Finding Light After Loss: How Lynda Rebuilt Her Life and Inner Glow

[00:00:06] Hey there listeners, welcome to Shit That Goes Under Our Heads, the podcast where we normalize conversations around mental health. That's right. I'm Dirty Skittles and alongside my amazing co-host, you Rex, we are here to share stories and tips from our incredible guests. Each episode, we deep dive into struggles and triumphs of mental health, offering practical advice and heartfelt support. Because no one should feel alone in their journey. Join us as we break the stigma and build a community of understanding and compassion.

[00:00:35] Tune in and let's start talking about the shit that goes on in our heads. One, welcome back to another episode of Shit That Goes On In Our Heads. I'm here with my amazing co-host, Dirty Skittles. And today we have an awesome guest, Linda. Thank you, thank you, thank you, Linda, for joining us today.

[00:00:59] I am so honored to be here. I literally, you know, I was like the other day I was thinking to myself, I'm like, oh my God, I'm so nervous. And I'm like, this is just stupid. Just, you know, whatever. Just be yourself. It's a place of support for people. Let's be real. Let's be, you know, as normal as I can possibly be, which is not necessarily very normal.

[00:01:25] So T-Rex knows that. She was on my podcast that I had for the shortest period of time. But, but yeah, just, I'm just honored to be here. So thank you guys so much for having me as a guest. This is a safe space. You can talk about literally anything, judgment-free zone. I'm excited to get to know you. I love your dream catcher in the background. Are those crystals behind you too?

[00:01:48] There is. I make crystal energy bracelets and I sell them on Etsy. I've been doing it since 2020, actually. So it's called Linda's Lovely Looks. They're not really looks. I don't know. Just the name all just kind of went together. It just does. So yeah. So I sell bracelets on there. I've been doing that for almost four and a half years now. But yeah, that's a little minor, little mini part of my story.

[00:02:13] I'm trying to get into crystals. I'm going to tell this because I find this hilarious. So I've been going through a lot of change in my life with just every aspect, right? And I went to New England and at the time I was talking to a colleague and I was like, you know, nothing is going right. I'm kind of like making mistakes left and right. I'm like, I think I need to get a crystal. And we're in Salem. Which just feels like the right time to do it.

[00:02:39] So I got all these crystals, came home, fucking lost the crystals. Remember T-Rex? I was like, okay, I think we had like an eclipse or something. And I'm like, oh, maybe I should pull out the crystals and put them on the window. So I couldn't find them for anything. Then I go into like the depths of the worst that it had been for me for a while. And I found it to be very therapeutic to rip apart my office, right?

[00:03:07] So we're like, we're going to completely renovate the office. And as I was taking stuff out, there were the fucking crystals. They just appeared. And I was like, it's a sign. I found the crystals as I'm transforming this space. Absolutely. Absolutely. I believe that though. I truly believe that. I mean, the universe does stuff like that. Puts things in place for you when you need them. You know? I agree. I agree. That's cool. That's so cool.

[00:03:37] Yeah. Now I've got them and I promised myself to never lose them again. Are they in your window now? No, because I don't have a window. So remember we like, we have, we're down to the studs. We're rebuilding as we speak, like putting in insulation and drywall and blah, blah, blah, blah. I mean, the whole thing. Right. Right. Super therapeutic. Oh yeah. Super therapeutic. Yeah. Like ripping shit apart. Hell yeah. The demo of it all. It was everything. I'm like working. And just cleaning, right? Like just cleaning your space up or whatever.

[00:04:07] Decluttering. I am such a, I always have like shit everywhere. There's always, I don't know. It feels like I've done it before where I've redecorated a room and I'm like, I'm just going to be a minimalist. I'm just going to have one picture there. One lamp over there. And I can't do it. I'm like, oh my God, it's way too bad. I need to find it. And then all of a sudden, before you know it, everything is up everywhere again. Yeah. Decluttering is a bit difficult for me, but it does, at least if you organize, I think that helps. Right. Yeah.

[00:04:37] Yeah. I don't think so. Because if somebody comes in and moves shit in my office, I get mad. Listen, everything has its place. It may look cluttered in here and maybe it is, but don't move my shit. Okay. Because then I lose track of where I actually laid a piece of paper. But if you do it yourself, then you know where you've put it, right? You know. Don't move the piece of paper. No. Do not move it. No. Absolutely not.

[00:05:07] Because, yeah, that could really become a big problem, like a war or something. I don't even know what the fuck I'm talking about. Am I allowed to swear? I just swore. Fuck yes. Yeah. Okay. Thank God. Yes, we do fucking swear on this podcast. You know what, though? I think that there is, if you're comfortable in your space, like who fucking cares, right? If you're happy in that space and your soul is happy, it doesn't matter what, you know,

[00:05:37] other people think it should look like. That's right. And if it's not, and if it's not a common room, right? If it's your own room, like your own office or your own bedroom. Yeah. Okay. Nobody comes in there anyway. Right. Really? Okay. Yes, I get it. I should probably put my clothes away. But do I want to? No. Like it's not in my energy circle. Yeah. But I love when I remember that when you and I did our, when I did my interview on your

[00:06:05] podcast, you know, we talked about so many different things. But what I loved is that you dive into so many different things. And like you've been through your own shit, like some serious shit in your life. But you always find ways to show your heart through everything you do. And that's the one thing that I really took away from that. And we became lifelong friends after that.

[00:06:31] I mean, you know, I think that the crazy part of it is that sometimes when we talk or whatever, and it'll be a video chat and we're just like so stupid and like the things that come out of our mouths or whatever, but it's, there's, it's truly the, one of the most incredible friendships that I've, I've formed. I'm just so blessed that you came into my life because I know that you're real. I know that you're love.

[00:07:01] You know what I mean? And you know that of me too. You know that I love you and that I am there for you as your friend for life. For sure. Just, yeah. Crazy. And that's really why I wanted to have you on our podcast is because you've gone through so much in your life. And every time I see you, you're smiling. And even through all the hard, really hard stuff, you remind us that like, even when we're going

[00:07:29] through really shitty shit, we can still smile. Right. And we can still be kind. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Does that want me to start sharing my story? Yeah. I was going to say for people like me who don't know your story, what are you comfortable sharing? I am literally an open book. I hate false pretenses. I hate pretending to be something I'm not. What you see is what you get. So is it perfect? No.

[00:07:59] Will it ever be perfect? No. But I do the best I can. So yeah, I guess let me start by seeing that the first thing that's coming to my mind is yesterday was my son Ryan's birthday. And Ryan, sheet. I'm allowed to cry too. Yes. Yes. Okay. So Ryan passed away on December 6, 2021. So he was 35.

[00:08:29] So yesterday would have been his 39th birthday. And that's the toughest fucking thing I've ever had to do in my life. The toughest thing I've ever had to do. Losing my baby. He passed away from severe alcoholic cirrhosis of the liver.

[00:08:49] And I think that's something that is super important to let people know that somebody that young can die of cirrhosis of the liver. Because my son is an example. It wasn't fake, you know. He's struggled for years and years with anxiety and depression and agoraphobia.

[00:09:17] So just a lot of mental health issues. A lot of mental health issues. And alcoholism goes in our family. Like, I mean, whether it's because of our Irish roots, I don't want to label all the Irish people as being alcoholics. But, you know, it just, there's a lot of alcoholism in our family. And I too was a functioning alcoholic. I have been sober now nine and a half years. So my sobriety date. Thank you. My sobriety date is July 15.

[00:09:46] So, yeah, it'll be 10 years in this July. But, yeah, losing Rye was just crazy. It just, the last time I had seen him was Father's Day of 2021. And it was, you know, of course, during COVID times and what have you. And you, he was estranged from his daughter. So he has a 14-year-old daughter. But he was estranged from her because of his alcoholism, basically.

[00:10:16] And then I have another son who has his family who had just had a baby in March of 2020. So we've got these two different fam, three different families, all with different views of the whole COVID thing and masking and vaccinations and what have you.

[00:10:35] So as a result, I kind of had to, like, do two-week intervals between sort of seeing everybody so that I kept everybody, that my husband and I kept everybody safe. And Ryan, unfortunately, was always on the bottom end of all of that because I had to put my grandchildren first. So we saw him for Father's Day. And when he showed up, his eyes were neon yellow.

[00:11:04] And I remember looking at him and going, oh, my God, Ryan, that's your liver, honey. He said, Mom, you're scaring me. And I said, I know, baby. I said, but that's not right. And then his girlfriend, who I later found out had issues with alcohol as well, and I had no idea the whole entire time. She said, I knew you were going to say that. She said, it's his gallbladder. And I'm like, okay.

[00:11:34] And I could tell Ryan was scared. And I'm like, you know what? Let's just drop this. Just let it go or whatever. So I kept in touch with him throughout the summer. But six months later, he was dead. You know, this is Father's Day. And now December 6th, he's gone. And in that time, I never video chatted with him because he would always say, you know, oh, the room's a mess or something. He always makes up excuses. But I know, damn, it was because if I saw his eyes, I would know it was still going on.

[00:12:04] But he basically said that it was gone. And I believed him. But so, yeah, that was the biggest thing of my life. That was the hardest thing I've had to deal with. It just, no mother should lose their child. You know? Yeah. It just is awful. And it doesn't matter how old they are. It's just awful.

[00:12:36] But I'll go back a little bit. When I was a kid, I don't remember an awful lot of my childhood because I lived in a home that there was a ton of partying that went on. And there were things that I was uncomfortable about when I was a kid. There's memories that are foggy. But maybe something happened sexually. I don't know.

[00:13:03] I remember hiding in my closet a lot as a little girl. And my dad would, like, throw things and fight with my mom. And I was scared a lot. So, in a nutshell, it was just not a good environment growing up. And then moving into my teens, I remember the first episode for me with alcohol. I was probably 16 years old, I'd say.

[00:13:32] And had a blackout drunk. And I don't know whether or not, I don't even remember anything about it. But the next thing I know is that I was home in my bed without any clothes on. And I did find out that my dad had picked me up and brought me home. But I have no idea what went on. I mean, that's terrifying. Absolutely terrifying. I don't know if I was drugged or no idea. But anyway, just not a very good scene.

[00:14:02] And I didn't, I don't recall really drinking anything after that. But when I got to be about 18 or whatever, I would drink out party with everybody else, just normal. And then I think after I had my kids is really when I was home. And so at nighttime, I would drink. And not every night, but I would, I was depressed.

[00:14:25] I was trying to, the word, forget about all this stuff from the past. What's that? Suppress it. Yeah, suppress it, right? And so I would, you know, I would just drink at night or whatever. And like I say, not every night. And I mean, I was a good mom. I mean, the best that I could be, I guess. And, you know, I ended up having a career. And then I got a career in the wine industry.

[00:14:54] Great place for a person who is an alcoholic to become an employee of. But that also really was a contributing factor, I think, to Ryan too. Because in our basement, we had a wine cellar. And so there was wine, right? It wasn't locked. It was like a, like a fruit cellar, you know, like a big, bigger room, not a proper fancy wine cellar or anything like that.

[00:15:20] There were some like wooden shelves or whatever, you know, I ain't no fancy girl. But anyway, yeah, so he had drank lots of wine from there or whatever. But so anyway, I continued on drinking. And, and then one night, oh God, I don't know if I really want to get into too many details just so to not hurt the other person. But basically, I went after somebody in my car drunk. I never drove drunk ever.

[00:15:47] I made a conscious, you know, practice to always say, okay, I'll have one or maybe two, depending on how long I'm at this place or whatever. But that would be it, right? Like just never do it. Anyway, I was drunk. And I ended up going after this person in my car because I love them so much. It was a whole fucking setup. Let me just tell you this. I did not know that at the time. It was brutal. I can't even believe they did this to me.

[00:16:15] But anyway, so I was, I drove down the street and I hit a parked car in a driveway. Like I hit a nice one. It was like a BMW or something. It was like, oh, shit. If you're going to hit something, you might as well hit something nice, I guess. I don't know. But anyway, no. So it just was like, I got arrested. I got put in jail.

[00:16:42] It was the most embarrassing, horrific thing that had ever happened to me. I was just, what? I couldn't believe it. I literally couldn't believe it. So that was it. I quit drinking, obviously. The next day that I, was my sobriety day. I never drank again. Total wake up call. It just, it blew my mind that if you could do something and like basically be in a blackout state,

[00:17:12] because I don't really remember getting into the car and I don't remember the details of it all kind of thing. Right. But if you could do something like that, I don't deserve to drink. I don't deserve, it is poison to my body is what I say. You know, it's just, it's not something that I can do. So I quit. So there was something else I was going to say about that, but I don't remember what it was now. Was it hard? So like next day, stop? You know what?

[00:17:39] The ironic part about it is that we were actually going to go on a family vacation, a family reunion thing. And, you know, my husband and my other son, they were like, just mom, you could just, don't worry about it. It's okay. You know, shit happens, whatever. I'm like, I'm never, ever drinking again, ever. That's, I could have killed somebody. If I had gone out onto that main street, like, I could have killed someone.

[00:18:09] You never know, right? I just had no way in hell am I ever drinking again. And yeah, no, it wasn't hard. I just stopped. I didn't, I mean, eventually, I think a few weeks later, I went to AA, which I found, I was terrified in the very beginning. But I found it to be helpful. But then after a while, I thought, meh, this is not really my thing. So I stopped. But yeah, I just, you know, different people go through different things and deal with their sobriety in different ways.

[00:18:39] There's lots of different ways that you can do it. But for me, I just went, whole turkey stopped. And that was that. What did you do for your mental health during that time, though? Were you like constantly beating yourself up? Or were you? Oh, yeah. Completely. Completely. I wouldn't. So, of course, I didn't have, I wasn't able to drive. I lost my license. And then when I finally was able to get my license back, however many months later, I had that stupid blower thing in the car.

[00:19:08] Oh, my God. And I remember going out for a dinner with friends this one night. And I was the DD. And I hated this thing because it was so touchy or whatever, right? If you didn't do it just right, it wouldn't start. And it was like pretty new, I think, that I had it. And so the two guys are outside of the car. And I'm trying to start the thing. And my friend is in the passenger seat. And she's freaking drunk.

[00:19:37] And she's like, look, if you just end up like, oh, my gosh. I'm not going to blow in it for Christ's sake. The bloody engine would probably blow up. Oh, my God. It was so fun. But that was a disaster. That was horrible to deal with. But yeah, I, the whole time leading up until the time that I was able to get my license back to drive or whatever, even with the blower, I took the bus everywhere. And I wouldn't let anybody drive me to the bus stop or pick me up from the bus stop.

[00:20:07] I just, I literally beat myself up so bad. And when did you learn to let it go? It's, I don't know. I don't know. I think I just, I don't know that I ever did, really. I think we're all a work in progress, right? I think we all still have our stuff that, and I've realized that about a couple of other things that I'll talk about in a sec.

[00:20:35] But I think there's stuff inside of me that I just still have not processed and just still have not dealt with. And it's really just more so a newer thing that I'm doing now that I'm starting to heal those things, you know? Yeah, so this is 2015. And I guess we just kind of coasted along doing whatever for the next few years.

[00:20:59] And then 2018 was, I ended up finding, I had a pain in the female region. And every time I went to go pee, it hurt like crazy. And so this was, this went on for, I don't even remember, like May or something like that of 2018, all the way through to the fall.

[00:21:28] And then finally, I ended up going to see a specialist. And they said, okay, we're going to have to do surgery because they had tried some other methods or whatever, but we're going to have to do surgery. And after the surgery, they said, okay, we've sent the stuff in for a biopsy. And I went back. So when I actually had the surgery, it was like a couple of days before Christmas.

[00:21:53] I went back a couple of weeks later, they had lost my biopsy. Oh my God. Yeah. What the fuck? I know. So then I had to make another appointment and had to wait another two weeks. So now it's the end of January. And I go in and they tell me I have vulvar cancer. And I'm like, okay.

[00:22:22] And so now they've scheduled me to have all the lymph nodes removed on either side of the groin. So that was actually kind of a funny thing. Because then I had dream balls hanging off my stomach, which was... Dream balls? Drain. Oh, drain. I was like, what is a dream ball? I was like, let's talk about that. They were not dreaming. It was not a dream ball. Okay. Drain. These drain balls hanging down.

[00:22:50] And oh my good God, what a freaking thing. So there was that. And so then I ended up having to have 33 rounds of radiation. No chemo. So that was 2018. Or 2019, I should say at this point now. And just I had to leave my job. I was a sales manager at the Ashley home store near me. And there's just no way I could do it.

[00:23:20] I just drained. Like literally drained from the like no energy or whatever. And so at that time is when I started picking up crystals. And I started like finding out about the energy of crystals. I actually ended up... So then Ryan passed actually then in December 6, 2021. And I became a crystal healing practitioner. And I took a course from two different schools.

[00:23:46] And then I ended up becoming a Reiki master. And all of these things, I'm just like in my heart. I'm knowing that at that time I was realizing I was distracting myself from reality. From what happened. That I had cancer. That I had, you know, had the whole thing with the sobriety or whatever. And losing Ryan.

[00:24:12] I was keeping myself so busy by just constantly doing and not facing the truth of anything. And but I also realized too that this was not something that I wanted to offer up after all to other people. It wasn't what I was supposed to do. So now in the last, I don't know, four months I guess or three months or so. So I had stumbled across this happiness coach.

[00:24:41] And I went, huh, this is what I want to do. I want to make people find their happiness again. If I could go through all these shitty times. And people have been through worse shitty times than I have. But these were some pretty shitty times.

[00:25:09] And if I could come out of it and do my best to find happiness somehow, some way. Then I can help other people too. And so literally today I just opened my website called Inner Glow Rising. And it's for anybody who's been through shitty times in their lives.

[00:25:38] Like that have just, that are struggling and just, like I had a lady yesterday message me saying, I'm lonely. I have no more friends. I have no family. And I'm just dealing with loneliness and isolation. There's so many people out there that are like this. There's so many people out there that are, have struggles, are going through struggles. Who have lost a child. Who have lost a spouse. Who've gotten divorced. Who are going through cancer.

[00:26:08] Whatever the circumstances might be. There's, life is hard. I mean, I'm not a therapist. But I'm a human being with a heart that just wants to help other people know that they're loved. And if we come together as a community and support one another, we can help each other heal. We can help each other find our inner glow again. Right? So yeah. That's me in a nutshell. Man.

[00:26:39] That is, first of all, I didn't know happiness coach was a thing. I know. It is. I'm like, oh. I have a certificate if you want her. Look it. Hey, what? She got her certificate. I got my certificate. I know you can't see this on the video, but. Oh. That's really cool. It reminds me of when I was a little kid. This is going to sound depressing. I don't mean for it to sound depressing. But as a little kid, every birthday, what I would wish for was happiness.

[00:27:08] And so when you said a happiness coach, I'm like, oh shit. If younger me would have known that there are people that could specifically help you to feel happy, wish for something else, you know? Yeah, exactly. But I think the thing is, I don't want it. That's the one thing is that I think I've realized is that I am not doing this from a coaching perspective. I mean, that's not my thing. I feel that's too, I don't know, teacher-like and I wasn't very good in school.

[00:27:36] So I don't want to be a teacher. I just want to be a person, the facilitator for something, you know? And so that's just what I want to do. But throughout the course, there were like tips and tricks and stuff like that that you can do for different things. And so I thought, okay, we could do that. We could implement that. Even if it's just, hey, an affirmation for the day. Let's, you know, whatever, positive energy stuff, right? So yeah, so that's where, that's where I'm going to lead it.

[00:28:04] And I love that because you're not only doing it for yourself, right? But you're like a genuine, like happy person, even through all the shit that you've dealt with. And, you know, in the last 10 years, it comes through you and you're like a lighthouse. Like you, you, wait a minute, that's not a good thing. Yeah, but you know what? If I'm the lighthouse, I'm, I could be like a beacon warning people to stay away from the shore.

[00:28:35] But I don't want to do that. I, I, I interpreted it as, oh, that's the light I needed. Like I'm attracted to the light. Maybe I'm right. Like a moth. Yeah. Like a little light outside. Exactly. I'll be a lamppost. There it is. You're, you're tall enough to win one. I'm not really that tall. I'm tall compared to you though. You know, she's a little angel is what I call her. It's true. A yard light.

[00:29:04] Oh God. But yeah, I don't know. That's yeah. So I'm going to keep busy like doing my crystal bracelets, which really brings me so much joy because I feel like, you know, like I do them for all different things. Like for cancer support, I'm kidney support, lung support. There's heartache and grief, anxiety, depression. I have seasonal depression one with the sunstone one.

[00:29:32] I have, of course, sobriety and addiction support. There's so many. There's just so many that I have on there. And when I see the comments of that people say, it just makes my heart feel so good to know that it's helped somebody, right? Like I just had this lady, she bought cancer support bracelets. She's a cancer patient. And so she bought them for all of her family and friends so that they're all united and

[00:29:57] they're all wearing a cancer support bracelet in to support her. And I thought, wow, what a nice idea, you know? So that just, it's, it makes me feel good, makes my heart feel good. And it's making somebody else feel good. So it's a double win. And that's exactly what this inner glow rising is about too. It's this double win of just, we all win. We all find this glow again, you know?

[00:30:27] Like I'm so excited about it. I'm just so excited. I love that you found it for yourself and you're willing to share it with others. Like I think that's beautiful. And kind of going back to what you said before, we can all help each other out and you're practicing what you preach. So I think that's really beautiful. It's so funny because like I was in this group chat or whatever, not long ago, it was all talking about the new moon and we were, and I was talking about what I was like intending to do. I said, oh my God, I'm so scared.

[00:30:56] Just like anything, you start anything. You guys were probably the same when you were starting your podcast, right? You're probably like, ah, it's Oscar. What are we doing? Very little drunk to be honest. No, just kidding. Oh, that doesn't sound right at all. Phoenix doesn't drink. Just shoot. We've grown a lot since then. I'm teasing you, honey. But yeah. And so they were, I mean, they were just amazing, but they were like, just do it. Do it. Stop waiting for it to be perfect.

[00:31:27] Stop waiting for it to be whatever. Just be genuine and just do it. And I really, my podcast was like that. That's when I was in sales my entire life. I was, that's, I was just a real person in that. And so I'm just like, you're right. I'm just going to do it. And if there's something that doesn't work out properly, oh, it'll fix itself. It's fine. The way it's meant to be. Right? Yeah.

[00:31:57] Yeah. It's like the rest of life. You know what? Just fucking wing it. Yeah. Right? Because you can't say, oh, it didn't work if you never tried. Right. Just give it a try. Yeah. Exactly. And I'll be your biggest cheerleader. Like, you know. You really are. I'll cheer for you. You're like. I'll just cheer for you. G-Rex is number one supporter of anything. Like, I could be like, I'm going to, I mean, I sometimes joke with her. I'm like, I'm going to start a Footfinders page and G-Rex is number one subscriber. You're good. You got this. A footfinder? A footfinder.

[00:32:28] A footfinder. A footfinder. A footfinder. A footfinder. No, have you heard of those fans? It's for other people to find your feet, you know? What? I don't understand. Oh my God. Have you heard of what is it? For fans? Like, they do like feet pictures or they do. I can already tell this is getting edited out of this. No, don't be skittles just lose me. I need to probably become more. Look, I have an almost 15 year old granddaughter that hangs around here a lot. So if this is something I need to know about.

[00:32:57] It is. I don't think it's what you need to know about, but I'll tell you what it is. Okay. It is a lovely site where people can post photos of their feet or toes. Okay. There's other people who want to see those types of photos. Yes. And you want to post your toes? I don't, but I do joke with G-Rex as that's my backup plan. If the just do it things that I'm doing don't work.

[00:33:26] You're going to post pictures of feet. Well, shit. I'll join you. Yes. If my inner horizon doesn't work, I'm getting a pedicure and I'm going to post pictures. Exactly. Right? Perfect. And people pay to see these pictures. They do. It is a job. What the heck? Oh my God. I need to look into this. Oh my God. I can just, my granddaughter's going to be like, oh no. Oh, I can't wait. You're going to be like, have you ever heard of feet finder?

[00:33:54] I swear she's going to know and she's going to be like, she's going to be dying. Yeah. Last time she's going to take your, she'll take your computer and your phone. Exactly. She will. Yeah. Okay. I have some of my favorite questions to ask you. Yeah. Okay. If you can go back in time to younger version of yourself and give that younger version some advice, what would you tell yourself and how old are you? You go back.

[00:34:24] You know what? I would go back to little, beautiful, smiling little Linda with her curly hair at five years old. I would say, you are strong and you are loved. And yeah, just so that she knew that. Next question. What would you say the hardest lesson you've had to learn so far in life is?

[00:34:55] Geez, that's a tough question. I, you know, you can't help, you can't make somebody do what they don't want to do. Life is their own life. It's their own journey. And you can try all you want, but it's up to them to make the decisions they are going to make. And yeah, there's nothing you can do about it.

[00:35:24] So just let it be. Let them learn whatever way they have to learn. It's hard. It's very hard. Very hard. Yeah. But it's true. We can't, you can't force somebody to do something they're not wanting to do, right? You can support them. You can't force them. Thank you. All right. So now I have a couple of questions for you. I'm not answering those. They're great. They're great, great questions.

[00:35:49] If your anxiety had a theme song, what would it be and why? Oh God, my anxiety? If it had a theme song. Jesus. It'd be like, I don't know. It's got to be loud, powerful and fucking scary as shit. What is it? I don't know. What would it be? It would be something like, I don't know. I'm not good at songs.

[00:36:19] Like I know songs when they come on the radio, but. Who is your favorite artist? Somebody you like listen to when you're like in an anxious state. The Bee Gees. Interesting. Interesting. Tragedy! What is this? I'll go with that. I'm going with that. Oh my God. First one that came out of my mouth. That's perfect. I love that. That was perfect. Okay. Now my other two questions.

[00:36:50] Okay. I got to stop laughing. That was perfect. What is, what do you do today for self-love and self-care? You know what I started to do. So I made a vision board this year. And I bought some dry erase markers or whatever, right? For the vision board. And now I am writing on the mirror in my bathroom.

[00:37:15] And I am writing affirmations or just like, you are loved. You are strong. Like just putting things in front of my face daily to remind myself that I'm worth it. Yeah. Yeah. That I'm okay. I'm worth it. I'm loved. And I have love to give.

[00:37:40] And so I'm just really trying to, it's very difficult for me, but trying to give myself as much self-love as I can. I freaking love that. Yeah, me too. So where can our listeners find you? Like at my house? Besides at the hole in the ground. Yes. At the hole in the ground. No, I guess the best place to find me. You know what?

[00:38:09] I think really right now I would say either Inner Glow Rising on Facebook or Inner Glow Rising 44 on Instagram. Four is the number that Ryan, 44 is the number that Ryan, my son, always, every time something comes around or whatever, I know it's Ryan when it's 44 or 444. So it's crazy.

[00:38:33] So Inner Glow Rising 44 on Instagram or Inner Glow Rising dot com, same name on Facebook. That's probably the best bet because then it'll just kind of link everything else, I think, everywhere else. So without complicating it all, just probably just keep it there because that's my newest adventure and my passion. So I think that's where I would like to direct people to. Yeah. I love that. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Linda, so much for being here.

[00:39:02] And I appreciate you sharing your story and being vulnerable with us. You know what the coolest thing was? I wasn't even anxious, so I didn't even have to sing Tragedy at all. So I'm still... That was why I was chuckling earlier. I could hear you. Perfect song. I love you guys. Thank you. So perfect. Thank you. Thank you for having me and allowing me to share my story because I think the more we share our stories, the more we help each other. Amen. Amen. Hi, all.

[00:39:31] Thank you so much for listening to this episode. I'm G-Rex. And I'm Dirty Skittles. Don't forget to subscribe, rate, and review this podcast. We'd love to listen to your feedback. We can't do this without you guys. It's okay to be not okay. Just make sure you're talking to someone. We'll see you next time. Bye.