Sometimes the Dragon Wins: Natasha J. Layton on Surviving a Cult, Five Suicides, and Herself

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Welcome to the Human Experience, a podcast about the stories we

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live out every day and the importance of championing the vulnerability

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and courage of the storyteller. I'm your host, Jennifer Peterkin,

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and it was through my own lived story of experiencing domestic violence that this

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podcast was created. By traveling the globe and interviewing

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each guest in person, I am convinced now more than ever, that stories

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have the power to change the world. Thank you for being here.

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In a world full of noise, to listen with intention is

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an act of resistance. Natasha, thank you so much

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for sitting down with me and for, well, hosting me in

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your home to do this interview. It's so lovely to finally meet you in

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person. Have a mutual friend that introduced us, and I'm so glad that she did,

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and I'm really excited to hear your story. I know that you've

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been through things that most people could never even imagine,

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but I. I'm so thankful that you

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are willing to tell your story to help people and to help

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people know that they're not alone. So thank you. Thank you so much for having

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me. I really appreciate it. It's. It's always a pleasure to come on a new

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podcast and. And connect with a new audience. You know,

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I'm still very new to this. This world, I would say,

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and sharing my story. It's been. Yeah,

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just six months since I went public with my story for the first time,

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and my world has changed dramatically in good ways.

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And I'm very grateful that me sharing my story has helped

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people. I never imagined what a tremendous

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amount of healing that would bring to me to share my

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story and to have people connect with me in that way. I receive

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messages pretty regularly from people just letting me know, hey, I.

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I heard your story. I. It resonated with me. Thank you

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so much for having the courage to share that. And it really.

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I read every single message that comes through. So just know

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that. That, like, there's not a team of people behind a small little podcast

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like this. Like, it is generally a one or a two man band and woman

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band, I should say. Yes. So I'm very, very grateful to

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be here and. And just know that even though

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you feel like you're alone in this world, there is always

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somebody out there that loves you and that appreciates you.

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And most of the time, the ones that have had the biggest profound

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impact from you sharing your story usually don't

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say anything. Yeah. So for every one person that I know

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that I get a message from, I know that there could be dozens, if not

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a hundred people out there. And so I just know that it's an

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honor to do this. It's not easy. I will say that it's

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not easy to relive the past, the horrible experiences.

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It does take a toll. I've actually had to cut back on

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the number of podcast appearances because it

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drains me emotionally. But I know that if I can

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help one person, that's good enough for me, and that's why I continue to do

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it. I actually had somebody reach out to me. I've known him since

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I was a kid, and he was like, why are you talking about this?

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It happened such a long. Why do you feel the need

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to do that? And I'm like, I tried to explain to him, you know,

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this what I'm talking about. You know, if I can help one person feel less

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alone or if it can help one person, you know,

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be reflected in my story or whatever it is. And he just

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couldn't. He couldn't grasp it. He very much is of the mindset

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that, you know, it's in the past, it can stay in the past.

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Talking about, it's not gonna do any good. Let's just bury

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it. And so I just. I had to.

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And that conversation because I could. I was getting frustrated.

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Yeah. Because he can't. He doesn't understand the power of what story can.

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Storytelling can do for others. So with that, I guess I'll

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just start with where I come from.

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Yeah, please do. I mean, I. I really want you

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to lead this and. And kind of. I know that you are getting

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more practice telling your story. You've done it. First of all,

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when you said six months, I was like, it's only been six months. I feel

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like I've been talking to you for longer than that. But, yeah,

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that's actually pretty incredible. I'm, like, hearing the timeframe. I'm not realizing

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how much you've done in such a short amount of time. And it

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is really incredible. So I just want to give you kudos for

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that because it is hard. It's incredibly difficult.

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And I think to your point about what the person

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you know, from childhood was talking about, to me, that speaks

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to unprocessed trauma. You know,

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whenever I hear somebody say, we're not going to talk about that,

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it's in the past, that's a red flag for me at this point.

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Right. Like, talking about the past doesn't mean you're living in

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the past. And so just because you're talking about

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your lived experiences doesn't mean that you're still wallowing

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in them. Or living in that place.

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But it is, I think that's actually a sign of healing,

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to be able to talk about your past experiences and

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to talk about them from a place of wholeness

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and from, you know, I lived through this and it's, it's always going to

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be a part of me. I can never forget that that exists. And I'm not

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going to because I earned those stripes. Right. Like I earned the,

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the right to talk about my own story.

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And so anybody that says that you shouldn't talk about it,

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and it's a, it's a common line brought up for a myriad of

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different things. Don't talk about that. It's in the past. We don't need to revisit

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it. Yeah, you do. It helps people, it helps you.

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There are ways that you have to take care of yourself

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as you do it, as you walk through it. And I will say, not everybody

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is made for a platform like this. That's okay.

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But if you have the capacity to do it, yes, do it.

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Absolutely. So with that, yes, please,

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Natasha, give us your story. Where does that start

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for you? Well, I was raised in the fundamentalist lds.

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Well, so it's called Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints.

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It was, we didn't realize it was a cult. Growing up, it was just a

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religion. It's a breakoff from the mainstream Mormon church.

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So I grew up in Salt Lake County, Utah in a

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family of. I had three mothers growing up and my grandfather

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ruling Jeffs was the prophet of our church at the time. So I was born

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in the mid-80s and he took over from the previous

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prophet kind of like, I guess you would say he usurped the throne.

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Feels appropriate, right? Right, yeah. Became the self

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proclaimed prophet. And there was actually a large split that happened in the church in

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the late 70s. And you find that a lot. I've looked back in our

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history from when Mormonism started in the mid-1800s when Joseph

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Smith founded it. And then, you know, there's always a fight for power amongst

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the men and there's generally splits happen. So there's very,

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you know, there's always these little sects that happen here and there because

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one man wants power or a group of men wants power. And.

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And so that is very much the case. And so my reality was

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that we grow up on a compound at the mouth of Little Cottonwood

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Canyon in Sandy, Utah. And so there was, you know, our big

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schoolhouse church house that was formerly my grandfather's house.

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He moved out of that house and into a house next door that was built

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for his family. And then on the compound, there was like four

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or five other houses that were my house and my uncle's houses.

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Obviously. My grandfather had 65 children. He's fathered

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65 children with 13 wives, I believe it was.

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I mean, but you can google Roland Jeffs and most infamously,

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his son Warren Jeffs, who took over the church in the

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90s as my grandfather was getting in his old age and

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becoming very feeble and was running the

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show from behind the scenes. And Warren eventually

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took over in 2002 when Grandfather died. There's also been rumors

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that Warren was slowly poisoning his father. And then Warren

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ultimately did take over and just was like, I'm your new prophet.

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And the amount of brainwashing that occurred so is

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actually starts from a very young age.

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So we went to the church that was actually run

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by Warren, or, excuse me, the school that was run by Warren, which was two

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houses down from mine. And he did what was called morning class.

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And it was basically like every single weekday we went in,

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we listened to him preach. He eventually started teaching

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from his own, I would say book, I can't remember what it

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was called, but he eventually wrote his own book and started teaching from that.

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We were instructed to read from the Book of Mormon every single night. And do.

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I never did. I have never read the Bible

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from. I've never read the Book of Mormon. I just,

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I just did what I had to do to get by. Granted, I was only

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in that school through fifth grade, but, you know, my reality

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was every day getting up, going to school, and then

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coming home to what I realize now was a very toxic environment.

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My dad was assigned to his wife Susan.

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He was on leave from the Vietnam War. He had been drafted.

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And on the way home from the airport, he was instructed from his parents that

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he was getting married in three days. Oh, yeah. To a woman he had never

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met. And in that time, you didn't say no.

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And because he just was

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like, okay. Three days later he was married. And they immediately

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started having children. And they had.

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She had six, I think she had five children in like

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six years. Wow. Yeah. And then my

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mother, who is the second wife, Sherry, she and Susan

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are full blooded sisters. Oh, wow. Yes. Which is very

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common from where I'm from for sisters to marry the same man. In fact,

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multiple sisters have married the same man.

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Very, very common. And so, and I've

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asked my mom this so many times because her and Susan never got along.

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I was like, why on earth did you marry the same man as

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your sister? That you hated. And she says,

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well, I fell in love with your dad. I really did. So I will say

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that, that she actually had asked to be placed with him when she was 18

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and her father told her, no, you know, you're too young. I will say that

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about my grandfather. Wayman is he did not like his daughters to get married too

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young. And so he made her wait till she was about almost 21.

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And then she did get married. And it was very, very tumultuous.

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You know, my mom was vivacious and very

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beautiful. And Susan was more subdued,

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quiet. I think she was still beautiful. She wasn't quite as beautiful

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as my mom, but I think she was incredibly intimidated. And then to see

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Watch your. So I have to look at it from a perspective and that I.

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From, you know, that perspective of watching your husband

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fall in love, truly, truly fall in love with

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your younger sister. Yeah. How hard would that be? Now,

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I'm not condoning any of Susan's behavior. She did some pretty awful things to my

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mom when she was newly married. But I still have to look at it from

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that perspective, and that would be incredibly hard. And, you know,

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Susan and dad did eventually, obviously grow to love each other, but it was never

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the level of love that my mom and dad had. And so

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I did have a really good example of what true love looked like. But because

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of that toxicity that was immediately prevalent from when

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my mom married my dad and then, you know, in was

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it the early 80s? So my mom married him in 1978,

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I believe. And then five years later, my dad was then assigned a

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16 year old girl that he was told to marry. By who?

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His father. Oh, wow. Yeah. His father said,

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there's a young girl that has been asked to be placed with your family and

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I want you to marry her. And again, my dad,

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you just, you don't say no. And we

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later found out years later that she had been severely abused

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by her father and her brothers. So she brought with

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her a tremendous amount of trauma. And she

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was incredibly abusive to the children.

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And she was immediately put in charge of. I don't know,

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it was like 10 kids. The moms would rotate who would take, who would be

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on kids each day they would work, you know, cleaning houses

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or doing whatever. And she was left at home with a

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number, you know, with all the children. And who at that

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age is emotionally equipped to handle that? I mean, and that

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happens, you know, where the older children are taking care of the younger children.

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And you don't have the level of maturity that is required

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to Be a good caretaker.

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They're your younger siblings. And so things are missed.

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My first experience and one of my very first memories

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is Martha is the third wife's name for

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my nap time, you know, two, three years old, she would

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put gobs of lotion on my hands and then

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on the door handle and then lock the door, and I was left there

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kicking and screaming and then fall asleep

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at the base of the door every day. And so that experience

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happening day after day after day for years, has instilled

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in me a very big sense of, like, fight or flight when I feel trapped.

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Like, I have a very visceral response,

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and it's all I can do to get out.

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And I actually. I remember driving somewhere with my

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mom. I was about 13. And I recounted this story to her, and she

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had no idea. She was like, oh, my God,

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it makes sense. I was like, what are you talking about? She says, when you

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were little, and after, I'd give you a bath and I would put lotion on

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your hands, you would cry and say, no, Mama, I get stuck.

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Yeah. And so by then, Martha had already

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left the family. She left the family when I was about 8, and she took

229
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her three daughters with her. As in, like, did she leave the church

230
00:14:57,610 --> 00:15:00,910
or. No, she. She left the family, and my grandfather

231
00:15:01,410 --> 00:15:05,070
reassigned her to another man. Okay. And we tried

232
00:15:05,570 --> 00:15:08,750
to have visits with. She had been claiming that she was

233
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abused and that there had been some sexual abuse

234
00:15:13,770 --> 00:15:16,350
with one of her daughters. Now, here's the interesting part.

235
00:15:17,630 --> 00:15:20,990
I was in when she left the family, and she.

236
00:15:21,070 --> 00:15:25,190
Cps Child Protective Services was called, and they came to interview myself

237
00:15:25,690 --> 00:15:28,730
and Jerush, who was from my mom, my older sister, by two years.

238
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So I was 8, and she was 10. And CPS came and interviewed

239
00:15:33,470 --> 00:15:37,050
us and asked us, has anybody ever touched you inappropriately within

240
00:15:37,550 --> 00:15:41,690
your home or anybody ever touched your privates or anything like that? And I responded

241
00:15:42,190 --> 00:15:45,690
honestly, no. Well, when I was 14,

242
00:15:46,650 --> 00:15:50,090
I began having flashbacks of being sexually abused

243
00:15:50,250 --> 00:15:52,780
by my elder brother, Marcus. Yeah.

244
00:15:53,260 --> 00:15:57,180
Oh, my God. So I was.

245
00:15:57,820 --> 00:16:00,940
The first time the flashback happened. I was on the phone with him.

246
00:16:01,100 --> 00:16:05,860
He was my teenage crush at the time. And we

247
00:16:06,360 --> 00:16:09,500
were just talking and having fun, and all of

248
00:16:10,000 --> 00:16:12,940
a sudden I got really quiet, and he's like, are you there?

249
00:16:13,180 --> 00:16:16,220
And I said, yeah. And he's like, what's wrong? And it's like,

250
00:16:16,860 --> 00:16:20,650
I just had this flash in my head. I was like,

251
00:16:22,090 --> 00:16:25,570
I think my older brother may have, like, sexually abused me.

252
00:16:26,070 --> 00:16:28,490
And he's like, what? We were. I was 14, he was 15,

253
00:16:29,690 --> 00:16:32,690
and he was very sweet and he let me talk about it for a minute

254
00:16:33,190 --> 00:16:35,450
and he's like, Natasha, you've got to tell somebody. You know,

255
00:16:36,570 --> 00:16:40,410
the amount of grace that he showed was incredible for a 15 year old boy.

256
00:16:40,890 --> 00:16:44,210
And by then we had left the church and I was in public

257
00:16:44,710 --> 00:16:47,580
school. So, you know, he was aware of my past but you know, we were

258
00:16:48,080 --> 00:16:51,580
kind of living a normal life, quote unquote. But still, you know,

259
00:16:52,080 --> 00:16:55,540
a boy from the mainstream world knowing what to say, but he said the right

260
00:16:56,040 --> 00:16:58,100
things and he was very kind and I just went on with my life,

261
00:16:58,260 --> 00:17:01,299
you know, didn't tell anybody. Sorry.

262
00:17:01,380 --> 00:17:04,660
So when I tell my story, it's very hard because I have to jump around

263
00:17:05,460 --> 00:17:08,660
how things are explained. You are good. Yeah, good. Because of

264
00:17:08,980 --> 00:17:12,620
things tie in. My, my story is very complex so

265
00:17:13,120 --> 00:17:16,540
I want to preface that again. So Martha left the family when I was eight.

266
00:17:17,020 --> 00:17:20,620
And then in 1997 we were

267
00:17:21,120 --> 00:17:25,060
excommunicated from the church because we, my older siblings had

268
00:17:25,560 --> 00:17:29,540
left the church and then became what were called apostates. And you're

269
00:17:30,040 --> 00:17:33,220
not supposed to have any communication with them. And my family

270
00:17:33,720 --> 00:17:36,740
were all very close. And so, you know, my siblings,

271
00:17:37,240 --> 00:17:39,820
we still had regular interaction with them even though they had left the church.

272
00:17:40,320 --> 00:17:43,460
They would come over every Sunday for dinner, family dinner. Well,

273
00:17:43,960 --> 00:17:47,040
our niece, my oldest brother Clayne's daughter had

274
00:17:47,540 --> 00:17:51,000
died at six months old. She died of sids. So we were

275
00:17:51,500 --> 00:17:54,120
trying to come together as a family to try and heal from that.

276
00:17:54,840 --> 00:17:58,920
And we were having a barbecue and Warren's spies,

277
00:17:59,160 --> 00:18:02,400
Warren Jeffs, you can look him up. They were driving

278
00:18:02,900 --> 00:18:05,840
by our home and watching and we had my, you know,

279
00:18:06,340 --> 00:18:09,920
Clayne had left the church and his girlfriend was a gentile from without

280
00:18:10,420 --> 00:18:14,000
the church, you know, smoking and drinking and all the things. Also my dad

281
00:18:14,500 --> 00:18:17,820
had a rule that if you smoked cigarettes, which a number of my siblings did,

282
00:18:18,320 --> 00:18:20,900
you had to smoke out on the street. You couldn't smoke on his property.

283
00:18:22,020 --> 00:18:25,340
Whatever. Yep, again. So Warren and

284
00:18:25,840 --> 00:18:29,060
his spies were driving by and seeing a whole group of people out on the

285
00:18:29,560 --> 00:18:32,980
street smoking cigarettes. Very, very evil. Ruh roh. Yeah.

286
00:18:33,060 --> 00:18:36,380
My dad had a meeting with his father the following Monday for

287
00:18:36,880 --> 00:18:40,140
his monthly tithing meeting to turn in his tithing. And my grandfather

288
00:18:40,640 --> 00:18:43,620
says to him, I understand you've been harboring apostates in your home.

289
00:18:44,120 --> 00:18:47,710
And my dad said, well, if you mean my children, yes, I have. And he,

290
00:18:48,210 --> 00:18:51,750
you know, explained to him, you know, it was my grandfather's great granddaughter that

291
00:18:52,250 --> 00:18:54,270
had died, which he didn't come to the funeral or anything.

292
00:18:55,470 --> 00:18:59,590
And my grandfather Said, well, you can choose your church or your children. And my

293
00:19:00,090 --> 00:19:03,310
dad chose his children. And that was absolutely unheard of.

294
00:19:03,710 --> 00:19:07,710
So we were the first family that Warren, again, this was all Warren

295
00:19:08,210 --> 00:19:11,150
behind the scenes, in grandfather's ear, get him out of here.

296
00:19:11,650 --> 00:19:15,040
Because Warren knew my dad posed a threat because my dad was a free thinker.

297
00:19:15,540 --> 00:19:19,000
Also my mom, my mom was very much a free thinker. And by,

298
00:19:19,500 --> 00:19:22,920
by this time, by the mid-90s, my mom had stopped going to church

299
00:19:23,420 --> 00:19:27,280
for years. Oh, wow. She didn't believe any of the bullshit. And so

300
00:19:27,600 --> 00:19:30,760
my dad was. Grandfather said to my dad, as far

301
00:19:31,260 --> 00:19:34,760
as I'm concerned, you've lost your priesthood. And my dad got up and left and

302
00:19:35,260 --> 00:19:38,480
we lost our entire community. We lived next door to our grand.

303
00:19:38,980 --> 00:19:41,560
Our cousins. They were our best friends. And from that day on, they could never

304
00:19:42,060 --> 00:19:45,520
speak to us again. Wow. Yeah. So your

305
00:19:46,020 --> 00:19:50,160
mom, I'm sure, obviously was fine with that. Not losing community, but leaving.

306
00:19:50,800 --> 00:19:55,240
What about Susan? She had considered

307
00:19:55,740 --> 00:19:59,760
leaving and being reassigned to another man. She was very self

308
00:20:00,260 --> 00:20:04,080
righteous and very pious and she had considered being

309
00:20:04,580 --> 00:20:08,000
reassigned and staying in the church. I don't know what changed her mind.

310
00:20:08,500 --> 00:20:13,040
I know that she had five boys that she was still raising that were underage,

311
00:20:13,590 --> 00:20:17,150
five or six. And I don't know what changed her

312
00:20:17,650 --> 00:20:20,950
mind, but she did stay with my dad and we all left the church together.

313
00:20:21,450 --> 00:20:23,830
We stayed there in our home. We tried to sell it. It was a white

314
00:20:24,330 --> 00:20:28,190
elephant polygamous house. There were so

315
00:20:28,690 --> 00:20:31,870
many additions, which is very common where as the family grows, you just put an

316
00:20:32,370 --> 00:20:35,790
addition on. It was a white elephant. My dad built it and it was beautifully

317
00:20:36,290 --> 00:20:39,430
built, but it was a white elephant. And actually it had been turned into a

318
00:20:39,930 --> 00:20:43,510
duplex, I believe in 1995, because the mothers were

319
00:20:44,010 --> 00:20:48,230
fighting so bad. Ah. So it's

320
00:20:48,730 --> 00:20:51,910
so interesting to talk about because this

321
00:20:52,410 --> 00:20:56,030
is nothing that I've ever experienced. But it's also interesting

322
00:20:56,109 --> 00:20:59,870
because Mormonism, especially flds, has become

323
00:21:00,110 --> 00:21:03,990
so prevalent in pop culture. And so, like, people do know

324
00:21:04,490 --> 00:21:07,790
who Warren Jeffs is. And you know, you have the,

325
00:21:08,460 --> 00:21:11,740
the sister wives show that has. There's like four different

326
00:21:11,820 --> 00:21:15,180
sister wife shows. And, and so all of these things that

327
00:21:15,580 --> 00:21:19,660
there's like a little glimpse of the quote unquote salaciousness

328
00:21:20,160 --> 00:21:23,820
of it, but it's not the same as obviously

329
00:21:23,979 --> 00:21:27,940
living through the real thing and having

330
00:21:28,440 --> 00:21:32,140
people in community that you're invested in and involved with and

331
00:21:32,640 --> 00:21:35,580
being separated from them. And how many siblings do you have?

332
00:21:36,080 --> 00:21:38,980
And where are you in the. There's 20 of us all together.

333
00:21:39,380 --> 00:21:42,100
I am the 13th child of the 20.

334
00:21:42,580 --> 00:21:45,780
And my mother had six children. I am her fourth.

335
00:21:45,860 --> 00:21:48,900
Okay. 13 was my grandfather's lucky number. Oh,

336
00:21:49,400 --> 00:21:52,700
wow. Yeah. So there you go. Yeah. 13 isn't

337
00:21:53,200 --> 00:21:56,860
always a bad luck number. No, it's not. So you were very

338
00:21:57,360 --> 00:21:59,540
much, based on what you've said thus far, like,

339
00:22:00,180 --> 00:22:03,940
don't really care about the church aspect of it. I'm sure community

340
00:22:04,020 --> 00:22:08,650
was a huge deal. Where were your other siblings or

341
00:22:09,150 --> 00:22:12,890
other members of your family at in terms of how big of a

342
00:22:13,390 --> 00:22:16,250
deal excommunication was from a religious standpoint?

343
00:22:17,130 --> 00:22:20,769
So the vast majority of my older siblings had already walked away from

344
00:22:21,269 --> 00:22:25,010
the church. So in 1997, I was 12, just turned

345
00:22:25,510 --> 00:22:28,930
12. And the only of my two siblings that were still, like,

346
00:22:29,430 --> 00:22:32,910
devout was Marcus, who was the one that abused me and Brenda.

347
00:22:34,020 --> 00:22:37,060
So Brenda had already been married, and so she,

348
00:22:38,100 --> 00:22:40,980
you know, basically, when we were excommunicated, wrote us off.

349
00:22:41,620 --> 00:22:45,100
Marcus had not yet been married, and so because he was

350
00:22:45,600 --> 00:22:48,899
still very devout in the church, he actually went and moved in with my uncle's

351
00:22:49,399 --> 00:22:53,420
family and assimilated into their family. And I

352
00:22:53,920 --> 00:22:56,900
think we had a bit of interaction with him. And keep in mind,

353
00:22:57,400 --> 00:23:00,860
I still, at this age, was not aware that he had been sexually abusing me.

354
00:23:01,360 --> 00:23:04,620
Right. Yeah. And so I only saw him a few times.

355
00:23:05,020 --> 00:23:08,300
And then after I did remember,

356
00:23:08,540 --> 00:23:11,820
I only saw him, like, two more times after that.

357
00:23:12,060 --> 00:23:14,860
Well, in my teenage years, I should say.

358
00:23:16,220 --> 00:23:19,980
And so, yeah, they just essentially just disassociated from

359
00:23:20,480 --> 00:23:23,460
the family and went on their merry way. And then we just tried to pick

360
00:23:23,960 --> 00:23:27,540
up the pieces and, you know, with that sense of loss. My dad actually came

361
00:23:28,040 --> 00:23:31,500
out that he had pretty severe PTSD from the Vietnam War.

362
00:23:32,540 --> 00:23:36,260
So he started going to therapy, and a lot of things came out

363
00:23:36,760 --> 00:23:40,780
with that. And I would say between

364
00:23:41,100 --> 00:23:45,020
95 and 2007

365
00:23:45,580 --> 00:23:48,580
was a very, very tumultuous time for my family.

366
00:23:49,080 --> 00:23:52,700
I genuinely don't know how we survived. There was so much had happened in

367
00:23:53,200 --> 00:23:56,780
such a short time. I mean, I literally could be here for hours talking about

368
00:23:57,280 --> 00:24:01,000
it all with what happened with us individually and as a collective

369
00:24:01,800 --> 00:24:05,800
marriages and divorces. And it was just incredibly

370
00:24:05,960 --> 00:24:09,240
chaotic. And we were all just left to deal with it.

371
00:24:09,480 --> 00:24:13,280
We didn't talk about it openly, and dad

372
00:24:13,780 --> 00:24:17,280
and Susan split up for a bit. And dad just wanted to be with mom,

373
00:24:17,780 --> 00:24:20,960
you know, and he did that. And then after six months of

374
00:24:21,460 --> 00:24:24,200
being with my mom full time, my dad's like, I can't do this anymore.

375
00:24:24,840 --> 00:24:28,320
And then he left, and my mom told me it was my

376
00:24:28,820 --> 00:24:32,260
fault that he left. Literally said those words. My dad left.

377
00:24:32,760 --> 00:24:34,860
Your dad left me because of you. When I was 16,

378
00:24:36,780 --> 00:24:40,300
just there. I. Again, I didn't

379
00:24:40,800 --> 00:24:44,100
realize how awful my life

380
00:24:44,600 --> 00:24:47,980
was until I started telling it to people from

381
00:24:48,480 --> 00:24:50,780
outside of the church. Regular, everyday people.

382
00:24:52,140 --> 00:24:55,500
I shared with my best friend at 16.

383
00:24:56,610 --> 00:25:00,010
About, you know, at that time was I had finally started having the

384
00:25:00,510 --> 00:25:03,610
courage to talk about the abuse from my brother. And I did. One night,

385
00:25:04,110 --> 00:25:07,530
I had a knife to my wrist, and I called my

386
00:25:08,030 --> 00:25:11,730
sister Jenny, and she picked up the phone, and I was. She talked

387
00:25:12,230 --> 00:25:14,410
me off the ledge, essentially. And she's like, look, it's time for you to tell

388
00:25:14,910 --> 00:25:17,570
your mom. Dad, Jenny is Susan's child.

389
00:25:18,530 --> 00:25:21,610
But another six months went by before I had the courage to tell them.

390
00:25:22,110 --> 00:25:25,410
And when I did tell them, they were in complete disbelief because Marcus had

391
00:25:25,910 --> 00:25:29,970
been, like, the perfect son. He was, you know, very devoutly religious, never did anything

392
00:25:30,470 --> 00:25:33,610
wrong, and so they didn't really believe me.

393
00:25:34,090 --> 00:25:37,290
But the next day, my dad did call him, and he

394
00:25:37,790 --> 00:25:40,650
admitted to it. Yeah. Were you the only one?

395
00:25:41,210 --> 00:25:45,610
Yes. From him. There had been other

396
00:25:46,090 --> 00:25:49,570
very minor instances with other siblings that I have become aware

397
00:25:50,070 --> 00:25:53,310
of, but within my family, yes.

398
00:25:53,810 --> 00:25:57,310
Yes. I know that some of my other siblings were sexually abused by, like,

399
00:25:57,810 --> 00:26:00,550
my uncles and things like that. So within my family,

400
00:26:01,510 --> 00:26:04,790
that was the only, like, severe one. And I

401
00:26:05,290 --> 00:26:08,630
guess. But when dad confronted Marcus,

402
00:26:08,710 --> 00:26:11,670
dad told him to write me and my mom an apology letter.

403
00:26:12,070 --> 00:26:15,750
Why my mom needed one, I don't know. A few weeks later, I come home

404
00:26:16,250 --> 00:26:19,680
from school, and my says, your letter from Marcus is

405
00:26:20,180 --> 00:26:22,880
right there. I saw mine and I saw hers. I never read hers. I actually

406
00:26:23,380 --> 00:26:27,040
still have mine. I read it a few months ago. But one

407
00:26:27,540 --> 00:26:31,320
thing that is forever seared in my brain is that he said,

408
00:26:31,820 --> 00:26:35,840
we both know there was no real damage done. And in reading

409
00:26:36,340 --> 00:26:39,800
the letter, which I had not read in decades, I read it a few months

410
00:26:40,300 --> 00:26:43,970
ago. There was no accountability on his part.

411
00:26:44,530 --> 00:26:47,010
And by then, he had had children. He had daughters,

412
00:26:47,330 --> 00:26:50,930
and he mentioned them. You know, I can't. He felt

413
00:26:51,330 --> 00:26:54,970
because he didn't penetrate me with his penis that there was

414
00:26:55,470 --> 00:26:58,369
no real damage done. And it happened more than once.

415
00:26:58,450 --> 00:27:01,970
I do know that. And that letter,

416
00:27:02,530 --> 00:27:06,250
I read it, and it was never spoken about again. And I

417
00:27:06,750 --> 00:27:10,860
was 15, and I was left to deal with that on my own and

418
00:27:11,360 --> 00:27:15,300
never given any amount of support to deal with that. And when

419
00:27:15,800 --> 00:27:18,860
I say how that has shaped me as a human being,

420
00:27:19,820 --> 00:27:23,500
I genuinely do not know how I survived those

421
00:27:24,000 --> 00:27:26,780
years. I was suicidal every day.

422
00:27:27,580 --> 00:27:30,780
And I look back and I see pictures of

423
00:27:31,280 --> 00:27:34,380
Myself, and I got so good at hiding it.

424
00:27:34,880 --> 00:27:38,250
Like, you look at pictures of me and you would have no idea what I

425
00:27:38,750 --> 00:27:41,850
was dealing with behind the scenes. And I've shared more publicly,

426
00:27:42,350 --> 00:27:44,810
obviously. I have survived three suicide attempts.

427
00:27:45,370 --> 00:27:48,810
I have a podcast that I co host with a very dear friend and

428
00:27:48,890 --> 00:27:52,650
it's called the Survivors Podcast. And I've shared in detail about my

429
00:27:52,730 --> 00:27:56,570
suicide attempts. And I've had aunts and cousins

430
00:27:57,070 --> 00:28:00,650
reach out to me and they. I had no idea. And I'm so sorry

431
00:28:01,150 --> 00:28:04,010
that you had to go through that alone. I wish I would have known.

432
00:28:04,170 --> 00:28:06,960
I. But I was taught that you stay quiet,

433
00:28:07,440 --> 00:28:10,800
you don't talk about it, especially when it occurs in your own home.

434
00:28:12,560 --> 00:28:16,000
And the amount of emotional neglect from

435
00:28:16,500 --> 00:28:20,080
my parents, you know, I don't know that I'll ever be able to forgive them.

436
00:28:21,360 --> 00:28:24,840
And what makes me the most angry is that a

437
00:28:25,340 --> 00:28:28,800
few years later, my brother Brent came forward about being sexually abused by Warren.

438
00:28:30,810 --> 00:28:34,570
And he was proclaimed a hero and was put

439
00:28:35,070 --> 00:28:39,090
on talk shows and he wrote a book and was given just

440
00:28:39,590 --> 00:28:43,530
a tremendous amount of support. And I

441
00:28:44,030 --> 00:28:47,730
just was like, what about me? And so I felt

442
00:28:48,230 --> 00:28:51,850
like I didn't matter. I felt so incredibly insignificant

443
00:28:52,250 --> 00:28:55,690
and that it was my fault. I brought it on myself.

444
00:28:57,000 --> 00:29:00,800
But how could a three year old bring that onto

445
00:29:01,300 --> 00:29:06,640
herself? No. Oh, my God. I just

446
00:29:07,140 --> 00:29:10,800
have. I mean, I have the deepest well of sadness

447
00:29:11,300 --> 00:29:14,400
and compassion for 3 year old you,

448
00:29:14,900 --> 00:29:18,840
but then 15 year old you, because even

449
00:29:19,340 --> 00:29:22,760
though they're both you, they were essentially different people,

450
00:29:22,920 --> 00:29:26,580
right? And the act of

451
00:29:27,080 --> 00:29:31,180
reliving your trauma through the

452
00:29:31,580 --> 00:29:35,580
neglect of other people that basically show

453
00:29:36,080 --> 00:29:40,060
or tell you that they don't care is as

454
00:29:40,560 --> 00:29:44,060
bad, if not worse than the original trauma

455
00:29:44,560 --> 00:29:48,500
itself. To go through something that changes

456
00:29:49,000 --> 00:29:53,140
you as a person and changes your life,

457
00:29:53,640 --> 00:29:56,780
it destroys your innocence. And then to

458
00:29:57,280 --> 00:30:01,100
bring that to somebody that you trust and to be told

459
00:30:02,540 --> 00:30:06,580
at best that it doesn't matter or it wasn't that

460
00:30:07,080 --> 00:30:10,460
big of a deal and to basically just get over it, that is its

461
00:30:10,960 --> 00:30:13,180
own form of severe trauma,

462
00:30:13,900 --> 00:30:17,100
that it's not just something you can sweep under the rug.

463
00:30:17,420 --> 00:30:20,660
But I think what people don't realize is they don't know

464
00:30:21,160 --> 00:30:24,440
what to say in those moments. It's not good enough

465
00:30:25,240 --> 00:30:29,040
because you're creating another traumatic event for somebody that

466
00:30:29,540 --> 00:30:32,440
has ar that is already trying to heal from the first trauma.

467
00:30:33,320 --> 00:30:36,600
And so, you know, I. I'm not saying that everybody

468
00:30:37,100 --> 00:30:40,480
has to have the perfect words or the perfect response, but what

469
00:30:40,980 --> 00:30:44,480
I will say is we have this idea in our heads

470
00:30:44,980 --> 00:30:49,400
that people lie about being abused if

471
00:30:50,200 --> 00:30:53,440
that does happen, it is so insignificant to

472
00:30:53,940 --> 00:30:57,880
the amount of people that refuse to come forward because

473
00:30:58,520 --> 00:31:01,720
they don't believe that they're going to be

474
00:31:02,920 --> 00:31:05,960
welcomed or believed when they tell their story.

475
00:31:06,520 --> 00:31:09,800
And so what I would say is we have to just believe

476
00:31:10,300 --> 00:31:13,480
the people that are telling their stories and just.

477
00:31:13,720 --> 00:31:17,190
We don't have to qualify it. It's their

478
00:31:17,690 --> 00:31:21,350
story to tell, right? Absolutely. So your brother came out

479
00:31:21,850 --> 00:31:24,430
and he told his story. What's the next?

480
00:31:24,910 --> 00:31:28,430
The one good, positive thing that did come out of that is a foundation

481
00:31:28,930 --> 00:31:32,630
was formed which allowed for children coming out of the FLDS

482
00:31:33,130 --> 00:31:36,550
cult to receive therapy. Was he the first one to speak up about Warren

483
00:31:37,050 --> 00:31:40,230
Jeffs? Yes. Yes, he was the first. And then that brought

484
00:31:40,730 --> 00:31:44,310
on a whole, eventually, the lawsuit that would eventually put

485
00:31:44,810 --> 00:31:48,770
him in prison. He wasn't prosecuted for what he did to

486
00:31:49,330 --> 00:31:53,290
Brent, per se, but that was just basically the

487
00:31:53,790 --> 00:31:57,970
opening door of it that would bring forth other charges. But. So a

488
00:31:58,470 --> 00:32:02,530
foundation was formed, and children that were from the FLDS could

489
00:32:03,030 --> 00:32:06,930
receive free therapy. And I started seeing psychologists,

490
00:32:07,010 --> 00:32:10,690
and I believe I was around the ages of 18

491
00:32:11,190 --> 00:32:14,560
or 19. And he diagnosed me with complex

492
00:32:15,060 --> 00:32:19,080
PTSD because of the systematic,

493
00:32:19,580 --> 00:32:25,120
you know, being abused by my brother as a young child, and then the systematic

494
00:32:25,620 --> 00:32:29,160
abuse of emotional neglect and emotional. Or excuse

495
00:32:29,660 --> 00:32:32,600
me, and physical abuse from my mother growing up.

496
00:32:34,120 --> 00:32:36,920
She, you know, was very physically abusive,

497
00:32:37,420 --> 00:32:41,460
emotionally abusive. And then, you know, being left to deal with all

498
00:32:41,960 --> 00:32:45,700
of what Marcus had done to me on my own. And I didn't even fully

499
00:32:46,200 --> 00:32:49,700
understand it and haven't for a number of years. I've kind of,

500
00:32:49,780 --> 00:32:54,260
through EMDR therapy and stuff, have remembered previous

501
00:32:54,760 --> 00:32:57,780
therapy sessions and things like that, and it's.

502
00:32:58,420 --> 00:33:02,380
It's insane when life continues to happen, and it's just like,

503
00:33:02,880 --> 00:33:06,260
one thing on top of the other. Like, if you're listening to this and

504
00:33:06,760 --> 00:33:08,900
you're thinking, oh, my gosh, this is a lot.

505
00:33:09,540 --> 00:33:12,660
I'm not even halfway through what has occurred.

506
00:33:13,540 --> 00:33:16,980
So in that regard, I try to look at it like,

507
00:33:17,620 --> 00:33:20,340
yes, this crappy thing happened.

508
00:33:21,220 --> 00:33:24,660
What has it done to me, and what can I do about it

509
00:33:25,160 --> 00:33:28,660
moving forward? And I know it's my responsibility to heal.

510
00:33:29,160 --> 00:33:32,810
Even though all these awful things have happened, I know it's my

511
00:33:33,310 --> 00:33:37,050
responsibility to heal. And I have come to the conclusion that

512
00:33:37,550 --> 00:33:41,050
forgiveness is not required. I do not have to

513
00:33:41,550 --> 00:33:43,730
forgive Marcus for stealing my innocence.

514
00:33:44,850 --> 00:33:49,210
I do not have to forgive my

515
00:33:49,710 --> 00:33:53,410
parents for leaving me alone in that. I do not have to forgive

516
00:33:53,910 --> 00:33:56,850
my mother for being absolutely horrible to me,

517
00:33:58,140 --> 00:33:59,420
for hijacking my soul.

518
00:34:02,220 --> 00:34:06,420
I could forgive her for what happened

519
00:34:06,920 --> 00:34:09,300
in my childhood, some of it because I know she was doing the best she

520
00:34:09,800 --> 00:34:13,220
could under the circumstances, being, you know, trying to raise a family in

521
00:34:13,720 --> 00:34:16,980
such a toxic environment with sister wives that were constantly fighting and

522
00:34:17,480 --> 00:34:20,500
bickering and my dad didn't know what to do. But what I can't forgive her

523
00:34:21,000 --> 00:34:24,940
for is her continued mistreatment of me into adulthood

524
00:34:25,400 --> 00:34:28,280
and continuing to dismiss me and discard me.

525
00:34:28,680 --> 00:34:33,400
That's what I can't forgive her for. And I know that because I

526
00:34:33,900 --> 00:34:36,680
have showed up for her and it's never been good enough.

527
00:34:37,640 --> 00:34:41,360
I have never been held to the same standard that Jenny

528
00:34:41,860 --> 00:34:45,560
has because she's the golden child. Even though she's not biologically

529
00:34:46,060 --> 00:34:49,320
my mom's child. Jenny is the golden child. Oh my.

530
00:34:49,720 --> 00:34:54,020
And I realize now, I mean, when I tell you that I have read more

531
00:34:54,520 --> 00:34:57,460
books than I can count on, Toxic Family Cycles, because I had to make sense

532
00:34:57,960 --> 00:35:02,140
of it all. You know, what I haven't shared is that I have lost five

533
00:35:02,220 --> 00:35:05,420
brothers to suicide. And the most recent

534
00:35:05,500 --> 00:35:09,100
one was coming up here. We're coming up on his one year anniversary,

535
00:35:09,580 --> 00:35:12,140
March 16, 2025.

536
00:35:13,900 --> 00:35:17,660
And I have tried to make sense of it by reading

537
00:35:18,160 --> 00:35:21,670
and because that's just the way my brain works, I needed to make

538
00:35:22,170 --> 00:35:25,510
sense of it. And the amount of like all

539
00:35:26,010 --> 00:35:29,110
the postmarks of what a toxic family looks like,

540
00:35:30,150 --> 00:35:34,230
my family has it in spades. And people have asked, you know,

541
00:35:35,030 --> 00:35:37,830
what happened or how could this continue to happen?

542
00:35:38,790 --> 00:35:41,990
And I just have to say we

543
00:35:42,490 --> 00:35:46,310
were marinated. And this is a phrase that was used by one of my therapists.

544
00:35:46,810 --> 00:35:50,910
We were marinated in trauma. It wasn't just a one singular event.

545
00:35:51,230 --> 00:35:55,150
And I know that I'm not the only one in my family to have some

546
00:35:55,390 --> 00:35:58,670
bad things happen to them. It was a number of us,

547
00:35:58,750 --> 00:36:02,270
some of us had it worse than others. I know that Clayne

548
00:36:02,430 --> 00:36:06,230
was my oldest brother and he was actually the first brother to take

549
00:36:06,730 --> 00:36:11,070
his life. In 2002, he was horrifically sexually

550
00:36:11,570 --> 00:36:15,550
abused by my dad's older brothers. Jesus. And that is

551
00:36:16,050 --> 00:36:20,430
ultimately why he took his life. And this is the one that had a

552
00:36:20,930 --> 00:36:24,550
child and had left and. Yeah, yeah, he had to.

553
00:36:24,870 --> 00:36:29,030
The daughter was his second child and she died in 97.

554
00:36:29,590 --> 00:36:33,430
And then he took his life in 2002

555
00:36:34,550 --> 00:36:37,710
and it was after 18 months. He had always been what

556
00:36:38,210 --> 00:36:42,910
we would call what was called, referred to as a troubled child. He just was

557
00:36:43,410 --> 00:36:46,880
angry all the time and we couldn't figure out, you know, the parents couldn't

558
00:36:47,380 --> 00:36:50,560
figure out why they took him to a. Like a troubled Boy's home.

559
00:36:50,640 --> 00:36:54,640
And he eventually went to live with another family.

560
00:36:54,800 --> 00:36:58,480
And, you know, we. It came out about 18

561
00:36:58,980 --> 00:37:02,040
months before he took his life. And he had attempted suicide many times.

562
00:37:02,540 --> 00:37:05,680
He would try to od, but he had been using drugs since he was like

563
00:37:06,180 --> 00:37:09,560
12 years old, and he had built up such a high tolerance that

564
00:37:10,060 --> 00:37:13,420
he would OD and just end up in the hospital. And about 18

565
00:37:13,920 --> 00:37:18,540
months before he took his life, he had came out in hypnotherapy.

566
00:37:19,040 --> 00:37:22,220
That all the horrific things that had been done to him as a young boy,

567
00:37:22,700 --> 00:37:26,580
and it was just too much for his brain to handle. And he put

568
00:37:27,080 --> 00:37:30,860
a shotgun in his mouth and his wife and his young boys are the ones

569
00:37:31,360 --> 00:37:34,780
that found him. He did it while they were home. Yeah.

570
00:37:35,500 --> 00:37:38,300
I mean, when you talk about that,

571
00:37:39,590 --> 00:37:43,510
I think the first thought that came into my

572
00:37:44,010 --> 00:37:47,110
head was, I understand why forgiveness isn't on the table.

573
00:37:47,830 --> 00:37:50,990
I get it. You know, I mean, we have this idea that,

574
00:37:51,490 --> 00:37:54,669
like, generally speaking, I want to say, yeah,

575
00:37:55,169 --> 00:37:59,270
I believe in the power of forgiveness, but I also think that

576
00:37:59,510 --> 00:38:02,470
accountability has to be a part of that.

577
00:38:03,110 --> 00:38:05,750
And there has been none, zero,

578
00:38:06,550 --> 00:38:12,390
absolutely zero accountability whatsoever. And that's

579
00:38:12,890 --> 00:38:16,550
how forgiveness happens. You know, there's a lot of buzz going on

580
00:38:16,710 --> 00:38:19,630
in the world right now about children going,

581
00:38:20,130 --> 00:38:24,470
no contact and all the. But what

582
00:38:24,970 --> 00:38:28,030
people don't understand and speaking from somebody who has gone no contact

583
00:38:28,530 --> 00:38:32,470
with their family before, it comes after years and

584
00:38:32,710 --> 00:38:34,950
years of begging for scraps,

585
00:38:35,910 --> 00:38:38,550
begging for the smallest amount of.

586
00:38:39,030 --> 00:38:42,710
Of accountability or, or love that

587
00:38:43,210 --> 00:38:46,470
you see your parents give to other siblings.

588
00:38:47,190 --> 00:38:50,350
That hurts more than I can ever describe. Because, you see,

589
00:38:50,850 --> 00:38:54,910
they're capable of it. Yeah, but I'm not worthy of it is what gets

590
00:38:55,410 --> 00:38:58,550
said in my brain. I don't deserve it. I'm not worthy of it. I will

591
00:38:59,050 --> 00:39:02,550
never be good enough as what I have said to myself for years.

592
00:39:03,050 --> 00:39:06,430
Yeah. And I don't know if that's. Those voices will ever

593
00:39:06,930 --> 00:39:10,870
stop because I. I will be honest. I still

594
00:39:11,370 --> 00:39:14,710
struggle to live every day. And I am coming out of a.

595
00:39:15,270 --> 00:39:18,630
A depressive state myself just recently.

596
00:39:19,830 --> 00:39:24,550
And when I say that the only reason I am alive is

597
00:39:25,050 --> 00:39:27,420
for my children, because I can't.

598
00:39:28,460 --> 00:39:32,380
I can't do that to them. I. I saw

599
00:39:32,880 --> 00:39:35,260
what it did to my. My nephews and they,

600
00:39:36,540 --> 00:39:39,500
you know, even though they were just little. I'm talking. They were just little,

601
00:39:40,000 --> 00:39:43,380
little boys. But I also have a dear friend who.

602
00:39:43,880 --> 00:39:47,420
Her dad took his life when he. When she was 17 years old,

603
00:39:48,060 --> 00:39:51,420
and it's been over 30 years and she

604
00:39:51,920 --> 00:39:55,690
still hasn't gotten over It. So I. I can't.

605
00:39:56,490 --> 00:40:00,610
I can't do that to my children. People don't

606
00:40:01,110 --> 00:40:04,890
understand how exhausting it is to find the will to live

607
00:40:05,930 --> 00:40:10,010
when all you want to do is just give up. It's like living a marathon

608
00:40:10,090 --> 00:40:14,010
every day, running a marathon every day, trying to find

609
00:40:14,510 --> 00:40:17,130
the will to get through the day.

610
00:40:18,010 --> 00:40:21,370
Because your brain constantly tells you it's the end, it's okay,

611
00:40:21,870 --> 00:40:25,170
it's okay to let go. It would be so much easier just to

612
00:40:25,670 --> 00:40:28,250
let go. Unfortunately,

613
00:40:30,010 --> 00:40:33,490
there are a lot of people that don't understand that, but I think there are

614
00:40:33,990 --> 00:40:37,730
a lot of people that do, but have never had a space to

615
00:40:38,230 --> 00:40:42,410
talk about it or had. Never have never had the words to put to it.

616
00:40:42,910 --> 00:40:46,330
And so that's one of the reasons why I think

617
00:40:47,110 --> 00:40:50,870
your story and the podcast that you and Lisa host is so

618
00:40:51,350 --> 00:40:56,270
important, because there's so. There is a lot of shame surrounding

619
00:40:56,770 --> 00:41:01,190
this. A lot of shame. And like,

620
00:41:01,270 --> 00:41:05,070
less shame, more compassion. Like, this doesn't come

621
00:41:05,570 --> 00:41:09,350
from nowhere. People don't. Don't want to leave happy

622
00:41:09,670 --> 00:41:13,110
lives, happy families, happy childhoods.

623
00:41:13,890 --> 00:41:17,730
There something is. Something's wrong. And even if it's

624
00:41:18,130 --> 00:41:21,970
your, like, chemical makeup, your brain,

625
00:41:22,130 --> 00:41:25,650
there's something that's wrong. And so it's not this.

626
00:41:26,210 --> 00:41:30,450
It's not a simple thing. It's not a black and white thing.

627
00:41:30,950 --> 00:41:33,970
It's hard and it's complex and it's nuanced and it's human.

628
00:41:34,530 --> 00:41:37,730
But we're still in a space that it's very difficult

629
00:41:38,210 --> 00:41:42,010
to be honest about because people don't know what to do with it. When you're

630
00:41:42,510 --> 00:41:45,680
honest. Absolutely. They are a complete lack.

631
00:41:45,760 --> 00:41:49,000
Loss of words. And I love my husband very dearly,

632
00:41:49,500 --> 00:41:53,040
but he had no idea because I have spent decades

633
00:41:53,280 --> 00:41:56,960
learning to hide it. And so when I was open and

634
00:41:57,460 --> 00:42:00,680
honest with him a couple of weeks ago and I let him read some poems

635
00:42:01,180 --> 00:42:04,960
that I had written, he doesn't

636
00:42:05,460 --> 00:42:08,000
know what to do. And I don't blame him for that. Sure.

637
00:42:08,320 --> 00:42:11,720
He just shows up the way he does, which is to make sure

638
00:42:12,220 --> 00:42:15,630
that the kids are taken care of, they're to their sports,

639
00:42:15,710 --> 00:42:18,990
you know, the. That things are getting done because I have to.

640
00:42:20,110 --> 00:42:24,030
I mean, this is not the worst depressive episode I've ever had by

641
00:42:24,530 --> 00:42:27,550
far. I mean, I'm still going to work and functioning like that's the other thing

642
00:42:28,050 --> 00:42:29,950
too, is like, I. I'm still functioning on the outside,

643
00:42:31,390 --> 00:42:33,150
what appears to be normal,

644
00:42:34,270 --> 00:42:37,230
but what I would consider slowly dying on the inside.

645
00:42:37,730 --> 00:42:43,470
Yeah. And so I'm, you know, on the upswing of It. And every

646
00:42:43,970 --> 00:42:47,150
time I've been in a dark place, I've been the one to climb out.

647
00:42:47,630 --> 00:42:51,190
I've had to claw my way out, and it's

648
00:42:51,690 --> 00:42:55,110
exhausting. I'm on the upswing, on the bottom end

649
00:42:55,610 --> 00:42:59,950
of the bell, I would say. But it's a definite struggle.

650
00:43:00,670 --> 00:43:04,390
And I definitely think there needs to be a better education on how

651
00:43:04,890 --> 00:43:08,320
to handle people when they come to you, when they have the courage to

652
00:43:08,820 --> 00:43:13,120
come to you and say, look, I am in this dark place. And I

653
00:43:13,620 --> 00:43:17,040
think the best thing that anybody could do is listen and

654
00:43:17,540 --> 00:43:20,480
just be there. No judgment, no remind. This is.

655
00:43:20,980 --> 00:43:23,920
This is the worst thing that people could do, and they do it all the

656
00:43:24,420 --> 00:43:29,000
time. Do not remind them that they have so much to live for that

657
00:43:29,500 --> 00:43:33,040
layers a whole other level of guilt, because nine times out

658
00:43:33,540 --> 00:43:37,590
of 10, they already know they have a lot to live for. And you reminding

659
00:43:38,090 --> 00:43:41,950
them of that, it's just another brick on top

660
00:43:42,450 --> 00:43:46,230
that just makes it that much heavier. Yeah. And so I would

661
00:43:46,730 --> 00:43:50,510
say, you know, just listening to them, asking what you can do to support them

662
00:43:51,010 --> 00:43:55,630
or what do you need in this moment? Or just

663
00:43:56,130 --> 00:44:00,230
a small. You know, even if they don't. If they don't have anything to.

664
00:44:00,730 --> 00:44:02,790
You know, if they don't know what to say or how they. You can show

665
00:44:03,290 --> 00:44:06,860
up for them. My aunt did this thing for me where she called

666
00:44:07,360 --> 00:44:10,540
me every single day for, like, three months.

667
00:44:10,780 --> 00:44:13,700
She's like, I'm gonna call you every single day on my lunch break. She's like,

668
00:44:14,200 --> 00:44:17,260
you don't have to answer. I'm just gonna call you every day.

669
00:44:17,340 --> 00:44:20,940
And she did that religiously. She would always leave

670
00:44:21,440 --> 00:44:24,700
a message. Sometimes I would answer, most of the time not.

671
00:44:24,860 --> 00:44:28,620
But just to know that somebody cared enough to

672
00:44:29,120 --> 00:44:33,470
show up for me every single day was

673
00:44:33,710 --> 00:44:37,710
incredible. Wow. Even if you don't have time to call,

674
00:44:38,030 --> 00:44:41,430
just a text message. And Lisa, when I

675
00:44:41,930 --> 00:44:44,990
did, was honest with Lisa, and I told her she did check in with me

676
00:44:45,310 --> 00:44:49,350
every day for a week or two. And again, it's just showing

677
00:44:49,850 --> 00:44:52,990
up and knowing that somebody knows that dark side of

678
00:44:53,490 --> 00:44:56,710
you, that you're in that dark place, and they're just witnessing it and they're

679
00:44:57,210 --> 00:45:00,430
holding that space for you is incredibly important.

680
00:45:01,460 --> 00:45:05,060
You don't have to fix it. You don't have to make it better.

681
00:45:05,620 --> 00:45:08,900
Just being there and witnessing it and knowing that you.

682
00:45:09,380 --> 00:45:12,420
That you have that support is incredibly healing. Wow.

683
00:45:12,820 --> 00:45:16,900
I think that is so profound and so important that

684
00:45:17,400 --> 00:45:20,460
you said that, because, again,

685
00:45:20,960 --> 00:45:24,700
I think people, generally speaking, do the

686
00:45:25,200 --> 00:45:28,180
best that they can. Right. And they don't know what to do. And so a

687
00:45:28,680 --> 00:45:32,260
lot of times what that looks like is us pulling away. Because there's also

688
00:45:32,760 --> 00:45:35,440
a fear that if, if we press in, we're going to do or say the

689
00:45:35,940 --> 00:45:40,000
wrong thing. And so having some

690
00:45:40,960 --> 00:45:44,960
practical instruction or guidance

691
00:45:45,280 --> 00:45:49,560
in terms of like what's actually helpful versus what's

692
00:45:50,060 --> 00:45:53,560
not, I think is really important because it puts you

693
00:45:54,060 --> 00:45:57,840
in the mindset of somebody that is actually living through that and not

694
00:45:58,340 --> 00:46:02,880
somebody that is coming looking in from the outside and really, truly doesn't understand what

695
00:46:03,380 --> 00:46:07,300
somebody else is walking through. But I think it's

696
00:46:07,800 --> 00:46:11,420
great to know that those,

697
00:46:11,740 --> 00:46:15,500
that impulse to check in isn't wasted

698
00:46:16,000 --> 00:46:19,220
even if you aren't getting a response. Right. I think

699
00:46:19,720 --> 00:46:23,660
there's, I've personally had this where I'm like, I'm just not going to keep,

700
00:46:24,220 --> 00:46:27,340
I'm not going to keep texting or I'm not going to keep calling because I

701
00:46:27,840 --> 00:46:31,100
feel like I'm bothering them because they're not answering. And I don't want to be

702
00:46:31,600 --> 00:46:35,390
that annoying person. And knowing that,

703
00:46:35,890 --> 00:46:39,910
you know what, it's, it's great to know that somebody is thinking about you even

704
00:46:40,410 --> 00:46:42,710
if they don't have the current capacity to respond,

705
00:46:43,350 --> 00:46:46,870
you know, is encouraging to keep going, keep pushing

706
00:46:47,370 --> 00:46:50,870
in, pressing in how you can without crossing

707
00:46:51,370 --> 00:46:55,310
anybody's boundaries. Right. Like don't show up every

708
00:46:55,810 --> 00:46:59,150
day. Right. But you know, letting somebody know that you're thinking

709
00:46:59,650 --> 00:47:02,960
of them is important. Yeah.

710
00:47:03,460 --> 00:47:06,120
And I would say even, you know, if you decide, okay, I don't have time

711
00:47:06,620 --> 00:47:10,800
for a phone call maybe and all you can offer is a text message not

712
00:47:11,300 --> 00:47:14,320
asking, how are you today? Don't ask,

713
00:47:14,400 --> 00:47:17,760
don't ask. Just all you have to say

714
00:47:18,260 --> 00:47:20,880
is I love you. Yeah, I'm thinking of you.

715
00:47:22,560 --> 00:47:26,560
Just small, simple things. Just wanted you to know I was thinking about

716
00:47:27,060 --> 00:47:30,010
you today. I am here. Just small,

717
00:47:30,510 --> 00:47:34,050
simple little things like that. Because even though somebody who is

718
00:47:34,130 --> 00:47:37,410
suicidal, they know most of the time that they're loved and they're cared for

719
00:47:37,910 --> 00:47:41,570
and that people will miss them. There's something that happens, I think

720
00:47:42,070 --> 00:47:45,770
within the brain or in the psyche that blinds us

721
00:47:46,270 --> 00:47:49,850
to that. And we're just deep in our

722
00:47:50,350 --> 00:47:54,410
thoughts and it doesn't matter. No matter how much I

723
00:47:54,910 --> 00:47:57,970
keep fighting, life's just gonna keep beating me down. Nobody really

724
00:47:58,470 --> 00:48:01,430
is gonna notice if I'm not hear those kinds of thoughts.

725
00:48:01,930 --> 00:48:05,790
Yeah. Especially when I was suicidal in my early 20s, I survived three

726
00:48:06,290 --> 00:48:10,630
attempts within. It was a two or three year period. Wow. And it's an absolute

727
00:48:11,130 --> 00:48:14,750
medical miracle that I am alive today. I should not Be here today.

728
00:48:16,830 --> 00:48:20,030
And so I know what it takes to get into that dark

729
00:48:20,530 --> 00:48:23,750
place. I have put a gun to my head. I have swallowed countless pills.

730
00:48:24,250 --> 00:48:27,470
I have swallowed rat poison in an effort because I had

731
00:48:27,970 --> 00:48:31,090
made the decision to end my life. And I was pissed.

732
00:48:31,570 --> 00:48:34,490
When I tell you I was pissed I was still alive. Oh, yeah. I was

733
00:48:34,990 --> 00:48:38,970
mad because I had made that decision. I had done the thing. And that

734
00:48:39,470 --> 00:48:43,330
is why I would say my brothers,

735
00:48:43,730 --> 00:48:46,850
so five have died by suicide. Of the

736
00:48:47,650 --> 00:48:51,170
four are self inflicted gunshot wounds. Wow.

737
00:48:51,730 --> 00:48:55,090
Yeah. Oh, wow. That is so.

738
00:48:55,590 --> 00:48:58,790
It's so intense. But you

739
00:48:59,290 --> 00:49:02,990
think because it, you're just, you've made that decision and so it's

740
00:49:03,490 --> 00:49:06,910
the, the quickest way to make sure it happens.

741
00:49:07,150 --> 00:49:10,750
Yes. Okay. David was the second brother to take his life

742
00:49:11,250 --> 00:49:15,070
on Valentine's Day 2005. And he overdosed.

743
00:49:15,790 --> 00:49:19,350
Initially, we didn't think it was a suicide, and it was actually, it hasn't been

744
00:49:19,850 --> 00:49:23,470
ruled a suicide, but based on his emotional state and

745
00:49:23,970 --> 00:49:27,020
where he was at, it was, you know, in what was going on in his

746
00:49:27,520 --> 00:49:31,100
life. We do believe it was a suicide. Yeah. And he swallowed

747
00:49:31,600 --> 00:49:35,020
copious amounts of narcotics and we had,

748
00:49:35,500 --> 00:49:39,140
you know, we put our lives back together. We went

749
00:49:39,640 --> 00:49:43,300
on with our lives and we just did the best we

750
00:49:43,800 --> 00:49:47,860
could, all of us. We began having families and we were,

751
00:49:48,360 --> 00:49:51,220
you know, most of us were doing okay. You know, life had been, had been

752
00:49:51,720 --> 00:49:54,580
rough, but we were putting ourselves back together. A lot of us had gone to

753
00:49:55,080 --> 00:49:58,520
therapy trying to cope with, you know, being raised in a cult and realizing Jesus,

754
00:49:59,020 --> 00:50:02,120
our lives, our childhoods were not this amazing thing that we thought it was.

755
00:50:03,480 --> 00:50:06,920
And then in 2002, or excuse me,

756
00:50:07,420 --> 00:50:11,200
in November of 22, is when our lives changed in

757
00:50:11,700 --> 00:50:14,440
such a drastic way. When Corey, our youngest brother,

758
00:50:14,760 --> 00:50:17,240
who knew he was loved and cherished,

759
00:50:17,720 --> 00:50:20,840
I mean, and he said that in his suicide note.

760
00:50:21,000 --> 00:50:23,400
He left a beautifully written suicide note.

761
00:50:24,540 --> 00:50:27,020
And he said, I know I'm loved and cherished.

762
00:50:29,180 --> 00:50:32,620
He's like, he's stressed.

763
00:50:33,500 --> 00:50:36,780
So importantly, I want you to know that it is nobody's fault.

764
00:50:37,740 --> 00:50:41,340
I just can't do it anymore. I just cannot live

765
00:50:41,840 --> 00:50:45,100
this life anymore. And he took his life.

766
00:50:45,660 --> 00:50:48,940
He had said in his letter, he had explained that there had been other attempts

767
00:50:49,260 --> 00:50:52,480
and he was very much anti gun, but he bought a

768
00:50:52,980 --> 00:50:56,360
gun a week before he took his life. Now, was he born?

769
00:50:56,440 --> 00:51:00,400
Cause he, you said he's the youngest. He's the youngest brother. He's Susan's youngest

770
00:51:00,900 --> 00:51:04,680
child. She had 11 and he's her youngest child and

771
00:51:04,760 --> 00:51:08,440
he was born in 94. So we

772
00:51:08,600 --> 00:51:11,680
had not been excommunicated from the church.

773
00:51:12,180 --> 00:51:16,080
So there's, you know, I have a Zachary from on

774
00:51:16,580 --> 00:51:20,040
down. So the last five children don't really remember life inside the

775
00:51:20,200 --> 00:51:23,540
polygamy. They don't really have much of an experience. Kind of

776
00:51:23,620 --> 00:51:27,820
seems I seem to be the last one that remembers

777
00:51:28,320 --> 00:51:31,580
any of it. I, Susan, or excuse me, Martha took her three daughters

778
00:51:32,080 --> 00:51:34,900
and we don't have any contact with them and so I don't know, you know,

779
00:51:35,400 --> 00:51:38,900
what their experience was. Was she also part of the excommunication or.

780
00:51:39,220 --> 00:51:41,860
No, because she had already left. She left in,

781
00:51:43,460 --> 00:51:46,820
I think it was probably like 93. Okay, 93. When she got reassigned. Yeah,

782
00:51:47,320 --> 00:51:50,320
she was reassigned to another man and went on to have more children with him.

783
00:51:51,590 --> 00:51:55,150
And but Corey, he just, he just

784
00:51:55,650 --> 00:51:59,910
talked about this darkness. And I do remember Clayne talking about it or

785
00:52:00,410 --> 00:52:03,750
excuse me, I don't personally remember about my brothers. Clayne was 13 years older than

786
00:52:04,250 --> 00:52:07,030
me, so I didn't have a lot of interaction with him. He left the family

787
00:52:07,530 --> 00:52:10,910
when I was pretty young. But Corey talked about this

788
00:52:11,410 --> 00:52:14,670
darkness that was just always there and he was tired of fighting it. And the

789
00:52:15,170 --> 00:52:18,280
last thing he wrote in his suicide note was sometimes the dragon wins.

790
00:52:19,950 --> 00:52:22,590
And I mean, when I talk about a dear sweet soul,

791
00:52:23,070 --> 00:52:26,830
just the kindest, sweetest person you could ever imagine, wouldn't hurt a

792
00:52:27,330 --> 00:52:30,190
fly. He was always incredibly skinny.

793
00:52:30,990 --> 00:52:34,389
And I had a conversation with him, I think about

794
00:52:34,889 --> 00:52:37,950
a little over a year before he took his life, a very, very in depth

795
00:52:38,450 --> 00:52:41,750
conversation. And he had struggled with anxiety, pretty severe anxiety

796
00:52:42,250 --> 00:52:45,270
and depression from the time he was pretty young. And he did go to his

797
00:52:45,770 --> 00:52:49,000
mother again at 14 years old and said, mom, I am not doing well emotionally.

798
00:52:49,950 --> 00:52:52,430
I need help. She didn't get him any.

799
00:52:53,710 --> 00:52:57,670
It seems to be an interesting age for you

800
00:52:58,170 --> 00:53:02,430
and your siblings, that kind of coming of age and

801
00:53:02,510 --> 00:53:07,190
maybe remembering some repressed things from

802
00:53:07,690 --> 00:53:10,190
childhood. He was around, I mean,

803
00:53:10,750 --> 00:53:14,030
he wasn't. You were older than him, but. Yeah, I was nine years older

804
00:53:14,530 --> 00:53:17,900
than him. And I did specifically ask him in that last in depth

805
00:53:18,400 --> 00:53:21,660
conversation that I had with him and I asked him had he ever been sexually

806
00:53:22,160 --> 00:53:25,780
abused and he said no. Okay. Because he had shared with, you know,

807
00:53:26,660 --> 00:53:30,020
the darkness, you know, as I had survived three attempts

808
00:53:30,520 --> 00:53:33,100
and I, you know, he didn't know about mine. He didn't know about. He.

809
00:53:33,600 --> 00:53:35,860
At that point we were, he was in his late 20s, I was in my

810
00:53:36,360 --> 00:53:39,900
30s. He didn't know about what Marcus had done to me in

811
00:53:40,400 --> 00:53:44,390
depth. He had heard rumors about it within the family, but he didn't know

812
00:53:44,890 --> 00:53:47,230
in depth to what had happened. And so I did share with him about that.

813
00:53:48,830 --> 00:53:52,070
But yeah, he definitely could relate to the darkness that

814
00:53:52,570 --> 00:53:55,950
he talked about. And I mean he was the poster child. He was in therapy.

815
00:53:56,110 --> 00:53:59,550
He was so incredibly in tune with his body. He was doing yoga, he was

816
00:54:00,050 --> 00:54:03,830
doing meditation, reading, I mean, taking medications.

817
00:54:04,330 --> 00:54:08,060
He was doing all the right things and was it. But you

818
00:54:08,560 --> 00:54:12,220
know, it just comes down to, it gets too much. And so in

819
00:54:12,720 --> 00:54:15,460
that regard, I cannot fault him.

820
00:54:16,180 --> 00:54:19,460
I like to explain it this way. When somebody

821
00:54:19,960 --> 00:54:22,900
is suicidal or they're carrying whatever it is that they're carrying,

822
00:54:23,620 --> 00:54:27,500
imagine them walking around with a gaping wound that won't

823
00:54:28,000 --> 00:54:31,860
heal that becomes eventually it just grows and grows

824
00:54:32,360 --> 00:54:36,230
and grows akin that to somebody with cancer. They're dying

825
00:54:36,730 --> 00:54:39,630
of cancer and they know it's terminal.

826
00:54:40,270 --> 00:54:44,070
Would you ask that person to continue fighting so

827
00:54:44,570 --> 00:54:47,870
that it doesn't hurt you? That is what suicide is,

828
00:54:48,190 --> 00:54:52,270
a gaping invisible wound that will not heal.

829
00:54:52,910 --> 00:54:56,110
And so knowing how hard it is to survive

830
00:54:56,270 --> 00:54:59,390
the loss of suicide as a family member by suicide,

831
00:54:59,830 --> 00:55:04,070
I know that, but I would never beg

832
00:55:04,470 --> 00:55:08,150
somebody to stay because it would cause discomfort

833
00:55:08,650 --> 00:55:11,990
to me. Yeah, I know that sounds weird. No,

834
00:55:12,310 --> 00:55:15,590
but. No, it doesn't. I think you're offering

835
00:55:16,090 --> 00:55:20,110
a lot of insight to people that have

836
00:55:20,610 --> 00:55:24,670
never experienced this before. Because I will say I

837
00:55:25,170 --> 00:55:29,080
think I can't, I can't make a generalized statement,

838
00:55:29,720 --> 00:55:33,920
but I assume that people that

839
00:55:34,420 --> 00:55:38,640
have experienced suicide in their family in

840
00:55:39,140 --> 00:55:42,800
some capacity are at least a little bit familiar with what

841
00:55:43,300 --> 00:55:47,560
you're talking about. But there's a lot of beliefs about suicide

842
00:55:48,760 --> 00:55:51,880
from people that have, that it's never touched personally.

843
00:55:52,600 --> 00:55:56,550
And that I think is where we get really

844
00:55:56,790 --> 00:56:00,230
self righteous and we get really black and

845
00:56:00,730 --> 00:56:03,510
white thinking about things. And you know, I,

846
00:56:03,910 --> 00:56:07,630
I look at it from a perspective of, you know, suicide is

847
00:56:08,130 --> 00:56:12,910
not something that I'm, that I know a whole lot about. But domestic

848
00:56:13,410 --> 00:56:16,910
violence is, and there is, so are so many misconceptions

849
00:56:17,410 --> 00:56:20,790
about domestic violence to the point where I'm like, I don't, I don't know

850
00:56:21,290 --> 00:56:24,510
how people still believe this about domestic violence,

851
00:56:25,230 --> 00:56:29,150
but it's because it's never touched them in a personal

852
00:56:29,310 --> 00:56:32,910
way. And so if people are

853
00:56:33,230 --> 00:56:36,590
willing to listen, to be

854
00:56:37,090 --> 00:56:40,030
educated about something that they don't know anything about,

855
00:56:40,670 --> 00:56:43,550
it only helps all of us as a society,

856
00:56:43,790 --> 00:56:47,400
as community. Because the other

857
00:56:47,900 --> 00:56:51,600
thing that I will say is that people will only speak up when

858
00:56:52,100 --> 00:56:55,880
they feel safe. And so if you

859
00:56:56,380 --> 00:56:58,760
are not a safe person because you're,

860
00:56:59,320 --> 00:57:03,160
the ideas that you're holding are more important

861
00:57:03,240 --> 00:57:06,640
than the People you're holding them about, you are never

862
00:57:07,140 --> 00:57:09,320
going to hear from those people. That's right.

863
00:57:09,960 --> 00:57:13,810
Absolutely. And if somebody has the courage to

864
00:57:14,310 --> 00:57:18,330
come to you and share an incredibly difficult and vulnerable thing,

865
00:57:18,890 --> 00:57:22,130
just know what amount of courage it took for that

866
00:57:22,630 --> 00:57:25,010
person to come to you and know that you are a safe place. So that

867
00:57:25,510 --> 00:57:28,730
is a place that you're coming from. Honor, like operating in a

868
00:57:29,230 --> 00:57:32,250
space of wow. I am incredibly honored that

869
00:57:32,750 --> 00:57:35,410
you would trust me enough to share this with me.

870
00:57:35,910 --> 00:57:39,290
Yeah. Because it does. And with any situation,

871
00:57:39,790 --> 00:57:43,480
whether it's suicide, domestic violence, sexual abuse, any of those things that

872
00:57:43,980 --> 00:57:48,000
are incredibly difficult for somebody to have the courage to speak up about because I

873
00:57:48,500 --> 00:57:51,800
mean, it doesn't take away the shame. As much as our society has

874
00:57:52,300 --> 00:57:56,040
changed in the last 10, 15, 20 years about

875
00:57:56,520 --> 00:57:59,480
sharing these things publicly and openly,

876
00:57:59,640 --> 00:58:03,480
it doesn't take away the fact that there is still shame and blame.

877
00:58:03,720 --> 00:58:07,280
Like for years I believe that little three year

878
00:58:07,780 --> 00:58:11,370
old me asked for to be sexually abused,

879
00:58:11,870 --> 00:58:14,730
that I did something to draw that to him, to me.

880
00:58:15,290 --> 00:58:19,010
Absolutely no way. And I'm sure that similar

881
00:58:19,510 --> 00:58:23,210
situation with you and what your ex husband did to you, that somehow you did

882
00:58:23,710 --> 00:58:26,810
something to upset him or to whatever, to bring

883
00:58:27,310 --> 00:58:31,410
that to yourself. Sure, sure. It's, it, I mean, in a way it's easier,

884
00:58:31,910 --> 00:58:34,730
Right. To think that we had control over it.

885
00:58:35,210 --> 00:58:38,850
Right. And so we could have stopped it because then we don't, we don't

886
00:58:39,350 --> 00:58:42,460
need that accountability. We're, we're in control

887
00:58:42,700 --> 00:58:46,380
of all, everything that we need because, oh well, if it's my fault,

888
00:58:46,880 --> 00:58:50,460
then then it, it stop, it starts and stops with me.

889
00:58:50,960 --> 00:58:54,260
And I don't need to upset

890
00:58:54,760 --> 00:58:58,540
the apple cart, as it were, and, and call for accountability.

891
00:58:59,660 --> 00:59:01,980
But that's not how that works. Right.

892
00:59:02,860 --> 00:59:07,410
So your teenage years were obviously incredibly

893
00:59:07,910 --> 00:59:11,930
tumultuous as you're trying to process what you have

894
00:59:12,430 --> 00:59:16,090
been going through, what your childhood was like. Was your mom

895
00:59:16,590 --> 00:59:19,650
also born into flds? Yes,

896
00:59:20,130 --> 00:59:23,490
just generational. Okay. Yeah. With both my parents.

897
00:59:23,890 --> 00:59:27,090
So I mean, unpacking that

898
00:59:28,050 --> 00:59:31,890
for everybody, plus the trauma on top

899
00:59:32,390 --> 00:59:36,350
of it, plus your brother's dying

900
00:59:36,850 --> 00:59:40,470
by suicide, how. How did you survive

901
00:59:40,970 --> 00:59:43,790
your teenage years? I don't, I genuinely,

902
00:59:44,290 --> 00:59:47,630
I look back at that and I have absolutely no idea.

903
00:59:48,030 --> 00:59:50,670
I. People are like, well, did you turn to drug? I.

904
00:59:51,150 --> 00:59:54,030
I can honestly say to this day I have only ever smoked pot.

905
00:59:55,310 --> 00:59:59,070
I know a lot of my siblings did turn to drugs and

906
00:59:59,570 --> 01:00:03,200
alcohol. I mean, I, I never, I don't, I think the

907
01:00:03,700 --> 01:00:06,560
only way that I really, I did turn to food.

908
01:00:07,360 --> 01:00:09,600
I guess that was my Coping mechanism was food.

909
01:00:10,880 --> 01:00:14,280
But I didn't get super overweight until I

910
01:00:14,780 --> 01:00:18,280
got on antidepressants. When I ended up getting severe

911
01:00:18,780 --> 01:00:22,880
postpartum depression after my second child was born. But I just learned

912
01:00:23,380 --> 01:00:26,800
to cope. I had my first suicide attempt, that was in 2004

913
01:00:27,520 --> 01:00:30,710
and again was given no support. How old were you

914
01:00:31,210 --> 01:00:34,390
at this point? 19. Yeah, my sister Jenny is actually the one that found me.

915
01:00:34,890 --> 01:00:38,630
I was on her back deck with a gun to my head and

916
01:00:39,130 --> 01:00:42,870
she said that I pointed the gun at her when she came out and I

917
01:00:43,370 --> 01:00:46,750
don't remember doing that. I do remember my dad was called

918
01:00:47,630 --> 01:00:51,070
and he came down to talk to me. I remember speaking to a psychologist on

919
01:00:51,570 --> 01:00:53,710
the phone to see if they were gonna check me in on a 72 hour

920
01:00:54,210 --> 01:00:57,280
hold but I wasn't and then I was

921
01:00:57,780 --> 01:01:00,920
just sent home to my apartment to deal with it on my own. Oh my

922
01:01:01,420 --> 01:01:04,760
word. I do remember my best friend came and spent a night with me,

923
01:01:05,000 --> 01:01:08,080
a couple of nights with me. But I just,

924
01:01:08,580 --> 01:01:10,440
I. But no one from your family? No.

925
01:01:11,960 --> 01:01:15,560
Was it like this idea that you were

926
01:01:15,640 --> 01:01:19,480
okay now or was it just an apathy?

927
01:01:20,360 --> 01:01:23,090
Probably, yeah, I think it was just.

928
01:01:24,370 --> 01:01:27,610
I genuinely, I don't know, it's really quite

929
01:01:28,110 --> 01:01:31,450
odd that the. Having just

930
01:01:31,950 --> 01:01:35,770
lost Clayne, right. And like two years,

931
01:01:36,270 --> 01:01:40,130
two, three years prior and then six months later David died.

932
01:01:40,530 --> 01:01:43,890
And I did find my journals and I've read them in the last six

933
01:01:44,390 --> 01:01:47,930
months and I attempted suicide more times than I can even

934
01:01:48,430 --> 01:01:51,870
count. Where I didn't actually. Where it was I was putting

935
01:01:52,370 --> 01:01:56,350
together a plan or whatever or. And finding suicide notes

936
01:01:56,670 --> 01:01:59,390
like countless where I had written the note I was.

937
01:01:59,870 --> 01:02:03,790
But I don't remember that specific instance. I only

938
01:02:04,290 --> 01:02:07,310
remember the three and nobody

939
01:02:07,810 --> 01:02:11,230
had any idea. I do know that the second and

940
01:02:11,730 --> 01:02:14,910
third attempts were within a 48 hour window. That was in 2006.

941
01:02:15,550 --> 01:02:19,460
I do know that my roommate at the time was aware of it. I vaguely

942
01:02:19,960 --> 01:02:22,540
remember her call. She was on the phone with somebody. I don't know if it

943
01:02:23,040 --> 01:02:25,460
was George who is my husband now. She was on the phone with George or

944
01:02:25,960 --> 01:02:29,500
my dad or somebody because I do remember my dad coming and

945
01:02:30,300 --> 01:02:33,580
trying to talk me out of it and reminding me how much I was

946
01:02:34,080 --> 01:02:37,420
loved and things like that. George was aware

947
01:02:38,060 --> 01:02:41,420
and he begged me not to. But I basically laid it

948
01:02:41,920 --> 01:02:44,020
out like this. I had made the choice, I was going to do it no

949
01:02:44,520 --> 01:02:47,670
matter what anybody said. I was done. And I told George,

950
01:02:48,390 --> 01:02:52,030
I said, look, you have two choices here. You can go

951
01:02:52,530 --> 01:02:54,750
ahead and check me in, I'll do whatever they tell me to do. I'm just

952
01:02:55,250 --> 01:02:58,310
gonna get out and I'll do it anyway. Or you can just let me make

953
01:02:58,810 --> 01:03:02,230
this choice on my own. I've made the choice and

954
01:03:02,730 --> 01:03:05,870
just let me go peacefully on my own. I wrote the

955
01:03:06,370 --> 01:03:09,510
suicide note and I swallowed. I had

956
01:03:10,010 --> 01:03:13,710
a couple bottles of leftover like narcotics from surgery. I swallowed that and

957
01:03:14,210 --> 01:03:17,550
then I shoveled handful upon handful upon handful of rat poison in

958
01:03:18,050 --> 01:03:21,430
my mouth. And I woke

959
01:03:21,930 --> 01:03:25,190
up the next day. I got up. What? Yeah, I woke up

960
01:03:25,690 --> 01:03:29,470
the next day, was pissed and got

961
01:03:29,970 --> 01:03:34,110
up and went to work like nothing happened. George was incredibly surprised

962
01:03:34,610 --> 01:03:38,070
to see me at work that day again. I don't have a lot of recollection

963
01:03:38,570 --> 01:03:41,910
of this time. I think he was obviously grateful to see me alive.

964
01:03:43,270 --> 01:03:47,710
And then I think it was the next night that I swallowed 33

965
01:03:48,210 --> 01:03:50,950
Lunesta sleeping pills which are stronger than Ambien.

966
01:03:51,830 --> 01:03:55,030
And I was pissed. And I do know that George

967
01:03:55,530 --> 01:03:58,630
had, he had come home with me that night and was begging me

968
01:03:59,130 --> 01:04:02,990
and just begging me, please don't do this, please don't do this. And I

969
01:04:03,490 --> 01:04:07,160
made him leave. And George does not cry. And he

970
01:04:07,660 --> 01:04:11,160
said he cried the entire 45 minute drive home sobbing,

971
01:04:11,660 --> 01:04:13,320
knowing that he would never see me again.

972
01:04:14,520 --> 01:04:18,640
And I took the pills and I remember as

973
01:04:19,140 --> 01:04:24,000
if I was gonna probably drift off into a coma and it

974
01:04:24,500 --> 01:04:29,360
was almost like being shocked by a defibrillator. I just remember gasping

975
01:04:29,860 --> 01:04:32,620
for air. And I felt Clayne and David there with me.

976
01:04:33,650 --> 01:04:36,970
They were there and there was multiple times that night where that happened where

977
01:04:37,470 --> 01:04:39,970
I was probably gonna drift off into a coma and slip off and die.

978
01:04:40,470 --> 01:04:43,090
And something brought me back. Yeah,

979
01:04:43,730 --> 01:04:47,130
wow. And I called George around 4 o' clock in the

980
01:04:47,630 --> 01:04:50,650
morning sobbing. And I said, I just

981
01:04:51,150 --> 01:04:53,730
won't die. Why won't I just die?

982
01:04:55,090 --> 01:04:58,210
And he said, I don't remember all of what he said,

983
01:04:58,710 --> 01:05:00,730
but he said, try to get some sleep, I'll come get you in the morning.

984
01:05:01,230 --> 01:05:05,020
Cause he lived almost an hour away and he said I'll come get you

985
01:05:05,520 --> 01:05:09,220
in the morning. And he did. It was Halloween and

986
01:05:09,720 --> 01:05:13,420
I went to work incredibly stoned because, you know that much sleeping pills in my

987
01:05:13,920 --> 01:05:17,180
system and I don't think I

988
01:05:17,680 --> 01:05:20,220
had any pto, I don't remember. But I think he just brought me to work

989
01:05:20,720 --> 01:05:23,820
because we worked together on the same team and had some

990
01:05:24,320 --> 01:05:26,420
really good friends at work and they. And I think he just brought me to

991
01:05:26,920 --> 01:05:29,470
work so that they got all keep an eye on me at work because they

992
01:05:29,970 --> 01:05:33,870
knew if I was at work. I don't think they knew at the time,

993
01:05:34,110 --> 01:05:37,750
obviously, George did, but the friends, he's just like, let's keep an eye on her

994
01:05:38,250 --> 01:05:41,590
here at work. And then again, over the next few days,

995
01:05:42,090 --> 01:05:45,550
I had to pass said rat poison and those narcotics

996
01:05:46,050 --> 01:05:48,470
and all of that through my system. And that was incredibly painful. I never went

997
01:05:48,970 --> 01:05:52,270
to the doctor. I never sought medical attention. Oh, my God.

998
01:05:52,990 --> 01:05:56,750
And I had to pass all of that. And I'm talking, like, violent,

999
01:05:57,650 --> 01:06:01,330
violent stomach cramps. And I remember laying in

1000
01:06:01,830 --> 01:06:05,370
bed with George one night and just my whole body was shaking as

1001
01:06:05,870 --> 01:06:09,090
it was, trying to pass all of that through my system. Wow.

1002
01:06:09,490 --> 01:06:12,050
And I never, ever sought therapy.

1003
01:06:12,850 --> 01:06:16,410
And the interesting thing was I had just started seeing a new therapist because I

1004
01:06:16,910 --> 01:06:19,450
knew how dark it was. So I saw him the week before, and I had

1005
01:06:19,950 --> 01:06:23,010
these two attempts, and then I went back a week or so later, and he's

1006
01:06:23,510 --> 01:06:24,930
like, it's very good to see you. And I was like, what are you talking

1007
01:06:25,430 --> 01:06:28,990
about? He's like, I wasn't expecting to see you alive. He knew.

1008
01:06:29,470 --> 01:06:32,870
Really? He knew. And I said, well, how would you have known if

1009
01:06:33,370 --> 01:06:36,190
I died? And he said, I was checking the obituaries. And he.

1010
01:06:36,350 --> 01:06:39,950
He had said, I knew there was nothing I could do to stop you because

1011
01:06:40,450 --> 01:06:43,230
you had made up your mind. And that's the.

1012
01:06:43,730 --> 01:06:48,350
That's where I have an incredibly different perspective is because you

1013
01:06:48,850 --> 01:06:52,070
could. Somebody can know again that they're loved and cherished and all that you.

1014
01:06:52,570 --> 01:06:56,020
It doesn't matter. When somebody has made that choice and

1015
01:06:57,300 --> 01:07:00,660
there comes a peace with it, that the pain will be over.

1016
01:07:02,340 --> 01:07:05,420
And that's why each time I would wake up and I

1017
01:07:05,920 --> 01:07:09,900
was mad, because I just wanted that pain that I

1018
01:07:10,400 --> 01:07:14,660
was carrying inside of me to be over. And so

1019
01:07:15,540 --> 01:07:18,660
I see all the people out there that struggle every day,

1020
01:07:18,820 --> 01:07:23,720
or maybe not see them personally, but I feel them. And if

1021
01:07:24,220 --> 01:07:27,120
you can just find one thing each day. But I also.

1022
01:07:27,600 --> 01:07:29,440
I hesitate to say this, but I just.

1023
01:07:30,560 --> 01:07:36,960
It's okay. It's okay to

1024
01:07:37,460 --> 01:07:40,520
let go. And I know what it's like because I had to say that to

1025
01:07:41,020 --> 01:07:43,800
my dad when he died of cancer. I had to call him because he was

1026
01:07:44,300 --> 01:07:47,440
waiting for me, and I had to call him and tell him it was okay

1027
01:07:47,940 --> 01:07:51,250
to go. And he drifted off into a coma an hour later.

1028
01:07:52,690 --> 01:07:55,930
And so as much as you know that you're loved and

1029
01:07:56,430 --> 01:07:59,770
you're cherished and everything, but if it just. It gets so heavy, and I know

1030
01:08:00,270 --> 01:08:03,610
what it does to those that you leave behind, but it's

1031
01:08:04,110 --> 01:08:08,050
such a heavy thing to carry. I mean, I. Have you ever been

1032
01:08:08,550 --> 01:08:12,090
Suicidal or dealt with that? Yes. And so having

1033
01:08:12,590 --> 01:08:16,100
come from that perspective, what do you say about it? Like, when.

1034
01:08:17,060 --> 01:08:20,940
What's your perspective on, I guess, on if

1035
01:08:21,440 --> 01:08:24,260
somebody decides to take their life? Yeah, I mean,

1036
01:08:24,820 --> 01:08:27,940
I think that it's an incredibly complex thing.

1037
01:08:28,020 --> 01:08:31,140
And I can't. I will never sit

1038
01:08:31,640 --> 01:08:35,700
here in judgment of somebody who has chosen that for

1039
01:08:36,200 --> 01:08:39,660
themselves. Because, yeah, I have been in a

1040
01:08:40,160 --> 01:08:44,340
place where I was making plans.

1041
01:08:44,420 --> 01:08:48,300
I didn't get extremely far, but I was

1042
01:08:48,800 --> 01:08:52,060
making plans. And it was, you know,

1043
01:08:52,560 --> 01:08:56,420
growing up the way that I did, it was a sin.

1044
01:08:57,460 --> 01:09:00,820
Right. And so that was. That was the biggest thing. It's a sin.

1045
01:09:02,100 --> 01:09:04,020
But I think that is such a.

1046
01:09:04,900 --> 01:09:08,159
It's such an easy view to take of something

1047
01:09:08,659 --> 01:09:12,639
that is incredibly complex and that leaves

1048
01:09:13,139 --> 01:09:17,119
no room for compassion, which my relationship with God

1049
01:09:17,999 --> 01:09:21,359
is full of. So I think that,

1050
01:09:22,319 --> 01:09:24,959
you know, suffering is.

1051
01:09:25,999 --> 01:09:30,239
We all have our limits of how much we can

1052
01:09:31,039 --> 01:09:35,000
suffer, and humanity unfortunately,

1053
01:09:35,880 --> 01:09:39,640
suffers constantly. And we are all

1054
01:09:40,600 --> 01:09:44,640
have. Have to make the choice our choices. And I

1055
01:09:45,140 --> 01:09:49,320
don't say that in a flip way. I say that your threshold

1056
01:09:49,400 --> 01:09:53,760
or your ability to what

1057
01:09:54,260 --> 01:09:58,440
you're able to live with and take and be okay

1058
01:09:58,940 --> 01:10:01,930
with, I guess, is different from everybody else's.

1059
01:10:02,430 --> 01:10:05,930
And that has to be okay because we are all made

1060
01:10:06,430 --> 01:10:09,690
differently and the way that we process information is different.

1061
01:10:10,330 --> 01:10:14,290
And I think that's something that, you know, going through therapy

1062
01:10:14,790 --> 01:10:18,490
myself, I have. Am still trying to

1063
01:10:18,990 --> 01:10:22,450
learn because, you know, one of the biggest questions and I think a lot

1064
01:10:22,950 --> 01:10:26,130
of people struggle with this is like, well, why does this affect me and

1065
01:10:26,630 --> 01:10:29,830
it doesn't affect somebody else? Why am I so hung up on this? But.

1066
01:10:29,900 --> 01:10:32,620
But that person over there seems to be doing fine.

1067
01:10:33,100 --> 01:10:36,660
First of all, you don't know that they're doing fine. But second

1068
01:10:37,160 --> 01:10:40,700
of all, the way that our brains process information is different.

1069
01:10:40,940 --> 01:10:44,780
And so we are all very

1070
01:10:44,940 --> 01:10:48,460
complex creatures. And it's

1071
01:10:48,960 --> 01:10:51,740
not as simple as you walk down this path.

1072
01:10:51,900 --> 01:10:55,660
And this is the formula for a good

1073
01:10:56,160 --> 01:10:59,910
life or for healing. It is a constant struggle.

1074
01:11:00,390 --> 01:11:03,510
And the other thing I would say about it is everybody is,

1075
01:11:03,670 --> 01:11:07,230
on some level, you know, everybody's struggling with

1076
01:11:07,730 --> 01:11:09,910
something we have chosen as a society,

1077
01:11:10,710 --> 01:11:14,070
what it's okay to struggle with and what it's not.

1078
01:11:14,790 --> 01:11:18,950
And that's really not our decision to make,

1079
01:11:19,350 --> 01:11:21,910
right, as a whole? Yeah,

1080
01:11:22,410 --> 01:11:26,120
absolutely. I mean, everybody is

1081
01:11:26,620 --> 01:11:30,120
dealing with their own thing at the. In any given moment. And even though I

1082
01:11:30,620 --> 01:11:33,760
know, for example, you know, my family, collectively, we've all

1083
01:11:34,260 --> 01:11:38,000
lost five brothers together, but no two people even within

1084
01:11:38,500 --> 01:11:42,120
the same household have experienced the same thing. Or have gone through

1085
01:11:42,620 --> 01:11:45,920
the same thing, because we all get different versions of different people, depending on our

1086
01:11:46,420 --> 01:11:49,960
own perspective and our own experiences. And so

1087
01:11:50,460 --> 01:11:53,930
if we can just have some compassion and just listen to people,

1088
01:11:54,410 --> 01:11:57,730
give them grace and just let them know that they're

1089
01:11:58,230 --> 01:12:01,490
not alone and they're loved. And how we can show

1090
01:12:01,990 --> 01:12:06,290
up for each other in a place of love and kindness goes

1091
01:12:06,790 --> 01:12:09,130
such a long way. Huge. Such a long way.

1092
01:12:09,610 --> 01:12:12,650
It's the most important thing that we can do for

1093
01:12:13,150 --> 01:12:16,650
each other. And there's so

1094
01:12:17,150 --> 01:12:20,540
much talk about showing up and

1095
01:12:20,620 --> 01:12:24,060
being vulnerable and being authentic and

1096
01:12:24,560 --> 01:12:28,180
genuine. And I believe we are all craving that,

1097
01:12:28,680 --> 01:12:32,620
which is why there's so much conversation around it. But again,

1098
01:12:33,180 --> 01:12:36,500
to reiterate what we were talking about before, people won't

1099
01:12:37,000 --> 01:12:41,540
do that if they don't feel safe to do so. So even authenticity

1100
01:12:42,040 --> 01:12:46,680
has been co opted by veneer. And we

1101
01:12:47,180 --> 01:12:51,600
have to intentionally create space where

1102
01:12:52,100 --> 01:12:56,240
people feel like they can show up as their authentic selves in

1103
01:12:56,740 --> 01:13:00,160
order for any of this to move, for us to move

1104
01:13:00,660 --> 01:13:04,160
the needle to a better world or a better version of ourselves.

1105
01:13:05,520 --> 01:13:08,400
And I would say allow showing.

1106
01:13:08,900 --> 01:13:12,590
And how we can show up authentically for each other is you showing

1107
01:13:13,090 --> 01:13:16,230
up authentically. And maybe if you notice

1108
01:13:16,730 --> 01:13:20,510
that somebody is, they might be a little bit off, but they don't quite

1109
01:13:21,010 --> 01:13:24,670
feel, but they don't want to share, maybe share something a

1110
01:13:25,170 --> 01:13:28,870
little vulnerable with them about you. And then that gives them that permission.

1111
01:13:29,110 --> 01:13:32,310
They're like, okay, this person is opening up

1112
01:13:32,810 --> 01:13:36,270
to me. Maybe this is a safe place for me to go ahead

1113
01:13:36,770 --> 01:13:40,440
and share this. Yeah. And so sometimes people need that permission,

1114
01:13:40,920 --> 01:13:44,200
a little open door to have that dialogue. Sure,

1115
01:13:44,760 --> 01:13:48,160
absolutely. And you know, remember that it is

1116
01:13:48,660 --> 01:13:51,160
a privilege when people share with you.

1117
01:13:51,720 --> 01:13:54,960
I think sometimes it depends on

1118
01:13:55,460 --> 01:13:58,200
who the person is in our lives, but sometimes we can see it as a

1119
01:13:58,700 --> 01:14:03,000
burden. And look, I get it. There are people

1120
01:14:03,400 --> 01:14:06,780
that it's just a constant

1121
01:14:07,020 --> 01:14:10,380
state of feeling like they

1122
01:14:10,880 --> 01:14:13,740
are emotionally taking from you.

1123
01:14:14,860 --> 01:14:18,220
I get that. And please have boundaries.

1124
01:14:19,340 --> 01:14:22,540
You do still have to have boundaries for yourself. You are not

1125
01:14:22,700 --> 01:14:25,980
an infinite supply of humanity

1126
01:14:26,380 --> 01:14:29,820
and support for somebody else. Right. If that's one thing I can

1127
01:14:30,320 --> 01:14:33,850
say about my other experience, my other two brothers,

1128
01:14:34,350 --> 01:14:38,010
Brandon and Monroe, we had

1129
01:14:38,510 --> 01:14:41,050
just lost Corey. We just lost our dad to cancer.

1130
01:14:41,690 --> 01:14:44,890
And we were all just trying to survive.

1131
01:14:45,690 --> 01:14:49,570
In a eight week period, Corey died, our maternal grandfather

1132
01:14:50,070 --> 01:14:53,290
died and our dad died. And we were just floundering trying to survive

1133
01:14:53,530 --> 01:14:57,010
and we couldn't keep our own heads above water. So this is where it comes

1134
01:14:57,510 --> 01:15:01,080
in with boundaries, where if we Were the rest of us were barely keeping our

1135
01:15:01,580 --> 01:15:04,840
own heads above water. And some of us could

1136
01:15:05,340 --> 01:15:09,320
see that Brandon was struggling. But you can't save

1137
01:15:09,820 --> 01:15:13,480
somebody who won't save themselves. So this is, you know,

1138
01:15:13,980 --> 01:15:17,360
where we were trying to be supportive. And particularly another brother that he was

1139
01:15:17,860 --> 01:15:20,880
living with was trying to be as supportive as he could, and it was just

1140
01:15:21,380 --> 01:15:25,440
not making any difference. And so this brother had

1141
01:15:25,940 --> 01:15:29,080
to ask Brandon to move out, and he moved in with another brother,

1142
01:15:29,880 --> 01:15:33,200
and he just wasn't getting any

1143
01:15:33,700 --> 01:15:37,120
better. And Jenny had gotten

1144
01:15:37,620 --> 01:15:40,480
Brandon to a point where he was going to go serve this some sort of

1145
01:15:40,980 --> 01:15:44,000
mission for two years. He was going to go and donate his time, and they

1146
01:15:44,500 --> 01:15:46,960
take care of you, you go live with them, they take you, they feed you,

1147
01:15:47,460 --> 01:15:51,090
but you're basically in service of somebody else for two years. And then at last

1148
01:15:51,590 --> 01:15:55,090
minute, he backed out. And then I think it was within like,

1149
01:15:55,590 --> 01:15:58,530
24 or 48 hours he disappeared and we couldn't find him.

1150
01:15:59,490 --> 01:16:03,130
And then we, you know, eventually they. They found his

1151
01:16:03,630 --> 01:16:06,930
body and he had taken his life. And he left a note.

1152
01:16:09,730 --> 01:16:13,690
The only note that we found in his car was, you got what

1153
01:16:14,190 --> 01:16:18,380
you wanted, the number four, because he was number four to go.

1154
01:16:19,340 --> 01:16:22,220
So we don't know if that was meant for us.

1155
01:16:23,500 --> 01:16:27,060
So we've all kind of taken our own stance on that. I do know

1156
01:16:27,560 --> 01:16:30,380
some of my siblings believe he was taken out by the mob,

1157
01:16:30,860 --> 01:16:34,380
whatever, the FLDS mob.

1158
01:16:35,500 --> 01:16:39,020
No, I just, you know,

1159
01:16:39,100 --> 01:16:42,230
sorry, not mean to laugh, but. No, no, no. You know,

1160
01:16:42,310 --> 01:16:45,750
I think that's just them trying to come to terms with the fact

1161
01:16:46,250 --> 01:16:50,190
that how could we have four at that point? And so

1162
01:16:50,690 --> 01:16:54,430
that note for me was his suicide note. I had

1163
01:16:54,930 --> 01:16:58,190
a very emotionally close relationship with Brandon. We didn't

1164
01:16:58,690 --> 01:17:02,390
always physically or. But he and I had an emotional

1165
01:17:02,890 --> 01:17:06,470
connection because he and I had a similar experience growing up. We were the

1166
01:17:06,970 --> 01:17:10,630
unseen, we were the unwanted. And so when

1167
01:17:11,130 --> 01:17:14,950
he died, a part of me died with him. And I struggled

1168
01:17:15,450 --> 01:17:17,790
incredibly, incredibly hard following his death.

1169
01:17:19,310 --> 01:17:23,870
But I want to, you know, and what I was getting to was that we

1170
01:17:24,370 --> 01:17:27,390
couldn't save him and he wouldn't save himself.

1171
01:17:28,430 --> 01:17:31,830
And so, again, if somebody in

1172
01:17:32,330 --> 01:17:35,260
your life takes their life, yes,

1173
01:17:35,760 --> 01:17:39,660
there is an initial. Like, what more could I have done? I have with

1174
01:17:40,160 --> 01:17:43,020
all five brothers. There's always been, like, a different perspective,

1175
01:17:43,340 --> 01:17:47,380
a different reason why. And so that's

1176
01:17:47,880 --> 01:17:51,020
where it's a unique perspective for my family, is that we have had

1177
01:17:51,520 --> 01:17:55,020
such a diverse reason for each one of them. You know,

1178
01:17:55,520 --> 01:17:59,180
Brandon refused to get help he had been to. He was in the Army.

1179
01:17:59,260 --> 01:18:02,790
He. He had gone overseas to fight the war

1180
01:18:03,350 --> 01:18:07,350
in Iraq and Afghanistan, but he refused

1181
01:18:07,850 --> 01:18:11,350
to get any help. And the same situation

1182
01:18:11,850 --> 01:18:15,430
with Monroe. He was the fifth one and he had

1183
01:18:15,930 --> 01:18:19,310
been saying for months, I think even for a few years, he would get incredibly

1184
01:18:19,810 --> 01:18:23,750
drunk and call siblings or friends and say he was no good and

1185
01:18:24,250 --> 01:18:28,520
that he wanted to end his life. And it was getting more and more increasing.

1186
01:18:28,600 --> 01:18:32,200
Again, I didn't have a close relationship with him, but I know the other

1187
01:18:32,700 --> 01:18:35,520
siblings had told me that they were getting more and more frequent phone calls in

1188
01:18:36,020 --> 01:18:39,880
the months leading up to his death of him getting drunk and saying he wanted

1189
01:18:40,380 --> 01:18:43,480
to end his life. And again, they would remind him how much he would love.

1190
01:18:43,980 --> 01:18:47,320
Please don't do this to our family. Please don't put us through this again.

1191
01:18:47,820 --> 01:18:51,360
We cannot survive. And yet he still

1192
01:18:51,860 --> 01:18:55,700
chose to do it anyway. I know he left some suicide notes. I didn't

1193
01:18:56,200 --> 01:18:58,540
read any of them because they were for direct, certain family members,

1194
01:18:59,500 --> 01:19:03,340
but they made that choice knowing

1195
01:19:03,420 --> 01:19:07,260
what it felt like to lose somebody,

1196
01:19:07,740 --> 01:19:10,980
to lose a sibling, and still choosing to do it

1197
01:19:11,480 --> 01:19:14,700
anyway. And I'm trying to find a point

1198
01:19:15,200 --> 01:19:18,780
of all this, but sometimes I don't have one. I think the point

1199
01:19:19,280 --> 01:19:22,470
is that it's your story and that's that this is how

1200
01:19:22,550 --> 01:19:25,590
it has happened and that's made you

1201
01:19:25,750 --> 01:19:28,950
who you are today. I'm curious.

1202
01:19:30,310 --> 01:19:34,150
So the, the. Obviously I have very little context

1203
01:19:34,650 --> 01:19:37,950
about your family, but when you said that about Brandon's

1204
01:19:38,450 --> 01:19:41,270
note, my mind went in a totally different direction.

1205
01:19:41,430 --> 01:19:45,070
Is your family or any members of your family or your siblings

1206
01:19:45,570 --> 01:19:49,220
spiritual still? Or has religion kind of

1207
01:19:49,720 --> 01:19:54,060
been left off of the table because of the experiences in the FLDS church?

1208
01:19:55,100 --> 01:19:58,620
I don't believe. Well, I think the vast majority

1209
01:19:59,120 --> 01:20:02,540
of us are pretty much basically like agnostic where we

1210
01:20:03,040 --> 01:20:06,940
believe in a higher power, but there's no religion. I think my

1211
01:20:07,440 --> 01:20:11,060
one sister did go to Christian church for a while, but I don't. You know

1212
01:20:11,560 --> 01:20:14,180
what. But I would say the vast majority of us are not religious in any

1213
01:20:14,680 --> 01:20:17,880
way. And do you think it's because of the experience in your

1214
01:20:18,380 --> 01:20:22,280
early life? Yeah, yeah. The religious trauma, having it, you know, force fed,

1215
01:20:22,780 --> 01:20:26,240
the. The amount of fear that was installed, instilled because of, if you

1216
01:20:26,720 --> 01:20:30,000
do this, you're going to go to hell. If you breathe in the

1217
01:20:30,500 --> 01:20:33,520
wrong direction, it was always, if you do anything wrong, you're going to go to

1218
01:20:34,020 --> 01:20:37,280
hell for the smallest little thing. And that was the teachings of Warren.

1219
01:20:37,680 --> 01:20:40,840
You know, the smallest little thing could send you

1220
01:20:41,340 --> 01:20:45,600
straight to hell. And so, yeah, that's that's religious trauma that was instilled

1221
01:20:46,100 --> 01:20:49,420
in us from a very young age. Yeah. And what about your parents?

1222
01:20:49,820 --> 01:20:53,180
Same. Okay. They, they pretty much when we left the church,

1223
01:20:53,420 --> 01:20:56,740
we did go to the like mainstream Mormon church for a few years because

1224
01:20:57,240 --> 01:20:59,580
our parents wanted us to have some sort of form of religion.

1225
01:21:00,380 --> 01:21:03,620
And I think a couple of my younger siblings did get baptized into the Mormon

1226
01:21:04,120 --> 01:21:08,060
Church, but they never really went beyond that and so they weren't really religious.

1227
01:21:08,140 --> 01:21:11,260
Yeah. So, you know,

1228
01:21:11,820 --> 01:21:14,940
in your teenage years, obviously you're still living with your family,

1229
01:21:15,340 --> 01:21:18,690
but I actually moved out when I was 16. Did you really?

1230
01:21:18,930 --> 01:21:23,050
Okay. Because of your relationship with your mom and

1231
01:21:23,550 --> 01:21:27,410
were you living by yourself? So I moved in. So dad

1232
01:21:27,730 --> 01:21:31,250
had left mom and gone back to Susan. And so I

1233
01:21:31,750 --> 01:21:34,050
went and moved in with my dad and Susan for a couple of months.

1234
01:21:34,370 --> 01:21:37,810
Then I moved in with a family and I became their live in nanny for

1235
01:21:38,310 --> 01:21:41,090
a few months and then I moved back in with Susan and dad for a

1236
01:21:41,590 --> 01:21:45,280
few months and then Susan may dad kick me out. And I was just barely

1237
01:21:45,780 --> 01:21:49,200
18. And Jeremy, my, my mom's oldest,

1238
01:21:49,520 --> 01:21:52,840
was living there at dad's, I mean dad's house and Susan's house was

1239
01:21:53,340 --> 01:21:56,000
kind of like a revolving door, unfortunately, you know,

1240
01:21:56,640 --> 01:22:00,360
losing apartments or whatever. So it was kind of like always. And so I,

1241
01:22:00,860 --> 01:22:03,800
I again, I sympathize in that. But Susan was very much, if it was not

1242
01:22:04,300 --> 01:22:06,960
her biological child, she did not want you there. And she made it very abundantly

1243
01:22:07,460 --> 01:22:11,490
clear that you are not welcome. But by all means, she had

1244
01:22:11,990 --> 01:22:15,730
her and dad bought a much bigger house to accommodate her grown ass boys

1245
01:22:16,290 --> 01:22:19,890
that all eventually moved back home. One was in his

1246
01:22:20,390 --> 01:22:23,650
40s. Oh, wow. Yeah. And he could stay as long as he wanted.

1247
01:22:23,890 --> 01:22:27,570
Yeah. So, you know, I essentially moved

1248
01:22:28,070 --> 01:22:31,650
out officially on my own when I was 18 and I never moved back home.

1249
01:22:31,890 --> 01:22:35,410
And once your dad left your mom for Susan, was that the end of their

1250
01:22:36,270 --> 01:22:40,030
marriage or relationship? Yes. Yep. They were married for 23 and

1251
01:22:40,530 --> 01:22:43,950
a half years and it was incredibly. That divorce was

1252
01:22:44,450 --> 01:22:47,670
incredibly toxic. And you know, they, the way

1253
01:22:48,170 --> 01:22:51,150
they spoke about each other was just really, really horrific.

1254
01:22:51,710 --> 01:22:54,630
They were both victims and it was, you know,

1255
01:22:55,130 --> 01:22:58,270
years of them talking shit about each other. And Ward

1256
01:22:58,770 --> 01:23:01,990
and Shaelyn were much younger than me and so they were going back and forth,

1257
01:23:02,490 --> 01:23:05,630
you know, doing the co parenting thing. And I mean,

1258
01:23:06,130 --> 01:23:09,970
they have their own trauma from the horrific things that were done

1259
01:23:10,470 --> 01:23:14,090
to them growing up and neglect and a lot of things that in

1260
01:23:14,590 --> 01:23:17,130
a lot of ways I'm like, I kind of feel like what they experienced with

1261
01:23:17,630 --> 01:23:19,410
our mom was even worse than what I had gone through.

1262
01:23:20,530 --> 01:23:24,970
But that's their story, and I'm not going to speak for them, but I

1263
01:23:25,470 --> 01:23:28,850
do know that I have an incredible amount of compassion for my siblings,

1264
01:23:29,410 --> 01:23:32,030
and I love them,

1265
01:23:32,980 --> 01:23:36,620
but I just. I know that I could not heal in

1266
01:23:37,120 --> 01:23:41,020
the place that broke me. And so my husband and I have

1267
01:23:41,520 --> 01:23:44,780
chosen to move across the country, and I don't have

1268
01:23:45,280 --> 01:23:48,700
any contact with my family anymore. Since my podcast with

1269
01:23:49,200 --> 01:23:52,340
Lisa went public, they haven't spoken to

1270
01:23:52,840 --> 01:23:56,020
me, and I haven't. I heard somebody say, well, it sounds

1271
01:23:56,520 --> 01:24:00,350
like the trash took themselves out. Oh. And I

1272
01:24:00,850 --> 01:24:04,030
was like, wow, somebody from your family? No, no, no, no, no. An outside

1273
01:24:04,530 --> 01:24:07,950
perspective was. Was that they took them. The trash took themselves out.

1274
01:24:08,430 --> 01:24:11,910
And I, you know, again, coming from a space of, you can't go through

1275
01:24:12,410 --> 01:24:15,070
what you've been through in my family and not still have some love and compassion.

1276
01:24:15,630 --> 01:24:19,270
I, again, I love them all. I want them all to

1277
01:24:19,770 --> 01:24:23,350
be happy, healthy. I just know that I cannot heal and

1278
01:24:23,850 --> 01:24:27,750
be the person that I need to be within my. And have them a

1279
01:24:28,250 --> 01:24:32,190
part of my life. Has anybody said anything to you about the

1280
01:24:32,690 --> 01:24:36,030
podcast? Like, do you know that that is the reason why

1281
01:24:36,530 --> 01:24:40,230
they're not speaking to you? Oh, absolutely. I know it's the reason why, because I

1282
01:24:40,730 --> 01:24:44,590
was speaking with my mom regularly and Jenny

1283
01:24:44,830 --> 01:24:48,070
daily. And then when the clips of

1284
01:24:48,570 --> 01:24:51,770
our podcasts were released on social media. Yeah.

1285
01:24:52,010 --> 01:24:55,410
It has been crickets ever since the very next

1286
01:24:55,910 --> 01:24:59,170
day. Is it like this sense of betrayal? Like, what is it

1287
01:24:59,670 --> 01:25:02,650
that they're upset about? It's that I have. Yeah.

1288
01:25:02,890 --> 01:25:05,610
It's that I have painted my mother in a negative light.

1289
01:25:06,330 --> 01:25:09,490
And I have done enough research to know that

1290
01:25:09,990 --> 01:25:14,250
my mother is an undiagnosed narcissist. Actually, a covert narcissist.

1291
01:25:15,210 --> 01:25:18,570
And so she had. Did the flying monkeys thing.

1292
01:25:18,730 --> 01:25:21,200
She had them over for dinner. You know, I.

1293
01:25:21,670 --> 01:25:25,230
So my one brother, Ward, he and I still stayed connected

1294
01:25:25,730 --> 01:25:28,310
for a couple of months, and he did let me know that mom had.

1295
01:25:28,550 --> 01:25:31,910
What have I done to Natasha? You know, her life wasn't worse,

1296
01:25:32,410 --> 01:25:35,430
and. But she would never. And he would encourage her.

1297
01:25:35,930 --> 01:25:38,950
Mom, why don't you call Natasha and talk to her? She never would.

1298
01:25:39,430 --> 01:25:43,030
Because that would require her to be accountable. Right. Or maybe

1299
01:25:43,530 --> 01:25:46,630
to. You know what I mean? And so she never did. I have never.

1300
01:25:46,710 --> 01:25:49,910
I have never said, don't call me, don't talk to me. Never again.

1301
01:25:50,470 --> 01:25:53,860
I have never said any of those things. Things. But it comes down

1302
01:25:54,360 --> 01:25:57,660
to emotional abuse and that they think that if they give me the Silent treatment,

1303
01:25:58,160 --> 01:26:02,020
then I'll come crawling back because I've done that in the past and

1304
01:26:02,100 --> 01:26:05,380
because I didn't want to be the unseen or the unloved.

1305
01:26:06,180 --> 01:26:10,260
But I have enough self worth to

1306
01:26:10,760 --> 01:26:14,420
know that if someone truly loved me and cared,

1307
01:26:14,900 --> 01:26:18,570
they wouldn't do that. Yeah. And so I just,

1308
01:26:19,070 --> 01:26:23,330
I have to love them from afar. And I

1309
01:26:23,830 --> 01:26:27,210
don't think that, you know, people are like, oh, what about forgiveness and

1310
01:26:27,710 --> 01:26:29,450
reconnection? And it's like, no,

1311
01:26:31,130 --> 01:26:34,250
I don't, I can't.

1312
01:26:34,750 --> 01:26:38,010
Think about it from your perspective, you know, domestic violence,

1313
01:26:38,650 --> 01:26:42,210
even though some of my abuse was physical, but how

1314
01:26:42,710 --> 01:26:45,150
could you go back? Would you ever go back to him?

1315
01:26:46,270 --> 01:26:49,590
No. And, and I think about, just because they're

1316
01:26:50,090 --> 01:26:53,910
family doesn't mean it's okay. In fact, you should

1317
01:26:54,410 --> 01:26:57,470
tolerate even less because they are your family.

1318
01:26:57,790 --> 01:27:01,390
Like, less they should be. You know, I'm not making any

1319
01:27:01,890 --> 01:27:04,510
sense. I don't feel like. No, you are. And I, and I totally understand.

1320
01:27:04,590 --> 01:27:08,670
And, and also just want to point out that absolutely

1321
01:27:09,550 --> 01:27:12,990
physical abuse is a very small part of

1322
01:27:13,150 --> 01:27:16,670
domestic violence and abuse. And you know,

1323
01:27:17,070 --> 01:27:20,830
from what we know about it is actually the least

1324
01:27:21,330 --> 01:27:24,990
psychologically harmful in terms of what

1325
01:27:25,149 --> 01:27:28,710
stays with you, with you in healing and the process of

1326
01:27:29,210 --> 01:27:32,750
healing. So I mean, there, I'm not, I'm not in the business of qualifying

1327
01:27:33,250 --> 01:27:37,270
anybody's abuse. Right. But there is a whole spectrum out

1328
01:27:37,770 --> 01:27:41,870
there. But it's a lot with domestic violence, it's more, it's the psychological

1329
01:27:41,950 --> 01:27:45,470
that is the most damaging and can leave the most

1330
01:27:45,630 --> 01:27:50,030
scars internally. And those can be the most damaging is

1331
01:27:50,530 --> 01:27:54,110
the scars inside that can't be seen and that

1332
01:27:54,610 --> 01:27:57,870
people are left to carry. And so I just have to say that

1333
01:27:58,270 --> 01:28:01,990
with anybody that is going through a really hard

1334
01:28:02,490 --> 01:28:06,060
time and people don't understand, and if you know your

1335
01:28:06,560 --> 01:28:10,180
truth and you speaking about it gives them

1336
01:28:11,140 --> 01:28:13,940
your family or whomever to give you the silent treatment,

1337
01:28:14,500 --> 01:28:17,700
that is a whole other level of abuse. Yeah.

1338
01:28:17,940 --> 01:28:21,220
And how dare you do that to somebody,

1339
01:28:21,940 --> 01:28:24,020
especially somebody that you claim to love.

1340
01:28:25,140 --> 01:28:28,100
Because that's not love. No, that's coercive control.

1341
01:28:28,980 --> 01:28:32,910
I think that, you know, what you were

1342
01:28:33,410 --> 01:28:36,750
saying did does make sense and that there should be a higher

1343
01:28:37,070 --> 01:28:40,910
standard for your family to treat

1344
01:28:41,410 --> 01:28:43,790
you with respect and dignity.

1345
01:28:44,590 --> 01:28:48,430
Because it's how we should be treating all human beings. Right. So that,

1346
01:28:48,930 --> 01:28:51,750
that should be the baseline. Right. Unfortunately, it's not,

1347
01:28:52,250 --> 01:28:56,190
but it should be. And so when you actually love

1348
01:28:56,690 --> 01:29:01,340
somebody, our treatment of them and capacity

1349
01:29:01,840 --> 01:29:05,820
for them should be so much bigger than

1350
01:29:05,980 --> 01:29:09,660
it is. Right. And I think that

1351
01:29:10,220 --> 01:29:13,420
it really does Come down to accountability and.

1352
01:29:13,820 --> 01:29:18,340
Or lack of accountability and our unwillingness

1353
01:29:18,840 --> 01:29:22,740
as humans to face the things that we've done to

1354
01:29:23,240 --> 01:29:27,260
hurt other people. Right. All of us are capable

1355
01:29:27,760 --> 01:29:31,100
of and have inflicted pain to somebody else,

1356
01:29:31,740 --> 01:29:35,820
whether or not it was the. Our intention, and to

1357
01:29:36,320 --> 01:29:39,940
varying degrees, of course, but we are all capable

1358
01:29:40,440 --> 01:29:44,540
of inflicting hurt and pain on others. And so we have

1359
01:29:45,040 --> 01:29:49,140
to be aware of that and to realize that just

1360
01:29:49,640 --> 01:29:53,590
because it may not have been your intention doesn't mean it

1361
01:29:54,090 --> 01:29:56,950
didn't hurt or doesn't mean it didn't affect that person.

1362
01:29:57,590 --> 01:30:01,430
And so taking accountability is a huge part

1363
01:30:01,930 --> 01:30:05,510
of being in relationship. And we really have no business being

1364
01:30:06,010 --> 01:30:08,310
in relationship if we can't take accountability for ourselves.

1365
01:30:08,789 --> 01:30:12,430
Absolutely. I couldn't agree more. And it doesn't

1366
01:30:12,930 --> 01:30:16,390
matter what the relationship is. Sibling, parent, child,

1367
01:30:16,950 --> 01:30:19,760
they're all. There has to be friendship,

1368
01:30:20,160 --> 01:30:23,560
coworker, there's accountability because it doesn't matter. You know,

1369
01:30:24,060 --> 01:30:26,320
and people are coming at it from their own perspective or if, you know,

1370
01:30:26,820 --> 01:30:30,600
they're within a triggered state or whatever, you could say something that was just totally

1371
01:30:31,100 --> 01:30:34,320
innocent, it doesn't matter. But if that person comes to you and is like,

1372
01:30:34,820 --> 01:30:38,280
hey, you know what? This really hurt me, or this really bothered me, and I

1373
01:30:38,780 --> 01:30:42,560
just wanted you to know, take a step back and

1374
01:30:42,880 --> 01:30:46,340
realize it wasn't about you. But have

1375
01:30:46,840 --> 01:30:50,140
accountability for what came out of your mouth or even your own actions.

1376
01:30:50,700 --> 01:30:54,100
You know, I want to say that leave

1377
01:30:54,600 --> 01:30:57,500
the door open, but to what?

1378
01:30:57,660 --> 01:31:00,620
The possibilities, you know, if there's healing or anything. But,

1379
01:31:01,660 --> 01:31:05,420
you know, I just. I don't know that I want to have people

1380
01:31:05,660 --> 01:31:09,660
in my life that would discard me so easily for

1381
01:31:10,160 --> 01:31:14,130
simply speaking the truth. Yeah, maybe you leave the door unlocked.

1382
01:31:14,610 --> 01:31:17,930
That's a good way to look at it, because they still have to do

1383
01:31:18,430 --> 01:31:22,370
the work to open it. Right? Yeah. Yeah, it's hard.

1384
01:31:22,870 --> 01:31:26,090
I mean, I think as humans, we contain multitudes,

1385
01:31:26,590 --> 01:31:29,890
and we are. We are capable of so much. I mean, just our

1386
01:31:30,390 --> 01:31:34,130
physical bodies. You. Your. You have put your physical body through

1387
01:31:34,210 --> 01:31:37,330
so much. You have been through so much,

1388
01:31:38,020 --> 01:31:42,340
and you're still here. We are very

1389
01:31:42,980 --> 01:31:46,740
adaptable and malleable in a lot of

1390
01:31:47,240 --> 01:31:50,940
ways, and we are very fragile in others. And it's something I think

1391
01:31:51,440 --> 01:31:55,140
about often that, like, really blows my mind how we can

1392
01:31:55,220 --> 01:31:58,940
experience so many things and still be here, and then yet

1393
01:31:59,440 --> 01:32:02,660
other things bring us to our knees, mentally or physically.

1394
01:32:03,060 --> 01:32:07,110
And so. So I think one of the things that I've taken from

1395
01:32:07,610 --> 01:32:10,150
that is that it doesn't have to make sense to everybody.

1396
01:32:11,430 --> 01:32:15,590
Right. You don't have to understand where your loved

1397
01:32:16,090 --> 01:32:19,030
one is at for you to have compassion for them. Right?

1398
01:32:19,590 --> 01:32:23,310
Yeah. I could not agree more. I've had experiences

1399
01:32:23,810 --> 01:32:28,150
with that where someone I love very, very dearly comes

1400
01:32:28,650 --> 01:32:32,460
from a perspective I don't understand, and because of that,

1401
01:32:32,780 --> 01:32:36,060
they can't wrap their brain around it, and they don't seem to have any

1402
01:32:36,560 --> 01:32:38,980
compassion around it. And I'm not going to say who this person is, but it

1403
01:32:39,480 --> 01:32:44,100
is someone that I love very dearly. And it

1404
01:32:44,600 --> 01:32:47,900
has been difficult just because of. That's where their brain operates

1405
01:32:48,400 --> 01:32:51,660
from. But just give yourself the

1406
01:32:52,160 --> 01:32:55,460
courage to drop your walls or

1407
01:32:55,960 --> 01:32:59,540
whatever, your own perspective, it doesn't have to be about you.

1408
01:33:00,100 --> 01:33:03,540
If you can just have some compassion and come from a space of,

1409
01:33:03,940 --> 01:33:06,100
damn, that sounds hard,

1410
01:33:07,220 --> 01:33:10,180
and that really sucks, but I love you,

1411
01:33:10,420 --> 01:33:13,820
and I see you like those. Those things that

1412
01:33:14,320 --> 01:33:18,580
you. You don't have to understand where they're coming from to

1413
01:33:19,080 --> 01:33:22,780
see them. Yeah. I mean, you and I are meeting for the

1414
01:33:23,280 --> 01:33:26,960
first time, but when you talk about the things that hurt

1415
01:33:27,460 --> 01:33:31,200
you, and even though I don't personally have any experience with domestic violence,

1416
01:33:31,440 --> 01:33:35,440
but damn, do I see that pain. And witnessing

1417
01:33:35,760 --> 01:33:39,280
that pain does something incredibly healing for people.

1418
01:33:40,080 --> 01:33:44,960
And just having a space of I love you and I see you is

1419
01:33:45,520 --> 01:33:48,560
healing beyond what I can even describe. Yeah.

1420
01:33:48,720 --> 01:33:50,570
Oh, absolutely. Truly. Truly.

1421
01:33:52,240 --> 01:33:57,880
I can tell you're a podcaster. You're pretty good at this girl.

1422
01:33:58,380 --> 01:34:01,720
This. I still, to this day, I feel like I go back and I

1423
01:34:02,220 --> 01:34:05,200
listen and I watch and I'm like, that doesn't change.

1424
01:34:06,080 --> 01:34:09,640
Don't worry. Yeah. I just. I just. I hope

1425
01:34:10,140 --> 01:34:13,760
people hear this. And I know it's a lot to swallow and

1426
01:34:14,260 --> 01:34:18,080
to take in. It is for me some days, you know, And I

1427
01:34:18,580 --> 01:34:22,320
mentioned to you earlier offline that I was listening to your previous episode and I

1428
01:34:22,820 --> 01:34:26,100
had deposit because it was a lot for me to hear. And that's okay.

1429
01:34:26,600 --> 01:34:29,060
Yeah. And I plan to go back to it when I may be in a.

1430
01:34:29,560 --> 01:34:33,020
In a stronger space mentally to listen to it. Because listening to these stories

1431
01:34:33,580 --> 01:34:36,780
from other people allows you to see people's

1432
01:34:37,280 --> 01:34:40,820
humanity. And if we can all witness the humanity

1433
01:34:41,320 --> 01:34:44,620
of each other's struggles, and it gives you a level of compassion that

1434
01:34:45,120 --> 01:34:49,020
is just absolutely incredible. Yeah. Well, speaking of compassion,

1435
01:34:49,520 --> 01:34:52,380
I do have a question I ask everyone at the end of each episode.

1436
01:34:52,460 --> 01:34:55,960
Okay. Through the lens of your experience, what does

1437
01:34:56,460 --> 01:35:00,440
compassion mean to you? I would say meeting

1438
01:35:00,940 --> 01:35:05,520
people where they're at and showing them love and

1439
01:35:06,020 --> 01:35:08,560
kindness and grace. Yeah.

1440
01:35:09,360 --> 01:35:12,160
Simple in concept, but not always in practice.

1441
01:35:12,320 --> 01:35:15,280
Right. Because we're kind of looking at it from our own lens.

1442
01:35:15,440 --> 01:35:18,760
Yeah. And so much of the time, I feel like we're up in our

1443
01:35:19,260 --> 01:35:22,680
head, and I don't know if you've ever heard of, like, moving into

1444
01:35:23,180 --> 01:35:26,520
your heart space. So we operate from

1445
01:35:27,020 --> 01:35:30,080
our ego mind, which lives up in our brain that talks to you all.

1446
01:35:30,580 --> 01:35:33,680
I don't know if everybody has somebody that talks to them. I do. My brain

1447
01:35:34,180 --> 01:35:38,040
is constantly talking to me. But if you can

1448
01:35:39,400 --> 01:35:43,000
learn to quiet your mind and move into your heart space,

1449
01:35:43,560 --> 01:35:46,040
you're listening with a whole other set of ears.

1450
01:35:47,110 --> 01:35:50,550
Yeah. And I guess that comes to where you're seeing and

1451
01:35:51,050 --> 01:35:54,590
witnessing that pain because you're connecting from

1452
01:35:55,090 --> 01:35:58,310
your heart space, not your head space. Yeah. That makes a lot of sense.

1453
01:35:59,030 --> 01:36:02,790
I think for myself, sometimes I will get so wrapped

1454
01:36:03,290 --> 01:36:07,030
up in something, and if I can be aware enough to take a step back

1455
01:36:07,670 --> 01:36:11,030
and this is probably what you're talking about and say, this is not about me.

1456
01:36:11,990 --> 01:36:15,360
And then something clicks. Right. Like you're able

1457
01:36:15,860 --> 01:36:19,560
to. Something that was frustrating or angering or,

1458
01:36:19,960 --> 01:36:23,480
you know, was inducing, even shame has now

1459
01:36:23,720 --> 01:36:27,440
become not about me. And so I'm able to

1460
01:36:27,940 --> 01:36:30,960
see it in a whole different way. Right. And sometimes you

1461
01:36:31,460 --> 01:36:34,120
don't even. I want to say this. Sometimes you don't even have to say anything.

1462
01:36:34,600 --> 01:36:38,400
If you can just listen and then give that person a damn

1463
01:36:38,900 --> 01:36:42,470
big hug. Yes. And don't be the first person to let

1464
01:36:42,970 --> 01:36:46,630
go. Let them decide when to let go, because that

1465
01:36:47,110 --> 01:36:50,470
I've done. I've been in that situation

1466
01:36:50,550 --> 01:36:53,550
where I was hugging somebody and I was the first one to let go,

1467
01:36:54,050 --> 01:36:56,750
and then you feel them release, and you could tell they weren't quite ready to

1468
01:36:57,250 --> 01:37:00,870
let go. Yeah. So when you're giving somebody a hug, try not to

1469
01:37:01,370 --> 01:37:05,190
be the first person to release. So you're gonna be creating games of chicken

1470
01:37:05,690 --> 01:37:09,800
all around the world now. Hug chicken. I didn't

1471
01:37:10,300 --> 01:37:10,840
think about that.

1472
01:37:13,960 --> 01:37:17,320
Yeah. No. But I do love that it is very important,

1473
01:37:18,040 --> 01:37:22,680
because being in spaces of hurt,

1474
01:37:23,240 --> 01:37:27,320
it's very difficult to ask for connection.

1475
01:37:28,200 --> 01:37:31,680
And so when somebody gives it, you feel like you don't want

1476
01:37:32,180 --> 01:37:35,490
to take too much. But being allowed

1477
01:37:35,570 --> 01:37:38,890
to take whatever you need in that moment is,

1478
01:37:39,390 --> 01:37:42,970
I think, incredibly healing. Yeah, absolutely. And when you hug front to

1479
01:37:43,470 --> 01:37:47,370
front, and your heart spaces are right next to each other, and your

1480
01:37:47,870 --> 01:37:51,290
hearts, your souls are talking to each other. They're connecting with each

1481
01:37:51,790 --> 01:37:54,930
other when you're hugging because they're that close to each other. Yeah.

1482
01:37:55,010 --> 01:37:57,730
So even just that hug can be incredibly healing.

1483
01:37:58,230 --> 01:38:02,370
Yes. Yes. I mean, physical touch itself is very healing.

1484
01:38:02,850 --> 01:38:06,170
Even as babies, we need it. Right? Like,

1485
01:38:06,670 --> 01:38:09,370
absolutely. The most important thing is that physical touch.

1486
01:38:10,010 --> 01:38:13,530
So there is certainly something to that that doesn't

1487
01:38:14,030 --> 01:38:17,450
go away as we get older, but less and less we.

1488
01:38:17,850 --> 01:38:20,250
We connect physically. Right. So.

1489
01:38:20,570 --> 01:38:23,690
Yep. Thank you so much. You're very welcome.

1490
01:38:24,190 --> 01:38:27,410
Did we hit, you know, I mean, I know there's multitudes to your

1491
01:38:27,910 --> 01:38:31,250
story, so I'm not trying to say we, we covered everything, but did we hit

1492
01:38:31,750 --> 01:38:35,200
the points that you wanted to cover in the. Yes, I do.

1493
01:38:35,280 --> 01:38:39,080
And as it evolves and I share my story and

1494
01:38:39,580 --> 01:38:42,720
as I learn and I heal, different points come up for me.

1495
01:38:43,220 --> 01:38:46,680
And so, and I've been told that before by other podcasters that your story

1496
01:38:47,180 --> 01:38:50,000
changes and it evolves and you share different points of it.

1497
01:38:50,400 --> 01:38:54,480
And so yeah. Thank you so much for giving me the space to share

1498
01:38:54,980 --> 01:38:58,240
this. It's been absolutely amazing conversation and I'm very

1499
01:38:58,740 --> 01:39:01,440
honored to be here with you. Same. Thank you.

1500
01:39:02,320 --> 01:39:04,490
Thank you for listening. Listening to the human experience.

1501
01:39:05,450 --> 01:39:09,050
Everyone has a story and I'd love to hear yours. So be sure

1502
01:39:09,550 --> 01:39:12,570
to check out the show notes for more information about how to stay in touch,

1503
01:39:12,810 --> 01:39:14,490
do good and love well.