Mindset and Resilience: Moving Beyond Grief in Midlife with Lisa Boehm

Have you ever wondered how to mend a broken heart or overcome grief and overwhelm in midlife?

In this episode of 'All Things Menopausal,' Mary interviews Lisa Boehm, a grief educator, health coach, author, speaker, and podcaster with a long career in oncology.


The conversation begins with Lisa’s recount of the tragic loss of her daughter, Katie, in 2015, and how it divided her life into a 'before' and an 'after.' 

Struggling with the widespread negativity around grief, Lisa sought and created positive resources, including a book and a grief support circle for grieving mothers. She emphasizes the importance of mindset and a healthy lifestyle, sharing how these have helped her and her clients navigate grief, menopause, and mental health challenges. 

Today, Lisa shares the power of hope and human connection in her presentations and podcast Rising Strong: Mental Health & Resilience. Her podcast explores the depths of mental wellbeing, burnout, stress, anxiety, overwhelm, and grief. Through candid conversations, expert insights, and personal experiences, Lisa uncovers strategies for navigating life's challenges and cultivating inner strength. 

• Learn more about Lisa and her free resources from her website
• Connect with Lisa on LinkedIn, Instagram and Facebook
• Listen to Lisa's podcast
• Read Lisa's book Journey to Healing (not an affiliate link)
• Lisa's recommeded read The High Five Habit (not an affiliate link)

Transcript

Lisa Boehm: 0:00

We definitely start with the mindset piece and the belief, if you don't believe you can do something, I don't care what tools you have in your toolbox, you will not be able to do them. Every single, Olympic athlete goes to the Olympics. With the visualization and the belief that they can stand on that podium. So we too have to have belief that we can do something before we even start. Because if we don't believe it's possible, guess what? It's not going to happen.

Mary Lee: 0:38

Welcome to All Things Menopausal. My name is Mary, and I'm a menopause doula. As a doula, we augment the healthcare profession as menopause support practitioners. I created this podcast, to build community for women going through menopause transition and to foster resilience through the stories that connect, educate, and empower. These stories are real, raw, relatable, And they're very much relevant to the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual whole person that we are. In our midlife transition, we are not alone. Each week, you will hear from courageous, vulnerable, and knowledgeable guests sharing their passion, their journey, and lived experience. These are little clues to finding solutions to our unique situation. The menopause symptoms are personal, but the experience is universal. I recorded this episode with Lisa a couple of months ago when I was really suffering from COVID. And on this day in particular, it was really bad. I had kept my mute on for most of the conversation because my coughing wouldn't stop. All that to say I had left the recording of the intro and the outro for much later on. And just this week I've been prepping and editing for this episode. So I went back and I listened to it. And of course it's been a good It's been a solid two months. So I forgot a lot of the great conversation I shared with Lisa. So when I replayed the episode and listened to her conversation intently, I got so much out of it. And I really think that you are going to get so much out of it too, my dear listeners. There is an enormous amount of information, advice and guidance, and honestly, just some plain old simple tips and strategies to deal with our midlife transformation. And truly, it all begins with mindset. Mindset and believing that whatever is going on in our life, whether we're facing some sort of trauma, grief, or the loss of someone near and dear to us, or just grief in general over the loss of our youth, it all begins with believing that we're going to be okay and that we can take these little baby steps, small, manageable steps to integrate into our life Just every day move that yardstick forward and get back to that place where we want to be and that is ultimately to be happy and to be healthy and This is it. This is my intro to you That's all I really wanted to share was to reflect on going back and listening to this interview with Lisa So sit back and enjoy And come to it with an open mindset, lean into Lisa's story as she pours out her heart, losing her precious teenage daughter, and then she manages to turn life around and find joy again. If she can do this amidst all that turmoil, the anxiety and the trauma, even that trauma that comes with the midlife crisis. Transition. Then we can all do it. So have faith and take comfort. Know that we're all in this together. So before we get started, here's something you should know about Lisa. Lisa is an author, a speaker, and a podcaster who shares the power of hope and human connection in her presentations and on her podcast, Rising Strong. Mental health and resilience. Her podcast explores the depths of mental well being, burnout, stress, anxiety, and overwhelm, and of course grief. Through candid conversations and expert insights and personal experiences, Lisa uncovers strategies for navigating life's challenges and cultivating inner strength. And as a resilience coach, she uses Her unique 1 percent shift strategy to empower women to make small, impactful changes that lead to significant transformation. So this episode kicks off with Lisa, who is also a health coach with a long career in oncology, sharing her journey of overcoming the loss of her teenage child and years of mental health struggles. A tragedy that she so tenderly was able to capture in a book on grief. And that book, Journey to Healing, A Mother's Guide to Navigating Child Loss, is available on Amazon. You can also find Lisa on LinkedIn. It's Lisa K Bohm Speaker Author. And then her website is risingstrongpodcast. com. And check out her website. She has several free resources for midlife moms.

Lisa Boehm: 5:24

Welcome Lisa to all things menopausal. And I'm really happy to have you here. My pleasure, Mary. Thank you. before we start unpacking how we can adapt, overcome and be resilient during the menopause years, tell us a little bit about your backstory and what brought you to where you are today. It's a little bit of a convoluted bumpy story, actually I'll give you the Coles note version because we could be here for hours, but, about 15 years ago, I decided that I wanted to, do something more for myself. I have a long career in oncology. I've been there for 33 years. Love it, love my patients, but wanted something a little bit more and had discovered in my own journey, the power of fitness and nutrition to handle my own mental health issues. I'd struggled with anxiety and depression, oh boy, for decades. So really found some, helpful benefits there. So I became a health coach and I helped busy, overwhelmed women find time to become healthy. And that was great. It was great until the unspeakable happened. And on a regular Tuesday night on December of 2015, we got the knock on the door that every parent fears. And there I stood in my front entryway in my pajamas, expecting my daughter to be coming through the door. But instead, there was a police officer and a lady in black who I later learned was the coroner who had come to tell us that our daughter had been killed in a head on collision. And thank you, as anybody can imagine, that was the moment in time that my life became, very definitively divided into before. And after Katie died and it, put every single one of us in my family just in a tailspin. A little bit of time went by and I don't know that you ever heal from grief of that magnitude. I always say it's like a suitcase that I carry around with me every day. But after a period of time and struggling to find positive, resources. I just couldn't find any. There were tons of books, tons of videos, tons of things that just said, doom and gloom, your life is over. This is the worst possible thing that a human can endure. I even had friends come up to me. Face to face and say, Oh, Lisa, you know that your marriage is over, right? Oh, Lisa, you know that your 15 year old son, yeah, he's going to face a lifetime of mental health challenges. And he's probably going to be addicted to drugs. Like these were the kinds of messages and maybe they were well intentioned. But I thought, okay. If I'm going to have to live with this pain for the rest of my life, I'm darn going to find a quote unquote, more positive way to deal with this. I need hope. I need encouragement and I couldn't find what I needed. So I made it. I wrote a book. I created a grief support circle just for grieving mothers who wanted hope and healing because not everybody does. But for anybody who wanted to focus on living with their grief because we got to figure out the with the grief part, I created that and then just this past summer, my son, who's now 24, he had gone through a bad breakup, his grandfather passed away, our dog that had been with us for Basically, as long as my son could remember was really, sick and just, he had a whole bunch of bad stuff going on and he was struggling and his mental health was in the toilet. And it was just a big wake up call for me that I had done. I had put all this energy into working on myself, which we all know we can't pour from an empty cup. I could be a better mom. I could be a better wife, better everything if I took care of me. So I don't regret that. But it was like a holy moly moment when I thought my kid, my, my surviving kid needs me. And it was looking around at my co workers, I'm a frontline healthcare provider, and not to say that we endured the worst of COVID. Man, it knocked everybody on their butts. But working on the front lines when we didn't know when they were building, a morgue outside in the back parking lot of the hospital, we had to walk past that every day. It was hard, especially in the beginning when we didn't know much. So I started looking at my coworkers, my neighbors, my community, my, my immediate family, my own brother it seemed like we were going from one epidemic straight into another. And the other being the, epidemic of mental health. So it's, really been, like I say, a long and convoluted road as to how I got here. But that is just a little bit of my backstory. Thank you so much for sharing. I applaud you and your strength right there, just to be able to stand in your power and know that you have a purpose still to serve and then find, dig deep and find that hope, the courage, the resilience to pivot and move on. And I. I'm in enamored of who you've become today and to share and then show other women, particularly in her midlife, how we can too, is we're not all going to face something so traumatic, but the weight of that transition is for many very traumatizing. So let's, look at that a little bit. A little bit more. And I see that this is, your week that you were actually focusing on the mental health and the midlife. And I listened to your podcast about the wine and oh boy, do I, about the effects of wine and just a little Piquito sip and what it can do wreaking havoc. But let's talk about that. Let's talk about the program that you have built, the speaking engagements, the workshops that you offer for others. And we're probably talking not just women, but Men as well. Yeah. It's, so hard to find an, I hate even to, use the word niche, but this is what they, any coach is going to tell you, you've gotta speak to one person, right? Is, if you're speaking to everybody, you're speaking nobody. And I understand that, but I feel like so much of my message. Whether it's whether I'm talking about grief, whether I'm talking about healthy lifestyles, whether I'm talking about midlife struggles, mental health, take any of it resilience, it can be applied to anybody. But I think that what all through all of this, like I say convoluted path, but there are some definite underlying commonalities through all of this. And the first one I would say for sure, hands down was mindset. Yeah. I think when we are, when life's going great we're sitting on a beach in Maui, we're sipping Mai Tais watching the sunset and the dolphins and the whales. That's great. But our mindset is in a good place because everything is in a good place. But when things start going sideways, it's so easy to get in our heads. For instance, in my situation after Katie died and people were telling me my marriage was over and my son was facing this horrible future. I could have listened to that, but instead the message or the, self-talk that I was doing was like, no thank You I, just did a podcast yesterday and we were talking about the power of perspective. Yeah. And as I said, I have worked in oncology for a very long time. I have seen a lot. And when Katie first died, I was so angry. So angry. I thought, she's 17 and a half. She's got the rest of her life to live. She was a rule follower. She had just been accepted into nursing in college. She had a 95 percent average. She was volunteering. She was a good kid and a good person. And you don't have to look very far, unfortunately, to see crappy people doing horrible things. And I just felt like her death was so unjust. But then there was a part of me that was like, wait a minute, Lisa, now this didn't happen right away. This was an in time thing, how many families have you seen at the cancer clinic where they bring their small child in and they sit with them day after day, week after week, month after month, years, sometimes of treatment, and then sometimes they don't get to take their child home. And I thought, instead of saying, I only got 17 and a half years. The language and the thinking that I do around that now is, I got 17 and a half years with Katie. She was healthy every second of it. She was happy. We got to travel. We got to do some really cool things and make some amazing memories. So things like this, like mindset is so powerful. It's so easy to take a look at our lives, even if nothing big and traumatic is happening right now, but maybe things at work are a little bit annoying, or maybe your husband didn't do the laundry. Like he said, he was whatever. It's so easy to go down the bunny hole of negativity. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And when we start looking at those things, that's all we see. But if we can stop doing that, even for a day, to stop complaining and to look for the positive in everything, challenge yourself, you start to realize something, you start to realize my life is actually pretty good. There's some bad parts. But overall, it's pretty good. So mindset has been huge. And I would say the other second thing, the close second, I'm not sure which comes first, is a healthy lifestyle. And I know that sounds cheesy and everybody says it and it's probably overplayed, but my God, it's the honest to God truth. Honest to God truth. I remember hauling my sorry butt out the door many days to go for a walk in the early days after Katie died. I did not feel like doing that. I did not. But my husband usually dragged me out the door and there was not a single walk that I came home feeling worse. Every time I came in the door, I was like, I feel a bit better. Good. Yeah. And same thing with healthy eating, mind you, I was a health coach right before Katie died. Healthy living was, a part of my life as it was, but. I could just feel myself if I was not eating healthy, if I was having too much wine any of these unhealthy coping mechanisms, I it was just like, okay, that made things way worse. So I would say those two were my, main go tos. Yeah. So when you're working with your clients now, obviously you're able to put them in the right perspective. Is that nothing can be so bad as, but when they first meet you with a sense of first of all, I would imagine that by the time they've come to see you, they're ready to make some shifts, to make some changes, to find that hope. But when they are dumping with this heavy baggage and are resisting because they just feel like they've, there's no hope for whether it's to lose weight or to improve some aspect of their life. What is the first adjustment, if you will, that you focus on? You know what, I find a couple of questions. Typically are self discovery questions for people. I think that's where it's at. I you and I can tell people things until we're blue in the face, but I think when we can discover them on our own, that's where the magic happens. But just asking people on a scale of one to 10, how are you feeling about X right now? And they'll give you a number. Where would you like to be on a scale of one to 10? Like, how would you like to feel in terms of being having more peace and happiness and joy or whatever it is that they're looking for, most people say they'd like to be a nine, 10, eight and a half for sure. Okay. How what would you think if we could get you from this point to that point? Do you want to stay at a six or a five or a three or whatever it is, or do you want to, what would what would you say if I could give you four steps to get you there, four steps starting today and things that are small and digestible. I think we live in this world of instant gratification, right? Like you, you think, Oh I'd really to lose this tummy for that dress I've got to wear to that wedding, and we want it to happen now in a week. We might've been able to do that when we were 20 but not so much now. And we just get frustrated, instead of focusing on these great big giant leaps in a week. What if we could make a 1 percent shift? You might think 1%, like, where's that going to get me? You think about it. What if you made a 1 percent shift for 100 days? Where does that get you, right? So we can take big, things and we can break them down into small manageable bite size actions that we can take every day. That's my love. I love it. As you say, even on your website, small manageable adjustments, which ironically is S M A. So That's As in smart goals. I was looking at that going small, manageable adjustments, which are, and you just gave it like relevant and time bound. So it's all about going back to that. Like you said, is as cheesy as it might sound smart goals. Yeah. So what is you talk about four steps? Do you have a specific formula? Not necessarily. I think it really depends on each individual person, what their goals are, and all of that kind of thing. But we definitely start with the mindset piece and the belief, if you don't believe you can do something, I don't care what tools you have in your toolbox, you will not be able to do them. Every single, Olympic athlete goes to the Olympics. With the visualization and the belief that they can stand on that podium. Love it. So we too have to have belief that we can do something before we even start. Because if we don't believe it's possible, guess what? It's not going to happen. Yeah. I found it really interesting too. And, I'm just as guilty of it with the midlife is that we, don't do overwhelm very well. And that should be our motto is I don't do overwhelmed, but overwhelmed seems to come a lot, easier than it did at almost any other stage of our lives. Even in the tumultuous teen years is that so much external stimuli from the workplace, be it. Even within our communities or in the home or stimulation at home from television. I just found digital world, social media. That's another area of overwhelm and a whole topic onto itself. So I've come to notice that a lot of weight is being put on the external factors. If only I could remove this, if only I didn't have overwhelmed from this, if only I could work, less. And. We're shifting from it's outside of us and expecting change on the outside, but as you said, that period that journey of self discovery. So walk us through how you would take as a health coach, take someone through, getting them back into that driver's seat saying hey look you know girl, you've got this, you're in control because As Eckhart Tolle says, and the power of now is that the key is in here. We have the solution. Absolutely. I think it's getting crystal clear on what they do want, right? Because I think the word overwhelm is like greige, right? Like it's so vague, overwhelm. Like I think we can all identify with it. We know what it means and what it feels like, but what is it? Yeah. That's overwhelming you and granted, we can't fix all the things, but what is the most overwhelming part of your life? Is it, the housework? Is it, that you've, got a workload in the workplace? That's just too much. Is it the kids? What is it specifically? And then the first thing that we actually do is we sit down and we itemize everything that they can think of that they do as part of that pain point. So let's take work for example, why do I feel so overwhelmed with work? And I usually send them home with this homework because in the moment, I think we can't list all 57 things that are overwhelming us about one thing, right? Yeah. But over the course of the week to identify everything that's overwhelming them, and sometimes it's a short list and sometimes it's a really long list. And then we start pulling it apart. And I think as women, I don't know if this was messaging from the 90s or where it comes from, or if it's honestly something that's innate, we're pretty good at multitasking. I think the data now suggests that multitasking is actually not good and that we're not doing anything really well. But I think when you compare men to women can do it much better. And I think it's the mom thing, right? Like we can have the laundry going, we can make a doctor's appointment, we can have supper going, we can do all the things right. But should we have to do all the things at one time? So we really look at listing out things as actually I need to do this thing. Or can I delegate? That's a big one. And it's so hard for so many of us, asking for help. Or can I delete this thing? That's powerful too. One of the challenges that I give a lot of my clients is to remove things from their plate. Take a look at this list you've just given me. Can you give any of this to your admin assistant? Can you tell your boss that, collecting data on the spreadsheet that nobody looks at anymore, that maybe we could just park this for a while? Cause we're not whatever it is, what can you take off your plate? And at first there's this, hesitation, I think everything I do is important, probably is, but really take a look at what you can delete. And then we will often blossom out from that too, if we're able to work through that and then things will bubble up that are associated with work like, yeah, my kids teacher always likes me to go on the field trips with them once a month on Friday, and it really cuts into my productivity time. What are we going to do about that? What are some other ways that we can continue to be a part of that and just, I think I find asking questions. And people, end up discovering the answer themselves. You just asked enough curious questions to get the conversation going again in the process of self discovery. So clever. So it's interesting. We're at that age in the midlife too. And this is the part where grief comes in where we're that sandwich generation caught in between our aging parents. and children who still not have left the home yet. Or they haven't we're, still pretty much a prominent role, parenting role in their lives. And then we lose our parents that we've been taking care of or, not, but we're at that age where we're going to start realizing that our parents are gone, live forever. And that grief can have such a heavy toll. So we feel like, okay, I'm managing my menopause. And then. Whammo, a parent or a loved one or a relative passes and it's 10 step backwards and the menopause journey is bad enough as it is. So what are you helping your clients with when they're transitioning through that menopause and then do have to inevitably face the grief that comes with the loss of a parent? And I will just add on to that as well. As a grief educator there are many, different kinds of grief that we experience in life and in menopause. And I will answer your question about loss of a parent, but so many things that we go through, like we're probably grieving our youth. Yes, we are, grieving different changes in our health. I don't know about you, but my joints, my poor old knees all these things like I, I miss that. Friends are starting to have not so good diagnoses, right? We're mourning all kinds of things. Emptiness syndrome is a kind of grief. So we've got all these kinds of losses that we're dealing with, and then we might be, as you say, having to face the loss of a parent, or even, the loss. There's a name for this and I cannot recall it I'm going to call it ambiguous grief that not might not be the right term but let's say a parent has got dementia or Alzheimer's. And we're losing them. They might be physically here, but that relationship, that recognition, all of those things, we're losing that. That's grief. Yes and grief, like we've got so much going on at this stage in life. As you said, the sandwich generation and then our hormones, we are not wired the same as we were 20 years ago. A lot of us can't handle as much as we used to. And I don't think that should be a negative thing. That's just a fact. It's just a fact. So then you've got this other layer of grief on and it, I always recommend that my clients go back to basics. So a couple of things, self care, and I'm not talking about getting your nails done, although that's fun or massages. That's fun. I'm talking about the basics, getting fresh air every day. getting enough sleep. And I'm going to get on my soapbox here for a minute and say, if you're not getting at least six hours of sleep, go have a conversation with your family doctor. Because if you're getting less than six hours of sleep, I'm going to let you in on a little secret that I learned. When we don't get enough sleep, it actually augments our, brain fog, our forgetfulness. It can actually kick us into Alzheimer's and dementia faster and earlier than if we were getting enough sleep. So and we can't cope. We can't cope with life stresses when we're not getting enough sleep. Go see your GP. I was on sleeping pills for a number of years after I lost Katie. I've just, gotten off them. But my doctor said exactly that. She said like it was a half or it was a quarter, but I was really worried about negative long term side effects. And she said, you know what, Lisa? She said, if you're not sleeping, all of this that I just said, she goes, you have a greater chance of having dementia or Alzheimer's. You can't handle your grief. You've told me that. So she said this, we're weighing out the pros and cons here. So I'm not an advocate to say to everybody to go on sleeping pills, but go and have the discussion and same thing with antidepressants. If that's what you need to help you cope, do it. They are there for a reason. And many of the people that I coach, whether it's in grief or whether it's just You know, other adversity in life, oftentimes, I would say 90 percent of these ladies are on either sleeping pills or antidepressants or a combination thereof for the short term, like I'm talking six months, nine months, whatever it takes to get through the worst. And there's no shame in that. None whatsoever. If you had a heart condition and you needed to take something, you would take something. That's it. That's it. That's it. So sleep is a really, big thing. So anybody that I'm, helping, with grief, that's where we start is the basics. Are you sleeping? Are you drinking water? Because when we grieve, we cry, when we cry, we lose hydration, a lot of hydration. And when I was writing my book, I did a ton of research and one of the things that I discovered is that even when we are a little bit dehydrated, like a little bit, that is, makes us more inclined to be depressed. Yes. And a friend of mine who actually works at the crisis center here in Regina said that when they're on a call, if somebody's calling in they're in a crisis. With mental health, she said the first thing that they ask them to do is walk over to the sink and pour a big glass of water and start drinking as they're talking. That's how critical hydration is to our mental health. Isn't that interesting? Yes. So we start with those basics. And then, because I find if we're not in a physical state of well being, we cannot be in a positive well being with our emotional health. So it's like doing a triage, if you will, you come to the emergency situation and the most, the issue that is the most demanding and the most life threatening you tackle first. Yes, absolutely. Yeah. And then I think when people can see. Oh Lisa and I talked about getting enough water, enough sleep and some decent, nutrition. Those were little things, but they made a big difference. So then the next week we come back and I, and then they start to believe in themselves. They start to believe that things can be better and that we can get some tools in their tool belt that will help them get through this difficult time. Very good. Like you said, those 1 percent shifts. Every day, have an extra glass of water. Sure. Try to get another extra hour of sleep. Maybe turn off the device before bed. Absolutely. Those things should be chucked out the window, honestly. And interesting that the report came out that they want to, they being in, it was in the U. S. I'm starting to recognize that they need to put safety warnings on our social media devices, much like they would on a cigarette package. It is that damaging to mental health, and we are in a mental health crisis. And I talked about this at great length and then I actually alluded to it earlier when we were speaking about the social media in itself is damaging and that is a whole other conversation. But I had just learned to that the exposure to blue light, which disrupts her melatonin production is also leading to melatonin in itself. is an anti inflammatory, but the blue light exposure just learned about this, raises our blood sugar level in our body. So it's not just a mental health issue. Now it's re wreaking havoc on our physical well being. It's unbelievable just how complex the body is, but Self care. Get back to the basics. Yeah. Yeah. I want to do focus on the social media aspect just really briefly because it does tie in the whole depression item. And, then we see this with midlife or bombarded with them if we're on our devices. And I'm telling you, I want to take a detox altogether. It's hard in this day and age when you do have a business, not to be on social, but we can, the comparison, comparing, like I have such a better presence than I do. Look how young they look. And yet they're older than me and just comparing who we used to be. Like you said, in that grief of who we used to be. So what is some of the approaches that you've taken? or even 1 percent shifts that we can do to tackle that and address it for what it is. It's a mental health issue. Absolutely. An excellent question. I just had this conversation with, one of my clients and that is, Do a little bit of a digital detox, as you said, now we're attached to these things. Like you said, you've got a business but go through there and delete every account that doesn't make you feel better. If it's somebody, like you say, you're like, Oh this or that, or they somehow just bring up some resistance in you, delete, unfollow, whatever it is, delete, That's number one. Number two is to go through and start following accounts that make you happy and giggle. I did this about six months ago, and I have got, I'm embarrassed to say, more puppy and kitty videos coming soon. than anything else. When I am busting a gut, scrolling through my, my social feed, my husband will always come and look around the corner and he'll say another dog video. Yep. Yep. But those are the things that make me feel good and make me laugh. So try and fill your feed up deliberately with things that make you feel better. Yes. Yes. That is so perfect. I'm glad you explained it that way because I find that in the, in what I'm doing as a menopause doula, I need to follow more menopause related businesses or podcasts. I'm just, I'm finding myself going down that comparison. And then I go on to my website, say, okay, I got to tinker with this. Oh, now I need a digital course. Oh, and now I need this. And I'm like a squirrel. My mind is going everywhere. And then it literally Lisa has been in the last, I would say week, 10 days. And I, not that I liked getting COVID another time, but I have to say it slowed me down enough to really think deeply about what's going on here. Okay. Bye. And I am just like you say, why would I follow somebody just to get my numbers up? And they teach you this in social media marketing classes that you've got to like all these people so that you're in their feeds. And, but I don't think that's necessarily good for mental health. It might be from a marketing perspective, go hire somebody out to do that because they're emotionally removed from all that. But the digital detox, just cleaning out and bringing joy, which is a perfect segue to my next question. I yesterday and it merits talking about, I had listened to Mel Robbins podcast and we're going to talk about Mel and it was about flowers. It was her solo episode talking about flowers and the science behind the joy it brings to us and just raising dopamine and serotonin. And I was just. enamored. I'm blown away with the message. And I'm looking outside my front window, looking at my peonies. And I thought I'm going to go treat myself to some flowers, just like Mel recommends. I went out there and I cut them. And then you just can't cut them. You, then you have to arrange them all beautifully. And then the light, and then you pick up your phone. You want to take a picture of it. And an hour had gone by and I had made a social media reel of these peonies, but it brought me so much joy. And I could feel. Good about that social media post and I didn't care about any results from it, but just being in the moment of capturing it. And then I went out to grab the other peonies, which are a different color. And this is the one that the ants really because they open up and of course you need the ants to open them up. So those ones don't come in the house. And I just sat there 20 minutes watching a couple of ants crawl all over. And it was the simple things of being in the moment, being completely present. And that brought me so much joy. I felt so good. Like I just had a massage, a day at the spa. And again, simple, basic self care things. And now I fill my Instagram with accounts, like the puppies dash helm in particular, my daughter has a dash helm. And so I just can't get enough of the doggies and the animals. And Mel Robbins, she posts some really wonderful things, but I do. And that's why I bring that up because I asked you what your favorite book is of all time. I ask all my podcast guests, or if I can remember to ask them spring fog does can, tell us what is your favorite book? I wrote it down there and you're going to have to tell me if I get the title mixed up, but I believe it's called high five habit Robbins. And. I just love Mel for 500 reasons, but I love her shoot from the hip, approach. She just says it as it is. She doesn't necessarily do everything that everybody else on social media is doing. She's exactly the same age as me. And, I don't see her using a bunch of fancy filters some days, a lot of days she's on there without her makeup she just got up and her hair's all whatever. And she talks about her family and she talks about the things that I can relate to. Yeah. She's not doing dance moves on her social and she's. Sometimes giving people some tough love, but I just love her approach. But the high five habit is definitely more of a personal development book than a business kind of thing. But I just love the idea of walking into the bathroom first thing in the morning, hairs sticking up, zit cream on, whatever, and high fiving yourself in the, mirror. You got this, and, her whole book breaks down why this simple, again, 1 percent strategy you could call it is so effective. And it's giving yourself self love, telling yourself that you respect yourself. That you believe in yourself and if you read the book, it follows a number of people all the way through and what after this period of time of them high fiving themselves every morning in the mirror. And I just think it speaks so much to the importance of starting your day off on the right foot, positive messaging, positive mindset. And yeah, I really like it. It's my favorite. Love that between that and the five second rule, which is the book that got me to start podcasting during the pandemic. And then that podcast ended and then I started another one, but I have to credit Mel Robbins exactly for that. Don't let the brain talk you to anything else because its job is just to protect you. But it's a lot of chatter that serves no purpose. override it. And I think gratitude, self appreciation, a high five is a beautiful way to override all of that negative self talk, certainly in the menopause years. Yeah. Quick question though, when you started your podcast, how did that get started? And Tell our listeners where they can find you as well. Yeah. I'm a big believer in, I call it the universe, call it what you will, but, and I also believe in spiritual connection. And I always believe that my daughter is with me, literally kicking me in the butt, literally kicking me in the butt. I didn't want to ask. That's awesome. Beautiful. And I, that could be another podcast for another day. I've got a hundred stories of connection and communication with her, but I just felt like podcast kept showing up in my life podcast kept showing up in my life, and I kept going, Nope, not for me. Nope, don't have time for that. And I kept thinking, as much as I enjoy helping grieving mothers. It's hard work. It's emotionally heavy work. And in some sense, it made the most sense for me to start a grief focused podcast. I didn't want to. I didn't want to. So I sat on the idea. I was like, okay, maybe I'll start a podcast, but I don't know what I'm going to do. And then just the way my summer unfolded last year, my son's struggling, my brother's struggling and it was just like mental health. And then looking around at the women around me and thinking, holy moly, like we are a generation of women that are struggling, quietly struggling because God forbid we ask for help. And I just thought, if this is a complete flop, no harm done. Even if I do did 10 episodes and I packed it in no harm done. So that was my approach going into it. And season one was more general. I had some amazing interviews. Amazing. I don't know if anybody's familiar with Dr. Jodi Carrington. I had a young man from Regina here, intergenerational trauma and first nations. Like all kinds of stories, because I honestly, I think everybody's got a story, at the end of the day while these stories were really good to listen to. And I always made sure to pull out some little nuggets. They weren't speaking to anyone in particular. And so season two is just for us, us midlife moms and just talking about some of the trials and tribulations that we face. And I'm, really enjoying it, but you asked where people can find me. And my podcast is called rising, strong mental health and resilience. And if you can't remember all that, my website is risingstrongpodcast. com, and everything you need to know is all there. And I also see that you offer up some free resources on your website as well. I do. I do. Right now I've got an eight minute guided visual meditation. So if anybody needs just a quick wind down, like at bedtime, like we were saying, or just at the end of the workday, I've got that. And there's a few other goodies in there as well. And I'm working on a freebie actually later this afternoon, all about burnout. Yeah. Yeah. It's something we need, right? So watch for that, too. I think by the time we have your episode aired, that just might be up on your free resources on your website. We'll have that all in the show notes. Lisa, I want to thank you so much for your time and just sharing your story being resilient, and vulnerable at the same time. And it takes courage to be vulnerable as we well know. It's quite a, an amazing journey, but you've come out of it in spades. I just, I applaud you for all that you're doing and many women can use your, guidance, your sage advice and how we can transition through the midlife. So thank you again so much for joining me here on all things menopausal. Thank you so much for having me.

Mary Lee: 50:52

It's been a while since I've given my key takeaways after an interview, but I want to get back to doing them because again, as I reflected in the beginning, I got so much out of listening to this episode after two months of sitting down with Lisa and I want to share them with you. I'm sure you have your own key takeaways, but here are mine. Of course, as I said in the beginning, it all begins with mindset, the power of the, of perception. If you can see your future and perceive the greatness or the healing that you want to have, that is the first step to actually achieving. Second is gratitude and trauma. Looking for the positive in everything and anything. Third, healthy lifestyle. Just keep moving. healthy eating. Not poor eating as a coping mechanism, but healthy eating as a remedy to cope and manage trauma. And then ranking. I love that she ranks where you want to be and takes small digestible steps to move in that direction. By taking one step, manageable and adjustable at a time, you are shifting towards your greatness. Whether it's healing, abundance, you name it. Rank it and go get it. And then, as I said, we don't do overwhelm very well. So examine the most overwhelming part of your life and itemize everything associated with that pain point. So good. And recognizing that multitasking, it isn't really all that healthy and good for us as we've been made to believe taking on too much prevents us from moving things off of our plate and delegating. We're simply just asking for help and learning to say no, which is all about setting boundaries. And then I love what she shared as a grief educator. Grief isn't just loss of loved ones. It's in mourning our youth or facing the empty nest syndrome. We're all carrying some grief and grief needs to be recognized as an emotion and dealt with in a healthy manner, It starts with basic self care, sleep. Fresh air, staying hydrated, and the importance of sleep. Well, if you're not getting good sleep, it just exacerbates any underlying mental health issues, cognitive hit or effects that come with menopause, as well as increase the risks of dementia and Alzheimer's. And of course, exposing ourselves to blue light before bed disrupts melatonin production. And I've talked about this before. Melatonin is a natural anti inflammatory too. So when it's not producing, we're losing that ability to address inflammation that comes with estrogen egress. And then dehydration. We're so inclined to depression if we're not properly hydrated. This is something I didn't know. And it's so critical to our mental health. And then the impact of social media, as Lisa suggests, we need a digital detox and you can do that by simply deleting what doesn't bring you joy or doesn't make you feel joy. So fill your feed up deliberately with what makes you feel good. going back to belief. Belief comes from self care. So take the time to indulge in self care. So important. So every morning, get up, go in that mirror, say something beautiful and positive to yourself. be grateful. Whatever it takes, cultivate positive mindset, delete the negative self talk. Those are my key takeaways. Thank you so much for joining me on All Things Menopausal and until next time. If you enjoyed today's episode and want to stay connected, be sure to follow me on Instagram for tips and updates. For even more support and community, Join our Facebook group, personal and universal, where we share experiences, advice, and empower each other through the transformative journey. if you found value in today's episode, please consider leaving a review on Apple podcasts. Your feedback helps reach more women who can benefit from these conversations. Okay, my lovelies stay empowered, stay informed and embrace the beauty of your menopausal journey. Remember midlife should be the best life and it will be. Namaste.