Natalie (0:09)

All right. Welcome back everyone to another episode of Motivation N'at, but not new guests. I am welcoming back Jessica and Elizabeth from the Grieving Sisters. As you listened a few weeks ago, you might've heard we ran into some fun tech problems. So we switched platforms. We are back. We know where we left off and it's going to be a good follow-up because we were on route there starting to talk about some dark humor conversations.

Jessica had a story that got cut off halfway through. So we're going to go back to that and we're going to talk about grief and identity and shame and some of those other feelings. We really focused on anger and a lot of those numbness components from before. And I think this will really complement it well. So if you haven't listened to part one, head on back, get that one in the system and then come back and listen to this great discussion that the Grieving Sisters are going to have with us here on Motivation N'at. So let's just dive right in.

​

We had been discussing what it's like when you are dealing with the loss of someone and there's things you learn about them or you remember about them in those instances that actually bring happiness and joy back to you and that weird nostalgia phase. And Jess, you've been talking about being out at Copacabana.

 

Jessica (1:29)

Yes, and we actually talked about that in one of our episodes. And I was like, you know Liz, I never shared this story with you. I think this had to be 2007, 2008, she was still very young. It so happened that I worked with a lot of Natalie's friends and we were going out and I was like, Natalie, you're here? And she was like, yeah, girl, you know, whatever. And I'm like, my God, you're a baby, what do you know. I still see her as little Nat, you know? And we were out, we were partying, we had a good time. I was like, my God, you're so much fun. You're more fun than Elizabeth. Don't tell her I said that. It's like, you know, Liz and I, we're the ones that are close in age, and then Natalie's close in age with my sister. So it's like, but we still were hanging out. And I was like, oh my God, you're so fun. You're so cool. You're kind of cooler than your sister. And she was just like, what? And I was like, that's a compliment, girl. Don't tell me. But you know, it's all out of love because we were growing up together and we just really had a good time. We always had those fun memories.

 

Elizabeth (2:18)

Very true.

 

Jessica (2:26)

You know, again, growing up where we grew up, I feel like we were very close knit. Everybody knew each other. Everybody knew who's the siblings, where they lived, uptown, downtown, whatever. But like that was one of my stories. I still have one story that's not about Natalie, it's actually about Liz and I, but we have so many like an abundance of stories. There's just one I'm saving for a very, very good day.

 

Jessica (3:20)

A special episode, yes. Because it's just, it's us. It's just something that would be between us and that we would just find funny. Everyone else would be like, what?

 

Natalie (3:38)

Well, I think we've definitely seen at least via media that there are cultures where it's a celebration of life when that person passes and you have a drink and you go out and you reminisce with these stories. And yes, there may be sadness, but it doesn't mean you literally stop your smile or your laugh because laughter is medicine, right? So in those components, but after those things happen, I'm curious from your experiences, Liz. You talked about finding the coffee cup in the back of the cupboard and when it's gone, there's almost a bigger void at that point sometimes. And then you start getting into the feeling grief, the shame almost of like, how dare I be happy or how dare I laugh at that? And then you can end up in a snowball really quick sometimes.

​

I'm sure there's moments where it's like, I just don't even want to start thinking about it or hearing that story. But what are some of those moments, and it's the wave, right? We've all heard grief is like waves and it comes and it'll either wash out or you'll stand through it. How have those waves shown up in your lives over time where you think you're fine for one minute and the next, there I go.

 

Jessica (5:03)

Liz, you can go ahead.

 

Elizabeth (5:04)

Yeah, to be honest, I had something similar that happened to me just this week and it's such a simple thing, but it's also such a reminder for you to be kind to yourself and give yourself grace. I used to always paint my nails a certain color red. And every time I did them, my sister used to compliment me. And I used to always say, this red is called Boston University Red because that's where she did undergrad. So it was like our cute thing that I would always paint my nails that color and she would always compliment them. And I went to a nail salon that I've been going to and I just picked out a red and then I saw it was the same brand of that color that I used to use. And so for a second I was going to say, do you have this one or can I see the book again? But I did it and I felt so guilty. The color red was beautiful, it was a little bit darker and I really liked it and she was like, what a pretty color. And I was like, yeah. But the whole time I was getting my nails done, I was feeling guilty that I didn't do the color that was her favorite. And it's like, would she really care? No. But it was just something, your mind is somewhere totally different and just a bottle of nail polish can remind you of your sister. Because it looked exactly like the other one. And I was like, I should ask. But I really want this color. Just feeling guilty. And for a minute I was like, you know, this is really silly.

​

Take the moment and acknowledge a nice memory, which was that she loved this color on my nails. And I always thought of her when I did it because it was named after the university she went to. Enjoy that moment and also give yourself grace. Enjoy the moment. Don't beat yourself up for being sad and don't feel guilt for doing something nice, switching up your nail color, enjoying it. Thinking of your sister, acknowledging it, and then having grace, feeling a little sad about it.

 

Jessica (7:13)

I love that. For me, the shame part... I think it was in one of our episodes, and we put it out there, how grief starts to kick up other things that you need to work on in life. Whether it's childhood traumas and other grief that you kind of disassociated with. I started therapy and I was really working on my people pleasing and setting boundaries and starting to say no to people. But there was a lot of shame behind it because I'm like, how can I say no to people who are trying to get me to go out or get me to do things? I just couldn't say no because my brother's not here. He can't celebrate. So I definitely felt a lot of shame.

​

There was a wonderful book that my therapist recommended, and shout out to Barb. It's called Healing the Shame that Binds You. And it is such a gem of a book. There are baby aha moments in each section. But there is one that talks about grief and how it can be shame based because of the fact that you are moving on without this person. Why are you moving on? Like you didn't grieve long enough. Why are you even having a child? Why are you having a baby shower and your brother's not here? Although we put a table for my brother and my husband's dad, we had a remembrance table. But I think I felt a lot of the shame because I'm like, my brother never had children and I'm here having children. Who do I think I am?

​

You know, like, I have a child, who do I think I am? And I think the real undercover shame of it all is that it comes down to self-worth. And then it goes down into other attributes that are internal that you need to work on when it comes with the grief. Now it's just like everything's a mishmash. So now you're really trying to figure out, okay, is this really coming from grief or the inner work that I need to work on within myself?

 

Elizabeth (9:37)

I also think it's a little bit of survivor's remorse. I think me and Jess have a little bit of that. Out of the siblings, why the youngest? The oldest, why not the youngest? And it's complex, trying to think of those things, why them and not me and all this. I should be living my life a certain way because we have the opportunity to and they don't.

 

Natalie (10:05)

Yeah, and we're definitely going to get into survivor's guilt because I think the other part of shame is also if you're not outwardly grieving sometimes. I had two losses so early that as losses continued, that weren't as close as my dad or any of those things, I got over it quick. Like I was just like, eh. And you haven't hit the urgency level. And so people around me would be grieving someone, like when my grandma died and I was just like, okay, she's 103. So I had justified it in my brain that it was much different than my 52 year old dad. And I was fine with it. I was like, this is my journey. I'm good. But do I need to pretend like I'm feeling more because other people are kind of wondering why I'm at work a day later?

​

But it goes back to what we talked about really early on, that we don't know everyone's circumstances. We don't know what they're using for their distraction or any of those pieces. Which great segue into the survivor's guilt conversation, because the element in it, it's not just around suicide. I think we've heard it the most around suicide or traumas that you survived the actual incident and the other person didn't, active shooters, car wrecks, those types of things. But there's an element, and I guess I apply my experience... I had an ex who battled with addiction and we had broken up, but we were always close. We always stayed in touch and he wanted to go to rehab. We were going to put him on a plane back to Pennsylvania, get him in rehab. Day of the flight, no one can get him up, got him up, couldn't find an ID, couldn't get him on the plane.

​

He ended up not dying of an overdose. He got hit on his bicycle, a traumatic accident, a couple months later. But the thought process of, you weren't even supposed to be there. We weren't supposed to do that. We were going to get help. And that was a tough experience. And I think that's also an element of should I have done more. And where that comes in. What are some of the reflections that your guests or your own personal folks that you know have been through, on how they've managed some of that internal conflict?

 

Jessica (12:36)

I could bring up Natalie. I think Natalie, with Xavier, her brother committed suicide. He was in our graduating class. She was just like, he was battling mental health and they tried everything. And there's only so much that you can do. One thing that she said was journaling. And that's been kind of the mainstream, I want to say. But then we also had intuitive healers on, from a medium to Miguel from breathwork. I always bring up Miguel. His breathwork is amazing. We had Agatha on and it's always about, you know, grief is in the lungs. We have to learn how to do breathwork and breathe better. So these are some of the tools that have been almost mainstream. I feel like it's been more the journaling, like they said, trying to do things to remember them by, certain things, aspects like that.

 

Elizabeth (13:45)

Yeah, I think definitely part of the survivor's guilt is that we're here and they're not here anymore. So I think a big part of that is bridging the gap between not so much we're here and they're not here, but how to still foster a relationship between us. If you still really try to keep the relationship growing in a sense, then I think it feels less like you're a survivor of this life and they aren't. And I'm working on it. I'm still working on it. But I think we had a guest, Rashma. She has three children and she lost her husband to suicide. And from following her journey and interviewing with her and keeping in touch with her, I see that she's doing that for her kids with her husband and for herself with her husband. And I feel like that's probably the best way.

​

Is to sort of keep them alive in a sense, especially within the relationship. And I think we had somebody on last week that said, just because their life on this earth ended, their relationship didn't end.

 

Natalie (15:00)

I think it's a beautiful perspective to lay on it because we tend to think of the past as a very closed book and you're left with what ifs. But if you see it in a way that you can still cultivate, whether it's your perspective on the relationship or changing and you're looking back with regret and saying, okay, but what did we do that did benefit, that did get us the time that we had together, that did contribute. It's a little bit of that flipping of the frame in the conversation.

​

Just to flip back to dark humor for a second. Since I've interviewed with you all and had the grief kind of on threads, my algorithm is obviously updated. I thought of you the other day and probably some of the listeners may have even seen it, it popped off a little bit. There was a post to the grief community about what was the one strange thing you did after your loss. And the responses were, I have to say, almost cathartic to listen to. Someone bottled a bit of bath water that the child had been in when they had a medical event and they still have it. A can of soup that they were planning to eat that night is still on the shelf. And then there was one who said she read her husband's coroner's report. They told her not to. She sat in the car, read it. And there was a comment, the anus was unremarkable. And all she could think about was how hysterical he would find that statement. And she started laughing and then she started crying. And then it was this whole... So I think it just brought out that repeating story that there's no right way. There's no one thing that all of us end up grieving over. There's no one trigger. There's no one token that you keep.

​

But I did want to ask, Liz, you mentioned folks bringing ornaments to the holidays, but as you've been potentially going through some more of their things or looking back at mementos, are there items that you have really treasured or that maybe are very unique to you? That one special thing that you like to keep of that person. Because I think it just helps us all feel a little more comfortable with the weird thing that reminds us of who we may have lost.

 

Elizabeth (17:29)

So for my sister, her makeup bag. She had a makeup bag with all the makeup that she would wear. And I have a vanity and it has two drawers under the mirror. And one of them is all her makeup that was inside her bag. Like I opened her makeup bag and I dumped everything in there. And I swear, every once in a while I'll be here and I'll be like, damn, I don't have an eyebrow pencil. And I'll be like, sis, and I'll open it. And I'll be like, I'm just going to use this. It's almost like I feel like she's going to catch me and I'm going to get in trouble because all of it's expensive. And then if I put it in a different part of my vanity, I'll make sure it goes back in there because it's like her stuff. Where's my eyeliner? I wore a pair of earrings, one of them I couldn't find, that was hers. And I was like, have you seen this earring? And I was like, my God, it's like I feel like she's going to catch me and be like, where's my other earring? You know? So it's kind of like this funny sister dynamic where I'm like, I feel like she's going to catch me.

​

And she wouldn't care. But it's sort of that funny sister dynamic. What do you do with all of somebody's makeup? I can't just dump it in the garbage and I can't just let it sit there. So I'm like, okay, I'll use a little bit of it. Most of the stuff I'm not going to touch anymore because now it's too old. But pencils and things, I try to use them and act like I'm borrowing from her in a sense.

 

Natalie (19:11)

Jess, anything for you from your dad or your brother?

 

Jessica (19:16)

A friend of mine had sent me something, they do this Victorian locket that you can actually take the person's hair and put it in, like one of those Victorian frames. I thought it was beautiful. She was like, no. I almost cut my sister's hair, but I didn't do it. I was like, I think this would have been amazing. So as for my brother, believe it or not, I have a Tupperware. I just threw everything in there. The hospital, they give you the bag with their clothes that they still wore. And I actually have that. But when I did peek inside of it, the toe tag was there and I was just like, oh man, I'm not ready for this. And it's so funny. It's been in there for seven years. As for my dad, I did put some stuff that was his, like a tie. But again, there's a book called Nobody Wants Your Shit and it's like the Swedish death cleaning. What do you do with all this stuff? What do you keep? How do you have this attachment?

​

But I do have a Tupperware with my brother's jacket that he always wore and inside the jacket was a pack of cigarettes. I still have the pack. It's in the jacket, it's in there. And he used to always walk around with this briefcase. What's in it? Junk papers, old like taxes or just stuff. But it was just the principle of him having that briefcase, you know? And that's the only thing that I kept. As for my dad, he lived in assisted living. So all of his stuff was in his apartment. And that's a whole other story for another day. His apartment was on fire. I really couldn't grab anything. The one thing I would have grabbed of his would have been his Bible because he was a deacon and that was one of his blessed things. But I didn't grab it. It was lost in the fire, which was fine. But I just feel like I have a lot of pictures and that's something I hold near and dear. And I have all the birthday cards and Christmas cards and graduation cards that my dad gave me, with his handwriting on them.

​

I'm still trying to look for, and I know it's in one of the boxes, I don't know where. But when my mom was pregnant with me, his mom died in Ghana. So my dad had to fly to Ghana and basically my mom was giving birth to me by herself. But my dad sent her a postcard, let me know how it's going, I'll try to call you when I can. And it was just this cute little card. I've saved that. And again, when do you go through this stuff? And then it's like, when you go through it year one, you go through it year two and you're like, whoa, I didn't see this picture. This was here and it's in the same stacks. So yeah, those are the two things. And then for both of them, since they're both cremated, I actually got these chains made. My brother has an angel wing and I got my dad a cross and they put their ashes in them. So I have it in my living room on top of their frame.

 

Natalie (23:19)

Yeah, and I was just thinking back while you were talking, what do I have of my dad's. He had remarried and there was not really anything left. My mom had purged his memory and my stepmom kept just about everything else. But there had been a chest, he had gone to West Point, been in the army for a few years, and his chest from West Point had just been in the basement for the longest time. My mom found it when she went to move years after he died. And it still had his engineering books. It still had like an order for a radio in it. So those are on our bookshelf. I put legs on the chest and now it's a little coffee table in my office and it still has his name tag on it with his last name. So it's like weirdly preserved for being in an old farmhouse's basement for a lot of years.

​

But it's fun. I always found it funny, like, it's the thing everyone forgot about and it's the one thing I got to keep. And then I'm one of those, I got handwriting tattooed. There was a little family tree he had written and this man, bless him, wrote himself as Mr. Wonderful on the family tree. I got Mr. Wonderful tattooed on my arm because he had the fanciest handwriting for a man you would never believe. So it was to carry with me. It's so unique that there's not a whole lot of chests out there from the 1970s. So it will definitely be there for the rest of time. But like you said, even when I go through what's in there occasionally, I've been like, why did I keep this torn paper that has nothing on it? And parsing some of that out over time.

​

So on these grief journeys that we're on, Liz, yours is newer, Jessica, yours has kind of come back around with your dad. But have you found that you are able to pick up on different kinds of grief a little bit more? My big one is, we were talking before we started recording, changing jobs, leaving a job that you were so emotionally connected to. And everyone was just like, why am I having such a hard time? And I said, you are grieving. You are grieving your community. You are grieving these people and what you thought was going to be your future. But do you notice that more in other people now when they're like, I can't put my finger on what it is, and you're like, that's a version of grief?

 

Jessica (25:51)

Yeah, I actually spoke with Roseanne, and Liz I didn't get an opportunity to tell you. She's like, Jess, I think I'm dealing with delayed grief. Her brother had passed and then her father a year later. And it was maybe a week after the brother's year to date. And she said, Jess, I'm dealing with delayed grief. I said, I knew that was going to happen. Like I'm here. I'll check in with you. And especially anticipatory grief, right? I feel like we've become so much more educated in it that we're just like, there it is. This is what this is, especially with the job stuff.

 

Elizabeth (27:03)

Yeah, I think I'm sensitive to other people going through things now. Once you've had a very serious loss in your life, some things seem very silly to worry about and some things you really understand. I was thinking lately, people who have lost family members or lost siblings, you don't realize how hard it is. I don't think I understood what Jess was going through until it happened to me. And it's like, you really don't know. So now that you know what it feels like when somebody loses a parent or a child or a sibling or someone who's really important to them or got fired from a job, you're kind of like, wow, I understand. I understand what you're going through, especially when you have compounded grief, multiple losses that happen over time or in a cluster. It happens to a lot of people where if their parents are elderly, the mom will come and then the dad will go soon after. And I always wonder about those people losing both of their parents and feeling sort of orphaned in that way. So yeah, my heart really goes out. I feel like I'm much more able to understand that sort of grief now.

 

Jessica (28:36)

And that's the other thing too, like we're in our grief but also trying to give compassion to other people because they've never been through that. But then it reels in the shame too because it's like, shame on me for trying to give other people the benefit of the doubt. I'm the one grieving. I'm the one that lost someone. Eventually they're going to lose someone. Why am I feeling sorry that because they didn't experience that they don't know how to react? All you have to do is be human and have kindness and have compassion. It's universal. You can say it in any language. You could say it in any country. It's universal.

 

Natalie (29:16)

I think I've had to learn, especially with the delayed waves that hit. I'll feel like I'm doing really well and then something huge will happen. And first person I think of is my dad. Like up to the wedding when I got married just a couple of years ago and I was like, man, my dad. And I've had to take those moments to be selfish and to just say, you're not going to get it. And that's okay. I need this and I'm telling you at this moment, this is what I need. All I want is the respect. And I know you guys said that last time. Respect what the other person is experiencing, because we're never all going to experience it the same, even with both of you losing siblings. It's not the same exact piece.

 

Elizabeth (29:59)

And I always think, don't think somebody's okay just because they look okay. Social media is a joke. If somebody looked at my social media, they'd be like, one minute this girl's super sick over her sister passing, and the next minute she's posting a funny video or she's doing a TikTok ad. And I don't want people to ever look at me and think, she's fine, she's doing okay. Because maybe church was really good that day. Maybe my medication kicks in at the right time. Maybe I had a really fun day, maybe something really great happened. Like you really don't know. And what I understand about grief is one minute somebody's super happy and then they could be crying or they could have cried for two hours that morning. So it makes me say, if this person had a loss, I'm never going to be the one that says, well, they're handling this really well. You have no idea until you reach out and say, how are you doing? Hey, what's going on? You really don't.

 

Natalie (31:06)

And can we just acknowledge a little bit of the toxicity of you're handling this really well, because of the stigma that it places that there's a right way to handle things. And by the way, the right way is you're holding yourself together and you're probably holding everyone else around you together.

 

Jessica (31:20)

We don't have a choice. Especially when you have a family, you have children, you're a caretaker for someone else. You don't know other people's situations. And I'll just piggyback off of Liz, social media is not real life. People are just posting highlights. I could sit there and be posting, my God, I'm having the time of my life. And I'm actually sitting here in tears. I just need to post something because I need the dopamine. I need someone to share likes and share something in the comments so that I can feel better about myself because I'm sitting here crying my eyes out, loathing about life. My brother's not here. My dad's not here. But again, very grateful, you brought up a wedding. I was very grateful that my dad and my brother were able to be at my wedding. I didn't even want a wedding, believe it or not. We were going to elope. But now looking back almost 10 years later, we're so grateful. We don't even care what we spent because we have these beautiful pictures and videos of my dad and my brother, of Roseanne's brother and his dad, and people that have passed on. My aunt Rosie. There was just a lot of people who've passed on that we have these pictures of and they look so happy.

​

They said they had the best time of their life. We got calls the next day that their feet were hurting because they danced so much. And I always get, wow, you're the strongest one. Like you're such a strong woman. You've really been through it. You're so resilient. You really adapt to adversity so fast. I don't have a choice, right? Because I will never survive in society. Nobody's going to do it for you. You have to find that inner strength to do it. But I'm just the queen of dissociation. I love to compartmentalize. That's my favorite. That's why I do well at my job. But in the same token, it's kind of like having to take the time out to address that grief. It's again shame based, and do it in private where people can't see it. I have shed my tears. That's the only way that we know. And then we've also talked about, is that something that we are accustomed to? My grandfather died and I was like, why is everybody crying? Pop-pop's in heaven. I was five and they're trying to help me understand emotion. And I'm like, he's just in heaven, he's sleeping. So is this something that by society you're supposed to cry, you're supposed to do this? Like who set these standards?

 

Natalie (34:30)

And then applies them blanketly across different cultures and different worlds. So I think one of the last things I want to make sure to hit on, and again how time gets away from us when we're recording, is the idea of grief and identity and the loss of things. My dad died when I was 18. I ended up going into the same industry he was in. I always said I wouldn't. And I ended up in the same general vicinity. So somehow I thought I wouldn't run into people that he knew. But I would be in the middle of an interview and the person would look at me and go, oh, you're Bob's daughter. Or they would put two and two together with my last name and they'd be like, Bob Bulger's Natalie? And I would just be like, yes. And it was this weird moment of confliction. It was like, that's amazing that he made such an impact on you that you're having this joyful moment. And then I also went, I'm no longer Natalie. I am now Bob's daughter. And this whole conversation will now be about Bob and how proud he would be of me or a story you had. And I wanted to hear it. And then it would be after the fact, I would just be like, am I ever going to be anything other than Bob's daughter?

​

Because he got frozen in time. And when he was frozen, he was still this magnanimous CEO that everyone respected and appreciated. So are you, do you experience some of that same thing? That instant linkage sometimes for folks that know you've been through loss is almost even a question of, how are you doing, how have things been. And so almost like people define those milestones for you now because you have this triggered event that is very important in their mind, even if that day it's actually not for you.

 

Jessica (36:34)

That's really something to think about. Liz, go ahead.

 

Elizabeth (36:43)

I'm trying to think of what to...

 

Jessica (36:44)

Because the thing is, I think for me, I worked in the high school where I graduated from. And my brother also went to school in the district too. So some people would come up to me and be like, hey, how are you holding up? But people who really knew me, they knew February was a tough month and they'll come and say, hey girl. And I have some of them on social media and they would see something in my story or something and they would be like, you know, how are you holding up today? With the identity, I totally understand where you're coming from with that because of the loss. I think more or less the loss of identity for me was just who I was before and who I am now. We've talked about zero tolerance. There's just a lot of things that I just don't have the energy for, I'm not tolerating this anymore. Not the old let's party party party, let's get wasted anymore. Things like that. But as for the identity shift, I'll be known as the bereaved sister or a bereaved daughter, but that's the extent of it. I can think of someone because Roseanne, we did an episode and I'll send you the link. Her dad was a big person in Toastmasters. And then she started to continue in Toastmasters. And in her story, she actually goes into how they were like, my God, Tony Santos, that's your dad. Like he was my mentor. She was very proud. It didn't turn into almost like, well, I'm only known as being Tony Santos' daughter. This is the legacy that he left behind and I'm going to move forward with that.

 

Natalie (38:54)

Yeah. And I think it's one of those, it's the hot mess piece for me of the whole thing. Because again, I love, I went to my dad's 50th West Point reunion. His entire class asked me to take his place and go with them. So I went. I sat on the guys' bus. It was amazing. There were so many people I had never met before who spent four years with him, were deployed with them, all those things. And in the same sense, there was a part of me that was so mad he never shared those stories. It goes back, Liz, to kind of the anger part. And I would listen and then I was like, I think I'm holding their grief right now. Like obviously the moment they saw me, they would think back. He had a friend that was his executor of the will. He has his own level of grief over how things were managed. It just, I've at one point said, I'm just going to be a sponge. I'm just going to take it. I've had 20 years to prep for this and they're all together in a weird, huge grief pool now because it wasn't just my dad. There were other guys too that had obviously been lost.

​

And you know, you're prepared to handle that for once, but it also came with all of these other unexpected things. What you mentioned earlier, Jessica, the things that start to uncover that you weren't anticipating. And it was a long drive home from New York after that, just taking all of it in. But I think also, no one intends to redefine you at that point. They don't intend to be like, Liz, Natalie's sister, or any of those things. It's almost for them their processing capability of registering.

 

Jessica (40:40)

I'm not known as Sean's sister because I'm the older sister anyway. Some people will be like, yeah, Sean was your sister, you know, I'll get that once in a while. But it will be more towards his friends and things like that, because I think our community was a little different when it came to that.

 

Natalie (40:58)

Yeah. And it's always, I think, as we become more aware of how we interact with people that have been through losses too, that grace that just keeps coming back, right? If that sets someone off because you walk in and you're like, how are you doing, I know it's Christmas, and they're like, I have been trying so hard not to think about this and now you've said it. Now I'm on edge. But if we're not honest enough to talk to each other about it, we continue to put grief in the dark corners of the room and we continue to hide the components of it.

​

I just want to thank you both for bringing to the light the conversations around all of these different complexities of grief. Because we can read every book, we can watch every movie where it happens. It's still never going to prepare us for what the journey looks like. And every time, to your point, that we get a compounded grief, the next loss that comes, it changes then what that picture looks like. So I want to thank you guys. I want to give you a chance now that we've had two sessions to share anything you've done, some additional recordings, where is the Grieving Sisters going from here? What do you see as the future of what you've started, the podcast itself, where do you hope this conversation overall takes us as we go forward?

 

Elizabeth (42:24)

I think that the Grieving Sisters was something so beautiful that was created in Jessica's mind out of her understanding the grief that she was going through and knowing what I was about to go through and saying, hey, I have this idea. Not sure if you're ready for it, but this is what I'm thinking. And when we started kind of writing for the show and thinking about what we want, it was always like, how could we take care of this community? And I think that's what we've been wanting to do. What did we want when we were hit with this devastating loss? And I think our mission has really been about finding other resources. Jessica is a professional in her field. I'm in real estate. So for me, I can only speak to my experience, understanding my process. There are certain griefs that we are like, this is mind blowing, like a parent losing a child, or suicide or drug abuse, things that we haven't had directly in our family. But we know that somewhere there's somebody with a broken heart because of it. So I think what we would like is more exposure and just to build this community of resources to be able to kind of send this out and to keep conversations honest.

​

I think what people really enjoy and why we've had such tremendous growth is that we're honest and we're real. We're pissed off about something that happened, whether it's our workplace or friends who we thought we were friends or partners. I had an engagement end not even a month after. So we're honest. You can be angry. You can have 400 stages of grief. It doesn't have to be five stages. But I think, Jess, if I left anything out, I think it's about growth, giving resources, and just making this community bigger and bigger to where, as Jess said from the first episode, grief doesn't need to be taboo. We want to make talking about grief like talking about anything that has to do with your life or your day.

 

Jessica (44:46)

And it should be because it's normal. I mean, as we lost our siblings, it was out of the norm. It's not your Lion King, like parents pass and that's the circle of life. But as for the Grieving Sisters, actually this month we make a year of episodes. We already have 50 episodes out. We have probably like eight or nine more in the can that are already done. And then we're just continuously, the things that we're trying to get out. I just want people to grieve in the way that they know how, but in a healthy way. Because it is very easy, at least for me, to go. Especially it happened for me in February 2019 and then March 2020, where were we? COVID. So it's like, wine and let's go party and all this other stuff. And it's like, that's not healthy. Healthier ways, go to the gym, go work out, start a nonprofit. Some people want to go see mediums. So we're trying to still keep in our niche with sibling loss. Because once you start to open it up to all losses, everybody has a loss. So we try to keep it within the niche, but it's like, okay, what helped you get through? We have another woman, she's down from Georgia, she wants to drive up to be on because she lost her fiance, but her faith is what has been keeping her going. So we haven't really had a really heavy faith based episode. Let's hear it. How can we help our audience in healthy ways to cope with grief? And that obviously ties in with my profession. And then it also helps Liz too, because I feel like some people she would have never met. And again, I'll bring up Miguel's name. His breathwork is really phenomenal. Where do we see ourselves? I don't know. At this point, we're just, as Barb would say, mosying along, and we'll see what the future holds.

 

Natalie (47:23)

Well, I want to thank you again. I know I said it last episode. I've said it a couple of times this time around for the space. In episode one, I shared my complex grief that I've never talked about really publicly. And after we were done with that, I talked to my husband about the day that it flipped and I decided I wasn't at least going to be ashamed of it. I wasn't ready to talk about it, but I wasn't going to be ashamed of it. And that whole process, I never would have done that had podcasting not brought together safe people who don't know each other historically. The place to have conversations without judgment, with exploration, with safety, even if it's in a virtual environment. I just can't thank you enough because I think it opens a lot of doors for people because they're things that don't often come out to be talked about in a way that doesn't have a judgment layer associated with it.

​

You're putting that just so important and thank you for kind of being one of the groups paving the way to do that. I think it's incredibly special.

 

Jessica (48:45)

Thank you. You are so sweet, absolutely. And thank you so much for everything and having us on. Sometimes it's a little hard for us because we're used to being on the other side.

​

Natalie (49:01)

Well, thank you for being here everyone. Just like the last one, the shows they mentioned will be in the show notes. You can find the Grieving Sisters on Instagram, on Threads, on YouTube to see and experience these conversations that they're talking about. Go give them a follow. Even if you don't feel like you need it now, you never know when you might. And there's all kinds of resources there for you. And we hope that you come back again soon for another episode of Motivation N'at. Thanks everyone.

 

Elizabeth (49:29)

Thank you.