I Lost Clients to Overdose - What No One Tells You About Grief & Addiction Recovery

And so I sat with Debbie Frankel about eight years back and she listened to me and she said, you know, you ought to consider the possibility of working with John James and his recovery method. And I researched it and I wish so drawn and I trained with Jocelyn eight years back and here we are. Okay. Great.

And in terms of so you've been doing this work now for eight years. And I just have to say this, usually we kind of chat off camera and Ed Owens who is our vice president of the Institute helps produce this show. And Leslie just mentioned so many incredible things about Ed and kind of the support she received with him. And it really just touched my heart again, kind of just just what this work does in terms of it really is a mission for all of us, right?

It goes far beyond a certification. And so in terms of just starting out, could we start there Leslie is eight years ago, you're a new specialist, you're kind of unsure of this whole thing. What was the beginning of your journey as a specialist? You know, in terms of any highlights or anything, you know, anything that kind of clicked or didn't click at first, just if you wouldn't mind just start from the beginning of your journey as a specialist.

I would love to do that with you. So eight years back, I when Debbie said this might be a suggestion for you. And I found myself at Jocelyn Jackson Williams training. I was so excited to be there that she and I have laughed for the years about it because I was always there early and sitting beside the opening of the door that hadn't happened to be the first one there.

So excited to be there. Then we had these four incredible days of training where my thinking process was just so touched with everything that she gave all of us. And they were like 20 in our training at the time call. And I have a dear MFT friend from that training Lisa Peterson with whom Lisa and I have shared so many letters.

We have met for lunch and fireside chats and have read with the purpose of doing our own work on ourselves as specialists and reading letters of completion to one another through the years. And it's been such a joy to have that support. And then I knew that I wanted to learn better about building the business. And I chose to work with our Sandy Derby for over a year to have her incredible support for me.

Alongside of that was our amazing lowest hall who when I had some difficult cases because I have built my practice on individual treatment. That's my specialty. And lowest would help me so very much with all the work that she had done for the institute. She would fit me in on a phone call or a long email and help me to help my clients.

So the beauty of GRM that I'm so happy with is we have a community that is so much deeper than just four days of training. And then returning to training to review the work during these eight years was important for me too. So I trained yet again for a review with Ed and I trained again with Sandy and all of that just continuing to learn and grow has made my practice what it is today. Wow.

That's incredible. All right, I'm getting inspired Leslie. Again, I just I love these calls because we get to we get to just check in with with what you guys are doing out there, you know, in the real world and stuff. So, you know, tell me a little bit about I know that I know that you work with people in the recovery community in addiction recovery.

Can you tell me a little bit about how that has been for you? Yes, you know, working with clients? Yes. And would it be okay?

Call if I shared for one moment about my late dad. Of course. So my late father, David was a highly functioning alcoholic man who brought a lot of chaos in our early years to our family. I have two older brothers and my late beloved mom Carol.

And only later in life did he go to his first eight meeting at age 77. And when he passed call at 91, he had 14 years of sobriety. Just amazing. So when you and I were speaking before we began the podcast, I was sharing that I was talking this last weekend and a Allen on meeting because those meetings are so special for me.

And sharing that here's a man who at 77 found at the right time to speak about recovery and being recovery and the gift that that gave me later in life. He was 37 years my senior. So when I was 50, Papa, my nickname for him was 87. And I was able to read a letter to him about the struggles I had as a young girl with him and have him because he was present from his work in AA.

He could hear me. And at the end of the letter, he said, you know, baby girl, I don't remember all of what you're telling me about what happened when you were five. But I want you to know that I never, ever meant to hurt you. And I'm going to read this letter again and get back to you about talking about it.

So forever back with my late father to have had this moment was just so unspeakably wonderful. And fast forward to beginning this work. And for my gratitude for having that moment with my father and for having those last years be graceful, I wanted to give back in the addiction community because my own recovery from an eating disorder and eating disorder is a stirb and underneath it is grief. And I wanted to be present in the addiction treatment community in a way that would be so wonderful for clients who are in residential treatment.

And if they didn't have seven weeks to be in our seven week program, they could at least hear some of the principles of what we teach. And so in the last four and a half years of my work, I have led groups at different facilities locally, Cole. And it's been ever so fulfilling. I talk with them since we don't have time to go through our whole program.

I talk with them about myths. I talk with them about stirbs. I open the groups and I say, please raise your hand. If anyone here has someone they truly love and miss and it's at least five years later and your heart is still in pain about that person.

And every hand in the room is raised. And then I'll ask them again, keep your hands up. Thank you for your authenticity. Keep your hands up of its 10 years.

And some of the hands are raised. And keep your hands up if it's more than 10. And some of the hands are raised. So then talking about unresolved grief is just the next normal step.

And we talk about that. And we talk about being present. And we talk about some of the principles that John has taught us that are so beautiful for everyday living and recovery. Yeah.

Yeah. Well, thank you. Thank you for that, Leslie. And just for for newers that are listener, sorry, listeners who are newer to this podcast, maybe they're not familiar with grief or covering, you know, Leslie mentioned a little bit.

She used the term myths about grief. What what we really mean by myths about grief is society helps us form our belief system growing up around what to do when loss happens to us when we have grief events, right? And you know, real real good spoiler alert here. It's all really bad tools at how to deal with grief, right?

It's it's grief alone. You got to be strong. Time's going to heal it. Just keep busy.

You know, it's and also just find a way to not feel bad at all costs, right? And so we go into that in much more detail in the program and in the book. But that's what that's what she means by myths or misinformation around grief. The other term she used is stirbs.

And that's kind of an acronym that we use and that all that means is short term energy relieving behaviors. And so when that memory comes to you at at at 11 at night and you can't sleep, that's painful or you know, that same smell around the accident, you smell it and you kind of go out of your body a little bit and think about that. You know, all of these things, if we hit a saturation point with them, we we participate in things called short term energy relieving behaviors. Okay.

And that can be anything that kind of distracts you from that feeling or that emotion that was produced. So obviously alcohol and drugs is the one we're talking about with Leslie. There's also food like Leslie spoke about earlier with one of her struggles. Their violence can be one for many people shopping ultra marathons.

I mean, the list goes on what you can use as a short term energy relieving behavior. Okay. So we don't need to spend too much time on it. But I wanted to mention that with with you because what Leslie is doing and I'm so grateful you're doing this Leslie is she is going to treatment centers in patient outpatient.

If you're not familiar with those terms. But obviously a massive, massive portion of our population is struggling with addiction. So if you aren't you you probably know family members are friends that are right. And so what we are trying to do here is connect the dots between unresolved grief and addiction and substance abuse.

You will almost never, ever, ever hear on the nightly news or on the internet on articles around addiction. You won't hear the topic of grief and unresolved grief. But we assure you that a massive rabbit hole and way that people come to find addiction is from unresolved pain from their past. Right.

And so it's it's no surprise to me when she has people raise their hand that everyone and these in you know, and at the meeting that she's speaking at understands, you know, that grief is the factor. But what a lot of the time they don't know is there's something to do to help with that unresolved grief. Right. So again, with that being said Leslie, please again, the floor is back to you.

How how do you find grief recovery works with people in recovery? It works so so beautifully. Call thanks for that question. And who I was thinking of while you were speaking is Dr.

Gabor Mate. And for anyone listening who isn't familiar with him, he is a Hungarian psychiatrist whose specialty for 60 years has been working with addiction treatment. And what he said eight years back when I was in a lecture with him in Manhattan Beach is not every trauma that we each can experience necessarily leads to an addiction. It does not however, he said, beneath the addiction of every client I have been honored to work with, he stated clearly beneath every addiction when I have been up close and personal is grief 100% of the time.

Wow. And so to have that be one of the first things that I share in a group when we're talking and see eyes open up wide is just that because yes, grief is so beneath the truth of any kind of addiction. And so for me, forever back when I mentioned food, my father drank, I used food to cover my loss and my feeling of insecurity. He traveled.

I was so young, I didn't know, was he coming back? Is he leaving? The losses were intangible, uncertainty, insecurity, trust, all of it with my father. And so to be able to be with people who are in residential treatment, who have used whatever they have used to then say, I need help.

I'm on the dark side, and this is bigger than me, and I need help. The first thing I always say when I'm working with is how I admire their courageousness for walking in the door of residential treatment, because it takes so much courage to call the grief recovery institute and say, I'm grieving, I need help, or to walk into residential treatment and say, my problem is bigger than me, I need help to be sober and to have a new life. And being a part of that is so gratifying, Cole, I don't truly have words for it, to have people come to me at the end of their stay at any other sites and write me a thank you note and say, this year words have meant so much to me. I'm keeping every psychoeducational paper you gave to me through the weeks and taking it with me.

So when I have another loss, I'm thinking about what I can do for myself care when that happens. It's so fulfilling. Yeah, thank you Leslie. I was really excited to talk to you about this topic, because I'm not sure how many podcasts have really covered the topic of addiction yet, you know, on this field, for you again, podcast.

I'm in recovery, so I've been sober for over 20 years. I got sober very young and, you know, and so I definitely have some insight on this. And again, we're not saying that grief recovery in the grief recovery method is the end all be all solution for people in recovery, right? So for instance, I went through the 12 step program, I worked the steps, they were hugely life changing for me and beneficial for me.

And this was a great additional piece for me to look at, right? And so a lot of the time our recommendation for people who are in recovery is make sure you have a firm footing in your recovery. So in other words, if you have two days of sobriety, you know, grief recovery is probably not the right place to start immediately. You want to have a foundation of yes, I have a problem with drugs or alcohol, yes, I'm an addict, those kind of things and have a firm footing around that.

And at a later time, and this is different for different people, grief recovery and going through the grief recovery method is a hugely beneficial secondary piece. We have thousands and thousands of people over the last 45 years who are in recovery have great success doing this method in conjunction with whatever other work they were doing around their addiction. Because again, what you said about Gabor Mate is so profound. And again, it's nothing.

It's nothing. We didn't know, but I'm glad he is telling, you know, connecting the dots behind that. Grief, grief for whatever reason is not given the credit in terms of the havoc that it wreaks in society. Again, when we talk about, and I think I covered this last podcast even, but it's like, if you look at the heart attack numbers in this country, grief is a huge culprit.

If you look at the drug addiction and the fentanyl and the ODE and the death, grief is a massive, massive part of that equation as well. When you look at the amount of people in prison, right, that is grief. If you look at, I mean, the list, the list goes on with so many different things, drunk driving. Again, we could, we could go on forever.

We don't need to. But, but if you are in recovery, consider this work. If you help people who are in recovery, consider this work. I'm actually about to email someone back to speak at a residential treatment center myself, which I've done through the years as well.

Just because again, that community a lot of the time is not told directly, hey, grief is a big factor. And you can do all this work. But if you have a backpack full of grief, if you have 25, 30 losses from your past that continually, either consciously or subconsciously are being stirred up through stimulus of your daily life, that stuff all needs to be looked at to be unpacked. I think for you to have a long that lasting sobriety.

Now, you mentioned something else on the other side of that coin. And I have used this myself as well, right? But a lot of the time, the odds are not good in terms of relapsing around people, right? Can you talk a little bit about how this is helped you as well on that side of the seat?

You, you, you, you read my mind. That's that's exactly where I wanted to go next. What I first want to say is my single regret in finding this beautiful work eight years back is that I did not have a mentor find me 40 years ago. Because as a youthful senior woman, I have had an anordinate amount of loss in my long life.

And one of them early on was when I was straight out of I went to graduate school later called an earlier. I went back from my graduate work in counseling when I was in my early 40s. And I finished at 47. It was a two year course.

It took me four years because I was paying my way, commuting, paying for the apartment, the books, all of it. My first work in my internship was at a women's treatment care center in Palm Springs forever back. And women from the ages of 18 to 75 would come to us from the hospital from drugs and alcohol treatment to us for three residential months. And then they would go back into their community to live independently.

So I was a brand new intern and I was hired as the eating disorder counselor on that clinic. Half a year later, a young woman took her life on the on that site. And it was so traumatic for me at that time. I did not yet have a spiritual defense in knowing there wasn't anything I could have said or done to make a difference.

And I didn't have that sensitivity yet for my own understanding. And I quit my hours of my internship. I was just devastated. I went back into sales because I was side of my personality that's on sales.

And I did that for some time. But I knew in my heart where my heart belonged with this kind of work. And so today, fast forward into the work that I've been doing in residential treatment for the last four and a half years, it would be, I would be a miss not to say that we have not kept all of our clients in good health once they have left. And when there have been a few who have unfortunately, oh, deed, and it has been a moment of such sadness and loss.

What I know today is I have this incredible program that has helped me each time that has happened. It still brings up tears for those losses. Yeah. To have the grace to be able to walk myself through action steps.

God bless John James for action steps, not just talking about it, but action steps that have helped me with my recovery from those losses so that I can continue to provide my good work as an advanced specialist. And I don't know that I could have done this in the most effective way that I have been able to without John's work. Yeah, he was, he certainly created a gift for the world. You know, and I'm glad we're continuing that on.

One thing I wanted to mention, again, because this is a very important part of this conversation. Every caregiver, or I should say, the majority of caregivers, right, get into this work because they genuinely want to help their fellow human being. And they go and they get this amazing education and a bunch of tools. But the amount of caregivers that have burnout and leave their whatever their field is is a pretty staggering number.

And obviously it's different for different industries and stuff. But again, if you are on the front lines, whether you're a police officer or a firefighter or a social worker or a therapist or a nurse or a doctor, you are going to have massive amounts of grief. And they simply in school kind of brush it off as if this is your client just don't get attached, as if that that's possible, right? The problem is is that is impossible.

And we start developing relationships and starting to think these people are really cool, starting a root forum, starting to love them, you know, because that's what we do as human beings. And unfortunately, some of the time, right, or again, depending on your line of work, all of the time in terms of hospice, right, these people are going to die. Not all of these people are going to make it. And that breaks our heart.

And anyone that tells you differently is not telling the truth, right? It is impossible to not get attached to our clients, you know, again, we want to use this term client. We want to make it very sterile. And it's just not that.

And so the other thing that we love to do with this method is allow people to unpack their grief around their clients and around the loss that they endure in their work. Okay. And that way they can process that and continue helping people and continue on the work that they started to do in the first place, right? And so this is a topic again that is not covered and not talked to talked about.

And we want to come up with these ideas on why do veterinarians have a very, very high suicide rate, right? Why do therapists, after a certain amount of years, you know, on average, not come back to that practice, right? A lot of it is unresolved grief, right? And if I sound like a parrot, or a, I don't know what animal repeats itself all the time, I guess a parrot.

If I sound like a parrot, it's because I am, right? Because I've been in this work for, you know, 15 years now. My dad was in this work for 40 years before that. Russell Friedman, who is my mentor and Lois Hall and Susan Dindjer and all these people before me.

Collectively, we have probably a thousand years of experience and we have connected the dots and grief is throughout it, throughout it all, right? So again, Leslie, I just want to thank you for telling the truth, which is, hey, I get to use these tools to put my heart back together when a client does overdose and die because that's really sad. And I cared about that person. And you know, if those stack up and we don't know what to do about it and our supervisor just says, well, you know, remember on in chapter four of the manual, you just don't get attached to him.

You know, if that's the only answer that someone has for you, it's going to be very hard to continue long term doing the work that you did. And you know, that you got started within the beginning because you wanted to help people. Exactly. So with exactly what you're saying, what I wanted to say earlier is with that death forever back hole, if I had had John's work in my understanding, then, oh, that would have saved me so much sadness and so many tears and such a long time that I carried that death in my knapsack without resolving it.

And then eight years back, that was one of the first experiences that I had with doing the work. And then I mentioned my friend from training and reading our letters to each other that has been such a support because the beauty of GRM, the grief recovery method is the community of the institute and the people who will meet who are other specialists and our trainers and our friends from our training and keeping in touch and supporting each other to walk this road together. Because since the horrific moment of the pandemic and all that isolation, oh my goodness, call what is the antidote to isolation and grief? It is connection every time.

And the wonder we have had this onslaught afterwards of death and horrid illness because people were so isolated for way too long. Yeah, it's really interesting you bring that up. My wife, Ashley and I often talk about, you know, we moved, we moved from California to Oregon and then Oregon to Idaho, right? And it's weird because we moved from Oregon to Idaho around the around right in the middle of the pandemic.

And a lot of the time, like for instance, if I drop my kids off for travel baseball practice or something like that, none of the parents really interact, right? It's kind of just like there's this coldness or this armor that is up. And Ashley and I are always like, is that COVID or is that just a Idaho thing or an Oregon thing? Is that just a Pacific Northwest thing?

You know, it's hard, right? Because you have a frame of reference to different places during different times, you know? And and I really do think you're right that I think that so many people, I mean myself included, but so many people did did have a lot of accumulated grief around the pandemic for a number of reasons, right? And so many people, their backpacks are full of grief.

And they they are shut down. And they're shut down emotionally and they're shut down and isolated. And I just never remember it being this way before 2020. I mean, yes, of course, we all had our problems before 2020, but collectively, I do feel a lot of what you're talking about just in our daily interactions with people, right?

The with strangers, it just seems like people are closed down and really hurting and really kind of, I don't know what the word is, but just kind of huddled up, right? Just they're not as open as they once were is my sense of it. What's your thoughts on that? My thoughts are to echo exactly what you're saying that in the discussions with the clients at residential treatment these last nearly five years, again and again and again, I have heard exactly statements similar to that.

We were so isolated during COVID and I wanted to I was trying to get to my meetings, but online I felt isolated and I couldn't and fill in the blank and I started using, I thought I could use just a little bit and be okay and back on the dark side and here I am. And again and again and again, I've heard similar stories as that. Yeah, I was just having lunch with an old friend of mine who I was in recovery with in Southern California and he was visiting up here in Idaho and he said the amount of people that he lost around 21, 22 in the recovery community, the amount of overdoses that he was seeing, again coming out of COVID and then you had fentanyl and all those kind of diff, it was just like a perfect storm of people just couldn't take it, right? And again, that is heartbreaking and that's a community I want to help, it's a community that I belong to, frankly, but again, I think it's so much bigger than that, right?

I'm seeing it with the soccer moms that drop their kids off for practice. I'm seeing with, you know, again, people that I meet through whatever event there is. People are, I mean, it's almost like I have to go out of my way to really have a conversation now with a stranger in a shared kind of meeting space where normally it wouldn't have been that hard. Same on planes, right, when I'm traveling.

Again, I think collectively we are just really filled up with some grief over past events and we don't know how to get complete with it and kind of to kind of have that armor around us as a protection. It's don't let people in. Yeah. Well, I guess we got our work cut out for us, Leslie.

I think we already knew that, but you know, I, it's heartbreaking, right? I don't mean to make light of it. Let's talk about another thing that's on my mind. You gave me your age, which I don't believe, but anyway, you gave me your age and you talked about how you want to help people in kind of the, in that community, right?

And my mom is 79. And so from my perspective, it has been, it's been very hard for me to watch because my, my mom really had just an incredible life and from the outside looking in, it didn't look like she had a lot of loss in her 40s and her 50s and her 60s, right? But, but, you know, hovering around late 60s and into her 70s, she's just been losing friend after friend, right? And it has been so hard for me to watch her losing a bunch of hair peer group, right?

And just loss after loss in her husband of 40 years and her best friend of, you know, 35 years. And, you know, it just keeps coming for her. And it just breaks my heart. Can you talk a little bit about grief recovery in, in kind of that, that, that community?

Yes. I am so grateful as a youthful senior woman. And yes, I'm proud of my age. I began my practice for anyone who's listening and is looking at maybe becoming a specialist.

I began my practice when I was 70 and I am so proud now to be healthy and 78. And it is never, ever, ever too late not to become a specialist, not to become healthy with being in a recovery community. When I mentioned my father a year younger than me went to his first AA meeting and because he was sober, I was able to have a friendship with him that never, ever could I have had if he had not become sober. I believe that sometimes because especially in California and especially that I live in the Los Angeles greater area, there is such a, you need to be young and only young and only look the certain way and be this where these clothes and it's all materially suggested.

And the truth is it doesn't matter what age we are, we can become a specialist. It doesn't matter what age we are if we're battling with any addiction, whatever the stirb is, whatever it is, we can come to residential treatment. And so I use proudly my age at times in my recovery groups because sometimes there'll be people who will be 60 or 65 and they'll come to me and they'll say, oh, I don't think I can do it. I'm too old and I'll say you are speaking with the wrong lady.

Let me tell you about my dad. And not only did he recover coal, but he became part of his community in Santa Monica and became a, became trained as a volunteer counselor so that he could be a part of his community as he aged in those later years. So this thing that we have in our larger community about youth is something that I did not buy. I am about whatever it is in one's heart.

If we follow our heart, it always knows where it's going and we can become sober, we can become a specialist, we can become an advanced specialist at any age. Yeah, I love that message. And also, look, if you are 70 and you just want to go through the grief recovery method, right? It is available to you because I used to kind of pay attention and it was like I would see some of the most vibrant people I've ever seen in their 70s where people I went to at meetings.

And I would literally take note. I want to, you know, forgive me, but you know, I was when I was 25 and sitting in these meetings, it was like when I'm an old dude, I want to be like that. You know, like there were some very inspiring older people. And I truly believe it's because they did a bunch of their work internally and they processed and got rid of a bunch of stuff that was weighing them down that they didn't want to carry.

And I truly think that that is a huge, huge piece of it, maybe not everything. But I think that's a huge piece of when I see older people and I say, you know what, I want what they have. That's how I want to be around my grandkids. That's that's the kind of energy I want to have.

I think a lot of it is they did up, they did some their work, their internal work that they needed to do. You know, now, you know, again, I think eating right and exercising, there's all these pieces of it. But again, if you have a lifetime full of grief and you get into your 70s and you have, you know, 35, 40, 50, 60 significant losses from your life, that is very heavy. That is very heavy.

And it's going to be hard to carry around, right? It's hard enough to carry around in our 30s or our 40s in our 50s. So yeah, anyway, I, I, and again, I want to just mention that I, I'm, I'm, my mother has been doing grief recovery, you know, and it's been incredible because again, the losses seem so consistently coming for her, unfortunately, right? But there are tools that she's using and I know you're using.

So now, do you, you mentioned earlier that you work one on one primarily with people like in your practice, right? And you go ahead. No, go ahead. No, please.

Oh, no, I'm talking way too much. I want to hear from you. Forever back, Sandy Derby, I know you're going to hear this. I love you.

Me too. I love you too, Sandy. I was, I was, I am so grateful for her inputs and Nicole for giving me this health confidence when I was beginning to speak and go out in the community and just begin to, begin to the beginning with developing the work. And I knew because of my work in hospice for all those 12 years, I worked either as a social worker or the manager of volunteer services with families at the end of life.

And I knew that I wanted and was capable of having a deeper connection with families than the particular space for which I was hired at the time. And I knew I wanted to go deep. So one on one is a totally different dynamic than being in the group. As you and I both know.

And because I am such a truly, I'm a personal person, the one on one focus has been my desire from the very beginning. And so for new people who are even listening and considering, oh, do I have to lead groups? Can I lead one on one? Any way one wants to develop his, her practice is possible.

And Sandy was so beautiful in telling me that because that was really where my heart was at. And so in my private practice, I do work only one on one. And then I work in the groups in just talking of our principles at the specific facilities where I deal with residential treatment. But one on one has been a joy.

And I have marketed myself across the nation, Nicole. And I'm proud to say that I now have worked in about 11 states. Wow. Bravo.

That's, that's great. And it's just, it's, you know, it's so fulfilling and it's so fulfilling to help any human being who has the willingness to look at their own heart of pain and walk through these action exercises to get to the place at the end of two months of work, feeling youthful, feeling reenergized, feeling anxiety, not part of the day any longer, feeling able to walk down the street of their loved one who passed with fond memories, not of great hurt. It is such a joy to do this work because I'll be it, it's educational and it is not therapy. It has so many therapeutic effects.

Yeah. Yeah. Well, well put. And that's why that's why we named it the Feel Free Again podcast, right?

Because when I went out for and again, this is different for everybody. But when I really try and kind of hone in on what this work feels like to me, it's freedom, right? It's like every time I do completion work around a relationship graph, most, most often I just feel free. I feel lighter, you know, and again, all of the things you touched on as well, that is the feeling, you know, of the work for a lot of people.

Um, I wish so much. Go ahead. I wish so very much that I had had this work in my understanding 40 years back when the San woman, unfortunately, committed suicide. It would have helped my process so greatly.

It took me years to walk through that and get to the other side, where if I had John's work and those action steps, then it would have helped me so tremendously. And guess what? We get there when we get there. So yeah, eight years, I'm very grateful.

Yeah. No, I remember I remember a couple of of instances where I worked with clients using the grief recovery method or I sponsored guys in the 12 step program I'm in. And things didn't work out how I'd hope they did, right? And I lost I lost sponsor ease and I, you know, and I heard really tragic things around grief recovery and it stuck to me and I didn't know how to get I didn't know how to get free of it.

And luckily, I had I had job James and I had Russell Friedman and they would they, you know, they take me out to lunch or they they would show me the process. And it was just grief recovery. It was just figuring out how to apply these tools and grieving complete what was unfinished in your relationship. It just happened to be a client, but just replace that word with a friend, right?

Because a lot of the time these that's what these people are to us is our friends. You know, not always again, it depends on what setting you're in, but a lot of the time that's how it felt like to me friends. And, and so again, I know we're kind of circling back, but I just can't stress it enough. Like if you got into some field because you really love the field or you're passionate about helping people and you're in a you're in a time in that career where you feel like maybe this isn't the field for you and you need to move on.

You know, that may just simply be you need to move on and you want to find something new, but if it's not that and if it's actually I am filled up with grief and pain around the culmination of years in this work, that just may be unresolved grief. And if you can complete that, you may have a renewed kind of lease on life in that profession, right? So I would just consider that if you're listening to this and that is you and you're looking for career change. Is it is it a career change or is it because I might you know, I'm filled up to hear with a bunch on resolved stuff and pain from from that because it's a hard job, right?

So, you know, the other thing too I wanted to touch on which you mentioned a couple of minutes ago, Leslie. I don't know why this is, right? But I feel like some people I know are happy talking about fantasy football or they want to talk about sports. And I don't, you know, it's like if we're at a party and you like are droning on and on about some NFL game, I'm going to go find someone else to talk to because I'm just not built to talk on surface level stuff, right?

And I just think there are men and women out there that are that are built that way. And then there's other men and women that are, you know, kind of built more to talk about, you know, kind of more surface level stuff. And then there's other people that I think would like to talk about deeper stuff. But really they talk about surface level stuff because they're scared or they don't want to unpack any, you know, that stuff and they just want to keep it there.

But if you are listening and you're one of those people that wants to connect hard to hard on a deep level, I mean, obviously, Leslie, when I was going through all your different credentials here, right? You've been on that mission for quite some time now connecting with people because I know that's who you are. And again, I just, I just can't reiterate enough that the grief recovery method tool helps you go so deep with people so quickly. And, you know, it's like I've had, I've had professionals ask me, Cole, you know, in this group, how do you build rapport so quickly with the whole group?

You know, there's 20 people in the room and within hours, you have built rapport. And I'm like, well, first of all, I'm going to never use a term build rapport, right? We're going to use much more simple terms that I learned from John James, who are Russell Friedman. That's tell the truth about myself.

It's really hard for you to not connect with me when I just tell the truth about myself and then ask you about yourself and then be quiet and listen, right? A heart with ears to you. All of a sudden, we're going to be a lot more human to human, right? And again, it sounds simple.

It's not that simple, but as long as you have some grief recovery tools, you can have as many real deep intimate conversations as you want with people, right? You can almost never operate from that surface level with these skills. And it's been such a gift for me to kind of understand how to navigate that. Yeah.

So when I made a group at the facilities, if what I have learned is that when something has happened, that's tragic in my own life. I don't begin the group and with unifying feelings inside, never expressed. I start the group and say, hey, I'm Leslie. I'm an advanced specialist and I'm so looking forward to meeting you today and doing this work together.

And I need to just share with you that I'm walking through a difficult moment myself. I have a friend who just passed from cancer and that's so in my heart. And if I get choked up, I get choked up. And I just model our work by speaking honestly about what's going on because just like your mom and I left her call, just like your mama, I am a senior who's losing people all the time and not speaking of it would be so foreign to the work that I'm doing that to be real about it.

And authentic is part of the work. And so sometimes at the end of the hour, some of the residents will come to me or clients will come to me and say, I so appreciated what you said at the beginning, just opening with that story about your own life. Thank you so much. And that's what's real.

Yeah. I, you know, if they're it's funny now that we're talking about this. One of the things that infuriates me in life is when people in professions have a lack of humility. And it's probably just because I've I was trained, you know, in this work where it's a very, it's a very, again, there is, there's humility in our work, right?

It's like, hi, you know, yes, you're in advance grief recovery specialist. And tomorrow you just may be grieving the death of your dad, you know, and you're just have a heartbroken, you're just a heartbroken person, and that has been me many times in this work, right? And it is so frustrating for me when you have these professions where people pretend like they have it all figured out and they're kind of robotic and they're never willing to kind of admit, no, they are human beings too. And I think it's just kind of I'm putting it together right now.

It's because of this because that's not how we're trained, right? We're from the day one of learning this work, you understand, sometimes you're just a griever, you're not an expert, right? Sometimes you go into a room and you forget why you were there. It's because your heart is broken over something and we don't get to sidestep that because we have some credential, right?

And we we kind of hammer that home in the training and in the support calls afterward is never leaves never leaves sight of your humanity. Never, never, never use your certification as a buffer or a barrier between you and your client, right? Always remember it's it's this you and your client is this and you're a human being and they're a human being and you just have a couple of extra tools to articulate to that person, you know? And you call our such a beautiful model of just that because what I remember so very well is in the sadness of losing your dad and all of us walking through that moment together with his loss.

There is a beautiful video that you made that I will always cherish and remember and you said I'm not speaking to you as the president of this organization. I'm not speaking to you as a specialist. I'm speaking to you as a son who's mourning the loss of his father and it was so beautiful and so real and so touching. It's giving me a little choke up just to speak it now because I remember that.

If you just modeling, this is what I'm walking through right now. I'm not these things. I'm not my profession. I'm a human being whose father is gone and my heart is broken and I just was so touched by your authenticity and your transparency with all of us.

Thank you. That means a lot to me. I really appreciate that and yeah, life is a life is a weird journey, right? It's like I never I never thought that I know this sounds very naive but until my dad started getting cancer, I had really never contemplating him have dying.

He was such a larger-than-life figure. I was like naive thinking, no, he'll just be around forever because the world just needs him, right? And then one day he's not there. You know, in one day, I'm just a grieving son and then even in his death, I'm utilizing the tools he taught me to grieve and complete what was unfinished with him, right?

It's just this really weird last several years, right? Where it's just, hey, that's what life that's how life played out and so anyway. But thank you again. Thank you for saying that and and yeah, and again, we make sure that our our specialists understand that, right?

There needs to be and will always be a humility in this work, right? We will never rise above and think we have we're too educated to like understand you or we, you know, we have too many skills to really relate to you. It's like no, no, no, no, this stuff is very flat. It's just this, you know, it'll it will always be that.

So and again, you you embody that Leslie and that's why I brought this up talking to you because look, you do have plenty of credentials and it would be really easy for you to just be like, hey, I'm a professional and let me I'm here to help you guys for the next hour or the next couple of weeks. But but again, you've you've you've you've put too much into this training and you just again, you you just embody these foundational skills, you know, Ed and I talk a lot about that is if there's one thing that we can continue to train people on, because the 4-day training is a whirlwind, right? I mean, you're doing your personal work, you're hearing a lot of stuff, you know, me or Sandier and or some other trainers up there, just throwing concepts at you nonstop. And it's it's amazing that that our specialists retain as much as they do in the 4 days, but they don't retain everything.

And sometimes either in the Facebook group or, you know, in questions, they're asking questions that are like very foundational questions that we're like, I thought we covered that like seven to 12 times in the training. But again, there's there's a lot. And so that's one thing that we're we're constantly thinking about is like, how do we just make sure that people work on the fundamentals, right? It's not like, yes, you're an advanced train, a trained specialist, I'm a trainer, but it's not like we have a secret place or see extra thing.

We're just really good at the fundamentals. And we very much understand the principles of this work and where we need to be and how we need to describe it. There's no secret sauce when you get, you know, more experience that this work, right? You just have a deeper understanding of the fundamentals, I would say.

Yes, absolutely. And that deeper understanding is a gift that takes work and commitment. And there's no short trip to doing this work well. It is the experience and the strength and the hope of continuing it in its all its great imperfection because it's not going to be great with every client and some clients are going to begin and maybe not have the strength to walk through the entire program because of what is going on with them and to allow that to be and just let it be because it takes a huge commitment from anyone to say, I am grieving and I need help.

And please work with me. Such approach. Yeah. Well, well said.

Well, Leslie, I wish that everyone that got certified would put in the work you did, you know, just because you again, you are a professional. You take your career and your reputation seriously. You take helping people seriously. And you really have taken advantage of everything we have to offer as an organization, right?

I mean, you've taken advantage of the support. You've taken advantage of like the coaching with Sandy. And you have just stayed close to us and you have changed the lives of many, many people because of it, you know, and I just I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart. You're exactly the type of person that we want to find that we want to help, you know, empower to go out there and help people as well.

So thank you on behalf of my dad and rustling all of those that came before me. Thank you for the work that you're doing. You're an absolute inspiration. Thank you so much.

Cool. It's my honor. It's not work for me. It's a calling.

Yeah. Yeah. Very different. A calling is something and work is another.

This is a calling. Yeah. Well, and it's like, I remember, I remember us talking very early on in your training, right? And it's like, yep, Leslie, I think she's going to be great at this work.

But you, you never know, right? And you just went off and you've been working with a lot of the team, not so much me because I'm off busy. But you've been out there just working with the team and just doing amazing things for the last eight years. And, you know, and again, thank you.

Where can people that want to work with you? How can they best find you, Leslie? Oh, that's so kind. Thank you.

They can text me at my phone. Am I able to is three 10 five seven zero one three three seven. You can find me on my microsite on our national website through my name. And you can find me on my individual website, which I just edited and reviewed and changed.

And I love it. It is Leslie, Jay, Tolen at whoops Leslie J Tolen dot com. Okay, perfect. And what we'll do is we will make sure we link to that in the show notes of this podcast.

And on YouTube, we'll make sure that we link to your site. And so if you're listening, and you're and you're thinking this stuff sounds kind of interesting. And you know, you have some some past hurt. And you're looking to do some work around that.

Again, I can't recommend Leslie strongly enough, right? You will be in very, very good hands with a loving, loving person if you choose to reach out to Leslie. So, make sure you do that. And any final closing thoughts, Leslie, anything you want to let the listeners know for anyone who's listening who hasn't yet taken a step to have this work be a part of your own recovery.

My thoughts and prayers are with you to just take the first step and find any specialist whom you can just have a consultation with at no fee just to hear about what this work is because it is so life-giving and so life-changing. And as I said to Colin, hour ago, my single regret is that someone didn't find me many decades ago to introduce me to it. So Godspeed. And thank you so much.

And and thank you all for listening. Make sure to like and subscribe to this podcast. If you if you think any friend or family member would get something out of this conversation, make sure to share this. And until next time, thank you for listening to the Feel Free again podcast.

And I have a great hope you have a great rest of your day. Thank you.