July 16, 2025 • 43 mins
Grief transforms us in ways we never anticipate - sometimes leading us directly into our life's purpose. Lisa McFarland joins Chris to share her extraordinary journey through child loss and how she discovered unexpected meaning on the other side.
After losing her daughter Alexis to a rare genetic bone marrow disease, Lisa took an unusual path: she became a pediatric ICU nurse. This decision marked the beginning of a series of career transitions as she navigated raising her son Zachary, who lives with the same condition that took his sister's life. Through each pivot - from nursing to legal consulting to corporate leadership - Lisa was unconsciously searching for healing.
The conversation delves into what Lisa calls the "grief cloud" - that state where we shut down emotionally to avoid pain. She describes waking consistently at 3AM, finally realizing these moments weren't insomnia but opportunities when her defenses were down enough to hear her true self. These middle-of-the-night revelations eventually led her to make profound life changes, including leaving her marriage and corporate career.
Chris and Lisa explore particularly sensitive territory around medical mistakes and whether to pursue litigation after a loss. Their nuanced discussion offers valuable perspective for anyone facing similar difficult decisions. They share insights about differentiating between happiness (fleeting and situational) versus joy (a deeper, more sustainable state) and how proper self-care creates the foundation for authentic healing.
What makes this episode especially powerful is the connection between two people who've experienced similar profound losses but found different pathways forward. Their conversation demonstrates how sharing our grief stories creates space for others to feel less alone in theirs.
Whether you're navigating personal grief, supporting someone who is, or working professionally with grieving clients, this episode offers both practical wisdom and emotional resonance that will stay with you long after listening.
Did you know you can now Help Us Continue Making Awesome Content for Listeners Affected by Grief!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Real Talk with Life After Grief, chris,
where we talk about relevantissues as it relates to
individuals in grief as theynavigate finances and the
advisors who help them.
We help clients in griefnavigate financial matters.
We also teach advisors how toemotionally and financially work
with clients in grief throughan unparalleled process.
This week's episode issponsored by Life After Grief
(00:24):
Financial Planning and LifeAfter Grief Consulting.
Hello and welcome to anotherepisode of Real Talk with Life
After Grief, chris.
In today's podcast, I have thepleasure of introducing a mother
who has thrived throughsignificant grief from child
(00:44):
loss.
You're going to hear her storyand how her experiences have
helped to shape her, inevitablyto help some other folks, myself
included.
I learn a lot from other peopleand I've learned a lot from.
Lisa is who I'm going to beinterviewing today, and in a
previous podcast I've spokenabout my experience with losing
(01:06):
a child, and Lisa and I sharethat in common.
She's a really dynamic lady whohas traveled to the other side
of grief and now has dedicatedher life to helping others.
We have some definitivesimilarities with some very
stark differences.
I want to introduce youformally to Lisa McFarland.
(01:28):
Hi, lisa, and welcome to theshow.
How are you?
Speaker 2 (01:31):
Hey, Chris, I'm great Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
You're welcome.
Lisa disclosed to me that sheis a freshman being interviewed
in the podcast world.
Lisa actually has her ownpodcast, but this is the first
time she's been interviewed, soyay for me.
I get to get her feet wet.
Speaker 2 (01:51):
The inaugural episode right.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
Yes, the inaugural episode.
So I promise I won't bite you,and if I do, then it's par for
the course.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
Perfect.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
Lisa, I want you to tell us in all seriousness, I
want you to tell us aboutyourself, your journey, anything
that you kind of want todisclose.
I think it's very important forfolks that know me, but you
kind of an extension of me, whohas, like I said, some different
experiences and you've had along road, so to speak.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Yes, sir, I thank you .
I have had a long road and I'mhappy to share it.
This is how we always say theclub that we wish nobody
belonged to.
But here we are, wish that Ididn't know some of the things
that I know.
But the benefit of sharing themis that they hopefully carry
some value and can help you know, help somebody else.
(02:44):
So yeah, I started my familyyoung.
I was in a corporate trainingprogram out of college and our
first pregnancy ended inmiscarriage, which isn't all
that uncommon, but I thoughtthat, you know, that was kind of
out of the way.
Then we were blessed with thepregnancy of our daughter, who
was born in August of 1996, andthen later died in 1997 due to a
(03:07):
bone marrow disease that welater found out was genetic.
But we didn't know right away.
So when we lost our daughter in97, alexis, we did genetic
counseling and tried to spendabout a year understanding what
had happened.
And it's a very complicated.
She had a very complicated body.
But at some point Children'sNational Medical said yeah, you
(03:29):
guys, this was a fluke, you know, go for it.
So we fired up the team bus andhad our son, zach, and soon
after his birth which was verytraumatic, and he was in the
NICU for quite a while.
Then we started to see a lot ofsimilarities between the kids,
like on x-ray their bones lookedlike they had rickets but they
didn't, and certain liverfunction tests were out of whack
(03:53):
, even though it wasn'tconnected to a particular source
.
So we started seeing some ofthese things and, before long,
of course, realized there had tobe a connection between the
kids and that this had to beanother presentation of a
genetic disease.
So we knew the folks atChildren's already and from
there we started a journey withour son, zachary, who's about to
(04:15):
turn 23.
Both of our children have hadSchwachman-Diamond syndrome or
we believe that is theirultimate diagnosis, which is a
genetic condition.
Diamond Syndrome or we believethat is their ultimate diagnosis
, which is a genetic condition.
When our son was born, wethought that we would lose him
at a very young age, the sameway we had lost his sister.
And we also knew that bonemarrow transplant was the number
one way to get ahead of thisbone marrow disease and Zach
(04:39):
should rear its ugly head andthought you know, for that and
many reasons, just because wewanted more children, we thought
having another child was areally good idea, and when our
son, emmanuel, was born in Aprilof 2002, he did not survive.
So what we have is or who wehave, I should say Levine,
(05:01):
zachary, our son.
And through all of this I wasjust a bit of a soldier.
I just felt like, if I playedwell with others and I didn't
let this get to me, I was goingto make lemonade out of lemons.
So when our daughter passed, Idecided to become a pediatric
(05:22):
ICU nurse, which took a coupleof years.
I jumped into an acceleratedprogram, took my boards and in
the meantime got pregnant withZach.
So Zach came soon after that.
So, yeah, I tried to kind ofpivot with like okay, we've got
this special needs kid at home,I've got this degree, now I can
work nights.
(05:42):
My then husband was going tonight law school.
We had a pretty good routinefor trying to cover all the
bases, and then at some point Icouldn't do the sick kids at
work and sick kids at home thing.
So I had to choose, which wasan easy choice, and, by the way,
I was working in the pediatricICU, the neonatal intensive care
(06:06):
unit and also the newborndelivery nursery at the very
hospital where I had deliveredEmmanuel and he had died in my
arms.
So I see that as a really goodmove that I got away from the
bedside because I was exposingmyself.
I didn't realize it's just howunaware I was.
(06:27):
I was just so focused, like Iknow what I'm doing.
This is going to make thingsbetter and nobody get my way.
So I did get away from thebedside and I opted into a
little bit of a career path fromthere, which was to get into
legal nurse consulting, becauseI had this background of
clinical work but I didn't wantto work at the bedside any
(06:49):
longer.
So I then shifted again, becamecertified as a legal nurse
consultant and in that role Iwas working for myself.
I started a company, mcfarlandRN LLC.
I ran that company for almostseven years where I was working
now with attorneys on theirmedical cases, and I was able to
draw on my expertise and myexperience without having to
(07:14):
actually be at the bedside.
So I could work on my own time,market as much or as little as
I wanted, to take on biggerlittle projects, however I
wanted to do it.
I consulted on about 100 casesultimately, before I then left
that role to move back intoreally the corporate mainstream,
where I was a sales leader inthe legal services industry and
(07:35):
managed a team in theMid-Atlantic for another
seven-ish years, and I guess,chris, through the whole thing,
and that was a really longintroduction.
But and I guess, chris, throughthe whole thing, and that was a
really long introduction butthrough the whole thing, I was
just waiting to feel better andwith each step, I mean, I'm a
very spiritual person, I have agood family that was there to
(08:00):
support me and friends andthings like that.
But honestly, I was just waitingto feel better and I tried, you
know, a lot of differentapproaches and what I found over
the last, you know, maybedecade or so, is I was starting
to get these like intuitive hitsI don't know how else to put it
, but they were.
I was having a lot of troublesleeping, like most people I
(08:20):
know, and then in the beginning,like, also like a lot of folks,
was frustrated that I wasgetting, you know, very
disrupted sleep and after awhile, after, you know, reading
and trying to find a way out ofthat issue, I realized that I
was unavailable to my ownconsciousness during the day and
(08:43):
the only time that I could hearmy real true self was at three
o'clock in the morning or fouro'clock in the morning.
And once I kind of realized thatand again it was through, like
reading different things andjust trying to understand it
became more of a blessing than acurse and I started sitting up,
I might make a cup of decaf teaand like all right universe,
(09:04):
I'm awake, like I can hearmyself, I can hear you, let's
get to it.
And that began a period oftransition and in a very short
amount of time I had toreconsider my major, most major
relationship, my marriage and myliving situation, my corporate
role as a sales leader, and inthe end, by this time last year,
(09:27):
I was just submitting myresignation and my corporate job
and in fact my husband and Idid divorce, but we're extremely
close.
So I couldn't make the changesI needed to make earlier because
I couldn't cure them.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
So I would call that a crossroads that you had
reached and I think, in griefand now that you can kind of
take that 30,000 foot view andkind of look down and kind of
see your situation, I see a lotof folks in the same predicament
when I'm working with folks, oreven in my own predicament.
(10:02):
You can't really see yourselfout of it until it's your time,
you know, for things to happen.
And as you're speaking, I'mhearing kind of a lot of
similarities that you know youand I have shared and the
similarity, you know, where youkind of were waking up at three
o'clock in the morning and youjust chose to embrace it.
(10:24):
It took other people in my lifeto kind of say, other people
that are really well respectedand I would never question their
judgment, to say to me hey,chris, um, you know you need to
do some things that are a littlebit different than you're doing
them now.
And my I'm a spiritual personas you are.
(10:45):
My priest said something to methat was so profound and during
my time of grief I was nasty toa lot of people, very nasty, had
a short temper, and that's notnecessarily my nature.
I'm usually a very patientperson, my wife might tell you
different, but generally otherpeople will tell you that I'm
(11:06):
very, very patient and my boyswill probably admit that I'm
very patient with them as well.
But I was not patient.
And I remember one of my guyfriends, my closest guy friend.
We went to college together.
Something happened between usand I remember saying to my wife
you know what, I don't care ifwe're friends any longer.
He can just go by the wayside.
(11:26):
And she looked at me and shesaid you've been friends with
this guy almost 20 years andyou're just going to discard him
that quick.
And she said well, father Leo,my personal priest that has been
my dear priest for such a longtime he said that you need to
apologize to people that youhave scarred and it took a lot.
(11:49):
And I went to my friend hisname is Charlie and I said I'm
sorry and I had a list, a longlist of people that I had to go
back and apologize to.
Probably the biggest person onmy list was my wife she took a
lot my brother and there was anumerous people.
(12:12):
And that was a very healingpoint in my life when I went
back to folks and I apologizedto them.
So and again that kind ofsimilarity where you know you
reached a crossroad or atransition in your life.
I reached the same transitionand it took someone else, kind
of a higher power, to expose me,to let me know that I need to
change this dynamic.
Speaker 2 (12:34):
Yeah, I mean, the first thing that's coming to me,
chris, is like just the sheercourage that it took you to do
that.
Most people can't muster thatup.
That's a higher level.
That's what good looks like ingrief.
I just don't want to havepeople think that that's an easy
thing to do.
It's a terribly hard thing todo, because when we're in pain,
(12:57):
don't we want to be the onesthat are?
I mean, who's apologizing to usthat our mom is gone or our dad
is gone or our child is gone,right?
Sure so I just want to call outhow incredibly courageous of a
move that was and it does makesense.
It does make sense that itbrought healing because,
ultimately, what we're talkingabout whether it's having
(13:19):
someone else call out the factthat we're not ourselves or that
we're missing something reallyimportant, or whether it's
waking up at three in themorning the idea is, when you're
grieving and you get into thiskind of grief cloud, you shut
everything down because youdon't want to feel the pain and
it just kind of closes up allthe communication in general.
(13:41):
So you kind of you know deep.
I call it like a deep freeze.
It's like a heart freeze.
So, yeah, I might not bebawling my eyes out every day,
but I'm also.
I also have no sense of self.
I also have no sense of what Ilike or what makes me happy or
how I want to contribute to theworld.
And when you get to be 50, likeI was, I'm now 52, you really
(14:05):
do.
I mean, it is a transition.
You're right, it's a crossroadsof saying like I'm aging
through this whole process, timehas not stopped and I have two
choices really I can continueunconsciously and be asleep, and
by asleep I mean eating thewrong stuff, not exercising,
drinking too much alcohol, bingewatching, you know, netflix.
(14:28):
Another favorite is, you know,watching old movies that I know
will give me an outlet to cry,like Steel, magnolias or you
know some of those you know,movies were because I wasn't
allowing myself to have thosefeelings on my own.
Speaker 1 (14:42):
So even take it a step further, Lisa, even
committing suicide.
Some people take it to thatextreme.
Speaker 2 (14:50):
Yes, tragically, and I think it's interesting because
I was just blogging andpodcasting about this idea of
connection today actually andreally, when we are not
connected to one another, theisolation is so painful, we
don't know what we're missing,but all the same we can't get
(15:12):
real happy.
I mean, we can get happy.
I don't want to confusehappiness with joy, because joy
is that pervasive feeling thateverything is okay.
Happiness is that fleeting, youknow transactional type of
everything's good.
In this moment I'm going forjoy.
I don't know what other peoplewant.
Speaker 1 (15:29):
I'm going for joy.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
So I knew that if I wanted to be able to feel that,
those parts of my heart that Ihad to let the other stuff out
of the you know, had to let itout of the ground and out of my
bones and let it have a life.
So, yeah, I'm going for joy andI knew there was a very
distinct period of time of abouta year maybe, maybe a year and
(15:52):
a half, 18 months or so around2017, 2018 is when I really
started to crave meaning and Ireally couldn't shut it up and,
yeah, I was talking about beingasleep.
So I remember I'm a big U2 fan,I'm a big music fan period but
I'm Joshua Tree to the end andlove U2.
And they have a song that talksabout being wide awake.
(16:16):
And I remember going into thatnew year I believe that was 2018
, with awake being my word goinginto that year and listening to
that after I meditated andlistening to that while I was
walking and really trying tounderstand for myself what that
even meant.
Because, again, when you're inthat spot, you don't realize all
(16:39):
the white space that's there.
You just know your own routineand that feels normal to you.
But it wasn't.
It's not that it wasn't normal,cause I think a lot of folks.
There's so much despair andpain in the world that you know
everyone is carrying pain andthere are very few of us and
very few of you shared what youjust did is.
So.
It's a profound way to addresswhat's happening, but most
(17:04):
people don't so, whether it'sgrief from losing a job or our
home tragically burning down ora death, no matter what that
grief is, most people aren'tprocessing grief in general in
our communities and in ourculture, because it's about as
popular as talking about, youknow, dying and aging, and so we
don't have a language, we don'thave a conversation that goes
on in our culture, which leavesus to not know what we're
(17:27):
missing.
So, yeah, wide awake became alittle bit of a mantra and I got
courageous myself and startedthinking all right, if I pull
away all these anesthesias,what's here?
And that was traumatic and thatwent on for a couple of years
and during that time, yeah, Idid, I made some major changes
(17:48):
when I left my corporate job, Ididn't so much leave it thinking
, oh, I'm going to start abusiness to share what I know.
It was more like I just want tocreate space to have these
conversations and thrilled thatyou are already creating that
space and whether or not itdevelops in a particular way.
In other words, I'm notattached to how it manifests,
(18:11):
but I just wanted to startputting it out there.
And the truth is, my blog'sabout a year and a half old, but
my website's brand new, becauseI was trying to get a lot of
those things out into the ethosbefore I tried to do anything
else, because that, as you know,is traumatic.
Speaker 1 (18:31):
Yeah, it's a journey.
It is absolutely a journey.
Yeah, it is absolutely ajourney.
Speaker 2 (18:36):
All right.
Speaker 1 (18:36):
There's a couple of, there's several things.
You got my mind racing.
Now, you know, when you reachedyour crossroads it made you
take a step back, pause and sayyou know what's my life all
about here?
No different than mine, and soI've explained.
You know, previously when I hitmy crossroads, so to speak, I
(18:57):
hit rock bottom like I was adrug addict.
For me it was either die or dosomething else with my life.
For me it was that cut and dry,because I just felt like I was
an open sore.
I just had to figure it out.
(19:17):
And that process began ofhealing.
I felt that I had a lot to give, and not that it was so much me
thinking this, it was otherpeople telling me hey, you've
experienced this at a very youngage and you have a lot to give
other people.
You know, in the way that youcarry yourself and the way that
people have done things for you,the people that have mentored
(19:39):
you and that really helped meout.
And like you said, lisa, thatyou know you didn't kind of
start this journey out to eithermake money or do things.
It's kind of just developed andit's developed into a great
thing that you're doing, youknow, helping other people, you
know, through your blog, throughyour podcast, through, you know
(20:01):
, one-on-one, you know,interactions with folks, whether
that's coaching or otherwise,it's a tremendous avenue, you
know, for some other folks.
So I would, you know, commendyou and it's, you know, very
interesting.
So the more people that I bringon and that are on my podcast,
I realize how well educated thefolks are that I bring on and I
(20:28):
I assure you that is not bydesign but just, lisa hearing
you, you are very well educated,lisa hearing you, you are very
well educated, very welleducated.
And you know some moresimilarities pop up.
You know you talked about beinga pediatric ICU nurse, which,
for folks that don't knowanything about nursing, that is
(20:48):
one of the absolute hardestnursing jobs that is available.
That is, you know, availablebecause you're dealing with sick
kids, sick adults is different,folks that have had to live,
they've had the time to livetheir life.
Kids are just starting out andwhen they have traumatic stuff
it's tough.
(21:08):
My wife did not want to be anykind of a peds nurse, kind of a
peds nurse, and so somethingelse that stuck out and I'm, you
know, taking notes, you know,in regards to having to choose
between being a nurse, apediatric nurse, and, you know,
having to, you know, care foryour son.
(21:29):
You know, the two worlds are soclose and it just it dumps on
you and it makes it hard.
My, I have a very, very remotekind of not necessarily
similarity, but a feeling.
So, as you may or may not beaware, lisa, I'm a volunteer for
hospice.
Speaker 2 (21:47):
Oh, okay, yes, I think you told me that.
I'm sorry for that.
Speaker 1 (21:50):
And so in my travels with hospice, they put me in the
same facility.
My mother was in, and it tookme a couple of times to go visit
that facility, and it's theonly way that I can describe it.
Going there, it felt like I waswalking into a burning house.
Every time that I walked in, Ijust had anxiety and I didn't,
(22:16):
and I was like, ah, you knowwhat, I think I can stomach this
, I think I can get through it.
And finally I had to call mycare coordinator and say, hey, I
can't do this.
And I actually spoke to one oftheir counselors it was one
conversation and I said thisisn't something that I can do,
it's not something that I needto revisit in my life, nor
(22:36):
something, a road that I want totravel down.
And I think I can liken that toyour experience Not that it is
the same, but I can liken it toyour experience, sure, of being
a nurse and then having to carefor Zachary at the same time.
Speaker 2 (22:53):
Yeah, and I want to say my son, zachary, who's
almost 23, is very complex, soit's more than just having for
my own experience.
It went from oh my gosh, mydaughter died to oh my gosh, my
daughter and my son died, andthen it went to and now I have
this child who has a feedingtube, who has all kinds of
(23:15):
learning and communication andabsorption and digestion
challenges and every kind oftherapy modality and working to
care for him.
I marvel now in great humilityat what I was able to do during
those years where I was managingeverything and I feel
(23:36):
compassion for the then me thatfelt like, okay, I'm going to
run right into my fiery fear andwork in the very place that is
at the heart of the death of mychildren.
I don't hold it against myself,I just have compassion because
it's not a choice that I wouldmake now and I wish I had had an
(23:58):
earlier wisdom or it might havebeen nice to have it a little
earlier of yours, which is tosay, yeah, this isn't okay for
me.
I just didn't have that senseof self, which I think is also,
you know, sometimes heavier onthe female side, not that we
don't all experience it, butthis idea that I'm a person
outside of my children, outsideof my husband, outside of my
(24:18):
career, that came late for me,even though I have a lot of
reasons to have gotten it sooner.
I just didn't because I was onthat treadmill the whole time.
So, yeah, and I will share toofor you and your listeners, the
very moment.
This is how visceral grief isfor folks listening that don't
(24:40):
know, and maybe a lot of folksdo know listening to this.
It's so visceral that, chris,you can describe walking into
that facility and I instantlyfelt my heart rate jump.
Speaker 1 (24:53):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (24:54):
My stomach turned and it's still hanging around.
I can get a little goosebumpshere.
It's so visceral because I knowthat experience of just it's
just horror and it's not.
It's not that we're the onlyones that feel this way, but it
is that we live in a world wherewe do everything we can not to
(25:15):
feel bad.
Speaker 1 (25:16):
Sure.
Speaker 2 (25:16):
So when you lose a parent or a child or a friend or
a spouse or a pet, even itdoesn't matter you have to learn
how to live in that worldwithout that person, and no one
talks about it or tells us howto do it.
So here we are.
Here I am at the age I'm at now, just starting to say wait a
minute, what the heck justhappened.
Speaker 1 (25:37):
It happens, life comes at you fast and my father
used to say that there's acouple of things that I'm
thinking about because I am afinance guy and there has been
some advice and this is reallynear and dear to you, having
lost children.
And one of my clients came tome probably in the last six to
(25:57):
eight months and said to me andI'm going to put you on the spot
here, lisa and said to me, I'mthinking about getting life
insurance on my child.
And I gave her some advice,which I'm going to withhold
until after Lisa speaks, and wetalked about it and my client is
in a very good financialposition the end of the day.
(26:19):
What I said to her any moneythat you get from the death of
your child how is that going tomake you feel?
And so I'm putting you on thespot, lisa, just to kind of ask
you, since you've been throughso much, what is your thought on
that subject?
Speaker 2 (26:35):
It's a great question , Thank you.
I'm going to answer it in acouple parts.
When we had our daughter whodied at 13 months, we never
thought about life insurancebecause we were living literally
at Children's Hospital.
I think our longest admissionat Children's was nine weeks
straight.
So in between were crises andinfections and it was a very
(27:01):
difficult time.
So that never crossed my radaras a first time mom.
When we had Zach and I wasworking in the pediatric ICU,
they had a financial planner,probably from someone they
contracted with at the hospitalto kind of come through and
present different options, andone of them was life insurance
for Zachary.
And I said you know, he's notreally that healthy of a guy, to
(27:23):
be honest.
He has a feeding tube, he's gotthis that.
The other and the persontalking about the plan with me
said look, you don't need to buyinsurance, but what you might
want to do is just get thisrider.
It's like 10 grand and then,and you don't, he doesn't have
to get it.
And this may all be eithersales jargon, it may not be true
.
Like, this is not my industry,so I'm gonna let you respond to
(27:43):
all that.
Speaker 1 (27:44):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (27:44):
But what he suggested was hey, do the rider.
If nothing else, he doesn'tneed an exam.
If, god forbid, he dies beforehe's 18, you'll get $10,000 and
that will help for the funeral.
Now, if I had never planned mychild's funeral before, I might
not have thought that was aworthy goal.
But having buried my daughterand knowing the costs incredible
(28:07):
costs involved, I thought thatif they're going to give, if
they're going to approve a$10,000 rider if Zach dies
between the time he's now and 18, and it only costs me $20 a
month, that's worth it to me.
So that's the way that Iapproached it, but I think that
there's probably a lot ofdifferent ways to, but that's my
(28:29):
short.
That's my short answer.
Speaker 1 (28:30):
Okay and I appreciate that because that's very candid
.
So as a financial planner, whatI said to my client and again,
my client was in a very goodfinancial position, currently is
in a good financial positionand to them $10,000 would
probably not be a lot of moneytheir child I'm being very
(28:52):
careful here their child is veryhealthy and there is nothing
wrong with their child.
And so my conversation withthem on the financial aspect and
I took it on both sides and Isaid financially you guys could
afford to handle the death ofyour child.
Because they asked me and itwasn't something that I
(29:15):
solicited of them I said if it's$10,000, you guys can stomach
that, it'll be a drop in the hatand would $10,000 help you feel
better?
And it is really ultimatelywhat I said to them If something
happened to your child and themother said no, and then I said,
(29:36):
well, financially speaking,this is because the child brings
in no income for you guys andthe child.
From that aspect, if there wasa loss financially, it really
wouldn't hinder you guys.
Speaker 2 (29:52):
Because it's not affecting an income at all.
Speaker 1 (29:54):
That is correct, and so are you now reaching for
something to make you feelbetter, and I said so.
The question was will it makeyou feel better?
And the answer was no, and Isaid well, financially, you
don't need it, and then,emotionally, it's not going to
make you feel better.
And so the advice is not tohave the life insurance on your
(30:16):
child and the situation you know, like yours, lisa.
By all means.
That is something that comes upand it's not often talked about
in regards to, you know,children, so specifically a
(30:37):
child that is ill very early on,and again, I throw in.
I try to throw in some financialthings you know, here and there
it would be interesting to kindof get your take on that a real
life person.
Speaker 2 (30:44):
And what a gift for you to be able to bring that to
your clients and your colleagues.
I know that it's, you know it'sa unique.
Like I said, we just don't havethe language and the space.
But it's bringing somethingelse up for me which I'm
thinking about, and that is thatwhen Alexis died in 1997, I was
sure that some things had beendone wrong.
(31:07):
I wasn't just sure, I mean Iknew, because there had just
been mistakes were made andthere was a lot.
Speaker 1 (31:13):
So I felt Are you talking about medical mistakes?
Speaker 2 (31:16):
Yes, I'm talking about medical mistakes.
Speaker 1 (31:19):
Okay, I didn't have to infer that because, yes, I've
been there, yep.
Speaker 2 (31:23):
Thank you.
No, I'm glad that you did, foreveryone else too, just to
clarify, but I felt pulledtoward finding out, I mean
literally, like I'll give youone really quick graphic example
.
Alexis had a Broviac catheterwhich went right into her heart
where we gave her her food.
She did not get her food from afeeding tube because she
couldn't absorb it.
And one of the ways and nursingpeople know this medical, but
(31:48):
you know one of the ways that wekeep a port from clotting and
being no good is we squirtheparin into it.
Heparin's a blood thinner.
Let's keep everything fromclotting so that the next time
we go to access that port it'sopen, it's patent.
This is just a quick example,but there was one night that we
had been discharged from thehospital after several weeks and
(32:08):
we're back at our apartment.
One night that we had beendischarged from the hospital
after several weeks and we'reback at our apartment, and at
some point I went in and Alexiswas fussing and crying and the
nurse, I don't know she hadstepped out of the room or
something, and when I picked herup we were covered with blood
and it's all it actually camedown to, as I won't go in the
whole story.
But she never hyperlocked thepoor.
(32:29):
So I know that that mistake wasmade.
So there were mistakes made.
There are mistakes made.
We can't do everythingperfectly.
But what I wanted to do was getsome perspective around what
happens next, because I happenedto be married at that time to a
lawyer lots of lawyers in mycircle, lots of legal stuff
going on.
So I thought, you know, I'mjust going to, I'm just going to
(32:51):
take a look, and I took all therecords in front of mine,
referred me to somebody and Itook all the records in and I
was devastated because this isstill very fresh in the
aftermath of her death.
And I went back a couple ofweeks later and I felt very.
I was just open to whatever therecommendation was going to be.
The attorney gave pardon me.
(33:14):
The attorney gave me what Iconsider to be one of the best,
most generous and compassionategifts in that moment, which was
you know what.
There's some stuff here.
Would it have prevented herfrom dying?
Probably not.
I can't say for sure and we canlook into that.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
I'm smiling because I have a very similar experience
and I give advice on thatsubject, so go ahead, lisa.
Speaker 2 (33:42):
Yeah.
So just wrapping it up is youknow?
Basically, you know you can, wecan litigate this and you may
get some financial restitution.
You may not.
But when we do that, no matterwhat the outcome is, you're
still gonna have to grieve.
So if you get into this wholeproject of litigation, it might
(34:08):
serve as a good distractor andI'm not trying to downplay the
value of a good distractor, andI'm not trying to downplay the
value of a good distractor,because sometimes we need it to
survive.
But he basically said look, youhave a broken heart, you've
buried your daughter.
There's some stuff here, but,big picture, she was a very sick
little girl and if it were me,I would just want to get on with
the process of trying to figureout how to I hate the term move
(34:29):
forward, but how to integrateand move forward.
So that is a situation where Iwas like, yeah, so it's very
personal.
Speaker 1 (34:38):
I wrote a blog specifically to that and I've
consulted a few clients in thatregard and your attorney gave
some very, very good advice.
And what I call in thatsituation, when you're going
through the legal process, oneis you're very angry and upset
when you're in grief, and then,two, you're extending your
(35:00):
grieving process and there's noright answer and there's no
wrong answer in regards to thelegal process.
But I think it really comesdown to is did the facility and
or a doctor or medical staff,did they do something that
(35:20):
drastically shortened I'm beingcrude here, but drastically
shortened a person's life?
Speaker 2 (35:25):
No, or you're saying in general sorry, no.
Speaker 1 (35:27):
You're saying in general, sorry, yeah, in general
.
And in my experience, if theanswer is no, if they were going
to expire in a shorter timethan normal, then it doesn't
really make sense.
And conversely, I had a clientwhose husband went into the
(35:50):
hospital and they did everythingwrong and the husband was the
breadwinner, and so that had adramatic financial effect on the
family.
So in their situation it madesense to go after some funding,
but again it extended the griefof that family.
So in my situation my mother andI've been in some other ones
(36:12):
which I won't disclose, but mymother the facility said not to
put her on anything that woulddiminish her cancer, so to speak
, at the tail end, and they saidher cancer is going to be slow
moving, which was far from thetruth.
So she was admitted in May andshe had one or two lesions on
(36:34):
her spine.
By August she had 12 to 14.
So it was fast moving and itwas very aggressive.
The doctor said no, weshouldn't put her on anything as
far as for cancer.
And looking back I could havegone after the doctors and said
you made a definitive wrongdecision here, but my mother was
(36:55):
going to pass anyways and so itdidn't make sense for me to
extend my grief, but there's noright answer there.
There's really no right answer.
I'd say the right answer is toget the best consultation.
Speaker 2 (37:07):
Objective consultation as possible and
that was those are human tohuman conversations and it's
reminding me so as a legal nurseconsultant going.
The irony would be that then Iwould go into the legal
community in Maryland andVirginia and DC where I'd lost
my own daughter, thought aboutlitigation, realized it probably
wasn't a good idea, made adifferent choice and then here I
(37:30):
am testifying to standard ofcare deviations for other cases
and I did that.
So I was very intimate withthat process and what you're
describing is what's coming tome and I have come to call the
but-for rule.
So it's a but-for, but for thatwhat would be different?
And if it's significant, thenthat gives you a direction.
(37:52):
If it's not significant, thatgives you a direction.
So, but for that mistake, butfor whatever we're looking at,
it just takes us.
I just like those two wordstogether just really helped me
through a lot of differentthings.
Speaker 1 (38:06):
Yeah, we share some very similar experiences.
Speaker 2 (38:09):
We do, we're going to have to talk again.
You're going to have to come onto the Healing Path podcast,
and when I get there, I'm not.
I haven't done any interviewsyet, but I would love to invite
you to be the first.
Speaker 1 (38:21):
Yeah, I would love to be on there.
You know it's it's very easyfor me to talk about these
things and it kind of roll androll and some folks, when I'm
interacting with folks, they'relike man, how do you know about
all this stuff?
And I used to wonder, like myfather, how he knew about a
whole bunch of stuff.
But he just had a whole bunchof life experiences and it's no
(38:42):
different than mine.
Mine are just in differentplaces.
And so I've kind of ingratiatedmyself in this aura to where I
can give this advice.
And I expose myself to goodpeople like you that help me
continue to learn.
So thank you, Lisa.
Thank you for being on thepodcast.
I appreciate you.
Speaker 2 (39:01):
Thank you so much for having me.
It's great to connect withsomeone who has similar
experiences and I think you knowin grief work, that's what it's
really about is connection.
Speaker 1 (39:11):
Sure, I would agree with you, so it helps me.
Speaker 2 (39:13):
I know Helps me.
Speaker 1 (39:16):
Is there anything that I didn't give you an
opportunity to talk about, thatyou wanted to talk about?
Speaker 2 (39:21):
I think the only thing I would take advantage of
the opportunity to throw outthere is, I think about what are
the?
What have been the big leversthat I've been able to pull from
my own grief and healing path?
And I just want to throw outthere just the self care aspect
of grief.
And you know, physically, weknow that we grieve in our
(39:43):
bodies, we know that thattraumatic pain is in our bones,
in our body, and so we'realready struggling physically.
So that's not really the timethat we want to put stuff in our
bodies that's going to make itharder for them to stay afloat.
Also, just the sleep factor alot of us aren't good resters
and so not to harp on it, butself care.
(40:04):
If someone were to say to me,like, what's the lever, what,
what can I pull, I would goright down to and I do this in
the coaching space go right downto fundamentals eat, move,
breathe, sleep.
How are you taking care ofyourself?
Because it's such a majortectonic shift when your body is
getting taken properly care ofthan when we're not taking care
(40:27):
of it, and it made such animpact on me, so I just want to
share that as well.
If you're not taking care ofyourself.
Be kind, be kind to your body,be kind to your mind.
Get some sleep, be with peoplethat care about you.
It will make a huge difference.
Speaker 1 (40:41):
And I'll just add to that it's okay to be selfish.
Speaker 2 (40:44):
I call that self-advocacy.
Speaker 1 (40:45):
I don't call it selfish, Chris.
Speaker 2 (40:47):
It's okay to advocate for ourselves.
Speaker 1 (40:50):
Well, I'm a little more crude because I've had to
tell people that I'm beingselfish in this moment and take
it or leave it.
So it is what it is.
Some folks have cast some illopinions of when I've been in
difficult situations.
That I'm caring for myself.
Speaker 2 (41:06):
Yeah, my mind is spinning again, it should be a
gift, not a sin.
I mean it should be somethingwe're proud of, and we need
people to show us how to do,because we don't know how to say
no, thank you.
Speaker 1 (41:19):
Yep, I agree with you 100% and hopefully you know
your writings, your podcast andyou know what I'm trying to do
on my end.
Help you know with all thatself-care.
So again, lisa, thank you forbeing on the podcast, so I want
to give you an opportunity totell how people can reach you.
What's your website?
Speaker 2 (41:39):
Great Thanks.
Yeah, it's actually my namelisamicfarlandcom, and all the
information about podcasting ison there.
My blog is included in thewebsite and I look forward to
seeing you there.
Speaker 1 (41:53):
So I'll just add to that.
There's a newsletter that youcan sign up for to hear from
Lisa directly, and I will putthat in the notes for this
podcast.
And so, lisa, thank you again.
I appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (42:07):
Thank you again, Chris.
Speaker 1 (42:10):
And for any of my listeners.
Thank you for listening as welland I hope I've given you some
more exposure to kind of someother folks, some real life
folks out in the world, andplease feel free to pass this
podcast or any others, on to anyfriends, colleagues, family
members, on to any friends,colleagues, family members, and
(42:37):
also, if you wouldn't mind, goon to Apple Podcasts, spotify,
google Podcasts and add this toyour listening pleasure, take
care and be well.
Thank you for listening to ourpodcast.
If you are a client and arelooking to work directly with me
, Chris and or my firm, head onover to Life After Grief FP.
(42:59):
That is, Life After Grief FP.
The FP is forfinancialplanningcom dot com.
If you are an advisor lookingto emotionally and financially
work with your client in grief,or if you are a client looking
to get your advisor's head inthe game, head on over to
lifeaftergriefconsultingcom.
That islifeaftergriefconsultingcom.
(43:19):
Any information referenced inthis week's podcast will be
located here in the podcastsection and, as always, please
feel free to share this week'spodcast with any friend, family
member or colleague.
Thanks for listening.
See you next week on the nextepisode.
Welcome to Real Talk with Life After Grief, chris,
where we talk about relevantissues as it relates to
individuals in grief as theynavigate finances and the
advisors who help them.
We help clients in griefnavigate financial matters.
We also teach advisors how toemotionally and financially work
with clients in grief throughan unparalleled process.
This week's episode issponsored by Life After Grief
(00:24):
Financial Planning and LifeAfter Grief Consulting.
Hello and welcome to anotherepisode of Real Talk with Life
After Grief, chris.
In today's podcast, I have thepleasure of introducing a mother
who has thrived throughsignificant grief from child
(00:44):
loss.
You're going to hear her storyand how her experiences have
helped to shape her, inevitablyto help some other folks, myself
included.
I learn a lot from other peopleand I've learned a lot from.
Lisa is who I'm going to beinterviewing today, and in a
previous podcast I've spokenabout my experience with losing
(01:06):
a child, and Lisa and I sharethat in common.
She's a really dynamic lady whohas traveled to the other side
of grief and now has dedicatedher life to helping others.
We have some definitivesimilarities with some very
stark differences.
I want to introduce youformally to Lisa McFarland.
(01:28):
Hi, lisa, and welcome to theshow.
How are you?
Speaker 2 (01:31):
Hey, Chris, I'm great Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
You're welcome.
Lisa disclosed to me that sheis a freshman being interviewed
in the podcast world.
Lisa actually has her ownpodcast, but this is the first
time she's been interviewed, soyay for me.
I get to get her feet wet.
Speaker 2 (01:51):
The inaugural episode right.
Speaker 1 (01:53):
Yes, the inaugural episode.
So I promise I won't bite you,and if I do, then it's par for
the course.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
Perfect.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
Lisa, I want you to tell us in all seriousness, I
want you to tell us aboutyourself, your journey, anything
that you kind of want todisclose.
I think it's very important forfolks that know me, but you
kind of an extension of me, whohas, like I said, some different
experiences and you've had along road, so to speak.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Yes, sir, I thank you .
I have had a long road and I'mhappy to share it.
This is how we always say theclub that we wish nobody
belonged to.
But here we are, wish that Ididn't know some of the things
that I know.
But the benefit of sharing themis that they hopefully carry
some value and can help you know, help somebody else.
(02:44):
So yeah, I started my familyyoung.
I was in a corporate trainingprogram out of college and our
first pregnancy ended inmiscarriage, which isn't all
that uncommon, but I thoughtthat, you know, that was kind of
out of the way.
Then we were blessed with thepregnancy of our daughter, who
was born in August of 1996, andthen later died in 1997 due to a
(03:07):
bone marrow disease that welater found out was genetic.
But we didn't know right away.
So when we lost our daughter in97, alexis, we did genetic
counseling and tried to spendabout a year understanding what
had happened.
And it's a very complicated.
She had a very complicated body.
But at some point Children'sNational Medical said yeah, you
(03:29):
guys, this was a fluke, you know, go for it.
So we fired up the team bus andhad our son, zach, and soon
after his birth which was verytraumatic, and he was in the
NICU for quite a while.
Then we started to see a lot ofsimilarities between the kids,
like on x-ray their bones lookedlike they had rickets but they
didn't, and certain liverfunction tests were out of whack
(03:53):
, even though it wasn'tconnected to a particular source
.
So we started seeing some ofthese things and, before long,
of course, realized there had tobe a connection between the
kids and that this had to beanother presentation of a
genetic disease.
So we knew the folks atChildren's already and from
there we started a journey withour son, zachary, who's about to
(04:15):
turn 23.
Both of our children have hadSchwachman-Diamond syndrome or
we believe that is theirultimate diagnosis, which is a
genetic condition.
Diamond Syndrome or we believethat is their ultimate diagnosis
, which is a genetic condition.
When our son was born, wethought that we would lose him
at a very young age, the sameway we had lost his sister.
And we also knew that bonemarrow transplant was the number
one way to get ahead of thisbone marrow disease and Zach
(04:39):
should rear its ugly head andthought you know, for that and
many reasons, just because wewanted more children, we thought
having another child was areally good idea, and when our
son, emmanuel, was born in Aprilof 2002, he did not survive.
So what we have is or who wehave, I should say Levine,
(05:01):
zachary, our son.
And through all of this I wasjust a bit of a soldier.
I just felt like, if I playedwell with others and I didn't
let this get to me, I was goingto make lemonade out of lemons.
So when our daughter passed, Idecided to become a pediatric
(05:22):
ICU nurse, which took a coupleof years.
I jumped into an acceleratedprogram, took my boards and in
the meantime got pregnant withZach.
So Zach came soon after that.
So, yeah, I tried to kind ofpivot with like okay, we've got
this special needs kid at home,I've got this degree, now I can
work nights.
(05:42):
My then husband was going tonight law school.
We had a pretty good routinefor trying to cover all the
bases, and then at some point Icouldn't do the sick kids at
work and sick kids at home thing.
So I had to choose, which wasan easy choice, and, by the way,
I was working in the pediatricICU, the neonatal intensive care
(06:06):
unit and also the newborndelivery nursery at the very
hospital where I had deliveredEmmanuel and he had died in my
arms.
So I see that as a really goodmove that I got away from the
bedside because I was exposingmyself.
I didn't realize it's just howunaware I was.
(06:27):
I was just so focused, like Iknow what I'm doing.
This is going to make thingsbetter and nobody get my way.
So I did get away from thebedside and I opted into a
little bit of a career path fromthere, which was to get into
legal nurse consulting, becauseI had this background of
clinical work but I didn't wantto work at the bedside any
(06:49):
longer.
So I then shifted again, becamecertified as a legal nurse
consultant and in that role Iwas working for myself.
I started a company, mcfarlandRN LLC.
I ran that company for almostseven years where I was working
now with attorneys on theirmedical cases, and I was able to
draw on my expertise and myexperience without having to
(07:14):
actually be at the bedside.
So I could work on my own time,market as much or as little as
I wanted, to take on biggerlittle projects, however I
wanted to do it.
I consulted on about 100 casesultimately, before I then left
that role to move back intoreally the corporate mainstream,
where I was a sales leader inthe legal services industry and
(07:35):
managed a team in theMid-Atlantic for another
seven-ish years, and I guess,chris, through the whole thing,
and that was a really longintroduction.
But and I guess, chris, throughthe whole thing, and that was a
really long introduction butthrough the whole thing, I was
just waiting to feel better andwith each step, I mean, I'm a
very spiritual person, I have agood family that was there to
(08:00):
support me and friends andthings like that.
But honestly, I was just waitingto feel better and I tried, you
know, a lot of differentapproaches and what I found over
the last, you know, maybedecade or so, is I was starting
to get these like intuitive hitsI don't know how else to put it
, but they were.
I was having a lot of troublesleeping, like most people I
(08:20):
know, and then in the beginning,like, also like a lot of folks,
was frustrated that I wasgetting, you know, very
disrupted sleep and after awhile, after, you know, reading
and trying to find a way out ofthat issue, I realized that I
was unavailable to my ownconsciousness during the day and
(08:43):
the only time that I could hearmy real true self was at three
o'clock in the morning or fouro'clock in the morning.
And once I kind of realized thatand again it was through, like
reading different things andjust trying to understand it
became more of a blessing than acurse and I started sitting up,
I might make a cup of decaf teaand like all right universe,
(09:04):
I'm awake, like I can hearmyself, I can hear you, let's
get to it.
And that began a period oftransition and in a very short
amount of time I had toreconsider my major, most major
relationship, my marriage and myliving situation, my corporate
role as a sales leader, and inthe end, by this time last year,
(09:27):
I was just submitting myresignation and my corporate job
and in fact my husband and Idid divorce, but we're extremely
close.
So I couldn't make the changesI needed to make earlier because
I couldn't cure them.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
So I would call that a crossroads that you had
reached and I think, in griefand now that you can kind of
take that 30,000 foot view andkind of look down and kind of
see your situation, I see a lotof folks in the same predicament
when I'm working with folks, oreven in my own predicament.
(10:02):
You can't really see yourselfout of it until it's your time,
you know, for things to happen.
And as you're speaking, I'mhearing kind of a lot of
similarities that you know youand I have shared and the
similarity, you know, where youkind of were waking up at three
o'clock in the morning and youjust chose to embrace it.
(10:24):
It took other people in my lifeto kind of say, other people
that are really well respectedand I would never question their
judgment, to say to me hey,chris, um, you know you need to
do some things that are a littlebit different than you're doing
them now.
And my I'm a spiritual personas you are.
(10:45):
My priest said something to methat was so profound and during
my time of grief I was nasty toa lot of people, very nasty, had
a short temper, and that's notnecessarily my nature.
I'm usually a very patientperson, my wife might tell you
different, but generally otherpeople will tell you that I'm
(11:06):
very, very patient and my boyswill probably admit that I'm
very patient with them as well.
But I was not patient.
And I remember one of my guyfriends, my closest guy friend.
We went to college together.
Something happened between usand I remember saying to my wife
you know what, I don't care ifwe're friends any longer.
He can just go by the wayside.
(11:26):
And she looked at me and shesaid you've been friends with
this guy almost 20 years andyou're just going to discard him
that quick.
And she said well, father Leo,my personal priest that has been
my dear priest for such a longtime he said that you need to
apologize to people that youhave scarred and it took a lot.
(11:49):
And I went to my friend hisname is Charlie and I said I'm
sorry and I had a list, a longlist of people that I had to go
back and apologize to.
Probably the biggest person onmy list was my wife she took a
lot my brother and there was anumerous people.
(12:12):
And that was a very healingpoint in my life when I went
back to folks and I apologizedto them.
So and again that kind ofsimilarity where you know you
reached a crossroad or atransition in your life.
I reached the same transitionand it took someone else, kind
of a higher power, to expose me,to let me know that I need to
change this dynamic.
Speaker 2 (12:34):
Yeah, I mean, the first thing that's coming to me,
chris, is like just the sheercourage that it took you to do
that.
Most people can't muster thatup.
That's a higher level.
That's what good looks like ingrief.
I just don't want to havepeople think that that's an easy
thing to do.
It's a terribly hard thing todo, because when we're in pain,
(12:57):
don't we want to be the onesthat are?
I mean, who's apologizing to usthat our mom is gone or our dad
is gone or our child is gone,right?
Sure so I just want to call outhow incredibly courageous of a
move that was and it does makesense.
It does make sense that itbrought healing because,
ultimately, what we're talkingabout whether it's having
(13:19):
someone else call out the factthat we're not ourselves or that
we're missing something reallyimportant, or whether it's
waking up at three in themorning the idea is, when you're
grieving and you get into thiskind of grief cloud, you shut
everything down because youdon't want to feel the pain and
it just kind of closes up allthe communication in general.
(13:41):
So you kind of you know deep.
I call it like a deep freeze.
It's like a heart freeze.
So, yeah, I might not bebawling my eyes out every day,
but I'm also.
I also have no sense of self.
I also have no sense of what Ilike or what makes me happy or
how I want to contribute to theworld.
And when you get to be 50, likeI was, I'm now 52, you really
(14:05):
do.
I mean, it is a transition.
You're right, it's a crossroadsof saying like I'm aging
through this whole process, timehas not stopped and I have two
choices really I can continueunconsciously and be asleep, and
by asleep I mean eating thewrong stuff, not exercising,
drinking too much alcohol, bingewatching, you know, netflix.
(14:28):
Another favorite is, you know,watching old movies that I know
will give me an outlet to cry,like Steel, magnolias or you
know some of those you know,movies were because I wasn't
allowing myself to have thosefeelings on my own.
Speaker 1 (14:42):
So even take it a step further, Lisa, even
committing suicide.
Some people take it to thatextreme.
Speaker 2 (14:50):
Yes, tragically, and I think it's interesting because
I was just blogging andpodcasting about this idea of
connection today actually andreally, when we are not
connected to one another, theisolation is so painful, we
don't know what we're missing,but all the same we can't get
(15:12):
real happy.
I mean, we can get happy.
I don't want to confusehappiness with joy, because joy
is that pervasive feeling thateverything is okay.
Happiness is that fleeting, youknow transactional type of
everything's good.
In this moment I'm going forjoy.
I don't know what other peoplewant.
Speaker 1 (15:29):
I'm going for joy.
Speaker 2 (15:29):
So I knew that if I wanted to be able to feel that,
those parts of my heart that Ihad to let the other stuff out
of the you know, had to let itout of the ground and out of my
bones and let it have a life.
So, yeah, I'm going for joy andI knew there was a very
distinct period of time of abouta year maybe, maybe a year and
(15:52):
a half, 18 months or so around2017, 2018 is when I really
started to crave meaning and Ireally couldn't shut it up and,
yeah, I was talking about beingasleep.
So I remember I'm a big U2 fan,I'm a big music fan period but
I'm Joshua Tree to the end andlove U2.
And they have a song that talksabout being wide awake.
(16:16):
And I remember going into thatnew year I believe that was 2018
, with awake being my word goinginto that year and listening to
that after I meditated andlistening to that while I was
walking and really trying tounderstand for myself what that
even meant.
Because, again, when you're inthat spot, you don't realize all
(16:39):
the white space that's there.
You just know your own routineand that feels normal to you.
But it wasn't.
It's not that it wasn't normal,cause I think a lot of folks.
There's so much despair andpain in the world that you know
everyone is carrying pain andthere are very few of us and
very few of you shared what youjust did is.
So.
It's a profound way to addresswhat's happening, but most
(17:04):
people don't so, whether it'sgrief from losing a job or our
home tragically burning down ora death, no matter what that
grief is, most people aren'tprocessing grief in general in
our communities and in ourculture, because it's about as
popular as talking about, youknow, dying and aging, and so we
don't have a language, we don'thave a conversation that goes
on in our culture, which leavesus to not know what we're
(17:27):
missing.
So, yeah, wide awake became alittle bit of a mantra and I got
courageous myself and startedthinking all right, if I pull
away all these anesthesias,what's here?
And that was traumatic and thatwent on for a couple of years
and during that time, yeah, Idid, I made some major changes
(17:48):
when I left my corporate job, Ididn't so much leave it thinking
, oh, I'm going to start abusiness to share what I know.
It was more like I just want tocreate space to have these
conversations and thrilled thatyou are already creating that
space and whether or not itdevelops in a particular way.
In other words, I'm notattached to how it manifests,
(18:11):
but I just wanted to startputting it out there.
And the truth is, my blog'sabout a year and a half old, but
my website's brand new, becauseI was trying to get a lot of
those things out into the ethosbefore I tried to do anything
else, because that, as you know,is traumatic.
Speaker 1 (18:31):
Yeah, it's a journey.
It is absolutely a journey.
Yeah, it is absolutely ajourney.
Speaker 2 (18:36):
All right.
Speaker 1 (18:36):
There's a couple of, there's several things.
You got my mind racing.
Now, you know, when you reachedyour crossroads it made you
take a step back, pause and sayyou know what's my life all
about here?
No different than mine, and soI've explained.
You know, previously when I hitmy crossroads, so to speak, I
(18:57):
hit rock bottom like I was adrug addict.
For me it was either die or dosomething else with my life.
For me it was that cut and dry,because I just felt like I was
an open sore.
I just had to figure it out.
(19:17):
And that process began ofhealing.
I felt that I had a lot to give, and not that it was so much me
thinking this, it was otherpeople telling me hey, you've
experienced this at a very youngage and you have a lot to give
other people.
You know, in the way that youcarry yourself and the way that
people have done things for you,the people that have mentored
(19:39):
you and that really helped meout.
And like you said, lisa, thatyou know you didn't kind of
start this journey out to eithermake money or do things.
It's kind of just developed andit's developed into a great
thing that you're doing, youknow, helping other people, you
know, through your blog, throughyour podcast, through, you know
(20:01):
, one-on-one, you know,interactions with folks, whether
that's coaching or otherwise,it's a tremendous avenue, you
know, for some other folks.
So I would, you know, commendyou and it's, you know, very
interesting.
So the more people that I bringon and that are on my podcast,
I realize how well educated thefolks are that I bring on and I
(20:28):
I assure you that is not bydesign but just, lisa hearing
you, you are very well educated,lisa hearing you, you are very
well educated, very welleducated.
And you know some moresimilarities pop up.
You know you talked about beinga pediatric ICU nurse, which,
for folks that don't knowanything about nursing, that is
(20:48):
one of the absolute hardestnursing jobs that is available.
That is, you know, availablebecause you're dealing with sick
kids, sick adults is different,folks that have had to live,
they've had the time to livetheir life.
Kids are just starting out andwhen they have traumatic stuff
it's tough.
(21:08):
My wife did not want to be anykind of a peds nurse, kind of a
peds nurse, and so somethingelse that stuck out and I'm, you
know, taking notes, you know,in regards to having to choose
between being a nurse, apediatric nurse, and, you know,
having to, you know, care foryour son.
(21:29):
You know, the two worlds are soclose and it just it dumps on
you and it makes it hard.
My, I have a very, very remotekind of not necessarily
similarity, but a feeling.
So, as you may or may not beaware, lisa, I'm a volunteer for
hospice.
Speaker 2 (21:47):
Oh, okay, yes, I think you told me that.
I'm sorry for that.
Speaker 1 (21:50):
And so in my travels with hospice, they put me in the
same facility.
My mother was in, and it tookme a couple of times to go visit
that facility, and it's theonly way that I can describe it.
Going there, it felt like I waswalking into a burning house.
Every time that I walked in, Ijust had anxiety and I didn't,
(22:16):
and I was like, ah, you knowwhat, I think I can stomach this
, I think I can get through it.
And finally I had to call mycare coordinator and say, hey, I
can't do this.
And I actually spoke to one oftheir counselors it was one
conversation and I said thisisn't something that I can do,
it's not something that I needto revisit in my life, nor
(22:36):
something, a road that I want totravel down.
And I think I can liken that toyour experience Not that it is
the same, but I can liken it toyour experience, sure, of being
a nurse and then having to carefor Zachary at the same time.
Speaker 2 (22:53):
Yeah, and I want to say my son, zachary, who's
almost 23, is very complex, soit's more than just having for
my own experience.
It went from oh my gosh, mydaughter died to oh my gosh, my
daughter and my son died, andthen it went to and now I have
this child who has a feedingtube, who has all kinds of
(23:15):
learning and communication andabsorption and digestion
challenges and every kind oftherapy modality and working to
care for him.
I marvel now in great humilityat what I was able to do during
those years where I was managingeverything and I feel
(23:36):
compassion for the then me thatfelt like, okay, I'm going to
run right into my fiery fear andwork in the very place that is
at the heart of the death of mychildren.
I don't hold it against myself,I just have compassion because
it's not a choice that I wouldmake now and I wish I had had an
(23:58):
earlier wisdom or it might havebeen nice to have it a little
earlier of yours, which is tosay, yeah, this isn't okay for
me.
I just didn't have that senseof self, which I think is also,
you know, sometimes heavier onthe female side, not that we
don't all experience it, butthis idea that I'm a person
outside of my children, outsideof my husband, outside of my
(24:18):
career, that came late for me,even though I have a lot of
reasons to have gotten it sooner.
I just didn't because I was onthat treadmill the whole time.
So, yeah, and I will share toofor you and your listeners, the
very moment.
This is how visceral grief isfor folks listening that don't
(24:40):
know, and maybe a lot of folksdo know listening to this.
It's so visceral that, chris,you can describe walking into
that facility and I instantlyfelt my heart rate jump.
Speaker 1 (24:53):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (24:54):
My stomach turned and it's still hanging around.
I can get a little goosebumpshere.
It's so visceral because I knowthat experience of just it's
just horror and it's not.
It's not that we're the onlyones that feel this way, but it
is that we live in a world wherewe do everything we can not to
(25:15):
feel bad.
Speaker 1 (25:16):
Sure.
Speaker 2 (25:16):
So when you lose a parent or a child or a friend or
a spouse or a pet, even itdoesn't matter you have to learn
how to live in that worldwithout that person, and no one
talks about it or tells us howto do it.
So here we are.
Here I am at the age I'm at now, just starting to say wait a
minute, what the heck justhappened.
Speaker 1 (25:37):
It happens, life comes at you fast and my father
used to say that there's acouple of things that I'm
thinking about because I am afinance guy and there has been
some advice and this is reallynear and dear to you, having
lost children.
And one of my clients came tome probably in the last six to
(25:57):
eight months and said to me andI'm going to put you on the spot
here, lisa and said to me, I'mthinking about getting life
insurance on my child.
And I gave her some advice,which I'm going to withhold
until after Lisa speaks, and wetalked about it and my client is
in a very good financialposition the end of the day.
(26:19):
What I said to her any moneythat you get from the death of
your child how is that going tomake you feel?
And so I'm putting you on thespot, lisa, just to kind of ask
you, since you've been throughso much, what is your thought on
that subject?
Speaker 2 (26:35):
It's a great question , Thank you.
I'm going to answer it in acouple parts.
When we had our daughter whodied at 13 months, we never
thought about life insurancebecause we were living literally
at Children's Hospital.
I think our longest admissionat Children's was nine weeks
straight.
So in between were crises andinfections and it was a very
(27:01):
difficult time.
So that never crossed my radaras a first time mom.
When we had Zach and I wasworking in the pediatric ICU,
they had a financial planner,probably from someone they
contracted with at the hospitalto kind of come through and
present different options, andone of them was life insurance
for Zachary.
And I said you know, he's notreally that healthy of a guy, to
(27:23):
be honest.
He has a feeding tube, he's gotthis that.
The other and the persontalking about the plan with me
said look, you don't need to buyinsurance, but what you might
want to do is just get thisrider.
It's like 10 grand and then,and you don't, he doesn't have
to get it.
And this may all be eithersales jargon, it may not be true
.
Like, this is not my industry,so I'm gonna let you respond to
(27:43):
all that.
Speaker 1 (27:44):
Okay.
Speaker 2 (27:44):
But what he suggested was hey, do the rider.
If nothing else, he doesn'tneed an exam.
If, god forbid, he dies beforehe's 18, you'll get $10,000 and
that will help for the funeral.
Now, if I had never planned mychild's funeral before, I might
not have thought that was aworthy goal.
But having buried my daughterand knowing the costs incredible
(28:07):
costs involved, I thought thatif they're going to give, if
they're going to approve a$10,000 rider if Zach dies
between the time he's now and 18, and it only costs me $20 a
month, that's worth it to me.
So that's the way that Iapproached it, but I think that
there's probably a lot ofdifferent ways to, but that's my
(28:29):
short.
That's my short answer.
Speaker 1 (28:30):
Okay and I appreciate that because that's very candid
.
So as a financial planner, whatI said to my client and again,
my client was in a very goodfinancial position, currently is
in a good financial positionand to them $10,000 would
probably not be a lot of moneytheir child I'm being very
(28:52):
careful here their child is veryhealthy and there is nothing
wrong with their child.
And so my conversation withthem on the financial aspect and
I took it on both sides and Isaid financially you guys could
afford to handle the death ofyour child.
Because they asked me and itwasn't something that I
(29:15):
solicited of them I said if it's$10,000, you guys can stomach
that, it'll be a drop in the hatand would $10,000 help you feel
better?
And it is really ultimatelywhat I said to them If something
happened to your child and themother said no, and then I said,
(29:36):
well, financially speaking,this is because the child brings
in no income for you guys andthe child.
From that aspect, if there wasa loss financially, it really
wouldn't hinder you guys.
Speaker 2 (29:52):
Because it's not affecting an income at all.
Speaker 1 (29:54):
That is correct, and so are you now reaching for
something to make you feelbetter, and I said so.
The question was will it makeyou feel better?
And the answer was no, and Isaid well, financially, you
don't need it, and then,emotionally, it's not going to
make you feel better.
And so the advice is not tohave the life insurance on your
(30:16):
child and the situation you know, like yours, lisa.
By all means.
That is something that comes upand it's not often talked about
in regards to, you know,children, so specifically a
(30:37):
child that is ill very early on,and again, I throw in.
I try to throw in some financialthings you know, here and there
it would be interesting to kindof get your take on that a real
life person.
Speaker 2 (30:44):
And what a gift for you to be able to bring that to
your clients and your colleagues.
I know that it's, you know it'sa unique.
Like I said, we just don't havethe language and the space.
But it's bringing somethingelse up for me which I'm
thinking about, and that is thatwhen Alexis died in 1997, I was
sure that some things had beendone wrong.
(31:07):
I wasn't just sure, I mean Iknew, because there had just
been mistakes were made andthere was a lot.
Speaker 1 (31:13):
So I felt Are you talking about medical mistakes?
Speaker 2 (31:16):
Yes, I'm talking about medical mistakes.
Speaker 1 (31:19):
Okay, I didn't have to infer that because, yes, I've
been there, yep.
Speaker 2 (31:23):
Thank you.
No, I'm glad that you did, foreveryone else too, just to
clarify, but I felt pulledtoward finding out, I mean
literally, like I'll give youone really quick graphic example
.
Alexis had a Broviac catheterwhich went right into her heart
where we gave her her food.
She did not get her food from afeeding tube because she
couldn't absorb it.
And one of the ways and nursingpeople know this medical, but
(31:48):
you know one of the ways that wekeep a port from clotting and
being no good is we squirtheparin into it.
Heparin's a blood thinner.
Let's keep everything fromclotting so that the next time
we go to access that port it'sopen, it's patent.
This is just a quick example,but there was one night that we
had been discharged from thehospital after several weeks and
(32:08):
we're back at our apartment.
One night that we had beendischarged from the hospital
after several weeks and we'reback at our apartment, and at
some point I went in and Alexiswas fussing and crying and the
nurse, I don't know she hadstepped out of the room or
something, and when I picked herup we were covered with blood
and it's all it actually camedown to, as I won't go in the
whole story.
But she never hyperlocked thepoor.
(32:29):
So I know that that mistake wasmade.
So there were mistakes made.
There are mistakes made.
We can't do everythingperfectly.
But what I wanted to do was getsome perspective around what
happens next, because I happenedto be married at that time to a
lawyer lots of lawyers in mycircle, lots of legal stuff
going on.
So I thought, you know, I'mjust going to, I'm just going to
(32:51):
take a look, and I took all therecords in front of mine,
referred me to somebody and Itook all the records in and I
was devastated because this isstill very fresh in the
aftermath of her death.
And I went back a couple ofweeks later and I felt very.
I was just open to whatever therecommendation was going to be.
The attorney gave pardon me.
(33:14):
The attorney gave me what Iconsider to be one of the best,
most generous and compassionategifts in that moment, which was
you know what.
There's some stuff here.
Would it have prevented herfrom dying?
Probably not.
I can't say for sure and we canlook into that.
Speaker 1 (33:34):
I'm smiling because I have a very similar experience
and I give advice on thatsubject, so go ahead, lisa.
Speaker 2 (33:42):
Yeah.
So just wrapping it up is youknow?
Basically, you know you can, wecan litigate this and you may
get some financial restitution.
You may not.
But when we do that, no matterwhat the outcome is, you're
still gonna have to grieve.
So if you get into this wholeproject of litigation, it might
(34:08):
serve as a good distractor andI'm not trying to downplay the
value of a good distractor, andI'm not trying to downplay the
value of a good distractor,because sometimes we need it to
survive.
But he basically said look, youhave a broken heart, you've
buried your daughter.
There's some stuff here, but,big picture, she was a very sick
little girl and if it were me,I would just want to get on with
the process of trying to figureout how to I hate the term move
(34:29):
forward, but how to integrateand move forward.
So that is a situation where Iwas like, yeah, so it's very
personal.
Speaker 1 (34:38):
I wrote a blog specifically to that and I've
consulted a few clients in thatregard and your attorney gave
some very, very good advice.
And what I call in thatsituation, when you're going
through the legal process, oneis you're very angry and upset
when you're in grief, and then,two, you're extending your
(35:00):
grieving process and there's noright answer and there's no
wrong answer in regards to thelegal process.
But I think it really comesdown to is did the facility and
or a doctor or medical staff,did they do something that
(35:20):
drastically shortened I'm beingcrude here, but drastically
shortened a person's life?
Speaker 2 (35:25):
No, or you're saying in general sorry, no.
Speaker 1 (35:27):
You're saying in general, sorry, yeah, in general
.
And in my experience, if theanswer is no, if they were going
to expire in a shorter timethan normal, then it doesn't
really make sense.
And conversely, I had a clientwhose husband went into the
(35:50):
hospital and they did everythingwrong and the husband was the
breadwinner, and so that had adramatic financial effect on the
family.
So in their situation it madesense to go after some funding,
but again it extended the griefof that family.
So in my situation my mother andI've been in some other ones
(36:12):
which I won't disclose, but mymother the facility said not to
put her on anything that woulddiminish her cancer, so to speak
, at the tail end, and they saidher cancer is going to be slow
moving, which was far from thetruth.
So she was admitted in May andshe had one or two lesions on
(36:34):
her spine.
By August she had 12 to 14.
So it was fast moving and itwas very aggressive.
The doctor said no, weshouldn't put her on anything as
far as for cancer.
And looking back I could havegone after the doctors and said
you made a definitive wrongdecision here, but my mother was
(36:55):
going to pass anyways and so itdidn't make sense for me to
extend my grief, but there's noright answer there.
There's really no right answer.
I'd say the right answer is toget the best consultation.
Speaker 2 (37:07):
Objective consultation as possible and
that was those are human tohuman conversations and it's
reminding me so as a legal nurseconsultant going.
The irony would be that then Iwould go into the legal
community in Maryland andVirginia and DC where I'd lost
my own daughter, thought aboutlitigation, realized it probably
wasn't a good idea, made adifferent choice and then here I
(37:30):
am testifying to standard ofcare deviations for other cases
and I did that.
So I was very intimate withthat process and what you're
describing is what's coming tome and I have come to call the
but-for rule.
So it's a but-for, but for thatwhat would be different?
And if it's significant, thenthat gives you a direction.
(37:52):
If it's not significant, thatgives you a direction.
So, but for that mistake, butfor whatever we're looking at,
it just takes us.
I just like those two wordstogether just really helped me
through a lot of differentthings.
Speaker 1 (38:06):
Yeah, we share some very similar experiences.
Speaker 2 (38:09):
We do, we're going to have to talk again.
You're going to have to come onto the Healing Path podcast,
and when I get there, I'm not.
I haven't done any interviewsyet, but I would love to invite
you to be the first.
Speaker 1 (38:21):
Yeah, I would love to be on there.
You know it's it's very easyfor me to talk about these
things and it kind of roll androll and some folks, when I'm
interacting with folks, they'relike man, how do you know about
all this stuff?
And I used to wonder, like myfather, how he knew about a
whole bunch of stuff.
But he just had a whole bunchof life experiences and it's no
(38:42):
different than mine.
Mine are just in differentplaces.
And so I've kind of ingratiatedmyself in this aura to where I
can give this advice.
And I expose myself to goodpeople like you that help me
continue to learn.
So thank you, Lisa.
Thank you for being on thepodcast.
I appreciate you.
Speaker 2 (39:01):
Thank you so much for having me.
It's great to connect withsomeone who has similar
experiences and I think you knowin grief work, that's what it's
really about is connection.
Speaker 1 (39:11):
Sure, I would agree with you, so it helps me.
Speaker 2 (39:13):
I know Helps me.
Speaker 1 (39:16):
Is there anything that I didn't give you an
opportunity to talk about, thatyou wanted to talk about?
Speaker 2 (39:21):
I think the only thing I would take advantage of
the opportunity to throw outthere is, I think about what are
the?
What have been the big leversthat I've been able to pull from
my own grief and healing path?
And I just want to throw outthere just the self care aspect
of grief.
And you know, physically, weknow that we grieve in our
(39:43):
bodies, we know that thattraumatic pain is in our bones,
in our body, and so we'realready struggling physically.
So that's not really the timethat we want to put stuff in our
bodies that's going to make itharder for them to stay afloat.
Also, just the sleep factor alot of us aren't good resters
and so not to harp on it, butself care.
(40:04):
If someone were to say to me,like, what's the lever, what,
what can I pull, I would goright down to and I do this in
the coaching space go right downto fundamentals eat, move,
breathe, sleep.
How are you taking care ofyourself?
Because it's such a majortectonic shift when your body is
getting taken properly care ofthan when we're not taking care
(40:27):
of it, and it made such animpact on me, so I just want to
share that as well.
If you're not taking care ofyourself.
Be kind, be kind to your body,be kind to your mind.
Get some sleep, be with peoplethat care about you.
It will make a huge difference.
Speaker 1 (40:41):
And I'll just add to that it's okay to be selfish.
Speaker 2 (40:44):
I call that self-advocacy.
Speaker 1 (40:45):
I don't call it selfish, Chris.
Speaker 2 (40:47):
It's okay to advocate for ourselves.
Speaker 1 (40:50):
Well, I'm a little more crude because I've had to
tell people that I'm beingselfish in this moment and take
it or leave it.
So it is what it is.
Some folks have cast some illopinions of when I've been in
difficult situations.
That I'm caring for myself.
Speaker 2 (41:06):
Yeah, my mind is spinning again, it should be a
gift, not a sin.
I mean it should be somethingwe're proud of, and we need
people to show us how to do,because we don't know how to say
no, thank you.
Speaker 1 (41:19):
Yep, I agree with you 100% and hopefully you know
your writings, your podcast andyou know what I'm trying to do
on my end.
Help you know with all thatself-care.
So again, lisa, thank you forbeing on the podcast, so I want
to give you an opportunity totell how people can reach you.
What's your website?
Speaker 2 (41:39):
Great Thanks.
Yeah, it's actually my namelisamicfarlandcom, and all the
information about podcasting ison there.
My blog is included in thewebsite and I look forward to
seeing you there.
Speaker 1 (41:53):
So I'll just add to that.
There's a newsletter that youcan sign up for to hear from
Lisa directly, and I will putthat in the notes for this
podcast.
And so, lisa, thank you again.
I appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (42:07):
Thank you again, Chris.
Speaker 1 (42:10):
And for any of my listeners.
Thank you for listening as welland I hope I've given you some
more exposure to kind of someother folks, some real life
folks out in the world, andplease feel free to pass this
podcast or any others, on to anyfriends, colleagues, family
members, on to any friends,colleagues, family members, and
(42:37):
also, if you wouldn't mind, goon to Apple Podcasts, spotify,
google Podcasts and add this toyour listening pleasure, take
care and be well.
Thank you for listening to ourpodcast.
If you are a client and arelooking to work directly with me
, Chris and or my firm, head onover to Life After Grief FP.
(42:59):
That is, Life After Grief FP.
The FP is forfinancialplanningcom dot com.
If you are an advisor lookingto emotionally and financially
work with your client in grief,or if you are a client looking
to get your advisor's head inthe game, head on over to
lifeaftergriefconsultingcom.
That islifeaftergriefconsultingcom.
(43:19):
Any information referenced inthis week's podcast will be
located here in the podcastsection and, as always, please
feel free to share this week'spodcast with any friend, family
member or colleague.
Thanks for listening.
See you next week on the nextepisode.
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