Learn From People Who Lived it

Teen Pregnancy and the Resiliency Needed to Make it Through

Teen Pregnancy and the Resiliency Needed to Make it Through 
In this episode, you'll hear:
What would Andrea do if one of her children entered teen pregnancy?
The toll the reaction from her family and church took on her and how she healed from it
What Andrea thinks leads to teen pregnancy
Where does resilience come from, and how can we foster it?
Andrea Wallen was raised in a Christian household with her brother and two sisters. She was homeschooled, so going to church multiple times a week was her main outlet and something that was very near and dear to her heart. When she was 16 and singing in the church choir, a new face walked in. It was an older boy who would eventually become the father of her first son. Contrary to conventional assumptions, Andrea tells us she believes that if she hadn't been homeschooled, she may not have gotten pregnant so young because she “would have known more” about life.
After she became pregnant, her church told her she was not welcome back because she was a “bad example”. When she told her parents, they offered to help her raise the child but told her if she didn't accept their terms and ever left, she could never come back. Andrea decided she’d rather stay with the father of her children and left home to get married. Shortly after, her son was born. A few months after that, her husband was deployed to Iraq. When he came back, she says he was a whole different person, and there were many scary nights she spent hiding from him due to his struggles with PTSD. Eventually, she left him, and before she was even 21, she began to work multiple jobs to make ends meet.
There was a period of time when her son was a few years old, when they were homeless, living in a hotel, and had no car, when she realized she needed her parents. At that time, her parents were going through a divorce, and like they told her, she was not welcome back. There were moments when she felt like her family was falling apart, and it was her fault. This weight, combined with being told she was a disappointment by her parents and church, took a toll on her self-worth. However, she maintained her faith and tells us now that it was the only thing that gave her hope and set her on solid ground.
Through it all, she just kept going. She lived many years in survival mode, and eventually, her resilience brought her to a life that she says she dreamed of on those nights when she was sleeping in a shed. She tells us it was her son who kept her going. She knew she couldn't let him down, and she had no other option than to make it work.
“Even if your life isn't stable in your living condition, know that you can be their stability. You are their rock. You are what their foundation is going to be when they look back.”
In this episode, you'll hear:
The psychological impact of being pushed out of the church
What would Andrea do if one of her children entered teen pregnancy?
The toll the reaction from her family and church took on her and how she healed from it
Why Andrea hasn't lost her faith and how her relationship with the church is different today
The importance of stable relationships, especially without stable living conditions
What Andrea thinks leads to teen pregnancy
Where does resilience come from, and how can we foster it?
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
 
 
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

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