Discovering Resilience: Dana Diaz's Journey Through Narcissistic Abuse and Beyond

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All right and welcome back to Life-Changing Challengers.

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Again, I'm your host, brad Minus, and I am so very honored to have Dana Diaz with me.

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She is the author of Gasping for Air, the Stranglehold of Narcissistic Abuse, and she calls herself an author and a voice for victims' abuse.

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So welcome, dana.

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Thank you so much for joining us.

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Well, thank you so much for having me.

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I'm very excited always to have this conversation because, unfortunately, too many people can relate, so we got to help them out.

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Yes, and that's what we're here to do, right?

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And as I always said, if any of you have a connection with the content that I'm bringing you and you get one nugget out of it, I've done my job and you've got something, and you've got something to take away, and always leave comments, and I always give contact information at the end so you can keep your journey going.

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But let's start out with how this came about.

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So, dana, can you just give us a little background on your childhood, where you grew up?

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What was a compliment to your house and what was it like to grow up in the Chicago area?

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Oh well, discuss the weather.

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Anybody that lives in the Midwest knows that the weather is always a thing, but you know, I've been in it all my life, so it doesn't faze me, just you get used to it.

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But the childhood that's always been the big question, because people read my book and this toxic, awful relationship and how it grew into domestic violence.

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And then they meet me and they're like but how did you end up in that situation?

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You're strong and you're this and you're intelligent and I'm like, yeah, but it happens to the best of us.

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But I think that the core of how it happens does go back to how we were raised.

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I think that most people don't realize that children are forgive the wording, but we're hardwired by the time we're about seven years old as to family, dynamics, roles, the way the world works, generally based on what we see around us, and I had unfortunately been born to a teenage mother back in the 70s, when it wasn't okay to be a pregnant teenager.

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So life was difficult, very difficult for her, as you can imagine a lot of judgments, a lot of shame at school, in her family.

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There was a lot she dealt with.

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But the problem where it came to affect me and still affects me to this day and I'm 48 years old is that I don't think she wanted children, but she certainly made sure that I paid the price for everything she went through during her pregnancy with me.

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I was born, actually, ironically, on her 17th birthday.

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Immediately after I was born she had her tubes tied, which indicates to me she just didn't want children at all.

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So pretty much imagine a young girl.

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She has a kid.

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She didn't want Pretty sure she didn't want any kids.

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Her life was made difficult.

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She's working three jobs just trying to feed us and keep us sheltered.

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I was fortunate that my grandma decided she would get a job to pay most of my expenses and great-grandma would care for me during the days since she was home.

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So I did have that love and that nurturing and that motherly aspect.

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Where I experienced love in that way, but from my mother it was always distant and almost in a neglectful way, emotionally and physically.

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There was no soothing when I was upset or couldn't sleep at night because I did spend some time with her.

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But I eventually moved in with her when she found somebody she was going to marry.

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She got married to a man when I was seven years old it was not my biological father.

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I didn't even know I had a biological father, honestly, because it hadn't occurred to me.

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I was just a kid living my life.

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I saw other kids had mom and dads, but I just had a mom and a grandma and a great grandma and some uncles and cousins.

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It just didn't occur to me that I was missing something.

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But my life really took a turn when my mother got married.

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So she married an older man who I recognized back then.

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I mean, this man was one way in front of people, boisterous and funny and charming and giving and generous and all these things.

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But then in our house or even in the car, sometimes leaving the family holidays or whatever, he was a nasty beast.

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I never liked him from the first time I met him.

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Actually I don't want to give too much away because I actually just finished my second book and the publisher's reviewing it now and it's about my childhood.

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But even on the first time I met him there was a situation where I was physically hurt and he had no remorse.

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He just didn't care that he had done that to me, but the sad thing is neither did my mother.

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So here I am in this childhood.

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Now, in this new place, he had moved my mother into his house that was away from our family and friends outside the city of Chicago, which was all I'd ever known, and a lot of her family didn't have vehicles.

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People that live in Chicago people have to understand you usually don't have a vehicle, you rely on public transportation.

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So it was very limited in the time that I was able to see my family in Chicago because they couldn't get to us and we couldn't get to them for whatever reason, mostly because of time, because all my mother did was work.

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But it was really hard being in this house with him.

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So my mother worked constantly, I realize now.

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I think it was her distraction from, I mean, she had to know what kind of life she had chosen.

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But she had always been very concerned about wanting a house and wanting a car and wanting things because we didn't come from, we were, I shouldn't say poor.

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I mean we grew up like I didn't have a bed in the apartment that we stayed in before moving in with him and there were times when there wasn't a whole lot of food.

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I mean, love my Puerto Rican great grandma.

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She could always stir up a pot of rice and beans and I lived on that and again it's like we're not having a dad.

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I didn't think anything.

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I didn't think that we had any less.

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We just we had what we had and it was enough.

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And but my mother was always obsessed with like things and wanting more.

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To her that was success and achievement and she didn't think she could have that alone.

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And looking back I realized I think she thought she could only have that with this man because he was attaining all these things if he didn't have them already.

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But it was just the constant back and forth with him and with her.

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It was like he was triangulating my mother and I against each other.

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Because I was often alone in the house with him.

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He was left to get me ready in the morning, get me to school, and it started with little stuff.

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And this is the thing about narcissists it starts with little stuff.

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Like I'd always have my hair when I was little in two pigtails and he would pull my hair I mean so tightly the kids at school and forgive me, I don't mean offense to anybody, but he would pull so tightly like it would stretch the skin on my face and my eyes back to where these ponytails were held, that the kids at school would make fun that I had Asian-looking eyes and I would get headaches and if I yelped or squealed in pain he would hit me with the hairbrush.

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And it was little stuff like that.

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But I would go to my mother and she would tell me oh stop, you're just trying to get attention, you're just jealous of my relationship with him.

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I was a kid.

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Nobody was listening to me, but then it escalated to where he would start telling me the verbal abuse I was starting to hear.

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Nobody ever wanted you.

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I shouldn't have to pay for another man's child.

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Nobody loves you, not even your mother.

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Nobody's ever going to love you.

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You're a burden.

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Basically, I was a bother.

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I was a burden.

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I was stupid as I was growing older.

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Getting on a roll wasn't enough.

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I wasn't smart enough.

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Being first chair viola in two symphonic orchestras wasn't enough.

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Teaching myself to play piano wasn't good enough.

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Writing my own music on piano wasn't like nothing was ever enough.

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And he would.

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I mean he was very overt and very direct in how he would tell me these things and I would stand up to him because I was a tenacious thing and I realized I mean, no matter how many times I went to my mother, she would just accuse me of lying or he would deny these things.

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So it was useless to go to her.

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All right, all right.

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So that seems pretty intense and I like the way you said that you were tenacious because you're D.

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Yes, you're D right, okay, exactly.

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Yes, you're d right, okay, exactly.

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But I'm interested to find out is if you feel like you were getting to the honor roll, getting to first chair, making all these amazing accomplishments for someone that young because you wanted his, his.

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Absolutely.

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I was absolutely the overachieving, desperately seeking their approval kind of a kid.

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But I wanted it more for my mother not so much for him because that was my mother and, like I said, even before him, there was always this distance between us.

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But him giving me this verbal, his words, just I internalized them, even though I knew he was mistreating me because my uncles didn't talk to me that way, my cousins didn't talk to me that way.

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I had little friends in the neighborhood.

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Their parents didn't talk to them that way, so I knew it was wrong.

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But it was my mother.

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I felt like I was always trying to convince her of my worthiness but she just wasn't interested and I in my mind, and I think most people can't comprehend that a mother just doesn't have any care or love for a child that came out of her womb.

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And it's very interesting In the 90s there was this book that came out.

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I don't know if you've read it.

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It's called A Child Called it and it was one of the worst cases of child abuse in California history.

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But the reason I bring it up I actually recently reread it it's so horrifying.

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It's actually very triggering and difficult to read, but the interesting thing about it was that it was only one of the five children in that house that was abused so severely.

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The others had a perfectly normal childhood.

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They were perfectly aware, as was the father.

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It was the mother abusing the one child.

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It was still so frustrating that how could a mother treat?

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I mean you think you have a baby.

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You're supposed to love and protect and nurture, raise this child and love it.

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And I mean we hear about cats rejecting some of their young.

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But you don't think people could do that.

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It just doesn't seem to make sense.

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So that's what I struggled with was I wanted my mother's approval, him.

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I didn't like him from day one and honestly, even when I stood up to him and even though I was internalizing all these awful things he was telling me I knew they were wrong.

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But it's just sad that come to when I was a teenager, it's hard enough being a teenager, especially a girl.

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You got your body's changing, you got hormones and you're concerned with how you look and body image issues, and I mean even that.

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I mean I remember being five, six years old because we moved in with him right before they got married and he would tell me that, oh, that toast you're having for breakfast is going to make you fat.

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I remember I actually tell this story in my next book about how I was eating a bowl of pasta after cross-country practice in high school and he came in as I was taking a second helping.

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He's like that's going to go all your hips.

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All those carbs are going to make you fat like a middle-aged woman and like your grandma.

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It was so offensive and I loathed him.

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But what did I do?

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Is I put down my spoon and I mean I've tried to purge.

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I went out for another run that night.

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After running six miles at cross country practice, I went out till after dark just running like I got to get these calories off.

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He's right, I got.

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So people need to understand the power of their words and I don't know how to explain, but you just have to be one of these people that you can.

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You can know that somebody is saying wrongful things to you, but they still affect you.

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They still affect you because when you hear it all the time and it was every day of my life there and it was backed up by the physical abuse because that hadn't relented, there were a lot of issues it escalated from the pigtails.

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Let me tell you, before I left the house, when I was 18, the worst thing that had happened was I was strangled and thrown down a half flight of stairs and, unfortunately, child services.

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Oh, we interviewed the neighbors and the people that worked for them and everybody says they're wonderful.

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They had created this narrative, like all narcissists do.

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Anybody that knows a narcissist knows they've already told everybody behind your back about you're crazy and you're the problem.

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So I was made out to be this difficult, defiant daughter of theirs that they just did the tears at the police station.

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My mother, oh, we just don't know what to do with her.

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I mean it was reminiscent of Rooster and Lily in the movie Annie, sitting there pretending to be so forlorn and oh, they lost their daughter Annie and they needed her back.

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It was all bull.

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But you know, nobody believed me.

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Nobody believed me Nobody.

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Because out in the world they presented as these charitable, wonderful, smiley, happy people who had a business of their own and helped family and neighbors whenever they needed to.

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Nobody believed me, nobody.

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So that's so disheartening.

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I mean I can't even tell you my heart's in my throat right now.

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I do have just one quick question, just for mentality's sake.

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You mentioned that you were all symphony, you were across country and you got all these accomplishments.

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Obviously and we're going to get into this, ladies and gentlemen but this young lady over here went to DePaul University and the University of Chicago, and the University of Chicago is very hard to get into.

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You might as well call it Ivy League, but you had all these accomplishments.

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So I'm wondering what would be the first thing that would go through your mind.

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You said that you had made what all symphony is the first thing that went through your mind at that point and I know it's a ways back, but was the first thing going through your mind, yes, I did it, I was able to accomplish this.

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Or was it, yes, I did this for my mom.

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Or, yes, I did this for this narcissistic no, it was always.

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I can't wait to tell my mom.

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But over time, the best way I can explain it is that when, over time, your successes, your accomplishments, your little achievements are just, they're not even acknowledged.

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It's just dismissed like it's any other day and oh, that's all you got thing, because that's how I was treated, you begin to think that's not enough.

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So it wasn't enough to be in two symphonic orchestras and be first chair in both.

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Now I had to.

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Well, what else can I do?

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Well, maybe if I get the solo.

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Maybe if I get the solo in the next concert I can do it.

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Maybe if I and I did.

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I got a few solo performances at different cultural festivals and different performances that we did, and one of the symphonic orchestras traveled around.

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I mean, it was just endless.

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It didn't matter what I did, it wasn't enough.

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So I had to do more.

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I had to do more.

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So all I did was exhaust myself with trying to get my mother.

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I basically just wanted her to notice me at all, because even when I would try to talk to her, she was always too busy washing dishes.

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She couldn't come to any of my sporting events she never went to.

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I always was one of those kids.

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When you go to like kids things at school little recitals or whatever I just feel so bad because there's always that one kid who's like, eagerly craning at his or her neck, looking out, hoping to see mom or dad.

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And that was me, and it just it pains my heart because if the kid is doing that because they know mom and dad probably aren't going to be there, and that was me, and it's so frustrating to feel so insignificant and so unimportant when your parents are supposed to be the people encouraging you and supporting you, even if they couldn't be there, to just pat me on the back and say good job.

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But B plus was well, how come you didn't get an A?

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It was never and it's still to this day.

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We have no relationship.

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They have cut ties with me a handful of years ago for the third time in my life, but this is the final time.

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But I say now.

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I mean I could win the Nobel Peace Prize and it won't be enough.

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I will have not have earned it at a younger age, even when I graduated from college.

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Well, that's like a kindergarten education compared to somebody else who has a doctorate, okay, well.

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Oh geez, and would you consider them successful?

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And would you consider them successful?

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No, I mean, I credit them because, honestly, who wouldn't?

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He never made it past sixth grade.

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He had a very troublesome childhood.

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He was actually he and his four siblings were abandoned, like literally abandoned by both parents I don't even think he was a year old, my stepfather and so they were put into the foster system, separated.

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They are now reunited as adults, but very sad.

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And he was abused in those foster homes and my mother came out of it.

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You want to talk about a narcissist?

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My mother's father was a raging alcoholic who liked to wield a gun and bring random women home and have interactions with them in front of my grandma, and just horrific things that my mother had to witness and grow up with.

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So I feel for them.

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I absolutely feel for them, but I know that they had a hard time.

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I know that they could only do what they could do and they did make the best of their situation.

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She had to drop out of high school because she couldn't stand the shame and judgment of being pregnant with me.

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He didn't make it past sixth grade for whatever reasons, but they did create together a business that has served them very well.

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They live in a ridiculously large and ridiculously showy home and he has Corvettes and classic cars and Harleys.

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But the thing is it's all for show and I want to honor that success.

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They literally went from rags to riches.

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I commend them for that.

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But at the same time the need to have that admiration and that praise for having attained things, that requirement for exaltation because you acquired material possessions, that just repulses me because that was just at the premise of all of that supposed success.

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But that's narcissism.

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I mean right there, that's narcissism.

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Yeah, that's a typical definition.

00:20:58.518 --> 00:20:59.980
Okay, so let's move on.

00:20:59.980 --> 00:21:08.226
All right, so at 18, you get to DePaul, you started at DePaul or you started at University of Chicago.

00:21:09.055 --> 00:21:10.057
No, I went to DePaul.

00:21:10.057 --> 00:21:12.142
So I went to DePaul.

00:21:12.142 --> 00:21:12.884
I did.

00:21:12.884 --> 00:21:14.867
I didn't even want to go to college.

00:21:14.867 --> 00:21:18.098
Honestly, I wanted to go to beauty school, but it wasn't good enough.

00:21:18.098 --> 00:21:20.361
It wasn't real school, I was told.

00:21:20.361 --> 00:21:22.344
So I went to DePaul.

00:21:22.344 --> 00:21:25.287
I grew up Catholic, I was raised Catholic.

00:21:25.287 --> 00:21:41.059
I figured I might as well go to Catholic University and I got in to be on my own and I actually lived with my boyfriend at the time, but that didn't go anywhere.

00:21:41.079 --> 00:21:45.509
Good, he treated me very well, he was older, had his own place, so it worked out really well.

00:21:45.509 --> 00:21:56.028
But I feel like, looking back, even though we cared about each other, it was, I hate to say it, but the reality was it was more of a transactional relationship.

00:21:56.028 --> 00:22:11.386
He liked the data boys from his friends for having a younger girl living with him and having that relationship, and I got a safe place to stay where I was treated like a human being and he did.

00:22:11.386 --> 00:22:15.827
I mean we were good friends, but there was a lot missing there.

00:22:15.827 --> 00:22:23.507
So when he started talking about marriage, I mean it scared me because I was nowhere near ready for that.

00:22:23.507 --> 00:22:45.209
So, yeah, we split up a few months before I was 19 and I ended up moving into a real estate community, that I was working in that management office and that is where I met my ex-husband, who walked in the office one day, and that's where my story gasping for air starts.

00:22:46.214 --> 00:22:46.315
Right.

00:22:46.315 --> 00:22:47.459
So that's Darren right.

00:22:48.561 --> 00:22:50.086
Yes, that is his name in the book.

00:22:50.835 --> 00:22:52.176
Okay, so, yeah.

00:22:52.176 --> 00:23:05.800
So it was interesting that in the book that you actually recognized Now I don't know if you were, if that was a hindsight, no, that was right then and there you make it sound just like that, like you recognize that.

00:23:05.800 --> 00:23:10.710
Wait a second, here this looks like a familiar situation.

00:23:11.170 --> 00:23:28.811
Oh yeah, the robot, and lost in space with his dangly little, coyly arms, danger Right what I pictured in my head, because it was this he was like arrogant and aloof, but I mean I, he was no Brad Pitt.

00:23:28.811 --> 00:23:34.353
Like there was no reasoning outwardly for this, like I didn't know who he thought he was.

00:23:34.353 --> 00:23:38.814
I didn't see a car that warranted this behavior.

00:23:38.814 --> 00:23:41.173
Like he was something and I don't know.

00:23:41.173 --> 00:24:00.837
Just he wanted servitude is all I felt from him and I was like, no, I know you, buddy, I don't want any part of it, but the people pleaser in me, the strange dichotomy in my head is that the people pleaser in me couldn't stand that he was keeping this distance like I.

00:24:00.837 --> 00:24:14.278
I felt like he didn't like me and I couldn't stand if people didn't like me, so I had to make him like me, okay, yeah, so that explains a lot of where that went in that first chapter oh man.

00:24:14.318 --> 00:24:28.452
So yeah, if I remember correctly, it's been a little bit, but if I remember correctly, you actually did like put your foot down and left, but you.

00:24:28.452 --> 00:24:31.238
But the problem was, is that you what you?

00:24:31.238 --> 00:24:37.267
You exchanged keys and he ended up like just showing up and pretending like it never happened.

00:24:38.148 --> 00:24:39.490
Yeah, so, yeah.

00:24:39.490 --> 00:24:52.799
So he, out of nowhere, invited me over one night and I was like, oh, ok, so you know he doesn't hate me like I don't like him much, but he doesn't hate me either, and we ended up.

00:24:52.799 --> 00:25:09.056
It's really sad to me and this is the part, this is the beautiful thing about writing a book about bad experiences and this is why I encourage people to journal is when you're reading it, when it's out of your head and on paper and you can really be honest with yourself.

00:25:09.056 --> 00:25:12.221
There's an objectivity you look at things with.

00:25:12.221 --> 00:25:33.069
And when I was writing about those experiences, I thought how sad, because my son's girlfriend is 19, and I was just turning 19 then and in that moment, wanting so eagerly for this young man who was an entitled ass, honestly, he acted like a frat boy.

00:25:33.069 --> 00:25:37.577
Honestly, he acted like a frat boy and he was disrespectful and rude to me.

00:25:37.577 --> 00:25:41.903
He made sexual advances and I let him have his way with me.

00:25:41.903 --> 00:25:43.645
Was it rape?

00:25:43.645 --> 00:25:46.990
No, but I didn't want it to happen.

00:25:46.990 --> 00:25:54.201
I wasn't trying to do that with him, or anywhere near that with him, but I allowed it.

00:25:54.201 --> 00:25:54.703
And then, yes, we ended up.

00:25:54.723 --> 00:26:01.022
I just, I just assumed, okay, we might as well be together because that's what he wanted after that and I thought, well, I could.

00:26:01.022 --> 00:26:02.326
His parents were lovely.

00:26:02.326 --> 00:26:03.296
I met them what?

00:26:03.296 --> 00:26:04.076
Within a week?

00:26:04.076 --> 00:26:10.036
And they were the loveliest people and I thought, oh my gosh, he can't be that bad.

00:26:10.036 --> 00:26:12.523
Maybe it's just me, maybe I'm missing.

00:26:12.523 --> 00:26:17.678
And here I have a childhood of my mother and stepfather telling me that I'm the problem.

00:26:17.678 --> 00:26:22.175
I'm looking at things the wrong way, I'm misinterpreting things the wrong way.

00:26:22.175 --> 00:26:28.326
So you start to wonder if everybody's telling you this, then it must be me.

00:26:28.326 --> 00:26:30.135
So why not give it a shot?

00:26:30.135 --> 00:26:36.586
Maybe it can be okay, but it wasn't okay and 25 years later it was the furthest thing from okay.

00:26:36.586 --> 00:26:41.603
But that's how I think abusive situations and toxic relationships work.

00:26:41.702 --> 00:26:49.778
I always joke with people that it's not like women don't see Chucky running down the street with a butcher knife and say hey, baby, come on hither.

00:26:49.778 --> 00:26:52.666
It doesn't work that way, it's not attractive.

00:26:52.666 --> 00:26:58.236
Even Ted Bundy, the serial killer handsome, he wore suits and he was charming.

00:26:58.236 --> 00:27:04.808
He didn't lure women because he outwardly expressed that he was a psychotic maniac.

00:27:04.808 --> 00:27:13.117
No, these are people that are luring us in, although my ex had a strange way of going about it, but he lured me in.

00:27:13.337 --> 00:27:22.923
I was so eager for any crumb of attention and affection that I let him, because there was nobody else asking me out on dates.

00:27:22.923 --> 00:27:25.348
There was nobody else interested.

00:27:25.348 --> 00:27:27.199
But I was also isolating.

00:27:27.199 --> 00:27:32.076
I stayed hidden away in my apartment with my cat because it was safe there.

00:27:32.076 --> 00:27:38.355
It was a safe place for me where people couldn't hurt me and nothing could happen to me.

00:27:38.355 --> 00:27:45.997
But this guy just wormed his way in and it was the I love you, it's you and me against the world.

00:27:45.997 --> 00:27:50.768
But then something bad would happen and he'd make me pay for it in some way.

00:27:51.194 --> 00:28:11.566
The problem is that when you're talking about a girl like me, who had come from a childhood where I was basically love-starved and emotionally abandoned, any slight little notion of having somebody's favorability worked for me.

00:28:11.566 --> 00:28:15.176
It was enough to overshadow all that bad stuff.

00:28:15.176 --> 00:28:16.298
It was enough to overshadow all that bad stuff.

00:28:16.298 --> 00:28:32.628
But the other problem was that I also didn't have boundaries, because people pleasers, usually their boundaries are very flexible, because it depends on what this person wants from you and you don't want to say no and disappoint anybody, and that was absolutely who I was.

00:28:32.628 --> 00:28:48.144
So every time something bad would happen you're right, as you were saying it would be enough that I would take a stand and say I'm out of here, like that, when the part where you talk about he threw something across the room at me.

00:28:48.144 --> 00:28:49.228
No, I'm done, I'm out.

00:28:49.228 --> 00:28:56.387
But then he comes to me acting like nothing happened and caressing my cheek and holding me and just what?

00:28:56.387 --> 00:28:58.920
We're just going to pretend nothing happened and move on.

00:28:58.920 --> 00:29:01.445
And I'm thinking, okay, and I'm rational.

00:29:01.445 --> 00:29:06.364
I thought I was like we all have bad days, we all have moments, we all.

00:29:06.364 --> 00:29:11.640
Maybe something happened at work and then you might take it out on the person when you get home.

00:29:11.640 --> 00:29:16.067
Whatever, we're all human and I get that and I give grace for that.

00:29:16.808 --> 00:29:30.748
But the problem with a narcissist or any abusive person or toxic relationship is that every time something bad happens, every time they get away with it and you don't end the relationship.

00:29:30.748 --> 00:29:36.708
The next time something happens, they push that boundary just a little bit further.

00:29:36.708 --> 00:29:47.707
Just enough that it's uncomfortable for you that you don't like it, but not enough that it's a deal breaker, not enough that you're going to walk out and they know what they're doing.

00:29:47.707 --> 00:29:59.221
So when you look at point A to point B, I mean certainly at the end of that 25 years, when I'm at the courthouse filing for an order of protection, because this man wants me dead.

00:29:59.221 --> 00:30:04.670
I am literally sitting here thinking how the hell did we get from point A to point B?

00:30:04.670 --> 00:30:12.186
This doesn't make sense to me and nobody would even believe me then, because his family had no clue.

00:30:12.714 --> 00:30:20.685
My family, well, my mother had seen some things, she'd witnessed things, but, just like in my childhood, she looked the other way.

00:30:20.685 --> 00:30:35.826
I'll never forget the first time, one of the first times my ex put his hands on me in our house, in the middle of our son's I think it was his first or second birthday party and I screamed for him to get his hands off me.

00:30:35.826 --> 00:30:40.924
My mother I don't know if she was just coming out of the bathroom or whatever she appeared, we didn't know.

00:30:40.924 --> 00:30:45.103
She was there and she just looked and kept walking and walked away.

00:30:45.103 --> 00:30:46.405
I'm her daughter.

00:30:46.405 --> 00:30:47.729
I'm her daughter.

00:30:47.729 --> 00:30:52.642
Like somebody should have said this isn't right, this isn't okay.

00:30:52.642 --> 00:30:55.547
But nobody said anything because nobody knew.

00:30:55.547 --> 00:30:59.258
And the few people who saw, they just let it happen.

00:30:59.258 --> 00:31:01.063
But how many times do we see this?

00:31:01.063 --> 00:31:03.048
I mean, look on social media.

00:31:03.048 --> 00:31:11.162
Somebody could be getting their forgive my language, getting their ass beat, and everybody's taking videos and posting them on Facebook and TikTok.

00:31:11.162 --> 00:31:14.087
What the heck is wrong with people.

00:31:14.087 --> 00:31:15.694
Stop this.

00:31:16.736 --> 00:31:23.857
Yeah, no, that's an amazing thing that you just mentioned, because I've seen it a lot and there's people that they take the videos but no one does anything.

00:31:23.857 --> 00:31:28.880
Finally, when someone steps up, that person ends up being in trouble for some reason.

00:31:28.920 --> 00:31:41.164
Yes, a lot of the time and all they're doing is trying to help, and this environment that we've come into is the well, it's coming back down, but the Sue Society, basically what it is.

00:31:41.164 --> 00:31:44.506
Oh, you've done this to me and you had no part of it, so I'm going to sue you.

00:31:44.506 --> 00:31:46.767
And now people are all scared of that.

00:31:46.767 --> 00:31:49.708
So here's the video in case you need it.

00:31:49.708 --> 00:31:52.028
But I'm not going to help and that's yeah.

00:31:52.028 --> 00:31:55.289
It's just not American, not in my no, it's not.

00:31:55.329 --> 00:31:59.652
And that basically describes how that whole relationship ended.

00:31:59.652 --> 00:32:04.334
Even because, even when I was in court trying to get an order of protection, I had to go.

00:32:04.334 --> 00:32:08.202
I was denied.

00:32:08.202 --> 00:32:09.250
After a knife incident, I was denied.

00:32:09.250 --> 00:32:11.115
After a gun incident, I was denied.

00:32:11.115 --> 00:32:13.483
They didn't see the urgency for it.

00:32:13.483 --> 00:32:20.368
And I'm thinking this, this I'm going to end up dead before this system acknowledges that I need protection.

00:32:22.155 --> 00:32:23.843
He didn't serve one day in jail.

00:32:23.843 --> 00:32:26.884
I couldn't press charges against him for anything.

00:32:26.884 --> 00:32:30.820
Two incidents of domestic violence I couldn't press charges.

00:32:30.820 --> 00:32:44.942
And then I recently learned it's horrifying to think I don't know if a lot of people know this but even as recent as the 1970s in this country, women could not press charges against their husbands.

00:32:44.942 --> 00:32:48.044
How backwards is this?

00:32:48.044 --> 00:33:06.445
So this is part of why I'm on this mission to create awareness and why I'm so open about it, because there's so many people who are still in these situations or maybe they're out, but they're afraid because of the consequences the obvious ones to expose their abusers and what has happened to them.

00:33:06.445 --> 00:33:17.670
But we need to start taking responsibility as individuals and as a society to prevent these things from happening, because I don't care what anyone says.

00:33:18.295 --> 00:33:21.365
I was sexually abused in my marriage.

00:33:21.365 --> 00:33:28.961
A piece of paper saying we're legally tied does not give the right to somebody to do things to me that I don't want to happen.

00:33:28.961 --> 00:33:45.929
There is financial abuse that usually is not recognized because if you're married, well, he drained $100,000 out of our retirement account without telling me, without telling me, but there's no recourse for that.

00:33:45.929 --> 00:33:59.238
The recourse was I had to come up with the tens of thousands of dollars to pay the tax liability on that, which I didn't have, so I had to go work harder for it and figure out a way to repay that to the IRS.

00:33:59.238 --> 00:34:11.295
Then there's legal abuse, where people threaten divorce on the low end to the higher end, where maybe you are divorced and they're not paying their alimony, they're not helping.

00:34:11.476 --> 00:34:49.918
Even at the end of my marriage, before we could legally file for divorce, we were just going into the COVID shelter in place, and so not only could I not file for divorce, but I had just been diagnosed with a lung disease as a direct result of the abusive situation I was living in, and he refused to work he hadn't worked in four years and he refused to help work during COVID to save our house from foreclosure and save his wife, who had a lung disease from being out in the world working with this virus that's killing people, beginning with the lack of oxygen.

00:34:49.998 --> 00:35:12.547
So there are all these things that abusive partners do that are not recognized by our courts, not recognized by our system, and the worst part of it is this very startling statistic, and let me say this as a preface Men and women alike are abused in relationships.

00:35:12.547 --> 00:35:24.440
However, I speak for women because I am one 38% of all women murdered are murdered by their partner.

00:35:24.440 --> 00:35:26.423
That is scary.

00:35:26.423 --> 00:35:35.108
While they're not murdered by perpetrators 38% it's by their spouse, their boyfriend, whoever they are in an intimate relationship with.

00:35:35.108 --> 00:35:40.327
So that's very startling and something we need to take a little more seriously.

00:35:42.456 --> 00:35:46.525
Wow, so all the laws and orders and NCISs and stuff where they sit there and go?

00:35:46.525 --> 00:35:48.289
Well, we have to look at the husband, uh-huh.

00:35:49.980 --> 00:35:53.222
That is where that's coming from it's super high, it's 38% Literally.

00:35:53.222 --> 00:36:10.480
Now, a lot of times when we're looking at this, we're looking at these shows and because they all sit there and say, well, it was because the show is fictitious, but it was based on facts and it was based on their become like a, like a history, where they call, like historical fiction Right, they're based on fact, but they're not.

00:36:10.480 --> 00:36:12.144
But they're not, it's fiction.

00:36:12.465 --> 00:36:12.827
Yeah.

00:36:13.215 --> 00:36:14.561
But, but that makes total sense.

00:36:14.561 --> 00:36:30.023
Now I'm like now I know I'm not mad at him, okay, so so let's run down the things that you've learned that of the abuses that you just mentioned, let's list some of those off and so people can understand.

00:36:30.023 --> 00:36:39.943
All right, what did you find that is recognized, that you could get something on the books as far as the law goes, and what are the things that are just not recognized at all mentioned?

00:36:39.943 --> 00:36:41.155
So obviously physical abuse.

00:36:41.617 --> 00:36:52.498
Yes, and honestly that's probably it Physical abuse, unless you have black eyes and gunshots or if you've been shanked.

00:36:52.498 --> 00:37:01.951
I mean, there were times I wanted him to hurt me just so I could have him jailed and put him where he should be.

00:37:01.951 --> 00:37:14.050
Because, particularly the night he shot a gun outside my bedroom window late at night, at that point we were actually already divorced.

00:37:14.050 --> 00:37:30.862
At that point we were actually already divorced.

00:37:30.862 --> 00:37:34.603
She had refused to take the house, so the house was redone in my name.

00:37:34.603 --> 00:37:41.228
I was the only one on the title and maintain some sense of normalcy and stability for him through all this chaos.

00:37:41.228 --> 00:37:58.416
But after this gun is shot multiple times outside my bedroom late at night, after he was hollering and screaming all kinds of vulgar, nasty things at me, I honestly thought and people have to understand for reference we didn't live in a city or a suburb.

00:37:58.416 --> 00:38:00.663
We are in a rural area.

00:38:00.663 --> 00:38:05.434
Even though there was a town five to 10 minutes away.

00:38:05.434 --> 00:38:11.181
We were under county jurisdiction and county was about 45 minutes away.

00:38:11.181 --> 00:38:30.900
I'm on the phone with 911 huddled in a corner, honestly knowing he can break down our very flimsy entry door of our older home and kill me, and I honestly thought he was going to read about it in the book.

00:38:31.461 --> 00:38:36.469
But the police, when they there, he denied shooting the gun.

00:38:36.469 --> 00:38:38.161
They couldn't find a gun.

00:38:38.161 --> 00:38:39.822
I had a four-acre farm.

00:38:39.822 --> 00:38:47.246
I had a cow paddock, I had a chicken coop, I had a 3,000-square-foot barn with a second story and hay and wood piles.

00:38:47.246 --> 00:38:53.161
And it's in the middle of the night, we don't have streetlights, some of the roads aren't even paved.

00:38:53.161 --> 00:38:56.815
Of course they didn't find a gun on the four acres of property.

00:38:56.815 --> 00:39:09.929
God only knows where he hid it, but it was hidden and they couldn't find shells because it was dark and they weren't going to scour a four acre property with multiple structures, with flashlights.

00:39:09.929 --> 00:39:11.317
It was unrealistic.

00:39:12.057 --> 00:39:20.911
So they said that if I had video proof that he had shot the gun they could do something.

00:39:20.911 --> 00:39:22.641
Otherwise there was nothing they could do.

00:39:22.641 --> 00:39:25.543
And I was beside myself.

00:39:25.543 --> 00:39:28.184
I said what did you do then before cell phones?

00:39:28.184 --> 00:39:30.884
What did you do before blink cameras?

00:39:30.884 --> 00:39:37.648
Because I'm pretty sure women were assaulted and abused before technology caught up with us.

00:39:37.648 --> 00:40:00.579
And it just was so appalling to me that I could be in my bed in my house that I owned solely, and that this man was trespassing on my property, committing an act of domestic violence, and they would not let me press charges.

00:40:00.579 --> 00:40:03.585
They would not let him take him away.

00:40:03.585 --> 00:40:07.219
In fact and again, this is all in the book.

00:40:07.219 --> 00:40:14.840
It is a very jarring night for me to know the reality of the way things work.

00:40:15.742 --> 00:40:19.614
They told me, unless I had that video proof, they couldn't do anything.

00:40:19.614 --> 00:40:24.981
And I said well, how am I supposed to just let you leave and go back to bed?

00:40:24.981 --> 00:40:30.001
And you won't even remove him from a property he is trespassing on?

00:40:30.001 --> 00:40:33.643
And they said well, you don't have to stay here.

00:40:33.643 --> 00:40:42.567
I said, but this is my home with my son, that he left and he signed off.

00:40:42.567 --> 00:40:49.719
So so that night I had to pack a bag and leave my house.

00:40:49.719 --> 00:40:53.641
In the middle of the night there were six squad cars at my house.

00:40:53.641 --> 00:40:55.342
Three of them escorted me out.

00:40:55.342 --> 00:41:04.048
Three remained at my house with him because he refused to leave, but they wanted to make sure he didn't.

00:41:04.048 --> 00:41:05.610
They just remove him.

00:41:05.610 --> 00:41:10.358
I mean, I would have still probably left because I wouldn't trust that he wouldn't have returned.

00:41:10.458 --> 00:41:22.481
But you know, then leaving, escorting me and leaving three squad cars behind to prevent him from following me, told me that they didn't trust him either, but none of them would let me do anything.

00:41:22.481 --> 00:41:28.963
I couldn't file a report, I couldn't file charges and it's just so ass backwards the way this all works.

00:41:28.963 --> 00:41:48.789
So what I learned and what I tell people because obviously, while somebody's shooting a gun directed at me, I'm not going to be standing there filming it like these other idiots do on social media I just tell people spend the hundred dollars on a blink camera system Everybody has Amazon.

00:41:48.789 --> 00:41:52.498
Spend the hundred dollars on a blink camera system everybody has amazon.

00:41:52.498 --> 00:41:53.119
That was the first thing I did.

00:41:53.139 --> 00:42:04.596
By the way, the next day is I went and ordered them and they showed up, and I'm gonna tell you I'm a 48 year old woman that I I have a lot of wonderful abilities and lots of knowledge of things.

00:42:04.596 --> 00:42:06.800
Technology is not one of those.

00:42:06.800 --> 00:42:13.737
So if I can can set them up, it is very easy, anybody can set them up.

00:42:13.737 --> 00:42:19.489
Get yourself one of those video doorbells, get yourself a couple blink cameras.

00:42:19.489 --> 00:42:32.449
I had a smartphone, which I didn't have until after the divorce, but I had a smartphone where, every time that camera sensed motion, I got the notification and I had a video recording.

00:42:32.449 --> 00:42:41.619
And let me tell you what that was like having an invisible fence on my property, because boy did he simmer down after that, knowing he was being watched.

00:42:41.619 --> 00:42:45.947
Things got a lot better for me and I felt a lot safer.

00:42:45.947 --> 00:42:51.842
And it's a shame that we have to resort to these kinds of things, but unfortunately this is the world we live in.

00:42:51.842 --> 00:43:01.387
They are very clear and out here it's a little more lax than it might be in the bigger cities like Chicago and New York and LA.

00:43:01.387 --> 00:43:04.644
But video proof you have to have video proof.

00:43:04.644 --> 00:43:07.894
Spend $100 on the blink cameras, absolutely.

00:43:08.496 --> 00:43:16.027
And one other thing I learned is that which I was told the first time I went for the order of protection there was no record.

00:43:16.027 --> 00:43:17.500
I had never reported.

00:43:17.500 --> 00:43:19.748
Of course, I never reported anything.

00:43:19.748 --> 00:43:23.717
I'd never called the police for anything else he did before, because I was scared.

00:43:23.717 --> 00:43:37.577
I didn't want to face the consequences of what would happen after, whatever consequence he'd have to face legally, because it might be worse than whatever I was calling them for and I didn't want to end up dead.

00:43:37.577 --> 00:43:39.940
So I never reported him.

00:43:39.940 --> 00:43:49.795
Plus, I had a child and my son had asked me many years before please don't ever call the police on dad before.

00:43:49.795 --> 00:43:50.717
Please don't ever call the police on dad.

00:43:50.717 --> 00:43:51.360
I don't want to be that kid.

00:43:51.360 --> 00:43:55.231
I don't want to have to go to school and deal with the other kids and the other moms and have that stigma.

00:43:55.231 --> 00:44:04.827
And I promised that to my son because all I wanted for my kid was everything we were dealing with in the house and he certainly, still, to this day, doesn't even know the half of it.

00:44:04.827 --> 00:44:08.900
But I just wanted him to have some kind of a normal life.

00:44:08.900 --> 00:44:11.217
I didn't want him to worry about that.

00:44:11.217 --> 00:44:13.083
So I never did file any reports.

00:44:13.083 --> 00:44:14.407
I never went to the cops.

00:44:14.407 --> 00:44:17.420
So that is a mistake that I made.

00:44:17.420 --> 00:44:19.083
Looking back, I wish that.

00:44:19.465 --> 00:44:27.829
Here's another tidbit for anybody you can go to the police station, you can go to the county sheriff's office, wherever you live.

00:44:27.829 --> 00:44:33.023
You can make a report and just have it on file.

00:44:33.023 --> 00:44:39.721
It doesn't have to be something where they go and arrest the person or go interrogate the person.

00:44:39.721 --> 00:44:41.985
But you need that paper trail.

00:44:41.985 --> 00:44:48.987
Because if I had that paper trail of all these things that had happened and let me tell you there were plenty of them.

00:44:48.987 --> 00:44:56.822
I know, brad, you said you've read part of the book there was plenty that I could have probably reported over the years, and there's stuff that's not even in the book.

00:44:56.822 --> 00:45:02.704
But if I had that, I would have been granted that order of protection in the first place.

00:45:02.704 --> 00:45:05.579
The first time I wouldn't have had to go back three times.

00:45:05.579 --> 00:45:10.197
And when you breach an order of protection, you are immediately taken to jail.

00:45:10.699 --> 00:45:19.440
So lesson learned because I didn't have to be in the position I was in, I put myself there, not that I had asked for it, but I also.

00:45:19.440 --> 00:45:24.257
I don't blame myself either, because who the hell thinks about these things?

00:45:24.257 --> 00:45:34.942
You don't actually think I mean, even though, like my ex, had sent me emails and said things insinuating that he wanted me dead.

00:45:34.942 --> 00:45:38.208
You don't, like you said, you watch these shows.

00:45:38.208 --> 00:45:39.757
I watch 48 hours.

00:45:39.757 --> 00:45:42.704
You don't think your spouse is actually going to kill you.

00:45:42.704 --> 00:45:47.485
You don't think they're actually going to shoot you or stab you with a knife.

00:45:47.965 --> 00:46:15.668
Yet here I was almost in the situation where I was going to be stabbed with a knife, almost shot, and nobody was protecting me because, according to the law, there was no trail, there was no record, and I even remember the judge looking at me a woman too, which kind of upset me when she said so you've been with him 25 years and you just expect me to, just out of nowhere, give you an order of protection.

00:46:15.668 --> 00:46:17.420
And I said, yes, actually I do.

00:46:17.420 --> 00:46:21.655
And she's like well, there's no reason for it, I don't see any urgency.

00:46:21.655 --> 00:46:29.550
And I remember leaving there crying and the bailiff even walked me out and patted me on the back.

00:46:29.550 --> 00:46:36.025
He was a much older man, he probably should have been retired, but you know that fatherly nature.

00:46:36.025 --> 00:46:37.277
He patted me on the back.

00:46:37.277 --> 00:46:42.856
He's like it's OK, kid, and he was getting me tissues and I wasn't sure it was going to be OK.

00:46:43.317 --> 00:46:44.378
I wasn't sure at all.

00:46:44.378 --> 00:46:46.362
So it's very harsh.

00:46:46.362 --> 00:46:48.364
You have to just please.

00:46:48.364 --> 00:46:53.599
I urge anybody, even if you really don't think your spouse will do anything.

00:46:53.599 --> 00:46:56.987
It's unfortunate, but you have to have some kind of record.

00:46:56.987 --> 00:47:07.217
Do not bait them or provoke them, but just have something that's in place that, if something does happen, you can rely on it for to back up your claims.

00:47:08.697 --> 00:47:13.059
So all right, so we've talked about, we've mentioned a few things.

00:47:13.059 --> 00:47:18.163
So one is we said physical abuse, legal abuse, financial abuse.

00:47:18.163 --> 00:47:20.224
Yeah, is there anything that I'm missing there?

00:47:21.204 --> 00:47:22.286
Sexual abuse.

00:47:22.286 --> 00:47:29.849
And then there's just I mean there's the emotional, verbal, psychological, I mean all the gaslighting, the manipulation.

00:47:29.849 --> 00:47:34.393
There's an aspect of medical abuse in there too.

00:47:34.393 --> 00:47:43.199
I touch on it somewhat in my book.

00:47:43.199 --> 00:47:45.775
But, for example, it's actually a joke that every narcissist everywhere likes to call their victim crazy.

00:47:45.775 --> 00:47:48.483
You're crazy, because it's not them, You're the problem.

00:47:48.483 --> 00:47:53.019
Call their victim crazy, You're crazy because it's not them, You're the problem.

00:47:53.059 --> 00:47:54.724
My ex had me so convinced that he kept saying I was bipolar.

00:47:54.724 --> 00:48:08.742
And I mean, he had me so convinced that I was actually an unfit mother because I was bipolar that I went to a psychiatrist just to make sure because my son was everything to me.

00:48:08.742 --> 00:48:15.684
He was about two years old at the time, or just going on two, and I answered all the questions at the psychiatrist correctly.

00:48:15.684 --> 00:48:22.125
I answered his questions as my then husband was telling me that this is how I act.

00:48:22.125 --> 00:48:28.007
And I left there with two mood stabilizers and Xanax for the quick calm downs.

00:48:28.007 --> 00:48:31.197
I was on those medications for 17 years and you want to know?

00:48:31.197 --> 00:48:52.159
The kicker of it is that since the divorce and since I've been open about what was really happening behind closed doors, my psychiatrist apologized to me in one of my follow-ups because he's like I'm so sorry, he's like you were just having normal reactions to abuse.

00:48:52.159 --> 00:48:56.728
But after more recent evaluations I was taken off.

00:48:56.728 --> 00:49:02.594
I was weaned off the medications because they were pretty hard hitters, but they retracted the diagnosis.

00:49:02.936 --> 00:49:04.257
I wasn't bipolar at all.

00:49:04.257 --> 00:49:11.219
It's just that obviously I was in situations that were causing me tremendous mental angst.

00:49:11.219 --> 00:49:33.641
But, yes, on Christmas I could sit there and be happy opening presents with my son, and I could laugh at jokes when I was at a family gathering or a barbecue and I could cheer on the teams at the school, and so it wasn't that I was having ups and downs school, and so it wasn't that I was having ups and downs.

00:49:33.641 --> 00:49:36.766
I was just trying to live my life and not let our circumstances behind closed doors.

00:49:36.766 --> 00:49:51.297
I mean, of course they affected me, but I didn't want them to define, inhibit my ability to live a life that I deserved, Although it's strange that I had no self-respect or self-love to get myself out of this situation.

00:49:51.297 --> 00:49:59.478
Yet I wanted to give myself whatever aspects of a normal life that I could, just like I was trying to do for my son.

00:50:00.481 --> 00:50:10.827
Right, okay, so recognizing all this physical, mental, financial, emotional, sexual, legal.

00:50:10.827 --> 00:50:12.822
So we have to recognize all of this.

00:50:12.822 --> 00:50:14.882
What would you say?

00:50:14.882 --> 00:50:24.827
So we and you've touched on a little bit of a little bit of advice is one get your cameras for outside in case of anything else, but you know what.

00:50:24.827 --> 00:50:32.768
You can recognize that whether you, even if you believe that you're in a good relationship, I would reckon I would say, spend the money for blank blanks.

00:50:32.768 --> 00:50:35.199
Great, have them myself, they're awesome.

00:50:35.199 --> 00:50:37.864
I'll link to some cameras in the show notes.

00:50:37.864 --> 00:50:42.163
Recognize that and who you mentioned.

00:50:42.503 --> 00:50:55.786
And on the physical side, if you feel like you're getting, if you're physically you're getting physically abused and some of the it takes some of the examples that Dana's given and, like she said, go to the police department and just file a report.

00:50:55.786 --> 00:50:57.179
They don't have to make it public.

00:50:57.179 --> 00:50:58.938
You just file a report.

00:50:58.938 --> 00:51:00.364
Tell them to keep it on file.

00:51:00.364 --> 00:51:05.806
Now you've got a paper trail so that you can go forth from there.

00:51:05.806 --> 00:51:07.635
What about some of the others?

00:51:07.635 --> 00:51:08.981
Can you do the same thing?

00:51:08.981 --> 00:51:19.657
It's like so he, you said that he had taken out a hundred thousand dollars and obviously that's easy to get, to get evidence, because when you come to the bank, oh wait, whose debit card was it that took it out?

00:51:19.657 --> 00:51:22.043
Or who's who put the order in?

00:51:22.043 --> 00:51:23.586
Or who went to the bank and took it out?

00:51:23.586 --> 00:51:24.275
That's easy.

00:51:24.275 --> 00:51:25.358
Can you do that?

00:51:25.358 --> 00:51:28.326
Can you bring that to the police and make a report as well?

00:51:28.326 --> 00:51:29.347
That's easy.

00:51:29.387 --> 00:51:30.070
Can you do that?

00:51:30.070 --> 00:51:31.853
Can you bring that to the police and make a report as well?

00:51:31.853 --> 00:51:35.500
No, unfortunately not, because I mean he was even taking out credit cards.

00:51:35.500 --> 00:51:38.731
He wasn't working the last four and a half years of our marriage because he said he didn't have to work anymore.

00:51:38.731 --> 00:51:44.565
He apparently decided that he could retire at 40 years old and that was OK.

00:51:44.565 --> 00:51:47.016
He actually told me, get to.

00:51:47.016 --> 00:51:53.260
It is what he said to me when he decided that I needed to support us, which I scrambled to do.

00:51:53.260 --> 00:51:53.922
But I did.

00:51:53.922 --> 00:52:00.557
But that's financial abuse as well, but no, unfortunately not.

00:52:00.659 --> 00:52:13.326
When you are legally married to somebody, the way the courts look at it, the way our judicial system looks at it, is that basically, one person's actions speak for the others.

00:52:13.326 --> 00:52:18.266
So he was able to take credit cards out in my name and rack them up.

00:52:18.266 --> 00:52:20.695
He racked up $100,000 in debt.

00:52:20.695 --> 00:52:25.487
By the way, he didn't use that $100,000 that he drained from the 401k to pay any of that.

00:52:25.487 --> 00:52:29.313
I had to pay all that off too, and even in the divorce I wanted so desperately to be rid of that.

00:52:29.313 --> 00:52:32.382
I had to pay all that off too, and even in the divorce I wanted so desperately to be rid of him that I took everything.

00:52:32.382 --> 00:52:37.719
I was like that's fine, I will take all the debt, I will repay everything back myself.

00:52:37.719 --> 00:52:39.023
I will do all of that.

00:52:39.023 --> 00:52:40.967
I just want to be done with this man.

00:52:40.967 --> 00:52:42.597
I just want to be done.

00:52:42.597 --> 00:52:44.402
He could have whatever he wants.

00:52:44.402 --> 00:52:46.668
I will take the brunt of everything.

00:52:46.668 --> 00:52:51.317
Just cut me off from this man because I couldn't take it anymore.

00:52:52.239 --> 00:52:58.315
And so then that's that obviously is a normal thing, and I understand that one as well.

00:52:58.315 --> 00:53:05.157
But the next thing would be would you do the same, would you make that same choice if you were in it today?

00:53:05.157 --> 00:53:06.501
I'm looking back Absolutely.

00:53:06.501 --> 00:53:08.706
Make the same place, absolutely, 100%.

00:53:08.706 --> 00:53:10.780
Fine, take it, I'll take it and go for it.

00:53:11.516 --> 00:53:30.092
I had said from day one and here's another little fun fact the sixth and seventh attorneys I talked to well, it takes a victim of abuse about seven attempts before they actually leave the situation.

00:53:30.092 --> 00:53:51.856
It was the seventh attorney I spoke to that I finally got my divorce because attorneys were trying to talk to me about what I was entitled to and what I should do here, and with that all I told every one of them I just want my kid and I want to be done.

00:53:51.856 --> 00:53:56.206
I don't care if he takes all my money, I don't want the damn house.

00:53:56.206 --> 00:53:57.835
It was the house he wanted.

00:53:57.835 --> 00:53:58.416
I don't want.

00:53:58.416 --> 00:54:00.161
I have terrible memories in that.

00:54:00.161 --> 00:54:01.043
I don't want it.

00:54:01.846 --> 00:54:04.038
He could have my car, he could have my panties.

00:54:04.038 --> 00:54:06.503
I could replace everything.

00:54:06.503 --> 00:54:09.027
I cannot replace me and my kid.

00:54:09.027 --> 00:54:10.740
I can make more money.

00:54:10.740 --> 00:54:12.141
I can replace things.

00:54:12.141 --> 00:54:13.639
I can't replace us.

00:54:13.639 --> 00:54:16.965
But from a legal standpoint they don't get it.

00:54:16.965 --> 00:54:20.125
They don't understand that I just wanted to be done.

00:54:20.125 --> 00:54:31.210
So I was fortunate that the seventh attorney I spoke with was actually a referral from somebody that we knew mutually, a judge that I knew.

00:54:31.210 --> 00:54:42.009
So I was very I impressed upon him enough that please just do this for me, just please trust me on this, that I just need this to happen the way I need it to happen.

00:54:42.009 --> 00:54:51.885
I don't want him contesting it, I don't want to fight over couches and alimony and I just want to be done and I'll be darned.

00:54:51.885 --> 00:54:56.831
He had me divorced within three weeks of our first telephone conversation.

00:54:58.255 --> 00:54:58.958
Oh, that was good.

00:54:58.958 --> 00:55:02.565
At least somebody was on your side at that point.

00:55:02.565 --> 00:55:12.735
That had to feel a little bit different it.

00:55:12.755 --> 00:55:14.039
It was unusual for me but I was so glad it was I.

00:55:14.039 --> 00:55:15.083
I mean, I'm breathing now because the the relief.

00:55:15.083 --> 00:55:17.530
But I will say this and people have to understand, and it's the same thing I told my son.

00:55:17.530 --> 00:55:24.034
Because I didn't tell my son I had even filed for divorce so he didn't know about it until afterward.

00:55:24.034 --> 00:55:31.358
But I said that piece of paper that's saying that we're divorced does not change the relationship.

00:55:31.358 --> 00:55:37.317
The two incidents of the worst incidents of domestic violence happened after the divorce.

00:55:37.317 --> 00:55:39.782
The relationship does not end.

00:55:39.782 --> 00:55:42.307
Believe me, I wish it did, but it does not end.

00:55:42.307 --> 00:55:52.478
So you have to be prepared for the worst, even when you think you're clear and free worst, even when you think you're clear and free.

00:55:52.498 --> 00:55:55.670
What advice would you give for someone that finally was able to get a divorce or got Lisa, was able to get filed.

00:55:55.670 --> 00:55:58.277
Well, what would be your advice, knowing what you know now?

00:55:58.938 --> 00:56:01.204
Be very careful, be very careful.

00:56:01.204 --> 00:56:04.436
He was stalking me, he was threatening me.

00:56:04.436 --> 00:56:11.940
He was he even told my next door neighbors that he was planning to kill me, which, like I said, there were some incidents.

00:56:11.940 --> 00:56:13.384
I think it's just.

00:56:13.384 --> 00:56:18.059
I go back to what I said Cameras look over your shoulder.

00:56:18.059 --> 00:56:28.201
I mean, even when I was going to work, he would be sitting on the corner watching me drive by in areas that he didn't need to be in or would not normally be.

00:56:28.201 --> 00:56:30.775
He was stalking me and intimidating me.

00:56:31.257 --> 00:56:34.387
So you just have to stand your ground and protect yourself.

00:56:34.387 --> 00:56:41.994
We don't want to necessarily expose our abuser because we're afraid, but you have to make other people aware.

00:56:41.994 --> 00:56:46.601
One of the things that I did was I had somebody that I trusted.

00:56:46.601 --> 00:57:01.458
I told her that I would either email or text her every morning by 9 am, and I said if you do not hear from me by 9 am every single day, please contact the police to do a wellness check.

00:57:01.458 --> 00:57:10.157
So I didn't have an advocate, exactly, and I said please don't ask any questions, please don't ask me to explain, just please do this for me.

00:57:10.157 --> 00:57:20.905
And she was gracious enough to let me, and we're beyond that point now, so I don't have to have somebody checking in with me every day, but just to say all is good, have a great day.

00:57:20.905 --> 00:57:29.092
Just something have somebody aware of your situation or aware that you need to be accounted for, just in case something does happen?

00:57:30.235 --> 00:57:44.699
Right, Would you like suggest okay, if this is going to happen and you feel like there's any type of threat, even the minimalist one, I would be thinking, okay, I need to new cell phone number, completely new cell phone number.

00:57:44.699 --> 00:57:49.648
Go someplace where they don't have no clue where you might be.

00:57:49.648 --> 00:57:59.519
Now you still got to go to work and I understand that, so, but I would say, let your co-workers know that this is happening.

00:57:59.519 --> 00:58:00.684
What do you think about that?

00:58:01.648 --> 00:58:09.688
I think it depends on the situation, because of course, there's a spectrum, some people, things don't get to this point where it's this tense and hostile.

00:58:09.688 --> 00:58:12.920
Some people are in much worse situations.

00:58:12.920 --> 00:58:14.123
So I think you have to.

00:58:14.123 --> 00:58:15.586
I always tell people.

00:58:15.586 --> 00:58:20.081
My advice for everything in any relationship is trust your gut.

00:58:21.465 --> 00:58:24.070
I used to think that I was being paranoid.

00:58:24.070 --> 00:58:45.867
I mean, there was a point towards the end of the marriage, even where he kept coming you may not have gone to the point in this in the book yet where he was coming in and out of the house even though he had moved out of it, and he was doing things that were just to make his presence known and present.

00:58:45.867 --> 00:58:47.612
Like you can't stop me.

00:58:47.612 --> 00:58:50.782
I am all powerful and I'm going to do what I want to do.

00:58:50.782 --> 00:59:03.545
It got to the point where I thought I was a crazy woman because before I would get in bed every night, I was pulling all the sheets and covers to make sure there wasn't like a scorpion or a snake in there looking under the bed.

00:59:03.545 --> 00:59:08.045
And to somebody that has not been in this situation even me I'm laughing.

00:59:08.045 --> 00:59:12.197
So I'm like that's so ridiculous, but I honestly.

00:59:12.197 --> 00:59:16.922
He wanted to hurt me and he didn't want to get his hands dirty.

00:59:16.922 --> 00:59:17.664
They never do.

00:59:17.664 --> 00:59:22.686
I was having these paranoid thoughts like I better do these things.

00:59:22.686 --> 00:59:26.204
You don't think you should have to, but you do.

00:59:26.204 --> 00:59:34.568
And if you're finding yourself in these situations, like I said, trust your gut, don't say I'm being paranoid and delusional.

00:59:34.568 --> 00:59:35.878
That'll never happen.

00:59:35.878 --> 00:59:48.157
It's silly to think that, because look at all the people it does happen to Look at all these things we hear about on podcasts or on these true crime shows that it's like, oh my gosh, you can't even make this stuff up.

00:59:48.157 --> 00:59:52.411
No, you can't, but somehow these people do and they do these things.

00:59:52.411 --> 00:59:54.416
So the situation best.

00:59:54.416 --> 01:00:03.824
And I'm going to even go so far as to offer one more little piece of advice, which is something I did before he moved out and before I was able to file for divorce.

01:00:03.824 --> 01:00:05.507
And again, it was during COVID.

01:00:05.507 --> 01:00:06.789
So I was stuck.

01:00:06.789 --> 01:00:11.106
But you know, you never know with their moods.

01:00:11.106 --> 01:00:19.282
They could be having a great day and treating you eerily nice and being very sweet and affectionate, and then five minutes later, turn on you.

01:00:19.954 --> 01:00:24.775
I had what I called a grab-and-go case $50 at Walmart.

01:00:24.775 --> 01:00:48.630
It was a small handheld, fireproofproof, waterproof safe with a key for a lock, and I put copies of my driver's license, any of my bank statements you know, like a list of my bank statements and numbers and whatever Any of my sons and my important documents like our birth certificates, passports, that kind of stuff.

01:00:48.630 --> 01:00:50.679
That was all in that little case.

01:00:50.679 --> 01:01:16.757
I also put cash in there If I, grandma, gave me 20 bucks for my birthday or something I was saving in there for 15 years because I knew if I had an opportunity where I could take my son and go and it was safe for us to go, that I'd at least have money that I could buy us some food or if I needed to pay for a place to sleep at night, I had all our important stuff.

01:01:16.757 --> 01:01:23.778
So there would be no reason to go back Because, like I said, I can get new clothes, I can get TVs.

01:01:23.778 --> 01:01:28.568
I just wanted the stuff that I didn't have to worry about going back for.

01:01:28.936 --> 01:01:30.601
I even had a hard drive.

01:01:30.601 --> 01:01:32.085
God love technology.

01:01:32.085 --> 01:01:39.666
I had a hard drive where I had downloaded tax returns and all this stuff from my computer and kept it in that safe.

01:01:39.666 --> 01:01:46.224
Family pictures, all that stuff now that it's all digital, they were all on that hard drive.

01:01:46.224 --> 01:01:49.637
So I just kept that drive in that safe.

01:01:50.318 --> 01:01:53.826
There was no need for me to have any reason to ever go back.

01:01:53.826 --> 01:01:57.463
So if I needed it I could grab and go, and he never knew I had it.

01:01:57.463 --> 01:01:58.608
I kept it hidden.

01:01:58.608 --> 01:02:00.355
I even moved my hiding spot.

01:02:00.355 --> 01:02:02.880
Every once in a while I hid the key.

01:02:02.880 --> 01:02:07.088
Sometimes I forgot where I hid the key, but I found it.

01:02:07.088 --> 01:02:08.219
I always found it.

01:02:08.219 --> 01:02:10.099
But you just have to.

01:02:10.099 --> 01:02:12.186
You have to put things into place.

01:02:12.615 --> 01:02:23.027
The other thing I did one more thing, if I can offer it, because I watch a lot of 48 hours, these shows, like you say, and what's usually a big motivator?

01:02:23.027 --> 01:02:24.940
Money, money.

01:02:24.940 --> 01:02:29.476
They get life insurance policies on you or they want the one that you have.

01:02:29.476 --> 01:02:31.300
They want money and things.

01:02:31.300 --> 01:02:32.661
So what I did?

01:02:32.943 --> 01:02:34.105
I went to my bank.

01:02:34.606 --> 01:02:43.088
I made sure that my son, even though he was a minor, was assigned as the only beneficiary on any of my bank accounts.

01:02:43.876 --> 01:02:49.869
On the house I had an annuity, I had whatever financial assets I had.

01:02:50.315 --> 01:02:59.682
My son was the beneficiary and I had a very good friend of 20-some years who is probably the only person on this earth that I've ever trusted to this extent.

01:03:00.063 --> 01:03:08.577
I assigned her as the trustee that if something happened to me, that she would ensure that everything I had, any asset I had, went to my son.

01:03:08.577 --> 01:03:19.768
I didn't even tell my then husband because he just assumed he would be the beneficiary on any of my life insurance policies and that he would get the car and he would get the house.

01:03:19.768 --> 01:03:30.159
No, the joke would have been on him, everything would have gone to my son and would have only been for my son, and that's that, and I'm not ashamed that I did that.

01:03:30.159 --> 01:03:46.057
It's just a shame that people put us in this situation, not just to live these secret lives, but to have to go to these same secretive extents that they do to basically make up for all the chaos that they cause.

01:03:46.057 --> 01:04:00.831
But it made me feel better to know that I had a set will in place, that I had my assets going only to my son and that he would be taken care of at least in whatever way I could take care of him if something were to happen to me.

01:04:01.757 --> 01:04:02.820
That makes pure sense.

01:04:02.820 --> 01:04:03.876
I'm going to put.

01:04:03.876 --> 01:04:07.621
I'm going to put one thing out there and I'm not affiliate for this, but I have this service.

01:04:07.621 --> 01:04:21.536
It's called Presidiocom, p-r-i-s-i-d-i-o, and basically what it is an encrypted place for all of your documents, so a place where you can put PDFs, you can put that there and it's all.

01:04:21.536 --> 01:04:25.137
It's encrypted, it's multi-factor authenticated.

01:04:26.057 --> 01:04:33.722
But I have copies of my license, I have copies of my passports, I've got copies of the deed to my house, I have the copies of all my insurance.

01:04:33.722 --> 01:04:34.583
I have all the copies.

01:04:34.583 --> 01:04:45.849
It's all there, it's all digital and the only people and I have set people that have the password and the multi-factor authentication to have that is that.

01:04:45.849 --> 01:04:47.510
So I would say that's one thing.

01:04:47.510 --> 01:04:51.552
Obviously, the pictures and everything else, it's all there.

01:04:51.552 --> 01:04:54.443
So, and it's, and they've got ways for you.

01:04:54.443 --> 01:04:57.460
There's a wizard in there saying OK, do you have these documents?

01:04:57.460 --> 01:05:04.237
These go here, these are these documents, these go here, and it's all laid out and if you ever need it, you can get it on your phone.

01:05:04.237 --> 01:05:07.460
You forget your, and what's nice is like you forget your driver's license somewhere.

01:05:07.460 --> 01:05:09.443
It's in my driver's license, it's in my Presidio.

01:05:09.443 --> 01:05:16.610
I can just pull it on up and say hey, listen, I forgot my driver's license, but this is a copy of it, anyway, so I would recognize that Again.

01:05:16.610 --> 01:05:18.231
I'm going to put that in the show notes.

01:05:30.135 --> 01:05:31.338
So let's go on to happier thoughts.

01:05:31.338 --> 01:05:33.123
So, after this is all over, how did you meet your new husband?

01:05:33.123 --> 01:05:34.306
Well, small town, gotta love these small towns.

01:05:34.306 --> 01:05:35.809
I knew his family for about 20 years, so it was easy.

01:05:35.809 --> 01:05:37.153
He was always there.

01:05:37.335 --> 01:05:57.494
But the beautiful thing about coming out of a toxic relationship and I have said this many times, but I felt like I was like this flower in a garden who had all these weeds overshadowing me, not letting me see the sun, and they were sucking the nutrients out of the soil so I couldn't get any nourishment.

01:05:57.494 --> 01:06:04.489
And once, I hate to say, my mom and stepdad, like I said, they decided to cut ties with me.

01:06:04.489 --> 01:06:06.461
Those weeds were gone.

01:06:06.461 --> 01:06:07.659
My ex was gone.

01:06:07.659 --> 01:06:11.342
His whole family decided to abandon me.

01:06:11.342 --> 01:06:15.476
I had other family that decided to side with my mother and stepfather.

01:06:15.476 --> 01:06:27.628
So all these weeds once they were all gone, it's like, oh, the sun is shining and there were some other flowers there and they'd always been there, but I couldn't see them through all the weeds.

01:06:27.628 --> 01:06:44.601
So it was a beautiful thing to realize that, even though I had felt so alone and I felt so distraught and destitute and lonely, there were always other flowers there, there were always people there, and one of them was my now husband.

01:06:44.601 --> 01:07:24.643
We knew each other, no-transcript, whether it's a friend or a coach, and you just click with that person.

01:07:24.643 --> 01:07:28.257
Everything just aligns perfectly, like where have you been all my life?

01:07:28.257 --> 01:07:29.561
You're finishing my sentences.

01:07:29.561 --> 01:07:31.206
You think exactly what I'm thinking.

01:07:31.206 --> 01:07:44.998
That was what I felt with him, but obviously I never interacted with him in any way where I would have known that, because I was busy being married to this maniac and that would not have been right anyway.

01:07:44.998 --> 01:07:54.503
But yes, he was there, he reached out, he was concerned and the more we got to know each other, I mean it was just like that click.

01:07:54.503 --> 01:07:56.661
It was like where have you been all my life?

01:07:56.661 --> 01:08:07.476
So it all happened very fast and it happened a lot quicker than people like to see, because it was like wait, you just got divorced, now you're engaged and it's like.

01:08:07.476 --> 01:08:12.351
But it's different when you're in your 40s, because I knew what.

01:08:12.351 --> 01:08:13.916
I didn't need to be married again.

01:08:13.916 --> 01:08:15.981
That was the last thing I thought I would.

01:08:15.981 --> 01:08:19.618
Actually, I had said many times the last thing I'll ever do is get married.

01:08:19.618 --> 01:08:27.766
I don't need to deal with somebody's crazy ex-wife and their kids that hate me because I'm not their mother and whatever, but this man and I.

01:08:27.766 --> 01:08:42.542
It's like we just developed a beautiful friendship and that was the basis and even though he didn't understand a lot of what I went through because he was from this very close, very loving and tight knit family we just meshed and it just worked.

01:08:42.542 --> 01:08:52.057
And it's such a beautiful thing when it just happens that way, like I wasn't looking for it and there it was, and so, yes, we are married and I love that.

01:08:52.057 --> 01:09:04.863
Even though my son was 18 when we got married, he sees another man treating his mom like a queen and I always say it's like princess and the pea over here.

01:09:04.863 --> 01:09:12.597
My husband handles me and treats me like a delicate flower, but I always say I'm a delicate flower, but I might still punch you in the nose.

01:09:12.597 --> 01:09:26.001
So we have a great relationship and the thing about it that people I think have an issue but which I want to address because it is important After a relationship like I had.

01:09:26.280 --> 01:09:29.216
Yes, I was literally heading for the hills.

01:09:29.216 --> 01:09:32.228
I was planning to go to North Carolina hide away.

01:09:32.228 --> 01:09:33.935
My son was going to school in Wyoming.

01:09:33.935 --> 01:09:48.635
I was just going to live my life, be a writer, do me, but it was so helpful to my healing to have somebody, that friend that was encouraging me and speaking words of positivity.

01:09:48.916 --> 01:10:09.301
After a childhood and a marriage full of insults and degradations and diminishment, to have somebody speaking, like I said, just positivity and encouraging me and telling me that I had more potential and more worth, that I even thought I had it helped me to see it too.

01:10:09.301 --> 01:10:15.119
It was like having a crutch that until you can walk on your own two feet again, you just need a little help.

01:10:15.119 --> 01:10:27.201
So I'm not telling everyone to run out and find the first person and get married, but certainly dip your toes in the water and don't isolate yourself Just because you've had some bad experiences.

01:10:27.201 --> 01:10:28.483
I had lifelong abuse.

01:10:28.483 --> 01:10:33.560
My heart was still open and I'm thankful it was because, at the end of the day, we all want connection.

01:10:33.560 --> 01:10:37.457
We all we're human, we want love and we're all deserving of love.

01:10:37.457 --> 01:10:42.068
Nobody's broken or damaged or any of these awful things we like to call ourselves.

01:10:42.068 --> 01:10:54.944
We are just affected by our previous circumstances, but we are still capable of having healthy relationships if you're not, or legal, or financial or sexual.

01:10:55.685 --> 01:10:57.645
You don't deserve that.

01:10:57.645 --> 01:11:13.319
What you do deserve is a loving relationship and someone that treats you like a human being and like you should be treated.

01:11:13.319 --> 01:11:21.802
So recognize some of these things and if you have any questions, make sure you reach out to Dana.

01:11:21.802 --> 01:11:44.180
You can grab her at wwwdanadiazcom, which will also be linked in the show notes, and then also grab her book, which again is called Gasping for Air the Stranglehold of Narcissistic Abuse, on Amazon, again, which will be linked in the show notes and it's also on our website.

01:11:44.180 --> 01:11:49.761
So that's that, and then keep looking out, because sounds like you've got some other book coming.

01:11:49.783 --> 01:11:51.216
Your way I do.

01:11:51.216 --> 01:12:13.699
I do, and I want to just point out one thing about Gasping for Air it is available in e-book because, as somebody who would not have been able to have a book that says abuse on the cover, I wanted to make that available in e-book form so that if somebody just wanted to have it on their phone or Kindle and not show that they're reading something like that, it is available.

01:12:13.699 --> 01:12:16.306
I wanted to be sensitive to everybody's circumstances.

01:12:17.314 --> 01:12:27.167
Yeah, and if you are a member of Amazon Kindle Unlimited, she put it in that library.

01:12:27.167 --> 01:12:31.877
So I want to thank you for that, because it makes it very easy for us.

01:12:31.877 --> 01:12:38.640
And, yeah, while I think that people should own the book, it's definitely a way for you to read it.

01:12:38.640 --> 01:12:46.527
And let me tell you something, I'm not done with it, and it's just because of the number of interviews that I have to do with people with books which I but it is a page turner.

01:12:50.682 --> 01:13:12.676
Dana is very good, she's excellent at putting words together that will keep you intrigued, but just don't take away, don't let it take away the message, and if you recognize anything that's going on with her, then make sure that you get help.

01:13:12.676 --> 01:13:16.503
So, anyway, with that being said and with the fact that my camera just went out, again, I'm going to say thank you, dana, so much.

01:13:16.503 --> 01:13:23.725
We really appreciate you coming on and I'm hoping to see you again, and maybe we can tackle something else.

01:13:23.725 --> 01:13:34.703
Maybe when the next book comes out, we can have you back on and we can continue on to see how your family is flourishing now that you found someone that appreciates you for who you are.

01:13:35.564 --> 01:13:36.327
I would love that.

01:13:36.327 --> 01:13:37.899
Thank you so much for having me.

01:13:37.899 --> 01:13:38.783
I appreciate it.

01:13:39.515 --> 01:13:40.539
All right and thank you.

01:13:40.539 --> 01:13:44.597
Thanks for joining us, everyone, and I will see you in the next one.