December 23, 2025 • 50 mins
Have you ever felt like something was “off” inside you, even when life looks good on the outside?
In this episode, I talk with Julie Brumley, trauma-informed adoptee coach and founder of Coming Home to Self, about the hidden impact of adoption trauma and why adoptee wounds often live at a deep, preverbal level.
We explore primal trauma, the pressure to “just be grateful,” and how somatic healing and nervous system regulation support real belonging and long-term healing.
✔️ Why adoption trauma is often unseen or misunderstood
✔️ How primal trauma impacts the nervous system and self-worth
✔️ What helps adoptees move from survival mode into self-belonging
If you or someone you love has been impacted by adoption, this episode offers validation, clarity, and hope. Healing is possible. Belonging is possible. And you are not broken.
Listen now and subscribe to the Rise 2 Shine Podcast for more conversations designed to help you rise, heal, and shine in your next chapter.
Episode Highlights
00:00 Welcome to the Rise to Shine Podcast
00:11 Meet Julie: Trauma-Informed Adoptee Coach
02:02 Julie's Adoption Story: Sunshine and Rainbows?
07:40 The Impact of Adoption on Relationships
15:13 Adoptee Mental Health: Shocking Statistics
19:56 The Power of Somatic Healing and Nervous System Regulation
27:57 Radical Self-Belonging and Curiosity
28:34 Consistency in Self-Compassion Practices
33:33 Grounding Techniques and Spiritual Practices
38:41 Deep Work with Adoptees
48:33 Final Thoughts and Where to Connect
Meet Julie Brumley
Julie Brumley is a trauma-informed adoptee coach who has been coaching men and women for more than 15 years to overcome addictive behaviors and heal the primal trauma of abandonment. She is also the CEO of Coming Home to Self, a company dedicated to helping adoptees heal. After her own birth mother tried to abort her twice, she found herself frozen in an unconscious trauma response for decades until she found the power of somatic trauma healing. Now she uses somatics, nervous system regulation, personal experience and her masters in counseling to help other adult adoptees find their way out of their own trauma and into a life of radical self-belonging
Website: www.cominghometoself.co
Instagram: https://instagram.com/juliebrumley_
Facebook: https://Facebook.com/julierasbrum
TikTok: https://tiktok.com/juliebrumley_
YouTube: https://youtube.com/@julie_brumley
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to the Rise to Shine podcast with Noel Custis where
we ignite the spark to discover your favorite self.
It is time to get real ladies. Hello, hello and welcome to the
Rise to Shine podcast. I'm your host, Noel Custis.
(00:20):
Today's guest is someone whose work and story truly moved me
the moment that we met. Julie is a trauma informed
adoptee coach. She's also the founder and CEO
of Coming Home to Self and a woman on a mission to help
adoptees heal the deep, often unseen wounds of abandonment and
(00:42):
rejection. And with over 15 years of
coaching experience, she has a Master's in counseling and very
powerful training and somatic and nervous system healing.
Julie helps men and women move from survival mode into radical
self belonging. And I'm telling you, her work is
(01:03):
changing lives and shining a light on a topic that I do not
think is talked about nearly enough.
And a fun little twist before weget started, we actually met.
We were just talking about this before we pressed record.
We actually met through a mutualfriend online when I was
teaching in her group and Julie was filling in and we started
(01:25):
chatting and quickly realized that we live less than a mile
apart. She had just moved across the
country and we are literally less than a mile apart and so we
have since met in person and have been cheering each other on
ever since. So I just know that you are
going to love her heart and her story and I am so excited to
(01:49):
welcome you, my friend. I am so happy to be with you.
It has been an honor just to getto know you in the last few
months and be a part of the collective and so many different
ground breaking things that so many women are doing.
So it's awesome to be together. Love it.
Well, I am really, really excited that you are here today
and your story is incredibly powerful and that work that
(02:14):
you're doing, like I said, is soneeded.
So I would love to just start with your story and if you would
be willing to share a bit about what led you into this work and
how you know this all came to befor you.
Yeah, I would be happy to do that.
Honestly, it's been, it's been aslow uncovering to be honest.
(02:37):
So, you know, there's people don't realize when they think
about adoption, what they think about is, you know, sunshine and
rainbows. And, and I think in some
situations, sure. And my adoption was sunshine and
rainbows in many ways. Like when I was adopted, I was
adopted into a great family. That isn't the issue.
That isn't actually what I'm going to be talking about the
(02:59):
whole time that I'm personally talking.
There are many people that have very traumatic adoptions.
I was not one of those. I'm talking and, and that I
still deal with and work with because there's much compounded
trauma that adoptees experience,but nobody's talking about it.
And one of the things that, well, people are beginning to
(03:19):
talk about it because it's starting to become pretty
evident. And there's some vocal adoptees
out there, me being one of them and trying to continue to get
the message out. But one of the things that I'm
realizing with my story, and forthe longest time I was a part of
of this idea was the status quo in society is that adoptees
(03:40):
should just be grateful. The fact that they were rescued
from a life of low, low economicclass or whatever, or addiction
or whatever it may be. And so we hear that should be
grateful. And we it shuts us down like,
well, OK, I know I should be grateful, but I'm still grieving
something and I don't even understand what it is that I'm
(04:00):
actually grieving because it waspre verbal and I don't have
words for it. So with my story along those
lines, none of that even surfaced, none of that even
showed up in my life. Meaning in a way that I was
aware that it was connected to adoption until 2010.
So at that point, I had two small children, probably, I
(04:23):
think they were probably like 7 and maybe 7:00 and 9:00.
And I guess that's not small. They were, you know, whatever.
And I found my birth mother. But where all of that started
was because I was in my master'sprogram.
And at that point, adoption was still this beautiful thing that
had all impact on me. But if I look back now, even
(04:48):
then and look at my relationships, my romantic
relationships, my friendships, so it impacted it.
It was negatively impacting it the whole time.
I just didn't know that that's what it was.
I was trying to figure out what was wrong with me.
Like, why do I feel like I need people to tell me that I'm OK in
(05:08):
order to be OK? And a lot of people feel that
way. Don't get me wrong.
I feel it at a level that is cellular, like there's something
literally defective wrong with me.
I'm not supposed to be here. I'm not supposed to exist.
These were the subliminal beliefs that were going on
(05:28):
inside my brain that I didn't have words for and didn't know.
So because of that, I felt as ifI had to interrupt in
conversations. I felt like I had to figure out
a way to be seen. So I was loud in order to be
accepted, even though that totally turned people off.
I had this fear of being rejected all the time.
(05:49):
And so I would do everything in my power to, you know, make
myself likable. It's the chameleon mindset that
a lot of adoptees have. And so that was really a lot of
the before, I didn't realize that that had to do with my
trauma from birth, which I call primal trauma because to me,
(06:10):
adoption trauma is different than primal trauma.
So and I can explain that. Yeah, I was going to say explain
that, please. I'm so curious.
I will so I I came to be in 1973about 3 months after or actually
that's not true. December of 72 is when I was
(06:35):
conceived. Roe V Wade passed in January of
73 and a few weeks later my birth mother attempted to abort
me twice between weeks 12 and 16.
Oh my gosh. So did not know that actually
until 2010, but I remember when I found that out what, how that
(06:59):
even came to be was because my professor in my master's program
pulled me aside after finding out that I was adopted, which I
I'm sure I said something, but Idon't, it's not like I walk up
to people and go, hi, I'm Julie.I'm adopted.
That's not how this works. It came out in conversation
somehow. So she pulled me aside and she
(07:19):
said I'm a foster parent and this is my professor.
She said, I am a foster parent and you have skeletons in your
closet relating to adoption, like point blank.
And I just looked at her like, what are you talking about?
Right? What skeletons?
She said you need to meet your birth mother.
And if you don't deal with thesethings, you will harm people.
(07:40):
Whoa. Like, even still, I get chills
all over my body because at thatpoint I felt like somebody had
figuratively slapped me across the face.
Right. Oh, OK.
So my adoption has impacted me How?
Like, I don't even know where tobegin at this point.
I had no idea. And this happens to many
(08:01):
adoptees at at that age, like anywhere between 30 to 50.
We kind of get hit by something.It's it's called the the rupture
that actually makes us go something is not right with me.
It's off and I've been noticing it my entire life, but I don't
know why and I don't know where it comes from.
(08:24):
So when she said that, that's when I started the search, the
actual search to find my birth family.
Because what I realized from what she said was that I'm going
to need to know that in order tohelp others, whether they're
adoptees or not. Right.
OK, you froze there for a minute.
Yeah, you kind of went and it looks like I'm still frozen on
(08:48):
my screen. It does, yeah.
Hopefully you'll come back, but I can hear you.
OK, that's good to know. I don't know if that's a problem
for the recording. Yeah, as I'm looking like that,
we'll definitely make sure this gets edited out, whatever this
is. Let's see if I let's take a
pause and just see if I actuallycome back.
Like maybe go off video and comeback and see what happens.
(09:11):
That's what I'm thinking, OK. Oh, look at that cute face.
Yep, you're back. OK, perfect.
There we go. OK, we will start.
I'm sorry. Oh, it's OK connectivity
technology. So that was when I began to
realize if I'm going to help people, I better deal with
(09:33):
whatever skeleton she's talking about.
I I don't know if you know the Enneagram well but I am A1.
OK. So if somebody tells me to do
something, I'm going to do it and I'm going to do it.
I'm going to do it real well. So I obeyed and did my own
search. But but what was interesting
about the whole thing was I discovered how I came to be in
(09:55):
that process, meaning I, I, I discovered how I was conceived.
So I did end up finding my birthmother, had a conversation with
her and over the phone. We were actually living in
Hawaii at the time. It was amazing.
But I was in the process of helping addictive behaviors.
I was getting my masters to try to help that population.
(10:19):
She herself was an addict. She was a prostitute at some
point. But how I came to be was she
hitchhiked across? Well, a few states from
California, 'cause I was born inOceanside, but from California
to Colorado on semi trucks. Sold her body to get to
(10:41):
Colorado. Met my dad in a courtyard,
hooked up with him that night, he left the next morning to go
to work. Came back from work that day and
found her in bed with two other guys, 2 room mates of his and
then kicked her out. So she slept with three guys in
24 hours. She told me that in our first
(11:02):
conversation. Wow, that's a lot to.
Take in so she said she said it was the 70s.
I slept with one of three guys. I don't know which one it was,
but they were all great and I'm just like and then she proceeded
to want to tell me what the night was like.
Would you like to know what it was like when I the cat the
(11:23):
couch? I'm OK?
No, but that's such a a. Weird.
Kind of like a weird Mamma Mia moment, but it.
Is a Mamma Mia? Way it's like a lot more
traumatic than the love and all the, you know, all of that in
the movie. This is like trauma.
Yeah, Yep. I mean, and and I think for me,
(11:44):
that's when it's, I didn't know it was trauma at that point.
Yeah, that's when my eyes started to be open to wow, the
way that I came into this world.I wasn't, I wasn't even thought
of it wasn't something that was considered.
She clearly and I had read in the paperwork right before I
talked to her about her attempting to abort me twice.
(12:07):
But of course, I'm not going to say that in our first
conversation, right? So, but I remember that feeling
when I first read that I couldn't read any further.
I stopped and I had this feeling, and I've shared this
before on multiple podcasts. I, I had this feeling as if my
head shattered into pieces. I felt fragmentation.
(12:29):
And then I immediately had a headache.
I was like, this is odd, never had felt that before.
But then I also read that and the words began to formulate
even though I didn't have them underneath.
No wonder I feel defective. No wonder, like all of those,
like almost compassionate validation.
Right. But I didn't even know that was
(12:50):
happening and it impacted my relationship with my ex because
at this point all I could think of was no wonder we haven't been
connecting the way that I want to.
I don't know how I don't know how to allow myself to be
nurtured because to me nurture means bye bye.
Like you you even even my mom that adopted me told me that
(13:15):
she's that I stiff armed her, that I wouldn't allow her to
nurture me because I had four different caregivers in those
first seven weeks of my life. So I I went from her womb, never
saw her in the 70s. They took you directly to the
nursery. I was held by some random woman.
That's a whole other story that should not have been let into
the nursery who wanted me and went and asked my mom for me, my
(13:37):
birth mother. Weird.
And then obviously I went from there to my foster family and I
was with my and I know I was in a foster care because it notes
it in my paperwork, but that's all it says.
There's no records, there's no, there's no names, there's
nothing. And then my foster family said
we can no longer accommodate herand gave me back to the state in
those first seven weeks of my life.
(13:58):
So you can imagine who are you and, and are you going to be
able to take care of me? I don't know and I don't trust
you. So that's how I started life.
What I realize now is that impacted all of my
relationships. And it dawned on me in my 30s
(14:19):
when I started exploring this. And as everything began to
become uncovered, I began to realize how deeply it had
impacted me in intimate relationships and friendships
with my children. I could not get on the floor and
play with them because I was afraid they would leave me.
What interesting doesn't even make sense, but it did to my
(14:40):
brain, right? So yeah, that's that's the story
of how adoption had impacted me.That is wow.
First of all, thank you for sharing all of that.
It's powerful and it is evident that this is very personal and
how it has become so purpose driven.
(15:02):
This work for you has become so purpose driven makes total
sense. You, I mean, you've lived
through experiences and then discovered things that most
people cannot imagine, obviouslyhaven't even gone through.
And one of the things I mean, you know, it shows how like some
of our some of our deepest pain can become our greatest purpose
(15:25):
when we're ready to fix it and we're ready to go through that.
You mentioned to me the other day and it like blew my mind
that the statistics around adopting mental health are, I
mean, first of all, just heartbreaking and that there the
suicide rate is actually one of the highest.
(15:47):
But nobody talks about it. I know.
Yeah. And I, I actually did research
on it, Noel, I recently because I wanted to make sure that I was
right. And, and I am.
But this is what's crazy. I wrote it down yesterday
because I was curious. There's 5 to 7 million adoptees
now. They still don't have the solid
number in the United States. There's a family flying around
(16:07):
my head. Right now, if you're wondering
why. 5 to 7 million adoptees in the world, we are twice as
likely to struggle with addiction.
That is an accurate stat. That's what came up.
Two stats came up with suicide that are kind of going to blow
your mind. In 2013, the National Institute
of Health did a study that showed that we were four times
(16:31):
more likely than the average person to commit suicide.
In 2025, the Ollie Foundation, which I believe is in the UK,
also did. This is a preliminary study and
it's shocking. Like I don't even the the the
number sounds almost ridiculous.Really.
(16:52):
The findings show that adoptees are 35 times more likely to
commit suicide. I I get the chills even reading
that when I read it the first time, I'm like, that can't even
be real. Like, I don't even how is that
possible? But we all knew in the adoptee
community as we've begun to workwith people.
(17:13):
You hear it all the time. I'd rather be dead.
I but you know, all the time. My mother should have just
aborted me. My all the time.
And you just think how awful is it for a human to live with that
belief system? The person who is supposed to
(17:33):
love you the most doesn't and gives you up places you for
adoption. There's two different scenarios
with that depending upon the time that you were adopted.
My mine, which is basically she didn't want me and did
everything she could to get rid of me because it didn't fit her
lifestyle. 2 They were forced because of society.
(17:57):
Yeah. Back in my time, those were
really the two options. 100 percent, 100%.
Because of society, economic stuff, you know, whatever now
it's addiction. There's so many factors that
are, and there were was addiction then too, but nobody
understood it, right. So there's those pieces.
And then the other statistic that I thought was really
(18:17):
fascinating is we are two times more likely to seek out mental
health. We are two to five times more
likely. And I've seen this, I've
witnessed this and adopted kids that I've I've helped the
parents. We are two to five times more
likely to be in outpatient or inpatient programs.
(18:38):
So we need some help. So, so that is the reason why I
feel what I feel. That well, and The thing is, is
that when you had shared that with me, I, I mean, it's so
interesting and fascinating because in recent, in the last
couple of years, there have beensome experiences, some adoptees
(19:03):
that have discovered like 1 was within our family, not my
immediate family, but there was a situation that we found out
that there was a family member that we did not know existed.
And then I also have a friend that is going through some,
yeah, you know, finding out thatshe was adopted and as an adult
(19:23):
had no idea. But what is so fascinating to me
is that you are sharing how always feeling like something
was off, something wasn't right.Something wasn't, you know, and
did not, I mean, in this scenario, didn't know until she
was an adult. And so it was just so traumatic.
And this is what really, and when I started talking with you
(19:47):
and starting to hear more about your story, and I just was like,
this opens people's eyes to the layers of what adoptees
experience far beyond what people realize.
I mean, I had no idea. I had no idea.
And so listening to those statistics blows my mind even
(20:08):
more because it's just like, Oh my gosh.
So Speaking of help like transitioning into that and what
it is that you do is you. You often talk about, you know,
somatic healing and you talk about nervous system regulation
as kind of this core part of your work.
So for people that are listeningto this for the first time, I
(20:29):
mean, I am praying that this show gets, you know, this
episode will get shared with if you know someone out there that
is struggling with this or it has gone through this, like,
please, please, please share because I feel like this is so
eye opening and this could thesecould help with some of the
answers. This can help with even just
(20:50):
feeling like you're not alone inthis all, all of the things.
But for those who may be hearingyou know some of this for the
first time, can you explain whatit means in simple terms, what
some you know the somatic healing and nervous system
regulation is and why it's so powerful for recovery or to like
get through this? Yeah, there's a couple of things
(21:13):
that I'm realizing with this arereally crucial.
And one of the reasons why my framework is revolutionary,
funny, my program is called revolution.
But the the reason why my program is revolutionary is
because I'm bringing in multiplemodalities.
It's not just one. We start with CBT, we move to
emotion focused, we then move into compassion.
(21:38):
Then we talk about ifs we like, we put and then the whole time
weaving in the somatic pieces. Part of the problem with
adoptees, myself included, was we are so disconnected.
Our brain is very much disconnected from our body,
which means we don't know how touse our voice.
In the middle of all of that is this part that cannot speak
(22:02):
because we don't have the language, literally don't have
the language. So anyway, all of that to say,
how that works is we need to establish safety within
ourselves first. No one else is going to provide
that. And I had to learn that the hard
way because when I found my birth father in 2021 that this
(22:25):
is when all of it really startedhappening for me, I still hadn't
done any somatic healing. I had done AMDR which a lot of
adoptees have attempted and somehave really felt some great
strides in, but there are many that have been re traumatized by
it because they don't have the ability in their bodies to
connect. When can you tell us what MDR is
(22:48):
just so people that. Does EMDR is a trauma based
therapy? It has to do with eye movement.
It has to do with in person holding things that vibrate in
your hands. It sounds like voodoo when you
when you're like talking about it and then you have this, these
things over your ears that Ding like it's, it's interesting.
(23:10):
Like there's tones that are going on in your brain.
And there's been a lot of of research recently on like hurts
and the tones, like the sounds that go through our body.
Part of the reason why is because our body actually
emanates emotions energetically from hurts.
So it's important. Yeah.
So it's important for us to connect that way.
So that's a part of what I do inour program as well.
(23:33):
All of that to say, in 2021, I found my birth father and
thought, this is it. My birth mother wasn't
trustworthy. He's going to be the one that
makes me feel like I belong somewhere.
I hadn't done I'd done a ton of work up until that point.
Clearly I was seeing clients. I was a therapist, you know,
bottle or whatever, coach more than I was a therapist.
And I find him, put all my my eggs in that basket and realize,
(23:59):
wait a minute, he's human. My sisters are human.
My brother is human. Of course they're not going to
know how to deal with this random human plopping in their
life. I don't know how to deal with
it. And I was trying to make them
drink from a fire hose. Hey, let's have a relationship.
I mean, we just didn't know whatwe were doing.
How do you? That's the other thing that's so
(24:20):
traumatic about adoption. When this happens, when you
begin to see your biology for the first time, it is again,
like you're being smacked acrossthe face.
I see somebody who looks just like me.
I'm getting the chills even talking about it right now.
I've never felt that before, besides in a child.
That's not the same. It was amazing, but yet it
(24:42):
scared me because, Oh, my goodness, I have to sustain this
human. I didn't have anything like that
growing up. I didn't have anybody that I
could look at and feel like theyknew me just from looking at me.
Now I look. I look at these people.
Yeah. And my sister is my twin, She
looks just like me, and my othersister sounds just like me.
(25:06):
I have not, I've not experiencedthat.
So there's something really settling in your spirit about
that and your soul. So to me, those fragments that
were there settled. So when I found them, they kind
of click back together. That's why I post a lot about
Kintsugi, the art of Kintsugi. You know.
Gold, do you know about this? No, I just from things that I've
(25:28):
seen that you've talked about, yeah.
That's for a lot of adoptees. I try to help them understand
that they're not broken. They're just being brought back
together beautifully with these,this gold Fleck paint that is
making their story even more beautiful those and that's how I
feel. And so when those came together,
I realized, OK, I have those pieces, but I'm still missing
(25:50):
something. Well, what I was missing was
this solid trusting relationshipwith myself.
And that is what I've worked towards.
So what helped me do that, the somatic work was being able to
actually tune into what does my body mean when it is saying
these things. So for years I had lower back
(26:10):
pain, bad crippling lower back pain to the point where the guy
who the orthopedic was like, I think you're going to need to
have surgery. I'm like, but is that even going
to help me? He's like, well, not really.
OK, well, why would I do that? Like crazy, crippling back pain,
hips. I ended up having autoimmune
diseases. A lot of adoptees have health
issues that have no explanation.A lot of them.
(26:34):
And So what I realized through all of that was I've tried
everything, everything you can think of, ortho, PT, meds,
therapy, EMDR, books, I've nothing, I'm still feeling the
same thing. What am I missing?
And I remember saying to the groups that I was leading at the
(26:54):
time, addictive groups, there's a missing piece and I don't know
what it is, but we're going to find it.
And then my friend who you who connected us, he was actually in
my program at the time, found this and I realized she had
stumbled upon the thing that I had been missing.
(27:17):
And crazy enough, I had been trained in it in school.
I had been not trained. I knew what it was.
I knew what semantics was. But it's.
A whole new language the body speaks and the vagus nerve from
the base of our, you know, skullto the base spine has different
nerve bundles that are like little brains.
(27:38):
And each one of the whole brainshave meaning to them.
They regulate parts of our bodies.
And the more that we learn aboutthat, the more that we're able
to honestly heal from the the bottom up, which is what we
need. Right.
I mean, it's so, I mean, there'sso many things that for me as
(27:59):
I'm thinking about this and going, gosh, we can unpack so
many different things. But I know something that you
talk about, and this is what reminded me of this when you
were saying, you know, we just have such a disconnection.
You really talk about that radical self belonging and you
know, having that, like being able to do that.
(28:21):
And so how can someone begin to feel more at home within
themselves? How?
How do they do that? Curiosity, curiosity, I'm not
kidding. It's curiosity and compassion.
This is one of the things that, that people can it be that
simple? That's what I hear all the time.
(28:42):
And I'm like, honestly, it is. But it's it and they're all CS.
It's, it's curiosity, compassionand consistency.
The more that we are consistent with the little things.
Like for example, when I noticeda heaviness in my heart when I
was beginning this process and Iwas it my, my marriage was not
doing well. We were having a really hard
(29:03):
time and I had this heaviness and I was like, I don't even
know what to do with this. And Becky, the person that you
and I know connected us was like, just lay your hand over
your heart and be sensitive to yourself, be compassionate.
And I was like, my very authentic self wanted to do
something obscene. I was like, you've got to be
kidding me that that's even going to work.
Like no. Right, but she said what have?
(29:25):
You tried up to this point and has it worked?
And I was like, you're right. So I started with something as
simple as that. Let me just when my body be
curious notice oh that that feels heavy.
I don't like that feeling. I feel constricted.
Oh, OK, well, my knee notice those things and started tuning
(29:46):
to them. And by tuning place your hand
there, you know, radically self accepted meaning, OK, I get why
your shoulders are doing that. You just had a horrible
conversation with somebody. So no wonder you're feeling
tense. Right, it's.
It's learning how, and you and Ialso have a shared mentor in
Kelly Brock. It's learning how to be on your
(30:07):
own side. Truly, yes.
Gosh, and and like you said, it,it sounds, it sounds easy in
theory, but it but it is I love that you said it's consistency
there that you have to show up for yourself because yes, it's
not that it's hard, like the action itself is not hard.
(30:30):
It's, it's loving yourself and it's trusting yourself and
trusting the process enough to do it, to actually do it and
take steps consistently because that's what ends up creating the
biggest transformation over time.
It's not going to change tomorrow, but it can give you
(30:51):
some peace in the moment. And that's what I've learned
about especially with the somatic work.
And all of that is just it can give you the peace in the
moment. Answers will start to come
because you are getting curious within yourself, Correct.
Yeah. I love, I love that you're
sharing this. It's so important.
And I can see especially for adoptees, like, you know, when
(31:15):
you've gone through something like this that's so heavy and,
and, and so, gosh, I mean, it just feels like it would be so
confusing, you know, because you're trying to find all of
these answers and, and it can I,I would imagine it can be very
complicated too, as you're goingthrough this process.
(31:38):
Like it's not like all of a sudden you just find your birth
mother in some cases, like sometimes people don't even ever
find them. And so there's, I mean, gosh,
there's so many layers. And This is why I feel like this
work is so important. And I think of you and I go, OK,
so not only have you gone through this and you're going
(32:00):
through the process of the healing, but you're also now
working with others that are going through it, which is deep
work. This is not like surface level
work. This is deep work.
So is are you staying grounded in these same ways like it?
Because I would imagine, I mean you have to hold so much more
(32:22):
space. Right.
No, that's a really good .1 of the things that I think I've
realized through this whole process is I think I was a
little shocked at how this is going to sound so weird, but I'm
just going to say it how well myframework works so I I realize
you. Can say it, I love it.
Yeah, I was just like, this is crazy because I've done it for
(32:44):
years, but I, I don't think I actually packaged it, put it
into like a Pretty Little package until the last couple.
And I really do believe it's thebelonging blueprint.
It's not as if you get to the end of my program and you are
like perfect and everything is solved and you don't have any
(33:04):
triggers anymore. We wouldn't be freaking human.
So that's not how that works. What it does is it helps you
begin, and that's why the name of my company is what it is to
come home to yourself. That is, if I can do that, if I
can help my clients feel not only like they're home with me
initially, like I provide that safe, homey, hospital hospitable
(33:29):
feeling in the containers that Ilead.
It helps them realize and they see me doing it.
It's funny, one of my clients actually asked me, do you
actually do all of this? And I was like, yeah, I created
it. So yes, I do.
Like, how does that even look? So that's pretty much how you're
(33:49):
asking me like now, currently what my, my grounding looks like
is I do yoga daily. I need to do yoga daily, partly
because of my back, but also because it's a way for me to
connect with myself, chill, be still allow.
And I hear, I hear from God during yoga, during movement a
lot of the time. So that is one of the things
(34:12):
that I do. I obviously still do my prayer
walks every day, pretty much without fail.
If I miss it, then I'm going to figure out where to put it in my
day. I can't give what I don't have.
You know this, this isn't new information.
So there's that piece now. And if people aren't God lovers,
that's fine. There is a spiritual practice
(34:32):
that is necessary for this kind of work.
And what I mean by that is BrenéBrown has done a ton of research
on this. This is not for me.
This is scientifically proven inher qualitative research that in
order to live wholeheartedly, there are two pieces to it and
one is spirituality. Just got to believe in a higher
power. 2 is gratitude. So those two pieces are a part
(34:57):
of my day. Every day I have a gratitude
journal that I wake up do in themorning and then when I go to
bed, same thing. And it, it, I love it.
It grounds me like nothing else and keeps me just remembering
all the wonderful things that I have in the last 24 hours.
So, and it's not like toxic positivity kind of stuff.
(35:18):
It's things like I was able to FaceTime with my son and he, I
was able to help him with this. Like I'm I'm I'm writing down,
putting down actionable things that actually happened.
You know. So those are the things that
that help me. And then of course, when things
come up, like I noticed that I'mtriggered, I, I put into
(35:40):
practice those things, whether it's hand over heart, whether
it's a, a containment like self hug and I'll rock I but I also
do that on a consistent basis when I'm not triggered.
So I think that's one of the keys that I've realized every
night before I fall asleep. It's not like I'm sitting there
crying myself to sleep. I'm rocking myself.
(36:00):
And part of the reason why I do that is because my little baby
within me needs that. She never had that.
Yeah. And I need to offer it to her.
And that's been really a beautiful thing recently, in the
last month or two, is me connecting with my 2 1/2 week
old self. I've actually created a
visualization for myself to do that.
(36:21):
And I do it on a consistent basis 'cause she's not ready to
be integrated, meaning she stilldoesn't trust that I'm going to
come back. And so I've had to come back
repeatedly for her to say and not say, 'cause she can't speak
to realize that I'm not leaving.And it's healing me at a level
that I didn't know I needed. So with all that to say, it's
(36:43):
like I'm, I'm some steps. I'm a few steps ahead of the
people that I help in order to show them.
It really can happen. It really can shift.
You really can transform. You can be different.
Yeah, no, it's so. I mean, this is what we talked
about in Rise to Shine Co all the time.
And, and this is just another confirmation, ladies, that these
(37:05):
practices, these, and now I say these are practices.
These are not just like one day you're just going, oh, I'm
thankful for this. You know, I no, this is, this is
intentional work. And I wholeheartedly agree 150%.
I agree exactly what you were talking about.
(37:25):
It's believing in a higher power.
I always say had I not when I was going through some of the
darkest days, heaviest things ofmy life, even going through the
good like all of it. It's like, Oh my gosh, you know
it. It has been through that
relationship and having having that relationship with the Lord.
And so for me, that's what that is.
(37:47):
And then on top of it, having a practice of gratitude.
As a matter of fact, we were just talking before we hit play
that I was, you know, speaking with my daughter who is having a
tough night, and we immediately went to that like I was like, I
hear you. We went through all the hard,
all the things that were just sohard that day.
(38:07):
And then I was like, how, how can we finish this day?
We're going to finish this day with gratitude.
And it's coming back to that. And, and constantly, you know,
she's in her early 20s, but it'shaving those conversations now
because she's already starting to develop that practice way
earlier than what I ever did. I didn't discover that I was in
my 40s. I'm like, I do not want you to
(38:28):
wait. I want this to be something that
you are doing. You know, I talked to my son
about it. I mean, I, I just want to shout
it from the rooftops because I'mlike, it is a game changer.
It is a game changer. But again, it's being willing to
do this consistently and make ita practice.
Well, and also seeing the value in it and not and not seeing it
(38:52):
as this pad answer to a problem.Yes, because for adoptees, Yeah.
So for adoptees, here's the thing.
That word is a loaded word for us.
Yeah, I could see that, yeah. You should be grateful.
You should be grateful. We've heard that our entire
life. So in the in my free, I have a
(39:13):
free Facebook group that is fullof adoptees and I do Thankful
Thursdays deliberately because it is my intention to take it
back. I'm not calling it gratitude.
I'm calling it. But there's a reason why I do
that because I know because I'veexperienced it, how it's
shifted. It's like changed my brain
chemistry. Well, it does.
(39:34):
It really, really does it. Truly, truly.
It's shocking, you know, like the saboteur assessment that a
lot of us do where we figure outwhat our voices are in our
heads. Yep.
Over the years, the last three years of me doing it, I went
from A10 Stickler. She's now 4.
Because they're not. They don't.
They realize I got them. They don't need to protect me
(39:55):
anymore. Exactly.
This beautiful the word that came to my mind was symbiosis.
Is that the right word? The connectivity that I have
with them, my internal family, true.
That internal family, yeah, has become what I value.
Not in a way that's selfish, butthen the in a way that allows me
(40:16):
to be more present for everyone else around me.
So good. Yeah.
No, I, I love that. I love that so much.
Julie and I, I feel like that's what's so great about it is
because we can all see it differently.
And just even having that perspective when we're talking
about the adoptee community likethat, it can be looked at so
(40:37):
differently, even though it benefits all of us, it can be
something that is like a whoa, whoa, you know, just the word
gratitude can just be a loaded word for people.
And, and gosh, I never have thought about like that whole
thing of like, you should be grateful.
I never thought that that would be a thing until you had shared
(40:59):
that. And I go, wow, I mean, that is,
oh gosh, there's so much. And This is why you guys, This
is why you need to be following my friend, because truly, truly.
And This is why you need to share because I don't feel like
this is being talked about enough.
And I think it's also a powerfulthing to have all of us who may
(41:20):
not be a part of it personally, you will be like, you'll know
somebody. We weren't planning on finding
out in our family. You know, there was a, you know,
you know, there was someone. And for our situation, it has
ended up being something that has, you know, everyone's
working through and there's somebeautiful relationships that are
(41:43):
forming because of it. But it took time.
It took time and you know, it's,I wish I knew all of this, You
know then that I know now. And one of the things I would
love to ask because of course I want everyone following you and
all of the things. But what's next for coming home
(42:03):
to self? What are you excited about as
your mission continues to grow? Yeah, I I'm doing a lot behind
the scenes right now. I actually just recorded a
couple of episodes for my podcast that is going to
actually, I'm going to release it this Friday, 'cause that was
the day that I was adopted. Yeah.
(42:25):
So I'm going to release it that day.
It's called the Resilience project where adoptees find
belonging. So that's new.
I, I I do I want to share. And you don't have pill you
don't have. No, it's, it's, it's like it's,
it's you. And I have been talking about
this. So I don't see why I can't talk
(42:46):
about it. But I am in the process of, of
really seriously considering andnot even considering making it
happen, a nonprofit organizationcalled the Adoptee Healing
Foundation. And it's something that has been
on my heart. This is gonna sound really
morbid, but I did. I wrote my eulogy a few years
ago. And in that eulogy, this came,
(43:07):
this came out, this name, Adoptee Healing Foundation came
out. And I've been praying about it
and envisioning it for so long. And in the last few weeks, I've
gotten confirmation after confirmation.
I need to stop. So I don't even know what that
looks like, but I had this wonderful friend, Noel Koustis,
who actually knows how to do some of these things.
(43:28):
So that's coming. And, you know, I have my, my
coaching program that I, I really wholeheartedly believe in
and know after all of the, the research that I've done, I think
I'm the only one doing what I'm doing.
And I think that's part of the issue.
It's hard when I'm like creatingthe market, you know, right?
(43:50):
Right, Yes, you are my friend. You're doing some groundbreaking
work there's. Like I'm here anybody, you know,
like you just don't and and a lot of things it's just because
adoptees don't realize that theydon't know that they something
like this so. Absolutely.
Well, it is definitely only the beginning of something much
bigger. I feel that lots of us feel
(44:10):
that, you feel that, and I'm just excited for what is to
come. I know, you know, I always say
God doesn't play something on our hearts that is not meant to
happen at some, you know, at some point and how whatever that
looks like, you'll figure that out.
It'll there will be more confirmations because there just
(44:31):
will be. God placed it on your heart for
a reason. And so I'm really excited for
that. And we will definitely be on the
lookout for all of that and keeping our listeners posted
about it. And you know, again, I just am
so grateful that we were able tohave this conversation.
I just think it is so enlightening and it just is such
(44:52):
an eye opener for so many of us that just don't know.
And and it's just so important. And obviously going back to
those statistics like it, this is work that cannot be
forgotten. And this is, you know, I can't,
I can't believe that we're saying, you know, gosh, this is
like ground floor, you know, I, I go, Oh my gosh, like I can't
(45:12):
believe it that it's only, you know what I mean?
Like I go, this should have beengoing on a long time ago, but
you know what? Here we are.
We can't take that back and we can start here.
And yeah, I'm really excited foryou and just appreciative of
you. And then, of course, you know,
before we wrap up every episode,we always have to do a spark and
(45:33):
spill. And I just feel like one of my
favorite parts because we get tomove from some of the heavy deep
talk for a little fun. And not to say this whole
episode has not been amazing, but I just love that we get to
talk about the lighter side of Julie.
So one of the things that my first question to you is what is
(45:54):
one thing currently sparking joyor inspiration in your life?
I would say this building of theadopted healing foundation, like
like really delving into that because to me, giving back
matters so much to me and I haven't known how to do that.
And so this is really just, it'slit me up in a way that has
(46:17):
caused me to like, OK, God, you,you put this on my heart.
I need to like make it happen now, right?
Someone else will. So I love that.
That's so awesome. I love that.
OK, a really light question. This isn't this won't be too
heavy here. Coffee, tea or something else?
What's your daily must have for either grounding or energy?
(46:38):
You know, it's funny, it's both.I have coffee in the morning and
then today I have my ginger turmeric tea.
So yeah. And I'm actually drinking my
little afternoon pick me up coffee right now, so.
Very nice. Mine is waiting for me because
it was so funny when you said that you go before we recorded.
You're like, I'm going to go grab my coffee.
And I thought, oh, mine is waiting for me because I told my
(46:59):
husband I was like, before you leave to go work out, do not
touch that. Don't pour it out.
I'm going to just put ice in it.I love it.
All right, So what is a song or a mantra that always lifts your
spirits, right? Now I don't know why, but it's
Firm Foundation by Cody Carnes. Like it's just it's been on my
(47:20):
mind. I can't seem to get it out of my
mind. So I there's a reason and I'm
just going to go with it. Awesome.
Love it, love it. This is why I love that part
because we always get these great recommendations through
our audience or through our guests for our audience.
OK, last question, Favorite podcast or a book that you would
recommend? Oh.
Goodness, I know this is tricky.It's so I mean, right now when I
(47:45):
think of the Adoptee Voice, my favorite podcast is the Making
of Me podcast. It is, it is the podcast where
their whole purpose is to get anoral history of adoptee stories.
That's what they do. And I think it's important.
I think it's important for us tobe able to tell our stories
because some of us have not spoken them out loud to anyone.
So that's probably for the adoptee voice.
(48:07):
I would say that podcast, I loveit.
Book wise, I think probably my favorite book of all time is
Redeeming Love. Do you Know?
That yes, gosh, I haven't heard,I haven't heard someone say that
and on the podcast, but I wow. Yeah, it's such a good book and
it's a movie, so you can actually watch the movie.
(48:30):
I think it's free on Netflix now.
But anyway, really, really good.Based upon the book of Hosea,
but set in like the 1920s, whichI think is hilarious, but just
so well done. About God's love, yeah.
Love it, love it. Oh my gosh.
Well, thank you so much for sharing your story and your
(48:51):
heart with us today. You know, I just really, I
believe that your work is just giving a voice to a community
that has maybe been misunderstood or just, you know,
helping so many people remember that healing and belonging are
possible. I think that is just what really
(49:12):
came through today as we were talking.
And so for those who do want to connect or learn more, we will
have it in the show notes. But can you just tell us as well
where they can find you? Sure, you can find me on TikTok,
on Facebook, on Instagram. I'm Julie Brumley under score on
TikTok and Instagram and then I think I'm Jules Rasbrum on
(49:34):
Facebook, but you'll find me. You know I'm there.
Those are the I'm also on YouTube, but I don't want to
overwhelm y'all. You can find me a lot on all the
socials pretty much. Love it, love it.
Yes you gotta follow her socials.
And to everyone listening, if this conversation moved you,
please share it. Someone out there may need to
hear Julies message today so just asking you to do that.
(49:57):
And I just wanna say thank you for spending your time with us.
And as always, keep rising, keepshining, and know your best day
is right here waiting for you. Thanks for joining me here
today. Your presence means the world to
me. If you enjoyed what you heard,
please consider leaving a ratingand review.
And don't forget to follow or subscribe so you never miss an
episode. Head to the show notes and let's
(50:18):
connect. Rise to Shine Co is ready to
support you in coaching, collaboration, light tips, or
even a coffee chat. Until next time, keep shining my
friends.
Welcome to the Rise to Shine podcast with Noel Custis where
we ignite the spark to discover your favorite self.
It is time to get real ladies. Hello, hello and welcome to the
Rise to Shine podcast. I'm your host, Noel Custis.
(00:20):
Today's guest is someone whose work and story truly moved me
the moment that we met. Julie is a trauma informed
adoptee coach. She's also the founder and CEO
of Coming Home to Self and a woman on a mission to help
adoptees heal the deep, often unseen wounds of abandonment and
(00:42):
rejection. And with over 15 years of
coaching experience, she has a Master's in counseling and very
powerful training and somatic and nervous system healing.
Julie helps men and women move from survival mode into radical
self belonging. And I'm telling you, her work is
(01:03):
changing lives and shining a light on a topic that I do not
think is talked about nearly enough.
And a fun little twist before weget started, we actually met.
We were just talking about this before we pressed record.
We actually met through a mutualfriend online when I was
teaching in her group and Julie was filling in and we started
(01:25):
chatting and quickly realized that we live less than a mile
apart. She had just moved across the
country and we are literally less than a mile apart and so we
have since met in person and have been cheering each other on
ever since. So I just know that you are
going to love her heart and her story and I am so excited to
(01:49):
welcome you, my friend. I am so happy to be with you.
It has been an honor just to getto know you in the last few
months and be a part of the collective and so many different
ground breaking things that so many women are doing.
So it's awesome to be together. Love it.
Well, I am really, really excited that you are here today
and your story is incredibly powerful and that work that
(02:14):
you're doing, like I said, is soneeded.
So I would love to just start with your story and if you would
be willing to share a bit about what led you into this work and
how you know this all came to befor you.
Yeah, I would be happy to do that.
Honestly, it's been, it's been aslow uncovering to be honest.
(02:37):
So, you know, there's people don't realize when they think
about adoption, what they think about is, you know, sunshine and
rainbows. And, and I think in some
situations, sure. And my adoption was sunshine and
rainbows in many ways. Like when I was adopted, I was
adopted into a great family. That isn't the issue.
That isn't actually what I'm going to be talking about the
(02:59):
whole time that I'm personally talking.
There are many people that have very traumatic adoptions.
I was not one of those. I'm talking and, and that I
still deal with and work with because there's much compounded
trauma that adoptees experience,but nobody's talking about it.
And one of the things that, well, people are beginning to
(03:19):
talk about it because it's starting to become pretty
evident. And there's some vocal adoptees
out there, me being one of them and trying to continue to get
the message out. But one of the things that I'm
realizing with my story, and forthe longest time I was a part of
of this idea was the status quo in society is that adoptees
(03:40):
should just be grateful. The fact that they were rescued
from a life of low, low economicclass or whatever, or addiction
or whatever it may be. And so we hear that should be
grateful. And we it shuts us down like,
well, OK, I know I should be grateful, but I'm still grieving
something and I don't even understand what it is that I'm
(04:00):
actually grieving because it waspre verbal and I don't have
words for it. So with my story along those
lines, none of that even surfaced, none of that even
showed up in my life. Meaning in a way that I was
aware that it was connected to adoption until 2010.
So at that point, I had two small children, probably, I
(04:23):
think they were probably like 7 and maybe 7:00 and 9:00.
And I guess that's not small. They were, you know, whatever.
And I found my birth mother. But where all of that started
was because I was in my master'sprogram.
And at that point, adoption was still this beautiful thing that
had all impact on me. But if I look back now, even
(04:48):
then and look at my relationships, my romantic
relationships, my friendships, so it impacted it.
It was negatively impacting it the whole time.
I just didn't know that that's what it was.
I was trying to figure out what was wrong with me.
Like, why do I feel like I need people to tell me that I'm OK in
(05:08):
order to be OK? And a lot of people feel that
way. Don't get me wrong.
I feel it at a level that is cellular, like there's something
literally defective wrong with me.
I'm not supposed to be here. I'm not supposed to exist.
These were the subliminal beliefs that were going on
(05:28):
inside my brain that I didn't have words for and didn't know.
So because of that, I felt as ifI had to interrupt in
conversations. I felt like I had to figure out
a way to be seen. So I was loud in order to be
accepted, even though that totally turned people off.
I had this fear of being rejected all the time.
(05:49):
And so I would do everything in my power to, you know, make
myself likable. It's the chameleon mindset that
a lot of adoptees have. And so that was really a lot of
the before, I didn't realize that that had to do with my
trauma from birth, which I call primal trauma because to me,
(06:10):
adoption trauma is different than primal trauma.
So and I can explain that. Yeah, I was going to say explain
that, please. I'm so curious.
I will so I I came to be in 1973about 3 months after or actually
that's not true. December of 72 is when I was
(06:35):
conceived. Roe V Wade passed in January of
73 and a few weeks later my birth mother attempted to abort
me twice between weeks 12 and 16.
Oh my gosh. So did not know that actually
until 2010, but I remember when I found that out what, how that
(06:59):
even came to be was because my professor in my master's program
pulled me aside after finding out that I was adopted, which I
I'm sure I said something, but Idon't, it's not like I walk up
to people and go, hi, I'm Julie.I'm adopted.
That's not how this works. It came out in conversation
somehow. So she pulled me aside and she
(07:19):
said I'm a foster parent and this is my professor.
She said, I am a foster parent and you have skeletons in your
closet relating to adoption, like point blank.
And I just looked at her like, what are you talking about?
Right? What skeletons?
She said you need to meet your birth mother.
And if you don't deal with thesethings, you will harm people.
(07:40):
Whoa. Like, even still, I get chills
all over my body because at thatpoint I felt like somebody had
figuratively slapped me across the face.
Right. Oh, OK.
So my adoption has impacted me How?
Like, I don't even know where tobegin at this point.
I had no idea. And this happens to many
(08:01):
adoptees at at that age, like anywhere between 30 to 50.
We kind of get hit by something.It's it's called the the rupture
that actually makes us go something is not right with me.
It's off and I've been noticing it my entire life, but I don't
know why and I don't know where it comes from.
(08:24):
So when she said that, that's when I started the search, the
actual search to find my birth family.
Because what I realized from what she said was that I'm going
to need to know that in order tohelp others, whether they're
adoptees or not. Right.
OK, you froze there for a minute.
Yeah, you kind of went and it looks like I'm still frozen on
(08:48):
my screen. It does, yeah.
Hopefully you'll come back, but I can hear you.
OK, that's good to know. I don't know if that's a problem
for the recording. Yeah, as I'm looking like that,
we'll definitely make sure this gets edited out, whatever this
is. Let's see if I let's take a
pause and just see if I actuallycome back.
Like maybe go off video and comeback and see what happens.
(09:11):
That's what I'm thinking, OK. Oh, look at that cute face.
Yep, you're back. OK, perfect.
There we go. OK, we will start.
I'm sorry. Oh, it's OK connectivity
technology. So that was when I began to
realize if I'm going to help people, I better deal with
(09:33):
whatever skeleton she's talking about.
I I don't know if you know the Enneagram well but I am A1.
OK. So if somebody tells me to do
something, I'm going to do it and I'm going to do it.
I'm going to do it real well. So I obeyed and did my own
search. But but what was interesting
about the whole thing was I discovered how I came to be in
(09:55):
that process, meaning I, I, I discovered how I was conceived.
So I did end up finding my birthmother, had a conversation with
her and over the phone. We were actually living in
Hawaii at the time. It was amazing.
But I was in the process of helping addictive behaviors.
I was getting my masters to try to help that population.
(10:19):
She herself was an addict. She was a prostitute at some
point. But how I came to be was she
hitchhiked across? Well, a few states from
California, 'cause I was born inOceanside, but from California
to Colorado on semi trucks. Sold her body to get to
(10:41):
Colorado. Met my dad in a courtyard,
hooked up with him that night, he left the next morning to go
to work. Came back from work that day and
found her in bed with two other guys, 2 room mates of his and
then kicked her out. So she slept with three guys in
24 hours. She told me that in our first
(11:02):
conversation. Wow, that's a lot to.
Take in so she said she said it was the 70s.
I slept with one of three guys. I don't know which one it was,
but they were all great and I'm just like and then she proceeded
to want to tell me what the night was like.
Would you like to know what it was like when I the cat the
(11:23):
couch? I'm OK?
No, but that's such a a. Weird.
Kind of like a weird Mamma Mia moment, but it.
Is a Mamma Mia? Way it's like a lot more
traumatic than the love and all the, you know, all of that in
the movie. This is like trauma.
Yeah, Yep. I mean, and and I think for me,
(11:44):
that's when it's, I didn't know it was trauma at that point.
Yeah, that's when my eyes started to be open to wow, the
way that I came into this world.I wasn't, I wasn't even thought
of it wasn't something that was considered.
She clearly and I had read in the paperwork right before I
talked to her about her attempting to abort me twice.
(12:07):
But of course, I'm not going to say that in our first
conversation, right? So, but I remember that feeling
when I first read that I couldn't read any further.
I stopped and I had this feeling, and I've shared this
before on multiple podcasts. I, I had this feeling as if my
head shattered into pieces. I felt fragmentation.
(12:29):
And then I immediately had a headache.
I was like, this is odd, never had felt that before.
But then I also read that and the words began to formulate
even though I didn't have them underneath.
No wonder I feel defective. No wonder, like all of those,
like almost compassionate validation.
Right. But I didn't even know that was
(12:50):
happening and it impacted my relationship with my ex because
at this point all I could think of was no wonder we haven't been
connecting the way that I want to.
I don't know how I don't know how to allow myself to be
nurtured because to me nurture means bye bye.
Like you you even even my mom that adopted me told me that
(13:15):
she's that I stiff armed her, that I wouldn't allow her to
nurture me because I had four different caregivers in those
first seven weeks of my life. So I I went from her womb, never
saw her in the 70s. They took you directly to the
nursery. I was held by some random woman.
That's a whole other story that should not have been let into
the nursery who wanted me and went and asked my mom for me, my
(13:37):
birth mother. Weird.
And then obviously I went from there to my foster family and I
was with my and I know I was in a foster care because it notes
it in my paperwork, but that's all it says.
There's no records, there's no, there's no names, there's
nothing. And then my foster family said
we can no longer accommodate herand gave me back to the state in
those first seven weeks of my life.
(13:58):
So you can imagine who are you and, and are you going to be
able to take care of me? I don't know and I don't trust
you. So that's how I started life.
What I realize now is that impacted all of my
relationships. And it dawned on me in my 30s
(14:19):
when I started exploring this. And as everything began to
become uncovered, I began to realize how deeply it had
impacted me in intimate relationships and friendships
with my children. I could not get on the floor and
play with them because I was afraid they would leave me.
What interesting doesn't even make sense, but it did to my
(14:40):
brain, right? So yeah, that's that's the story
of how adoption had impacted me.That is wow.
First of all, thank you for sharing all of that.
It's powerful and it is evident that this is very personal and
how it has become so purpose driven.
(15:02):
This work for you has become so purpose driven makes total
sense. You, I mean, you've lived
through experiences and then discovered things that most
people cannot imagine, obviouslyhaven't even gone through.
And one of the things I mean, you know, it shows how like some
of our some of our deepest pain can become our greatest purpose
(15:25):
when we're ready to fix it and we're ready to go through that.
You mentioned to me the other day and it like blew my mind
that the statistics around adopting mental health are, I
mean, first of all, just heartbreaking and that there the
suicide rate is actually one of the highest.
(15:47):
But nobody talks about it. I know.
Yeah. And I, I actually did research
on it, Noel, I recently because I wanted to make sure that I was
right. And, and I am.
But this is what's crazy. I wrote it down yesterday
because I was curious. There's 5 to 7 million adoptees
now. They still don't have the solid
number in the United States. There's a family flying around
(16:07):
my head. Right now, if you're wondering
why. 5 to 7 million adoptees in the world, we are twice as
likely to struggle with addiction.
That is an accurate stat. That's what came up.
Two stats came up with suicide that are kind of going to blow
your mind. In 2013, the National Institute
of Health did a study that showed that we were four times
(16:31):
more likely than the average person to commit suicide.
In 2025, the Ollie Foundation, which I believe is in the UK,
also did. This is a preliminary study and
it's shocking. Like I don't even the the the
number sounds almost ridiculous.Really.
(16:52):
The findings show that adoptees are 35 times more likely to
commit suicide. I I get the chills even reading
that when I read it the first time, I'm like, that can't even
be real. Like, I don't even how is that
possible? But we all knew in the adoptee
community as we've begun to workwith people.
(17:13):
You hear it all the time. I'd rather be dead.
I but you know, all the time. My mother should have just
aborted me. My all the time.
And you just think how awful is it for a human to live with that
belief system? The person who is supposed to
(17:33):
love you the most doesn't and gives you up places you for
adoption. There's two different scenarios
with that depending upon the time that you were adopted.
My mine, which is basically she didn't want me and did
everything she could to get rid of me because it didn't fit her
lifestyle. 2 They were forced because of society.
(17:57):
Yeah. Back in my time, those were
really the two options. 100 percent, 100%.
Because of society, economic stuff, you know, whatever now
it's addiction. There's so many factors that
are, and there were was addiction then too, but nobody
understood it, right. So there's those pieces.
And then the other statistic that I thought was really
(18:17):
fascinating is we are two times more likely to seek out mental
health. We are two to five times more
likely. And I've seen this, I've
witnessed this and adopted kids that I've I've helped the
parents. We are two to five times more
likely to be in outpatient or inpatient programs.
(18:38):
So we need some help. So, so that is the reason why I
feel what I feel. That well, and The thing is, is
that when you had shared that with me, I, I mean, it's so
interesting and fascinating because in recent, in the last
couple of years, there have beensome experiences, some adoptees
(19:03):
that have discovered like 1 was within our family, not my
immediate family, but there was a situation that we found out
that there was a family member that we did not know existed.
And then I also have a friend that is going through some,
yeah, you know, finding out thatshe was adopted and as an adult
(19:23):
had no idea. But what is so fascinating to me
is that you are sharing how always feeling like something
was off, something wasn't right.Something wasn't, you know, and
did not, I mean, in this scenario, didn't know until she
was an adult. And so it was just so traumatic.
And this is what really, and when I started talking with you
(19:47):
and starting to hear more about your story, and I just was like,
this opens people's eyes to the layers of what adoptees
experience far beyond what people realize.
I mean, I had no idea. I had no idea.
And so listening to those statistics blows my mind even
(20:08):
more because it's just like, Oh my gosh.
So Speaking of help like transitioning into that and what
it is that you do is you. You often talk about, you know,
somatic healing and you talk about nervous system regulation
as kind of this core part of your work.
So for people that are listeningto this for the first time, I
(20:29):
mean, I am praying that this show gets, you know, this
episode will get shared with if you know someone out there that
is struggling with this or it has gone through this, like,
please, please, please share because I feel like this is so
eye opening and this could thesecould help with some of the
answers. This can help with even just
(20:50):
feeling like you're not alone inthis all, all of the things.
But for those who may be hearingyou know some of this for the
first time, can you explain whatit means in simple terms, what
some you know the somatic healing and nervous system
regulation is and why it's so powerful for recovery or to like
get through this? Yeah, there's a couple of things
(21:13):
that I'm realizing with this arereally crucial.
And one of the reasons why my framework is revolutionary,
funny, my program is called revolution.
But the the reason why my program is revolutionary is
because I'm bringing in multiplemodalities.
It's not just one. We start with CBT, we move to
emotion focused, we then move into compassion.
(21:38):
Then we talk about ifs we like, we put and then the whole time
weaving in the somatic pieces. Part of the problem with
adoptees, myself included, was we are so disconnected.
Our brain is very much disconnected from our body,
which means we don't know how touse our voice.
In the middle of all of that is this part that cannot speak
(22:02):
because we don't have the language, literally don't have
the language. So anyway, all of that to say,
how that works is we need to establish safety within
ourselves first. No one else is going to provide
that. And I had to learn that the hard
way because when I found my birth father in 2021 that this
(22:25):
is when all of it really startedhappening for me, I still hadn't
done any somatic healing. I had done AMDR which a lot of
adoptees have attempted and somehave really felt some great
strides in, but there are many that have been re traumatized by
it because they don't have the ability in their bodies to
connect. When can you tell us what MDR is
(22:48):
just so people that. Does EMDR is a trauma based
therapy? It has to do with eye movement.
It has to do with in person holding things that vibrate in
your hands. It sounds like voodoo when you
when you're like talking about it and then you have this, these
things over your ears that Ding like it's, it's interesting.
(23:10):
Like there's tones that are going on in your brain.
And there's been a lot of of research recently on like hurts
and the tones, like the sounds that go through our body.
Part of the reason why is because our body actually
emanates emotions energetically from hurts.
So it's important. Yeah.
So it's important for us to connect that way.
So that's a part of what I do inour program as well.
(23:33):
All of that to say, in 2021, I found my birth father and
thought, this is it. My birth mother wasn't
trustworthy. He's going to be the one that
makes me feel like I belong somewhere.
I hadn't done I'd done a ton of work up until that point.
Clearly I was seeing clients. I was a therapist, you know,
bottle or whatever, coach more than I was a therapist.
And I find him, put all my my eggs in that basket and realize,
(23:59):
wait a minute, he's human. My sisters are human.
My brother is human. Of course they're not going to
know how to deal with this random human plopping in their
life. I don't know how to deal with
it. And I was trying to make them
drink from a fire hose. Hey, let's have a relationship.
I mean, we just didn't know whatwe were doing.
How do you? That's the other thing that's so
(24:20):
traumatic about adoption. When this happens, when you
begin to see your biology for the first time, it is again,
like you're being smacked acrossthe face.
I see somebody who looks just like me.
I'm getting the chills even talking about it right now.
I've never felt that before, besides in a child.
That's not the same. It was amazing, but yet it
(24:42):
scared me because, Oh, my goodness, I have to sustain this
human. I didn't have anything like that
growing up. I didn't have anybody that I
could look at and feel like theyknew me just from looking at me.
Now I look. I look at these people.
Yeah. And my sister is my twin, She
looks just like me, and my othersister sounds just like me.
(25:06):
I have not, I've not experiencedthat.
So there's something really settling in your spirit about
that and your soul. So to me, those fragments that
were there settled. So when I found them, they kind
of click back together. That's why I post a lot about
Kintsugi, the art of Kintsugi. You know.
Gold, do you know about this? No, I just from things that I've
(25:28):
seen that you've talked about, yeah.
That's for a lot of adoptees. I try to help them understand
that they're not broken. They're just being brought back
together beautifully with these,this gold Fleck paint that is
making their story even more beautiful those and that's how I
feel. And so when those came together,
I realized, OK, I have those pieces, but I'm still missing
(25:50):
something. Well, what I was missing was
this solid trusting relationshipwith myself.
And that is what I've worked towards.
So what helped me do that, the somatic work was being able to
actually tune into what does my body mean when it is saying
these things. So for years I had lower back
(26:10):
pain, bad crippling lower back pain to the point where the guy
who the orthopedic was like, I think you're going to need to
have surgery. I'm like, but is that even going
to help me? He's like, well, not really.
OK, well, why would I do that? Like crazy, crippling back pain,
hips. I ended up having autoimmune
diseases. A lot of adoptees have health
issues that have no explanation.A lot of them.
(26:34):
And So what I realized through all of that was I've tried
everything, everything you can think of, ortho, PT, meds,
therapy, EMDR, books, I've nothing, I'm still feeling the
same thing. What am I missing?
And I remember saying to the groups that I was leading at the
(26:54):
time, addictive groups, there's a missing piece and I don't know
what it is, but we're going to find it.
And then my friend who you who connected us, he was actually in
my program at the time, found this and I realized she had
stumbled upon the thing that I had been missing.
(27:17):
And crazy enough, I had been trained in it in school.
I had been not trained. I knew what it was.
I knew what semantics was. But it's.
A whole new language the body speaks and the vagus nerve from
the base of our, you know, skullto the base spine has different
nerve bundles that are like little brains.
(27:38):
And each one of the whole brainshave meaning to them.
They regulate parts of our bodies.
And the more that we learn aboutthat, the more that we're able
to honestly heal from the the bottom up, which is what we
need. Right.
I mean, it's so, I mean, there'sso many things that for me as
(27:59):
I'm thinking about this and going, gosh, we can unpack so
many different things. But I know something that you
talk about, and this is what reminded me of this when you
were saying, you know, we just have such a disconnection.
You really talk about that radical self belonging and you
know, having that, like being able to do that.
(28:21):
And so how can someone begin to feel more at home within
themselves? How?
How do they do that? Curiosity, curiosity, I'm not
kidding. It's curiosity and compassion.
This is one of the things that, that people can it be that
simple? That's what I hear all the time.
(28:42):
And I'm like, honestly, it is. But it's it and they're all CS.
It's, it's curiosity, compassionand consistency.
The more that we are consistent with the little things.
Like for example, when I noticeda heaviness in my heart when I
was beginning this process and Iwas it my, my marriage was not
doing well. We were having a really hard
(29:03):
time and I had this heaviness and I was like, I don't even
know what to do with this. And Becky, the person that you
and I know connected us was like, just lay your hand over
your heart and be sensitive to yourself, be compassionate.
And I was like, my very authentic self wanted to do
something obscene. I was like, you've got to be
kidding me that that's even going to work.
Like no. Right, but she said what have?
(29:25):
You tried up to this point and has it worked?
And I was like, you're right. So I started with something as
simple as that. Let me just when my body be
curious notice oh that that feels heavy.
I don't like that feeling. I feel constricted.
Oh, OK, well, my knee notice those things and started tuning
(29:46):
to them. And by tuning place your hand
there, you know, radically self accepted meaning, OK, I get why
your shoulders are doing that. You just had a horrible
conversation with somebody. So no wonder you're feeling
tense. Right, it's.
It's learning how, and you and Ialso have a shared mentor in
Kelly Brock. It's learning how to be on your
(30:07):
own side. Truly, yes.
Gosh, and and like you said, it,it sounds, it sounds easy in
theory, but it but it is I love that you said it's consistency
there that you have to show up for yourself because yes, it's
not that it's hard, like the action itself is not hard.
(30:30):
It's, it's loving yourself and it's trusting yourself and
trusting the process enough to do it, to actually do it and
take steps consistently because that's what ends up creating the
biggest transformation over time.
It's not going to change tomorrow, but it can give you
(30:51):
some peace in the moment. And that's what I've learned
about especially with the somatic work.
And all of that is just it can give you the peace in the
moment. Answers will start to come
because you are getting curious within yourself, Correct.
Yeah. I love, I love that you're
sharing this. It's so important.
And I can see especially for adoptees, like, you know, when
(31:15):
you've gone through something like this that's so heavy and,
and, and so, gosh, I mean, it just feels like it would be so
confusing, you know, because you're trying to find all of
these answers and, and it can I,I would imagine it can be very
complicated too, as you're goingthrough this process.
(31:38):
Like it's not like all of a sudden you just find your birth
mother in some cases, like sometimes people don't even ever
find them. And so there's, I mean, gosh,
there's so many layers. And This is why I feel like this
work is so important. And I think of you and I go, OK,
so not only have you gone through this and you're going
(32:00):
through the process of the healing, but you're also now
working with others that are going through it, which is deep
work. This is not like surface level
work. This is deep work.
So is are you staying grounded in these same ways like it?
Because I would imagine, I mean you have to hold so much more
(32:22):
space. Right.
No, that's a really good .1 of the things that I think I've
realized through this whole process is I think I was a
little shocked at how this is going to sound so weird, but I'm
just going to say it how well myframework works so I I realize
you. Can say it, I love it.
Yeah, I was just like, this is crazy because I've done it for
(32:44):
years, but I, I don't think I actually packaged it, put it
into like a Pretty Little package until the last couple.
And I really do believe it's thebelonging blueprint.
It's not as if you get to the end of my program and you are
like perfect and everything is solved and you don't have any
(33:04):
triggers anymore. We wouldn't be freaking human.
So that's not how that works. What it does is it helps you
begin, and that's why the name of my company is what it is to
come home to yourself. That is, if I can do that, if I
can help my clients feel not only like they're home with me
initially, like I provide that safe, homey, hospital hospitable
(33:29):
feeling in the containers that Ilead.
It helps them realize and they see me doing it.
It's funny, one of my clients actually asked me, do you
actually do all of this? And I was like, yeah, I created
it. So yes, I do.
Like, how does that even look? So that's pretty much how you're
(33:49):
asking me like now, currently what my, my grounding looks like
is I do yoga daily. I need to do yoga daily, partly
because of my back, but also because it's a way for me to
connect with myself, chill, be still allow.
And I hear, I hear from God during yoga, during movement a
lot of the time. So that is one of the things
(34:12):
that I do. I obviously still do my prayer
walks every day, pretty much without fail.
If I miss it, then I'm going to figure out where to put it in my
day. I can't give what I don't have.
You know this, this isn't new information.
So there's that piece now. And if people aren't God lovers,
that's fine. There is a spiritual practice
(34:32):
that is necessary for this kind of work.
And what I mean by that is BrenéBrown has done a ton of research
on this. This is not for me.
This is scientifically proven inher qualitative research that in
order to live wholeheartedly, there are two pieces to it and
one is spirituality. Just got to believe in a higher
power. 2 is gratitude. So those two pieces are a part
(34:57):
of my day. Every day I have a gratitude
journal that I wake up do in themorning and then when I go to
bed, same thing. And it, it, I love it.
It grounds me like nothing else and keeps me just remembering
all the wonderful things that I have in the last 24 hours.
So, and it's not like toxic positivity kind of stuff.
(35:18):
It's things like I was able to FaceTime with my son and he, I
was able to help him with this. Like I'm I'm I'm writing down,
putting down actionable things that actually happened.
You know. So those are the things that
that help me. And then of course, when things
come up, like I noticed that I'mtriggered, I, I put into
(35:40):
practice those things, whether it's hand over heart, whether
it's a, a containment like self hug and I'll rock I but I also
do that on a consistent basis when I'm not triggered.
So I think that's one of the keys that I've realized every
night before I fall asleep. It's not like I'm sitting there
crying myself to sleep. I'm rocking myself.
(36:00):
And part of the reason why I do that is because my little baby
within me needs that. She never had that.
Yeah. And I need to offer it to her.
And that's been really a beautiful thing recently, in the
last month or two, is me connecting with my 2 1/2 week
old self. I've actually created a
visualization for myself to do that.
(36:21):
And I do it on a consistent basis 'cause she's not ready to
be integrated, meaning she stilldoesn't trust that I'm going to
come back. And so I've had to come back
repeatedly for her to say and not say, 'cause she can't speak
to realize that I'm not leaving.And it's healing me at a level
that I didn't know I needed. So with all that to say, it's
(36:43):
like I'm, I'm some steps. I'm a few steps ahead of the
people that I help in order to show them.
It really can happen. It really can shift.
You really can transform. You can be different.
Yeah, no, it's so. I mean, this is what we talked
about in Rise to Shine Co all the time.
And, and this is just another confirmation, ladies, that these
(37:05):
practices, these, and now I say these are practices.
These are not just like one day you're just going, oh, I'm
thankful for this. You know, I no, this is, this is
intentional work. And I wholeheartedly agree 150%.
I agree exactly what you were talking about.
(37:25):
It's believing in a higher power.
I always say had I not when I was going through some of the
darkest days, heaviest things ofmy life, even going through the
good like all of it. It's like, Oh my gosh, you know
it. It has been through that
relationship and having having that relationship with the Lord.
And so for me, that's what that is.
(37:47):
And then on top of it, having a practice of gratitude.
As a matter of fact, we were just talking before we hit play
that I was, you know, speaking with my daughter who is having a
tough night, and we immediately went to that like I was like, I
hear you. We went through all the hard,
all the things that were just sohard that day.
(38:07):
And then I was like, how, how can we finish this day?
We're going to finish this day with gratitude.
And it's coming back to that. And, and constantly, you know,
she's in her early 20s, but it'shaving those conversations now
because she's already starting to develop that practice way
earlier than what I ever did. I didn't discover that I was in
my 40s. I'm like, I do not want you to
(38:28):
wait. I want this to be something that
you are doing. You know, I talked to my son
about it. I mean, I, I just want to shout
it from the rooftops because I'mlike, it is a game changer.
It is a game changer. But again, it's being willing to
do this consistently and make ita practice.
Well, and also seeing the value in it and not and not seeing it
(38:52):
as this pad answer to a problem.Yes, because for adoptees, Yeah.
So for adoptees, here's the thing.
That word is a loaded word for us.
Yeah, I could see that, yeah. You should be grateful.
You should be grateful. We've heard that our entire
life. So in the in my free, I have a
(39:13):
free Facebook group that is fullof adoptees and I do Thankful
Thursdays deliberately because it is my intention to take it
back. I'm not calling it gratitude.
I'm calling it. But there's a reason why I do
that because I know because I'veexperienced it, how it's
shifted. It's like changed my brain
chemistry. Well, it does.
(39:34):
It really, really does it. Truly, truly.
It's shocking, you know, like the saboteur assessment that a
lot of us do where we figure outwhat our voices are in our
heads. Yep.
Over the years, the last three years of me doing it, I went
from A10 Stickler. She's now 4.
Because they're not. They don't.
They realize I got them. They don't need to protect me
(39:55):
anymore. Exactly.
This beautiful the word that came to my mind was symbiosis.
Is that the right word? The connectivity that I have
with them, my internal family, true.
That internal family, yeah, has become what I value.
Not in a way that's selfish, butthen the in a way that allows me
(40:16):
to be more present for everyone else around me.
So good. Yeah.
No, I, I love that. I love that so much.
Julie and I, I feel like that's what's so great about it is
because we can all see it differently.
And just even having that perspective when we're talking
about the adoptee community likethat, it can be looked at so
(40:37):
differently, even though it benefits all of us, it can be
something that is like a whoa, whoa, you know, just the word
gratitude can just be a loaded word for people.
And, and gosh, I never have thought about like that whole
thing of like, you should be grateful.
I never thought that that would be a thing until you had shared
(40:59):
that. And I go, wow, I mean, that is,
oh gosh, there's so much. And This is why you guys, This
is why you need to be following my friend, because truly, truly.
And This is why you need to share because I don't feel like
this is being talked about enough.
And I think it's also a powerfulthing to have all of us who may
(41:20):
not be a part of it personally, you will be like, you'll know
somebody. We weren't planning on finding
out in our family. You know, there was a, you know,
you know, there was someone. And for our situation, it has
ended up being something that has, you know, everyone's
working through and there's somebeautiful relationships that are
(41:43):
forming because of it. But it took time.
It took time and you know, it's,I wish I knew all of this, You
know then that I know now. And one of the things I would
love to ask because of course I want everyone following you and
all of the things. But what's next for coming home
(42:03):
to self? What are you excited about as
your mission continues to grow? Yeah, I I'm doing a lot behind
the scenes right now. I actually just recorded a
couple of episodes for my podcast that is going to
actually, I'm going to release it this Friday, 'cause that was
the day that I was adopted. Yeah.
(42:25):
So I'm going to release it that day.
It's called the Resilience project where adoptees find
belonging. So that's new.
I, I I do I want to share. And you don't have pill you
don't have. No, it's, it's, it's like it's,
it's you. And I have been talking about
this. So I don't see why I can't talk
(42:46):
about it. But I am in the process of, of
really seriously considering andnot even considering making it
happen, a nonprofit organizationcalled the Adoptee Healing
Foundation. And it's something that has been
on my heart. This is gonna sound really
morbid, but I did. I wrote my eulogy a few years
ago. And in that eulogy, this came,
(43:07):
this came out, this name, Adoptee Healing Foundation came
out. And I've been praying about it
and envisioning it for so long. And in the last few weeks, I've
gotten confirmation after confirmation.
I need to stop. So I don't even know what that
looks like, but I had this wonderful friend, Noel Koustis,
who actually knows how to do some of these things.
(43:28):
So that's coming. And, you know, I have my, my
coaching program that I, I really wholeheartedly believe in
and know after all of the, the research that I've done, I think
I'm the only one doing what I'm doing.
And I think that's part of the issue.
It's hard when I'm like creatingthe market, you know, right?
(43:50):
Right, Yes, you are my friend. You're doing some groundbreaking
work there's. Like I'm here anybody, you know,
like you just don't and and a lot of things it's just because
adoptees don't realize that theydon't know that they something
like this so. Absolutely.
Well, it is definitely only the beginning of something much
bigger. I feel that lots of us feel
(44:10):
that, you feel that, and I'm just excited for what is to
come. I know, you know, I always say
God doesn't play something on our hearts that is not meant to
happen at some, you know, at some point and how whatever that
looks like, you'll figure that out.
It'll there will be more confirmations because there just
(44:31):
will be. God placed it on your heart for
a reason. And so I'm really excited for
that. And we will definitely be on the
lookout for all of that and keeping our listeners posted
about it. And you know, again, I just am
so grateful that we were able tohave this conversation.
I just think it is so enlightening and it just is such
(44:52):
an eye opener for so many of us that just don't know.
And and it's just so important. And obviously going back to
those statistics like it, this is work that cannot be
forgotten. And this is, you know, I can't,
I can't believe that we're saying, you know, gosh, this is
like ground floor, you know, I, I go, Oh my gosh, like I can't
(45:12):
believe it that it's only, you know what I mean?
Like I go, this should have beengoing on a long time ago, but
you know what? Here we are.
We can't take that back and we can start here.
And yeah, I'm really excited foryou and just appreciative of
you. And then, of course, you know,
before we wrap up every episode,we always have to do a spark and
(45:33):
spill. And I just feel like one of my
favorite parts because we get tomove from some of the heavy deep
talk for a little fun. And not to say this whole
episode has not been amazing, but I just love that we get to
talk about the lighter side of Julie.
So one of the things that my first question to you is what is
(45:54):
one thing currently sparking joyor inspiration in your life?
I would say this building of theadopted healing foundation, like
like really delving into that because to me, giving back
matters so much to me and I haven't known how to do that.
And so this is really just, it'slit me up in a way that has
(46:17):
caused me to like, OK, God, you,you put this on my heart.
I need to like make it happen now, right?
Someone else will. So I love that.
That's so awesome. I love that.
OK, a really light question. This isn't this won't be too
heavy here. Coffee, tea or something else?
What's your daily must have for either grounding or energy?
(46:38):
You know, it's funny, it's both.I have coffee in the morning and
then today I have my ginger turmeric tea.
So yeah. And I'm actually drinking my
little afternoon pick me up coffee right now, so.
Very nice. Mine is waiting for me because
it was so funny when you said that you go before we recorded.
You're like, I'm going to go grab my coffee.
And I thought, oh, mine is waiting for me because I told my
(46:59):
husband I was like, before you leave to go work out, do not
touch that. Don't pour it out.
I'm going to just put ice in it.I love it.
All right, So what is a song or a mantra that always lifts your
spirits, right? Now I don't know why, but it's
Firm Foundation by Cody Carnes. Like it's just it's been on my
(47:20):
mind. I can't seem to get it out of my
mind. So I there's a reason and I'm
just going to go with it. Awesome.
Love it, love it. This is why I love that part
because we always get these great recommendations through
our audience or through our guests for our audience.
OK, last question, Favorite podcast or a book that you would
recommend? Oh.
Goodness, I know this is tricky.It's so I mean, right now when I
(47:45):
think of the Adoptee Voice, my favorite podcast is the Making
of Me podcast. It is, it is the podcast where
their whole purpose is to get anoral history of adoptee stories.
That's what they do. And I think it's important.
I think it's important for us tobe able to tell our stories
because some of us have not spoken them out loud to anyone.
So that's probably for the adoptee voice.
(48:07):
I would say that podcast, I loveit.
Book wise, I think probably my favorite book of all time is
Redeeming Love. Do you Know?
That yes, gosh, I haven't heard,I haven't heard someone say that
and on the podcast, but I wow. Yeah, it's such a good book and
it's a movie, so you can actually watch the movie.
(48:30):
I think it's free on Netflix now.
But anyway, really, really good.Based upon the book of Hosea,
but set in like the 1920s, whichI think is hilarious, but just
so well done. About God's love, yeah.
Love it, love it. Oh my gosh.
Well, thank you so much for sharing your story and your
(48:51):
heart with us today. You know, I just really, I
believe that your work is just giving a voice to a community
that has maybe been misunderstood or just, you know,
helping so many people remember that healing and belonging are
possible. I think that is just what really
(49:12):
came through today as we were talking.
And so for those who do want to connect or learn more, we will
have it in the show notes. But can you just tell us as well
where they can find you? Sure, you can find me on TikTok,
on Facebook, on Instagram. I'm Julie Brumley under score on
TikTok and Instagram and then I think I'm Jules Rasbrum on
(49:34):
Facebook, but you'll find me. You know I'm there.
Those are the I'm also on YouTube, but I don't want to
overwhelm y'all. You can find me a lot on all the
socials pretty much. Love it, love it.
Yes you gotta follow her socials.
And to everyone listening, if this conversation moved you,
please share it. Someone out there may need to
hear Julies message today so just asking you to do that.
(49:57):
And I just wanna say thank you for spending your time with us.
And as always, keep rising, keepshining, and know your best day
is right here waiting for you. Thanks for joining me here
today. Your presence means the world to
me. If you enjoyed what you heard,
please consider leaving a ratingand review.
And don't forget to follow or subscribe so you never miss an
episode. Head to the show notes and let's
(50:18):
connect. Rise to Shine Co is ready to
support you in coaching, collaboration, light tips, or
even a coffee chat. Until next time, keep shining my
friends.
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