January 4, 2025 • 56 mins
This episode ends at 38:00 fyi!! I do not know what happened during the editing/exporting process, nor do I know how to fix it! So please bear with me and just skip to the next thing or end the episode at 38:00, lest you end up listening to absolute nothingness for 18 minutes. You know, unless that's your jam.
🎙️ Episode 7 - How Grief Almost Took ME Too (But Didn't)
In this episode of The Single Mom Glow Up, we’re diving into:
Part two of BriBri's villain origin story (not really, but kinda lol).
TRIGGER WARNING: suicide and suicidal ideation are discussed in this episode.
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✨ Stay Connected!
Submit your questions here:
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💬 Join The Single Mom Sanctuary Discord Server: https://discord.gg/FGyArx9Q76
Gain access to a supportive community of single moms where we share tips, advice, and encouragement.
💎 Support the Podcast on Patreon: patreon.com/BriBriSanders
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(38:01):
Grief is a storm that no one canfully prepare for.
When I lost my best friend,Desiree—a newly single mom—to
suicide, my world changedforever.
Navigating that heartbreak wasone of the hardest journeys of
my life, and at times, Iwondered if I’d ever find my way
out.
The weight of that loss nearlyled me down a dark path, but
(38:26):
through self-care, support, andrediscovering hope, I managed to
reclaim my life.
In this post, I’ll share mystory of surviving grief, what
helped me heal, and how Ilearned to prioritize myself in
the process.
If you’re a single momnavigating loss, struggling to
take care of yourself, or justfeeling alone, know this:
(38:48):
there’s hope, even in thedarkest moments.
The Day Everything Changed Thispost is part 2 of a five-part
series about the loss of myfriend.
Can you tell that the grief(andthe process of overcoming it)
was so great that I had todivide the story into five
parts?
(39:09):
If you're encountering thisstory for the first time here at
part two, and you want to readpart one, you can read it here,
or you can listen to it here.
Part one tells the story of howDesiree and I came to be
friends, what our friendship waslike, what she was like as a
(39:32):
friend and a mother, and theseries of events leading up to
her passing.
Now I resume the story here,talking about what happened
internally for me after I losther.
The things that still, 5 yearslater, I am healing from.
The Weight of Grief as a SingleMom To give you a time frame to
(39:54):
reference, Desiree passed inlate July of 2019.
I was in my last semester ofgraduate school getting my
Masters in Mental HealthCounseling, and I was also
working full time completing myinternship at a mental health
clinic.
My son was just 7 months old,and my daughter was a couple
(40:15):
months away from turning 5.
They were both in daycare thatcost about$2400 a month total,
and their dad was paying nada,but doing the silly dance of"I'm
gonna get a job and as soon as Imake money, I'm gonna send it to
you." And then never sending it,and then if I said anything
(40:38):
about it he would say thingslike"you CHOSE to be a single
mom" and would imply that he'dpay for daycare if we got back
together.
These details are importantbecause there was a whole lot of
stress piling up on top of mearound the time of her passing.
(40:59):
At the beginning of 2019 I hadtwo best friends.
My kids' dad, and Desiree.
And then I also had somechildhood friends, but we'd been
steadily growing apart since Ihad my kids.
Not in a negative or toxic way,but we were just going through
very different things in life atthe time.
(41:21):
So when I broke up with my kids'dad at the beginning of 2019,
and I was down to one bestie,for her to just up and die left
me with what felt like no onewho could see me.
I was able to lean on my cousinfor support, but our friendship
(41:42):
was kind of new, so I didn'tnecessarily feel seen or super
close to her at the time.
I'd also been friendly/flirtywith someone I met around May,
and he was super supportive froma distance, but again, it had
been a short period of time sothe depth of friendship wasn't
(42:03):
there.
It wasn't like I could lean onthese newer, fresher friendships
in the same way I could lean onthe two deeper ones I'd just
lost.
(And let's be real, I couldnever really lean on my kids'
dad anyway, but I definitelycould and did lean on Desiree.)
Things were kind of tensebetween my family and I since I
(42:28):
broke up with my kids' dad backin February.
We'd had to move back home to myparents' house less than a year
prior, I was pregnant with myson, and then my kids' dad
totaled one car, got thereplacement one repo'd, and it's
a whole long story, feel free tolisten to it here, but let's
(42:51):
just say they weren'tnecessarily mad at me, I think
they were just worried/irritatedabout the whole situation.
And then I went and made itworse by going out on dates and
asking them to watch the kidsfor 4 hours or so and then
consistently losing track oftime and staying out for waaaay
(43:13):
longer than 4 hours.
Bad stuff.
So, I was already losing myselfa bit from the breakup and
recovery from being in arelationship with a very
covertly narcissistic individualfor 7 years.
Now that I've set the stage forwhat I was dealing with
support-wise, I can talk aboutthe story of my collapse.
(43:35):
Have you ever seen someone fallin slow motion, but in real
time?
Where somehow they're able tofight gravity enough to not just
hit the ground in one quick fellswoop falling at the usual
9.8m/s/s?
First you see that they're aboutto fall, and then maybe their
knees hit the ground, and you'relike are they done?
(43:58):
Can they recover?
And then their momentum carriesthem forward and you're like
"ope, it's not over" and thentheir arm hits the ground, then
their other arm goes to do thesame, but it slips from under
them, so the left side of theirbody falls to the ground, but
(44:19):
the momentum from losing their"footing"(handing?) causes them
to also roll a bit?
And then they get up a littlebit too early and fall AGAIN?!
Yeah, that's how the grief hitme.
Let me explain (44:32):
When Desiree died, as I described in the
first part, I was hit with asingle wave of grief.
Anyone watching would have seenthis as the part of falling
where someone hasn't fallen yet,but you know they're gonna fall.
I cried about it that day, andthen I had to go to work the
(44:56):
next day, so I did.
Because I was feeling okayenough.
I kind of coasted like that allthe way through August.
I was fine.
I mostly felt numb, but then Icried sometimes.
So I thought I was going throughthe grief just fine! TW: And
then, in late September after aparticularly sleepless set of
(45:19):
days, I started to want to notbe alive anymore.
I started thinking"this is sohard, I can't do this anymore, I
see why Desiree would want toescape this" etc.
etc.
I eventually started to imaginewhat I would do to end it.
I'll spare you the details ofwhat the beginnings of my plan
(45:42):
were.
But here's what saved my life.
Or rather, I should say who (45:44):
I was talking to my cousin and
telling her how I feel and kindof asking if she'd ever felt the
same.
And she certainly did empathizewith how I felt.
But she also reached out to ourgrandmother, who then reached
out to my mom and told her totake me to the hospital, or she
(46:10):
would.
So I went.
Voluntarily.
And they admitted me.
And I got a good night's sleepthere without my phone, without
having to wake up in the middleof the night multiple times to
feed or soothe my children.
So when I woke up, I felt somuch better.
The suicidal thoughts andideation had vanished.
(46:32):
I just wanted to get back homeand see my kids.
However, the doctor refused tolet me go, and I was transferred
to a psychiatric hospital thatnight.
I was very upset at first andreluctant to go, to hand in my
phone, and to sleep in a roomwith strangers whose mental
(46:54):
states I knew nothing about.
But I also saw it as a time toget even more uninterrupted
sleep and fill that up.
So I went.
I missed work, I missed class, Ididn't tell anyone I was going
except for that guy I was in aflirtationship with(maybe I will
(47:14):
share more about him anothertime because that story is
pretty wild too), and mydaughter's best friend's mom as
I requested that she pray forme.
Anyone else I didn't tellprobably for about a year! Maybe
it was shame, maybe it was justbeing very self-protective of
that level of vulnerability.
(47:36):
I spent about three days in thehospital before busting myself
out nearly against medicaladvice because a new person came
into the shared room I was in,and I left for art therapy or
something and came back and theroom smelled like someone had
smeared dookie all over thewalls.
(47:56):
I was up in arms like"Y'all caneither find me another room to
sleep in or let me out of here.
I'm no longer a threat tomyself, and technically wasn't
when I was admitted here.
Go in that room and tell me ifyou'd sleep there tonight!" And
when no one even wanted to walkin there I was like"Exactly.
(48:22):
So lets get this paperworkgoing." That worked and they let
me go! Wow.
In the spirit of transparency, Iwant to pause here and share
with you what's going on with meas I write this.
I just had to take a moment andtend to the part of me that
(48:42):
survived all of that, becauseshe's started crying.
I'm writing about it in a candidway, but it was a very serious,
very scary experience.
I was very broken.
And I am so motherfuckinggrateful I survived it.
But I also hate that I had toexperience any of it at all.
(49:03):
One of the hardest parts of mygrief for me to process was my
anger.
How dare Desiree fucking leaveme?
I can't tell you how many timesI've written that, whispered it,
yelled it, screamed it.
Dreamt about her and sobbed inher arms about it.
Even though I went through myown stint of feeling the same
(49:27):
feelings that she did, knowingshe had it way worse support
wise.
That's not to invalidate how Ifeel, but to hold space for
both.
I've had to learn to hold spacefor both instead of minimizing
one(empathy and understanding)in favor of the other(rage and
betrayal).
I feel both(and many otherthings).
(49:49):
My grief is massive.
That's okay, that's normal,even.
Okay.
Back to the story, thank you forholding space for me with me.
I finally left the hospital andwho did I text first(besides my
mom to come pick me up and takeme to my babies lol)?
The flirtationship guy.
(50:10):
What can I say, he was specialto me.
He's always been special to me.
I also texted my daughter's bestfriend's mom.
And then I didn't really tellanyone else what happened.
I didn't speak to my cousin fora little while after because
while I know she saved my life,I was kinda pissed she snitched
(50:33):
and felt betrayed.
Even though I'd have done thesame, and it was the right thing
to do and I am also eternallygrateful to her for it(we don't
speak anymore because sheproperly stabbed me in the back
a year or so later, but that's astory for another time).
(50:54):
From there I thought I was allgood.
My daughter's birthday was atthe end of September, I can't
remember how we celebrated offthe top of my head(another clue
that I really was not out of thedepths of my grief just yet), I
went back to class as normal.
(51:15):
I brought the paperwork to myprofessor/advisor to not get
dinged for missing class andassignments, and he was like"oh,
that's what was wrong.
Let me know if you needanything," because apparently
his infinite elder therapistwisdom saw I was falling well
before I perceived it.
I ultimately left my internshipbecause I'd gotten enough hours
(51:38):
and I needed to take things offmy plate.
Although it left room for me tonot have any money for the next
few months until I could getlicensed after graduating.
So I coasted(like a zombie)through October and November,
graduated in December, and beganjob hunting and got a job as a
(52:00):
therapist(with no clients) acouple weeks before I got my
license in January.
I also snagged myself a guy whowas the exact opposite of my
kids' dad, down to his physicalappearance.
Definitely NOT a rebound,definitely didn't also have the
opposite kind of narcissism.
Things were looking up.
(52:20):
Then, in February 2020, thatanger I hadn't let myself feel,
the grief I kept unconsciouslystuffing away for another time
because I had shit to do, thefeelings I was afraid of looking
at because of how depressed Iwas in September, they morphed
into something new (52:38):
SHEER PANIC.
I started having at least threepanic attacks a day.
Once upon waking up, at leastonce during the day, and once an
hour and a half after fallingasleep.
I also developed emetophobia,and so I was terrified of taking
meds for anxiety lest my tummynot like it.
(53:00):
And speaking of my tummy, itstarted to not like a lot of
things.
I'd become so traumatized andheld in so many feelings that my
body started to express my griefin this new way.
It was sounding the alarm for meto feel.
I know this now.
But when it was happening?
(53:22):
I was terrified! I thought I wasdying, I thought I got cancer,
or HIV, or something elsedeadly.
I was tethered to the thingsthat distracted me from the
anxiety.
This went on for a year.
At some point along the way,though, I decided that if the
anxiety was here to stay then Ineeded to learn how to befriend
(53:47):
it.
This was the beginning of myself-care journey.
From that point, the anxietypushed me to find ways to
befriend and hopefully minimizeit.
I was in therapy, I sought thecounsel of my aunt who was
studying Traditional ChineseMedicine, I even did take
hydroxyzine for it which helpeda bit.
(54:08):
I saw a functional NP, afunctional medicine doctor, I
got acupuncture, I switchedtherapists to try a different
modality, I did yoga, I changedmy diet again and again and
again.
Different teas, aromatherapy,weighted blankets.
I even shaved my head bruh.
There are probably other thingsI tried that I am forgetting
(54:30):
about.
And while some things didn'twork, some things made it worse,
others stuck! I still see myacupuncturist and I'm still with
the second therapist.
In times where I've been sooverwhelmed at night that I need
to sleep somewhere other than mybed, I always bring my weighted
blanket.
(54:50):
I'd used lavender essential oilto calm myself so often that it
began to work instantaneously tobring my anxiety down a notch.
The beauty in all of this, thegift that the grief anxiety
brought me that I am stillgrateful for--I had to learn
through trial and error all theplaces I wasn't taking good care
(55:13):
of myself and fix it.
It's one thing when you'reavoiding a feeling that actually
quiets down when you avoid it.
It's another thing entirely whenyou're avoiding a feeling that
only becomes stronger the moreyou avoid it and will completely
derail your life and put you outof commission until you address
(55:35):
it.
Anxiety beat my ass y'all.
You know that scene in everyaction movie where the hero gets
their ass beat into dust beforehaving to take a break and then
they do the whole trainingmontage to get stronger so that
they win the battle?
Yeah, my grief anxiety was likethat, except every single day.
(55:58):
Go to bed 10 minutes past mybedtime?
Panic attack.
Eat a meal an hour too late?
Panic attack.
Didn't do yoga before 6pm?
PANIC! IN THE BEDROOM.
There was no room for slackingon myself.
If there were, I would not havechanged.
My body new that, God knew that.
(56:18):
I got collected okay?
Edges snatched.
I've gotten to a point now whereI have much more wiggle room
because I've spent the time torepair the absolute brokenness I
was dealing with before.
Grief is a storm that no one canfully prepare for.
When I lost my best friend,Desiree—a newly single mom—to
suicide, my world changedforever.
Navigating that heartbreak wasone of the hardest journeys of
my life, and at times, Iwondered if I’d ever find my way
out.
The weight of that loss nearlyled me down a dark path, but
(38:26):
through self-care, support, andrediscovering hope, I managed to
reclaim my life.
In this post, I’ll share mystory of surviving grief, what
helped me heal, and how Ilearned to prioritize myself in
the process.
If you’re a single momnavigating loss, struggling to
take care of yourself, or justfeeling alone, know this:
(38:48):
there’s hope, even in thedarkest moments.
The Day Everything Changed Thispost is part 2 of a five-part
series about the loss of myfriend.
Can you tell that the grief(andthe process of overcoming it)
was so great that I had todivide the story into five
parts?
(39:09):
If you're encountering thisstory for the first time here at
part two, and you want to readpart one, you can read it here,
or you can listen to it here.
Part one tells the story of howDesiree and I came to be
friends, what our friendship waslike, what she was like as a
(39:32):
friend and a mother, and theseries of events leading up to
her passing.
Now I resume the story here,talking about what happened
internally for me after I losther.
The things that still, 5 yearslater, I am healing from.
The Weight of Grief as a SingleMom To give you a time frame to
(39:54):
reference, Desiree passed inlate July of 2019.
I was in my last semester ofgraduate school getting my
Masters in Mental HealthCounseling, and I was also
working full time completing myinternship at a mental health
clinic.
My son was just 7 months old,and my daughter was a couple
(40:15):
months away from turning 5.
They were both in daycare thatcost about$2400 a month total,
and their dad was paying nada,but doing the silly dance of"I'm
gonna get a job and as soon as Imake money, I'm gonna send it to
you." And then never sending it,and then if I said anything
(40:38):
about it he would say thingslike"you CHOSE to be a single
mom" and would imply that he'dpay for daycare if we got back
together.
These details are importantbecause there was a whole lot of
stress piling up on top of mearound the time of her passing.
(40:59):
At the beginning of 2019 I hadtwo best friends.
My kids' dad, and Desiree.
And then I also had somechildhood friends, but we'd been
steadily growing apart since Ihad my kids.
Not in a negative or toxic way,but we were just going through
very different things in life atthe time.
(41:21):
So when I broke up with my kids'dad at the beginning of 2019,
and I was down to one bestie,for her to just up and die left
me with what felt like no onewho could see me.
I was able to lean on my cousinfor support, but our friendship
(41:42):
was kind of new, so I didn'tnecessarily feel seen or super
close to her at the time.
I'd also been friendly/flirtywith someone I met around May,
and he was super supportive froma distance, but again, it had
been a short period of time sothe depth of friendship wasn't
(42:03):
there.
It wasn't like I could lean onthese newer, fresher friendships
in the same way I could lean onthe two deeper ones I'd just
lost.
(And let's be real, I couldnever really lean on my kids'
dad anyway, but I definitelycould and did lean on Desiree.)
Things were kind of tensebetween my family and I since I
(42:28):
broke up with my kids' dad backin February.
We'd had to move back home to myparents' house less than a year
prior, I was pregnant with myson, and then my kids' dad
totaled one car, got thereplacement one repo'd, and it's
a whole long story, feel free tolisten to it here, but let's
(42:51):
just say they weren'tnecessarily mad at me, I think
they were just worried/irritatedabout the whole situation.
And then I went and made itworse by going out on dates and
asking them to watch the kidsfor 4 hours or so and then
consistently losing track oftime and staying out for waaaay
(43:13):
longer than 4 hours.
Bad stuff.
So, I was already losing myselfa bit from the breakup and
recovery from being in arelationship with a very
covertly narcissistic individualfor 7 years.
Now that I've set the stage forwhat I was dealing with
support-wise, I can talk aboutthe story of my collapse.
(43:35):
Have you ever seen someone fallin slow motion, but in real
time?
Where somehow they're able tofight gravity enough to not just
hit the ground in one quick fellswoop falling at the usual
9.8m/s/s?
First you see that they're aboutto fall, and then maybe their
knees hit the ground, and you'relike are they done?
(43:58):
Can they recover?
And then their momentum carriesthem forward and you're like
"ope, it's not over" and thentheir arm hits the ground, then
their other arm goes to do thesame, but it slips from under
them, so the left side of theirbody falls to the ground, but
(44:19):
the momentum from losing their"footing"(handing?) causes them
to also roll a bit?
And then they get up a littlebit too early and fall AGAIN?!
Yeah, that's how the grief hitme.
Let me explain (44:32):
When Desiree died, as I described in the
first part, I was hit with asingle wave of grief.
Anyone watching would have seenthis as the part of falling
where someone hasn't fallen yet,but you know they're gonna fall.
I cried about it that day, andthen I had to go to work the
(44:56):
next day, so I did.
Because I was feeling okayenough.
I kind of coasted like that allthe way through August.
I was fine.
I mostly felt numb, but then Icried sometimes.
So I thought I was going throughthe grief just fine! TW: And
then, in late September after aparticularly sleepless set of
(45:19):
days, I started to want to notbe alive anymore.
I started thinking"this is sohard, I can't do this anymore, I
see why Desiree would want toescape this" etc.
etc.
I eventually started to imaginewhat I would do to end it.
I'll spare you the details ofwhat the beginnings of my plan
(45:42):
were.
But here's what saved my life.
Or rather, I should say who (45:44):
I was talking to my cousin and
telling her how I feel and kindof asking if she'd ever felt the
same.
And she certainly did empathizewith how I felt.
But she also reached out to ourgrandmother, who then reached
out to my mom and told her totake me to the hospital, or she
(46:10):
would.
So I went.
Voluntarily.
And they admitted me.
And I got a good night's sleepthere without my phone, without
having to wake up in the middleof the night multiple times to
feed or soothe my children.
So when I woke up, I felt somuch better.
The suicidal thoughts andideation had vanished.
(46:32):
I just wanted to get back homeand see my kids.
However, the doctor refused tolet me go, and I was transferred
to a psychiatric hospital thatnight.
I was very upset at first andreluctant to go, to hand in my
phone, and to sleep in a roomwith strangers whose mental
(46:54):
states I knew nothing about.
But I also saw it as a time toget even more uninterrupted
sleep and fill that up.
So I went.
I missed work, I missed class, Ididn't tell anyone I was going
except for that guy I was in aflirtationship with(maybe I will
(47:14):
share more about him anothertime because that story is
pretty wild too), and mydaughter's best friend's mom as
I requested that she pray forme.
Anyone else I didn't tellprobably for about a year! Maybe
it was shame, maybe it was justbeing very self-protective of
that level of vulnerability.
(47:36):
I spent about three days in thehospital before busting myself
out nearly against medicaladvice because a new person came
into the shared room I was in,and I left for art therapy or
something and came back and theroom smelled like someone had
smeared dookie all over thewalls.
(47:56):
I was up in arms like"Y'all caneither find me another room to
sleep in or let me out of here.
I'm no longer a threat tomyself, and technically wasn't
when I was admitted here.
Go in that room and tell me ifyou'd sleep there tonight!" And
when no one even wanted to walkin there I was like"Exactly.
(48:22):
So lets get this paperworkgoing." That worked and they let
me go! Wow.
In the spirit of transparency, Iwant to pause here and share
with you what's going on with meas I write this.
I just had to take a moment andtend to the part of me that
(48:42):
survived all of that, becauseshe's started crying.
I'm writing about it in a candidway, but it was a very serious,
very scary experience.
I was very broken.
And I am so motherfuckinggrateful I survived it.
But I also hate that I had toexperience any of it at all.
(49:03):
One of the hardest parts of mygrief for me to process was my
anger.
How dare Desiree fucking leaveme?
I can't tell you how many timesI've written that, whispered it,
yelled it, screamed it.
Dreamt about her and sobbed inher arms about it.
Even though I went through myown stint of feeling the same
(49:27):
feelings that she did, knowingshe had it way worse support
wise.
That's not to invalidate how Ifeel, but to hold space for
both.
I've had to learn to hold spacefor both instead of minimizing
one(empathy and understanding)in favor of the other(rage and
betrayal).
I feel both(and many otherthings).
(49:49):
My grief is massive.
That's okay, that's normal,even.
Okay.
Back to the story, thank you forholding space for me with me.
I finally left the hospital andwho did I text first(besides my
mom to come pick me up and takeme to my babies lol)?
The flirtationship guy.
(50:10):
What can I say, he was specialto me.
He's always been special to me.
I also texted my daughter's bestfriend's mom.
And then I didn't really tellanyone else what happened.
I didn't speak to my cousin fora little while after because
while I know she saved my life,I was kinda pissed she snitched
(50:33):
and felt betrayed.
Even though I'd have done thesame, and it was the right thing
to do and I am also eternallygrateful to her for it(we don't
speak anymore because sheproperly stabbed me in the back
a year or so later, but that's astory for another time).
(50:54):
From there I thought I was allgood.
My daughter's birthday was atthe end of September, I can't
remember how we celebrated offthe top of my head(another clue
that I really was not out of thedepths of my grief just yet), I
went back to class as normal.
(51:15):
I brought the paperwork to myprofessor/advisor to not get
dinged for missing class andassignments, and he was like"oh,
that's what was wrong.
Let me know if you needanything," because apparently
his infinite elder therapistwisdom saw I was falling well
before I perceived it.
I ultimately left my internshipbecause I'd gotten enough hours
(51:38):
and I needed to take things offmy plate.
Although it left room for me tonot have any money for the next
few months until I could getlicensed after graduating.
So I coasted(like a zombie)through October and November,
graduated in December, and beganjob hunting and got a job as a
(52:00):
therapist(with no clients) acouple weeks before I got my
license in January.
I also snagged myself a guy whowas the exact opposite of my
kids' dad, down to his physicalappearance.
Definitely NOT a rebound,definitely didn't also have the
opposite kind of narcissism.
Things were looking up.
(52:20):
Then, in February 2020, thatanger I hadn't let myself feel,
the grief I kept unconsciouslystuffing away for another time
because I had shit to do, thefeelings I was afraid of looking
at because of how depressed Iwas in September, they morphed
into something new (52:38):
SHEER PANIC.
I started having at least threepanic attacks a day.
Once upon waking up, at leastonce during the day, and once an
hour and a half after fallingasleep.
I also developed emetophobia,and so I was terrified of taking
meds for anxiety lest my tummynot like it.
(53:00):
And speaking of my tummy, itstarted to not like a lot of
things.
I'd become so traumatized andheld in so many feelings that my
body started to express my griefin this new way.
It was sounding the alarm for meto feel.
I know this now.
But when it was happening?
(53:22):
I was terrified! I thought I wasdying, I thought I got cancer,
or HIV, or something elsedeadly.
I was tethered to the thingsthat distracted me from the
anxiety.
This went on for a year.
At some point along the way,though, I decided that if the
anxiety was here to stay then Ineeded to learn how to befriend
(53:47):
it.
This was the beginning of myself-care journey.
From that point, the anxietypushed me to find ways to
befriend and hopefully minimizeit.
I was in therapy, I sought thecounsel of my aunt who was
studying Traditional ChineseMedicine, I even did take
hydroxyzine for it which helpeda bit.
(54:08):
I saw a functional NP, afunctional medicine doctor, I
got acupuncture, I switchedtherapists to try a different
modality, I did yoga, I changedmy diet again and again and
again.
Different teas, aromatherapy,weighted blankets.
I even shaved my head bruh.
There are probably other thingsI tried that I am forgetting
(54:30):
about.
And while some things didn'twork, some things made it worse,
others stuck! I still see myacupuncturist and I'm still with
the second therapist.
In times where I've been sooverwhelmed at night that I need
to sleep somewhere other than mybed, I always bring my weighted
blanket.
(54:50):
I'd used lavender essential oilto calm myself so often that it
began to work instantaneously tobring my anxiety down a notch.
The beauty in all of this, thegift that the grief anxiety
brought me that I am stillgrateful for--I had to learn
through trial and error all theplaces I wasn't taking good care
(55:13):
of myself and fix it.
It's one thing when you'reavoiding a feeling that actually
quiets down when you avoid it.
It's another thing entirely whenyou're avoiding a feeling that
only becomes stronger the moreyou avoid it and will completely
derail your life and put you outof commission until you address
(55:35):
it.
Anxiety beat my ass y'all.
You know that scene in everyaction movie where the hero gets
their ass beat into dust beforehaving to take a break and then
they do the whole trainingmontage to get stronger so that
they win the battle?
Yeah, my grief anxiety was likethat, except every single day.
(55:58):
Go to bed 10 minutes past mybedtime?
Panic attack.
Eat a meal an hour too late?
Panic attack.
Didn't do yoga before 6pm?
PANIC! IN THE BEDROOM.
There was no room for slackingon myself.
If there were, I would not havechanged.
My body new that, God knew that.
(56:18):
I got collected okay?
Edges snatched.
I've gotten to a point now whereI have much more wiggle room
because I've spent the time torepair the absolute brokenness I
was dealing with before.
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