Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
131. Grief As Part Of Our Ecosystem- with Sarah Davis
78 Plays3 years ago
Sarah Davis is a podcast producer and learning experience designer who started Breathing Wind in 2019, three years after her dad died, as a way to process grief over what she considers her most significant loss and provide the resource she didn't have while grieving his death. In her first season, she almost exclusively focused on guests who were the first of their peers to lose their parents and she has expanded since then. Each year parallels her grief journey as she has explored grief, healing, and joy, accompanied by guest hosts who are experts in the end of life and grief space.
Links:
www.breathingwind.com
https://www.instagram.com/breathingwindpodcast
www.connectedpodcaster.com
Contact Kendra Rinaldi to be a guest or for coaching:
https://www.griefgratitudeandthegrayinbetween.com
Recommended
Transcript
The Role of Support Groups in Grief
00:00:01
Speaker
Similar to what I'm doing right now with support groups, I go to support groups to air out what's happening and it normalizes it. It's kind of similar with grief. It normalizes grief and like now, I still have a lot of grief and I just kind of experience it, let it wash over me and then I am able to move on and be a human in this world.
00:00:26
Speaker
Because otherwise, I don't feel like I feel like grief never really fully takes over. It's just a part of the ecosystem of Sarah. Hello and welcome to Grief, Gratitude and the Gray in Between podcast.
00:00:48
Speaker
This podcast is about exploring the grief that occurs at different times in our lives in which we have had major changes and transitions that literally shake us to the core and make us experience grief.
00:01:04
Speaker
I created this podcast for people to feel a little less hopeless and alone in their own grief process as they hear the stories of others who have had similar journeys. I'm Kendra Rinaldi, your host. Now, let's dive right in to today's episode.
Creating 'Breathing Wind': A Podcast Journey
00:01:26
Speaker
Today on the podcast, I have Sarah Davis. She is a podcast producer and learning experience designer who started Breathing Wind in 2019, just three years after her dad passed away, after her dad died.
00:01:44
Speaker
And she created that in order to be able to express her grief, as well as to be able to learn the different ways people are grieving. And that was one of her tools. And I am happy to have her on the podcast. So welcome, Sarah. Oh, thank you. Thanks so much for having me.
00:02:04
Speaker
I am glad you're here. Last week, I was recording on your podcast and now we swapped it. So if you're on the other side, it's always different to be on the receiving end of a podcast when you're the one asking questions usually, right? Yes. It is always different. Yeah, it feels a little different. Sometimes I'm like, wait, can I ask a question? Or can I ask a question?
00:02:30
Speaker
So welcome. So, Sarah, I'd like to start off with a little bit of who you are. Let's start with where you are. Where do you live now?
Sarah's Life Journey Across States
00:02:39
Speaker
I am in Des Moines, Iowa, and this is actually where I was raised, born and raised, and then I left when I was young and then came back. Young, how old? How old were you when you left?
00:02:53
Speaker
Well, I guess I was 22 and I moved to the East coast to DC mostly. And then I moved to the West coast to the San Francisco Bay area. And yeah, yeah, it's, it's very different coming back as an adult. There's a lot of familiarity, but then there's also a lot of newness to it that I wouldn't have experienced had I stayed here forever.
00:03:20
Speaker
That's great. You're seeing it differently because of who you are now. It's how you're perceiving the reality of your space very differently because you've also lived away and just looks different when you come back. The question I have for you is, did you leave to go to school when you left at 22? Is that why you left?
00:03:44
Speaker
Yeah, well, I think that was around when I graduated. I went to University of Iowa. So I was still in Iowa. So I guess I did technically leave Des Moines to go to school. So yeah, I was still in Iowa, but just had graduated. And I had studied in DC for a semester. And so I was like, I'm going to go back. That's where I'm meant to be.
00:04:13
Speaker
End-end game is DC, so.
00:04:16
Speaker
And then it was really surprising for me to make that shift then to the West Coast. To San Francisco. What did you study? What did you study? Was it in the media aspect? Oh, that's a really good question. No, I'm somewhat of a multi-potentialite, multi-passionate person. So I've had a lot of interest for a long time. I studied in high school. I started studying Chinese.
00:04:44
Speaker
and Mandarin. And I was so interested in it. I went and I studied abroad when I was in high school and stayed with the host family. And so I was pretty much like, this is it. This is it for me.
00:05:00
Speaker
Definitely like we were talking about in last week, I'm this sort of like, I like having spreadsheets in order and things happen in this way. And so I was just like, okay, I found it. It is Chinese and I am meant to be in China for some period of time and like studying international relations or something.
00:05:23
Speaker
So I had a double major in global studies and then East Asian Languages and Literature with the emphasis on Mandarin. And I did not do anything with that degree.
00:05:38
Speaker
Except that when I was in grad school, I was studying the likelihood of whether rural Chinese students would repeat their senior year as part of the education umbrella. I did use it a little bit then.
00:05:56
Speaker
I didn't use it nearly as much as I had hoped or thought or dreamed. And it's probably like one of my earliest disappointments. But looking back on it now, it's very clear to me I'm not a native Chinese speaker. And a lot of the roles that I was looking at were required some much more fluency than what I had developed in college. So yeah.
00:06:18
Speaker
But the part of learning a language is more than the fact of whether you're going to use it too. Is this the part of how it even stimulates your brain? The fact that you were able to be exposed to a whole other culture because you went even to the country of that language, it opened this other door of you learning
00:06:39
Speaker
about other cultures and within that learning even about yourself because it took you even away. So whether you pursued it as a career per se or using it in your career still molded who you are now, right?
00:06:53
Speaker
Oh, yes, totally. Thank you for reminding me about that. I'm like, Oh, who am I speaking to? Listen, I'm saying this because I relate to it as someone that studied theater and that I am not on a stage right now, you know, so I say it based on my own assessment of my my own reality.
00:07:17
Speaker
that we all, something that we do within that is still building us to who we are now, right? We just don't sometimes see all the little puzzle pieces. Yeah, and I remember Chinese is such a, I don't know if you know much about Chinese. Oh, very, very little, but I know it's one of the hardest languages because it is a very complex alphabet.
00:07:42
Speaker
And it's a tonal language, too. So you have to listen. You have to build your listening ear and then speak in a way that you're not accustomed to, to kind of match the cadence. And I remember when I left, when I got back, and my mom just told me it sounded like I was singing all the time.
00:08:02
Speaker
And now I audio, I am kind of an audio nerd now. I try to like, limit it. I try to not like, let myself get carried away because you could, there are editors and sound engineers who could really, you know,
00:08:20
Speaker
get into the nitty gritty and I've already decided that's not the path for me. I'm not going to become professional sound engineer, but it has helped me a lot with identifying sounds and hearing and listening for all the things that you listen for when you're listening to spoken word. Yeah, when you're interviewing and that's what you picked up even when I interviewed on your podcast that my mic was not sounding proper.
00:08:47
Speaker
And if it had not been that you picked that up, I would have not known that I'd been using the mic from the computer and not my mic that I have here, which now we do have set up. So thank you for your tuned ear that realized that something was off
00:09:05
Speaker
with my sound. And for the listeners now, hopefully you'll hear better quality sound coming out of my podcast. And that's all due to Sarah pointing out there's something not right. I'm like, I knew there was something not right, but we didn't know what. So thank you. Thank you for you studying Chinese. And that now brought us to you picking up on all those little details.
00:09:25
Speaker
So after all that, you then lived in DC. You were there probably working. Then when you then left, you found job. Went to then San Francisco.
Returning to Iowa: A Turning Point
00:09:34
Speaker
What brought you back to Iowa? Because that's part of the the journey here. So tell us your story of returning back home. Hmm. Yeah, it's. I think it's something I had toyed with for a long time when you're in the Bay Area.
00:09:56
Speaker
The cost of living is so big. Unless you're a tech person, it's astronomical. You learn how to live with it. I learned how to use my network to find housing, which was helpful, because I was never into the tech scene. So I do remember, and one of my friends reminded me of this. When I was first in San Francisco, I had toyed with the idea of leaving to be with my parents or to be back at home.
00:10:24
Speaker
because it is so much more affordable and you could do adult things here like purchase a house. So I have been toying with the idea for a long time but
00:10:36
Speaker
I didn't really seriously start thinking about it until my dad got sick. And it was October of 20. So October is always an interesting month for me. It was October of 2016. And I was just kind of like, I need to go back. And he was like, no, no. Your life is there. Do not come back. So I just came back and visited. I would visit.
00:11:03
Speaker
once a month and that was really helpful but I think
00:11:12
Speaker
I think that it really was a process because that first year was really just about like figuring out what is it? How do I grieve? What am I doing here? And then the second year afterwards was like, how do I live my purpose? Because my purpose isn't going to an office every day.
00:11:33
Speaker
But what is it going to look like? How am I going to earn money? What am I going to do? You know, where am I going to create content that gives back to the world? So that was what I was spending that year doing. So this is the year. So October 2016.
Podcasting as a Healing Tool
00:11:47
Speaker
So this is this is when your dad was sick. And then this is when you're toying with the idea of going back. You just decided to just go back and forth a month. How long after that did he die after that 2016 October to October 2016 when you started going back and forth?
00:12:04
Speaker
It was December. December. So just a few months after. So you had been going that and then all these questions start coming up for you. Okay. What do I do now? Right. More of that kind of catalyst of change.
00:12:22
Speaker
So for a year, you're going through that. So 2017 comes around, you're still kind of in that back and forth of figuring out how you're grieving and what do you do and then what happened.
00:12:37
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, I think then I had this idea about a podcast and I also really wanted to be a digital nomad. I wanted to be doing more work abroad, but that was kind of further down the line. Ultimately, I was spending a lot of time thinking, what is the thing that I spend the most time thinking about
00:13:03
Speaker
What are my gifts and how can I give back? And I thought it would be a book because I felt more drawn to the written word. I didn't feel as comfortable in front of a mic back then. By the way, listeners, people get more comfortable in front of mics when they are podcast hosts. Oh yeah, you learn to have to be.
00:13:27
Speaker
I went through this whole process. So I was actually really afraid of being a podcast host. I was like, this may not be the thing for me, you know, this is a very vulnerable topic. But the idea kind of came around the very beginning idea in January of 2018. And I was like, also working with a coach to try and quit my job, because that had been something ingrained in me.
00:13:51
Speaker
for a long time that you have a job or you move, you move through the steps and you do the things. And, um, and during that time, that's when I was like, okay, if I do this, I am going to spend half of my time dreaming up this podcast, making this podcast happen. So I spent a lot of time that year decompressing and then contracting and also working on the podcast and
00:14:21
Speaker
I mean, I didn't even think it probably wouldn't have even come to existence if I hadn't reached out to my community and asked, hey, you know, I'm thinking about talking about this vulnerable topic. Would anybody want to do this beyond this podcast? And suddenly I had like 20 pre-interviews.
00:14:41
Speaker
which was a lot. And and then I was like, okay, this is this is what I need to focus on right now. And eventually got it out in the world. So that was 20
00:14:56
Speaker
20 when it finally made its way into the world. So no, no, 2019. 2019, 2019. Yeah. So a year in that process, doing the pre-interview. Now, how did it feel at the beginning? Because that was part of your way of grieving was also learning about how people grieve. Do you remember that first interview you had and then
00:15:21
Speaker
how it felt and the story and how you started to learn more about your own grief journey of your father as you were listening to other people's journeys.
00:15:33
Speaker
Hmm, such a good question. I had no training whatsoever and I just, I remember feeling at some point a sense of kind of despair because I had been so immersed in it. I'd been talking to people. Not everybody became somebody who I talked to because I was very focused on this concept of pre-interview then interview and then
00:16:02
Speaker
and then record and then edit. But all the editing, I wasn't even focused on the editing. I was just focused on the recording. And by October, November, I remember this distinctly, by November of 2019, I had amassed all these recordings, not 20. It was probably four or five.
00:16:29
Speaker
And I had a freak out moment at that at that time and I was like, I don't want to do this. This is really vulnerable. I don't want to put this out there. I hadn't even keep in mind. I hadn't even edited any of this yet. So I didn't know about the quality or anything.
00:16:46
Speaker
I was just like in my own head. I was in my own head. I was still trying to figure out what the name was going to be. I was so like I had a deadline. So I was like, OK, I've got the deadline. I've got to reach that. But do I really even want to do it? And I just I went on a long hiking trip, backpacking with a couple of friends in California. And we just we had a lot of conversations about it. One happens to be
00:17:14
Speaker
He's a producer, video producer. He's like, you really need, this is authentic. This is something that is really going to help people. So he really kind of like built me up to do it. And then the other one, he's more of a consultant type. So it was helpful to hear his perspective too, just on like the name and like some of the formats. So I was able to decide the name and then kind of move forward after that. And then I also had an in-person interview with Ken Brenneman.
Incorporating Rituals in Podcasting
00:17:44
Speaker
And one of two, I only had two in-person interviews because then, as we know, the pandemic hit. But he introduced the concept of ritual for me. And he also had some realizations after we had recorded.
00:18:04
Speaker
which his mom had passed away a long time ago, even though he works in the grief space now. He's a yoga therapist, a anontologist. He had had some early experiences that made me think he had already kind of processed everything, but it had been a long time that he'd spoken about it.
00:18:24
Speaker
And afterwards, he said, I felt stuck. It was like, well, why? Why would why would anybody feel stuck? And and that's kind of when I started to think about ritual. He had brought in some ritual elements of his own. He brought in a photo of his mom. But I started to think about it because I spoke with a friend who was a Zen Buddhist. And he he said, well, if he feels stuck, it's because you're not creating
00:18:54
Speaker
He didn't say it in this way. He said it in a very kind way. But you're not creating a safe container. And not just for your guest, but for you. What is going to be your symbolic space holding place? Or how are you going to create that? And so I started to introduce some elements that helped with the ritual of
00:19:19
Speaker
bringing in photos of our loved ones. I love sound healing, so it's a button bull. And I asked you to do it today because you did it right before we recorded last week, and I'm like, oh, that felt so good.
00:19:36
Speaker
that I actually then incorporated that in another interview. I had not a sound, but I did the deep breath with... Well, because the person I was interviewing was a yogi, and that interview probably come out for yours.
00:19:51
Speaker
And so with that interview, I said, Phoebe, would you guide us and throw some breath work before we start the interview? But it was really inspired based on how you started. I am much of, for me, like in certain things, my ritual a lot of times is prayer. But at the same time, with this space, not knowing where a person's coming from, you know, starting that way may not be
00:20:20
Speaker
the right space for everyone because every guest is different. But how you incorporate the part of the sound and the breath and the bringing the spirit, the pictures is something anybody could relate to regardless. So I really love that part of incorporating that ritual into your recording. So thank you for introducing me to that. You said Ken introduced you and now Ken draw. Ken, Ken draw.
00:20:49
Speaker
Ken is one of my nicknames too. So it's like, thank you to Ken to then kind of guiding it to you that then now I learned it myself too. So that's awesome. So how did that change then when you started to incorporate that then? How did that start shifting the energy of how you felt when you started incorporating ritual and how did that also shift
00:21:12
Speaker
in your own grief, not just your recording, that that also then become a part of your own practice and your own grief journey aside from when you're recording. Oh yeah, so the
00:21:28
Speaker
timeline is what I'm thinking about here, but it shifted everything for me in terms of my recording. I was able to be present with people and be in the moment more as opposed to kind of that, let's get through the production part, right? Because there is an element of production that happens, but I was maybe more focused on that before I realized, hey, this is,
00:21:57
Speaker
This is a sacred space for sharing stories. Yes, we are sharing stories to the whole world.
00:22:04
Speaker
But in this moment, we are here together as two people. And we are holding a space for each other, essentially. So it really, really helped. And I don't always do it now because now it's like a slightly different subject matter. It's not always personal. Sometimes it is. But yeah, it's slightly different focus. But it's shifted a lot for me. And then how I found sound healing was just, I think, one of the many.
00:22:34
Speaker
I tried basically everything under the roof when I was grieving. Sound healing came about actually
00:22:45
Speaker
I was doing a triathlon. I was training for a triathlon for raising money for blood cancers because my dad had had blood cancer. And I fell and I had a concussion. So sound healing came that year, it was New Year.
00:23:06
Speaker
And it was quite by accident. It was at a yoga New Year's ceremony. And the person who was doing the sound had went around and she had like a tuning fork and some kashi chimes and just kind of gave each person a sound healing in addition to a sound bath.
00:23:32
Speaker
So I actually had been, I decided I'm going to volunteer with her. I'm going to learn everything I can about sound healing. Back to the multi-potentially, multi-passionate person. So sound healing became a part of my life and so it felt quite natural. Back to sound too though. Here's back to sound though.
00:23:50
Speaker
you mentioned musicality in the language of Mandarin Chinese, then here with sound again, with that being incorporated into your healing, it's like all these elements that it's, okay, sorry, I just like, okay. That's, I mean, yeah, and you're reminding me, I studied, I mean, I,
00:24:14
Speaker
played flute and piano growing up and cello as an adult. So it's always had a place in my life. Wow. So perfect. So it's just all kind of all bringing it all together in your own healing journey of that. That's amazing.
00:24:32
Speaker
So then you started then to do that. Did you start feeling like your grief was moving through more as you were doing these sound rituals for yourself? Yes. Sound healing. Thank you. Thanks for guiding me back there.
00:24:52
Speaker
I'm the one that interrupted, so I better find, if I'm detouring, I better bring you back to your thoughts. Let's just talk about sound healing this whole time. No, just kidding.
00:25:07
Speaker
I just started vocalizing more. I started thinking about how do I tell my story in addition to how do I hear other people's stories. I think I started interviewing for podcasts that year and trying to find my voice but also hearing how other people spoke about their grief journeys. It helped for me to find my voice that way.
00:25:30
Speaker
But I would say, at first, it was hard because it was talking about the very thing that I was dealing with. And I don't think I realized that it would be that hard to talk with people about that in the beginning. I just was thinking about it from a producer's standpoint. Like, here's this product I want to create for some unknown listener who needs this the way I needed it.
00:25:59
Speaker
But essentially in the process of talking, in the process of listening deeply to other people's stories, I was also confronting grief more often and befriending grief if that's even possible. Like now I have quite a bit to grief. I moved back because my mom has aging issues and
00:26:24
Speaker
she's alone, and that she needs extra support, not aging issues, just she's aging. Her memory is going. So it's, it's for me, it's just that it was that chance to really kind of step in and
00:26:44
Speaker
begin to process as I was experiencing it, which is not something I would necessarily do right now. I am not jumping up and down wanting to create a podcast about caregiving. Because I know that it's, I just know it would be just too much. It wasn't too much then, because it wasn't 2016 or 2017. It was 2019. 2018, 2019.
00:27:13
Speaker
So I was a little bit removed from it, but I was still able to tap into it. Back when I was trying to write the book, it was way too much. Way, way, way. Like I needed there. I was like, I can't keep writing this because I think I'm going to need therapy to write this. It wasn't quite the same because I was so inside myself. I wasn't connecting with other people. And in the process of connecting with other people who are going through something similar,
00:27:41
Speaker
Similar to what I'm doing right now with support groups, I go to support groups to air out what's happening and it normalizes it. It's kind of similar with grief. It normalizes grief and now I still have a lot of grief and I just kind of experience it, let it wash over me and then I am able to move on and be a human in this world.
00:28:06
Speaker
Because otherwise, I don't feel like grief never really fully takes over. It's just a part of the ecosystem of Sarah, right? Yes. Yeah. It is part of one of the array of emotions that we go through, and it's part of our experience. It is not about making it go away. It's just about incorporating it into our
00:28:31
Speaker
lives and just seeing how we kind of ride along with it because it is going to be part of our lives, whether it's one form of grief here or there, it's going to be part of our lives. I'm curious to ask you about your upbringing and your beliefs about death prior to your dad dying and how that played a part in your grief journey.
Childhood Beliefs and Death
00:28:58
Speaker
What were your beliefs being brought up about what happens after we die? Yeah, I love that you ask this question because I know from our conversation last week, your beliefs and how much grief and dying is already a part of your belief system.
00:29:28
Speaker
for me being from the Midwest and having parents who weren't super open about expressing their feelings, although I will say caveat, my mom's a retired psychologist. So I did have a feelings wheel in the bathroom and I did have all the things related to that. So that was part of my upbringing, but it was
00:29:56
Speaker
A lot of times when I was expressing emotions, the kinds of expressions I made were like temper tantrums or things that got shut down because that isn't how good girls behave or whatever, right? So there was some of that happening. But in terms of religion,
00:30:19
Speaker
My mom was very spiritual new age and she had grown up in an atheist family and I think was creating her own belief system. My dad was Methodist and he was very much of the, you know, we go to church every week.
00:30:43
Speaker
So I did go to church, but I also had every week I had the choice not to. My mom would ask me if I wanted to go and we would talk about it and then we would go if I wanted to. And then I do remember a confirmation having
00:31:07
Speaker
giving a speech about hypocrisy in the church, because to me it felt like this is just something people are going to for social reasons. It was very judgmental at age 13. Oh, but the fact that you're having those, no, the fact that you're having those type of thoughts and beliefs at 13 is still very mature, because which 13-year-old is thinking about, I wonder why people are here? So a very mature way of thinking.
00:31:35
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, so now I mean now I really I think it's great if you find community and church that's great you have community, like, as an adult I see that very differently but
00:31:48
Speaker
So growing up, I had two different belief systems kind of intertwined. And I was sort of left to figure it out what I wanted to do and what I wanted to believe in. But I didn't really think a lot about death. I didn't really think a lot about end of life. I had grandparents pass away, but we didn't spend a lot of time talking about that experience.
00:32:17
Speaker
it wasn't really a part of our family conversations. So yeah, it really wasn't until I was sort of faced with the reality of my dad dying that I realized, oh, I don't have anything really to lean on. I'd been spending so many years in the Bay Area, which is pretty secular.
00:32:40
Speaker
in a lot of ways. Like there's some people who are religious and some people who do have different beliefs, obviously. I just hadn't tapped into that world. I hadn't explored it. And so I actually started going to a church after my dad passed because I wanted to be in a space that reminded me of my childhood religion, right? And I also, at the same time,
00:33:08
Speaker
had gone to a meditation on grief led by somebody who practices shamanic techniques and learned more about that side of the world. So I was still doing both at the same time. It took me a while to figure out
00:33:26
Speaker
What does it mean to die? And I still don't I still figuring that out, right? I think we all are. And we'll only we'll only kind of get a glimpse of it. Who really, really truly knows. Right. I mean, those that have had, you know, life, life and death experience, like death experiences that that, you know, come back, have a glimpse of it. And even that, it's probably not even the full expression of what death is. Right. So, yeah, we're all in that. Go ahead, Sarah, continue.
00:33:54
Speaker
I was just going to say, but I'm not afraid to talk about death or grief. And I'm usually the first person to reach out if somebody has had a death. And I'm like, I know you may not, we may not be very close, but just know that if you want to talk off the record, because I guess I have to say that, you know, I'm here. I have a good listener, right? Like we can talk about it.
00:34:18
Speaker
Yeah, you and I are similar in that. Yeah, I'm not afraid to talk about it either. And it's interesting because in this society, it's something that I think we shine away from talking because it reminds us of our own mortality in
Coping with Sudden Loss
00:34:32
Speaker
general. And that's why I think people are so uncomfortable sometimes when someone is going through a really hard experience because it's a reminder that like illness or things like that, a lot of times people lose even friendships during that time.
00:34:48
Speaker
Yes. Because others are reminded of their own mortality. Did your dad talk about it when he was sick? Did he talk about his own mortality and his upcoming death during that time with you or not? No, no, he didn't. He mostly
00:35:10
Speaker
was in the mindset of, I'm going to beat this thing and I'm going to stay around. And I think that was one of his emails. He said, I, my work is not done here. I know it's going, I'm going to be better and it's going to be, and he did, he went into remission and
00:35:29
Speaker
At the end of the day, the chemotherapy had basically eaten up his organs. And that's how it all kind of went down. So it was very sudden. He had been feeling really weak around Christmas. And so around that time, he had done a couple of things that were different than normal. He really, really, really wanted me to go to this 6 AM coffee meeting that he had with his friend.
00:36:00
Speaker
And 6 a.m. Iowa time is 4 a.m. California time where I was living at the time. And I was like, dad, I love you, but I just cannot make 6 a.m. work. And he's like, justice once. And I just was like, I was like, no.
00:36:23
Speaker
I mean, I regretted that. So actually I met with his friend later, a year later for coffee because I was like, my dad really wanted me to do this with him and I didn't do this. And it was sort of a regret that I had held on to. Like a guilt. Yeah, guilt a little bit of that. That dude didn't honor what he won.
00:36:43
Speaker
And he probably knew, those are the little things that he probably knew he was, he did have some sense of awareness that he was going to die. Like you kind of see those glimpses and I'm saying this for my own, you know, both your mom, your my mom and then your dad died the same.
00:37:00
Speaker
year. So we would see these glimpses too of the hope kind of mentality when she was going through cancer of like, Oh, so next year when na na na na, and little glimpses of, okay, so let's, you know, I'm like, have to look for a graveside. Mom, do you want to be part of it? Yeah, sure. I want to go and look at the different, you know, cemeteries. So she wanted to be a part of that as well. So that kind of duality,
00:37:28
Speaker
of still holding on to hope, but at the same time facing reality can come up in little, little ways. So your dad was probably sharing that.
00:37:40
Speaker
I think there's a lot of language around cancer, survival and war, the war that you're going through when you're in cancer and being a warrior and fighting the battle. And there's so much of that in that culture, maybe of like, maybe there are, there are probably plenty of cases where people have recovered. And so there is reason to have hope.
00:38:05
Speaker
But there's also maybe a subculture happening of like, yes, there's a cure. Yes, it is possible to get out. Yes, it's something to hold on to.
00:38:16
Speaker
Well, I guess it gives you something to look forward to at least for the next day. At least let me look at the future. Yeah, I don't know. It just gives you some reason of living, holding on to this, because it is so hard going through what they're going through physically, emotionally, that at least saying, OK, I'm doing this for a reason.
00:38:44
Speaker
that maybe it will turn around and I will live through this. It gives them some reasoning behind all the struggle that they're going through as they're going through that battle, as you mentioned. Now, regarding your dad,
00:39:01
Speaker
dying during December and you mentioning Christmas time. Take us into what the holidays in for you, since it is something you celebrate and you celebrate and still that nowadays.
Finding New Meaning in Holidays
00:39:18
Speaker
OK, what what do the holidays mean to you? What does Christmas mean to you? And how do you celebrate it now being that it's during the time that you're
00:39:32
Speaker
died and has it changed in the last almost six years then? I will say also that it was really sudden to me. I thought he was going to make it through because he had been in remission and I thought he just has to get to the hospital to get a blood transfusion.
00:39:57
Speaker
So when he passed away, it was so shocking to me. It was so unreal in so many ways because I thought he would be around for longer. He was a very vibrant, very energetic person. And I mean, I think he was 73. Everybody thought he was in his 60s.
00:40:20
Speaker
He's just like very, I thought he would be around. And so I was in a fair amount of shock. And I just remember I got the news because I had gone to Seattle to celebrate New Year's with friends. And I got the news that night that I arrived. And it was just like I just spent that night in a hotel room.
00:40:46
Speaker
taking a bath. I don't know why I was taking a bath, but the water had gotten cold. My friend finally called me. At first she had offered to help arrange for me to leave. And I was like, I don't know. I can't do anything. I just need to be in a bath. What date was it? December what? December 30th. December 30th. Okay.
00:41:09
Speaker
She called back and she arranged everything. She canceled the hotel bill. She got me on a flight with her miles because she traveled a lot. And she just covered it all for me. And I was able to get back.
00:41:29
Speaker
I mean, it was still the holidays. It was still like New Year's was happening the next night. And I was up all night just like writing. I was creating a video for his funeral. I was very focused on like, how do I honor this? Documentation. I wanted to document, right? I was like, OK, we've got to like go in and take photos of everything because I know my mom's going to do her own process, which is to purge.
00:41:59
Speaker
So it was a very hard year. It was very hard. I, the next year, did not want to celebrate anything. My mom is a huge celebrator of Christmas, so I did have to come back and do it, but I was like blinders on. I do not see lights. I do not hear music. I am not interested in any of the commercialization.
00:42:23
Speaker
And even I guess 2020 was great in that I didn't have to go anywhere for Christmas.
00:42:33
Speaker
But finally, I would say as of 2021, I actually went out and I saw lights and I wanted to. And I was like, oh, this is interesting. Lights have a different meaning now. And I actually went to like a festival, a tree festival, and toured around and looked at the lights with a friend of mine. And it was just really
00:42:56
Speaker
It was a new way of seeing the holiday. So that was the first time. I don't know how it will be now because here the holidays are so much more emphasized. So I'm not sure how it's going to feel in, I guess people start to do holiday stuff right after Halloween. Oh yeah. So I don't know how it's going to feel.
00:43:21
Speaker
you know, to have it bombarded. Whereas in San Francisco, there are just so many more religions. So it's not the focus. So this is going to be the first year that I'll have two months of Christmas.
00:43:38
Speaker
And it's great that you're sharing this with us and with the listeners because this is six years later and still how this time period of the holidays is still can be triggering. And as someone that's listening to this,
00:43:58
Speaker
that you'd be mindful or we all can be mindful that during these happy times, like even Mother's Day, Father's Day, Thanksgiving, Christmas, this, you know, a lot of people are also going through a lot of pain. It can be a time in which you're
00:44:17
Speaker
Your world around is all about celebration and all you want to do is to retrieve. So as someone that is maybe someone else that's not grieving, that's listening to this, but knows of someone that has had a loved one die, recently be very mindful how these holidays can bring up a lot of grief in them. So thank you for sharing that. I know it could be years later and still these emotions come up.
00:44:46
Speaker
Thank you, Sarah. Yeah. And I mean, I think just to add to that, maybe even though somebody might find the holidays to be difficult, still invite them. Yes. Even if they say no repeatedly. That for me is so amazing when somebody invites me to something that's a holiday gathering.
00:45:13
Speaker
even if in giving you the choice to say no, not right. Giving you the choice to say no, but at least the invitation's there. Yeah.
00:45:22
Speaker
Yeah. Sarah, I want to talk about friendships. You mentioned your friend. What was her name? The one that gave you her miles by sharing her name? Allison. Allison. Did this show up in other parts of your life and with your friends or family? Did things for you or helped you in your grief journey?
Community Support During Grief
00:45:45
Speaker
I'm so glad you asked that. That's such a huge part of an immediate grief. I had such supportive friends.
00:45:54
Speaker
that came out of the woodwork. I mean, I did have one friend who disappeared who couldn't handle it. I think everybody has one friend kind of like that. It was really hurtful because he was probably my closest friend who was my climbing partner. But at the same time, there are just so many people. When I got back from the airport, a friend picked me up and she gave me a couple of bags of
00:46:21
Speaker
whole foods salads and soups because she's like I know you're healthy I know you like to eat healthy and I was like but what I can cook for myself her name's Kitty I can cook for myself Kitty and she's like you know what just take it like you know it'll it'll be okay
00:46:40
Speaker
And I took it and I tell you I ate every single item in those bags for two weeks and I did not want to go shopping. I didn't want to leave. And it was like that was sustaining me. So thank you Kitty.
00:46:55
Speaker
I had another friend who went, he didn't go to the Camino de Santiago with me. He met me there, but he knew it was important for me to go there. My dad had wanted to go for many, many years and I knew I was going to go to spread his ashes there.
00:47:15
Speaker
Where is this at? What did you say? Do you just kind of rub it with the where? I just kind of gave you another nugget, right? Okay, yeah. So go ahead and say this and then please dive deeper into that.
00:47:30
Speaker
I had a friend who was very adamant about me getting to the Camino while it was still fresh. My dad had wanted to go for a long time and I knew I wanted to go spread his ashes.
00:47:48
Speaker
but I didn't know when and I didn't know how and he just he just put a fire under me so we'll just get the plane ticket okay we'll just do a little bit of training you know just carry a heavy bag around and see how you feel and then
00:48:05
Speaker
And then he was there when I arrived, and that was helpful. He had his own plan. Everybody kind of has their own plan when they do a walk like that. But it was helpful for him to kind of begin that. And he even helped me with the first spreading of my dad's ashes, which I was kind of like holding on to them. I didn't want to let them go. And he happens to have a background in seminary.
00:48:32
Speaker
So he whipped up something beautiful to say, we spread my dad's ashes. And the second, I feel like the second later, a fish jumped out of the water. And from then on, I just, I spread them on my own. I was able to kind of do that after that. I was able to find a way to make it special and make it a moment where I was talking to him and being with him.
00:49:02
Speaker
And this is how long after. So this is coming. This is in Spain. This is this. This is in Spain. You're doing this that it was at a week long. I don't know how long that I have a friend. That's actually as worse as we're recording. That's there now. I said a week long. How many days is it that you do it for? If you do the full thing like my friend did the full thing, it can take about four weeks. Oh, my gosh.
00:49:30
Speaker
I didn't realize that it was that long. Oh wow. I did a two week version of it. I didn't feel like I could take four weeks off of work, which was kind of silly, but I think it was just an excuse because I was worried about it too. I was worried about confronting, you know, not having work to kind of cloud
00:49:52
Speaker
I was worried that I would just be full on grieving. Exposed. Exposed. It's like this exposed, like you're out there with nothing to hold on to and just your grief. They're like, well, at least if it's just two weeks, I don't have to go back to work. It's something else to kind of hide you or kind of shield you from exposing your grief for four weeks.
00:50:16
Speaker
Yeah, but it was so incredible and there are so many people on that trail, on that path who are going through major life transitions, who are going through grief themselves. I remember the first time I expressed to somebody why I was there, there was just a deep understanding. He happened to work at a funeral home in Germany.
00:50:43
Speaker
And he was like, oh, I totally get that. I was like, you do? He's like, yeah, this is my job. And he was there because he had gotten out of a very long term relationship and lost his job and was kind of exploring his own inner world around that.
00:51:03
Speaker
It was so good. And the other part of it is you're not grieving. Yes, you have time to grieve. You have time to be by yourself, but you're exercising. You're out there. You're walking. You're moving. You're feeling the nature around you, the sunshine, the trees.
00:51:21
Speaker
It's a really beautiful part of the path that I had started in. And you're experiencing just the wonder that is travel and just being in a different place and being able to happen upon a place to stay that night.
00:51:38
Speaker
So for me, it was wonderful. It wasn't just a chance to spread his ashes, but my friend had my friend not urged me to do it and shown up there. I probably wouldn't have done it right then. I would have done it maybe a year after. This was only four months after it was in April. So we have Alison with the ticket, Kitty with the with the soups and salads and this friend that worked to something. What is his name? His name's Rich.
00:52:05
Speaker
and then rich to Santiago. So you have all these friends, different ways in which they supported you in your grief journey, either by inspiring you to do something that you'd wanted to do and doing it with you.
00:52:22
Speaker
like you did or by feeding you or by putting you out of light. So there's all these different ways in which we can be supported and also ideas for us to support others who are going through that. Anyone else that you'd like to call out that supported you in this journey and just share how they supported you.
00:52:46
Speaker
Yeah, well I was thinking about Duncan as well, as well as Benjamin, but I'll get to Duncan first. Duncan is a wilderness guide and he's just a wealth of resource and information. So when I was looking to select a backpack, he helped me select a backpack.
00:53:06
Speaker
And then when I got back, I found out that I had to move. So I had an in-law unit in an Oakland house. I was always in the Bay Area moving from place to place, and then the houses would flip.
00:53:25
Speaker
And then I'd have to find another place. It's like couch surfing, couch surfing, but you're like in La Suite surfing. In La Suite surfing. So I had to move and I moved into a new in-law unit. It was like a, it was a bigger in-law unit in a backyard, like separate, right? So that was like ideal, but it had no closet space. So I had to construct armors from IKEA and Duncan,
00:53:55
Speaker
I don't know if you've ever constructed an armoire from Ikea. Oh, yes, anything, anything from Ikea.
00:54:03
Speaker
But he's very handy, so he helped me. I feel like IKEA can be a real relationship breaker for people, but we just grew closer as friendship through that time. I think for him, he had had some very major grief experiences himself, so he just knew how to be present.
00:54:26
Speaker
we would talk necessarily, we would just do this activity together, either that or we would go for walks together. It was just so nice to be in the presence of somebody because at that early time, I didn't necessarily feel like talking about it. It's great. And then the other then the other friends that I was doing, and then you said one more friend that you said you wanted to shout out and mention how he helped you.
00:54:55
Speaker
Yeah, in February, so now we're backtracking a little bit. I went to a friend's birthday party, and it was basically a month after my, a month and a half after my dad had died.
Inspiration Behind the Podcast: A Friend's Story
00:55:10
Speaker
And I really didn't want to go to this birthday party. I was like, I'm not feeling social. I'm not feeling up for this. But he kept encouraging me to go. And I sat next to his friend, actually, Benjamin Gunning, and also who had been on the podcast. So I'm going to send you that link because he has an amazing story.
00:55:33
Speaker
But I sat next to him and he just, I said, hey, you know, like you might want to sit somewhere else.
00:55:45
Speaker
Because my dad just died and I'm not, I don't feel like talking. And he was like, oh, well, you know what? My mom passed away from cancer when I was in my 20s. And then he told me the whole story and I just was like wrapped. I was wrapped by it. I was just so consumed by his story. And it just felt like I had been seen in some level, despite hearing his story and his compassionate presence.
00:56:13
Speaker
and willingness to be sitting there with me. So I, that also kind of inspired, looking back on it later, that inspired the concept of a podcast of listening to other people's stories. I was just, if you did not say that, I was just like, okay, let me unmute because I want to like say, I like,
00:56:32
Speaker
Thank you, Benjamin, because yeah, I was just going to say it was just going to ask you if had you not heard that, would that not been like the case of you being able to do this podcast yourself? Totally. Totally. I was like, first of all,
00:56:50
Speaker
talk about people coming out of the woodwork. He totally came out of the woodwork. He was an acquaintance and they didn't even, you know, like the generosity he had with that story was just so, I mean, he's a natural storyteller. I will say that, but it was just, it was incredible. Yeah.
00:57:10
Speaker
That's wonderful. Thank you for sharing all your friends' names as well as the capacity in which they helped you in their own way, helped you in your own grief journey.
00:57:24
Speaker
So now going back and wrapping to now the podcast.
Collaborative Podcasting: Building a Community
00:57:29
Speaker
So when you started, you started doing this and then you going through your own grief journey as you're interviewing people and listening to people's stories. Now you've kind of transitioned your podcast to now be that other people also are the hosts. Share with us that and what drew you to making that shift in your podcast.
00:57:55
Speaker
Yeah, I think.
00:57:58
Speaker
The first year felt really lonely in a sense. It wasn't that I was alone because I was connecting with people, but I really wanted collaborators. I really felt like I didn't have that. And that was something I was missing. I was missing it both in my professional life because I was, you know, I was contracting. I was kind of like project to project. I did something different each time, but not a lot of collaboration. So,
00:58:26
Speaker
I was missing that in my professional life. And so I was like, OK, well, I'm going to build that in here. And I think I put a call out the end of that year to see if anybody would want to do it.
00:58:38
Speaker
And two people came immediately, and then I asked the third to join. And it was just an experiment, really, just to see how can we do this together? How can we create something together? And one of the guest hosts is actually Ken Brenneman, who I mentioned earlier, Wendy Rolan and Debra Seto. And both Ken and Wendy are kind of in that, actually, everybody was in that end of life healing state.
00:59:08
Speaker
profession and it felt to me like that season was going to be about healing. So it became a season and a theme of healing and it was supposed to be short. It's always supposed to be short.
00:59:27
Speaker
It became like this full year journey and where we kind of all came together and created this and now my guest hosts are close friends. I'm meeting up with Wendy for what we call Zoom and cider, where we drink our favorite cider as well, talking to each other on Zoom.
00:59:47
Speaker
Actually, I don't think she's even drinking right now, so it's just sort of symbolically. Just like saying, meet for coffee. When we say let's go meet for coffee and someone doesn't drink coffee, but that's just the saying, yeah. So you still call it zoom inside or zoom inside. I want to say zider now because of zoom. Zoom inside or even if she's not drinking cider, but okay.
01:00:09
Speaker
So then you've basically created your community as well of support by then inviting these other hosts that have also been your community in your own grief journey. They're your community now in your working environment because this is not what you do as well as your now friends and community. Now tell us more about breathing wind as well as
01:00:36
Speaker
what other projects it is you do because you also help produce other people's podcasts and other things as well. Can you tell us more about that, please? Yeah. So Breathing Wind is a podcast about grief, loss, change and healing. And as I mentioned, it started out as a personal project and now it's evolved into this community of people.
01:00:59
Speaker
each who kind of take their own lens on a theme. So that year that season two was healers talking with a lot of other healers. So season two is a great healing focused journey. Season three has been about joy and it has been so light but also deep in so many ways because I feel like joy can often be that
01:01:25
Speaker
polar opposite of grief. It makes people feel almost as uncomfortable. And when you put the two together, imagine what you have to pitch. So it's just been a beautiful project. It's been such a beautiful connecting space. And I'm so excited for what next year will bring. I don't know yet what that's going to be, but I'm sure it's going to be something amazing that will get dreamed up when I'm taking a break.
01:01:55
Speaker
And then the other projects that you help? Yeah, so I have transitioned out of that to doing podcast production. So my business is called the Connected Podcaster, where I help hard-centered individuals and organizations really learn how to find their voice, create stories within their podcasts,
01:02:20
Speaker
and share it and build community of their own. So basically doing everything I've done with guest hosts, Breathing Wind, and kind of replicating that, specifically focusing on people who want to share a message that kind of helps the world. Paying it forward. And what is your dad's name?
01:02:44
Speaker
John and John for having birthed this very creative child here being part of the creation of Sarah and that his life then inspired your own life now and your own journey. So just sending love to John and to your mom and your mom. What is your mom's name? Sandy.
01:03:07
Speaker
and Sandy to John and Sandy because they're part of who you are too. So I just wanted to say thank you to them. And I know that now that you're in that role of caretaker to your mom, that it's important to honor her as well in this journey that she's on as well. Is there anything I have not asked you, Sarah, that you would like to share with the listeners?
01:03:35
Speaker
No, no, I don't think so. I just I thank you for giving me this space and it always feels good to kind of talk about this experience with other and hopefully in hopes that other people hear it and they benefit from it so.
01:03:54
Speaker
Thank you for holding this space for people because it's so important. It's so not spoken about enough in our culture and I think that more of us that are out there doing spreading this message the better.
01:04:08
Speaker
Yes, it's so true. We all created it because we saw a need for ourselves right in here. We are providing now a service for others, but really it started because we needed it ourselves. So that's why we created. So thank you as well for being part of this podcast as well as creating your own podcast. So thank you again and again to contact Sarah Davis, Breathing Wind,
01:04:36
Speaker
podcast.com? Is that correct? I'm not looking at my notes. Tell us the website that I say it right. BreathingWinds.com. Okay. BreathingWinds.com. And then you can find all her different offerings on that website, her podcast being one of them, as well as your production component as well there. So thank you so much once again.
01:05:04
Speaker
Thank you again so much for choosing to listen today. I hope that you can take away a few nuggets from today's episode that can bring you comfort in your times of grief. If so, it would mean so much to me if you would rate and comment on this episode. And if you feel inspired in some way to share it with someone who may need to hear this, please do so.
01:05:33
Speaker
Also, if you or someone you know has a story of grief and gratitude that should be shared so that others can be inspired as well, please reach out to me. And thanks once again for tuning into Grief Gratitude and the Gray in Between podcast. Have a beautiful day.