Beautifully Mending: Sylvia Moore Myers' Insights on Grief, Loss, and Resilience After Violent Tragedies

Sylvia Moore Myers shares her profound journey of loss, resilience, and healing, emphasizing the transformative power of resilience in the face of unimaginable and violent tragedies.

After the tragic loss of her son Jacob to violence and surviving her own attempted murder, Sylvia highlights the importance of understanding grief as a lifelong journey rather than something to be rushed through. She invites listeners to embrace their scars, reframing them not as marks of suffering but as symbols of strength and growth.

Through her S.C.A.R. framework—Strength, Courage, Adaptability, and Resilience—Sylvia provides valuable insights on how to navigate life's challenges and emerge stronger. Her experiences and wisdom serve as a powerful reminder that healing is possible and that we can beautifully mend from our scars.

Takeaways:

• Sylvia emphasizes that grief is a lifelong journey that requires patience and self-compassion.
• Sylvia's S.C.A.R. framework represents the strength and adaptability we all possess within us.
• Finding beauty in scars can help reframe our view of past trauma and loss.
• Open conversations about grief can foster connections and understanding in difficult times.
• Sylvia shares her journey of healing to encourage others to embrace their own stories.

Sylvia Moore Myers has over three decades of experience in entrepreneurship, authorship, and grief recovery. She is a certified mental Health Coach, Personal Life Coach, Suicide Prevention Specialist, and First Responder in Crisis and Trauma. Sylvia transforms personal tragedy into hope and healing, offering compassionate guidance for those grappling with profound loss. She is the author of Gold Scars: The Truth About Grief, Loss and Trauma, and How to Beautifully Mend, offering deep insights into navigating personal and professional challenges. As a sought-after speaker and thought leader, Sylvia inspires audiences with the insights she calls S.C.A.R. (Strength, Courage, Adaptability, and Resilience) as she walks us through the 7 to Heal Method of Healing from Grief, Loss, Trauma, and PTSD.

Website: https://www.sylviamooremyers.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/goldscars/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SylviaTizzyMyers

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sylviamooremyers

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@sylviamooremyers

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Episode Transcript

(00:00):
And it was eight months almostto the day that Jacob was killed.
It was now, like August. And Iwas coming home. I had been with
friends. The boys were at thehouse. And I came home, garage door
opened up. I pulled my littleVolkswagen Bug in there, and I opened
my door, and a man steppedinto that spot, and he said, can

(00:24):
you give me directions toSandy Run? I knew. I knew he was
fake. I knew that was justsomething that he was sent just to
catch me off guard. So Ithought of something really quick.
I said, oh, you mean Lake Joy?You know, another. I named another
road rather. And he goes,yeah. And I went. Now I knew I was
dead, right? It's like I'mdying. I'm gonna die right here in
my little car. I said, sure,let me get out and I'll get you directions.

(00:47):
And he backed up. I got outand I tried to run. Grabbed me by
the hair. We fisticuffed allthe way to his car as he tried to
shove me in. I ended up in theback of his car.
Today I'm joined by theincredible Sylvia Moore Myers. She's
an author, she's a griefrecovery expert, and she's a mental
health coach. And she has atruly extraordinary and unimaginable

(01:11):
story of resilience, healing,and transformation. In this conversation,
she opens up about losing herson Jacob to a truly senseless act
of violence and then survivingher own harrowing encounter with
an attacker. Her just a fewmonths later, through these horrific
events, she emerged with this,I don't know, deep, deep, deep insights

(01:36):
of grief and truly the powerof having scars and the strength
within us all to beautifullymend. In this conversation, she shares
this raw, unfiltered truthabout navigating grief and trauma,
the lessons she's learnedalong the way, and her transformative
scar framework, which standsfor strength, courage, adaptability,

(01:59):
and resilience. She also shedslight on how we can embrace these
scars as symbols of growth andhealing. So, once again, this episode
is just a powerful testamentto the human spirit, and I'm really,
truly honored to shareSylvia's story with you. Without
further ado, here is myconversation with Sylvia Moore Myers.

(02:20):
I'm Matt Gilhooly, and this isthe Life Shift candid conversations
about the pivotal moments thathave changed lives forever. Hello,
my friends. Welcome to theLife Shift podcast. I have been talking

(02:43):
and you haven't been hearingthis, but I've been talking to Sylvia
now for a couple minutes. Hey, Sylvia.
Hey, how are you?
Fantastic, as you know. Well,that's a lie I might be getting a
cold, so. But we're justtelling me, right? Like I'm telling
myself, I'm not going to get a cold.
You're not going to get a cold.
And that is the salt.
Mind over matter. You're done.
Thank you for wanting to bepart of the Life Shift podcast. We

(03:04):
were talking a little bitbefore recording. I dropped a little
bomb on you. So the Life Shiftpodcast really comes from my own
experience of losing my momwhen I was a kid. And my failure
is what I call it. Otherpeople don't like when I say that,
but my failure of grief as Iwent through 20 years of trying to
make a mess of my life andthen figuring it out. And part of

(03:27):
that is the questions that Iask my guests come from that personal
experience. And we weretalking of how I don't do a lot of
research because I don't wantto know too much until it kind of
gets revealed live. And sosometimes that takes us down really
fun roads. So I'm lookingforward to this conversation. So
thank you for being open to that.
Absolutely. Yeah. That's whatI do.

(03:48):
Well, life is important. Ithink we were, you know, stories
I found, having Talked to now167 people, maybe more on the Life
Shift, it's everyone's story,although wildly different, has so
many pieces in which we canresonate with in our own journey
or can inspire us in anotherway or can kick off a different perspective

(04:13):
of something. So I think it'sjust so beautiful when people are
willing to kind of bear alland share that deeply personal story,
whether it's with society usedto tell us that shouldn't share some
of these stories out loud.Right. Like we should hide behind
things and not tell people. Soit's just such a beautiful journey
that I've been on. Andhopefully you found the same in your

(04:34):
own journey.
Absolutely did. Yeah. Thank you.
Is it. Is it. Do you find.Before we get into your specific
story, do you find thatsharing your story helps heal you
in new ways each time you tell it?
It does. And, you know, Ithink a lot of people hide behind
a mask. You. You know, and Ithink I told you, I'm the expert
mask wearer. I've been wearingone my whole life. When you pull

(04:57):
that mask down and you tell ithow it really happened, what really
hurt, and, you know, you getinto the minutia of what happened
in your life, you find outthat there's a lot of people that
have had the same experience.Some of them have moved on and Some
of them are still stuck, likeyou. And I love to tell people people

(05:18):
with wounds are looking forpeople with scars. We want to know,
how did you get to that point?Where did. How did you get to that
point where you are now? Andwhen I got to that point.
I wrote my book, you know, andnow you can help people without even
having to say the words outloud anymore. It's. It's a beautiful
journey. And you're right.What you just said was my journey

(05:39):
from like, 8 years old toprobably, like, early 30s, in which
had I. And logically, I knewall of this was true, but in my emotions
and in my brain, had I seenother people that had a dead mom
in the way that I did, thatwere succeeding and doing great things
and not having to try to geteveryone's approval, maybe earlier

(06:02):
in my life, I would have beenlike, oh, like this is possible.
I'm not the only one out here.I knew logically I wasn't. But, you
know, you feel that way. Youfeel like you might be the only one
that would understand howyou're feeling, and it's. It's just
not true.
You know, we. We broke griefin this country about a hundred years
ago. We just broke it. It wasgoing on just fine. We. Grandmother

(06:25):
would die. We would go to herhome, where she would be laid out
in the parlor, and we'd allgather in the kitchen and eat and
talk and maybe even laugh alittle bit about the funny things
Grandma did before she died.And then we would bury her, and the
kids would be there, and thegrandkids and the great grandkids
and all of the ext. And itwould be sad, but happy, but resolving.

(06:48):
And then we would go on. Youknow, we decided for some reason
to change all that. Now wetake everybody to this strange building,
including small children. It'slike, why is Grandma here? This is
not where she lives. Why arewe here? And then we stuffed the
children in the kitchen at thefuneral parlor, which they stole
from Grandma's house. And wegather around and we torture the

(07:14):
family members that arestanding by the. The casket for two
or three or four hours,depending on how many people showed
up. And we just stand in lineto say something very profound, like,
God needed Jacob in heaven.It's like, did he. It's like, there's
another angel there now. Isaid, is there? Jacob's work on earth

(07:35):
was done. And I'm like, whatwas he working on? And why did he
finish so soon? But we. Webroke grief, and now we don't model
it for children like weshould. And therefore our children
do not learn how to grieve andgo through those stages and resolve
which they could have takencare of in your case, 30 years before.

(07:56):
Yeah, my mom was 32 and peoplewould tell me the same thing. She
would be just. They would belike, yeah, her work on earth was
finished. And I was like, Iwas eight.
Really?
Well, I mean, I thought shewas old. You know, at 8, you think
32 is pretty old.
So practically in the grave at 32.
Yeah. And to that point, like,we're not even taught how to be with

(08:16):
someone that is grieving. Wedon't know how. Like, there's nothing
we can say really.
In the English language. Thinkabout it for a second. Our language
doesn't have anything forsaying, I don't know what to do.
Your person that you loved hasdied. You. There's no words for that.
The best you can do is sayyou're sorry. My condolences, which

(08:36):
is supposed to be from likeyour boss, not from your family and
friends, or I love you andwhere for you, which is the best
answer and I'm sorry is okay.But we just have to feel like we
have to create something. But,you know, God and never created a
word for that. And it was a noword for a reason. It doesn't exist

(08:57):
for a reason.
It's so fascinating and I'mglad that, you know, it sucks that
our situations bring us hereto have this conversation, but at
the same time, I find itmyself personally, just to my earlier
question about this healing,every time I'm able to talk about
my journey, it gives meanother piece of the puzzle that
kind of, you know, finishesthat piece. And I don't know, finish

(09:19):
is not the right word. But,you know, it starts to make it feel
more complete in that way. Soany case, let's get to you before
we get into your. Yourdetailed story and your life shift
moment and how you got towhere you are. Tell us who you are
now. Like, who is Sylvia?
Well, let's see. I am agrandmother to two lovely grandchildren.

(09:41):
I've ordered eight more, butthey won't reproduce. Really upset
about it too. And no one'snamed their child Sylvia yet, so
I'm very upset about that. SoI'm soliciting neighbors now for
that happen. But I'm a fifthgeneration Sylvia. I wanted to continue,
but I have three beautifulsons. One is in heaven, two are here
live near us. And my husbandAdam is not my first husband. He

(10:04):
is my last. And Also my verybest friend in, in the world. God
put him in my life at a, at apoint when we both needed each other.
We were as mismatched as youcan imagine. An ink pen and a pencil,
a crayon and a black magicmarker, whatever, we just didn't
match. But it, it's now 20years, so I think we're pretty stuck

(10:25):
with each other. And I'm awriter, I'm an author, I'm a speaker.
I've trained with NationalSpeaking association so I can speak.
I'm a late autistic. I'm alate diagnosed autistic. Talk about
a puzzle piece, 61 years oldand find out that you're autistic.
It's like, really let me sithere for a few weeks and think about

(10:48):
my whole life.
I would imagine that's like a flood.
Book two coming out next year,so. But yeah, so I own real estate
companies and propertymanagement companies. That's what
we do for a living to other tobring in money. And my husband's
a contractor and he has apsychology degree. I'm working on
a master's degree in trauma crisis.

(11:11):
So you're not busy.
So I just have nothing left todo. I'm just so bored.
Hey, you know, it sounds veryfulfilling. Does it feel fulfilling?
It does. And you know, thefirst time in my life I've really
felt fulfilled is, you know,the last, probably 10 years, I'd
say, of my life. You know, wehave a small farm also and chickens

(11:32):
and goats and.
So you are really bored. I'msorry. That's so sad that you have
nothing to do.
I have absolutely nothing to do.
That's why you made beautifultime for us this Saturday afternoon.
So thank you for that.
I've been given a lot ofrevelation. I've given, I've been
given a lot of gifts and Ihave a very short time on Earth.

(11:53):
I'm 63 in January.
Happy birthday. Almost. Well,by this time comes out, you'll be
63.
63. I could get SocialSecurity in it. Great. And I'm starting
another career, but I justfeel, I don't. There's no promise
time, you know. And so withwhat I've learned about grief recovery,
with what I've learned abouthow easy it is to walk someone through

(12:16):
those steps and get them to,to, you know, from scar to scar to
heal, I just feel like I, Ineed to be in, in a rush to do that.
I don't need, you know, to sitaround and contemplate it. I need
to get busy and do so.
That's why you're making ithappen, which I think is a beautiful
thing. A lot of us, to yourpoint, I think a lot of us sit around
like, oh, there, there'll betime. And then pretty soon 10 years

(12:40):
have gone by and you're like,oh, I guess I could have done that
10 years ago.
So I give it a go until I get.Till the, you know, till the Lord
what? My work on earth isdone, as we talked about earlier.
Exactly, yeah. So why don'tyou, why don't you just take us back
however far you want to go andkind of paint the picture of your
life before this major lifeshift that's kind of brought this

(13:00):
version of Sylvia out to the world.
I appreciate that. And Ioffered you before a red pill, a
blue pill or the purple.
I said take them all.
I'm gonna give you a purplepill, which is a little bit of everything.
So I want to start in themiddle. We'll work our way back each
end. How's that sound?
Sounds great.
All right. So in 2003, I had athriving real estate company, married

(13:21):
to the nicest man on theplanet, James. He was sweet husband.
I had three sons, Jacob, Isaacand Daniel. And life was good. Jacob
was playing guitar. It wasDecember, December 5th, I think is
when he was December 5th, itwas a Friday and he was playing guitar
with friends. He was 19 yearsold, in college, on a scholarship,

(13:42):
so he was having a good time.What most 19 year old boys with a
girlfriend do. So he was goingto come home later that evening,
sneak in. He knew not to wakeanybody up. And then the next morning
we had a parade in the citythat his brothers were in and he
and I were going to finishputting up the tree because we were
the only two humans in thehouse that liked to put up a Christmas

(14:03):
tree. At our home. We actuallymade ornaments every year and we
had made some that year. So itgot late, we went to bed. The boys
were younger boys went tosleep. Isaac was 16, just, just turned
16 and Daniel was, I guessseven. And so we were sound asleep
and the phone rang and wentstraight to the answering machine.

(14:24):
And it was James's mom,Grandma Judy, and she was yelling
our names and she said thatsomeone had called her and they needed
to talk to us right away. Ilistened to the next voicemail and
it was a hospital in Macon,which is about. Normally if you're
not driving like a bat out ofhill, it's about a 30 minute drive.

(14:45):
Jacob was near grandma's Housewhere he was playing guitar. You
know, he was five minutes awayfrom home and five minutes to our
local hospital. So, numberone, my mind's going crazy. Like,
why is he in Macon? Why is hethat far away? And so the gentleman
that I called at the emergencysaid, your son is here. You need

(15:06):
to come here now. I said, isit an accident? What happened? He
goes, ma'am, you need to comehere now. And I said, you've got
to give me something. I'mdressing, you know, I'm putting on
yesterday's clothes on the topof the basket. James is, you know,
calling his mom, getting herto come over and take care of the
boys. And so off we jump inthe car, and I told James on the

(15:26):
way, I said, I just feel likesomething really terrible has happened.
So we rush into the emergency.It took us about 20 minutes to get
there. We rushed in there, andJacob's in the emergency center by
himself, obviously withnurses, but there's no surgery going
on, and he's apparently gothead injury. And I. As I got closer

(15:47):
to him, I realized. I knowthat it was on the table. That's
all I can say. It was pretty.Pretty horrific. I had run Life Squad
years before. I'd seen a lotof horrific things as a very young
person. And I don't know why Ididn't just totally collapse, but
I knew that the emergency roomwas filling up with teenagers and

(16:09):
their parents, and half ofeverybody that knew us was coming
to see Jacob because, youknow, they. They were balloons and
flowers and cards and get wellsoon and we're here for you kind
of stuff. And so I end uphelping the nurse to clean my son
to find out that they'vealready done several brain scans,
and even though he looksperfectly fine everywhere else, there's

(16:30):
no activity. He's a donor. Andthey wanted our permission to let
him be a donor, which meantthat we were going to go through
the whole night with all ofthe children wishing him well and
hoping he'd be great and allthis and walk away from him while
he was still warm, because youcan't. You can't harvest organs if

(16:51):
the person has died. You can'tif you sit there and hold the hand
of the person you love untilthe last heartbeat. Beads. They are
not a donor now because it'stoo late to use those organs that
very second it happens. So ithas to be done in spontaneously,
and I can't be present. So weleft the hospital the next morning.

(17:12):
I'll leave out a lot of thedetails from the hospital. But the
boys were devastated, as youknow, Everybody was there. His girlfriend,
their parents. Hisgirlfriend's mom took Daniel home
with her and left early andgot him out of that. That situation.
We broke the news to Isaac,which, you know, he's was just devastated.
That was his best friendbesides his.
Brother, closer in age.

(17:34):
Yeah. And so we left thehospital in the morning, knowing
in a few hours or more, he wasgoing in surgery. But we had to go
pick out a coffin and that thenext time we would see our son, he
would be cold and in a coffinthat we had to go choose. And we
were leaving him while hishands were still warm and his heart
was still beating. And it'sreally hard. You know, he had been

(17:56):
a cost. Busted at a gasstation and shot in the head at close
range by the person that was.Yeah, Rob. The bullet went across
the back of the kid sitting inthe truck with him, busted through
the glass, went across theparking lot into a metal building,
and bounced off the other sideof the wall inside the building.
That's how much the velocitythat bullet had. But it entered in

(18:20):
one spot under the ear and outthe other. So that was where the.
The wound was. And that's whythere was no brain activity. That
was devastating. And whathappens to you when you lose someone
in a tragic accident is yourbrain rewires. A lot of that is temporary,
but some of it is permanent.You. You think one way, and then

(18:40):
the next day you don't. You'rethe person that cooks all the food
in the house, and then thenext thing you know, somebody else
has become that person. Roleschange, personalities change, and
relationships are destroyed.And so my good marriage ended almost
as quickly as you can counton. We couldn't stand to be around

(19:01):
each other. Mostly it was me.
I think that's very common.
It is. By the way, to put it.I put a little light on here for
you this morning. Now, thatwas 21 years ago that Jacob was murdered.
This morning, my ex husbandand I, I fed him breakfast while
he waited on our son so theycould go to an event. While my Adam

(19:22):
and I entertained him with aquiche that we had made. We. We mended
all those relationships. Andthat's part of healing, is it? Healing
is relationships. Words arerelationships. Words are not words.
It's connection. Right. Soit's learning to heal everything,
and it includes thoserelationships. But our marriage ended,
and it was eight months almostto the day that Jacob was killed.

(19:46):
It was now like August, and Iwas coming home. I had Been with
friends. The boys were at thehouse, you know, locked in, you know,
normal. And I came home,garage door opened up. I pulled my
little Volkswagen Bug inthere. And I opened my door and a
man stepped into that spot andhe said, can you give me directions

(20:09):
to Sandy Run? I knew. I knewhe was fake. I knew that was just
something that he was sayingjust to catch me off guard. So I
thought of something reallyquick. I said, oh, you mean Lake
Joy? You know, another. Inamed another road rather. And he
goes, yeah. And I went. Now Iknew I was dead, right? It's like
I'm dying. I'm gonna die righthere in my little car.
Yeah.
I said, sure, let me get outand I'll get you directions. And

(20:31):
he backed up. I got out and Itried to run. Grabbed me by the hair.
We fist cuffed all the way tohis car as he tried to shove me in.
I ended up in the back of hiscar and I saw his license plate number,
which I can tell you today isAK 30943. But I saw his license plate.

(20:52):
And when I got up that nexttime I ran, I got my son's baseball
bat and I just startedswinging it at him and screaming
his license plate number at.At him. There's no reason. He could
have overpowered me instantlyand kill me, but for some reason,
he got in his car and hebacked down my driveway and he left.
He told the police that nightthat he was just trying to kill someone.
He. I was his fourth victim,not his first. I was the only one

(21:16):
that got his license platenumber. And, yeah, so I escaped an
attempted murder on my life inthe driveway in the safest subdivision
in town. Our little safetyteam that walks around the subdivision
had walked by 15 minutes priorto that. That's my driveway. But

(21:36):
I knew if I didn't get. If Ididn't take him out or at least escape,
that he was going to walk inmy house and probably my other children,
too.
I mean, you tell this story,this horrific story of losing your
child in such a horrific way,and after that you're going through
your grief journey.Everything's falling apart in some

(21:56):
ways. Everything. You know,you're trying to keep life together
and this happens.
Happens.
How do you.
The red pill, the blue pilland the purple pill. Which one did
you want? Right, so, yeah, I.We're with you. The DA comes to my
house. By that time, we'rebest friends because we're going
to trial in 30 days on the manthat murdered my son.
Right, right.
DA and the assistant DA aresitting in my living room. After

(22:18):
I've id'd the guy. They had todrive me there to say, is this the
mf. That. That's the guy. So.Wow. So he's sitting by, learning
this. I can't believe this.
Right.
I can't believe it either. Andhe said, I have to tell you something,
because you need to know. Isaid, okay. He goes. When I. When
they questioned him a littlewhile ago, they asked him, why did

(22:40):
he want to kill someone? Andhe said, he wanted to kill someone,
just like Tommy Hardison had.Tommy Hardison was the man that murdered
my son. Didn't even know myson. Just shot him. The guy that
tried to kill me swears hedidn't know that I was Jacob's mother,
but none of us believe it. Imean, he went to jail anyway, but.

(23:00):
But it was. It was frightening.
Yeah. How do you. I mean,like, how. First of all, like. I
mean, I think a parent losinga child. How do you Go on. How do
you.
It was really hard because Ialready had PTSD from Jacob's murder,
and I had recovered from that.There was no. I was in deep grief,
and I was in what's calledtraumatic grief grief, because I
hadn't. You know, there was noresolution. You know, 30 days after

(23:24):
that, if you're still as badoff as you were the first day. Yeah,
it just got worse. And thenthat was kind of like, icing on.
And talk about my other twochildren. They just lost their brother
now their mother just foughtfor her life. She's got. Her hair
is missing out of the back ofher head. There's. I mean, I've got
a man's blood all over my handwhere. Punched him as hard as I could.

(23:45):
He left one hand free, man. Ihad to do something with it, so I
hit him. But, yeah, that waspretty horrible, wasn't it?
Yeah.
Yeah. And I call it in my bookFight Club, because no one talks
about Fight Club. And I said,how do you top someone murdered my
son? But guess what? I wasalso attacked by a serial killer.
Eight months. I couldn't evenarticulate it for the longest time.

(24:09):
Yeah. And it sounds likeyou're fairly like you have a faith
or religion of something thatyou. That you lean in.
I lost it for a while becauseI was really angry at God. Yeah.
I yelled at God for a whilebecause I would.
I mean, I would imagine, too.And I. I would imagine that you're
like. Like, I've already doneone. Like, I don't need another piece.
Right. Like, I don't need allthese elements to. To knock me off.

(24:32):
Why me?
Why me? Yeah.
Yeah, I can imagine that. Butthat didn't save you then.
I think it brought me back. Soit took me a while to completely
heal and really learn theprocess of, you know. You know, because
people don't really, you know,we're not a chameleon. We're not
going to grow back our tail.If we. If it gets chopped off, we
lost it, it's gone. You know,we get a big gaping wound. You know,

(24:52):
we're not a sea cucumbereither. It doesn't heal overnight
or even in a couple of weeks.They can grow back organs. The darn
little creatures. But nothumans. We were meant to scar. And
so we don't really heal. Wescar. And that's why I say people
with wounds are looking forpeople with scars. And it's like,
how did you do it? You know,how did you get to that scar? But

(25:13):
Kintsugi was. What the ideafor the book was, is we beautifully
mend, you know, and I didn'tneed a way to forget what happened
to Jacob. I didn't. I didn'tneed a way to forget what happened
to me. I needed a better wayto remember what happened. And that
meant I had to heal. Andthat's where the Kintsugi came in.

(25:33):
It's like, we beautifully mend.
Right. That's the gold.
Yeah. And if you look on theCOVID of the book, you'll see that
there are. Oops. There areKintsugi vases and Kintsugi throughout
and all over the back. Butit's just to symbolize the fact that.
That I still have scars from.That I still have scars from the.
Attack, physical and emotionaland mental and all.

(25:56):
The shoulder will never be.Yeah, it's always going to be bad.
And, you know, just anythingthat you have that happens to you
in life, you've got a scar. Ifyou have a surgery, you can prove
it. Say, and here's three Csections right here. I can't. I know
where that. And. But, youknow, and here's where I burn myself.
We just don't heal. Notreally. We mend, and so why not beautifully

(26:18):
mend? And that's where thatcame from. But. But yeah, that I
lost basically my faith. It'snot that I didn't believe in God.
I was very angry at God, and Idon't believe that God said, you
know, she's kind of losing herfaith. Let's go down there and have
her beat up real quick andthen she'll come back, right? Not
the God I serve. Neither didhe call Jacob into heaven because
needed him for some bigproject in heaven, like everybody

(26:40):
said, right. God needs him inheaven. I said, for what?
No, and why in that way? Like,I mean, none of it makes sense.
Food for him to eat orsomething, but. No, none of it makes
sense. But. But I do believethat when. When bad things do happen
to you, that God can turn themto good for you. And in my case,
that attack actually was thevery moment that I said to myself,

(27:03):
I need to live. Because up foreight months after that, I didn't
give a rat's ass whether I wasalive or not. And I was doing a very
lousy job helping my childrento grief because we were hiding in
our house. After about a monthor two of someone murdering your
son, nobody shows back up, youknow? Yeah, you just. They just all

(27:24):
go, I hope, I hope she's overthat. Does she need us? Hope not.
I hope they don't actuallythink that. Yeah, no, but they're
just oblivious to otherpeople. I mean, we just kind of.
It's just like the humannature of we just keep going and
then, you know, we're therefor the moment and then we're like,
well, what else can I do?Forgetting that these people are

(27:46):
living in the same house.They're, you know, like you're. You're
seeing all the memories.You're remembering everything that
you always did there.
Everything. Yeah. I hadnightmares that Jacob almost every
night for a long time that hewas standing up on the balcony. We
had a two story with thebalcony on one side over the living
room. And he would, he wouldbe standing go, mom. I go, yeah.

(28:07):
I go, mom. I go, yeah. I go,mom, I go, yeah. And then he would
jump and I would wake up and Icould never figure that dream out.
But I knew that was just mybrain's way of reliving that trauma
over and over. I was in atrauma treadmill, like a little gopher.
You know what? I've never saidthis out loud, but I've had many

(28:29):
dreams after my mom died oflike different ways of her dying.
Yeah.
And it was. I. I don't think Iever told anyone that, but it was
very weird. And it was like. Iguess I. There was like a shame in
it because I was young. Like,why am I picturing my mom being like
kidnapped and killed in thisway when, you know, like. But I've.

(28:51):
I mean, it's so. It's it seemslike it's common.
Very normal. Yeah. Ieventually became a grief recovery
specialist because I wentthrough a grief program that actually
stuck. And it was just very,very simple. It's like, you got to
acknowledge it. You got tolive in that grief. You got it. You
know, you got to turn thisinto something where you can find
the resilience. And it workedfor me, but it. There was so much

(29:14):
compounded grief that I justkept on writing that book for them.
It's like, okay, we need totake this a little bit further. We
got to give people somethingto kind of hold on to. And that's
where my seven to heal camefrom. Because they're not steps necessarily.
But, you know, one of the veryfirst things that people have to
do is say that they need helpor get help. And that's the first
age is help. And then healingis just setting that yourself, you

(29:37):
know, into that healing. Don'tI screw it up too much? I hadn't.
Where my bookmark? There itis, my little bookmark. I have these
online. You guys can get forfree, but we'll come.
Oh, awesome. Yeah.
But being healthy, no onethinks about eating right, drinking
water, having enough to, youknow, eat, eating the right foods,
not eating carbs, like fourcarbs on your plate and a piece of

(29:59):
meat is not a good meal.
Well, it is a good meal. It'snot good for you.
Please don't post that onFacebook. That's not healthy.
Right.
And then having hope, and Ithink a lot that's hard that I lost
first was hope. But you canfind something, you know. Are you
hopeful for what? That themint colored mint flavored toothpaste.
I mean, find 10 or 20 thingsthat you're hopeful for that you

(30:21):
know, that you can think andgo, I really. I really hope that
I have this. And I hope thatlife is good. And I. I hope that
I find someone that I can helplike me. I hope that I can make friends.
In your case, I hope I canfind someone to interview that'll
teach me something new aboutwhat I've already think. I know.
And then holiness is justworthiness. We. We hate ourselves

(30:42):
when we grieve. We don't like us.
Yeah. We think we should bedone with it. We think, like, why
am I like, it was five monthsago, it was 20 years ago. It was
whatever. Like, why am I stillthinking of this?
Yeah. People come up to us andgo, what's wrong? And it's like,
yeah, just thinking aboutJacob still. It's like, yeah, he's
still dead. So I'm still gonnathink about it. Yeah, I'm. I'm cocky

(31:06):
and funny, and I'm prettymuch. That's. That's my personality
when I go on stage, I makepeople laugh. I make them cry, and
then I make them laugh. But Ithink that's because God gave me
that gift of. Of joy, and Ican't get rid of it, so I pass it
along. But that's. The nextthing is being happy. We don't give
ourselves permission to behappy. We feel like we have to punish

(31:30):
ourselves for that. And that'swhat holds people down in the grief
for years and years.
We think there's a timetable,like, we should be sad for X amount
of time. And then what if Ilaugh? What if I watch a TV show?
That's funny.
Yes. We're afraid to be, youknow, be joyful. We can't go out
with friends because thatwould look bad, you know? And it's

(31:50):
like. Because the next step inthe seven is being hilarious. Being
able to laugh your ass offabout something and make fun of someone,
even someone that you lost. Itell this story because it happened
the day of Jacob's funeral. Mybrother and his wife flew down on,
I think, SouthwesternAirlines, right? Together, of course,
husband and wife. His ex wifebooked the same flight. They ended

(32:12):
up sitting side by side, thethree of them. Right? Well, they're
right up in the front row.Stuart finds out about it. He grabs
the mic. He's like, so, isanyone flying today? Welcome to Southwestern.
Is anyone flying today withtheir wife by chance? And then, you
know, the hands go up, and hegoes, anyone flying with their ex
wife? And my brother, who'salso a asshole like me, stands up,

(32:38):
takes the mic. He turns aroundto everybody, you know, in the audience.
He goes, my girlfriend triedto get on this flight, but we had
to book her on the next one.And it made everybody laugh. And
then my brother told that inthe kitchen that morning before we
left for the funeral. We wereall dying. And I'm like, is this

(32:59):
even allowed? And, you know,it's those moments that we feel like
we don't have permission tohave, and they come naturally, and
we should just enjoy that,because that's part of healing, is
being able to laugh and beingable to laugh out loud.
The most important. I mean, tome, the most important piece that
you said is this. Like, it's ageneral awareness of, like, this

(33:22):
is what. Where you are, andthis is what you need to do. Until
you have that, it's just likethis. It's like a shame wave. It's
like it just. You're drowningin it.
You're paying a bill that youhave no money with to pay.
Oh, that's a good.
Yeah, Never do it.
Yeah.
Trying, but it's never goingto pay it off. The large credit card
with the 75% interest rate. Right.

(33:43):
Yeah. And it's, it's sofascinating to me that even, I mean,
my mom died so 35 years ago, Ithink. Yeah, 35 years ago. So this
was late 80s, early 90s.People weren't talking about grief.
I can maybe remember I was putin like a school counselor like twice

(34:04):
maybe right after she died.And my life had changed a lot because
my dad lived in Georgia, mymom lived in Massachusetts. I lived
with my mom, but I wasvisiting my dad when she died. And
so, like, it was right beforeschool started, so I had to start
at a new school.
Oh, new.
You know, like I'm the, I'mthe kid with the Boston accent coming

(34:24):
into a Georgia school for deadmom. Like all the things that, like
realize.
That moving schools, movingacross town causes grief for a child.
Right.
Yeah.
Moving across country and youlost your mom and your. Yeah. All
of that together compounded.Was compounded grief for you. You

(34:44):
needed to be in counseling immediately.
I did and I needed. But what Idid at the time, and this is why
it's so important, I think,that we have these conversations
and that you put your book outthere, that you're doing, the work
that you do, is at the time,as an 8 year old, I guess you understand
that what death is just in asmall way. Right. Like, I saw my
mom's body in the casket and Ifigured she was dead. I saw the,

(35:08):
the burial, all those pieces.But at the same time, I, I associated
her death with abandonment.And so everything that I did after
that point was in hopes that Iwas a good student. I was making
my dad happy so that hewouldn't abandon me because my mom
abandoned me in my smallbrain. And it was just like, I didn't

(35:30):
realize this until I was in my30s of like, why I was doing the
things that I did. But I wasjust so fearful that everyone else
was going to leave. Like, shehad a choice, she didn't have a choice.
But you put yourself in theposition of being the one that controlled
it.
Yeah. And had. And I thinkback, and I don't. Obviously my dad
was doing the best he knew howto do with the tools that he had.
And my grandmother, you know,like the people around me were just.

(35:53):
They didn't know how to grief.Like, nobody did. Nobody was really
talking about it.
No one teaches that. I do.
Yeah. Which is great. And Ithink to your earlier point of, like,
how we lost that from 100years ago, of, like, that we talk
about death, we see it. It'spart of this experience that we have
here on Earth.
We don't model it anymore. Andthat's what I think we need to do.

(36:17):
We've lost that ability.
We make it like this shamefulthing. Like, I mean, people are going
to die every day, and that'sjust part of it. And some people
are going to die too soon, andsome are going to live too long.
You know, like, there'sguarantee. There's no guarantee.
Exactly. And it's. I think,you know, I think of you in the hospital,
and I know we kind of wentpast that moment.

(36:38):
Yeah. I don't. I put peoplethere too long, and it gets very
traumatic for my audience. SoI would imagine back. Yeah.
But I'm curious, because Ithink that's something that we don't
know how to experience. Like,how do we. Was it a checklist moment
for you? Was it like, theseare the things that I need to do
so I can, like, move forward?
I took on that responsibilityof protecting everyone that was waiting

(37:01):
to see Jacob. So I should nothave been helping the nurse clean
brain matter off at the table.No offense, but I shouldn't have
been that person. I did,though, because she said, I have
to clean him up. And she said,if you'll step out. And I went, I'm
not leaving, but I'll helpyou. And. But I knew his girlfriend
was on the way. We'd alreadycalled her mother woke them up. They're

(37:23):
all on their way. Andeverybody else in town had already
found out because teenagersthat go to school together call each
other just like that. Andeveryone was coming.
Was it a dissociation for you,or were you fully in the moment,
do you think?
I remember every moment,pretty much of that hospital. And
that was a long time ago, andI remember all of it. I think I started

(37:44):
to break down finally when wewere in the icu when he was on support
and we were holding his handand we were trying to leave, you
know, which is really hard.
I can't imagine.
We. It's like, yeah, so I juststay here until y'all wheeling down.
It's like, we can't let you dothat, because, you know, you can't,

(38:04):
you know, and so we'd Alreadymade that decision, and that was
hard. And I know for a lot ofparents, there's nothing wrong. If
you have a child that's dyingand you want to hold that baby in
your arms until that babydies, that is your business. And
I'm all for it. If you makethe other decision, I'm all for it
again, it's, it's, it's. It'sstill a loss. And no one can judge

(38:27):
you for that because they toldme, it's like you change your mind
at any moment. We're good, youknow. But the very next morning,
there were five people who hada new leash on life because of Jacob.
And I ended up knowing eachone of them. Not personally. I knew
who they were and what theydid for a living. They knew who I
was and our family. And it wasjust a feeling. And I would sometimes
cry when. Because they startedto pass after, you know, some time,

(38:49):
we would lose one and I wouldlose Jacob in a way again. It's like
I lost, you know, Yeah, I losthis kidney, but, you know, it's.
But I lost a part of him.There's another part of him that's
going. So it was hard to dothat, to be that gift giver. Right.
But there was also anotherside of it that just gave us all
this great joy.

(39:09):
There's beauty in what youjust said and the sadness of that,
because I, like, I've neverheard anyone say that before. Of
like, the giving of the organsand people having it. And then when
they pass another lostfeeling. Like, I think that is so
important to share because Idon't want to.

(39:30):
Think about it from organdonation, because it was also. It's
just been a beautiful gift toknow. It's like, you're late, you
know, the birthdays, Mother'sDay, you know, talk about divine
intervention. The firstMother's Day after Jacob's death,
I was going through a box inmy closet just to, like, people do.

(39:50):
And I pulled out a letter thatJacob had written me last year, the
year before, for Mother's Day.He didn't send cards. He wrote novels.
Right? I mean, you write. Sohe wrote this long, beautiful letter
for me for Mother's Day. And Iremembered it, of course, but I read
it and I just laid in thefloor and cried. But those kinds
of things bring back reallygood memories. It's like, you don't

(40:11):
want to take all that and hideit or burn it anywhere you want to
run into it again. Right? Andthat was a big gift that I saw that
on Mother's Day. How. What arethe odds? Right? But that's the same
for organ donation. You've gotanother person that's alive because
your child, when he was 16years old, walked in and asked, ask
your husband, what does thismean if I sign the back of this card?

(40:33):
And he says, well, that meansthat if something were to happen
to you, that you're okay withthem using your organs for someone
else. He's like, oh, thatsounds good. And he signs it and
he walks away. And you don'tthink anything about it until three
years later when he dies. Andthen you honor his wishes to do what
he wanted to do.
And that's probably a veryhard decision for a lot of people
and maybe easier for some. Buteither way, like you said, you know,

(40:57):
look, there's no judgmentthere. We don't know how we're gonna.
Also, we don't know how we'regonna act in any of these moments,
and nor should we have toprepare for that.
But, you know, and don't. Anddon't give it. If anybody writes
you a book and says, here'swhat you do when you lose someone,
punch them. Tell them I saidto, yeah, no, but. No, you can't.
But everyone wants the book.Yeah, everyone wants the book.

(41:20):
Yeah.
That's not going to help them.Right. Because we all have to find
our own journey through it.There might be tips and tricks and
things that we can consider,but, yeah, you've got.
Well, you know, you canprepare yourself by modeling grief
right now, by understandingit, knowing what not to say at a
funeral. There's a wholesection, and I call them middle eight,
intermission. And of the bookwhere I just stop and go, please

(41:45):
don't say these things at afuneral. You know, and I explain
how we broke it. And, youknow, it's a great section. I can
just pull that out, put acover on it, and sell it to everyone.
Funeral parlors.
Right. Yeah.
So that people will kind of beprepared for that part of it. It
is hard to lose, but there'sno right or wrong way to grieve.

(42:05):
It is when the grief becomesso obsessive and so harmful that
it starts to hurt the person.And there's. There's no healing in
sight. There's no mending thatin your future, and you start to
step all over yourself. And,you know, again, I don't think that
eight months after Jacob'sdeath that I was supposed to get
attacked so that I wouldappreciate life. You know, it's like

(42:27):
that. That wasn't the point. Iwanted to live because I had two
children on the other side ofthat door that really needed me and
I needed to get my shittogether so I could help them.
And did. How long after that,that devastating attack were you.
Did you feel like you were onyour grief journey?
We got through two jury trials.

(42:49):
Okay.
The murder of Jacob and thenthe attack on me.
And that's because that's justreliving everything. Right?
Right. Isaac went through adeep depression a year after that.
We had to get him throughthat, and he got through it okay.
We ended up sending him tocollege in Northern Kentucky with
family. You know, just get himout of this area for a short time.
Came back, got married, cameback with Jessica, and they're married

(43:09):
with my two only grandchildren.
One more. Come on. Come on,kids. That's.
Make more. Make more. But. Butyeah, that, you know, Daniel, his
is a progress because Danielwas seven. So Daniel's real grief
came when he turned 19ish. Andhe was the same age as his brother
was. I know past now Daniel'sinto his 20s. But those are hard

(43:33):
moments when you. Those areplaces in a child's life when they
get to a certain age, youknow, that they start to relive that
experience as the person thatdied and really rethink it again,
you know, so grief is a long,lifelong process. Grief recovery
is, I think, getting over thetraumatic grief, the ptsd. I had

(43:54):
PTSD so bad after the attackthat I couldn't be. I couldn't even
walk down a hallway by myself.Any person that was unfamiliar to
me that started walkingtowards me, I just almost passed
out. I mean, it was really,really rightfully so. I mean, yeah,
it took a while for that oneto get over. The first thing that
I tell people is use the wordscar. Because everything that you've

(44:18):
already got in your brain.Remember I told you when you go through
bad grief, when you go througha traumatic event, your brain rewires
itself. Some of it'll go backto normal and. But a lot of it is
permanent. Right. You're notthe cook anymore. You don't want
to be married to the personyou're with. Most marriages, things
fail. It's common for it tofail. Not most, but those things
change. But the things thatyou have inside of you right now

(44:41):
are strength, courage,adaptability, meaning the ability
to change, and thenresilience. They're already pre wired
into your brain, and I usethem as scar. And that's where that
kind of came from.
I didn't even Put it together.
Yes. Strength, courage,adaptability and resilience. They're
already pre wired in. You justgot to kind of tap into those and

(45:02):
kind of tell yourself, I cando this. I've got the strength to
do this. Right. It's not myfault. I didn't do it. I've got that.
I've got to have courage.Because most of us don't have the
strength to make any kind ofchange in our life. You know, we
just, you know, really hardgive up. Like, I'm not going to do
it, you know, you can't makeme kind of attitude. So it's got
to be internal, but it'sactually there. We were created with

(45:25):
that in us already. And if yousay that and you go, and I was meant
to scar, that I'm always goingto have it. You don't. I didn't need
an eraser to get rid of whathappened to me. I needed a highlighter,
right? I didn't need toforget. I needed a better way to
remember. Right? So if you'regoing to scar, then make it a way

(45:48):
that you can remember it in agood way. No one's going to give
you a lobotomy where you'llforget about what happened to your
mom. No one's going to takeaway my memory. What happened to
Jacob. Why would we want tolive that way? We were. We were supposed
to remember.
I. I did re. I rememberreading one. One piece or I remember
one piece of like our back andforth a little bit about how grief

(46:09):
doesn't end or we don't like,close the door on that. And I get
in trouble with a lot ofpeople that I talk to on this show
about grief because I. I dokind of feel. And maybe it's wrong
because I talk about all thetime now that in my 30s, I closed
the door on grieving my mom.And I think it's because. And maybe

(46:31):
it's the wrong terminology,but I think it's because I don't
remember my mom. And so for solong, that growing up, period, maybe
because I was pushing stuffdown and I wasn't actively remembering
because people weren't tellingme stories because we don't want
to upset the kid, right? Like,we don't want to. So she was a figment.
She was an idea of a personthat existed in my life growing up.

(46:53):
And so all of the grief wasreally seeing other people with their
happy families and theirmothers seeing, you know, like, hanging
out with people, getting closeto other people's mothers. So a lot
of that was that. And when I,my grief journey started in like
early 30s, I was going to atherapist and she was like, you realize

(47:13):
that every decision thatyou've made, you've done with your
8 year old brain that wasafraid of losing someone else. And
like that's when the cloudsparted and I started actively grieving
the loss of my mother. Andthen it felt like it was over. So
it's weird.
You really were, you werereally just suppressing everything
and then all of a.
Sudden there it was and thenno more.

(47:35):
Yeah. And you know, andnothing, like I said, nothing against
family. I had a very quiet,you know, childhood in a sense that
I have very. My mother wasvery loving, but not to me. So she
was very. She was not anurturer. I had, I had to schedule
appointments to have a. Withher. As she got older, there was

(47:57):
just no nurturing. I didn'tsit on her lap, we didn't chat, we
never shopped together. Shenever curled my hair, she never combed
my hair. She just wasn't thattype of mom. And I learned years
later, after she died that shewas probably Asperger's. And when
I was finishing this book, Iwas teaching grief recovery to a
lot of people, but I felt likeI was teaching like one person at

(48:18):
a time and I would be like ahundred before I helped anybody.
And so I spoke to good. Andthat's where the book came from.
And it's. It's a New Yorkpublished book with Morgan James,
but I was finishing the bookup. He. He sent me to do a last reread
and the last re. Edit, youknow, come back and he says, go through
it one more time. And I said,I really want to talk about my last

(48:40):
statement because I want todo, you know, give me about a week.
And because during the time Iwas researching about my mom, the
more I learned aboutAsperger's and autism, the more I.
And she was brilliant,fricking smartest woman you ever
knew. I mean, she worked forthe governor, the United States government,
she flew all. She was as smartas she could be. Terrible mom as

(49:01):
far as nurturing, but she wasa great cook. But the more I learned
about her, the, the more I sawthat in me. And I was like, this
is me. And that was, that wasthe revelation that I made towards
the end of the book. And Iwrote that last piece and it went
to publishing. I said, I thinkI'm autistic. I'll let y'all know.
You know, so. And then youKnow, several months after it went

(49:23):
to press, the diagnosis, I gotmy appointment finally, and I went
in and got diagnosed. But alot of that, my inability to handle
grief was because I reallywasn't. Nothing was modeled to me
as a child. You know, I didn'thave nurturing. I didn't know how
to lose anyone. I lost mygrandmother. We did have a funeral.
It wasn't in her parlor, itwas at a funeral home. And I did

(49:46):
see my dad, you know, modelinggrief for a minute, but there was
no discussions, no talkingabout it. My babysitter committed
suicide when I was like 10 oranything. And no one told me why.
They just said it was over aboyfriend. And I'm like, why would
anybody kill themselves over a boy?
Yeah.
Doesn't make sense. You know,it's like. But no conversations,

(50:10):
you know, nothing. And Ireally just was. When Jacob was killed,
I really seriously wasn'tprepared for that.
Although I don't. I mean, tobe fair, I don't know that anyone
is really prepared for thatexperience. I think we can prepare
for, like a grandparent. Wecan prepare for those things a little
bit easier. But this traumapiece is. That's a whole new world.

(50:31):
That's different. And then.And then no one came forward, and
they. So they wanted to domarriage counseling for James and
I, and now. And James and Iare friends now. You know, we, the
three of us, co parent. He'smarried now, and they're all. We're
all. We all go to the ballgames, watch kids play.
That's great.
That's important, you know,and we all get along just great.
But, you know, it. No onetells you, you know, you know how

(50:54):
you're going to deal with allthat. You know, you don't know how
it's going to affect you.Sorry, I lost my train of thought,
but.
No, it's fine. But do you. Doyou think I. I mean, part of this
feels so much like the worldalready gives us permission to grieve,
but it feels like we don'thave that permission. And it's almost
like once we feel like we havethe permission to be fully however

(51:16):
we want, whether that's. Iwant to punch something. I want to
cry on the floor for 16 hours.I want to watch this really funny
movie that I've always.Whatever it is, once we feel that
permission, I think that'swhen things start.
Yeah. So there's a. You know,I told you, I'm seeking my PhD. I'm
getting my master's. And so Ijust went through A class on. And
they were talking about grief.And in. I think it's McMinn. But

(51:40):
he said that it takes so manymonths to get through the initial
trauma of the grief. Right. Ifit's after 30 days and you're still
in the deep grief, you know,you're. You probably need to get
some help. But probably about6 months to 18 months is about the
time, you know. But peoplegive each other six and a half weeks.

(52:00):
That's it.
Six and a half weeks, likefrom beginning to end.
Yeah.
That's all.
You get that. To our neighbor.We don't know we're doing it, but
we set as a people, as a. Asa, you know, creature living on earth.
After six and a half weeks,we're like, well, what's her problem?
I mean, God. Yeah.
Yeah.
Taking a little long togrieve, don't you think?

(52:21):
Until they realize it themselves.
Yeah. Until it happens tothem. That's right. And by the way,
we all are going to face griefin one way or another. And if you're
lucky enough to escape throughlife without some kind of tragedy,
congratulations. But it'scoming to a house near you. It's.
Yeah.
Yeah. I mean, I hate creatinga silver lining in my own life, but.

(52:43):
Oh, no, you need a few silverlinings in there.
The version of me I now, Ifeel is far different than the version
of me had that not happened tome as a kid.
Yeah.
To the rewiring point and allthese things. But the trajectory
that I saw, if I look back onthat version of me in that version
of my life and where I livedand all the other things seems a

(53:06):
lot different. And so there isa silver lining of the things that
I've gained because failing atgrief for so long, eventually finding
the way to do it.
Yeah.
You know, so it's a weirdthing to say, though.
Look at the. The pat. Look atthe path I went down. I'm Dorothy,
you know, and I've had the redshoes on the whole damn time and
didn't know it. It. It tookthis. I'm in my 60s, and discover

(53:30):
I'm autistic. You talk aboutputting puzzle pieces into place.
Every bully, every bad thing.I was sexually abused by two people
in my life. I was harassed bytwo employers. I had to quit the
legal field because of sexualharassment. I dropped out of college
twice. I went back after Jacobdied. I went back. He was studying

(53:53):
business. Right. And had. It.Had a small scholarship. And I went
back to the college that hewas going to, and I Finished my business
degree. I walked valedictorianat age 52 at college, but I didn't
find out I was autistic untilI was 60. But the whole thing. Remember
the purple pill?
Yeah.
Just, you know, would I knowthat today? Would I understand why,

(54:17):
you know, I was picked on as achild? You know, I was a very creative
teenager, and I got throughhigh school with a little bit of
popularity, you know, but itwas very strategic. And I was exhausted
all the time. I couldn't keepa relationship. You know, I would
laugh at people. I've beenmarried four times. My first marriage
lasted 30 days. He was engagedto be married to someone else. My

(54:41):
second husband was abusiveverbally and everything else. James
was my nice husband. Andsomeone murdered our child. And I've
got Adam. And God's gift to mefor all I've been through is that
I am perfectly paired withsomeone very much different than
me. But we love each other somuch, and we've made it all this
way. But I used to tell peopleI don't have a lot of close friends

(55:04):
because I'm autistic. I havefriends, but I only have one or two
close friends. Right. I'malways a bride, never a bridesmaid.
That's funny. But it's like.But. But it's. If. Had I known if
I'd been diagnosed as a child,a lot of the things that I went through
as a child would have beenavoided. But my family didn't talk.

(55:26):
I could have had a disease,and my mother would have never let
a soul know about it.
But that was the time period, too.
I think I was born in 62.That's right. They would institutionalize
me if. And half of mysiblings, because I have five brothers
and four sisters. So.
Wow, you've had quite a life.And. And all the things. Any of those

(55:47):
things that you just mentionedcould knock someone off their path,
could knock someone out of therace. And. And you have this resilience
to that R. I mean, that. Itseems like it's wired in there.
And I think that's what'sreally kept me through. It was just
harder to get after Jacob'sdeath because I was dealing. I was

(56:08):
helping everyone else, and Inever went back and helped myself.
And when I finally did it, I'mnot kidding when I tell you it was
almost an instant, like,revelation. I was like, oh, yeah.
You know, it's like, let's dothis. And I wrote the first. You
know, in grief recovery, youwrite a letter to whatever happened

(56:30):
to you. Some people run to theevent, to the person. And so I went
to grief recovery to getthrough the grief of my son. Right.
And then the. Then I thought,I'm gonna do Jacob first, and then
I'm gonna work on the attack.
That's how it works.
And tried to kill me. Yeah.The murderer that's, you know, out
there somewhere. And. Andinstead I wrote a letter to my mother

(56:52):
because my grief started fromthe neglect that I suffered as a
child. There was no nurturing.So everything's taught. When I said
everything's tied torelationships. They start at that
very young age. That nurturingbetween parent, that attachment.
And how you handle grief, alot of times depends on how well

(57:14):
the attachment is in theparenting as well. So for you, you
lost your nurturer. Thenurturer. For you, you lost very
early, and that's what made itso difficult for you. What we've
learned in grief in the last10 or 15 years, it's amazing.
All right. Do you thinkyou're. Do you feel different now

(57:34):
than you did like, the daybefore? Jacob? Do you feel like a
different person?
I'm a whole different in theworld. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that's
a wonderful gift, you know,that. That you can do, because a
lot of people don't. Theydon't make it through that.
Right, exactly. So you'veevolved in a way. Do you feel that.
How would you describeyourself then versus now?
I think I was seeking incomeand status, and I wanted to be like,

(58:00):
the perfect woman. And I was,you know, business lady and. And
I was people. I was aformidable person. And, you know,
I made myself. I created. Ihad a great person to go after. My
mother was a businesswoman ofall. Businesswoman.
You check the boxes.
She was there. I knew it. Ifollowed her pattern. I was smart
like her, and I knew I could.I could to do it. I was going to

(58:21):
be a billionaire in business,real estate person, you know, and
all of that was fake because Ihated it.
What would this Sylvia say to.To that version of you?
I would have probably told herback then. I would have told her,
just go get your. Go back andget your degree, you know, go finish

(58:42):
your law degree. I've lost mydesire to be a lawyer. I'm going
to be a psychologist instead.It's all right. But. But, hey, you
know, but I would have toldher to do that, you know, and focus
more on the kids and. And lesson the house and, you know, just.
There was just the relationships.
Yeah. On the relationships.Yeah. And because Again, it's never

(59:03):
about words. It's always aboutrelationships when we talk to each
other. And the relationshipwas with God too. I, I was a Christian
because I wore a cross and hada bible and said I was right. But
when you have chat with God at70 miles an hour in 30 degree weather
with the top down on yourVolkswagen convertible, that's different

(59:25):
type of being a Christian. Andwhen you come out of it on the other
side, if you've given, ifyou've given yourself to that scar
process, if you've givenyourself to that change, then there's
no telling what you're goingto come out on the other end. But
it's going to be good.
Yeah. No, I mean your story isso this cliche to say this, but inspiring

(59:45):
in a way that you've movedforward. You found this, this new
path for you. As hard as thepath was, you've paved something
new in front of you and you'rekind of working towards that. And
I think it's, it's a goodinspiration to others to know that
like it's possible they don'thave to follow what you did, but
they can move through.

(01:00:06):
Yeah. And the skills, I meanthe scar, just if you take nothing
back with you, take the scarwith you that you, you have all,
I promise you, your brain isalready wired to be able to do those
things. Your, youradaptability is there, your strength
is there, your courage isthere. You only need a little bit
of each and, and thenresilience, that is called bounce

(01:00:28):
back. You know, resilience ispart of your brain. You know when
I told you it rewires, it doesit for a reason. It's protect you.
That's why. So everything inyour body, when you go through something
traumatic like that, startsrewiring, redoing to get you ready
so that you can scar.
You know, speaking of scar,how can people like connect with

(01:00:49):
you? Find your book, find likeget in your space.
Get in my space. If you go togoldscars.com I mean literally that's
the website and you will findpretty much everything you need there.
Perfect.
Let me make sure it's got thething on it still and then I'm going
to give you a code. But GoldScars is the name of the book. You

(01:01:11):
can find it everywhere. But ifyou buy it from my publisher, I get
credit for it on New YorkTimes. Right. If you buy it from
Amazon. I don't. Okay, good toknow to make sure everyone does.
My publisher says if they goto my website and they go to goldscars.com
and you hit the Buy the book.Get the book and you go to the buy
from publisher, put in MJA 40M. Morgan J. James A author 4 0.

(01:01:42):
You'll get 40% off the book.So it's just a fraction.
Awesome.
Yeah. Really good deal. Andthen on the seven to Heal, I have
the seven to Heal portion ofthe book free on my website. So if
you go there, look for it.It's in the little scroller, but
it'll say download the freereport. You'll get the free version.
It's a small version of it.
Awesome.
And we do have a, a largerportion of that coming out really

(01:02:04):
soon. I've got it written. Wejust got to polish it up and that
should be on the websitehopefully by the end of the year.
So we're going to try to offerthat one for cheap. Cheap, you know.
But yeah, we'll definitely putthe links in the show notes so if
you're listening, you don'thave to rewind and type in some stuff.
I try to make it easy.
Goldscars.com and we'll putthat in the show notes. And are you
on socials? Do you like whenpeople connect with you?

(01:02:26):
Yeah. If you put Sylvia MooreMyers in Google, you'll find everything
about me except for my blood,blood type and I'm.
An A positive and that's,that's important now, you know, just
in case you need some. No,it's been, it's, it's been such a
wonderful journey to go onthis conversation with you. So thank
you for, for being open tothis experience and helping heal

(01:02:49):
a little piece of me. You knowhow we said that little puzzle? Today's
puzzle piece is recalling andremembering those dreams that I had
as a kid and realizing thatthey weren't weird, they weren't.
That was your brain rewiringyou for healing.
So thank you for, for a pieceof my healing journey.
I wanted to say one thingabout autism and healing. I, I found

(01:03:13):
something as I go through mygrad school and my final months of
this is that there's verylittle research done on grief recovery
for autistic children.There's, there's very little on children
alone. I mean, there's enoughout there that I wrote many papers
on it so far, but when Isearch for autism, it comes up blank
in the grief. So I'm, I'm,I've talked to a lot of folks, a

(01:03:35):
lot of professors, and I'mwriting my next book called Being
Tizzy, which Was my nicknameas a child, Tizzy. And all my family
still calls me Tizzy. So youfeel free. But that's gonna be the
next book. I really want tofocus on that because I think we're.
We have an entire group ofpeople. 5 million adults in this
country right now areautistic. Right. Adult autistics,

(01:03:56):
not let alone children. One inevery 40. And that has. That hasn't
even scratched the surfacewhere there's no research on it.
Yeah, that's important.
I want to make sure that there is.
Well, you're starting it.You're starting. You're spreading
the word, and you are beingopen with your journey and how, you
know, you can help otherpeople. Just by hearing your story,

(01:04:17):
people are going to hear yourstory. The most random of sentences
that you shared will stickwith them. And that's the beauty
of storytelling, because wenever know what part's gonna resonate
or light someone up.
You know, before I got on yourshow, I talked to God and I said,
whatever the words that comeout of my mouth, I want them to represent

(01:04:39):
you. So. So whether I mess itall up, it's all your fault. No,
I'm kidding. But. Sorry. Meand God have a good relationship.
But. But I. I wanted thatbecause I know that, like you said,
there's somebody out there,whether they're autistic or whether
they got children who aregrieving or whether they've just
been stuck in this grief forso long and they don't know why,
there's a really good way out.And at the very end of it, it's kind

(01:05:03):
of like I said, you've had itin you the whole time, Dorothy. Just
click your heels. Right. But Ican show you that. And I try to make
everything I do as free aspossible, because when I wrote the
book, I really seriously meantto get as many people healed as possible.
And I wasn't going to do thatone on one in Georgia.

(01:05:24):
You know, no doubt you'redoing it. And thank you for what
you're putting into the world.And it's just. It's. It's really.
I'll say this silly, inspiringword again, though, but it's to see.
To see you having survived allthose things and now thrive through.
Because of all the otheradjectives and descriptions that

(01:05:46):
we can make. It's really justa beautiful story. Although you.
All the scars that you're, youknow, showing through there, it's
important to show.
I'm proud of them. There theyare. Well, I'll show you mine. You
show me yours.
Exactly. Thank you for. Forbeing a part of this journey for
me and. And all the listeners.And if you need to reach out to Sylvia,

(01:06:08):
please do that. I'm sure shewould love to hear from you. Check
out her book, buy it from thepublisher, use the code that we put
in the show notes, all thosethings. Thank you for being on my
website.
Yeah, you can find me.
Exactly. So find Sylvia.
There's no way you won't findme foreign.

(01:06:35):
For more information, pleasevisit www.thelifeshiftpodcast.com.