Navigating the stormy seas of grief isn’t easy, especially when Veterans Day comes calling without my father. His brave service during the Vietnam War and the subsequent exposure to Agent Orange left indelible marks not only on his health but also on our family. This week, I open up about the bittersweet memories that Veterans Day brings, and the immense courage my father showed by moving to the United States to build a new life as a surgeon. His legacy of resilience guides me through the ebbs and flows of sorrow and serves as a source of strength and inspiration.
Joined by Denise, we discuss how taking small, deliberate steps can help manage grief’s unpredictable waves. Even when faced with overwhelming sadness, it’s crucial to grasp those fleeting moments of joy and let them shine through. It’s a heartfelt conversation that aims to offer solidarity and comfort to those tangled in their own grief, while seeking purpose and light amidst the darkness. Let’s walk this path together, honoring the past and shaping a future filled with hope and resilience.
Transcript:
Speaker 1:
If you’ve ever struggled with fear, doubt or worry and wondering what your true purpose was all about, then this podcast is for you. In this show, your host, sylvia Worsham, will interview elite experts and ordinary people that have created extraordinary lives. So here’s your host, sylvia Worsham.
Speaker 2:
Hey, Lightbringers, it’s Sylvia Worsham. Welcome to Released Out Revealed Purpose. In this episode we’re going to be referencing my interview with Denise, but I’m also going to be talking a great deal about doing the baby steps to get past your grief, especially when your grief threatens to bring you down, as it has for me this week. This week was tough because on Veterans Day it was my first Veterans Day that I could not reach out to my father and thank him for his service and it was also bittersweet in that because of that service, my dad ended up getting exposed to Agent Orange and ended up developing a meningioma, which is a brain tumor in the meninges part of the brain. In his case it was on the brainstem.
Speaker 2:
So even though it wasn’t a malignant brain tumor, it was malignant in the position of the tumor and at the time that they caught it in 2001, it was the size of a golf ball, so it was really big. And what they didn’t know at the time was the tumor was wrapped up main arteries and veins of the body. So when they went in there to remove it in 2003, it was an extensive surgery and it was a miraculous surgery in that my father did not die on the operating table and he could have easily. So we know that God’s protection and God’s providence was there During the two days of surgery. He had the first surgery lasting eight hours and then the second surgery at 16 hours, so in total 24 hours surgery. So when you know all these details and you know that his choice to go to Vietnam caused, like directly caused a meningioma that ultimately took his life, and that was a tumor that just kept coming back. No matter how many times they removed it, it just kept coming back and life is a series of trade-offs, isn’t it?
Speaker 2:
It truly is a series of choices and trade-offs, and in his case he traded off all of that. That occurred for the opportunity to move to this country from Mexico and build his medical practice. And the first question they had asked him at the police office because my father came through legal channels they asked him if he was willing to fight in Vietnam. And he knew and he said it multiple times intuitively that if he had said no he would have been denied the visa. So he says yes. And then this was in 1967 when he came to this country. In 1968, he goes back to Mexico, marries my mother, and then they move to Chicago, illinois, and he starts his residency there at St Elizabeth’s Hospital. And let’s see, they get married in March of 68, and in October of 69 is when he gets drafted into Vietnam and they don’t want him as a soldier, they want him as a surgeon. That’s what my father was a surgeon as a soldier. They want him as a surgeon, and that’s what my father was a surgeon.
Speaker 2:
And of course, in those years is when the US government decides to use Agent Orange to clear the fields and they get exposed and he comes back with tumors, those veterans in those years it has been determined that Agent Orange was a direct link and cause of their tumors. A lot of them ended up with the same kind of tumor. My father had others brain cancer, others Parkinson’s disease. I mean all sorts of neurological complications, and that’s not the end of it. Their children, because it changed their DNA, their children because it changed their DNA, their children, um, and that I ended up with medical complications. My sister too, my brother it’s a lot of their children ended up with complications, and so it doesn’t end there.
Speaker 2:
So because this week was veterans, the week the Veterans Day fell on, my grief was at an all-time high and, like we discussed in the interview on Tuesday I it can take a toll on you. It comes in these massive waves and it hits out of nowhere, and on that day my energy was very low, I was very quiet, I was very sad. I needed to inject more moments of joy and that’s why I’m dressed the way I’m dressed. I have played pickleball every morning of this week for at least two hours, an hour and a half at times, or sometimes even two hours. And I’ve done that purposely because when grief hits so hard. It can take you down if you let it, if you’re not aware of it and how it hits you and how it brings you down, and both Denise and I were very frank on our interview. We both felt like imposters, because we’re both faith-based coaches, and it’s really hard to show up in life when you yourself are being hit by these human emotions that tear you apart, and it’s shocking when it hits so hard, and it’s shocking that, with all the training we’ve received and I received it from the John Maxwell team you’re seeing my visor on. I love this visor because it helps me play very well and it keeps my hair out of my face, and it reminds me that I’m part of the team the John Maxwell team as a life coach, but it also reminds me that I’m human the John Maxwell team as a life coach but it also reminds me that I’m human. You know that I I also feel imposter syndrome. I feel vulnerable at times and I feel like it can they can take me down if I let it.
Speaker 2:
The first step, though, in moving forward in anything in your life through the grief is being aware of the grief and how it hits you and when it hits you In my case, my energy gets very low. I get quieter, which is a scary thing because I’m always talking, I’m a talker, and when I get quiet most people think oh, she’s mad. I have a real serious face. I don’t smile, I look pissed off, but I was actually very sad this week and I would tear up very easily. And I would tear up very easily and I started watching more shows on TV because it’s my way of escaping the pain that I’m feeling inside. Here’s what I’m going to stop you right there and say take an inventory of how you’re escaping your pain and choose differently and choose differently. So what I did is I saw it, I was aware of it and I injected more moments of joy, because pickleball brings me joy and it also releases a lot of these feelings, pent-up feelings that I have inside of me the anger, the frustration, the sadness all that comes spilling out of me in every hit I take of that wiffle ball and it feels good right.
Speaker 2:
So being aware of it, how it shows up and how you’re avoiding feeling the grief and the pain, is step one, and then having a plan of action to address it. So what I’ve leaned into this week is feeling the feelings because when it hit me it hit me at three o’clock in the morning the day precede like after Veterans Day. So the Veterans Day had just occurred and then that evening I just couldn’t go to sleep and I went outside to go watch some TV and interestingly enough, it didn’t work and I felt like it was God’s way of saying deal with your pain, stop avoiding it. So I went back inside my bedroom and I went to the bathroom and I closed the door and I just sat there and sobbed. I just could not. I felt all the feels. I allowed the grief to come and I dealt with it by feeling the grief and sobbing and releasing.
Speaker 2:
And I had a plan in place. I knew I needed to be very close to God this week, so I upped my time in my war room, I sat and read scripture and I got on my Bible Recap a little app that helps me read the Bible, digested by reviewing a video that Terri Lee Cobble reviews the chapter with me on and just kind of talking to him and saying I need your help and submitting my grief to God, totally submitting, surrendering this grief and asking for help. And I’ve reached out to a couple of friends this week and I’ve actually told my husband about it because I wanted him to be aware that I’m extra sensitive this week. It informs us and gives me a little bit more grace, because my anger and my frustration would come out and I may not even realize it. And it’s because my grief is so significantly felt this particular week. And I know, as the holidays are showing up, coming up, I know those are also going to be hits, and so now it’s having a plan in place, doing more exercise, doing more spiritual work, maybe journaling, you know, getting some of these feelings out. And luckily, this is.
Speaker 2:
What’s really interesting about god’s timing is I am starting therapy session, individual therapy sessions, because there are some things that I feel within me that I’m not dealt with, in particular the belief systems that were formed when I was in high school and being bullied. There are feelings of inadequacy that are showing up in my relationships with others that I want to just nip in the bud. And I know, believe me, I’ve been down this road many times. I know it’s going to be interesting, it’s not going to feel good, there’s going to be days. I’m not going to want to do this, but I know that when I push past the deception of my mind, because your mind will throw deception. It will try to get you out of doing these things that are very good for you and it will trick you. It will trick you and the problem with deception is that it’s very convincing. That’s your ego identity, what I claim, or call the ego identity, in my best-selling book, in Faith I Thrive.
Speaker 2:
The ego will come in within about two weeks, a week, maybe sometimes even a month after a change you’re making, maybe sometimes even a month after a change you’re making, and it will start to mess with you. It will call into question what you’re doing. It will call you names. It will tell you to quit. However, you just have to be aware of how those thoughts show up for you. In my case, it’s going to make me not want to be close to God, and some of you are probably thinking well, that might be. You know the evil one. It could very easily be On the neuro-linguistic part of the programming and the way the mind works. It is the ego identity coming into recabic. So let’s review the steps. It’s being aware of how these changes are affecting you.
Speaker 2:
In my case, my grief was very significant. This week it showed up, I started to want to watch more Netflix shows in order to avoid and escape my pain. It’s very common in deception that’s how it shows up for me and it’s a pattern of behavior and it’s usually tied to a feeling of of sadness in my case, with grief, it’s kind of attached to it and so now that I know that it’s attached to it, it’s like okay, it’s there, I’m aware of it having a plan in place. How am I going to inject a little bit more joy in my life? How am I going to address this pain and not avoid it? And I address it by talking to God and asking friends to help me. And, lastly, is like I’m actually looking forward to my therapy sessions because I know they’re going to get to the root of what is really bothering me and it’s also going to help me address a slight case, possibly, of PTSD from from my father’s death, because there was some trauma there that needs to be cleared.
Speaker 2:
Because what I’m doing is I’m getting ahead of this and I’m doing it very purposely. It’s a preemptive strike, because I know how my mind is and I know how it works, and that’s the beauty of doing as many trainings as I’ve done in my life and being a life coach, and having that awareness, that knowledge, knowledge, that wisdom gained through life experiences that I’ve had. That that’s what’s awesome about all of this and my training with the John Maxwell team. I I learned so much from all those trainings and I did so many and I continue to do them because they’re good for my health, for my growth mindset, for my focus, mindset for my focus in life, and I will continue to do it till the day I die.
Speaker 2:
I’m always looking forward to more wisdom and more knowledge, and I find myself staying even more curious, even when it’s not fun to stay curious, because it’s things that I need to work on myself and that are affecting my relationships with my spouse, with my kids, with my parents, even deceased or not. I’m staying curious because I want to break that cycle. I want to keep going back to the same way of operating. It doesn’t help me, it doesn’t help my, my growth, it keeps me stuck, and so I am pushing past the ego identity as it shows up. So I’m Sylvia Worsham. Thank you so much for tuning in and listening to how we address these chapters of change, this grief. What are the steps I’m taking to move forward in my grief, actually face my pain and and and move through it through submitting and surrendering to God. Have a wonderful week, stay safe. Love y’all bye now.
Speaker 1:
So that’s it for today’s episode of release. Doubt reveal purpose. Head on over iTunes or wherever you listen and subscribe to the show. One lucky listener every single week who posts a review on iTunes will win a chance in the grand prize drawing to win a $25,000 private VIP day with Sylvia Worsham herself. Be sure to head on over to ReleaseDoubtRevealPurpose.com and pick up a free copy of Sylvia’s gift and join us on the next episode.