Anna Janssen was twelve when something happened that shaped the way she would love, grieve, mother, and trust for the rest of her life. Decades later, she found her own daughter on the other side of the same nightmare — and became the only person who could meet her there.
In this episode of Her Side of the Stories, she sits with Asal Zara and tells the truth about silence, the love she lost in a single phone call, and the woman she became on the other side of all of it: a healer, a mother, a power woman who is finally soft.
This isn't a story about what happened, it's a story about what stays.
What it does to the way you love. The way you grieve. The way you mother. The way you finally, after everything, learn what forgiveness actually means — and who it was always for.
Anna speaks about losing the man she loved in a single phone call. About anger. About the years she spent avoiding pain by avoiding everything. About the moment she became the only person her daughter could turn to — and what she said.
About finding herself again on the other side of all of it.
This is one of the most honest conversations we've had on Her Side.
If you've ever survived something you weren't ready for, kept something to yourself for too long, or wondered whether the past will ever stop sitting in your body — this is for you.
— — —
CHAPTERS
00:00 Welcome
02:01 Three years after the war
03:38 A happy childhood
06:45 At 12, something happened
09:28 The strength that came out of her
11:54 Telling her mother
12:45 "Don't tell your father"
15:02 What it did to intimacy — until today
15:22 Forgiveness is for yourself
15:40 The pattern survivors don't talk about
17:16 The smell that stayed
20:43 Anger and forgiveness
22:46 Seeing him again at 23
26:43 Blaming herself
28:13 The school years
30:27 The confusion no one names
33:18 The anger her son could see
37:27 Texas
38:50 Falling in love in America
39:38 The day he didn't come
42:14 The funeral she ran from
43:18 Italy
47:56 Meeting the father of her children
51:18 Her second great love
54:48 Living on a boat
57:24 The Sunday afternoon
59:41 Walking back onto the boat
61:50 What her daughter did
65:07 The silent retreat
66:33 A year of teaspoons
67:12 The letter
69:10 Becoming a power woman
70:34 Her trauma vs her daughter's
72:13 "The trauma stays. But you can change it."
73:12 Becoming a healer
78:45 How to actually forgive
80:20 Walk in the water and forgive
81:33 What she'd say to them now
82:25 Her advice
84:36 Becoming softer
— — —
Her Side of the Stories is a cinematic, emotionally honest conversation series exploring the inner lives of women — what they've survived, what they've become, and what they've never said out loud until now.
Hosted by Asal Zara. Filmed in Ibiza, Spain.
Her Voice. Her Truth. Her Side.
New episodes every Tuesday, 3PM CET.
If this episode meant something to you, the kindest thing you can do is share it with the woman who needs it. And subscribing (it's free) is how we keep telling these stories.
— — —
FOLLOW HER SIDE OF THE STORIES
YouTube: https://youtube.com/@hersideofthestoriesofficial
Spotify:https://open.spotify.com/show/0NdDte4w6fgcuZZwZH1rpi?si=5u1ARRWURf2ynKa0n3Fe8g
Apple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/her-side-of-the-stories/id1890695561
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hersideofthestories
Website: www.hersideofthestories.com
FOLLOW ASAL ZARA
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/asal_zara__
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/asal-zara-aa845766
— — —
#hersideofthestories #asalzara #annajanssen #childhoodtrauma #traumahealing #grief #forgiveness #motherdaughter #womensstories #realstories #survivorstory #generationaltrauma #healingjourney #losingapartner #emotionalhealing
