching me. You think I'm your senior, you think, I mean, I am your senior, 21 years, right? I am your senior, but you think, oh, Sherry's the more experienced one. She's got all the stuff with psychology and stuff. But Nathan, you got a lot of a lot of the goods too, right? You're teaching me what true love, like we were talking before we started recording this, and I I I often say, I don't know that I've ever experienced true, true love, right? Because um, trauma attracts trauma. So to two unhealthy marriages were true trauma-based, but um I have experienced some true love, of course, much true love from friends. So I'm gonna say that, but also with my first ex-husband's grandmother, I experienced true love, but it's been a hot minute, right? That that's been many, many, many years ago. Um, it's been a hot minute since I've experienced true love, and Nathan models that so so well. And and I don't know how to explain it. He's he's the best, he's just the best battle buddy, and he's teaching me, I made all the things, but he's teaching me things I don't know that I'm not so familiar with, so I'm super thankful for that. Um, and he he doesn't get tired, he he doesn't get tired of that. I'm like, are you sure? Like, are you sure you're not you don't ever get tired of me, like these parts of me surfacing and needing, you know, a little extra love? And he's like, nope, nope, not I don't ever get tired, right? And I would say the same thing to him, but you know, when you're going through it, and oh, what did you say to me? Like, Sherry, are you asking me if you're being a burden? Yep, because guess what trauma does to you? Trauma makes you feel like you're a burden, like you're burdening people because some of those parts of me didn't that little girl for sure did not get to be present growing up. She was told little girl, little girls are to be seen and not heard, and I'm gonna give you something to cry about. So that little girl often was told, you're not important, don't have a voice, you don't matter, right? So, of course, she's gonna show up even at the age of now, 62. She still shows up. She still shows up, and she still needs to know um that it's okay. Um, so yeah, thanks for that. Thanks for thanks for loving that little girl part of me when I'm having a hard time loving her. Um, and I'm gonna keep working on that.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:20

Well, thank you. That is very beautiful and it's humbling. And know that that is very much mutual. Everything that you said, I feel exactly the same way about you. I am grateful for, I recently got to attend a professional event that recognized some of the losses that we've had over the years in in teammates, some that we know and some that we don't. And at this event, there were a lot of people there that I didn't expect would be there. And these are uh people who just have made such significant contributions and have been really significant in my life. They've been mentors in ways that that I think they know because I actually have told them, but it's difficult to truly express all that accurately in words. And I'm just grateful for that professional bond. I'm grateful for those people in my life. I'm grateful that I've been able to experience those relationships and that I know I know people like this who are who are worthy of respect and who are worthy of looking up to, you know, that that I've been able to look up to these people over 20 years and be inspired by them and learn from them and be humbled by them. And I it was it was just a very it was a very unexpected and a very cool experience. And I found myself like almost that entire time just right on the verge of tears. They were just they were just underneath my eyeballs, and I was working hard to keep it from getting into my eyeballs, but yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:10

It would have been okay to release them, right?

SPEAKER_01 1:14:13

It would have been okay.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:14

Even though I don't like to release mine, it would have been okay for you to release it would have been okay. Nathan has been blessed with some stellar people around him for sure who have helped to shape and form him. And his people give me hope. I tell him all the time, his people around him give me hope, especially the men, because he tells me sometimes men friends don't listen, his men friends don't listen, but he tells me sometimes about your communications, and I'm like, Nathan, dudes like that really exist? Yeah, he's like, Yes, they do. Because in my world of therapy, I don't get to see that very much because people come to me when there's problems. I don't get to always see, I do see the good side of my clients, but I see more of the the problems in their lives, right? Right, because um as even as a coach, I I sometimes see more of the problems helping them grow towards more a positive, a more positive future. But so yeah, your friends encourage me, Nathan, because um, when when someone's gone through trauma and had all the experiences we've had, we need to know there's the good people, we need to know there's good people out there.

SPEAKER_06 1:15:24

Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:25

We need to know that, and we need to know especially that there's good men out there. As women, we need to know there's good men, and as a man, you need to know there's good women. Absolutely, right?

SPEAKER_01 1:15:33

Yep, absolutely.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:34

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:36

And we want to thank you for coming to spend some time with us again. We know that your time is limited, it's very valuable. You can't make any more of it, and we certainly hope that you've gotten something meaningful out of this. Absolutely. Thanks for spending some time with us, and we hope you'll come and see us again soon on Divine and Most Unlikely.