July 9, 2025 • 39 mins
At 17 weeks pregnant with triplets, Ashleigh Conwell’s life changed forever when her husband Matt passed away suddenly during the height of the pandemic. In this raw and profoundly moving conversation with host Luke Cook, Ashleigh opens up about the identity shift that followed, the brutal reality of solo parenting through grief, and the quiet resilience it takes to keep showing up.
From collapsing on the pavement in shock to rising each day with intention, Ashleigh's story is not just one of tragedy - it’s a masterclass in courage. She speaks about the power of saying “I’m not okay,” the weight of new labels like “widow,” and how she's transforming her pain into purpose through her work with Yellow Falcon.
This episode is for anyone navigating the complexity of grief, identity, or starting over - and a testament to the fact that healing doesn't mean forgetting... it means carrying forward with love.
Find Ash online: @ashleigh.conwell and @yellow.falcon
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
All right, run it. I wonder what you mean?
When you use the word I, use theword I, I, I, I kick a break.
We have an aversion to ourselvesand to what's happening inside
(00:21):
us, inside us. I've been very interested in
this. Problem for a long long time.
Something settles. Welcome everyone, and welcome to
the Heart of My Sleep podcast. I'm the cook, your host, and
today I'm joined by someone I'veonly recently got to know, but
(00:42):
I'm so gratefully appreciative that we've being able to
connect. Ashley has left a deep
depression on me and she will dofor you too today.
Ashley Cromwell is someone who carries A fierce love, raw
honesty and a quiet strength in every word she speaks.
At the height of COVID, while 17weeks pregnant with triplets,
Ashley's world shattered when her husband Matt tragically
(01:04):
passed away. In the face of the imaginable
grief, Ashley had to keep going and keep facing reality in every
single day. Now, as a solo Mama speaker and
founder of Yellow Falcon, Ashleyis helping others face their
grief, but also in a growth based mindset.
Today's story isn't just about heartbreak.
It is a story of strength, like I said, and I can't wait to be
(01:25):
welcoming in Ashley today. Ashley, welcome to the Heart of
Muslim podcast. How are you?
I'm good. Thank you for having me.
Well, Asha, I want to start by just looking at you today,
someone who's sitting across from me right now in the on the
screen. And if today was a chapter in
your book, what's the chapter about right now?
Yeah, the chapter is for the first time in many years, it is
(01:46):
a chapter that has got some colour back in it probably.
And I look back and I can now see some admiration for myself,
for what I've been through, whatI've achieved.
And I'm feeling joy again, I'm feeling happy again.
I'm socialising and yeah, I justdescribe it as the colour has
(02:08):
returned to the book. It's it's been a long journey
for you my friend, since that day in 2020.
Can we just start from the reflection piece of who Ashley
Conwell was before that tragic accident?
So Ashley Conwell probably liveda fairy tale.
(02:29):
She was very lucky in that she had the absolute love of her
life and she had a successful job.
She had everything going for herand there was a part of her that
really knew that, particularly with with my husband, I really
knew I was living a fairy tale and at the same time probably a
(02:49):
little bit naive in that everything was good.
I was on cloud 9, you know, do it, like I said, doing well at
work, doing well, you know, personally, like everything was
great. And you know, having that
outlook on life, that positive outlook also attracted beautiful
friendships. It gave me a lot of opportunity,
(03:11):
travel, adventure. And so, yeah, pre accident,
everything was fabulous. You had, yeah, you were pregnant
with triplets. It was at the height of COVID in
those moments when you found outthat you were going to have
triplets. And like that firstly is a
massive shock. Like, you know, that would have
been a shock for the system, buthow, how are you navigating that
(03:33):
zone during that time? Because even that moment would
have been a whoa, okay, all these different factors that we
need to now think about and, andall that type of stuff.
Yeah, definitely shock. I mean, the timeline of that
happening was very short. We found out that we were
pregnant and we were so overjoyed because this was
something that we had really longed to be parents and finding
(03:56):
out we're pregnant is obviously fabulous and so excited.
It was only three weeks later that we found out that it was
triplets. And so it was a huge shock
because you're like, oh, pregnant, something that we had
wished for. And then it was this really
like, what do you mean there's three?
(04:16):
What does that mean practically as well.
So the truth is, what actually happened in that conversation
when the doctor told us was froma state of elation.
We were brought down to reality real fast.
And so the doctor said to us, OK, we need to have a pretty
serious chat here. And his tone of voice changed
(04:38):
completely to the point where Matt and I looked at each other
and said, what's going on? You know, we've walked into this
appointment feeling so much joy.And then the conversation was
pretty harrowing, to be honest. It was very scientific.
And it was very like, there is avery good chance that you will
(04:59):
not meet all three babies. And this is a very high
pregnancy. And we started then really
questioning what are we meant tobe responding here like?
And we, we were asking this of the doctor, we're saying, OK,
but what does this mean? And at that point it was very
much he just needed to give us information at that point.
(05:21):
It was also there was conversation about the birth
plan, which is obviously something that's very common for
a lot of mothers is to have thissort of ideal plan.
There was no choice in the matter.
For me, it was this is what willbe happening, even choice of
hospital, etcetera. So I remember walking out and
Matt and I both just looked at each other and said what just
happened? You know, So we'd walked in
(05:44):
feeling joy and, you know, spring in our step and we both
got in the car and I remember just bursting into tears.
So that was the reality of finding out triplets.
I remember the next morning waking up and then we went, OK,
let's allow ourself a few days to just process this
information. We've just received a lot of
(06:05):
information. Let's just work through that.
And almost, we almost gave ourselves permission to be a
little bit sad and a little bit shocked.
And then we said, OK, then there's a line in the sand.
And we just don't ever feel those emotions ever again
because that's not truly how we feel about the situation.
We're just experiencing a littlebit of shock here.
And so we really wanted to honour those emotions to go,
(06:27):
yeah, we are feeling a bit rattled by this.
And we don't want to feel like that because it's actually not
how we truly feel. So we also then made that very
conscious decision to go great. We've, we've had that moment and
now we are genuinely happy aboutthis.
We have every faith in the pregnancy in, in our babies.
And all we can do is be positivebecause we are.
(06:51):
Yeah, OK, it's changed a few things in, you know, the baby
budget tripled and, you know, thankfully we, we were able to
fit car seats in the car. So, you know, we were able to
relieve some of those practical things.
But we we genuinely made that choice to honour our true
emotion and to move forward withthat.
What a profound way of thinking though, Ashley, because you
(07:12):
know, so, so often many people get sent off on a tangent of I
can't do this, etcetera. But for you to actually and you
and Matt to be aware that, OK, we're going to need to sit in
this for a moment because this moment is important for us.
What a great a great way of thinking because, yeah, not many
people see through that and givethemselves space to be able to
(07:32):
navigate that next spot and understand that the gift that
you will bring to the world in these three beautiful children
is something that you could lookforward to.
And that's probably the key point is we didn't want to miss
out on the joy. This was still a really exciting
time. And, you know, post birth, what
I've actually said is that, you know, because so many people ask
(07:54):
me, oh gosh, you know, you must be so shocked.
I said we were hopeful for one and blessed with three.
We are so lucky. And that has always been our
mindset. Yeah, OK.
It's been a shock. And, you know, extra expense and
all of the things. Absolutely.
Yes. It's hard work and it is such a
joy, like so lucky. And we didn't want to miss out
(08:17):
on that joy of feeling excited because that was, you know, how
we walked into this and we were excited for, you know, to
welcome a baby. It now just meant that we needed
to do it times 3. So I think that was, yeah,
important for us and our own mindset.
The reality was internally, I'm like, how the hell am I going to
do this? You know, there are a lot of
(08:38):
questions and there was a lot ofconcern, absolutely.
But we didn't want to be fuelledby the Doctor either.
I mean, the Doctor had an important role of kind of
lowering our expectations and that was necessary.
And yeah, the truth is it is high risk they will be born
premi. You know, all of these realities
that he was sharing with us werereally important for us to be
(08:58):
aware of. And we did need all of the
information. And that continued through the
pregnancy and even now. And we just spent, Yep, we'll
take that information, but we won't let it define the
pregnancy or define the fear either.
And making that contract choice.At that time, how were the
people around you as well? Did they the energies from them
(09:20):
joy or did you have people closeto you that also added the
anxiety as well? And how did you deal with that?
Yeah, Interestingly enough, every time we told someone,
every single person had a different reaction.
I had, you know, we had people that just genuinely didn't
believe us and wanted proof of an ultrasound.
Yeah. Like as if that was, you know,
(09:40):
as if we were lying. We had people just really
confused and saying what do you mean and how does this happen
and is it in the family? So a lot of questions, but not
one person reacted negatively orwith concern or with anxiety.
And so we were really grateful for that.
We were surrounded by love firstly and support as well to
(10:04):
go, OK. And I think people people
realised, OK, I'm going to have to step up a little bit more
here to support these babies. But it was only really the
medical field that we're providing that reality.
And that's really important. They needed to do that.
And it was true. But we're really grateful that
no one around us ever had that reaction, probably because they
(10:26):
actually had no idea. I think a lot of mothers, that
or expecting parents get a lot of advice, often unsolicited
advice. We never got that.
And even in the early stages of pregnancy, because I think
people like, oh God, I can't help you.
Is there many resources out there for mums with triplets or
(10:47):
parents expecting triplets? Yeah, look, there are, there's
the multiple birth association. So you know, the, the reality is
we are a small minority, but there are some definitely
support groups out there who do local catch ups and things as
well. So we did join a webinar early
on and I remember it's, you know, volunteers.
(11:09):
So it is other triplet parents hosting these webinars and on
the call it's mainly twins. And there was one triplet mum
and she was sitting on the floorof the nursery with a bottle of
wine doing this webinar. And I went, OK, this just sums
it up. Whereas the twin mums are
sitting at a desk doing the doing the webinar.
(11:30):
It looked a little bit more professional.
The triplet mum was like, I've got my wine.
And that was the glimpse into myfuture where I went, Oh yeah,
triplet mums look different. She was in her pyjamas and look,
she was present. And I'm so grateful for her.
And she shared some wonderful tips.
But I just, that's the vision that I'll never get out of my
head. And I can so relate to that now.
(11:53):
Oh, Ashley, what a story. Nothing like a bottle of wine to
support some days. I'll tell you what.
But Ashley, you know, life has its twists, turns, massive
hills, deep valleys, and it willchange for you in September 2020
when Matt tragically passed away.
The moment that that occurred and the moments that have led
(12:16):
past that, is there anything that you can share with the
audience of, you know, how you were at that time when you found
out? Yeah, when I found out I was
actually at the scene of Matt's accident and I remember, you
know, it was. And I look back now and that
moment has completely transformed my life.
(12:39):
You know, we all have a moment that we can imagine that sort of
divides our life into before andafter.
And my moment was sitting on theside of the footpath and an off
duty police officer happened to be there and sort of grabbed me
and I'm sitting there. And then another officer who was
at the accident informed me thatMatt had passed.
(13:04):
And that moment was a complete shutdown for me then, you know,
complete shock. And that continued then for
several days. So my entire body shut down.
I didn't walk for five days because I genuinely didn't know
how to walk. And I know that probably sounds
(13:25):
really crazy, but I've lost all strength.
And it was this, if I didn't remember how to walk, my family
was spoon feeding me because I couldn't eat.
And yeah, just, I think my entire body just went into this
survival mode of protection of the babies and protection of of
(13:46):
me. And that is the moment that
changed my life forever. It's the one and only time where
I've truly switched off from theworld really, and turned
completely inward as a form of protection.
It's I sit with this and firstlyI want to say thank you for
sharing, but I sit with this andI hear your words saying how
(14:10):
your body went into protection for the babies and whilst
everything else for you shut down, the body was there to be
able to support your beautiful triplet kids.
How does that make you feel on the power of the human body to
be that protector even in the most biggest traumatic
experience that anyone could experience themselves?
(14:32):
It was proof as to how powerful the body is, the mind and the
body I am in. So like I'm in awe that my body
sort of knew what to do because I definitely didn't.
I just was completely mentally, I was completely out of it,
emotionally out of it and physically, all my body knew was
(14:54):
just, OK, let's stop walking. She doesn't really need to walk
right now. Let's just completely channel
all of the energy into growing through humans because already,
yeah, already a high risk pregnancy.
I'm now faced with this sudden passing of my husband.
So I honestly, I can't describe it other than pure Mother
(15:15):
Nature. The body just kicked in and you
know, every calorie that I was consuming, like I've continued.
I lost so much weight. All of the weight was the
babies. And so again, I just believe
that my body was like, this is where the energy needs to go.
We're just going to take over here.
And so I look back in complete awe of my body and it kept our
(15:35):
babies safe. That's amazing.
It's beautiful. It's such a beautiful thing to
think about. Just the power of what we can be
as humans, even in the state of such trauma and tragedy that our
body can still support not only ourselves, but also especially
(15:55):
for you as growing three babies within within you.
And you know, to me, that is just such a profound moment.
But then I switched my thinking to, well, shit like, how did you
navigate the next year of, you know, growing the babies, having
the triplets? Like to me, that is just such a
(16:16):
mountain that would have just been so challenging to climb.
Yeah, it was. And I look back now with
sadness, to be honest, because that was such a rough time in my
life, obviously the hardest thatI've ever endured and hoped to
(16:36):
ever endure, but also something I've never, I mean, everyone
has, you know, shit that they'redealing with.
And I just look at my story and go, Oh my God, like, how is that
a real story? And how did that happen?
And then you think, oh gosh, that poor girl.
And it was me. And I look back and I also don't
recognise myself during that time because I lost myself in
(16:58):
the process and obviously lost my husband.
We'd lost our family before it had even started and I'd lost
myself. So the person speaking today,
I'm not the same ash, I'm not the same Ash that I was during
that time, nor am I the same ashpre accident.
And that carries a lot of sadness just from my own
(17:18):
identity and what I've lost. But I look back at that time and
what I had to do was I literallytook it 10 minutes at a time
because that's all I was capableof.
And I struggle with that becausepre accident I was a very high
achiever. I was doing well in my corporate
role and basically my career mapped out ahead of me, you
(17:41):
know, married to an incredible husband, baby's on the way.
Like everything was so fabulous.And I'm a type A personality.
So everything was, you know, lined out in front of me.
And then to have every single thing stripped away from you.
I just was it even a basic function of walking like that
was taken from me and start to literally hit rock bottom is a
(18:04):
really scary place to be. And so I had to do a lot of
work. The the truth is though, is I
had to do that work immediately because I had a funeral service
to plan. And so there was no time to
grieve or to, you know, do nothing.
It's like I've I've got a funeral and he deserves this
(18:24):
beautiful send off. So that was my first priority
and working through that. But then there is a lot around a
funeral service, and it is that when someone passes is huge.
At the time, I was 29 years old.You're not meant to become a
widow at 29 years old. So I'm 29.
(18:46):
I don't know what I'm meant to do.
I don't know who to call. I don't, you know, I know I'm
dealing with funeral directors and I'm, you know, calling banks
and providing death certificatesto people.
And I'm just thrust into this world that none of us ever
imagined being in. And here I am at 29 years old,
pregnant with triplets. Like just so scary.
(19:09):
It's probably a really good way to describe it.
And, you know, I had no energy. I had no, no concept of what was
also going on. But I just knew that I, I had
this to plan for. And then also the not just the
reality of that, but it's like, hang on, are the bills still
taken care of? Like, is everything automated?
Like is because there is an element that life still happens,
(19:31):
like the mortgage payment's still going to come out.
I need to make sure that things are practically set up or, you
know, just things around the house, you know, did I remember
to lock the door? I don't know because my brains
aren't really working right now.So there are, it's a really
strange place to be in because you're 100% of your energy and
your focus is on sort of a funeral service.
(19:54):
But then everyday life still needs to be taken care of.
And I'm pregnant. So it really got to a point of,
like, 10 minutes at a time and breaking it down.
And also I had to ask for help. That was a really important part
of all of this, is seeking professional help.
And I put my hand up, you know, the week after the accident, and
I was like, I need help and I need it now.
So I was able to be very vocal about that, knowing that that
(20:16):
was the support I needed, despite having beautiful family
and friends who really pitched in and did a lot.
But also, yeah, sort of getting that formal support straight
away. It's so good that you say that
because you know, here at heart on my sleeve, we're talking
about I'm not OK is the three most powerful words that you can
say. And to be able to seek that
(20:37):
support and help no matter whereyou are in your journey, no
matter what storm you're in, is so critical to be able to say.
Because without saying that we can't get the support that we
need during that time, whether it's mentally or, or physically
or having that network of peoplearound you that can, can guide
you Now, Ash, I, I just want to go back to those moments.
(20:57):
I think you, you, you alluded toa, a really good point around
you can only just focus on the next one step.
Like you can't think too much. Probably.
It's just the next one thing that you can sort through.
But then I also challenged my thinking here and, and what you
said about your identity, like your identity had to completely
shift. And, and I remember when we
spoke in the pre conversation, you spoke about the new labels
(21:18):
that appeared in your life that you, that you had to become
accustomed to. Can you just explain that a
little bit further for me? Yeah, absolutely.
This was something that happenedvery quickly in the grief
journey for me. So it was only two weeks after
Matt had passed, I went to the hospital for a scan.
So when you're a triplet mom, all of your scans are done at
hospital. You don't get the luxury of
(21:40):
going to a local ultrasound. But I went into the hospital,
and that was fragile because I'mwalking into an appointment
without my husband, and I'm walking into an appointment
where expectant mothers are withtheir husbands.
So that was a very confronting environment.
Anyway, so I remember walking in, I couldn't look up.
(22:02):
I just looked at the floor the whole time.
And they said, oh, we just need you to complete this form.
And my parents were with me, which, you know, was also, like
I said, very emotional experience.
And I remember sitting in the waiting room surrounded by other
couples and the form, you know, it starts as normal.
(22:23):
Fill out your personal details. And then I got to the question
that said marital status. And at that point I realised
that I had to tick the box widow.
And that was the first time thatI realised that that was my new
(22:43):
label. And that was a moment, but it's
still very hard for me to accept.
I struggled using the word. I've become somewhat more used
to it, I suppose, because it is me.
But I remember that moment of I was already fragile.
I was already crying. And then to see that was just
(23:05):
this real reality check of I'm now in this category.
I'm no longer, you know, I've always considered like I still
see myself married, but instead of ticking the married box, I
had to tick widowed. So that was a hard.
Moment again, thank you, Ashley,for sharing that because I think
(23:26):
people who are listening today, the identity sometimes that we
have to show now physically in our in our worlds may not
necessarily be the ones that we want to carry.
And there has to be a moment. And this is my question to you,
Ash, around how have you been able to move forward?
Because what you're doing right now with yellow Falcon and I
(23:47):
can't wait to talk about this ina little bit bit more of the
journey. But how have you been able to
move into this place of strengthand willingness to not only use
your grief in a way that might be able to support others?
Can you share with us that journey to be able to get to
this point where you are now? Because on I dare say it would
have been, you know, Rd hard travelled as well to be able to
(24:09):
get to where you are right now. Absolutely.
I think the first thing that I needed to do was put up my hand
and say I'm not OK. That was the moment.
Because up until that point, like I said, I was living this
fairy tale and everything was fabulous.
And then I was thrust into this world of going holy moly.
(24:31):
Everything around me has just been taken from me.
I've lost almost everything except our unborn babies.
I mean, even at the time as well, I was also on stand down
due to COVID. So I'd also lost my job, you
know, So it was just this loss after loss.
There were other family members that passed in the same year.
So it was just like absolutely relentless.
(24:53):
But the first thing I did was I had to acknowledge I'm not OK.
The acknowledgement itself was the hardest bit because when you
say I'm not OK, there is a levelof accepting your circumstances
and that's really heavy to carry.
(25:14):
And it's a very courageous step because then it allows you to
see the next step. Not necessarily take the next
step, but to see the next step. And then it allows others to
help you. Because in my situation, I
wasn't able to do that myself. So I needed to say I'm not OK
(25:36):
and I also have no idea what to do.
And I learnt very early on and afriend said this to me because I
felt so overwhelmed with all thedecisions I needed to make, all
the forms I was filling out. And I was just, the decision
fatigue was so real and I genuinely didn't know.
And I kept saying to this friend, I was like, I don't
know, I don't know. And then I was getting more and
more flustered. And she said to me, I don't know
(25:58):
is a full sentence. You don't need to justify
anything beyond that point. You don't need to, you know,
reflect any further, just say I don't know full stop.
So they're probably the two things.
It was the I'm not OK, which wasincredibly difficult and
(26:21):
learning to say I don't know. And it wasn't necessarily then
allowing others to find that answer or provide, you know,
that information because often Ididn't really want their
opinions. I had my own journey.
And that's a lot of what this has been is yes, there is
support, but the truth of the matter is, whether it's grief or
anything else that people are dealing with, I truly believe
(26:43):
that we are the person in it. We can have support, whether
that be formal support or informal support, but ultimately
it is us. We are responsible.
And so that was a learning for me as well to say, you know,
yes, I can ask for advice or yes, I can be talking to my
psychologist, but it's actually up to me.
And in some ways the easy solution to all of this would
(27:05):
have just been to stay in my depression, to stay in my my
grief and just live in that. But that's not what I wanted to
do. That's not a joyful life.
And in most part as well, it's also not honouring Matt and the
life that he would want the kid to be living.
So it actually became in my head, I'm like, Oh, my gosh,
(27:26):
staying in this space, as hard as it is to move from it, by
staying in here, I'm actually doing a disservice to Matt, who
is now, you know, my reason for everything and, you know,
continues to be. So for Matt and the children, if
I'm staying in this space, yeah,that weighed really heavily on
(27:48):
me. So it was that step to move
forward. Such a profound moment there
because you created so much insight for those listening
today. And I think the biggest one that
stuck out for me was the fact that you took the right to own
your story and you took the right to be able to craft the
next version of your story. Not disregarding your past, not
(28:09):
disregarding the trauma heading towards that pain, but realising
that you were you held the pain.Yeah, and that's an important
point to own. The story though, doesn't erase
the pain or it's not me closing that chapter, brushing it off
and pushing it to the side. It's owning it from a place of
love. And to say that that is part of
(28:31):
my story and that required a lotof work.
That was not just this overnightdecision where I'm like, OK,
cool, I'm going to be joyful tomorrow doesn't work like that.
But it is continuing to think about, well, how do I best
honour that story and know that it is part that I carry with me?
Grief doesn't ever leave you. It's not something you move on
(28:51):
from. You carry it with you.
And how do you do that in the most loving way?
Because grief, you know, there'sa lot of quotes out there, but
they say, you know, grief is thelove that's still remains or,
you know, and that's why it's soprevalent in every single moment
of my day. Yeah, it's it's carrying it with
you. But how do you carry it in a way
(29:13):
that honours the love as opposedto, yeah, you know, staying in
that place of sadness? And there's still a lot of those
moments. I always say to people like, I'm
in the trenches, I'm in the arena.
I still have a lot of moments because I've now learnt, you
know, some of the tools to sort of step out of that.
And it's it is the point where Ineed to say I'm not OK.
(29:35):
Ash, as we move forward and as you have ventured into doing
what you do now, what guiding lights are driving you to make
the impact now in who you are, what you stand for?
And what are your hopes for other people who may need
support around certain things like grief, etcetera as well to
(29:56):
see that there is a an opportunity to grow from this
place of pain? One of the main things for me in
doing this type of work has beenthat I am creating knowing that
I was once that girl who needed this.
And you know, I was that girl inthe audience or listening to the
(30:16):
podcast or doing the online research, clutching at straws,
seeking help from a place of fear, from a place of deep
sadness and from a place of complete isolation, not knowing
who I was, where I fit in anymore.
Sadly, that will continue. Sadly, grief is something we
(30:37):
will never escape as human beings.
How do I make it a little easier?
How do I show hope to someone tosay I have travelled this road,
it's not going to be easy. And I've never 1 to sugarcoat it
and say, oh, positive thinking. No, I've, I've done it.
I've done the hard yards and I'mstill doing them.
(31:00):
And these are some of the thingsthat helped me, you know,
sharing that lived experience. But I've also been lucky in
recent times, particularly to start connecting with some other
experts as well. I've never claimed to be an
expert. I'm not a psychologist.
I'm just a, you know, a normal girl who lost her husband.
And I've lived that tragedy. And it can happen to anyone.
(31:24):
And we all have grief. You know, sadly, we've all lost
someone. It's not always a partner.
It could be a parent, a child. Like there is a lot of loss and
there are realities of grief that we need to face.
So how do we get the emotional support?
How do I also connect with the experts as well to support, you
know, my community to say, look,these are all of the things you
(31:46):
may need. How do we create that support,
that holistic support and community where even though our
grief may be different, there's still a level of connection and
we still have this level where Ican relate to you.
And that is what humanity is, because grief is never leaving
us. It's a beautiful fact when we
(32:08):
become real and when we are having these honest and and
vulnerable conversations and thebeauty of that humanity and
connection has in these powerfulmoments of sharing, these
powerful moments of listening. It is something that you know,
we live and breathe here at heart on my sleeve.
And Ashley, it's been awesome today to have you, but I can't
(32:30):
go away without asking you. You know, you see your three
beautiful daughters, how old arethey now?
So I've got a girl and two boys and they're 4 1/2.
So we are really hectic in this household.
It would be crazy, but you know what?
What is it? What is it?
Sum up a triplet life. Now that the kids are here, what
(32:51):
what is it like? I call them Energizer bunnies.
I'm up at 5:00 AM every day, they're up at 5:30 and they go
non stop until bedtime and thereis no break, there is no
downtime. Probably the best way to
describe it actually is a story that happened a few weeks ago.
We had our beautiful friends over for a really casual pizza
(33:13):
making night. So you know, 8-4 year olds,
really casual night, no craziness at all.
And what happened to all of the kids were actually out playing
outside and my daughter walked in and she looked at me and she
said, what are you doing? I said, oh, I'm just chatting
with my friends. And she goes, no, what are you
doing? And then my friend said, oh,
(33:37):
mommy's sitting down. And my daughter had never seen
me sit down. So when I am at home, I, I
genuinely go sit down. There is always something to do,
whether it's making beds, doing laundry, getting lunch boxes.
And she genuinely didn't understand what I was doing.
I sit down for meals because family meals are really
(33:57):
important to me. We always sit down at the dinner
table, TV off and have connection and questions and
conversation. But yeah, literally that was a
moment. And I just laughed, went, oh,
she's right. She's never seen me sit down.
She doesn't understand this concept.
So at 4 1/2 years old, she yeah,she saw mommy sitting down.
So that is the. Difference.
I think Ashley, it's also like what I, what I know of you is
(34:21):
that you are trying to find waysto keep you grounded though as
well. Like, yeah, what, how are you
doing that? What are some of the practises
and what are some of the commitments that you've had to
go with to make sure that you can still have you time to be
personal to you or to do the things that you want to do?
Yeah, that's been an evolving practise.
(34:41):
Honestly, I've really struggled with it.
I feel like I'm getting closer, but I know that as the kids
start school next year, I'll go through another version of that.
But sunrise walks are really precious to me.
I do have a nanny who comes niceand early to support the kids
getting ready for the day so that I can start my day with a
clear head. And that has been game changing
(35:04):
because then when I come home, I'm fully present for the day
with the kids because I've had my moment to just go, OK, not
starting the day with, you know,breakfast craziness.
So that has been really helpful.I'm also very aware of my mental
health and I've learnt what those levels are.
So I do have a psychologist and at the moment I'm doing monthly
(35:25):
sessions, but I also know when to tell her if I need to dial
that up or down. And so I do have to
compartmentalise a lot of my grief for those sessions because
there is a reality of parenting triplets and solo parenting and
that means running a household, looking after three kids,
getting them to swimming lessonsand kindy and all the things.
(35:45):
So there is a very demanding reality of my life, which does
mean I've had to learn to compartmentalise a lot.
But that's not suppressing. So it's a very different thing.
So I make sure that I don't hideany emotion from the kids and
that if mommy's having a sad day, that's OK, let's talk about
it. Why is mommy sad, you know?
And I make sure I honour that for the kids as well.
(36:06):
Like if they're feeling sad, let's talk about that.
What's going on for you? And really supporting them.
So it's really important to me, particularly from this
experience of losing that, is tobe emotionally present for
myself and for the kids. And so that's been really
important, not just for myself, but for our family life, is to
honour those emotions and to support each other through that.
(36:28):
And so I don't ever hide my emotion.
The kids are very aware and I share that.
That's important to me. You know, we talk about daddy
every single day and he's very present.
And they also know, you know, that the loss as well.
And they've got their own grief journey.
So it's important that we are aspresent as we can be.
So it's not a place of suppression, it's a place of
(36:50):
compartmentalising as needed. And yeah, they they're some of
the practises that are really important to me.
Well, Ash, it's a beautiful place where you are right now
because I can see how you in particular are doing the best
you can and the best you can is all that can happen.
You don't need to be anything else.
You're doing everything as good as you can.
(37:13):
And you know, you're creating moments where your kids because
you know, as I mentioned to you Ash, I lost my dad when I was 4.
So to create those little moments where you can honour
Matt in in for your kids is is critical for them to be able to
to grow as well. So Ash, how can people get in
contact with you if they do wantto get in contact with you?
(37:34):
And can you explain a little bitmore about what Yellow Falcon is
all about? Yeah, I'd love to.
The best way to get in contact with me is through Instagram.
So it's Ashley dot Conwell is myhandle or Yellow Dot Falcon, and
I've got a really exciting vision for Yellow Falcon and
where I'm taking it. So I am in the process at the
moment of creating an online course and it is about the
(37:57):
balance of practical grief support.
So when we find ourselves in these situations, what do we
actually have to do? What does that practical process
look like? And what is the the next step?
What is that emotional support beyond that?
And when I say that, it's thingslike returning to work or how do
we navigate these particular situations?
(38:18):
And so that's the online course that I'm working on at the
moment. So I'm excited to to bring that
to life. And also a big part of that is,
like I said, connecting with experts, but also creating a
community that's important and to have that relatability.
I've definitely felt isolated inmy in my new labels of being a
widow and a triplet mum. And so the reality is, as much
(38:41):
support as we may get in our grief, we can feel like no one
understands us. So that's going to be an
important part of the course as well, to have that community
based. So I'm excited.
Yeah, it's in the works. So watch this space.
Watch this space indeed, everyone.
Well, I hope you enjoyed today'spodcast for Heart on My Sleeve.
Please make sure that you connect with Ashley.
(39:02):
It's been an absolute pleasure, Ashley, to have you on the
podcast. So thank you so much for being a
part of it. Thank you so much.
Appreciate it. Emotions have a natural tendency
to dissipate unless they get reinforced.
And so if there's more thoughts,more stories, more intentions to
come along. So the act of how am I leaving
it alone is an act of not an act, adding more stories, adding
(39:25):
fuel to it. So it might not go away in 2
minutes, but it then begins to relax and dissipate.
And so rather than being the person who has to fix, it would
become the person who makes space for the heart, the mind,
to relax and settle away itself.
All right, run it. I wonder what you mean?
When you use the word I, use theword I, I, I, I kick a break.
We have an aversion to ourselvesand to what's happening inside
(00:21):
us, inside us. I've been very interested in
this. Problem for a long long time.
Something settles. Welcome everyone, and welcome to
the Heart of My Sleep podcast. I'm the cook, your host, and
today I'm joined by someone I'veonly recently got to know, but
(00:42):
I'm so gratefully appreciative that we've being able to
connect. Ashley has left a deep
depression on me and she will dofor you too today.
Ashley Cromwell is someone who carries A fierce love, raw
honesty and a quiet strength in every word she speaks.
At the height of COVID, while 17weeks pregnant with triplets,
Ashley's world shattered when her husband Matt tragically
(01:04):
passed away. In the face of the imaginable
grief, Ashley had to keep going and keep facing reality in every
single day. Now, as a solo Mama speaker and
founder of Yellow Falcon, Ashleyis helping others face their
grief, but also in a growth based mindset.
Today's story isn't just about heartbreak.
It is a story of strength, like I said, and I can't wait to be
(01:25):
welcoming in Ashley today. Ashley, welcome to the Heart of
Muslim podcast. How are you?
I'm good. Thank you for having me.
Well, Asha, I want to start by just looking at you today,
someone who's sitting across from me right now in the on the
screen. And if today was a chapter in
your book, what's the chapter about right now?
Yeah, the chapter is for the first time in many years, it is
(01:46):
a chapter that has got some colour back in it probably.
And I look back and I can now see some admiration for myself,
for what I've been through, whatI've achieved.
And I'm feeling joy again, I'm feeling happy again.
I'm socialising and yeah, I justdescribe it as the colour has
(02:08):
returned to the book. It's it's been a long journey
for you my friend, since that day in 2020.
Can we just start from the reflection piece of who Ashley
Conwell was before that tragic accident?
So Ashley Conwell probably liveda fairy tale.
(02:29):
She was very lucky in that she had the absolute love of her
life and she had a successful job.
She had everything going for herand there was a part of her that
really knew that, particularly with with my husband, I really
knew I was living a fairy tale and at the same time probably a
(02:49):
little bit naive in that everything was good.
I was on cloud 9, you know, do it, like I said, doing well at
work, doing well, you know, personally, like everything was
great. And you know, having that
outlook on life, that positive outlook also attracted beautiful
friendships. It gave me a lot of opportunity,
(03:11):
travel, adventure. And so, yeah, pre accident,
everything was fabulous. You had, yeah, you were pregnant
with triplets. It was at the height of COVID in
those moments when you found outthat you were going to have
triplets. And like that firstly is a
massive shock. Like, you know, that would have
been a shock for the system, buthow, how are you navigating that
(03:33):
zone during that time? Because even that moment would
have been a whoa, okay, all these different factors that we
need to now think about and, andall that type of stuff.
Yeah, definitely shock. I mean, the timeline of that
happening was very short. We found out that we were
pregnant and we were so overjoyed because this was
something that we had really longed to be parents and finding
(03:56):
out we're pregnant is obviously fabulous and so excited.
It was only three weeks later that we found out that it was
triplets. And so it was a huge shock
because you're like, oh, pregnant, something that we had
wished for. And then it was this really
like, what do you mean there's three?
(04:16):
What does that mean practically as well.
So the truth is, what actually happened in that conversation
when the doctor told us was froma state of elation.
We were brought down to reality real fast.
And so the doctor said to us, OK, we need to have a pretty
serious chat here. And his tone of voice changed
(04:38):
completely to the point where Matt and I looked at each other
and said, what's going on? You know, we've walked into this
appointment feeling so much joy.And then the conversation was
pretty harrowing, to be honest. It was very scientific.
And it was very like, there is avery good chance that you will
(04:59):
not meet all three babies. And this is a very high
pregnancy. And we started then really
questioning what are we meant tobe responding here like?
And we, we were asking this of the doctor, we're saying, OK,
but what does this mean? And at that point it was very
much he just needed to give us information at that point.
(05:21):
It was also there was conversation about the birth
plan, which is obviously something that's very common for
a lot of mothers is to have thissort of ideal plan.
There was no choice in the matter.
For me, it was this is what willbe happening, even choice of
hospital, etcetera. So I remember walking out and
Matt and I both just looked at each other and said what just
happened? You know, So we'd walked in
(05:44):
feeling joy and, you know, spring in our step and we both
got in the car and I remember just bursting into tears.
So that was the reality of finding out triplets.
I remember the next morning waking up and then we went, OK,
let's allow ourself a few days to just process this
information. We've just received a lot of
(06:05):
information. Let's just work through that.
And almost, we almost gave ourselves permission to be a
little bit sad and a little bit shocked.
And then we said, OK, then there's a line in the sand.
And we just don't ever feel those emotions ever again
because that's not truly how we feel about the situation.
We're just experiencing a littlebit of shock here.
And so we really wanted to honour those emotions to go,
(06:27):
yeah, we are feeling a bit rattled by this.
And we don't want to feel like that because it's actually not
how we truly feel. So we also then made that very
conscious decision to go great. We've, we've had that moment and
now we are genuinely happy aboutthis.
We have every faith in the pregnancy in, in our babies.
And all we can do is be positivebecause we are.
(06:51):
Yeah, OK, it's changed a few things in, you know, the baby
budget tripled and, you know, thankfully we, we were able to
fit car seats in the car. So, you know, we were able to
relieve some of those practical things.
But we we genuinely made that choice to honour our true
emotion and to move forward withthat.
What a profound way of thinking though, Ashley, because you
(07:12):
know, so, so often many people get sent off on a tangent of I
can't do this, etcetera. But for you to actually and you
and Matt to be aware that, OK, we're going to need to sit in
this for a moment because this moment is important for us.
What a great a great way of thinking because, yeah, not many
people see through that and givethemselves space to be able to
(07:32):
navigate that next spot and understand that the gift that
you will bring to the world in these three beautiful children
is something that you could lookforward to.
And that's probably the key point is we didn't want to miss
out on the joy. This was still a really exciting
time. And, you know, post birth, what
I've actually said is that, you know, because so many people ask
(07:54):
me, oh gosh, you know, you must be so shocked.
I said we were hopeful for one and blessed with three.
We are so lucky. And that has always been our
mindset. Yeah, OK.
It's been a shock. And, you know, extra expense and
all of the things. Absolutely.
Yes. It's hard work and it is such a
joy, like so lucky. And we didn't want to miss out
(08:17):
on that joy of feeling excited because that was, you know, how
we walked into this and we were excited for, you know, to
welcome a baby. It now just meant that we needed
to do it times 3. So I think that was, yeah,
important for us and our own mindset.
The reality was internally, I'm like, how the hell am I going to
do this? You know, there are a lot of
(08:38):
questions and there was a lot ofconcern, absolutely.
But we didn't want to be fuelledby the Doctor either.
I mean, the Doctor had an important role of kind of
lowering our expectations and that was necessary.
And yeah, the truth is it is high risk they will be born
premi. You know, all of these realities
that he was sharing with us werereally important for us to be
(08:58):
aware of. And we did need all of the
information. And that continued through the
pregnancy and even now. And we just spent, Yep, we'll
take that information, but we won't let it define the
pregnancy or define the fear either.
And making that contract choice.At that time, how were the
people around you as well? Did they the energies from them
(09:20):
joy or did you have people closeto you that also added the
anxiety as well? And how did you deal with that?
Yeah, Interestingly enough, every time we told someone,
every single person had a different reaction.
I had, you know, we had people that just genuinely didn't
believe us and wanted proof of an ultrasound.
Yeah. Like as if that was, you know,
(09:40):
as if we were lying. We had people just really
confused and saying what do you mean and how does this happen
and is it in the family? So a lot of questions, but not
one person reacted negatively orwith concern or with anxiety.
And so we were really grateful for that.
We were surrounded by love firstly and support as well to
(10:04):
go, OK. And I think people people
realised, OK, I'm going to have to step up a little bit more
here to support these babies. But it was only really the
medical field that we're providing that reality.
And that's really important. They needed to do that.
And it was true. But we're really grateful that
no one around us ever had that reaction, probably because they
(10:26):
actually had no idea. I think a lot of mothers, that
or expecting parents get a lot of advice, often unsolicited
advice. We never got that.
And even in the early stages of pregnancy, because I think
people like, oh God, I can't help you.
Is there many resources out there for mums with triplets or
(10:47):
parents expecting triplets? Yeah, look, there are, there's
the multiple birth association. So you know, the, the reality is
we are a small minority, but there are some definitely
support groups out there who do local catch ups and things as
well. So we did join a webinar early
on and I remember it's, you know, volunteers.
(11:09):
So it is other triplet parents hosting these webinars and on
the call it's mainly twins. And there was one triplet mum
and she was sitting on the floorof the nursery with a bottle of
wine doing this webinar. And I went, OK, this just sums
it up. Whereas the twin mums are
sitting at a desk doing the doing the webinar.
(11:30):
It looked a little bit more professional.
The triplet mum was like, I've got my wine.
And that was the glimpse into myfuture where I went, Oh yeah,
triplet mums look different. She was in her pyjamas and look,
she was present. And I'm so grateful for her.
And she shared some wonderful tips.
But I just, that's the vision that I'll never get out of my
head. And I can so relate to that now.
(11:53):
Oh, Ashley, what a story. Nothing like a bottle of wine to
support some days. I'll tell you what.
But Ashley, you know, life has its twists, turns, massive
hills, deep valleys, and it willchange for you in September 2020
when Matt tragically passed away.
The moment that that occurred and the moments that have led
(12:16):
past that, is there anything that you can share with the
audience of, you know, how you were at that time when you found
out? Yeah, when I found out I was
actually at the scene of Matt's accident and I remember, you
know, it was. And I look back now and that
moment has completely transformed my life.
(12:39):
You know, we all have a moment that we can imagine that sort of
divides our life into before andafter.
And my moment was sitting on theside of the footpath and an off
duty police officer happened to be there and sort of grabbed me
and I'm sitting there. And then another officer who was
at the accident informed me thatMatt had passed.
(13:04):
And that moment was a complete shutdown for me then, you know,
complete shock. And that continued then for
several days. So my entire body shut down.
I didn't walk for five days because I genuinely didn't know
how to walk. And I know that probably sounds
(13:25):
really crazy, but I've lost all strength.
And it was this, if I didn't remember how to walk, my family
was spoon feeding me because I couldn't eat.
And yeah, just, I think my entire body just went into this
survival mode of protection of the babies and protection of of
(13:46):
me. And that is the moment that
changed my life forever. It's the one and only time where
I've truly switched off from theworld really, and turned
completely inward as a form of protection.
It's I sit with this and firstlyI want to say thank you for
sharing, but I sit with this andI hear your words saying how
(14:10):
your body went into protection for the babies and whilst
everything else for you shut down, the body was there to be
able to support your beautiful triplet kids.
How does that make you feel on the power of the human body to
be that protector even in the most biggest traumatic
experience that anyone could experience themselves?
(14:32):
It was proof as to how powerful the body is, the mind and the
body I am in. So like I'm in awe that my body
sort of knew what to do because I definitely didn't.
I just was completely mentally, I was completely out of it,
emotionally out of it and physically, all my body knew was
(14:54):
just, OK, let's stop walking. She doesn't really need to walk
right now. Let's just completely channel
all of the energy into growing through humans because already,
yeah, already a high risk pregnancy.
I'm now faced with this sudden passing of my husband.
So I honestly, I can't describe it other than pure Mother
(15:15):
Nature. The body just kicked in and you
know, every calorie that I was consuming, like I've continued.
I lost so much weight. All of the weight was the
babies. And so again, I just believe
that my body was like, this is where the energy needs to go.
We're just going to take over here.
And so I look back in complete awe of my body and it kept our
(15:35):
babies safe. That's amazing.
It's beautiful. It's such a beautiful thing to
think about. Just the power of what we can be
as humans, even in the state of such trauma and tragedy that our
body can still support not only ourselves, but also especially
(15:55):
for you as growing three babies within within you.
And you know, to me, that is just such a profound moment.
But then I switched my thinking to, well, shit like, how did you
navigate the next year of, you know, growing the babies, having
the triplets? Like to me, that is just such a
(16:16):
mountain that would have just been so challenging to climb.
Yeah, it was. And I look back now with
sadness, to be honest, because that was such a rough time in my
life, obviously the hardest thatI've ever endured and hoped to
(16:36):
ever endure, but also something I've never, I mean, everyone
has, you know, shit that they'redealing with.
And I just look at my story and go, Oh my God, like, how is that
a real story? And how did that happen?
And then you think, oh gosh, that poor girl.
And it was me. And I look back and I also don't
recognise myself during that time because I lost myself in
(16:58):
the process and obviously lost my husband.
We'd lost our family before it had even started and I'd lost
myself. So the person speaking today,
I'm not the same ash, I'm not the same Ash that I was during
that time, nor am I the same ashpre accident.
And that carries a lot of sadness just from my own
(17:18):
identity and what I've lost. But I look back at that time and
what I had to do was I literallytook it 10 minutes at a time
because that's all I was capableof.
And I struggle with that becausepre accident I was a very high
achiever. I was doing well in my corporate
role and basically my career mapped out ahead of me, you
(17:41):
know, married to an incredible husband, baby's on the way.
Like everything was so fabulous.And I'm a type A personality.
So everything was, you know, lined out in front of me.
And then to have every single thing stripped away from you.
I just was it even a basic function of walking like that
was taken from me and start to literally hit rock bottom is a
(18:04):
really scary place to be. And so I had to do a lot of
work. The the truth is though, is I
had to do that work immediately because I had a funeral service
to plan. And so there was no time to
grieve or to, you know, do nothing.
It's like I've I've got a funeral and he deserves this
(18:24):
beautiful send off. So that was my first priority
and working through that. But then there is a lot around a
funeral service, and it is that when someone passes is huge.
At the time, I was 29 years old.You're not meant to become a
widow at 29 years old. So I'm 29.
(18:46):
I don't know what I'm meant to do.
I don't know who to call. I don't, you know, I know I'm
dealing with funeral directors and I'm, you know, calling banks
and providing death certificatesto people.
And I'm just thrust into this world that none of us ever
imagined being in. And here I am at 29 years old,
pregnant with triplets. Like just so scary.
(19:09):
It's probably a really good way to describe it.
And, you know, I had no energy. I had no, no concept of what was
also going on. But I just knew that I, I had
this to plan for. And then also the not just the
reality of that, but it's like, hang on, are the bills still
taken care of? Like, is everything automated?
Like is because there is an element that life still happens,
(19:31):
like the mortgage payment's still going to come out.
I need to make sure that things are practically set up or, you
know, just things around the house, you know, did I remember
to lock the door? I don't know because my brains
aren't really working right now.So there are, it's a really
strange place to be in because you're 100% of your energy and
your focus is on sort of a funeral service.
(19:54):
But then everyday life still needs to be taken care of.
And I'm pregnant. So it really got to a point of,
like, 10 minutes at a time and breaking it down.
And also I had to ask for help. That was a really important part
of all of this, is seeking professional help.
And I put my hand up, you know, the week after the accident, and
I was like, I need help and I need it now.
So I was able to be very vocal about that, knowing that that
(20:16):
was the support I needed, despite having beautiful family
and friends who really pitched in and did a lot.
But also, yeah, sort of getting that formal support straight
away. It's so good that you say that
because you know, here at heart on my sleeve, we're talking
about I'm not OK is the three most powerful words that you can
say. And to be able to seek that
(20:37):
support and help no matter whereyou are in your journey, no
matter what storm you're in, is so critical to be able to say.
Because without saying that we can't get the support that we
need during that time, whether it's mentally or, or physically
or having that network of peoplearound you that can, can guide
you Now, Ash, I, I just want to go back to those moments.
(20:57):
I think you, you, you alluded toa, a really good point around
you can only just focus on the next one step.
Like you can't think too much. Probably.
It's just the next one thing that you can sort through.
But then I also challenged my thinking here and, and what you
said about your identity, like your identity had to completely
shift. And, and I remember when we
spoke in the pre conversation, you spoke about the new labels
(21:18):
that appeared in your life that you, that you had to become
accustomed to. Can you just explain that a
little bit further for me? Yeah, absolutely.
This was something that happenedvery quickly in the grief
journey for me. So it was only two weeks after
Matt had passed, I went to the hospital for a scan.
So when you're a triplet mom, all of your scans are done at
hospital. You don't get the luxury of
(21:40):
going to a local ultrasound. But I went into the hospital,
and that was fragile because I'mwalking into an appointment
without my husband, and I'm walking into an appointment
where expectant mothers are withtheir husbands.
So that was a very confronting environment.
Anyway, so I remember walking in, I couldn't look up.
(22:02):
I just looked at the floor the whole time.
And they said, oh, we just need you to complete this form.
And my parents were with me, which, you know, was also, like
I said, very emotional experience.
And I remember sitting in the waiting room surrounded by other
couples and the form, you know, it starts as normal.
(22:23):
Fill out your personal details. And then I got to the question
that said marital status. And at that point I realised
that I had to tick the box widow.
And that was the first time thatI realised that that was my new
(22:43):
label. And that was a moment, but it's
still very hard for me to accept.
I struggled using the word. I've become somewhat more used
to it, I suppose, because it is me.
But I remember that moment of I was already fragile.
I was already crying. And then to see that was just
(23:05):
this real reality check of I'm now in this category.
I'm no longer, you know, I've always considered like I still
see myself married, but instead of ticking the married box, I
had to tick widowed. So that was a hard.
Moment again, thank you, Ashley,for sharing that because I think
(23:26):
people who are listening today, the identity sometimes that we
have to show now physically in our in our worlds may not
necessarily be the ones that we want to carry.
And there has to be a moment. And this is my question to you,
Ash, around how have you been able to move forward?
Because what you're doing right now with yellow Falcon and I
(23:47):
can't wait to talk about this ina little bit bit more of the
journey. But how have you been able to
move into this place of strengthand willingness to not only use
your grief in a way that might be able to support others?
Can you share with us that journey to be able to get to
this point where you are now? Because on I dare say it would
have been, you know, Rd hard travelled as well to be able to
(24:09):
get to where you are right now. Absolutely.
I think the first thing that I needed to do was put up my hand
and say I'm not OK. That was the moment.
Because up until that point, like I said, I was living this
fairy tale and everything was fabulous.
And then I was thrust into this world of going holy moly.
(24:31):
Everything around me has just been taken from me.
I've lost almost everything except our unborn babies.
I mean, even at the time as well, I was also on stand down
due to COVID. So I'd also lost my job, you
know, So it was just this loss after loss.
There were other family members that passed in the same year.
So it was just like absolutely relentless.
(24:53):
But the first thing I did was I had to acknowledge I'm not OK.
The acknowledgement itself was the hardest bit because when you
say I'm not OK, there is a levelof accepting your circumstances
and that's really heavy to carry.
(25:14):
And it's a very courageous step because then it allows you to
see the next step. Not necessarily take the next
step, but to see the next step. And then it allows others to
help you. Because in my situation, I
wasn't able to do that myself. So I needed to say I'm not OK
(25:36):
and I also have no idea what to do.
And I learnt very early on and afriend said this to me because I
felt so overwhelmed with all thedecisions I needed to make, all
the forms I was filling out. And I was just, the decision
fatigue was so real and I genuinely didn't know.
And I kept saying to this friend, I was like, I don't
know, I don't know. And then I was getting more and
more flustered. And she said to me, I don't know
(25:58):
is a full sentence. You don't need to justify
anything beyond that point. You don't need to, you know,
reflect any further, just say I don't know full stop.
So they're probably the two things.
It was the I'm not OK, which wasincredibly difficult and
(26:21):
learning to say I don't know. And it wasn't necessarily then
allowing others to find that answer or provide, you know,
that information because often Ididn't really want their
opinions. I had my own journey.
And that's a lot of what this has been is yes, there is
support, but the truth of the matter is, whether it's grief or
anything else that people are dealing with, I truly believe
(26:43):
that we are the person in it. We can have support, whether
that be formal support or informal support, but ultimately
it is us. We are responsible.
And so that was a learning for me as well to say, you know,
yes, I can ask for advice or yes, I can be talking to my
psychologist, but it's actually up to me.
And in some ways the easy solution to all of this would
(27:05):
have just been to stay in my depression, to stay in my my
grief and just live in that. But that's not what I wanted to
do. That's not a joyful life.
And in most part as well, it's also not honouring Matt and the
life that he would want the kid to be living.
So it actually became in my head, I'm like, Oh, my gosh,
(27:26):
staying in this space, as hard as it is to move from it, by
staying in here, I'm actually doing a disservice to Matt, who
is now, you know, my reason for everything and, you know,
continues to be. So for Matt and the children, if
I'm staying in this space, yeah,that weighed really heavily on
(27:48):
me. So it was that step to move
forward. Such a profound moment there
because you created so much insight for those listening
today. And I think the biggest one that
stuck out for me was the fact that you took the right to own
your story and you took the right to be able to craft the
next version of your story. Not disregarding your past, not
(28:09):
disregarding the trauma heading towards that pain, but realising
that you were you held the pain.Yeah, and that's an important
point to own. The story though, doesn't erase
the pain or it's not me closing that chapter, brushing it off
and pushing it to the side. It's owning it from a place of
love. And to say that that is part of
(28:31):
my story and that required a lotof work.
That was not just this overnightdecision where I'm like, OK,
cool, I'm going to be joyful tomorrow doesn't work like that.
But it is continuing to think about, well, how do I best
honour that story and know that it is part that I carry with me?
Grief doesn't ever leave you. It's not something you move on
(28:51):
from. You carry it with you.
And how do you do that in the most loving way?
Because grief, you know, there'sa lot of quotes out there, but
they say, you know, grief is thelove that's still remains or,
you know, and that's why it's soprevalent in every single moment
of my day. Yeah, it's it's carrying it with
you. But how do you carry it in a way
(29:13):
that honours the love as opposedto, yeah, you know, staying in
that place of sadness? And there's still a lot of those
moments. I always say to people like, I'm
in the trenches, I'm in the arena.
I still have a lot of moments because I've now learnt, you
know, some of the tools to sort of step out of that.
And it's it is the point where Ineed to say I'm not OK.
(29:35):
Ash, as we move forward and as you have ventured into doing
what you do now, what guiding lights are driving you to make
the impact now in who you are, what you stand for?
And what are your hopes for other people who may need
support around certain things like grief, etcetera as well to
(29:56):
see that there is a an opportunity to grow from this
place of pain? One of the main things for me in
doing this type of work has beenthat I am creating knowing that
I was once that girl who needed this.
And you know, I was that girl inthe audience or listening to the
(30:16):
podcast or doing the online research, clutching at straws,
seeking help from a place of fear, from a place of deep
sadness and from a place of complete isolation, not knowing
who I was, where I fit in anymore.
Sadly, that will continue. Sadly, grief is something we
(30:37):
will never escape as human beings.
How do I make it a little easier?
How do I show hope to someone tosay I have travelled this road,
it's not going to be easy. And I've never 1 to sugarcoat it
and say, oh, positive thinking. No, I've, I've done it.
I've done the hard yards and I'mstill doing them.
(31:00):
And these are some of the thingsthat helped me, you know,
sharing that lived experience. But I've also been lucky in
recent times, particularly to start connecting with some other
experts as well. I've never claimed to be an
expert. I'm not a psychologist.
I'm just a, you know, a normal girl who lost her husband.
And I've lived that tragedy. And it can happen to anyone.
(31:24):
And we all have grief. You know, sadly, we've all lost
someone. It's not always a partner.
It could be a parent, a child. Like there is a lot of loss and
there are realities of grief that we need to face.
So how do we get the emotional support?
How do I also connect with the experts as well to support, you
know, my community to say, look,these are all of the things you
(31:46):
may need. How do we create that support,
that holistic support and community where even though our
grief may be different, there's still a level of connection and
we still have this level where Ican relate to you.
And that is what humanity is, because grief is never leaving
us. It's a beautiful fact when we
(32:08):
become real and when we are having these honest and and
vulnerable conversations and thebeauty of that humanity and
connection has in these powerfulmoments of sharing, these
powerful moments of listening. It is something that you know,
we live and breathe here at heart on my sleeve.
And Ashley, it's been awesome today to have you, but I can't
(32:30):
go away without asking you. You know, you see your three
beautiful daughters, how old arethey now?
So I've got a girl and two boys and they're 4 1/2.
So we are really hectic in this household.
It would be crazy, but you know what?
What is it? What is it?
Sum up a triplet life. Now that the kids are here, what
(32:51):
what is it like? I call them Energizer bunnies.
I'm up at 5:00 AM every day, they're up at 5:30 and they go
non stop until bedtime and thereis no break, there is no
downtime. Probably the best way to
describe it actually is a story that happened a few weeks ago.
We had our beautiful friends over for a really casual pizza
(33:13):
making night. So you know, 8-4 year olds,
really casual night, no craziness at all.
And what happened to all of the kids were actually out playing
outside and my daughter walked in and she looked at me and she
said, what are you doing? I said, oh, I'm just chatting
with my friends. And she goes, no, what are you
doing? And then my friend said, oh,
(33:37):
mommy's sitting down. And my daughter had never seen
me sit down. So when I am at home, I, I
genuinely go sit down. There is always something to do,
whether it's making beds, doing laundry, getting lunch boxes.
And she genuinely didn't understand what I was doing.
I sit down for meals because family meals are really
(33:57):
important to me. We always sit down at the dinner
table, TV off and have connection and questions and
conversation. But yeah, literally that was a
moment. And I just laughed, went, oh,
she's right. She's never seen me sit down.
She doesn't understand this concept.
So at 4 1/2 years old, she yeah,she saw mommy sitting down.
So that is the. Difference.
I think Ashley, it's also like what I, what I know of you is
(34:21):
that you are trying to find waysto keep you grounded though as
well. Like, yeah, what, how are you
doing that? What are some of the practises
and what are some of the commitments that you've had to
go with to make sure that you can still have you time to be
personal to you or to do the things that you want to do?
Yeah, that's been an evolving practise.
(34:41):
Honestly, I've really struggled with it.
I feel like I'm getting closer, but I know that as the kids
start school next year, I'll go through another version of that.
But sunrise walks are really precious to me.
I do have a nanny who comes niceand early to support the kids
getting ready for the day so that I can start my day with a
clear head. And that has been game changing
(35:04):
because then when I come home, I'm fully present for the day
with the kids because I've had my moment to just go, OK, not
starting the day with, you know,breakfast craziness.
So that has been really helpful.I'm also very aware of my mental
health and I've learnt what those levels are.
So I do have a psychologist and at the moment I'm doing monthly
(35:25):
sessions, but I also know when to tell her if I need to dial
that up or down. And so I do have to
compartmentalise a lot of my grief for those sessions because
there is a reality of parenting triplets and solo parenting and
that means running a household, looking after three kids,
getting them to swimming lessonsand kindy and all the things.
(35:45):
So there is a very demanding reality of my life, which does
mean I've had to learn to compartmentalise a lot.
But that's not suppressing. So it's a very different thing.
So I make sure that I don't hideany emotion from the kids and
that if mommy's having a sad day, that's OK, let's talk about
it. Why is mommy sad, you know?
And I make sure I honour that for the kids as well.
(36:06):
Like if they're feeling sad, let's talk about that.
What's going on for you? And really supporting them.
So it's really important to me, particularly from this
experience of losing that, is tobe emotionally present for
myself and for the kids. And so that's been really
important, not just for myself, but for our family life, is to
honour those emotions and to support each other through that.
(36:28):
And so I don't ever hide my emotion.
The kids are very aware and I share that.
That's important to me. You know, we talk about daddy
every single day and he's very present.
And they also know, you know, that the loss as well.
And they've got their own grief journey.
So it's important that we are aspresent as we can be.
So it's not a place of suppression, it's a place of
(36:50):
compartmentalising as needed. And yeah, they they're some of
the practises that are really important to me.
Well, Ash, it's a beautiful place where you are right now
because I can see how you in particular are doing the best
you can and the best you can is all that can happen.
You don't need to be anything else.
You're doing everything as good as you can.
(37:13):
And you know, you're creating moments where your kids because
you know, as I mentioned to you Ash, I lost my dad when I was 4.
So to create those little moments where you can honour
Matt in in for your kids is is critical for them to be able to
to grow as well. So Ash, how can people get in
contact with you if they do wantto get in contact with you?
(37:34):
And can you explain a little bitmore about what Yellow Falcon is
all about? Yeah, I'd love to.
The best way to get in contact with me is through Instagram.
So it's Ashley dot Conwell is myhandle or Yellow Dot Falcon, and
I've got a really exciting vision for Yellow Falcon and
where I'm taking it. So I am in the process at the
moment of creating an online course and it is about the
(37:57):
balance of practical grief support.
So when we find ourselves in these situations, what do we
actually have to do? What does that practical process
look like? And what is the the next step?
What is that emotional support beyond that?
And when I say that, it's thingslike returning to work or how do
we navigate these particular situations?
(38:18):
And so that's the online course that I'm working on at the
moment. So I'm excited to to bring that
to life. And also a big part of that is,
like I said, connecting with experts, but also creating a
community that's important and to have that relatability.
I've definitely felt isolated inmy in my new labels of being a
widow and a triplet mum. And so the reality is, as much
(38:41):
support as we may get in our grief, we can feel like no one
understands us. So that's going to be an
important part of the course as well, to have that community
based. So I'm excited.
Yeah, it's in the works. So watch this space.
Watch this space indeed, everyone.
Well, I hope you enjoyed today'spodcast for Heart on My Sleeve.
Please make sure that you connect with Ashley.
(39:02):
It's been an absolute pleasure, Ashley, to have you on the
podcast. So thank you so much for being a
part of it. Thank you so much.
Appreciate it. Emotions have a natural tendency
to dissipate unless they get reinforced.
And so if there's more thoughts,more stories, more intentions to
come along. So the act of how am I leaving
it alone is an act of not an act, adding more stories, adding
(39:25):
fuel to it. So it might not go away in 2
minutes, but it then begins to relax and dissipate.
And so rather than being the person who has to fix, it would
become the person who makes space for the heart, the mind,
to relax and settle away itself.
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