Inspired By U

hi thank you so much for joining me I'm Hecate and this is finding okay a healing podcast for survivors of sexual assault and abuse and I'm here today with Santeresa Wilson thank you so much for joining me thank you so much for having me how are you today I'm well how are you i am doing good i'm doing good i'm delighted i should actually change that into my into my first icebreaker which is are you okay yes i am okay i think that um my my day's been good the the shift of of everything that's happened during covid has placed me in a good place so i'm good wonderful yeah and you just uh yeah we were just talking about this but you just moved recently yes yes i did so it's just the settling part i hate moving i think that um people shouldn't move very frequently it's very stressful it is it throws your whole life and just just kind of topsy-turvy and yeah especially trying to find things even if you like label it separate it it's still like did i forget something but i can always go back to where i came from um because my roommate stayed there and actually go retrieve if i forgot something so that's the good part that is a good part that is uh that is a rare blessing yes awesome so um i would also love to hear a compliment that you've received that you've never forgotten um actually it was in regards to my book and um the particular person that i had to read my book said that after she read the book that she no longer felt the need that she had to write one because she already had my book and so decided to promote my book instead so that's so beautiful yeah oh wow to have it like so strongly connect with somebody that's so powerful yeah yeah so i never really forgot that and it it pushed me um to just keep going you know sometimes we question things about ourselves or we question should we do whatever it is that we uh task out to do and so that was just a big encourager for me to just keep going yeah and i would love to hear what your what is your favorite color or color combination and what do you associate with it i love royal purple um it reminds me of just royalty and i love white it reminds me of purity so like i don't like like dingy white you know i like you watch white and it changes color i'll get rid of it i think that white should just be pure like a pure color so yeah yeah it's extraordinary yeah they're so exquisite together as well

yeah beautiful and um yeah i'm probably this is this is when you asked me for the problem images and i was like sometimes i change it uh because when people give their answers i love to include some of their favorite color because now i i know a little bit more about them and so i'll probably create some that have like some of that that royal purple in them and send them your way so that'd be beautiful it will especially yeah especially with the uh the black and the golds that you have and in some of those pictures that'll look like he's pretty yeah yeah yeah um but lost my place uh what five things best represent you as a person um i would say

um i would say god in church um music uh

people right god church music people and i would say family oh wow i know people and family are kind of like people family but it's to separate two separate entities for me they very much are loving the the places that they occupy in your life and also like the kind of love um and and also like the the way that you have to uh to work on that love and and uh and find that within yourself yes the work that's required in that relationship it's it's all just very very different yeah yes yeah i'm sharing those those are beautiful yes thank you and uh what are three essentials to your self-care

quiet time um just have time to reflect journaling um i have different journals i buy journals all the time and uh for me journaling you could journal about your day then i have this one journal where i just empty out every single thought that's coming through my mind and it's not formatted it's just kind of like whatever i think about that's what i write and that's what i just call really emptying out your whole mind and your whole thought process and everything you just write and it will not make sense you know like some people think about it think about what they're going to write no you just have to write and not think about what you're writing what format it is just right so yeah and uh

church prayer in church yeah so are are you willing to share what kind of church you go to or what that looks like for you yeah so i i go to a pentecostal church um which is charismatic uh type of church um you know with covet virtual you go to any kind of church nowadays but i i just i love the the the worship i love the music i love the prayer i love the fellowship um and so for me that's kind of being around like-minded people and just gaining strength and gleaning off of what they have to offer you kind of like pour into each other i believe that um iron sharps eye as iron um which means that you know we as people we were there to build each other up and and strengthen each other you know at all times i just believe that humankind we do that anyway so

it's beautiful thank you and um so you mentioned covid has the have the services become virtual for for you do you attend virtual church or so we used to um attend virtual church i am what you would call i was about to say an essential worker in church um so i am a worship leader in church i sing and so when um you know they started opening back up and letting us back in um i was able to go in before the congregation i would go and sing before my pastor preached um so i've been back for a while but um we have opened up the doors we are allowed to have i think up to 50 uh capacity a lot of people still do virtual so we do do virtual but we have two services so we have one for the elderly higher risk um people and then we have our normal service time

that's great yeah wow i'm really glad to hear that yeah i don't um i don't know uh a lot of people right now that uh that actually attend church so it's i i keep just seeing the signs and i've been really curious about what that's been like for for people or uh or how they've been handling it and it's a lot of churches too where you have to reserve before you go and things like that my church is kinda i wanna say small but on a smaller scale from a mega church so it's good to have that intimate type of setting um i think a lot of the mega churches some are open some aren't some you have to reserve and you know before you go to church so um just it just so happens that we happen to be open i really and then you get the temperature check yeah you get the temperature check you get the questions actually you have to come in wash your hands sanitize so it's just it's a lot you know a lot of different protocols that need to be followed yeah yeah i would imagine it would be kind of like new rituals yes and we wear a mask during service so we social distance so yeah it's the same thing you just implement everything else that's going on you know if they're doing it when you're going to stores you can still do the same thing in church and have your sense of normalcy still yeah that's good yeah well i'm i'm glad that you're back and that everybody's you know staying safe and uh and that you've been able to to maintain that that community that's so important to your self-care during this time yeah yes that's that's good that's beautiful thank you for talking about that no problem anytime yeah so i would actually love to to start off um and talk about your book and yeah so i read it and it's really beautiful and very powerful at one point i actually just kind of sat there and just kind of cried a little bit but it is called releasing my secret and it is a 30-day devotional to support your healing process and it is really beautiful uh just the way that it's laid out um and i'd love to to hear in your own words uh kind of what this is and how it came about and how how this this book came into into being okay so um in in regards to the book um it started a long time ago i think i had started writing i wanted to write something but i didn't know what to write um and being a survivor of sexual assault a lot of times we hear people's stories we hear stories of survival we hear stories of you know everybody has a a different story about how they came through um what they they've gone through a very few times do you really hear um where they offer help a lot of times um or really like step-by-step instructions on how they get through a lot of times you hear people offer help to remove themselves from a situation but then people are kind of stuck in an emotional state of where emotionally they're still stuck right and so for me i did an event that was entitled take back the night which is an annual event that they have worldwide um where they kind of come and they celebrate survivors of sexual assault domestic violence and people tell their stories and things and i was honored to be on the platform of this particular um take back the night which was held in plainfield and so plainfield new jersey and so that night i i gained my voice it was kind of it was so surreal um just to be able to talk about my assault my salt is not common to um most assaults that happen my story is a little bit unique and so a lot of people were encouraged by the story they felt empowered and so uh for me i was like okay i need to pen a book um and what better way than to uh birth something that is written based off of a person's emotions of what they deal with um i understand that healing is a process so a lot of people say you can heal you can heal you can heal and so i feel like sometimes people get disappointed because they feel like their healing should have happened a long time ago or it should have happened a week after the assault or maybe a couple years have gone down the line and so the devotion of releasing my secret is um the title alone deals with the secrets that we deal with on a continuous basis when we feel violated and traumatized in some type of way and they become secrets because a lot of times we don't want to share with people like this is i'm still going through this i'm still dealing with fear i'm still dealing with self-identity i'm still dealing with forgiveness issues and so those are our secrets right our intimate secrets that we deal with late at night when no one's around or we find that we can't always disclose it to people so the book is written based off of emotions it's not necessarily written based off of my assault is based off of emotions and that's why the book is so relatable to people who have gone through various traumas because those emotions are emotions that we all experience so the book presents you with a devotional i present you with an affirmation a daily affirmation there's a prayer there's a scripture and i sing and i love music so i put a suggestive song of worship and so when i i wrote the book even the songs it's not like the standard you can always find a song in there that could go with the type of music that you listen to because i listen to all different types of music and so um the book is just basically to be a guide to walk with you it's not one through thirty like i'm on day five and today's day five and let me look at day five it's really written to say okay i'm going through this emotion right now let me read this page and then two days later you could be angry let me read that page and now you know i'm i'm hurting again and dealing with unforgiveness let me go back to that emotion because trauma presents you with different emotions every single day and sometimes it's not the same emotion that you're dealing with i could be happy today and sad tomorrow and so that's how the book is written so that it's not formatted so that you feel stuck to these 30 solid days it's written so that is guiding you along so even if you put the book down for 10 days 20 days you can always be like oh i'm not feeling my best today um you know and then you can always pick up the book and go what does the book say about that and then turn to that page and deal with that so the book was really just intended to be a guide to walk along people as they deal with their secrets of whatever emotions that they're dealing with

i love that about the book um because something that i'm always uh really saying just over and over and over and i think it's so important for survivors to to know to experience for somebody to tell them is that healing isn't linear uh it's it's just it's all over the place and it's gonna be one thing one day and something else the next and then it might come back to what it was before and you know and so it's not this incremental thing like you said like day one day two day three you know and then you're done with day one you might have to go back to that so i loved that we think of both being linear and i loved that you wrote a non-linear book for a non-linear linear experience of healing from trauma and that was uh i love it thank you yeah but um but yeah uh

how how long did this take you to write like how how did you um yeah i i just i feel like you might have been on a roll and that uh a sound experience might have like tripped you up so i just wanted to ask if there was anything else that you wanted to say about the book

no not really i mean it took me about two about a year and a half to write the book um i poured my heart into the book and it was days where i was writing and i was like bawling like crying so hard um a lot of times when i wrote the book the song that i chose it would be on repeat i would have my headsets on and i would just be listening and crying because i kind of relived those emotions for every emotion i wrote i really relived it and so um i had the strength when i first started writing the book to write the book but i wanted to put everything into it so that when someone read it they actually knew that i'm writing from experience my writing all my writings even my upcoming book is is from experience is what i've gone through and so a lot of times i'm there and i'm reliving it and experiencing unforgiveness and experiencing anger and experiencing feeling lost and and so i just it was just like a life-changing experience for myself i still pick up the book and read the book sometimes because sometimes i have to go back and be like i need that breather so yeah but it did take me that long um to actually write the book because it was certain days where i was like i don't want to feel like this right i don't i want to feel i don't want to feel that emotion like i i thought i was over that like i don't want to feel that and so i would put it down and pick it up and then i was encountering so many different people who i'm like they could benefit from i have to get it out they can benefit from this so yeah no it's it's beautiful and it it honestly even though i'm i'm not christian i i do feel like this is a book that i could return to um and i i did um actually did have a a very powerful kind of healing experience reading it that really surprised me uh that just had to do with um i mean i i have my own trauma that is um oh put the pen down that's bad for sound but um sorry just talking myself but um i was just like clicking it i'm like great that's awesome um but yeah i i have my own trauma with um with christianity where um you know and usually when when someone experiences religious trauma it's because they were actually in that religion but for me it was actually uh completely different you know so it was the experience of having um people who were christian who who were using uh you know the the bible or jesus as a weapon and so you experience it as a weapon if and if you especially if you've never um if you haven't grown up with um associating you know that that name with uh with love then having your first experience of it be an experience of hate or violence um you know is is understandably traumatic but reading this was a really beautiful uh reminder that that was their failing and that it's my job to to take that that healing on myself and to say you know what whatever you know whatever way that they misused um you know the the word of god or jesus you know that's that's on them that's between them and that's their their creator and uh and and it's between me and my creator to to acknowledge that that that that name doesn't mean what they made me think it does that you know the name of jesus means love the name of god means love and that that's what it is yeah no matter what happens that that trauma ends and uh and and god or different things and to to begin to really separate them from myself so this book really helped me with that um and i wanted to thank you so yeah thank you thank you you're about to make me cry because that's the that's the that's but but that's no but that's the that's the purpose you know like trauma has no religion trauma has no no race attached to it trauma has no religion attached attached to it and so that's the key because we all go through it right it's just like coping had no name it had no race it had no age it had no you know anything attached to it but we all experienced it and so that's the key and so that just really touched me that might have to go you know you asked me that question in the beginning i might have to put that as my response but thank you if you know i definitely thank god for that so

no um

well feeling things yeah right

well let's um yeah so uh i would actually you mentioned take back the night and i i love that that was a part of your experience because that was definitely a part of my experience uh as well and so i would love to to hear more about that how did you find out about it uh did i mean did you have to get up the courage to go how did you end up speaking do you remember what you said i'm just very curious

um so i i have um i was a volunteer with our local rape crisis center here in new jersey and um being an advocate for a while you know they always want close to crisis center to partake in those type of events um because number one it could be a trigger for someone where someone could need someone to speak to on that day and then number two just to show people that we are there for them and you know if they need any type of services and so they were looking for representatives they asked if you know anyone wanted to speak and i was like sure i'll speak i really had no clue what i was going to say um but i spoke and and so this is the reason why and it kind of leads into my um my story if you don't mind i don't know if you're gonna ask me that down the road but um so it my speech is actually on youtube i have a youtube channel um which is my name coach santeria wilson and so that actually that clip is actually on there um so just a little bit about my assault of course when you're training if anyone's out there and they know because a lot of people normally go from a survivor to i want to work the crisis line a lot of people do that um or they have a family member who have gone through a sexual assault and they decide to work the line and so you go through this very intense training and even though the training is preparing you to work with those who have been assaulted um the training is actually i feel healing for you right and so you learn about different types of domestic violence you learn about different types of sexual violation you know whether you're being coerced whether you're being forced whether you know you all of a sudden you decide to just change your mind and you know just different types of uh how you could definitely be violated right and so for me it was like an awakening moment because i was very active at a young age and so when i started reflecting on the relationships that i've gone through or so thought relationships that i had because i was so young then you realize that you know oh man i've been violated so many times right but what what got me was my sexual assault the the i would say the the number one sexual assault that i went through the whole experience i um and i'll partially tell my story so i was um in my 20s it was around christmas time and i taken my kids to their aunt's house i was getting the house ready for christmas um a neighbor's friend knocked on my door she was an acquaintance and asked me for a ride i said okay i like i really don't normally ride people anywhere but i'm like it's holiday time you know you ain't really thinking about it okay not a problem so i take them to their destination i pull back up in front of my apartment building and she is like going your house if you scream i'm going to kill you i'm like what right and so i just did what she said i didn't know what else to do you know nobody i've never encountered anything like that before and so i go in my house she pulls out a knife now i have a knife to my throat and i'm like crying profusively i'm like god spare my life you know if i gotta die tonight lord please say i'll make it to heaven cause i don't know what's going on right now and so that night was like 12 hours of sodomy um it was a lot of mental torment she had like bumps on her i had pop bumps and you know whatever and i apologize because i did not say um possible trigger but you know and so that was my whole night 12 hours and so when she left she took my money she took i'm the keys to my house and she left and told me if i ever told that she would come back and kill me and so i was scared of course i tell who my neighbors because that's their friend right and so they say oh we're going to handle this the street way the street way you know i think it was just you know we're gonna handle this you know privately and so they was like take a shower so take a shower and they take me to the casino down in atlantic city new jersey and they give me a hundred dollars and i guess the hundred dollars in the casino in the shower was supposed to wash away what i went through but i what i experienced um they convinced her to give me back my money and my keys but i still experienced something right so i called the hotline and you know the hotline was telling me you know you could still go you know they could do an exam you know you have this amount of time and i was scared because of the threat that was made and so i waited and probably about a week later i finally went now i reported but this time when i reported um it was a little bit different because again i was past the time for the exam so by time i went they really can't collect collect dna evidence um but however they caused me to um you have to commit when you report right they want you to commit and be true to your story and if you renege after you commit then you know they could technically prosecute you and so i went through the whole criminal justice system it was about 12 charges they wind up picking her up blocking her up and i went to grand jury i told my story the jurors laughed at me i mean i remember sitting there telling my story of all i went through and got laughed at and so i walked out of there they did not indict at all they kicked it back to municipal and she got one charge out of all the 12 of disorderly persons um they back dated it to when she was first originally locked up so by the time we went to municipal court and we have the court case her 90 days that she got jail time for for disorderly persons automatically released her and so then i couldn't get a restraining order because we were never in a relationship we had no children together and we never lived together and so i was left to walk around in fear for years literally years and you know i am so grateful for the detective that i had who was on my case because he stood by my side and i used to always go back and go visit him and you know just to say hello because he stood by my side even when i got laughed at and so unfortunately he passed away a couple years ago but that if it wasn't for him i at that time i don't think that i would have been able to endure because people at the time were like saying sex rape like what do you mean same sex you know and it's kind of like yeah it happened and so the the embarrassment of saying it you know the people explaining it and so um take back to the night that night i told my story i told my story i found my voice that night i mean a lot of people they tell their stories but for me that was one of the okay so let me just table back before i did take back the night my pastor had preached a sermon about forgiveness and i realized that i never forgave that person for doing what they did to me right and so i had to let it go and i believe that forgiveness is not necessarily forgetting the action it's actually just releasing the emotions that's a tied to the trauma so that you can feel free because sometimes we hold on to those emotions and we feel so heavy and so burdened down and so like you get sick you still feel the the side effects from the emotions and so i literally released it and then i facebooked her and i said i forgive you for what you did to me her response was rape lol but it wasn't about her response it was about the sincerity of me saying i'm releasing i'm no longer going to feel hatred towards you i'm no longer going to feel scared of you right i'm no longer going to allow for that every time christmas comes around i'm reflecting on what happened to me i'm no longer giving you that much power in my life so i forgive you so i can let it go and so after i did that i literally take back the night was you have your voice back again because that's the first thing that happens when we go through a trauma we go through sexual assault the first thing that we lose is our voice because we don't know what to say we don't know how to express it we don't know how to come out of our mouths and verbally you know say anything or whatever like we literally lose our voice and that night gave me my voice back

oh thank you for sharing that that's incredible i'm so glad that you had that experience um of of reclaiming that and um and thank you also for for i mean there there are so many parts of that story that are so important for people to hear uh i mean i i think you might be the first person on the show who's actually gone through the justice system um most most people that i talk to never report it and so it's uh it's incredible to hear what that experience was like for you and i'm so sorry that it involved that level of ignorance uh and cruelty um that's very upsetting and i'm so glad that you that you had that officer who was so supportive um so it's also great to hear that that you had that um that kind of support from the police because a lot of the time um i hear that the police were actually you know a part of why someone didn't report because the police in the initial uh you know kind of process weren't supportive or or or maybe they were the ones that laughed um you know and so i'm i'm so glad that you have an officer so let me just

and so let me just say that um being a sexual assault advocate we know that when you report and i just wanted to throw this out there because i've been in situations to where people who have reported it has been a very positive um a positive process for them and because i don't want anyone to feel like if they go through it it's going to be that was my experience i mean i believe that the ignorance came from because it was same sex right um to know your rights is to understand that when you report you have a sexual assault and you report to the hospital number one the hospital is obligated to put you in a private room separate from everyone else a very private room you're going to have a nurse who specializes who's going to come in and do your exams there's a police officer who may may or may not come and you'll have an advocate such as what i was right and so you have a choice and i don't want anyone to feel like you don't have a choice and that's the beautiful thing about that part of the justice system so the choice is this you can say um i want a full examination however i do not want to report to the police and the police have to leave you do not have to report you can say take my dna now and you know i'll go jane doe just so you can have my specimen on file and they're obligated i believe it's five years that they keep it or something like that and they they keep your specimen on file as a jane doe just with a number on it so if you ever change your mind about reporting say a year later two years later they have that information that dna they collect all of that they take your clothes your underwear they take everything and they give you a fresh pair of clothes a fresh pair of underwear hygiene products and all that stuff um i would say don't be afraid to go don't worry about the police even if you have a criminal a sale warrant somewhere they cannot take and seize that moment to arrest you because you already just went through something that was dramatic so they're obligated to cater to you in that moment whatever that moment is for you and you your advocate is there to be your voice now you could decline your advocate you could decline the police officer you could decline the nurse you could just go and you know get an exam you could say i don't want anything done i just want to you know get some some medication give me a couple shots you know something like that um or my recommendation a wholeheartedly would be um to have your advocate with you we're thoroughly trained with new laws that come out we're thoroughly trained to be your voice and when we go into the hospitals or we you know you call on the hotline we are obligated to be that voice for you to give you information if you don't want to speak there's been plenty of times where i've stepped out into the hallway and said she does not want he does not want um a police officer present at the time and the police have to leave they cannot make you go we don't advocates do not work with the prosecutor's office so we're trained to solely cater towards you good bad ugly and different we don't care what the situation was you could have went to a party you could present drunk you could be high on drugs our job is to be there for you now if you are high if you are drunk we do wait until you're in a stable enough mental capacity so that you can say i want an advocate because we want to make sure that whatever is done that your power of choice is given back to you on that day so if you've been assaulted if you're pondering if it's just happened if it's fresh you know i i highly suggest you go call your hotline you know first and say you know i'm gonna present you could give them heads up or you could just present to the hospital and say i've been sexually assaulted and they'll make the phone calls um you do not have to answer any questions you could say i'd rather wait for my advocates to come oh i'd rather wait for you know my advocate to call if you do not speak english they do have a translation line but everything that you discuss with your advocate is 100 confidential we do not go back to the nurses we do not go back to the police officer we do not say anything and it's been times people have became young people and they fabricated stories because they were afraid of what their parents would say i'm not there to judge you i'm not there to call you a liar right i'm not there to say anything but to make sure that your care is number one is number one for me so i just wanted to let you know everyone know that yes i may have had a bad experience but that was one of the reasons why i decided to join the team but we are trained to be your voice and to stand up for you when you feel like you cannot stand up

oh thank you so much for talking about that that's incredible okay oh i and you you i had some questions along the way and you answered them before i even could ask them so thank you so much that's incredible about that what was um what was it like uh you said that it was actually very like healing and powerful um to do the training to become an advocate and to work within the the rape crisis thing i'm actually interested in doing that myself um was i mean and i've also talked to other survivors and i think a lot of us have the concern that it would actually um be triggering and uh to you know be in a situation uh where you were dealing with with someone who's really raw uh or in a triggered state um what what would you say about that or what's what's your experience uh with that ben uh about like self-regulation managing that or encountering that

so you are not alone um as a as an advocate so what normally happens with the at the the county that i was with um it's required that if i get a call tonight i get calls i have to call in when my shift is over like the next business day and i have to um just kind of talk about the calls give information do a check-in and it's a mental check-in as well um so that and then there's always like a person over you who's on to supervise you don't call them unless you have an issue so they always offer you the support as well um and then you also learn the i my issue i think as being a advocate sometimes was leaving and knowing that i was not going to speak to that person probably ever again because once i'm done um is up to the next everybody's trained so they're not necessarily dealing with the same person they probably go to you know the supervisor or they'll go to they decide okay i'm gonna go to the police department tomorrow then it'll be a different advocate that would go with them so they don't keep you on the same case and a lot of times i would be so mind boggling like what happened i hope they're okay you know or something like that i that's when your own personal coping skills come into play um where you could kind of you know just kind of release that like you're there for that moment and i would say be present in that moment for them but when afterwards you call the the hotline and you can say you know this call was really triggering to me we had monthly meetings that were mandatory where we all the advocates got together and we would sit down over a meal and we would just talk about if something really bothered us that was our venting session because again everything's 100 confidential so i can't call a family member and say hey i just had this this crisis that i just you can't do that because you're violating confidentiality right and so that was the protocol and i believe that that's a very healthy protocol because um when you're in the moment of you know uh and you're dealing with these cases sometimes it's good to say or call the person who's on for that night to supervise you hey i just had this call um i'm not in a good place right now and and be able to talk about it or you know on that monday when you call and you give them the information about the calls or because unfortunately um you have some people that get get off on just playing on the hotline and so sometimes you have to you know learn yeah people call and joke around you know we've had some people call and they tell these stories to get your reaction so that they could kind of get off from you know them telling the story in the reaction so you get all types of calls on the hotline so it's good to have those people to kind of call your superiors to call to say hey i'm dealing with this or hey this same person keeps calling with this same story or i hear them doing something in the background and so there's regulations and protocols for you to follow that are kind of keep you guarded and kind of keep you in a safe place and if not they offer the services to you so that you'll be able to deal with whatever call or case that you've had

thank you for talking about that too because it didn't even occur to me that someone would do that but of course they would yes unfortunately why not of course why wouldn't you oh yeah why not yeah wow oh what a trip um yeah i actually may have dealt with something like that and i and i am not a part of an organization i don't have that support network and so i was left to to just kind of uh have this with this kind of surreal experience of like i don't know if this is real and i can't make that judgment so all i can do is to continue providing like the most authentic support that i can um and give you the best advice that i can for how to like reach out to other resources in in your area um and uh to improve your safety or your support network or grow that support network and to continue validating whatever it is that you say without you know questioning it and hope that if it's real that this has been helpful to you and if it's not real that you just get bored and maybe realize that you're being a joke and so we yeah and we learned that the key thing is really just giving people back their voice so a lot of times we listen and the key is so that it doesn't wear you out is just to really redirect them by asking questions like what do you normally do when you're feeling like this you know oh you listen to music have you tried that is um re-empowering them and that's the key you know or if it comes to much excuse me if it becomes too much i would give them the hotline and say hey you could call you know and they have the resources they can help you out you know because sometimes people are drain you with their stories drain you with you know whatever they're going through and most people who are advocates most people who work in this sector have a heart of gold and you know we want to help everyone we want to help them work through things and sometimes you got to say listen let me refer you out to you know here's the agency number here's you know who you would call here's who you can talk to you know they're they're trained in this area so you know it's kind of like um let me just refer you like i can help you out a little bit but these people are kind of trained to do it and all they do really is just empower you to make that decision of and if it becomes too much they get referrals to counseling as someone who's experienced same-sex assault how has has that changed uh the support that you've been able to access in your life do you think

it was rough at first a transparent moment so when i experienced the same sex assault i was kind of indulging in my sexuality i was you know out of a relationship and i had tried to date a female and um and so that's the kind of the place where i was at and um so when my assault happened it was kind of like are you sure you just didn't want to sleep with her and she turned you down so now you're screaming rape and it's like really and that came for our family members i mean even my mom didn't believe me at first right it was kind of like are you sure and i'm like i'm sure i wouldn't lie about something as serious as rape and so being that i and i got i stated earlier i started young and so you know becoming sexually active at the age of 12 and being in and out of falsified relationships and i say that because they i was too young to know what a relationship was at the time right and so being in these sexual relationships or being a living a promiscuous type of lifestyle when something that serious presents no one believes you they think that you are just this person who um is just promiscuous and now you're trying to put something on someone else and so that's another um factor to let people know it does not matter what your lifestyle is you can be a prostitute you can be you know um whoever you know you want to be at that moment no means no at that moment any type of non-consent means that's non-consent and i'm not doing it and any violation in regards to that is is a rape any violation that is assault you know what i mean like no means no and that's all it is if you even if you say yes at first and you change it to a no that's no if you say no at first change it to a yes and you change your mind that's still a no if they decide to give you a little bit of wine to make you a little bit more comfortable now you have placed me in a position to where it's still sexual assault because you got me drunk i was not coherent enough to make a conscious decision to say that i wanted to sleep with you and that's another thing that advocates do we let you know it does not matter your walk of life what you what you do know is always no

yeah 100 and that's um yeah the uh the lack of understanding that we have culturally as far as consent goes uh and and the lack of agreement as well uh just culturally is uh i think really feeds into a lot of the uh the shame and the blame that's a that's a big part of things for survivors and um yeah how did you navigate that

personally like within your own healing um shame and blame

um i and again i believe that my training was a big part of it outside of my own personal relationship with the lord and just understanding that again no means no um no matter what i've done no matter what lifestyle i may have lived at the time

i'm still a victim and and still my decision on that day does not constitute you know like you know at first you kind of blame yourself and i did you know at first i was like i should never put put her in my car i should have never taken her anywhere i shouldn't have did i shouldn't have did i shouldn't have did and you know she's out on the street telling her story i'm telling my story you know some people believe you some people don't and i just got to the point to where i just was like i was still violated at the end of the day no matter what and i had to forgiveness wasn't even just about me saying to her i forgive you it was me saying to me i forgive myself for even allowing for myself to take on that pressure listen we all make decisions and we can't determine the outcome of our decision until it actually happens so if you go out to a bar and you decide to pick up somebody and you decide to go somewhere else and have a conversation or even if you decide you know maybe we'll indulge in something else once you change your mind that's what it is you can't don't fall i'm not saying you can't but don't fault yourself because of their actions their actions are wrong you know their actions are wrong and you're saying no you know is it's nothing wrong with that you can change your mind and that's again that's your voice that you have we have the power of choice and so for me the shame was really telling my story because a lot of people didn't believe me right and um it was hurtful sometimes it was hurtful people say well how could a woman rape a woman you know most men or people would find that to be something kind of sexy right because it's just like one of those images that they would just see in their minds but no this was a traumatic event that actually happened and it can happen to anyone and i say that too a lot of times and my heart goes out to men because i have seen men present to the hospitals and because of the shame they never report you know they may go john doe i don't know if they ever go back to report but a lot of men do not report out of shame but there is nothing to be shameful of when you're the person who's been violated

yeah thank you for for mentioning men um especially it's uh yeah and i i remember seeing that at take back the night when i went as well um there were i mean so few uh men that were there uh wheth you know cis men trans men you know male presenting people uh that actually got up the guts to be there considering what the stats are um and then so few of them that had the courage to speak um and i mean the ones that did i've never forgotten it it was it was so powerful and

it there was there was just such a sense of isolation um and desperation for connection and inclusion in this space and also just this this um yeah it was just visceral the the way that they were in the room like and and i mean like that space that point in time like that subject matter like the space that was being held for survivors and then the way that they were occupying space you could tell that that they were so that they maybe didn't feel welcome um or you know weren't sure if if it was valid uh if they should be there um you know there were some of them that were that had like more you know fully embodied like i am a survivor i am entitled to to be here to be in the space and to to hold it with you um and uh and then there were it was it was just um it really it really drove home for me um actually like in that space meeting male survivors talking about it hearing them talk about it and the lack of support that they receive in our society um and then them not being you know so so many survivor spaces being um uh exclusively for for women um or or femme people and uh and just how uh inadequate and cruel that is uh the the shame and the stigma that that exists and yeah i've yeah if you have anything else to say about that because it's it's also been um you know i started this podcast and and and i was really big on intersectionality like this happens to everybody no matter what body you're born into no matter what identity you know you you are like race religion sexuality it happens to all of us and uh and i really wanted to to talk to all different kinds of people i haven't been able to find uh specifically a cis man um uh to to come on the show and it's and it's been frustrating because i know that i have cis men listening who who don't hear a voice that sounds like theirs uh and i know that that's got to be hard that's yeah i think that it's the the stigma you know a man is supposed to be a man and man's not supposed to cry and and and so i think also men feel as if you'll question their sexuality um in regards to it um because just like men get raped by men men get raped by women and so um you know a guy you know when you talk about it sometimes people are like a guy raped by a female and it's like yes because you know it happened man's no is still no and what people need to understand is even though your body reacts as it should right when you're in those type of situations does not mean that um what happened to you wasn't wrong and so i think a lot of times that that's kind of what it is you know um people and then guys especially guys who were assaulted by a man they're like well why you know did i reach my peak and why is this but it's still assault because your body mechanism your body chemistry is created to react in a certain way when certain things are done to you and so that you is even with women who are sexually assaulted it's the same thing you may reach your peak but that does not mean that you are not violated in some type of way it just means that your body is normal you are human that's what it means so you know for men my heart goes out because a lot of times when they've reported it was kind of like uh no i'm going john doe just treat me just give me the medication just you know get me in and out and sometimes they don't even report because they're scared they're scared of what people would say would somebody believe them you know it's it's it's just a really bad situation i'm just overall i feel that um that they experience so that they go through and i just hope that they can uh technically get their voice back i think i told you before that i knew a couple of survivors so i will uh definitely i'm gonna write this down in my calendar because i have to write stuff down but i have to definitely reach out and see um if they're willing to um speak and you know come forward i know some of some of them do speak already and do um talk about what they've actually gone through and i think that that is something that is um very um important for people to hear because there is nothing new under the sun and if it happens to you it happens to someone else the key thing is is for us to come together and support one another not be so judgmental you never know what a person has gone through what they're currently going through you never know the effects that it can have on them um as to why and it doesn't necessarily even have to be something that happened to you by someone that you know um or somebody that you don't know it could be people that you know it could be something in childhood it you know it just it the list could go on and on and on and on and on and so what i would really say is is that if you are a man and you've experienced that you are not alone um there are tons of support groups out there that can help you and assist you um maybe not enough support groups that i would say but you can once you come through you can make that difference as well and you can be that support for someone as well there's a lot of men who are out there hurting but um i just be strong and you know find someone you can always call the hotline as well and speak to someone and again those calls are 100 confidential and and just be able to speak to them and find out what you can do and get some resolve and the only time that when i say confidentiality the only time that we are as advocates required to report is if and i have to say this as if you tell someone um whoever's on the line that um the assault happened between a minor child um anyone who is a under 18 17 and under um or if you're saying that you're calling and you're going to hurt someone or someone it hurts yourself or hurt someone else then by law we are required to report it into to say something other than that everything else is 100 confidential

yeah well thank you um for making that note i really appreciate that and thank you for talking about that that's incredibly important um i'd like to uh with the time that we have left i'd like to shift gears and i'd like to talk to you about inspired by you and uh and what that is

yeah so inspired by you as sorry as a hashtag

um so what i used to do is um is so much negativity out there and i used to go through my friend's post on instagram and they would post some friends will post something that was just so phenomenal and i would post and i would take their posts and repost it and i would be like you know thank you for posting this i am inspired by you right and um over time um for me i'm like oh inspired by you it's just a great idea because i want to um inspire people to change because they're inspired by you right something that you did inspired them to change and so funneled through inspired by you came so much um and which was my coaching business um i'm a certified life and development coach i specialize in trauma recovery so i title i'm titled as certified trauma recovery coach and so it was that it was my small business mentorship i i mentor small business owners or people who are looking to go into business a lot of times my coaching and the mentorship for business goes hand in hand some people find that it's difficult to move forward in their business a lot of times is something to dealt behind trauma and so i would host events through my business um inspiring things uplifting things i have a youtube well i have a facebook page i normally go live on depending on and i talk about um issues or that are relevant to people to to today and i normally upload those videos to youtube as well and so it's really just inspiring people any kind of way that you can so that as they see you change it'll inspire for them to want to change a lot of times you have silent um people who silently look at you and they see you growing and seeing progressing and they're like what did you do and you know and it's kind of like what this is what i've done so that i could get to this point and so maybe you can do the same thing or maybe i could pull you along or maybe i can help you along to change and i've gone through so much in my life that i feel so relatable to so many different people on so many different levels and so inspired by you as birth um we are still growing i have rebranded a couple of times i never rebranded what i believed in in regards to inspiring others to change because they are inspired by you but just um it's so much deeper than that and it's really just dealing with people who are in hurt places who you know they want to move forward they want to be that person that role model that person and it's just kind of pushing them along the way

that's beautiful that's awesome yeah you mentioned just in terms of of relating to so many different people and so many different struggles and and some of the things that you mentioned in your bio um included um i think like homelessness and divorce and um yeah are yeah i i just kind of wanted to to see if you're willing to talk about that a little bit or um yeah or just it's just some of the things that yeah i feel like different people and struggles

yes so um trauma is uh defined as of simply deeply something that's deeply distressing or disturbing experience right and so that can present to someone in so many various different ways and you know i've gone through um you know starting off losing my best friend when i was 12 to gun violence um losing you know my parents i lost the older sibling um and losing my mom and having to be that person who would have to make the decision of whether to make a medical decision that could change her life um hence i made the decision she wound up dying the next day so that was kind of hard um i lost my dad to covet you know you lose pets and um you know sexual assault domestic violence marital sexual assault marital domestic violence um the controlling factor of you know the going through uh bullying as a child um because you're different um you know like you said church hurt sometimes we're in church and we experience things and you know i like to tell people that um and even to you like you know don't be discouraged i understand people could be harsh what i do understand as well is that people that are in church come from off the streets and so a lot of times you think that they should be different but a lot of times they're not and so that's why it's always just so um i always direct people back to the basics to learn for themselves because a lot of times people will be people all the time you know the bible says that the arms of flesh are fellas every time but back to my story so um just different layers of trauma being in and out of you know i was married um twice on the first time i got married it was because i was pregnant for a second time and i wasn't married and the church at the time that i was attending the pastor told me i had to get married because that was the right thing to do and so you wind up in a in a marriage with someone who totally doesn't believe what you believe who's totally abusive towards you um and marital rape in regards to i wound up having my son early because um he decided that he was excited my ex-husband he was excited and i was like i don't want any and he took it anyway and i wound up in the hospital and i delivered my son when i was six weeks pregnant um you i came home i've stayed at the ronald mcdonald house and i love that place i think if i ever became a millionaire they would be one of the top people that i donate to um they will be one of the top people i don't need to and so going through the homelessness um behind that and having to stay there and um just life you know i was talking to i was setting up an interview for um another podcast and hers uh podcast is based around murder and it's not really dealing with the murderer of the situation it has to deal with the healing process of the family of what they go through when your family goes through and she calls me and we're having a conversation i'm like i experienced that my aunt was murdered with her her her stepdaughter and so you have these conflict and and murdered by our first cousin her first cousin so you have a whole family that's one family but the murderer was a cousin who murdered his other cousin and so being in that and dealing with that trauma so when i say that i'm relatable to a lot of people i've i've walked a lot of different paths i've experienced a lot of different paths i've seen a lot of different things and a lot of it when it was personal had to do with you know again forgiving myself some of the the things that we've gone through is just due to bad choices that we've made in life right poor money management poor budgeting you know i used to gamble oh man i used to gamble my life away because that was a coping mechanism for me at one point in time because when when i was going through with my ex-husband we would go to the casino together because that was our only place that we never argued so we found ourselves there so then when we finally split i found myself in that place trying to shield the way i don't know if you ever been to a casino but you know there's no lights there's no clocks everything looks like it's daytime yeah it just looks like it's daytime all the time and so just being inserted yeah just so you could get just so that you could just be there with no sense of anything so that used to be my escape and so when i say i'm relatable to a lot of people that's what i did it just caused me to be in that place to where i was just like this is my escape this is what i did and so yes my bio is only a snippet of what i'm going through like a very tiny snippet of you know being in that place where you start things you don't complete a task or you know you feel like it's going to take too long but it really wouldn't have if you would have waited because you know i used to sign up for school and come out because my graduation date was 2021 and i'm like 2021 it's it's 2015. what you mean like that's so far away so like learning to be patient and to embrace the moment embrace your journey embrace and then understanding that life is not over even if you've gone through something i'm a strong believer in strategically planning out your life as much as possible you know having a plan writing it out and really just you know following those steps we have goals that we write out but you need a strategic plan because sometimes the goals that we write they're steps that you need to do before you achieve that goal and that's really just understanding that

well i'm i'm really curious how was there kind of like i'm just i'm i'm really curious what that what that kind of transition was when did you kind of get to that place or start to realize that maybe you had gone from a place where you were uh kind of in a spot where you're where you were like i'm healing i'm healing and then move into a a mental space where where it was like i'm capable of empowering other people i could help other people i could heal other people with you know things like the the rape crisis um take back the night and inspired by you and writing and writing this book so these these things that that you've been doing um what was that transition like how did you get from that space of uh of wounding and uh and healing into now i'm strong and i'm ready to hold this space for other people and to inspire and heal other people

it's a it's a i believe it's a it's a process um it doesn't all come at once because we we process at one you know thing at a time and so i do not take on more than i can chew let me say that um i still have my own support system i believe that every coach needs a coach i believe that every coach needs a mentor i'm mature enough to say that when i lost my father last year to covet that i was like i am not okay right because it's okay not to be okay and so i'm human right i'm human just like everyone else um but i'm in a place that you know where and where i can say i can help you out if i cannot be of assistance to someone i will not play with someone's life i will definitely refer them out i will be that extra added support i will not take on more than i can chew because again it's someone's life and so i deal with the issues that i know that i'm capable to deal with now i can coach in any single area i am thoroughly trained um i have my degree in divinity i'm currently in my master's program right now and so it's very few things that i could coach in but if i feel like someone's area is too much right because a coach is really just there to empower you to push you on it's not counseling services we don't counsel people it's really empowering you to do what you know that lies in you and kind of pulling it out of you to help you to see the strategies of how you can get to the place to where you want to get to and i think a lot of times people confuse coaching with counseling and those are two totally different things um so for me a lot of my clients um had are in the places where i have been and that's why i'm able to come and say now it took me a while you know probably i've been a certified coach i would say about three years i did not start directly in the business i was like i don't know what's going on my life i was like all over the place i was taking all these different certifications and all kinds of stuff and so really just what would i do when i was coaching my whole almost my whole life right so what would i do if i wasn't getting paid for it and so coaching for me being a trauma recovery coach is not about the money if you look on my website i'm extremely reasonable not only that i offer two free sessions and i still give my 100 um to my clients to those who inquire i don't turn anybody away because i want to see everyone walk in liberty and walk in freedom and so my aha moment was about two years ago um when i launched inspired by you it'd be two years come may that it would officially be a legal business and um unfortunately last year the day that i planned my thank you i planned my one year anniversary my dad died on my one year anniversary date and so i stopped and i think we had that conversation we met and so it was okay for me to stop so you know some people go how can you coach and you know you're going through this but i'm human right and so a lot of people when they look for a trauma recovery culture they look for a coach who deals in trauma they want someone who is hands on have been through something who can relate to what they're going through because i don't just come with book knowledge i have it i have the papers behind my name but i also come with life experiences to understand i have one client and you know i tell him okay you can vent today but what are you going to do tomorrow to change your situation what can we do to fix this okay you wasn't able to do this well what can you do to fix this situation and so i i understand i can relate but then what are we going to do to move past it you could cry today but we got to work through this tomorrow right and that's kind of where i'm at because i've gone through it and i understand the tears so i'm with you 100 but now it's time for me i can't sit at your level with you but for so long because we're not going to get anywhere but i have to come up and pull you up and say you could do this you know you could you could supersede this you could get past what what you're going through

when do you think life coaching would be helpful to somebody under what circumstances or when would you suggest it for somebody when someone feels like they're they're they're doing the same thing over and over again and not getting results

where someone feels like they're just not progressing and they really just don't know why we could indulge into those areas and see i'm again i'm the type of coach where if i feel like the situation just you know entails it needs escalation then i will say okay hey maybe you should consider some counseling for this area um and it's not always necessary sometimes sometimes it's just helping them process through a certain area where it won't necessarily take um counseling um but where um again where they could just say okay i feel a little stuck or i've been in business and it's not going much further sometimes this fear again sometimes there's traumas sometimes it's it really just depends on you know that person but um there's a lot of good coaches out there a lot of coaches offer consultation you know you have to kind of find the person that works with you you're good fit um and again you know like i said that's why i do too you know free coaching sessions because you might meet with me the first day you might feel me out the second time you might be like i don't think we're gonna be a good fit together or you may say oh we're we're great let's move forward let's continue to progress um either which way you know my desire my heart's desires always just to get to see people progress in life and to go as far as they're destined and purpose to go

i want to uh with the time that we have left um there's a few things that i want to get to um and i think one might lead into the other but i wanted to ask about your faith and the role that that's played in your healing

yes um so trent i always say transparent moment um so i've been i was raised in church my whole entire life charismatic church um but i got to a place in time where i questioned right because i think a lot of people question sometimes and it's like i've been told this and is it really real um and so i had to do some soul searching and i had to be like god if you're real make it real to me um because a lot of times we operate in a place of religion um we look at people in their religious ways their religious studies right and so when christ came he didn't bring religion it was so many religions out there judaism and you know you had the pharisees and the sadducees and everybody was teaching something and what he was teaching was about the kingdom of god and just the principles of for us to live by and how to live um i think that um when you understand that and you understand that we were created to have a relationship with god a personal relationship with him so that means that if i want to do certain things and you feel like it's not right but i don't feel bad about it like you know like i have my own personal relationship with the lord my own personal things that we've dealt with i could sit and cry and talk and it don't come back through anybody else you know and it's just like you develop a relationship with like a regular person like a friendship and it's the same thing that i do with god my faith is is big because i just believe that um he's created me i believe he created me for a purpose and that my purpose ties back to his purpose um which is again to see people walk in a freedom that he created all mankind to have and a lot of times we put our own blockers up um my pastor said it best on sunday that we look at our ourselves sometimes and we think that we're not good enough and when god created mankind human beings his first words was it's good and so when we realized that he created us in a good place a good manner and that he wishes that we prosper and be in health as our soul prospers and he wants good things for us and sometimes the lessons that we learn or the things that we go through in life is not always a walk in the park um and i say that because it has to teach us life lessons we have to learn it's just like a baby right before they start walking they fall a couple of times but the best part is is falling knowing and having my faith to be assured that he's with me and that even though it may get rough the book of isaiah says that when you go through the fire he's there you know when you when you're in the flood of life he's there and just to know that his name is emmanuel and that he's with us and he walks with us um that's the best part i love i'm just saying that because you know in relationships sometimes it's quiet sometimes he doesn't say anything but that's just like when you take a test in school the person who's giving you the test there they don't talk while you're taking the test but sooner or later you'll see the outcome of your test and so my faith and my my walk with the lord i wouldn't necessarily say religious religion i don't deem myself to be a religion person religious person i deem myself to be a child of god and because that's how he created us to be his children a person who has a relationship with him who can say that sometimes i've made decisions that wasn't in his perfect will but even though i made those decisions he gave me the strength to push through them the strength to overcome them and the strength to look back and say oh i came through that end and i'm good i'm okay you know and i came out with a lesson and that's why i can't keep it to myself and walk around and see people who are bound or people who are stuck and not bring them out and i don't push religion on people because a lot of people don't want to hear that but if i can display emmanuel god is with us through my actions through my words through my my empathy through me just being who authentically who i am that alone would be enough for someone to say you've inspired me right i want to change because i'm inspired by you and that's my main purpose that's my goal i love my faith and i say a lot of times people when they present christendom they present it as as if life is going to be this blissful life but the apostle paul tells us and i'm not going to get all deep but he tells us that he struggled with something and he had a thorn in his side and he was like god you know remove this from me but it was that one thing that kept him close to god because if we are just as perfect people will never understand that we still need him that we still need and we need still need to rely on him if everything just came so easy so that's our reality checks but the the blessed part about it is is to know that no matter what i'm going through that i'm going through it with him so my faith is something that's there to keep me encouraged and to keep me lifted that when the chaos of this world is everything is going crazy i have the peace of god in my life to understand that nothing can happen to me unless god says so and that at the end of the day it says that he knows the thoughts and the plans that he has for us and he says not to harm you but to bring you to your expected and and so at the end of the day he i'm always on his mind my hairs the hairs on my head are numbered he said if i care about the birds and the foxes and their place to live what more would i care about you and so i have that assurance and that a surety to know that god is with me and and that no matter what i go through he's the lifter of my head

that was beautiful thank you for talking about that and i i loved what you said about

being being filled with god's love and that that means that you it's it's not necessary to to press religion on other people and something that that just i thought of while you were talking about that and you talked about being around other people um and inspiring them or and and i just thought in terms of like if you are filled with god's love and with light and you shine in other people's lives that then you've brought god's love into their life you don't it's there and and you don't have to you know like preach it's not necessary you've brought it into their life and however they interpret it or or whatever name they they put upon it light is light and love is love and that's that's what it's about ultimately yeah i think you you definitely um you definitely glow and it's a pleasure to meet you and to talk to you you um the first time we talked you told a story about lazarus and i cannot for the life of me remember what it is but i wrote it down because i was really excited and i would love if you remember what it was you said i would love to share it yes so what i share about lazarus is um what i i share with people even now um last year and i always refer back because i'm writing this book based around grief and loss and trauma and i thought when i wrote the book i'm just giving a little background story so i thought when i wrote the book that um it was going to be based around the loss of losing my mother so i started writing and i got these chapters and for some reason i get writer's block right so people tell you get black keep writing keep writing get right and i just could not write i told you i put everything into my writings because i don't write like a standard author that's out there who'll just pin a book in two days because they just got all these wonderful thoughts and so um i lose my dad and i was not okay and i'm like god and i told you i had you know the lord and who's the lifter and his peace and you know processing everything and the lord brought me to the scripture people always talk about it and the scripture is jesus wept and so i'm like jesus what so when i start you know you like google like i what does it say show the scripture in the bible right people like all that show description of the bible not really paying attention to it but it's so powerful it's powerful when you're dealing with grief is powerful when you're dealing with trauma why because even though christ was 100 god and 100 man he still showed us that in his humanity side that he stopped to process his emotions and process his feelings knowing that he was going to raise lazarus from the dead knowing what the end of the outcome would be because he's god he's all-knowing and so he already knew but his human side he showed us it's okay to take time out for self-care it's okay to process your feelings it's okay to process your emotions the thing is is that whatever that thing is that you need to process as jesus wept and it's a period on the end it wasn't a comma it was not a semicolon when jesus wept he stopped that's what it tells us he stopped and after he stopped it doesn't say for how long normally the bible sometimes references you know he went away for a little while or you know he's still the way to the noon time or whatever it's a period and and so there may have been a gap in between there i don't know how long that gap was and so i don't know how long your healing is going to take but it's okay to be busy as he was as christ was he was busy he was healing people and walking about it he was teaching he had death of his best friend he stopped he processed his phyllis jesus wept he cried he showed us it's okay you we are human we are not super people as people we sometimes think that we are we don't have to keep it moving as they tell us you know okay i am keep it moving keep it going you don't have to do that it's okay not to be okay it's okay to stop christ stopped he processed his emotions and then he went along to raise lazarus from the dead so you would think that oh he wasted tears no what he did was he showed us he was human and that he had the process his human side had to process the fact of a loss right the the the process the emotions the grief the people saying if you was only here mary lazarus sister was like if he was only here he wouldn't have died so now it's the scrutiny is that everything that we go through when we're going through something traumatic he went through all of that and he stopped to process it and afterwards he continued his purpose and his his goal of what god had you know brought him to do so he went about and he continued his healing and everything after he processed that but you know i had a great conversation with my pastor and he was saying like christ always displayed to us self-care he always left the disciples and went instilled away early in the morning or late at night to take some time to be by himself and so the lesson that we have to learn is we have to learn self-care and it's okay not to be okay it's okay to stop i tabled my business last year for a few months before i did anything i think this year i really kicked back into high gear because i had to stop and i had to process the emotions that i was dealing with and that again that goes back to me saying that i'm still human i have my coaches on the phone with me my counselor was i do go to counseling my counselor was on the phone with me you know during that time of me processing what i needed to process at the time did that mean that i couldn't help out anyone else no that just means that i had to take the time out to make for sure that santrissa was okay before santa theresa was able to make sure that someone else was okay yeah oh thank you so much for sharing that story i fell in love with it all over again and i'm so excited to share it oh i love it it's so powerful oh and i love i love the idea of jesus not only being a teacher of all the things that he was a teacher of but being um this uh this amazing example of someone who practices good self-care i think that's incredible yes all about it yes love it

uh i know that we are um technically out of time but i would love um just to to wrap up if you have the time um for for one more question is that is that okay sure that's fine okay i i just wanted to ask is there anything that you want to say to other survivors

um i just want to tell um other survivors that you can make it um there is healing healing is possible um don't self-bully yourself um don't beat yourself up um it is not your fault no matter what you've gone through um it is not your fault um and just to be encouraged you know i'm here if you reach out to me you know through my website uh through instagram i am on clubhouse as well um i'm on twitter but if you reach out to me those messages are 100 confidential i i do have an assistant but um all my messages because i am a trauma recovery coach they come to me first and so i'm able to filter through and to see um if you deem that it's something that's urgent you know i would say contact your local crisis center and speak to them um if you have benefits on your job look into your eap programs you can get free counseling they're open 24 7 um seven days a week where you could call them up a lot of times our jobs offer them we never take advantage of those those programs or we hear about it and it's called an employee assistant program we hear about it we just never utilize it but i found that to be a great tool especially now um a lot of insurances have um lowered the cost on counseling and and things like that so there's help out there um and then you have your support you know via this podcast as well as other you know sources that's out there but i i definitely want to say that i i am available you know if you are looking for a culture if you're looking for someone to talk to if even if you don't want me listen we are not meant to be loners we were not created to be loners we were created to be helpers of one another um to walk out this journey with each other um and you know just get with someone talk to someone don't hold it in even if you have to just write until you can find someone um to talk to get it out it would be so liberating and so free

thank you you're welcome oh thank you thank you so much for coming and for sharing so much of yourself and your life and your your love and your light and your passion thank you for having me i'm just so touched um and i'm so grateful yeah and have i have a beautiful workout have a beautiful day and so much love thank you too all right take care bye keep on loving keep on fighting and hold on and hold on hold on for your life for your life

keep on fighting and hold on

you