Full Transcript for Trauma Informed Living: Reclaiming Wholeness

sudden I was nothing made sense. 00:05:40.480 --> 00:05:46.160 So red wasn't red, a square was not square, neither was a s like nothing made sense. 00:05:46.160 --> 00:05:48.319 And I fell to pieces. 00:05:48.319 --> 00:05:54.480 I think later on I went to describe it that I died every night and I would get reborn every morning. 00:05:54.480 --> 00:06:02.639 So I would prepare for death every night because he wouldn't sleep, he had a lot of sleeping issues, he had feeding problems. 00:06:02.639 --> 00:06:08.800 So if he didn't feed during the day, he wouldn't feed, you know, you'd have to be up because he was he was in pain. 00:06:08.800 --> 00:06:10.720 He was traumatized himself. 00:06:10.720 --> 00:06:19.680 Um, so that took that was a whole different picture because he had his brother and then his brother wasn't sleeping because he was awake, so he'd have to split them up. 00:06:19.680 --> 00:06:26.720 Um, that meant added pressure on myself and and their dad at the time because it was like, what is this? 00:06:26.720 --> 00:06:28.879 We didn't really get any support. 00:06:28.879 --> 00:06:30.560 The hospital was horrendous. 00:06:30.560 --> 00:06:40.160 They referred me at the time to psychiatry, you know, which I now know was pathologizing me, saying I had mental health issues because I was questioning them about what happened. 00:06:40.160 --> 00:06:41.600 And I kind of missed a bit. 00:06:41.600 --> 00:06:46.319 So my son also sus sustained injury, but so had I sustained injury. 00:06:46.319 --> 00:06:50.319 So I was uh temporarily I was temporarily paralyzed. 00:06:50.319 --> 00:06:57.040 So I was in a wheelchair and I had a few complications myself, to have a blood transfusion, had they had infected me. 00:06:57.040 --> 00:06:58.560 The list goes on and on and on. 00:06:58.560 --> 00:07:03.040 So there was just a lot of challenges around the birth and what they had done. 00:07:03.040 --> 00:07:13.360 And as I said, I'd entered this new land, not just with new babies and that there were twins, because my new reality was that I was black like that. 00:07:13.600 --> 00:07:14.480 Let's unpack that. 00:07:14.480 --> 00:07:17.519 You said that second this is the second time you said like that. 00:07:17.519 --> 00:07:19.199 Let's unpack that. 00:07:19.439 --> 00:07:19.839 Yeah. 00:07:20.160 --> 00:07:27.519 What when you said due to so many things, your babies had complications, you had complications. 00:07:27.519 --> 00:07:29.199 One not making it. 00:07:29.199 --> 00:07:32.879 Were your concerns ignored? 00:07:32.879 --> 00:07:36.319 Did you feel like your concerns were ignored as you were going through pain? 00:07:36.319 --> 00:07:44.959 Because when you say you're black like that, we know now what we know now about black maternal statistics, and that's both in the US and the UK. 00:07:44.959 --> 00:07:46.079 Is that what you mean? 00:07:46.399 --> 00:07:47.040 Absolutely. 00:07:47.040 --> 00:07:47.839 Absolutely. 00:07:47.839 --> 00:07:50.959 From beginning to end, I was completely ignored. 00:07:50.959 --> 00:07:53.600 I was left for hours. 00:07:53.600 --> 00:08:00.240 Um, I think it was over a day in the worst conditions ever imagined. 00:08:00.240 --> 00:08:03.839 Like you just can't imagine a situation like that that they left me in. 00:08:03.839 --> 00:08:05.279 Um I was terrorized. 00:08:05.279 --> 00:08:06.480 I was terrorized. 00:08:06.480 --> 00:08:11.120 I had, if anyone should enter the room, they would just ignore me. 00:08:11.120 --> 00:08:16.480 I was saying, you know, I you know, I was vomiting at one point, they were making me walk in another point. 00:08:16.480 --> 00:08:19.759 I was telling them that like something's wrong, you know. 00:08:19.759 --> 00:08:23.199 The heart monitors were going off, like just going off. 00:08:23.199 --> 00:08:26.240 And I was just left humiliated. 00:08:26.240 --> 00:08:43.679 Um, in my experience, the doctor, when she did check, it was more of a humiliation ritual where she would make comments about my, you know, my feminine area and what was going on around my feminine area and why my partner couldn't have done something about that. 00:08:43.679 --> 00:08:50.000 I remember getting sick and I had a temperature and she said, Well, you know, you probably got something in Africa. 00:08:50.000 --> 00:08:52.159 You know, she would comment on my appearance. 00:08:52.159 --> 00:08:59.679 So, you know, my my uh doctor at the time, a lady, was commenting on how I looked while I was going through labor. 00:08:59.679 --> 00:09:03.600 So by that time I was swollen because they'd also given me an infection. 00:09:03.600 --> 00:09:08.000 You know, it was just the worst pain, the worst of everything. 00:09:08.000 --> 00:09:12.320 And I remember saying that I'm going to die, and they would just laugh. 00:09:12.320 --> 00:09:18.480 So I was induced, which was against my obstetrician's advice at that time. 00:09:18.480 --> 00:09:36.799 And I think it was 48 hours I was left, and then they decided to unfortunately, which we now know was the seminal moment of the of the start of the rest of my life, they burst one of the sac, which actually infected him, infected us with uh E. 00:09:36.799 --> 00:09:38.159 coli septicemia. 00:09:38.159 --> 00:09:44.159 So it was just the worst thing, and and it was at that point she said, you know, you must have got that infection from Africa. 00:09:44.159 --> 00:09:51.120 Despite having an uneventful pregnancy, my babies were full term, I had no complications, never had a problem. 00:09:51.440 --> 00:09:53.519 Full-term twins is not an easy feat. 00:09:53.519 --> 00:09:54.399 Full-term twins. 00:09:55.279 --> 00:09:56.559 Yeah, full term. 00:09:56.559 --> 00:09:59.519 So that's what I mean when I said I was black like that. 00:09:59.519 --> 00:10:02.240 I realized I was I was a nothing. 00:10:02.240 --> 00:10:09.519 I was uh nobody, I was nothing, I was a scum of the earth, I was filth, I was no one.

00:10:09.519 --> 00:10:11.200 Yeah. 00:10:11.200 --> 00:10:17.120 And I became this nothing in the hospital, just sweaty in pain. 00:10:17.120 --> 00:10:21.759 They had put my legs into the stirrups, I think that's what they're called, and left me there. 00:10:21.759 --> 00:10:24.399 So I basically bled out. 00:10:24.399 --> 00:10:31.200 They cut me with uh scissors, they cut my vagina without anesthetic and just left me there. 00:10:31.200 --> 00:10:32.639 And I remember bleeding out. 00:10:32.639 --> 00:10:36.399 I remember another doctor coming in saying, What is this? 00:10:36.399 --> 00:10:48.480 And there was just a lot of noise, and then he refused to get involved, so people were refusing to touch me because they were very aware of what was happening and that it was wrong, but they didn't want to get their pin in the middle of it. 00:10:48.480 --> 00:10:53.600 So eventually a doctor did come in and he said, I'm really sorry, this is gonna hurt you a lot. 00:10:53.600 --> 00:11:01.440 And yeah, he was the one who stitched me up and I ended up having a blood transfusion and it was um I had seizures. 00:11:01.440 --> 00:11:04.080 I remember even convulsing at that point. 00:11:04.080 --> 00:11:11.919 So it was one of the you know, that that was my experience, that was my entry into Into motherhood. 00:11:11.919 --> 00:11:12.879 Into motherhood. 00:11:12.879 --> 00:11:16.799 Um and at that time I d wasn't aware that my twin had been brain injured. 00:11:16.799 --> 00:11:22.080 I didn't know this because um they refused to take me out of the room. 00:11:22.080 --> 00:11:28.159 Being that I was very ill, I could understand now why they didn't allow me to see him. 00:11:28.159 --> 00:11:42.000 I think it was a couple of days because I was in intensive care, because I had also contracted ecology sepsemia, my legs because they'd left me up in the stirrup, I was quite physically enabled, disabled, and I wasn't able to walk. 00:11:42.000 --> 00:11:46.080 And I had a lot of uh out-of-body experiences while on while on that ward. 00:11:46.080 --> 00:11:53.600 And I remember uh, you know, a nurse coming to see me in the night and she said uh I said to her, Who's that sitting next to me? 00:11:53.600 --> 00:11:55.120 And she said, Who? 00:11:55.120 --> 00:12:03.519 And I said, There's a uh there's a man in a chair writing down notes and wheeling back in a chair. 00:12:03.519 --> 00:12:05.120 And she said, There's no one there. 00:12:05.120 --> 00:12:11.759 And she explained where I was and she was a Christian, so she just got down on her hands and knees and she started praying. 00:12:11.759 --> 00:12:13.440 And I said, Where am I? 00:12:13.440 --> 00:12:15.039 She says, You're in the hospital room. 00:12:15.039 --> 00:12:16.080 I said, No, I'm not. 00:12:16.080 --> 00:12:20.159 Because I in my mind, I was on a raft and I was at sea. 00:12:20.159 --> 00:12:23.120 So I had a lot of kind of experiences. 00:12:23.120 --> 00:12:31.279 I'm not sure because I was awake, but my my reality, what was being what was coming to me, was not being in that hospital room. 00:12:31.279 --> 00:12:33.039 I was somewhere, somewhere else. 00:12:33.039 --> 00:12:40.240 So I had I had a few of those, but I was told, you know, it's a ward, a lot of strange things happen on the ward, which didn't help me at the time. 00:12:40.240 --> 00:12:41.600 Did not help me at the time. 00:12:41.600 --> 00:12:53.039 So as I said, it was a couple of days before I was able to be willed to see my my twins, and they brought us into a room and they said, I'm really sorry. 00:12:53.039 --> 00:12:54.559 And I don't know what they said. 00:12:54.559 --> 00:12:56.639 I don't know what they said, to be honest. 00:12:56.639 --> 00:12:58.559 I just heard sorry and that was it. 00:12:58.559 --> 00:12:59.519 I have no memory. 00:12:59.519 --> 00:13:06.399 Even after years of therapy, I have no memory of what they said to me and uh my twins, my twins' dad. 00:13:06.399 --> 00:13:08.320 At that time, no, no memory. 00:13:08.320 --> 00:13:17.440 But I remember the nurse crying, I remember like this hollow sound permeating through my body, and that was it. 00:13:17.440 --> 00:13:18.159 That was it. 00:13:18.159 --> 00:13:26.720 And they took us into the intensive ward, and my son was hooked up to every piece of equipment that I I would I never knew that was possible. 00:13:26.720 --> 00:13:33.919 And he was this beautiful baby, and he was so big and he was so juicy, you know. 00:13:33.919 --> 00:13:35.279 He was gorgeous. 00:13:35.279 --> 00:13:38.720 And I was like, Oh my god, did did did I make this baby? 00:13:38.720 --> 00:13:43.919 And I remember just being very angry and helpless all in the same time. 00:13:43.919 --> 00:13:44.240 Yeah. 00:13:44.240 --> 00:13:47.440 And I couldn't do anything, and I said, take me out of the room. 00:13:47.440 --> 00:13:51.200 I just wanted to run away, but I couldn't run away because I was in a wheelchair. 00:13:51.200 --> 00:13:56.799 So they were saying, you know, we don't know what's gonna happen to him, and this is what happens to black boys. 00:13:56.799 --> 00:13:58.799 This this is what happened, yeah. 00:13:58.799 --> 00:14:08.159 So yeah, so that was my that was my start into motherhood and into this beautiful existence that I was gonna have. 00:14:08.480 --> 00:14:18.320 I often tell people that sometimes for those of us with these similar journeys, it's being drafted into the special unit forces of motherhood or parenthood. 00:14:18.320 --> 00:14:25.039 Your story is tragic, but unfortunately it's all too common. 00:14:25.039 --> 00:14:27.519 Yeah, it's absolutely all too common. 00:14:27.519 --> 00:14:30.000 I can relate to parts of your story. 00:14:30.000 --> 00:14:51.200 We've talked about this offline before we ever started recording, but I can relate because hopefully people now see that systemic racism and bias, it's not in the name calling, it's not in the finger pointing, it's the complete

ignoring and erasure of somebody else's humanity. 00:14:51.519 --> 00:14:52.080 Absolutely. 00:14:52.799 --> 00:15:02.080 And when somebody is at their most vulnerable, they're literally giving life and you're ignored until you've experienced it. 00:15:02.080 --> 00:15:03.200 You have no idea. 00:15:03.200 --> 00:15:10.080 And it's triggering, you've seen recent viral videos at the time we're taping this. 00:15:10.080 --> 00:15:12.240 It's November 30th of 25. 00:15:12.240 --> 00:15:22.720 And we've seen this, and you and I have talked about this briefly last week of these viral videos of these women screaming for pain, screaming for them to be seen. 00:15:22.720 --> 00:15:25.679 They just want to be seen, and they're not being seen. 00:15:26.320 --> 00:15:26.559 Yeah. 00:15:26.879 --> 00:15:28.639 So thank you for sharing this. 00:15:28.639 --> 00:15:30.080 Thank you so much. 00:15:30.080 --> 00:15:32.639 I thank you. 00:15:32.639 --> 00:15:34.240 That was not easy to share. 00:15:34.240 --> 00:15:35.039 So thank you. 00:15:36.320 --> 00:15:36.559 Thank you. 00:15:38.720 --> 00:15:43.279 And it's like I said, I came across your LinkedIn profile. 00:15:43.279 --> 00:15:47.919 We don't know each other personally, but we share a similar journey. 00:15:47.919 --> 00:15:56.320 Could you share how this experience somehow, someway, you talked about dying every single night? 00:15:56.320 --> 00:16:06.639 Talk to us more about what you mean by that and what made you realize that okay, this is my lane from which I'm gonna jump off from. 00:16:06.639 --> 00:16:09.519 How did I learn to recognize the lane I'm in? 00:16:09.519 --> 00:16:10.559 So tell us more. 00:16:10.960 --> 00:16:13.919 How did I learn to recognize the lane I was in? 00:16:13.919 --> 00:16:17.039 I think I I recognize it in different ways. 00:16:17.039 --> 00:16:19.200 Society has a way of setting you up. 00:16:19.200 --> 00:16:32.000 So I think at that point I believe so much in the doctors, you know, in the physios and the OTs and the speech and language therapists, and you know, all these people, you know, they they're gonna help me and things are gonna change. 00:16:32.000 --> 00:16:34.720 And actually, I was black like that. 00:16:40.000 --> 00:16:40.480 It's true. 00:16:40.480 --> 00:16:41.120 That's true. 00:16:41.519 --> 00:16:50.559 And you know, they will come to my home and it was really just about your house is clean, and it was never about getting my son to walk. 00:16:50.559 --> 00:16:56.799 So at that time, you know, my son's gonna walk, my son's gonna sit up, my son's gonna see, you know. 00:16:56.799 --> 00:16:59.440 At that point, they told me, you know, it's gonna be fine, you know. 00:16:59.440 --> 00:17:01.679 Stevie Wonder is doing well, isn't he? 00:17:01.679 --> 00:17:03.679 So he's blind, so your son will be fine. 00:17:03.679 --> 00:17:05.279 And I was horrified. 00:17:05.279 --> 00:17:10.720 So they would come and I had all these kind of ideas, you know, they're

gonna make it better. 00:17:10.720 --> 00:17:14.000 So from that context, I was black like that. 00:17:14.000 --> 00:17:18.160 My own family, you know, disability was frowned upon. 00:17:18.160 --> 00:17:25.279 And at that time, being that he was a baby, there was a sense of from my immediate family, of disgust. 00:17:25.279 --> 00:17:28.480 There was a lot of shame, there was a lot of rejection. 00:17:28.480 --> 00:17:33.759 You know, my social circle again, there was a lot of shaming, there was a lot of rejection. 00:17:33.759 --> 00:17:37.440 My my culture was very, well, it's your fault, you know. 00:17:37.440 --> 00:17:42.240 So I used to say to myself, Oh, it's because I wore that black skirt to the hospital. 00:17:42.240 --> 00:17:43.839 Maybe I didn't pray enough. 00:17:43.839 --> 00:17:52.000 There was something that I didn't do that should have been done, or maybe I went out without a a cardigan or something. 00:17:52.000 --> 00:17:55.200 So that must be the reason why this has happened. 00:17:55.200 --> 00:18:03.599 So you know, there was a whole spectrum of different things at the same time that was focused on me being the problem. 00:18:03.599 --> 00:18:10.160 You know, children's dad, his family was very much culturally, there's something wrong with m my body. 00:18:10.160 --> 00:18:12.160 There's something wrong with my womb. 00:18:12.160 --> 00:18:17.440 So I would there's something and they would just suggest so many different things. 00:18:17.440 --> 00:18:23.279 It was like a form of terrorism, like a a spiritual terrorism that I was battling to get out of. 00:18:23.279 --> 00:18:34.400 But I had a had a strong background in in local authority, local government, and I had a uh a strong kind of um fighter mentality of finding something. 00:18:34.400 --> 00:18:35.680 There has to be something. 00:18:35.680 --> 00:18:43.839 So I I don't know what it was, but I remember very early just phoning people or going online and searching. 00:18:43.839 --> 00:18:51.440 I don't know what I was searching for, but I would get my son's files and I'll put the words in because I didn't know what the words meant. 00:18:51.440 --> 00:19:00.000 Some of these clinical terms, I didn't know what it meant, and I would Google or I would phone or I would do whatever it was, you know. 00:19:00.000 --> 00:19:08.160 I would uh we had the most fantastic uh dietitian and she was very inspirational in supporting me as to what I could do. 00:19:08.160 --> 00:19:18.000 So I got heavily into nutrition and food and what's good for the brain and learning about myelin cells and you know all these things around, you know, what could be done. 00:19:18.000 --> 00:19:28.160 So I think my my journey into finding my own path started early, but it took a long time because there was a lot of deconstructing that had to happen. 00:19:28.160 --> 00:19:32.480 So at the same time I'm deconstructing, the world is pulling me down. 00:19:32.480 --> 00:19:40.960 So then I and then I

had to find space to look after the children at the same time as building them up and building myself up. 00:19:40.960 --> 00:19:50.880 So it's like I was at war and that war was myself because there was no help in the way that there should have been, and no one's gonna tell you, because remember I'm black like that. 00:19:50.880 --> 00:19:53.359 You know, I'm you've unmistakably black. 00:19:53.359 --> 00:19:59.039 So the the access, the support was not there for me, but it took a while. 00:19:59.039 --> 00:20:04.880 I think the first step for me, you know, in my home was to educate my children. 00:20:04.880 --> 00:20:11.839 So because I knew what was problematic, I would set about doing educational stuff with them at home. 00:20:11.839 --> 00:20:14.960 So when I say educational stuff, I mean rolling. 00:20:14.960 --> 00:20:22.400 So my son couldn't roll and he couldn't creep, so he couldn't do anti-ye coordination. 00:20:22.400 --> 00:20:33.359 So I would set up this little gym in my house to make sure he had everything in the house to help to support himself to reach it reaching these developmental milestones. 00:20:33.359 --> 00:20:41.039 So every book I had it, every toy I had it, every visual aid, every stimulus, every pillow I had it in in in my home. 00:20:41.039 --> 00:20:47.839 And, you know, people who came into into my home, they were highly critical, so I would have to get through that. 00:20:47.839 --> 00:20:54.319 The the crit criticism, the judgment, uh the rejection, the isolation, the shaming. 00:20:54.319 --> 00:20:56.880 So it was constant and it it weathered me. 00:20:56.880 --> 00:20:58.240 It weathered me a lot. 00:20:58.240 --> 00:21:06.079 I think um I finally got some I finally got some reprieve, I think, possibly when they were 18 months. 00:21:06.079 --> 00:21:08.559 And I I I don't know exactly what occurred. 00:21:08.559 --> 00:21:14.799 I think I had to look for a a nursery because I refused to let them go to nursery. 00:21:14.799 --> 00:21:21.039 So they were saying, Oh, you need to look for a nursery, and it dawned on me, Oh my god, they're gonna be two years old. 00:21:21.039 --> 00:21:23.119 I have to get them into nursery. 00:21:23.119 --> 00:21:28.799 And I finally got a ray of sunlight from a lady called Shade Kocha. 00:21:28.799 --> 00:21:33.359 And she was the nursery owner, and it was around the corner from me. 00:21:33.359 --> 00:21:39.119 So I went and I called her and I don't know, she just said, Please come and see me. 00:21:39.119 --> 00:21:48.000 And I went and she radically shifted my whole trajectory of the path that I was on. 00:21:48.000 --> 00:21:50.319 And she you know, she would just say stuff. 00:21:50.319 --> 00:21:58.559 She she she implored on in me to, you can do this, you can do that, you can do this, you know, you can do that, we can h help you, they have to do this. 00:21:58.559 --> 00:22:03.920 It was you know, it was It was kind of like very soft, but it was very firm and strong. 00:22:03.920 --> 00:22:04.480 Yeah. 00:22:04.480 --> 00:22:08.160 So I would I was like, oh, okay, I I can do this. 00:22:08.160 --> 00:22:10.240 So that gave me more space. 00:22:10.480 --> 00:22:13.839 It sounds like a hope multiplier came into your life. 00:22:13.839 --> 00:22:19.519 I call them hope multipliers because on this journey there are so many hope detractors. 00:22:19.519 --> 00:22:20.640 So many. 00:22:20.640 --> 00:22:21.519 So many. 00:22:21.519 --> 00:22:33.839 And it sounds like Shade was the one that helped, was the first person, it sounds like, besides the dietitian who said, Okay, I I will hold your hand because this road is long. 00:22:33.839 --> 00:22:35.440 This road is a marathon. 00:22:35.680 --> 00:22:35.920 Yeah. 00:22:36.240 --> 00:22:37.759 I'll help you hold your hand. 00:22:37.759 --> 00:22:39.039 Let's unpack. 00:22:39.039 --> 00:22:41.440 You've dropped again so many nuggets. 00:22:41.440 --> 00:22:47.279 Let's go back to cultural stigma, cultural expectations. 00:22:47.279 --> 00:22:49.039 Where is your family originally from? 00:22:49.279 --> 00:22:51.680 So my family originally from Jamaica. 00:22:51.680 --> 00:22:53.039 Yeah. 00:22:53.039 --> 00:22:55.440 I mean, I was born in Jamaica. 00:22:55.440 --> 00:22:59.200 Um, and I lived in Jamaica up until I was 10. 00:22:59.200 --> 00:23:05.039 My mom is born in the UK, but went to Jamaica when she was probably around 10. 00:23:05.039 --> 00:23:08.319 And then uh, you know, we we came back to England. 00:23:08.319 --> 00:23:12.079 So we have lots of family in in the in England and and the US. 00:23:12.400 --> 00:23:16.880 I jokingly call Jamaican well, not jokingly, it's it's historical. 00:23:16.880 --> 00:23:20.480 We are DNA cousins as well, Jamaicans and Nigerians. 00:23:20.480 --> 00:23:38.400 And me being Nigerian, a lot of your story I could relate to about the cultural stigma, about the blaming the woman, about there's something must be quote unquote wrong with her or her womb or her essence or her spirit or fill in the blank. 00:23:38.400 --> 00:23:39.839 It's and it's always the her. 00:23:40.160 --> 00:23:40.400 Yeah. 00:23:40.640 --> 00:23:41.599 I wrote in my book. 00:23:41.599 --> 00:23:47.359 I said it's funny that whenever something like this happens, it's due to a witch in the family, and but there's never any wizards. 00:23:47.359 --> 00:23:48.559 There are never any wizards. 00:23:48.799 --> 00:23:50.880 No, only witches, never wizards. 00:23:51.680 --> 00:23:53.759 Yeah, only witches. 00:23:54.160 --> 00:24:01.759 And knowing that, and just that goes back to the recognizing of the lane because you call it deconstruction, and it certainly is that. 00:24:01.759 --> 00:24:17.200 I call it deprogramming, which is again another cousin, but there's so much of this mind that becomes a battlefield that if you don't treat it as such, it's very, very, very hard to get to reimagining what it now means to thrive. 00:24:17.200 --> 00:24:21.839 And it

sounds like you and I once again have similar, similar journeys. 00:24:21.839 --> 00:24:25.039 So thank God for Sade as a hope multiplier. 00:24:25.039 --> 00:24:33.119 So tell us more about some of the things she talked to you about, and maybe maybe that became the segue to your career in therapy now. 00:24:33.359 --> 00:24:33.599 Yeah. 00:24:33.599 --> 00:24:45.200 Yeah, I think what Sade did was not just install still hope, was she reminded me of of a realization that I I could it could happen and it must happen. 00:24:45.200 --> 00:24:49.599 Not even that it could, she shifted, like, of course this can happen, and they have to do that. 00:24:49.599 --> 00:25:03.599 So she ignited that spirit that I don't think was dormant, it had died, and I needed to reseed, you know, I needed to get up, and I didn't know how to get up because I was carrying so much shame. 00:25:03.599 --> 00:25:06.799 I was carrying so much, I don't even know what I was carrying. 00:25:06.799 --> 00:25:11.680 It was heavy, and I was exhausted and I didn't have any words. 00:25:11.680 --> 00:25:17.440 So she reminded me of what I could do, what I what I was good at. 00:25:17.440 --> 00:25:32.000 To f you know, identify not just all the things that was bad and what had happened, you know, the trauma, but what was good, what was what was your strength, and how could you use it, and what could you do and what could you look forward to? 00:25:32.000 --> 00:25:36.720 Like, you know, that point I'd given up hope of the school that I wanted them to go to. 00:25:36.720 --> 00:25:39.759 So she reminded me, but that's not impossible, you know? 00:25:39.759 --> 00:25:40.880 That's not impossible. 00:25:40.880 --> 00:25:42.000 You can still do this. 00:25:42.000 --> 00:25:46.079 You know, this person can help you, I can help you, I can contact this person. 00:25:46.079 --> 00:25:51.599 So she did a lot, and there was also a social worker, and he wasn't my son's social worker. 00:25:51.599 --> 00:25:55.359 Actually, he was uh you worked for the council, there was two of them. 00:25:55.359 --> 00:26:00.079 One was called Michael Duncall, and there was another gentleman that his name escapes me. 00:26:00.079 --> 00:26:04.880 But they recognized my talent because I worked in local government before. 00:26:04.880 --> 00:26:15.119 So they would invite me onto steering panels and and groups for mothers of, you know, complex needs, disabled children, all the spectrum. 00:26:15.119 --> 00:26:41.039 And that brought me into a community space where I could do what I do best, which is to which is to listen and believe the mothers and work with them in whatever area we are able to facilitate facilitate and be kind of like the medium space between the local authority and the the parents and help the local authority to make sure the policies and procedures they were putting in place actually worked. 00:26:41.039 --> 00:26:48.640 And if it didn't work, we'll have to do a consultation and we'll feed back to them and we'll work with them on drafting these policies or procedures. 00:26:48.640 --> 00:26:50.240 And that opened up another door. 00:26:50.240 --> 00:26:57.039 So that's I started to work with a charity and um who was supported by a firm of solicitors. 00:26:57.039 --> 00:26:59.200 So the doors just kept opening. 00:26:59.200 --> 00:27:07.440 I started to meet different people, um, I started to become more engaged in understanding of this new world that I'd found myself in. 00:27:07.440 --> 00:27:11.039 And it was interesting and it became very fruitful. 00:27:11.039 --> 00:27:14.880 And they were very supportive and they understood me. 00:27:14.880 --> 00:27:22.400 So everyone understood, everyone had space, and we were able to create a lot of meaning, you know, we were able to communicate. 00:27:22.400 --> 00:27:36.160 We could, as you said, reimagine what life could be like if this is done in a particular way, if services were provided in a particular particular way, and if mothers were empowered in a particular way, what that could look like. 00:27:37.039 --> 00:27:44.319 So you recognize the lane you now found yourself in, you started to redefine what success now look like. 00:27:44.319 --> 00:27:54.960 So you took this history of local government work and this experience that you know could have been different. 00:27:54.960 --> 00:28:01.920 And somehow the two came together, and then you started studying psychotherapy. 00:28:02.160 --> 00:28:03.680 No, not quite, not there yet. 00:28:03.680 --> 00:28:04.960 We've missed a whole bit out. 00:28:04.960 --> 00:28:13.200 So while doing that work, again, my blackness was not just the only intersection, class was an intersection. 00:28:13.200 --> 00:28:19.920 You see, I was surrounded at the table by white middle class women who had time and money and resources. 00:28:19.920 --> 00:28:22.000 And who who was I? 00:28:22.000 --> 00:28:23.519 Where did I get the time? 00:28:23.519 --> 00:28:34.160 Where did I get the money and the resources to sit at that table and navigate the local authority to get access for my child and get these services? 00:28:34.160 --> 00:28:38.319 So in some respect, you know, that kind of what could you say? 00:28:38.319 --> 00:28:42.799 That was, you know, through that situation, you know, I became highlighted. 00:28:42.799 --> 00:28:48.400 I wouldn't say targeted, but yes, I was highlighted, like, who's this black girl? 00:28:48.400 --> 00:28:50.559 You know, not a woman, I was this girl. 00:28:50.559 --> 00:28:52.079 And how did she get here? 00:28:52.079 --> 00:28:53.920 And why are they listening to her? 00:28:53.920 --> 00:28:55.359 What was going on there? 00:28:55.359 --> 00:28:57.839 So that for me stayed with me. 00:28:57.839 --> 00:29:01.200 And then I decided that what was I gonna do with my life? 00:29:01.200 --> 00:29:07.519 Because now I started to think, you know, my twins are now over two, they're more than two years old, what am I gonna do

with my life? 00:29:07.519 --> 00:29:09.359 So my imagination kicked in. 00:29:09.359 --> 00:29:15.279 I'm gonna do creative writing and I'm gonna write books and I'm gonna do all these wonderful things. 00:29:15.279 --> 00:29:24.160 But at the time I was going to therapy and I remember speaking to my therapist about it, and I I felt completely dissatisfied. 00:29:24.160 --> 00:29:34.079 At that time, I still felt incomplete, like the pain, it wasn't just the pain of what happened from the birth, it was just the pain of the unknowing. 00:29:34.079 --> 00:29:42.000 There was so much uncertainty and I I I didn't underst I didn't have the words. 00:29:42.000 --> 00:29:52.960 I had no words to make sense of my experiences, like all these intersections, what was going on, you know, I wasn't in my work anymore, what was gonna happen to me. 00:29:52.960 --> 00:29:59.599 And I decided, you know, I w I remember just going to therapy all the time and having this real struggle. 00:29:59.599 --> 00:30:06.400 And because I was going to therapy, it was really challenging because my family hated me going to therapy, because only crazy people go to therapy. 00:30:06.400 --> 00:30:08.079 Yeah, so I must be mad. 00:30:08.079 --> 00:30:09.279 So I must be mad. 00:30:09.279 --> 00:30:11.599 So I I really struggled at that time. 00:30:11.599 --> 00:30:24.559 And then I started to become more creative in my outlook, and it started with my own house, um, trying to voice what was coming up inside. 00:30:24.559 --> 00:30:36.640 I would I think at the time I was having kind of like a uh maybe, you know, my therapist said it wasn't a break, but because I didn't have the words and I I couldn't write. 00:30:36.640 --> 00:30:39.279 I wanted to do writing, but I couldn't write. 00:30:39.279 --> 00:30:41.680 So I started to redecorate. 00:30:41.680 --> 00:30:44.640 But more interestingly, I would paint everything black. 00:30:44.640 --> 00:30:49.519 Everything was black in my in my bedroom, but everything on the stairs was pink. 00:30:49.519 --> 00:30:54.640 And yeah, I it was having some kind of breakdown, but they said no, it's a breakthrough. 00:30:54.640 --> 00:31:03.599 So it was after that I decided I'm going to step into counselling and learn about counselling itself. 00:31:03.599 --> 00:31:07.440 And I went and I completed three certificates at the time. 00:31:07.440 --> 00:31:12.400 And by the time I did the second one, I realized I could help more people. 00:31:12.400 --> 00:31:27.759 Because I think I initially went in it to help myself, but by the time I did the second certificate, I thought, no, I I I could do this, I could change my career, I could do stuff and I could help people, I could go to charities and I could help the solicitors and I could work with them. 00:31:27.759 --> 00:31:30.000 And I was so unsure. 00:31:30.000 --> 00:31:38.079 And I did another certificate, but by the time I did the third certificate, I knew that I was gonna not just be a counsellor. 00:31:38.079 --> 00:31:51.519 I didn't want to just be a counsellor because I knew these I knew this the this existence was gonna be problematic and they had to have some more credibility behind what I was gonna do. 00:31:51.519 --> 00:32:02.160 And I discovered counselling psychology and I applied for an undergraduate degree in counseling psychology, and it was on that course that I broke apart. 00:32:02.160 --> 00:32:06.240 Yeah, I broke apart on that course and it had to happen. 00:32:06.240 --> 00:32:23.279 Yeah, um and I I you know I understand that, and it was the three best years of my adult life being on that course because imagine being encased in something that's very hard, but thinking, you know, just going about your business, but you're actually encased in something. 00:32:23.279 --> 00:32:30.799 So that what that course did was to break all of this thing that had crystallized around me, and I just fell out. 00:32:30.799 --> 00:32:37.599 I just fell out, and in falling out, that's when I discovered existentialism and black existentialism. 00:32:37.599 --> 00:32:44.480 And I just thought this is insane that at this age I'm just learning about this. 00:32:44.480 --> 00:32:49.839 I'm just learning about existentialism, I'm just learning about black existentialism, this is insane. 00:32:49.839 --> 00:33:12.559 I'm just learning about, you know, the good mother, and I recognize so much of what had happened to me and how systems how systems are layered and interplayed and they make trauma very individualistic when actually it's a sick system that's that's per you know perpetuating violence against my existence. 00:33:12.559 --> 00:33:14.000 That's what was happening. 00:33:14.000 --> 00:33:19.839 So I kind of fell out out of breath, soaked and wet and just ready to move on. 00:33:20.079 --> 00:33:27.200 So you it was through existentialism that helped you see sounds like the fullness of yourself. 00:33:27.200 --> 00:33:28.000 Absolutely. 00:33:28.000 --> 00:33:39.200 So talk through, I guess, how that helped you move into this next chapter, how existentialism helped bring those building blocks. 00:33:39.200 --> 00:33:49.279 So what made you it sounds like, and please correct me if I'm wrong, but from what I'm gleaning from the conversation, existentialism helped you to see all of you. 00:33:49.440 --> 00:33:56.640 It's almost like you feel like how I describe it is the older you get, you almost feel like, oh, this is like the matrix. 00:33:56.640 --> 00:34:04.640 Like, oh, I thought I was acting alone in concert. 00:34:04.640 --> 00:34:09.360 I thought I was more compartmentalized than I really was. 00:34:09.360 --> 00:34:25.039 And it's part of the rebrand of this podcast to unapologetically whole, because I think the more we all seek being whole and not some societal view of what all this is supposed to look like, hence the matrix, the better off we will all be. 00:34:25.360 --> 00:34:28.400 So existentialism, you broke down.

00:34:28.400 --> 00:34:43.039 What was just take us into your mind as you're painting that black wall, take us into your mind as to what those initial thoughts you're starting to understand more about yourself, that road to self-awareness. 00:34:43.280 --> 00:34:43.599 Okay. 00:34:43.599 --> 00:34:50.400 So when I did my room like a cave, I had already told myself I'm death. 00:34:50.400 --> 00:34:56.320 Yeah, I I'm death, and I'm not gonna come alive until my son walks. 00:34:56.320 --> 00:35:05.119 And I used to say that, well, I'm not gonna, I'm just gonna be dead and I'm just gonna bury myself in this room until everyone else changes. 00:35:05.119 --> 00:35:07.280 You know, everyone else has to change. 00:35:07.280 --> 00:35:08.719 Then I will change. 00:35:08.719 --> 00:35:10.960 That's what I was telling myself at that time. 00:35:10.960 --> 00:35:16.639 By the time I did the ed, you know, my uh degree and I'd go in through the course, it's me. 00:35:16.639 --> 00:35:18.000 I need to change. 00:35:18.000 --> 00:35:20.400 I need to I do have the choice. 00:35:20.400 --> 00:35:22.239 I can have I do have a choice. 00:35:22.239 --> 00:35:27.119 I don't have to become what they say I have to become. 00:35:27.119 --> 00:35:28.559 I don't have to do this. 00:35:28.559 --> 00:35:34.639 It's perfectly fine if my life is not nine to five up in the night to look after my son. 00:35:34.639 --> 00:35:42.000 It means I it's perfectly fine to create my own existence to serve myself and my family. 00:35:42.000 --> 00:35:47.599 It's perfectly fine that they don't like me, that they don't love me, that they don't care for me. 00:35:47.599 --> 00:35:49.039 Do you care for yourself? 00:35:49.039 --> 00:35:50.400 Do you love yourself? 00:35:50.400 --> 00:36:05.280 So it was all of those kind of questions around being being a woman, being a black woman, being a human being, being a mother, being a mother of twins, you know, what was I setting myself up for? 00:36:05.280 --> 00:36:13.440 So all these kind of questions, you know, when broken down to their common denominator, became just around my existence. 00:36:13.440 --> 00:36:16.159 So that's what existentialism did for me. 00:36:16.159 --> 00:36:22.159 It kind of opened up something that I already possessed but didn't even know, didn't even know it. 00:36:22.159 --> 00:36:34.400 And in fact, that whole three years, which was, as I said, one of you know the three most beautiful years of my adult existence, set me up for the next 10 years of my life. 00:36:34.400 --> 00:36:40.880 Because without that, I don't think I would have survived again the the next ten years. 00:36:41.119 --> 00:36:43.519 Because I it would have consumed you. 00:36:44.480 --> 00:36:44.880 Pardon? 00:36:45.119 --> 00:36:46.480 It would have consumed you. 00:36:46.800 --> 00:36:48.239 Absolutely, absolutely. 00:36:48.239 --> 00:36:51.039 So the universe has a way of doing that, you know. 00:36:51.039 --> 00:37:00.880 It it it puts you through some things for you to make choices, you know, and and it's it's about knowing that even with any choice you have another choice. 00:37:00.880 --> 00:37:10.800 I think uh I think within the first year of completing the uh my degree uh their dad had a stroke. 00:37:10.800 --> 00:37:13.599 He had a major yeah, he had a major stroke. 00:37:13.599 --> 00:37:25.840 And I think I've all often said those three years, if I didn't have the psychology of understanding around trauma, of understanding around, you know, lived experiences, I would have folded. 00:37:25.840 --> 00:37:32.079 In fact I did fold, but not into pieces that that could have easily will have happened. 00:37:32.400 --> 00:37:34.719 There's a book title I've been drawn to. 00:37:34.719 --> 00:37:37.519 It's called um Damaged But Not Destroyed. 00:37:37.519 --> 00:37:38.000 Yeah. 00:37:38.000 --> 00:37:40.559 And that's what I hear in your story. 00:37:40.559 --> 00:37:46.000 You've been through so much, but it there's still so much to give. 00:37:46.239 --> 00:37:47.679 Yeah, I do feel that. 00:37:47.679 --> 00:37:52.159 I'm glad you see it and hear it, because that's exactly how I feel. 00:37:52.159 --> 00:38:00.239 I do feel this there is so much more of who I am as a as a person for me to even indulge in. 00:38:00.239 --> 00:38:16.639 It's not just to give to someone else, it's for me to discover about myself and find peace with about myself because so much of my experience has been not just pathologized, but shamed and you know, twisted and rejected. 00:38:16.639 --> 00:38:25.440 Um and when you start to live other people's perceptions, you know, it it's it's it's profound. 00:38:25.440 --> 00:38:35.039 But when you start living your own truth and your own reality from your own choices, and you're completely at peace with that, it's it's revolutionary. 00:38:35.280 --> 00:38:50.000 It truly is, and then you have to start preparing for something else, which is and this is what's been happening to me in the past couple of years, and tell me if you agree, is once you one I call it owning your story. 00:38:50.000 --> 00:38:59.119 Yeah, it's actually the tagline in my book, and once you start to own your story, other people notice, and it almost creates this own dichotomy. 00:38:59.119 --> 00:39:04.480 They're the people who become team Neresia and those who become like who does she think she is? 00:39:04.480 --> 00:39:10.239 She's supposed to sit in this old existence that I wanted her to stay in. 00:39:10.239 --> 00:39:12.719 But that's how you know you're doing this right. 00:39:12.719 --> 00:39:15.119 That's how you know you're doing this right. 00:39:15.119 --> 00:39:23.519 Because walking towards the light when you've been hit with this level of darkness is not, it's not an assignment for the week. 00:39:23.840 --> 00:39:24.559 No, it's not. 00:39:24.559 --> 00:39:25.920 Absolutely, it's not. 00:39:25.920 --> 00:39:30.880 And owning my story, I I actually tell people that

this is my path. 00:39:30.880 --> 00:39:33.039 I don't reject it, you know. 00:39:33.039 --> 00:39:36.719 I wouldn't wish it on someone else, but this is mine. 00:39:36.719 --> 00:39:39.119 I this is you know, it's mine. 00:39:39.119 --> 00:39:44.800 You know, there's a there's a it doesn't matter if there's a reason or or who's re this is it. 00:39:45.039 --> 00:39:46.719 And it's uniquely yours. 00:39:46.719 --> 00:39:48.880 It's uniquely yours. 00:39:49.039 --> 00:39:49.360 Yeah. 00:39:49.679 --> 00:39:54.719 Because um in Nigeria there's this old saying, and I'm gonna code switch a little bit. 00:39:54.719 --> 00:39:57.039 Now you know where your shoe de pinch. 00:39:57.039 --> 00:40:01.519 Like we're all wearing shoes, but only you know where in that shoe it hurts. 00:40:01.519 --> 00:40:03.519 The rest of the world may not know. 00:40:03.519 --> 00:40:18.800 But knowing that, knowing that, and just seeing just even you telling your story, and I'm so glad you brought up deconstruction, deconstruction, deprogramming, and what it takes and the realness of that. 00:40:18.800 --> 00:40:25.760 Because I think we live in this generation of everything once everybody wants things done yesterday, overnight. 00:40:25.760 --> 00:40:27.519 This is a process. 00:40:28.000 --> 00:40:28.480 Yes. 00:40:28.719 --> 00:40:51.760 Sometimes you gotta sit in the process, you gotta sit in the pain, in the ugliness of it, in the why did this happen the way it happened, and especially if you're from a performance culture, you've learned you're a woman, you're a black woman, especially, you learn to be a human doing before you ever become a human being, at least for many of us. 00:40:52.559 --> 00:40:53.679 And that's so true. 00:40:53.679 --> 00:40:59.119 And that's one of the reasons why, you know, traditionally in Jamaica you do rice and peas on Sunday. 00:40:59.119 --> 00:41:02.960 And I intentionally don't do rice and peas on Sunday sometimes. 00:41:02.960 --> 00:41:04.159 Because I'm tired. 00:41:04.159 --> 00:41:04.559 Yeah. 00:41:04.559 --> 00:41:21.360 I'm I'm exhausted, and I don't does the, you know, because this thing is, oh, you're supposed to, good mom, you're respecting the culture, you know, you're doing but actually we might just want to sleep because we're up we because we've been up all night or something could have happened. 00:41:21.360 --> 00:41:23.440 It I don't clarify anymore. 00:41:23.440 --> 00:41:31.199 In the past I used to kind of say, Oh no, we have to do this, we have to No, we don't, because that doesn't work for us. 00:41:31.199 --> 00:41:35.119 And you know, going back to what you said, the culture wants things done now. 00:41:35.119 --> 00:41:40.719 If I have an appointment and they say, Oh, the appointment's for 9 15, I'll say, No, I I can't make that. 00:41:40.719 --> 00:41:54.719 Oh, you have to come to the appointment because I said we are unable to make that time because I have to factor in uh travel time and the time it will

take to get my son up so that you're asking us to get up five o'clock in the morning. 00:41:54.719 --> 00:41:57.840 And that would yeah, that will not be possible. 00:41:57.840 --> 00:42:01.840 So it's just l and it's it's up to them after that. 00:42:01.840 --> 00:42:02.960 It's not up to me. 00:42:02.960 --> 00:42:24.400 You know, so it's kind of uh it's not just assertive, it's kind of knowing it's kind of knowing what it takes to be you every single day and to not fall into that pleasing factor that's gonna now disrupt, interrupt, and dismantle the rest of the day for you. 00:42:24.400 --> 00:42:28.000 If you've got other priorities, it's just not gonna work. 00:42:28.000 --> 00:42:29.440 So I don't buy into that. 00:42:29.440 --> 00:42:32.239 And if I want if they want to label me difficult, they have. 00:42:32.239 --> 00:42:37.360 Yeah, that's your definition of a difficult mother, but that doesn't really work for me. 00:42:37.360 --> 00:42:45.760 So if you may want to have another look and give us an afternoon appointment, then we can make that work, but it's not gonna it can't happen any other way. 00:42:45.760 --> 00:42:47.199 So I'm very strict about that. 00:42:47.440 --> 00:42:53.039 And you that's a great point, is establishing boundaries is essential to this journey. 00:42:53.039 --> 00:43:01.920 I think it's really, I mean, redefining success and establishing boundaries go hand in hand, and even reimagining what it means to thrive. 00:43:01.920 --> 00:43:10.480 My definition of that, because it means how do you now flourish under these circumstances, is connecting to the wholeness of you. 00:43:10.480 --> 00:43:14.320 Like I you know, who who are you really? 00:43:14.639 --> 00:43:15.039 Yeah. 00:43:15.039 --> 00:43:18.159 It's recognizing your own humanity. 00:43:18.159 --> 00:43:22.559 Because this journey takes you out of your own humanity. 00:43:22.559 --> 00:43:27.840 If you're a carer, you end up thinking about everyone's needs but your own. 00:43:27.840 --> 00:43:49.760 And if you're in a careful, you have knickers with the elastic coming out, and I'm talking about Liv Deg Rally, you know, you've got holes in your underwear, your hair is not done, and you know, just simple things about being human, is you're no longer recognized, yeah, because you're you you've not really it's not about letting yourself go, you forget your own. 00:43:50.320 --> 00:43:51.440 You genuinely forget. 00:43:51.440 --> 00:43:52.880 You genuinely forget. 00:43:52.880 --> 00:43:53.679 You really do. 00:43:54.719 --> 00:43:54.960 Yeah. 00:43:54.960 --> 00:43:59.760 So I think what happens here is what what's becoming whole, I had to say. 00:43:59.760 --> 00:44:03.840 Step in without guilt because this is what this does to you. 00:44:03.840 --> 00:44:12.800 It makes you feel that if you start to look after yourself, you know, you're you're no longer good enough because you're not looking after everyone else. 00:44:12.800 --> 00:44:15.280 And how dare you look after yourself, you know. 00:44:15.280 --> 00:44:27.760 So the moment you recognize your own needs and not to ignore what your body's saying, you know, my legs hurting me, my arms hurting me, I am tired without judgment, because we do that a lot. 00:44:27.760 --> 00:44:33.360 We can go around judging ourselves for feeling or not feeling or not being up to it. 00:44:33.360 --> 00:44:37.039 So I think for me it was really about knowing that I'm human. 00:44:37.039 --> 00:44:37.840 I'm human. 00:44:38.079 --> 00:44:46.559 So reconnecting to all of you the woman, the mother, the therapist, the advocate. 00:44:46.559 --> 00:44:53.440 Tell us what made you realize that you now needed to found the therapy and coaching consultancy. 00:44:53.760 --> 00:44:54.079 Okay. 00:44:54.079 --> 00:44:58.159 So I what happened after that? 00:44:58.159 --> 00:45:01.920 Yeah, so their dad had a stroke and I'd got my undergraduate degree. 00:45:01.920 --> 00:45:09.360 So in the UK, you have to do the doctorate to be uh HCP registered to practice as a counseling psychologist. 00:45:09.360 --> 00:45:11.039 It's a protected title. 00:45:11.039 --> 00:45:18.079 And again, I found myself because of his stroke, uh face down, because there was another shame now. 00:45:18.079 --> 00:45:23.199 Oh my god, you have two disabled people, you know, and the family and the oh just everyone. 00:45:23.199 --> 00:45:32.079 So I was face down again, palms down, and I lost or forgotten about my ambition to be a you know, to do this doctorate. 00:45:32.079 --> 00:45:36.320 And I decided instead to again go back to what Shade said. 00:45:36.320 --> 00:45:37.199 What have you got? 00:45:37.199 --> 00:45:38.079 What have you got? 00:45:38.079 --> 00:45:48.239 And what I had was the natural ability to coach and support and to help people to reimagine and to provide space and be creative. 00:45:48.239 --> 00:45:55.519 And so at the time I was still helping, you know, other parents, you know, using my therapy skills, but mainly as a coach. 00:45:55.519 --> 00:46:05.840 So I decided to do an integrative course in counseling and coaching, which I entered, you know, very uh, you know, excited. 00:46:05.840 --> 00:46:11.119 Um, but feeling that I'd betrayed myself, but I continued. 00:46:11.119 --> 00:46:18.079 But I think within the first six months I knew um I needed to do my doctorate. 00:46:18.079 --> 00:46:22.000 So I think just a journey again of being on that course. 00:46:22.000 --> 00:46:32.400 Um I got confident again and um I decided to finish the course, which I did, I finished it, and then I decided to uh apply for my doctorate, which I did. 00:46:32.400 --> 00:46:52.719 And it was during that journey um I was encouraged to set up a service for mothers like myself to work with mothers with children with complex needs, ADHD autism, Down syndrome, because it was naturally happening, it was natural, you know, I'd get referrals, so that was my inspiration. 00:46:52.719 -->

00:47:04.960 Um as time went on and I started to accept the black like me, I was encouraged to put your face on that screen, put your story on that screen, put your story out there. 00:47:04.960 --> 00:47:06.239 And it took me a while. 00:47:06.239 --> 00:47:15.679 It took me a while, but with more therapy, I got there and I put my picture up that this is me, I'm black like this, and it just took off from there. 00:47:15.679 --> 00:47:30.000 So I have a s because I'm doing the doctorate now, uh, I have a small practice that I still run and I help to support mothers um who've been, you know, experienced traumatic birth and birth trauma, but it's mainly black women that I work with. 00:47:30.239 --> 00:47:34.239 So um can you talk to me a little bit about the open heart model? 00:47:34.719 --> 00:47:38.079 Okay, it's the open heart model came out of the coaching. 00:47:38.079 --> 00:47:50.639 It by it's by a lady called I can't remember her surname, but it was a very good approach to how you you work with parents who have disabled children. 00:47:50.639 --> 00:47:54.079 So that model was an integration, really. 00:47:54.079 --> 00:48:08.719 It used integrative skills and how you would say work with a mother of a child with autism, how you would enter the home, how you how you would, you know, work with paperwork so that you're not belittling, you're not encrouching on any boundaries. 00:48:08.719 --> 00:48:14.639 So I used not the approach per se, but the concept of having an open heart. 00:48:14.639 --> 00:48:21.039 So it's just basically saying, you know, you're working from an empathetic place, not a place of sympathy. 00:48:21.039 --> 00:48:27.360 You're working in a wholeness, you're working with the person and not the child's disability. 00:48:27.360 --> 00:48:31.599 The person comes first, the human comes first, the family comes first. 00:48:31.599 --> 00:48:37.039 So you're making that connection as a professional, but as a human being first. 00:48:37.039 --> 00:48:38.719 So that's how I use it. 00:48:38.719 --> 00:48:44.960 And that's why I say sacred spaces, because a lot of black families don't have a safe space. 00:48:44.960 --> 00:48:47.440 A lot of black women don't have a safe space. 00:48:47.440 --> 00:49:00.480 So I say it's a sacred space, it's a space where they can enter and be safe, and then they can put the rules in, the boundaries around how they work, and they can be authentic, they can bring everything about them. 00:49:00.719 --> 00:49:06.639 Speaking of bringing everything, you have both a therapeutic and coaching background. 00:49:06.639 --> 00:49:13.280 How do you know which services to employ or mix the two depending on the client? 00:49:13.519 --> 00:49:14.079 Yeah, yeah. 00:49:14.079 --> 00:49:17.039 With the client, it's always contracted. 00:49:17.039 --> 00:49:28.559 So some clients come just for therapy, so you can contract based on the you know what's been discussed, on the services that they're looking for, and

what the service that may be provided. 00:49:28.559 --> 00:49:32.880 So it could be a client might say, I just want six weeks of coaching. 00:49:32.880 --> 00:49:45.360 You know, sometimes if a person has never been into therapy before, the word therapy is like a cuss word, you know, it's a word for some cultures, um, it's bad, you know, it's a for mad people, you know. 00:49:45.360 --> 00:49:49.599 So sometimes it's easier for them to say coaching rather than therapy. 00:49:49.599 --> 00:49:51.360 But it it is it is changing. 00:49:51.360 --> 00:49:52.320 It is changing. 00:49:52.320 --> 00:50:01.119 But for each client, it's a contracting, you contract based on the client's needs, whether it's for therapy or coaching or integrative therapy and coaching. 00:50:01.360 --> 00:50:32.000 We've talked a lot about systemic barriers as they've applied to you, but as you've opened up your practice and you've seen others with similar stories, where do you think, at least in the UK through your eye, where do you think there could be, where can we start towards removing some of these systemic barriers in a way that could help mothers overcome just the barriers to services, the barriers to just feeling like they belong. 00:50:32.000 --> 00:50:34.400 Where would you start? 00:50:34.400 --> 00:50:38.159 So, in other words, if you had all the money in the world, where would you start? 00:50:38.559 --> 00:50:39.920 I will start with you, Lola. 00:50:39.920 --> 00:50:45.360 Platforms like this that are visible, raw, and truthful and authentic. 00:50:45.360 --> 00:50:46.480 That's where I will start. 00:50:46.480 --> 00:50:53.920 Because it starts with the lived experience, because a lot of what's already out there pathologizes black women, and that's what's dismissed. 00:50:53.920 --> 00:50:56.239 What's dismissed is our lived reality. 00:50:56.239 --> 00:51:00.079 But with the social media now, there's a lot of the same story. 00:51:00.079 --> 00:51:00.639 Yeah. 00:51:00.639 --> 00:51:06.320 Yeah, they're they're very visible because people are putting these things out there. 00:51:06.320 --> 00:51:16.880 But with platforms like yours, when you can get lived realities out there and you and people can share and empower through speaking, through visibility, that's where we need to start. 00:51:16.880 --> 00:51:21.679 You know, you could throw thousands and thousands of whatever money at this. 00:51:21.679 --> 00:51:24.320 It wouldn't change the systemic barriers. 00:51:24.320 --> 00:51:35.440 It starts with these conversations, it starts with the reality, it starts with the visibility and the networking and the understanding that to dismantle this is not going to be overnight. 00:51:35.440 --> 00:51:36.000 Yeah. 00:51:36.000 --> 00:51:39.199 Because you could have because you see, what was I gonna say? 00:51:39.199 --> 00:51:42.880 Systemic barriers, it's not just the typical gatekeepers. 00:51:42.880 --> 00:51:44.719 Sometimes it's people that look like us. 00:51:44.880 --> 00:51:46.320 Well, there's there's a whole other show. 00:51:46.559 --> 00:51:47.199 Yeah, yeah. 00:51:47.199 --> 00:51:49.679 Sometimes it's people that look like us that you know. 00:51:49.679 --> 00:51:59.679 I once gave a presented at a small conference, and you know, one of the most openly attacking person was a woman. 00:51:59.679 --> 00:52:07.119 And it was a black woman who, you know, who went on to voice that, you know, black women's bodies, there's something wrong with our bodies. 00:52:07.119 --> 00:52:14.639 So they there's this internalized pathology that our problems, our bodies are a site of problems. 00:52:14.639 --> 00:52:26.239 So I think what I'm doing in my work in the UK is not only to inform therapeutic practice or to bring visibility to black existentialism, is to create a whole new praxis. 00:52:26.239 --> 00:52:40.559 Because again, if you look at, you know, I've uh, you know, part of my research, I've just started, there's literally so such limited information on black women with children with complex needs. 00:52:40.559 --> 00:52:41.599 It's it doesn't exist. 00:52:41.599 --> 00:52:42.800 There's there's nothing there. 00:52:43.039 --> 00:52:50.639 Yeah, we are out here, we exist, and we are doing our best to make the world a little bit better than how we came into it. 00:52:50.639 --> 00:52:53.039 There's we could go on for hours and hours. 00:52:53.039 --> 00:52:55.119 I would love to have you back on the pod. 00:52:55.119 --> 00:53:11.360 I really would, because I would love to talk to you about women who you've coached, that I'd love to talk to you more about your coaching tree and how you view legacy, because I'm going to guess, based on all the work you're doing, that you believe that legacy is beyond just your children. 00:53:11.760 --> 00:53:12.480 Absolutely. 00:53:12.880 --> 00:53:13.920 I feel that way too. 00:53:13.920 --> 00:53:16.320 The legacy is beyond just your children. 00:53:16.320 --> 00:53:21.039 It's who you manage, who you coach, who you pour life into. 00:53:21.039 --> 00:53:26.320 And I'm sure people want to know where are these babies now? 00:53:26.320 --> 00:53:29.199 And I'm guessing they're no longer babies. 00:53:29.519 --> 00:53:31.599 No, they're not no longer babies. 00:53:31.599 --> 00:53:34.320 Uh, this happened almost 20 years ago. 00:53:34.320 --> 00:53:41.119 So my first twin, which is a twin who has disabilities, he's doing very well. 00:53:41.119 --> 00:53:49.199 He's very, very healthy, you know, he gets involved in the community, enjoys swimming and a variety of activities. 00:53:49.199 --> 00:53:58.079 So he's well supported by uh his carers which assist him with most of his daily living outside of the home and inside the home, to be honest. 00:53:58.079 --> 00:54:02.159 And my second twin is doing very, very well. 00:54:02.159 --> 00:54:14.400 So he's become, you know, I mean, both my boys are all of me, but he has showered me with this, you know, this powerful beam of light, and he's done even more more for himself. 00:54:14.400 --> 00:54:21.440 He's more, he's become more than me, which I'm so grateful to witness after everything that we've gone through. 00:54:21.440 --> 00:54:25.519 So he currently sits pure maths, and I'm so proud. 00:54:25.519 --> 00:54:26.880 He's at university. 00:54:26.880 --> 00:54:35.199 He got like three double A stars, and he got a B in Mandarin and physics and maths and further math. 00:54:35.199 --> 00:54:37.280 So he's just amazing. 00:54:37.280 --> 00:54:44.400 And I'm just so grateful for who I was and who I became to help to support them on their life journey. 00:54:44.400 --> 00:54:55.119 I'm just, you know, really, really pleased about, you know, that brings another dimension of wholeness for me, you know, as a as a mother to see them doing so well. 00:54:55.119 --> 00:54:56.000 Well done. 00:54:56.000 --> 00:54:56.880 Well done. 00:54:57.039 --> 00:54:57.440 Thank you. 00:54:57.920 --> 00:55:06.880 If you could distill one lesson from your work that you'd want every caregiver to carry with them, what would it be? 00:55:07.599 --> 00:55:08.719 I believe you. 00:55:08.719 --> 00:55:09.679 I believe you. 00:55:09.679 --> 00:55:16.639 I believe you. 00:55:16.960 --> 00:55:17.679 I believe you. 00:55:17.679 --> 00:55:18.480 Say that again. 00:55:18.480 --> 00:55:19.280 I believe you. 00:55:19.280 --> 00:55:22.480 This was not a figment of your imagination. 00:55:22.719 --> 00:55:22.960 No. 00:55:23.199 --> 00:55:24.800 I see you, I believe you. 00:55:24.960 --> 00:55:28.000 Yeah, I believe you with all my open heart. 00:55:28.000 --> 00:55:29.840 Like, I I believe you. 00:55:29.840 --> 00:55:32.239 For so many of us, we're just not believed. 00:55:32.239 --> 00:55:33.039 Thank you. 00:55:33.039 --> 00:55:34.719 You're welcome, and thank you. 00:55:34.719 --> 00:55:36.320 And I'd love to come back on. 00:55:36.320 --> 00:55:37.199 God bless you. 00:55:37.199 --> 00:55:38.000 God bless you. 00:55:41.440 --> 00:55:46.480 Thank you for joining me on Unapologetically Whole. 00:55:46.480 --> 00:55:57.280 My hope is that something you heard today offered you some space to breathe, reflect, and feel seen. 00:55:57.280 --> 00:56:05.920 If this episode resonated with you, please take a moment to rate and review the podcast on Apple Podcasts or wherever you live. 00:56:05.920 --> 00:56:08.880 It helps this community grow. 00:56:08.880 --> 00:56:36.000 And if you want to stay connected, visit loladadaali.com, l-ol e y dot com to sign up for my monthly newsletter, purchase my upcoming book, Unapologetically Whole, or learn how to bring me to your next event as a speaker. 00:56:36.000 --> 00:56:44.239 Until next time, I'm Lola Dada Olley, and this is Unapologetically Whole.