Latest / Turning Grief into Growth: The Journey of Transformation / Episode #43-Sarah

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Episode #43-Sarah · Turning Grief into Growth: The Journey of Transformation

0:00
SPEAKER_02: Welcome to this episode of Turning Grief into Growth: The Journey of Transformation.
0:04
SPEAKER_02: This is a podcast that's hosted by Greg Jacobs and Don Lipstein.
0:08
SPEAKER_02: Well, good morning, Don.
0:10
SPEAKER_02: How are you doing?
0:11
SPEAKER_01: Good morning.
0:12
SPEAKER_01: Good morning.
0:13
SPEAKER_01: I'm doing pretty good.
0:14
SPEAKER_01: Um do you know what happens when a doctor gets frustrated?
0:19
SPEAKER_02: Well, I don't know, Don.
0:20
SPEAKER_02: Tell me what happens when a doctor gets frustrated.
0:23
SPEAKER_01: They lose their patience.
0:28
SPEAKER_02: Oh, you're always full of dad jokes on this good old Labor Day weekend.
0:31
SPEAKER_02: I know this uh podcast will drop after Labor Day, but uh me for one, I'm excited for a long weekend.
0:38
SPEAKER_02: But I'm not excited about the heat outside.
0:40
SPEAKER_02: It's nasty.
0:41
SPEAKER_01: Uh we just uh walked, and and I say we because normally I go with um Callie, my golden retriever, just her and I.
0:51
SPEAKER_01: Uh, but Carol joined us on a walk today.
0:53
SPEAKER_01: Nice.
0:54
SPEAKER_01: And uh yeah, it was.
0:55
SPEAKER_01: It was very nice.
0:56
SPEAKER_01: Um, she's kind of excited because she's got some things happening uh in the uh in the world of of careers, and uh so she's kind of uh she's like, yeah, let's let's go for a walk and talk.
1:13
SPEAKER_01: Nice, nice.
1:14
SPEAKER_02: Love that.
1:15
SPEAKER_02: You know, I walk with uh a friend of mine.
1:17
SPEAKER_02: We've been doing it every uh for several years, every Thursday.
1:21
SPEAKER_02: And I woke up, we walk about three miles around my town, but I woke up yesterday morning, I was like, oh, you know, I walk every day three miles.
1:29
SPEAKER_02: I don't have to walk today.
1:30
SPEAKER_02: I'm gonna take the day off because my knees are really hurting.
1:33
SPEAKER_02: And then I looked at my calendar and it said walk with Matt at noon.
1:36
SPEAKER_02: I'm like, ah, dang on it.
1:37
SPEAKER_02: But it was a good walk because I always love the conversation.
1:40
SPEAKER_02: Well, without further ado, we've got a special guest with us today.
1:43
SPEAKER_02: All our guests are special, Don.
1:45
SPEAKER_02: Uh, but we have Sarah uh joining us uh today.
1:47
SPEAKER_02: And Don, I'm gonna go ahead and turn it over to you to introduce Sarah to us.
1:52
SPEAKER_01: Well, I am delighted to introduce Sarah to our listeners.
1:57
SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, I've known her.
2:00
SPEAKER_01: We worked together for 10 years at TAPS Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors.
2:05
SPEAKER_01: I've known her for 14 years.
2:08
SPEAKER_01: And uh one of the things that I have found with Sarah is she's got a very high EQ.
2:16
SPEAKER_01: Um and EQ, for those of you who don't know, is emotional intelligence.
2:22
SPEAKER_01: And um whenever I talk to her, I just feel it.
2:28
SPEAKER_01: Uh I have a feeling um that it's going to come across in this podcast, not to put any pressure on you, Sarah, but uh but you know, it just she's she reads the room.
2:42
SPEAKER_01: Um and and I've noticed that she reads the room, she she meets people where they are, and I've always admired that about her.
2:53
SPEAKER_01: So um uh welcome, Sarah.
2:56
SPEAKER_01: And uh please tell us a little bit about why uh you are working with taps.
3:04
SPEAKER_01: Why what what brought you to this place?
3:07
SPEAKER_00: Well, thank you, Don.
3:08
SPEAKER_00: You're you're you have much too glowing a report of me.
3:13
SPEAKER_00: But I appreciate that.
3:15
SPEAKER_00: That's so kind of you to say.
3:17
SPEAKER_00: Um I have been working for TAPS, I think about 15 years now, or it will be 15 years in the spring.
3:24
SPEAKER_00: Um and I came to TAPS because of the loss of my husband.
3:30
SPEAKER_00: I lost my husband Dave back in 2004.
3:34
SPEAKER_00: So we're talking it's 22 years this summer.
3:38
SPEAKER_00: Um and at the time when I lost him, I had just turned 40 years old.
3:44
SPEAKER_00: He was about to turn 40 years old.
3:46
SPEAKER_00: Uh always kidding me about being the older woman.
3:50
SPEAKER_00: Um and uh he was in Iraq, he was due to come home in a few weeks, and um, we had very limited uh communication because back in the day it was emails, which we thought was wonderful, but uh that was about it.
4:08
SPEAKER_00: And it was only when he could get to computer and they had service, so it was it was uh sparse communication.
4:18
SPEAKER_00: Um but uh he uh unfortunately he was killed.
4:24
SPEAKER_00: Uh he was a helicopter pilot, he was um in a in a mission to support uh troops on the ground, and uh the helicopter he flew as a pilot co-pilot.
4:36
SPEAKER_00: Unfortunately, um some enemy on the ground was shooting up at the helicopter and and happened to get him, and his co-pilot survived.
4:46
SPEAKER_00: So um I unfortunately we had the the the white van pull up in the driveway, and the marines come to the front door, and I knew what that meant.
4:56
SPEAKER_00: My kids did not, and they reported to me, mom, mom, there's there's a white van in the driveway.
5:03
SPEAKER_00: There are some marines.
5:05
SPEAKER_00: I knew exactly what that meant.
5:07
SPEAKER_00: And um, boy, 22 years later, just thinking about it, still kind of takes me back a little bit.
5:13
SPEAKER_00: Um, so I I told my kids to go upstairs and play in one of their rooms, shut the door, and uh they were so dutiful and they did.
5:23
SPEAKER_00: Um, so I was informed right there in my my house uh that uh my husband had died.
5:29
SPEAKER_00: Um and uh, you know, immediately it it was very hard to get rid of the casualty assistance officers.
5:37
SPEAKER_00: They didn't want to leave unless somebody else came, but was able to convince them that a neighbor was coming.
5:43
SPEAKER_00: Um and just uh immediately called my kids down and held them.
5:48
SPEAKER_00: We just stood in the living room in a circle of hug, and I'm just crying and calling.
5:55
SPEAKER_01: How old were they at that time?
5:57
SPEAKER_00: Eight and ten.
5:58
SPEAKER_00: Wow.
6:00
SPEAKER_00: Um so just a very um uh so traumatic for all of us, and um uh just a very uh uh I will, you know, I'll never forget that.
6:16
SPEAKER_00: I think when I call my survivors, that that a glimpse of that always sort of enters my head to remember um where they are, what they're experiencing.
6:29
SPEAKER_00: And I'm very grateful that I can now mentally process that and think about it.
6:35
SPEAKER_00: And it's not it does not take me immediately back to all of the sensations uh and difficulties and um just the immediate trial of it.
6:46
SPEAKER_00: So um so grateful for growth.
6:48
SPEAKER_00: I did not think it was possible, but um anyway, that loss, uh it was obviously staggering, uh upended our lives, turned, turned everything around.
7:00
SPEAKER_01: So so how did you find um taps?
7:05
SPEAKER_01: How did you get connected with TAPS?
7:07
SPEAKER_00: I was casualty assistance officer gave me a pamphlet, I believe.
7:12
SPEAKER_00: Um, I believe somebody from TAPS did contact me.
7:16
SPEAKER_00: She tells me she did.
7:17
SPEAKER_00: I don't recall.
7:18
SPEAKER_00: I have a vague memory of talking to somebody who said that they were calling, you know, about what I had been through and they wanted to offer support.
7:29
SPEAKER_00: Um, but I was very reluctant, very hesitant, and uh did not engage with it.
7:35
SPEAKER_00: And it took a few years, and I realized doing this on my own is not happening.
7:41
SPEAKER_00: It's not working for me.
7:43
SPEAKER_00: This is extraordinarily difficult.
7:45
SPEAKER_00: And I remembered the pamphlet, I dug it out, I called TAPs, and uh I was ready at that point.
7:52
SPEAKER_00: So a nicest person answered the phone, um, convinced me in that phone call to make a trip to one to a big event um with TAPS on Memorial Day weekend.
8:05
SPEAKER_02: You know, all three of us have uh encountered the casualty affairs officers.
8:10
SPEAKER_02: Um, I think Don shares in previous podcasts about how he knew, I think a little bit before, just because he was on the phone with Josh before he took his life.
8:19
SPEAKER_02: Um, but you know, I it was real similar in the fact you said that you you saw the white van pull up um and your kids didn't know what it was.
8:27
SPEAKER_02: My daughter, uh, she was a senior in high school.
8:30
SPEAKER_02: She looked out the door and she thought it was two police officers uh locally collecting for toys for tots because it was New Year's Eve or sorry, Christmas Eve.
8:39
SPEAKER_02: Um so you know, it's just that whole shock factor and how people see this in the movies, uh, but we've lived it in in real life.
8:46
SPEAKER_02: So, Sarah, on this podcast, we have talked numerous times about B C A D as far as a timeline that we go off of.
8:55
SPEAKER_02: Um, and we really kind of change that a lot for for me and for you.
9:01
SPEAKER_02: Your husband's name is David, my son's name is David, uh, where it's more B D A D, before David, after David.
9:08
SPEAKER_02: Um, and that doesn't mean that after, like, you know, we he's he's gone forever.
9:12
SPEAKER_02: We don't keep his memories alive with us, we don't take them where we go because I do everywhere I go.
9:17
SPEAKER_02: Um, but do you had did you sense that as well for you that there was just a kind of a cut point in time where everything is just from that point on, and everything you reference, all that was before David passed.
9:29
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
9:30
SPEAKER_00: Yes, for a long time.
9:32
SPEAKER_00: Um, I that was a perspective or the lens that I viewed uh my life and history through.
9:39
SPEAKER_00: Um, I was so fortunate.
9:41
SPEAKER_00: I had um, I think 20 years of knowing him, 15 years together married, and we just we were soulmates.
9:50
SPEAKER_00: Um I as long as he was in the world, I was happy.
9:55
SPEAKER_00: And um he we just meshed so well and we're such a team and such a happy little family, and so so blessed.
10:05
SPEAKER_00: Um that we just we had this little unit that um really operated well, functioned well based on love and just trust and commitment, all the things that you hope for um in a marriage.
10:19
SPEAKER_00: So I was extremely nervous about his deploying, um, very upset about it, very concerned.
10:26
SPEAKER_00: I knew the gravity of it and how risky and um just the possibilities, what they were.
10:33
SPEAKER_00: Um, so yeah, I when he died, he was my rock.
10:38
SPEAKER_00: Um he was, you know, just the center of everything for me.
10:45
SPEAKER_00: Um, and uh that really started, which I didn't know at the time, a very spiritual uh search path uh journey.
10:57
SPEAKER_00: Um, because I I came to realize pretty quickly, oh, I I put all of my faith and trust in another person.
11:05
SPEAKER_00: And that that's such a huge weight to have put on him, and I felt guilty about that.
11:11
SPEAKER_00: Um, but also realized there is nothing, no person or thing that we that that I can put that trust and faith and and um base my happiness off of in the world.
11:24
SPEAKER_00: There's just nothing.
11:26
SPEAKER_00: So it started a big spiritual journey too, but um, for years after his loss, there was just lots of of recollection, thinking back, life before and comparison and um just for the first few years, it was just struggle, it was trial, and um I just felt compelled to fake it for the kids to make sure that they could grow up and they'd be okay.
11:56
SPEAKER_00: Um, but lots of meltdowns, you know, in my walk-in closet as soon as I saw his flannel shirt in the shower, around the corner, you know, kind of hiding a lot of uh emotions that really shouldn't have been hidden, but um very, very uh challenging time period because again, I didn't I wasn't anchored to any faith or anything when he died.
12:21
SPEAKER_00: Um so I was addressed.
12:24
SPEAKER_01: Sarah, can you talk to us about that spiritual awakening?
12:30
SPEAKER_00: Sure.
12:31
SPEAKER_00: Um I mean, I am a stubborn girl.
12:35
SPEAKER_00: So the I I apologize, Lord.
12:38
SPEAKER_00: Um I just uh I really tried to do things on my own.
12:44
SPEAKER_00: I kept telling myself for thousands of years, people have managed with this kind of trial with worse, and they've managed, they've they've um made it, you know, surely I can manage too.
12:56
SPEAKER_00: And um the issue was is is I didn't um life wasn't fulfilling.
13:04
SPEAKER_00: It just wasn't fulfilling anymore.
13:06
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I was obviously wanted to see that my kids were happy and and could um go forward in life and eventually, you know, be have purpose and meaning.
13:18
SPEAKER_00: And um, but I really struggled with worldview and understanding where where is he?
13:25
SPEAKER_00: I uh I immediately imagined him in heaven, even though I didn't have that worldview.
13:31
SPEAKER_00: Um so long story short, I started to notice other people angered in faith and how stable they were, how they had peace.
13:41
SPEAKER_00: They still mourned, they still experienced emotions, but they were navigating life way better than I was.
13:50
SPEAKER_00: Um so I started recognizing that and just um through time, I wanted that.
13:58
SPEAKER_00: And um, and I I as I said before, I really realized I can't put, you know, you can't put on any person, hey, you're my rock, you're my my stable, as long as you're here, you know, I'm okay.
14:13
SPEAKER_02: No, I go ahead, Don.
14:15
SPEAKER_01: I'm sorry, Greg.
14:17
SPEAKER_01: Um I can relate to this um spiritual peace and and uh faith.
14:25
SPEAKER_01: Um that but but what I've noticed, it doesn't matter what faith uh people have.
14:34
SPEAKER_01: Um it's that they have something that and and they've been able to manage their way through their grief.
14:43
SPEAKER_01: The people that I've worked with when when they have a strong faith, like I say, it doesn't matter you know whether it's Christianity, Buddhism, Jewish, Muslim, um, that they they tend to find their way through this grief and this life, as you know, as you uh put it, um, a little bit easier.
15:07
SPEAKER_01: Um that's that's something that I've been noticing with the the uh people that I do outreach with myself.
15:16
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know, and I've never made amends uh on your apologies that you know I'm a born-again Christian, and um for me, um I encountered a crisis of faith.
15:27
SPEAKER_02: Uh, you work with Taps, I wrote an article in the TAPs magazine uh a couple Christmases ago called Crisis of Faith.
15:34
SPEAKER_02: And it was just this real um aspect of I had a strong faith before David passed, but then trying to reconcile, I've done nothing but serve you faithfully all my life, and this is what I get type aspect versus somebody that didn't have a faith prior to their loss.
15:53
SPEAKER_02: A lot of times they gravitate towards the seeking and the searching versus the questioning uh aspect of that.
16:00
SPEAKER_02: Um, but yeah, like like all three of us have said, those that seek and uh and have that faith journey tend to move forward um a little more succinctly.
16:12
SPEAKER_02: I'm not gonna say uh they heal faster or they do better or whatever uh necessarily, but um I think it gives hope.
16:20
SPEAKER_02: Uh and that's that's really what I have seen is I have more of a peace and a hope.
16:24
SPEAKER_02: It doesn't mean I wasn't sucking carpet fibers earlier on on my face in the you know bedroom laying down or collapsing in the shower.
16:32
SPEAKER_02: Uh people always ask me, man, how do you do it?
16:34
SPEAKER_02: And I'm like, man, you didn't see me in those dark hours.
16:36
SPEAKER_02: And I still have those dark hours, you know, uh, but not as frequently.
16:40
SPEAKER_01: So right we we talk about sustainable and and not sustainable.
16:48
SPEAKER_01: And um, I think that's kind of what we're we're talking about here.
16:54
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, um, it's a sustainable way of of moving through our grief.
16:59
SPEAKER_00: Sure, through life.
17:01
SPEAKER_00: Um because this is the thing.
17:04
SPEAKER_00: After you've experienced a loss, especially a traumatic loss, you will encounter risk and threat and struggle again.
17:13
SPEAKER_00: It will come up.
17:15
SPEAKER_00: And that is what you know, I realized what's my plan?
17:20
SPEAKER_00: I I what I how I lived isn't didn't work.
17:24
SPEAKER_00: It's nothing to fall back on.
17:26
SPEAKER_00: Um, so yeah, it definitely, I mean, I also read some books about like meditation and Buddhism and other things.
17:35
SPEAKER_00: This was a whole journey.
17:36
SPEAKER_00: Um, but I just I wanted, I really became a um um an orientation toward I need to find truth here this rock, this truth somewhere in this world of chaos, because the world, as any survivor will will tell you, the we hate shock, we hate something coming up unexpectedly.
18:01
SPEAKER_00: Um, and how do we navigate, you know, when that happens again?
18:05
SPEAKER_00: Um, and I have definitely noticed in talking to survivors who have faith, even if it's early on, they are are they they have a certain comfort.
18:18
SPEAKER_00: They're in pain, they're struggling, but they have a uh um that hope aspect that Greg was mentioning.
18:24
SPEAKER_00: And it's giving it gives them a comfort and a um a stability.
18:29
SPEAKER_02: Yes.
18:31
SPEAKER_02: I was I was reading uh uh a book last night.
18:33
SPEAKER_02: I don't remember the name of the book, but anyway, I I screenshotted this uh paragraph.
18:38
SPEAKER_02: I thought it was really good.
18:39
SPEAKER_02: Uh it says, grief that is not faced stays exactly where it is, sealed and festering, and no amount of temporary escape from it changes that.
18:48
SPEAKER_02: The man or woman who puts down the escape mechanism and turns to face the pain finds almost always that it's more manageable when faced directly than it appeared from the edge of it.
18:58
SPEAKER_02: And it just to me, it's so simple but so profound.
19:02
SPEAKER_02: Um, you had mentioned uh it took you a couple years uh once like TAPS reached out to you.
19:08
SPEAKER_02: Um, I constantly tell people, you don't know, like I had a men's call last night.
19:12
SPEAKER_02: There were 10 dads around the country who had lost children.
19:15
SPEAKER_02: And I asked a couple of the newer guys who were probably six or eight weeks out.
19:18
SPEAKER_02: I was like, what questions do you have for the group?
19:21
SPEAKER_02: And they just kind of looked at me with deers and headlight.
19:23
SPEAKER_02: And I knew that would be the case because I'm like, you don't know what you don't know to ask or to even pursue or to seek or to do.
19:32
SPEAKER_02: Um, that's why I like calling these empathy calls versus sympathy podcasts, because learn from us, we're not experts in the field, but we have walked this path and we have learned what has worked and hasn't worked, what took a little longer, that maybe you can carve off a little time uh with that.
19:49
SPEAKER_02: So we talk a lot about peer support.
19:51
SPEAKER_02: Sarah, what would you say going back to, you know, because really that activation of emotions of taking you back 22 years ago to that day when that white van pulled up, what would you recommend to our listeners um that they uh pursue at the beginning of their grief journey?
20:10
SPEAKER_00: Um, well, I really try to um, if I'm talking to somebody who it's just happened, the loss has just happened, I really focus on, hey, we're trying to find some stability here because everything feels like it's not stable.
20:26
SPEAKER_00: I know what that is.
20:28
SPEAKER_00: And just keep things simple.
20:31
SPEAKER_00: And even if you're not used to doing this, allow yourself to lean on someone else, to let someone else help in some way.
20:40
SPEAKER_00: Um, this is definitely it's a community effort early on.
20:46
SPEAKER_00: Uh, you're doing this alone is extraordinarily difficult.
20:50
SPEAKER_00: And um, if you can even allowing someone to bring a prepared meal um or just to listen to you, you you've got we we are very good at being independent in our modern society.
21:03
SPEAKER_00: Um and grief asks you to be vulnerable, it asks you to rely on someone else to humble yourself.
21:13
SPEAKER_00: And it breaks you, it really does.
21:16
SPEAKER_00: So it's kind of a survival skill um to allow yourself that it's really um it's a comfort, it's a care.
21:27
SPEAKER_00: And and we're so used to being self-reliant and able to do things on our own as a matter of pride, it was for me, um, but to let somebody do something for you.
21:38
SPEAKER_02: And you said that you said earlier on that you put that facade on and that you faked it with your kids.
21:44
SPEAKER_02: How what what changed with that?
21:46
SPEAKER_00: Um well, it didn't work.
21:48
SPEAKER_00: It wasn't working.
21:49
SPEAKER_00: I was a couple of years out and I'm still I'm still miserable.
21:53
SPEAKER_00: I'm still uh deeply hurting, sad missing him.
21:59
SPEAKER_00: Um You know, there's uh when the loss happens, we sort of we have a choice.
22:06
SPEAKER_00: Um, we we can try and stuff it down, we can kind of become bitter.
22:11
SPEAKER_00: Um, we can try and stay where we are, but we you can't.
22:15
SPEAKER_00: It this is going to affect you.
22:17
SPEAKER_00: And or you can this growth resilience aspect that your podcast is based off of you have a choice to sort of um respond to what's happened and almost in spite of it to keep you keep trying, you keep moving.
22:34
SPEAKER_00: You you I kept, I realized I'm I I woke up this morning, you know.
22:39
SPEAKER_00: First thought, I'm awake, I'm alive, I have breath in my lungs.
22:44
SPEAKER_00: Why?
22:44
SPEAKER_00: Why?
22:45
SPEAKER_00: I really wish I didn't.
22:47
SPEAKER_00: I didn't have any kind of plan, but I just um life went to black and white.
22:54
SPEAKER_00: And uh there was no codachrome, no multicolor, there was uh just existing.
23:00
SPEAKER_00: There was not, I wasn't engaged in life, I wasn't um living, I was just managing, I was surviving.
23:10
SPEAKER_00: And um that wasn't working.
23:12
SPEAKER_00: I had kids.
23:13
SPEAKER_00: I couldn't, that was not um, it wasn't beneficial for the family, it wasn't good for me, and I it just I knew it wasn't right.
23:23
SPEAKER_00: I knew it wasn't that wasn't what where I was supposed to be.
23:28
SPEAKER_01: Um so your your initial reaction um was you know to do nothing, basically, right?
23:37
SPEAKER_01: To to just exist.
23:39
SPEAKER_00: Uh you know what I did?
23:41
SPEAKER_00: I got outside and I walked and I hiked and I had friends and we lived in a beautiful area, and they would meet me and we would walk and they would listen.
23:52
SPEAKER_00: And I talked to friends on the phone, bless them all.
23:55
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I I did a lot of external processing.
23:59
SPEAKER_00: Um, but again, you can go over something again and again in your head, and you can physically exhaust yourself at the end of the day.
24:08
SPEAKER_00: When you go to bed, you're still wide awake with this is this reality.
24:12
SPEAKER_00: And um, that that that was helping to some degree, but I knew it wasn't the solution, it wasn't a path forward.
24:23
SPEAKER_01: So you you had made choices early on and they weren't working for you, so then you decided to choose another another path.
24:34
SPEAKER_00: I well, the path chose me to be okay, to be honest.
24:39
SPEAKER_00: Like the Lord sought me out, even though I was resistant to I was walking, I was talking, I was deeply psychology, okay, the mind and how we manage things and willpower and just all self-seeking stuff.
24:55
SPEAKER_00: And it was not working.
24:56
SPEAKER_00: I came to the end of myself and I realized I'm trying to be the god of myself in my own world.
25:03
SPEAKER_00: And that doesn't that does not work.
25:06
SPEAKER_00: I I am a poor manager, I'm terrible.
25:09
SPEAKER_00: I need a manager, and um that that all of that revelation would it came with time.
25:16
SPEAKER_00: It took some time because again, stubborn.
25:19
SPEAKER_02: Um that that brings up a really good point in the fact that um a lot of times, so we were talking about spiritual journey on this, a lot of times people will talk to everybody under the sun.
25:32
SPEAKER_02: Um, and part of the spiritual journey aspect, if you have faith, is prayer.
25:37
SPEAKER_02: And I think that that's something that um going to the source is very powerful in uh and just being still and listening as well, um, because people don't have the answers.
25:51
SPEAKER_02: And they could be support and they could be moral support, the peer support, uh, and things like that.
25:57
SPEAKER_02: But it's it's hard just to um we want to be self-reliant.
26:02
SPEAKER_02: We want to think that you know we can find I I'm a businessman, so I I'd start off with manila folders, and I thought, man, I could go ahead and compartmentalize all this stuff, I can close out his estate, I can do this stuff.
26:13
SPEAKER_02: And it was like, man, this is with me for life, and I've got to figure out um what's working for other people because I have the I am in uncharted waters, you know, with this.
26:23
unknown: Right.
26:24
SPEAKER_01: I I know I grabbed on to the shirt tails of uh people that had been down this road.
26:31
SPEAKER_01: Um and like the first thing that I knew that I needed, and and actually I didn't know it until it it arrived, uh it found me, as you say, Sarah, was hope.
26:44
SPEAKER_01: I needed to have hope that I could get through this.
26:48
SPEAKER_01: Um, but before it before it showed up, I didn't know what the hell I needed.
26:54
SPEAKER_01: You know, I I was like so lost.
26:58
SPEAKER_01: Um, and then you know once I found that hope, then other things started to pop up that were um helpful.
27:08
SPEAKER_01: Uh, you know, the connections and and uh and Sarah, you know, I I think of you because I was still very new in my grief, even when I started working with taps.
27:21
SPEAKER_01: And um, you know, I just I I think of the people that made a difference for me.
27:27
SPEAKER_01: And you were you have been one of them, and and we continue.
27:32
SPEAKER_01: I feel very fortunate Sarah lives about a half hour from me.
27:35
SPEAKER_01: Oh yeah, like that's very unusual in the in the world of uh of survivors and you know.
27:42
SPEAKER_02: Does she know your lighthouse too, Don?
27:45
SPEAKER_01: She does, she's been here.
27:48
SPEAKER_01: She's been here.
27:49
SPEAKER_02: We're all jealous of this lighthouse.
27:52
SPEAKER_01: Well, she she she introduced me um kind of to um a pastor that uh I've become friends with.
28:01
SPEAKER_01: This guy, he does church on the beach.
28:04
SPEAKER_01: Um, and it's just an amazing talked about that.
28:07
SPEAKER_01: That's yeah, it's amazing.
28:10
SPEAKER_02: You know, um you you talked about just surviving, existing.
28:14
SPEAKER_02: And I just wrote down uh a quote that I use all the time not just surviving, but thriving.
28:20
SPEAKER_02: And I think I get this whole blank stare at from people that are earlier on, they're like, thrive is not even in my vocabulary.
28:28
SPEAKER_02: Right.
28:28
SPEAKER_02: I don't even know what that means.
28:30
SPEAKER_02: So I'm very cautious in saying, look, you don't even know what that means at this point.
28:34
SPEAKER_02: It's not even a blip on the radar, but just know that you can live again.
28:39
SPEAKER_02: And when I say live again, I'm not talking about waking up and this doldrum of having to put my shoes on.
28:44
SPEAKER_02: It's just another day, life sucks.
28:46
SPEAKER_02: Um, but you can actually thrive again.
28:49
SPEAKER_02: And one other area I wanted to mention is um I've found, and I'm curious if you find this as well, but I I have found there's a complexity to military loss um from the outside looking in, from people that are civilians.
29:04
SPEAKER_02: Um, for example, with your husband.
29:06
SPEAKER_02: Okay, he was a helicopter pilot, he was a war hero, he was shot down, um, killed in action.
29:12
SPEAKER_02: And there's this whole aspect of that that, you know, rah-rah, let's get the flag out.
29:18
SPEAKER_02: And it's like, but this was Dave, and this is my husband, and this was the father of my children.
29:24
SPEAKER_02: And it's hard for them to connect the whole aspect of the humanity aspect in the intimacy and relationship you had and built your marriage on versus the war hero.
29:34
SPEAKER_02: And it's not that there's any, you know, shame in that whatsoever.
29:37
SPEAKER_02: Um, but I see that a lot where they don't see the behind the scenes aspect.
29:42
SPEAKER_02: Does that make sense?
29:44
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I mean, again, grief levels you, loss levels you, um, trauma, and it humbles you.
29:53
SPEAKER_00: It break it broke me and it humbled me.
29:56
SPEAKER_00: And I no longer held in high value, or I I try not to, you know, great achievement, success, what man perceives as important.
30:09
SPEAKER_00: Um, that uh that went away in a in a manner of time.
30:15
SPEAKER_00: It took a while.
30:16
SPEAKER_00: I mean, we're all we all have a past, we have a history, the way we're raised, and uh our foundation.
30:22
SPEAKER_00: So a lot of that changes, can shift and change.
30:26
SPEAKER_00: Um, but yeah, for sure.
30:28
SPEAKER_00: I just, and the thing about Dave, he was so humble.
30:31
SPEAKER_00: He was such a um, he was did not want accolades and praise and big commentary about himself at all.
30:39
SPEAKER_00: He just wanted to do the job and do it well.
30:42
SPEAKER_00: And um, I love that about him so much.
30:45
SPEAKER_00: Um, but I I wanted to go back for just a quick second.
30:49
SPEAKER_00: When I first reach out to my survivors, like I'm entering into that that moment, um, you know, just touching on, okay, opening my heart up to what I recall.
31:03
SPEAKER_00: And there's so much value in that pure connection, that lived experience, there's the concept of hope.
31:12
SPEAKER_00: Um, when I call them, I think of I don't, I don't have a picture in front of me.
31:18
SPEAKER_00: I don't know much.
31:19
SPEAKER_00: I might see an obituary, it might have a little bit of background, but the way I look at it is my broken heart that's healing is calling another broken heart that's in it right now.
31:30
SPEAKER_00: And again, this is the spiritual aspect where I'm able to do this only because of the Lord, because this is emotional tough work.
31:38
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
31:38
SPEAKER_00: And I'm not a clinician.
31:40
SPEAKER_00: I'm up here.
31:41
SPEAKER_00: I've been through some professional training, I've been there for years doing this.
31:46
SPEAKER_00: But um, I'm, you know, I'm not a professional in the way we look at professionals.
31:52
SPEAKER_00: Um, but entering that space and talking to them and even saying to them, it it's not important to you now to consider growth.
32:02
SPEAKER_00: You're just trying to survive.
32:03
SPEAKER_00: You're trying to get through the these first days, weeks, months, years.
32:08
SPEAKER_00: Um, but it is possible.
32:10
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
32:10
SPEAKER_00: And I'm here to tell you that because I was the girl who didn't care.
32:14
SPEAKER_00: I wouldn't, if you had told me about growth in the first six months, I could have cared less.
32:19
SPEAKER_00: Um, that's not, you know, people in the moment, they're that's they're just trying to survive.
32:25
SPEAKER_01: So um that that's what I was talking about when I introduced you, that emotional intelligence that you have that is so important, I think, when you're doing the work that you do.
32:39
SPEAKER_01: Um, and you do it so well.
32:41
SPEAKER_00: Well, thank you.
32:43
SPEAKER_00: It's that's you know, that's lived experience, right?
32:46
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
32:46
SPEAKER_02: It's just, you know, and taking notes from the And I'll take somebody like you any day over a professional that hasn't walked that path, that has no understanding or empathy.
32:55
SPEAKER_00: And yeah, the beauty of taps.
32:58
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
32:58
SPEAKER_02: And I struggle every day talking with uh men that I know who have lost children, for example, and they're like men grieve different than women, they just pour themselves into work, they ignore it, they're like, this is gonna go away if I just you know put my nose to the grindstone, and it's like, man, it doesn't work that way.
33:15
SPEAKER_02: Um, but it's it's hard.
33:17
SPEAKER_02: You can't, you know, convince somebody they have to figure it out on their own.
33:21
SPEAKER_00: Right.
33:21
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
33:22
unknown: Right.
33:24
SPEAKER_01: And go ahead.
33:25
SPEAKER_00: I was just gonna say, I mean, uh my understanding of men, I mean, I have a son, so I raised him for much of his life, you youth without his dad there.
33:36
SPEAKER_00: Um, men do not want to sit three feet apart from each other, you know, no table, knee to knee, looking each other in the eyes and talking about their feelings.
33:45
SPEAKER_00: And I try and get this across to a lot of widowed moms who have boys, because you're the the valuable, important, productive things you're going to do and learn about your son, or if you're doing something, um, maybe side by side activity, something, um, that's where the valuable conversation will start to come out.
34:09
SPEAKER_00: So it should we're very different.
34:12
SPEAKER_00: And there's a reason for it.
34:14
SPEAKER_00: Um, but yeah.
34:16
SPEAKER_01: In a couple of weeks, I'm gonna be facilitating a men's group um in Acton, Maine, uh, October 9th through the 12th.
34:26
SPEAKER_01: Uh, but um it thinking of that, I mean, we are gonna be sitting around in a circle uh and stretching their comfort zones.
34:36
SPEAKER_01: I know that.
34:37
SPEAKER_01: Uh, but there's good reasons for that.
34:41
SPEAKER_01: And I feel like women, you know, tend to uh be in touch with their emotions easier than men are.
34:49
SPEAKER_01: So it's important that we help men to to figure that out.
34:53
SPEAKER_01: Sarah, um, as we wrap this up, uh, and I I'm telling you, and I think Greg would agree with me, I feel like we could sit and chat with you all day.
35:04
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
35:04
SPEAKER_01: Um you've been you've been a delight.
35:06
SPEAKER_01: But I um I'm wondering if you have any pearls of wisdom that you could uh leave our listeners with.
35:14
SPEAKER_00: Oh man.
35:16
SPEAKER_00: Um I would, I mean, something I've been thinking about uh recently is grief is a violent experience, trauma.
35:28
SPEAKER_00: I mean, it we we tend to think the violent experience was what happened to our person.
35:35
SPEAKER_00: Um but the actual the process of living after that, it's tough.
35:44
SPEAKER_00: It's hard.
35:46
SPEAKER_00: And um, I don't, you know, we don't talk about it in these terms or hear it, but again, humans are made for each other, and we are not meant to process something like that solo.
36:01
SPEAKER_00: Um and uh for sure for me, my faith has been so instrumental and valuable, but what we need concretely right now, especially in the immediate um time period right after loss, we need another human.
36:20
SPEAKER_00: And a lot of people don't have that.
36:22
SPEAKER_00: But if an organization calls, um, or if you have a number for an organization, and there are a lot of organizations out there that are there for people, um go to your church, go to your neighbor.
36:37
SPEAKER_00: You need somebody, you need to have somebody um who's there to kind of bear witness with you and um and to lean on.
36:46
SPEAKER_00: So I just humans are made for community for each other.
36:51
SPEAKER_00: And the this is something that even for the most independent, stubborn, you know, introverted, I'm gonna do it by myself, um, autonomous person, you're gonna need a human.
37:04
SPEAKER_00: And uh just just let them in if you can.
37:07
SPEAKER_01: And if possible, more than one.
37:09
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, right.
37:10
SPEAKER_00: Oh, a circle.
37:11
SPEAKER_00: If you if you can get some layers so valuable, you know.
37:16
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
37:17
SPEAKER_02: Wise words to leave us with.
37:19
SPEAKER_02: Uh, folks, if you see a resounding theme here, it's because it's there.
37:23
SPEAKER_02: Uh, we constantly talk about the importance of peer support.
37:26
SPEAKER_02: I constantly talk to people who say, I don't need therapy, I don't need groups.
37:31
SPEAKER_02: And there's just so much power in that.
37:33
SPEAKER_02: Whether it's grief share at a church, whether it's compassionate friends, whether it's taps, you know, military-related, whatever it is, find your tribe and uh people that can empathize with you, that have walked that road.
37:46
SPEAKER_02: And uh it's it's definitely needed and beneficial.
37:49
SPEAKER_02: Sarah, thank you so much for joining us today.
37:51
SPEAKER_00: Oh, thank you both so much.
37:53
SPEAKER_00: It's a pleasure.
37:54
SPEAKER_02: Absolutely.
37:55
SPEAKER_02: Until next time.
37:57
SPEAKER_02: Thank you so much for taking time out of your day to listen.
38:00
SPEAKER_02: We hope turning grief into growth spoke to your heart and becomes a part of your own journey of healing and transformation.
38:07
SPEAKER_02: If you know someone who could use a little hope, please share this episode with them.
38:12
SPEAKER_02: And don't forget to follow, like, or subscribe on your favorite platform so you don't miss what's coming next.
38:19
SPEAKER_02: Don and I can't wait to share more conversations to help you keep turning your grief into growth.
38:25
SPEAKER_02: Until next time.