Episode 58: Courageous Mourning

Guest: Melina Laus

Lauren: Melinda, thank you so much for joining me. Thank you for having me then. It's a beautiful day. This is our first outdoor This is Not what I Ordered interview.

Melinda: I'm so delighted that I get to be the one that has this experience with you.

Lauren: I hear little birds. It's pretty nice. I would love for you to tell me a little summary of what your health journey has been and you're just being a person having a body.

Melinda: Well, we talked before a little bit about even going back to early childhood and while I don't have memories of it, um, the story I've been told my whole life is that I had a doctor, a pediatrician that worked with me before I was a year old who said to my mom, “I'm sorry Mrs. Neil, but I think your daughter is kind of an alien because she's just allergic to everything here on the planet.” Wheat, dairy, all kinds of allergy problems and I was really prone to pneumonia and bronchitis, which I think was ultimately linked to the, the allergies that once we got that figured out, I was, I was healthier. But it just seems like I've always had a, a weakness in my body that had a lot of problems with asthma growing up in Southern California. So, um, there's just always been this, I'm a little different feeling about my body. Um, other kids could run and jump and play and go up and down the basketball court and it was no big deal. But I remember needing my inhaler and feeling a little, a little less than. And then, um, as an adult after a tragic event in my life, the, the death of my husband when I was 32. Um, I ended up going into this experience with adrenal exhaustion and, um, have been diagnosed with hyperthyroid, which has really impacted my stamina so much about metabolism and how I take care of myself. So I don't know if that answers completely what she wanted to hear.

Lauren: It does. So just hearing that story, knowing you as I do and hearing that, which I didn't know about you, that you had that earlier childhood association with your health experience and the story that the doctors told about you and then how you saw yourself and in comparison to others that… there's that feeling of difference.

Melinda: Yes.

Lauren: And I think that that feeling of differences, one, it's a really good way of putting how I think so many of us feel with any kind of health challenge that it's like, is there something wrong with me? Which my answer is no, there's nothing wrong with you.

Melinda: And that’s just what we love about spending time with you.

Lauren: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And I also, cause I have to tell myself that like, “No,” and I regularly remind myself there's not something wrong with me.

Melinda: Right.

Lauren: But what you mentioned about this more present day stuff is that right after you lost your husband, you had this health thing come up. Can you talk a little bit about that?

Melinda: Sure. Well, part of the, the timing with, um, David's death, which was sudden unexpected arrhythmia, cardiac arrhythmias, what he died from. So it completely came out of nowhere. There was no warning, no symptoms. He died 20 days after we'd had our first child. So I was into postpartum healing and recovery and my body was working really hard to nurse my baby and try and figure out how do I take care of two little children. Our oldest child at that time was a two and a half. So it was a busy demanding time on my body anyways. And then adding in the tragedy and the suddenness and the just absolutely traumatic experience of David's death, my body let me know how impactful that was. And it took a long time, actually a long time for me in terms of figuring that part out. I wasn't diagnosed with hyperthyroid and the adrenal exhaustion until about two years after David's death.

Lauren: Wow. Okay.

Melinda: And you know, some of the things that came along that were, were body clues, were health clues that things are different now. I remember trying to get my body back by going and doing some pretty extreme exercise work and had a trainer and I wasn't building muscle mass. I wasn't gaining stamina. My body was working so hard to tell me “You're exhausted.” So I remember doing a wonderful workout and like, “eah, I lifted more weight and I paid for this coach and isn't it great?” And I left the gym and got in my car and took a two hour nap. I couldn't even leave the parking lot at the gym because I was so exhausted.

Lauren: And not knowing it. Not having a diagnosis yet. Yeah. Your body was really like, “What are you doing?”

Melinda: And it was just a different, a different phase of that whole experience of “What's wrong with me? I'm so different.” Like other people talk about feeling so energized after exercise. Why am I not feeling pumped up? Why am I, where's the exercise high? I had an exercise low. So it was actually very comforting when I finally found the right naturopath that helped me kind of put these puzzle pieces together. And I remember one of the questions was, “Do you feel tired after exercise?” And it was just even being asked that question helped me reframe, “Oh, maybe this is not just me.”

Lauren: And that it's a real thing. Like it's a real enough thing that they knew to ask you the question and you're, you got that, what did you say? It felt reassuring or…

Melinda: Yeah, there was a validation about it. Oh, there's something more here than just, there was an element of the inner dialogue can be pretty brutal about, “Come on, get your shit together. This isn't that hard.” We all that, that self-deprecating self-criticism stuff that I really had to work my way through. And it all started with first having a perspective given to me from the doctor that was about, “You know, you're going to need to take care of yourself differently.”

Lauren: Mm. Have a little talk about that. So tell me if you, if you're open to it, tell me a little bit about what that has meant for you and taking care of yourself differently.

Melinda: The first thing was the idea that actually the path to health is rest. That was earth shattering. It still is at times, but with two tiny children, especially with newborns, moms are often given the advice that you sleep when the baby sleeps. And there's an element of that when you have one child that's like, “Sure that's, that's doable,” but when you have two, the likelihood they're both napping at the same time or there's so many other things to do. But again, this, um, this protective layer of permission that I was being given by the people taking care of me, that they all said you whenever you can, you need to rest. So I remember really specifically, um, my youngest Brendan at the time, we're still having a pretty hefty afternoon, two hour nap and we would snuggle up and that was our time together and I would make sure my oldest, I'm, a lot of times he'd go play at the neighbor's house or you know, he'd have an activity that was safe and close by that he was occupied. But I would just really let myself rest and putting a priority on that made a big difference.

Lauren: Yes. Well, and it goes exactly the opposite. It's, it's, it goes against the idea of personal failure, laziness, all of that. Because it's this thing that can keep us from taking the rest that we need is the story that there's something wrong with the fact that we want to rest. Yeah. Like, and, and it's funny because we absolutely need rest. We know this. It's, you know, but culturally there's a lot of story that's put on sleeping late or taking a nap or saying no to certain activities or stepping out of activities. Just all of that can have so many different social consequences or judgments either from other people or like you were mentioning from ourselves.

Melinda: Oh, absolutely. There were times that, um, you know, to other friends and some of the other people in my life, it would feel like a little bit of a dirty secret. Like, “Yeah, you know, no, I'm not doing housework or writing an article or doing something ambitious with my afternoons. I'm, I'm in a deep sleep.” And I just noticed how protective I needed to be about that in terms of how I, how I shared socially with people in my life. Because there were, “Oh, I wish I could do that” kinds of responses from other moms or good for you. But all the while kind of that, “Mm, I could never do that. I can never let myself do that.”

Lauren: I do think that sometimes, I feel like I can be a mirror to other people when I'm taking care of myself in a way that they're not, or vice versa. If they're taking care of themselves in a way that I haven't thought to or I haven't had the courage to do, sometimes they can have a little resistance inside. Like that whole “Must be nice” kind of feeling, but it's a really good indication to me as you know, when that feeling comes up, like, Oh, maybe I need or want that thing. Yeah. So I wonder if the folks who said that to you longed for it.

Melinda: And I think because of my personal experience with loss and trauma, at that point, there may be, was permission they could give me in their minds about that, like, “Oh, well, but I'm not facing such a difficult thing as Melinda.” So as much as they may be like, “Oh, I would love to do that. Yeah, well my husband's alive and while, and I still have expectations that my house is perfect” or whatever that is. Um, but there, there was this constant dance of take the time, rest, be with yourself. What do we need to do to change our diet? And it's so fascinating to me, just the grief experience within a grief experience about changing diets for me.

Lauren: Tell me about that.

Melinda: Uh, well, leaving, leaving the world of normal and realizing, uh, and this was my journey with Lizzie David started 16 years ago. So it's been, there's been a lot of change in food and products and things available, but, um, I could no longer just hang out like everybody else on Friday night for pizza and beer. I would bring my little salad or my gluten free knockoff product for dinner or whatever. And, and how, how much of a grief experience that was feeling like I was so different or problematic or difficult to feed if we went to somebody's house for dinner. I mean there just was a lot of food is, is about gathering and sharing and showing up differently for that was hard.

Lauren: I think that is such a big theme and just as you were talking about, I could definitely relate to it and it is so personal, both what we choose or want to take into our bodies and not, and then also when we prepare food for others and like what it means to accept or not accept certain meals or types of food and the social aspect of it. So for you, when you say your grief experience inside of the grief experience, you're referring to in the midst of a time when you're grieving the death of David. You are also grieving the loss of a role kind of that you held, um, as a friend or a family member, a loved one that could say yes more often.

Melinda: And so that's a big shift in and of itself. It was another layer of feeling isolated and different that uh, everybody else gets together for lasagna. Yeah. And I have to pick it apart and just eat the tomato sauce, you know, like they're just… And for me, grief was such a deep experience of feeling isolated, feeling different. My life got thrown into a totally different trajectory then everybody else on my street. Um, and I think that it's, it was specifically, there were elements in, in terms of the food, but also just again, how to, how do I take care of myself and rest? What does my house look like on the inside on a Tuesday afternoon to like that, that judgment that. Who, who is that council of people in our head that we're trying to please? I had to really work hard to figure out if somebody shows up at my door on a Tuesday evening and says, “Wow, this place is a mess.” Hmm. Okay. That's good information for me because maybe you don't get to be invited back.

Lauren: Yeah. Right. And, and recognizing that it can be so powerful and saying like, I love that question, “Who is it internally that I'm trying to impress?” Like is there some judgmental aspect of me that I'm really just trying to please? Because if, if so, then I can just do that work inside of me versus inside of my house. And then saying, I get to choose who I welcome into my house and it's people who reflect the way that I love myself, the way that I accept myself.

Melinda: It’s, you know, that constant work and it ebbs and flows and changes. But who's, who's on my healing team? You know, who's in my life that comes in and offers comfort, support, really sees me and loves me no matter what. Isn't that what we're all looking for? And I had these, these new X factors in my life at that time. One of the other things that I remember working hard with and it, and it still shows up in diff at different times, not as frequent as it did back in the day… But just feeling completely overwhelmed with all the to do's and sometimes getting to the point that “Yeah, we're all out of dishes, all the silverwares on the counter and used” and just taking a break to let myself know that if I really can't tackle that because the energy isn't there, there will be a day coming soon that I will have the energy and learning to trust that.

Lauren: Oh, I just got chill. I was getting chills. Oh my gosh. Yes. Because what you're describing is such like, even as I think about, cause I've definitely had times like that. Absolutely. Dishes, just shame. Totally. And like nobody could be around to see them and I just still have that, you know, cause I've had days at a time where I've been alone and you know, needed to eat. And I didn't have the energy to even go to the fridge to get the food but had to do it. And then, so then I was like, of course I'm not gonna wash my dishes. But then seeing them there, and I think that's part of why I got chills is because it was so resonant for me when you said that you could trust that there would be energy. And for me, I'm remembering a time when I was going through something really hard and it actually wasn't about a health challenge, but it was, I was going through a grieving process and I just, my house was messier. That's what happens. We literally, our life energy shifts in such a tremendous way. And I remember resisting, resisting, resisting, you know, the fact that I didn't feel the energy to be more tidy and trying to shame myself out of it and trying to tell myself that there was, you know, if I, that I would be happier if I would just do that or that my life would be better and that I'd be more virtuous or whatever. And finally saying, “What if I just fell in love with the mess? What if I just created a love relationship with the mess and see it as a representation of the best way to love myself right now?” I so, and I have to tell you, I still have to do that if I get into a time and space like that again, it's not enjoyable for me in the same way, you know? Like I love having a clean space. I love having that easy breezy feeling, but it sort of represents so many things, whether it's a mess in our lives or something else that isn't going quite right. That it doesn't all have to be perfect and lined up and synced up. And what I did find is that I would wake up in the morning during this grieving process and just start with welcoming all of my home. I even joyfully stepped over some laundry at one point. I was like, “This is part of my loving myself.” I love you, laundry. I'll, I'll get to you. You know, I'll get to you. But it was huge because it took away the shame part. And then when I was cleaning, I was cleaning from joy.

Melinda: Yes. I, you know, again, a thousand tiny whacks at this process to get to a place where I can talk about it today. Because maybe let's talk again in two weeks when the dishes are piled, the laundry is just on the sofa and in giant mound. And I will, I will, you know, lean on you to remind me about, remember that thing that you do? Because it, it just, it is, it's a befriending myself in the moment. “Okay, what, what else is going on in my life that's making the dishes, the laundry, the bill, paying the whatever… really overwhelming?” Right. I think it's also a parallel process. I've noticed with my creative life force that maybe of that energy is going into writing or building something else in my work. And how lovely. You know, sometimes the laundry pile is that because we're having fun.

Lauren: Yes, I love that.

Melinda: And why would we waste those energy chips right on the laundry when we could be doing it's formative joy work. So I think that, you know, one of the biggest things that my body has taught me with these little dings and bumps and issues is that energy isn't unlimited. It ebbs and flows.

Lauren: So true. And that's okay. It's okay. There's a sadness to it. And there's also just this real, for me, it's almost like the recognition of impermanence that because it's not infinite, it's not going to be like always present, always available. There's something a little bit more sacred about it. We can really spend those energy chips on things that we love on things that are important to us. So I'm with you on that. And I want to acknowledge something really important that we're talking about and just name it, which is managing real health challenges in the midst of such tremendous grieving process. Because I know the show focuses on, okay, how did you deal with your health challenge? But it's, that's not the only thing going on in our lives. For most of us. There's life is happening at the same time and so to have such a life changing event. So I'm just really glad that we're talking about it cause I have the sense that there are people listening today who I've been waiting for this who had been waiting to hear from you, maybe not knowing you… but who are able to hear their story a little bit and what you are talking about. And I wonder if you could even speak directly to them what you would want them to know. Those who are in the midst of grieving loss.

Melinda: I think so much of it is coming to terms with maybe first when, when, uh, um, a grief event or an event that creates grief in our lives happens…. Whether it's a diagnosis or a loss or all of the above. Because within diagnosis I think there's loss. There's just no way around it. Yeah. That I think sometimes one of the first parts of the work is to recognize some of the dreams that we've had that maybe we didn't know we had some of the perfect life stories or the, the way I thought would be, this is not what I ordered, that maybe we didn't even know we'd put in a different order to the universe until it's real clear. We're not going to get what we didn't even know we were looking for or wanting. And I think coming to terms with that, moving clothes, touching that, befriending the dream that was on the way to creating something new for ourselves. So much of the work for me was, um, I had to kind of put names to, befriend, sit with everything that I wished had happened, everything I wanted that I wasn't going to have and love myself through that.

Lauren: Which is hard and it's so tender and vulnerable. Like sometimes I say to my partner, it's really vulnerable to want something. It's me showing my little kid self to someone if I let them know that I wanted something because it means that I could not get it. And then that's really a whole other kind of vulnerable. And so what you're talking about sounds like this very intentional process of saying, “Oh no, I see what the dream was.” And instead of just saying, “Oh no, I can't have it,” I'm going to name it and I'm going to spend some time with that dream. In relationship with the dream, knowing that it's not going to pan out the way that you thought. That is powerful. What have those moments and inner conversations looked like for you?

Melinda: I think one of the harder parts is that it's shown up as surprise in terms of feeling that sneakier wave of grief. That like, why, why am I upset today? Why is what's showing up? And then it's, it's doing a little backwards look at, “Oh, okay.” Things like when my boys got old enough to start playing soccer and I'm sitting, you know, on the sidelines, cheering on my sweet guys as they, you know, tried for a goal. And then just realizing the influence and presence of other dads. And wondering where David would have been in that and what that would've looked like or could have looked like. Realizing again, I have a whole universe inside of me that I know from top to bottom, inside and out that just didn't actually get realized in this life.

Lauren: I'm just hearing that and feeling your dreams and feeling the dreams of everyone you know who listens and everyone in the world, and myself and it's so bittersweet. Oh. Because I know I have this part of me that responds to that in myself and says “Yes, and there's still going to be all these great adventures.” Right. And yet just sitting with the silence for a moment. Sitting with the not having fun, with not having what I wanted. Yeah. And being with it, slowing down enough to be with the awareness. It’s so sweet. It's so precious. It's exactly what I think my inner child needs.

Melinda: It comes up almost like a wave and it's sacred. And giving myself permission to sit on the sidelines and cry. Yeah. To really rage as I needed to. To really push against the, the current culture that's death averse, that's grief averse, that really helps fuel that rush to the good rush to the happy ending rush to the “Yeah but.” Yeah but you might get remarried. Yeah, but look at how healthy and happier boys are. Look at how wonderful the coach is, you know. Great. Good, great, good, great. I think some of my mission in this life that I have learned to befriend, embody, feel good about is that I am okay with being a one woman show who welcomes grief. I don't want the sad things. I don't want the tragedies to happen in my life or anybody's life, but what I found out the hard way is that I don't get a choice about that. So I've surrendered and because I don't have a choice, I've made so much peace with letting myself just feel, feel the good things and feel the bad things. And what I've found is that the more permission I gave myself to feel the bad, hard, difficult, painful things, the more room there was to feel the joyful, beautiful, exquisite things more deeply. It’s almost like the scale grew after this terrible experience of loss that I became more capable of feeling even more on both ends. Yeah, sure, the pain side isn't as much fun, but with every experience of grief, there's the connection to David. There is a connection to the life that would have been and that's that sacred. I get to remind myself in that moment of [inaudible] if he was here, he would be the coach. He would at minimum be on the sidelines holding my hand, basking in the joy of watching our sons play. And that's beautiful. And I don't want to miss out on holding both the pain and the joy of being alive.

Lauren: That's how you stay connected to all of it is allowing it. Like allowing him because part of it too is you don't ignore him. No. You know like you think about here's what he would be doing at this game and I feel joy thinking about that too. And that's a bittersweet joy happening right in the physical form. Also happening in the internal world. Like you're playing it out and you can see it. You can see him, you know him, you know his energy. And you allow that in too, which is so vulnerable because it means more pain comes with it.

Melinda: Absolutely. It's the catch 22 but you're like, I'm signing up for that catch 22 because what I found is that… I use the analogy a lot, for myself and with the people I work with … A grief process is a lot like birth in reverse. That in births we're, we're working with our bodies to manage and just yield to the pain of childbirth and those contractions start far apart but then move closer together as birth is imminent and in grief it's the rivers, the contractions of grief are one right on top of another in the initial experience of loss and then they, there's more time between those sneakier waves or those grief attacks. Yeah, just hit. The way that I worked with my body in labor was if I fought the pain of a contraction, if I resisted, if I tried to out-smart or outrun my own body, then it was worse. I could feel myself almost lose my ability to just survive. But if I, if I let myself go into this meditative trance state of just yielding, of softening, of being present, it was manageable. And so I've just used that in my own life with, with the pain of loss.

Lauren: I love that way that you just described it. And it reminds me of this poem by Danna Faulds, which I have mentioned on the podcast before, but I'm just going to bring it up again because I need to hear it again today and maybe somebody else does. Part of her poem says “Resist and the tide will sweep you off your feet. Allow and grace will carry you to higher ground.” Beautiful. She gets it. And it reminds me too of my symptoms. Like when I resist my symptoms. And by the way, I kinda like to give myself permission to resist them too because that's an experience and absolutely I resist them all the time. Yeah. And often it gets worse and that's an experience too. And I get to feel that. Yeah. And it's not a punishment, it's just a result. And when I have the fortitude, cause they really do think it takes tremendous strength to allow. Yeah. Like that's some spiritual heavy lifting. And I really let my symptoms be what they are through a variety of tools. You know, mindfulness, like visualization, you know, various things. Then what winds up happening is I have a transformative experience. I usually learn something. There's usually a little bit of humor that shows up. Yeah. There's usually some kind of spaciousness I find in myself. I get a little impressed with myself and the universe. Like it's really cool. I mean, both experiences have their own richness.

Melinda: Yes. And I think that's what you're speaking to. What I'm hearing is that part about, there's no right or wrong. There's just being with. And while I'm talking about how I've learned to, to surrender and yield, that doesn't mean there isn't still protest. That shows up. I just don't feel like it today. Yeah, let's not.

Lauren: Sometimes the pain is so great. It's so big that it feels like the only thing you know.

Melinda: Well, and I think that's, that's the part that how, how brilliant of us to resist that. You know, there's something really wise in that too, that like, “Oh hell no. I don’t want to go into the darkness of the soul. I'm keeping the lights on. That’s bullshit.”

Lauren: That is so important for you to say this because as much as we talk about the tools of allowing or the tools of being with, it's so important to know that using the tools doesn't make you better as a person. It doesn't mean that you're better, it just means you're able to that day. Or in that moment. And not using them has its own wisdom. Yes. Taking a moment to say, Oh, of course you don't want to feel that thing. Like, of course you don't want to feel your symptom. Of course. You don't want to feel the depth of this grief. Why would we desire that?

Melinda: Absolutely. And I think that that's part of what, um, and sharing stories with people who've experienced loss or going through a difficult transformative experience. I love to hear how the resistance showed up for them. How, how the tools are working, not working, changing. I mean honestly as we've talked about, you know, I've had a gluten issue forever. I don't, I'm not celiac, but my body definitely is like not okay with gluten, but there was a phase in the early loss, um, after David that the neighborhood boys, one of their fundraisers was to sell these buckets of frozen cookie dough and that was the tool that got me through some difficult times was I would sit and bake myself a couple of cookies anytime I wanted. The permission at that moment was, “I'm not going to say no to you about anything” and later, “Yeah, that probably caused my body some other issues that I have had to learn to heal through, sorry, body.” And at the same time, that was what worked in that moment.

Lauren: Sorry body and thank you cookie dough. So let me just be really transparent. I'm the host of the podcast. I'm a psychotherapist. Yeah, you're a psychotherapist. People listen to the show and they listen for tools. And then I hear you talking about food and something comes up for me like, Oh my gosh, what if this triggers someone? And they think that we're telling them that it's good to use food as medicine and all that or medication or something. And there's so many different relationships with food. Same thing has come up before and people talk about alcohol. Oh yeah. The truth is I really don't think anything is bad or makes you bad. I really don't believe that. And I want to say that so that people hearing this can at least make sense of why I want to keep that in this episode, I want to keep talking about when we say, “How do you get through this?” It's not just how do you get through this with, you know, meditation and totally, you know, community service and all that. Like placing a hand on your heart and saying, I love you. It's also, you're in the depths of grief. How did, what was the life raft that you held onto? It's not just riding on a lotus pad. And so there are things that we do that, like I just heard you say, okay, was it the perfect shiny answer? No. But it was exactly what I needed at that time. And there's something about not resisting desire or not resisting what came to you I want to say intuitively.

Melinda: What's more comforting than a little bit of sugar and a little bit of gluten and a little bit of warm cinnamon smell in the house. Like, yeah. I have no regrets. I certainly don't do bucket loads of snickerdoodle cookies. It's been a long time since I visited that place for comfort. But also part of loving myself through this process and being present to myself through this has also been not judging myself for what worked in a moment and learning from it. I'm super grateful for the cookie dough. I mean, I'm super grateful for the times that I've needed to numb out a little bit with uh, Netflix. Thank you Netflix.

Lauren: Thank you to all of those things and recognizing that it's a relationship and I've said before, cause I talk about Netflix all the time. Again, they're not a sponsor yet. It's just culturally understood way of talking about taking in TV and movies. It's going to like the word bandaid. But it's a relationship because I've mentioned before, great watch, Netflix. Titrate. Titration is when we can step in and out of the intensity of an emotion by also having something we go to that doesn't require emotional depth like going for a walk like cookie dough, like you know Netflix and because it's a relationship, it requires our attunement. It requires us to be in constant connection, communication with what we need so that we don't go too far in one direction and it's about finding balance but sometimes too far in one direction is being so resistant to the cookie dough or the thing that we have labeled to be the bad thing that for some of us it can feel unbalanced to not allow that. Some people have spent their lives with their relationship with food or with alcohol or with gambling, I mean with different things that they have found peace in complete abstinence. And I think that's awesome too. Or you can't abstain from food. So that's not a very good example. But people who have found balance in their own ways, then I would say for a lot of us, you know, we haven't had a journey specific to those things. And so we're just doing our best listening to what our needs are. Just like with the dirty dishes. We're not advocating for a house full of dirty dishes. Completely. Unless that helps you to be completely clean. Just do what you need to do to get through today.

Melinda: And I think it's that place of, um, befriending ourselves. You know, how, how do I talk to myself the way I would talk to my friend Lauren, you know. I wouldn't walk into your home and say, “Dear God, get your shit together. This place is a mess.” I wouldn't be invited back. Rightly so. I mean, it's that how come sometimes it's so much easier for us to extend that grace and compassion and love to other people. But when it comes to how we are managing, loving, supporting ourselves, there's this bad neighborhood mentality.

Lauren: Yes, absolutely. And I think that's part of the gift of friendship too, is you know, you and I can call each other and say, Hey, this thing is happening in my life. Can you remind? Right? Can you remind me of the good love stuff? Absolutely. The good non-judgment stuff. Yeah.

Melinda: And it took about probably, if I were to count it, a good 5,000 invitations from beloved mentors, friends and loved ones in my life in the last 16 years, that when I would get into a space of, “I'm not getting things done, I'm behind in this, that and the other,” and I'd get the response of, “What if you just took a nap?” And it always felt like, where's that coming from? Because how many times do I have to hear that before it's the thing I know to do. Right? And for me, apparently it was a lot of times. But again, that's that base of permission. I think it's another place our culture loves to be. It's extroverted, ambitious self. And so there's conflict that comes up in terms of I'm going against the flow of the rest of the salmon run. I'm not going to build an empire today. I'm going to find my bed.

Lauren: I love that. I want that to be a bumper sticker. Maybe we can make it one. So one thing I'm really excited about and would love to hear your experience with is you are writing a book right now. Yeah. And I am so in love with the concept of the book and you're actually finishing it. Very soon. So I'd love for you to talk a little bit about what it is.

Melinda: Sure. So all the way through my, um, my grief experience on any given day, I would kinda summarize my day for myself before I fell asleep at night with what would the title of the book be today. And you know, some days it was, you know, “Living in a shit storm known as grief” or I mean I have, I have a notebook, a three ring, just a spiral notebook that's got all kinds of just random… Like if I could summarize today in a sound bite. So I've had this book growing within me that I've, I've just noticed, been present to wanting to share my story partly because I am so grateful for every woman, every man who's written their story of how they survived after the loss of their young spouse. That was the gift that came to me. Any memoir that that showed up. So driving away from the emergency room, one of the things that just weighed heavy on my heart was this, this deep knowing that someone has done this before, someone knows how to do this. And I went on a quest to try and find those stories. That was food to my soul. Talk about food. That was food to my soul, to have stories of people that had experienced the loss. This is what they did. I loved the variety of reading. Even if it was somebody that this loss for them occurred in a different country, in a totally different culture. There was just information for me, felt helpful that, um, also made space for me to do my own thing that I, I borrowed some from what they experienced and what their wisdom was and also figured out that my way wasn't going to be their way. There isn't a, a matrix, a do this then do that to get through this cause this is life and it's messy and it's hard and I was going to have to do that for myself. So that was part of where tuning in, just scratching the dirt to try and find every story I could help me also know that I wanted to contribute my story because I wanted to give back to that, that cannon of hope that I just so appreciate it. So one of the things that, that I realized is as I went through my last experiences that, and maybe people know this because they've had experiences themselves that when someone you love dies, you are showered with gifts and kindnesses from your community hopefully. And that shows up in the form of dishes, brought over food, flowers, kindnesses like gift cards or actual gifts, you know, smelly hand lotions and all kinds of thoughtful, sweet things. And then the expectation is that you will be a kind and polite person and send a thank you note for that generosity that's been shared with you. And I had tons of generosity and beautiful gifts and kindness is shared with me and I could not bring myself to write a single thank you note, not because I wasn't grateful, but because I was completely overwhelmed with a 20 day old infant and a two and a half year old boy. I realized as I've been trying to write this book all these years, it finally came to me that the way I want to tell my story is through finally writing those thank you notes to the people that have meant so much in my grief and loss, but also the people that helped create my world. I'm writing a thank you letter to James Taylor for writing the first song that David and I ever danced to. So it's part of how I'm sharing my gratitude for artists, friends, people that have again created the world that I live in and all the ways that those elements are, um, part of my, my loss and part of my life.

Lauren: I love that you wrote this book. I can't wait to read it. It's something that, you know, it's such an intimate way to know you and to know your grief journey and it's a gift to the people who really want and need to read it. And I, and I honestly think that's all of us because we all experienced loss and grief and so to look at it in this way, it's almost like looking at you doing your exercise of reflection and public so that we get it a model for to do that too.

Melinda: I hope so. Thank you. Yeah, I, I that's, that's the dream is that again, to add my experience, um, so that other people could have one more picture, one more story of how somebody did this and for right or wrong, again, cookie dough will be part of this, but so will, um, poems that have been just soul support, friends, camping trips, nature. I mean there's all kinds of stuff in there that have been part of my tools and I'm part of the things that I've wrestled with.

Lauren: What does it mean to you to live a fulfilling life and has that impacted by your health journey, that definition of fulfillment?

Melinda: Yes. Um, so my health journey definitely has impacted my, my experience of living a fulfilled life and at different snapshot moments in my life. I think my answer would be yes, and it's, it's sad and negative, but where I'm sitting today, I've just, there's a partnership I feel with my body, with my sweet little hypothyroid issue that is adding to the fulfillment because there's this deeper communication that my body and I have together about how, how are we going to do this day? How are we going to do this moment? And man, I don't know if that sounds silly, but it, it, it makes my life richer.

Lauren: That totally makes sense. So that for you helps you to feel fulfilled that relationship.

Melinda: Yeah, relationship with myself and with others. You know, it's, it's a definitely a fulfilling experience to be present to other people's struggles, successes and I, I'm always going to show up for that.

Lauren: That's so cool. Do you have any funny stories from your experience with your body?

Melinda: So one of the things that I think I've been able to laugh with myself at myself about is my experience of traumatic loss. PTSD is definitely part of, part of my experience. Um, physically, emotionally, just being able to work with my body around things that would trigger. And there was a day that the boys were really little and we were playing on the floor in my bedroom upstairs and there was a box fan that was actually still in its box and you know, box fans weigh, like not even a pound and it fell over the box fan and made a tiny little sound. But I scooped up my boys and ran like something dangerous. It just happened. And that quick response that my body, like “I'll get us to safety, don't worry about it.” And then getting to the bottom of the stairs with two boys in my one in each arm and realizing it's okay, “You’re all right. Wow. You're really in a, in a scary, sad place. You got startled.” So what helped me calm down the startled was to laugh. Just see the humor and wow. A little box fan falling over was enough to send me into like run for cover. I've just found that when that trigger happens, when those things show up, just humor. It can be a real gift.

Lauren: And it's so interesting too because when you were telling that story, I felt a lot of compassion and reverence and then I also totally got the shift you made. I can almost feel it in me as you said. And also it was kind of funny because it was just a little poof, you know, a little sound of the fan falling over and it, you know, helped you to reconnect with yourself and reground with your two sons with you and to just be able to laugh.

Melinda: They thought it was funny. Yeah. That's the other thing. The little toddlers, they were like, Wee, where are we going? That was fun Mom. So, um, and that the gift of those beautiful boys in the middle of, of all of this, that what bright lights and quick for humor and what support that was.

Lauren: Oh, that's so cool. What do you have now that you might not have had without your health challenges?

Melinda: The first word that comes to mind is compassion. Compassion for others and compassion for myself on a scale that I just, you know, talking about, um, my early childhood, even my teen experiences with asthma and the things that, that I experienced early and just how much shame, anger, frustration, feeling weird that, that how, um, how much that's changed with the hypothyroid piece, that’s just really deepening my relationship with myself. It has been a sideways beautiful gift.

Lauren: Finish the sentence. This is not what I ordered but…

Melinda: I thought I ordered the joy platter. I thought I ordered the joy only platter.

Lauren: Just joy. Thank you so much for joining me.

Melinda: Thank you for having me. It's been a just treasure of time with you.