Stepping In to Processing Pain as a Path to Move Forward Through the Story of Her Daughter’s Rare and Incurable Autoimmune Disease with Maggie Kang

In this episode, Kara is stepping in with Maggie Kang, a board certified radiologist whose nine year old daughter had a very sudden diagnosis of an incurable and rare autoimmune disease. That moment in time and the weeks following completely changed Maggie's life, her daughter's life, and their whole family's way of being in the world. The two talk about the importance of processing pain and grieving in order to truly find acceptance and live in the reality of now after life-altering events. Maggie shares her journey with exploring new ways of thinking about the changes in order to let go of resistance, move through her pain, and find a way to move forward. This episode will leave you full of hope.

Highlights:

• Honestly exploring expectations of yourself and how that can put feelings of toxic guilt on you.
• Removing labels of Good and Bad helps you find acceptance and a way forward.
• Give space for recurring grief when you are navigating life events that change everything.
• It takes time to heal. There is hope.
• Mental and physical demands of caretaking.
• Transitioning from a regular life to mobility struggles, feeding changes, etc.
• When our kids are born we have dreams, let go of who they were to embrace who they are now. 
• Maggie’s world ended and became dark, then opened up and became very light again. Now they have an impact and can support other people on a similar journey.
• Focusing your thoughts as a practice to create your new narrative. Holding onto thoughts that allow you to feel hopeful and better within the new circumstances that are now part of life.
• The art of releasing guilt as a mom.
• Modeling behavior for our children, how getting ourselves better really does make a difference for our kids.
• Hard experiences give you greater depth of compassion for others

Quotes: 

• “I think expectation of what you think things need to look like or what they should look like because they did in the past… does sort of impede your ability to move forward”
• “When a certain situation arises in our lives, how we respond to it is basically by way of our thoughts. And for me, when she was diagnosed, my thought was, this is my fault, this is terrible. I didn't know that I was choosing that thought. I just thought that that was the fact of the situation. But it wasn't, I could have chosen, oh my gosh, she is sick and I want to be the best mom I can be for her. Let me think about all the ways I can do that. There are different ways you can look at it.”
• “Living in the space of possibility and hope.”
• “At the end of the day, the thing that was most challenging was feeling alone.”

Episode Links:

• Maggie Kang’s TEDx Talk: The Truth About Pain and Suffering Will Change Your Life
• Maggie’s Daughter’s book on Amazon: My Hospital Story
• Subscribe to Maggie’s Newsletter plus a free gift: www.maggiekang.com/narrative

Connect with Maggie Kang:

• Website: https://maggiekangmd.com/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/maggiekangmd/
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/maggie-kang-03088a229
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/maggiekangmd/

Dr. Maggie Kang is a board-certified radiologist, mom of two kids, one with a rare disease. She wa