Speaker 1: I Ami Yamla. I've been very open about the fact
Speaker 1: that I was not always good at making my relationships work.
Speaker 1: I have been divorced three times, twice from the same person.
Speaker 1: In other words, I have seen a lot and failed
Speaker 1: a lot in my relationships. So I am here to
Speaker 1: share with you what I learned along the way, because
Speaker 1: I did take copious notes. Welcome to the Our Spot,
Speaker 1: a production of Shondaland Audio in partnership with iHeartRadio. One
Speaker 1: of the things that I find so interesting in relationships
Speaker 1: and the whole drama of the relationships that we have
Speaker 1: in our lives, is that we can get so focused
Speaker 1: on what we don't have, what didn't happen, what went wrong,
Speaker 1: until we totally miss the opportunities and the possibilities and
Speaker 1: the blessings that do exist. And when we're in relationships,
Speaker 1: because we're externally referenced most of the time, we're looking
Speaker 1: outside of ourselves. We only see the person based on
Speaker 1: our needs and not based on their needs. And nothing
Speaker 1: will turn a relationship on its head quicker than you
Speaker 1: looking at what that other person isn't doing, doesn't have,
Speaker 1: didn't do. We have to be more present focused in
Speaker 1: a relationship and particularly relationships with our parents, caregivers, guardians.
Speaker 1: We look at what they didn't give us, what they
Speaker 1: should have given us, and not the sacrifice they made
Speaker 1: to give us whatever it was. I always talk about
Speaker 1: the mother who gave her children trash. It was trash.
Speaker 1: I'm talking stinky trash out the garbage can. Now here's
Speaker 1: what the children don't always consider, and that is that
Speaker 1: she got up at three o'clock in the morning while
Speaker 1: they were sleeping, and she walked two and a half
Speaker 1: miles up to the good part of town, the good neighborhood,
Speaker 1: and she dug through the trash cans of the condos
Speaker 1: and the high rises to find the best trash she
Speaker 1: could find, because she knew that all she had to
Speaker 1: give her children was trash, but she made it her
Speaker 1: responsibility to get them the best trash that she could find.
Speaker 1: And then she walked back two and a half hours
Speaker 1: with that trash and told careful not to drop a
Speaker 1: piece of it. That's all she had to give. And
Speaker 1: when she gave it to the children without them the
Speaker 1: five hours that she walked back and forth and how
Speaker 1: many trash can she had to dig through, they focus
Speaker 1: on the fact, Oh, Damn, my mama gave me trash
Speaker 1: and not what she had to go through together. Sometimes
Speaker 1: all people have to give us it's trash, but we
Speaker 1: never consider the effort they made to make sure it
Speaker 1: was the best trash they could find. We stay mad
Speaker 1: because all they gave us was trash. Relationships they are
Speaker 1: so difficult and challenging. And my guest today she's got
Speaker 1: a real challenging one, but there is a solution. Listen up,
Speaker 1: good morning, Welcome to the our spot and what is
Speaker 1: your relationship issue, challenge, question dilemma This morning, I have
Speaker 1: a tough thing with my sister slash guardian. I'm trying
Speaker 1: to figure out how to put my foot down without
Speaker 1: severing the family relationship because she has an amazing relationship
Speaker 1: with my daughter, but she's also undermining my authorities, belittering me.
Speaker 1: The whole entire our relationship is extremely toxic. So I'm
Speaker 1: trying to figure out what to do because talking to
Speaker 1: her isn't working. And every time I try to even
Speaker 1: say anything, it's like I try to have a big voice,
Speaker 1: but then she makes me have a little voice again.
Speaker 1: So I'm just trying to figure out what can I do? Okay,
Speaker 1: let me. See if I got this, you have a sister,
Speaker 1: I'm assuming she's an older sister. What does that mean
Speaker 1: she's your guardian? When my mom passed when I was eight,
Speaker 1: she took over guardian ships of me and my brothers. Um.
Speaker 1: But now I'm twenty nine, I'm a full adult, and
Speaker 1: you know, I've went through mental abuse with her, physical abuse,
Speaker 1: and just all kinds of crazy stuff. So I'm just like,
Speaker 1: how do I fix this? Well? Why do you still
Speaker 1: call her your guardian? Why do you still call her
Speaker 1: your guardian? If you're a grown woman, Why do you
Speaker 1: call her that? Um? Because it's it's hard for me
Speaker 1: to say my mom, I don't, I don't, I don't know.
Speaker 1: She keeps throwing out and like I said, this extreme
Speaker 1: toxic situation, and it's it's it's confusing because one minute
Speaker 1: you want to be my sister, next minute you're trying
Speaker 1: to be my mom. So I don't know which one
Speaker 1: is she trying to be. I don't know. It's confusing,
Speaker 1: it's toxic and effecting my relationship with my daughter. It's
Speaker 1: affecting a relationship of you know, my mental helps and everything.
Speaker 1: And I just don't know what to do at this point,
Speaker 1: I really want to encourage you to stop saying you
Speaker 1: don't know what to do. You do know what to
Speaker 1: do now, whether or not you have the courage to
Speaker 1: do it, that may be what we need to work through.
Speaker 1: Do you and your sister live together? Yes? Why do
Speaker 1: you live with her? I ran into financial issues about
Speaker 1: a month ago and I had to move back in
Speaker 1: with her, and I'm trying to look for my own
Speaker 1: place again, but until then, I am living with her. Okay,
Speaker 1: So you're in a kind of dependent situation where you
Speaker 1: want to be seen as independent. Yeah, okay, well that's
Speaker 1: a problem. So part of the problem is you have
Speaker 1: to act like an adult if you want to be
Speaker 1: treated like an adult. That's sister. She You no longer
Speaker 1: need her to be your guardian, but you're still holding
Speaker 1: her in your mind as your guardian, but you want
Speaker 1: her to act as though she's your sister. She has
Speaker 1: a relationship with you where she was the mother figure
Speaker 1: or in the mother role, and the mother's job is
Speaker 1: to nurture, nourish, educate, and be that soft place for
Speaker 1: you to fall. So she's been that. She wasn't that
Speaker 1: it was the exact opposite any but that's the role
Speaker 1: she had. How she filled the role may have been dysfunctional,
Speaker 1: but the role that she had in your life, and
Speaker 1: in the role that she had in the eyes of
Speaker 1: the law or the world, was that she was to
Speaker 1: take care of you, provide for you, nourish you, nurture you.
Speaker 1: That's the role she had. How she did it is different.
Speaker 1: I mean, that's a completely different issue. Understand. So the
Speaker 1: way she raised you was based on what she thought
Speaker 1: she had to do. And now, but you called her
Speaker 1: your guardian. If you no longer want her to be
Speaker 1: your guardian, then it's time for you to learn how
Speaker 1: to take care of yourself. And sure, we all have
Speaker 1: setback some problems. See for me, I didn't have a
Speaker 1: mother or father. When I fell on my face, I
Speaker 1: was just on my face, licking mud. I didn't have
Speaker 1: nowhere to go. Friends took me in. So you say
Speaker 1: you had some financial difficulties, Well, you know what do
Speaker 1: adults do when they have financial difficulties. They experienced consequences.
Speaker 1: They don't go running home. No, that was honestly, that
Speaker 1: wasn't my first choice. But you know, due to the
Speaker 1: fact that I do have her six year old daughter,
Speaker 1: it was like I didn't have a secure place to live.
Speaker 1: So that's not your sister's problem, that's your problem. And
Speaker 1: the fact that at twenty nine, your life is set
Speaker 1: up so that you only you know my mother, my
Speaker 1: father actually used to say to me, you know, it's
Speaker 1: a poor rat that only got one hole. Rat got
Speaker 1: to have a lot of holes to run to. You
Speaker 1: set your life up so that you only have one
Speaker 1: place to go. So now that you're there, it's not permanent.
Speaker 1: It's not going to be permanent. So you've got to
Speaker 1: focus on getting up out of there as quickly as
Speaker 1: you can to avoid the toxicity, and then perhaps when
Speaker 1: you're out of there, you can work on healing your
Speaker 1: relationship with your sister. You can do it while you're there,
Speaker 1: but not as long as you continue to hold her
Speaker 1: in your mind as your guardian. How old is she
Speaker 1: he is in I think her late forties, early like
Speaker 1: or fifties. I'm not too quite sure because she keep
Speaker 1: telling us a different age, so I don't know. And
Speaker 1: what is the conversation that you have had with her
Speaker 1: about wanting to be seen and treated as an adult?
Speaker 1: Have you ever had that conversation with her? Yes, I
Speaker 1: had that conversation plenty of times, but it's like talking
Speaker 1: to a brick wall. And then it goes into the
Speaker 1: belittling thing. She will bring up things that I've done
Speaker 1: in high school and I'm like, normal teenagers do these
Speaker 1: kinds of things, and it turns into a big old argument.
Speaker 1: Then eventually, you know, we both come down because you know,
Speaker 1: both tensions are high. And then I'm just like, I'm
Speaker 1: literally trying to do everything in my willpower to obtain
Speaker 1: my career because I'm trying to be an EMT or
Speaker 1: a firefighter. I've been trying to do that. And it's
Speaker 1: just like, listen, i don't need you to talk down
Speaker 1: on me. I'm an adult. And then she always, you know,
Speaker 1: comes with kinda like the condescending and I'm like, all
Speaker 1: I'm asking is just to support you. Don't have to
Speaker 1: agree with what I'm doing or how I want to
Speaker 1: live my life, just support me. And that just turns
Speaker 1: into a whole nother thing, and you know, unfolds more
Speaker 1: and more and more stuff, and I'm just like, well,
Speaker 1: we're just not getting anywhere because she seeks, oh if
Speaker 1: it's not her way in her ideal situation that everything
Speaker 1: is a pipe dream, and it's stupid and it's the
Speaker 1: wrong decision, just like a typical mother. Just like a
Speaker 1: typical mother, every mother has dreams for their children, and
Speaker 1: if the children don't follow the mother's dream, the mother
Speaker 1: has a problem. Ask me how I know, Go ahead,
Speaker 1: ask me how I know? Go ahead, None of your business,
Speaker 1: just like a typical mother. And do you know where
Speaker 1: that comes from? Because your baby's only six. So round
Speaker 1: about the time when she gets thirteen and starts what
Speaker 1: my grandmother used to say, smelling herself and starts to
Speaker 1: want to break break free of your tyranny over her life.
Speaker 1: That's gonna happen around thirteen. Okay, you're gonna see the
Speaker 1: things that she's doing and you're just gonna want to
Speaker 1: bang your head up against the wall because they're gonna
Speaker 1: look wrong and stupid because you have a real idea
Speaker 1: of what has to what she has to do to
Speaker 1: be successful. And you know mothers are neurotic. So this
Speaker 1: is your sister who lost her mother, who lost her
Speaker 1: mother and ended up responsible for two children in the
Speaker 1: midst of her grief. That's what happened to her at
Speaker 1: that time too. We'll talk more about it when we
Speaker 1: come back. Welcome back to the our spot. My guests
Speaker 1: and I are talking about what happens when a person
Speaker 1: in your life plays a dual role and we hold
Speaker 1: them responsible for that role without even considering how difficult
Speaker 1: or challenging it was for them to be two things
Speaker 1: at the same time. Let's get back to the conversation. Probably,
Speaker 1: I don't know what her relationship was like with your mom,
Speaker 1: but it must have been good in order for her
Speaker 1: to take on her mother's two children, because she didn't
Speaker 1: have to do that. You could have gone into foster home.
Speaker 1: I wonder how much of her obsession with you it's
Speaker 1: about not wanting to fail her mother and wanting to
Speaker 1: prove to her mother that she did a good job
Speaker 1: with you. And if you fail, she's going to be
Speaker 1: disappointing her mother. I wonder. I mean that can be too.
Speaker 1: I mean, because it was points of time growing up.
Speaker 1: You know, teenagers in touch school, you know, do other
Speaker 1: things and stuff like that normal teenager behavior. But when
Speaker 1: I was doing it, I got kicked out of the house,
Speaker 1: which led me into other things. But she couldn't fail
Speaker 1: her mom. And you know, a twenty year old with
Speaker 1: four kids, that's a lot How grateful are you that
Speaker 1: she took you in? How grateful I mean, I'm grateful,
Speaker 1: it's just good aship. I'm not grateful of that relationship. Well,
Speaker 1: you can't heal the relationship as an adult woman with
Speaker 1: another adult woman as long as you're dependent upon her
Speaker 1: for something so essential in your life. You and her
Speaker 1: have to create a new normal. She's not your guardian anymore.
Speaker 1: She is your bigger sister, and but you have to
Speaker 1: conduct yourself in such a way that she can respect
Speaker 1: who you've become. And even though for her it'll be whew,
Speaker 1: you know I didn't fail my mom, for you, it'll
Speaker 1: be this is who I am. And I want to
Speaker 1: be in relationship with you as another woman, not with
Speaker 1: you as my guardian or my mother. You may not
Speaker 1: be able to do that right now. But I heard
Speaker 1: you say that she's condescending or she'll talk down to you.
Speaker 1: Have you ever said something as simple to her as
Speaker 1: Do you have any idea how much it hurts me
Speaker 1: to hear you talk to me like that? Yes, I tried,
Speaker 1: he said, so white. It's called tough love, and that's
Speaker 1: the only way I know how to do it. And
Speaker 1: I don't care if you rule me as a bitch
Speaker 1: or and then she starts going more into now this
Speaker 1: aggressive spin. Well you know, well, for me, what I
Speaker 1: would say to that is, She'll hope nobody, particularly God
Speaker 1: ever treats you the way you're treating me right now,
Speaker 1: because I would not want that for you. Yes, but
Speaker 1: I want to go back to this. This is not
Speaker 1: an excuse at all. It's really just a consideration that
Speaker 1: at twenty she lost her mother, when she had two children,
Speaker 1: that she probably wanted her mom to be there for her,
Speaker 1: be there with her, help her raise them, you know,
Speaker 1: give her advice. She didn't learn how to be a
Speaker 1: mom because my mom was gone, and then in the
Speaker 1: midst of losing her mom and grieving that she has
Speaker 1: four kids, she took on her siblings. I mean, if
Speaker 1: we could just hang out there for a moment and
Speaker 1: send her some level of compassion. My birth mother died
Speaker 1: when I was two. Nobody ever told me that, But
Speaker 1: I grew up between my stepmother and my grandmother. But
Speaker 1: my performative years from two to five, I was with
Speaker 1: my grandmother, and then all throughout the rest of my life,
Speaker 1: my grandmother was like the primary female caregiverer. My grandmother
Speaker 1: was meaner than a wet cat. She was so mean
Speaker 1: to when she came in the room, the goldfish stopped swimming.
Speaker 1: They didn't want they didn't want her to see that
Speaker 1: move because she would have something to say about the
Speaker 1: way they were swimming. That's how mean my grandmother was,
Speaker 1: and it scared me. It scared me, and I hated
Speaker 1: her until I was about maybe forty years old, when
Speaker 1: I recognized that in her mid thirties, or maybe she
Speaker 1: was forty, she might have been early forties, her son's
Speaker 1: concubine died because my mother was the other woman. She
Speaker 1: wasn't my father's wife. My father had a wife, and
Speaker 1: she ended up with two children to raise. And as
Speaker 1: the grandma. You know, grandmothers do what the parents can't do.
Speaker 1: That's part of what the grandparents do. They come in,
Speaker 1: they support, they step in, they help when the parents can't.
Speaker 1: So she did that. She took me and my brother on.
Speaker 1: She was part Native American, part Black. She was a
Speaker 1: domestic worker. She scrub floors and toilets and cooked for
Speaker 1: people for a living. She worked from five o'clock in
Speaker 1: the morning til nine ten o'clock at night, and all
Speaker 1: of a sudden, she's got a two year old and
Speaker 1: a five year old. And she did that for the
Speaker 1: next I don't know how many years, And I was
Speaker 1: forty when I realized that she was bitter and resentful
Speaker 1: that her life had been placed on whole to raise
Speaker 1: her son's two children. It didn't have anything to do
Speaker 1: with me. It had to do with her bitterness and
Speaker 1: resentment that this had happened in her life, her anger
Speaker 1: towards my father for not having his life together, that
Speaker 1: she ended up with these two kids. It didn't have
Speaker 1: anything to do with me. So I'm wondering if some
Speaker 1: of the ways your sister behaved didn't have anything to
Speaker 1: do with you, but had to do with her own
Speaker 1: grief and resentment or bitterness or anger or frustration that
Speaker 1: her mom died and left her with these two kids. Hell,
Speaker 1: where is they father? Why can't they Daddy take up?
Speaker 1: Why got to have them? At twenty she saddled with
Speaker 1: four kids. Do you have any compassion for her? Because
Speaker 1: that's what I had to get from my grandmother in
Speaker 1: order to heal. I had to stop seeing her as
Speaker 1: bitter and mean, and see her as tired, and see
Speaker 1: her as sad, and see her as disappointed and see
Speaker 1: her as broken. Can you see any of that for
Speaker 1: your sister? I do. Yeah, Now I get it, I
Speaker 1: really do get it. It's just it's it's unfortunate that
Speaker 1: that that birness and the angriness was just lashed out
Speaker 1: onto me because it's it's like what it's it's not
Speaker 1: an excuse like as you said, but it's just like
Speaker 1: I don't understand, like the physical when you know the
Speaker 1: physical abuse of it. I understand she was she was
Speaker 1: still hurt in and it's very frustrating. She was grieving
Speaker 1: and everything like that. But at the same time, you
Speaker 1: didn't have to constantly put your hands on me like
Speaker 1: I was a stranger in the streets. It didn't see.
Speaker 1: You can't have it both ways. You can't have it
Speaker 1: both ways. You can't you either have I understand, recognize
Speaker 1: and hold it with compassion and not be angry at her,
Speaker 1: or just continue to be angry at her and say
Speaker 1: what it shouldn't have been. You can't have it both ways.
Speaker 1: When I was five, I didn't go to go to kindergarten.
Speaker 1: My grandmother needed me to be disciplined and obedient and
Speaker 1: total line because she had to get up and get
Speaker 1: to work and make that money to feed me and
Speaker 1: my brother. And I was not disciplined, obedient, nor I
Speaker 1: total line and she beat the Holy living But Jesus
Speaker 1: oide of me. When I was five, I didn't go
Speaker 1: to kindergarten because my grandmother beat me. And she's old
Speaker 1: school with a ironing chord, and welts and scars were
Speaker 1: on my back that she didn't attend to because she
Speaker 1: was going to work. And when my stepmother came to
Speaker 1: take me school shopping, she pulled my undershirt off and
Speaker 1: pulled all the skin off my back so I couldn't
Speaker 1: go to kindergarten. I was in hospital. Now I can
Speaker 1: be upset about that I didn't go to kindergarten my
Speaker 1: grandmother beat the skin off my back, or I can
Speaker 1: say it really I understand it wasn't personal. She needed
Speaker 1: me to be disciplined and I wasn't. She needed me
Speaker 1: to be ruthlessly obedient to everything she said, and I wasn't.
Speaker 1: She needed me to follow instructions implicitly, and I didn't.
Speaker 1: I did the normal things that a three year old,
Speaker 1: five year old, ten year old kid did, just like
Speaker 1: you said, cut in school and blah blah blah blah blah.
Speaker 1: I wasn't with her then, but at five, you know,
Speaker 1: she told me, don't go in the room and touch
Speaker 1: the stuff. I went in the room and touch this up.
Speaker 1: She said, don't play with the knickknacks. I played with
Speaker 1: the knickknacks. Yeah, I was a problem. I was a problem.
Speaker 1: I get it now that for her to leave two
Speaker 1: children in the house in order for her to travel
Speaker 1: two and a half hours to get to work, to
Speaker 1: scrub floors, clean toilets, and cook food for white folks
Speaker 1: so that we could eat. She needed me to follow
Speaker 1: her rules and I didn't. And when I didn't, she
Speaker 1: became extremely frustrated, and she was gonna beat obedience into me,
Speaker 1: and she was gonna beat discipline into me, and she
Speaker 1: was gonna beat Do you understand it won't even about me.
Speaker 1: It was about what she needed. I didn't know that
Speaker 1: as a child, but as an adult I had to
Speaker 1: either let that scar me or say I get it
Speaker 1: and I forgive you. Like you said, it's about understanding
Speaker 1: his forgiveness. I'm not I'm not angry. I'm just hurt.
Speaker 1: It's just a lot of pain and a lot of
Speaker 1: herbs that we're not talking about it. It's like, all right, spepid,
Speaker 1: I'm a drug. That's it. I don't want to hear
Speaker 1: nothing else about it. But I'm like, we've got to
Speaker 1: talk about these things because it was other things that
Speaker 1: happened to me, you know, in my young adulthood, which
Speaker 1: I can't I can't share with her because it's it's
Speaker 1: a lot. It's just like, well, is she gonna be condescending,
Speaker 1: is she gonna feel compassion? Anything? Like? Is she gonna
Speaker 1: recognize you know, anything? So I just keep a lot
Speaker 1: of pain and hurt to myself. Well, that's what therapists
Speaker 1: are for. Do you love your sister, you said? Do
Speaker 1: I love her? Yeah? Do you love her yes? Do
Speaker 1: you want the best for her? Yeah? In spite of
Speaker 1: everything that's happened. Okay, So I want you to close
Speaker 1: your eyes, just for a moment, close your eyes, and
Speaker 1: I want you to see her. And I want you
Speaker 1: to see her bandaged from head to toe, everything, her head,
Speaker 1: her face like a mummy. The only thing that's out
Speaker 1: is her eyes and her mouth, her nose so she
Speaker 1: can breathe see her, I mean, her hands are bandaged,
Speaker 1: her legs, her stomach, her face, everything she's bandaged in
Speaker 1: those white bandages from head to toe. Can you see that? Yeah?
Speaker 1: And can you see or imagine that everything under that
Speaker 1: bandage is raw? It's raw flesh. How would you treat her?
Speaker 1: How would you treat her knowing that she's raw under
Speaker 1: those bandages and the only thing out is her eyes,
Speaker 1: her nose, in her mouth? How would you treat her? Her? Passion? Love? Yeah, gentleness? Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: So even though she raised you, she's bandaged from head
Speaker 1: to toe, and even though you think, because she as
Speaker 1: in the mother role, she should have been good to you,
Speaker 1: you get an opportunity to treat her the way she
Speaker 1: didn't treat you, Kindly, gently, with compassion, hearing everything she
Speaker 1: says as a reflection of her pain that has nothing
Speaker 1: to do with you. What if you're really the one
Speaker 1: who has to raise her, even though she raised you?
Speaker 1: What if? And I know the little girl inside of
Speaker 1: you doesn't want to do that, but I need the
Speaker 1: grown woman right now, the twenty nine year old, to
Speaker 1: make another choice. Forget the role, forget that she was
Speaker 1: older and the guardian and that you were younger and
Speaker 1: feel victimized. Switch roles. Treat her the way she didn't
Speaker 1: treat you and get your stuff together, to get the
Speaker 1: heck about that house as quickly as you can. She's wounded,
Speaker 1: she's broken, and she doesn't have the capacity. She's not capable.
Speaker 1: She really isn't, because if she was, she would do it.
Speaker 1: She's not capable of treating you any differently than she
Speaker 1: already has. Yeah, tell me what you're hearing, Tell me
Speaker 1: what's going on. I'm just thinking about, you know, trying
Speaker 1: to get into therapies with her, not with her, not
Speaker 1: with her for you leave her alone. She's bandaged. She
Speaker 1: can't go to therapy with bandages from her head to
Speaker 1: her feet. She can't even sit in the therapist's chair.
Speaker 1: She can't do it right now. And it doesn't mean
Speaker 1: that the relationship can't be healed and change. But the
Speaker 1: work is on you. Sure, the work is on you,
Speaker 1: because obviously she ain't having no problem you are. Yeah,
Speaker 1: she thinks it's okay you don't. So what do we
Speaker 1: do now? We'll talk about that right after this break.
Speaker 1: Welcome back, I Amy, I'm ling. This is the our spot.
Speaker 1: So tell me, in your current relationship with your sister,
Speaker 1: what is something you can do differently I mean, I
Speaker 1: could try not to take things as as personal. Well,
Speaker 1: either you're gonna take them as personal or you're not.
Speaker 1: There is no try, There is only do or don't do. So,
Speaker 1: either you're gonna do it or you're not gonna do it.
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna take Well, let's not go so big first,
Speaker 1: Let's do something real small. Stop seeing her, calling her,
Speaker 1: holding her as your guardian. That don't have nothing. You
Speaker 1: don't need her to do that, that's in your mind,
Speaker 1: in your heart. This is not my guardian. This is
Speaker 1: a wounded woman. This is my sister, and she's a
Speaker 1: wounded woman. She is not my guardian. You could do that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you don't expect her to be nice to you, or
Speaker 1: listen to you, or care about your feelings because she's
Speaker 1: wounded from head to toe. She's just trying to deal
Speaker 1: with her own pain. Can you see that? Yes, So
Speaker 1: that's one thing you can do that you don't need
Speaker 1: her permission or insight to do it. And I hear
Speaker 1: you saying you want to heal with her, and I
Speaker 1: hear you saying there's things you want to say to
Speaker 1: her that you can't. Don't expect her to do it.
Speaker 1: She's bandaged, she's wounded. Okay, what's going on? You're not thinking,
Speaker 1: You're not speaking, what are you thinking? I'm just I
Speaker 1: was just thinking, like maybe it's time that I should,
Speaker 1: you know, stop putting so much on just this one
Speaker 1: sister and oh you know how she treated me and
Speaker 1: stuff like that, and actually just go into therapy and
Speaker 1: try to work on my other relationships with family members
Speaker 1: because right now I'm only a so she like her
Speaker 1: as my number one, Like you said, it's a guardian.
Speaker 1: I need to stop putting her at that plateau. That
Speaker 1: might be helpful. And maybe you, instead of focusing on
Speaker 1: these family relationships that come from brokenness and hurt, maybe
Speaker 1: you just need to focus on being an EMT. How
Speaker 1: about that? Is that what you said you want to
Speaker 1: do become empty? So what do you need to do
Speaker 1: to make that happen? Um, well, it's I have to
Speaker 1: put an application go to the fire academy. What's the
Speaker 1: conversation that I had with my sister last night was?
Speaker 1: And I've had this conversation with her for two months now.
Speaker 1: I'm like, well, I need someone to, you know, look
Speaker 1: out for my daughters because the schedule that they are asking,
Speaker 1: it's Monday through Friday six am to five pm. As
Speaker 1: an adult woman with a few supportive people in your life,
Speaker 1: how would you handle that? How would you handle that?
Speaker 1: That's your business. You've got to get that handle. And
Speaker 1: she's bandaged from head to toe. So if she can't
Speaker 1: do that, what's your other options? Friends? In bigcare, I
Speaker 1: can't really afford the head right now. So I mean,
Speaker 1: she's she's in school, but she gets out of school
Speaker 1: at two fifteen. So from two fifteen until five five thirty,
Speaker 1: it's like I'm stuck in the same situation as I
Speaker 1: was before New Jersey where I went to be in
Speaker 1: T school four times and had to enroll every single time.
Speaker 1: Why because I didn't have the support when it came
Speaker 1: to my daughter. So what is your prayer that I
Speaker 1: find support and be able to accomplish the career that
Speaker 1: I I want? Because honestly, these these little dead end
Speaker 1: jobs isn't isn't enough, It's not enough. I need more? Well,
Speaker 1: you want more, and that you have a right. But
Speaker 1: if your mind is made up that you don't have support,
Speaker 1: that your sister should be doing it and she's not,
Speaker 1: that you don't have anybody there for you, There may
Speaker 1: be possibilities and opportunities that are available that you don't
Speaker 1: even see. So that's why I'm asking you, what's your
Speaker 1: Your prayer doesn't have to be that I find. It
Speaker 1: could be God's source, creator who whatever it is for you,
Speaker 1: send me what I need to make this dream my reality.
Speaker 1: Send me the proper person in the proper way. I
Speaker 1: know it's here. It has to be here because God
Speaker 1: never gives you a vision without giving you the provision.
Speaker 1: If you have a vision of being an EMT, if
Speaker 1: you've gone to school four times, then the provision you
Speaker 1: need is there. But if you're thinking it has to
Speaker 1: come from your sister or your family, you may not
Speaker 1: even see other possibilities. So let your prayer be that
Speaker 1: everything you need to complete or manifest this dream, that
Speaker 1: it comes forward, that it shows up easily, effortlessly. It
Speaker 1: doesn't have to be hard. It doesn't. You're making it
Speaker 1: harder than it needs to be. Did you finish EMT school? No,
Speaker 1: what do you have to do to finish? I literally
Speaker 1: just have to go back for one semester and test
Speaker 1: to tests and that's it. All right, Well that'll happen.
Speaker 1: Take it off, your sister, take it off of her.
Speaker 1: Open yourself to greater possibilities. There may be a retired
Speaker 1: old school teacher that takes in children on a twenty
Speaker 1: four hours basis. I mean, you don't know. They could
Speaker 1: be right in your backyard. But you've got to be
Speaker 1: open and stop looking at what happened and what you
Speaker 1: don't have. What's possible for tomorrow is where we got
Speaker 1: to focus. She's bandaged from head to toe. She cannot
Speaker 1: give you what you need. Doesn't mean you can't get
Speaker 1: it from other places and other people. And as your
Speaker 1: life balances out and you become more secure in yourself,
Speaker 1: you can heal those other relationships too. I'm gonna give
Speaker 1: you a prescription, all right. You want to write this
Speaker 1: down or will you remember it? Okay? I remember it
Speaker 1: all right? Every single day for the next twenty one days,
Speaker 1: every day that your eyes open up. I don't care
Speaker 1: where you are. I want you to make ten statements
Speaker 1: of gratitude whoever you pray to God, Jesus, Buddha Allah,
Speaker 1: I don't know you know the universe divide mother, it
Speaker 1: doesn't matter. Thank you for the perfect childcare situation for
Speaker 1: my daughter so that I can complete EMT school. Thank
Speaker 1: you for the perfect opportunity to earn the money that
Speaker 1: I need to find the place to live. Thank you
Speaker 1: for my health. Thank you for my strength. Thank you
Speaker 1: for this roof over my head. Thank you. Ten statements
Speaker 1: every day. It could be the same statements, different statements.
Speaker 1: It could be for stuff you have and for stuff
Speaker 1: that you want. Ten statements of gratitude every single morning
Speaker 1: that your eyes open. You can speak it out loud,
Speaker 1: you can write it down. Thank you, Thank you. Thank
Speaker 1: you for the babysitter, for the EMT school taking you back,
Speaker 1: for the money you need to go to EMT school,
Speaker 1: for the passing the em two school tests, for your
Speaker 1: first jobs on an ambulance. I don't know whatever, But
Speaker 1: instead of turning it into complaints of what you don't have,
Speaker 1: your prescription is to give thanks for it right now,
Speaker 1: calling it in give thanks right now. Every day, for
Speaker 1: twenty one days, you give thanks, and you watch how
Speaker 1: stuff starts showing up for you. I could do that.
Speaker 1: Thank you for my sister and her healing. Thank you
Speaker 1: that the relationship between me and my sister is healed.
Speaker 1: Thank you for my new two bedroom apartment overlooking the
Speaker 1: forests in the trees or whatever you want, I don't know,
Speaker 1: start affirming and calling in what you desire instead of
Speaker 1: complaining about what you have and what you don't have,
Speaker 1: and leave your sister alone. Thank you? And you know
Speaker 1: you have to stop seeing how as your guardian and
Speaker 1: expecting things from her that she may not be able
Speaker 1: to give you. Stop seeing her as that calling her
Speaker 1: that holding her is that? Stop that see her as
Speaker 1: your sister, as a broken, wounded woman that needs your kindness,
Speaker 1: your gentleness, your love, and your compassion, even if she
Speaker 1: doesn't give it to you. She needs that. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: you do you know now that even though she was
Speaker 1: responsible for your growing up, that maybe it's your job
Speaker 1: to raise her and give her what she didn't or
Speaker 1: couldn't give you. Do you know that? And do you
Speaker 1: know you are going to find everything that you need
Speaker 1: and you are going to be an emt even if
Speaker 1: your sister doesn't believe it. Do you know that? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Do you know you've got the power to make your
Speaker 1: dreams come true? Do you know that? Yeah? Okay, so
Speaker 1: you're in much better shape than when you're called you think. Yeah,
Speaker 1: don't try to do everything at once. Let's focus on
Speaker 1: where we are right now, making that better, and then
Speaker 1: we'll move on. You can move on to other things,
Speaker 1: making the relationships with the other, healing your relationship. Let's
Speaker 1: get you through school and on your first ambulance as
Speaker 1: an EMT. Let's do that. Let's focus on that, and
Speaker 1: these ten statements will get you there. I promise you
Speaker 1: you're right. Like my brother said, you won't have anything,
Speaker 1: but Tom, that's right. You're twenty nine. I got braws
Speaker 1: older than you. Check back in with me and let
Speaker 1: me know how you're doing. Okay, all right, I can
Speaker 1: do that, all right, my love, thank you, Okay, bye bye.
Speaker 1: My guest today brings up a very very interesting topic
Speaker 1: and one that I'm sure many of us have encountered
Speaker 1: at some point to another, and that is the person
Speaker 1: in charge of raising us, guiding us. Our primary caregiver
Speaker 1: was anything but nice to us, and we want to
Speaker 1: hold them responsible for the hurt, the harm, the danger
Speaker 1: that they did, even if they did the best they could.
Speaker 1: It's hard for us to see that. I have so
Speaker 1: much compassion for my guests today, and I truly understand
Speaker 1: exactly where she's coming from, because when what you receive
Speaker 1: from your primary caregiver is trashed, you really don't want
Speaker 1: to consider the effort that they put in to give
Speaker 1: it to you. But sometimes people simply don't have the capacity.
Speaker 1: They don't have the capacity to give us anything more
Speaker 1: than they've given us an Our job, for our healing,
Speaker 1: it's not to ruminate over what we didn't get or
Speaker 1: how we got what we did get. Our job is
Speaker 1: to dig within deep enough to be able to say
Speaker 1: thank you, even for the trash, thank you for what
Speaker 1: I got, even though I don't like how I got it.
Speaker 1: Thank you because without that person and that trash, who
Speaker 1: knows where you'd be today. I hope this has been
Speaker 1: helpful to someone, And if you have a question about
Speaker 1: this or any other relationship issue, you can call me
Speaker 1: live at seven seven five three zero seven seven seven
Speaker 1: sixty eight. Now be sure to follow me on social
Speaker 1: media for all of the calling times, and until then,
Speaker 1: stay in peace and not pieces. The R Spot is
Speaker 1: a production of Shondaland Audio in partnership with iHeartRadio. For
Speaker 1: more podcasts from Shondaland Audio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast,
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.