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Goodpain Episode No. 006: Loss, Grief, & Recovery – Acceptance
142 Plays3 months ago
Tyler & Jeremy open this episode with a present-day reflection on the release of Goodpain Podcast and the first five episodes. The discussion moves to acceptance as a product of denial.
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Transcript
Introduction and Content Warning
00:00:00
Speaker
As a content warning, this episode discusses trauma, healing, grief involving a child, and catastrophe. Due to the sensitive nature of this topic, please take care of yourself.
00:00:12
Speaker
I'm Jeremy. And I'm Tyler. Welcome to Good Pain, where we talk about life's true intensities without pretending they're easy to solve. What if
Feedback and Audience Engagement
00:00:21
Speaker
the things we're told to fix, optimize, or get over are actually where the real wisdom lives?
00:00:26
Speaker
Each week we gather for the kind of honest conversations you desire to be a part of more often about the relentless demands, the unexpected grief, the quiet victories, and everything in between. Because maybe, just maybe, the answer isn't to eliminate the hard stuff, it's to find the good in it. Welcome to the conversation.
00:00:56
Speaker
we're We're in episode
Authenticity and Perception
00:00:57
Speaker
six now, five behind us. And we've started to get feedback. The opportunity is for us to evaluate what are we hearing? What do we think as we're even listening back to it and in hearing things? what What's coming up for for each of us?
00:01:13
Speaker
Yeah, I'll start with your thoughts. Yeah, so we were talking about this a little bit earlier about my friend who's a psychologist and whose opinion I valued, and I wanted to get his feedback first. And so he was very ah supportive and gave a lot of recognition about the...
00:01:33
Speaker
I'm not sacrificing the giving of the exchange and what he was hearing. And I thought that was super honest and also gratifying. I would hate for this to be perceived as just attention grab or that doesn't work. Right. And that's not what we're doing. So,
Challenges in Promotion
00:01:49
Speaker
um, so that was really helpful. I thought, um, um, I thought your feedback was actually much better because it sounds like it's more robust. Mine was very singular. I have a couple of people that have tried the, um, the podcast.
00:02:03
Speaker
And as I was explaining earlier, I think that the the entry point for this is tricky when i'm promoting it and how do we say oh this is what you're gonna getting into and it's gonna be fantastic and it'll be life-changing and i don't think anybody knows what that means and until they listen to it and realize oh oh i had no idea yeah you meant that yeah talk more about like the that that entry point of of even ah somebody you share with somebody hey we're we're launching a podcast sure and and what's the question they get and they they they say oh what's it about yeah what's it about and and and what what makes this difficult or or or just what what is your reaction to that
00:02:50
Speaker
Well, so you're wrong, first of all. The first question is not what's it about. yeah The first question is, oh, great. Another friend with a podcast. That's something to the end of it. ah So there's that. And then, um yeah, and they they typically will have some form of what is it about?
00:03:08
Speaker
And I will tell them, well, I would like for you to listen to it first before but describe it. I'm happy to talk with you
Community and Storytelling
00:03:13
Speaker
after, but I really don't want to taint the lens. I don't want to sway their opinion one way or the other about what they're getting into.
00:03:21
Speaker
But I think I need to do a better job of what it is they're getting into with listening to this because I don't know how to prepare people for driving to their daily commute or whatever and going to their kids' practice and they're listening to it in the car or whatever.
00:03:37
Speaker
So i'm I'm working on finessing that modifying language so that it's honest, but also engaging, because I think that I think there's an entry point for everybody with these conversations.
00:03:48
Speaker
They may not recognize they need to be a part of it. They might not want to talk about it yet. And that's, of course, fine. But um I need to do a better job. That's my challenge right now of how, how do we start getting people to, to give it a try and, and realize that it's okay.
00:04:04
Speaker
Yeah, I think, i mean, what what you just described first is we're wayfinding our way into what is the the life and spirit of two things that are deeply interconnected here.
00:04:22
Speaker
First is we've we launched Good Pain. And good pain stands for something that is, is bigger than me and my family's story. But our, our first point of entry was going to be this story. Yeah. and it's familiar. It's what we have access to There's no stretching involved. We kind of, it's there. It's available.
00:04:41
Speaker
Yeah. And, and it's,
00:04:44
Speaker
it's It's hard to, on on one hand, say, hey, we're over here at Good Pain. we're We're talking about shared stories, shared questions, shared wisdom. And we imagine ourselves gathering on the fire and sharing these stories. yeah Oh, whats what's your first story?
00:04:59
Speaker
It's tragedy and trauma involving a pediatric. And like and and so it's like, wait a minute. We... For me, even that wrestling with the classic questions of how do you position this? yeah Tiffany was at her pickleball group. She on on Mondays goes and is a part of a group of women who sign up and two instructors have high regard for Tiffany. And so when Tiffany shared this with them, that we were starting this and that we were telling the story, they were advocates.
00:05:31
Speaker
We're touched by
Connection through Personal Stories
00:05:32
Speaker
the degree of people that are around us that our allies and advocates. And these are two people that are at the top of the list. So they offered and and had Tiffany share the link to Good Pain and to the podcast.
00:05:46
Speaker
Tiffany showed up this past week and there were a handful of women who had questions. And this was one of the questions that did come up. Wow. what is what are what is the podcast trying to say? This is after they listened to episodes or no? Yeah, they they they had. And i when she relayed this to me, I had somewhat of a visceral visceral reaction to it. and and And my reason for that is i get that question a lot. You know me and my appetite for pursuing lots of different activities and interests and Tyler takes a deep dive at every turn for those you that don't know him Yes. yeah
00:06:21
Speaker
Yes. I frequently get that question. What are you going to do with this? What's your reason for this? And I have a relationship to those kinds of questions, which is that oftentimes that's, I understand that people are trying to understand my motivations.
00:06:36
Speaker
Okay. But I also feel that there are certain things that I do because we need to do them. I think it was Sir Edmund Hillary when he was asked, oh yeah why did you climb Mount Everest? Because it was there. yeah and um It's become so cliche now that everybody kind of gives that response, not knowing the severity by which those words came into the world. Yes. And the impossible task that was in front of him. Yes. Norgay was the partner. Is that right? Yes, he was. Yeah.
00:07:06
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I've mentioned that because that might be one of the closest approximations to why I feel we are doing this is because the story has to come out. And, but there's also an aspect of trusting that I've shared this story enough times. You and I have had enough conversations where we know that there's something here and it's not my job to defend it.
00:07:31
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It's not my job to give a reason yeah for why this is going out there. I don't have anything that I'm trying to say other than this is my story and my family's story through the lens of Tyler.
00:07:45
Speaker
Okay. Yeah. And it's important to share it because it is my story. And I think
Impact on Listeners and Cultural Shifts
00:07:51
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that brings us back to the importance of good pain is, is what we believe is, is that we need to get back to sharing stories because it's important to share stories. It's important to connect, to be in relationship.
00:08:02
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It's what create cultures historically. Yeah. It's what keeps people together. Yeah. It's what bonds them as a people. Yeah. As a group, as a community. Yeah. And we need to do that without creating some formula that says, i do this because it has this utility. The defense of. Yeah. It has this outcome that I'm trying to drive.
00:08:22
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Part of why I think where we find the disconnect with ourselves is, is that we live in a world that is constantly asking us to justify, to rationalize.
00:08:33
Speaker
It's all about efficiency. It's all, yeah what am I doing with my time? Why are you taking my time to be a part of it? Wow. Yeah. That's interesting. Even those who are are listening and following along with the story, i recognize there's going to be a struggle with says that says like, hey, this is impacting me. I think this would be good for somebody else. And they say, you know, well, why should I listen to this? Or or there's a pull to give reasons.
00:08:58
Speaker
Yeah. My encouragement would be rather than seek to convince about why you should listen and and why it's compelling is is that I think it's an opportunity for each of those who are along with us to consider why is this important to me?
00:09:14
Speaker
What is meaningful to me? Someone saying, I listened to this and Tiffany had this experience herself with somebody who has been listening coming up to her, who had himself been through a surprising episode with his mom where he felt isolated and alone. Yeah.
00:09:31
Speaker
And in listening to us, he shared with her, I was given language for things that I knew were always there that resided right, right in my solar plexus, right in the the heart of it. In the core of your being. Yeah.
00:09:45
Speaker
And I didn't know how to name it. Hmm. Not only did I know how to name it, but I i knew other people went through this as well. I didn't know my own proximity to that. I didn't know that I felt alone.
00:09:59
Speaker
I felt isolated. I can't do away with those feelings, but there is something to be said that I feel recognized. I feel seen and witnessed through hearing the stories of others. yeah And if there's anything that is really enriching to me personally,
00:10:17
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is not hearing people come up and say, your story impacted me when you said this. It's hearing them share back their stories. this Listening to your story empowered me to be able to do this with my story. Either validate it, recognize what's going on, see that I'm not alone, yes or know that there's somebody else who's going through this.
00:10:39
Speaker
Is that all valid? Absolutely. absolutely Yeah, that's an incredible gift. Yeah. You had said something earlier about the pickleball group and the question about what is the message you're trying to share? Because this is not light fair, as I mentioned, this is not ah an easy listen type of scenario here. Do you think that there was some dynamic of protection that they were, listen, Tiffany, we are crazy about you.
00:11:02
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We want to support the work that you're doing with the podcasts. I just need to know what to prepare myself for because this is a lot. This is heavy. Do you think there's a dynamic of that as well with the question? I think that's that's fair.
00:11:14
Speaker
I think that could definitely be one of the dynamics that's at play here, especially once people start making their way through the first one and are kind of blindsided. I gave a talk where i used the story and...
00:11:28
Speaker
Oftentimes i'll I'll describe it as the sucker punch, which is is, that, um, yeah, I I'm sharing this story and the context. And then all of a sudden I introduced this and people don't know what they're walking into. And, and I I've spent a fair amount of time evaluating what is the, what's the ethic of that for myself.
00:11:46
Speaker
And I'm comfortable with where I have ended up on that. The phrase I keep coming back to, and we've used it in episodes of the podcast, is we are stronger than we think we are.
00:11:56
Speaker
Some of the broader themes of what we're talking about through this scene is is that none of this was planned. We couldn't prepare ourselves for it. We could we didn't have a say in in in raising our hand and saying, yeah, we'll we'll submit to this. Based on the playbook that has been presented to me, this all sounds like something I can handle. That's right.
00:12:13
Speaker
That's right. That's right. Had that been the case, we would have said, hell no. i Sure. Sure. sure of course. So that's one aspect. Now, the other aspect of the of that is that that's not licensed to go out and just be indiscreet and just share this. It's why we have a content warning at the beginning of this.
00:12:30
Speaker
But we do believe that we are strong enough to confront, engage, wrestle with the intensities of life. And in a world where for the last 15, 20 years, we have had platforms that have been about key curating a life that is on the surface free of struggle, we know, and I'm not even going to reach for statistics or any research. We know culturally that what we are craving is more, when we say it, vulnerability, authenticity. Well, we don't get to condition that with, I want vulnerability, authenticity, and the genuine, as long as the messiness yeah is is kept still in the closet. I want everything you just described, but maybe a 10% starter.
00:13:14
Speaker
I can't handle the 100% yet. Let's yeah give me a piecemeal. Yeah. Yeah. I'm not naive enough. I'm naive in many different ways, but I'm not naive enough that, Hey, this is, you know, this is easy
Beauty in Tragedy and Personal Growth
00:13:27
Speaker
and approachable. Hey, just turn it on. And this is not the podcast equivalent of yacht rock.
00:13:32
Speaker
No, it's not. And I love yacht rock. Oh my gosh. i do guilty it's And there's a great documentary on HBO max right now. Oh my gosh. All right. Thank you. I have my evening planned.
00:13:44
Speaker
I'm here for the dance. I'm here for the dance of what actually just happened here is is that we're talking about a serious matter and then we we're we're jumping to Yacht Rock. And and like I want that form of flow more in my life. Everyone I talk to, everyone that's important to me, I'm hearing more and more frequently, whether it's because of the time that we live in or because of what people are carrying or what historically we've been brought to at this point.
00:14:11
Speaker
I'm hearing more and more people say, i want to re-engage in the business of living together, in the business of bumping into one another without automatically having these predefined rules that says, in order to engage, we have to check these boxes.
00:14:30
Speaker
That comes with some degree of surrendering to, I'm going to be surprised. I'm going to turn some corners. And I'm going to be surprised by some messiness, but I'm also going to be surprised by some beauty.
00:14:44
Speaker
In fact, I might be surprised by beauty in the messiness. Trying to disentangle those, I believe is folly. This is going to keep coming up in the rest of the series is like, that's that's even where I am. I can't disentangle the beauty from the tragedy of my family story.
00:15:02
Speaker
We've got to pause on that for
Managing Emotions and Community Support
00:15:04
Speaker
just a second, because what you said is incredibly beautiful and amazing. And there's some dynamic of evolution that you've been able to make personally happen. But I think most people are not in that place, right?
00:15:14
Speaker
ah Finding beauty when there's nothing but chaos and fear surrounding them. That's a huge ask. Part of what we have been conditioned to do, whether we call it compartmentalizing or cracking the code of how we get through things.
00:15:31
Speaker
Sometimes we do need to compartmentalize. i Like early on after Claire's accident, I needed to say there's this box over here and there's this box over here and there's this box over here.
00:15:42
Speaker
i didn't have the energy. And sometimes when something new came up, even putting it into a its own box, sorting it. Yeah. Or having the wherewithal to say no, to draw a boundary line.
00:15:53
Speaker
That chaos and not having the bandwidth or not having the tools or the training on how to do that. Maybe i don't have that training so that somebody who is witnessing what's happening can see what's happening to me. That I'm becoming overwhelmed.
00:16:09
Speaker
that that That this is adding to the chaos. yeah why So that they can find their voice to step up and advocate on my behalf. to come alongside and say, let me handle this, let me take this. And and sometimes I think we're so worried about believing that we need to to absorb and take on everything, all of the chaos, everything, sure that we forget that maybe I need to break down, maybe I need to be at my rock bottom because other people are staying on the sidelines until that happens.
00:16:42
Speaker
I wish that didn't happen. I wish we
Postpartum Experiences and Systemic Support
00:16:44
Speaker
had a culture that didn't require us getting to rock bottom right and potentially facing the abyss right before we can raise our hand for help.
00:16:54
Speaker
Some people don't know how to do it and some people don't know how to see those who don't know how to do it. And and that's what we're in process of bringing back because there have been points in history, there have been cultures that do this well. Yeah.
00:17:08
Speaker
We've somehow forgotten how to do that. That's why nothing we're sharing is new. don't I don't find anything that we're discussing to be new. It's that we've forgotten how to do it well.
00:17:20
Speaker
You're raising such an interesting question about the human nature of people's desire to grasp onto in these moments where nothing is familiar, everything is scary and happening at rapid pace.
00:17:33
Speaker
The desire to reach for and grab onto with a death grip of control and just, I don't want to let go of this control. I need to be able to account for what's going to happen next and know that this thing is going to be okay.
00:17:46
Speaker
But recognizing that i don't have all the answers and I need to be able to release this, but also that there are people in your life that will recognize that moment of you're about to get into a bad place.
00:17:59
Speaker
You need to step away. Let me let me take this away from you. I mean, those are ah beautiful dynamic of two people in theory, could be more, but a catalyst in that moment said, no, I got this.
00:18:11
Speaker
You step back for a minute. That's amazing. And also not the norm. Those are really special people. I think we even mentioned this in one of our sessions that we recorded two years ago. I think the classic example of that is postpartum.
00:18:25
Speaker
I don't know if I can disentangle the fact that is postpartum endemic to pregnancy and the process of of birthing a baby. Yeah.
00:18:36
Speaker
Or is it because of the environment we have created that does not permit for us to provide the support that's necessary? That's systemic. and And I don't think there's a clean answer on that. I think it's a mix of the two. yeah But what I
Societal Values and Storytelling's Role
00:18:51
Speaker
will say, this is what we know is, is that there's nothing about our system that's really established in a way that honors that stage of of life or for women. And we don't have systems that come alongside them out of a position of abundance because we must express this.
00:19:11
Speaker
We have plenty, plenty of commercial options. But as soon as we have commercial options, we're ignoring everybody that doesn't have access to those commercial options, doesn't have the means.
00:19:22
Speaker
And I feel that that reflects on us. That's part of what we are seeking to do with these conversations is to ask the questions and recognize we're strong enough to look at people's stories, to look at what they're experiencing, to look at what they're wrestling with, to look at how they're celebrating, to look at all the the peaks and the valleys and everything else in between.
00:19:45
Speaker
And use that as a mirror back to me to say, is this what I want to stand for in life? And then collectively to say, is this what we want to collectively lift up? And I think that we're in the process of saying, but we want to do this differently.
00:20:01
Speaker
Yeah, for whatever reason, this is not working. And I think there are studies that would support these numbers. People that are feeling less and less close to happiness. Yeah, there's so much more of a human scale that people could connect with that maybe is being ushered further and further away from the people who need it.
00:20:20
Speaker
This has
Recording Personal Stories and Acceptance
00:20:21
Speaker
been ah long journey for you to relive in having a conversation with me and also sharing with the rest of the world. Can I just check in with you about how this has been for you as far as process? you've You've alluded to the fact that we recorded this some time ago. It took some time for you to navigate through hearing yourself talk of these stories. You want to speak to any of that now?
00:20:41
Speaker
Big things changed in the last two years. That story might be something for a future Good Pain episode with a different topic. My relationship to that hearing myself talk about this has changed. Going through this, it's actually been delightful. I'm editing these episodes right now at about a three weeks ahead of when they're going to drop.
00:21:04
Speaker
It's a very different experience than what I had started to experience two years ago, which was two years ago, i was still starting to feel a little bit more re-traumatized.
00:21:15
Speaker
This one, I'm having fun with it partially because I don't even remember some of the things that we discussed. Yeah, sure. Time's lost. Yeah. So it's it's it's like, I didn't remember that we talked about it in this way.
00:21:25
Speaker
i'm I'm amused also by what we talk about. I'm amused by myself and the hearing myself try to think through things. Yeah. I'm finding it to be more playful. That is a really interesting juxtaposition to the nature of the topic. And what's being discussed is, is that I'm experiencing this playfully at the same time that there's serious matter here being explored.
00:21:48
Speaker
Finding that beauty again. That's interesting. What else should we say? I mean, this is, We thought this was a good opportune time to do that kind of check-in, almost like this wellness check and see, because it's now live, it's out there and we're getting feedback and we're hearing things and we're having things come up within us.
00:22:06
Speaker
It's its own new experience that's unfolding. This episode that is the episode where we talk about acceptance and it's up one of the more abbreviated episodes and it follows that episode on denial.
00:22:21
Speaker
I think the sense of acceptance, going back to that question you just asked of how I am doing this, that this that might be the best answer is is that there's a different level of acceptance that I've had in the last two years that I didn't have two years ago. right And so i'm I'm excited about the conversation continuing.
00:22:47
Speaker
If you had the ability yeah to change this reality, to deny this reality that's in front of you, would you do it? And that's that's maybe the bigger takeaway is the fact that we do choose to deny to some degree yeah as a form of coping.
00:23:06
Speaker
And at times, it's a part of the process, yet it comes with some costs potentially to ourselves. It comes with costs potentially to those around us. yeah And the costs are instructional, but they can be costs that we may not be interested in paying once we sober up, once we're further away from that. and I think that's the inlet for shame and guilt. If anything, that's the message.
00:23:29
Speaker
When we embrace denial, it's okay. So the recognition that it's an important part of this, I'm hearing you say multiple times, unavoidable. This is a thing. Everybody goes through it in various ways.
Journey of Acceptance and Family Dynamics
00:23:39
Speaker
You've also meant overtures to suggest that there is a transition to the other side of that coin, which is the acceptance. Could you pinpoint a moment or an experience or ah a thought or a conversation that you had with your wife?
00:23:53
Speaker
What was the acceptance piece for you? You asked, can I pinpoint a time when you know Tiffany and I talked about this? And i can. Yeah. I'm a little bit surprised by this because i didn't recall this until you asked the question.
00:24:09
Speaker
We were about two years in. i think both of us were on the same page that at this point in our individual solitudes been coming to grips with the fact that We're getting close to the ceiling of recovery, but we hadn't verbalized it to each other. And we were in Texas. And I think we finally resigned ourselves to saying there's probably not much more beyond this until stem cell research or something else.
00:24:38
Speaker
But trying still often a distant possibility. Yeah. Yeah. So I think the question of acceptance is one that has a practical aspect to it. you You kind of have to run down multiple care modalities, therapeutic modalities that you're going to test and you're going to does that recover some functionality? Does it do nothing?
00:25:02
Speaker
We had all of our maintenance therapies that were going on focused on stretching, Claire, physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech therapy. So there's the maintenance component to that. And then there's the strengthening component, trying to see how close we can get to a full recovery.
00:25:18
Speaker
Okay. And over time with all of those, we were seeing some things come back, but then we would see them plateau. Okay. And then we would switch to something else. And so the acceptance was this rolling acceptance where you're testing for one thing, waiting to see if it can come back online. Yeah. It doesn't come back online. Yeah.
00:25:39
Speaker
And sometimes those things that don't come back online don't mean that just that one thing's going to come back. It's a precursor to a whole bunch of other things that if you were able to get her to start using her mouth and lassoing the motor movement of her tongue and her lips, and well, then you get some feeding and then you get some swallowing.
00:25:59
Speaker
Then you get talking. And those first 18 months, we had a mix of having to accept that some things were unlikely to come back and some things kept us moving along.
00:26:10
Speaker
I don't think we really even had the time to catch our breath and realize that we had a hope for was whether Claire would smile or laugh again. Hmm. 11 months after her injury, both those things happened within a week of each other. And we were at home.
00:26:28
Speaker
Claire was on the couch. We had her propped up. And at this time, she's almost four. At this point, I didn't remember what we were doing, but we were doing something that we were getting just slight movement at the corners of her lips that resembled a smile.
00:26:45
Speaker
And so we keep going and and and we're seeing just this slight movement. We had moved on to the street with our closest friends in Texas.
00:26:55
Speaker
We call them down. Come over. You got to see this. godma Yes. It kept getting just a little bit bigger, bigger, bigger, bigger. And we saw her smiling, this cute little grin.
00:27:06
Speaker
There are times when we have been so happy. It's indescribable what is going through your body at that time. You're describing this and I'm sorry to, you're going to get to a good crescendo of all of this and I'm going to jump over and and just obliterate But I imagine that that was like taking a drug of some kind and you probably did everything you could you try to tease that out. Is that correct? Yeah.
00:27:31
Speaker
the experience of euphoria and seeing that, the word compersion, taking joy in other people's joy. wow It's just this virtuous feedback loop where there is no limit to it.
00:27:43
Speaker
And what you described then, the the degree to which we were willing to make fools of ourselves like to to elicit this. yeah Why do we not make more fools of ourselves more frequently for this kind of connection?
00:28:00
Speaker
and And oftentimes, you know, that is a touchstone for me to remember the ways that I abridge myself, that I hold myself in reserve. Yeah. When it's the most honest, yeah authentic expression from her.
00:28:15
Speaker
and i don't care if she's smiling because I'm making a fool of myself. It doesn't even matter. I just don't care. It doesn't matter in that moment for sure. A week later, i am at work and I get a call. And Tiffany and I have had to talk about this before is is that there's been calls that I've gotten where there's a gasp on the other end and there are tears and i'm bracing myself for bad news. And we've had those calls before as I just want to make sure I'm crystal clear on this. You receive a call. You are not doing the gasping. I was not doing the gasp. I hear it. yeah okay No words.
00:28:45
Speaker
In this case, hearing through tears, Claire laughed. Wow. I'm out of my chair as I'm hanging the phone. Yeah. I run to my boss's office. I say, I'm leaving. gotta go. Claire just laughed. And just left.
00:28:58
Speaker
And we have video of it now. Wow. 11 months, you don't remember how much you miss something until it's been gone for 11 months and it's now shocked you.
00:29:11
Speaker
It's blindsided you in the best way possible. It's greater than it ever would have been had you not lacked the experience of having it for a period of time. Yeah. I think those are the kinds of things that, for me, were the sustaining pieces that broke through the denial and actually drove towards acceptance.
00:29:29
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. They were gifts that were never guaranteed to be given to us. Yeah. Claire doesn't smile or laugh now as frequently as she did.
00:29:40
Speaker
you know, there's been periods of times where we've gone, you know, a couple of years and not seen or heard her laugh. There's some clinical reasons for that. We feel there's also some teenager reasons for that. She's just a sullen teenager now that she's. That was very much me when I was a teenager. Yes. I get that. She can be cheeky.
00:29:58
Speaker
We hear stories of her going to class with her teacher and she will do something right on the edge yeah and she will, ah she'll smile a little bit and chuckle. And our nurse brings that back to us. And it as desperate as we sometimes make ourselves out to be for wanting to hear that there's also something that,
00:30:17
Speaker
about hearing she's now reserving the laughing and smiling even for herself. She's triggering it It's not us being the ones that are making fools of ourselves to do it. She's finding things that are funny to her yeah and reserving enjoyment for those. And even that has a new richness to it.
00:30:40
Speaker
And it's a new ask of us to accept something else that is something we've always said for all of our daughters is they are their own autonomous individuals. When she does choose to laugh or smile with us, it's even more of a gift.
00:30:55
Speaker
She's choosing to. yeah We've also gone through acceptance as a fatalistic approach where it's like, I guess this is just it. We're just going to have to get used to this.
00:31:06
Speaker
Going back to last week, I think that word just was is is can sometimes be a signpost for that and andoling you know resigning ourselves as opposed to embracing.
00:31:19
Speaker
yeah I don't want to belabor the clarity aspect of acceptance that it's, you know, there's good acceptance and there's there's bad acceptance. No, totally, it's a spectrum, right? Yeah, it's an interplay and it's an interplay with denial. it's an interplay with some of the others that and we'll end up talking about as well.
00:31:38
Speaker
Acceptance might just be part of a process. Sure. There's going to be forms of acceptance, forms of denial, and the timing between those will change. The further away we get, the more we get into the the new normal, the cadence, the routine.
00:31:53
Speaker
But it is a process.
00:32:00
Speaker
Sit tight and we'll
Vulnerability and Cultural Challenges
00:32:01
Speaker
be right back after this short break.
00:32:09
Speaker
Marco, you come to my office on the day of my daughter's wedding, asking for forgiveness. Don Antonio, I can explain. Silencio, you violated our trust.
00:32:23
Speaker
You took what was not yours. In the old days, such betrayal would be met with swift justice. Please, Don Antonio, I have a family.
00:32:36
Speaker
Your betrayal can only be met with one unequivocal response. Kindness, forbearance, compassion and forgiveness.
00:32:49
Speaker
Don Antonio? You see, Marco, I have learned something. Pain. Real pain. It teaches us. Your betrayal?
00:33:00
Speaker
It shows me who I want to be, not who I was. But boss, what about respect? True respect comes from growth, not fear.
00:33:12
Speaker
There's a place called GoodPainCo.com. They understand this. Subscribe to their newsletter, the podcast on Apple and Spotify.
00:33:24
Speaker
Learn what I learned. I don't understand. The old ways died with my pride, Marco. Go. Share this story. Like it.
00:33:34
Speaker
Review it. Tell others how healing happens. So what do we do with him boss? Take the love. Leave the unholy.
00:33:50
Speaker
Welcome back to the rest of the episode.
00:33:58
Speaker
Yeah, for sure. I just came and wrapped my head around what those moments must have been like. You have laughter again a time. does it seem like seems like it was coming from the source that you most desperately wanted it to, but maybe the message was not that, oh, that thing was funny.
00:34:17
Speaker
But it's like, okay, you're going to be okay in some capacity. And um my gosh, that's a huge gift. Yeah. One
Milestones in Recovery and Resilience
00:34:25
Speaker
of the things that Tiffany and I were on different stages for this, I was much more aware and and and cautious of false hope.
00:34:33
Speaker
We talked about this yeah previously. And and and so interpreting. Events like this has, has a gravity towards a lot of storytelling.
00:34:47
Speaker
Okay. and, but comedy and humor is, and, and the ability to laugh and react it it's one that you ask the question of what what does that mean? Like, what is she getting? What is at this time?
00:35:02
Speaker
You know, we had had the report from that neurologist that her MRI was, this was the neuro neurologist who, said, you know, he, he didn't see any reason why she wouldn't be able to laugh and talk and walk. And we've got one of those things, but we don't have the others. So, so there was an aspect here of, of we had accepted at this point, a number of things, but then we're surprised by, we're surprised because we actually hadn't even thought about, you know, when was last time Claire laughed? Like we, we were, we were too, were just treading water at this time, but then all of a sudden we're surprised by, oh we forgot.
00:35:39
Speaker
And she laughed. Checklists yeah in your mind. it was yes out of nowhere. Yeah. Yeah. And so it almost hit the reset button a little bit on, on things that we thought we had accepted and put to bed and, or we're in the process of accepting and putting to bed that now it,
00:35:57
Speaker
it opened things up for, for more potentially possibilities. And, and it creates this, this roller coaster. And I, this is the piece that i haven't even parsed out the, the nature of human resiliency and,
00:36:14
Speaker
how oftentimes we're the the gift of her laughing is also the initiation into a new roller coaster you know youd you we felt that in one degree we'd finally reached maybe something where things weren't undulating as much there wasn't much volatility and things are starting to calm down and then all of a sudden this great news is introduced into it we celebrate at the same same time that now all of a sudden undulations start and even so even just about that is as is that now we've gotten her to laugh every day we're trying to get her to laugh and sure yeah and then there's this decreasing you know this marginal return of doing the exact same thing over and over again it's not getting the same response so we've got to either up our antics or yeah and you're just back on this roller coaster and
00:37:09
Speaker
Denial is still part of this conversation in the moment. yeah It's, it's maybe in this situation, i mean, we could have gotten to a point where at that point, you know, we're denying that she's, you know, denying some aspect of reality and her recovery. And then, you know, after six months, we kind of come around to accepting that we're not going to see her smile or, or laugh again. if that had been in our, in our frame of mind, And then she does it, she surprises us, and now we're in the denial of reality again and and maybe you know being a little bit more hopeful as we look at things.
00:37:49
Speaker
It is such a picture. As much as the charge of emotionality is we're talking about something like this that feels so stark. It is such a picture of just so much of what we experience in general.
00:38:06
Speaker
I can describe this same cycle for when I was, you know, hoping to get a certain job and I had interviewed for it and that denial and acceptance and going back and forth. Of course. Yeah. We've all been there. Yeah. We get that.
00:38:22
Speaker
i For me, there's the I wrote something down about this, and it starts with a Parker Palmer quote again. There's no way to be human without having one's heart broken.
00:38:35
Speaker
That's what he said. And he follows that up and describes that having one's heart broken, broken wide open is the core of my sense of self.
00:38:45
Speaker
Like, what does it mean to... to have one's heart broken, it means that there's something that has attacked the core of, of my sense of self. And, and I think that that, that roller coaster of that roller coaster that
Defiance, Cultural Expectations, and Grief
00:39:01
Speaker
we sometimes work, you know, for denial and acceptance to kind of take the vault volatility of that, at least on the denial side. And, and it might even be, you know lending some of this to the acceptance side is, is that,
00:39:13
Speaker
Some of this is rooted and in a desperate cry stop being human, to say that, you know, ah enough. i've had enough. It's too hard. I cannot bear anymore. Like if, if this continues to weigh on me to break my heart open more and more, like that core of the sense of myself is going to disappear. Like I,
00:39:38
Speaker
And yet, and yet the reason I bring up how this is so reflective of so many other aspects of life is like, this is our shared experience of being human that, yeah that rollercoaster we, if anything, I, I, I think for a long time, I denied my, my predisposition and preference for highs and my resistance towards the lows and,
00:40:05
Speaker
And I have moved closer to an acceptance that I don't get the highs without the lows. And, and, and that's denying that that was possible or working for things to be consistently good or for me to get everything that I want in the moment is a form of denial that, that my growth,
00:40:27
Speaker
My love for Claire, my love for my family, the euphoria experience. like I could never have experienced that euphoria. Autumn and Heidi couldn't have experienced the euphoria without her smile disappearing.
00:40:42
Speaker
for a while yeah and i i don't say this to be a a sadist or to try to encourage that that we ought to look for these uh these you know or create these things it's right it's that wrong yeah absolutely it's it's more of a how do we how do we commune with these how do we how do we build community yeah that invites both of these things to the table understanding that that this is what this is what life is It is going to be ah give and take.
00:41:15
Speaker
Yeah, it's going to be up and down. Yeah. the The concept of this being linear with ah within finish line is wildly absurd, I assume. And so it has to have twists and turns and nuance and undulation and surprises and hopefully moments of poignancy and joy as well. um You're alluding to a topic that maybe we should talk about in another conversation about...
00:41:44
Speaker
community and these other things absolutely this a fair place to put a wrap this one up and yeah i think i yeah i think this is definitely a fair place i think the the denial piece of of uh that we've been talking about i think then gives gives way to another form that we'll talk about next time which is okay so maybe if i i have accepted that there's ups and downs now i'm going to control the sizes of those ups and downs and and i'm going to live in defiance of nothing's going to be dictated towards me i'm going to wrestle this thing to the ground yeah and it's not going to dictate
00:42:21
Speaker
eight uh anything about what can and cannot be done yeah and i think that's the next piece is is that um if anything i think that that's the more rambunctious version of of of this that um that oftentimes also is celebrated and expected, um, at the very least because of the culture that, that we've grown up in is, is that defiance is actually, uh, somewhat of a positive attribute, um, in, in our culture.
00:42:50
Speaker
the Showing some fight. Yes. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. All right. Looking forward to the next yeah Good. All right. Thanks, man.
00:43:00
Speaker
um The only other thing... Did we want to say what our thoughts were from last week? As far as wrapping up, yes. Like key takeaways from last week, if we did that in like two or three minutes.
00:43:15
Speaker
Okay. Would this be... both of us going back and forth about just a little bit. Yeah. Like what? what was What? When? Think of it like this, like as we listen to the playback for our conversation for last week or went over our notes, what were the things that maybe surprised you or were key takeaways?
00:43:32
Speaker
the think The thing we talked about when we were talking about grief, there was this really powerful concept that you've laid on me before about the 10-year mark and the power with that, which I never saw that coming.
00:43:45
Speaker
And i think i think this shows up in other ways. so When my best friend, I mentioned him a second ago, Alex, he unfortunately died unexpectedly, and that was just mind-blowing.
00:43:58
Speaker
And, uh, in these moments where people are talking, talking through and, and kind of sharing some of that space with you. Somebody said something really fascinating to me. They said that, um, they asked, how are you doing? Which is, think a fair question in that moment.
00:44:14
Speaker
But, uh, I wasn't really, i wasn't doing well, but I also wasn't recognizing the full impact of all this. And so he said something really brilliant. And he said, you know, when my friend died, ah I wasn't overtly showing anything. It was a thing that internally i felt loss about and I was sad about, but it wasn't until two years later this thing and who knows what the thing is going to be but it was just this catalyst that it was uncontrollable and i was sobbing and i couldn't stop and it was what what i needed to really process this
00:44:52
Speaker
uh and he said that might be your experience and uh and i didn't put the two together your conversation that we had last time at this point and uh and it's just it's bizarre to me how we find areas to hide these emotions and when they come up it's just you can't even get out of the way it's just going to consume you.
00:45:16
Speaker
So that was really fascinating to me that this is a common thread, I think, with loss in a lot of ways. What you just described i kind of reflects, I had two big takeaways. One, i should say, I had a very similar takeaway, or at least one that I think reflects a little bit of of how nebulous grief and how nebulous grief is relative to the trauma itself.
00:45:43
Speaker
The trauma, when we, when we first talked about the trauma, yeah it was a little bit, I felt the conversation was a little bit tighter and linear because, Okay. Yeah, absolutely.
00:45:55
Speaker
And when we got to the grief, it spidered quite a bit more. The shape changed in the hurry. Yes, it did. It became much, you know, the attempts to grasp onto it, it falls through the fingers a little bit more. And I think that that conversation around grief is common is that...
00:46:15
Speaker
When the trauma happens and, you know, someone moves into the grief stage or, you know, into grieving very quickly and somebody else does not. I think the the nature of our conversation reflected that the further away you get from the event, the less...
00:46:30
Speaker
The less predictable things are, the you know the the more the things go in different directions. And and it was a reminder that, and we've I've said the the phrase before, is there is no playbook for this. right and And with trauma, the closer you are to the trauma, it's like, do these things. you know there There is something you know some good things.
00:46:50
Speaker
The farther you get away from it and move more into that grief. Yeah. it just becomes much more nebulous. And and what what the other thing that surprised me about this was that ah we we kept mentioning grief and afterwards I reflected, there were a couple of words that I was surprised that we did not bring up. Oh.
00:47:12
Speaker
And um that I think are sometimes synonymous with grief, but also points to activities within us that happen at different stages within grief.
00:47:26
Speaker
And... and might be for for the full duration of while we're grieving, might be punctuated. And those two words that that really came up for me was also mourning.
00:47:38
Speaker
You know, we're in when we're going to mourning, and and and oftentimes that that shows up differently, that that grief can can be reflected in mourning, and then when mourning's gone, it doesn't necessarily mean that grief is gone. Oh, yeah.
00:47:53
Speaker
despair is the same despair you know you know around that hopelessness and what you you go through and and wrestling with that from a grief perspective and i think the reason why i bring those up is because in the nature of our conversation um that we had I think we touched, overall, we've we touched on what we were just saying, is is that there is no playbook, it's different for everyone, it becomes much more ah much more difficult to wrangle down, and that's because these things happen at different times, they happen in different ways, and that in and of itself, going back to what we've talked about from an interaction with suffering and trauma and grief with this culture that we're around,
00:48:36
Speaker
we are not equipped as a culture for, for even embracing that, that there is no rule. It's, it's our culture is one that says you've had six weeks.
00:48:46
Speaker
Yeah. Now it's time to return to work. Now it's time to get back. Why are you still crying? You know, it's, it's those kinds of things. I think the, Yeah, the the takeaways that that I'm glad we brought up here is is that this stuff is not, it is not linear.
00:49:07
Speaker
Right, at all. No, not at all. Yeah, and i
Conclusion and Call to Action
00:49:10
Speaker
think it also is disrespectful to... and the word but really the concept the the entity that grief becomes to try to put it into that type of a framework and because it's just so much bigger and it does change shape doesn't it and it's amazing and horrible and also necessary and so yeah i'm reminded of the line and um Shawshank Redemption where they were talking about Andy and his ah imagine like just fantastic escape and kind of coming out smelling like a rose from the whole process and ah the narration
00:49:49
Speaker
done by Morgan Freeman was just right on the money. said, some birds you just can't cage because their are feathers are too bright. And I think in this experience of grief, maybe bright feathers are not the example, but just can't confine it. You can't trap it.
00:50:05
Speaker
Yeah, it lives where it lives and it comes up when it wants to come up. And you're kind of just holding on for for all you can in the moment. But bizarre.
00:50:17
Speaker
Thank you for sitting with us in this conversation, for bringing your own story, your own questions, and your own hard-won wisdom to what we're building together. If you want to keep this going, subscribe to Good Pain on Apple Podcasts or Spotify, where you can also leave us a review that helps others find their way to these conversations.
00:50:36
Speaker
And for weekly doses of conversations that go beyond quick fixes or surface-level advice, subscribe to our Kindling newsletter at goodpainco.com. Good Pain was recorded in Colorado on Arapaho, Ute, Cheyenne ancestral lands.
00:50:52
Speaker
And let's remember, we are not alone in this. Our struggle is not our shame. Whatever we are carrying today, we don't have to carry it alone. We will see you next time.