Full Transcript for E22. Adjusting to Change

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WEBVTT 00:00:03.359 --> 00:00:11.039 Welcome to the Sadie Green Story about an older adult looking back on her abusive childhood. 00:00:11.279 --> 00:00:17.359 It's a conversation between Sadie and myself, Pam Colby, her longtime friend. 00:00:17.760 --> 00:00:22.000 We are exploring how early trauma can affect a lifetime. 00:00:22.640 --> 00:00:24.480 Thanks for joining us. 00:00:26.320 --> 00:00:27.440 So here we are. 00:00:27.760 --> 00:00:34.320 Sadie and I have been talking a lot about what it's like to come to the end of this podcast. 00:00:34.640 --> 00:00:48.719 Coming down the exit ramp and just feeling all the feelings about what we've been through, making it and hearing this story and trying to figure out how to tell it to you, our listeners. 00:00:49.439 --> 00:01:03.759 And I guess uh one of the biggest things we've been talking about is how Sadie's dealing with her feelings about being part of this podcast and in general where you're at in your life right now. 00:01:05.280 --> 00:01:06.560 What am I feeling? 00:01:07.120 --> 00:01:13.280 Well, right now I'm a little nervous, but there's been a whole gamut of feelings while doing this. 00:01:13.840 --> 00:01:25.680 And it's hard to know what's related to the podcast and connecting with that history and what is related to other things going on. 00:01:27.120 --> 00:01:29.599 But it's certainly a different time of my life. 00:01:31.120 --> 00:01:34.319 We've been working on this project for about two years. 00:01:35.200 --> 00:01:37.760 And it began shortly after I retired. 00:01:38.879 --> 00:01:48.959 And during the disillusion or divorce of my long-term relationship, I also started meeting with a great therapist. 00:01:49.599 --> 00:01:57.040 So the big feeling overall is change and adjusting to change. 00:01:58.000 --> 00:02:01.760 Learning a lot about myself and loss. 00:02:03.120 --> 00:02:06.400 Just to go to the piece about your being retired. 00:02:07.359 --> 00:02:14.879 A lot of people I think couldn't relate to that because there's a fear of retirement of how valid am I? 00:02:15.120 --> 00:02:16.879 How does society view me? 00:02:17.280 --> 00:02:18.719 Am I invisible? 00:02:19.840 --> 00:02:24.719 Well, I've always been a worker and I've always prioritized my work. 00:02:25.919 --> 00:02:29.520 Much of my life has been working with vulnerable people. 00:02:30.159 --> 00:02:35.680 I worked in a shelter for homeless women and kids for twelve years. 00:02:36.800 --> 00:02:41.039 I was a city bus driver in Duluth for twelve years. 00:02:41.680 --> 00:02:53.120 And then I worked in a nonprofit here in Minneapolis where we worked with folks with mental health disabilities, physical disabilities, or both. 00:02:54.479 --> 00:03:04.240 I think a gift that I have is I can see unfairness or there's a way that people are comfortable with me. 00:03:04.800 --> 00:03:10.800 I used to do the initial assessments for bringing new clients into our organization. 00:03:11.360 --> 00:03:14.479 I would meet with them and we would develop a goal plan. 00:03:14.639 --> 00:03:19.680 So I would be the first one to meet people who had never met any of us before. 00:03:20.400 --> 00:03:34.719 And I think I was really good at that because in part I've always thought that because I have a birth defect in the middle of my face, I'm recognizable as an outsider to people who feel like outsiders. 00:03:35.919 --> 00:03:42.879 And I think there was a way that I could meet people where they are or accept people where they are. 00:03:43.360 --> 00:03:44.639 And people trust you. 00:03:44.960 --> 00:03:50.080 Yeah, it was just a gift that I innately feel like I was given. 00:03:51.280 --> 00:03:58.000 I also understand how people that are doing well do not need things to change. 00:03:58.240 --> 00:04:03.360 And usually those are the same people that have the most power to make change. 00:04:03.840 --> 00:04:11.520 Folks who have the least amount of power living on the edge, they're the ones that need the most change. 00:04:11.759 --> 00:04:13.360 And I've known that all my life. 00:04:13.439 --> 00:04:14.400 I've always known that. 00:04:14.560 --> 00:04:17.439 That's just a core reality for me. 00:04:18.000 --> 00:04:26.399 Can you talk more about how work has been part of your grief process or not part of your grief process? 00:04:26.800 --> 00:04:29.759 You do sometimes feel unmoored. 00:04:31.040 --> 00:04:34.079 You know, work gives you structure, it gives you other people. 00:04:34.879 --> 00:04:38.079 I got a lot of my validation, certainly, from work. 00:04:39.120 --> 00:04:45.120 I've also been lucky to work in settings that are very much community. 00:04:45.360 --> 00:04:48.319 And I think community is just a basic need. 00:04:49.360 --> 00:04:59.199 And that visceral connection with people I would not have met otherwise, you know, of different ages, different cultures, different life experiences. 00:04:59.439 --> 00:05:00.959 All that is a loss. 00:05:01.199 --> 00:05:02.879 And I liked my coworkers. 00:05:02.959 --> 00:05:05.040 I had a lot of respect for my coworkers. 00:05:05.519 --> 00:05:14.000 We really had a mission as being conduits between that power that we had and the people who had very little. 00:05:15.040 --> 00:05:17.839 We meet every month since I left. 00:05:18.079 --> 00:05:22.720 First we met at a coffee shop that's now evolved into a book club. 00:05:23.120 --> 00:05:29.360 You've done jobs where you're visible to lots of people and super helpful to lots of people. 00:05:29.600 --> 00:05:32.319 And here you are looking inward. 00:05:32.959 --> 00:05:47.759 And I'm wondering how do you think that has impacted your ability to focus on yourself and see who you are without all this validation from the outside world? 00:05:48.240 --> 00:05:48.959 Well, time. 00:05:49.279 --> 00:05:55.199 Time is precious, and I've just never had this kind of time. 00:05:55.839 --> 00:06:02.480 I'm lucky to be really healthy, but

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I do have close friends who are not as healthy. 00:06:02.800 --> 00:06:10.959 So I do there are some commitments that I still maintain where I'm uh a helper, but I think that's important. 00:06:11.759 --> 00:06:17.120 I'm also spending a lot of time taking care of myself. 00:06:17.279 --> 00:06:22.800 I have an exercise routine every day, I meditate, I try and write something every day. 00:06:23.040 --> 00:06:26.399 I spend a lot more time alone and I feel things. 00:06:26.560 --> 00:06:31.279 I'm more aware of my body, I'm w more aware of how I feel. 00:06:32.240 --> 00:06:39.600 And while I talk about my grief, I also have this richness in my life. 00:06:39.920 --> 00:06:49.680 And there's a way of just appreciating people and appreciating, you know, these pink flocks that are I'm looking at right now outside my window. 00:06:50.079 --> 00:06:51.040 Life is good. 00:06:51.199 --> 00:06:54.000 You can find that by yourself, you know, alone. 00:06:54.240 --> 00:06:56.879 I did know it as a child, actually. 00:06:57.120 --> 00:06:58.240 I did know that. 00:06:58.399 --> 00:07:07.360 And that's what saved me, that world beauty, the wind and the rain and the chipmunks and the you know, what was around me. 00:07:07.519 --> 00:07:09.519 That is what comforted me. 00:07:10.079 --> 00:07:12.240 Can I ask you with your therapy? 00:07:12.480 --> 00:07:24.399 Because I've heard talk that talk therapy isn't always the total answer, that there's also ways of dealing with your body or alternative. 00:07:24.800 --> 00:07:29.839 I don't know, Mamie, for you it's the exercising every day and the meditation. 00:07:30.079 --> 00:07:31.439 Do you think that's true? 00:07:31.600 --> 00:07:34.079 That there's gotta be more than just talk therapy? 00:07:34.399 --> 00:07:37.120 Yeah, somatic therapy about the body. 00:07:37.279 --> 00:07:38.959 I've always loved to dance. 00:07:39.199 --> 00:07:43.680 Dancing has been one of my greatest pleasures. 00:07:44.160 --> 00:07:45.519 And I still do that. 00:07:45.680 --> 00:07:48.480 In fact, I go to dance church every Sunday. 00:07:48.800 --> 00:07:59.040 And I think moving your body is something that in every culture throughout time has been a type of healing. 00:07:59.279 --> 00:08:05.519 Just this movement, this back and forth, this rhythm, this drum, this it's a healing. 00:08:05.680 --> 00:08:08.399 You know, this dance church that I go to every week. 00:08:08.560 --> 00:08:14.480 It's a huge dance room, probably a hundred people, all ages, genders. 00:08:15.040 --> 00:08:19.040 There's a rule that you can't talk on the dance floor. 00:08:19.360 --> 00:08:24.959 And that really adds something because everybody's in their own world. 00:08:25.199 --> 00:08:26.720 And people do crazy things. 00:08:26.879 --> 00:08:31.839 They're on the floor, they're they do whatever they feel like as far as movement. 00:08:32.159 --> 00:08:39.039 And it's so freeing, and you don't have to worry about what people are thinking or whether there's somebody to dance with. 00:08:39.200 --> 00:08:40.799 I mean, it's not about that at all. 00:08:41.039 --> 00:08:42.320 It's just movement. 00:08:42.879 --> 00:08:47.440 Even if I don't feel like it, I go and I always feel better afterwards. 00:08:47.840 --> 00:08:48.159 Yeah. 00:08:48.399 --> 00:08:54.320 That's a great answer to the body needing to heal itself in different ways. 00:08:54.639 --> 00:08:56.559 Yeah, there's so much we don't know. 00:08:56.799 --> 00:08:57.200 Mm-hmm. 00:08:57.360 --> 00:09:02.879 And so much that maybe we're led to without knowing we're being led. 00:09:03.360 --> 00:09:07.840 I think our bodies try and heal themselves somehow. 00:09:08.320 --> 00:09:09.120 Survival. 00:09:09.360 --> 00:09:10.080 Yeah, yeah. 00:09:10.159 --> 00:09:17.440 It's a some people see it as God or a power greater than themselves that is, let it go. 00:09:17.600 --> 00:09:18.559 I'm being led. 00:09:18.720 --> 00:09:24.799 I just need to live in the moment, and it's gonna figure itself out, and I don't have to fix everything. 00:09:24.960 --> 00:09:29.840 It's a natural, our bodies are gonna help us whether we know it or not. 00:09:30.240 --> 00:09:38.240 One of the things that we don't get to in the podcast is your relationship with your mother and father later in life. 00:09:38.399 --> 00:09:44.000 There is in the podcast you talking to your father at one point as an adult. 00:09:44.320 --> 00:09:52.080 But how did the final years, your mother's now deceased, how were the final years with her? 00:09:52.240 --> 00:09:54.720 I know you had very limited contact. 00:09:55.120 --> 00:09:56.399 I stopped visiting them. 00:09:56.559 --> 00:10:02.960 I visited them probably half a dozen times between the age of 21 and 40, maybe. 00:10:03.279 --> 00:10:06.799 And there was only one time that I didn't have somebody with me. 00:10:06.960 --> 00:10:19.759 And that time I had people staying in a cabin nearby, and I actually had a limit on that visit, and I exceeded that limit, and they came and pulled into the driveway. 00:10:20.240 --> 00:10:23.600 And I was that was the time I was talking to my father. 00:10:23.759 --> 00:10:26.799 He had come up to my car and I panicked. 00:10:26.960 --> 00:10:28.000 I just panicked. 00:10:28.159 --> 00:10:33.440 I must have been in my car by that time because I just barreled out. 00:10:33.600 --> 00:10:40.000 They backed out and I barreled ahead of them and they followed me until I was out of sight, and then I pulled over. 00:10:40.159 --> 00:10:41.679 And I was just panicking. 00:10:41.759 --> 00:10:50.960 And I realized later that the panic was not about protecting me or my I was protecting my family. 00:10:51.279 --> 00:10:53.360 I was protecting the secret. 00:10:54.240 --> 00:10:58.720 Others knew they had to know because they were coming to rescue me. 00:10:58.879 --> 00:11:04.399 I did not want my family to know that people cared enough to come and get me. 00:11:05.120 --> 00:11:10.399 This person

I would assume was an outsider, maybe from Duluth, a city person. 00:11:10.720 --> 00:11:13.200 Yeah, two people in a pickup, Lindy and Ethel. 00:11:13.600 --> 00:11:18.240 What I didn't know at the time was how my body was involved. 00:11:18.480 --> 00:11:23.840 My body was so stressed, it was just, oh my God, oh my god. 00:11:24.559 --> 00:11:26.480 But otherwise, I always had someone with me. 00:11:26.559 --> 00:11:35.519 And my mother was very good at socializing and bringing out the coffee and the cookies and talking about unrelated stuff. 00:11:35.840 --> 00:11:45.200 But in her old age, my sister called me and told me she was in the hospital and in my town in Minneapolis. 00:11:45.440 --> 00:11:48.960 So I said, okay, I'm gonna go and see her after work. 00:11:49.120 --> 00:11:55.120 But then our furnace went out, and so I had to take the day off work to get the furnace fixed. 00:11:55.279 --> 00:12:02.080 And they came at noon, it was done, so I went to the hospital early, and she wasn't expecting me. 00:12:02.159 --> 00:12:10.879 And so I get to her room, and here's this elderly lady with white hair sitting up in her bed, she's filling out a uh menu sheet. 00:12:10.960 --> 00:12:14.000 And I walked in and she goes, Oh, hi, Susan. 00:12:14.480 --> 00:12:17.039 And it was like she saw me every day. 00:12:17.200 --> 00:12:18.320 It was so bizarre. 00:12:18.559 --> 00:12:21.600 So I've always avoided being direct. 00:12:21.919 --> 00:12:24.159 I think I'm gonna say something, I'm gonna ask. 00:12:24.320 --> 00:12:26.720 And then I just get terrified and I don't. 00:12:26.960 --> 00:12:32.000 But this time I said, So what happened with us? 00:12:32.159 --> 00:12:33.440 What happened between us? 00:12:34.240 --> 00:12:43.519 And she said, Oh, I think it was a little grandma's fault and a little my fault, and a little she almost said your fault, but she didn't. 00:12:43.600 --> 00:12:44.320 She stopped herself. 00:12:44.559 --> 00:12:45.759 We didn't go further. 00:12:46.000 --> 00:12:51.679 But what was bizarre about that visit is she was getting ready to go home. 00:12:51.919 --> 00:13:02.000 And so I go out, I talk to a doctor, and it's like, I'm this daughter, she's my mother, and the family is trying to figure out how to get her home. 00:13:02.159 --> 00:13:05.759 And I actually volunteered to drive her home over a hundred miles. 00:13:05.919 --> 00:13:06.799 I can't believe it. 00:13:07.039 --> 00:13:10.240 But a brother's wife said, No, I'm ready to go. 00:13:10.320 --> 00:13:12.159 I'm I'm gonna come and get her. 00:13:12.480 --> 00:13:18.559 Even after that visit, like I was on my way home, I called my sister to give her an update. 00:13:18.720 --> 00:13:20.159 Like we talked every day. 00:13:20.399 --> 00:13:20.720 Ah. 00:13:21.679 --> 00:13:26.960 Maybe we do what we maybe she wanted to feel like she had a sister. 00:13:27.120 --> 00:13:29.360 Maybe I wanted to feel like I had a sister. 00:13:29.600 --> 00:13:31.600 Maybe I wanted to

feel like I had a mother. 00:13:31.919 --> 00:13:33.840 Yeah, it sounded like you did. 00:13:34.000 --> 00:13:38.480 And did you feel empathy for your mother at that time or no? 00:13:38.639 --> 00:13:40.320 It was again very removed. 00:13:40.399 --> 00:13:41.440 It was all in my head. 00:13:41.600 --> 00:13:44.399 It was emotional in that it was scary and fearful. 00:13:44.480 --> 00:13:47.200 It was this huge thing in my chest. 00:13:47.440 --> 00:13:51.039 So it was emotional that way, and then it just took over my body. 00:13:51.279 --> 00:13:56.799 But your brain doesn't your intellectual brain doesn't really work when you're in that. 00:13:57.200 --> 00:14:01.919 So I know your entire adult life you were pretty fearful of her or her finding you. 00:14:02.159 --> 00:14:05.919 Did you feel any of that as this old very sick woman? 00:14:06.320 --> 00:14:13.679 No, I didn't think that she was gonna come after me or that she was No, she seemed so normal, and uh of course she is normal. 00:14:13.840 --> 00:14:16.799 But just we just fell into this kind of role. 00:14:17.039 --> 00:14:19.200 So I still couldn't go further. 00:14:19.440 --> 00:14:21.759 I'm conflict avoidant, I always have been. 00:14:22.080 --> 00:14:38.720 Yeah, but you think about her, she lived her entire life with all of the went on between you and her without you know, you wonder if her and your dad ever had talks about it, or it seems like there was no confession on her part ever. 00:14:39.120 --> 00:14:48.320 No, it did affect her because of the change in her in those years between when I left home and when I came back to visit. 00:14:48.480 --> 00:14:59.840 And I have thought maybe the change was that I saw her as this all-powerful person before, but it felt to me that she literally looked different. 00:15:00.000 --> 00:15:03.679 She looked older, she looked and I still had that fear, of course. 00:15:04.000 --> 00:15:05.759 I'm saying two things at once here. 00:15:06.000 --> 00:15:08.799 I had this fear and yet I'm talking out of my head. 00:15:09.039 --> 00:15:10.799 Both those things were true. 00:15:11.360 --> 00:15:13.120 I could carry on a conversation. 00:15:13.440 --> 00:15:15.679 Yeah, they c they can be true. 00:15:15.919 --> 00:15:18.559 In fact, I could even carry the conversation. 00:15:18.720 --> 00:15:18.960 Right. 00:15:19.200 --> 00:15:22.799 When it was with siblings who didn't know what to do with me. 00:15:23.039 --> 00:15:34.320 Like I visited a brother once, and another brother just happened to come into the driveway and visit while I was there, not knowing I was there. 00:15:34.720 --> 00:15:38.240 And I literally stood so that he could leave at any time. 00:15:38.799 --> 00:15:46.879 And he it was about a 15-minute conversation, and he sweated his forehead, he just was sweating. 00:15:46.960 --> 00:15:51.360 I thought he's not going to introduce me to his wife and his daughters who were waiting in the van. 00:15:51.919 --> 00:15:53.679 At the last

minute he did. 00:15:54.159 --> 00:15:56.799 But I carried that conversation. 00:15:56.960 --> 00:16:03.360 And I think the fact that I was normal, that I appeared normal, that I was in normal clothes, and I don't know. 00:16:03.440 --> 00:16:04.799 I don't know what it does to them. 00:16:05.039 --> 00:16:07.039 But it clearly affected him. 00:16:07.440 --> 00:16:24.480 I think the other thing that when we're talking about your mother and then how it affected them, besides the big secret of you, and especially those younger ones who wouldn't have any memory of it, there's also the possibility of where did she take all that anger? 00:16:24.720 --> 00:16:25.039 I know. 00:16:25.360 --> 00:16:30.240 That was rage that came at you, and then suddenly you disappear. 00:16:30.559 --> 00:16:32.480 What happens to that rage? 00:16:32.799 --> 00:16:34.080 Yeah, I've thought of that. 00:16:34.240 --> 00:16:46.639 So I had a uh, I don't know, a couple hours meeting with my sister in a restaurant maybe three years ago, and I think that was maybe the only time we've spent that kind of time together. 00:16:46.879 --> 00:16:57.200 She has this whole different story about my grandmother interfering, and she'll tell me things that I don't remember about taking a train and normal things. 00:16:57.360 --> 00:17:00.080 And I don't doubt that happened, but I don't remember them. 00:17:00.320 --> 00:17:03.200 So in this conversation, I liked her. 00:17:03.360 --> 00:17:07.680 I thought we both were really direct, we both really said what was on our mind. 00:17:07.920 --> 00:17:09.759 We both were ourselves. 00:17:10.079 --> 00:17:11.839 I really appreciated that. 00:17:12.160 --> 00:17:17.440 One of the things I told her was the story about the milk being force-fed milk. 00:17:17.680 --> 00:17:28.319 And she said once that she also was force-fed milk because she didn't have the refrigerator arranged efficiently. 00:17:28.559 --> 00:17:30.240 And she said, I learned how to do that. 00:17:30.880 --> 00:17:39.920 She also told me that she had a daughter who had some, oh, what was the word, some psychological problem, and she thought that was my situation also. 00:17:40.400 --> 00:17:42.160 And I said, No, that isn't true. 00:17:42.319 --> 00:17:43.039 That's not true. 00:17:43.680 --> 00:17:57.680 I remember there was a we had a conversation once, years ago, when Ross Perot was presidential candidate, and she was talking about how she supported him because he lived in a prisoner of war camp. 00:17:58.160 --> 00:18:00.400 And anybody that can survive that. 00:18:00.640 --> 00:18:03.119 And I thought in my head, like, wow. 00:18:03.279 --> 00:18:04.880 And Is this your sister? 00:18:05.119 --> 00:18:05.920 This is my sister. 00:18:06.160 --> 00:18:07.599 And I remember that conversation. 00:18:07.759 --> 00:18:19.519 I was sitting upstairs on the phone, and I had to stop it because it was so crazy-making to me about the denial and the different worlds that we were in. 00:18:19.759 --> 00:18:29.200 I lived with Molly at the time, and I remember coming down and I felt like it was living in the Twilight Zone, and she brought me back to reality. 00:18:29.359 --> 00:18:36.720 And again, it was all grandma's fault and the welfare's fault and the school's fault and my fault, of course. 00:18:36.960 --> 00:18:38.640 And none of those people were there. 00:18:38.960 --> 00:18:39.759 But she was there. 00:18:39.920 --> 00:18:40.079 Yeah. 00:18:40.319 --> 00:18:41.599 It's just crazy making. 00:18:41.759 --> 00:18:41.920 Yeah. 00:18:42.319 --> 00:18:44.160 But she also was there. 00:18:45.119 --> 00:18:47.920 She had that adult relationship with your mother. 00:18:48.079 --> 00:18:51.200 Her mother even worked in her flower shop. 00:18:51.519 --> 00:18:52.079 Yeah. 00:18:52.319 --> 00:18:55.440 And she was the one calling you when your mother was in the hospital. 00:18:55.519 --> 00:18:56.240 Oh, that's right. 00:18:56.720 --> 00:19:04.400 So there's just a way that she her brain figured out what workaround she needed to do. 00:19:04.640 --> 00:19:05.279 Yeah. 00:19:05.759 --> 00:19:15.119 You know, I'm so far removed now, and I've read lots of stuff about how memory can be two people at the same accident see things differently. 00:19:15.279 --> 00:19:17.519 And I think, was it really that bad? 00:19:17.839 --> 00:19:19.119 But it was that bad. 00:19:19.359 --> 00:19:20.720 I remember being naked. 00:19:20.799 --> 00:19:23.599 I remember being in it it was that bad. 00:19:23.680 --> 00:19:24.799 I remember the barrel. 00:19:24.880 --> 00:19:27.440 I remember I did not live inside. 00:19:27.680 --> 00:19:29.920 They cannot they have to know. 00:19:30.079 --> 00:19:31.119 I did not sit at the table. 00:19:31.519 --> 00:19:37.200 You have those records that show how what state your body was in when you were taken out of the home. 00:19:37.440 --> 00:19:38.000 Yeah. 00:19:38.240 --> 00:19:40.160 Yeah, but I can doubt myself. 00:19:40.400 --> 00:19:45.279 It's easy to doubt yourself when people that were there are saying something different. 00:19:45.680 --> 00:19:52.400 The other thing is for most of your adult life you've been in a relationship or different relationships. 00:19:52.720 --> 00:20:00.640 How do you think that your relationships were affected or impacted by your childhood? 00:20:01.039 --> 00:20:02.240 Yeah, that's a good question. 00:20:02.400 --> 00:20:05.200 And something I'm just really trying to look at now. 00:20:05.599 --> 00:20:10.799 I feel like I limited my capacity for being close. 00:20:11.039 --> 00:20:17.759 Like that song, that Bob Dylan song, A Lover for Your Life and Nothing More, what is it, bring flowers and blah, blah, blah. 00:20:18.000 --> 00:20:21.359 That was like a theme song in my head in every relationship. 00:20:21.599 --> 00:20:24.319 I really felt that's what you want, that's not me. 00:20:24.880 --> 00:20:29.279 An example would be if I'm in a relationship with somebody, living

with somebody. 00:20:29.440 --> 00:20:35.119 If we were at a party or somewhere in public, I'd want to move around and talk to other people. 00:20:35.440 --> 00:20:37.519 And I'd say, We see you every day. 00:20:37.599 --> 00:20:39.200 I'm here to see other people. 00:20:39.519 --> 00:20:42.960 And I was not aware of how that affected them. 00:20:43.119 --> 00:20:49.119 And I've never really been intimate in the way of sharing my insecurities. 00:20:49.359 --> 00:20:51.920 I don't fight in relationships. 00:20:52.400 --> 00:20:54.799 If you fight with somebody, they're gonna leave you. 00:20:55.519 --> 00:20:59.839 Not that I was aware of that, but I'm sure that is part of it. 00:21:00.079 --> 00:21:02.559 That's how you get a lot of things on the table, I think. 00:21:02.880 --> 00:21:03.759 We're different. 00:21:03.920 --> 00:21:04.880 We're all different. 00:21:05.039 --> 00:21:15.200 And in order to learn those differences, you have to either really share what hurts and what you like or don't like, what you're afraid of. 00:21:15.359 --> 00:21:17.359 And I was never good at that. 00:21:17.759 --> 00:21:20.160 I think feeling safe enough to fight. 00:21:20.400 --> 00:21:26.079 You didn't feel safe as a kid to fight your mother, that would have been too dangerous. 00:21:26.319 --> 00:21:29.359 And your family wasn't a family of conflict. 00:21:29.519 --> 00:21:40.720 It was a family of very dominant parents and kids who obeyed, and one who was particularly being the continual. 00:21:41.519 --> 00:21:42.079 Yeah. 00:21:42.880 --> 00:21:45.279 If I argue with somebody, they're gonna leave me. 00:21:45.519 --> 00:21:48.160 You're risking abandonment. 00:21:48.640 --> 00:21:57.759 It's interesting too, because you are a person who stands out on the Lake Street Bridge and the name of your two senators is above you right now. 00:21:58.160 --> 00:21:59.759 You are not some passive. 00:22:00.559 --> 00:22:01.119 Person. 00:22:01.440 --> 00:22:07.599 But conflict with in personal relationships is something that you don't go for. 00:22:08.079 --> 00:22:10.400 Intellectual stuff, I can do well with that. 00:22:10.720 --> 00:22:17.680 But it's the heart stuff, it's the really knowing other people who they are and who I am. 00:22:18.480 --> 00:22:22.240 I've only been in one relationship that was at all abusive. 00:22:22.880 --> 00:22:25.359 And that was when I was much younger. 00:22:25.759 --> 00:22:31.119 He threatened me and threw things at me, and once a couple people had to pull him off me. 00:22:31.440 --> 00:22:32.880 But that that ended. 00:22:33.440 --> 00:22:42.400 I lived in a community then that supported me and the people that pulled him off of me literally got him out of town. 00:22:43.839 --> 00:22:44.559 So good friends. 00:22:44.799 --> 00:22:45.359 Yeah. 00:22:45.839 --> 00:22:48.240 And you've been in relationships with men and women. 00:22:48.559 --> 00:22:49.680 Yes, yes, men and women. 00:22:49.839 --> 00:22:52.000 My longest relationship was was with a woman. 00:22:52.160 --> 00:23:04.240 I'm not sure when I was at home or with my family, it just never would have occurred to me that there's an option of loving someone of your own gender. 00:23:04.480 --> 00:23:06.240 It just didn't occur to me. 00:23:06.480 --> 00:23:12.079 But when I was on the psych ward there was a staff person, a fellow who was gay, and I really liked him. 00:23:12.319 --> 00:23:14.799 And then I saw this guy in a phone booth. 00:23:14.960 --> 00:23:19.519 I might have been waiting, I don't know, I saw him up close and he had makeup on. 00:23:19.680 --> 00:23:21.359 And that was fascinating to me. 00:23:21.519 --> 00:23:26.880 And then when I lived with Stevie, the other person that lived with her had a girlfriend. 00:23:27.119 --> 00:23:29.599 And they would hold hands in South High. 00:23:29.839 --> 00:23:30.880 They're in high school. 00:23:31.039 --> 00:23:32.480 They're beautiful, both of them. 00:23:32.720 --> 00:23:34.960 Long hair, beautiful, straight looking. 00:23:35.200 --> 00:23:36.319 And they would hold hands. 00:23:36.400 --> 00:23:39.680 And they actually got married at the Lesbian Resource Center at the time. 00:23:39.920 --> 00:23:42.160 And they were in the house all the time. 00:23:42.400 --> 00:23:48.960 And then Stevie was trying to date men when we were with her, but she came out as a lesbian. 00:23:49.519 --> 00:23:51.359 So I had people close to me. 00:23:51.519 --> 00:23:55.519 And then when I'm old enough, I'd go to gay bars with them. 00:23:55.839 --> 00:23:56.960 And I loved it. 00:23:57.119 --> 00:23:58.480 I could dance just freely. 00:23:58.559 --> 00:23:59.839 I didn't have none of this. 00:24:00.000 --> 00:24:01.680 Somebody asking me to dance. 00:24:01.759 --> 00:24:03.920 And I loved doing that. 00:24:04.160 --> 00:24:06.480 But I still wasn't a lesbian. 00:24:06.720 --> 00:24:14.240 But then I went to Nicaragua and I was in a in this international work crew and I was with all these lesbians. 00:24:14.640 --> 00:24:19.599 And I believed that you could that gender shouldn't matter. 00:24:19.759 --> 00:24:30.160 I know it's all a continuum for everybody, but for me, I believe that it's a person and that you could have feelings for somebody regardless of their gender. 00:24:30.319 --> 00:24:31.519 I made a political choice. 00:24:31.680 --> 00:24:39.039 After my trip to Nicaragua, I I recognized, of course, for years the difference in power between men and women. 00:24:39.279 --> 00:24:47.599 And I made a decision that I was not going to give to men until there was it was equal. 00:24:48.000 --> 00:24:50.640 And so I committed myself to women. 00:24:50.799 --> 00:24:53.599 And it took me a while to really feel that desire. 00:24:53.839 --> 00:24:56.799 Or it took me a couple practices, maybe. 00:24:57.359 --> 00:25:03.039 But I can I recognize the cultures are really different. 00:25:03.200 --> 00:25:06.240 Of course, every individual within the culture is unique.

00:25:06.559 --> 00:25:10.319 And one person doesn't represent all men, of course. 00:25:10.640 --> 00:25:18.160 But there is something about ownership or I would have to add that that it's our generation. 00:25:18.799 --> 00:25:22.720 I find so much is in the heads of our generation. 00:25:22.960 --> 00:25:24.160 We're baby boomers. 00:25:24.480 --> 00:25:26.319 And I work in a middle school. 00:25:26.480 --> 00:25:35.119 I see my kids and I find that there's a freedom that we cannot escape in our heads for all people. 00:25:36.000 --> 00:25:36.799 All genders. 00:25:37.200 --> 00:25:39.039 Because of our conditioning. 00:25:39.359 --> 00:25:42.079 And when I this is a something totally different. 00:25:42.640 --> 00:25:51.440 But when you mention the gender things with younger people now, sometimes people will say something about how my situation is very unique. 00:25:51.599 --> 00:25:59.839 And in my bubble, in my white in my bubble, it might be unique in that my family discarded me. 00:26:00.640 --> 00:26:21.599 But when you think of history, when you think of slavery, when you think of what people have endured for generations, there's so many examples of people going through maybe the family rejection is somewhat unique, but not for gay people and not for now transgender people, yeah. 00:26:21.759 --> 00:26:24.480 Who are really being used as scapegoats. 00:26:25.119 --> 00:26:31.359 Such a small percent of the population elevated certain news cycles. 00:26:31.759 --> 00:26:39.440 They want to blame the whole democratic failure on transgender people or immigrants, of course. 00:26:39.680 --> 00:26:40.240 The wars. 00:26:40.400 --> 00:26:43.920 People endure incredible misery. 00:26:44.319 --> 00:26:47.599 But let's go on to something more positive. 00:26:48.799 --> 00:26:56.000 Pam, so many people have commented on how important your part of this podcast is. 00:26:56.240 --> 00:27:03.039 I wondered how you feel about having gone through this whole process. 00:27:03.680 --> 00:27:08.240 Well, I feel like it has been a really deep dive. 00:27:08.480 --> 00:27:14.799 I've done a lot of long-form documentaries working in video and film over the years. 00:27:15.119 --> 00:27:19.920 But this was into the deep story of Sadie. 00:27:20.079 --> 00:27:25.599 So I felt really honored to become part of this podcast story. 00:27:26.000 --> 00:27:40.079 Sometimes it got pretty dark, as many of our listeners have said, but at the same time, has been a really I think I have grown doing it. 00:27:40.319 --> 00:27:47.440 I've also had a sidelong, sad story of my brother's alcoholism going parallel. 00:27:48.079 --> 00:27:54.960 And I think that whenever you're dealing with sadness, there's always comfort in knowing you're not alone. 00:27:55.519 --> 00:28:07.920 So I think that your story has so much sadness in it, but also so much inspiration and survival, and it's very life-affirming, as hard as it is. 00:28:08.640 --> 00:28:14.319 I just want to say it's been very comfortable, and I've really liked working with you. 00:28:14.480 --> 00:28:21.200 I feel like we've been able to be really honest with each other, and there hasn't been hard feelings. 00:28:21.359 --> 00:28:23.200 I feel very supported. 00:28:23.599 --> 00:28:26.480 It's been a great partnership. 00:28:26.960 --> 00:28:27.839 I think so too. 00:28:27.920 --> 00:28:42.640 And I think one of the things I would say, because I have uh history of doing documentary films, and early on I could see that this story wasn't gonna happen unless you had total directorial. 00:28:43.279 --> 00:28:55.440 And that was a lesson for me in letting go, because in a film project, you decide who's the director or co-directors or whatever, and and they have this powerful position. 00:28:55.519 --> 00:28:59.359 But I knew right away that that wasn't gonna work on this. 00:28:59.599 --> 00:29:06.000 And I guess the thing that I've watched so much is what a strong creative mind you have. 00:29:06.240 --> 00:29:08.319 Technology is not your best friend. 00:29:08.799 --> 00:29:11.839 I have a love of technology, but you do not. 00:29:12.000 --> 00:29:23.599 And I think that has been something that has been fun to watch as you overcome the technology, and and then your creativity in editing has been very great. 00:29:23.920 --> 00:29:31.519 And of course, the other piece of the mix here is Lucy Matthews Hegard, who came on board when we were fumbling with music. 00:29:31.839 --> 00:29:36.000 Yeah, fumbling with so much and has really great skills. 00:29:36.640 --> 00:29:41.519 Audio engineer on your podcast is something you definitely need. 00:29:41.839 --> 00:29:42.720 Leveling sound. 00:29:42.799 --> 00:29:45.039 I know nothing about sound engineering. 00:29:45.359 --> 00:29:48.799 And she came to our rescue and has been so much. 00:29:48.960 --> 00:29:50.480 And she's been wonderful, yeah. 00:29:50.799 --> 00:29:59.519 And I want to say beyond the technical stuff, will you really bring a whole depth to this project? 00:29:59.920 --> 00:30:02.400 Insights that give it a lot of gravitas. 00:30:03.359 --> 00:30:05.680 Your contribution is really important. 00:30:06.640 --> 00:30:08.400 I've had a lot of therapy. 00:30:08.720 --> 00:30:10.079 We both have, right? 00:30:10.880 --> 00:30:14.079 I can say I've had a few years now, a couple years. 00:30:14.400 --> 00:30:17.839 I had somebody tell me recently, oh, I just love that. 00:30:18.000 --> 00:30:21.200 Pam! Every time I have a question, she'll ask it. 00:30:21.359 --> 00:30:23.119 It's like she reads my mind. 00:30:23.519 --> 00:30:25.440 You brought a lot to this project. 00:30:25.920 --> 00:30:26.480 Well, thank you. 00:30:26.640 --> 00:30:36.720 And I have known you so well over the years, and I know your story, and it's been a big accomplishment for you getting it all out here like this. 00:30:36.960 --> 00:30:43.599 So thanks for all your support and your reliable visits doing all these recordings. 00:30:43.839 --> 00:30:45.440 Okay, here we go. 00:30:45.759 --> 00:30:47.200 Till next time.

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