Agoraphobia is a mental and behavioral disorder, specifically an anxiety disorder characterized by anxiety symptoms in situations where the person perceives their environment to be unsafe with no easy way to escape. These situations can include open spaces, public transit, shopping centers, or simply being outside their home.

Amy's mom died suddenly and unexpectedly when she was 11 of a massive heart attack. They were the best of friends a mother and daughter could be. As an only child of a single mom, it was just the two of them - until they weren't.

Amy found herself living with her Godmother and her Godmother's family. However, one day a series of events led to Amy being forced to turn over her key to safety and security and trade it for loneliness, homelessness, and insecurity. But that's not the whole story.

After years of bouncing around from shelter to shelter, Amy would later turn her life around. Without the support of family and only that of a few friends, Amy got her G.E.D., overcame agoraphobia, learned life skills for the first time, and discovered a path of service as a social worker.

Our conversation went to many places, including raising/mentoring/teaching kids, mental health challenges, and the fact that family isn't always blood - sometimes it's the people you choose.

RESOURCES:

• Ep. 65 Sirry Berndsen | The Spirit World Walks Among Us
• Complex PTSD

CONNECT:

• Once Upon a Nightmare Podcast on Facebook
• Once Upon a Nightmare Podcast on Instagram

 ______

NEED HELP?

• National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
• Crisis Text Line provides free, 24/7 support via text message. Text HOME to 741741 to connect with a trained Crisis Counselor

Send Victoria a text message!

Support the show

_______

NEED HELP?

• National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
• Crisis Text Line provides free, 24/7 support via text message. Text HOME to 741741 to connect with a trained Crisis Counselor

If you are struggling with grief due to any of the 40+ losses, free resources are available HERE.

CONNECT WITH VICTORIA:

• Instagram
• Website
• LinkedIn
• Facebook

This episode is sponsored by Do Grief Differently™️, my twelve-week, one-on-one, in-person/online program for grievers who have suffered any type of loss to feel better. Click here to learn new tools, grief education, and the only evidence-based method for moving beyond the pain of grief.

Would you like to join the mission of Grieving Voices in normalizing grief and supporting hurting hearts everywhere? Become a sup...

In this Takeaways & Reflections episode, I reflect on the importance of not grieving alone. We all need support through grief because, going it alone, keeps us stuck and ruminating on our grief. Connection to others is what gives a griever hope.

I also share in this episode how I took a long way around to find the right support for me and the impact that had on my own life and my grief.

If not now, when? And, if what you're doing now isn't working, then when will you seek something else that will keep moving you forward?

When we continue to do the same thing, we continue to get the same result. History repeats itself - even in grief.

Please utilize the numbers listed here in the show notes if you are having thoughts of suicide. And, if you would like a guide to light the path and aid you in clearing your own, my contact info is also listed below.

Connection is an antidote to grief; consider nurturing it within yourself and toward others.

RESOURCES:

• EP 96 Brent Scarpo
• FREE E-Books
• Energy Healing
• Biofield Tuning

 ______

NEED HELP?

• National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
• Crisis Text Line provides free, 24/7 support via text message. Text HOME to 741741 to connect with a trained Crisis Counselor

If you or anyone you know is struggling with grief due to any of the 40+ losses, free resources are available HERE.

Are you enjoying the podcast? Check out my bi-weekly newsletter, The Unleashed Letters.

💛 Would you like to Learn Your Energy Type? Free Quiz ➡️

Send Victoria a text message!

Support the show

_______

NEED HELP?

• National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
• Crisis Text Line provides free, 24/7 support via text message. Text HOME to 741741 to connect with a trained Crisis Counselor

If you are struggling with grief due to any of the 40+ losses, free resources are available HERE.

CONNECT WITH VICTORIA:

• Instagram
• Website
• LinkedIn
• Facebook

This episode is sponsored by Do Grief Differently™️, my twelve-week, one-on-one, in-person/online program for grievers who have suffered any type of loss to feel better. Click here to learn new tools, grief education, and the only evidence-based method for moving beyond the pain of grief.

Would you like to join the mission of Grieving Voices in normalizing grief and supporting hurting hearts everywhere? Become a sup...

Fear can hold you prisoner, hope can set you free. - The Shawshank Redemption

This week's guest, Brent Scarpo, was a casting director for one of the most acclaimed and beloved films of all time, "The Shawshank Redemption." Through his personal love of the film, he shares a few of his favorite lessons from the movie.

These lessons served him well as he grieved the loss of his best friend and mother to cancer. But a chance conversation with his mother years earlier would be the catalyst for comfort after she passed. They had agreed on a red balloon being the sign they would bring to the other so the one left behind would know there is life after death. They also created very specific rules around this sign and sealed the deal with handwritten letters preserving this conversation and plan in a sealed envelope that wouldn't be opened until after one of them passed away.

Through his grief, Brent found comfort and healing through group and one-on-one therapy as well. But, the Red Balloon has become a huge part of his existence, landing him on the Today Show, and soon a book releasing, very fittingly, on Mother's Day.

Brent offers many tips throughout this episode but there's one question you may be surprised to learn the answer to. What's the question? How do we learn to laugh again without the person we used to laugh with? The answer? You'll have to listen to find out!

RESOURCES:

• Brent Scarpo on The Today Show
• FindaGrave.com
• Tombstone Cleaning Tutorial
• James Van Praagh
• Ep 68 Ken Ross

CONNECT: 

• Website

______

NEED HELP?

• National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
• Crisis

Send Victoria a text message!

Support the show

_______

NEED HELP?

• National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
• Crisis Text Line provides free, 24/7 support via text message. Text HOME to 741741 to connect with a trained Crisis Counselor

If you are struggling with grief due to any of the 40+ losses, free resources are available HERE.

CONNECT WITH VICTORIA:

• Instagram
• Website
• LinkedIn
• Facebook

This episode is sponsored by Do Grief Differently™️, my twelve-week, one-on-one, in-person/online program for grievers who have suffered any type of loss to feel better. Click here to learn new tools, grief education, and the only evidence-based method for moving beyond the pain of grief.

Would you like to join the mission of Grieving Voices in normalizing grief and supporting hurting hearts everywhere? Become a sup...

What is your relationship with food? Would you say it's healthy? Does it leave you often feeling shameful? Does the self-critic lurk out from the shadows after you've eaten something that isn't deemed "healthy?"

I know I've left a drive-thru at times wondering why on earth I ever stopped, as I just feel like physical crap after eating something I know isn't serving me. Perhaps that is my intuition and my inner-knowing saying "I told you so!" Or, perhaps it's neither good nor bad; rather these are labels that, as a society, we've placed on food? Either way, shame is often a large part of our food relationship.

We often "eat our feelings," as the saying goes (which seems to be a buzz phrase nowadays), and then feel shameful for doing so. We may then eat, even more, bingeing and stuffing, only to feel like physical crap later or, as my guest from last week's podcast shared, develop an eating disorder.

Our food relationship starts in childhood. Whether you were forced to clean your plate, food was used as a reward, you grew up with food insecurity, food was part of a punishment, or became a means of control in body image - I guarantee that many of the patterns of behavior that existed with food in childhood, still exist in your adulthood. At the root of it, however, is grief.

I don't think this is a topic talked about as it relates to grief. So, I'm happy to share this week's episode and, I encourage you to listen to last week's episode as well. I will be talking about this again this fall with a therapist who struggled with an eating disorder as well. We dive into the topic of food and kids more in that episode coming up. Stay tuned!

In the meantime, after you listen to this week's episode, I encourage you to give some thought to how you feel about food and your relationship with it. Is it a means to survive or is it a means to thrive?

RESOURCES:

• EP 94 Hannah Howard | Food My Perfect Obsession
• EP The Manifestation of Grief

______

Send Victoria a text message!

Support the show

_______

NEED HELP?

• National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
• Crisis Text Line provides free, 24/7 support via text message. Text HOME to 741741 to connect with a trained Crisis Counselor

If you are struggling with grief due to any of the 40+ losses, free resources are available HERE.

CONNECT WITH VICTORIA:

• Instagram
• Website
• LinkedIn
• Facebook

This episode is sponsored by Do Grief Differently™️, my twelve-week, one-on-one, in-person/online program for grievers who have suffered any type of loss to feel better. Click here to learn new tools, grief education, and the only evidence-based method for moving beyond the pain of grief.

Would you like to join the mission of Grieving Voices in normalizing grief and supporting hurting hearts everywhere? Become a sup...

Anorexia nervosa: an eating disorder characterized by attempts to lose weight to the point of starvation.

Hannah believed she was destined to suffer in silence. Her obsession with food, body image, and a strive for perfection began in middle school. She was always the tallest in her class and developed early on as well. Hannah would go through periods of starving herself followed by an episode of bingeing. This went on through college and into her 20s when she finally "got sick and tired of being sick and tired." One email to an author led to learning about a support group for those who are struggling with an eating disorder. This group opened her up to support, and a sense of community that aided her in dismantling the shame that had consumed her for so many years.

Years later, and married, it was a miscarriage that taught @hannahmhoward how to have compassion for herself in a way she hadn't fully practiced.

One book, email, a phone call -- action, can change your entire life.  Now 10 years into recovery, Hannah learned and wants to share that you're not alone, and going through challenges alone doesn't help with shame, if anything, it perpetuates it.

We all have a relationship with food, whether we have an eating disorder or not. And, like grief, there are so many ways we are misinformed and there are false beliefs we have been raised with that shape the rest of our lives.

CONNECT:

• Website
• Instagram
• Book, Plenty

______

NEED HELP?

• National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
• Crisis Text Line provides free, 24/7 support via text message. Text HOME to 741741 to connect with a trained Crisis Counselor

If you or anyone you know is struggling with grief due to any of the 40+ losses, there are free resources available HERE

Send Victoria a text message!

Support the show

_______

NEED HELP?

• National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
• Crisis Text Line provides free, 24/7 support via text message. Text HOME to 741741 to connect with a trained Crisis Counselor

If you are struggling with grief due to any of the 40+ losses, free resources are available HERE.

CONNECT WITH VICTORIA:

• Instagram
• Website
• LinkedIn
• Facebook

This episode is sponsored by Do Grief Differently™️, my twelve-week, one-on-one, in-person/online program for grievers who have suffered any type of loss to feel better. Click here to learn new tools, grief education, and the only evidence-based method for moving beyond the pain of grief.

Would you like to join the mission of Grieving Voices in normalizing grief and supporting hurting hearts everywhere? Become a sup...

This episode is a quick and dirty one about how we don't heal in isolation and that support is an important piece of the grief puzzle.

In all of the conversations I've had with grievers of all kinds over the past several years, none of them wished they would be alone in their grief. Every single one had a desire to be heard and held in their sorrow.

Grief is alienating. And, society doesn't help by perpetuating the 6 Myths of Grief:

• Don't Feel Bad
• Replace the Loss
• Be Strong 
• Keep Busy
• Grieve Alone
• Time Heals [All Wounds]

This episode is a love note of encouragement if you find yourself living the myths listed above.

Allow yourself to be heard and held, my friend.

RESOURCES:

• Ep. 92:  Phoebe Leona | I'm Only Grieving on Fridays
• Do Grief Differently™️

OTHER EPISODES YOU MIGHT LIKE:

• Ep. 4 | The 6 Myths of Grief
• Ep. 34:  Lizzy Flavin | Never Fatherless

______

NEED HELP?

• National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
• Crisis Text Line provides free, 24/7 support via text message. Text HOME to 741741 to connect with a trained Crisis Counselor

If you or anyone you know is struggling with grief due to any of the 40+ losses, there are free resources available HERE.

Are you enjoying the podcast? Check out my bi-weekly newsletter, The Unleashed Letters.

💛 Would you like to Learn Your Energy Type? Free Quiz ➡️

Send Victoria a text message!

Support the show

_______

NEED HELP?

• National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
• Crisis Text Line provides free, 24/7 support via text message. Text HOME to 741741 to connect with a trained Crisis Counselor

If you are struggling with grief due to any of the 40+ losses, free resources are available HERE.

CONNECT WITH VICTORIA:

• Instagram
• Website
• LinkedIn
• Facebook

This episode is sponsored by Do Grief Differently™️, my twelve-week, one-on-one, in-person/online program for grievers who have suffered any type of loss to feel better. Click here to learn new tools, grief education, and the only evidence-based method for moving beyond the pain of grief.

Would you like to join the mission of Grieving Voices in normalizing grief and supporting hurting hearts everywhere? Become a sup...

Like many kids, Phoebe grew up in a broken home. Her parents split up when she was 7 and she would remain living with her father until she turned 14. With her own knowing and willpower, she left her father to go live with her grandmother until landing back with her mother.

What she experienced between ages 7 and 14 was a frightening relationship with her father, a Vietnam vet, who was struggling with PTSD along with alcohol and drug abuse. Despite loving her father, she knew wasn't safe in his care. And, life wasn't done throwing curveballs Phoebe's way either. It would be a long journey for her to find her own radiance.

Fast forward to adulthood, she reconnected with her father when he called her one Father's Day out of the blue, after having been rehabilitated and desiring to build a connection again with his daughter. Only, this newfound connection wouldn't last; four years later, Phoebe's father died suddenly of a heart attack in his sleep.

Struggling to cope with the death of her father in that first year, Phoebe made a commitment to herself to only grieve on Fridays. And, this seemed to be working for her a time in her mind until one bright, sunshiny day, after feeling like the fog was lifting, her husband sat her down and said he wanted a divorce. 

She would find herself living in Costa Rica, looking for a life reset and to reclaim what she wanted for life as Phoebe 2.0 after grief came like a steamroller, leaving heartbreak in its wake.  What followed were a lot of lessons, healing, and a re-discovery process of who Phoebe was before her life fell apart and everything went downhill as a child. 

RESOURCES:

• Ep. 65 | Sirry Berndsen
• Book (with a new title since recording)

CONNECT:

• Website
• Facebook
• Instagram

______

NEED HELP?

Send Victoria a text message!

Support the show

_______

NEED HELP?

• National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
• Crisis Text Line provides free, 24/7 support via text message. Text HOME to 741741 to connect with a trained Crisis Counselor

If you are struggling with grief due to any of the 40+ losses, free resources are available HERE.

CONNECT WITH VICTORIA:

• Instagram
• Website
• LinkedIn
• Facebook

This episode is sponsored by Do Grief Differently™️, my twelve-week, one-on-one, in-person/online program for grievers who have suffered any type of loss to feel better. Click here to learn new tools, grief education, and the only evidence-based method for moving beyond the pain of grief.

Would you like to join the mission of Grieving Voices in normalizing grief and supporting hurting hearts everywhere? Become a sup...

What is it costing you by looking to others for permission to grieve your way?

What is it costing you, to not address the child within you and the grief you've carried with you into adulthood from your childhood?

Grief isn't about death alone. So, don't be mistaken that because someone did not die in your childhood that you don't have grief or, that you aren't holding on to the energy of grief.

The loss of hopes, dreams, expectations - for relationships, your life, career, health, finances...
Anything you wish would've been different, better...this is grief.

We so quickly judge our grief; thinking we're not doing it "right" or, doing it badly or not quickly enough, etc. We also judge other grievers and how they're "dealing with" their grief. Which is ironic, isn't it? Since the vast majority of the population has no idea how to "deal with" their own grief, right?

We break this vicious cycle of judgment when we know better, learn new tools and information, and stop having these crazy expectations of others and ourselves.

Every relationship is unique, therefore, we cannot begin to know or understand the grief of another on the level the griever themselves knows it. It's impossible. We can relate to their story or their loss, but we can't truly know what their grief is like for them. This is why judgment is hurtful and can even be harmful.

I get on a bit of a soapbox in this episode, but this information matters to me. And, I want it to matter to you, too. THIS is how we change the conversation around grief - new knowledge, new information, and new tools. Let's end the judgment!

RESOURCES:

• Ep 90 | Jill Johnson-Young
• Ep 68 | Ken Ross (son of Elisabeth Kubler-Ross)
• Do Grief Differently™️

______

NEED HELP?

• National Suicide P

Send Victoria a text message!

Support the show

_______

NEED HELP?

• National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
• Crisis Text Line provides free, 24/7 support via text message. Text HOME to 741741 to connect with a trained Crisis Counselor

If you are struggling with grief due to any of the 40+ losses, free resources are available HERE.

CONNECT WITH VICTORIA:

• Instagram
• Website
• LinkedIn
• Facebook

This episode is sponsored by Do Grief Differently™️, my twelve-week, one-on-one, in-person/online program for grievers who have suffered any type of loss to feel better. Click here to learn new tools, grief education, and the only evidence-based method for moving beyond the pain of grief.

Would you like to join the mission of Grieving Voices in normalizing grief and supporting hurting hearts everywhere? Become a sup...

I asked this week's guest, Jill Johnson-Young, the following question:
"How are you still upright?"

@RebelliousWidow experienced the loss of Linda, her first love, after 23 years. Linda had survived breast cancer but later succumbed to pulmonary fibrosis which was due to the chemo she received to beat the breast cancer.

Jill would find herself, what she calls, a "rebellious widow" once more after her love, Casper, died of Lewy Body Dementia after 3 1/2 years.

The capacity to love is plentiful in Jill's heart, along with Linda and Casper, who were also co-parents in their own time, to at-risk children who needed it most; children who had experienced grief and trauma, too. Jill weaves in stories of being an adoptive parent throughout this episode, providing tips and guidance in supporting grieving children.

We are all "built" differently. Our environments, family unit, generational beliefs passed down, personal experience, our own uniqueness, and more all add to the tapestry of our lives. And, altogether greatly influence how we respond to grief and trauma.

Growing up within a family unit that openly talked about death, dying, and grief at the kitchen table, Jill learned valuable lessons that would shape her path forward as a clinical social worker and set her up to embrace the grief that was to come rather than run from it.

We talk about so many areas of grief and loss, as it pertains to children, death and dying, hospice/palliative care, boundaries, and the how of getting through it all.

We are taught how to acquire things/people, not what to do when we lose them. Let this episode bring hope to your sorrowful heart if you are grieving today.

As Jill states, "You can still go to Disney if you're grieving!"

RESOURCES:

• Book, The Rebellious Widow
• Tools & Resources

Send Victoria a text message!

Support the show

_______

NEED HELP?

• National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
• Crisis Text Line provides free, 24/7 support via text message. Text HOME to 741741 to connect with a trained Crisis Counselor

If you are struggling with grief due to any of the 40+ losses, free resources are available HERE.

CONNECT WITH VICTORIA:

• Instagram
• Website
• LinkedIn
• Facebook

This episode is sponsored by Do Grief Differently™️, my twelve-week, one-on-one, in-person/online program for grievers who have suffered any type of loss to feel better. Click here to learn new tools, grief education, and the only evidence-based method for moving beyond the pain of grief.

Would you like to join the mission of Grieving Voices in normalizing grief and supporting hurting hearts everywhere? Become a sup...

As a child, were you called a crybaby?

A child taught to grieve alone becomes an adult who also grieves alone. To break the cycle of learned behavior, we have to learn new information.

If you want to learn how to support children in their grief, this episode walks you through what not to do and what to do instead. Most of us grew up without a healthy demonstration of how to grieve healthily. When we are faced with challenges as adults, we resort to what we know and what we've been taught.

When someone does something hurtful to you, is your knee-jerk reaction to blame that person for "making" you angry or sad? First, that's a lot of power to give the other person. And second, this is a learned behavior that is also what keeps us in a victim mindset well into adulthood.

Take twenty minutes out of your day today and learn a better way to support a grieving child you know or love.

RESOURCES:

• Book, When Children Grieve
• The Grief Recovery Method

______

NEED HELP?

• National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
• Crisis Text Line provides free, 24/7 support via text message. Text HOME to 741741 to connect with a trained Crisis Counselor

If you or anyone you know is struggling with grief due to any of the 40+ losses, there are free resources available HERE.

Are you enjoying the podcast? Check out my bi-weekly newsletter, The Unleashed Letters.

💛 Would you like to Learn Your Energy Type? Free Quiz ➡️ HERE! ⬅️

SUPPORT THE SHOW:

• Rate & Review: Apple

Send Victoria a text message!

Support the show

_______

NEED HELP?

• National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255
• Crisis Text Line provides free, 24/7 support via text message. Text HOME to 741741 to connect with a trained Crisis Counselor

If you are struggling with grief due to any of the 40+ losses, free resources are available HERE.

CONNECT WITH VICTORIA:

• Instagram
• Website
• LinkedIn
• Facebook

This episode is sponsored by Do Grief Differently™️, my twelve-week, one-on-one, in-person/online program for grievers who have suffered any type of loss to feel better. Click here to learn new tools, grief education, and the only evidence-based method for moving beyond the pain of grief.

Would you like to join the mission of Grieving Voices in normalizing grief and supporting hurting hearts everywhere? Become a sup...