Learn From People Who Lived it

Facing Grief One Day at a Time and Living Without Fear

In this episode, you'll hear:
What it felt like to lose her parents and how she deals with the grief
How a near-death experience impacted her life for the better
How being a teacher has changed since 1995
Tools she has learned and developed over the years to help her cope with the stressors of life
Elizabeth was born and raised in Arizona with her brother. Her mother was an educator, and her father worked for the newspaper. She tells us she had a great childhood and recalls good memories from that time in her life. However, like many of us, Elizabeth has faced more than her fair share of hard times. Not all of us have a single huge life-defining moment, but rather we face several “normal” challenges throughout our lives.
Health scares, raising children, professional conflicts, divorce, losing our parents.
Through it all, Elizabeth has always found a way to put one foot in front of the other, grow from the pain, and move forward. Today, she joins us to talk to all the people who are doing life and share the tools she has learned and developed over the years that help her through it.
In 2008, Elizabeth had a near-death experience when she survived two pulmonary embolisms. That scare endowed her with a sense of fearlessness when it came to trying things she’d only dreamt of until then and pushed her to pursue her dreams of writing a children's book and trying out stand-up comedy.
In 2015, Elizabeth's mother passed away unexpectedly. She tells us her mother was her best friend, and losing her took an immeasurable toll on Elizabeth and her two sons. Just two months and eight days later, her father passed. Her boys were 6 and 12 at the time, and she felt pressure to keep it together for them. However, through this experience, she learned that she had to feel her feelings in order to move through them. Grief counseling helped her during this period, but even now, all these years later, she tells us that grief never leaves her; it just changes form.
A few years after she lost her parents, Elizabeth went through a divorce that was finalized in 2020. This brought a new version of a feeling she knew well: grief. She compared these different periods of grief to going through a metamorphosis that changed who she was. It can be painful, but when you come out the other side, you have grown.
As a backdrop to all of these experiences, Elizabeth has been an early childhood educator for 28 years. She started teaching in 1995 and tells us she has seen drastic changes in the kids she works with since the advent of social media in the aftermath of the pandemic. Between these changes in children, a lack of appreciation and understanding from parents, and pressure from administrators, being an educator has been getting harder every year.
No matter what your life looks like, grief and strife are inevitable. However, joy and growth are just as ever-present. For Elizabeth, taking one day at a time, remembering tomorrow is a new day, embracing change and fear, using humor, and talking to counselors and peers helps her through it. Start small and find a thing that makes you happy, then try that without fear.
“An adventure takes a first step. Don't be afraid to take that step.”
In this episode, you'll hear:
What it felt like to lose her parents and how she deals with the grief
How a near-death experience impacted her life for the better
How being a teacher has changed since 1995
Tools she has learned and developed over the years to help her cope with the stressors of life
Follow the podcast: 
Listen on Apple Podcasts (link: https://apple.co/3s1YH7h) 
Listen on iHeart (link: https://ihr.fm/3MEY7FM) 
Listen on Spotify (Link: https://spoti.fi/3yMmQCE) 
 
Resources:
Sticker Room Adventure by Elizabeth Detrick Jeffrey 
Grief Relief Retreat
EricsHouse
LFWPLI: Marianne Gouveia, life after loss by suicide and finding healing at EricsHouse 
 
Connect with Mathew Blades: 
Twitter - twitter.com/MathewBlades
Instagram - instagram.com/MathewBladesmedia/ 
Facebook - facebook.com/mathewbladesmedia/ 
Website - learnfrompeoplewholivedit.com/
 
Additional Credits:
LFPWLI is managed by Sam Robertson

Finding Longevity and Avoiding Compassion Fatigue with Dr. Kathleen Rickard

Finding Longevity and Avoiding Compassion Fatigue with Dr. Kathleen Rickard
 
In this episode, you'll hear:
The difference between compassion and empathy
How Dr. Rickard looks at the full body and follows the emotion to bring healing
The ways emotional and mental stressors affect how our bodies work and feel
Ways to overcome and recover from burnout and compassion fatigue 
Dr. Kathleen Rickard was born and raised in a Catholic family in Phoenix as the only daughter of five children. Her father was absent, and her mother was tough out of necessity, so Kathleen’s emotional needs were often pushed to the side. As a silver lining, these challenges make her great at what she does now. Kathleen has been a registered nurse since 1981. She was in the emergency room for 12 years, then became a nurse practitioner because she was concerned about burnout. She went back to school in 1997 to become a Family Nurse Practitioner (FNP), then went back to school and is now a Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP).
In this episode, Mathew, Frank, and Dr. Kathleen Rickard discuss the healer's dilemma, the ways chakras impact our health, and how our diets and guts affect our overall wellness. Dr. Kathleen also talks about burnout, compassion fatigue, and how revisiting our childhood loves can guide us to longevity. She encourages us to give ourselves pause long enough to feel what feels right to us. Seek out fun and stay in the flow.
"Your body works better when you're working with ease and you use emotion to be your guide."
In this episode, you'll hear:
The difference between compassion and empathy
How Dr. Rickard looks at the full body and follows the emotion to bring healing
The ways emotional and mental stressors affect how our bodies work and feel
Ways to overcome and recover from burnout and compassion fatigue 
Follow the podcast: 
Listen on Apple Podcasts (link: https://apple.co/3s1YH7h) 
Listen on iHeart (link: https://ihr.fm/3MEY7FM) 
Listen on Spotify (Link: https://spoti.fi/3yMmQCE) 
 
Resources:
Dr. Frank Bevacqua
HEALGRACEFULLY: Deeply Healing With Energy Medicine
Jill McMahon’s Episodes: Understanding Suicide, Prevention, and Coping with Loss and The Brain Believes What You Tell It 
 
Connect with Mathew Blades: 
Twitter - twitter.com/MathewBlades
Instagram - instagram.com/MathewBladesmedia/ 
Facebook - facebook.com/mathewbladesmedia/ 
Website - learnfrompeoplewholivedit.com/
 
Additional Credits:
LFPWLI is managed by Sam Robertson

Talking about Death with Children and Connective Compartmentalization with Caryn Kondo

Talking about Death with Children and Connective Compartmentalization with Caryn Kondo
 
In this episode, you'll hear:
Best practices to communicate about death with children
How Caryn dealt with the fears, pain, and desire for control leading up to her cancer diagnosis
What is connective compartmentalization?
In this episode, Mathew, Dr. Frank, and Caryn discuss how the death of her brother was explained to her when she was a child and how she dealt with it, why the language used to talk about death with children is so important, and how making the switch from caretaker to patient impacted Caryn and her family.
Caryn Kondo grew up in a grieving household. When she was about to turn 5, her younger brother drowned. Her parents did a great job of talking about what happened, but that kind of loss affects everyone in the family. As she grew older, she decided she wanted to help others who were grieving and became a clinical social worker and bereavement specialist. After a long and successful career, a few years into her retirement, Caryn was diagnosed with a rare cancer. After a month of unknowns, it was eventually identified as goblet cell carcinoma, a rare, aggressive subtype of appendix cancer. Caryn tells us she dealt with a lot of insecurity and fear around the unknowns when her doctors couldn't figure out what it was. The time between identifying there was an issue and actually receiving the diagnosis was a time full of pain and struggling to remain in control of the unknown. She was used to being the professional helping others grieve, but then she was in it, and things changed.
As a clinical social worker, "This isn't my story today" was her mantra to help her not take her work home with her. However, after her diagnosis, the challenge in front of her was her story, and she had to find new mental boundaries to help herself survive. Connective compartmentalization is the coping technique she developed. "Building fences, not walls" is how she describes this practice. This method, in addition to new mantras, mindfulness practices, and self-pep talks, got her through it.
"The word death is not a bad word. We can say it with kindness and love."
In this episode, you'll hear:
Best practices to communicate about death with children
How Caryn dealt with the fears, pain, and desire for control leading up to her cancer diagnosis
What is connective compartmentalization?
Follow the podcast: 
Listen on Apple Podcasts (link: https://apple.co/3s1YH7h) 
Listen on iHeart (link: https://ihr.fm/3MEY7FM) 
Listen on Spotify (Link: https://spoti.fi/3yMmQCE) 
 
Resources:
Dr. Frank Bevacqua
Jill McMahon’s Episodes: Understanding Suicide, Prevention, and Coping with Loss and The Brain Believes What You Tell It 
Grief Relief Retreat
 
Connect with Mathew Blades: 
Twitter - twitter.com/MathewBlades
Instagram - instagram.com/MathewBladesmedia/ 
Facebook - facebook.com/mathewbladesmedia/ 
Website - learnfrompeoplewholivedit.com/
 
Additional Credits:
LFPWLI is managed by Sam Robertson

The Intersection of Sobriety and Sexuality

The Intersection of Sobriety and Sexuality
Tawny Lara is an NYC-based writer, podcast host, and sober sexpert. Her writing has been featured in Playboy, Men’s Health, and the Huffington Post. Her most recent book, Dry Humping: A Guide to Dating, Relating, and Hooking Up Without the Booze, is available now!
 
In this episode, you'll hear:
You don't have to reach rock bottom to decide to reevaluate your relationship with alcohol.
How did her environment have to change when she got sober?
What does it mean to "date yourself," and why is it an important step on the journey to sobriety?
Tawny tells us she was the stereotypical bartending party girl when she was living in her hometown of Waco, Texas. She didn't have a traditional rock bottom moment, instead, she felt like she was constantly living at rock bottom. She was binge drinking regularly, driving drunk, having unprotected sex, and entering into unhealthy relationships. Eventually, she realized something had to change, so she bought a one-way ticket to New York to get serious about her writing career. Your problems are going to move with you no matter where you go, but for Tawny, leaving the bartending scene in Texas allowed her to escape the patterns she was stuck in and become the writer she knew she could be. However, after she moved to New York, her partying decreased, but she was still drinking regularly. At 29 in 2015, she realized that alcohol was standing in the way of her being the best version of herself. She decided she would give up alcohol for her 30th year and start a blog about it. What started as a year-long social experiment to hold her accountable turned into 8 years without a drink and a thriving career showing others you can thrive in sobriety.
Alcohol abuse is often a symptom of a larger problem. For her, those larger problems were undiagnosed anxiety, depression, and PTSD. Once she quit drinking and started yoga, therapy, and developing healthy relationships, she was able to meet her real self, address the real issues, get on proper medications, and stop self-medicating with drugs and alcohol. After she removed the alcohol, she finally had to deal with the repercussions of her past actions. Tawny says "That is the work". The hard part is figuring out why you drink and how you can replace that with healthy coping mechanisms that you can use every day.
Tawny's first anniversary of sobriety, 2016, is the same year she met Lisa on Instagram. Tawny went to Lisa's book launch, and the rest is history. Together, they have been co-hosting the Recovery Rocks Podcast for the past 5 years. Recovery Rocks is part of Tawny’s passion to live sober out loud and show people that you can have fun, date, network, have great sex, and live a great life without alcohol.
Tawny's new book, Dry Humping, is about this intersection of sobriety and sexuality. When she gave up alcohol, she felt like she had no idea how to date, let alone have sex without drinking. Between the social stigma of sobriety being boring or the "liquid courage" we think we need to engage in social activities, she has had to do a lot of unlearning problematic tropes and figuring out who she is in a world that expects certain behaviors from her. Women are taught their role is to please others, and that leads to a lot of their dating and sexual activity being performative. Mathew and Tawny end on an interesting conversation about how porn and social expectations impact men and women in different and surprisingly similar ways. Tawny also talks about the impact alcohol and drug abuse have on the LGBTQ+ community, her bisexuality, and how sobriety changed her relationship with her own identity.
"When I got sober was really when I met me for the first time."
In this episode, you'll hear:
Why was Tawny drinking to excess?
Why did she feel like she needed to get sober?
You don't have to reach rock bottom to decide to reevaluate your relationship with alcohol.
What are some of the stigmas surrounding sobriety?
How did her environment have to change when she got sober?
What does it mean to "date yourself," and why is it an important step on the journey to sobriety?
Sigmas around sexuality for women and how porn impacts the way people think about sex
How alcohol impacts the LGBTQ+ community
Follow the podcast: 
Listen on Apple Podcasts (link: https://apple.co/3s1YH7h) 
Listen on iHeart (link: https://ihr.fm/3MEY7FM) 
Listen on Spotify (Link: https://spoti.fi/3yMmQCE) 
 
Resources:
SobrieTea Party
Angela Pugh’s Episode
Mathew’s Episode
Lisa Smith
Recovery Rocks Podcast
Weekly advice column, Beyond Liquid Courage
 
Connect with the Guest
Tawny Lara on Instagram 
Tawny Lara on Twitter 
Tawny Lara on Facebook 
Tawny Lara on LinkedIn 
 
Connect with Mathew Blades: 
Twitter - twitter.com/MathewBlades
Instagram - instagram.com/MathewBladesmedia/ 
Facebook - facebook.com/mathewbladesmedia/ 
Website - learnfrompeoplewholivedit.com/
 
Additional Credits:
LFPWLI is managed by Sam Robertson