May 5, 2025 • 48 mins
*Part 2 of the trauma discussion* Morgan's friend Haley Dollarhide gets very vulnerable sharing her story of survival. In childhood, Haley dealt with an abusive step father who made growing up a constant experience of walking on eggshells. When she was in high school, religious trauma reared its head as she navigated becoming a woman. The trauma continued when Haley was faced with a very difficult decision after being raped in college.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:13):
Take Personal Life with Laura Felsman.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Welcome everybody. This week we are entering part two of
the Trauma series. Last week I had on expert trauma
therapist Lauren Are to help us understand trauma better and
all the ins and outs of it. This week, my
friend Hailey dollar Hide joins me. She is being incredibly
brave in opening up about the experiences of her life.
I'm honored she chose to share such difficult parts of
(00:40):
her story here on the podcast, and I hope everyone
listens to it because I believe it's going to bring
up some hopefully healthy conversations and understanding. Now, I do
want to give a warning we are getting into the
subject of r ape. I know the subject isn't for everyone,
but it is a very important and hard conversation to have.
Hailey's perspective is not only insightful, but also inspiring in
(01:02):
one full of strength and resilience. I'm joined this week
by one of my friends. This is miss Haley dollar Hide.
How are you.
Speaker 1 (01:14):
I'm good? How are you?
Speaker 2 (01:15):
I'm good? I'm so excited that you decided to join
me and share your story, because your story, man, it
comes with a lot of bumps. Along the way, and
I say bumps so lightly because it is so much
more than that. But I want people to get to
know you because I think beyond the fact of you
being a great human being, you also have this story
(01:37):
of inspiration in the end of everything that you've gone
through to be who and where you are today, and
that's a story that deserves to be told.
Speaker 1 (01:46):
So thank you, thanks for being here, thanks for having me.
Speaker 2 (01:50):
You can share these different pieces of your story and
then we'll get into each one. So I'll let you
start from where you want to.
Speaker 1 (01:57):
Start, Okay, from there, I feel like I'll always start
at the very beginning, just because I view it in
my head as a timeline everything. But I think when
I was five or six, my parents got divorced. But
up until then, everything was very normal. Leave it to Beaver,
(02:20):
at least from my point of view. Yeah, small town
in Mississippi. And then I feel like when my parents
got divorced, that was the beginning of such a common
tale of and especially in small towns in Mississippi. Nobody
in the nineties was talking about therapy or feelings. It
(02:42):
was all just matter of fact, and the kids were
along for the ride. My mother got remarried when I
was in the third grade, and I would say things
were pretty normal for the first part of it, so
I'm sorry. Let me backtrack. They got married when I
(03:03):
was in second grade. Okay, by the time I got
to third grade, things he was just very abusive, and
I've learned now as an adult that he not to
spill his memes. But I think he had an abusive upbringing.
And you hear that so much people that they just
repeat patterns that they hated themselves, but they don't know
(03:26):
any different. So I'm also on this grace journey right now.
You have to give it to receive it. That's where
I am with that, because I actually hate.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
This man, but you're like, I hate you, But also
I do.
Speaker 1 (03:38):
Understand, yes, which is a really peaceful place to be.
And as a Christian, you hear your whole life piece
beyond all understanding, and I feel like I'm finally out
of place now where none of it really makes sense,
but I am so at peace. But yeah, So my
stepfather growing up was just very verbally abusive, Like I
(04:00):
was never touched or anything like that by him, and
my mother did her best, but she also didn't have
resources like we have now and you certainly didn't.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
Talk about nothing that happens in the home.
Speaker 1 (04:16):
Yeah, and don't air your dirty laundry, Morgan, Yes, yes,
the age, Yes, and now I can't air it enough.
Who wants to hear I have. I've got this new mantra.
Now that's I am always going to be just who
I am in the same room, because for years, Morgan,
I was just somebody else everywhere I went. And it's
(04:38):
very life giving to just be yourself all the time.
There's no story to keep up, there's no shame of
other I think that's also it is I grew up
and realized all of this shame I carried, none of
it was actually mine, you know what I mean? It
was And if you have a life partner, spouse, that's
(05:01):
in the deal of helping each other carry burdens. But
outside of that, I don't really see an equation where
you need to carry that deep a load of someone else's,
do you know what I mean?
Speaker 2 (05:13):
Yeah, And especially as a child.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
Yeah, I think I always say that Boomer generation because
it's always a joke about how like our grandparents raised
us like millennials. But it wasn't like that. For them.
It's just something about boomers where we're not talking about things.
But I don't think it's because they don't want to.
(05:37):
Really don't think they felt like they could.
Speaker 2 (05:42):
Yeah. I think a lot of what was ingrained into
that generation was you deal with things on your own,
and you have tough skin, and you don't need to
bring anybody else into the picture. This can be fixed
on its own. There was a lot of that just
intense drive home that you don't need anybody else and
if you do, you Yeah, And I think that was ingrained,
(06:03):
not just in men, but in women. I think it
was ingrained in all of them.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
No, Firs's honestly, I think especially for men. I feel
like back to my Bravo because I love Bravo, you
know that. But I was watching the Summer House, you know,
the Southern Charm reunion last night and these two guys, Craig,
which you might have met with Amy. I think he's
been on Amy's podcast and they've done things. But then
(06:29):
Craig and Austin they have this really great friendship, but
it mimics like two girlfriends and they talk about their
feelings and cry, and I was thinking, people want people
to express themselves, but they were getting all this hate
about it, and I'm like, I think boys actually have
it worse because you're supposed to be so exterior, like
(06:51):
on the exterior is so tough, and it's really weak
to cry. But yeah, so third grade to about fourth grade.
Yet we lived in this one place for one year
and it wasn't that bad then where I spent the
majority of my life. It was just awful all the time.
(07:11):
It was things like I tell the story all the time,
and I really am over it, and it comes up
a lot because I will never forget the look on
my therapist's face when I was telling him the story.
But and I still to this day have a weird
thing with condiments. But I had a corn dog and
(07:33):
I put too much mustard on my plate. According to
my stepfather and Morgan, he made me dump a whole
jar of French Is mustard in a bowl and made
me eat it with a spoon because it was too
much on my plate. And if you ask my mom,
like I love her, but if you ask her, her
(07:55):
response is that we'd been telling you forever to not
too much on your plate. And that's where I think
the disconnect from us is she now. Granted I don't
see it from a mother's standpoint. I could not. I
can't imagine what that was like for her, and the
guilt and like wanting to do whatever I could to
(08:17):
make it not seem so bad. But that's not normal,
and that's not a correct punishment. Shape it no matter
how you want. But it was stuff like that, just
he almost you would think he took joy. He was almost.
He prayed on me a little bit. And my sister
got a lot of it. And that is her story.
(08:37):
So I try really hard not to speak from her
experience and how she felt. But there were big moments
where I will say this, the majority of my life
I felt uncomfortable in my home and it was always
walking on eggshells and go get the man before your
(09:00):
stepdad gets home, and go. If I was sitting on
the couch and watching a show, like eating a snack
after school, and I heard somebody pull into the driveway, Morgan,
I would run like a bad guy was chasing me.
That was normal, It really was.
Speaker 2 (09:19):
It's like you lived your childhood in survival and yeah,
this person had all of these rules and stipulations that
it was never really safe.
Speaker 1 (09:27):
Yeah, and you never knew what version you were gonna get.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
Some days it was gonna be great, and some days
it was gonna be Oh, hold on, this is about
to get really bad.
Speaker 1 (09:34):
So I think that's the hard part for my mother.
And again I'm not speaking on her behalf. Can you
tell I'm married to a lawyer?
Speaker 2 (09:40):
Yeah? Like, how can I make sure? But also I
love to remind people of a lot of things when
they come in this room, But one in particular is
that your story is your story to tell, Yes, and
your accounts of it are your story. Is there another
side of that story? Always? Always yes, but it's also
still your story. You were very much a part of
(10:01):
this story, and it's yours to do with how you please?
Speaker 1 (10:05):
Yeah, And I am like, I'm not a prophet or anything,
but I do feel a strong as an eight. I
feel like that is my superpower that was I wasn't
allowed to use. But I think because they say whatever
your Achilles hill is so like for Enneagram aids, it's
(10:25):
the vulnerable part of it. But ironically, when we are vulnerable,
it's the most powerful thing that we can offer somebody.
And so I have to I live my life by
faith and nothing will stop me from doing what I
(10:45):
can to, even if it's just like somebody understanding me
a little bit better or giving someone grace a little
bit better. But the hang up for my mother is
it wasn't all bad. That is what she That is
the heel she will die on.
Speaker 2 (11:02):
And I can speak from being in an abusive relationship.
This is something I recently opened up about, and mine
was on a different side. There was physical and emotional
yours being even just on emotional, which people often just
be like, what was just yelling? It was just verbal. No,
you're fighting a similar battle in the sense where you
are convinced of a different reality. They love to create
(11:26):
a world where you believe that they are actually the
person in the right and you are the person in
the wrong. And so much of an abuser's reality is
they believe everything they're doing is correct and they can't
do any wrong. So that's why you walk on eggshells.
That's why you never know where they stand, because it's
(11:48):
their world and you're just living to exist in it.
It's also why your mom experienced this. There's good days.
You're justifying what they've told you to justify you have
this warped version of reality. And so there is no
blame from me to your mom, even never having known
her and will probably never meet her. But there's no
(12:10):
blame from me in the sense that she thought what
was happening was normal.
Speaker 1 (12:15):
I've told you this before. The Enneagram like truly changed
my life and for the year that I got into it,
I had everybody in my family take the test and
my mom is a three. And I think for her
it's a sign of failure. And that's you talk about
Achilles heel with with the achiever. Yeah, I mean it.
(12:38):
All she hears is I lost motherhood. I failed And I.
Speaker 2 (12:41):
Feel that this relation about this marriage I feel at
my kids. All she's hearing is that on repeat.
Speaker 1 (12:46):
Yeah, and she can't accept that. That's very it's and
I think that is important to say. That is harder
for her to accept than me because I have like
such little three in me. I'm not competitive, I'm not
win or lose. I'm like, let's play to have fun.
But yeah, I think for her because I didn't, and
(13:07):
this is what I was telling you earlier, I think
because I didn't come to her with a lot of things.
Her question is why didn't you come to me, and
why didn't you? And my answer is and always will be.
I was a child. That is the role I choose
to play with my children is letting them know always,
(13:29):
no matter what it is, I can handle it, Like
we will get through this together. You were never alone.
And honestly, Morgan, that wasn't something I could verbalize or
even understand until last year. So I went therapy Cat
that does a podcast with Amy. I didn't even know
Amy at the time, and I had been going to Cat.
(13:52):
I went every Tuesday for an entire year, and there
were so many things that just being allowed to have
this is non biased the right word. She had no
dog in any of us.
Speaker 2 (14:04):
Yes, that's the role that a therapist is supposed to
provide you. It's an unbiased perspective of your experiences instead
of getting like half of one biased view and half
of another and piecing them together.
Speaker 1 (14:14):
Yeah, and like back to echo what I said earlier
about burdens and shame and things that we carry. That's
not even John, my husband's job, Like he can be
there for me, but that's a lot for somebody to carry.
And I talked about losing my virginity with Kat and
(14:36):
it was in that it was weird because I have
you seen Firefly Lanes?
Speaker 2 (14:40):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (14:40):
Okay, So there was about six months where I would
watch these shows or movies and I felt so like
God was trying to talk to me through them, because
like the it would be like so random how I'd
start watching it. And I was watching Firefly Lane and
when Catherine is it.
Speaker 2 (15:00):
Katheryne Nigel, Katherine Heigel say, yeah, her character as.
Speaker 1 (15:04):
A child was she lost her virginity and it felt
consensual based on the knowledge we had. Yeah the time
at twenty years ago and I was watching, I just
started bawling, crying, and my husband was like, okay, like
it's not that sad, and I'm like no, Like John,
I'm having this epiphany that it changed the entire trajectory
(15:30):
of my life Morgan from that very first time, and
it all so like the practice I what is it
like the practice I preach? I guess that the tool
I've been given in therapy is to just go all
the way, like retrace all the steps until you get
to the root. And so I was fifteen and my
(15:52):
it was my friend's older brother who was eighteen with
a girlfriend, and he had just finished high school, so
he was like getting ready to go play ball at
a community college or something, and we were drinking Zema's,
remember those with like you remember za with a jolly
(16:15):
rancher down in the bottom. And I was much younger
than all of these girls, and I remember everything about it.
I remember like being excited, but I also remember thinking
like we were about to start dating, and it was
this thing. I was such a virgin that I had
never even worn a tampon. Wow, wow, And I remember
(16:40):
when I could choice. Yeah, Like I was terrified to
use a tampon. And I remember coming home and I
had spotted because we're going I had no proper information
to even know that was normal, and my sister at
the time had already gone to college. I was in
(17:00):
the house all alone, and in my mind it was like, yay,
I'm not pregnant because I just started my period. And
I remember going to the bathroom when I got home
using a tampon and thinking, well, what does it matter now?
And I was so afraid to tell anyone that I
(17:22):
just never did. But in my mind, with all the
religious trauma that I discovered later was I felt damaged,
Like I remember thinking it doesn't matter now because I've
already lost my virginity. So it's like the seal is
already broken.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
And can I point out that it shouldn't have ever
been a it doesn't matter now, Like that's a product
that your body needed, Yeah, that you should have known
was okay to use, and it didn't mean anything like
that was something that was a matter of your health.
Speaker 1 (17:56):
Yeah, and that you had.
Speaker 2 (17:58):
To blur the lines between the two.
Speaker 1 (18:01):
It's just heartbreaking. But it stayed blurred for years. I
don't know if I ever I'm not kidding. I was
sitting in Kat's room at therapy that day just it
hit me like a stack of bricks, Like it was
like I was finally seeing the real reality of it.
(18:22):
And just my very first therapist told me this would happen.
But just we worked on inner child stuff a lot,
and he was like, there's going to be a day
where your current self catches up and I think I'm
finally there, which is great, Like on inside Out.
Speaker 2 (18:42):
Riley, we made it. I made it parton.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
I know, it's just it's brutal, but it changed so
much for me and it affected every single It was
like I couldn't I think that was the day I
put my armor on, like when you learn about so
I started my Enneagram journey. In therapy and in any
agram world, they call it your adaptive self, like the
(19:05):
day that you became this way, and some people believe
it's the day you're born, and some people believe lots
of other things. But if you have a really traumatic
which we all have trauma, but if you have as
especially traumatic situation in your life, it can be altering.
And I feel like that is that's a pivotal moment
(19:31):
for my journey because I felt the heaviness of carrying
and not to throw men under the bus, But that
was the day I really realized the heaviness of carrying
a man's shame. And because the only reason I couldn't
(19:51):
tell anybody is because he had a girlfriend, remember, So
then it was like, Okay, this is just how it works,
and I can be this, I can call girl, and
so sex from then on was very not heavy for me.
Speaker 2 (20:07):
We're about to get into really one of the hardest
probably moments in your life. And not that any of
these are even a little bit easy. What I know
with that information and hearing the theme of all these
stories is they all involve a guy that's older than you.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
Every second one of them.
Speaker 2 (20:24):
That was supposed to be either a leader or have
the ability to take care of you, or have the
wisdom of an older adult.
Speaker 1 (20:37):
Like.
Speaker 2 (20:38):
I don't want to call them authority figures because they're not.
Speaker 1 (20:42):
But that was my version of what it. That was
my idea of what they shouldn't have been.
Speaker 2 (20:46):
Yeah, and all of them are, and we're gonna get
into that, but I'm going to let you head into
this kind of last piece of Yeah.
Speaker 1 (20:54):
So in college, I went to a friend's someone I
thought was a friend, and we were drinking and playing games.
It was cranberry juice and vodka. I'll never forget it.
And I was not a first time ever to drink
college person. And still to this day I can drink
(21:14):
vodka all night long and not get like hammer drunk.
I don't know what it is. Would give me one
like spritzer and I'm telling dirty drugs to the preacher. Yeah,
but I had one drink and then the next thing
I remember, do you remember galchery pants?
Speaker 2 (21:29):
I do remember Galucha pants.
Speaker 1 (21:31):
And we wouldn't wear panties with them because they were
like so thin. You would have a nasty pantyline that
comes up.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
Yeah, and then.
Speaker 1 (21:37):
This is another trend I hope that never comes back, which.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
I also hope galuchos.
Speaker 1 (21:41):
Thanks never say. Honestly, I could deal with those if
but the clear bras straps.
Speaker 2 (21:48):
Oh yeah, those are bad too.
Speaker 1 (21:50):
We would wear these like silky lacy cameusls with no
like just wear the strap of fra yeah, because they
weren't even comfortable. If you had like spray tea, you're
just unlocked with these. And yeah, but that's what I
was wearing. And I remember waking up and I was
not a part of something like I was in the
(22:11):
middle of sex, and my straps were broken and my
pants were not even off, like it was like they
were so stretchy, like he just went up my pant leg.
And if that's too much, just.
Speaker 2 (22:24):
You, I want you to share your story as you feel.
Speaker 1 (22:28):
I woke up and I remember feeling like my mind
was there, but my body was like just completely unable
to move, so similar to I don't know if you've
ever had anesthesia or just like what I like when
I had a C section, I compared it to that,
just very not like heavy. And then when I finally
(22:52):
got up. He said, if you tell anybody, I'll never
talk to you again. And I got my stuff and
I left. And this was in Oxford, Mississippi. I went
to Ole, miss and the square closes like during the week.
It shuts down during the week at midnight, and on
weekends it used to be until two am. Where I
(23:14):
was these condos like right off the square. And I
walked with my shoes in my hand, my brough broken,
and I was still so disoriented that I called the
first person you want to talk about? God. I called
the first person that had been saved in my cell phone,
who was a girl named Angela that I had met
just a few weeks before in the dorm. She's from
(23:36):
Atlanta and she's an a. So I clicked on it
and she had just so happened to be up going
to the shower in the dorm and saw my call
and she was like, where are you? And I couldn't read.
I was spelling out the name of a store on
the square. So she said, oh my God, I'm coming
(23:57):
to get you and she I got in the car
with her and she could tell like something was very wrong,
and I said, I think I might have just been raped.
I'm not sure. And she took me to the university
police and they were like, we can't help her because
it didn't happen on campus, but this is what you
(24:17):
should do. So they were very nice, but it was
like not in their jurisdiction or whatever. Yeah, I know.
So she took me. Maybe they suggested she'd take me
to the hospital. I can't remember, but we ended up
at the hospital and Morgan, this is like a second
layer of it. The nurses in there were following it's
(24:38):
called a rape kit, so like they have this protocol
that they have to follow, and so first my body
like went into shock and they had to wrap me
and all of these heated blankets and so I don't
know if that was part of the drug or just
like the trauma of it.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
Probably a mixture of both.
Speaker 1 (24:58):
Yeah, so all of that happen. I'm in there and
these two it was like Tweedlede and Tweedledum. These women
were arguing over who was going to do this and
what do we do. It was like they were reading
instructions of a puzzle and like scraping under your fingernail
and touching areas and you're influorescent lighting.
Speaker 2 (25:17):
And you're already scared. You already don't know what just
happened to you in a way, and you're freaking out
and you're stuck and you're being proked and yeah.
Speaker 1 (25:25):
And you're thinking of the magnitude of it's all happening
so fast, and you still haven't even wrapped your mind
around like whether or not you want to tell anybody,
And now, like it was just a lot. And because
I wasn't a minor, they said I had the choice
to call my mom. I was eighteen, and I did
call my mom. She and my sister came to the rescue,
(25:49):
and then we went straight to the police station and
they were That was another part, like at this point
I had never spoken about sex in any form with
my mom, and she sat in the room with me
and a man stranger that was the police officer or
the detective or whatever, and I had to like really
(26:13):
go into detail and I couldn't say that. I had
to say like penis vagina, which at eighteen was still
like horribly embarrassing in front of your mom. And so
they waited until after four pm to arrest him, because
if they had done it before before he wouldn't have
had to spend the night. He came from a prominent family,
(26:34):
which to this day nothing has ever. We did go
to trial and I got ripped to shreds in front
of a grand jury, and it was like, I just
want to be done with this because Morgan. Nobody took
my side in this, no one. It was like around
rush time, like with sororities and stuff. And some people
were like, oh, she just did this for that, you
(26:56):
blamed now. And I always tell people that this was
not a moral hangover at this point in my sex
life and my sex journey. If I was gonna cry rape,
I would have done it before this, I mean. And
the Dean of Old Mess had written me like an
absent excuse, like I could take a leave and I
didn't have a ding against my credits or anything. And
(27:19):
I took some time, but I never saw a therapist.
I never saw it. We never spoke of it again.
Then I find out, so when you're doing the rape kit,
they give you essentially a plan B pill, you take it,
you start your period, it's it's done. And I had
(27:41):
started a heavy period, and so I just you didn't
think much of it. But then I found out I
was pregnant, and that was terrifying, and so I made
the decision to have an abortion, which I honestly thought
I would never ever tell anyone really did and I
(28:03):
can honestly say a big part of me died that day,
and not because of what like maybe pro lifers might think.
I just felt numb to everything. At that point. It
was like, Okay, I'm not gonna have anyone that wants
to be in this space with me. There is no
(28:24):
place to talk about it. I have to make I
really became tough as damn nails that day. It was like, Okay,
from this point forward, that's it. We're not talking about
this again. It's over. And if it is out of sight,
it is out of mind, and we're never going to
go there. And it wasn't until I started dating John,
my husband, now, who I could tell was different than
(28:46):
people I had dated in the past, But it came
up because we were excited to start our own family
and I was having some issues and I was It
was like, abruptly, all this guilt came out of nowhere.
So it was like a volcano that was just sitting
(29:07):
there waiting. My therapist says, it's like champagne. You shake
it up and then you wait forever to pop it.
You just need to slowly Coca cola bottle or whatever.
So I told John and he sat with me in it,
and I was very worried about how he was gonna
judge it. And it honestly wasn't until I started relationships
(29:34):
with my children outside of diapers when this whole like
Rover versus Wade stuff came up. It brought up some
people take to social media too loudly, and it was
people that I really have relationships with and I know,
and they were saying really awful things. And it always
shocks me when women because my stance on that is
(29:58):
always no woman, like, not a single one, it doesn't
matter for what reason, wants to be there. So let's
rally from woman to woman. Hey, let me just be
there for you, because I know this can't be easy.
And I realized that a lot of my friends didn't know.
They weren't doing it to be in my face. And honestly,
(30:20):
a lot of people I've talked to about it since
then see it in a different perspective because I'm like,
I didn't want to be there, but I also didn't
want the other option.
Speaker 2 (30:31):
You were faced with an impossible decision.
Speaker 1 (30:33):
And you were truly damned if you do. And damn you.
Speaker 2 (30:35):
Didn't even want to be in the first place, asked
to be in. You didn't want to be faced with
that type and you even took every step that you
were supposed to take.
Speaker 1 (30:43):
Yeah, it was wild just to think. Thinking about the
magnitude of that alone is wild to me now because
I have two daughters and I just cannot fathom. So
this is the part I was telling you. My therapist
(31:04):
was saying, You'll run in like your current self, will
hit your younger self, and you'll catch up. But then
there will be these parts with your children that you
will be awakened unexpectedly because you see so much of
them in you. And so I knew that was coming,
but I didn't know it was coming until it really
(31:25):
got here. And I started thinking about my youngest friends,
my youngest daughter, Francis. She is so much Honestly, both
of our kids are such a good blend between the
two of us. But Francis loves her daddy the way
that I did, and I think about how devastated she
(31:46):
would be morgan if he just left and didn't ever
talk to her again or treated her poorly.
Speaker 2 (31:52):
Yeah, or something happened to her in the capacity that
did when you were eighteen, or something happened in the
capacity that did when you were dealing with the first guy,
that something happened, Like in all of those scenarios, you
can't possibly fathom.
Speaker 1 (32:09):
No, And like my mom and I act, my mom
came in town last weekend and it actually didn't end well.
We touch base on some things, and her reality of
it is much different than mine. But the problem that
I face with that relationship with her is and maybe
(32:32):
and honestly she probably feels the same way about me,
but her unwillingness to extend grace to something that she
disagrees with, you know what I mean?
Speaker 2 (32:46):
I think for you, Haley, unfortunately, and it shouldn't be.
But I think unfortunately a lot of the things that
you've dealt with are probably a lot of things that
people don't know how to give grace to.
Speaker 1 (32:57):
Yeah, No, I agree, I mean.
Speaker 2 (32:59):
It's and I's tricky. So unfortunately, like it should not.
Speaker 1 (33:03):
Be that way. It shouldn't be conditional, it.
Speaker 2 (33:06):
Shouldn't and you shouldn't be able, You should be able
to talk about each of these scenarios, in each parts
of these stories and say this is what happened to me,
and somebody just be like that's horrible and that should
have never happened to you, instead of it being I
see it this way, this is another side of it.
The facts are laid out, this is the fact.
Speaker 1 (33:26):
And honestly that was what that was. Like the aha
moment for me in therapy is when my very first therapy,
John Evans, He's was the door opener to changing my life.
But he looked at me and said, it's really not normal.
That's really bad.
Speaker 2 (33:47):
None of those are normal.
Speaker 1 (33:48):
Yeah, that's what I mean. Like he was like, you
need to face that because I think I had tried
for so long to justify it. You know what else
he told me to remove from my vocabulary is the
word just I just. It's just a like nothing is just.
Speaker 2 (34:05):
Because just I learned this too five years ago. It's
because you're trying to justify everything. Don't justify it. It
is what it is.
Speaker 1 (34:12):
Yeah, it is exactly what it is.
Speaker 2 (34:14):
And then it's a filler word.
Speaker 1 (34:15):
You don't even need it. You do not need it,
especially in the hardest habit of mine was when someone
would compliment me whatever it is, and it's oh, it's
just they could always be better. I mean, everything could
always be better, but everything could also be worse.
Speaker 2 (34:29):
So when you finally entered therapy, gosh, a year and
a half meet now.
Speaker 1 (34:34):
I started therapy in twenty twenty.
Speaker 2 (34:38):
Okay, but still all of these are long after. But
I didn't go every week until recently. Recently, Yeah, but
still this is long after. Oh, all of these events
up until then? How were you coping? How were you dealing?
Speaker 1 (34:54):
Not another Bravo reference. Not well, bitch, she's from New
York and shooting Derenda. No, I was not doing well
at all. Like I Teresa Judaice flipped the table at
anything that didn't settle with me correctly, I just lashed out.
I think that's the best way to sum it up.
(35:15):
And I didn't understand this was the big thing that
was so life giving to me with Enneagram. From my
perspective was the only perspective, and it was very much.
I would have done it this way, and because she didn't,
it's wrong.
Speaker 2 (35:30):
Hey, I bet my guess is that you were trying
to take your power back.
Speaker 1 (35:35):
Oh, I'm sure I'm sure there's like a whole science
behind this.
Speaker 2 (35:40):
Because having not to the point ever talked about it,
ever worked through any of that. But you were finally
in a safe space with your husband and you had
your family and things were good. You probably felt, Okay,
I figured this out, and I do feel like I
have my power now.
Speaker 1 (35:58):
Yeah. I don't think I got my power until like recently.
Speaker 2 (36:01):
No, but you probably thought you did. Oh yeah, So
you're saying in a safe space, you weren't in survival anymore.
You weren't fighting someone all the time, you weren't on
eggs shells. I don't think we realize the drastic change
that happens when you're no longer living on eggs shells.
Speaker 1 (36:15):
That alone, Yeah, you're almost in eggs shells, like waiting
for eggs shells literally, I mean.
Speaker 2 (36:22):
And to not be in that state, you're like, Okay,
so I want everything to go my way. For so
long nothing went my way.
Speaker 1 (36:28):
Yeah, nobody listened.
Speaker 2 (36:29):
Nobody listened, so you thought what you were doing, you
went the other extreme. If there's something I've recognized in
traumatic events of our lives, we often go the direct
opposite because we want so much of the different and
then you somehow, when you start to heal and grow
and get better, you find your way in the middle. Yeah,
and that's probably where you are now, which is truly
(36:51):
where the power lies.
Speaker 1 (36:52):
Yeah, it's great. It really is so great to just
feel so light. I saw this quote like recently and
it says she was set free when she realized the
cage was her own thoughts. And that was really profound
for me because everything I did was always based off
(37:18):
of someone else's sign off. How is this going to
make them? Look, how is this going to make them feel?
All the while, I'm not taking in any consideration of
like how the person living inside his body feels, you
know what I mean? And sometimes being selfish gets poopooed,
and I'm like, I think more people need there's a
(37:41):
great way to be selfish.
Speaker 2 (37:43):
You can still be a good person and be selfish. Yeah,
I think we've associated it with really bad things. And
don't get me wrong, there are very selfish bad people
in the world. Yes, But you can selfishly want the
best for yourself. You can selfishly want to make yourself
happy and selfishly deserved to feel safe. Yeah, all of
(38:04):
those things are technically considered selfish.
Speaker 1 (38:06):
Yeah, we should come up with a word.
Speaker 2 (38:09):
There should be ad but technically, yeah, and the technicality
of the way people view the world. All of those
things are selfish. But what you were actually doing was
caring for yourself for the first time in a really
long time.
Speaker 1 (38:20):
And people that know you one way. This is something
I always call it my friend cleanse. I went through
a major divorce with friends when I left Mississippi to
come here. Around that time is when I started evolving
and branching out into even just politics. Like I can
remember believing one thing always because that's just like what
(38:41):
everybody in my hometown leaves, but I remember coming into
my own decision because I landed there. Yeah, and just
things like that. Even church is a big thing for me.
I am closer to God than I've ever been and
I very rarely go to church. And that's just my journey.
I'm not saying that people can't find that same relationship
going every Sunday, But yeah, You've just had.
Speaker 2 (39:05):
Multiple moments of your life that have shaped who you
are in this moment right now, which for you probably
feels like the best version of yourself.
Speaker 1 (39:14):
If I had to guess, yeah, and I will say
the one thing I can, without a doubt stand on
is knowing the difference between forcing and trying. And that's
something I tell my girls every day because anytime organ
even down to an Instagram post, any time in my
(39:35):
life I have ever forced something, it has not been
successful for me. And when I just finally gave up
the forcing and was like, I'll try this and I'm
not going to just give up because it's hard. But
when I am just authentically who I am, it's great.
Speaker 2 (39:54):
Things always work out in that way. And they also
work out exactly how they're supposed to do in that capacity.
Speaker 1 (39:59):
Yeah, I know they do.
Speaker 2 (40:00):
I have learned. I did want to ask you to
I mentioned the fact that all of these events in
your life involved men. When you met your now husband,
what was that like?
Speaker 1 (40:13):
Crazy? Like? I worked for his dad. His dad is
not alive anymore, but he was a cinematographer and at
the time I was trying to pursue music in Nashville,
that ship is sailed. I was on American Idol and
all that. It was like in between time of moving
to Nashville and still being in Mississippi, his dad hired
me his craft services or a Mississippi tourism commercial and
(40:38):
when the commercial shoot was over, we had what they
call a rat party, and it happened to be my birthday,
and so John's dad threw a big party at his
house and John came and I met him. He looks
like nobody I've ever dated. He acts like he had
(40:58):
at the time. His funny because like, we didn't have
Instagram then, or if we did, it was so new
when kids did, but we had Facebook. And his Facebook
said so it said Missipy State and then it said
MC Class of twenty ten. I was like, this guy
is older than me. He's still in his undergrad Like,
what a loser. It took you seventeen years to graduate
(41:20):
undergrad And then come to find out he's just like
lawyer at this prestigious law firm. He graduated law school.
He was just a ding dong and didn't know how
Facebook worked because MSSI B College has a missib College
and they have a missis Be College School of Law.
And he put on his Facebook that he graduated miss
By College. But that's you see what I'm saying. So
I was like, that's how you know? John. I wasn't
(41:42):
after you for anything because I thought you were like
a loser, actually, but we were hot and heavy in
the beginning and it was really fun. I think both
of us knew, like I knew after the first time
I hung out with him. I told my girlfriends. I
was like, I'm going to marry him. They're like, Haley, really,
And I was like, nope, I'm telling you, I'm going
to marry him. But you didn't have.
Speaker 2 (42:00):
Any like fearful of this was it? Because there was
something about him that felt.
Speaker 1 (42:05):
I really did just know. And maybe but I also too,
Morgan didn't look past like Friday.
Speaker 2 (42:12):
Night, but you thought you were gonna marry him.
Speaker 1 (42:15):
But if I really sat down and thought about it,
I'll say this, I felt there was a difference. But
if I didn't end up marrying him, it would have.
Speaker 2 (42:25):
Been like.
Speaker 1 (42:27):
I can't say that because it probably would have. It
was just something always kept me coming back. But I
didn't invest too much into anything. But that's what That's
a better way of saying it. Like I had always
had balls drop, so putting all of the eggs in
a basket or whatever. It was fun to say, but
like I wasn't disappointed if it didn't happen, because that
(42:47):
was what I was so used to.
Speaker 2 (42:48):
You were so used to that it could just fall and
be like, okay, whatever'll square one. Yes, Okay.
Speaker 1 (42:53):
So we dated and it was rock and then once
it started getting serious, it got right because then later
I found out that he was like he had just
gotten out of a bad relationship also, but he told
me later that it was he was so rude to
me and so uncommittal was because he felt it too,
and he was scared to this be the last person
(43:17):
he dates, and he wanted to get that single out
of his system. But yeah, things I really liked about John.
Every guy had ever dated before it had come from
essentially a leave it to Beaver family, and it was
always so hard for them to relate or understand me
because everything had been just so easy. And while John
(43:42):
didn't have such a traumatic childhood, he grew up with
an alcoholic father who ended up dying in a house
fire from alcohol, like felt passed out. Like John knows
family drama well, and.
Speaker 2 (43:56):
He had empathy, I would imagine for your experiences, just
as you had empathy for his.
Speaker 1 (44:01):
Yes, which is funny because John's an enneagram five and
that is like that's the main thing they lack is empathy,
which is funny because he was such a softie for me.
But now he is my best friend still. I told
him just two days ago he saved my life and
he didn't even know it, and he's like, you've saved mine,
and I'm like, I know that sounds so cliche, but
(44:24):
he is genuinely the only thing in my life ever
that is just solid as a rock and stable, consistent.
Speaker 2 (44:32):
I've always said it and I will continue to say it.
Consistency is so sexy.
Speaker 1 (44:35):
Oh my god. I know you never.
Speaker 2 (44:38):
Realize it until it happens. You're like, yeah, okay, whenever
you want, I got it.
Speaker 1 (44:41):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (44:42):
I would love to sit here and talk with you
all day, and we totally could. There's two things I
want to ask you before we end this and wrap
this up. But what do you feel like for you
in your life now having all of these moments, What's
something you wish you would have known maybe when you
were going through any of these experiences that maybe you
(45:04):
I can look back now and be like, I wish
I would have had that information, or I wish I
would have been able to.
Speaker 1 (45:10):
Do this, probably that I wasn't broken. I think that's
another like common feeling from all of this, like from
the beginning, like the dad, the stepdad, the sex, all
of it was that it was somehow a product of me,
like I was broken or I was damaged, or I
was constantly trying to swim out of just really dark
(45:35):
holes that I thought I caused and you didn't and
I didn't.
Speaker 2 (45:39):
But in the moment, in all of these moments, you're
probably feeling.
Speaker 1 (45:42):
That way because that was one of the first So
like in this inner child thing, we did, my therapist
like close your eyes and go back to your very
first memory, and I was like, okay, and I like
went somewhere faster than I would have imagined had he
had asked me that on the spot later and he
(46:02):
was like, now you're you and she's her, what are
you going to say to her? And I was like,
everything's gonna be okay. Just it's all Internet. That sounds
so like cheeky or not cheeky, but something that should
be on a sign it Bucky's chowchke. That's the word
I was looking for.
Speaker 2 (46:20):
But the inner child often does want very simple things
very much. You're gonna be okay. They want to hug,
they want safety. They don't need these big, elaborate things.
They just need to be seen.
Speaker 1 (46:30):
And heard, reassured. Yeah and yeah, so that's it.
Speaker 2 (46:34):
I'd like to point out too, because we got so
much into so much of your past, but like you
today is incredibly successful. You have a job that you love,
you found your way back into the music industry and
a different capacity. You have a husband that you love
is your rock, as you said, you have daughters that
you love, a life that you love. I think so
(46:57):
much of your story is a testament to there's always light,
it's just finding it and finding the right time and
space for it. And you're also a testament that truly
you can get through anything, you really can.
Speaker 1 (47:12):
You can.
Speaker 2 (47:13):
And it's a reminder of when if you are in
your darkest, deepest moments, right now, there is a light.
Speaker 1 (47:19):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (47:19):
And Haley's had multiple of these moments where she had
to find the light and you did.
Speaker 1 (47:24):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (47:25):
So I would I always end episodes with whether it's
a piece of motivation, advice, inspiration, however you want to
go in that direction. But all of these things in
your life where you are now, however you want to
leave us, the floor is yours.
Speaker 1 (47:40):
I love to say, when you give up trying to
fit in, you find where you belong and it's really
a beautiful place to be.
Speaker 2 (47:50):
I love that. Thank you for being here, Thank you
for sharing such difficult parts of your story. But also
you're truly an inspiration and what you've been through where
you are now that I'm happy you've chosen to use
your voice same this story and I know that's really
hard some days though too.
Speaker 1 (48:09):
No, yeah, for sure, but I agree. Thank you.
Speaker 2 (48:12):
Thanks for being here. Friends. I hope this episode came
with some takeaways and maybe even some more understanding of
our fellow humans. If you want to follow Haley, her
instagram is at Haley dollar Hide. I'll put it in
the description too, so it's easy to click. The next
few weeks, we will be diving into the subject of
disabilities with some very special guests. I'll talk to you
all then
Take Personal Life with Laura Felsman.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Welcome everybody. This week we are entering part two of
the Trauma series. Last week I had on expert trauma
therapist Lauren Are to help us understand trauma better and
all the ins and outs of it. This week, my
friend Hailey dollar Hide joins me. She is being incredibly
brave in opening up about the experiences of her life.
I'm honored she chose to share such difficult parts of
(00:40):
her story here on the podcast, and I hope everyone
listens to it because I believe it's going to bring
up some hopefully healthy conversations and understanding. Now, I do
want to give a warning we are getting into the
subject of r ape. I know the subject isn't for everyone,
but it is a very important and hard conversation to have.
Hailey's perspective is not only insightful, but also inspiring in
(01:02):
one full of strength and resilience. I'm joined this week
by one of my friends. This is miss Haley dollar Hide.
How are you.
Speaker 1 (01:14):
I'm good? How are you?
Speaker 2 (01:15):
I'm good? I'm so excited that you decided to join
me and share your story, because your story, man, it
comes with a lot of bumps. Along the way, and
I say bumps so lightly because it is so much
more than that. But I want people to get to
know you because I think beyond the fact of you
being a great human being, you also have this story
(01:37):
of inspiration in the end of everything that you've gone
through to be who and where you are today, and
that's a story that deserves to be told.
Speaker 1 (01:46):
So thank you, thanks for being here, thanks for having me.
Speaker 2 (01:50):
You can share these different pieces of your story and
then we'll get into each one. So I'll let you
start from where you want to.
Speaker 1 (01:57):
Start, Okay, from there, I feel like I'll always start
at the very beginning, just because I view it in
my head as a timeline everything. But I think when
I was five or six, my parents got divorced. But
up until then, everything was very normal. Leave it to Beaver,
(02:20):
at least from my point of view. Yeah, small town
in Mississippi. And then I feel like when my parents
got divorced, that was the beginning of such a common
tale of and especially in small towns in Mississippi. Nobody
in the nineties was talking about therapy or feelings. It
(02:42):
was all just matter of fact, and the kids were
along for the ride. My mother got remarried when I
was in the third grade, and I would say things
were pretty normal for the first part of it, so
I'm sorry. Let me backtrack. They got married when I
(03:03):
was in second grade. Okay, by the time I got
to third grade, things he was just very abusive, and
I've learned now as an adult that he not to
spill his memes. But I think he had an abusive upbringing.
And you hear that so much people that they just
repeat patterns that they hated themselves, but they don't know
(03:26):
any different. So I'm also on this grace journey right now.
You have to give it to receive it. That's where
I am with that, because I actually hate.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
This man, but you're like, I hate you, But also
I do.
Speaker 1 (03:38):
Understand, yes, which is a really peaceful place to be.
And as a Christian, you hear your whole life piece
beyond all understanding, and I feel like I'm finally out
of place now where none of it really makes sense,
but I am so at peace. But yeah, So my
stepfather growing up was just very verbally abusive, Like I
(04:00):
was never touched or anything like that by him, and
my mother did her best, but she also didn't have
resources like we have now and you certainly didn't.
Speaker 2 (04:13):
Talk about nothing that happens in the home.
Speaker 1 (04:16):
Yeah, and don't air your dirty laundry, Morgan, Yes, yes,
the age, Yes, and now I can't air it enough.
Who wants to hear I have. I've got this new mantra.
Now that's I am always going to be just who
I am in the same room, because for years, Morgan,
I was just somebody else everywhere I went. And it's
(04:38):
very life giving to just be yourself all the time.
There's no story to keep up, there's no shame of
other I think that's also it is I grew up
and realized all of this shame I carried, none of
it was actually mine, you know what I mean? It
was And if you have a life partner, spouse, that's
(05:01):
in the deal of helping each other carry burdens. But
outside of that, I don't really see an equation where
you need to carry that deep a load of someone else's,
do you know what I mean?
Speaker 2 (05:13):
Yeah, And especially as a child.
Speaker 1 (05:16):
Yeah, I think I always say that Boomer generation because
it's always a joke about how like our grandparents raised
us like millennials. But it wasn't like that. For them.
It's just something about boomers where we're not talking about things.
But I don't think it's because they don't want to.
(05:37):
Really don't think they felt like they could.
Speaker 2 (05:42):
Yeah. I think a lot of what was ingrained into
that generation was you deal with things on your own,
and you have tough skin, and you don't need to
bring anybody else into the picture. This can be fixed
on its own. There was a lot of that just
intense drive home that you don't need anybody else and
if you do, you Yeah, And I think that was ingrained,
(06:03):
not just in men, but in women. I think it
was ingrained in all of them.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
No, Firs's honestly, I think especially for men. I feel
like back to my Bravo because I love Bravo, you
know that. But I was watching the Summer House, you know,
the Southern Charm reunion last night and these two guys, Craig,
which you might have met with Amy. I think he's
been on Amy's podcast and they've done things. But then
(06:29):
Craig and Austin they have this really great friendship, but
it mimics like two girlfriends and they talk about their
feelings and cry, and I was thinking, people want people
to express themselves, but they were getting all this hate
about it, and I'm like, I think boys actually have
it worse because you're supposed to be so exterior, like
(06:51):
on the exterior is so tough, and it's really weak
to cry. But yeah, so third grade to about fourth grade.
Yet we lived in this one place for one year
and it wasn't that bad then where I spent the
majority of my life. It was just awful all the time.
(07:11):
It was things like I tell the story all the time,
and I really am over it, and it comes up
a lot because I will never forget the look on
my therapist's face when I was telling him the story.
But and I still to this day have a weird
thing with condiments. But I had a corn dog and
(07:33):
I put too much mustard on my plate. According to
my stepfather and Morgan, he made me dump a whole
jar of French Is mustard in a bowl and made
me eat it with a spoon because it was too
much on my plate. And if you ask my mom,
like I love her, but if you ask her, her
(07:55):
response is that we'd been telling you forever to not
too much on your plate. And that's where I think
the disconnect from us is she now. Granted I don't
see it from a mother's standpoint. I could not. I
can't imagine what that was like for her, and the
guilt and like wanting to do whatever I could to
(08:17):
make it not seem so bad. But that's not normal,
and that's not a correct punishment. Shape it no matter
how you want. But it was stuff like that, just
he almost you would think he took joy. He was almost.
He prayed on me a little bit. And my sister
got a lot of it. And that is her story.
(08:37):
So I try really hard not to speak from her
experience and how she felt. But there were big moments
where I will say this, the majority of my life
I felt uncomfortable in my home and it was always
walking on eggshells and go get the man before your
(09:00):
stepdad gets home, and go. If I was sitting on
the couch and watching a show, like eating a snack
after school, and I heard somebody pull into the driveway, Morgan,
I would run like a bad guy was chasing me.
That was normal, It really was.
Speaker 2 (09:19):
It's like you lived your childhood in survival and yeah,
this person had all of these rules and stipulations that
it was never really safe.
Speaker 1 (09:27):
Yeah, and you never knew what version you were gonna get.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
Some days it was gonna be great, and some days
it was gonna be Oh, hold on, this is about
to get really bad.
Speaker 1 (09:34):
So I think that's the hard part for my mother.
And again I'm not speaking on her behalf. Can you
tell I'm married to a lawyer?
Speaker 2 (09:40):
Yeah? Like, how can I make sure? But also I
love to remind people of a lot of things when
they come in this room, But one in particular is
that your story is your story to tell, Yes, and
your accounts of it are your story. Is there another
side of that story? Always? Always yes, but it's also
still your story. You were very much a part of
(10:01):
this story, and it's yours to do with how you please?
Speaker 1 (10:05):
Yeah, And I am like, I'm not a prophet or anything,
but I do feel a strong as an eight. I
feel like that is my superpower that was I wasn't
allowed to use. But I think because they say whatever
your Achilles hill is so like for Enneagram aids, it's
(10:25):
the vulnerable part of it. But ironically, when we are vulnerable,
it's the most powerful thing that we can offer somebody.
And so I have to I live my life by
faith and nothing will stop me from doing what I
(10:45):
can to, even if it's just like somebody understanding me
a little bit better or giving someone grace a little
bit better. But the hang up for my mother is
it wasn't all bad. That is what she That is
the heel she will die on.
Speaker 2 (11:02):
And I can speak from being in an abusive relationship.
This is something I recently opened up about, and mine
was on a different side. There was physical and emotional
yours being even just on emotional, which people often just
be like, what was just yelling? It was just verbal. No,
you're fighting a similar battle in the sense where you
are convinced of a different reality. They love to create
(11:26):
a world where you believe that they are actually the
person in the right and you are the person in
the wrong. And so much of an abuser's reality is
they believe everything they're doing is correct and they can't
do any wrong. So that's why you walk on eggshells.
That's why you never know where they stand, because it's
(11:48):
their world and you're just living to exist in it.
It's also why your mom experienced this. There's good days.
You're justifying what they've told you to justify you have
this warped version of reality. And so there is no
blame from me to your mom, even never having known
her and will probably never meet her. But there's no
(12:10):
blame from me in the sense that she thought what
was happening was normal.
Speaker 1 (12:15):
I've told you this before. The Enneagram like truly changed
my life and for the year that I got into it,
I had everybody in my family take the test and
my mom is a three. And I think for her
it's a sign of failure. And that's you talk about
Achilles heel with with the achiever. Yeah, I mean it.
(12:38):
All she hears is I lost motherhood. I failed And I.
Speaker 2 (12:41):
Feel that this relation about this marriage I feel at
my kids. All she's hearing is that on repeat.
Speaker 1 (12:46):
Yeah, and she can't accept that. That's very it's and
I think that is important to say. That is harder
for her to accept than me because I have like
such little three in me. I'm not competitive, I'm not
win or lose. I'm like, let's play to have fun.
But yeah, I think for her because I didn't, and
(13:07):
this is what I was telling you earlier, I think
because I didn't come to her with a lot of things.
Her question is why didn't you come to me, and
why didn't you? And my answer is and always will be.
I was a child. That is the role I choose
to play with my children is letting them know always,
(13:29):
no matter what it is, I can handle it, Like
we will get through this together. You were never alone.
And honestly, Morgan, that wasn't something I could verbalize or
even understand until last year. So I went therapy Cat
that does a podcast with Amy. I didn't even know
Amy at the time, and I had been going to Cat.
(13:52):
I went every Tuesday for an entire year, and there
were so many things that just being allowed to have
this is non biased the right word. She had no
dog in any of us.
Speaker 2 (14:04):
Yes, that's the role that a therapist is supposed to
provide you. It's an unbiased perspective of your experiences instead
of getting like half of one biased view and half
of another and piecing them together.
Speaker 1 (14:14):
Yeah, and like back to echo what I said earlier
about burdens and shame and things that we carry. That's
not even John, my husband's job, Like he can be
there for me, but that's a lot for somebody to carry.
And I talked about losing my virginity with Kat and
(14:36):
it was in that it was weird because I have
you seen Firefly Lanes?
Speaker 2 (14:40):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (14:40):
Okay, So there was about six months where I would
watch these shows or movies and I felt so like
God was trying to talk to me through them, because
like the it would be like so random how I'd
start watching it. And I was watching Firefly Lane and
when Catherine is it.
Speaker 2 (15:00):
Katheryne Nigel, Katherine Heigel say, yeah, her character as.
Speaker 1 (15:04):
A child was she lost her virginity and it felt
consensual based on the knowledge we had. Yeah the time
at twenty years ago and I was watching, I just
started bawling, crying, and my husband was like, okay, like
it's not that sad, and I'm like no, Like John,
I'm having this epiphany that it changed the entire trajectory
(15:30):
of my life Morgan from that very first time, and
it all so like the practice I what is it
like the practice I preach? I guess that the tool
I've been given in therapy is to just go all
the way, like retrace all the steps until you get
to the root. And so I was fifteen and my
(15:52):
it was my friend's older brother who was eighteen with
a girlfriend, and he had just finished high school, so
he was like getting ready to go play ball at
a community college or something, and we were drinking Zema's,
remember those with like you remember za with a jolly
(16:15):
rancher down in the bottom. And I was much younger
than all of these girls, and I remember everything about it.
I remember like being excited, but I also remember thinking
like we were about to start dating, and it was
this thing. I was such a virgin that I had
never even worn a tampon. Wow, wow, And I remember
(16:40):
when I could choice. Yeah, Like I was terrified to
use a tampon. And I remember coming home and I
had spotted because we're going I had no proper information
to even know that was normal, and my sister at
the time had already gone to college. I was in
(17:00):
the house all alone, and in my mind it was like, yay,
I'm not pregnant because I just started my period. And
I remember going to the bathroom when I got home
using a tampon and thinking, well, what does it matter now?
And I was so afraid to tell anyone that I
(17:22):
just never did. But in my mind, with all the
religious trauma that I discovered later was I felt damaged,
Like I remember thinking it doesn't matter now because I've
already lost my virginity. So it's like the seal is
already broken.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
And can I point out that it shouldn't have ever
been a it doesn't matter now, Like that's a product
that your body needed, Yeah, that you should have known
was okay to use, and it didn't mean anything like
that was something that was a matter of your health.
Speaker 1 (17:56):
Yeah, and that you had.
Speaker 2 (17:58):
To blur the lines between the two.
Speaker 1 (18:01):
It's just heartbreaking. But it stayed blurred for years. I
don't know if I ever I'm not kidding. I was
sitting in Kat's room at therapy that day just it
hit me like a stack of bricks, Like it was
like I was finally seeing the real reality of it.
(18:22):
And just my very first therapist told me this would happen.
But just we worked on inner child stuff a lot,
and he was like, there's going to be a day
where your current self catches up and I think I'm
finally there, which is great, Like on inside Out.
Speaker 2 (18:42):
Riley, we made it. I made it parton.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
I know, it's just it's brutal, but it changed so
much for me and it affected every single It was
like I couldn't I think that was the day I
put my armor on, like when you learn about so
I started my Enneagram journey. In therapy and in any
agram world, they call it your adaptive self, like the
(19:05):
day that you became this way, and some people believe
it's the day you're born, and some people believe lots
of other things. But if you have a really traumatic
which we all have trauma, but if you have as
especially traumatic situation in your life, it can be altering.
And I feel like that is that's a pivotal moment
(19:31):
for my journey because I felt the heaviness of carrying
and not to throw men under the bus, But that
was the day I really realized the heaviness of carrying
a man's shame. And because the only reason I couldn't
(19:51):
tell anybody is because he had a girlfriend, remember, So
then it was like, Okay, this is just how it works,
and I can be this, I can call girl, and
so sex from then on was very not heavy for me.
Speaker 2 (20:07):
We're about to get into really one of the hardest
probably moments in your life. And not that any of
these are even a little bit easy. What I know
with that information and hearing the theme of all these
stories is they all involve a guy that's older than you.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
Every second one of them.
Speaker 2 (20:24):
That was supposed to be either a leader or have
the ability to take care of you, or have the
wisdom of an older adult.
Speaker 1 (20:37):
Like.
Speaker 2 (20:38):
I don't want to call them authority figures because they're not.
Speaker 1 (20:42):
But that was my version of what it. That was
my idea of what they shouldn't have been.
Speaker 2 (20:46):
Yeah, and all of them are, and we're gonna get
into that, but I'm going to let you head into
this kind of last piece of Yeah.
Speaker 1 (20:54):
So in college, I went to a friend's someone I
thought was a friend, and we were drinking and playing games.
It was cranberry juice and vodka. I'll never forget it.
And I was not a first time ever to drink
college person. And still to this day I can drink
(21:14):
vodka all night long and not get like hammer drunk.
I don't know what it is. Would give me one
like spritzer and I'm telling dirty drugs to the preacher. Yeah,
but I had one drink and then the next thing
I remember, do you remember galchery pants?
Speaker 2 (21:29):
I do remember Galucha pants.
Speaker 1 (21:31):
And we wouldn't wear panties with them because they were
like so thin. You would have a nasty pantyline that
comes up.
Speaker 2 (21:36):
Yeah, and then.
Speaker 1 (21:37):
This is another trend I hope that never comes back, which.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
I also hope galuchos.
Speaker 1 (21:41):
Thanks never say. Honestly, I could deal with those if
but the clear bras straps.
Speaker 2 (21:48):
Oh yeah, those are bad too.
Speaker 1 (21:50):
We would wear these like silky lacy cameusls with no
like just wear the strap of fra yeah, because they
weren't even comfortable. If you had like spray tea, you're
just unlocked with these. And yeah, but that's what I
was wearing. And I remember waking up and I was
not a part of something like I was in the
(22:11):
middle of sex, and my straps were broken and my
pants were not even off, like it was like they
were so stretchy, like he just went up my pant leg.
And if that's too much, just.
Speaker 2 (22:24):
You, I want you to share your story as you feel.
Speaker 1 (22:28):
I woke up and I remember feeling like my mind
was there, but my body was like just completely unable
to move, so similar to I don't know if you've
ever had anesthesia or just like what I like when
I had a C section, I compared it to that,
just very not like heavy. And then when I finally
(22:52):
got up. He said, if you tell anybody, I'll never
talk to you again. And I got my stuff and
I left. And this was in Oxford, Mississippi. I went
to Ole, miss and the square closes like during the week.
It shuts down during the week at midnight, and on
weekends it used to be until two am. Where I
(23:14):
was these condos like right off the square. And I
walked with my shoes in my hand, my brough broken,
and I was still so disoriented that I called the
first person you want to talk about? God. I called
the first person that had been saved in my cell phone,
who was a girl named Angela that I had met
just a few weeks before in the dorm. She's from
(23:36):
Atlanta and she's an a. So I clicked on it
and she had just so happened to be up going
to the shower in the dorm and saw my call
and she was like, where are you? And I couldn't read.
I was spelling out the name of a store on
the square. So she said, oh my God, I'm coming
(23:57):
to get you and she I got in the car
with her and she could tell like something was very wrong,
and I said, I think I might have just been raped.
I'm not sure. And she took me to the university
police and they were like, we can't help her because
it didn't happen on campus, but this is what you
(24:17):
should do. So they were very nice, but it was
like not in their jurisdiction or whatever. Yeah, I know.
So she took me. Maybe they suggested she'd take me
to the hospital. I can't remember, but we ended up
at the hospital and Morgan, this is like a second
layer of it. The nurses in there were following it's
(24:38):
called a rape kit, so like they have this protocol
that they have to follow, and so first my body
like went into shock and they had to wrap me
and all of these heated blankets and so I don't
know if that was part of the drug or just
like the trauma of it.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
Probably a mixture of both.
Speaker 1 (24:58):
Yeah, so all of that happen. I'm in there and
these two it was like Tweedlede and Tweedledum. These women
were arguing over who was going to do this and
what do we do. It was like they were reading
instructions of a puzzle and like scraping under your fingernail
and touching areas and you're influorescent lighting.
Speaker 2 (25:17):
And you're already scared. You already don't know what just
happened to you in a way, and you're freaking out
and you're stuck and you're being proked and yeah.
Speaker 1 (25:25):
And you're thinking of the magnitude of it's all happening
so fast, and you still haven't even wrapped your mind
around like whether or not you want to tell anybody,
And now, like it was just a lot. And because
I wasn't a minor, they said I had the choice
to call my mom. I was eighteen, and I did
call my mom. She and my sister came to the rescue,
(25:49):
and then we went straight to the police station and
they were That was another part, like at this point
I had never spoken about sex in any form with
my mom, and she sat in the room with me
and a man stranger that was the police officer or
the detective or whatever, and I had to like really
(26:13):
go into detail and I couldn't say that. I had
to say like penis vagina, which at eighteen was still
like horribly embarrassing in front of your mom. And so
they waited until after four pm to arrest him, because
if they had done it before before he wouldn't have
had to spend the night. He came from a prominent family,
(26:34):
which to this day nothing has ever. We did go
to trial and I got ripped to shreds in front
of a grand jury, and it was like, I just
want to be done with this because Morgan. Nobody took
my side in this, no one. It was like around
rush time, like with sororities and stuff. And some people
were like, oh, she just did this for that, you
(26:56):
blamed now. And I always tell people that this was
not a moral hangover at this point in my sex
life and my sex journey. If I was gonna cry rape,
I would have done it before this, I mean. And
the Dean of Old Mess had written me like an
absent excuse, like I could take a leave and I
didn't have a ding against my credits or anything. And
(27:19):
I took some time, but I never saw a therapist.
I never saw it. We never spoke of it again.
Then I find out, so when you're doing the rape kit,
they give you essentially a plan B pill, you take it,
you start your period, it's it's done. And I had
(27:41):
started a heavy period, and so I just you didn't
think much of it. But then I found out I
was pregnant, and that was terrifying, and so I made
the decision to have an abortion, which I honestly thought
I would never ever tell anyone really did and I
(28:03):
can honestly say a big part of me died that day,
and not because of what like maybe pro lifers might think.
I just felt numb to everything. At that point. It
was like, Okay, I'm not gonna have anyone that wants
to be in this space with me. There is no
(28:24):
place to talk about it. I have to make I
really became tough as damn nails that day. It was like, Okay,
from this point forward, that's it. We're not talking about
this again. It's over. And if it is out of sight,
it is out of mind, and we're never going to
go there. And it wasn't until I started dating John,
my husband, now, who I could tell was different than
(28:46):
people I had dated in the past, But it came
up because we were excited to start our own family
and I was having some issues and I was It
was like, abruptly, all this guilt came out of nowhere.
So it was like a volcano that was just sitting
(29:07):
there waiting. My therapist says, it's like champagne. You shake
it up and then you wait forever to pop it.
You just need to slowly Coca cola bottle or whatever.
So I told John and he sat with me in it,
and I was very worried about how he was gonna
judge it. And it honestly wasn't until I started relationships
(29:34):
with my children outside of diapers when this whole like
Rover versus Wade stuff came up. It brought up some
people take to social media too loudly, and it was
people that I really have relationships with and I know,
and they were saying really awful things. And it always
shocks me when women because my stance on that is
(29:58):
always no woman, like, not a single one, it doesn't
matter for what reason, wants to be there. So let's
rally from woman to woman. Hey, let me just be
there for you, because I know this can't be easy.
And I realized that a lot of my friends didn't know.
They weren't doing it to be in my face. And honestly,
(30:20):
a lot of people I've talked to about it since
then see it in a different perspective because I'm like,
I didn't want to be there, but I also didn't
want the other option.
Speaker 2 (30:31):
You were faced with an impossible decision.
Speaker 1 (30:33):
And you were truly damned if you do. And damn you.
Speaker 2 (30:35):
Didn't even want to be in the first place, asked
to be in. You didn't want to be faced with
that type and you even took every step that you
were supposed to take.
Speaker 1 (30:43):
Yeah, it was wild just to think. Thinking about the
magnitude of that alone is wild to me now because
I have two daughters and I just cannot fathom. So
this is the part I was telling you. My therapist
(31:04):
was saying, You'll run in like your current self, will
hit your younger self, and you'll catch up. But then
there will be these parts with your children that you
will be awakened unexpectedly because you see so much of
them in you. And so I knew that was coming,
but I didn't know it was coming until it really
(31:25):
got here. And I started thinking about my youngest friends,
my youngest daughter, Francis. She is so much Honestly, both
of our kids are such a good blend between the
two of us. But Francis loves her daddy the way
that I did, and I think about how devastated she
(31:46):
would be morgan if he just left and didn't ever
talk to her again or treated her poorly.
Speaker 2 (31:52):
Yeah, or something happened to her in the capacity that
did when you were eighteen, or something happened in the
capacity that did when you were dealing with the first guy,
that something happened, Like in all of those scenarios, you
can't possibly fathom.
Speaker 1 (32:09):
No, And like my mom and I act, my mom
came in town last weekend and it actually didn't end well.
We touch base on some things, and her reality of
it is much different than mine. But the problem that
I face with that relationship with her is and maybe
(32:32):
and honestly she probably feels the same way about me,
but her unwillingness to extend grace to something that she
disagrees with, you know what I mean?
Speaker 2 (32:46):
I think for you, Haley, unfortunately, and it shouldn't be.
But I think unfortunately a lot of the things that
you've dealt with are probably a lot of things that
people don't know how to give grace to.
Speaker 1 (32:57):
Yeah, No, I agree, I mean.
Speaker 2 (32:59):
It's and I's tricky. So unfortunately, like it should not.
Speaker 1 (33:03):
Be that way. It shouldn't be conditional, it.
Speaker 2 (33:06):
Shouldn't and you shouldn't be able, You should be able
to talk about each of these scenarios, in each parts
of these stories and say this is what happened to me,
and somebody just be like that's horrible and that should
have never happened to you, instead of it being I
see it this way, this is another side of it.
The facts are laid out, this is the fact.
Speaker 1 (33:26):
And honestly that was what that was. Like the aha
moment for me in therapy is when my very first therapy,
John Evans, He's was the door opener to changing my life.
But he looked at me and said, it's really not normal.
That's really bad.
Speaker 2 (33:47):
None of those are normal.
Speaker 1 (33:48):
Yeah, that's what I mean. Like he was like, you
need to face that because I think I had tried
for so long to justify it. You know what else
he told me to remove from my vocabulary is the
word just I just. It's just a like nothing is just.
Speaker 2 (34:05):
Because just I learned this too five years ago. It's
because you're trying to justify everything. Don't justify it. It
is what it is.
Speaker 1 (34:12):
Yeah, it is exactly what it is.
Speaker 2 (34:14):
And then it's a filler word.
Speaker 1 (34:15):
You don't even need it. You do not need it,
especially in the hardest habit of mine was when someone
would compliment me whatever it is, and it's oh, it's
just they could always be better. I mean, everything could
always be better, but everything could also be worse.
Speaker 2 (34:29):
So when you finally entered therapy, gosh, a year and
a half meet now.
Speaker 1 (34:34):
I started therapy in twenty twenty.
Speaker 2 (34:38):
Okay, but still all of these are long after. But
I didn't go every week until recently. Recently, Yeah, but
still this is long after. Oh, all of these events
up until then? How were you coping? How were you dealing?
Speaker 1 (34:54):
Not another Bravo reference. Not well, bitch, she's from New
York and shooting Derenda. No, I was not doing well
at all. Like I Teresa Judaice flipped the table at
anything that didn't settle with me correctly, I just lashed out.
I think that's the best way to sum it up.
(35:15):
And I didn't understand this was the big thing that
was so life giving to me with Enneagram. From my
perspective was the only perspective, and it was very much.
I would have done it this way, and because she didn't,
it's wrong.
Speaker 2 (35:30):
Hey, I bet my guess is that you were trying
to take your power back.
Speaker 1 (35:35):
Oh, I'm sure I'm sure there's like a whole science
behind this.
Speaker 2 (35:40):
Because having not to the point ever talked about it,
ever worked through any of that. But you were finally
in a safe space with your husband and you had
your family and things were good. You probably felt, Okay,
I figured this out, and I do feel like I
have my power now.
Speaker 1 (35:58):
Yeah. I don't think I got my power until like recently.
Speaker 2 (36:01):
No, but you probably thought you did. Oh yeah, So
you're saying in a safe space, you weren't in survival anymore.
You weren't fighting someone all the time, you weren't on
eggs shells. I don't think we realize the drastic change
that happens when you're no longer living on eggs shells.
Speaker 1 (36:15):
That alone, Yeah, you're almost in eggs shells, like waiting
for eggs shells literally, I mean.
Speaker 2 (36:22):
And to not be in that state, you're like, Okay,
so I want everything to go my way. For so
long nothing went my way.
Speaker 1 (36:28):
Yeah, nobody listened.
Speaker 2 (36:29):
Nobody listened, so you thought what you were doing, you
went the other extreme. If there's something I've recognized in
traumatic events of our lives, we often go the direct
opposite because we want so much of the different and
then you somehow, when you start to heal and grow
and get better, you find your way in the middle. Yeah,
and that's probably where you are now, which is truly
(36:51):
where the power lies.
Speaker 1 (36:52):
Yeah, it's great. It really is so great to just
feel so light. I saw this quote like recently and
it says she was set free when she realized the
cage was her own thoughts. And that was really profound
for me because everything I did was always based off
(37:18):
of someone else's sign off. How is this going to
make them? Look, how is this going to make them feel?
All the while, I'm not taking in any consideration of
like how the person living inside his body feels, you
know what I mean? And sometimes being selfish gets poopooed,
and I'm like, I think more people need there's a
(37:41):
great way to be selfish.
Speaker 2 (37:43):
You can still be a good person and be selfish. Yeah,
I think we've associated it with really bad things. And
don't get me wrong, there are very selfish bad people
in the world. Yes, But you can selfishly want the
best for yourself. You can selfishly want to make yourself
happy and selfishly deserved to feel safe. Yeah, all of
(38:04):
those things are technically considered selfish.
Speaker 1 (38:06):
Yeah, we should come up with a word.
Speaker 2 (38:09):
There should be ad but technically, yeah, and the technicality
of the way people view the world. All of those
things are selfish. But what you were actually doing was
caring for yourself for the first time in a really
long time.
Speaker 1 (38:20):
And people that know you one way. This is something
I always call it my friend cleanse. I went through
a major divorce with friends when I left Mississippi to
come here. Around that time is when I started evolving
and branching out into even just politics. Like I can
remember believing one thing always because that's just like what
(38:41):
everybody in my hometown leaves, but I remember coming into
my own decision because I landed there. Yeah, and just
things like that. Even church is a big thing for me.
I am closer to God than I've ever been and
I very rarely go to church. And that's just my journey.
I'm not saying that people can't find that same relationship
going every Sunday, But yeah, You've just had.
Speaker 2 (39:05):
Multiple moments of your life that have shaped who you
are in this moment right now, which for you probably
feels like the best version of yourself.
Speaker 1 (39:14):
If I had to guess, yeah, and I will say
the one thing I can, without a doubt stand on
is knowing the difference between forcing and trying. And that's
something I tell my girls every day because anytime organ
even down to an Instagram post, any time in my
(39:35):
life I have ever forced something, it has not been
successful for me. And when I just finally gave up
the forcing and was like, I'll try this and I'm
not going to just give up because it's hard. But
when I am just authentically who I am, it's great.
Speaker 2 (39:54):
Things always work out in that way. And they also
work out exactly how they're supposed to do in that capacity.
Speaker 1 (39:59):
Yeah, I know they do.
Speaker 2 (40:00):
I have learned. I did want to ask you to
I mentioned the fact that all of these events in
your life involved men. When you met your now husband,
what was that like?
Speaker 1 (40:13):
Crazy? Like? I worked for his dad. His dad is
not alive anymore, but he was a cinematographer and at
the time I was trying to pursue music in Nashville,
that ship is sailed. I was on American Idol and
all that. It was like in between time of moving
to Nashville and still being in Mississippi, his dad hired
me his craft services or a Mississippi tourism commercial and
(40:38):
when the commercial shoot was over, we had what they
call a rat party, and it happened to be my birthday,
and so John's dad threw a big party at his
house and John came and I met him. He looks
like nobody I've ever dated. He acts like he had
(40:58):
at the time. His funny because like, we didn't have
Instagram then, or if we did, it was so new
when kids did, but we had Facebook. And his Facebook
said so it said Missipy State and then it said
MC Class of twenty ten. I was like, this guy
is older than me. He's still in his undergrad Like,
what a loser. It took you seventeen years to graduate
(41:20):
undergrad And then come to find out he's just like
lawyer at this prestigious law firm. He graduated law school.
He was just a ding dong and didn't know how
Facebook worked because MSSI B College has a missib College
and they have a missis Be College School of Law.
And he put on his Facebook that he graduated miss
By College. But that's you see what I'm saying. So
I was like, that's how you know? John. I wasn't
(41:42):
after you for anything because I thought you were like
a loser, actually, but we were hot and heavy in
the beginning and it was really fun. I think both
of us knew, like I knew after the first time
I hung out with him. I told my girlfriends. I
was like, I'm going to marry him. They're like, Haley, really,
And I was like, nope, I'm telling you, I'm going
to marry him. But you didn't have.
Speaker 2 (42:00):
Any like fearful of this was it? Because there was
something about him that felt.
Speaker 1 (42:05):
I really did just know. And maybe but I also too,
Morgan didn't look past like Friday.
Speaker 2 (42:12):
Night, but you thought you were gonna marry him.
Speaker 1 (42:15):
But if I really sat down and thought about it,
I'll say this, I felt there was a difference. But
if I didn't end up marrying him, it would have.
Speaker 2 (42:25):
Been like.
Speaker 1 (42:27):
I can't say that because it probably would have. It
was just something always kept me coming back. But I
didn't invest too much into anything. But that's what That's
a better way of saying it. Like I had always
had balls drop, so putting all of the eggs in
a basket or whatever. It was fun to say, but
like I wasn't disappointed if it didn't happen, because that
(42:47):
was what I was so used to.
Speaker 2 (42:48):
You were so used to that it could just fall and
be like, okay, whatever'll square one. Yes, Okay.
Speaker 1 (42:53):
So we dated and it was rock and then once
it started getting serious, it got right because then later
I found out that he was like he had just
gotten out of a bad relationship also, but he told
me later that it was he was so rude to
me and so uncommittal was because he felt it too,
and he was scared to this be the last person
(43:17):
he dates, and he wanted to get that single out
of his system. But yeah, things I really liked about John.
Every guy had ever dated before it had come from
essentially a leave it to Beaver family, and it was
always so hard for them to relate or understand me
because everything had been just so easy. And while John
(43:42):
didn't have such a traumatic childhood, he grew up with
an alcoholic father who ended up dying in a house
fire from alcohol, like felt passed out. Like John knows
family drama well, and.
Speaker 2 (43:56):
He had empathy, I would imagine for your experiences, just
as you had empathy for his.
Speaker 1 (44:01):
Yes, which is funny because John's an enneagram five and
that is like that's the main thing they lack is empathy,
which is funny because he was such a softie for me.
But now he is my best friend still. I told
him just two days ago he saved my life and
he didn't even know it, and he's like, you've saved mine,
and I'm like, I know that sounds so cliche, but
(44:24):
he is genuinely the only thing in my life ever
that is just solid as a rock and stable, consistent.
Speaker 2 (44:32):
I've always said it and I will continue to say it.
Consistency is so sexy.
Speaker 1 (44:35):
Oh my god. I know you never.
Speaker 2 (44:38):
Realize it until it happens. You're like, yeah, okay, whenever
you want, I got it.
Speaker 1 (44:41):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (44:42):
I would love to sit here and talk with you
all day, and we totally could. There's two things I
want to ask you before we end this and wrap
this up. But what do you feel like for you
in your life now having all of these moments, What's
something you wish you would have known maybe when you
were going through any of these experiences that maybe you
(45:04):
I can look back now and be like, I wish
I would have had that information, or I wish I
would have been able to.
Speaker 1 (45:10):
Do this, probably that I wasn't broken. I think that's
another like common feeling from all of this, like from
the beginning, like the dad, the stepdad, the sex, all
of it was that it was somehow a product of me,
like I was broken or I was damaged, or I
was constantly trying to swim out of just really dark
(45:35):
holes that I thought I caused and you didn't and
I didn't.
Speaker 2 (45:39):
But in the moment, in all of these moments, you're
probably feeling.
Speaker 1 (45:42):
That way because that was one of the first So
like in this inner child thing, we did, my therapist
like close your eyes and go back to your very
first memory, and I was like, okay, and I like
went somewhere faster than I would have imagined had he
had asked me that on the spot later and he
(46:02):
was like, now you're you and she's her, what are
you going to say to her? And I was like,
everything's gonna be okay. Just it's all Internet. That sounds
so like cheeky or not cheeky, but something that should
be on a sign it Bucky's chowchke. That's the word
I was looking for.
Speaker 2 (46:20):
But the inner child often does want very simple things
very much. You're gonna be okay. They want to hug,
they want safety. They don't need these big, elaborate things.
They just need to be seen.
Speaker 1 (46:30):
And heard, reassured. Yeah and yeah, so that's it.
Speaker 2 (46:34):
I'd like to point out too, because we got so
much into so much of your past, but like you
today is incredibly successful. You have a job that you love,
you found your way back into the music industry and
a different capacity. You have a husband that you love
is your rock, as you said, you have daughters that
you love, a life that you love. I think so
(46:57):
much of your story is a testament to there's always light,
it's just finding it and finding the right time and
space for it. And you're also a testament that truly
you can get through anything, you really can.
Speaker 1 (47:12):
You can.
Speaker 2 (47:13):
And it's a reminder of when if you are in
your darkest, deepest moments, right now, there is a light.
Speaker 1 (47:19):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (47:19):
And Haley's had multiple of these moments where she had
to find the light and you did.
Speaker 1 (47:24):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (47:25):
So I would I always end episodes with whether it's
a piece of motivation, advice, inspiration, however you want to
go in that direction. But all of these things in
your life where you are now, however you want to
leave us, the floor is yours.
Speaker 1 (47:40):
I love to say, when you give up trying to
fit in, you find where you belong and it's really
a beautiful place to be.
Speaker 2 (47:50):
I love that. Thank you for being here, Thank you
for sharing such difficult parts of your story. But also
you're truly an inspiration and what you've been through where
you are now that I'm happy you've chosen to use
your voice same this story and I know that's really
hard some days though too.
Speaker 1 (48:09):
No, yeah, for sure, but I agree. Thank you.
Speaker 2 (48:12):
Thanks for being here. Friends. I hope this episode came
with some takeaways and maybe even some more understanding of
our fellow humans. If you want to follow Haley, her
instagram is at Haley dollar Hide. I'll put it in
the description too, so it's easy to click. The next
few weeks, we will be diving into the subject of
disabilities with some very special guests. I'll talk to you
all then
Host
Morgan Huelsman
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