LadyGang - FLASHBACK FRIDAY: Amyra Braha

Episode Date: December 2, 2022

Spiritual Psychologist and Grief Counselor Amyra Braha joins us to talk about one of the most difficult things we all deal with, our grief. Grief is brought on by any number of life events and can feel like an impossible burden, but by talking with counselors, such as our guest, you can learn to develop the tools to help process your hurt and handle your grief. Original Air Date: August 25th 2020 Check out our amazing sponsors!!! Ipsy: Go to Ipsy.com/lady and take their free quiz to get YOUR beauty bag! Progressive: Quote your car insurance at Progressive.com to join the over 27 million drivers who trust Progressive!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hey, Lady Gang, welcome to Flashback Friday, where we bring some of our favorite Lady Gang episodes from the vault to you in the feed. We have over 600 episodes of this podcast, and whether you're an OG and you've heard this episode before, or you're a new listener and we're just bringing this up and you had no idea we had this person on our podcast, well, you're welcome. Small caveat here, we are an imperfect group of trio of ladies, and we've been podcasting for almost six and a half years. If something we said in this podcast doesn't align with Lady Gang 2020, please give us grace. For instance, there was a period on Lady Gang where I was not into Taylor Swift. It was the reputation era. I wasn't feeling what she was begging, but now I'm like a

Swiftie again. And so I just don't want you to hold me to that because we're all growing and learning and our opinions change pretty much every day. Without further ado, welcome to Flashback Friday. We were thinking about December and what we should do for this Flashback Friday from the vault. And this is a serious episode. So if you're feeling, you know, a little broken, maybe you need it or maybe you should shut it off. But Becca's grief counselor, Amna Braha, came on the podcast in 2020, summer of 2020. And I think that the holiday season can really bring up a lot of emotions for people, whether it's been loss, loss of a friendship, loss of a lover, a divorce, a family member, a grandparent, a child, because it's like supposed to be this super happy

celebratory time. But for a lot of us, it can be a really emotional time and it can bring up a lot of loss and so we thought this is the perfect episode to just put right at the top of December it's a little heavy you might have a cry if you need that we're so glad to bring that to you she's amazing and there's things that she says in this episode that I still apply to my life right now and Becca was so gracious and so open in this episode so we're thrilled to have her here on flashback Friday and enjoy your weekend well what is this welcome to the lady gang that's amazing. Say that again. The Lady Gang. Things are about to change around here. Each week we catch up with Hollywood's hottest girl posse, Kelty Knight, Becca Tobin, and Jack Vanek.

Our guest today has made it her life's purpose to help people through the uncomfortable and inevitable topics most of us avoid, life changes and dying. In fact, she may be one of the few people who actually enjoys talking about them. As an educator, counselor, and consultant in the field of death and dying, she teaches people how to use the grief they experience from any loss, the loss of a loved one, of a beloved pet, a job, even a dream, as an opportunity to open our truest selves and heal on the deepest levels. She combines over 20 years of experience as a hospice and grief counselor with training in the methods of spiritual psychology and the study of various spiritual traditions. She's been a longtime advocate for the needs of the dying and

their families. She was a founding member of our community, House of Hope, California's first social model end-of-life care home established for those who do not have the resources to die at home. Please welcome to the podcast, our friend, Amira Braha. Yay. Welcome. Hello. Thank you. So excited to have you here. And this is a little bit of a different conversation. So after our book came out, we realized that there were certain parts of the book that our fans were absolutely gravitating towards. And I think all three of us have received messages and emails about being vulnerable and talking about these things. And in our mission to have women feel less alone, we can't just talk about Britney Spears' latest TikTok video. We need to kind

of dig into the deep stuff. And so that's what today's episode is for. This is something that happens to so many people, obviously everyone. And I think it's a wonderful conversation. So we're going to open it up, Becca. Maybe you can explain how you know each other and then we'll let you take it from there. Yes. So, um, in the book, my chapter called spiritual therapy, I discuss how I found Amira for those of you who don't know, she's my personal grief counselor turned just life counselor. And, um, we've worked together for almost six years and I truly, I can say that my life has changed dramatically since her entering it. And it was on the heels of a very traumatic loss. And I could cry my eyes out right now thinking of how grateful I am to you

and anybody who does the work that you do in this space. So without further ado, Amir Abraha, can we talk a little bit about, you know, my, I think when I opened up about my personal journey, in the book, a lot of girls said they resonated a lot with me. So, um, I was like, I was holding on for dear life. I was one of the ones that were, yes, it was like, if I, and you kept you at, do you remember asking me, what are you afraid of? Um, I don't remember, but I can imagine that I did. Yes. And I said, I'm so afraid if I let go right now and I really feel all these feelings that I'm going to end up on a bathroom floor and be toted away into a psych ward. And that's the end of Beccatobin. And that is, I hate to tell you this, such a common fear. It's a totally,

every single person who's had to, who really has dealt with not just death, but that loss and that and that dark place it takes you to the reason that most people won't allow themselves to grieve is that fear because if I let go nothing good will come of this and I will go to the pit the the deepest darkest pit and I will never come out and I guess because I keep you know through the work and through my own experiences I've heard this you know every single time I don't know if it's helpful to tell people you're not, you know, this is very normal. I think it is helpful and also to be able to say to them, and you, you will climb out, you will find a way to climb out. Um, so that's all I have to say about that. And you also told me the only way out is

through the only God, I'm smart. You're really smart. Um, yeah, the only way out is through. And, you know, I like to think that part of it is also just taking some comfort in knowing that others have done it, have walked through it. For me, that became a much less scary experience. You know, when I walked through my own, what I call the pit of hell, you know, the dark place. Yeah. When, you know, I remember being in such a dark place, I had to go to bed. I was in bed for three days, I could not even bear to have light and turn to my eyes, you know, like a just, and I couldn't speak. And my husband was really worried about me, you know, go off to work, and he didn't know what to do. And I just, it was just, it was a, it was a really dark place. and I remember the the counselor that I was seeing at the time I guess my husband must have

called him and said you have to do something because she's not okay and he called and he started to talk to me I remember the phone kept ringing and it wouldn't stop ringing so he must have called again and again right and I finally answered it and I remember it's just like this deep from far away place voice. And he started to talk to me and described almost in detail where I was. And I was like, what? How do you know that? He said, because I've been there. And that just changed everything. Yeah. Well, and that's why we want to have these conversations on the Lady Gang. I think that everyone thinks that their experience is unique. And so a lot of the time when it's a really terrible experience. You think you are alone and that you're the only person that's

been through it. And so having a therapist or a counselor or someone to sit there and tell you these are totally normal and also to stop judging the process. That was something that you taught me. You have a lot of guilt when somebody passes away and you're left like as a survivor. And I came in week after week and I just would confess all of these things to you. Like that I was continuing to live my life and I was ready for you to say, how dare you? That's not the way that you're supposed to grieve. And you taught me so beautifully to, you know, kind of love myself and accept myself and to look at myself as the person who had just experienced some great loss and that there was no place for judgment.

Is that a really common theme for people to judge the process? Absolutely. And I would say it's not just around grief and death, but in life. Yeah. You know, we are constantly judging our thoughts, our actions, everything, the way we live, all of it. And I think that's probably one of the most challenging things in our lives is to learn how not to judge it.

You know, just to accept and to move into, it's a cliche word, but it really, to me, it really is about surrendering. And my belief and the reason that I do work with grief is that it's the one moment in our lives where we're really stripped bare, have no choice, and it forces us to look at all of this, to look at all the judgments, all of the stuff that's going on inside and surface it in a way that most of us haven't been able to do before that. I think it's really interesting. Can we just add, I think it's so interesting, Becca, what you just said, because, you know, when we've all had people in our lives that have experienced this great loss, right? And then you

just want to wrap yourself around them and say, everything's going to be okay. And then there's an interesting thing that like when they start being okay again how you could possibly feel guilty like the people around you want you to be okay if that takes two weeks or 20 years like it's such an interesting thing to me that you started to feel guilty when you could like wake up in the morning and not be on the bathroom floor like that to me is so heartbreaking because you've already been through the heartbreak and then for you to have to be so hard on yourself about like I just think that it's it's it actually blows my mind like that's so sad to me could I just respond to that um because what what's come forward is that the

the the real work is looking to see what purpose the guilt has for you in your life you know is there some underlying belief that you deserve to feel this way the pain right um is there and again it's it's similar to if I let go then what well if I let go of this pain if I let go of the guilt guilt is pain right it's a form of pain so if I let this go then who will I be what will I be it's it's really letting go and facing the unknown and that guilt that makes sense It makes total sense. And I did learn that through you because the guilt was serving a purpose for me. I was able to sort of beat myself up as opposed to wrap my own arms around myself and sort of fall into a puddle and experience the true sadness. And I found that I had a lot of misdirected, I guess, energy during that time, you know, of guilt or judgment or anger. But that also leads me to another question about the misconceptions of grief and how I came to you and I was like, well, there's the five steps, right?

like the ones everyone talks about your response was I laughed probably yes you did um well yes certainly we feel those five original things right but we've also learned that it's so much more than that right and that it's not linear you know so you can feel these things sometimes in conjunction they're not sequential you could feel acceptance and then oh boy then comes in the anger and the bargain like it's just it's a one big mess and a roller coaster and no two people i always say this no two people grieve in the same way even in the same family because no two people live life in the same way and we have this expectation you know that it's a it's a charted course right and and again it comes down to needing and wanting

to control our process yeah and the more you try what what happens the universe just keeps picking it up i was so excited to get home from tour and i received my first clam bag from ipsy and i know a lot of you have been longtime ipsy fans and you know i just like love a little surprise and i am going to continue my subscription because my skin is changing and i'm really into trying out new products and that is why i'm so excited and we have a code for you lady but first let me tell you what i got this month so i got an eyeshadow palette from smashbox a beautiful blush from nars a mascara from tart i would have never tried the tart mascara on my own and honestly it's really really an amazing product and I actually could see myself buying it in the future. So go to

ipsy.com slash lady and take their free beauty quiz. That's ipsy, I-P-S-Y.com slash lady. And Ipsy will send you five beauty products picked just from you from five different brands and you get a cute makeup bag. The products are worth over $50, but Ipsy is only $13 a month. Five new products a month for 13 bucks. I mean, hello, no brainer. Ipsy.com slash lady to join. That's ipsy.com slash lady. What's the most common, I guess, feeling that people have that's outside of those main five kind of stages of grief? I think it's, it's the, the one that's about the future. Like, it's like, what's going to happen, you know, fundamentally it's what's going to happen. Yeah. Where, where is this going exactly? It's the not knowing. Fear of the unknown.

And also, I think that there's a phase where a lot of people, I'm like almost six years into this grieving process, and I could only admit really recently there's a level of gratitude also for the experience. obviously not for the loss, but for what the loss brought to me as far as growth. And I don't know, I don't know the wording for it. But can you talk a little bit about that? Because there's also the guilt that people and they think they're going to be judged for saying that they've learned so much from the loss of someone so important. Yes. And it's something that I will often ask people at the beginning of working with them and i can't tell you um you know sometimes it's a good thing that it's not in person because when we're in so much pain we don't want to hear that there's any any possibility that there's a blessing or anything positive that's going to come out of

this experience um but as we do the work and i ask the question again later almost always a person is able to see that this was a form of a gift so again but it's not and it has nothing really to do with the loss itself

or so if the loss is about a death it's more to do with how what that experience is bringing forward and what we're learning from it

and there's always something to learn from it if we let it if we have the courage and it takes i want to say great courage to to do this work and i think it's also the reason why people who haven't been able to grieve for a whole bunch of reasons if their losses occurred early in life they've got a life to live they've got jobs to do they've got families to raise and everything kind of gets put off and then it'll take a death or some major loss toward the end of life or at the later stages of life and it's like it's like this you know it all just comes forward all of it and you're not just grieving that one loss you're grieving a lifetime of losses um so that's that experience and that can feel so much more intense and people don't

understand why you know i had a client who came and he said you know i didn't cry this much when my wife died but my dog died and i can't i can't you know get over it and it was just this profound experience you know how is that possible because rationally logically you'd think that would be the loss of the wife but when we started looking to see what else had happened in his life and also what this dog represented it made a lot of sense it made a lot of sense wow also um i had a lot of people ask me what the difference between this spiritual therapy versus regular psychology you know sit across the therapist lay on a bed why it's different can you kind of give an answer to that um i can give a stock answer okay you know

so there's a there's a there's a i think you know there's a so therapy in general terms um deals with the mental emotional the physical and it typically you're going in because there's some it it looks at things from a mental health perspective so if there's anxiety depression PTSD something like that or you know or or more grief counseling is specific to the grieving process and spiritual grief counseling looks at those three elements the mental the emotional the physical and adds the spiritual component which is the soul or what we call the soul and what i would call the heart and it really addresses the whole being the whole person and it began when we look at it from that perspective we begin to look at the the

awareness of who we are who we truly are and for a lot of people that's scary because we have an idea of who we think we are in the world, right? And that's from, you know, messages from the culture from whatever. But then to kind of really looked and see and understand that that's not really who we are. That's just a definition of what we think we are, but that they're who we really are is so much more and go so much deeper. A little some exercises that you and I did to help me get out of my own head and sort of drop into that place of like finding out who I really am and how, what I'm really feeling. And, um, I did things like I had to sit in front of a mirror and stare at myself and look into my own eyes. And it was crazy how much like empathy and, and like,

how much more sensitive you are to yourself when you look at yourself as if you look at another human being and try to connect. You're like, oh, you're in there. And I actually, I care about you and I care about what you're feeling and who you are. And then I had to sit in silence for one or two minutes at a time, which sounds like no time at all, but it is excruciating when you're running from who you are that's absolutely that was absolutely right because and I think that those are some of the practices in that we learn in you know in the study of spiritual psychology it's really bypassing the brain bypassing the mental because most of us operate from that place right and it gets in the way it gets in the way of the heart and so it's like how can I

trick my head to allow myself to really get to know myself and to start uncovering and so the mirror what we call the mirror gazing most of us look in the mirror every day right and we're looking at the face and the pimples and the whatever and the hair but we're not looking we're not really seeing ourselves and so that teaches us to start to see deeply and then to start transmitting loving thoughts that most of us are really good at doing with others right right I have a question so you obviously did have Becca do these different types of exercises so for any of our girls out there like I think there was two different girls that posted on our Facebook group yesterday about losing someone is there any type of easier exercises that these

girls can kind of incorporate into their everyday life that you think make a big difference that's maybe like a small little thing that they could do you know and I'm offering this one because it actually helped me before I even started doing this work and it's it's going to sound crazy but it works and that is to take it really it's about self self-soothing right how do we soothe those parts inside that are hurting because when we're grieving we're hurting and so how do I calm myself how do I make myself feel safe and secure and okay and a lot you know it can be whatever that means for you but one of the the loveliest tools that I that I discovered for myself and then went on to find out that this was a thing is coloring and I don't mean um you know those

but it's like taking taking literally crayola crayons like a child would good old-fashioned crayola crayons a white sheet of paper no drawing you know just letting yourself go through color and through this expression as as though you know letting that young part of yourself come out and express and you'd be amazed so for me that experience was I just remember sitting there feeling really calm and it was soothing you know and so those are just small little things that you can do that don't take a lot and I would night after night sit and color because it was all I could do and it helped finding somebody to talk to is obviously going to be really important just talking about it and I would find the people

who are willing to just listen and not if you can't afford to find a counselor a therapist then um find find a place where you can just let it out um because that's I think that's a big part of this is acknowledging that you're hurting and and and verbalizing it yeah all right when we come back we are going to talk about some questions that we kind of sourced some general inquiries for Amira from the Facebook group. This episode of Lady Gang is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Hey, Lady Gang, whether you love true crime or comedies, celebrity interviews, news, or even motivational speakers, you call the shots on what's in your podcast queue, right? Well, guess what? Now you can

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coverage match limited by state law you're listening to the lady gang okay we're back so we had a lot of girls in the facebook group who heard you were coming as our guests on the podcast um and let me first say that you never realize how many people are grieving whether it's a person a job a pet um even right now COVID, we're grieving a life that's kind of never going to be the same again. So first of all, thanks to all the lady gang for sharing, because that's not easy. And we had a lot of really beautiful, but very sad stories. So Amira, do you want to sort of talk about some themes that you... Well, I think one of them was, there are a couple of people who asked about what's normal,

right and again i think this is where it's it'll it's important to try to find a professional to speak to because um normal grief is what we call uncomplicated it's just your standard this is going to sound very flip but it's a standard experience of loss and there's been no and there's been no other history or no other family complication or no other issue that the person is holding right it gets complicated if there's been a traumatic loss or um if there's uh if there's been a string of losses um or if there are other health issues we just don't know so it's become and again to say normal it's like it assumes that there's one way of doing it And so I have a really, I struggle with that word. Normal. The length of time, people seem

very concerned with, you know, shouldn't this be over by now? And we have the standard one year rule, right, that you hear, like, it's been a year. And my answer to that is, again, there's no one way. And for some people, it takes longer than others, because every circumstance is different some people literally can't grieve right away and so they do everything that they can to just kind of put it aside right and then so that's when you start finding people grieving you know five six ten twenty years out um it it will come out yeah um it's just a question of when and from my perspective the sooner the better because then you get to live your life in freedom right and not carry this thing around with you typically the first year is the people

think is the hardest and i would say on the physical level it might seem like the hardest because you're living in anticipation of first of all doing all the stuff that has to be done around a death and then getting through all the milestones right the birthdays the anniversaries the holidays whatever holidays he celebrated the you know all of those ones that you go into with such with sheer terror how am I going to get through this and then you find that you do and so it's like okay all right you know I'm going to be okay I made it what happens is and I want to say this to people my experience it's the second and third years that are in fact the hardest and the reason for that and it's just it's simple and it makes sense is because we spent the first year

in this kind of constricted tight place of holding on right I just need to make it just need to make it and then you think oh all right and you start to let go and it's in the letting go that the other the pain the hurt right the grief starts to surface and it takes you by surprise because it's like you're you're you're not you're unaware you're unprepared you haven't been kind of you know holding on so I don't know if that makes sense to people but that's an important piece yeah I think for me I definitely had a harder second and third year because it was like you're sort of just like soldiering on that first year and and like I don't even remember so much of that first year but the second year is like oh shit

life went back to normal and I'm still fucked up well and the people around you're saying what you're still yeah you're still in it yeah do you know so you're not even getting their support anymore because they're fed up you're like you had your year it's over it's over move on well Well, and that's, that's great advice for people. Cause some of the girls were writing in because people like their one girl's sister had experienced some, some loss. And that's actually just good to know for someone who is supporting another person. It's that it's not just that first year. It's lovely that you're there for the first year, but yeah. And just to know that it goes to a deeper level, the experience. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Actually Becca,

and she probably maybe got this from you, but I remember her saying the most poignant thing when my beloved dog hobo died, which I know is not the same on the scale of what you have been through Becca, obviously. And it's still, it's still lost, but I, it was, it was very profound for me. And I remember all these people were texting me saying, it's going to be okay. You're going to be okay. And that was like, you just don't feel like you're ever going to be okay. Right? Like you're just so sad. And Becca said to me, you know, the thing about loss is that it is always going to hurt. Your heart is going to be broken forever. It just gets less and less debilitating. And that, yes, that's so good. I mean, that brought me so much comfort and I have passed

that on to other people in my life that have been experiencing loss and they've been like, wow, that it really speaks to me because you're never going to be okay. Like you're always going to be sad. I'm choked up thinking about that day right now, but like, it's, you know, you, you learn to live with that and you can then get out of bed and you can eat again and you can have a life, but you're never not going to be sad over it. And I think that that's giving yourself permission. Her saying that to me gave me permission to be like, all right, you know, and I can imagine, And I just always remember that, Becca. And it really, I've passed that on so many times.

It was such a beautiful thing to say. Thank you. I'd like to add to that if I could. I would say it's not that you don't ever get over the hurt. It's that you, and so I want to separate out the loss from the hurt. Because we can definitely get quote unquote over the hurt. most of us hold on to the hurt because we think it means that we're going to forget that we're going to forget your was it a dog the person the person right whatever right it doesn't

whatever that was whatever's brought and so that's why we hold on and once we begin to understand that we can heal that in ourselves and hold on to the memory and what gets replaced is beautiful there's just a sweetness and so you're no longer remembering the the loved one from a place of hurt you're remembering them from a place of love right gratitude and so i just want to you know ask you to consider that possibility that we can let go of the pain and not forget yeah that to me is a really important distinction that that's a hard place to get to it it's not easy but it's totally it's totally doable you know and you know and and and here's another one that I want to make to offer to people and

that is that people often feel guilty that they experience joy when they're grieving you know like there's something wrong I had a one client who didn't go home after her husband died she couldn't because she said she it meant having to face first thing there's a photograph of the two of them i guess in the front hallway and it would be the first thing she would see and she just she just said i can't do it and so then she started going home but she you know made sure to keep herself in this you know state of of grief of hurt and um but but when she when she would come to see me or when she she'd come to the grief there was a group that she was a part of she would experience joy and she'd be laughing she felt great right and then she'd go home and she'd

crash and so we started working with that because she had this notion that she wasn't supposed to feel good right and that her husband would would be mad and so when i asked her about it you know do you really think that he doesn't want you to be happy and she said no i think he would want me to be happy and so what would happen if you showed him and she just so there's so we developed an exercise where she would you know go in and and smile at this picture and let the joy come through and it just transformed her right doesn't mean that she wasn't hurting it doesn't mean that she was going to forget him but she was allowing him in her way right to see her heart to see her happiness and to share in it it was beautiful amazing wow

so there's a lot of girls that get very um judgmental about uh grieving miscarriages like judgmental of other women and of themselves because you know it's like when first of all women we love to judge one another that is like we're really great at it, probably because we hate ourselves so much. That's a whole other podcast of digging, Becca. That's a whole other podcast. But there were a lot of girls in the Facebook group talking a lot about the loss of someone or something or an idea of something. And then one girl said it really well. And she said, it's not that I'm sad that I am grieving this baby. I'm grieving the idea

of what life was going to be like with this baby. Right. And I think that rang very true to me because I have been someone who's been like, is that really something we're sad about? Is that something warranted? But then when she said that, I said, oh my God, I've been there a million times. It's, it's, it's grieving the idea of something that you were anticipating or kind of fantasizing about. So that's, I would say that that's exactly right. And, and, and, and oftentimes we're grieving the relationship, not the person. So we're grieving who we got to be or who we were hoping to be in the, in the case of a miscarriage, right? We were grieving the idea or the idea of hope yeah and so then it feels like well what's the point right so it's it's really i think in

working and with those situations it's really understanding everything that we put into it like you know that we we we it's kind of like we put out onto these situations or onto the idea the very things we should be putting into ourselves right it's like we're waiting we're we're hoping that this this pregnancy and this child is going to make me i don't know becca you tell me what's what would that you know for me it would be a make me a better mother right you know um give me a purpose give me a purpose right and and when that's taken away from us well then again it's the who am I well then so what am I supposed to do now right I had a bit of a different experience so last um spring I had a miscarriage but I wasn't

trying to get pregnant and I wasn't fantasizing about my life with a child or what that would be but it was a very strange thing because it was super early and there's obviously any woman that's gone through that there's like the trauma of these like you know the trauma of the actual like blood and stuff that's kind of intense obviously but for me you know the grief I was feeling and the sadness that I was feeling about it it actually really rocked me even though I wasn't dreaming about my life of being a mom it was the like sort of end of that dream like yes I wasn't trying to be a mother, but it was like, oh, okay, my body doesn't work the way that it's supposed to because I'm 38 years old. And if I was going to do this, I would have to do it now. And since I'm not doing it, my parents won't ever be grandparents. I won't ever be a mom. I'm not going to ever experience my life with a baby bump. I'm not going to see Chris as a father, like all of those things. So for me, that was the grief I

was feeling. I was never like, oh no, the baby. I mean, of course it was sad, but my grief was like the life that I'm saying no to in a way. And then also I feel like with you Kelty, it was probably like you are so, um, you want to be in control of so many different things. And it's always been your decision to like not have it. But then life is kind of coming at you being like, well, no, it's actually outside of what you want to do. So it's probably that situation too. Yeah, it was, it was kind of crazy. So I do have like a soft spot for people that don't know really how to deal with that. And I think there's like two ways. I think people hurt and then they reach out. They're like a Kelty where they're like, everyone, I need attention

because I want to take my mind off this. And there's a Becca who is like, I don't want anyone to know that i'm ever hurting you know there's like two spectrums there so it's and really grieves the same way nobody does nobody lives the same way nobody grieves the same way and nobody dies the same way oh bro did you like that that's good it's actually you know because we see because we do i mean and so i i realize i'm taking myself into another tangent but um it is about a lot of this is about control and about perceived notions of how we should be and who we should be and what we should be right we're assuming that every woman is supposed to be a mother and every woman is supposed to carry and get pregnant and bring to term how do we know that

mm-hmm these are just ideas that have been put on us right and so it's a lot of it is just again building ourselves up and trusting ourselves enough to know what's right for us um the um the idea of people no two people dying in the same way i think is a really important one also um because again there's an expectation especially if um there's a family involved and i used to see this a lot people don't understand why there's so much tension and so many issues that are coming to come forward you know when there's a when there's a death when the person is dying typically a parent for example right and what i say to people is if there are any issues in this family that have been hidden or untalked about they will come they will surface they will

come out and in the same way that there are no two families that are alike you know it's it's it's so we have this assumption that oh the person's dying everything's supposed to be now beautiful right like we're going to have this beautiful end of like death well if it wasn't beautiful before it's not going to be beautiful now wow and it takes it takes doing the work right um to help a person have a beautiful death a peaceful death and that's a great segue into one of the books that i want to talk about yes please we were going to ask for some books um one of my favorites is by dr ira biok b-y-o-c-k he was um a hospice doctor physician

he's written quite a bit but the most important piece that he wrote was some a book called the four things that matter most a book about living and it comes out of the work that he did with his patients and their families right and in it he talks about completing relationships and you know what i want to add to this is i i firmly believe that we should be doing this in life not just waiting for a death you know an imminent death to happen um and he talks about how to complete gives you the steps for how to complete a relationship so that there's nothing left unsaid right you want to be able to live your life with no regrets and ideally to die with no regrets or you are ideally not to lose

someone with regret and having a regret that you didn't say or do what needed to be said or done And so he talks about, you know, doing forgiveness work, forgiving one another, right, and then expressing gratitude and expressing love, right, and then releasing them if there's a death. and those are those are in fact the most powerful things that i can say to anybody when you're dealing with well with loss too because you can do this for yourself right you can do it after the fact but if you've got somebody in your life who is who is dying that you can do this with them and it's a way of just releasing and letting go of all of that stuff that's getting in the way yeah and i i i've done this work with so many people and seeing families shift from i mean i one example i have is of being called to a family where there was a police involvement

because there were restraining orders where the wife wouldn't let the patient sister come in and i mean it was just it was wild and this poor man was in active death and he said to me i i want to be able to say goodbye to my sister and my father and the wife is not going to let them in the house and it was you know it was just it was and when we got clear and each person got to come in and talk to him and do this work he actually died in the span of a few hours with his wife on one side on the bed and his sister on the other and the rest of the family surrounding him and the wife and the sister from that day on would meet weekly and we're in each other's lives i'm not making this up i mean it's powerful

the work that we can do so this man was you know went from being so he couldn't die because he wanted to say goodbye to his father and sister right and the minute that he he was allowed he was given this gift he could let go and so he died in peace wow well that's also something i feel like in the years that we've worked together, you've had so many stories like that where, I mean, you've, you have experienced many people die because you were a chaplain in a hospice. Um, and the stories are really beautiful. And I think that people are so afraid, they're so afraid of what that looks like. Um, but then they experienced it. I have a friend who watched her brother, you know, they, he, he

had I think I believe an aneurysm and the family decided that he wasn't going to make it so they had to make that decision to quote pull the plug and she said her ideas and the anticipation of what that was going to do was so much worse

than the actual event itself yeah and again it's the fear of the unknown and what we place on it right you know and I think also you know what are what are your ideas about death you know i think that's also again it's a very individual thing and that will that will temper you know how this goes yeah now back to the lady

gang well we are so grateful that you came on to talk with us um i don't want it to end I know. So, so wonderful. Were there any other themes that you picked up on, on the Facebook questions that you want to cover? You know, some of the, the posts were just heartbreaking. I know. And I just, you know, obviously the need is so great. And I can't, I don't, you know,

I can't address the specific because they're just, they're just so big. And I would encourage people to seek support. It's important. Yeah, I mean, there, you know, there's, I don't, I really, I'm hesitant to kind of pinpoint anyone. You know, there's one who talks about the fear of getting, so losing a parent and then the fear that you're going to lose others, right? Oh, yeah. And I think that that's, that's fair. That's a pretty common one that this is, you know, I'm going to, this is going to happen again. And I don't know if I can handle it. And again, it comes down to that question of, you know, what, what's going to happen to me. And so my encouragement with people is to really work on that self-soothing piece, the part of you that is so afraid and really trying to understand what that is. Well, I was just going to say like, Becca, I, I mean, I know you're such a courageous woman, but it's like, I have thought many times, like, how do you even allow yourself to fall in love with someone, get married, like love someone after you've lost someone that you loved? Like that to me seems absolutely impossible. Well, I will say that I probably wouldn't have if I hadn't had help to get through it. But, you know, there were times, there were definitely times throughout dating Zach that I was afraid that he would also suddenly pass away and that I would never survive it. but I actually found that the majority of the time I did have to have those conversations with myself to say, you've been able to handle this before and you can handle whatever else is coming

next. It's going to suck so bad, but it is how I feel about the next loss because it's inevitable. I do feel like I have the tools, but I know that it's going to be painful. But you know, what's weird Amira is that this week, um, a guy that we've all been watching his story, Nick Cordero, who Broadway actor, and I worked with him for a brief moment in time years ago. And, um, I had so much come up over the last 90 plus days that he was fighting for his life in the hospital. And I actually had to stop watching sometimes because it does bring up a lot. It brings up a lot of stuff and it brings up a lot of, um, so many things. And, and I just last night, uh, he passed away two days ago today. Um, just last night I was putting the sheets on the bed

with Zach and I just felt that feeling of like, I know, I feel like I know what she's going through right now. And I feel like I know what she's feeling. And that like almost took me to my knees. Like that is like, you do not want to ever feel that again. And you don't ever want anybody that you care about to feel that way. But then it was only a moment. And then I just thought, but here I am, you know, like life goes on and I'm putting the sheets on my bed with another man that I love so much. And it's like, it was this really crazy moment, but I mean, life goes on. And like, that's how I did it. I just, you get up every day and you do the work and you don't avoid yourself. Even though there were days that I definitely did avoid myself because I just

couldn't deal. And I made stupid decisions and I did things that I judged myself so harshly for. But I think because I had someone to talk to every week that said, it's okay. And like, you should do all the things that you feel you need to do right now. And you shouldn't judge yourself and you shouldn't, you know, it was just so freeing to have that ability. So I just beg anybody out there who is struggling to go easy on yourself and find somebody who can be compassionate with you. Yes. Yes, yes, yes. I don't have to say anything. You're saying it all. It's fabulous. i think it's allowing ourselves to be in the dirt in the muck and to also you know i want to say that if you could if you're capable of experiencing deep hurt despair pain to be brought down to your

knees there's a opposite equivalent or whatever you know there's you you can then experience those incredible highs right and so that's life and so i think it's also just putting it into a context and understanding that um all of this especially death is a part of life that's a really important concept to get you know like the concept we hate the concept that's like it's and there's a reason they call it a transition in some traditions right it's a transition to the whatever's next and there may be that there's nothing next but it's still a transition in the same way that we're bringing you know i used to think of myself as a midwife yeah because you know there are midwives who bring who welcome and assist a woman to bring

a being into this earth right well the same at the other end yeah one more thing we often will think that we don't how can we possibly when we've experienced the loss of a loved one a partner how can we possibly go on to love again or love somebody else right it's like i i how can i do that we have enough love in our hearts and it just keeps growing and growing and growing it's like a parent saying i've already got one child that i love so much how can i possibly love another you ask those people who have you know more than one child right they don't not love the second and third right maybe my parents definitely well no I'm pretty sure no I'm sure mine didn't right and I was and I was the first so there okay we're like we'll save it but you see do you understand

what i'm saying yes it's like we again we think that love is finite you know and it's it's like in a little box and it's not it just keeps growing and expanding it's like a muscle so um are you taking new clients yes i am thank you how do people find you they can go on to my website which is my name amirabraha.com can you spell it for people like me who can't spell it's a m y r a b r a h a dot com perfect and you'll be able to find me and we'll post that in our facebook group and our thank you letter as well so everyone who it might be walking or driving or whatever right now um thank you so much for coming on the podcast thank you becca tobin for being so vulnerable um you too really special um and thanks to all the lady gang members

for supporting each other in the facebook group um sharing this episode with people you think might need it and um and that's it thank you so much for being a part of the show i want to thank you guys for doing the work that you're doing because it's important thank you i love you i love you bye-bye next tuesday thank you thank you very much thank you thanks for listening and make sure to rate and review this podcast wherever you get your podcast we have new episodes of lady gang every tuesday and thursday follow us on social media at the lady gang uh follow us personally at kelty most importantly at becca and at jack bannock the lady gang network is produced by will sterling steve delamater kirsten woodward and elizabeth beckwet thanks for rating and

reviewing wherever you get your podcasts, and tune in for new episodes every single week. I'm Lola. And I'm Megan. And we're the hosts of Trust Me, cults, extreme belief, and manipulation. We both have childhood cult experiences, and we're here to debunk the myths about people who join them and show that anyone can be manipulated. Our past interviews include survivors and former members of the Manson family, NXIVM, MS-13, Teal Swan, Heaven's Gate, Children of God, and the Branch Davidians. Join us every week as We help you spot the red flags. Get new episodes of Trust Me every Wednesday on Podcast One or wherever you get your podcasts.