No. 93 - Ambiguous Mother Loss + Self-Mothering + Happy Mother's Day ❤️ - Hand Me My Purse.

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hand Me My Purse is a production of iHeart Podcasts,
so perusing great Shown's Internet and I stumbled upon this
post on Instagram from an account that I follow and
I enjoy called Weavy Urban, and I thought, with the
context of the conversation today, it would be great to

(00:23):
share this with you guys, because they kind of work
together a lot, you know, a lot of them are
tied in together with the conversation of the topic that
I'm going to be discussing today. It's just me today,
there's no guest, it's just raw me, just all me.
And I also wanted to share it because almost all

(00:48):
of these are how I am feeling right now, Like
almost all of them, with the exception of maybe three,
this is in my bag and so let me see
maybe three, three, maybe four, but yeah, so let me

(01:08):
just go ahead and share it. It says, sending love to
those not feeling their best lately, Sending love to those
who feel hard to love, Sending love to those struggling
to move on, Sending love to those grieving a loss,
Sending love to those unhappy with their looks, Sending love
to those who struggle this time of year, Sending love
to those navigating heartbreak, sending love to those struggling financially,

(01:32):
sending love to those on the verge of giving up,
sending love to those feeling unsupported, sending love to those
healing from family trauma, sending love to those navigating dark emotions,
and sending love to those just trying to make it through.
And I am sending love to you if you can

(01:54):
relate to any of those, or all of them, or
a few of them. But I'm sending love and light,
energy and prayers and prayers for God's mercy and grace
and peace for you during this time. And I also,

(02:21):
on a lighter note, want to apologize in advance because
my microphone is very It understands the assignment. It shows up,
and it does what it's supposed to do. So I
want to apologize in advance. If you can hear my
stomach making it sounds, you know I have digestive issues
and issues with my tummy, and my stomach today is

(02:42):
making sounds like a sad wolf or like a husky.
I know what huskies sound like because I like to
look at dogs and animals on the internet sometimes before work.
It brings me a little bit of joy and that
is what my stomach sounds like today. It sounds like
a husky when it sings. So I want to apologize
in advance for that. On a lighter note, now, let's

(03:05):
go ahead and get into this porty and get it
kind of stored. I can't see the path that okay,

(03:30):
what's up, y'all? Welcome to hand Me my Person the podcast.
I am Mimi Walker, and I will be your forever
host each and every single time you tune into this podcast.
So go ahead and get yourself comfortable. Get a glass
of your favorite beverage, whether that's ice water and the
ice is tap water and the water is tap water.
A mango lach LOSSI okay, which for me is a

(03:53):
big time yup or a fresh paloma. I love a
good paloma. Oh yeah, oh yes. Go light yourself a candle,
some incense, burn some sage, and just get ready to
chill out and have a good time. What's out, Friends

(04:18):
of kenn It's me and me, Resident Auntie Supreme, here
at hand me my purse the podcasts, and today I
am sipping on a nice little drink. It's a nice
little hood drink, a little bit, you know, because don't
ever get it fucked up. I'm a very multifaceted black woman.
I am literally a crystal or gem I am. It's

(04:40):
a peach lemonade that was in the freezer. It was
so it's a little slushy, and you know, I got
them ice chips in it. And it's some Reposodo tequila.
And I'm not going to say the brain of the
tequila because pay me my money. But let me tell
you something. This drink is a whole situation that juice.
I will tell you what the juice is because I'm

(05:02):
not gonna leave you out there. You can use any
kind of tequila you want. It doesn't even have to
be Reprisodo. I just prefer Repisodo. But the juice is
by the brand Calypso. And if you go into any
drug drug store like a Rite Aid, Wild Greens, if
you go into a gas station wah wah, circle K
seven to eleven, or you know your regular corner store bodega,

(05:27):
you will see them. They're called Calypso. They also sell
them at the Caribbean food stores like the carry outs,
and it's one of the fancier juices, fancier than ever Fresh.
But you mix that thing up. You got to have
the slush though. You got to put it in the freezer,
drink a little bit out of it, don't put you know,

(05:48):
that's the rule with slushing up your beverage. You got
to open it and drink some out and then you
put it in a freezer and let that thing get slushing,
and then they be pour it up. Clink, clink, it's magic. Okay,

(06:09):
try it. It is the I want to call it say.
It's called Southern Peach Lemonade by Calypso let that thing
get slushy, little tequila. Listen, it's going to be right,
I promise some friends who came for today's jam. The

(06:32):
song I chose for this episode, I chose this song
very very very intentionally. I stumbled upon it, so the
finding it was not intentional. That was just God on
the universe or whatever you want to say, But that
was just God kind of dropping it in my lap.
But I chose it for this day or this episode specifically.

(06:55):
Mother's Day is tough for me. That's not a secret.
I've talked about this for the past four years. So
this song is like a full manifestation for me. Excuse me,
let me try to get through this a lot, Bryan. Actually,
this is future me. Come on, Husky, tell me stop it.

(07:16):
This is basically my future self singing to me in
the present as I prepare for this episode. I was crying,
you know, just thinking about it. And it's just a
beautiful gesture that I chose to show to myself and
share with you because I try to be very transparent
and I don't mind being vulnerable with you, guys, I

(07:39):
don't and it kind of gives you. This will kind
of give you a glimpse into how my mind works.
It's me not really seeking outside validation for love, but
looking within and allowing me to validate myself, if that
makes sense, even if it is future me me, because
future Mimi knows that it's gonna be a okay. And

(08:00):
so this song is essentially my way of telling myself
to not be so afraid of love and to let
it down. And by let it down, I mean let
my guard down and to allow love in, even the
love from myself, To just allow myself to love myself,
to not just allow love from other people in and

(08:24):
not just love from a potential partner, just love, all
the love, love from God, love, for me, love from
romantic partners, love from sexual partners, love from my family,
my friends, the children at my school, you know, my coworkers.
Just to allow myself to feel love, to give myself

(08:49):
permission to be loved, and to allow myself, excuse me,
the freedom to feel the love and to experience the love,
and to experience it authentically, because the truth of the
matter is that I am worthy of the authentic love
from everywhere. I'm deserving of it. I'm worthy of it,
and the love that I seek is also seeking me.

(09:11):
And so I chose this. I know I'm getting kind
of deep, but I chose this song even though this
song is clearly from one lover to the other lover
who's struggling with letting their guard down and being vulnerable.
When I listened to it, I heard myself talking to myself.

(09:34):
And I know I'm like I said, I was veering
off for getting a little heavy, but I just thought
it was imperative to kind of give you that background
and to say all of those things, because a lot
of us are always looking for the shit outside of ourselves,
and it ain't outside, it's inside. The call is coming
from inside of the house, as they say. And in

(09:55):
preparing for this episode, I kept hearing we are the medicine.
I saw that on the internet either last week or
two weeks ago, and I sent it to my friend Janet.
Shout out to Janey. She is has Native American ancestry,

(10:15):
and she talks about to me. She tells me all
the time about when she goes to her sweat lodges
or when she goes to her Native American events. How
the leaders, whoever is leading the event or the experience,
talks about medicine a lot. And when I saw that,
I thought about her, And for some reason, as I
prepared for Ooh, it's just about to cry, I feel

(10:37):
it in my bones. Feeling in my bones. That was
just a distraction for me to get myself together. I
just as I was preparing for this episode, I just
kept seeing in my mind and hearing in my ears,
we are the medicine. So, as I said, the call

(10:58):
is coming from inside of the house right. So to
connect this to Mother's Day, there's a line in the
song I'm gonna try my best to hold it together.
There's a line in the song that said learn who
you are without her love. Now in the song the
woman is singing that to whoever her lover is. Whether

(11:18):
it's a man or woman, that's my business. But I
think in the video that I'm gonna link in the
show notes. I didn't watch the full video, but I
believe it's a man she's singing too. And so she
sang to him, learn who you are without her love, like,
even though you're having a hard time moving beyond your
heartbreak or whatever broke your heart, or whoever broke your heart,

(11:42):
learn figure out who you are without that love, so
that you can prepare yourself to be in other healthy relationships. Right.
And so when I heard that, ooh, that shit sent
me all the motherfucking way of Venus. Do you understand me?
Other stuff send me to Venus and back. And I mean,

(12:03):
I was crying in the coffee shop where I was working,
and shit, it was bad. And that's because music can
be so powerful, and that's why I love it so much.
I love it. And I'm not saying that my mother's
love and both of my grandmother's love and my aunt's
love that may not be here anymore, or any family

(12:26):
member that was a woman or a man, like anybody,
their love isn't with me every day because I'm well
aware that those that we love never leave us, even
if they are twenty seven hundred and sixty miles across
the country, or if they are no longer in this
physical realm, they are always with me, and their love

(12:49):
is connected to my DNA because they are my family,
they are my people. So I just want you to
enjoy the song, like I said when I received it,
and I have never listened to this song this way before.
I probably listened to this song fifty to sixty times before,
if not more than that, because i will listen to the
Moonchild while I'm working and when I'm on a long trip,

(13:12):
but I've never listened to it or I've never received
the song this way before, but for today, but today,
excuse me. When I was preparing for this episode, I
received it this way and it was that line learn
who you are without her love?

Speaker 2 (13:31):
Man?

Speaker 1 (13:31):
That motherfucker hit me in the ribs. Baby, do you
understand me? It got me? What did the lady say,
sweet brown? And then the smoke got me? It got me.
I got bronchitis. Ain't nobody got time for that. Listen
it got me. So I'm just glad I got through
that without crying. So the song is a love letter
to myself. Listen to the song, enjoy it, let the

(13:54):
words get into your soul. I really love the chorus
to the chorus as I can show you that love
is the cure for heartache. Let me show you, baby,
don't be afraid of a good thing. I can show
you that love is the cure for heartache. That's the cure.
Of course, that's all there is. Of course, like I said,
there's a link to the actual music video, the official

(14:15):
music video and the show notes. Have at it. Enjoy it,
and after you listen to it, we're gonna go ahead
and get into it. So let's get this porty story.

Speaker 2 (14:27):
I had my eyes on your floor, and it is
a time, isn't bide.

Speaker 1 (14:38):
I know.

Speaker 2 (14:40):
You want the love that I've got to be.

Speaker 1 (14:55):
Jolly fu. So friends and can let's go ahead and
go off into this deep water. Mother's Day is upon us.
And I've said this before, but Mother's Day is my

(15:16):
least favorite holiday of the entire American calendar year. I
literally hate it, and I have hated it for years.
I've hated it for decades. I probably really ain't been
fond of the shit now that I think of it, like,
I can't even think back that far, but I really
really hated it. Since my grandmother has died and had noticed,

(15:39):
I didn't say she passed away or she transitioned or
left this realm because after my conversation with the death
with Death Doula aluah excuse me a Lua Arthur, which
is episodes ninety one ninety two, So definitely go listen
to them. If you have lost anybody, if you have
dealt with any brief or any death, you definitely need

(16:04):
to listen to episodes ninety one and ninety two. It
definitely made me think about the verbiage and the way
that I speak about death and how I process those words.
Oh wow, that was my stomach. Sorry, and think about
the words that I use when discussing death. And there's
no need to soften the blow or try to ease

(16:25):
into it. My grandmother has died and that's not okay,
but it is okay because it was God's will. And
I think that one thing I learned from Alua is that,
you know, like we just got to be real with
each other, like or with ourselves. Like she has died,
she's not here anymore. There's no need to try to
soften it up. She died and that's normal. It's normal

(16:48):
that people die because we are human beings and we
are born and we live, and then after we are
done living, we die and that's that. And so as
I reflect on my relationship, bear with me. This is
going to be interesting. I'm going to try to hold
myself together. But if I need to cry or release,
you will already know. Then I'm gonna go ahead and

(17:10):
do what I need to do. Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. So,
like I said, as I was reflecting on my relationship
with Mother's Day, which has been a thorn in my
fucking side probably since about nineteen ninety nineteen ninety one,
and it's twenty twenty four, I realized that I began
planning seeds of what's called self mothering when I was

(17:30):
about ten or eleven years old because I had to,
not because I wanted to, nor because I knew that
was what I was doing. It was all about survival
and resilience. Perseverance will kick in and kick you in
your ass if it's a part of your genetic makeup.
And I am a black woman, and I was a
black girl, and so the shit is in my bone
marrow like it's kind of what we do. And this

(17:52):
doesn't mean that I didn't have people around me that
helped to mother me, because I definitely did, but this
is not about them. And so to be very clear,
I am very, very very grateful and thankful to God
for all of the women that God placed in my life.
I had beautiful humans for grandmothers. They were beautiful on
the inside and outside.

Speaker 2 (18:16):
You know.

Speaker 1 (18:16):
Thank God for my Grandma Edie and my Grandma Shirley.
I'm grateful. I had wonderful aunts and great aunts, my grandma,
my aunt excuse me Grace, my aunt along and my
Aunt Jackie. Like I had tons of aunts and my
aunt Madie too that nurtured me in their own way
and in different ways. I was the child of teenage parents,

(18:39):
so you know, I was naturally like the village child
because my parents were still children when I was born.
I had a stepmother when I got older that did
the best that she knew how to do based on
her own lived experience, and for her, I'm actually forever
grateful because she helped me with so much when it
comes to learning about womanhood, whether it is what to

(19:00):
do or what not to do. And even if she
doesn't think so, or think that I am grateful, or
you know, whatever it is at this point that's not
really my responsibility to navigate. But you know I am.
I have cousins, I have friends, I have former coworkers
that have all poured into me, and I could name
them and I would be talking forever, right and again,

(19:24):
like I said, I'm very thankful for every woman that
God has gifted me with to help me on this
journey of my life. But I'm not really here to
talk about them today. I'm here to talk about self mothering.
And so self mothering is all about nurturing yourself with
the same love, care and compassion that a mother would provide.
The tricky thing about that, though, is that if you

(19:47):
don't have it, if you deal with mother laws at
an early age, you're kind of out here just winging it,
and you're kind of out here just trying to figure
it the fuck out the best way you can. And
so I read on da Davenport. If you don't know
who in Dia Davenport fixed your life, and go find out.
But anyway, I read on India Davenport's Internet that mothering

(20:08):
yourself is the act of meeting emotional and physical needs
as an adult that weren't taken care of when you
were a child. It's about addressing the gaps in emotional
and physical support from childhood and realizing how that trauma
translates into who you are as an adult. I read

(20:30):
an article. Actually I'm not going to talk about it
too much, but I read an article that ironically was
released on my birthday a few years ago, and I
thought that was crazy, because God be coming through with
the synchronicities right. This article started off with a very
heavy gut punch for me that people who have not
experienced mother laws just don't understand. In the heading of

(20:53):
the article said the void is always there. And when
I read that, I kind of melted into the seat
a little bit because I try to explain this to
people all the time, but they don't really get it.
You know, you'd be surprised how many times people have

(21:15):
told me things like get over it or you got
to move on. I love when people say that to me.
You got to move on. If you still have a mother,
shut the fuck up. And that's that's that straight like that,
if your mother's still around, if she's still alive, or
if you had her for your entire life and you

(21:35):
lost her when you were in your thirties, forties, fifties,
even twenties, shut the fuck up because you don't know
what it's like to deal with mother loss as a child. Okay.
I hate when people say things like that to people,
because who the fuck do you think you are to
tell me how to regulate and how to deal with

(21:59):
my emotions if you're not my therapist or my counselor
or I'm not seeking that kind of professional advice from you,
which I wouldn't be because I don't seek professional advice
from people who are not professionals in that realm. But
that is a long ass time to live with a void, Okay,

(22:23):
for those of us who have experienced mother loss as
a child, even if it is even if your mother
died when you were young, because that's still mother loss.
There's an ambiguous mother loss, and then there is concrete
mother loss, concrete mother loss being death, ambiguous mother loss
being so many other things. I've been than that in

(22:43):
a second. But that's a long time, and to live
with a void in your heart, or like a hole
in your soul, and the void or the whole is
always longing. It's like it's not really you longing, it's
the whole wanting to be filled, and you go through
life trying to figure out ways to feel it, and
then at some point, as an adult woman, you realize

(23:04):
this shit is never going to be filled ever, ever.
And for those of us who deal with mother loss
but not with concrete mother loss or the physical death
of a mother, I read like I said that it
can be called ambiguous loss or even ambiguous grief, meaning

(23:26):
those whose mother loss comes in the form of morning
loss of a living mother, that is an that's ambiguous
grief or ambiguous grief, excuse me, or ambiguous loss. In
this case, ambiguous mother loss. She could be physically absent
or psychologically absent or both. But the boid, the void,

(23:47):
the void, excuse me, is forever there and it won't
be filled, you know, even if or when she returns
to your life, because she could return to your life
several times, you know, and leave again and come back
and leave and come back and leave, or she could
return to your life and stay. The void is just

(24:10):
there to be because you can never go back to
that lost time or that lost energy when she wasn't there.
She can come back. You guys couldn't have a healthy relationship.
She can show up for you. I know somebody whose
mom has done that, and I have to say that
I still see in them where they are longing for

(24:38):
a mommy as a child, and there's sometimes turbulence in
their relationship because of the void, because of the void.
And the void is just there, It's just there to exist.
So you have to fill it up knowing that it's
contents or whatever you fill it up with, it's going
to disappear. And you have to spend your INtime, hire

(25:00):
life consistently pouring into this hole or into this void
knowing that the things are going to dissipate or disintegrate,
and not in a negative way. This is not a
negative thing. This is just what it is. But this
is why I am constantly pushing the agenda or the

(25:21):
concept or the lifestyle of gratitude, joy and self care.
You gotta be grateful, you gotta find joy, and you
gotta take care of yourself because that is the only
way to manage the void, because you're not like the
void is never going to be filled and stay filled.
You have to manage the void, right, and so you

(25:45):
have to again be grateful, even if you're grateful for
the void. And I know that sounds kind of crazy,
but I exist in a space where I am grateful
for all things, even things that I don't understand, even
things that God gives me that doesn't make sense to me,
or that may even bring me sadness or pain. I

(26:07):
have to be grateful for them because they are going
to help to create the me that I will be tomorrow,
right and so, and hopefully the me that I am tomorrow,
or the meat that I am five years from now,
would have evolved and will be greater than the me
that I am today. And that's no slight to the
me that I am today, because the me that I
am today is a dope ass bitch. Like I'm dope.

(26:29):
I'm a pretty awesome woman. I gotta say I'm pretty dope.
But five years from now, I don't want to be
the same meat that I am today. I want to
be much more evolved. I want to want to have grown,
I want to have transformed. But shout out to me today,

(26:51):
Shout out to the me that I was five years
ago and shout out to the me that I will
be five years from now. I counted all joy. I'm
grateful for all of those phases, in those embodiments of
who I am. But you have self care is important.

(27:14):
Excuse me. People talk about self care, you know, you
know it's massages. When you think about self care, people
have towels wrapped around their heads and they have robes on,
and you know, all that shit is cute. But self
care is so much more than just that self care.
All week this week it's been really warm, or last

(27:36):
week it was really warm, and I said, I want
to go outside at least three to four times this
week and just sit in the sun just for vitamin
D also because my vitamin D levels are low. But
I just want to sit in the sun. And I did,
and I went and I sat in the sun and
I wrote intentions down and I wrote prayers down. That

(27:58):
is self care. Self care ain't got to be getting
your nails done, But self care is also getting your
nails done because you're taking care of yourself. Sitting outside
in the sun is self care because I'm caring for myself.
I am allowing the sun to touch my skin. It
is so important to And maybe you're void or your

(28:23):
whole and I'm not talking about that, but to help
you relate, maybe yours name mother lost, maybe you lost
a child, Maybe you lost a brother or sister, Maybe
you lost a pet, Maybe you lost a friend, or
maybe maybe you lost a friend and they are still
alive and you guys have just grown apart. Whatever it is,

(28:49):
you got to pour back into yourself. Now. I do
feel like different. Or maybe it's a father because I
do realize that dads don't get a lot of play.
Let me just make sure I give dad some play
on here. But you got to pour into yourself now.
Relationships with the mother is very different than your relationship
with your dog, or your relationship with your friend or

(29:13):
sibling or brother or whatever. But and I'll get into
that in a second. But whatever the whole is, or
whatever the void is, or whatever the loss is or
the grief is that you deal with, you got to
pour back into yourself to fill yourself back up. Now.
The reason that self care is really important to me
is because if I did not make it a really

(29:35):
big part of my life, I would be in a
bad way. I would and some of you guys might
think I'm being negative, but I'm not. I'm not because
when I'm being negative, I would say it. I'm just
telling you the truth, according to me, Mimi Walker. Okay,
I think that sometimes people think that the void can
be filled, maybe in terms of mother loss. I'm back

(29:57):
up talking about mother loss by another woman nurture like
a grandmother or stepmother, or an adopted mother or an
aunt or a cousin. And I'm here to tell you
that it absolutely cannot. It can't. And I did not
realize that until a few years ago. It cannot. It

(30:19):
can't even be filled and sustained by me. It can't
when we really begin to like sit in the connection
that a child has to their mother, like we literally
grow inside of their bodies. They house us. They are

(30:39):
our first line of protection. They are protecting us from
the elements as we develop into a fetus, our first
means of sustenance and how we develop, you know, it's them.
They're our very first home. When you think about home,
and when you think about the home that you live

(31:00):
and how you feel protected and how you feel safe,
and how you feel warm, and how you have freedom
in your home. And I pray that you have all
of those things in your home. But they are the
very first home that we know without even knowing that
we know because we're only babies in our brains are
like beans. We are literally connected to them via an

(31:22):
umbilical cord. So their blood, their bodily fluids, the juice
they drink, the food they eat like that shit is wild,
like think about it. And so it's such a beautifully
complex thing when you really sit in the connection between

(31:46):
a mother and a child. And I think about women
who lose children, whether it's via miscarriage or stillbirth. That
woman could have a thousand more children, a million more children,
but the loss of that one child will always leave
avoid And I think it's the same kind of thing
that that void never gets filled. And it doesn't matter

(32:06):
how many children she has and how many children she loves,
and one child could be her favorite because of the
connection that they had with the child that they lost,
because just like we are there, we're in them, and
you know they the mother is our home, Like the

(32:28):
mother has a connection with the child because she is
there to protect, protect the child, and feed the child
and make sure that the child develops into a healthy
fetus into a healthy baby to deliver. I think it's
along the same lines that mother child connection is intense
and it is beautiful, and it is so complex and

(32:48):
so complicated. Anyway, back to mother lass. So I've actually
done a show about mother loss. It's episode number five
in season one of the hand in my first podcast.
I don't even like that, Hand Me my Purse. The
podcast actually season one. It's one of my very first episodes,
and in it I discuss what mother loss is in detail. Actually,

(33:12):
it was the very first episode that I ever produced
by myself because at that point COVID was kicking Afroalistics
and Saffron, my very first producer, was had to stay
home and take care of her mom who was ill.
But it was the first episode that I produced and

(33:32):
did everything by myself at home, and in that episode,
I discussed what mother loss is in detail. So go
ahead and listen to that episode. It'll probably be really
helpful if you're interested in this. I'm going to link
it in the show notes for your convenience, of course,
but I suggest you check it out. If this episode
and this topic is something that sparks some interest for you.

(33:56):
Moving forward, stick to the game plan. Oftentimes, people don't
really see mother loss as ambiguous mother loss, as we

(34:17):
were saying, as true loss, because the person is still
physically on this planet or in this realm. However, if
you sit in the truth that is that they are
not present, that is big time aucies. Guys like that
is painful because it's like you have the option to

(34:38):
be present, and you are choosing, whether subconsciously you're choosing,
whether you have a substance abuse problem, whether you have
severe mental health, whether you know whatever it is, whether
you have a health condition, whether you're in prison, whatever
it is. You are not there, whether you feel like

(34:58):
the person is choosing it or not. They're not here. Okay,
they're not present. That's big time out cheese. Okay. As
someone who understands that first hand, first line of defense,
I get it, and to try to explain it, like
when God takes someone and they are no longer here

(35:18):
and they die. Excuse me, when someone dies, you know
they're not here. And unfortunately, not to be cold when
I'm saying this, but there's no hope around reconnecting. Let
me tell you something. I'm not even going to delve
into the psychological trauma around hope, because Hope is a motherfucker. Okay,

(35:44):
Hope will have you high. Hope is like a drug.
Hope will have you high, and then before you know it,
hope will drop your ass down to the ground on
the concrete and you gotta bust up head. Okay. Hope
will have you living in a world world of your
own imagination, and that can be really really dangerous. Dangerous. Lord,

(36:05):
what is dangerous, Jesus, Jesus, Jesus, And that is very dangerous.
Hold on anyway, living with this void eventually becomes normal
for people with ambiguous mother loss because you got to
go on, like you have to keep living. You can't

(36:27):
stop living, you know. And some people they can't handle it.
But you know, for those of us who do, we
figure out how to navigate this shit, regardless of how
traumatic and the toll that it takes on our life.
It becomes our everyday way of living. Like I have

(36:49):
had to learn how to. And this is the first
time I ever really candidly talked about this. I think
a lot of people thought that, based on previous shows,
thought that my mother there was dead. She is not.
It becomes your everyday way of living. My everyday way
of living is that I am a human, I am

(37:11):
a woman. I am a daughter who is absent psychologically
and physically from or not connected to my mother, or
my mother is absent physically and psychologically, emotionally mentally from me.
I won't say spiritually, because I don't. That's a whole

(37:31):
other story. We won't even get into that. But I
don't really have a choice but to accept it. It becomes
my everyday walk because I don't have a choice but
to accept it. And we, as in everybody loss or
no loss, we don't control our mother's way of navigating
her life, right Her life is her journey and our

(37:55):
life is our journey. All that we have control over
is how how we respond, how we receive, how we
react to someone else's choices or to someone else's journey,
or how they navigate. We have to fight really hard
to accept their behavior because sometimes it's hard, it's hard

(38:15):
to understand, it's hard to make sense of it. But
then you have to move forward accordingly, not move on,
because I hate when somebody says to move on. You
just have to move forward. You just have to keep walking, right.
You don't move on from it, You just move forward.
Think about how difficult this is when you are a

(38:36):
child and you don't have the tools and the coping strategy,
coping strategies, strategies, and the coping strategies to navigate this
hand of cards that you've been dealt. Let me tell
you something. It is not easy. No, h it ain't

(39:00):
easy at all. It's listen. It's a motherfucker, That's all
I got. It's not easy.

Speaker 2 (39:11):
That's a tone.

Speaker 1 (39:13):
That's exactly what it is, a fucking tornado. And this
is why I think that mental health assistance or therapy
or mental health regulation should be a federal mandate starting
at about age twelve or thirteen. As soon as them
hormones get to jump in like a disco. Humans need
mental health check ins and regulation like for real anyway.

(39:37):
So now you see what I'm talking about when I
say that I am or that self mothering excuse me,
is essential when you deal with mother loss. Right, whether
your mother or loss is ambiguous mother loss or what
I'm calling concrete mother loss, self mothering is essential, and

(39:59):
it's essential regardless of how old you are. You could
be seventy five and lose your mother and your mother die,
you still need to mother yourself because we need our mothers,
Like let's just keep it a buck, like we need
our mothers. You don't know how many times I have
longed to have my mother wash my hair or grease
my scalp or pop a black head on my back

(40:22):
or you know, like just little things like that, or
make me soup when I'm sick. Like children need their
mothers period. You have to do it if you deal
with that. I didn't know that I was doing it
because I didn't know what the fuck it was until well,
technically I didn't know what it was until maybe two

(40:43):
years ago. But the reason that we have to mother
ourselves is because mother loss, especially early childhood or childhood
mother loss, leaves us with so much heavy fucking trauma.
Early mother loss specifically, it has a serious long term
impact on girls, particularly in almost every aspect of our lives.

(41:07):
From our identity I read this on the Internet from
whose Internet? Grace Jones's Internet? From our identity to abandonment, trauma,
and child that's a night relationships and friendships. I'm not
even gonna talk about how that shit affects relationships, romantic

(41:28):
relationships and relationships with men. Like child everybody's always saying, oh,
she got daddy issues. Not saying that to me, but
people are always saying in society, oh that women have
daddy issues. Daddy issues. We ain't even to talk about
daddy issues because mommy issues. Fucking Trump daddy issues, you know,
I said Trump gross. Anyway, relationships and friendships, the way

(41:55):
you view the world like sometimes like you're the whole
way you see the world is completely skewed. You deal
with a fear of more loss. You're always afraid that
people are going to abandon you, reject you, or leave you,
which leads to anxiety and sometimes other mental health issues.
Of course, I'm here to offer some tips or some
suggestions because I can talk about this shit all day

(42:15):
because this is my life. But I do want to
offer some tips or some suggestions. Excuse me, for those
of us who do deal with specifically ambiguous mother lass.
I will say that these are universal tips that people
can use if you're dealing with any kind of loss
or grief. But I am talking specifically. This is for

(42:37):
these This is for my This is for my you
know what I want to say, This is for my niggas,
This is for folks. This is for my girls, my sisters,
who are dealing with mother loss, whether it be ambiguous
or concrete mother loss. But this is for us, okay,

(42:57):
specifically those of us dealing with ambiguous mother loss. But
like I said, those of you dealing with concrete mother loss,
you need help too, right, those of us who are
actually grieving the loss of an actual living mother. I
come bearing flowers for you. I come bringing you a
rose because people always bring roses to women, so I

(43:18):
just think that that's the right thing to do. I
will bring you a tulip because they grew in my
yard when I was growing up. It is the one
flower that always reminds me of my mother. The irony
is that every spring when I was growing up, they
would come back and they would grow in the yard
every year. Red ones, pink ones, and yellow ones and

(43:40):
maybe white ones. I can't. I know red ones, I
know pink ones, and I know yellow ones. I know
that for sure. And I come bearing a lotus for
you because it is my flower. For all of the
reasons that lotuses are lotuses, I come bearing that. So
I come bringing you flowers on Mother's Day. And here
are some tips for some self mothering, because we all

(44:03):
deserve to be nurtured and loved deeply. And it starts
with us. It starts with me for me, and it
starts with you for you. Okay, the first one I'm
going to talk about, or the first one I'm not
going to delve too deep here, it's self compassion because
you can just do your own work. You might want
to get a pen and a pend soul and write
this down and then do your own research. But self compassion,

(44:27):
you want to be kind to yourself, especially during difficult times,
especially during times like this like Mother's Day, or you know,
around the time of your mother's birthday, or maybe even
your children's birthday if you have children Grandparents' day, you know,
treat yourself with the same gentleness and understanding that you
would offer someone that you love. Next to self care,

(44:49):
because self care is my jam, prioritize your physical, your emotional, mental,
and spiritual wellbeing because as people sometimes forget about spiritual
health nurture it all. Make time for activities that rejuvenate
who you are, whether it's a warm bath or a

(45:10):
walk in nature, sitting outside, or doing something that makes
you happy, like if you really like to crochet or
paint or go on long drives. I love going on
a long drive when it's sunny outside with my sun
roof open, listening to songs that I can sing along to.
It makes me happy. Number three, I'm going to say,

(45:31):
set boundaries, setting a healthy boundary, or setting healthy boundaries
to protect your time, your energy, and your emotions. And
I'm going to expound on that your mental health, your
emotional health, your physical health, and your spiritual health. You
need to learn when to say no. Learn to say no. Okay,

(45:52):
I've gotten really good at this. Learn to say no
when it's necessary. And prioritize things that align with your
needs and your values. That should be the priority, not
something that is going to align with someone else's needs
and their values and what makes them happy. That doesn't
mean that you become a selfish, self absorbed, self centered bitch.

(46:14):
That's not what I'm saying. And if somebody feels like
you prioritizing you makes you a selfish, self absorbed, self
centered bitch, you kind of gotta look at that now.
Don't get me wrong. It's some people out here who
are selfish, self centered, self absorbed bitches. It is. It's
some selfish people out here. So what I'm saying is,

(46:38):
I'm not saying cut everybody off and don't do nothing
nice for nobody, or and say fuck everybody, it's all
about me. That's not what I'm saying. What I am saying, though,
is you need to prioritize your needs and your values
and what you need to be joyful, to be grateful,
to be happy first for self self. Why don't I

(46:58):
always put the thh where the fist? Self soothing? Come
up with coping strategies and mechanisms that help to comfort
you during times when you're like sad or distressed. This
could be deep breathing exercises, practicing mind practicing mindfulness exercises,

(47:20):
could be yoga for you. It could be let me
tell you something, breath work or breathing exercises. That's my shit.
It helps me, It helps me a lot. It even
helps me when I'm working out, if I'm in pain,
or if something is a bit too heavy, or if
it's you know, a hard workout, Breathing exercises helped me

(47:41):
through that. Excuse me, or sometimes just being alone, being
alone doing the things that you like to do that
is a way to soothe yourself. Like I said, I
sat in the sun and I was writing that made
me happy. I enjoyed it, and I was outside in
the sun by the water writing big joy. Next, you

(48:06):
need to do some inner child work. What does that
look like? You connect with your inner child, that little
girl who had to deal with that loss of that mama.
Nurture her with love, with compassion, with empathy, with understanding.

(48:28):
And you also got to acknowledge any trauma or anything
from your past that that pains you. You got to
ignowe well, first you gotta acknowledge it. Then you got
to accept it. That you know my triple A. Acknowledge it,
accept it, and take some action, and then offer yourself
the compassion, the support, and the validation that you needed

(48:52):
back then, and the understanding. Because another thing that I
feel like, I feel like as a kid, nobody really
understood what I was going through. And so because I
felt like nobody understood, I didn't talk about it at all,
because I promise you if I talked about it with
the people that I loved, because I've been surrounded, I

(49:13):
love my entire life, my entire life like I have
been smothered in love. But that goes back to that
void I was telling you about. It don't matter how
much smothering of love you get, the whole or the
void is still there. It's like a vortex. It's still there.

(49:34):
That does not negate the love, the smothering, wonderful, joyous, healthy, beautiful, black,
familial love that I have gotten in no way, shape
or form. But if I would have talked to some
of those people that loved on me and nurtured me

(49:56):
about what I was dealing with, my journey not have
been as difficult. But I felt like nobody understood me,
nobody would get it. And I also, as a young child,
understood rage very well because of some incidents that I

(50:17):
that I was in, you know, I can remember and
not that you know, I'm not a big fighter. I
wasn't in a lot of fights, but I was in
a couple of them where it was the rage, and
I can still remember, like just being really angry. So
I'm very in tune with what rage can manifest or

(50:39):
what it can bring out in a person. And so
I didn't want to talk about it because I identified,
or I understood young that when people belittle my feelings
or try to diminish or be dismissive of my feelings.

(50:59):
It it hurt me. I did not like it, and
so I just didn't really talk about a lot of things,
which is probably why me and my therapist have such
a good shout out to my therapist with four years insists,

(51:26):
which is probably why I have such a good relationship
with my therapists, because I want to talk about this.
I want to get it out because I held it
in for so long. So you need to do some
inner child work. And let me tell you, it's fucking uncomfortable.
It's painful. It's uncomfortable. In the process, you start remembering
shit that you had pushed down so deep or that
you wanted to forget. The shit comes back out. It's

(51:48):
like comes up like vomit. Okay, but you got to
do the work. So that's that positive self talk. I
struggled with this sometimes, especially as a result of ambiguous
mother loss, if you will, especially as a result of this,

(52:12):
I struggle with positive self talk. You've got to monitor
and pay attention to the you that is inside, the
internal dialogue and the you within, and you need to
like combat any negative self talk, like stop it in
its tracks and replace that negative self talk and that
constant criticism with positive affirmations or affirming words phrases. People

(52:41):
think I'm crazy because I listen. I listen to affirmation
podcasts where all the people do is repeat affirmations over
and over and over. I listen to solfaggio sounds and
sound bath podcasts and music because I believe that these
things are connected to or combat or can affect my

(53:02):
central nervous system, which is what houses all of my trauma,
my pain, the negativity. Like I feel like it's a war,
and so if I am a warrior, then I need
to be ready and I need to have some armor.

(53:24):
I need to have some tools. I need to have
some weaponry to fight, even if the fight is within myself.
So those things are important to me. Whatever those things
are for you, it could be yoga, it could be
riding a bike. It could be roller skating. It could
be breathwork, it could be whatever. Just make sure something

(53:48):
healthy heavy. Make sure it's something healthy and not smoking weed,
taking edibles, doing mushrooms, popping pills, drinking. Make sure that
it is something healthy, because if it is not, that
becomes a whole world of another issues, and then before
you know it, you have a substance abuse problem, and

(54:12):
oftentimes people with substance abuse problems that are functioning addicts
don't really acknowledge that they are functioning addicts. Moving on, last,
you need to seek some support. You gotta get some help, right.
You got to, you know, surround yourself with strong supportive friends,

(54:33):
family people. You got to keep positive, supportive people around you,
like if you negative, don't be around a whole bunch
of negative people, because like y'all just a bunch of
miserable motherfuckers together. And trust me, I see the shit
at work every day. And if you listen to my
podcast and you work with me, I don't. I don't listen.
Is it you? Is it you? Is it you listen?

(54:57):
I don't know. If you don't work with me? Is
it you? Like you gotta really think about that. You
need a network of people who are positive. You need
to have people around you that that help your your
light to shine, not help keep it like dim and
not dim in the sense of like trying to hate

(55:19):
on you, because there are different ways to get your
light to not be shining. Right, But you gotta think
of that song, this little light of mine, I'm gonna
let it shine, listen, I uh uh no, find a therapist.
You know good and goddamn well, I'm always gonna say,
find a therapist. Find a therapist that is going to
help you and guide you and encourage you along your

(55:44):
self mothering journey. That's what you gotta do. You gotta do,
and when you get a therapist, you gotta let them
know on the front end. Look, I'm dealing with some
mother laws or I got some issues with my mama,
so that they know what to help you with. I
don't tell the therapist what you need help with. How
to fuck They supposed to know what you need help with.

(56:05):
They therapists. They ain't shamans, they ain't psychics. Y'all ain't
in there doing ayahuasca. I wouldn't mind trying ayahuasca, but
i'd have to be around people I really trust. But anyway,
moving forward, personally, I choose to I chose to seek
it within myself first. And this goes back to what

(56:27):
I said when I say we are the medicine. And
when I truly began to heal, I realized that the
love that I used to seek outside of myself is
dwelling right in me. It's in me, and the only
way to access that love is to heal all of
the brokenness that just sat there untouched. Think about it,
like broken porcelain or broken glass, just sitting on the floor.

(56:51):
Then nobody sweeps up, or that people sweep into the
corner and think, you know, I'm gonna get it up
later because the dust pan is in another room. Now
you gottat that shuit up and throw it away, Get
it up and throw it away. And I know that
people are probably thinking and when I stay seeking within
myself first, that includes seeking help and getting a therapist.

(57:13):
But you got to go within first to say, you
know what, I acknowledge there's an issue. I accept that
this is my life and this is what I need
to deal with and my the action that I'm going
to take is to get some support or get some help.
And some of y'all might be thinking, bitch, you've been
in therapy for four years. And to those people, I say,
healing is hard, and I also say, shut the fuck up,

(57:35):
because you probably ain't even in therapy, so you shut up.
And healing is not a destination. It's not like getting
going on vacation or getting on the highway, getting on
the four h five or the ninety one or the
one ten or the one oh one or the two
on two ninety five and three ninety five or ninety
five south or north or two eighty five. That's not

(57:57):
a rout sixty six. That's what it's like. It's not.
I wish it was that simple. It's not. Eventually all
of those roads stop somewhere. Healing does not stop. It's
some nasty work, real nasty work. It's for people who
want to grow, who want to expand who want to evolve,

(58:18):
and you are doing this work forever. It's never over
because life is always lifing. Life be life and the
shit out of us, and it gets to be a
smoother experience because you develop a toolkit of coping strategies
and ways to navigate your life. You adjust and you
aren't as uprooted when life is lifing. When you are

(58:39):
on a healing journey and you are actively trying to heal,
but the journey is forever, it's ongoing, and as it
gets smoother, you start to trust yourself more. You start
to know, like, hey, I know how to deal with
this because I know in my toolkit or in my
toolbox or in my brain or my heart, or my
spirit or my soul what it takes to get through this,

(59:02):
and that is so rewarding, Like for real, in order
to heal, you have to spark the flame inside of
you that yearns to be better. And that doesn't mean
that you do it alone. You be in the medicine
or me being the medicine, doesn't mean that you do
it alone. It doesn't mean that you don't need help
nor get help. But inside of us is what we
need to find the help. That's the medicine. The medicine

(59:26):
is to be willing and to be yearning to be better.
So I'm gonna get what I need to make myself better.
We have everything that we need to find the path
to our own healing. And as I stated earlier, as
I've been saying this whole episode, we are the medicine.
We are the medicine that we seek. We are the

(59:48):
medicine that we need. We are our own medicine, and
we can heal ourselves. And that doesn't mean we heal
ourselves by ourselves. We heal ourselves because starting the journey,
that's you, that's on me, baby, that's you and all
the people that come along with you on your healing journey.
They are there for you, but you are the You

(01:00:09):
have the medicine that it takes to get everything that
you need for your healing journey. I love y'all, and
I ain't even cry because I'm a because I'm a baddie,
Because I'm a healing journey, self healing, mental health awareness baddie.
That's what I am. I love y'all. Happy Mother's Day,

(01:00:49):
so friends, again for today's straight facts question. The name
of the person is a little triggering, but moving too
that in a second, it says I'm a little kinky, okay,
a lot kinky me and this dude smashed a few times.
Very aggressive with your language, young lady. Me and this
dude smashed a few times, and it's been all right.

(01:01:11):
I mean, I like him, but he's kind of like
a square or like he's corny. But in the words
of the great poet Laureate Cisco, I need him to
unleash the dragon. How do I tastefully bring this part
of me to his attention? And that is from Odessa
from Oakland, California. This name is triggering for me because

(01:01:35):
for some reason, there's a young lady that went to
high school with me, and her name was Odessa, and
Odessa fucking hated me. Odessa, if you're listening, I don't
really know why you don't even like me, because everybody
liked me, but you did not. You did not like me, Odessa,

(01:01:56):
and I personally feel like that was bullshit, bullshit. Say
it one more time, Yes I do. I don't understand
what that was about, Odessa, and I don't care anymore.
But when I was younger, I really cared because I

(01:02:16):
didn't understand. I wanted to understand why you didn't like me,
because I don't remember doing anything to you. But I
will say this, knowing my mouth and who I was
in high school or as a child, I probably say
something rude. I probably say something mean to you or
loud and you heard it because me and my friends

(01:02:38):
we did that. So if I did, no, I wasn't
a bully. But if I did say something and I
offended you, I apologize. And if any of you, for
the people who listened to our podcasts that went to
high school with me, if there are anyview because I
think there might be a couple of y'all, but if
you are friends with Odessa tell her that I apologize

(01:03:00):
if I said anything mean or was rude to her.
I don't think I did, actually, but I probably did,
but I don't think that I did, because like she
was kind of scary, like you know how I like,
it's like I ain't fucking with her because she looked
like she fight like a dude. And she kind of
looked like she fight like a dude. That's you know,

(01:03:21):
this go not to segue off, but this is probably
why she didn't like me, So let me just move on.
So Odessa from Open California, I don't think that this
is that Odessa because it said me and this dude
smash and I don't think that Odessa likes dudes. But anyway,
so yeah, Odessa, you just tell them. Okay, what do

(01:03:46):
you mean how do you tastefully do it? I mean, like,
if you guys are having sex and you're an adult,
and I would imagine that you are an adult of
a certain age because you called Cisco a poet laureate,
So you just tell him and if he's a square,
it's okay. Nurse need love too, Maybe you need to
bring out the freaking him, Odessa, you suggested it you

(01:04:10):
suggested the next time you guys are hanging out, you know,
if you're drinking some wine or some coniac or whatever
it is you drink, or if you're eating, to say like,
I want to talk to you about something. He gonna
be like what. And I know that sometimes it's interesting
because I have zero problem with doing this kind of stuff.

(01:04:30):
You say when you get you know, I want to
talk to you about something, do it face to face.
Don't do it over text on the phone, because that's
whack as fuck. You're gonna tell him, you know, I
want to talk to you about you know, you know,
exploration in the bedroom, and he's gonna look at you
like what the fuck you're talking about? And you can

(01:04:50):
let him know. No, I'm not talking about having sex
with a snake on top of us that I would die.
I'm terrified snakes. I'm not talking about that. Like make
a little joke or you know, say calm down, it's
not that heavy. I just wanted to know if you know,
we could try, and then you tell him what you
want to try. It's really about being direct. And I

(01:05:14):
read this thing that said something like I wish I
could find it. People who in this. It explains you
know why I navigate the way that I do with communication.
People who have a lot of trauma, they prefer direct communication.
We don't like wishy washy communication. We don't like you know,

(01:05:39):
if he communication, just say what the fuck you need
to say to me directly, even if it's you know,
I hate you. You smell like bubblegum, and I hate
bubble gum. Just say it. So just say it to him.
And I'm not saying that he's got trauma, but if
he's as a man, if he can't handle or I
won't even say as a man, I take that back,

(01:06:01):
toxic femininity as a human. If he can't handle an
adult man, if he can't handle you being direct with
him about sex, and you guys are sexually involved, I
can tell you you don't want to keep fucking with him,
says you know. I can tell you that, because who
wants to deal with a man who can't even deal

(01:06:23):
with a woman saying I would like to try this,
or I'm interested in this, or even if you don't
tell him, because that could be intimidating, sometimes I want
to try this. Tell him what do you think about us?
Ask him? You know, what do you think about us
trying this? Let's say it's sixty nine. You know, I

(01:06:45):
just wanted to talk to you about trying some different
stuff in the bedroom, Like what do you think about
us trying sixty nine and not make an appointment with
it for it like it's rigid, but like what you
think about that? And he could say, oh, I don't
really like it because my old girlfriend did it and
she fell and she broke her ankle, and da da
da whatever, or he'll be like, I'm down, let's try it.

(01:07:07):
Do you want to try it now? Do you want
me to get to check? We can go right now?
You know. So, I think that if you're in a relationship,
even if it's just a sexual relationship with someone, and
yes there are things that you know, people can just
have sexual relationships, if you're in a sexual relationship with
someone and you don't feel comfortable enough to express to them,

(01:07:28):
especially if all y'all doing is doing it, you don't
feel comfortable expressing them things that you want to try
or you know, finding out if he's open to try,
and things like girl, throw the whole fucking friends with
benefits away, throw it all away. I don't play them
kind of games like what if we are to get busy? Listen,
do you want to do this? Because I was thinking

(01:07:50):
we should try this. There's nothing wrong with that. You're
an adult. He's an adult. And what's gonna happen. He's
either going to say, yeah, I want to try it,
or no, I don't really want to try it. And
if you tell you no to a whole bunch of
stuff you want to try, y'all are not There's no
balance in your sexual relationship and you should probably think
about whether or not he's somebody that you want to
continue having sexually. Good luck with that, Odessa, friends and

(01:08:20):
kN For today's We Got to Do Better segment, I
went to Black Liturgies again. And this is a book
by Cole Arthur Riley Prayers, poems and meditations for staying human.
This book just gives me life. It just brings me joy.
And for the rest of this season, season four we

(01:08:44):
Got to Do Better segment will be from this book.
And so I told you guys that this book, in
addition to like feelings or yeah, feelings or emotions, it
also has sections on holidays, holidays that are important to

(01:09:06):
black people, I guess and I'm going to read the
prayer from the Mother's Day section, and this is on
page two hundred and sixty seven. It says, God, our Mother,
we thank you for grounding your character in the tenderness, protection,
and even sorrow of a mother. To know that no

(01:09:28):
human experience, mother or child is far from you gives
us permission to uncover the particularities of how we were
made to love and be loved. On this day, we're
reminded that we do not begin with ourselves. Our beauty,
our pain does not exist in a vacuum, but are

(01:09:50):
tethered to those who've come before us. We pray for
the mothers who have protected us, who are weary, who
have stayed, who have live left, who are grieving, who
are proud, understanding that the story of what it means
to be a mother is not singular. And as children,

(01:10:10):
would you remind us that it is okay to lament
the ways we have not been loved well? While oh,
here comes a cry, excuse me? And as children, would
you remind us that it is okay to lament the
ways we have not been loved well, while also celebrating

(01:10:34):
the miracle and mystery of those who loved us fiercely.
We are made of more than us. Help us to
be hold it, Help us to behold it. Sorry, amen, listen,
this book just gives me life. God of Mercy, it

(01:10:55):
just gives me life. And like, I just want everybody
to have a copy of it. If I could afford
to buy all of the black people in the whole
wide world of this book, I would do that. I
want to read something else from the book, section the
Mother's Day, section two. It is a quote from Jamaica
ken Caid. It says, out of the corner of one eye,

(01:11:16):
I could see my mother. Out of the corner of
the other eye, I could see her shadow on the
wall cast there by the lamp light. It was a
big and solid shadow, and it looked so much like
my mother that I became frightened, for I could not
be sure whether for the rest of my life, I
would be able to tell when it was really my
mother and when it was really her shadow standing between

(01:11:39):
me and the rest of the world. Listen that Cole
Arthur Riley, She's a genius, and I'm going to buy
her other book. I think it's called This Here Flesh
it is. I'm going to be buying it this week,
and I'm going to buy my best friend and copy
of this book Best Black Liturgies, and I might buy
it from my cousin and my aunt too because black

(01:11:59):
people this book, Okay, get it. So the very first
thing that I want to do is say thank you
to God first, because God is supreme and I recognize

(01:12:19):
and appreciate the grace that God extends to me every
single day of my black ass life. Next, I want
to say thank you to my mother. Thank you. Thank you,
Mommy for protecting me for nine months. Thank you for
whether you did this subconsciously or consciously. Thank you for

(01:12:41):
choosing a father that was connected to a family that
would protect me for the rest of my life and
smother me with love. Thank you for sacrifice. Thank you
for love seen and unseen. Thank you for love that

(01:13:04):
is felt. Yeah, thank you for love that has felt. Yeah.
I want to say thank you to my people. I
want to say thank you to each and every one
of you that I have been rocking with me since
marsh the first of twenty twenty. Thank you so much.

(01:13:24):
I truly appreciate you for being here. And even if
you just started listening to hear me, my person today.
I thank you for that as well. I'm grateful either way.
I'm thankful for my family, my friends, my friends and Ken,
all of my supporters, and of course, most importantly, every
single one of you guys out there listening. I love
y'all so much and it is nothing short of an
honor to share my time and my energy with you,

(01:13:45):
especially if you keep coming back to spend time with me.
It is such a blessing and I look forward to
the next time that we get to do this with
one another. Now, before you exit out of whatever streaming
service you're using to listen this, before you click out
of this and hang up on me, stop what you're doing,
and if you haven't already done so, look for the
subscribe or follow button click on it. If that's an

(01:14:06):
option on the streaming service where you're listening, then I
want you to go to Instagram. Follow me at hand
me my person Underscore podcast. Also follow me on Threads
and you can find me there from my Instagram profile
at the same link. You can just click on the
little swirly thing and it'll take you there. And I
got to say I'm activism of on threads. I talk

(01:14:29):
a lot on threads a lot more on threads than
I do on Instagram, although my Instagram stories do be lit.
I be posting a lot of stuff on my Instagram stories,
but I talk more on threads than I do on
Instagram and Facebook now, so follow me on threads, Instagram
and Facebook. I'm slow to Facebook, but follow me on
there anyway. If you listen on a streaming service or

(01:14:51):
medium that allows you to do so, please rate and
review the show or give it a thumbs up. If
you can, be sure to share hand me my purse
with your friends, your loved ones, even people that you
can't fucking stand. Because the best way for people to
find out about the show is by you guys telling
them all about it. So tell a friend to tell
a friend to tell a friend. Please, friends and kad
submit your questions for the straight fact segment. I don't know,

(01:15:13):
like I need y'all to do it, like I need
some help. Can y'all submit the questions? Or no? Submit
the questions? Submit questions by clicking on the link and
the show notes that say submit a question for Straight Facts,
or click the link in my Instagram profile and look
for the button that directs you to submit a question,
and who knows, your question may be featured on an
upcoming show. Also, remember that show notes are always available

(01:15:35):
in the episode description wherever you're listening to the show,
and be sure to take a look at the show
notes because that's where I put everything that I mentioned
during the show and other information that I just want
to share with you. So make sure you check out
the show notes. Also, just so you know, the music
for Hiding My Purse is provided by none other than
West Baltimore's own Gloomy Tunes. Last, but not least, I

(01:16:00):
want to give a big old shout out to my
producers Taylor and Evan Evern. His name is not Everen,
It is Evan, Taylor and Evan, and together we make
up a rando banjo in the Dirty Throats. And I
look forward you. I can't talk, okay, that means it
time for me to go. I look forward to you
looking forward to listening to hand Me my personal podcast

(01:16:22):
each and every Tuesday, and I'm out this bitch piece.
Hand Me My Purse is a production of iHeart Podcasts.
For more shows from my Heart podcast, this is the
iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your

(01:16:43):
favorite shows,

All Episodes

No. 93 - Ambiguous Mother Loss + Self-Mothering + Happy Mother's Day ❤️

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

Stuff You Should Know

Dateline NBC

On Purpose with Jay Shetty

.css-15opob5{left:0;position:absolute;top:0.8rem;} All Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}No. 93 - Ambiguous Mother Loss + Self-Mothering + Happy Mother's Day ❤️