Aware & Aggravated - 41. The Gift Of Trauma & Power It Left Behind

Episode Date: May 26, 2025

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Oh my God. Okay. I have so much to tell you. My soul wants to talk so bad right now. I didn't even have time to turn on my little lights. We just going to roll with it. All right. First thing I got the earrings. I sure did. And I got another bracelet. There's a lot that goes into it. We've got to talk, babe. First things first. I think I'm going to title this episode, the gift of trauma or something like that. All of first, I think I'm going to title this episode the gift of trauma or something like that. All of us, if you've listened to my podcast before and you relate to anything I say, if you're new, hi. Hi friends also. I can't even introduce this right. Anyone who's related to what I say, we've all been through things and can say, I did not deserve that

happening to me. But when bad things happen, we can take it on the chin. It's like we can accept that unexpected bad happens. Unexpected things that we didn't deserve happen. The gift in that, and it just cracked me upside the head. Thanks earrings. Thanks new bracelet. Undeserved good can also happen to you and unexpected good can also happen. We just haven't been able to see it and I don't think I would have had this belief of it if I didn't have so much contrast of the bad. A lot of people like to say, oh everything happens for a reason. Shut up. I don't want to hear it. This makes me so happy. Like I feel so relieved. I feel so like hopeful, faithful again, if you will. Like faithful that having hope is not stupid. Because as much as we can accept bad things

happening that we didn't deserve, hey, dumb ass, wake up. You got to accept the opposite too. You just ain't been letting it in. And oh my God, look at us, stupid we've been. I kind of want to go in order with how things happened because there's also like a giant side about trauma and like PTSD and things that have happened to you that have kind of warped the way that you go through life that I want to get to and it kind of all ties in together. Like with me, with things that I've been through in the past,

I still have trauma responses that come out. Like with fighting, with aggression, with protection, we can get into all of it, but I had a whole kind of like shift around things that have happened to you that are bad. When your body reacts to stimulus that is no longer a threat, anytime somebody looks like an ex of mine in public,

even though it's not them, my body reacts like there's a threat in front of me. Like fight or flight mode kicks on, and I have a whole new relationship to that whole dynamic and like things triggering you and like, not this triggered shit people talk about on TikTok, like I'm triggered. Like when you actually been through some things and you and like not this triggered shit people talk about on Tik Tok like I'm too big. Like when you actually been through some things and you really get triggered and

your body keeps the score, your body remembers and your body gets you ready. I have a whole new perspective around that because I had to pull my gun on somebody the other night, but this past week has been a lot of realizations wrapped up in one. So let's go back to the store. Okay? Let's set the scene with the store. I go try the earrings on, the Panther earrings. Oh, I love them so bad. And I talked about in the last episode

how these were like an epiphany of their own. But I went to go try them on, because I was like, I'm gonna go see what I turn into when I put these on. I love them so bad. Soon as I put them on, I was like, oh, okay, we're gonna get them, we're gonna get them. And these were the last pair in the company. I love them so bad soon as I put them on I was like, ah Okay, we're gonna get them we're gonna get him and these were the last pair in the company They had to be shipped in so nobody could copy me. I like that but

The plot thickens a little bit because like I said, I bought another one of the bracelets like I have on this arm This bracelet style is discontinued. It's the big love bracelet from Cartier I've always hated the love bracelets. I don't like the classic ones. I bought one from my sister a few months ago. But back when I bought the first one, I had an opportunity where I had some extra money and I was like, I wanna go buy my sister a love bracelet.

She's wanted one forever. And they're very expensive. And I kinda wanted the big ones so we could match. And like the whole thing about a love bracelet is it's like a handcuff to the person that you love. It's typically for like a relationship. That's how it started was like people who were married or in a relationship. You cuff yourself to the other person because you have to take them off with a screwdriver.

Mine's a bangle, so it's different. But my sister's the only person who's been like with me since I'm born, where it's never been like a betrayal beyond repair. Sure, we've fought. Sure, we've whatever. But we've fought for each other physically. We've sacrificed for each other. We've proven our loyalty and we've been there for each other, that's my best friend. And we have a bond that nobody can ever touch. Like no one can ever get in between that. We'll cut anybody off if you try and get in between me and her. That's like the one person where I will have

that toxic, undying loyalty to, I don't care what happens. If anybody gotta be killed to save her, kill them. But she's always wanted this damn love bracelet for like years and years and years. So I'm like, okay, I want to go buy us both one. And what I wanted was one of each of these for myself. And I was like, ugh. I don't want to go buy two and not get her one.

So I bought one for her and one for me. And I got the big version, like the cuff version. She got the classic one because she's like skinny, got the little arms, whatever. But what I wanted was one on each wrist of the big one. I don't like the small one for me. I'm six foot seven. It's not going to look right. It's going to look a little dainty little nutty. So I bought us both one months ago, right? Cute. They discontinued the big version of this. And when I bought the other love bracelets together, I had them, the guy bring in two in my size because I

wanted to try them both on and I knew that I loved them. That one in my size, I'm the biggest size. They don't make a lot of these and typically you have to request sizes in for me with shit that I need. That bracelet has stayed there for four months. No one has requested it out of the store. No one's bought it. No one's nothing. And when I was in there trying earrings, I saw online a couple of days ago, they discontinued

this big bracelet. So what they have in stores is all they have left. And I was like, I'm never going to be able to get this again. And this one is here. Did I manipulate myself a little? Yes. But my soul like fully locked in, in the moment and was like, get it. Because the left is the receiving arm. In Albanian culture, you give money with your right hand. When you take money and receive money, you take it with the left. When I got this one and put it on my right hand,

I didn't understand what was going on, but what's been building is my giving. I've been doing nothing but giving, producing, creating social media, people in my life, situations. I've been doing nothing but giving. And this bracelet was like a symbolic lockdown and like anchor into receiving. Now I have a balance because I've been feeling fucked over with like how much I give and

not get. And I've had a bad relationship to receiving. Didn't know it was this bad until this little motherfucker, because when I put it on, I felt my soul link into it. And it was like anchored into flaring up everything to do around my relationship with receiving the amount of downloads and brain shattering shit, the amount of emotional things I've had to process and like go through. One of the big ones I talked about was, okay,

unexpected bad can happen and you can accept it. Unexpected good. You can't accept that. And typically my relationship in the past with receiving is if I spend or if I'm reckless or if I just honor myself and what I want, I get punished for it. So I did it as a moment to rewrite the narrative with me with this damn bracelet, lock in the left side, lock in a balance of giving and receiving. But also, I'm not going to let myself question this purchase at all. I'm not going to let myself freak out. I'm not going to let myself be fearful and guilty. Fuck that. I wanted it. I got the money. I'm going to buy it. And

I didn't realize how much you could activate with a piece of fucking jewelry. I'm not saying because it's Cartier. You can do it with anything. But following my soul to like anchor it into the left side of my body has been nuts. Because like I said, the thing's unraveling, but now I see deserving and actually receiving things are completely separate. And there is a lot of trauma for a lot of people around receiving. There's trauma around deserving and there's trauma around receiving trauma around receiving for me was nothing is given to you. Nobody's going to look at you and just say, I want you to have this

just because I care about you and just because it makes you happy. Every time I was given something in the past, it was a control tactic. It was to hold it over my head. It was to ensure that I would treat somebody a certain way, especially with my dad's side of the family, the Albanians. That's a big thing in Albanian culture, but nothing ever felt safe to receive it. Everything was like uneasy and it goes down to love too for someone to love me

or care about me. In the past, it's like, there's so much trauma around that shit. It's like to receive love, to receive money, to receive anything, to have someone just look at you and say, I want to give you this. I could not fathom it. There was always a string attached. So that's why I wanted to give myself this as like to stamp walking into a new chapter of this thing, got no strings attached. I didn't buy this bracelet to go and say, okay, now you have to go work harder.

Now you have to go prove you deserve it. Now you have to go make up for it. There's none of that. This was just fucking because, and I wanted to anchor into my growth with it. That's it. So the whole like trauma thing around deserving, girl, it goes deep. Real deep.

Not fun. I feel like I deserve good shit to happen to me and I can justify it by how much bad has happened to me. It's like I have to feel worthy of good things happening unexpectedly and I feel like I have to deserve good. If I don't deserve bad and I can still get it, I cannot deserve good and still get it. That's what I'd like to open up the channel for.

I'd like to experience some good I don't fucking deserve. Ooh, I'm mad about that one. There's so much like grief in that, like living life so long feeling like I have to earn good, but I just need to take on bad. I didn't deserve, but also with like receiving anything and deserving anything. I like when I talk about my whole like cocaine addiction to like keep going, it was like every time I received something, it was like, okay, now I have to do something because of

it. I couldn't just receive something and sit still and feel okay or feel safe. I had to do other shits or make more money or do more for the person who gave me something to show my appreciation. I couldn't just take something and sit with it. Like if you wonder if you have any kind of issue with this, imagine somebody walking up to you and saying, okay, here's $5 million. This is for you. For me, I'd freak the fuck out.

I would be so paranoid where to come from, what do you want, what kind of setup, what kind of scam? I would not be able to trust it. And you should be discerning. Don't be stupid. But that feeling of like, what you would have to do when you got that, it's like everybody says they want money. Everybody says they want certain opportunities, this, that, and the third. If you actually got it, how uneasy would you feel? When I'm angry, I'd be like, oh yeah, I would take it.

Like I always say, these dumb fucking bastards who are billionaires don't deserve it because they don't know how to spend it. Anybody who says, oh, I could never spend $10 million, are you stupid? I could piss through it in a week. What do you mean? What do you mean it could spend $10 million?

How about give some of it the fuck away? How about do things for other people? Your taste might not be $10 billion worth, but mine is. My heart would know exactly what to do with that 10 billion. And I'm talking about like the anger thing of like, you're sitting here, you've been through so much bad that you didn't deserve and you're like, no, I do deserve it. I would be okay if somebody did this kind thing for me. But if it actually happened, when that anger subsides,

when people actually do things for you or give you love, it reveals so much unsafety. You don't feel safe with good things happening to you that you don't feel like you deserved. Me too, girl. This also kicked up a notch because when I talked about unsafety with receiving, a lot of things around unsafety have been coming up and I think it's got to do with this. So a lot of people say with the relationships and with people, you're insecure if you behave a certain way.

I've always said, no, I'm sensitive to disrespect. For you to go flirt with somebody in front of me if you're dating me, for me not to smack you upside your fucking head, like where does that not make logical sense? For you to be disrespectful to me and do anything, it doesn't mean I'm insecure. It means you disrespected me, but I have a whole new understanding of the disrespect thing. So people who are hypersensitive to disrespect and the people label it as, oh, you're insecure

because someone did or said this thing. It is not you're insecure about it. It's not just you're sensitive to disrespect. Me and you both know. Trauma's taught us you can evaluate how much of a priority you are to somebody through their words. As soon as someone starts to disrespect you, that is an indicator. They will soon you. Disrespect is a wake up call and a way to know how much someone values you. And you need to be very careful when you have an upbringing where it's not safe and people are prioritized over you or you never feel like anyone's looking

after you. If you've had to figure it out on your own, you're going to be very sensitive to disrespect. And it's not that you're just sensitive. You're seeing how much people value you. You're seeing how safe people are to be around. And my whole thing in the past was like, lash out when someone disrespects me. What's really going on is I see you do not respect me. Therefore you do not value me as much. Therefore you're way more likely to discard me or hurt me. So to retaliate, to hit them, to yell at them, to do anything is to reestablish a level

of, yeah, you're not going to be able to treat me like this. It's like to establish more respect. It's not respectable for someone to be mistreated and just take it. That's how you can make sure you get walked all over. But my whole thing with retaliating was like you disrespect me, it makes me see you don't value me as much. So if I can disrespect you back or retaliate, it makes me seen as more valuable in your eyes and you're a little bit more cautious before you try and fuck with me again. You're not going to be someone who I trust and can relax around. I will never feel safe to receive your love again because I see that you don't with the disrespect. I hope that makes sense as I talk about it. There's so many layers to it, but so

many people are like, oh, certain things that you do are insecure. No, babe. That's a trauma fucking response when you're disrespected. What's really going on is you see somebody don't value you and how somebody treats you when they don't value you is not something you want to go through. If I'm going to have to look after myself, I'd rather know as quick as possible. So going through what I've gone through, it's like a keen ability you get, where certain people do not notice disrespect, but I do. The way you talk to me, the way you treat me,

it's so clear. It's like I can perceive any unsafety in a relationship. And that's one thing I don't like, is how people judge how other people feel safe. It's weird. A lot of human behavior is just people trying to feel safe and people's reactions to things are feeling unsafe. How they react when they feel unsafe. Because you make me feel unsafe, I'm not going to act like most people would tell you to, oh, you just need to be calm and still and know who you are. When you've depended on people in the past, like when you're a child and you depend on somebody to live,

you need to be very keen and very aware when they don't fucking value you because you're left on your own. So that whole thing of like, what felt like such a traumatic thing has given me like a radar for assessing people's like value of me. And it's like, okay, your actions become more predictable. Or I have like kind of like a warning system. So feeling so sensitive and people always attacking me, oh, you're insecure, you're this, you're that. No, I got a radar, you don't.

Happy you don't have it, but good luck, dumb ass. Cause people who treat you bad, it's like people with relationships. I read so much more into everything. Friends of mine are always like, I didn't see this coming. And I'm like, in my head, I fucking did, because they did this, this, this, and that, and they said this.

That one thing tipped me off to they don't value you no more as a partner, and then they cheat. Ooh, it didn't come out of the blue. So if you feel like hypersensitive to shit and it makes you annoyed and it makes you angry, it's not a bad thing. It's actually there to help you.

And if you tune into it right, this is like a keen ability and it will save you a lot of times. But this also takes me into my next point that's coming up of like the trauma responses of physically having to be ready, fight or flight mode. So I've talked about some things in the past about my uncle has tried to kill me, my dad, and my sister. And there was periods of my life where my stepdad was actively trying to come harm us when I lived with my dad and my sister. So I am very alert about my physical surroundings. I don't feel safe a lot of the time just in general and it's something I've gotten used to. And I've felt more safe here

and there but like when you have somebody, this is what people don't understand and I want to bash them upside their fucking head people criticize me and say You need to call the police You numbskull fuck you never dealt with outlaw. You never dealt with somebody who's outside of the law who don't listen. Okay Yeah, there's laws people break them every day My stepdad was somebody who saw a restraining order as a challenge to show you I can still get you. I never got one on him, never even would have considered it because there are people who are smart enough to get around the law. You think a piece of paper

is going to help you? If somebody wants to come get you, nothing is stopping them from coming and busting your door and getting you. So there's times in my life where things have gone wrong with my dad and my uncle was trying to kill him, he was trying to hurt him and he was coming after me and my sister. So there's been plenty of times in my life where me and my sister are sitting in the house together with our gun in our lap. We go take a shower, we got the gun with us, we go take a shit, we got the gun with us. We're sitting in the kitchen, we're going to our bedroom. We gotta be, we were like with each other

because we were ready to protect each other. We would take turns sleeping. That's not a fun dynamic to be in. And it also happened with my stepdad. My uncle, we weren't that scared of because we'll shoot you dead, no problem. But my stepdad was a different breed. I really want to do a podcast episode with my mom and another one with my sister

to talk about this because they have so many of their own experiences and like different perspectives on all of it. Cause my stepdad was nuts. Like taught me all the ways somebody can hurt you in this world and taught me how to defend myself by doing them so when he Was threatening to come after me and my sister That was a fear I've never felt before and it's a weird dynamic when you got somebody who's a fucking lunatic because I never felt safe with anybody

Except Josh. I don't hate him. I miss him every day. He's passed a few years ago, but he was the one person I always felt safe with. And I've never felt safe with somebody like I did with him again because he was so dangerous and I watched him and was with him when he did some of the craziest shit I've ever seen. He had been shot, he had been stabbed and lived like a super villain. You couldn't kill him like Michael Myers. Oh my God. I know it sounds nuts, but my mom will literally when I do a podcast with her, we'll tell you

about the night he got shot and then he stabbed the guy in the face and came home and passed out in her arms and she had to take him to the hospital. He wasn't invincible. He would get hurt. He would have to go to the hospital, but the things he survived, it doesn't make sense. But anyway, this type of person coming after me and my sister, not coming after us, but it was like we were ready. We were terrified because there was like things being said and done where we were like, okay, he's off his rocker. He's made threats to my dad about coming to the house

with me and my sister. We had to go get security cameras put up in the whole house. My dad didn't know how to do it. We had to go set them up. We had to go buy security cameras put up in the whole house. My dad didn't know how to do it. We had to go set them up. We had to go buy them and figure it out. The security cameras were not to save anything. They're just to let you know when someone's there. But the thing with my stepdad was

he was able to get around anything. He could sneak up on you in your sleep. And that's one thing he did to me a lot. And that's why I have an issue with sleeping. I'm going to kind of go around the board with a lot of this, but my stepdad used to attack me while I was asleep and sneak up on me. So I was always ready when I was sleeping. Cause when he was in prison,

you didn't get a chance to fall asleep and be off your guard. People would fuck you up in your sleep where he went to prison if they wanted to. So he always had to be alert and be ready and he would have to do things in prison. You got to do what you got to do. That's not the topic. Life taught him to be ready even when you're asleep. And that's what he taught me by attacking me while I was sleeping and just fucking with me. Sometimes a lot of times it wasn't that aggressive,

but like when you wake up to a gun pointed in your fucking face, when you're 16 years old, kind of sticks with you. You know, there was one time he pulled the trigger, but he emptied the clip. This, I'm not on me to be laughing about it. It's just crazy. But like, he emptied the clip, but he pulled the trigger to like instill that fear into me of like it's never a joke. Moral of a story he taught me to be ready even when I'm sleeping and this is something I still deal with issues about to this day because when I'm in the bed with someone sleeping with a friend a partner whoever it is if I'm just asleep if they move

slightly if they get out of the bed if they they go to pee, if I go to sleep first and they try and come get in the bed, my body wakes up full-fledged, swinging, kicking, throwing shit, like my body just reacts. I don't know how to fix it. I don't even think I want to fix it because it's kind of cool. But you can't sneak up on me, bitch.

And you can't sneak out to bed, neither. Where you going? Why are you leaving me? Like there's times I've fallen asleep on friends' couches and they try to come put a blanket on me. I've attacked a couple of people by accident. Sorry, I didn't mean it. Don't fuck and sneak up on me.

I be ski. But my cousin like a year ago tried to do it and it was funny, but it's, I looked at it for so long. Like I'm traumatized. I'm fucked up. Like, and when I was trying to go against my violent side and shut down my violent side, like a year ago, I was so, I didn't want to acknowledge it because I was getting canceled online for talking about what I wanted to fucking do to my ex. Episode 67, if you wanna watch, I put it back public

because suck my dick, what happened happened. But after that whole cancellation and like literally millions of people turning on me and me losing a lot of my business opportunities, money, relationships, whatever. I subconsciously turned against the side of me that was violent and I didn't want to be violent anymore. I tried to like throw that away and like get rid of it and like discard that part of myself

and never be violent again. And this dynamic where I would wake up out of my sleep ready to attack caused me physical and like emotional pain. I would like get so of my sleep ready to attack, caused me physical and emotional pain. I would get so upset that I was like that. I hated that I was like that. It hurt and made me sad every time I would wake up in fight or flight mode because I was like, I can't stop. I don't wanna be violent anymore, but I can't stop.

My body will not stop. It just does this from what I can't stop. Like, I don't wanna be violent anymore, but I can't stop. My body will not stop. It just does this from what I've been through. And I like felt shame around it for a while, but I've been honest about reconnecting and everything and like owning myself again fully. But now that I fully own violence as a part of me, yeah, it's a survival skill. What kind of fucking idiot wants to get rid of that ability?

You know? After what you've seen and what you've been through in my life, you gotta be violent. You gotta just have that side to you. You're not that you have to be violent, but you have to be able to protect yourself and do what you gotta do. So the whole thing like flipped with me being ready with waking up like panicked the paranoid, like trauma response, literally fight or flight mode, your body remembers. I don't feel bad about it anymore. I don't feel like I hate it. I love it because I'm ready.

Like I don't have to worry for my wellbeing and my safety. And I'm kind of appreciative that I have this now because it's not at a point where it's like any little noise will wake me up out of my sleep. Because what I was talking about before, being prepared for my stepdad to come and harm me and my sister or my uncle trying to come and like fuck with us to get revenge on my dad.

That period and what that did was train us, me and my sister both, where like any little noise, you wake up in a panic, you grab your gun, we would sleep with our gun next to us. I still sleep with mine under my pillow. But that whole thing of like every single little noise would trigger my body so bad. It's not like that anymore. It's not like the every little noise. It's like when there's a presence. My body will react to a presence. And I'm grateful for it.

Because what a survival skill, actually. Like now that I'm fully come to terms with it. But this whole realization came up because like I said, I had to pull my gun on somebody the other night. So when I was driving home from the gym, other night, it's like 10 p.m., this car is up my ass. Like all of a sudden gets up on me,

and I'm like, what the hell? I'm not driving crazy, I'm doing the speed limit, I'm going like five OVA, that's how it goes. I'm not on the interstate, I speed more than that. But on like main roads, I'll do like five O or max, okay? I'm driving crazy. I'm doing the speed limit. I'm going like five OVA. That's how it goes. I'm not on the interstate. I speed more than that, but on like main roads, I'll do like five over max. Okay. I'm driving to my house and this car all of a sudden like gets up on me and then start swerving around to my window. And this person's like waving at me through the window, like pissed off.

And I was like trying to stay calm. I'm like, maybe they think I'm somebody else. I don't know. I didn't cut anybody off. There's like three cars on the road and this one all of a sudden just gets fucking pissed. I'm like, okay. And this car is like pretending like they're going to run into me and I'm trying to like stay calm, but my protector side wanted to come out and I was trying not to let it.

But this car got back behind me and was so close to me. You couldn't even see their headlights. I was looking at them in the rear view. I was close to my house. So I keep just driving down the road. I'm like, if I don't know what's going on, maybe they'll fuck off. Maybe they're just in a bad mood. I don't know what they got a little problem about, but whatever it is, I'm gonna leave it with them. But I get to the point where I'm about to turn into my neighborhood. I put my blinker on. They put their blinker on. You going to try and follow me to my house? Okay.

My full fledged, like, all the anger I've not been able to, like, let out. Oh my God, I was so excited. I was trying so hard in this car to not let myself get mad and be crazy. You got me scared to a point where I'm like, you know what? Let's do it. As soon as I let the leash off of myself, oh, the invigoration, the adrenaline, the moment I've been waiting for, I pull into my neighborhood,

but I'm not stupid enough to let you follow me to my house. I flip up on the curb, throw my car in park and hop out with my gun. You pulling up behind me? Now get out. I did not feel one lick of fear. When I let myself protect myself, I feel zero fear. I don't care if there's 100 people coming up on me.

If I just let myself go to that point, even if I die, I ain't dying scared. I'm dying swinging. I'm dying shooting till I don't got a bullet left. So I haven't let myself full fledged, like let the reins off like that in a long time. Oh my God, I missed it. But how quickly I pulled up on that curb

and my nice ass Mercedes, like I gave a damn, flipped up on that curb and so I could jump out and get in front of them fast. They saw me get out that car and aim that gun I've never seen somebody shit their pants but I guarantee you they did I've never seen nobody peel out and take off so fast in my life but I was standing there after they drove off I'm standing at the front of my neighborhood at like 10 30 at night. Just with my gun in my hand, I'm like, that's it.

No climax. Had they got out of their car, I don't care if there's three people in the car, I'd have put the gun down and I was so mad. I just wanted to box their fucking face in. I wanted to pummel them. I didn't even wanna shoot them. I wanted this interaction to go south.

It was like I weirdly got off on getting so scared to the point where I was finally gonna get to let it out. It was a little bit scary for me to let myself let myself off the leash like that because I have so much to lose now and I've grown and changed so much but I cooled off a little, came home and I was pissed off. I was like why do people do this? If you're not about shit why are you picking a fight? Why are you pretending to follow someone to their house? Do you understand what happens when you do that?

Clearly not. Clearly the fuck not. You die. You follow me to my house, I'm bringing you inside. That, I think people don't understand Albanians are the way that we are. If you try to come in my house, you're not leaving my house. You will not walk out.

I'm gonna do what I want to you until I feel better, but I was just so irritated I was like, why do people pick fights like this because you get me to a point where You scare me bad enough that I let the leash off and I let attack dog Leo come out and then you want to run off cuz now I'm left just irritated, pissed off, adrenaline rushed. Like a dick. Like no, it's like edging. No climax, no nothing. Like damn, this is what I live for. Come on. This is what Protector Leo lives for. And I finally let him come out. And then there was nothing to do. Like, come on, why you ran away? Why you drove off? It's good that they drove off.

I'm like being funny about it now, but this whole dynamic, I used to have no control over when I would protect myself. When I would feel scared before, it's like I wouldn't have any kind of control about it. And this whole situation, I realized I love my ability to protect myself as harshly and as viciously as I have in the past and still will. Because I don't feel fear. A lot of people run around this life out of fear. And they do a lot of things and avoid doing a lot of things because they're scared. I'm discerning with things,

but I don't have fear. For somebody else to be followed home, they would shit themselves. They would be deathly scared. I know exactly what to do and I'm excited by it, which is weird. But that ability I'm grateful for, it's like this whole thing of everything in the past and like how I used to get mad that I would Protect myself. I love it now because like with this situation I realized I'm fully in control of it and I talked about this like right before I moved to LA from Houston It's like the first time I had a grip on my body like reacting and protecting myself because I got hit by a car I was walking over a crosswalk and somebody hit me with their car love BMW dirty ass car and

I Went around the car to snatch them out and beat the fuck out of them and I stopped myself. I grew Like you hit me with your car you had a stop sign you saw me and still hit me with your car. You had a stop sign. You saw me and still hit me. So that was like my first time getting control over my reaction and my response. And I was like, okay, there's people watching. You're out in public.

You're online now. Someone has hit you with the car. I get it. But like the guy wouldn't get out and I was gonna break the window and snatch him out. But I decided not to in that moment. That was like the first time I got control over this. So now with this situation that just happened at the day, I control when protector Leo comes out and it made me aware of it.

I was like, Oh my God, like this trauma response that I had, sometimes like I talked about, like the trauma response that I had, sometimes, like I talked about, like the gift of trauma, it's not gonna be something that's detrimental forever. Like the things that I've been through and the trauma responses that I have are so much deeper than I thought and I'm so grateful I have them.

I'm genuinely so grateful for the things that have happened to me and the gifts that it's given me because I'm not at a point now where I'm resisting any of it and I'm not at a point now where I'm out of control. Like with that situation, I realized in the moment when I had the gun in my hand, it's like my body got me in the position.

I raised the gun, It clicked for a minute. My body gets itself ready. And it made me feel so much safer going around life. Because even when I'm out in public, if a car misfires or someone's got a really loud car and they drive by really fast, my body reacts. Like my body just always gets ready. I don't have to think about it. It's annoying as hell.

It was annoying, but now I'm kind of grateful for it. I'm like, oh, you got scared little body. You got scared. You're trying to fight girl. You're fine. It was a car. But that whole situation, like I'm so grateful for my body. Like it gets me ready when there's a threat. I'd rather my body get ready, even if there isn't a threat, just in case, you know? So I have like a whole new appreciation for my responses when my body remembers something. And like when I see people now who look like an ex of mine and my body, it's like a cat, it's like hair stands up on its neck.

My body gets like ready to like perceive whatever's going to happen next. I get on high alert. Not that I want to attack, but I'm prepared. It's like I'm going to, I'm paying very close attention to this person. It's like I'm scanning their face to like see if it's actually them. But not that I want to attack them, but like my body's just ready. My body remembers people who harm me. My body remembers who hurts me. And if my body needs to defend itself against you, that's your fucking problem. So it's not that I'm running around attacking people. That made me feel so like happy because I used to think, oh, when I see somebody who looks like an X of mine and my body reacts,

it means I'm not over it. No, I am over it. My body's just not stupid. It's going to remember what's hurt it before and be prepared. It's not that my body is attacking and lashing out and being crazy. It's like my body gets ready. My body is preparing me to never be hurt like I was before. And it's not in a toxic way anymore. It's nice. Like, it's so sweet, my buddy. Like you getting ready in the middle of the night

because somebody gonna come get me. Oh, how cute. You pulled a car over for me and get the gun and then I get to decide if I shoot them or not. Oh. I guess that's the realization is like, I'm not feeling ruled by my body. My body's not like dictating what I do.

Past traumas are not dictating what I do. My body is getting ready and I get to decide what to do. So it's like, cute. I like it, I appreciate it very much. Okay, one more thing I wanna add that's come up that's been like a big thing to do with like not valuing yourself and like people will treat you bad and all that. Yeah, yeah, we get it. I met somebody recently and I left

y'all off on like a cliffhanger. I met somebody who's just like me and this dude irritates the fuck out of me because he's just like me. But like it's not because it irritates me. It's because like I appreciate so many things about him and it makes me mad. Like I've tested this motherfucker so many times. Anytime I meet somebody new, I test you and people claim to be one way and then they're not. It's like people talk a lot of shit but like this guy's actions back them up. There's so many things about myself that have made me the problem for other people in the past. And I questioned how lovable I was at times, many times in my life.

I questioned like, this thing about me is irritating. It's not lovable. It's like this thing about me makes me where people don't care about me and There's so many things about myself that were so Unappreciated by so many people I questioned if they had any worth and this guy that I met all of the things That people didn't appreciate about me in the past, he has.

It's nuts how much of like a match, character wise, mentally, like he's just like me in so many ways. And I'm seeing myself for the first time where it's like all the things that were never appreciated, I see how much I appreciate them in him. And I can't even fathom that I've had that and people didn't appreciate it. I didn't realize I could appreciate these things so much and it made me appreciate them so much more in myself.

Like people just treated me in the past like the things about me that I value in him weren't that important. Really didn't fucking matter. It takes someone who has it to appreciate it. So to people in my past who have made me question things about myself or not feel appreciated or wonder if certain things about me were really that important, they are.

And I appreciate them so much more than I thought I would. Like, the way I feel safe with somebody who is like me, I don't even know how to word it. It's the most healing thing. And like all the times I've questioned myself, I'm never questioning myself again, because I thought so many things about me were just overlooked. They'll never be overlooked when somebody is the same way. Like when you have the same character and morals and values, it's never going to be overlooked. Like with my sister, she's got

all of the character traits that I've got and I've held on to her for so long. And like, that's like the one connection. If she dies, I'm killing myself. We have a pact about it. I'm not doing this life without her because she's like the only person who gets it. But this is my first time meeting someone and it's a guy who has the same... It's like I've only known it in a woman. I've only known it in me and my sister. And now there's another dude here and I've had friends in the past but like this dude it's just baffling my fucking mind. The things that you think are special about you are so much more special than you can even realize. Don't question it at all.

You're so much more lovable than you think. It's just going to take a meeting somebody who's got the traits that you love. And you'll realize how lovable you are. It's like such a nice reflection. I needed this right now fully. Having to question it so many times and like question if these things were valuable gave me the gift of appreciating them in somebody now

more than I ever thought I could. But it's not just me appreciating this person that I met. This is just me seeing myself and it's healed something in me. Please. Oh my god. I wish it for all of you. Oh my god. All the things that people have told you make you unlovable, but you appreciate those things. I wish and I hope that you find somebody who's got the traits that you question about yourself because you will see how much more lovable

than you ever thought you were. You're gonna see how much more appreciated you were. You will see how truly everybody else was the fucking problem. And I don't mean to say that to sound like a narcissist, because there's people in my life who have not made it with me to this point. And I did get to a point where I was questioning like, am I the problem? Am I the one who's like the issue? My sister has been the one person where she's been in my

life my whole life. We've fought, we've had arguments, we've had shit be miscommunicated, but we've always managed to figure it out. So she's been my one validation of like, no, I'm not the issue. And all of our problems with people, my sister and me both, we go through the same shit with people. It's always people who don't have the character and the integrity and the wherewithal to be a decent human being.

It's like you don't have the loyalty, you don't have the integrity, you don't have something. And me and my sister have been each other's like saving grace of like, okay, we both see this situation the same way. There's people who have made it this far with me in my life, but I was starting to question it. Like this few of people have made it this far own family members couldn't even

hold up their end of like being a decent person. I'm like, no way. Me and my sister are the issue. Nope. Cause this motherfucker gets it. You gotta be with someone who's been betrayed and like be friends with someone who's been betrayed if you've dealt with it in the past or people just going to say you crazy insecure. But like I said before about the disrespect thing sensitivity to disrespect is a trauma response and it's a good one to have. I love it.

I need to go have a cigarette. Me and my new panthers. We need to go have a cigarette. I feel better after telling you all this. I hope it all made sense. Leave me a comment. Let me know. And if you made it this far in the episode,

what are we going to comment this week? Comment a car emoji because don't follow me home, bitch. But that's all I got for this week's podcast. I feel my soul's done being chatty. Everything you need from me is in the description as always. Social media, my app, everything you want is down there. So go check it out. Go look, see, update on the sunglasses the first sample is Finally being produced Tank tops are coming sooner than we think I may have to drop those first But we'll see we will see we will see all the details of clothing and all the updates with that and like more behind-the-scenes shit

Of like where I go live and talk about more than I talk about on here and I talk about things as they're happening is sub stack so I'll leave that description if you want to join that come hang out that's my private little family every single one is be safe take care of yourself and I'll talk to you guys next Sunday hopefully with a new podcast set this time I know I ordered the wallpaper it's coming and the guy that I met he knows that hang wallpaper