May 9, 2025 • 46 mins
Join host Tina Huggins, Divorce & "Narcissist Conflict" Specialist, on The Awakening show for a deeply personal and powerful episode titled "Men, Fathers, Spirituality, & Autism." Guest Drew Deraney, MA, MBA, CPXP—Caregiver Coach and advocate—shares his inspiring journey navigating fatherhood, faith, and raising a child with autism. Together, they explore the emotional depth and spiritual strength it takes to lead with love, vulnerability, and resilience in the face of life’s challenges. Watch now on NEWStreamingNetwork.com for an honest, heartfelt conversation that will move and empower you. More About Tina: Tina Huggins, CTA Life Coach certified, CDC Divorce Coach, CDC Transitions Coach, CDC Recovery Coach, TKG Restorative Family Mediator Certified, TKG Family Circle Certified. I have coached for over 30 years coming from the background of law enforcement and self-defense instructor. Connect with Tina: coachtinalynn@gmail.com https://divorcecoachspecialist.com/ More about Drew: Drew Deraney believes that his success happens when he finds a better way and is willing and able to share it with others. HOW he does that is by challenging the status quo and thinking differently. Ultimately WHAT Drew brings to the table is a way to contribute and add value by having an impact on the lives of others. It wasn't always this way. For most of his life he was concerned with what people thought of him and how he was supposed to act. He wore many masks to either fit in or be accepted. He didn't realize he was a people pleaser, hiding his authentic self. Fast forward... In a 9-month span a few years ago, he endured four faith-shaking life events that caused him to question his existence and determine his purpose in life. Why was he here? Drew is the proud father of three children, a daughter and two sons. His oldest son was born with autism spectrum disorder and is, what the experts call, "high functioning," previously called "Asperger's" - cognitively strong and socially and emotionally delayed. Now a Caregiver Coach, Drew supports families caring for those with special needs and fathers caring for children who have autism spectrum disorder to navigate the system for appropriate services for their loved ones and themselves. Connect with Drew: drew@profitcompassion.com https://www.profitcompassion.com/
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
You're listening to WGSNDB Go and Solo Network Singles talk
radio channel, where we take a lighthearted and candidate approach
to discussions on the journey of relationship, laws, divorce, parenting,
being single, relationships, building, dating, and yes sex. Join our
listeners and begin living your best life.
Speaker 2 (00:27):
Hello and welcome to my show The Awakening here on WGSNDB,
the Going Bold and Going Solo Network. The information and
opinions expressed on this show are just that, the opinions
of the individual speaking based on their individual personal experiences.
They are not intended to diagnose and do not constitute
(00:47):
professional advice or recommendations. So you know all of the
pain and the stress and the struggles that divorcing people
go through while there is a way to find peace
and sanity and assist the lawyer in their legal process.
This saves you thousands of dollars. Hello, my name is
Tina Huggins. I'm your divorce coach, specialist, divorce consultant, restorative
(01:10):
family mediator, and conflictual co parenting coach. And today I'm
joined with Drew. Now that we practiced our last name,
I'm not going to attempt it again. So Drew as
a caregiver coach. Drew believes that his success happens when
he finds a better way. He found a better way
(01:34):
is willing and able to share it with others. How
does excuse me? How he does that is by challenging
that status quo and thinking differently. Ultimately, what Drew begins
excuse me. Ultimately, what Drew brings to the table is
(01:56):
a way to contribute and add value by having an
impact on the lives of others. It has always It's
not always been this way for Drew. For most of
Drew's life, he was concerned with what other people thought
of him and how he was supposed to act. He
(02:17):
wore many masks, either to fit in or to be accepted.
He didn't realize he was a people pleaser, hiding his
authentic self. Fast forward in a nine month span or so.
A few years ago, he endured four faith shaking life
(02:38):
events that caused him to question his existence and determine
his purpose in life. What was he here for? Drew
is a proud father of three children, a daughter and
two sons. The oldest son was born with autism spectrum
disorder and is what the experts call high functioning previously
(03:05):
called Aspergers cognitively strong but society but societal and emotionally delayed. Now,
as a caregiver coach, Drew supports families caring for those
with special needs and fathers caring for children who have
autism spectrum disorder to navigate the system for appropriate services
(03:31):
for their loved ones and for themselves. So I'm excited
to have you talk today, Drew, So thank you for
joining me.
Speaker 3 (03:40):
Thanks so much.
Speaker 4 (03:40):
Tina, And the last name is pronounced Durani, And the
joke I made with Tina is some people call me deranged,
but that's like and I.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
Practiced it just in front of him, and I'm like, yeah,
we're going to say We're going to say deranged just
because he said to say that. So yeah, we're just
going to let him say that. So so the part
that's probably the most important is that you are supporting
fathers because so many of my fathers that come to
(04:09):
me are becoming single parents and tending to their children
for the very first time on their own. And many
of my clients have children on the autism spectrum. So
to be able to be able to talk about how
you teach and what you do is going to be super,
(04:30):
super important. So I know that I talked about earlier
inside there, just a bit ago, that you had four
life changing events. And then just as we were talking,
we were talking about how what set those four life
changing events off was your divorce. So when we go
(04:50):
through life changing events, it brings us to just what
you were saying, It brings us to this realization of
who am I? Why am I here? So kind of
tell us a little bit about that time frame.
Speaker 4 (05:02):
Well, the yeah, so when people ask, you know me,
tell my story, I mean, obviously the story I'm fifty six.
There's a lot of stories in there, but I say
the most recent, second most recent earth shattering stuff did
happen in April of twenty eighteen. Now, my former wife
moved out in October fifteen, twenty fifteen. She wanted the divorce,
(05:25):
and when she left, we did two or three months
later started mediation because we did not want to drag
the kids through the court system for many reasons. And
the mediation went on for until December of twenty seventeen.
So you know, we had that final MSA or mediation,
(05:48):
the support agreement in end of December twenty seventeen. Now,
the divorce wasn't final until April third of twenty eighteen,
so you know, when you look at those timeframes. For me,
especially because I just didn't initiate the divorce, it was
anxiety provoking for me, and I had one mindset of
trying to save the marriage, not realizing that my former
(06:11):
wife didn't have a plan being she was set on
the divorce, and that was one thing I didn't realize.
So April third of twenty eighteen, I walk out of
the courthouse with this piece of paper, the divorce decree.
I call that legal closure because other closures sometimes it
takes longer, or sometimes doesn't happen, or it's suppressed or whatever.
Speaker 3 (06:30):
So I was ready to like that.
Speaker 4 (06:32):
So that was like faith shaking moment number one, even
though I knew it was coming. When you walk out
of that courthouse and the signatures are on that paper
and you get that divorce decree, it's still it's still
something that you don't totally totally you get over right away.
So I had the mindset of really thinking, all right, Drew,
you can take this as a barrier or you can
take it as an opportunity. And I finally in that
(06:56):
moment started to see adversity as opportunities rather than barriers,
and I wanted to throw myself a fiftieth birthday party.
My birthday was October sixth, twenty eighteen. I turned fifteen.
I invited everybody from my childhood to family, to middle school,
high school, college coaching, you know, all friends in town.
So many people showed up and it was just probably
(07:19):
one of the better days of my life. And so
I was ready to take step two of my life.
And ten days after my birthday, I had worked in
healthcare hospitals for twenty four years. I was fired from
my last hospital job. I did the right thing. I
reported a hippo violation, and it wasn't because I reported it.
Speaker 3 (07:39):
I know it was because of my timing.
Speaker 4 (07:41):
I was asked to do a little more research and
I didn't listen, so basically didn't listen to my boss.
Speaker 3 (07:46):
Of course, they don't give you the reason when you're
fired as an attwill employee.
Speaker 4 (07:49):
So I walk out of there knowing in my heart
I did the right thing, still in a way of
really upset because I wanted to make an impact and
I started to think I could make it more of
an impact on the outside of the healthcare system.
Speaker 3 (08:02):
So that was faith shaking moment.
Speaker 4 (08:03):
Number two was losing my job, and as a man
who had I would say at the time of week
self identity.
Speaker 3 (08:11):
My identity was based on my.
Speaker 4 (08:12):
Marriage and my profession, and within a matter of six months.
Speaker 3 (08:18):
I had lost both.
Speaker 4 (08:20):
I didn't even have time to fall into any kind
of mode, whether it's victim or blame mentality, because literally
ten days after I got fired, my fourteen year old
son at the time had a suicidal ideation. We found
out from his therapist he had made an attempt and
I was in the next room and didn't even realize it.
Thank God, he's okay now. But what we had to
do is we didn't know what to do. It was
(08:42):
the first time we ever encountered something like that. So
his professional caretakers suggested an inpatient facility. We found one
in Connecticut, which was it was about two hours away
from our home. Toughest decision I've ever made. They didn't
have a bed for him until December eighth, So October
twenty ninth was when he had was the event in December.
Speaker 3 (09:03):
It's about forty days he was living with me at
the time.
Speaker 4 (09:06):
I had all three kids, and I spent like forty days,
like night and day, making sure.
Speaker 3 (09:11):
I told him, my job as your dad.
Speaker 4 (09:12):
Is to keep you alive and safe and healthy. Come
December eighth, we drive up there, my parents come up,
my former wife and my other two kids, and as
we're saying goodbye, my parents are in the waiting room.
My son points to my parents and I hope nothing
happens to them when I'm here.
Speaker 3 (09:28):
I said, honey, nothing's going to happen. Take care of
your health. That's the most important thing.
Speaker 4 (09:32):
So now we have that third faith shaking moment was
my son's issue.
Speaker 3 (09:37):
And on the day night before.
Speaker 4 (09:39):
Christmas Eve, my father goes to the bathroom, strains on
the toilet, perforates his bowel, goes into septic shock, and
my dad passes away three weeks later in intensive care
while Nick is up at the home. So there's your
fourth faith shaking moment in a nine month period, And
that basically shook me to the core, and that right
away put me into victim blame mentality. It was a
(10:02):
wife's fault for the divorce, boss's fault for the firing,
my fault for my son's illness, and God's fault for
my father, and at that point I really didn't want
to be on the earth. I didn't have a plan
to kill myself, but I just didn't find the purpose
in my life at that point. And I know now
(10:22):
that when we are looking for purpose, we look from
within and we can heal ourselves from within.
Speaker 3 (10:27):
At that point, I didn't believe that.
Speaker 4 (10:29):
And even if I looked inside my heart, my head,
and my gut would have told me to.
Speaker 3 (10:32):
Kill myself, I thought.
Speaker 4 (10:34):
So I looked outside myself into the eyes of my
three kids and my mother, and I said, that's why
I'm on this earth right now, and I plowed through it.
I did what men are supposed to do, Tina. I
manned up, sucked it up, just did it, no emotion,
no asking for help.
Speaker 3 (10:49):
I got my family through it, my kids and my mom.
Speaker 4 (10:51):
But on the other side, I was an empty, empty man,
not really understanding really anything at that point, and that's
when I didn't realize the transformation was coming.
Speaker 2 (11:05):
So I know we talked about some of this when
we talked the first time that we talked together, But
so I'm going to kind of shift our conversation just
away from in the direction where where you were at
at this time. We're going to go into the spiritual
realm that reasons for all that, because this is the
(11:26):
way that I work prior to coming into divorce coaching.
I'm a master body worker, so I'm trained to read muscles,
kind of like a palmist is trained to read poems.
And the way that I'm able I often asked this question,
is how am I able to do the work with
the clients when there's so much stress going on, like
(11:47):
the stress that you just described. But it's this connection.
If we have this connection, we can can find the
stuff that you were looking outside for when the answers
are insights. So as you were telling the story, you know,
you lost your identity. That wool had to be pulled
(12:12):
off of you so that you could find the true
you so you could do the true work that you're
doing now. And so I feel that you are so
blessed that spirit worked. I mean it comes in ugly
wrapping paper. I think you know that my husband died
ten months ago, and of course we didn't expect that,
(12:35):
just like you did it with your father, and that
he and I were alone and we had gone out
for dinner that night, a pre celebration for my birthday, actually,
because my birthday was the following day, and so he
(12:55):
got sick. Basically, he went down with a heart attack
and died the next day on my birthday. From I mean,
he went brain dead at that point with a stroke,
and I had to force the hospital to keep him
alive when the doctors, I mean the doctors were even
(13:15):
crying that they didn't want to continue the work, and
I'm like, he has six wonderful children, You've got to
keep his body here so that they have a body
to say goodbye to. And so after they did their
crash card on him, I had to say, I can't
go through it again. If he goes down again, we
(13:37):
can't keep him alive with the drugs, then then I
don't want to do the crash card again. I just
can't do it. So much like what you experienced with
the death of your dad. So now we're inside of
that and you looked out and you saw your kid's
eyes and your mom's eyes. So tell me how that
progressed for you.
Speaker 3 (14:00):
Oh jeez.
Speaker 4 (14:05):
I fell into not really caring much for myself more
caring for others.
Speaker 3 (14:12):
I had found that.
Speaker 4 (14:16):
Later on, I realized I was a people pleaser in
terms of I would always give, give, give, and not receive.
Speaker 3 (14:22):
And I don't know if the receiving.
Speaker 4 (14:23):
Was part of me wanting to be a martyr or whatever,
but I still have trouble receiving something I like to give,
and so it wasn't It was an easy decision for
me to want to give that empathy and care and
compassion to my kids and my mother and ignore myself.
Self care wasn't a thing for me, especially during times
(14:46):
of deep stress and any kind of grief. What I
thought made me feel better was helping others. So it
was kind of an easy approach. And as I saw
my kids progressing in under and time doesn't heal old,
it just puts a coding over it. I mean, they're
always there, it just makes it harder to dig for.
(15:10):
I saw the kids progressing, and there were occasional smiles
and happy thoughts about my dad and their grandfather, and
my mom and I talking about being grateful that he
was with us for solo, because we knew people who
didn't even know their fathers. I never met my grandfather's
so I started thinking, you know, I'm grateful that I
(15:32):
had my dad for the fifty years I did.
Speaker 3 (15:35):
And I'm grateful that my children.
Speaker 4 (15:37):
Got to grow up at ages I think they were
if you're talking twenty nineteen, yeah, seventeen, fifteen, and thirteen,
so they still remember my dad. So it started with gratitude,
and I find that gratitude, having gratitude for what you
have is very important no matter what stage of your
(15:58):
life you're in. And every day you can think about
what you're grateful for. It kind of puts out of
your mind what you don't have. And so that's kind
of how it started. So I don't know if that
answers your question.
Speaker 2 (16:12):
So it's just I mean, you went through a lot,
and then I myself have my oldest son who will
turn forty this year. He's on the autistic spectrum, but
he's on the very very bottom manning, very very functional.
Just you see him withdraw into the corner when he's
(16:34):
in group. Sometimes unless he can be the center of attention,
he'll step up into the plate with that. But I
can tell you going back to raising him with his dad, Yeah,
sometimes we wanted to kill him. The teachers wanted to
kill him. So so now you're a caregiver coach for
special needs, so kind of explain a little bit about that.
Speaker 4 (16:56):
Well, what I found interesting is up to that time,
this son who's got the autism again the same probably
same spectrum, you know, on the spectrum where your son
is cognitively, I mean on paper twenty three realistically, but
he's like he's twenty six years old and he's probably
sixteen on them managing his social skills and emotion management.
(17:19):
At that time, before my dad had passed, they were
best friends and we at times thought Matthew was callous,
didn't care flat affect. I mean, nothing seemed to bother him.
We didn't see stress, we didn't see any I think school,
no big deal. Things happened, well, no big deal. It
was like the same thing all the time. So for me,
I almost didn't realize and think that he had autism
(17:41):
because it wasn't negatively affecting him. I thought, later on
we find out, you know, the bully in school and
being heavy and eating for depression's sake wasn't healthy.
Speaker 3 (17:53):
I didn't see that.
Speaker 4 (17:54):
I just saw him, you know, I just wondered, all right,
maybe it's a phase. Maybe at some point he'll care.
When things happened, well, when my dad passed away.
Speaker 3 (18:04):
I saw a change in him.
Speaker 4 (18:06):
And what I saw was, at the time, he was seventeen,
a seventeen year old young man who was experiencing grief
and depression and sadness for the first time in his life. Now,
we as typical, as typical versus a typical you know,
we are used to having some of those feelings for
a long time in our lives, but to exhibit to
(18:28):
feel those emotions for the first time and not be
able to articulate what they mean at age seventeen, I
was with him for his first feelings of that, and
I had to kind of try to explain it and
that people manage it differently and all that, and so
that really got me to think, and I'm like, wow,
this shook this kid to the core.
Speaker 3 (18:47):
And now he's feeling what a lot of us feel.
Speaker 4 (18:50):
Yet he's unable to He hasn't learned the social skills
to kind of, you know, understand it and the griefing process.
I taught on about the grieving process and it's too
darn logical.
Speaker 3 (19:00):
He just didn't get it. And then then COVID hit in.
Speaker 4 (19:05):
So my dad died in January of nineteen and then
COVID hits March of twenty twenty, and all of a sudden,
my son exhibited other behaviors and feelings he's never felt before.
Speaker 3 (19:16):
Anxiety and stress. Dad, what's this like?
Speaker 4 (19:21):
It's anxiety and stress, and it's kind of like the
opposite of the depression. In brief, you felts because now
what he fell into was really thinking about his past,
which has created more depression, all the things that bad
things that happened to him. And then he's worried about
his future without his grandfather and how am I going
to be able to be independent, be like my grandfather?
(19:42):
And then all of a sudden, this anxiety of the
future and stress, and oh my god, to experience those
those strong emotions for the first time of your life
at age seventeen, it's quite powerful.
Speaker 3 (19:55):
And at the time I didn't know how to handle that.
Speaker 4 (19:57):
I was still reeling from all the stuff that happened
to me, So I wasn't even think about caregiver a coach.
When all was said and done, all I knew is
I wanted to own my own company. I didn't want
to answer anybody anymore. I was, you know, fired from
two hospitals for Drew always does his own thing, which
was doing right by the patient. So whatever I did,
I you know. So I'm like, you know, I'm not
answering anybody anymore. I want to do the right thing
(20:17):
and build something big.
Speaker 3 (20:19):
But I didn't know what it was.
Speaker 4 (20:21):
I thought about a healthcare consulting company. In the end,
I ended up buying a franchise. It was at that
time I believe a shortcut, just because I didn't have
the energy, that the brain power to start something from scratch.
I justified, oh, this is a good model. They're doing well.
Speaker 3 (20:39):
They can just hand me a business and I'll do well.
I didn't. I should have researched owning a business myself.
Speaker 4 (20:45):
So anyway, so I spend the money on that, go
to training, doing okay, but I'm not loving it, you know.
And then COVID hits and the business I had bought
was all about relationships in person. So now I'm wet
behind the and the whole thing. And then had the
transition to all this remote stuff. So I learned what
zoom is and I start networking across the country, all
(21:07):
across the globe. Now I always wanted to write a book.
I never had content now I had content. I just
needed that push to do it. And I'm on this
networking event and there's an editor there who says, oh,
what I do is I'm an editor, and I help
people write a book in ninety days without writing a word. Well,
there's the shortcut, right up, Druzaley. I didn't have to
write a word. Zoom recording every recording the questions and everything,
(21:30):
and otter electronically like transcribing everything. So I'm saying my words.
My words are being transcribed on paper, and then i'd
review the audio recording and the visual and you know,
change the word if I didn't want to. You know,
I want a certain tone.
Speaker 3 (21:45):
For the book.
Speaker 4 (21:46):
That's how I wrote the book, and it was published
in twenty twenty three. The point of me saying this, though,
is I was telling everybody in my story what I
just told you, guys, and whoever would listen. And I
realized I started to heal myself from within by telling
my story.
Speaker 3 (22:01):
And it hit me that just like my son now
is exhibiting these feelings and he's.
Speaker 4 (22:06):
Starting to learn how to articulate what he's feeling, I'm
telling people my story and I'm healing myself from within,
what the heck's going on? Then I started doing a
lot of research Tina and learning that eighty five percent
of physical ailments are due to unaddressed internal stress. I
was like, Ah, we hold in stuff and then it
(22:27):
exhibits physically because we're not paying attention to our body. Interesting,
then I find it. Then I read that our tears
have natural toxins in them, so we cry to release
natural toxins. Well, men are told not to cry, so
we're taught to suppress those toxins, and we have a
(22:49):
choice not to. We choose to because society tells us to.
Then I learn that emotional toxins are released when we
tell a story or ask for help. Well, men are
told not to ask for help or share stories or
story so we keep that in So then then I
looked at more data, and I'm seeing that the average
life span for women in this country is like seventy
(23:11):
nine point four or something and men is seventy three
point two. It's like a six year gap, the largest
gap since nineteen ninety six. And then I look at
more data. Men are fifty percent of the population, get
eighty percent.
Speaker 3 (23:23):
Of the suicides.
Speaker 4 (23:25):
Now I'm really thinking that men are choosing to die younger,
and what do I mean by that? We're choosing to
suppress all our emotions, our feelings of everything, not knowing
that the data is showing that when you release all that,
you feel better and all the right hormones are released.
(23:45):
And so I started getting on this mission of wanting
to help men redefine what it means to men up
that we can still be strong, and we can still
have empathy, we can be authentic, are not caring what
people think about it.
Speaker 3 (24:01):
As long as we do the right thing.
Speaker 4 (24:03):
And when I started being like that, my authentic self,
I was starting to draw people closer to me who
were like.
Speaker 3 (24:10):
Me, who would bring me up not knock me down.
Speaker 4 (24:14):
My self identity started getting stronger, which I defined is
my self respect, my self trust, and my self love,
and my own confidence started improving. And I ended up
with all of this walking away from the franchise.
Speaker 3 (24:27):
I breached a ten year agreement.
Speaker 4 (24:28):
Thank god, the franchise or knew what I had been
going and they respected me so.
Speaker 3 (24:31):
They didn't penalize me at all.
Speaker 4 (24:33):
And I started the journey on men's self development, not
knowing what that meant In.
Speaker 3 (24:38):
Terms of coaching.
Speaker 4 (24:40):
But I got certified and were coaching men and that's
where the most recent faith shaking moment happened with my
son with autism. I won't get into the details, but
he ended up going to a psychiatrist to overdose them on
ketemine and created a psychosis from July eleven of twenty
(25:01):
twenty four to September twenty one. And finally the Russian
of the hospital who's suicidal cutting himself was awful and
he got an injection of Haldall in the hospital and
that broke the psychosis. So he's doing a lot better
now trying to go to college. Those the four year
school's not for him. He's going to try community college.
But I had stopped working completely, stopped my coaching business
(25:22):
in July, and just finally came above water in February
of this year. And it came with a pivot. I
realized that I have such a passion for the underdog
in life. I mean, even you look at the sports
teams I root for, they're always the ones losing. So
my son is my passion. My kids are my passion.
Why can't I take that passion and also make it
(25:45):
part of my business and make a living helping others.
So I've pivoted my coaching career from men's self discovery
to a caregiver coach. So my for profit business is
focusing on caring for families caregivers of people with special needs.
Speaker 3 (26:02):
And then I'm in the.
Speaker 4 (26:03):
Process of creating a nonprofit that I will coach fathers
of children with autism and to form a foundation where
all the proceeds go to families of children with special
needs have financial hardships because all our mental health payments
are out of pocket in this country for the most part,
because it's just a lot of stuff's not covered. And
(26:24):
I'm talking to so many different families who are almost
financially bankrupt taking care of their special needs kid, and
that shouldn't be the case. So that's how, in a
weird way, you know, we think that what we taught
life's lindear in the beginning, and it is until it's not.
And so I never thought I'd get here, but it
was that winding, circuitous road that.
Speaker 3 (26:42):
Got me where I am.
Speaker 2 (26:44):
Yeah, that's kind of the way skirt just kind of works.
It's it's always that ugly wrapping paper that once we
get past it that we can see what's underneath. That's
the true gift. You know, when you were talking about
how time doesn't heal all wounds. So because I come
(27:07):
from a medical background myself, I think that the wound
gets healed, but it just depends on how bad that
wound was as to how bad that scar is going
to be, and that scar gets to itching every once
in a while, and that's where talk therapy I think
can help some people. And with others coaching. You know,
(27:29):
I've had men's relationship coaching and I really truly believe
that that can help people that struggle going to therapy.
So having a coach, I think of any kind of
whatever field that we tend to coach. When you know,
I'm a certified divorce coach and transition and recovery. But
(27:51):
the it's the care giving part, the fact that we
do this because we truly care about the people we're
working with. And I know, as you were talking about
the autism and the so you know, I fit my
son in the neurodivergent group and he married this last October.
He married a neurodivergent and they're both wonderful people. Most
(28:17):
of us wouldn't notice that anything's different about them. That's
why my son they never thought about running him through
tests because for the most part, you don't know. And
I'm glad now he talks about it. He tells me,
I have Asperger's mom. That's what I am, because that's
what he wants to be. So but I'm going to
back up to the suicide attempt now, was the suicide
(28:40):
attempt your autistic son?
Speaker 3 (28:43):
Both of them?
Speaker 4 (28:45):
The when my middle guy was fourteen, he's I mean,
his challenge in life is Crohn's disease. So we basically
got his diagnosis around the same time as we got
my oldest the autism. But his was abandonment that attempt
because he was so tight with his mother and said,
basically told me when I was taking care of that,
(29:06):
mom is dead to me. And I had all the
opportunity to do what some other fathers or mothers doing, like,
you know, get.
Speaker 3 (29:12):
The kid against it. I didn't. I said, listen, you
have every right to be upset.
Speaker 4 (29:16):
You're gonna want your mom in your life someday, so
don't lock the door to it. And now he lives
with her instead of living with me, which I don't
regret my advice because he'll find his way.
Speaker 3 (29:28):
So no, So that was the first. That was the
attempt back in eighteen.
Speaker 4 (29:31):
But Matthew, when he had that psychosis because of the
ketamine overdose, he was cutting himself. He said the cutting
was just to make sure he was alive, you know,
does he feel the kind of thing. But he did
say he didn't want to live and he wanted to
kill himself. He just didn't have a definitive plan except
during this psychosis. That Saturday morning, we finally took him
(29:53):
to the hospital. He did ingest two beers and he
had two hits on his bomb. He had medicinal cannabis
so boom, and he took a clon up and all
that together not good.
Speaker 3 (30:05):
And he still felt suicidal and depressed.
Speaker 4 (30:07):
That he actually volunteered to go to the hospital because
he was scared. And it was there that ultimately the
held all injection broke the psychosis.
Speaker 3 (30:16):
We learned a lot, you know, we learned a lot
from the whole whole thing.
Speaker 4 (30:22):
But yeah, it's just everything I'm doing is from the heart,
always has been, really, but this one's even deeper now.
Speaker 2 (30:29):
Yeah, yeah, so you know, and I'm going to go
back again, and I'm going to talk about the parts
where you where you were learning what the tears were,
financial toxins, and all of the hormones that are released
during certain times, certain events, during the times we're crying,
(30:50):
when we're laughing. A lot of people just don't understand that,
either parents or just us individual about ourselves, and we
don't we don't get that those things. I mean, I
personally had my own little problem with my thyroid where
where my thyroid hormone did some malfunctioning. And that's back
(31:16):
in a point where I found out that my son
got suicidal, the one on the autism spectrum. But what
was going on with my thyroid. Medical doctors did not understand.
They were trying to force me to take a thyroid
medication that I could tell you was not helping my body.
It was. It was called tyrosant, and I called it
(31:39):
the tyrant drug because it released the tyrant within me.
And I had to go to a therapist to get
the therapist to tell my doctor that this wasn't a
mental thing, that it was a physical thing, so that
we could get me off that medication. I could have
quit the medication, but then I when I'm not on
(32:00):
thyride medication, I get really sick. And so so we
had to get that convinced. And then come to find
out because doctors, medical doctors just don't understand this stuff.
I got diagnosed with bipolar disorder, and nobody tells me this.
They just write it down in my chart. Real my
(32:23):
new doctor now says, oh, we have to get this
off of the chart. So I'm going to have you
take this written exam. I'm going to ask you one
hundred questions, and this is how we're going to prove
that you're not you're not bipolar. So I did all
of that, and of course it shows up as non bipolar.
But the whole thing just you know, as a caregiver, coach,
(32:48):
the whole hormonal bunch of stuff. Medical doctors just don't
have have the clue that that therapists have a little
bit more understanding with. And then I am finding the
natural coaches, natural doctors you can understand that way more
(33:09):
than the medical field.
Speaker 3 (33:11):
Well what I what I've found, and I agree with
you to an extent.
Speaker 4 (33:13):
In the medical field, I have seen a distinct difference
in the thinking and the practice patterns of a medical.
Speaker 3 (33:20):
Doctor versus a do O.
Speaker 4 (33:23):
The do os, I have a do O and they
think more like the chiropractice of the whole body, that
if you come in with your ankle hurting, it's not
necessarily your ankle, it could be your.
Speaker 3 (33:32):
Hip cause and so so so.
Speaker 4 (33:35):
I agree with you for the most part, but in
the medical field that the do os are the type.
Speaker 3 (33:40):
Of human beings who who have been.
Speaker 4 (33:43):
Trained and went into be a DOO rather than an
MD because of the understanding that the whole body is
interconnected and you need to look at the whole body,
not just one aspect of it. So, but I understand
what you're saying, and I do agree to an extent.
And uh, you know, my general practice is now my
boys doctors too, and he is so understanding of what
(34:04):
the kids, what the boys have gone through, and he's
been absolutely fantastic.
Speaker 3 (34:09):
M HM.
Speaker 2 (34:11):
And and I uh, I recently found I mean I've
been getting bioidentical treatments for about eight years, but I
recently found a hormone doctor.
Speaker 3 (34:22):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (34:23):
Yeah, and so she she's a guynecologist and she's not
an MD, she's a nurse practitioner. But but she just
like you're OD you're yeah, Dio that she understands the hormones.
And so I have talked to doctors since my husband
(34:43):
died because my body did some wild thing. And I'm
even I've talked to doctors in Switzerland and nobody's heard
of this stuff before. But I go in with her
and right away she's like, Oh, we're going to check
for this because this is this is a scary situation.
Speaker 3 (34:59):
So yeah, well, I mean I've also heard the term
functional medicine.
Speaker 2 (35:02):
Is that similar to the hormone Yeah, it's very very similar.
Functional is like the deal where they're working with the
body and just it's a holistic approach. So so but
I I really you know, and coming back to that
holistic approach is that caregiver right and being being the
(35:23):
caregiver for especially if you're a dad, being a caregiver
now for your autistic child or children like I have.
I have one client who has two children that are
both on the spectrum and they're in an almost a
non functional, almost non audible and they're really struggling and
(35:46):
and to be the dad, ye, then how are you
tending to yourself the caregiver of the caregiver.
Speaker 4 (35:55):
God, especially with two and being by yourself doing it. Yeah,
it's that's challenging. And you know, some men, it's interesting,
don't feel that they're worthy of self.
Speaker 3 (36:07):
Care and.
Speaker 4 (36:10):
I kind of understand where that comes from, from me
wanting to give and not receive.
Speaker 3 (36:14):
Kind of thing.
Speaker 4 (36:15):
But that's where we really have to teach men how
how wonderful they are as they are who they.
Speaker 3 (36:21):
Are, without having to change.
Speaker 4 (36:23):
And you know, I think for men, the big, big
challenge is looking in the mirror and telling you're telling
the person you've seen in the mirror that you love him,
because it sounds like corny and stuff like that.
Speaker 3 (36:33):
A lot of men can't do it.
Speaker 4 (36:34):
I wasn't able to do it until recently, and I
almost believe at one hundred percent I'm working towards it.
Speaker 3 (36:39):
You know, it's been a long time.
Speaker 4 (36:41):
But yeah, it's the self care aspect for men. I
think the way society paints it is that that's for women.
Self care is for women. You know, self care is
not for men. We go and fix things, we go
and you know, so there's a shift. I feel the
paradigm shift happening. I think there are more men now
who want it and know they need it.
Speaker 3 (37:03):
I think the men.
Speaker 4 (37:04):
There are a lot of men who know they need
it and aren't willing enabled to say they want it
and go pursue it. So we got to find a
way to get them to volunteerily voluntarily pursue it.
Speaker 2 (37:17):
Yes, and you know, I focus my work towards men
because men have a harder time asking for help because
of societal things. You know. My father was the rough,
tough cowboy. I mean he rodeoed and did all of
that before I was born. And then we had a
(37:40):
ranch where we robed, you know, one hundred mile days
sometimes and he cried. That was a gift that I
feel I got is to be there. He would cry
almost every time he'd see a calf hit the ground
because he said, this is life. And he would tell me,
I don't go into a churching. This is my church
(38:02):
out here with God in God's land, you know. And
and then he could cry at Kleenex commercials. My youngest
son is born with that ability to my oldest son
with the autism aspect. He struggles with emotions, he struggles
feeling the emotions. He can get anger, he understands anger.
(38:25):
So yeah, those are those are important things. I think
that that being there and supporting fathers, especially when we've
got neurodivergent children autism specifically, Yes, they they need that
extra support. They need to be told given permission to
take care of themselves.
Speaker 3 (38:47):
Absolutely.
Speaker 4 (38:47):
You know, I've since I started this work, I've joined
a few like autism dad groups in Facebook, so to
see what the other men, what their needs are. And
the men are talking to each other, and they're offering
empathy and compassion to each other. And I can feel
(39:08):
the emotion from those posts, which.
Speaker 3 (39:14):
Is to say that.
Speaker 4 (39:15):
Men have it in them to be empathic and compassionate,
and especially those now whether their single dads are not
caring for a child with a disability where you can't
just as a parent fix it is causing these men
to start looking inward and they are becoming stronger men.
(39:37):
They maybe think they're weaker because they can't fix it,
but to me, being able to exhibit humility and vulnerability
to other men in a close, safe space, to me
is a friggin strength. It's not a weakness. And if
we can if we can get men to understand that
outside of the Facebook groups, you know, the men's retreats,
(40:01):
men's groups in public and have more men.
Speaker 3 (40:04):
Be open to that.
Speaker 4 (40:05):
But like you said, that giving permission piece is so
important because many men will be with a woman who'll
say be emotionalist, and when they are, sometimes the woman
shuts them down because down the woman might want a
strong man who's going to take.
Speaker 3 (40:21):
Care of her.
Speaker 4 (40:22):
Or she'll inadvertently roll her eyes or shrug her shoulders
and not knowing she's doing it, and he thinks she's
belittling or not taking his feelings, you know, seriously, So
give permission and back it up when it happens.
Speaker 3 (40:36):
You know, because when a man, when that happens to
a man.
Speaker 4 (40:40):
Just once, he'll won't go back and do it right,
you know, right, So there's almost no second chances. So
make sure you give permission, you back it up by
allowing it to happen, and embrace it and thank him.
Speaker 2 (40:56):
Amen. So it Yeah, My late Has was compassionate, very empathic,
and an excellent dad. He loved his children more than anything,
and so drew as we start to close today, so
I know all of your contact information is going to
be low in the show notes, but can you tell
people how to find you? Oh?
Speaker 4 (41:17):
Absolutely, I'll start with my email because I'm redoing the web.
I'll still give you the website, but I'm going to
redo it to point more to what I'm doing now.
But Drew drw at profitcompassion dot com. It's named in
my company and the website is profitcompassion dot com. Love
for you to go to my YouTube channel. I have
(41:38):
a podcast. I'm a host of a podcast called from
Caving Into Crushing It and I just recorded episode and Tina,
you're gonna be probably around one thirty one, one thirty two.
Speaker 3 (41:51):
But it's it's.
Speaker 4 (41:52):
Near and dear to my heart because I have people
on who have faced adversity and changed from a victim
mindset to being the one to say this is an
opportunity for me to become stronger person.
Speaker 3 (42:03):
It's inspirational. So if you can look that up and
subscribe and watch some.
Speaker 4 (42:07):
Of those episodes, that you can reach me that way too,
because I comment on everybody's you know, I reply on
everybody's comments, So I think that's probably the best ways
right now.
Speaker 2 (42:18):
So awesome. So I'm a certified divorce coach, meaning that
I'm trained in the complexities of divorce. I specialize in
high conflict divorce, especially that from a toxic, narcissistic partner.
My way, husband, my dad and myself all experienced abuse
in some form or another. So I not only have
the training in my head, I have that in my
(42:40):
heart and in my soul where I have come from.
I can be reached through my email at Coach Tina
Lynn at gmail dot com. That's Coach co a c
H Tina t I n A Lynn l y n
n at gmail dot com. My website is Divorcecoach Specialist
dot com. You can also find me on social media
(43:03):
Facebook under Tina Lynn Huggins that's hugg i n s
LinkedIn under Tina Huggins, on Instagram under Divorce Coach Tina Lynn,
TikTok under Divorce Tina and So Drew. I always ask
for the last bit of advice, So if you can
give our viewers a little bit of advice here.
Speaker 3 (43:26):
Yeah, and it's people who've read my book.
Speaker 4 (43:30):
When I give a signed copy, I always put this
on the inside corner. I'll say, Tina, choose to write
your own story instead of letting others.
Speaker 3 (43:38):
Write it for you. That would be my advice.
Speaker 2 (43:42):
Awesome. I love that so and my advice are for
our viewers to do what Drew has been talking about.
Give yourself a little grace, pgive yourself, especially if you're
the caregiver of either a child or a you need
to have that grace. Give yourself grace, step aside from
(44:05):
the for a time and take care of yourself. Enjoy yourself.
Whether that's a hot bubble bath or going out with
your friends, it doesn't matter. Just make sure that you're
taking care of yourself. So I often talk about domestic violence,
but I also want is to be aware of suicide.
And so if you or somebody you know are in
(44:26):
contemplation of suicide, please call the suicide hotline. And I
lost my suicide hotline phone number, Okay, nine eight eight.
Please call the Suicide Prevention Hotline at nine eight eight
and it's just a simple, simple, simple number, nine eight eight.
(44:50):
If you are involved in a domestic situation, please call
nine one one or in the UK nine nine nine.
At this point press charges. That is your key out
of the relation ship. Do not drop those charges. Charges. Oftentimes,
if you drop the charges, what goes on after is
way worse than what went on before. This is your
(45:10):
key out of that abusive situation. If you or somebody
you know is dealing with domestic violence, Please call a
domestic violence hotline at eight hundred seven nine nine seven
two three three. That number again is eight hundred seven
ninety nine seventy two thirty three, and I ask that
you please like, comment, and share so that this can
(45:30):
be moved forward and help others. Thank you so much,
Drew for joining us, and thank you and blessings for
all the work that you do.
Speaker 3 (45:40):
Oh, thank you so much, Tina. Thank you for having
me on. Thanks for everything you do.
Speaker 2 (45:44):
Thank you and we'll see you next time.
Speaker 1 (45:48):
You're listening to WGSNDB going Solo Network Singles Talk Radio channel,
where we take a lighthearted and candidate approach to discussions
on the journey of relationship, laws, divorce, parenting, being single, relationships, building, dating,
and yes sex. Join our listeners and begin living your
best life.
You're listening to WGSNDB Go and Solo Network Singles talk
radio channel, where we take a lighthearted and candidate approach
to discussions on the journey of relationship, laws, divorce, parenting,
being single, relationships, building, dating, and yes sex. Join our
listeners and begin living your best life.
Speaker 2 (00:27):
Hello and welcome to my show The Awakening here on WGSNDB,
the Going Bold and Going Solo Network. The information and
opinions expressed on this show are just that, the opinions
of the individual speaking based on their individual personal experiences.
They are not intended to diagnose and do not constitute
(00:47):
professional advice or recommendations. So you know all of the
pain and the stress and the struggles that divorcing people
go through while there is a way to find peace
and sanity and assist the lawyer in their legal process.
This saves you thousands of dollars. Hello, my name is
Tina Huggins. I'm your divorce coach, specialist, divorce consultant, restorative
(01:10):
family mediator, and conflictual co parenting coach. And today I'm
joined with Drew. Now that we practiced our last name,
I'm not going to attempt it again. So Drew as
a caregiver coach. Drew believes that his success happens when
he finds a better way. He found a better way
(01:34):
is willing and able to share it with others. How
does excuse me? How he does that is by challenging
that status quo and thinking differently. Ultimately, what Drew begins
excuse me. Ultimately, what Drew brings to the table is
(01:56):
a way to contribute and add value by having an
impact on the lives of others. It has always It's
not always been this way for Drew. For most of
Drew's life, he was concerned with what other people thought
of him and how he was supposed to act. He
(02:17):
wore many masks, either to fit in or to be accepted.
He didn't realize he was a people pleaser, hiding his
authentic self. Fast forward in a nine month span or so.
A few years ago, he endured four faith shaking life
(02:38):
events that caused him to question his existence and determine
his purpose in life. What was he here for? Drew
is a proud father of three children, a daughter and
two sons. The oldest son was born with autism spectrum
disorder and is what the experts call high functioning previously
(03:05):
called Aspergers cognitively strong but society but societal and emotionally delayed. Now,
as a caregiver coach, Drew supports families caring for those
with special needs and fathers caring for children who have
autism spectrum disorder to navigate the system for appropriate services
(03:31):
for their loved ones and for themselves. So I'm excited
to have you talk today, Drew, So thank you for
joining me.
Speaker 3 (03:40):
Thanks so much.
Speaker 4 (03:40):
Tina, And the last name is pronounced Durani, And the
joke I made with Tina is some people call me deranged,
but that's like and I.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
Practiced it just in front of him, and I'm like, yeah,
we're going to say We're going to say deranged just
because he said to say that. So yeah, we're just
going to let him say that. So so the part
that's probably the most important is that you are supporting
fathers because so many of my fathers that come to
(04:09):
me are becoming single parents and tending to their children
for the very first time on their own. And many
of my clients have children on the autism spectrum. So
to be able to be able to talk about how
you teach and what you do is going to be super,
(04:30):
super important. So I know that I talked about earlier
inside there, just a bit ago, that you had four
life changing events. And then just as we were talking,
we were talking about how what set those four life
changing events off was your divorce. So when we go
(04:50):
through life changing events, it brings us to just what
you were saying, It brings us to this realization of
who am I? Why am I here? So kind of
tell us a little bit about that time frame.
Speaker 4 (05:02):
Well, the yeah, so when people ask, you know me,
tell my story, I mean, obviously the story I'm fifty six.
There's a lot of stories in there, but I say
the most recent, second most recent earth shattering stuff did
happen in April of twenty eighteen. Now, my former wife
moved out in October fifteen, twenty fifteen. She wanted the divorce,
(05:25):
and when she left, we did two or three months
later started mediation because we did not want to drag
the kids through the court system for many reasons. And
the mediation went on for until December of twenty seventeen.
So you know, we had that final MSA or mediation,
(05:48):
the support agreement in end of December twenty seventeen. Now,
the divorce wasn't final until April third of twenty eighteen,
so you know, when you look at those timeframes. For me,
especially because I just didn't initiate the divorce, it was
anxiety provoking for me, and I had one mindset of
trying to save the marriage, not realizing that my former
(06:11):
wife didn't have a plan being she was set on
the divorce, and that was one thing I didn't realize.
So April third of twenty eighteen, I walk out of
the courthouse with this piece of paper, the divorce decree.
I call that legal closure because other closures sometimes it
takes longer, or sometimes doesn't happen, or it's suppressed or whatever.
Speaker 3 (06:30):
So I was ready to like that.
Speaker 4 (06:32):
So that was like faith shaking moment number one, even
though I knew it was coming. When you walk out
of that courthouse and the signatures are on that paper
and you get that divorce decree, it's still it's still
something that you don't totally totally you get over right away.
So I had the mindset of really thinking, all right, Drew,
you can take this as a barrier or you can
take it as an opportunity. And I finally in that
(06:56):
moment started to see adversity as opportunities rather than barriers,
and I wanted to throw myself a fiftieth birthday party.
My birthday was October sixth, twenty eighteen. I turned fifteen.
I invited everybody from my childhood to family, to middle school,
high school, college coaching, you know, all friends in town.
So many people showed up and it was just probably
(07:19):
one of the better days of my life. And so
I was ready to take step two of my life.
And ten days after my birthday, I had worked in
healthcare hospitals for twenty four years. I was fired from
my last hospital job. I did the right thing. I
reported a hippo violation, and it wasn't because I reported it.
Speaker 3 (07:39):
I know it was because of my timing.
Speaker 4 (07:41):
I was asked to do a little more research and
I didn't listen, so basically didn't listen to my boss.
Speaker 3 (07:46):
Of course, they don't give you the reason when you're
fired as an attwill employee.
Speaker 4 (07:49):
So I walk out of there knowing in my heart
I did the right thing, still in a way of
really upset because I wanted to make an impact and
I started to think I could make it more of
an impact on the outside of the healthcare system.
Speaker 3 (08:02):
So that was faith shaking moment.
Speaker 4 (08:03):
Number two was losing my job, and as a man
who had I would say at the time of week
self identity.
Speaker 3 (08:11):
My identity was based on my.
Speaker 4 (08:12):
Marriage and my profession, and within a matter of six months.
Speaker 3 (08:18):
I had lost both.
Speaker 4 (08:20):
I didn't even have time to fall into any kind
of mode, whether it's victim or blame mentality, because literally
ten days after I got fired, my fourteen year old
son at the time had a suicidal ideation. We found
out from his therapist he had made an attempt and
I was in the next room and didn't even realize it.
Thank God, he's okay now. But what we had to
do is we didn't know what to do. It was
(08:42):
the first time we ever encountered something like that. So
his professional caretakers suggested an inpatient facility. We found one
in Connecticut, which was it was about two hours away
from our home. Toughest decision I've ever made. They didn't
have a bed for him until December eighth, So October
twenty ninth was when he had was the event in December.
Speaker 3 (09:03):
It's about forty days he was living with me at
the time.
Speaker 4 (09:06):
I had all three kids, and I spent like forty days,
like night and day, making sure.
Speaker 3 (09:11):
I told him, my job as your dad.
Speaker 4 (09:12):
Is to keep you alive and safe and healthy. Come
December eighth, we drive up there, my parents come up,
my former wife and my other two kids, and as
we're saying goodbye, my parents are in the waiting room.
My son points to my parents and I hope nothing
happens to them when I'm here.
Speaker 3 (09:28):
I said, honey, nothing's going to happen. Take care of
your health. That's the most important thing.
Speaker 4 (09:32):
So now we have that third faith shaking moment was
my son's issue.
Speaker 3 (09:37):
And on the day night before.
Speaker 4 (09:39):
Christmas Eve, my father goes to the bathroom, strains on
the toilet, perforates his bowel, goes into septic shock, and
my dad passes away three weeks later in intensive care
while Nick is up at the home. So there's your
fourth faith shaking moment in a nine month period, And
that basically shook me to the core, and that right
away put me into victim blame mentality. It was a
(10:02):
wife's fault for the divorce, boss's fault for the firing,
my fault for my son's illness, and God's fault for
my father, and at that point I really didn't want
to be on the earth. I didn't have a plan
to kill myself, but I just didn't find the purpose
in my life at that point. And I know now
(10:22):
that when we are looking for purpose, we look from
within and we can heal ourselves from within.
Speaker 3 (10:27):
At that point, I didn't believe that.
Speaker 4 (10:29):
And even if I looked inside my heart, my head,
and my gut would have told me to.
Speaker 3 (10:32):
Kill myself, I thought.
Speaker 4 (10:34):
So I looked outside myself into the eyes of my
three kids and my mother, and I said, that's why
I'm on this earth right now, and I plowed through it.
I did what men are supposed to do, Tina. I
manned up, sucked it up, just did it, no emotion,
no asking for help.
Speaker 3 (10:49):
I got my family through it, my kids and my mom.
Speaker 4 (10:51):
But on the other side, I was an empty, empty man,
not really understanding really anything at that point, and that's
when I didn't realize the transformation was coming.
Speaker 2 (11:05):
So I know we talked about some of this when
we talked the first time that we talked together, But
so I'm going to kind of shift our conversation just
away from in the direction where where you were at
at this time. We're going to go into the spiritual
realm that reasons for all that, because this is the
(11:26):
way that I work prior to coming into divorce coaching.
I'm a master body worker, so I'm trained to read muscles,
kind of like a palmist is trained to read poems.
And the way that I'm able I often asked this question,
is how am I able to do the work with
the clients when there's so much stress going on, like
(11:47):
the stress that you just described. But it's this connection.
If we have this connection, we can can find the
stuff that you were looking outside for when the answers
are insights. So as you were telling the story, you know,
you lost your identity. That wool had to be pulled
(12:12):
off of you so that you could find the true
you so you could do the true work that you're
doing now. And so I feel that you are so
blessed that spirit worked. I mean it comes in ugly
wrapping paper. I think you know that my husband died
ten months ago, and of course we didn't expect that,
(12:35):
just like you did it with your father, and that
he and I were alone and we had gone out
for dinner that night, a pre celebration for my birthday, actually,
because my birthday was the following day, and so he
(12:55):
got sick. Basically, he went down with a heart attack
and died the next day on my birthday. From I mean,
he went brain dead at that point with a stroke,
and I had to force the hospital to keep him
alive when the doctors, I mean the doctors were even
(13:15):
crying that they didn't want to continue the work, and
I'm like, he has six wonderful children, You've got to
keep his body here so that they have a body
to say goodbye to. And so after they did their
crash card on him, I had to say, I can't
go through it again. If he goes down again, we
(13:37):
can't keep him alive with the drugs, then then I
don't want to do the crash card again. I just
can't do it. So much like what you experienced with
the death of your dad. So now we're inside of
that and you looked out and you saw your kid's
eyes and your mom's eyes. So tell me how that
progressed for you.
Speaker 3 (14:00):
Oh jeez.
Speaker 4 (14:05):
I fell into not really caring much for myself more
caring for others.
Speaker 3 (14:12):
I had found that.
Speaker 4 (14:16):
Later on, I realized I was a people pleaser in
terms of I would always give, give, give, and not receive.
Speaker 3 (14:22):
And I don't know if the receiving.
Speaker 4 (14:23):
Was part of me wanting to be a martyr or whatever,
but I still have trouble receiving something I like to give,
and so it wasn't It was an easy decision for
me to want to give that empathy and care and
compassion to my kids and my mother and ignore myself.
Self care wasn't a thing for me, especially during times
(14:46):
of deep stress and any kind of grief. What I
thought made me feel better was helping others. So it
was kind of an easy approach. And as I saw
my kids progressing in under and time doesn't heal old,
it just puts a coding over it. I mean, they're
always there, it just makes it harder to dig for.
(15:10):
I saw the kids progressing, and there were occasional smiles
and happy thoughts about my dad and their grandfather, and
my mom and I talking about being grateful that he
was with us for solo, because we knew people who
didn't even know their fathers. I never met my grandfather's
so I started thinking, you know, I'm grateful that I
(15:32):
had my dad for the fifty years I did.
Speaker 3 (15:35):
And I'm grateful that my children.
Speaker 4 (15:37):
Got to grow up at ages I think they were
if you're talking twenty nineteen, yeah, seventeen, fifteen, and thirteen,
so they still remember my dad. So it started with gratitude,
and I find that gratitude, having gratitude for what you
have is very important no matter what stage of your
(15:58):
life you're in. And every day you can think about
what you're grateful for. It kind of puts out of
your mind what you don't have. And so that's kind
of how it started. So I don't know if that
answers your question.
Speaker 2 (16:12):
So it's just I mean, you went through a lot,
and then I myself have my oldest son who will
turn forty this year. He's on the autistic spectrum, but
he's on the very very bottom manning, very very functional.
Just you see him withdraw into the corner when he's
(16:34):
in group. Sometimes unless he can be the center of attention,
he'll step up into the plate with that. But I
can tell you going back to raising him with his dad, Yeah,
sometimes we wanted to kill him. The teachers wanted to
kill him. So so now you're a caregiver coach for
special needs, so kind of explain a little bit about that.
Speaker 4 (16:56):
Well, what I found interesting is up to that time,
this son who's got the autism again the same probably
same spectrum, you know, on the spectrum where your son
is cognitively, I mean on paper twenty three realistically, but
he's like he's twenty six years old and he's probably
sixteen on them managing his social skills and emotion management.
(17:19):
At that time, before my dad had passed, they were
best friends and we at times thought Matthew was callous,
didn't care flat affect. I mean, nothing seemed to bother him.
We didn't see stress, we didn't see any I think school,
no big deal. Things happened, well, no big deal. It
was like the same thing all the time. So for me,
I almost didn't realize and think that he had autism
(17:41):
because it wasn't negatively affecting him. I thought, later on
we find out, you know, the bully in school and
being heavy and eating for depression's sake wasn't healthy.
Speaker 3 (17:53):
I didn't see that.
Speaker 4 (17:54):
I just saw him, you know, I just wondered, all right,
maybe it's a phase. Maybe at some point he'll care.
When things happened, well, when my dad passed away.
Speaker 3 (18:04):
I saw a change in him.
Speaker 4 (18:06):
And what I saw was, at the time, he was seventeen,
a seventeen year old young man who was experiencing grief
and depression and sadness for the first time in his life. Now,
we as typical, as typical versus a typical you know,
we are used to having some of those feelings for
a long time in our lives, but to exhibit to
(18:28):
feel those emotions for the first time and not be
able to articulate what they mean at age seventeen, I
was with him for his first feelings of that, and
I had to kind of try to explain it and
that people manage it differently and all that, and so
that really got me to think, and I'm like, wow,
this shook this kid to the core.
Speaker 3 (18:47):
And now he's feeling what a lot of us feel.
Speaker 4 (18:50):
Yet he's unable to He hasn't learned the social skills
to kind of, you know, understand it and the griefing process.
I taught on about the grieving process and it's too
darn logical.
Speaker 3 (19:00):
He just didn't get it. And then then COVID hit in.
Speaker 4 (19:05):
So my dad died in January of nineteen and then
COVID hits March of twenty twenty, and all of a sudden,
my son exhibited other behaviors and feelings he's never felt before.
Speaker 3 (19:16):
Anxiety and stress. Dad, what's this like?
Speaker 4 (19:21):
It's anxiety and stress, and it's kind of like the
opposite of the depression. In brief, you felts because now
what he fell into was really thinking about his past,
which has created more depression, all the things that bad
things that happened to him. And then he's worried about
his future without his grandfather and how am I going
to be able to be independent, be like my grandfather?
(19:42):
And then all of a sudden, this anxiety of the
future and stress, and oh my god, to experience those
those strong emotions for the first time of your life
at age seventeen, it's quite powerful.
Speaker 3 (19:55):
And at the time I didn't know how to handle that.
Speaker 4 (19:57):
I was still reeling from all the stuff that happened
to me, So I wasn't even think about caregiver a coach.
When all was said and done, all I knew is
I wanted to own my own company. I didn't want
to answer anybody anymore. I was, you know, fired from
two hospitals for Drew always does his own thing, which
was doing right by the patient. So whatever I did,
I you know. So I'm like, you know, I'm not
answering anybody anymore. I want to do the right thing
(20:17):
and build something big.
Speaker 3 (20:19):
But I didn't know what it was.
Speaker 4 (20:21):
I thought about a healthcare consulting company. In the end,
I ended up buying a franchise. It was at that
time I believe a shortcut, just because I didn't have
the energy, that the brain power to start something from scratch.
I justified, oh, this is a good model. They're doing well.
Speaker 3 (20:39):
They can just hand me a business and I'll do well.
I didn't. I should have researched owning a business myself.
Speaker 4 (20:45):
So anyway, so I spend the money on that, go
to training, doing okay, but I'm not loving it, you know.
And then COVID hits and the business I had bought
was all about relationships in person. So now I'm wet
behind the and the whole thing. And then had the
transition to all this remote stuff. So I learned what
zoom is and I start networking across the country, all
(21:07):
across the globe. Now I always wanted to write a book.
I never had content now I had content. I just
needed that push to do it. And I'm on this
networking event and there's an editor there who says, oh,
what I do is I'm an editor, and I help
people write a book in ninety days without writing a word. Well,
there's the shortcut, right up, Druzaley. I didn't have to
write a word. Zoom recording every recording the questions and everything,
(21:30):
and otter electronically like transcribing everything. So I'm saying my words.
My words are being transcribed on paper, and then i'd
review the audio recording and the visual and you know,
change the word if I didn't want to. You know,
I want a certain tone.
Speaker 3 (21:45):
For the book.
Speaker 4 (21:46):
That's how I wrote the book, and it was published
in twenty twenty three. The point of me saying this, though,
is I was telling everybody in my story what I
just told you, guys, and whoever would listen. And I
realized I started to heal myself from within by telling
my story.
Speaker 3 (22:01):
And it hit me that just like my son now
is exhibiting these feelings and he's.
Speaker 4 (22:06):
Starting to learn how to articulate what he's feeling, I'm
telling people my story and I'm healing myself from within,
what the heck's going on? Then I started doing a
lot of research Tina and learning that eighty five percent
of physical ailments are due to unaddressed internal stress. I
was like, Ah, we hold in stuff and then it
(22:27):
exhibits physically because we're not paying attention to our body. Interesting,
then I find it. Then I read that our tears
have natural toxins in them, so we cry to release
natural toxins. Well, men are told not to cry, so
we're taught to suppress those toxins, and we have a
(22:49):
choice not to. We choose to because society tells us to.
Then I learn that emotional toxins are released when we
tell a story or ask for help. Well, men are
told not to ask for help or share stories or
story so we keep that in So then then I
looked at more data, and I'm seeing that the average
life span for women in this country is like seventy
(23:11):
nine point four or something and men is seventy three
point two. It's like a six year gap, the largest
gap since nineteen ninety six. And then I look at
more data. Men are fifty percent of the population, get
eighty percent.
Speaker 3 (23:23):
Of the suicides.
Speaker 4 (23:25):
Now I'm really thinking that men are choosing to die younger,
and what do I mean by that? We're choosing to
suppress all our emotions, our feelings of everything, not knowing
that the data is showing that when you release all that,
you feel better and all the right hormones are released.
(23:45):
And so I started getting on this mission of wanting
to help men redefine what it means to men up
that we can still be strong, and we can still
have empathy, we can be authentic, are not caring what
people think about it.
Speaker 3 (24:01):
As long as we do the right thing.
Speaker 4 (24:03):
And when I started being like that, my authentic self,
I was starting to draw people closer to me who
were like.
Speaker 3 (24:10):
Me, who would bring me up not knock me down.
Speaker 4 (24:14):
My self identity started getting stronger, which I defined is
my self respect, my self trust, and my self love,
and my own confidence started improving. And I ended up
with all of this walking away from the franchise.
Speaker 3 (24:27):
I breached a ten year agreement.
Speaker 4 (24:28):
Thank god, the franchise or knew what I had been
going and they respected me so.
Speaker 3 (24:31):
They didn't penalize me at all.
Speaker 4 (24:33):
And I started the journey on men's self development, not
knowing what that meant In.
Speaker 3 (24:38):
Terms of coaching.
Speaker 4 (24:40):
But I got certified and were coaching men and that's
where the most recent faith shaking moment happened with my
son with autism. I won't get into the details, but
he ended up going to a psychiatrist to overdose them on
ketemine and created a psychosis from July eleven of twenty
(25:01):
twenty four to September twenty one. And finally the Russian
of the hospital who's suicidal cutting himself was awful and
he got an injection of Haldall in the hospital and
that broke the psychosis. So he's doing a lot better
now trying to go to college. Those the four year
school's not for him. He's going to try community college.
But I had stopped working completely, stopped my coaching business
(25:22):
in July, and just finally came above water in February
of this year. And it came with a pivot. I
realized that I have such a passion for the underdog
in life. I mean, even you look at the sports
teams I root for, they're always the ones losing. So
my son is my passion. My kids are my passion.
Why can't I take that passion and also make it
(25:45):
part of my business and make a living helping others.
So I've pivoted my coaching career from men's self discovery
to a caregiver coach. So my for profit business is
focusing on caring for families caregivers of people with special needs.
Speaker 3 (26:02):
And then I'm in the.
Speaker 4 (26:03):
Process of creating a nonprofit that I will coach fathers
of children with autism and to form a foundation where
all the proceeds go to families of children with special
needs have financial hardships because all our mental health payments
are out of pocket in this country for the most part,
because it's just a lot of stuff's not covered. And
(26:24):
I'm talking to so many different families who are almost
financially bankrupt taking care of their special needs kid, and
that shouldn't be the case. So that's how, in a
weird way, you know, we think that what we taught
life's lindear in the beginning, and it is until it's not.
And so I never thought I'd get here, but it
was that winding, circuitous road that.
Speaker 3 (26:42):
Got me where I am.
Speaker 2 (26:44):
Yeah, that's kind of the way skirt just kind of works.
It's it's always that ugly wrapping paper that once we
get past it that we can see what's underneath. That's
the true gift. You know, when you were talking about
how time doesn't heal all wounds. So because I come
(27:07):
from a medical background myself, I think that the wound
gets healed, but it just depends on how bad that
wound was as to how bad that scar is going
to be, and that scar gets to itching every once
in a while, and that's where talk therapy I think
can help some people. And with others coaching. You know,
(27:29):
I've had men's relationship coaching and I really truly believe
that that can help people that struggle going to therapy.
So having a coach, I think of any kind of
whatever field that we tend to coach. When you know,
I'm a certified divorce coach and transition and recovery. But
(27:51):
the it's the care giving part, the fact that we
do this because we truly care about the people we're
working with. And I know, as you were talking about
the autism and the so you know, I fit my
son in the neurodivergent group and he married this last October.
He married a neurodivergent and they're both wonderful people. Most
(28:17):
of us wouldn't notice that anything's different about them. That's
why my son they never thought about running him through
tests because for the most part, you don't know. And
I'm glad now he talks about it. He tells me,
I have Asperger's mom. That's what I am, because that's
what he wants to be. So but I'm going to
back up to the suicide attempt now, was the suicide
(28:40):
attempt your autistic son?
Speaker 3 (28:43):
Both of them?
Speaker 4 (28:45):
The when my middle guy was fourteen, he's I mean,
his challenge in life is Crohn's disease. So we basically
got his diagnosis around the same time as we got
my oldest the autism. But his was abandonment that attempt
because he was so tight with his mother and said,
basically told me when I was taking care of that,
(29:06):
mom is dead to me. And I had all the
opportunity to do what some other fathers or mothers doing, like,
you know, get.
Speaker 3 (29:12):
The kid against it. I didn't. I said, listen, you
have every right to be upset.
Speaker 4 (29:16):
You're gonna want your mom in your life someday, so
don't lock the door to it. And now he lives
with her instead of living with me, which I don't
regret my advice because he'll find his way.
Speaker 3 (29:28):
So no, So that was the first. That was the
attempt back in eighteen.
Speaker 4 (29:31):
But Matthew, when he had that psychosis because of the
ketamine overdose, he was cutting himself. He said the cutting
was just to make sure he was alive, you know,
does he feel the kind of thing. But he did
say he didn't want to live and he wanted to
kill himself. He just didn't have a definitive plan except
during this psychosis. That Saturday morning, we finally took him
(29:53):
to the hospital. He did ingest two beers and he
had two hits on his bomb. He had medicinal cannabis
so boom, and he took a clon up and all
that together not good.
Speaker 3 (30:05):
And he still felt suicidal and depressed.
Speaker 4 (30:07):
That he actually volunteered to go to the hospital because
he was scared. And it was there that ultimately the
held all injection broke the psychosis.
Speaker 3 (30:16):
We learned a lot, you know, we learned a lot
from the whole whole thing.
Speaker 4 (30:22):
But yeah, it's just everything I'm doing is from the heart,
always has been, really, but this one's even deeper now.
Speaker 2 (30:29):
Yeah, yeah, so you know, and I'm going to go
back again, and I'm going to talk about the parts
where you where you were learning what the tears were,
financial toxins, and all of the hormones that are released
during certain times, certain events, during the times we're crying,
(30:50):
when we're laughing. A lot of people just don't understand that,
either parents or just us individual about ourselves, and we
don't we don't get that those things. I mean, I
personally had my own little problem with my thyroid where
where my thyroid hormone did some malfunctioning. And that's back
(31:16):
in a point where I found out that my son
got suicidal, the one on the autism spectrum. But what
was going on with my thyroid. Medical doctors did not understand.
They were trying to force me to take a thyroid
medication that I could tell you was not helping my body.
It was. It was called tyrosant, and I called it
(31:39):
the tyrant drug because it released the tyrant within me.
And I had to go to a therapist to get
the therapist to tell my doctor that this wasn't a
mental thing, that it was a physical thing, so that
we could get me off that medication. I could have
quit the medication, but then I when I'm not on
(32:00):
thyride medication, I get really sick. And so so we
had to get that convinced. And then come to find
out because doctors, medical doctors just don't understand this stuff.
I got diagnosed with bipolar disorder, and nobody tells me this.
They just write it down in my chart. Real my
(32:23):
new doctor now says, oh, we have to get this
off of the chart. So I'm going to have you
take this written exam. I'm going to ask you one
hundred questions, and this is how we're going to prove
that you're not you're not bipolar. So I did all
of that, and of course it shows up as non bipolar.
But the whole thing just you know, as a caregiver, coach,
(32:48):
the whole hormonal bunch of stuff. Medical doctors just don't
have have the clue that that therapists have a little
bit more understanding with. And then I am finding the
natural coaches, natural doctors you can understand that way more
(33:09):
than the medical field.
Speaker 3 (33:11):
Well what I what I've found, and I agree with
you to an extent.
Speaker 4 (33:13):
In the medical field, I have seen a distinct difference
in the thinking and the practice patterns of a medical.
Speaker 3 (33:20):
Doctor versus a do O.
Speaker 4 (33:23):
The do os, I have a do O and they
think more like the chiropractice of the whole body, that
if you come in with your ankle hurting, it's not
necessarily your ankle, it could be your.
Speaker 3 (33:32):
Hip cause and so so so.
Speaker 4 (33:35):
I agree with you for the most part, but in
the medical field that the do os are the type.
Speaker 3 (33:40):
Of human beings who who have been.
Speaker 4 (33:43):
Trained and went into be a DOO rather than an
MD because of the understanding that the whole body is
interconnected and you need to look at the whole body,
not just one aspect of it. So, but I understand
what you're saying, and I do agree to an extent.
And uh, you know, my general practice is now my
boys doctors too, and he is so understanding of what
(34:04):
the kids, what the boys have gone through, and he's
been absolutely fantastic.
Speaker 3 (34:09):
M HM.
Speaker 2 (34:11):
And and I uh, I recently found I mean I've
been getting bioidentical treatments for about eight years, but I
recently found a hormone doctor.
Speaker 3 (34:22):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (34:23):
Yeah, and so she she's a guynecologist and she's not
an MD, she's a nurse practitioner. But but she just
like you're OD you're yeah, Dio that she understands the hormones.
And so I have talked to doctors since my husband
(34:43):
died because my body did some wild thing. And I'm
even I've talked to doctors in Switzerland and nobody's heard
of this stuff before. But I go in with her
and right away she's like, Oh, we're going to check
for this because this is this is a scary situation.
Speaker 3 (34:59):
So yeah, well, I mean I've also heard the term
functional medicine.
Speaker 2 (35:02):
Is that similar to the hormone Yeah, it's very very similar.
Functional is like the deal where they're working with the
body and just it's a holistic approach. So so but
I I really you know, and coming back to that
holistic approach is that caregiver right and being being the
(35:23):
caregiver for especially if you're a dad, being a caregiver
now for your autistic child or children like I have.
I have one client who has two children that are
both on the spectrum and they're in an almost a
non functional, almost non audible and they're really struggling and
(35:46):
and to be the dad, ye, then how are you
tending to yourself the caregiver of the caregiver.
Speaker 4 (35:55):
God, especially with two and being by yourself doing it. Yeah,
it's that's challenging. And you know, some men, it's interesting,
don't feel that they're worthy of self.
Speaker 3 (36:07):
Care and.
Speaker 4 (36:10):
I kind of understand where that comes from, from me
wanting to give and not receive.
Speaker 3 (36:14):
Kind of thing.
Speaker 4 (36:15):
But that's where we really have to teach men how
how wonderful they are as they are who they.
Speaker 3 (36:21):
Are, without having to change.
Speaker 4 (36:23):
And you know, I think for men, the big, big
challenge is looking in the mirror and telling you're telling
the person you've seen in the mirror that you love him,
because it sounds like corny and stuff like that.
Speaker 3 (36:33):
A lot of men can't do it.
Speaker 4 (36:34):
I wasn't able to do it until recently, and I
almost believe at one hundred percent I'm working towards it.
Speaker 3 (36:39):
You know, it's been a long time.
Speaker 4 (36:41):
But yeah, it's the self care aspect for men. I
think the way society paints it is that that's for women.
Self care is for women. You know, self care is
not for men. We go and fix things, we go
and you know, so there's a shift. I feel the
paradigm shift happening. I think there are more men now
who want it and know they need it.
Speaker 3 (37:03):
I think the men.
Speaker 4 (37:04):
There are a lot of men who know they need
it and aren't willing enabled to say they want it
and go pursue it. So we got to find a
way to get them to volunteerily voluntarily pursue it.
Speaker 2 (37:17):
Yes, and you know, I focus my work towards men
because men have a harder time asking for help because
of societal things. You know. My father was the rough,
tough cowboy. I mean he rodeoed and did all of
that before I was born. And then we had a
(37:40):
ranch where we robed, you know, one hundred mile days
sometimes and he cried. That was a gift that I
feel I got is to be there. He would cry
almost every time he'd see a calf hit the ground
because he said, this is life. And he would tell me,
I don't go into a churching. This is my church
(38:02):
out here with God in God's land, you know. And
and then he could cry at Kleenex commercials. My youngest
son is born with that ability to my oldest son
with the autism aspect. He struggles with emotions, he struggles
feeling the emotions. He can get anger, he understands anger.
(38:25):
So yeah, those are those are important things. I think
that that being there and supporting fathers, especially when we've
got neurodivergent children autism specifically, Yes, they they need that
extra support. They need to be told given permission to
take care of themselves.
Speaker 3 (38:47):
Absolutely.
Speaker 4 (38:47):
You know, I've since I started this work, I've joined
a few like autism dad groups in Facebook, so to
see what the other men, what their needs are. And
the men are talking to each other, and they're offering
empathy and compassion to each other. And I can feel
(39:08):
the emotion from those posts, which.
Speaker 3 (39:14):
Is to say that.
Speaker 4 (39:15):
Men have it in them to be empathic and compassionate,
and especially those now whether their single dads are not
caring for a child with a disability where you can't
just as a parent fix it is causing these men
to start looking inward and they are becoming stronger men.
(39:37):
They maybe think they're weaker because they can't fix it,
but to me, being able to exhibit humility and vulnerability
to other men in a close, safe space, to me
is a friggin strength. It's not a weakness. And if
we can if we can get men to understand that
outside of the Facebook groups, you know, the men's retreats,
(40:01):
men's groups in public and have more men.
Speaker 3 (40:04):
Be open to that.
Speaker 4 (40:05):
But like you said, that giving permission piece is so
important because many men will be with a woman who'll
say be emotionalist, and when they are, sometimes the woman
shuts them down because down the woman might want a
strong man who's going to take.
Speaker 3 (40:21):
Care of her.
Speaker 4 (40:22):
Or she'll inadvertently roll her eyes or shrug her shoulders
and not knowing she's doing it, and he thinks she's
belittling or not taking his feelings, you know, seriously, So
give permission and back it up when it happens.
Speaker 3 (40:36):
You know, because when a man, when that happens to
a man.
Speaker 4 (40:40):
Just once, he'll won't go back and do it right,
you know, right, So there's almost no second chances. So
make sure you give permission, you back it up by
allowing it to happen, and embrace it and thank him.
Speaker 2 (40:56):
Amen. So it Yeah, My late Has was compassionate, very empathic,
and an excellent dad. He loved his children more than anything,
and so drew as we start to close today, so
I know all of your contact information is going to
be low in the show notes, but can you tell
people how to find you? Oh?
Speaker 4 (41:17):
Absolutely, I'll start with my email because I'm redoing the web.
I'll still give you the website, but I'm going to
redo it to point more to what I'm doing now.
But Drew drw at profitcompassion dot com. It's named in
my company and the website is profitcompassion dot com. Love
for you to go to my YouTube channel. I have
(41:38):
a podcast. I'm a host of a podcast called from
Caving Into Crushing It and I just recorded episode and Tina,
you're gonna be probably around one thirty one, one thirty two.
Speaker 3 (41:51):
But it's it's.
Speaker 4 (41:52):
Near and dear to my heart because I have people
on who have faced adversity and changed from a victim
mindset to being the one to say this is an
opportunity for me to become stronger person.
Speaker 3 (42:03):
It's inspirational. So if you can look that up and
subscribe and watch some.
Speaker 4 (42:07):
Of those episodes, that you can reach me that way too,
because I comment on everybody's you know, I reply on
everybody's comments, So I think that's probably the best ways
right now.
Speaker 2 (42:18):
So awesome. So I'm a certified divorce coach, meaning that
I'm trained in the complexities of divorce. I specialize in
high conflict divorce, especially that from a toxic, narcissistic partner.
My way, husband, my dad and myself all experienced abuse
in some form or another. So I not only have
the training in my head, I have that in my
(42:40):
heart and in my soul where I have come from.
I can be reached through my email at Coach Tina
Lynn at gmail dot com. That's Coach co a c
H Tina t I n A Lynn l y n
n at gmail dot com. My website is Divorcecoach Specialist
dot com. You can also find me on social media
(43:03):
Facebook under Tina Lynn Huggins that's hugg i n s
LinkedIn under Tina Huggins, on Instagram under Divorce Coach Tina Lynn,
TikTok under Divorce Tina and So Drew. I always ask
for the last bit of advice, So if you can
give our viewers a little bit of advice here.
Speaker 3 (43:26):
Yeah, and it's people who've read my book.
Speaker 4 (43:30):
When I give a signed copy, I always put this
on the inside corner. I'll say, Tina, choose to write
your own story instead of letting others.
Speaker 3 (43:38):
Write it for you. That would be my advice.
Speaker 2 (43:42):
Awesome. I love that so and my advice are for
our viewers to do what Drew has been talking about.
Give yourself a little grace, pgive yourself, especially if you're
the caregiver of either a child or a you need
to have that grace. Give yourself grace, step aside from
(44:05):
the for a time and take care of yourself. Enjoy yourself.
Whether that's a hot bubble bath or going out with
your friends, it doesn't matter. Just make sure that you're
taking care of yourself. So I often talk about domestic violence,
but I also want is to be aware of suicide.
And so if you or somebody you know are in
(44:26):
contemplation of suicide, please call the suicide hotline. And I
lost my suicide hotline phone number, Okay, nine eight eight.
Please call the Suicide Prevention Hotline at nine eight eight
and it's just a simple, simple, simple number, nine eight eight.
(44:50):
If you are involved in a domestic situation, please call
nine one one or in the UK nine nine nine.
At this point press charges. That is your key out
of the relation ship. Do not drop those charges. Charges. Oftentimes,
if you drop the charges, what goes on after is
way worse than what went on before. This is your
(45:10):
key out of that abusive situation. If you or somebody
you know is dealing with domestic violence, Please call a
domestic violence hotline at eight hundred seven nine nine seven
two three three. That number again is eight hundred seven
ninety nine seventy two thirty three, and I ask that
you please like, comment, and share so that this can
(45:30):
be moved forward and help others. Thank you so much,
Drew for joining us, and thank you and blessings for
all the work that you do.
Speaker 3 (45:40):
Oh, thank you so much, Tina. Thank you for having
me on. Thanks for everything you do.
Speaker 2 (45:44):
Thank you and we'll see you next time.
Speaker 1 (45:48):
You're listening to WGSNDB going Solo Network Singles Talk Radio channel,
where we take a lighthearted and candidate approach to discussions
on the journey of relationship, laws, divorce, parenting, being single, relationships, building, dating,
and yes sex. Join our listeners and begin living your
best life.
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