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The Bunkhouse Live Pippa Bagley You’re Not Broken, You’re Exhauste · Military Broadcast Radio | MBR Talk

0:08
There were times I was looking at myself in the mirror, like,
0:11
dude, why are you putting on khakis?
0:16
Where Gunny Holly, who was blown up and killed, who had two
0:20
children? I lived in a reality for about I
0:24
think 15 years that it should have been me.
0:30
Your source of strength has never been you.
0:32
It has always been from somewhere else.
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It's just might believe that mine is from God and I, I choose
0:37
to rely on God. I'm far from perfect.
0:40
I screw up all the time, but my life is at peace.
0:44
I found it in past the storm where I am at peace.
0:51
When things got really bad, which they will, we all are
0:54
going to have times in our life where we just can't handle some
0:57
things. To know that reaching out for
0:59
help is an option. It's the same as going to the
1:02
doctor. When you you can't get over the
1:04
common cold and it's turned into something crazy, sinus
1:08
infection, you got to go to a doctor and get medicine.
1:10
It's the same with your mental health.
1:32
Hey everybody, and welcome back to the Bunkhouse Live here every
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Monday on military broadcast radio where we get veterans a
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voice. If you could before we get
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some some act, some real help. I'm all right.
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And before we bring my guest on, a quick word from military
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Beat got wisdom to share if you listen this week.
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So pull up a chair and stay for a spell.
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We're heading down the trail where good stories dwell.
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It started all right. Well, everybody, please welcome
2:52
Pippa Bagley to the show. Pippa, welcome.
2:54
Thank you. Hi, John.
2:56
Thank you so much for having me. It's great to be here.
2:59
No, absolutely. You are my first non American
3:02
veteran that I've had on my live.
3:04
So thank you for thank you again for joining.
3:07
There is my pleasure, I I love supporting our fellow
3:10
communities across the pond, so always a pleasure.
3:14
Yeah. And that that's one thing I've
3:15
learned with like the networks that I've started to kind of
3:18
interact with over the last couple of months is it's all
3:21
veterans regardless of where you come from that that struggle
3:24
after they get out. So definitely I appreciate you
3:28
coming on. If you could real quick, just
3:29
kind of tell everybody a little bit about yourself to a little
3:31
quick enter and give yourself, give us some background on it.
3:34
Yeah, thank you. So my name's Pippa or Philippa,
3:37
but Philippa is a mouthful. So I am from the UKI served 14
3:43
years in the British Army in the Intelligence Corps and a little
3:48
bit in the Royal Signals, which I, I try to not talk about too
3:50
much because, you know, the Intelligence Corps is better.
3:55
I also, so I did mostly a reservist service.
4:00
I also did a tour of Afghanistan as part of that.
4:03
In parallel, I worked in programme management for
4:05
companies like Lockheed Martin, Deloitte.
4:08
I'm now working in a science organization as their head of
4:11
delivery. And but one of the reasons I
4:14
think I'm here is, is I also trained in therapy and that's
4:17
what I also do now. So clinical hypnotherapy, I'm
4:20
currently finishing my masters in neuroscience and psychology
4:24
and I've done a whole bunch of other different therapy
4:27
modalities as we'd like to call them.
4:29
So I'm really keen to support the mental health journey of of
4:33
veterans, but the people, the people as well.
4:37
That, that's awesome. So coming from the British Army
4:41
and, and with the deployment in Afghanistan, what was the
4:43
transition like after those 14 years?
4:46
I know you said you mostly was in a reservist type of role, but
4:49
I, I imagine there's still some transition leaving even the
4:53
reserve side back into being complete full civilian.
4:57
What? What was that like for you?
4:59
Yeah, I think there were two points for me.
5:01
The first one was coming back from Afghanistan.
5:04
So the way it worked for me and, and actually this is incor in
5:08
general, you're often what's called an individual augmentee.
5:11
So you're dropped into a unit. I was dropped into a wonderful
5:15
unit of artillery and, and I worked with them and, and
5:17
actually U.S. Marines as well.
5:20
And I did my tour and I came back.
5:23
Now, what normally happens when you come back from deployment is
5:27
you're, you come back as a group and so you have your brothers
5:30
and your sisters around you. You've all had the shared
5:32
experiences. It's probably a little bit, I'm
5:35
not going to say easier, but there is more people around you
5:38
understand what you, what you've been through.
5:41
When I came back, I, I was back on my own essentially.
5:45
I was, I was, I came back at Christmas and whereas the rest
5:50
of my artillery friends were all back on base, I was back home.
5:54
I was about to start a new job actually working for Lockheed.
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And the first thing I remember actually was the silence was
6:03
deafening. And I'd been living under a
6:06
flight line of drones and helicopters and, and the C1
6:10
thirties coming in and suddenly I was at my parents' house in a
6:14
suburb and in Kent at the time, which is in South S England.
6:17
And I couldn't sleep because the silence was too loud.
6:21
My brain was constantly active and that was, that was really
6:25
hard. And, and again, like at that
6:27
point I felt I had no one I could talk to about this
6:29
experience because all my muckers were, well, it was
6:32
Christmas and all my muckers were at the camp or with their
6:34
families. But also there was no one
6:37
immediately in my vicinity who, who had been there who could
6:40
understand the, the next challenge is part of my job was
6:45
looking for IEDs. And what we would do is we'd fly
6:49
Overwatch with the drones and we'd go like, that's an IUD
6:51
sign. And you'd be looking for those
6:54
who've been untold know this, you know, changes in the ground,
6:58
piles of stones, behaviours, you know, you're constantly looking
7:01
for these things. And I must have spent at least a
7:05
month and a half seeing IED signs everywhere I went, like on
7:09
the pavement in the UK, the sidewalk in the UK, cracks in
7:14
the ground. And every time I were like, oh,
7:15
no, no, it's just normal crack. But I spent about a month and a
7:18
half doing that. And I would say it wasn't until
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sort of the August, so maybe eight months later that I felt
7:26
me again. And I processed all of that
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pretty much on my own. Now Lockheed, I'm sure most of
7:34
you know, is a, is a defence company.
7:37
So I had military people around me and I, I love that community
7:41
and the banter and the fact that that was still quite a safe
7:44
space. But there was still a feeling of
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that, you know, I was new to the company.
7:49
They didn't know me. They weren't there on that tour.
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What, what could I have said? And so that was probably the
7:56
hardest thing. I think the second part, as you
8:00
said, just leaving the reserves, I only left in 2021.
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I left mostly because my health just wasn't doing what I wanted
8:07
it to at the time. And when you spend so long
8:13
basically having two careers, there's an absence that's that
8:18
you don't realise. And not only that, again, I,
8:25
because I was in the Intelligence Corps, just so
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happened to have a degree in Russian.
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So you can imagine I spent a lot of time doing Russian.
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And I was at that point though, even in 2021, the British Army
8:37
had kind of stopped teaching Russian.
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So people who did Russian in the army were either people like me
8:42
who had ran to me, done a degree in it for literally Cold War
8:45
warriors. And we had the best
8:49
dysfunctional family you can imagine.
8:52
And probably, and, and we all know this being being being in
8:56
the army, there are conversations you just can't
8:58
have anywhere else and they're completely inappropriate
9:00
anywhere else. And I, my last unit was a unit
9:04
of specialist and it was Tri service.
9:05
So it's Army, Navy, RAF. And I always say I had like 50
9:09
mad uncles and a few mad aunts, that we were all linguists and
9:15
we could have really geeky jokes, but also really
9:18
inappropriate geeky jokes. And suddenly that was taken away
9:21
from me as well. And so you don't realise how
9:26
much that dysfunctional family really means to you until it's
9:29
not there anymore. Yeah.
9:32
What were some things that you kind of leaned on during that 88
9:37
months that you said to kind of that was the point where you
9:41
kind of started feeling like yourself, so to speak a little
9:44
bit more? What were some things that you
9:45
leaned on to kind of help get through those eight months?
9:49
So I had a really unhealthy relationship with myself at that
9:53
point. So the things I leaned on was
9:56
shit happens, work harder. That's what I did.
9:59
And I think that's a really common reaction.
10:02
I didn't discover therapy really until like the last 5-6 years.
10:08
And then Afghanistan for me was 20, 2011, 2012.
10:11
And so at that point in time, I would not have considered
10:14
talking to somebody. Also, I was the only girl.
10:19
And so, and this is just the way the world is, but if the girl
10:24
has a problem, it's a female problem as opposed to there is a
10:28
problem. And I was very cognizant
10:31
throughout my career of not being the girl with the problem
10:34
because you just don't want to stand out.
10:36
You want to be part of the group.
10:37
You want to fit in, you want to muck in the best you can.
10:40
And I didn't want to be the girl who had a problem.
10:43
And so I just thought, keep my head down, work harder.
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But I, I will be honest here and say I cried on my own a lot.
10:52
I racked my brains kind of replaying things.
10:58
I questioned many decisions that I'd made, but ultimately this
11:03
was my upbringing. Shit happens.
11:05
Work harder. And that's what I did.
11:08
And eventually I processed it. Eventually I got back to me, but
11:15
I it probably could have been done a lot more quickly and a
11:19
lot less painfully had I known at that point in time that it
11:23
was OK to talk to somebody. Yeah, that that's a, that's a
11:27
common, very common trend amongst all veterans that I've
11:32
talked to is we just, and it's, I think it's because of the
11:38
mentality that we're kind of brought up in middle of the
11:41
military with is you just figure it out, right?
11:44
Like you keep pushing, there's a mission to get done.
11:47
You don't worry about what you just push it aside, bottle it
11:52
up, keep pushing because you have a mission to do.
11:54
You got a job to do. And so we get really good at
11:57
being able to do that. And what I like to say is put on
12:00
the mask of being OK. You know, even even though we're
12:03
not, we, we, we are very good at pretending to be OK when we're
12:07
not. Yeah.
12:09
It, it's, that's one of the hardest things, I think is, is
12:14
getting to a point to where you're honest with yourself
12:18
about not being OK and how not OK you really are right.
12:23
I think that was, that was one of the toughest things for me
12:27
was to be honest, be completely and truly honest with myself
12:30
about how I was not OK After I got out.
12:34
I kind of same kind of story. I did 16 years in the Marine
12:37
Corps, deployed Iraq, Afghanistan twice.
12:41
And after four, after 16 years, like my body just kind of
12:45
started giving out and was like, you just like, we can't do this
12:48
anymore, kindly, right. And so my time got cut short and
12:51
not because I wanted to, but because my body says we
12:53
couldn't, we couldn't do the Marine Corps stuff anymore.
12:55
And so I ended up having to retire early because of that.
12:58
And so, yeah, I mean, I, I could definitely understand,
13:03
especially when you leave something that you truly have a
13:06
passion for like that, because I assume staying in 14 years, you
13:10
didn't do it just because you wanted a paycheck.
13:12
You, you actually enjoyed what you were doing, right?
13:15
Most of us that stay in long enough, it's because we enjoy
13:17
what we're doing. No one.
13:19
Does it for the money? No one, no one can afford to do
13:21
it for the money. No, Exactly.
13:24
Exactly. It's definitely not a a lavish
13:27
lifestyle. You know, it's definitely not.
13:30
You don't get a really good income from being in the
13:32
military. Like you really don't.
13:34
No. So yeah, no, I mean you stay on
13:36
the longest because you have a passion for it.
13:39
It is. And I, and I think I mean I
13:41
still miss it now and I still am very fortunate.
13:43
There's a lot of military folks that I still work with, my day
13:45
job. But what's really funny for me
13:50
is why I joined the army in the 1st place.
13:52
So I went to, we're talking before you're going to the
13:56
Northeast, to the best place in the world, Durham, if you go to
13:59
Durham. So I was born in Durham, but I
14:01
also went to Durham University. And in the UK, Durham is quite a
14:06
prestigious university. It's very academic.
14:10
And so I went there and I didn't have a clue what to do when I
14:14
graduated, but I did a four year degree in Russian and history.
14:20
And while that degree I lived in Russia while I was, I got hit by
14:26
a car. So it's quite common.
14:30
Well, this is 20 years ago, but it was still quite common.
14:32
Drunk driving definitely a thing.
14:35
And. I had to relearn on my
14:37
coordination and at that point I was really into martial arts and
14:40
sports as well. And I was like captain of
14:42
martial arts university. And so my 4th year was kind of
14:45
spent not just graduating but also rehabilitating my body.
14:50
And because I'm quite a prestigious university, it
14:53
obviously has an officer training corps.
14:55
A lot of my friends were in the OTC and some of this went to me.
14:59
Have you ever considered the Army?
15:01
And I was like, not really and and so I joined on a whim to see
15:06
if my body was fixed from being hit by a car.
15:09
Wow and. I loved it so and I like, I love
15:14
my way through basic training. Literally.
15:15
I used to giggle inappropriate moments, which probably wasn't
15:18
very helpful, but but when I went through basic training,
15:20
they'd never trained women before in this particular card
15:23
and they didn't know what to do with us.
15:25
And so we kind of had to teach them.
15:26
You can just throw us around a little bit and we'd still bounce
15:29
back. And it was OK.
15:30
And I, I loved the, I loved it all, really loved it all.
15:33
So yes, I stayed because I loved it.
15:35
I say because, and I still have great friends today who, who are
15:40
military, ex military. But there is a bonding and
15:45
camaraderie and a chaoticness that is so unique to the
15:50
military. And it's such a special thing.
15:53
And we, we lie to ourselves and we tell ourselves it's, it's
15:56
brilliant even when it's shit. But we wouldn't have it any
15:58
other way. That is so true.
16:01
You're not, you're like, you're absolutely right about that,
16:03
right? Like those, those are some like
16:05
when I, when I, when I talk to any of my buddies that I've
16:08
deployed with or, or went through anything hard or
16:12
rigorous with, like those are the times that we talk about the
16:15
most and laugh about the most are the ones that were the
16:18
shittiest times, right? Like those are the ones that we
16:21
laugh and talk about the most 100%.
16:24
Yeah, I mean, I remember doing field work and coming back into
16:30
transit accommodation where the shower barely worked more than a
16:34
drip, but just standing there and then.
16:35
And I never thought I bruised until I joined the Army.
16:38
And then I just had like, black and blue arms from leopard
16:41
crawling and scratches that I don't know where they came from.
16:44
And under this tiny shower and a freezing cold British night
16:46
going. It's terrible, but I kind of
16:48
love it. It it.
16:50
You have to be crazy to do that. Yeah.
16:53
Absolutely. So after you kind of started
16:57
finding yourself, what, what was next for you in in your growth
17:02
in in healing after that? So I, I think I said earlier, I
17:08
didn't come to therapy until about 5 or 6 years ago.
17:12
What I went through was, I mean, so I was in my 30s at this
17:19
point. I'm now in my 40s and the way I
17:22
can describe it is in my 20s I made all the mistakes and had a
17:25
really good time. At the same time in my in my 30s
17:28
I kind of went, oh I should do some adulting and and try to get
17:31
a proper career. Realised that I don't really
17:33
like adulting and a proper career really sucks.
17:36
And then in my 40s had the confidence to go what, who am I
17:40
and what do I really want? So I'd say I spent a good 7 to 8
17:45
years after Afghanistan and before in in the Reserve, still
17:49
playing the game, running around.
17:52
But I did notice in myself, I got increasingly frustrated with
17:56
with different aspects of both the military and my own life.
18:01
I found that I had a really increasingly short tolerance for
18:08
bad leadership. And you know, I said earlier
18:13
about being a woman and not complaining.
18:15
Maybe I started to complain despite being a woman when, when
18:19
challenge challenging what I thought was, was was wrong.
18:22
Not I think there's a difference between being a Dick and trying
18:26
to do the right thing for the right reasons.
18:28
But again, in the military you find that sometimes doing the
18:32
right thing isn't the easiest thing.
18:33
It'll just make you popular either.
18:35
So I, you know, I had some situations where I really felt
18:38
strongly about behaviour and I would raise it and it wouldn't
18:42
make me popular, but I, but I felt it was the right thing to
18:45
do morally. And, and basically I found
18:50
myself being very frustrated with the way that things are,
18:52
but also the way that people would respond to the way that
18:55
things are. And I realised in myself that
18:58
basically I, I had a lot of unprocessed trauma, not just
19:03
from Afghanistan, not from the military specifically.
19:04
I mean, there were, there were things that obviously weren't
19:06
great. But as you go through life, and
19:10
I think this applies to everybody in different ways.
19:13
The face that you put on to the world around you, the person you
19:16
feel that you have to become to order to, to fit in.
19:20
And in the military, you want to fit in because you want to be
19:23
part of that team. You want to be a reliable member
19:25
of that team. But also in the civilian world,
19:27
the same thing applies. We, we all want to belong to a
19:30
tribe. We all want to fit in, but what
19:32
we don't realise is the cost to ourselves when we're not true to
19:35
who we are. Yeah.
19:38
And so I think really the first step for me was understanding
19:42
who I am and what really makes me tick.
19:46
And then from that leads into well, how can I help others?
19:51
Yeah, No, you're absolutely right.
19:54
That's one of the hardest, that's part of the biggest
19:57
struggle that I even myself I've experienced.
20:01
But most veterans, I'd probably say, actually I was almost even
20:05
ventured to say all veterans that I talked to.
20:08
That is probably the, the, the hardest struggle is figuring out
20:11
who you are after the uniform comes off and why we're all in.
20:17
I don't, I don't know if or like with the British Army, you guys
20:21
do the same thing. But like, I don't know what I
20:22
want to be when I grew up, right?
20:23
Talking about when you get out of the military, like we joke
20:26
about that, but it's really true.
20:28
Like 'cause you got to really, really redefine who you are
20:32
because you've been a soldier or a Marine or Airman or whatever.
20:39
Like you've been that for so long.
20:41
Like that is who you've, what you've identified As for so
20:44
long. And it, it's hard to figure that
20:48
out. And it it takes a lot of work
20:50
and a lot of effort and a lot of sometimes pain even to, to kind
20:56
of work through that and figure out who, that, who you are now.
21:01
And, and I think it changes as well.
21:03
I, I like to joke that I've had a new career every decade of my
21:06
life and I kind of have, but, but all it is, is I think, I
21:13
think if you look at children, they have actually have it all
21:15
figured out and we just haven't realised it.
21:17
Like children know what they like and what they don't like
21:20
and they're very clear about what they want and what they
21:22
don't want. And they and they kind of go for
21:23
it because they're little shits who haven't learned that you
21:25
can't do that yet. Now.
21:28
If, if you, if you look at the cycle of life as you get older,
21:32
you know, you, you like, I look at my mum, she's now 76 and
21:36
she's very clear what she wants, what she doesn't want.
21:38
And she doesn't tolerate things she doesn't want to do.
21:39
And I'm like, yeah, And we all kind of go, well, you've earned
21:42
the right to be that way. She's not quite a little shit.
21:45
I should should make it very clear.
21:46
She's, she's fairly pleasant most of the time, but we, again,
21:53
in order to fit in, we, we, we've just mask ourselves
21:57
constantly and we, and we do it in every environment we go into.
22:00
But of course, in a military environment, there's a higher
22:04
level of masking, not because we're not being true.
22:06
No, it's not because we don't enjoy the job because we often
22:08
do, but because if you show that weakness, you could let the team
22:12
down if and you don't want them to think you can't do the job
22:16
because there's a hierarchy that you want to follow and respect
22:19
the the rank system. And even if you think that that
22:23
Sergeant over there is a dickhead, you know that you have
22:26
to follow them. It you, you give a lot of
22:29
yourself away in the military, but what you get back is that
22:32
dysfunctional family and that sense of purpose and that sense
22:36
of pride in in what you're doing, hopefully.
22:39
But as you say, when you leave, who are you and who are you with
22:44
no uniform and no rank and no even no hierarchy behind you.
22:49
And one of the things that that I've, you know, and I'm sure use
22:53
in this as, as people leave is that loss of, of who I am, that
22:57
loss of purpose. And for some people, you know,
23:01
they throw themselves into a new career.
23:04
For some people, though, they, they fall and they flounder.
23:06
And, and it's not necessarily their fault because I think the
23:09
other thing we forget about the military, it is a microcosm of
23:12
society. You have every walk of life in
23:14
there, every educational background, and part of what I
23:20
sometimes think is the biggest failing of the military is it
23:24
doesn't set people up for well enough when they leave.
23:27
And it's not a consistent thing. It depends on where who you
23:31
serve with, where you serve, what you did.
23:34
So me as an intelligence core analyst, well, I, I can, there's
23:39
a lot of transferable skills there.
23:40
Now, I'd argue that the infantry have a lot of transferable
23:43
skills, but does the civilian world see it?
23:45
Sometimes yes, sometimes no, but probably a lot harder than than
23:49
the, the challenges I have. And we, we have to recognise
23:52
what that does 'cause you might have served in Afghanistan 567
23:57
times over the last 20 years, as in the infantry and become, you
24:01
know, AW1W2, Gunny, all of these things like really, really well
24:08
deserved position. And then suddenly you're, you
24:14
know, a junior manager in a big company.
24:17
You know, you've gone for being a big fish in a small pond to
24:19
being a small fish in a, in a massive pond.
24:22
And suddenly everything you've done, everything you've done for
24:25
your country doesn't matter anymore.
24:27
And in some cases it's even not even respected.
24:31
No, I mean, you're absolutely right.
24:36
I would say I've been fairly fortunate in the positions that
24:39
I've worked since getting out of the out of the Marine Corps that
24:44
like my first job, I worked for a company that was contracted by
24:46
the Department of the Navy. So it was, so it was super easy
24:50
for me to fall into that because a lot of the stuff that I did in
24:53
the Marine Corps is what the Navy had to do as well.
24:55
So it was super easy for me to fall into that and being around
24:58
that was, was nice. But working for the company I
25:02
work for now, I was fortunate because the person who hired me
25:08
is somebody I worked with in the Marine Corps.
25:10
Now me and him were really like the only two veterans like in
25:15
our corporate staff. And so that was definitely a
25:18
change for me. And was I, I that was something
25:22
I had to get used to because again, working 100% remote too
25:26
is different. And now not having anybody
25:29
around to talk to you on a regular basis, like in the
25:32
office, like you would you just kind of just turn around in your
25:34
chair just bullshit, really just to kind of kind of decompress
25:38
from whatever like meeting that you just got out of that should
25:40
have been an e-mail. You know, it's like you just
25:42
decompress like that. And not having that ability now
25:47
made it a little bit, made it way different.
25:49
And yeah, I mean, there's no same purpose in my job.
25:56
And me doing my podcast is now how I found my purpose, right.
26:01
Like being able to have veterans on like yourself and, and tell
26:04
your story and talk about success and, and hope and, and
26:08
healing and like being able to do that.
26:11
That's that's where I found my purpose, you know, after, after
26:14
uniform. This is what gives me joy every
26:16
day is being able to do stuff like this, you know?
26:22
But yeah. I absolutely.
26:25
I mean, it's interesting about the sort of the being the work
26:28
remoteness and I think that really adds to the challenge
26:31
that we have now. I never work from home until the
26:34
pandemic. And for me then it was a
26:37
revelation. I was like, Oh my God, this is
26:38
amazing. Like up at 9:00 and go to work
26:41
in my pajamas. It's fantastic.
26:44
But I've almost gone full circle now.
26:46
And I was going to leave my, my day job to do full time therapy
26:51
and I do a lot of one off work, But I realised that actually I
26:54
need a community still. And I love doing therapy, but
26:58
that is one-on-one work. A lot of that is remote.
27:01
And also if the therapy, the therapeutic relationship is very
27:04
different from a, you know, a working 1.
27:08
And for my own well-being, I realised that the thing I need
27:11
is community. And so I now I get that in a
27:14
number of places. I get it from from the day job I
27:16
do, I get it from my therapy like cohorts that I train with.
27:21
So we still have that connection, but it's also from
27:24
playing sports and it's from doing languages and martial arts
27:27
and the things that I used to always do.
27:30
And I should mention my husband and my husband's all right.
27:35
But you know, it's making that time for, for connection and
27:38
relationships. And so we don't, people are
27:44
different. So my, my brother is autistic.
27:46
He likes working from home because going into London where
27:49
his office is, makes him very stressed, but he will do it.
27:53
And, and, but he's also not a hermit.
27:57
You know, he does need people. So we all need people at
28:00
different levels. The, the challenge is what is
28:03
the right level for you? So I, I, I'm still an introvert
28:07
at heart. I do like to have recharging,
28:09
but I I know without a community, without belonging to
28:12
somewhere, I am 10 times worse off than just at home on my own,
28:17
even if I can go to work in my pyjamas.
28:20
Yeah, no, you're absolutely right.
28:21
I think that's one thing too. Like I've, I've learned and, and
28:27
there's not a large, like there's a lot of veterans around
28:31
where I'm at. I cuz I retired out of a Marine
28:33
Corps base and I like, we stayed, we stayed in the same
28:36
area. So we're still around a lot of
28:39
even active duty service members, but there's not like a
28:42
really a big network of where veterans just get together and
28:46
hang out, you know, like, so like, like there are places in
28:50
the US that are like that. But I will say that even getting
28:56
into an online community, even just that little bit helps out a
29:01
ton. It's still feeling like you
29:03
belong somewhere, that you have a tribe.
29:05
It's everyone you can reach out to and talk to if you really
29:07
need to. You know it.
29:10
It helps with not feeling alone all the time, you know, even
29:13
even if it is via, oh, either a Zoom call or shoot, maybe
29:20
getting on once a month and and having a live episode with a
29:23
group of veterans like TOTS, you know, and so like just just
29:27
that, just that little bit even helps out a lot in my opinion.
29:31
Definitely. Funny enough, I went to my my
29:34
college at Durham. We had a reunion back in
29:37
September and my new best friend is a 70 year old man who
29:41
graduated obviously a few years before me.
29:42
But he has an online folk group that I remember of.
29:48
We had the formal dinner, we're starting each other and I was
29:51
like, tell me what we need to do.
29:52
And he's so but so once a week, people from around the world
29:57
actually join his online group and they sing folk songs.
30:01
That's. Cool.
30:02
It's so cool, I know. I mean, I can't wait to retire
30:05
and be as cool as this guy. But again, the point is, it's
30:09
just once a week. I have AI, love music, so I
30:12
always think music is all fantastic, but it's not
30:16
complicated, it's not difficult and you can join from anywhere.
30:20
And I think if you know, particularly if you're if you
30:24
are homebound for personal reasons or or medical reasons,
30:29
like you say, finding that community even online and you'll
30:32
be surprised at what you can do online these days, like join a
30:37
folk group. It's wonderful.
30:40
But it makes such a difference. And so many studies show that
30:45
connection is what gives us long life, that one of the biggest
30:48
killers actually is isolation and loneliness.
30:51
And particularly as a veteran, if you're carrying around that
30:55
those the stigma that we place in ourselves, if we carry around
30:58
whatever shame you think you may or may not deserve, finding that
31:02
community will hopefully start to heal some of that some of the
31:07
self talk that that we give ourselves.
31:10
No, you're absolutely right. And and I think we we're at a
31:14
good point. We're going to take about a 3
31:17
minute break real quick. And when we come back, we're
31:20
going to talk more about who Pippa is today and what success
31:24
looks like for you today. So everybody out there
31:28
listening, we'll be right back. All right.
34:30
Welcome back, everybody. And so before the break, we were
34:33
talking about how Pippa was, how it took her some time after she
34:40
transitioned out to kind of really figure out who she was.
34:43
And some of the struggles I think that a lot of us deal with
34:46
even after we start our healing process, How and also how
34:52
important it is to find your really your community or your
34:55
tribe, even if it's online. And so Pip, if you could, what
35:00
does success look like for you today 'cause I, I said this,
35:04
I've said this on, on some of my other episodes, like about
35:06
strength and success and what that looks like it when we're in
35:09
uniform. Like how there's a big
35:10
difference of what at least mostly I and most other
35:14
veterans, how we now gauge success and strength now versus
35:17
what it looked like in uniform. Can you kind of give us what
35:19
that is for you? Oh yeah, yeah, it's a great
35:23
thank you. I think it's still in some ways
35:26
it's still evolving. And part of that is because it's
35:29
it's still about me finding the best version of me.
35:33
But what what that's been funny enough, part of that I've come
35:40
journey was on last year, which was this whole thing about do I
35:42
become a full time therapist and success was raising how I
35:47
operate best. And that part we've talked about
35:50
earlier when like one-on-one on my own all the time is not how
35:55
you get the best out of me. And so I think just knowing that
35:59
about myself made the every decision that followed a lot
36:02
easier. And I've just slowed down so
36:07
much, which sounds crazy if people who know me well, but I
36:13
from a five day working week to I do a four days in four.
36:17
But before that I was actually really doing like a 7 days and
36:19
5:00. So it like this is, this is a
36:21
big deal for me. But what that's meant is so I
36:26
sort of work Monday to Thursday on the day job Friday.
36:29
Well, my plan was Friday, I'd be doing all my study and all my
36:33
therapy clients. But what I actually initially
36:37
was, was six months of just accepting the fact that I was
36:41
really burnt out and I'd just push myself too far for too
36:44
long. And again, that's something I
36:47
think anyone military can relate to because we just wired to keep
36:51
going. And I was doing, running a,
36:55
running a program, I was doing my master's.
36:58
My dad, I'll say unfortunately last year he got diagnosed with
37:01
dementia quite suddenly. It was a very sudden overnight
37:04
thing that happened where he deteriorated very quickly.
37:08
So I had that going on and I just didn't stop.
37:15
I didn't stop at all. And then Christmas last year, we
37:19
got my dad into a really good care home, so he was getting
37:23
looked after 24 by 7. So that kind of eased things up.
37:26
And then I kind of spent the next three months like feeling
37:29
really guilty for my mum. So I took on loads of trips
37:31
everywhere because, you know, she's on her own now and it's
37:34
already hard and, and doing that and then I'm still doing this
37:37
program and I'm still doing the masters.
37:40
And I got to 8 and I was like, oh man, I I just don't want to
37:44
do anything. And so I saw I made this shift.
37:48
So going. So now I'm still doing the
37:51
masters, I'm still working. But I'd say in the last couple
37:55
of months for me personally, I have structure and routine to my
37:59
life that I didn't have before. And before I was achieving all
38:04
the things for working all the hours and not sleeping.
38:06
Like I would go to bed at 2:00, 3/4, 5:00 in the morning and
38:09
then get up, like have three hours sleep and go, go on.
38:12
And of course, again, military, we're programmed to go through
38:15
sleep. We don't need to sleep.
38:19
But I mean, I, I, I logically know this must not be true.
38:24
Like I logically know the chemical damage that you do to
38:27
yourself by not sleeping enough and it deteriorates brain
38:31
functions and actually it can lead to Daniel down the line.
38:35
Higher risk of dementia, higher risk of Alzheimer's, higher risk
38:39
of of heart disease. Like not sleeping is a terrible
38:41
thing that we do to ourselves. But I'm so wired to just push
38:46
through. Just keep going, do it all,
38:48
don't let it stop. So success for me going.
38:51
Do you know what I did last weekend?
38:53
I stayed in bed half the day, had lots of naps, and I watched
38:57
some crappy stuff on YouTube that gave me academic or
39:02
personal benefit other than being enjoyable.
39:06
I allowed myself to do that. And then I got up and I baked
39:09
some bread and I made some muffins and then I pretty much
39:13
went to bed again because I was just so tired and and I didn't
39:19
beat myself up about it. I didn't say I'm not being
39:21
productive. I'm not, you know, I should use
39:23
every minute of my time doing something to to grow me as a
39:26
person. I went, I need to just recharge
39:29
and rest. So success is, is recognizing
39:31
that I don't have to push through throughout anything that
39:34
I can stop. I can do nothing.
39:37
I can do things that don't add value to me in some
39:39
developmental way, but just resting in itself adds value.
39:45
No, you're absolutely right. Excuse me.
39:47
And that's one thing I know for me, that's one thing I had to
39:52
figure out kind of the hard way was learning that it's OK to not
39:58
do anything, right. And like you said, it's coming
40:01
from the military. It's you're always doing, doing,
40:04
doing. There's always a mission,
40:06
there's always a task, There's always something that has to get
40:09
done or needs to be done. And so.
40:12
You just learn to keep moving and just getting things done
40:16
regardless of how much time it takes you like you said, stay up
40:19
till 12O clock in the morning, getting a task done, knowing you
40:22
have to get up to start work again AT56O clock the next
40:26
morning. And it's like you just, you just
40:28
make it work. And, and burnout is a real thing
40:34
in in mental burnout is probably for me, it was the most like
40:40
debilitating thing that happened to me.
40:44
Like it got to the point to where I just didn't want to do
40:48
anything period. Like I got to that point of
40:51
burnout to where I just stop even putting an effort to do
40:55
anything. And it just it, it, it was not,
40:59
it was not good. And it during that time is I, I
41:04
was going through a lot of like post retirement growing pains,
41:10
figuring out who I was and over committing myself to literally
41:14
everything I would put myself into and just burn myself out.
41:18
And it, it LED down some pretty bad times.
41:22
And I had, like I said, I had to learn the hard way.
41:25
A lot of us, that's that's how we have to learn a lot of times
41:27
is the hard way. But you know, I, I think you're
41:32
right though, like it is funny how we now categorize what
41:35
success really looks like, right?
41:37
So like the success isn't just always about completing the task
41:41
or completing the job. And I think you hit it just
41:45
right is because the success isn't you not doing anything for
41:49
the weekend. It's not like the success isn't
41:51
you laying in bed. It's the success is you
41:53
accepting that it's OK to do that to recharge.
41:56
Like that's the success in that story.
42:00
And, and I think the thing that I've realised, so outside of the
42:05
Army, I've been in very high stress environments as well.
42:09
So the Lockheed Martins of the world, they, they're, so I love
42:12
working for Lockheed and I think it's fantastic.
42:15
But it is a high stress environment.
42:17
And where I am now, I'm the head of delivery for a, what we call
42:21
a major program. So it's a program that delivers
42:24
benefit to the, to the nation. And so I have the responsibility
42:28
of delivering that. And I have every day loads of
42:32
people coming to me going, Papa, what do I do?
42:34
What do I do? And you're trying to empower
42:37
them to take control of their own destiny.
42:40
But the way these things go, people still come to you.
42:43
And funny enough, I was talking to my boss this morning and we
42:46
both got to Friday and I did I, I say I don't work Fridays.
42:50
I do some work Fridays if I need to.
42:51
And I, I worked a little bit and she had two and she was like, I
42:56
just couldn't speak. Like I just, I just couldn't
42:59
speak. And we, and the nice thing about
43:03
where I am now is I'm so comfortable telling people about
43:07
when I'm not doing well. And one of the, one of the
43:11
health issues I had was actually a thing called endometriosis,
43:14
which is a thing that women get. It's very painful.
43:17
And particularly in this organization.
43:20
I mean, currently it's full of scientists who are all super
43:24
smart but also super hopeless sometimes as well because it
43:27
goes with the territory. But it's the first time.
43:31
So I was approached to take on this program three years ago and
43:35
it's the first time I felt comfortable enough for myself to
43:38
sell even anybody who asked me that the fact I had
43:41
endometriosis and I was having a really bad painful day.
43:44
And This is why I have a hot water all at work because it
43:46
just hurts and it makes me feel better.
43:49
And what was really wonderful for me in, in that, in those
43:54
conversations was them. And again, a lot of lot of male
43:58
who went, Oh, I never knew about this.
44:00
It sounds horrendous. I'm like, yes, it is horrendous.
44:04
But having the conference to go, even if they hadn't been
44:08
sympathetic, I kind of didn't care.
44:09
I was just like, This is why I do it.
44:11
I don't have to tell you, but I think it's important to know
44:14
because actually a lot of women have this.
44:16
You all have wives, sisters, daughters, whatever, who are
44:19
female. So it might happen to someone,
44:22
you know. So I'm telling you now and
44:25
feeling confident in myself that if I am judged, that's about
44:28
them. That's not about that me.
44:31
And confidence to go to my boss this morning.
44:34
Look, I was just so tired on Friday.
44:35
I didn't do anything on Saturday.
44:36
And she was like, Oh my God, I feel you.
44:38
You know, these are the conversations I had, which I
44:40
think 10 years ago I would definitely not have had the
44:43
confidence to get to do. And 20 years ago, I'm said would
44:46
never have said a word. And I think that success is
44:49
being confident to have those conversations.
44:52
No, you're absolutely right. And I always say like my boss
44:56
that I currently have same thing.
44:58
Like he is so understanding and he has made it a very good like
45:04
climate at work to where if I need to take an afternoon
45:08
because I just feel overly stressed or there's like an
45:12
issue going on, He's like, he, he's not, he's, he's the type of
45:16
person that doesn't care about the amount of time that you
45:18
work. He's all about the results of
45:20
the work that you do. And so he's like, Hey, look,
45:22
like if you need to take an afternoon because of whatever,
45:25
like just go, go handle yourself.
45:26
He's like, the work will be here tomorrow.
45:28
I promise you, you know, And so like having a boss that's like
45:32
that and, and you know that somebody you can actually talk
45:36
to you about stuff like that. It it makes a world of
45:38
difference in in in your work life balance like 100% makes a a
45:43
world of difference. Well, and I think the same thing
45:46
applies though in the military, right in, in the stuff talking
45:48
about here, the mental health challenges, finding, finding the
45:53
people within the community. And, and I do think again, the
45:58
militaries of microcosm, you're not going to like everybody.
46:00
You don't have to like everybody, but you can you have
46:03
a shared experience, you have a shared understanding of what
46:08
it's like to, you know, even just going through basic
46:11
training, not everyone makes it through.
46:13
You know, it's understanding these these collective
46:15
experiences that give you that bond, which should you give you
46:20
the confidence to go, well, you did what I did.
46:23
So maybe you feel how I feel. Maybe I'm not alone in thinking
46:27
that. It's sometimes it's just like
46:29
it's just too hard or some days I just need I just need to stay
46:32
in bed all day and watch crappy YouTube videos and eat cake.
46:37
You know, I think if I could, you know, if I had one wish for
46:44
for us as humans, it's that we we get better at communicating
46:48
when we're down and stop pretending that we're not, that
46:52
we're OK when we're not because we're just not serving
46:54
ourselves, but we're also not serving others who need to hear
46:57
that message as well. No, you're, you're absolutely
47:00
right. And I, I think part of finding
47:06
that community to be able to, to have a shared related
47:12
experiences with it that make you a little more comfortable,
47:15
maybe make you a little more comfortable to kind of open up
47:17
and be a little more honest about what's really going on.
47:20
I think that's extremely important.
47:22
And I know you kind of have used some of your experiences and
47:28
your growth and how you now gauge success and kind of leaned
47:32
into that to add to the veteran community.
47:35
And just I think the the mental health community as well online,
47:38
like if you could, like how did, how did the Journey to Purpose
47:42
podcast come to kind of come about?
47:47
Great question. So originally when I started on
47:52
my therapy journey, I thought I wanted to do a podcast about
47:57
neuroscience. OK, now I neuroscience is a
48:03
really popular terminology and everyone talked about it and you
48:06
would talk about mindfulness, the real neuroscience or like
48:09
the breadth of neuroscience, I should say is biochemistry,
48:13
maths, physics and woo, right? It covers all.
48:18
And So what I, what I've quickly realised was that yes, people
48:23
want to hear like the mindfulness side of
48:25
neuroscience, but they don't want to hear about the Shank 3
48:27
gene that if you in a mouse, you can then test autism and see how
48:32
it works. You know, they don't want to
48:33
hear about that kind of what something else do.
48:37
So I took a step back and I was like, well, what, what do I want
48:39
here? And I and I realised what I
48:41
wanted, what I really want to do is help people like the service,
48:46
the mission. That's that still remains, but I
48:49
cannot help everybody. Firstly, not everyone needs the
48:52
kind of services Ioffer. Not everyone will connect with
48:55
me and I don't have all the answers.
48:59
So when I started looking at it in that way, I went, well, what
49:03
if I just found out what other people are doing and talk to
49:06
them about it? And this means I can learn.
49:09
And this also means that if even if one person hears my podcast
49:13
and goes, Oh my God, I've never heard of that before.
49:15
And that sounds like the thing I need or I recognise that story
49:19
of myself. Maybe there's hope for me.
49:22
Then. I, I think that that's kind of
49:24
enough. And and to honest, I learn from
49:27
every conversation I have with everybody and even I and I, the
49:31
only people I turn down are like extreme extremists of any any
49:37
variety. We didn't do.
49:38
Extreme, but I have heard people on the show who do things that
49:43
that like I don't necessarily believe in or I don't or I, I, I
49:48
would hear you and go really, I've still learnt from those
49:52
conversations and I tried to go in with knowing that I don't
49:55
know everything. I don't have all the answers.
49:58
And someone else might hear this and go, I, I do believe in all
50:01
of this and I want to learn. So it really is about giving
50:05
people a place to go and learn about other ways of being, but
50:12
also learning. That's the journey to purpose.
50:15
Like it doesn't stop because you change the changes, the purpose
50:19
changes. And that's also OK, and we
50:23
should embrace it. No, you're absolutely right.
50:28
It's funny you say that too, because when I first started my
50:31
podcast, so I, I started the bunkhouse back in early 2022,
50:36
right as like I found out when I was going to actually be my
50:40
retirement was going to happen. I started my podcast in early
50:44
2022 to state that it was my way to be able to stay connected to
50:48
the veteran community once I was out, right?
50:51
Like that's, that's the one of the biggest reasons I wanted to
50:53
start my podcast is to stay connected to the veteran
50:56
community once I was out. And the first, like when I first
51:02
started, my entire premise of my show was to have veterans talk
51:08
about their career path and journey in cybersecurity.
51:11
And IT because that's what I did in the Marine Corps.
51:14
So it's super easy for me to talk about is it's a very
51:17
comfortable space for me to be in and talk about and hopefully
51:20
give some veterans or even some transitioning service members
51:23
some, some guidance and some pointers on how to get into the
51:26
field if they weren't already in it or if they were in it while
51:31
they were in the military, what that looks like transitioning
51:34
out and doing that job in a saboon world, you know?
51:37
And so that's kind of like where my podcast really started.
51:42
And then we really didn't really talk about mental health a whole
51:46
lot. If we did, it was more wrong
51:47
kind of what we talked about earlier with the whole burnout
51:49
over committing and just really just wearing yourself down
51:52
mentally, you know, just with tasks saturation.
51:56
And then I decided that kind of at the end of 2022, I decided I
52:02
was going to, you know, start a second episode every month to
52:06
talk about mental health. And so I kind of shifted into
52:10
that a little bit and I recorded one episode on that.
52:17
And also at this time, I was only doing audio releases like
52:21
on Apple podcast, Spotify, like the the main podcast platforms
52:25
and it was audio only. And I was, I didn't have a
52:29
really good system for how I was doing things either.
52:32
So I would try to find my guest, I would try to record, I would
52:35
try to edit and try to publish all in the same month.
52:37
And that was a headache. Like I can like completely
52:39
overwhelmed myself. And at this at the same time is
52:44
when a lot of my downfall post retirement started happening
52:48
too, because I didn't feel like I was being successful at my
52:51
podcast. I was still trying to figure out
52:52
who I was supposed to be outside the uniform, having some
52:56
problems at home with the family and think there was a lot of
52:59
stuff that just kind of compounded on these all at once.
53:02
And, and so, and January of 2023, I decided to kind of re
53:08
prioritize some things on my life and my podcast just kind of
53:11
took the back seat and I, I put it down and it took me 3 years
53:17
to, to start it back up. And so last year I decided I was
53:21
like, you know what, I want to relaunch my podcast.
53:22
And so when I did it this time, I took all the lessons I've
53:26
learned from the first time. I'm going to do audio and video
53:30
this time, you know, so I was trying something different.
53:34
I was front, I was front loading how I was going to set up my
53:36
guests and record my content before actually giving it an
53:40
official relaunch date. So like I did a lot of the prep
53:43
work upfront and and I was like, you know what, I'm only going to
53:48
focus on mental health and life after service.
53:50
So complete pivot from what I originally started my podcast
53:53
on. So like kind of the same thing
53:55
is like you start it and you're like, is this, it really doesn't
53:59
bring me as much joy or it doesn't fulfill me as much as I
54:02
thought it was going to. And so I think having the
54:08
courage to pivot on something like that when you almost kind
54:13
of go all in when you started, at least I know I I went all in
54:16
when I started my podcast and had no idea what I was doing.
54:19
I just started doing it and was kind of learning as I went.
54:24
But I think being able to recognize and be able to pivot
54:29
midstream with stuff like that, I think that is another sign of
54:33
learning what success is because that sometimes failure can be
54:37
success, right? Because you, I, in my opinion,
54:40
you learn a lot more from failure than you do from any
54:42
win, right? And so like identifying that and
54:46
and having the courage to pivot and not call it a failure, but
54:49
call it success because hey, I'm now going to do it this way
54:52
instead. Yeah, I mean, there, there's no
54:56
failure, there's any feedback, right.
54:58
So we we can learn something, everything.
55:01
So, So my question for you then, John is with your pivot, with
55:05
your relaunch, how does it, how do you feel now when you're
55:08
doing the podcast? Do you still feel the same sort
55:11
of struggle that you had or or do you now feel that you are on
55:14
the path that you want to be, at least for now?
55:17
Yeah, no, I, I, I don't feel any of the struggle that I felt
55:20
before. I, I, I don't feel like that I'm
55:24
trying to force anything or force content or force episodes
55:29
because that's how I started chilling there for a while back
55:32
in 2022 and I don't feel that way anymore.
55:35
Also, when I relaunched in April, I was still only doing a
55:39
monthly pre record. Then I branched out 2 1/2 three
55:43
months ago, partnered with military broadcast radio and
55:46
started doing lives. First time ever doing lives, you
55:49
know, and so I would definitely say I, I definitely, I like
55:53
doing my pre records because I get, I get to have veterans
55:56
share their entire story, not just a portion or clips of their
56:01
story. They share their entire story in
56:03
which I definitely would love to have you on that one as well and
56:07
get your entire story out there if you're willing.
56:11
Always. But I, I will say I, I, I do
56:14
enjoy the dynamic of a live show.
56:16
Like I didn't know, I didn't realize I was going to enjoy it
56:19
as much as I have, honestly. And like, I'm at a point now to
56:22
where by the end of the year, I'm, I'm looking at doing at
56:27
least multiple lives instead of doing one a week, I'm going to
56:31
look at it, doing it maybe even like where there's two or three
56:33
times a month where I have two in one week, you know, just
56:36
because I do enjoy it that much. And I'm, I want to expand and,
56:39
and branch out and into different little pieces too.
56:42
So like, that's, that's another thing, finding a pivot point and
56:46
then figuring out what that's going to look like and being OK
56:49
with not knowing what the outcomes going to be and not
56:52
worrying about if it's going to fail or, or, or succeed because
56:55
success no longer is, do I get 100 likes or do I get this many
56:59
followers? My success is do I feel, do I
57:03
feel fulfilled whenever I I'm, I'm doing it and am I, do I feel
57:09
stressed while I'm doing it? If I, if both, if, if I feel
57:12
like I'm being fulfilled while doing it and I don't feel
57:15
stressed, that's success in my opinion for my show, you know?
57:19
Yeah, No, I think that's that's amazing.
57:22
I, and I also want just to sort of acknowledge the fact that the
57:25
commitment to do this as well, right, to do it live.
57:29
So I, I record, I prerecorded my, all my episodes and I have a
57:33
lovely system now. And I, I, I'm normally about two
57:36
or three months ahead and recording and it's fantastic and
57:39
it suits my, my lifestyle. But to show up live each week
57:43
that, that's a different level of commitment that, that not
57:46
everyone can do. And, and so to come back, I, I
57:50
love the fact that you haven't just come back to a pivot.
57:52
You've come back to a, a pivot, A nosedive and just see, see
57:55
where it goes. And that takes guts.
57:58
Yeah, no, I love it. We are coming close to time.
58:03
So I want to give you the opportunity to be able to tell
58:05
everybody where they can find your show and how they can look
58:08
you up for if they want to do an inquiry about getting into you,
58:12
getting being a client. Yeah, well, thank you very much
58:17
and it's been wonderful being here.
58:19
So you can find me at philippabagley.com.
58:22
So my name is in the title there and my show is on Spotify,
58:27
YouTube, Apple. There's a website I've got to
58:30
check how up to date it is, but the website is Jelly to
58:32
purposepodcast.com. I am very non judgmental in who
58:37
I take as guests and also very non judgmental as who I take as
58:40
clients in fairness. But if you just want to chat, do
58:44
you reach out? I am on social media, but I'm
58:46
terrible at social media, so it's probably easier just to
58:50
like, e-mail me via the website and I will get back to you that
58:54
way. Awesome.
58:57
I did grab your link tree as well.
59:00
So let me put that up on the screen.
59:02
So if anybody you can find her show information there as well
59:07
along with her, her her business as well.
59:11
If you want to reach out for her trying to be a client or want to
59:14
look up her show, you can find both of those there at her link
59:18
tree as well. So again, Pippa, it's been a
59:22
pleasure and an honor having you on the show.
59:24
Thank you so much for joining us.
59:28
Real quick, before we do sign off, if there's one thing you
59:32
could tell anybody that's listening right now, what would
59:35
that one thing be? If you wanted them to leave with
59:37
one thing, one thing, and want to remember, what would that one
59:40
thing be? Go and find anyone and just tell
59:48
them how you feel and sometimes a stranger is easier in all
59:52
honesty. So pick up that phone, call a
59:55
hotline, call your mate who you went through basic with, it
59:59
doesn't matter. But if you are somebody who
1:00:02
right now simply going, I just don't know if I can do this,
1:00:05
just pick up a phone and have that conversation and you'll be
1:00:10
amazed by how wonderful people truly are.
1:00:13
Absolutely. And again, Pippa, thank you so
1:00:16
much and for everybody out there that that stick stuck around
1:00:19
with us. I do appreciate you guys listen
1:00:21
again, like share, follow and until the next time be to
1:00:25
lighten someone's dark. Thank you for listening today's
1:00:35
episode of the Bunkhouse that this episode speaks to you or
1:00:38
made you think of someone who might be struggling.
1:00:40
Please share this with me and remember, you don't have to
1:00:42
carry this along. There are people who care and
1:00:44
there's always the next step. If you'd like to stay connected,
1:00:47
press follow and leave a review for more veterans and their
1:00:49
families can find these stories. You can also connect with me and
1:00:53
find other resources by following the links in the
1:00:55
shadows. And as always, you lighten
1:00:57
someone's dark.