Born Into A Grieving Family with Pat Sheveland

Ian Hawkins 0:02

Are you ready, ready to release internal pain to find confidence, clarity and direction for your future, to live a life of meaning, fulfillment and contribution to trust your intuition again, but something's been holding you back. You've come to the right place. Welcome. I'm a Ian Hawkins, the host and founder of The Grief Code podcast. Together, let's heal your unresolved or unknown grief by unlocking your grief code. As you tune into each episode, you will receive insight into your own grief, how to eliminate it and what to do next. Before we start by one request. If any new insights or awareness land with you during this episode, please send me an email at info at the Ian Hawkins coaching.com. And let me know what you found. I know the power of this word, I love to hear the impact these conversations have. Okay, let's get into it.

Just had a most amazing conversation with Pat Shetland that you're about to hear now. And if you are into it exploring the energy of the afterlife of money you're curious about connections with ancestors have passed? Well, then you all love this episode. Pat was born into a grieving family. And she didn't know why until she started getting some of the answers. And her story is an amazing one of of connection to young people that had passed when she was only quite young that she was drawn to from a young age didn't have a sense of it until much later in life. But if you've if you've ever felt or seen signs from your loved ones who have passed, and you want some more clarity around that, and some more guidance around that you're going to absolutely love this conversation with everyone. And please welcome this week's guest. Pat Shetland. Pat, how are you?

Unknown Speaker 2:16

I'm great. Thanks. Yeah.

Ian Hawkins 2:19

Great to hear. Got introduced by a fellow grief worker, Kathy Koenig, which is always nice to get connections, and we kind of hit it off straight away. Right, we had a great connection immediately. And then we added a an awesome chat some weeks back. So I'm very much looking forward to this. We're very much on the same page with a lot of our own experiences. So bad. Can you share a bit about your journey into working in this space? So you mentioned there had been grief in your family for most of your life. But for most of that time, you weren't aware of it?

Unknown Speaker 3:01

Correct. I was born into a grieving family. But I had no clue. Until I knew that I had a brother that died. I probably when I was five or six. I found out about that. So I was a little kid at that time. But it really was Greg was never talked about spoken about there was no part of him being a part of our family. It was just a like his little all the HIS SPIRIT and everything about him was buried with his tiny little body back when he died at like four months of age in the 50s.

Unknown Speaker 3:43

I lost I lost your voice. How about now? Now I've got to

Ian Hawkins 3:49

looking, looking back. Can you now recognize so many signs that you just didn't see?

Unknown Speaker 3:57

Absolutely. I tell people, I found out about him because I went up into my parents attic. And I used to love to look at the photographs of the ancestors and my family. And I was just very connected to understanding these people that came before me. And I just so happened to find a little manila envelope that was like a five by seven. And I opened it I was probably five, maybe five years old. And I opened it and inside were these two pictures black and white pictures of this baby. And he looked odd. It just didn't look like a healthy baby. It just there was something off with the pictures. And I thought Why would my parents have these pictures of this little boy? Because I knew that it wasn't my older brothers. I didn't know it was any of those three older brothers and so somehow either my mom came to check on me or I took them down to her and said who is this baby? And I remember thinking that he looks sick. And that's when she found only shared that I had a brother by the name of Greg who died six years before I was born. Yeah. And interestingly, when you ask, when I look back on signs, I was the kid that when I learned how to ride a bike, I would bike up to the local cemetery because I wanted to, like be connected to ancestors, and I had a my next door neighbor was three, his name was Joey. And he was like my best friend when I was five, and he died. And when you're five, you don't really understand what death is, or anything. But I just knew one day he was there, and we'd play and then he wasn't there anymore. And we weren't playing and his sister said he died. Didn't really know what that was. But when I started riding my bike to the cemetery, I don't know why I was drawn to the cemetery, but I was. And I would go to his grave site, because they had a little picture of him on the gravestone in his little sailor suit, and I would go and just talk to him and just hang out and just like, hang out at the cemetery. And then one, I don't remember the exact day, but as I recall, I was probably wandering around there and not even probably 80 feet away. I looked down, and there was a little gravestone in the ground, that was pretty much almost covered. But I saw my brother's name on it. And I realized that so that I just spent a lot of time. And you know, so there was a connection.

Ian Hawkins 6:39

Yeah, other tingles all through that when you talked about being drawn to that space. It's almost like your friend there. What was his name? Sorry, Joey. Joey. Like, you're like you're drawn to that energetic connection. So much of this just comes naturally when we're at a young age, right? Like, I can remember moments with my children, whether after my dad passed them saying I was talking to, I was talking to granddad, and then you and then oh, it was granddad wearing just out of curiosity. And he just describes like, what he would have been wearing to a tee. And it's like, yeah, yeah, that's

Unknown Speaker 7:18

beautiful. And for my brother, Greg, I never thought of him has a baby. He was my older brother. And the interestingly, interesting thing there too, is, when I looked at the gravestone, I realized he was born the day before mine, so his birthday was the day before mine only it was six years, you know, difference, and I'm like, wow, I'd start to have conversations with him in my head, like we could add birthday parties together, you would have really liked me, you know, we would have been really tight and close, even though you know, you're a bit older, but I always pictured him as you know, this, this brother that had this maturity about him.

Ian Hawkins 8:01

I wonder if, at the same time that you're celebrating your birthday, your your parents, were very conscious of Greg's birthday at the same time, and whether that was bringing up some really difficult stuff for them, which would have made your birthday? Probably not. I don't know if you can think back, looking back whether maybe

Unknown Speaker 8:27

I had one party. Interesting when I was six years old, that's the only party that they ever had for me.

Ian Hawkins 8:36

Yeah, I mean, we

Unknown Speaker 8:37

still celebrate it, I'd still get the birthday cake and a present or something. But that was the only time that there actually was a gathering. That was a celebration that it was a true birthday party. Yeah. I never thought about that. I never thought about that until just now.

Ian Hawkins 8:54

I mean, we refer siblings getting parties.

Unknown Speaker 8:58

I don't know I mean, that they're older than me and I to that in our seven and nine years older. And then my other brother that was three years old, or there's like a lot of dynamics when a child dies in the middle. And then two of you come after and so my brother Mike that's three years older than me. I don't know that he had any parties either. But I don't know about the two older ones. They could have.

Ian Hawkins 9:22

They usually with with guests, I kind of asked questions around the different things showing up in my body but right now I'm getting this word tightness across my gut like crossing my stomach. Like, is there anything there that comes to mind when we're talking about this stuff around your parents or birthdays or or digesting information like

Unknown Speaker 9:49

there is so much that I have been really spent the last definitely 11 years really processing through a lot of it and I'm gathering more information from my mother. But I would say over the last since she died, it's two years ago in January, I've actually done more processing and a lot of forgiveness. Because, boy, I just think about her as a young mother, who she was 26 when Greg died, two kids, a three year old and a 15 month old. And then she brought Greg home, he was four months old, he was fine. And then one day, he just when it first baby shots, and then he got sick, and by that night, he had died. And I just think of how I can't even imagine, I can't imagine having all of that. And she's told me that she really kind of went off the rails mentally with it. And she actually had a friend that had to help her, had to get back on track and say, Listen, you have two other little kids. And then after Greg died, there was a three year span before my brother was born. And then that brother had a lot of attention. And Mom told me that she was so fearful of him getting sick, and the possibility of him dying. And so he was very, she tried to insulate him, but he was quite the, you know, he's a very all boy kind of boy out there and doing lots of things and living on the edge ever since he was a kid. But then it was another three years after that, that I was born. And I believe, I don't know if you've heard the term of an UPS baby. But I truly believe that this was that my mom probably carried me with such fear. Because their her marriage wasn't great. You know, the finances were not great. I think that there was just a lot of fear. And so energetically, that's what I grew up in. And so my mom and I had a interesting relationship, deep love, but also like oil and water. So yeah, so I've spent a lot of time and just kind of working through and processing through and loving her as the 20, some year old, you know, young woman that went through so much heartache, and didn't feel like she was supported at all during that time.

Yeah, just thinking back to when when I was a young parent and trying to comprehend what that could have been like, like it's yeah, like I can't even comprehend, I do also think about the impact that I would have had for your older brother, or your next older one. But also for you, like the fearful element, but sometimes when, when you're, when you're over cared for, that can create a whole other raft of problems. So like dependency and, and it's a think about a friend of mine who talked about, he was adopted, and he felt like, because he siblings weren't that his parents tried to, they went over the top to try and make him feel included. And I had a whole other raft of challenges for him. Do you feel like you? Like was there any if, if your next older brother was getting a lot of attention? Did you do feel any sort of any impact that would have had now thinking back around what your mother would have been experiencing? And if so, how did that show up?

I think, you know, I mean, she told me that she really wanted to insulate him from she was so fearful. And then when I came along three years after the fact, there was a lot of competition. I think my brother viewed me as you know, who are you coming in here, and I was the only girl. Right? And so my father was ecstatic. He had a little girl. And it's interesting, because I was telling my daughter in law this the other night, my dad is one who took me fishing. He's the one who took me out and did a lot of those things. But he didn't do it with my brother that was three years old or so I wonder if my brother that was three years older, was more of, you know, insulated by my mother, but by the time I came along, and my mom and I, it wasn't a real maternal child relationship. And I think it to no fault of her own. You know, I think she was just totally overwhelmed with everything that was going on her life and never having been able to express any of her grief with anybody. It wasn't until my brother would have turned 60 So I was in my what late fit I was 50 in my 50s, early 50s When she finally was able to speak of all the anger, the feelings of abandonment, the guilt that She carried from, you know, that day that he got second died. All of those feelings just erupted as if they happened yesterday.

Mm hmm. So had like, was that something that just happened? Or were you conscious of the fact that it was your brother would have been your brother's 60s? Well, how did that unfold for you to?

And now, she and I got very close the older because it's like the daughter cave in because my you know, I'm the caregiver, the caretaker, and so she was in her 80s. And I don't know, I just remember going to her apartment. And it would have been my brother's June 21. My birthday was going to be June 22, the next day, and she said, this would have been Greg's 60th birthday. So she never talked to me about any of this. Wow. And that's what opened up the conversation. And it just so happened that I started my coaching. Training, I guess I would call it at that time, and I was just so curious. And so I just sat down with her and asked her questions, I was a coach, really, kind of stepped outside of being the daughter and had her really tell me the factual information that happened because she had so much story that had developed in her mind over all those years. And being a nurse, I could go through, okay, tell me what happened on a medical standpoint. And we just went through that probably 24 hours of Greg's life and death in great detail. And that's what opened up the ability for us to have, you know, more conversations over time. Yeah. Wow.

Do you mind if I asked you why what? Like, why, what was the condition that he had? Like?

Well, she we don't know that. The interesting thing is they listed on his birth certificate that he died of pneumonia, which I think is just bullcrap. Yeah. She went in, and he had his four month baby shots. And then she brought him home. And she said, he just started crying, and just, you know, she couldn't console him. And so she thought it was the baby shots, you know, so she's walking around, she's got these other two little kids running around. But she's, you know, just trying to take care of him and get him to settle down and console him. And he just wants to stop and she said, when his eyes rolled back in his head, I knew something was very wrong. But she called our friend who was our the doctor, a friend of theirs, who was our family doctor, he said, Bring him in right away, brought him into the hospital. So he was having seizures. So was it from the baby shots that I don't know if it was from that? It's who knows? Who knows? She felt guilty, though. And her big guilt was when I was trying to console him, Did I hurt him? And I really had the conversation with her mom, you did what any? Mom would do. You were holding him, you were bouncing him like any one of us as parents, you know, have done with our children. Absolutely. So that, you know, you didn't, you didn't harm him with that. You were trying the best that you could and you got him to the hospital. And they seem to have got him stabilized. And so the doctor said, Oh, go home, to both my parents go home, you know, get some rest. And so they went home. And to our, you know, at 2am in the morning, they get a phone call saying I'm sorry, your child died. So then when they went back into the hospital, rushed to the hospital. He was laying on it. This was you know, this is back in the early 50s. Right 1952 It was a hospital run by nuns, you know, a Catholic organization. Who knows what all went on, but what mom remembers is that she walked into the hospital and there her baby was on a gurney outside the room. And he didn't even have a blanket on him. And his little arms were up. And she number one got very angry at the at the nuns like, that's my baby. How dare you have him out here? You don't even have a blankie on him. Yeah, and that his arms were up. She had in her mind that he was looking for her and reaching up and she wasn't there. And so you I just asked her she was, you know, she had a deep faith grew up as a Catholic her whole life. And I said, you know, there's always that saying, you know that all the little children come to Jesus. And you know that God loves us. And I said, What if his little hands were going up and just saying, Please hold me. And it really was for him to be able to go to heaven. And that helped her at once. And I could see in her eyes that that shifted a little bit of that belief, because she really she blamed herself for over 60 years. This baby's death.

Oh, I got tingles all through that, what a beautiful message and gift to be able to give you a mom.

Like just thinking the guilt like about not being there about what what could I have done differently? You guys too, stories about the maternal instinct was something's not right. Like you described? Could I have actually, you know, I knew something wasn't right. Could I have done more all of those different things. And I imagine if your mum's not processing that, and you are born into a grieving household, and you are extremely sensitive and sensory to those kind of energies, you must have been dealing with some big stuff, like all through those well, all through life, but particularly those younger years when you can't make any sense of it. Yeah,

you know, you don't know that. That's what it is, like you said, you go look back then when he wants you once I found out and when I think back, I think, wow, our home was very quiet. You know, there when my parents weren't around with my three older brothers and myself, it could get rambunctious. But when my parents were, everything was very quiet. And I girlfriend told me, you know, maybe five years ago, I said, Oh, I used to love going to your house, because you had you know, six, seven siblings, and it was just so much fun to go to your house and all that activity and noise and all that. And she said, Pat, I used to love to go to your house because it was so quiet.

Wow. Interesting.

And but I think that's part of it is we I think there was just this enveloping sadness and, and my mom never talked to anybody about it. My dad never talked to anybody about it. So and they didn't talk to each other. And I asked my mom that before she died, you know, maybe a year or so before she died. And I said, Did you and dad ever have a conversation about how you felt? You know, the depth the loss? And she said Never. There was no, we never talked about it. And then and I'm going to share this if you don't mind. There was when we talked about like layering, grief, you know, and and multiple, multiple grief events in our life. At the time, right before Greg died, my I had a cousin. He was 12 years old Bobby. And he had a ruptured appendix and he died. So that was on my dad's side of the family. So their nephew Bobby died unexpectedly on a Saturday, about it all summer, four to six weeks after that. They get the call that Bobby's mother, my dad's half sister, Eleanor died unexpectedly. She had a brain aneurysm on a Saturday. Then bought that same amount of time for six weeks or whatever. on a Saturday, they get the call that my dad's grandmother, who lived with elder Bobby died,

what? And then

four to six weeks or whatever, I don't have the exact timeframe. Greg dies on a Saturday. And my mom said you didn't want to answer the phone on a Saturday. And it was just like this compounded grief. And so she felt like no one was there for her. And when we talked about that when she finally opened up, I said, you know, Mom, I'm not excusing that. You didn't feel like anybody was there for you. I'm not going to make excuses for that. But I said, if you look at my dad's mother, I said, she lost her first grandchild, her daughter, her mother and a second grandchild, all in a matter of just a couple of months. She didn't have the capacity, she was probably in such deep shock and grief, then have the capacity to be there for you, which is so, so unfortunate. And I think the family and its of itself was probably so immersed in, you know, just a total fog of grief. And my father similarly, and so my mom felt totally abandoned because all of this you know, there was attention being given to like the grandma Other the math is that they're holding but there wasn't that kind of attention given to Greg because she said, they just kept saying, Oh, he was just a baby. So he doesn't need the mass. You know, you don't need a big funeral. He's just a baby. And she held on to her for forever those messages, just totally dismissed her child.

But at the same time, all of that stuff within a continuing to come to the surface and remind her Oh, that must have been awful. No wonder the house was quiet in a perpetual state of mourning.

And with my when my brother died, they took him from the hospital, he went over to the mortuary. And I don't think they didn't even do a math for him went the Catholics. That's a big deal. So they didn't even do a funeral. They had the the thing at the mortuary visitation people came, but she doesn't remember a lot of that she was in such a state of shock. And then they buried him the next day. So she never had a chance to even like, hold and be with that baby and wrap her arms around him and her heart and her head. And then then he was buried. And so a couple of years after his 60th birthday, it happened to be Father's Day here in the US landed on June 21st. It was Greg's birthday landing on June 21. And I just had this thing. You know, Mom, let's let's go to the cemetery. Let's, I've got a bunch of roses, why don't we go and lay some roses for Father's Day, and Greg's birthday. And that's a whole story about that whole event at the cemetery. But by the time we got to my brother's grave and my dad's grave right next to each other, and my parents were divorced by that time, by the time my dad died, my parents were divorced. But I later rose on Greg's grave. And I started walking this little tiny little lady, old lady back to the car and she just looked up at me and she said, all I wanted to do was just get on my knees and scrape that dirt and pull him out of there and take him home with me that day. That was the most emotion and I you know, what do you say? I just said Mom, I can't even imagine. I can't even imagine

so that you gave her that opportunity to grieve like she should have 60 years, bro. Yeah. What a job she was able to do as a mum. Given that's what she was experiencing every single day.

Absolutely, absolutely. She did. She did wonderfully as a mother she provided for us. She made sure that you know, we were taken care of she was the biggest mama bear you could have. She was this little tiny lady four foot 11 You know, little tiny lady, but boy, if any of her kids were, you know, threatened in any way back in the day, she was right there. Ready to make sure that we were we were protected and, and and you know, and then the relationship with her and my dad both beautiful people, but I think unfortunately, because they could not communicate that just kind of went off the rails and so bad dad wasn't working and was drinking too much and, you know, kind of went off to the bars to hang out with his buddies from World War Two because that's how they commiserated right. And then my mom was left home. Just trying to grapple with it. And her and her friends. They never talked about a Joey's mom who lived right next door experience terrific child loss when her three year old had a brain tumor and died. And I said to Mom, did you to ever talk about the losses of your children? They never ever had a conversation. He just didn't talk about it back then.

So if you look at your own journey, like did you then learn by observation, to then not talk about the things you're experiencing?

Now? I I had the one that actually people used to come to me even in grade school when someone I remember my neighbor across the street her father died of cancer and I was probably I think she said she was nine so I would have been seven. And I remember her coming over and sitting on our stoop in front of the house because all the people were at their house after he died and I just I just asked what's it like? What's it like to have your dad died at seven You know, so I started really being that curious, inquiring wanting to hold the space for people at a very young age. And then I became a nurse. And my nursing in the hospital was at the time when AIDS was the epidemic in the 80s. And I worked straight nights, and I would hold the hands of young men, you know, young 18 year olds that were dying, and just hold their hands and just listen and be present for them. You know, because the fear and just to let them know that they're loved and cared for. So I think that's where my journey was, is that I was born in I was, I know, now, unequivocally. I was brought onto this earth. And I don't know, my brother died. But he has come to me and said, I was born through you. And together, he and I had this mission to help people who are grieving. And so I don't believe I believe we're two different souls. But that he came to me on a plane one time, and just that was what I heard, I was born through you, and I knew it, I just knew that our connection was absolutely. And so I believe, that's why our birthdays are within probably 24 hours of each other, all of that type of thing. And so he's been my guide, to be able to help me hold the space and be available for people. So I'm one that I'm really comfortable around death and dying. It's it's not something that I retreat from, or I talk about it.

Like you said, and he's there as your guide and the tingles of confirmation, I got through that, well, that was intense.

He's my buddy, he's my pal.

Yeah, and just for any listener, this, maybe it's a stretch of a belief, it's just tuning into when you may have received these messages, and when you may have dismissed them, because it doesn't fit in with what society or your family thinks is normal. The more you can be open to that sort of belief. It's just opens your whole life to so many more possibilities of sensory experience. It made me think about a couple of things. And I've talked to Ben on this podcast a lot that the moment when, when I've got that sort of message from my dad, just like, it's hard to explain, but there's just an overwhelming sense that you can't, we can't be anything else. Like, it's like, where does that even come from. And then I was also drawn to something I haven't talked about in the podcast, but my daughter was born and there was an abnormality in the in the umbilical cord. And we found out later, through, actually through two different one was a Kinesiology test. And one was so one was my daughter found out one was I found out like the safe two different people not connected at all giving us the same reading of all actually, because she was a twin and the other twin didn't make it past whatever it was 1011 12 weeks and, and so it's funny, I when I first found out I, I felt so bad for my daughter that she lost her sister. It took me like, three, four years for it hit to hit home that when I actually lost a child, we lost the child lost a child. And now she's here for me. And I'm getting that same feeling in my body. Now she's here with me all the time. And yeah, and it's just bought, like, a whole new dimension to my relationship with my daughter now daughter's and, and to be able to talk through her own grief, which I imagine she didn't even understand for so much of our life. All right, right. Yeah. So I mean, I'd love for you to share, like just how much comfort those experiences bring to you and help you in going forward.

How? Well I'm going to share something that I did for my mom, but this is what is sitting in front of me is Greg's picture. So remember I said about those little black and white photos. And he says, well, they were taken because he was already deceased. They were the only two pictures they had of them. So those are the only two tucked away A manila envelope up at the attic, right? And I commissioned someone who actually does portraits for fallen soldiers in the United States. He has a nonprofit. And I reached out to him because I saw once in a while that he did babies. And I reached out to him and I said, Is there any way that I could commission you to create a drawing of Greg with his eyes open? And Michael Regan is his name. He just got the same, like, oh my gosh, and so he just sat and he prayed. And he connected. And he drew this amazing, amazing portrait of my brother. And when we got it, I went to my mom was living with us at the time. So she was in her early 90s. And I took it to her. And I held it up. And I said, Is this Greg? And all she could do was smile and just shake her head? Yes. Yes, his eyes are open. She said. Wow. So I had it professionally framed. It's huge. It's huge. It's a huge, huge portrait. But I had it professionally framed. And you know, you kind of I wanted to be my brothers would never talk about this. And I think they My feeling is that they thought that me bringing this up was causing harm to my mom, that it wasn't good to be having these conversations. So books that I've written, they just like, won't have anything to do with it. They just didn't really want to have that part of the story. And so I asked mom, I said, Where do you think we should put him? Where should we put Greg, and she had a little sitting room. It's a little mother in law suite. And she just pointed ahead. I want him right there. She wanted him right in her line of sight when she was sitting in her chair, so that she could look at it every day. Well, now I have that portrait, he's in my bedroom, and he's up there. And then this beautiful picture of my mom is also tucked into the and that's who I wake up to, and I go to sleep to every day. And I get to be able to just have conversations with them and knowing that the two of them are together. And and now my mom is my guiding force. You know, she'd never believed in any of this kind of stuff. So for your viewers that I get it, you know, I was not the big spiritual guru type person, but I can't make this stuff up. And when my mom died, before she died, I would ask her, would you, I need a sign from you that heaven, whatever you know, our next life is is what I believe it is. I just need a sign. I don't know what it is. And she immediately gave us a sign. She wasn't even taken out of the home because she had died at home and started giving a sign and her sign is 1111. She died at 1111 at night in my arms, I believe, because I went in there it was probably about nine minutes after 11am When I rolled her over and she took that last exhale. I truly believe I didn't look at the clock, but it was probably 1111. And so she was never into this, but it is multiple times where she that comes up. And so and she is my guiding light along with Greg. So now I have a magnificent guides. twofold, you know, that helped me do what I'm here to do? Help others on their grief journeys.

Amazing. What you mentioned before around how from a young age, you're already helping people with their grief and holding space at it. Right now I'm getting tingles again. Like when people are looking for purpose, or a deepening of their story. To me, and I did a individual episode about this a couple of weeks ago. It's not 10,000 hours now the concept of 10,000 hours, then you become an expert. No, the thing that you're actually an expert at is more like 100,000 hours, because you've been doing it and living it your whole life. That's why our story and our backstory is so important because it holds so much of the key to unlocking whatever our future looks like. It doesn't mean you need to have a business. It doesn't mean you don't need to look like anything except that when you can realize just how valuable you are in that space. It will change everything for how you feel about yourself and it'll change everything for every single relationship you have.

Yes, yes.

Can I dig a bit deeper into that relationship with your mum? Because when you talk about her as the guide, I didn't get tingles, I actually got a feeling of frustration. And I don't imagine that's the frustration from now but frustration from perhaps earlier years of the relationship when you were growing up, so so what? What did you not get from your mom in those years that you badly needed?

Attention? Physical Touch. Yeah, and understanding. You know, I didn't fit the bill of what she thought a daughter should be. And so there was a lot of misunderstandings. And thus, I went and started acting out at a very, you know, in my early teens, yeah. 1213, I started like walking around with a little smartass attitude, and, you know, just and just to get attention, and then her and my dad's relationship was deteriorating. So a lot of things like, imploded when my parents got divorced. And then I was 15, my brother, other brother had graduated. So when my mom moved away, it was just me and her, which vary. So my whole family dynamic, I lost my family in one fell swoop basically. And, but yeah, that's what I was looking for, as just an understanding. And now I know that she had that she had that she had that spiritual thing, like, she would give to me. Angels when I got older, but she would never talk about any of her feelings regarding that. And I think because she was, you know, so many years with, and this is not a diss on any religion, but for her, the Catholicism, she went grade school, high school, you know, it was so deeply embedded in her that talking about the spiritual side of it, it was all the Catholic dogma that, you know, and so for her to be able to really tap in, and she always thought I was weird, you know, even as an adult, and she was living with us, you know, here she is in early 90s. And she was praying one night, she was I went into her bedroom, and she's sitting there and I'm like, What are you doing so early? It was like eight o'clock at night, and I'm saying my prayers, and I said, Oh, she goes, I have a lot on my prayer list. I have a lot. And I said, Mom, do you ever just like talk to God? And she looked at me like, that was blasphemous. And I said, seriously, do you ever just, like have conversations? And, and I said, I've been talking to God, since I was a little kid having little conversations. I didn't. It wasn't prayers. It was just conversations and she looked at me and she goes, Do people think you're strange? I'm like, probably, I don't know. You know, you probably think I'm strange. But I think she always used to say like when Greg died or at various periods in her life that she often wondered if people thought she was strange, so I kind of think that she was very intuitive. I know she was very intuitive but that she was tapped in much deeper but never had a conversation about it and while could that that's probably where you're sensing the frustration because what could have been what could have been and and just to be able to share that would have been so awesome.

Okay, well, I'll tell you what I got through then and again tingles as I say it I don't know what the significance of the river in that picture. I know we talked about that last time we spoke but it was showing up for me the first time in this chat so there's something around that maybe it's the baptism as I speak this out loud but

wow, so much emotion in this she was acting on that far more than she ever led on is what I'm getting. And she was almost like cheeky like like which I think of lots of different older people I've met and had conversations where they kind of wink at you as if I know exactly what I'm doing here. I know that you know that I do this but I'm gonna lead on it's almost like yeah, she she was she was tuned into that perhaps way more than you think but also also know that and I think about this from my own lens, right. Same with my dad like he If he just acted in certain ways that you dislike, he knew what's going on, he made out like you didn't? Yeah, but it also, her journey unlocks something for you that that allows you to then go and do this work at the level that you do. So I don't know if that, if that helps. But the frustration is normal. But also it's like, what a gift, like, and I also think about, I will talk about your next generations too shortly. But I think about, you know, like, how often as parents do we get caught in in that same space? The untold damage that I've done to my children, and it could be this and it could be that it's like, now you just did the best that you could do the best? You can. Yeah. And and somewhere in whatever experiences and grief they've had through their life is unimaginable gifts for them as well. Absolutely,

absolutely. My mother is I like I said, I had to do some real forgiveness work. But it really came down to I put myself in her shoes at that age, and everything that she went through and and what a strong, I mean, just a woman that isn't strong and smart. And you know, she lived till she was 96 and a half, and she lived with us those last eight years, and the gift of being able to have all that time and it wasn't always easy. You know, it wasn't always easy, especially as she got older and that type of thing, but that I was able to be able to be gifted to take care of her. Even during the most frustrating of times that I was given that and I knew that she and I don't know what people believe in life, life's you know how many times you go through your life cycles, and you know, come back and do your work and your karma and all that type of thing. But I just had a knowing that she and I have had done this dance many times. I just knew that there were lots of different lifetimes that we had done this dance, and I chose consciously that the dance was not going to replay again, in the negative way it was going to be that we were healing this.

Yeah, I believe that we absolutely do. And again, that it's some stories that that unfold that, like what you said, you can't make up how things getting guidance from three different people from completely from parts of the world that all tell you the same message around that sort of space. And you're like, Okay, well, whatever it is, you can believe what you believe it is there's something going on beyond what we can comprehend at a logical level, which is why there's just so much more to open up when we we open ourselves for the possibilities. You mentioned there the physical touch from your mom, like I don't know if you've drawn this connection, but you just described how she felt like she might have done damage to to Greg by by being too physical with a touch whether, whether then that led her with her all of her children after that to go like there's an unconscious pattern playing out there of you know, touching. Pain, right?

Oh, I never thought about that. Ooh, you're good. I mean, because there is. Yeah, kind of you just don't know. But yeah, it was very much she was not the the hugging, nurturing, I don't remember her ever kissing me at a young age or hugging me or having me on her lap. I remember my dad, you know, being more nurturing that way. But yeah, for my mom and I just think the armor she probably had just to keep herself moving forward. had to you know, and it had to be for her, you know, just to keep herself pieced together. You know, I think about when, you know, especially grieving moms because they're the ones that I've worked with the molars to have come to me. They're so the fragility is so great that they're afraid that if they get in a certain situation, they will break apart like Humpty Dumpty into bazillion pieces and not be brought back together again. And so they're almost half and I think for my mom, I just she had to have that. That protection around her because she did have she had four kids she had to raise. But I want to tell you one thing that is just so powerful and for the people who are listening, that just even being able to have the conversation and start the conversation with your family members. If it's not happening now. It's I don't think it's dangerous. I think it's healing It's beautiful. And you do it with that heart space. But so my mom and I have been talking about Greg quite a bit. And, you know, it just I allowed it just to be a part of the conversation. When she wanted to talk about him. It wasn't like we were doing this all the time every day. But when there was an opening, or I felt that, you know, it was a good time. But we went into a bank. And my mom, I needed to take my mom to the bank, and she needed to sign something. And the woman comes up to her and said, Hello, Mrs. hooks, and just making small talk. And how many children do you have? And my mom looked right at her and said, I have five, four of who are living. over 60 years, I see I'm just getting chills. over 60 years, she was never able to say that. Wow. And she just, you know, her little four foot 11 frame just stood there, just look this woman and then said I have five.

Wow. With pride, with pride. Wow, what a gift. For the moms listening, you don't have to have experienced that to resonate with that fragility. This real eye opener, I've been coaching my wife's football team for the last three years. And just the pressure, like, gave me a whole new comprehension of the pressure that mums feel when when they made mistakes in football. And I told them, it was okay, this is the one place of your week where it doesn't matter. But also even through that lens, there's still the emotion they would get if they did something that sort of cost the team something and it's like it shows up in so many different ways. It doesn't have to be through this this deep, deep grief that you're aware of. Because we've all experienced something that has created that fragility and it's okay for you to feel that way. And it's even more okay for you to admit that and to have conversations with people like Pat to. To open up about it. You mentioned Yeah. Did you do remember those good memories of what is going on with your dad and EI?

You mentioned your dad and what you do remember those those moments of affection from him? Like how was your relationship with him? Like obviously, you've had this whole conversation with your mum and dad's credit, so much pace. But then what was the the other side of that if they've got separated? Were you able to have any of those conversations with him at all?

Not Now. Now. My dad and I were very close when I was young. Like I said he'd take me fishing, he'd do all the things that typically you would have done probably with the boys. Yeah, you know, my brothers were older and probably not interested in doing that. And so we were very, very close. And then when my parents divorced, we lived my mom and I lived almost three hours away. And back in the day, it didn't just go do those kind of travels. And so I don't recall, it's it's kind of weird. I've had to do some healing on that. Not spending much time with my dad for a lot of years. Maybe a phone call here and there. But I didn't see him too often, you know, over many years span throughout my high school years. And I was the rebellious teenager and laying it all out. But then when I graduated from nursing school, and I had gotten married, we moved back to where my hometown was, and I was able to reconnect with my dad, but by them he had had numerous strokes. He was a phasic. So he couldn't speak. I could understand him, but others couldn't. He is very independent, but he just wasn't in the best physical shape. And we never the only time that we ever talked about Greg is I took him up to the cemetery when I saw that it was all being grown over. And then he insisted that we needed to find someone to bring some cement and lift up the little stone. But that's the only time that we ever had a conversation about Greg. But my dad, you know, I took care of him. He died 33 years ago. He was in his 60s. He had cancer so we never had that opportunity. I was with my mom a heck of a lot longer than I was so we really, and I don't know that I needed to clean up a lot with my dad. There was just an there was just this acceptance and a peace within our relationship. That was just easy. My dad was a very, he even through His death. It was just super easy and my grief was easy. Even though he had lived with us, you know, I was there when he died. It was It's easy for my mom's was a very long drawn out many decades of fits and starts in our relationship. So

what I'm getting is like so my right shoulder, so like your, your left shoulder, I wonder if your dad was doing a lot of space holding and, and bearing a lot of the load for your mum. But also for you and all the siblings as well, but more probably not you because well, maybe, but but maybe if the others aren't so way inclined. Then that would be a heavy weight to carry for for your life.

Yeah, yeah. And very typical for men. Yeah, dads is to really because it's, it is to, we're here to, you know, make sure we keep the family going and be the be the protector that way and, you know, take action, and like go go to work and do the things that you do there versus you know, that role. And I'm not putting all men into that category. But I see that in working with grieving parents a lot that the dads don't necessarily talk a lot about it. But they're, they're doing their work there through activity, and that type of thing and holding the space

100%. And that's been my experience, too, is that most men, they just Yeah, it's the doing and the action, whether that's journaling or actually getting out there and making a difference. But actually real learning for me around the grief that I had around my dad was that was something my mum said to me, he's like, Well, he, you may have felt like, there wasn't this, this and this, but but he was a man of action. And he and he showed it through everything that he did. And yeah, it's like, yep, 100 I guess the the the lesson there is for matters, you don't feel like you need to do it any more than what you are doing. Because you're already doing way more than enough.

When you were younger, being that highly intuitive and sensory child and you're living in a grieving family, did you find yourself bringing out the emotion in others by like you said, you're you know, you're rebellious. And so were you were you picking fights? Were you creating any sort of, of that?

Only what the brother that was three years older than me. There was a very, and I don't think it was intentional, but I just thought, you know, birth order and all of that. But I think, you know, there probably was a lot of jealousy. All of a sudden when this new child comes in and needs to be you know, where my other brothers were, it was like there were two different families almost because of the age differences. And so and we were home and so we yeah, we would duked it out. They didn't treat me like a little porcelain Princess being the only girl I had to hold my own in the family.

A bit. I think that I reckon that sort of grief would be true for any older sibling. Yeah,

I think so. The field watching with my granddaughter, you know, I I live part time in a multi generational home helping out with the kids. And there's a four year old and an 18 month old and a four year old definitely there is that jealousy pattern going on here. So I don't like it. necess I think there's that's just part of you know, having someone new come in when you've had so much attention.

Yeah. I'd love to come back to that. But but also just want to join the dots around the work you do now. So you just you said when you started doing the coaching that grieving mums just started showing up, but you weren't advertising yourself as that. And it to me this is again, it's like when when you in whatever business you're in, but from my experience, particularly coaching is that when when that's been your journey, then people show up with the same sort of grief because you've been doing it your whole life. They're drawn to it. Yep. So it just makes perfect sense that of course you are helping your grieving mum for for what? How long? 50 something. Yeah. So tell us a little bit about that. Like you you have this moment where everything changes because your mum opens up. You're already at that place of coaching but then like then you have this experience with grieving mums. Sure, yeah. What does your life

well, it's Because I haven't had the actual lived experience like they have at first you question yourself like, am I the right person, but yet they were coming to me. And the first client I had, she came to me and she came because her her father had died. And my client was in her 60s, and within our first conversation, and she was so distraught, so distraught over her father dying, while it comes to be that she had a seven year old daughter who had died in a cat in an accident 30 years prior, and she never got to be able to express her grief and process it and give it air. And that was really what the coaching ended up being around is really going back and helping her to find healing and movement forward from that, because she had been on autopilot, you know, for 30 Some years and that her dad's death, just like, it was like a volcano that just erupted all of those feelings inside. And, and then Yeah, another woman came and there's more women came and I don't know, I mean, and it was just like, it just felt so natural that, you know, at first I kind of questioned do I know what I'm doing? But then it was like, people were feeling better. You know, and I am comfortable talking about death. And I think that was like, the key is, okay, I'm just gonna continue down this path. And I never really what do I want to say, I never put out there that I was a grief coach, up until a few years ago, I just wasn't, it's just like, people are coming to me, I'm here. And then, you know, I don't know, three, four years ago, I don't even know the timing. I created the brief coaching model for grief, just like you've created your program. And and it really was all because of the wisdom of all the people I've worked with, including my mother, and all of my lived experiences and my education as a nurse. And I'm, you know, a Qigong practitioner, and teacher, which is, you know, ancient Chinese medicine, work and mind, body, and all of that type of thing. So it just kind of all wrapped up in my coaching and my positive psychology and all that kind of stuff came together, but I really believe that I didn't create it. My wisdom keepers helped me to know what really seemed to help for especially grieving parents. And so I created the breathe coaching model for grief because the breath work is it's when we are grieving in ancient Chinese wisdom, and the five element theory, grief and depression settle in our breathing energy system and can block it. And so the, everything just kind of came together from that. And that's where I probably really declared, okay, I'm a grief coach, this is what I do.

Yeah, amazing. Can you tell us a little bit about the breath work, because I think that would be extremely valuable for the listeners.

It's so simple. It really is. Every time I get with a client, there's so many different ways to breathe. There's so many different breath work. And mine is like Uber simple. It's just take for socked, deep, gentle breaths, breathing in through your nose, and exhaling out of your mouth. We know that when we breathe in, physiologically, our heart rate goes up a little bit, our blood pressure goes up, the oxygen is needed to act alginate everything in our body, the cells and all of that. But when we exhale, especially through an open mouth, we're able to release the stress hormones or the cortisol, that exhale brings our blood pressure down, it brings our pulse rate down. So I have everybody when they come, and they are just sitting in front of me for the first time because usually they're sobbing their eyes out there. They can't believe that we're just really sitting there and we're gonna have this conversation that they're actually stepping into getting some support. I just have them do the four soft, deep, gentle breaths, and that's all it takes. And so, for anybody who's listening, that's really all it takes. When you're feeling like life is just like so overwhelming, and you can't get your brows that stuck. I'm going to share last night someone I know was having extreme pain. She's a young woman and she was having a stream physical pain, and she was hyperventilating and I needed to, that's all I did was I'm going to have you breathe in through your nose, and out through your mouth. And I can't, I can't. And I just kept your breathing in through your nose and out through your mouth, I just want you to say to yourself, I'm breathing in and breathing out. And within 30 seconds, everything started calming down, the fear factor started releasing, the pain was lessening, because it just took in our bodies are amazing. Yeah, we can find so much healing in that. But that's my simple, it's not rocket science at all. And there's so many different ways, like if you do yoga, there's certain ways of breathing. If you do Qigong, there's certain ways of breathing, that's just a simple way to bring ourselves into the present moment. Because fear is something that you know, the fear of the, you know, the emotions of grief, a lot of it is the fear, like, how can I continue to live like this? Without my loved one? So you're looking into the future and thinking, how can I do this? How can I how can I do this? How can I do it, or it's looking in the rearview mirror, and remembering the good times, and the not so good times, and all of that. And so then all of that emotion, so if we can bring ourselves into that present moment. And I'm not saying it's easy, initially, but when we start creating some of those habits, it it is a way to bring some calm in the middle of the storm.

Well said, plays into what you mentioned before, like really early on in the conversation is the grief on top of the grief. And then you shared it again, when you talked about the the woman that was grieving her dad, but actually it was all that stuff around her daughter's passing. When we have moments of grief, sometimes the moments of grief can be something like we we sort of make peace for something and it feels like part of us died because that part of our behavior is now gone for good, then, and yeah, it's normal for that tsunami of other stuff to come to the surface. So to bring it back to something simple, like breath. Because how often do we hold? Yeah, we tense up and everything holds me including our chest kind of thing kind of thing, probably just to do

that for myself. I mean, there's times where it's like, okay, girlfriend, just, you know, worry them and exhale out, even when it's like, you know, something to do with my work or in our something around the household. You know, it's not necessarily the, you know, the deep grief that we go through when someone has died. But there are little moments of grieving that goes on in our lives constantly. Things change, you know, change, things change. And in those changes, sometimes things are felt like a deep loss, like, oh, now I'm going to be 65 and June and I sometimes I think, what happened to my body, you know that, and you grieve some of that, like, oh, I used to be able to do that five years ago, I What's going on here, right? And they just need to kind of process through that and breathe through it. So when I'm frustrated, or getting a little ticked off about something, it's remembering to breathe.

Yeah, and that's a great point. Just because we do this work for other people doesn't when they were immune from having your own, where we need to, to regulate or get help with someone else helping us to regulate

our mutual friend Kathy, who introduced us, we actually gather every week, and we all are working in the grief space. And because we need the support of one another, because when you are doing this life purpose, the souls purpose that we do, you know, it's more than a job. It's, it's, you know, the it, we do hold a lot of space and energy and we need to be able to have people that understand what we're doing to be able to process through that. And so that's where we support one another that way because we're gonna hate we have it in our own lives all the time.

Yeah, absolutely. Now, you mentioned you're living in intergenerational household and you also said that you've you've kind of ended up doing some help with people in that space as well. told me was that a product of of living with your mom and those older years and then and then realizing just how much value there is?

Yes. It was during the pandemic. And mom was already living with us, right. We knew that I we invited her and she made the decision. because she just was having difficulty keeping her apartment, keeping herself going. And but during the pandemic, it really hit me. We had five people in our little neighborhood five families were either the children, the married children and their children moving in with mom and dad, because they needed to from financially or the elders were moving in with the children. And so I yeah, I created a coaching program called the balance coaching model for caregivers. It was really about, you know, how do you create this in a multi generational thing. And ours was a beautiful story, because my son married a woman who was an orphan. And she was adopted by a woman in the United States and her mom had died and her grandparents died this family. And so she was kind of sitting out there by herself. And and she said, well, let's just buy a big house. And then we can have everybody move in. And we started thinking, Well, I was thinking financially, that makes sense, like, you know, they can get a bigger home, we can help pay for that. And I am so grateful that we followed that path, because had we not my mom was living with my husband and I, my husband, and I would have never been able to go anywhere, for years. But because we had this multigenerational, and mom had the mother in law suite. And so my son and daughter in law, were there, my husband, and I actually were able to get out and still have a life, even though I was caring for my mom. And so it was such a beautiful thing. And then my granddaughter was born. And so when we talk about the relationship, and the true healing that I saw on my mother is when she she had other great grandchildren, but she was here, present moment, every single day when Grace was born, and she was able to hold grace and she could feed grace and then Grace would be like two years old and toddle into grandma's great grandma's room. And they would have like these conversations, that mom just had an intuitive knowing of what this little child was. And they had just this beautiful relationship. And that's where I just saw my mom become that nurturing, loving, with not only that great, great granddaughter, but with all of her great grandchildren, she just, she was able to open up and open her heart to just really take in the children and just embrace it, it was so beautiful, so beautiful.

Wow. And again, I'm drawn to that gift that you gave her to be able to process that to you then give her that opportunity. Well,

and our family the opportunity, I mean, to to be able to, you know, in a lot of cultures, serving the elders and taking care of them is very important. But in the United States, not so much. I don't know where it what's like where you're at, but people you know, work and all of that kind of thing. And for my son and my daughter in law and these grandchildren and people to just have experienced that depth of a relationship with great grandma and, and you know, she was 96 and a half. So there was a lot of things going on there. Physically, but what a beautiful, beautiful gift for all of us to be able to do it. And I remember the owl I would have to bathe my mom and I'd get her into the shower once a week because it was just so much on her breathing and everything. And I remember drying her off just having her sit there and, and just how grateful I was that I could gently just dry off her little skin and put lotion on it and what a gift what a gift it was to just be able to you know, have that. That tactile energy together.

Yeah, magic. Now, was it grace the one that you mentioned to me last time we spoke it was the the highly intuitive one. It's

Yeah, well, I think both of them are I think the the little one that's 18 months. She's the one that you watch her. And she's, she's like, watching everything vary and I just feel like she's she's gonna be the one that actually is even more so. But yeah, children are. They're amazing, you know, and grace. It's been you know, two years so she was two years old when my mom died. And we're not we don't I mean, we talked about grandma Ruth but she remembers grandma and she you know, she has these stories about great grandma Ruth and just yeah, just this loving energy and I just think what a great thing for her, you know, to have had that in her developing stage. I feel sorry for Miss Laney because she didn't get to know her great great Amma but she was named after Grandma. And this though this, okay, I'm throwing this out on a podcast. She was conceived the weekend my mom died. And she's the little intuitive one, she's much like my mother. So it's like really kind of weird.

Well, I have heard stories like that before. So nothing would surprise me. I think that's what you said there about having that ongoing conversation with your granddaughter, I think is important because I think about my two kids that had a great relationship with their great grand mother. But now they can't really remember, because we didn't do a good enough job of continuing those conversations and their stories, and we tell them some stories, but to keep that conversation ongoing, so that it's still in their head in their heart, I think, well, I know what would be really important. Well, what a what a conversation, I knew it was gonna be good.

I could talk to you for like days on. And I just think as things would be popping all the time.

Yeah. Well, I was just thinking, like, there's so many more questions I want to ask you. So we'll have to get you back for a second go. Thank you, that was amazing. And hopefully, I imagine you have opened people's hearts and minds up to all new possibility. So thank you for sharing so openly your beautiful form of magic.

Thank you. And thank you for what you bring to this world. And I mean, you and I had a wonderful conversation, you know, a few weeks back when we chatted, and we just knew that we were like a soul to soul connection. And that's what it's about. And I just hope that I know that the people that are listening to your podcasts are drawn because they have so many of these same beliefs or they're, you know, if you're enjoying it, they're exploring, they're curious. And in our yeah, there's so much so much out there and, and, and so many people that are willing to listen. And so if you're sitting out there and you know, you're feeling like you don't have anybody to talk to. There are people finding people that you can just chat with.

Yeah, absolutely. Well said. Thanks, but

thanks again. Bye. So,

I hope you enjoyed this episode of The Grief Code podcast. Thank you so much for listening. Please share it with a friend or family member that you know would benefit from hearing it too. If you are truly ready to heal your unresolved or unknown grief. Let's chat. Email me at info at Ian Hawkins coaching.com You can also stay connected with me by joining the Grief Code community at Ian Hawkins coaching.com forward slash The Grief Code and remember, so that I can help even more people to heal. Please subscribe and leave a review on your favorite podcast platform