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99. Had to Learn to Parent Myself- with Stephanie Cerins
80 Plays3 years ago
Stephanie Cerins' goal since 2000 is to "Cheer Up The People of Our Planet". In 2012 she started her blog HappinessHeals.wordpress.com writing affirmations on a daily basis for her blog and her Reflexology clients and good friends. She received positive feedback about her blog and personalized affirmations that offered support on issues like parenting, relationships, creating abundance and personal growth. "Healing My Heart, After A Loss" is Stephanie's second book. She dreamed of being a writer since she was in grade three. Her first book "Healing My Heart, After Domestic Abuse" was written to help people who love have loved someone who chose to deal with their emotional issues through anger and violence, thrive once again.
When Stephanie was 15 years young her father transformed back to pure energy. After discovering her father's lifeless body she ran to the house to tell her mother she had found her dying father outside near his car in the driveway to their home. That is the day Stephanie's journey of deep grief started.
Stephanie hopes the skills she learned to help heal her own grief can help others. The 52 affirmations in each of her books offer new ways of looking at old problems. Her quirky humor, varied life experiences and interesting perspectives will gift you with new perspectives and skills to deal with your own deep grief.
Contact Stephanie Cerins:
https;//www.happinessishealthy.com
https://www.wordpress.happinessheals.com
https://www.facebook.com/HappinessIsHealthy/
Contact Kendra Rinaldi to be a guest or for coaching:
https://www.griefgratitudeandthegrayinbetween.com/
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Transcript
Introduction to the Podcast
00:00:02
Speaker
being able to have a partner where I could grow and be understood and who was trying to support me emotionally and physically, then not having to feel like, you know, every time I do something, I'm in trouble about this or that, right? Because he had a very much more trusting perspective, right? My ex-husband just came from too violent of a home.
00:00:30
Speaker
Hello and welcome to Grief, Gratitude, and the Gray in Between podcast. 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.
00:00:54
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.
Stephanie Sarin's Grief Journey
00:01:05
Speaker
I'm Kendra Rinaldi, your host. Now, let's dive right in to today's episode.
00:01:15
Speaker
I'd like to welcome you all to our podcast today. Today, you will be listening to Stephanie Sarin's story. Stephanie is an author. She recently wrote a book called Healing My Heart After a Loss, affirmations that encourage me to feel and heal my grief.
00:01:37
Speaker
And we will be hearing about her story, her journey of grief and gratitude in that process. And also learning a little bit more about what got her to write this book. So welcome, Stephanie, to the podcast.
00:01:56
Speaker
Well, thank you, Kendra. I feel real grateful to have a chance to share my story on your podcast. Thank you so much for having me. I'm so happy you're here and we have a two hour difference. You're two hours earlier than me. If you'd like to share a little bit of where it is, you live with the listeners and I'm going to ask you a little more about your life as well so they get to know you. Sure.
00:02:21
Speaker
Yes, I am blessed to live on Vancouver Island. So it's a very beautiful spot in Canada. And I think it's one of the best spots. We drove quite across Canada in 2017. And I thought, yeah, I like Vancouver Island. Now, when you take you take a ferry then to go inland. Yes. How long does it take? How long does it take to take about an hour and a half?
00:02:48
Speaker
Oh, it is a long ferry ride. Oh, yeah. And then you have, I mean, you could sit at the ferry terminal for three hours if you don't make a reservation.
00:02:58
Speaker
Oh, wow. So you really do have to prepare just like going on a flight, like really like just preparing as if you're going on a flight, reserve your ferry ride if you're going to go into if you really if you got a real appointment. Now, from there, can you also do you have to go into Canada or do you have access also to Seattle to Washington State as well?
00:03:22
Speaker
Yes, we have access to, we have a ferry that, a walk-on ferry that goes from the island to Seattle, and then we have a drive-on ferry that goes from the island to Port Angeles and Washington. So we have two different ways to get there.
00:03:38
Speaker
But wonderful. It's good. You have the best of all worlds, you know, in an island, but also access to two different countries within. Yeah, and it's good because I was born in the States. And so then I fell in love with Robert and then I moved together.
Stephanie's Upbringing and Family Dynamics
00:03:54
Speaker
Okay, so let's go into there. So where in the States did you grow up?
00:03:59
Speaker
in Western Washington. Oh, okay. So you are still there. Okay. So tell us about your childhood since that is part of your story to and to then writing this book. So let's go into that. Where did you where in Western Washington did you grow up and tell us about your upbringing? Well, I was just raised by regular middle class parents and we had a, you know, my dad worked at a pulp mill. So he had a regular job where he worked shift work and
00:04:28
Speaker
I had a stay-at-home mom. And so, you know, just regular and kind of life. And we were lucky enough that I got to have some horses. My parents moved to a farm when I was nine. And I was, I believed I was Laura Ingalls Wilder, reincarnate. Because I loved that story so much. And ever since I was in my grade three, I wanted to be a writer. And so,
00:04:54
Speaker
the house, you know, I just wasn't, I had a very pretty blessed childhood and then when I was in my thinking fear I woke up one morning and then my dad's car was like parked on the little road that came to my house off the main road. And so when
00:05:13
Speaker
So I went running out there, why is my dad's car out there, right? And I didn't even say anything. Like my mom was still in bed and my brother was in bed and I just go running out there because I'm always the first one up
Impact of Father's Death and Coping Mechanisms
00:05:24
Speaker
in the house at that time. And then he was just laying there on the ground and I was, so I went running back in the house and someone, a neighbor or someone had already been there and he came while I was there again and he had called the ambulance somehow.
00:05:41
Speaker
He saw my dad or something. Oh, so the neighbor had already reached the ambulance before you had reached my dad's had reached my dad's car and then seen him outside because he kind of wrecked the car but He died from alcoholism. He coughed so hard. He ripped his esophagus inside It's called a Mallory Weiss terror and you bleed to death inside yourself
00:06:06
Speaker
real fast our esophagus has so much blood vessels which i didn't know so is it so okay so because of the amount of he so he was he was intoxicated in that moment and then cough or because of his body already having had so much alcohol that then when he coughed that okay so that that kind of eruption on the exophagus is was caused because of
00:06:33
Speaker
what his body had already endured from alcohol in the years. Yes, it can. Having so much alcohol can actually erode your esophagus if you drink too much. And he had a lot of indigestion, right, probably from that and reflux, all those kind of things that also then create all that irritation in the esophagus. And so because it was in 1980, right? I was only 15. So it was a long time ago.
00:06:59
Speaker
We didn't have, my mom said, your dad wouldn't have lived if they would have had that little purple pill back then.
00:07:06
Speaker
Maybe. Who knows? So your brother was younger than you, or is he younger? Yeah, he's like eight years younger. I was like the second mom. Yeah, you have a difference in age, similar to my younger siblings and I. So you see this, you come in, had he already passed away, or was it that he went to the hospital?
00:07:33
Speaker
No, he was just in the process. I don't think he was quite passed away because the ambulance picked him up and then he passed in the ambulance. Okay. So in that moment then you have then growing up then with your mom and your brother, you go through this. What was the process of supporting your grief like either from your mom, your family around? Was there that support in your grief journey? Was it something that was talked about or not?
00:08:03
Speaker
What was that like? No, we had a very normal family where we didn't talk about anything. And we had a very normal family. And it was much too shameful in 1980 to go to a counselor, right? Because then that meant you were crazy. Crazy, right. So true. How much taboo around mental health and support around mental health and emotional health in this case with grief as well. That is not just, you know,
00:08:30
Speaker
So then what tools then did you have or not have during that time then as a 15-year-old going through this, not being able to talk about what you had just witnessed at the same time as what you had felt? And what time of year was it, by the way? Was it in the summer? Was it school time?
00:08:57
Speaker
Yeah, I was getting ready to go to school. It was actually Earth Day in 1980. So it was a nice day. I just went running out. And it's interesting because I couldn't even have really talked about it. I mean, probably right away, but my brain blocked it out. I didn't remember binding my dad till after, because of course,
00:09:26
Speaker
I use the time-tested methods of alcohol and drugs and self-abuse to cope with my pain because I didn't have any other way to cope with pain. Well, that's also how you had seen your dad probably also handle whatever else emotionally, right?
00:09:43
Speaker
he'd gone through too, right? So it's like, if there was nothing else to, yeah, you didn't know any, any, any different. And at school then there was no like school counselor either. Uh, they didn't have in the eighties, we didn't really have school counselors. Not like now, not, you might have a, you might have a counselor where you
00:10:08
Speaker
you know, you would go to talk about your schooling, you know, what classes you wanted to take, but not about your emotional state. So then how was it for you then share like in school then with your friends, did you ever then talk about that at school with your friends or to nobody? You didn't talk about
00:10:28
Speaker
No, because every time we talked about it or I talked about it, I would just cry and I didn't want to feel that pain. Even to my mom, it was just in the last few years, 10 years probably before she died that we could even talk about my dad without crying because she would lay in bed every night and still playing for my father,
Mother's Health and Personal Transformation
00:10:50
Speaker
even though she had a new husband.
00:10:53
Speaker
She's still going to give up. So she did. So she remarried how many years after your dad? Oh, the first time she remarried, it was just like one year after. My mom was they'd x-rayed my mom for acne in the 50s. So my for six months, two or three times a week. And they baked her in these x-rays. So my mom was quite ill from that experience my whole life. My mom was ill. She had terrible in the program.
00:11:24
Speaker
Wow, so that was a lot. So you grew up basically with two ill parents and then your dad passing and then just not too long ago then your mom. So let's talk then about what shifted then because here you're sharing then about all these
00:11:43
Speaker
tools, quote unquote, of coping, which were really more ways of avoiding the coping, right? Of trying to not feel all this pain. What changed then? Because here you are writing a book now about all these affirmations. So what changed from the age of 15 to now in that journey? Well, at about 24, then I quit drinking.
00:12:13
Speaker
And I started reading, I mean, I read some books before about positive thinking and stuff, but not a lot. And then when I got into AA and I got sober, then that's when I started doing more reading.
00:12:32
Speaker
and learn about Louise Hay and the affirmations and using those on myself because I knew I was so messed up that I didn't have children or anything because I knew I was a real mess and I needed to re-raise myself. That's how I kind of felt. So I was just going to learn to parent myself.
00:12:53
Speaker
First, correct. And that's such a good phrase you're using there. It's like we hear we're giving, giving, giving to others sometimes in general. And this is something for any of us to even really reflect, whether we've gone through something as hard as you have or not, is that fact that we also have to nurture and parent that little child in us.
00:13:17
Speaker
as well, and we sometimes neglected, right? So the fact that you had gone through something so hard, you learned then to re-parent yourself first. Then at the age of 24 is when this journey started for you of
00:13:32
Speaker
learning to re-parent as well as learn to love yourself and all these affirmations and for those not familiar with Lewis Hay and her books and her methodology, would you mind just sharing a little bit about how it is she uses these affirmations in terms of healing our body? Sure.
00:13:55
Speaker
been you know in the healing realm and an author and a book publisher you know probably since the 70s or 80s I think she started and she was really helpful in the AIDS crisis down in San Francisco and helping people to reach out or I mean reach inside themselves to and reassure themselves and give affirmations because if we can change our perceptions of ourselves we can change our lives
00:14:25
Speaker
And mostly, we've been raised by parents that were, you know, I mean, my husband's parents were in World War Two, they didn't have any, you know, like, seriously, his mom's was getting bombs dropped near her and that's when the bomb shelters right when she was priorities were completely different. That was survival priorities. That's like, yeah. Yeah. And so, you know, when you go through that, you're, you know,
00:14:51
Speaker
His parents didn't have time to give him emotional support in some ways because of that, right? I'm just trying to say we all come from kind of broken parents because of just society and we didn't really, I mean, it was always just suck it up on our cup.
00:15:09
Speaker
Cause I mean, really wallowing in, in sad emotions really isn't going to help you anyway. So you might as well suck it up, but you do have to deal with those emotions sometimes if you want to have a more happy life, right?
00:15:22
Speaker
Right. So which affirmations that Lewis, if you recall, and like, which ones when you started that journey of reading into her books, of that self healing, I know I've looked anytime I have like, Oh, I have lower back pain, let me see what affirmation I have to look to and see what emotional aspect is related to my lower back pain. And so that has to do with
00:15:46
Speaker
emotional or financial support or something like that. So then I say this affirmation. So which ones were some of those that you started using during that time? And I know also, I'm sure that, and you mentioned this with being in the AA as
Healing Through Affirmations and Reflection
00:16:05
Speaker
well, the amount of
00:16:07
Speaker
spiritual and emotional awakening that goes through even going through those kind of journeys. Right. And the support you get even there as well. So, yeah, sorry, I asked too many, too, too many at once. That's all right. Yeah. You know, that mostly the affirmations I use to just reassured myself, like I am lovable, I am kind, I am worthy. You know, they were just really short affirmations than what Louise say.
00:16:37
Speaker
they were just like little one liners, right? I am worthy of love. I think before I act or speak, that was one that really helped me to be able to just have a more happier life, because then I wouldn't say things that I had to feel bad about later, right? If I thought, you know, just think things through and just affirmations that, you know, like to befriend death,
00:17:06
Speaker
because I know it's coming for me. That's what I was so upset about. It's like, what? I'm going to go through all this shit. Oh my god. That seems like pointless. Why did I even come here then?
00:17:19
Speaker
So to be able to befriend it after having been your enemy, quote unquote, and for so many people in general, we fear it so much yet it's like the one thing we actually know is certain in our life is death, right? So to know that that is certain and to know that the pain and the grief that will come from losing those around us that will die as well as our own mortality is just a fact of life.
00:17:48
Speaker
How was that then, that evolution of Stephanie Sarin's going into then befriending it? How was that process? Well, it took a long time. It wasn't overnight, that's for sure.
00:18:09
Speaker
because, you know, I had no framework and then it was just this shock and it was like I had my great grandma die, but that's in order. When someone's really old and then they die, that's in order. But when someone dies, my dad was only 39, right? So that was- Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So he sobered up a lot of his friends, right? He said, oh, Jim, I don't know. Straighten up. Right?
00:18:33
Speaker
He was able to help his friends in that. I just got chills in that moment because right now how you said that he was able to help his friends in that, that that realization for them of him passing so young from something that they themselves were also suffering from. And even for yourself, that even though you did go through a period of life of that, because again, that's all you knew,
00:19:01
Speaker
for you to also know that you couldn't live that way. And also sober up, but sober up, buttercup. Maybe you should say not suck it up, buttercup. Now it's sober up, but you have to sober up, buttercup. So that is that is. Yeah, that is quite a big learning there that his death didn't go in vain. Right. No, it's okay. Hmm.
00:19:29
Speaker
No, he really, it really affected his friends because he was the life of the party and he would always lend a helping hand and he was good natured like that. So, yeah, a lot of people really did, you know, miss him. He had a packed house, right? Because he was so young. The younger you are, the bigger the funeral, right?
00:19:53
Speaker
Wow, that's true. Because well, there's also more people that are still alive to see you go, you know, because sometimes when we're older, all our friends might have already passed already too. So yes, go ahead. Oh, I was just gonna say Robert's dad just passed at 96 in October, the end of October and the 30th and you know,
00:20:15
Speaker
There wasn't really any, you know, he was like, he says, Wait, wait, wait. Am I like, I don't know who Robert was. Oh, my husband's father.
00:20:24
Speaker
Oh, OK, OK, OK, OK. Sorry about that. Robert's dad. I thought you said Robert. And I thought you said like a last name. And I'm like, who's Robert's dad to dad? I thought you said you say your husband's dad. OK. Yeah, that's a beauty. That's a long, long life. But yeah, none of his friends were at his but all the right, you know, kids, grandkids or any of, you know, things like that.
00:20:46
Speaker
Now, let's go then into how it is you ended up then becoming a writer and then there's other things you do too. We were talking before we started recording, you do Reiki, reflexology. So how did you get into that line of work? And I also want to know how you met Robert.
00:21:03
Speaker
You decide which order do you which one came first Robert or reflexology and Reiki and then go in that direction Well reflexology started when When I was at home with my mom because she had terrible and with white arthritis in my mom's
00:21:20
Speaker
had tried everything to get better. She slept under a pyramid, like, and she would adjust the pyramid to be perfectly at North. Like, truly, my mom tried to wait, wait, wait, okay, wait, I need to understand this visually what a pyramid slept under a pyramid. Explain to me what that means. So there was a like a tube.
00:21:39
Speaker
pyramid. So it's just like a frame of a pyramid. Okay. But big like it went over the whole queen size bed. Oh, kind of like a teepee like a teepee over like a teepee over her bed to some type of shape over okay, but a pyramid with four sided you know, and then on the top it had a copper top to like draw energy to it or some I'm not sure of the psychology of it all or the methodology whatever you want to call it and then
00:22:10
Speaker
And then she slept with the bed up, so her blood would get down from her legs better. Like my mom tried everything, right? She slept on Nikkei magnets. She took every vitamin, right? And so...
00:22:25
Speaker
But her body just never got any better. So you grew up seeing her then doing all these different methods to try to support her health in that process. And then that kind of sparked your curiosity into all these different methods of healing. Yeah. The reflexologist that she went to, Dick Thurston, was a wonderful man. And he saw I had an interest in it. And so he trained me so I could help her. And then he
00:22:55
Speaker
He was just a very, he was kind of looked like Humpty Dumpty. He had suspenders and blue pants always. And he was bald and a little portly.
00:23:04
Speaker
But he just was so kind and whenever he would do the reflexology, he would just be so peaceful looking and the energy around him, I just loved it. And so, and then he would always give me a little mini treatment, like for a few minutes, you know, when I would go along with my mom and I just loved it. And I thought, oh my gosh. So, and my mom hardly paid him anything because he discharged by donation.
00:23:29
Speaker
So she would give him like five or ten dollars. And so I carry on. What a kind. What a kind. Oh, so you carry on that same method of payment as well. Yes. Tell him because he taught me how to do it by whatever the person wants to give you. Yeah, I just say, you know, it's for in trade. Well, you know, it's a by bar or whatever, you know, whatever money you can afford to pay by donation.
00:23:57
Speaker
So for you, it's really more about the service that you are providing to someone in that process. That is really what is also bringing you joy is that energy exchange in some way or another. And if it's not financial that they're giving you, then like you said, a barter. So what's some of the things that people have bartered for your services? Like just example, just curious what type of thing.
00:24:26
Speaker
Well, usually it's just, I have a friend where we do a trade, like she gets a massage, like today's her massage day, if it doesn't start to snow before too long. And then every other week we trade and then, but mostly it's just for cash or trades, you know, if I want to trade or then I'll trade with them. But usually, it's usually on a sliding scale of cash, right? I mean, I would take a trade if, you know,
00:24:56
Speaker
A friend of mine, I do have a friend where she's making me a sweater and I give her massages. She's a good knitter. Now, when you do that massage and reflexology, do you do Reiki in the same session or is it a separate session that you do that? No, yes, I do the Reiki and the reflexology simultaneously so that I'm doing the energy body and the physical body as well.
00:25:24
Speaker
Oh, that's so perfect. Now with that, with that combination where you just said the energy body and the physical body, let's go into those spiritual components of that grief journey. What were your beliefs when your dad passed away, when your dad died, about death and what happens after? And did that change or did that also play a part in your grief journey?
00:25:52
Speaker
about spiritual beliefs about whatever happens after we die? No, I think we weren't a very religious family. We mostly believed in beer. But we did go to church a little bit. Like I went to church with the neighbor girls and my dad's mother was very dogmatically Christian, right? But that's probably why we didn't know because she's very dogmatic about it, right? So that's kind of to be kind of harsh. And so, no, I didn't really know.
00:26:20
Speaker
you know, you just die and go to heaven, right? Like, I don't know. But what is heaven? Like you had that understanding of it was not. So then what has shifted or what are your feelings about it now in terms of your own real in this and you don't have to answer by the way, but I always I'm the one that's usually curious if that's played a part and you also be friending
00:26:43
Speaker
grief and befriending the idea of death as well. If the shifting of what you see about death has made a difference, you know what I mean? In your belief. Yeah, it totally does.
00:27:00
Speaker
Like when my mom just passed away like three years ago, it was for me a totally peaceful, wonderful situation to see because my mom's body was broken and really disheveled and she, like, if I would have had that body, I might have let it go like a long time before it was like, she was good at dealing with physical discomfort, something like my mom. Like,
00:27:24
Speaker
I couldn't stand this up for as long as my mom did, really. I wouldn't have wanted that life. My mom had a stroke a few years before, like she could hardly walk, and she couldn't even walk then before that. And so my view of death was from
00:27:41
Speaker
you know i wanted to die with my dad i wanted to why didn't you take me with you let me go with mom for my car right and so um because i was daddy's girl right and so um but now um my view of death is very beautiful and stunning i did a distance healing on my mom right before she passed and as she was we were kind of
00:28:06
Speaker
hovering above the hospital bed, that's the only, it was just feelings, not really, I couldn't see me and my mom, I could just see what was in front of us kind of thing. But it was like the energy of me and my mom hovering over the hospital bed and my mom was like the most giant raisin you ever seen in the bed. And I said, gosh, mom, that body's pretty trash looking, you know? And she's like, oh, you know, and yeah, it is, you know?
00:28:35
Speaker
Then we just hung out there a little bit longer. And then the next thing, we were going down this path together. And there was lights. Bright, golden light. And we were going toward the light. And then the light all kind of individuated. It was all these beings of light. They were very
00:28:59
Speaker
just, you know, they didn't have like faces and arms and, but you just got this feeling of that they
Transformative Meditation Experience
00:29:04
Speaker
were beings of light. And then I felt like I passed my mom's hand to my dad. And then, then that was, then it was pretty much the meditation immediately like ended after that. And it usually when my healing meditations go about 45 minutes,
00:29:23
Speaker
But with my mom, when I came out of the meditation, it was like, wow, that's only 20 minutes. I ripped my mom off. I better try again to get back in there. But really, that was just, and then I found out that right during that time, my mom got a big dose of morphine. So maybe that's what cut off the, but why we didn't go farther, I don't really know why. But it just, I felt real peaceful about death since then.
00:29:52
Speaker
I mean, before that I felt okay about it and I had befriended it and maybe that's why, but it was just like, I never had a meditation experience like that before, right? Yeah, it was transcendental. It was just something that you got to see
00:30:08
Speaker
just a different perspective of what could be this spiritual or energetic realm, whatever we want to call that, whatever continues. That is so beautiful that you were able to have that
00:30:26
Speaker
healing process before her passing and actually be probably part of that, of course, journey as well as you were doing that long distance session with her as you were doing that. That's beautiful. Now, tell us more then of the tools. So we've talked about then affirmations being part of the tools that you used in your grief journey.
00:30:49
Speaker
having gone through AA being part of the tools that you did start implementing then at the age of 24 as well of this reconciliation with yourself as well as with the things that had happened in your life, what other tools have you used and how did then writing come into play in this journey and then the trajectory of now having written your book?
00:31:16
Speaker
Oh, I mean, we still have to get to how you met Robert, too. So that's right. I was going to go back to that because he's kind of a big part of it. Yes, because this is my third marriage and the other two obviously didn't work out. And but in the other two marriages, it's like I just got littler and littler and littler till the marriage ended. Right. For whatever reason, different reasons. But for
00:31:44
Speaker
The first husband, I just didn't really like him. And then the second husband, I really loved him, but he dealt with his emotional stuff by slapping me around. So I couldn't put up with that forever. And so when I met Robert, I was much healthier. And my second ex-husband was a very good person, and I learned lots. I read Italians and really grew in that relationship, even though it was a rather stressful relationship.
00:32:14
Speaker
I had never had an orgasm before that man either, and he fixed me on there. So that was very good. Well, because that's also all related to emotions, right? So the fact that- All related. Right? So all related. So in that, that is a key, you sharing that it's not a TMI kind of moment as it is actually, no, just so that the audience and how much our emotions and all this grief play a part in all aspects of our life.
00:32:39
Speaker
So the fact that maybe at that with him was in that moment of maybe your body already going through a shift in changing emotionally as well, that then you were able to actually experience pleasure, not maybe feel guilty about actually experiencing, because who knows what other reasons you might have not before, not felt that maybe you deserved to feel
00:33:04
Speaker
anything. And if you had completely blocked feelings of even grief or of this, you know, then that can also block all these other emotions of joy and pleasure as well. Exactly. Because it was in that marriage that when I remembered that I had all that finding my father because I had just blocked it out and I had I didn't even know you could do that. Right. But then when I was in that marriage, that's when with all the book reading and all the talking
00:33:34
Speaker
that Jeffrey and I did and stuff. He was very good with emotional problems except his own, right?
00:33:42
Speaker
So, but it was part of, you know, that what you were talking about in general, like this is actually a good segue of seeing even how many other grief journeys we go through and learnings that in that relationship, even though he was broken, it actually in certain things of his own life that ended up helping you grow.
00:34:06
Speaker
in that process. So it's, again, that grief and gratitude and growth that goes in even in relationships. So you outgrew that relationship per se, that a relationship ended. And then in 2000, when that relationship ended, that's when I made a commitment in my heart to cheer up the planet. What did I want to do now that I got done this crappy marriage and good and stressful.
00:34:35
Speaker
I went to a battered woman shelter and all that right and so I got all started over and then four years later I met Robert and
00:34:45
Speaker
And this relationship, I've just got to get bigger and bigger and bigger. Like Robert, my husband's six foot seven and he's an artist. Oh my goodness. Six foot seven. And then he played basketball. That's like the typical question for someone that's tall. Are you a basketball player? Yeah, he wasn't, but everybody wanted him to do that.
00:35:13
Speaker
Yeah and so because he's and he's quite bamboyant and so I've just gotten to get bigger and bigger and bigger like like it's okay now like if in my last marriage if I attracted attention to myself that was a very bad thing and I would get in very big trouble but in this like I wouldn't even make eye contact with people by the end of that relationship and all kind of things right.
00:35:37
Speaker
And now, in this relationship, I get to talk to everybody, and I get to have as much attention to myself as I want. You got permission. You got permission to do, yeah. Why? And no matter what, I'm still the straight one, right? I guess Robert's even more, like, he's going to get more attention no matter what. Because when you're six foot seven,
00:35:57
Speaker
How tall are you? When you walk in the room, they notice, right? He already has a presence, so you have to kind of grow yourself in order to even be at least six foot tall next to a six foot seven.
00:36:15
Speaker
So then in that, in this relationship, then you've grown. And in this process then, because you said you wanted to write since you were a little girl. So where was writing in this whole journey? And did you journal even while you were going through these other relationships? Did journaling ever play a part in your process of grief and in these marriages as well? I did.
00:36:45
Speaker
Journal for a while before my first marriage I mean between my first marriage and my second marriage in AA Then my second husband used my journals against me so I never journaled again because he found them and read them right and I was in trouble and then So then but what I have since 2012 I started a blog on called happiness heals and
00:37:11
Speaker
And so I've written blogs of affirmations almost, I might've missed five months where I didn't write anything, right, in all them years or, but I think it's under 10 months, not all them years. It's 11 years now that my blog's been going. And so, and that's just, I just wrote affirmations. In 2012, I started writing affirmations for people.
00:37:36
Speaker
I had a couple of friends that were in a real big mess and every day I wrote them affirmations to try to cheer them up. You know, sometimes it worked better than others, but you know. And then because we need, I think for us to be happy, we need to change our perspectives about ourselves because we're ever evolving spiritual beings in these earthly meat suits and
00:38:02
Speaker
If you really, what you think about, I mean, I was a housekeeper in New Mexico and I was like, not happy with American politics. And I was like, God, get me out of here. I don't want to pay taxes for all this stuff. I want to pay, go somewhere else and pay taxes. They would not fight all the time, right? Cause like, I didn't believe in hitting, right? My ex-husband, I didn't, I never hit him back. I promised I would never hit him back. His hitting's wrong. Even if you're hitting back, it's still wrong. It's still hurting.
00:38:29
Speaker
And I mean, he was bigger and stronger in me, so it wouldn't be pointless. But I pushed him off of me a couple of times, but not addressing back. And then, because I was going to fix him, he gave me an orgasm. I wanted to fix him to stop hitting me. I loved him. It was a video. He was like, he could fix everything. It's possible.
00:38:52
Speaker
And so there was lots of good things that I liked about him. And he peeled my lifelong problem. I was 29 before I had to orgasm, right? I was really wanting that. I was going through them. And if you can't help me have one, get out of here. So, so then this, this goes through then with him, then you did, you were writing, then you stopped journaling because of the fear of then being seen.
Writing to Heal and Share
00:39:18
Speaker
Then you, you write then this
00:39:20
Speaker
blog in 2012, start writing affirmations for others as well, helping others. In that journey then, were you already doing Reiki and reflexology or in that time? Okay. So all this healing and helping others had started around then 2012?
00:39:39
Speaker
Oh, well, I've been, I've been doing reflexology with your mom. I know when she's off and on, not like professionally or just for friends, pretty much my whole life, you know, and then, and then I.
00:39:56
Speaker
And then the Reiki came in later first it was reflexology and then the memory. Okay. And then, but mostly since I met Robert in 2004 in Silver City, New Mexico, where I was living.
00:40:11
Speaker
I just had went to a dance and then he ended up, I was dancing with just a bunch of girlfriends, right? So you don't get drunk, right? You have to dance. So I mean, you get too drunk just drinking. And I was quite good at that still, right? Because once I quit drinking, then I started and now I don't drink anymore since 2014. But, and never with quite the zealousness that I did when I was young, but still too much. And so, you know, with just,
00:40:39
Speaker
being able to have a partner where I could grow and be understood and who was trying to support me emotionally and physically, then not having to feel like, you know, every time I do something, I'm in trouble about this or that, right? Because he had a very much more trusting perspective, right? My ex-husband just came from too violent of a home, right? And so that he was too scared. And so to
00:41:08
Speaker
So, you know, I could have friends and and it was important for me to pick a man who had friends, because if someone don't have friends, a man or a woman, if you're dating, if they don't have friends, then they might not be that friendly. So it's a 2004 then with Robert 2012, then the the blog. And then how did then the blog turn into now the book?
00:41:37
Speaker
I just had always wanted to write. And so I started, here's my first book, Healing My Heart After Domestic Abuse. Oh, okay. So you have that one too. Okay. Yeah. And so then my other one, it'll be the same format, right? There'll be a short affirmation and then a photo, I mean a sketch and then a longer affirmation. And I like the longer affirmations because
00:42:05
Speaker
I mean, we ad nauseam in our head berate ourselves. Oh, I'm not pretty enough. Oh, I'm too fat. Oh, I'm not, you know, whatever. There was lots. I used to berate myself ad nauseam, right? And instead to try to reprogram myself so that I say nice things to myself and be supportive. Like I could be bad or like when I do my workout, it's like, oh, I'm strong in between every repetition. Strong, I'm strong.
00:42:35
Speaker
to build myself up, because our thoughts, I mean, in AA, they said, well, you know, if anybody talked to me like I talked to myself, I would kill them, someone said once, and I thought, oh, well, that makes sense. Yes, like we are so not kind of, yeah, like we give so much grace to others, yet we don't give enough grace to ourselves and things, and how we speak to ourselves.
00:42:59
Speaker
So, in the new book, then, that you just released, then, in November of 2021, again, and I'm going to repeat the title, Healing My Heart After a Loss, affirmations that encourage me to feel and heal my grief. And again, this is Stephanie Serens that I'm talking to and the author, and then you have an illustrator in that book.
00:43:26
Speaker
Would you mind sharing one of the affirmations in the book with the listeners? Oh, you know, let's see. I actually because I see the one that's on Amazon. If you don't on the Amazon little clip, there's one a sample of it. I could read that one or if you want to read yourself one. You know, if you want to, whichever, if you want to read it, you can just read that one or I can just go to the to word.
00:43:54
Speaker
Right. And then read one. I was hoping I have my books are in the mail coming. I was hoping they would be here, but they're going to be here in about three days. So then as you're looking for that, then so the best ways for people so you can get them on Amazon and there's Kindle edition paperback as well as then your website as well, where you have your blog. Is that also where they're able to
00:44:22
Speaker
Find the book as well. Can they purchase it from your website too?
00:44:26
Speaker
You know, that was another goal that I had to get done before today, but it's going to be done soon. But, you know, Amazon Amazon. And then while you're looking at her blog is happiness heals dot WordPress dot com. Again, Stephanie Sarens, who we're speaking to. And the reason I'm saying the name several times, my dad, who's my biggest listener, the one that's probably listened to every single one of my episodes the most, he's like,
00:44:55
Speaker
Kendra, can you please repeat the person's name again at the end of the podcast and say their last name a little bit like, dad, I will do all my best to remember to do that as I'm doing this. So thank you, daddy, for the advice. So people hear me saying that at the end a little more and acknowledging the full name of who I'm speaking to. It's because one of my biggest fans, my dad, has recommended I do that. So that's great. Yeah. Tell me when you have found one.
00:45:25
Speaker
all right i think there we go so let's see i'm closing my eyes i'm gonna close my eyes as i listen so how about expressing my grief so expressing my grief through conversations with trusted friends heals my heart
00:45:51
Speaker
My grief spills forth from my heart through my words, causing my soul to connect to source energy, enabling me to cope with my sorrow. Remembering that even though my loved one has transformed back to golden light, we are one through our heart's connection. And then,
00:46:20
Speaker
So that was the short part. So beautiful. I love that imagery of the golden light. And plus that just brought me back to when you were talking about you doing that meditation and like, you know, with your with your mom and you seeing that golden light and it kind of re refracting into several, you know, individual lights that you mentioned before. So I love that visual.
00:46:48
Speaker
Oh, thank you. And then so that's the short affirmation. And then the other side is the full page affirmation. And so this is the affirmation for from the book. Each time I allow myself to share my grief with trusted friends, my heart gets lighter. My friends comfort me with soothing words that remind me I am loved. It is up to me to keep sharing my grief so that my heart receives the solace.
00:47:17
Speaker
it needs to heal. Creep is best shared with friends who love me wholeheartedly. My life is blessed to have caring friends that want what is best for me. As I am able to speak about the loss of my loved one, my face is soon covered with tears once again. My friends give me the gift of listening so that I am able to hear my sorrow. The attention my friends offer me is mending my soul.
00:47:48
Speaker
My grief is eased by the care of my friends. As my tears start to flow, my friends step up to give me space, hugs, chocolate, or a warm blanket, and I feel safe. I choose to visualize my beloved as golden light, which brings to my heart a sense of peace. It is a blessing to me to know that his body
00:48:13
Speaker
is what has dissolved so that the golden light of His Spirit is free to roam the heavens. We are still connected by our gift of love. I am a comforted child of universal life and universal love knows I am connected to my loved one through my heart.
00:48:35
Speaker
All right, he liked it. Yeah, that was my my my guest, my nephew, my nephew dog who's visiting is like, yeah, he did a game. So I was so like concentrated in that right as you ended.
00:48:50
Speaker
Poncho is his name. Wow, that it was just so beautiful. Thank you so much. It's such a beautiful way of just wrapping all this conversation up so that people can just connect again, not only to your book, but also just to you because those words that you wrote
00:49:11
Speaker
just really do give comfort and know you know people know that when they're reading these affirmations it does come from someone who's already been through something like that they might have been and therefore
00:49:27
Speaker
You know, you can relate to that pain. And if they've helped you in your healing journey, I am sure that they will play a big part in your readers as well as they read your book. Thank you so much, Stephanie. Stephanie, is there anything I did not ask in this journey or any question that I asked that we might have gone in all these different loops that we didn't get to answer?
00:49:54
Speaker
I think we pretty much have covered it all. I just feel very blessed that you gave me the opportunity. This is my second podcast. And the first one about my book, a friend of mine, she has a podcast.
00:50:10
Speaker
living your juiciest life. And I've had such a messy life and now I'm, now it's juicy. But that's what inspired me because she did that. I thought, you know, now that my books and I should reach out to grief podcasters, right? And maybe that can help me to
00:50:27
Speaker
become the next Louise Haye because she passed away, right? So we need a new affirmation person in the world. Yes. And it's beautiful and we all connect. I always say this with, in general, like there's a lot of, for example, grief podcasts, there's a lot of different authors as well, but there is never enough because everyone will relate or connect to a different, you know,
00:50:55
Speaker
either podcast or a different author or book because it has to be something that resonates with the person that's either reading if it's a book or the person that's listening. So the more that there's out there, the more tools that are out there,
00:51:11
Speaker
the better and so that's that's wonderful that you now have this affirmations book and again you can find healing my heart after loss affirmations I'd encourage me to feel and heal my grief on Amazon and Stephanie Sarens it was a pleasure having you on and thank you so much for sharing
00:51:31
Speaker
your juicy life because you did hear that was probably some juicy conversation. I don't think that the word orgasm has ever been in my podcast till today. Death and orgasm don't always go together, right?
00:51:52
Speaker
Then that would also be that that person had a very juicy life as they lived but thank you so much for sharing If you're interested I'd love to offer you a free copy of my book if you send me your if you'd like a copy of my real book I'll send you one if you send me your address
00:52:11
Speaker
Oh, thank you so much, Stephanie. That's so kind of you. Thank you. And thanks again to the listeners for tuning in. And again, make sure to check the show notes so that you can go and access the website links as well. Thank you once again. All right. And I'll make sure you have the book link if I didn't give it to you. Perfect. Thank you. All right. Thank you.
00:52:36
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.
00:53:05
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.