Speaker 1: In this episode, we'll be discussing eating disorders and child abuse,
Speaker 1: which may be triggering if you or someone you know
Speaker 1: is dealing with an eating disorder. Call or text the
Speaker 1: National Eating Disorders Association at eight hundred nine three one
Speaker 1: two to three seven for mental health resources. Visit NAMI
Speaker 1: in a m I dot org. Hey y'all, Hey, what's up?
Speaker 1: And welcome the Let's Red Table that. I'm Tracy t.
Speaker 1: Brow and I'm Carl Pressley. Red Table Talk is back,
Speaker 1: but we Let's Red Table that another left But now
Speaker 1: we'll be recapping Red Table Talk episodes as soon as
Speaker 1: they come out. Right, Yes, the Red Table Talk return
Speaker 1: is starting out. We're talking about abuse and how things
Speaker 1: you become normalized even though they are completely left of center,
Speaker 1: and parental abuse is absolutely left the center. We talk
Speaker 1: about dad's people joke about the dad's being absent, but
Speaker 1: no one talks about the mom is being abusive. Oh
Speaker 1: and that's a true statement, very very true statement. And
Speaker 1: this episode, as usual, Red Table talkings out here, shaking
Speaker 1: tables and in these streets and bringing up the concepts
Speaker 1: that no one wants to talk about. And this Net
Speaker 1: mccurty episode, there's no different since it is on the
Speaker 1: front of the cover holding the ashes urn right saying
Speaker 1: through me, I didn't know what I got, wondering it's
Speaker 1: sold out? Do you know why? I think it's sold
Speaker 1: out too? When people say things that no one else
Speaker 1: is saying. Clearly, she's not the only one going through this,
Speaker 1: and that's exactly why we're here today. There were so
Speaker 1: many pieces and parts of it, and she went through
Speaker 1: so much with her mom for so long, the apartment.
Speaker 1: When she moved into her own apartment, it was the
Speaker 1: never left for me. It was so many things in
Speaker 1: this episode. It was the eating let us with no
Speaker 1: salad addressing, It was the way five times today. It
Speaker 1: was the seven year affair that they slid that in there.
Speaker 1: Did they not just ease that right on anywhere? You're
Speaker 1: not going to just slide past that, just get up,
Speaker 1: but they did. They just eased on it. And then
Speaker 1: she was acting out as this character on our car
Speaker 1: League and she was living a lie. It's time to
Speaker 1: hear from our community. We want to hear from you,
Speaker 1: our fantastic listeners. We are now sharing these questions in
Speaker 1: several online red table talk communities. So if you want
Speaker 1: to answer our weekly question. Follow Cara or me on
Speaker 1: social media or join Red Table Talk Facebook group. Don't
Speaker 1: you love that car? Because we had a I mean,
Speaker 1: we're everywhere, We're here, everywhere, We're everywhere. This week, we
Speaker 1: asked y'all if you experienced abuse or maltreatment by your
Speaker 1: parents growing up, how have these experiences affected your adulthood? Cara,
Speaker 1: let's hear from these wonderful people in our community what
Speaker 1: they say. Let's kick it off. Anthony Vincent said, it's
Speaker 1: impacting my relationships, my worth. It fueled my insecurities and
Speaker 1: so much more so. Unfortunate, Anthony Vincent. We are just
Speaker 1: sending you love in life because that that is hard.
Speaker 1: How can it not affect everything? Facts? Absolutely? Tristan Scott said,
Speaker 1: to treat people better than you were treated, so don't
Speaker 1: repeat the cycle. Break it. That's good, That's very good.
Speaker 1: Katie Washington said, I think it's informed a lot of
Speaker 1: my work and mental health around boundaries and worth. No
Speaker 1: one has the right to abuse you. We can honor
Speaker 1: all people by respecting their boundaries. I like that, Katie Washington,
Speaker 1: thank you for sharing that. Our community is our backbone.
Speaker 1: We rely on you to get involved. So we got
Speaker 1: all these different ways for you to get in touch
Speaker 1: with us now, so we're moving forward to hearing from you. Yes,
Speaker 1: we're going to take a quick break, but when we
Speaker 1: get back, we'll be joined by an incredible guest from
Speaker 1: our Red Table Talk community. We usually invite two guests
Speaker 1: unless Red Table that, but this week we wanted to
Speaker 1: give our one amazing guests as much space as possible
Speaker 1: to share about her journey with us because the topic
Speaker 1: of prints of abuse and its long term effects is
Speaker 1: a big one. So we are grateful that Joy is
Speaker 1: here with us today to walk us through what it
Speaker 1: is like growing up in an environment like Jeanette McCourty experienced.
Speaker 1: How are you today, Joy, I'm good. Thank you so
Speaker 1: much for being here. Joy, Joy Haven's is a psychology
Speaker 1: student in Georgia, where she lives with her husband. Joy
Speaker 1: relates to a lot of what Jeanette shared at the
Speaker 1: Red Table. Her parents were emotionally abusive and her dad
Speaker 1: made her feel shame about eating, leading Joy to develop
Speaker 1: an eating disorder. Joy is working to heal and understand
Speaker 1: how her experiences impact her today, and we're just grateful
Speaker 1: to hear and share your story. Oh thank you, I'm
Speaker 1: grateful to be here. I'm so excited to be here
Speaker 1: and talking to you guys. Oh that makes me happy.
Speaker 1: That makes me happy, especially since what we're talking about
Speaker 1: isn't necessarily the happiest topic. But I'm grateful that you're
Speaker 1: here with us because I think it's going to be
Speaker 1: a gift for so many people. This is the part
Speaker 1: of the show where we reveal which Red Table Talk
Speaker 1: moments made us pause, rewind and listen again. This wait,
Speaker 1: what moment or moments was? It was just, oh, what
Speaker 1: what was that? What was that? And what was that?
Speaker 1: Because I don't think we could all believe what we
Speaker 1: were hearing. And I loved that Carly as the parent
Speaker 1: who had the child who loved the show as well.
Speaker 1: I watched it right along with everybody else, so it
Speaker 1: was eye opening from me. So let's just kind of
Speaker 1: jump into it, right. Jeanette reading the excerpt from her
Speaker 1: book about her mother showering her and her brother together
Speaker 1: when they were eleven and sixteen years old. Mom showers
Speaker 1: made with Scotty sometimes he's almost sixteen at this point.
Speaker 1: I get really embarrassed when she showers us together. I
Speaker 1: can tell he does too. Usually just look away from
Speaker 1: each other, and Scott distracts himself by drunk pokemon the
Speaker 1: fogged glass. He does a pretty good chars arc. When
Speaker 1: she showers us together, Mom says it's because she's got
Speaker 1: too much to do. Scott asked me he could shower
Speaker 1: himself once. Mom sobbed and said that she didn't want
Speaker 1: to grow up, so he never asked again after that.
Speaker 1: That was a total waite. What for me? I was like,
Speaker 1: the brother is sixteen? Like thoughts, Yeah, who right, We're
Speaker 1: all just at a lost for words. Yeah. I think
Speaker 1: this episode as a parents the first time I really
Speaker 1: thought about parents really manipulating their children. I just couldn't
Speaker 1: fathom someone going there. I remember my son being sixteen, right, yeah,
Speaker 1: and it wasn't I didn't want time you want to
Speaker 1: spend with them in the bathroom, I don't want anywhere
Speaker 1: near him. Sometimes just because it's teenage, they're all trying
Speaker 1: to figure their own sol those hormones, right, right, So
Speaker 1: it's interesting that she was trying to guide that teenage
Speaker 1: journey for them. Really, she didn't want them to grow up, right,
Speaker 1: So there was no But it does lead into this
Speaker 1: next moment. Deb's emailed to Jeanette. When Jeanette ran off
Speaker 1: with her boyfriend to called Jeanette name just owner, but
Speaker 1: still managed to find the audacity to ask for some
Speaker 1: money for a fridgerator. What happened to my good little girl?
Speaker 1: Where did she go? And who is this monster that
Speaker 1: has replaced her? You're an ugly monster. Now. I told
Speaker 1: your brothers about you, and they all said they disown you,
Speaker 1: just like I do. We want nothing to do with you.
Speaker 1: Love mom, or should I say deb since I'm no
Speaker 1: longer mother? PS send money for a new fridge? Arts broke,
Speaker 1: pure unmitigated goal is what I call that? That? It's
Speaker 1: it's like you what, I'm what? And what? And what?
Speaker 1: And oh, by the way, send money. The fridge is broke, right?
Speaker 1: Can you imagine having the burden of being your households
Speaker 1: breadwinner as a child, especially while being treated this way? Dooy?
Speaker 1: How did you feel about that? As you want the episode,
Speaker 1: I was taken it back what I had to like
Speaker 1: rewind to make sure that she said that, and I
Speaker 1: was like, oh my gosh, that's right. I can't believe
Speaker 1: that people even think of things like that. I kind
Speaker 1: of want to know if she sent the money for
Speaker 1: the fridge. Why did you knowing Janette, she probably done
Speaker 1: just to kind of be done with it and here
Speaker 1: you go, and that's all you care about any way,
Speaker 1: and then she's just been programmed, right, you know. I
Speaker 1: would have definitely sent the money, probably because I'm just
Speaker 1: it's my mom, you know, at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: it was still her mom, and she wouldn't want her
Speaker 1: mom to be without a fridge. I'm sure she sent
Speaker 1: the money. It's interesting because they didn't ask that because
Speaker 1: everybody was so like completely shocked at all the stuff
Speaker 1: that she was saying before that. It's like, how can
Speaker 1: you say this about your daughter? Her mom had a
Speaker 1: lot to say. The quote from Jeanette's mom, My mom
Speaker 1: was always saying men will never really know you and
Speaker 1: they'll hurt you, but women will know you deeply and
Speaker 1: then they'll hurt you. You tell me which is worse? What?
Speaker 1: So who am I supposed to trust exactly? What are
Speaker 1: you leaving me here with? That's it's all you gets.
Speaker 1: My mom has actually said something similar like that to
Speaker 1: me before, and it was when I was leaving for college.
Speaker 1: Wasn't in the same way as Jeanette's mom said it,
Speaker 1: but she was basically saying, you can't trust anyone, and
Speaker 1: so I was like, well, then who do I trust?
Speaker 1: I'm confused. At that point, she was like, you should
Speaker 1: just stay home and go to community college and just
Speaker 1: live with me. I'm like, no, no, I have to go.
Speaker 1: And even when I was at college, she was trying
Speaker 1: to do the same thing, trying to get me to
Speaker 1: come back home and what are you doing? Like why
Speaker 1: are you out so late? And it's it'd be eleven
Speaker 1: thirty and I'd be in my friend storm and she'd
Speaker 1: be like, you need to go back to your room.
Speaker 1: I'm like, I'm literally in kenne Staw, Georgia. You were
Speaker 1: in Albany, Georgia. We are four hours apart. You can't
Speaker 1: tell me what to do. But even they're still trying
Speaker 1: to control. Yeah, And with that, she was basically saying,
Speaker 1: you just can't trust anyone. At this point, I'm about
Speaker 1: to figure that out for myself. You can't trust anyone,
Speaker 1: but come home because you can trust me? Like what, No,
Speaker 1: I can barely even trust you. Was it a trigger
Speaker 1: for you joy to see this? Oh? In so many ways,
Speaker 1: I was trying my best to keep it together, like
Speaker 1: I was trying to not start crying because Jeanette was
Speaker 1: talking about like the emotional abuse and the eating disorders,
Speaker 1: and I'm not gonna lie. I'm still dealing with that
Speaker 1: as a twenty seven year old adult, and it just
Speaker 1: hearing another adult talk about it so freely. I'm like,
Speaker 1: holy crap, the stuff is real and it was very triggering.
Speaker 1: That episode really did do something to me in a
Speaker 1: good way. It just made me self aware of my
Speaker 1: mental health and what I need to work on and
Speaker 1: what I need to be more expressive about and express
Speaker 1: my feelings. More so, hearing Jeanette talking about like finally
Speaker 1: getting into that element of herself and like, oh, I
Speaker 1: can do that too. That's cool. So she was a
Speaker 1: beacon for you, yes, yeah, definitely. And me growing up
Speaker 1: and watching her, I'm not even kidding. Me and my
Speaker 1: little brother and my mom would watch that show, like
Speaker 1: we loved that show, and it's just it's just crazy
Speaker 1: listening to her tell her story and all that going
Speaker 1: on behind the scenes. It sucks that like they take
Speaker 1: advance image of the Childhood stars in that way, and
Speaker 1: it's just it's it's disgusting, and I relate to her
Speaker 1: with her character being obsessed with food, and she was
Speaker 1: already going through the meeting disorder. I went through that
Speaker 1: like I pretended like I love food. I do relate
Speaker 1: to what she was saying. Her life was kind of
Speaker 1: mocking her in a way. That was my whole life.
Speaker 1: When Kelly shared about her betrayal blindness, betrayal blindness is
Speaker 1: forgetting or simply not knowing you're being hurt in an
Speaker 1: intimate relationship. This plays into the difficulty people have accepting
Speaker 1: that their mother abused them. Kelly said, as a culture,
Speaker 1: we don't like to think that mothers can be abusive. Really,
Speaker 1: it's called betrayal blindness. One of the things I love
Speaker 1: about Kelly McDaniels is having had the opportunity to see
Speaker 1: the episode where it was the maternal deprivation taps so
Speaker 1: much and it's so aligned with this episode two. We
Speaker 1: are taught not to talk about our mothers. Yeah, even
Speaker 1: if it's the stone cold truth about it, you can
Speaker 1: say my mom literally did the best she could, but
Speaker 1: it wasn't great. It wasn't what I needed. It was
Speaker 1: the absolute opposite. My mom did the antithesis of what
Speaker 1: I needed as a child. But if you say that,
Speaker 1: it's like, oh, you know right right, just the acknowledgment
Speaker 1: and your mother right right versus because she had done
Speaker 1: better for me. It was from both parents. My parents
Speaker 1: were I was there accident, they never got married, their
Speaker 1: good accident. They love them, they loved me. But that's
Speaker 1: another thing I need to stop doing, is having a
Speaker 1: disclosure after everything I say, but you know what, I'm
Speaker 1: I'm gonna help you right there, because yeah, I did
Speaker 1: the same thing. I don't know why I do it,
Speaker 1: I just do it. It's just it's a validation for yourself.
Speaker 1: So for my mom's and my dad's side, it was
Speaker 1: definitely the emotional abuse. And then most of the issues
Speaker 1: of me growing up was mainly my mom having issues
Speaker 1: with my dad, and it was like I knew everything
Speaker 1: that was going on, but there wasn't anything I could
Speaker 1: do about it, and my mom would subconsciously take it
Speaker 1: out on me, and my dad would do the same
Speaker 1: exact thing, and it would just be constant, you can't
Speaker 1: do anything right, like you're so stupid. From both parents,
Speaker 1: it was just like because of their issues, they took
Speaker 1: it out on me and I didn't realize until now
Speaker 1: like what was going on. And then on top of
Speaker 1: that with them not really even knowing how to handle
Speaker 1: my emotions and my anxiety and my depression issues. And
Speaker 1: technically I was an only child for sixteen years and
Speaker 1: I have a brother, but I only saw him once
Speaker 1: a year, and so all that energy was just put
Speaker 1: all on me of if anything went wrong, it was
Speaker 1: like my fault in a way, and it wasn't my fault.
Speaker 1: But as child, I'm thinking, oh, maybe I need to
Speaker 1: do this, Maybe I need to, I don't know, talk
Speaker 1: to my mom or ask her what's wrong. But every
Speaker 1: time I would go ask her what's wrong, she would
Speaker 1: just snap at me and be like, leave me alone,
Speaker 1: go to your room. I'm just you know, you're my mom.
Speaker 1: I want to be there for you. But looking back now,
Speaker 1: she was just a young parent and she didn't know
Speaker 1: like much of what she was doing, not in a
Speaker 1: bad way, but I'm gonna I'm gonna just say it
Speaker 1: might be a bad way, it's okay. I feel like, yeah,
Speaker 1: and it's all right if it's not even bad though,
Speaker 1: it's just she did the best, yeah, what she had. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Because I watched how she grew up with my grandma,
Speaker 1: and it's funny how Jeanette was talking about her grandma.
Speaker 1: If there was any any sort of emotion, she'd then
Speaker 1: meet it with like ten times that emotions. So if
Speaker 1: my mom's crying, she was like chaos on chaos on chaos.
Speaker 1: It was so much noise in our house. I was like, wait,
Speaker 1: my grandma was not very nice to my aunts and
Speaker 1: uncles or my mom. And then the same thing with
Speaker 1: my his dad was abusive, and so it just the
Speaker 1: patterns and now I'm like, okay, so now it's my
Speaker 1: job to stop it. But now I'm like trying to
Speaker 1: figure that out of like how to start. So that's
Speaker 1: just it's a lot that is good. It kind of
Speaker 1: reminds me of remembering the Mother Hungry episode when they
Speaker 1: defined the spoiling of being set on the shelf and
Speaker 1: that's really when you spoil. And that kind of reminded
Speaker 1: when you said she told you to go to your room,
Speaker 1: that's when your thoughts were spoiled because you started to
Speaker 1: be like, was it me that I actually do because
Speaker 1: you were left alone instead of, like Tracy just said,
Speaker 1: receiving that love that you truly deserved. I told you
Speaker 1: that if I don't feel well or if I'm having anxiety,
Speaker 1: I deal with it by myself because that's just what
Speaker 1: I've been trained to do since I was a kid.
Speaker 1: And my friends were like, I don't understand, Like why
Speaker 1: can't I help you now? Please? Like I can't. So
Speaker 1: it's just it's crazy how childhood can really affect you
Speaker 1: up until you're on a du until forever, until for
Speaker 1: average like it's a true like unlearning any fast. Just
Speaker 1: when you know that that wasn't your best and you
Speaker 1: want to be your best and you know it's not
Speaker 1: to other environmental conditions, it can be changed. Your mindset
Speaker 1: can be changed one day. I'm learning that now. In
Speaker 1: her book, one of the ways that Jeanette described the
Speaker 1: atmosphere in her home growing up was saying that the
Speaker 1: air felt like held breath. That painted a really clear
Speaker 1: picture for me. I can just feel that tension, right
Speaker 1: you think about you holding your breath and walking around joy.
Speaker 1: How was it like in your childhood home? Oh, my gosh.
Speaker 1: Basically that from both houses actually my God's house and
Speaker 1: my mom's house was my mom It was more so
Speaker 1: like if there was tension, it would be died down
Speaker 1: within a few days. And there was tension because of
Speaker 1: financial stuff or just her having a bad day and
Speaker 1: not really knowing how to channel that energy into something else.
Speaker 1: It would be taken out on me in a way.
Speaker 1: Or if I would come home and I want to
Speaker 1: just talk to her after school, she would just go
Speaker 1: straight to her room and be by herself, and if
Speaker 1: I wanted to talk to her, she would kick me
Speaker 1: out and be like no. And so it just most
Speaker 1: of my childhood during the school year, I was mostly
Speaker 1: just by myself in my room, doing my homework or
Speaker 1: watching movies and re enacting all the scenes and playing
Speaker 1: by myself. I would literally pretend like my dogs were
Speaker 1: there with me, playing with me, and I would play
Speaker 1: Cinderella with them. Even up until like high school, it
Speaker 1: was always like that. And and with my dad, I
Speaker 1: was terrified of really even talking because I felt like
Speaker 1: sometimes even to this day, I'm twenty seven and I'll
Speaker 1: say certain things and he'll just pop off, and I'm
Speaker 1: just like, I don't I don't understand. And even as
Speaker 1: a kid, I was walking on eggshells most of the
Speaker 1: time at his house, and even whenever my I mean,
Speaker 1: my little brother, he didn't really understand. He just kind
Speaker 1: of just dealt with it. My cousin would come to
Speaker 1: visit to she would feel the same way. It was
Speaker 1: always tension because we were scared of doing something to
Speaker 1: set my dad off start yelling and cussing us out.
Speaker 1: It sucks, and so you didn't have any place of solitude,
Speaker 1: no place of serenity, no place of comfort, no place
Speaker 1: of support, no place that you felt loved and in safe.
Speaker 1: I have my best friend, but I wasn't even allowed
Speaker 1: to see her because my mom was so protective over me,
Speaker 1: like I was not allowed to do anything. I wasn't
Speaker 1: allowed to go hang out with anyone. The only thing
Speaker 1: I could do with school orchestra after school every Tuesday,
Speaker 1: and church. That was it. We had to literally beg
Speaker 1: my mom for me to go to my best friend's house.
Speaker 1: And I barely even went to her house. So I
Speaker 1: really didn't have anybody. To be honest with you, as
Speaker 1: an example of my mom being really protective and not
Speaker 1: letting me do any saying, she didn't even let me
Speaker 1: go to my high school homecoming dance and I asked
Speaker 1: her why and she just said, there's no reason, I
Speaker 1: just don't want you to go, and I'm like okay,
Speaker 1: and I asked her, was like, so did I do
Speaker 1: anything wrong, and she said, no, you didn't do anything wrong.
Speaker 1: I just don't think that you need to go. I
Speaker 1: still to this day to understand she would do that.
Speaker 1: There would be times where we would have plans for
Speaker 1: me to go do something and she would say, actually, no,
Speaker 1: we're staying home today. We're not going, and I would
Speaker 1: think it's because I did something wrong. And there was
Speaker 1: one time where I was a senior in high school
Speaker 1: and I had senior right, it's like really really bad.
Speaker 1: I was trying to get all my stuff in order,
Speaker 1: I was practicing for my senior recital. I was stressed,
Speaker 1: and I was applied to all these college places and
Speaker 1: my mom. It really irked me because she just kept
Speaker 1: trying to get me to stay. And we got into
Speaker 1: this huge fight because I told her, I said, I
Speaker 1: can't stay because of what you're doing now. I can't
Speaker 1: stay because I won't be a to grow as a
Speaker 1: human being because I'm stuck. And she didn't like that,
Speaker 1: and she didn't like that I was standing up for
Speaker 1: myself and she started yelling and things got heated and
Speaker 1: I got to the point where she literally threw it's
Speaker 1: not funny. I'm sorry. She threw a lamp at me
Speaker 1: and I was like, oh my god. And I was like,
Speaker 1: why would you do that? What was the point of that?
Speaker 1: And I said something disrespectful and she ended up hitting
Speaker 1: me in the face. And after that, I was just
Speaker 1: like you know what. I literally left. I literally start
Speaker 1: walking down the street and I called my aunt and
Speaker 1: I was like, can you come pick me up? Because
Speaker 1: this is not working. I want to live with you
Speaker 1: until I graduate. I'm just gonna move in with you
Speaker 1: because I can't do this. I think my senior year
Speaker 1: was a year of when I really realized like, oh
Speaker 1: my god, like I'm stuck and I need to get out.
Speaker 1: What did your aunts say? Oh? It didn't really. She
Speaker 1: didn't really know what to do because she was just like,
Speaker 1: I want to be there for you. She came and
Speaker 1: got me. We hung out, but she was just like,
Speaker 1: at the end of the day, that's my sister, and
Speaker 1: I don't want to get in between that. She was like,
Speaker 1: I will tell her you aren't treating George right. What
Speaker 1: you're doing is wrong. But at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: she's an adult and she it's gonna do what she wants.
Speaker 1: And that's mom. Still having the ultimate authority, yes, and
Speaker 1: and trying to maintain some control. And then as I'm listening,
Speaker 1: I'm hearing that she probably had some anxiety of her
Speaker 1: own because telling you know, you can't go to homecoming,
Speaker 1: now that that says to me, I want to keep
Speaker 1: you as safe as possible, and I'm gonna have to
Speaker 1: keep you in the house. Joe. You know it doesn't
Speaker 1: make it right at all. No, I've been to other
Speaker 1: homecoming dances. I'm like, yeah, I went to my ninth
Speaker 1: grade with my tenth grade one and my limp grade.
Speaker 1: Why can't I go to my senior one? Why not
Speaker 1: the senior Are you having a mental break and you
Speaker 1: needed a moment? And now it's it's bleeding on me,
Speaker 1: Like yeah, yeah, there's so much more to that. But
Speaker 1: back to what Kelly McDaniel said, it's had to be
Speaker 1: a result of her mom's own traumas, right, most definitely
Speaker 1: that this has been a handed down thing. But when
Speaker 1: I'm working with a daughter, yeah, I kind of don't
Speaker 1: worry so much about let's understand your mother's trauma. I
Speaker 1: don't really want her to be able to unpack her
Speaker 1: own trying to figure out the why on the mom's side,
Speaker 1: it's almost fruitless, right. It's about how you process and
Speaker 1: how to deal with what your experience was, which is
Speaker 1: a lot of work. I mean, that's why I applaud you,
Speaker 1: because you've been processing through this. Yes, you are doing
Speaker 1: the work. Talking about that now, I'm like, holy crap,
Speaker 1: that's why I am the way that I am now,
Speaker 1: and it makes so much sense. I'm just glad that
Speaker 1: Jeanette talked about her story because now it's opening up
Speaker 1: everyone's eyes too. Abuse in every single way, right right.
Speaker 1: And I think people again, the betrayal blindness, they just
Speaker 1: bypassed it because they love these people, and how could
Speaker 1: someone who loves me do this? And my mom was
Speaker 1: definitely going through her mental health stuff and that's why
Speaker 1: she was always by herself and like being a single parent.
Speaker 1: How old were they when they had you, Joy? My
Speaker 1: mom was twenty five, my dad was like thirty or
Speaker 1: something like that. I don't remember you were And you
Speaker 1: said you were surprised, not a mistake. I was framing that.
Speaker 1: You know. My dad says the same story. You listen,
Speaker 1: you why that your dad says, Oh my dad? Every time,
Speaker 1: I'm like, how did I get here? Dad? Oh? Well,
Speaker 1: I know what your mom said. Do you need me
Speaker 1: to fix your TV? And if this, she says she's pregnant.
Speaker 1: My dad says that every year on my birthday. I
Speaker 1: wouldn't quite consider that abuse, but I didn't take it
Speaker 1: well growing up. You can you can laugh because I
Speaker 1: know Joy Wait a second, does not care? Okay, wait,
Speaker 1: let me make sure. Okay the way, by the way,
Speaker 1: but I mean, dad, y'all have been married for over
Speaker 1: thirty years. Stop trying to act like you know this
Speaker 1: was one night need TV that it's hilarious. That is
Speaker 1: a very matter of fact person. He says what's on
Speaker 1: his mind. He does not care. Now, did that make
Speaker 1: you feel like terrible? I felt terrible about it. I
Speaker 1: don't know the difference. My dad doesn't have the language.
Speaker 1: He doesn't tap into his feelings directly. Did you feel
Speaker 1: like you had to like walk on the xhels with
Speaker 1: your dad? Oh? Yeah, but it wasn't looking back. It
Speaker 1: wasn't a wife from an abusive standpoint or anything like that.
Speaker 1: But just his language is because he is a he
Speaker 1: is a an alpha male. Is I can't even describe
Speaker 1: what you looking at me like that, Tracey. I'm looking
Speaker 1: at you because it sounds like, are you betrayal blindness? Literally?
Speaker 1: Are you maybe do you to talk? I definitely have
Speaker 1: accepted some of those things because my dad is just
Speaker 1: my dad. I also have boundaries with my dad now
Speaker 1: because you talk to me any kind of way. So again,
Speaker 1: I definitely did feel that piece of it. Did you
Speaker 1: create some boundaries with your dad as you get older?
Speaker 1: I don't really know how to do that, to be
Speaker 1: very honest with you, because we I'm actually going through
Speaker 1: something with him right now where he's not really talking
Speaker 1: to me and I don't know why, and my brother
Speaker 1: doesn't even know why, and we're just kind of figuring
Speaker 1: out that. With my mom, I definitely have boundaries. She
Speaker 1: actually was the one who taught me how to be
Speaker 1: how I am when people come at me sideways, and
Speaker 1: she's even as an adult, she'll try to talk to
Speaker 1: me all types of ways. I'll ask her to repeat herself,
Speaker 1: and I'll say, I really don't appreciate how you're talking
Speaker 1: to me. I'm an adult now, I'm still your child,
Speaker 1: but I'm not a child. You cannot talk to me
Speaker 1: that way because x y Z or I'm just not
Speaker 1: going to have a conversation with you. And that's just
Speaker 1: respectfully me saying that, And that's with anybody, very clear
Speaker 1: parameters and boundaries. Now that's with my dad, not really,
Speaker 1: because I don't really talk to him as I want.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be honest. It didn't happen for me still thirty.
Speaker 1: It might be just or maybe you just own that
Speaker 1: you don't have have to have a conversation with your
Speaker 1: dad a relationship with your dad. Trust me, he tries,
Speaker 1: but it just he goes through these spouts of not
Speaker 1: really talking to me, and I can't really do anything
Speaker 1: about it. But I do have some boundaries. If I
Speaker 1: feel like he's raising his voice or trying to talk
Speaker 1: to me all types of ways, I just get quiet
Speaker 1: because that's what I did when I was a kid. Okay,
Speaker 1: how do you feel about him having these moments of
Speaker 1: the drawal from you? How does that affect you emotionally?
Speaker 1: It affects me a lot, because I want to tell
Speaker 1: him what's going on. I want to tell him all
Speaker 1: the awesome opportunities I've gotten and what I'm doing now.
Speaker 1: I haven't even been able to tell him that I've
Speaker 1: told my brother and my brother he's supportive and he's
Speaker 1: super excited for me, and he just he's the same
Speaker 1: way he's I wish we could tell Dad, and he'll
Speaker 1: go through like these spouts of like months of not
Speaker 1: talking to me, and then the holidays come around or
Speaker 1: my birthday comes around, and then he'll talk to me.
Speaker 1: And don't get me wrong, I love him. He's a
Speaker 1: really good encourage or the reason why I am the
Speaker 1: way I am today is because he's encouraged me to
Speaker 1: keep moving forward and follow my dreams. I will say that,
Speaker 1: but other than that, like we don't really Unfortunately, we
Speaker 1: don't really talk like that, and I want to, but
Speaker 1: my mom kind of knows more of what's going on
Speaker 1: than my own dad. So I'm a psychology major, so
Speaker 1: I'm all about mental health and even if you know
Speaker 1: what motivated you to be a psychology major, yeah, oh yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: I want to help people that are going through something
Speaker 1: similar that I'm going through. And I haven't graduated yet,
Speaker 1: but I do. I do know a few things. Yeah yeah.
Speaker 1: Jeanette felt inkling that something was not right when her
Speaker 1: mom caught her calorie restriction, which ironically was something that
Speaker 1: bonded them, but it took her years of therapy with
Speaker 1: multiple therapists to accept that her mom actually abused her
Speaker 1: joy How and when were you able to understand what
Speaker 1: you had experienced from your parents was abuse? When probably
Speaker 1: around middle school, because for my mom, it was when
Speaker 1: we were living with one of my aunts and my
Speaker 1: mom was going through whatever she was going through, and
Speaker 1: she would take it out of me, and my aunt
Speaker 1: came to me and was like, I'm gonna have to
Speaker 1: have a talk with your mom because she can't talk
Speaker 1: to you like that. And that's when I was like,
Speaker 1: what do you mean, That's just how every mom talks.
Speaker 1: And for my dad, it was whenever his girlfriend at
Speaker 1: the time around the same time, actually pulled me aside
Speaker 1: and asked me if I was okay because we were
Speaker 1: at a restaurant and I may have made a comment
Speaker 1: or done something I don't remember, but I just remember
Speaker 1: him cussing me out and yelling at me and making
Speaker 1: kind of a scene in the restaurant and she was like, whoa, whoa,
Speaker 1: like what And that's when I realized, Okay, so other
Speaker 1: people are seeing it, so this is abuse, Like this
Speaker 1: his my parents just being emotionally abusive, and that's when
Speaker 1: I started to realize, Okay, so I'm not just a
Speaker 1: bad child. They just have stuff and they're taking it
Speaker 1: out on me because just meet me, right, so someone
Speaker 1: else sees this, now, it's not it's not me that part.
Speaker 1: Plus we came kind of from a six and stones generation.
Speaker 1: If it wasn't a black guy, Are you being abused? Really?
Speaker 1: Like we were so literal. Yeah, That's where my dad
Speaker 1: would always say, is at least I'm not hitting you.
Speaker 1: And I'm like like, like that makes the pain less though,
Speaker 1: And that's the thing like that you're saying that makes
Speaker 1: it ten times worse, like because you know what you're
Speaker 1: doing is at this point, I'd rather you hit me
Speaker 1: because I'm like, you were saying all kinds of stuff
Speaker 1: to me. That's the weirder part about it. I think
Speaker 1: I read something one time that said it to somebody
Speaker 1: cutting you out or getting pushed in the eye, Like
Speaker 1: the brain knows pain. There's the same pain, literally, and
Speaker 1: the healing process takes the same healing process, but we
Speaker 1: just can't see the verbal abuse. One of the clear
Speaker 1: consequences of Janette's abuse was that she developed an eating
Speaker 1: disorder with the help of her mother. No less, my
Speaker 1: father spoke to me about my weight in unhealthy ways
Speaker 1: as well. Okay, so literally I just wrapped my hands
Speaker 1: and head around the fact that I too have an
Speaker 1: eating disorder. Joy And so it gave me some comfort
Speaker 1: to know because so often now, eating disorders stereotypically have
Speaker 1: been associated with people being on the super thin side
Speaker 1: and antorexic side, and for me, it's the opposite, it's
Speaker 1: the other end. Right. I overeat, and I'm grateful now
Speaker 1: that I have a term and language so that I
Speaker 1: know I can work through that. How did your parents
Speaker 1: influence your relationship to food and what is your relationship
Speaker 1: with food like today? My mom didn't really understand it
Speaker 1: when I was going through my eating disorder. She's all
Speaker 1: that I was just being dramatic, and in her eyes,
Speaker 1: it was I was so stressed out that I didn't
Speaker 1: want to eat. For my dad, it was him making
Speaker 1: a comment about my weight and how much I was eating,
Speaker 1: and because I wanted his acceptance at such a young age,
Speaker 1: and I honestly wanted him to stop yelling at me.
Speaker 1: And if that was one thing that I could do
Speaker 1: that I could control. That's where it started was when
Speaker 1: I was like in middle school. Honestly, up until now
Speaker 1: for me, it was more so like a combination of
Speaker 1: anorexia and bolomia, and now it's of me over eating
Speaker 1: with candy and snacks and all that jazz, and my
Speaker 1: relationship to food today is a little bit better. I'm
Speaker 1: healing from all that. And it's kind of hard to
Speaker 1: really put into words. Really, it's kind of like a
Speaker 1: hit or miss, Like it's an off and non type thing.
Speaker 1: I've noticed if I started to get stressed out, I'll
Speaker 1: go like days without eating, or or I'll buy a
Speaker 1: whole bunch of junk food and just stay up all
Speaker 1: night and eat it. And it's gotten to the point
Speaker 1: where I already have teeth issues as it is, but
Speaker 1: now my teeth are being affected by it, and it's
Speaker 1: like it's embarrassing to talk about. Sorry, I can't believe
Speaker 1: I've talking about that, but like it's just it's realized,
Speaker 1: like it when I get stressed out, I started to
Speaker 1: eat candy or I have to even eat candy to
Speaker 1: fall asleep sometimes, and that's just it's not good. But
Speaker 1: because I've had such harmful mental yeah, different experiences with
Speaker 1: food since I was a child, and even whenever I
Speaker 1: would go through my spouts, of not wanting to eat.
Speaker 1: When I was in high school, my mom would literally
Speaker 1: shove food down my throat and that made me not
Speaker 1: want to eat even more because she didn't understand. She
Speaker 1: was just like, why are you not eating? I don't understand.
Speaker 1: Are you're trying to get attention or you just is
Speaker 1: that what you want? And I'm like, no, like you don't.
Speaker 1: I didn't even understand what was going on with me.
Speaker 1: I didn't even understand. I didn't understand why I didn't
Speaker 1: want to eat and why I have body dysmorphia and
Speaker 1: all that. So it's a really tough question. They talked
Speaker 1: about it on the episode a little bit right about
Speaker 1: how Janelle character was obsessed with food, but then in
Speaker 1: her real life she's on this complete caloric restriction let
Speaker 1: us with no dressing. That's really yeah, that's not considered
Speaker 1: a salad and right, just you eating like a rabbit exactly,
Speaker 1: and you think about it, how high water content let
Speaker 1: us is, right, So you're really not eating anything. And
Speaker 1: I completely relate with you Joy on the whole dad thing,
Speaker 1: because my dad he was just weight prejudice and because
Speaker 1: I was always the chubby kid. It was literally he
Speaker 1: at one point said, I can't shame you into losing weight.
Speaker 1: We have talked about it with the neighbors, and we
Speaker 1: have talked about you, and it's just it doesn't make
Speaker 1: any sense, like we can't even shame you in a
Speaker 1: losing way. Why is he talking to other people? That's
Speaker 1: another thing I don't like is when parents talk to
Speaker 1: other people about their child. I was an adult at
Speaker 1: that point, and this is a crazy story about Wait
Speaker 1: with my dad, my former sister in law literally had
Speaker 1: taken some of my clothes and decided she was going
Speaker 1: to throw them away. That's another episode for another conversation. Okay, Yeah,
Speaker 1: and she did it with my dad's approval. Yes, she
Speaker 1: throw my clothes away, y'all. Because I went in confront
Speaker 1: of my dad and I was like, Daddy, what the heck?
Speaker 1: And he said to me, what difference does it make?
Speaker 1: You can't get your big arm in it shirt now anyway?
Speaker 1: And I was like, I would have broke down crying.
Speaker 1: I would have just I would have melted into tears.
Speaker 1: I would have been like, you know what, You're right, dang,
Speaker 1: oh my gosh, I'm so sorry. But I relate in
Speaker 1: that moment, Tracy, like you sharing that. That's how I
Speaker 1: related to when Jada said, like she calls it the unthawing,
Speaker 1: because I definitely my dad definitely said stuff that made
Speaker 1: me cray. I wanted to cry about and couldn't crab about.
Speaker 1: So now that definitely crap about time all the time.
Speaker 1: See I didn't cry then I was mad as hail.
Speaker 1: I understand, I'm an Arias on the hothood, so I
Speaker 1: get mad more. So now I'm just starting out with
Speaker 1: I'm allowing myself to feel the emotions because back then
Speaker 1: I wasn't allowed to cry, and now I'm like, okay,
Speaker 1: so now I'm allowed to, Like, how do I feel now?
Speaker 1: So I get it right? Is it that I'm even feeling? Right?
Speaker 1: How are you able to find light and joy and
Speaker 1: all this darkness and hurt? What? What were your what
Speaker 1: were your coping mechanisms? That's really good question. It was
Speaker 1: my imagination of me dreaming about my future and getting
Speaker 1: out becoming therapists. Or I could just do my childhood
Speaker 1: dream and be an actress and to move far away
Speaker 1: and I have to worry about this. I would play
Speaker 1: violin or watch Twilight movies. Really, my coping was movies
Speaker 1: and it's okay and read it and playing violent because
Speaker 1: I had nothing else to do. I was by myself.
Speaker 1: That's why I'm obsessed with movies, because that's literally all
Speaker 1: I could do. And so I would let my imagination
Speaker 1: wander if what I would want to do when I
Speaker 1: was an adult, and that would give me some kind
Speaker 1: of comfort of okay. In this movie, this is what
Speaker 1: they did whenever they were kind of going through something
Speaker 1: of what I'm going through. Maybe this is what I
Speaker 1: can do in the future. That right there was My
Speaker 1: method was me remembering there is a light at the
Speaker 1: end of this tunnel. I know it sucks right now,
Speaker 1: but I would tell myself, Joy, just take your dreams
Speaker 1: and take your imagination and put it into reality, and like,
Speaker 1: just do it. And that way you can't move far
Speaker 1: away and not have to work out this. And so
Speaker 1: I'm still doing it. I'm still figuring that out. Still
Speaker 1: have visions, still have hope, still have dreams. Yes, yes, Dinia,
Speaker 1: this is often attract it's cold dependent romantic relationships, because
Speaker 1: that's what she had with her mon Jolia married. So
Speaker 1: how has all that you've experienced with your parents affected
Speaker 1: how you developed your relationship with your husband. Oh, I'm laughing.
Speaker 1: I love the Oh, I'm so sorry, I'm laughing. I
Speaker 1: have to laugh because that's wow. It's hard. It's very very,
Speaker 1: very very very hard. We've been married for three years,
Speaker 1: we've been together for five years. I'm having to remind
Speaker 1: myself and learn that my husband's not my dad and
Speaker 1: he's not going to cust me out say the things
Speaker 1: that my dad would say, and even my mom too.
Speaker 1: You had to remind myself that because you grew up
Speaker 1: this way and your parents treated you this way, it
Speaker 1: doesn't mean that your husband's going to treat you this way.
Speaker 1: And even if he did do things that would kind
Speaker 1: of trigger me, I just I don't really know how
Speaker 1: to answer that question. Um, it affected a lot, to
Speaker 1: be honest, it's still affecting a lot. And we both
Speaker 1: came from broken homes and we're trying to figure that
Speaker 1: out together and it's definitely affected a lot emotionally, how
Speaker 1: we handle conflict, our communication. We knew that we love
Speaker 1: each other and we wanted to be together, but now
Speaker 1: it's like the nitty gritty parts of marriage and we're
Speaker 1: literally going through that right now. Both of our parents
Speaker 1: has definitely affected our relationships with each other. It's mostly
Speaker 1: emotional really, and like communication because I'm too scared to
Speaker 1: communicate how I feel. I mean, I know my husband's
Speaker 1: not my dad, but I'm worried that he's going to
Speaker 1: blow up, go off and go on a tangent and
Speaker 1: not want to talk to me anymore, or I'm being
Speaker 1: too dramatic, So I just kind of shove how I
Speaker 1: feel down and it's not going to explain me, and
Speaker 1: I over explain. Holding your breath and still walking on
Speaker 1: eggshails hoping that you don't suffer reconcussions. Yes, that's basically
Speaker 1: what's happening, and it just it takes time. And let
Speaker 1: me tell you something, joy being married, at our being married,
Speaker 1: it's the hardest thing you'll ever do. You're in the
Speaker 1: year where it's okay, the honeymoon is really over now.
Speaker 1: Oh so I'm with you. Okay, wait a minute, when
Speaker 1: you get past your seven you will be in a
Speaker 1: smooth selling period. Just trust me. That's what everyone's been saying.
Speaker 1: You're six or your soul. How was your husband able
Speaker 1: to handle your trauma while you were dating in such
Speaker 1: a way that you trusted him enough to marry him?
Speaker 1: Maybe someone else is dealing with this right now and
Speaker 1: they're like dating, like you got married. What was the
Speaker 1: deciding factor? Maybe it was very hard for him. I
Speaker 1: definitely had a lot of walls up. It took months
Speaker 1: for him to realize, Okay, like she obviously we want
Speaker 1: to be with each other, but she has trauma and
Speaker 1: trauma from other relationships too. It wasn't until I did
Speaker 1: open up to him about my childhood, and then he
Speaker 1: opened up about his childhood, and then he started to
Speaker 1: kind of understand where I'm coming from more and why
Speaker 1: I was so shut off Because my whole life was
Speaker 1: taught to be shut off. It was taught from an
Speaker 1: early age to be alone and handle everything alone. And
Speaker 1: so when it came to like us dating and us
Speaker 1: even having like fights and stuff, he had to remind
Speaker 1: himself where I'm coming from and where I grew up,
Speaker 1: and vice versa with him too. But it wasn't until
Speaker 1: he sat me down after three or four months and
Speaker 1: he was just like, hey, I'm not trying to scare you.
Speaker 1: This is not me trying to scare you away, but
Speaker 1: I'm just going to lay it out on the table.
Speaker 1: I do see myself marrying you. I want to marry you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and he It wasn't until he put his intentions, saying, hey,
Speaker 1: you're safe, it's okay, you don't have to put so
Speaker 1: many boundaries up, just so you know, like my end
Speaker 1: goal is to marry you. And that's when I realized, Okay,
Speaker 1: so he does want to be with me, like I
Speaker 1: don't have to be scared of really showing myself fully
Speaker 1: and it just I think that was Yeah, that's when
Speaker 1: I started to open up more. Was when you said
Speaker 1: those words. I was like, Okay, so you want to
Speaker 1: be with me because you want to be with me
Speaker 1: forever and not just you know, for the time being. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And I needed to hear that. Do you guys have
Speaker 1: time where you do canceling or sessions together? We're about to.
Speaker 1: It's funny you asked that we have before, but we're
Speaker 1: about too soon because him and I are doing individual
Speaker 1: therapy and then we're going to do one together. That's
Speaker 1: great to hear. Jeanette shared that her therapist told her
Speaker 1: that maybe she doesn't have to work towards forgiveness of
Speaker 1: her mother, and I agree. I don't think we have
Speaker 1: to forgive people who don't deserve it or we don't
Speaker 1: aren't ready to maybe forgive them yet. GAMMI framed it
Speaker 1: in a good way, which is we can reach acceptance
Speaker 1: sometimes rather than forgiveness. So Joy, where do you feel
Speaker 1: like you are as far as forgiving your parents? I
Speaker 1: forgive them a long time ago. To be honest, I
Speaker 1: forgive them every single time they do anything to hurt me.
Speaker 1: I have to remind myself that, like, they have their
Speaker 1: own stuff going on, and it doesn't, you know, justify
Speaker 1: it's not an excuse, but I have to in order
Speaker 1: to forgive them, I have to just say that are
Speaker 1: going through their own thing. I don't know what that is,
Speaker 1: but and the time being, the least I can do
Speaker 1: is forgive them for what they did. They might not
Speaker 1: even know what they did to hurt me, but for
Speaker 1: me to feel better about and moving on, I have
Speaker 1: to forgive them for what they did and what they
Speaker 1: said to me growing up and even recently, because otherwise
Speaker 1: I'm just not going to move on because that takes
Speaker 1: such tremendous strength and it's it sucks. But I have
Speaker 1: to forgive in different ways, like I have to learn
Speaker 1: how to forgive too, because I have ten thousand other
Speaker 1: things to worry about and other people that have hurt
Speaker 1: me too, and even with other people hurting me from myself,
Speaker 1: I know that in order to move on, I have
Speaker 1: to forgive them and figure out in myself in my mind. Okay,
Speaker 1: so what does that look like, satisfying yourself to get
Speaker 1: to the next, to your next now and your journey
Speaker 1: of healing. Yes, yes, that's so powerful. Joy. Wow. I
Speaker 1: think your name as much of a surprise as you
Speaker 1: may have been your mom may have needed her TV fixed,
Speaker 1: or however you got here, I think that the name
Speaker 1: that they selected for you is completely appropriate because even
Speaker 1: in the midst of you having the parental abuse from
Speaker 1: not one, but both of your parents, you have found
Speaker 1: the joy in your life and are in pursuit of
Speaker 1: that and are intentional. The one thing that you have
Speaker 1: is those are your stories. Joy, So you can select
Speaker 1: whatever is you want to share. You can share what
Speaker 1: you think is going to be helpful for someone else.
Speaker 1: You can share what it is helpful for you. That's cathartic,
Speaker 1: that gives you the continued release that you need to say,
Speaker 1: you know what, this is what happened to my mom
Speaker 1: and here's how it felt about it. Yeah, I love
Speaker 1: you guys. You guys are so cool. That is like,
Speaker 1: that is the ultimate compliment. Absolutely, thank you. I'm not
Speaker 1: gonna learn. Had a lot of anxiety. I was like,
Speaker 1: if what if I say the wrong saying? What if
Speaker 1: I don't look right? You look fantastic and everything you
Speaker 1: said was perfection. Thank you. We're gonna take a short
Speaker 1: break right now, and when we return, we're going to
Speaker 1: share a brand new segment with you. I'm looking forward
Speaker 1: to this. I can't wait. We've been saying this all
Speaker 1: season long, and it continues to be true that the
Speaker 1: Red Table is covering some immensely tough topics this year. Right.
Speaker 1: So while these conversations are important for our growth, we
Speaker 1: also want to make sure that we are all equipped
Speaker 1: to care for ourselves during this time while we do
Speaker 1: this introspection right and probably assess some of the relationships
Speaker 1: that we're in. That's why we are including a new
Speaker 1: segment on upcoming episode. So get ready for our first
Speaker 1: mental health moment. We get to welcome Katie Morton to
Speaker 1: Let's Red Table that I'm excited about this. Katie is
Speaker 1: a licensed marriage and family therapist, YouTube creator, author, speaker,
Speaker 1: and passionate psycho education facilitator who works to deepmystify mental
Speaker 1: health and replace stigmas with understanding her master's degree in
Speaker 1: clinical psychology and years of experience at her own practice,
Speaker 1: Katie now shares her expertise with the masses via social media.
Speaker 1: So smart, Thank you so much for joining us at
Speaker 1: our virtual red table, Katie. Yeah, thanks for having me.
Speaker 1: So excited to have somebody here with all these accolades. Right, absolutely,
Speaker 1: I would need someone to help us navigate through these things.
Speaker 1: It's more common than we really realize. We're discussing mental
Speaker 1: and emotional abuse by parents on this episode of Let's
Speaker 1: Red Table that and a common thing we've seen is
Speaker 1: people who are not even realizing they're experiencing some type
Speaker 1: of abuse or toxicity until teenage years and sometimes even
Speaker 1: adulthoods So, Katie, what are some honest people can look
Speaker 1: for right now to just identify there in an unhealthy
Speaker 1: or toxic environment. Yeah, I mean there's quite a bit. Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: one of the things we don't realize the most is
Speaker 1: emotional neglect, like things that aren't there because we always
Speaker 1: look for things that are right. We think of like, oh,
Speaker 1: if I was physically abused or sexual abused, even that
Speaker 1: it's hard for people to often actually acknowledge and not
Speaker 1: try to minimize. But when things aren't there, when we
Speaker 1: don't feel heard or understood in our family, I think
Speaker 1: that's a big piece. If you ever feel like when
Speaker 1: I go home, I don't fit in there, I think
Speaker 1: that's a good indicator because that means that no one
Speaker 1: ever heard you, no one ever met you where you're
Speaker 1: at and said I see you and you're important. And
Speaker 1: those words are just so they're so key to our
Speaker 1: growth as a child. Right to feel seen and heard
Speaker 1: and understood. I mean, I think we say it and
Speaker 1: think yeah yeah, yeah, yeah yeah, But if we didn't
Speaker 1: get that, oh god, we need it. You know, it's
Speaker 1: like it's it's palpable. So I think that's like one
Speaker 1: of the number one things, or I mean a more
Speaker 1: obvious one would be not feeling safe, like always feeling
Speaker 1: more hyper vigilant. And I think some of us can
Speaker 1: feel that way physically or emotionally, right like I have
Speaker 1: to have my guards up. I don't know who's going
Speaker 1: to try to trigger me with this, that or the other,
Speaker 1: or maybe you know you have that crazy and her
Speaker 1: uncle who always wants to engage in that conversation. You
Speaker 1: don't want to have pay attention to those things. Yeah,
Speaker 1: avoiding those awkward moments with that Oh, here's that family
Speaker 1: member that's going to ask me this thing I don't
Speaker 1: want to talk about. Right, I've definitely at all and
Speaker 1: I've told him I don't and they still try. Right,
Speaker 1: they don't respect about that. Katie is being you know,
Speaker 1: one of the things environmentally, because that happens in so
Speaker 1: many families so often. But that's good to know. It
Speaker 1: is we think of things as like normal, right, that's
Speaker 1: like what oh families just uncomfortable. We take these things
Speaker 1: and like it should but it shouldn't have to be
Speaker 1: that way, right, And so just notice if that's happening
Speaker 1: in your family of origin when you have to go
Speaker 1: home or let's used to live home, and then a
Speaker 1: way you can know if you're like, well, I don't
Speaker 1: really go home ever and I don't really engage. Do
Speaker 1: you notice and just be honest with yourself because I'm
Speaker 1: even laughing in my own life. Do you see the
Speaker 1: same patterns in your relationships? This could be romantic, this
Speaker 1: could be friends. Is there always like the same kind
Speaker 1: of hiccup and like I said, you kind of have
Speaker 1: to take time with yourself and be honest because there
Speaker 1: tends to be these patterns. Like for me, back when
Speaker 1: I was growing up, if someone got too close too fast,
Speaker 1: I call it puffer fishing. I was like, get out.
Speaker 1: So absolutely, yeah, just to push you away before or
Speaker 1: it's just uncomfortable like and like you said, like sometimes
Speaker 1: we felt like, especially dealing with your family, we had
Speaker 1: to deal with them because that's the uncle whoever. But
Speaker 1: you can actually remove yourself, and when you're children, you
Speaker 1: don't really identify that. You know, you can do, like
Speaker 1: your spidey sense goes off to tell you something's wrong
Speaker 1: with your gut, but there aren't people around to affirm that,
Speaker 1: to say yeah, you're right if even if they heard
Speaker 1: you to your point earlier. In your latest book, try Ammatized,
Speaker 1: which is all about identifying, understanding, and coping with PTSD
Speaker 1: and emotional stress. That's a lot. I mean, so many
Speaker 1: of us have that you share some therapeutic techniques to
Speaker 1: heal from childhood trauma. Could you give our listeners a
Speaker 1: sneak peek into some of those techniques things that we
Speaker 1: can start using today. Yeah, one of my favorites is
Speaker 1: if you start to feel overwhelmed. Because something that's really
Speaker 1: common when we've been traumatized or abused or just honestly
Speaker 1: like in chronic stress, is we dissociate. Do you ever
Speaker 1: have those like lapses in memory where you feel real
Speaker 1: spaced out and you just you're like, I'm just not
Speaker 1: here with you. I'm kind of here with you, but
Speaker 1: I'm not. If you're feeling that way, or if you
Speaker 1: start to feel it, come on, you start to feel
Speaker 1: yourself fade, do a full body shake, like like a
Speaker 1: dog out of the bath, because what's happening is our
Speaker 1: nervous system is killing us up for fight flight. So
Speaker 1: it's getting all this energy ready to like save your life.
Speaker 1: So thanks nervous system, But if we don't have a
Speaker 1: way to get I don't. I know. It's like Jesus,
Speaker 1: thanks for coming to my rescue. But right it's not
Speaker 1: actually a threat that I can run or fight from.
Speaker 1: So what do you do with energy? You dissociate boom,
Speaker 1: So you have to just shake it off. You have
Speaker 1: to move it out and give it a way to
Speaker 1: get out. That's why we can find ourselves fidgeting too
Speaker 1: or feeling like restless or like that anxious feeling inside
Speaker 1: because it's all cute up. So I think that's something
Speaker 1: that we can all do. I even find if I'm
Speaker 1: feeling a little extra anxious or on edge before bed,
Speaker 1: I just do a full body shape them and it's
Speaker 1: really called me feels a little weird. You can do
Speaker 1: it like in secret, but it works. I think I'm
Speaker 1: going to do a full body shake out now, you know,
Speaker 1: like I love that. I love to body shape, and
Speaker 1: I probably I'll probably sing with my full body shape Katie.
Speaker 1: You know, just you can totally turn on some music
Speaker 1: and make it like a dance movie. We can give
Speaker 1: it a sound, not even just to shake. Sometimes I
Speaker 1: feel like for me personally, I need to just verbalize
Speaker 1: whatever emotion I'm trying to feel because I don't have
Speaker 1: words for you know what I mean. Sometimes you need
Speaker 1: to shout or make a noise totally because that's like
Speaker 1: your expression of that energy. Right. So that's how we
Speaker 1: can go to all the time. But I think another
Speaker 1: good tool for people that maybe is a little more
Speaker 1: labor intensive is if we find ourselves acting in ways
Speaker 1: we don't like and going like why did do that?
Speaker 1: Why did I say that thing? Start engaging in what
Speaker 1: I'd call like a mental impulse log So when we
Speaker 1: have this urge, right for me, it'll be like I'm
Speaker 1: going to buy that random thing on Amazon that I
Speaker 1: don't need but I think, or for some people could
Speaker 1: be like I want to drink something. I want to
Speaker 1: say that thing in text or call or whatever. We
Speaker 1: can feel very impulsive about what I want to get
Speaker 1: out of the house. We just feel this like gonna
Speaker 1: move consider just for a second, take a beat instead
Speaker 1: of doing the thing, I think, what is it that
Speaker 1: I actually feel right now? And what is it that
Speaker 1: I'm trying to say with this action, Because a lot
Speaker 1: of times when it comes, especially for myself, like when
Speaker 1: it comes to buying that random thing, it's that I've
Speaker 1: earned it because I'm I'm worth it, because I'm enough,
Speaker 1: but I don't believe it, so I try to prove
Speaker 1: it through purchase, which is such an interesting thing, and
Speaker 1: a lot of us we just don't correlate it right.
Speaker 1: We're like, but it was cool. I saw it on
Speaker 1: TikTok that it does like five things in one in
Speaker 1: my kitchen, and you know, but then you have like
Speaker 1: six of those things and you don't use any of them,
Speaker 1: and you're like, why am I doing this and that
Speaker 1: way of trying to validate your worth in some sort Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: because when is the last time you peeled the potato?
Speaker 1: Do you need that? Moves to say to feel are
Speaker 1: like that's me a target totally, and and so just
Speaker 1: taking a beat to think what is it that I
Speaker 1: really am needing? Because usually not all the time. Usually
Speaker 1: what we're needing is actually connection. That's key. So as
Speaker 1: we change and as we get older, we even move away,
Speaker 1: if we go home to visit our parents or even
Speaker 1: just our family, that parents will maybe still be in
Speaker 1: their own behavior and not want to acknowledge this is
Speaker 1: how I live my life now, like even just coming
Speaker 1: to church with us, or why aren't you looking for
Speaker 1: a new job? So how can that person respond to
Speaker 1: prioritize their own mental health when someone's doing That's a
Speaker 1: great question. And I think we've all been there where
Speaker 1: they're like, you're expected. And even though I'm thirty eight,
Speaker 1: my mom still I'm sure sees me as like twelve
Speaker 1: years old. So right, I think one of my best
Speaker 1: words of advice this is what I call the hug
Speaker 1: and roll. So when someone comes at you as something
Speaker 1: that feels abrasive to you or like boundary overstepping right. Um,
Speaker 1: it could be anything like you said from you need
Speaker 1: to go to church. You're like, I don't believe in that,
Speaker 1: or you need to eat this or don't eat that.
Speaker 1: You're like, get your thoughts off my body. But you
Speaker 1: can't say that right, so you have to come in
Speaker 1: with I understand that you love me and care for me,
Speaker 1: and I appreciate you so much. So we're gonna hug.
Speaker 1: And it depends on the person what you want to say, like,
Speaker 1: especially if it's like my mom or something, I'll be like,
Speaker 1: I know you love me and you want me to
Speaker 1: do better, and you're trying to make me healthier. You're
Speaker 1: trying to, you know, make sure I go to heaven.
Speaker 1: I get that. So you're hugging, hugging, hugging, and then
Speaker 1: we're going to roll away, and then you say something
Speaker 1: like but you know, I'm an adult and I make
Speaker 1: my own decisions and even though I love you, I
Speaker 1: can't do that. And so we don't give excuses. We
Speaker 1: don't because if we give excuses, then there's there's loopholes.
Speaker 1: There's other ways they can try to keep talking you
Speaker 1: into it. And so instead of just saying, you know,
Speaker 1: well not now because you know it's the holidays, or
Speaker 1: I'm busy and I gotta do X Y or Z,
Speaker 1: you start to impulsively, like you were just saying, start
Speaker 1: to ramble off things that the more we ramly acceptable.
Speaker 1: Oh man, right, that's not even how I feel. I
Speaker 1: don't want to go totally. You have a parent. Most parents,
Speaker 1: especially mothers, they're ready for a comeback, you know. It's like,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, I gotta Oh you don't want to do
Speaker 1: it for Christmas, will waite child in New Year and
Speaker 1: then we'll be ready, you know, come first. I don't
Speaker 1: never want to do it right exactly. And I think
Speaker 1: that line and then it comes to that they're not
Speaker 1: happy anyway, because even if you said you wanted to
Speaker 1: go to church, you don't like what I'm wearing now,
Speaker 1: you don't like how how long I stayed where I
Speaker 1: chose to sit, Like it's just never raise your hands
Speaker 1: at that one song, you know, or what a sing
Speaker 1: loud enough for? I mean, I don't know what I
Speaker 1: grew up Pentecostal, So it's like all the music, can
Speaker 1: we really get into it? If you went into it,
Speaker 1: like what's wrong with you? My son, Jason is forty
Speaker 1: and he has his own wife and family, and so
Speaker 1: oftentimes when they come back, I find myself wanting to,
Speaker 1: you know, treat him even though you know he's an adult.
Speaker 1: Obviously he's got his own wife and family. It's still
Speaker 1: and what you said, he's right back to the twelve
Speaker 1: year old from me. So I want to say, like, Jason,
Speaker 1: wait a minute, baby, do you you know you want
Speaker 1: to say, And it's like, okay, let me get myself together.
Speaker 1: But I honor where he is, and I think that
Speaker 1: I need to give myself a hug and roll yes,
Speaker 1: because you're doing it out of love, just like most
Speaker 1: parents are. I think if we can just see it
Speaker 1: from that perspective, that it because often we get defensive,
Speaker 1: right like they're coming at me wanting me to do
Speaker 1: this or that, or they're judging my life. Instead, just
Speaker 1: think it's coming from a place of love. How can
Speaker 1: I tell them I appreciate that, but I'm not I
Speaker 1: don't want to, or I'm not going to and just
Speaker 1: hold it because you are an adult. That's so good,
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, it's so good. I am happy that
Speaker 1: you joined us, Katie. I mean, this is like a gem.
Speaker 1: It's a nugget that I want to just store away
Speaker 1: and keep with me because I can use it, and
Speaker 1: I know that our listeners are going to feel the
Speaker 1: same way. Thank you so much for coming to the
Speaker 1: Virtual Red Table and for sharing your expertie. You can
Speaker 1: learn more about Katie and these topics and others at
Speaker 1: Katie Morton dot com. Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 1: We want to know how you're feeling about this new
Speaker 1: season of Red Table Talk. We are open to talk
Speaker 1: about anything with you. Also, please send in your questions
Speaker 1: at Let's red Table That at red table talk dot com,
Speaker 1: follow us on Instagram, I am Cara at the Career Cheerleader,
Speaker 1: and of course follow Tracy at Tracy t row r
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Speaker 1: you so much for listening. We love, love, love having
Speaker 1: you listen with us. Continue to go on this journey
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Speaker 1: of Let's Read Table Back, Let's Red Table that Hey,
Speaker 1: Let's Read a Table that Hey. A big thank you
Speaker 1: to our executive producers Jada pink Itt Smith, Ellen Rakinton
Speaker 1: and Fallon Jethro. And thank you to our producer Kyla
Speaker 1: Khru and our associate producer Yolanda Chow. And finally, thank
Speaker 1: you to our sound engineers Calvin Bayla and Devin Donnaghy.