Sound United Presents
Sound United Presents is a community-centered podcast that highlights the authentic stories of entrepreneurs, professionals, and everyday heroes. Each episode features guests who discuss their victories, challenges, lessons, expertise, insights, wisdom, and "One-Word." Our goal is to Empower with Sound.
Sound United Presents
Navigating Grief and Growth
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In this season finale and special two-hour episode, we present Dr. Sherri Harper Woods, a counselor, professor, and advocate from Warren, Ohio. A mother and community leader, she shares how early lessons, family loss, and faith led her from local classrooms to global trauma healing. You’ll hear how she built wellness programs reaching from Ohio to Rwanda—offering care, connection, and hope. Most of all, you’ll meet a woman whose mission crosses borders and begins with heart.
In This Episode, We Discuss:
- Growing Up in Warren and Early Lessons
- Choosing Social Work Over Teaching
- Juggling Motherhood, School, and Tenure
- Losing Loved Ones and Finding Purpose
- Building MyBoSo and Global Healing Work
- Faith, Trauma, and Mental Health Access
- Dr. Woods’s “One Word”
So press play and be moved by Dionne's inspiring story. Ladies and gentlemen, Sound United Presents... Dr. Sherri Harper Woods!
Be sure to subscribe wherever you vibe with podcasts or visit our website. www.soundunitedpresents.com
Sound United Presents is a community-focused podcast powered by Sound United Podcast Studio. Produced by Kimberly Gonzales and D. Lee Scott
Introduction to Dr. Sherry Harper-Woods
Speaker 1Hello, ladies and gents, welcome to Sound United Presents, a diverse and inclusive podcast focused on local entrepreneurs, professionals and unsung community heroes. Within each episode, our guests will candidly share their stories filled with triumph, failures, humor, lessons learned, insight and some nuggets of wisdom. I'm very excited about this and I hope you are too. Let's get started, hey folks. Thank you for hitting the play button. Welcome to another episode of Sound United Presents in the comfy conversational confines of Sound United Podcast Studio, which we are the new location but I will talk about that later because I'm excited about our guests and she's excited to be here, so I'm going to give a little tad every now and then. I like a little tad backstory or something. I'm not going to say who my guest is, because I got to get that intro you know how I'd like to do it but an interesting story that's connected to her. Her husband gave me my first job, that that was the foundation of my nonprofit experience and that was the team mentoring program. I was the program coordinator and he was moving to do something else and he gave me I'd even say his last name, but I want to spoil that either, because I got to say, say, I guess, last name, but he gave me that opportunity. But during all this time I had to collaborate with my guests in different things A lot of community stuff, team building stuff, mentoring stuff with the school district and stuff. And always the one word that I can, always, if I had to use one, was just like moxie, determination, like that. That would be my word for her, and so I'm very excited.
Speaker 1We actually spoke in 2022 and I wasn't even sure if I was going to do a podcast or not. I was like we were talking about if I do, I really want you on, because our topic was just a lot of what we're going to talk about today and I thought it was very important to have her on here and for her to share her story. So 2023 comes along and I'm still not sure and in 2024, in the beginning come along and Deshaun says I'm going to do it, I'm doing season four, and the first person I thought about getting on this show was my guest and we worked it out and she's here and with that, ladies and gentlemen, sound United presents Dr Sherry Harper Woods. Welcome to the show, thank you. So you know that I give our guests, I give you like a minute or so to just kind of briefly you don't have to hit everything you know just briefly, kind of talk about yourself a little bit and let the audience know just a little snapshot of who you are.
Speaker 2First of all, thank you for the opportunity. I'm really excited to be here. This is my first podcast, so excuse me if I fumble or get a little nervous. I'm really excited about the opportunity.
Speaker 2So I was thinking, when asked to introduce ourselves, that oftentimes we start with our roles right, like I'm a woman, I'm a female, I'm a wife, and then we might go into our profession.
Speaker 2You know, I'm a trauma therapist, I am a certified yoga instructor, I'm a professor at YSU and I think that when we do that, we sort of minimize answering the question right, because we relate it to our roles and that becomes our identity and where I am right now in my life. I think it's more important that I would introduce myself as who I've become. So I would say that I'm Sherry, I'm a visionary, I'm an equipper. So I would say that I'm Sherry, I'm a visionary, I'm an equipper, I'm an empowerer, I'm a person who has done the work, the copay I call it to build a. People who have that crippling of their identity begin to walk with their limp, those who are blinded by their circumstances to begin to see the real worth of who they are, and those who have been silenced by the voices of others to begin to speak for themselves. I'd say this is Sherry.
Speaker 1I'm going to use another word and I'm just say incredible, like that, you know, taking that in and going into it the way you did that, that's, that's awesome. That's the first time, first time that that's been done on the show. You just laid it out there. That's beautiful too. So your time, here are you are. Has the valley been your home for? Like, where did you grow up?
Speaker 2Well, so I grew up here and then I ventured out into foreign waters and I lived in Germany and Colorado and then I came up Florida and came back here. There's something about the valley. Some people run from it. I found myself running to it right. I ran away from it as a child. Some different traumatic experiences that led me to think that I needed to leave and I couldn't be who. I needed to be here, but the same thing brought me back to the valley. It's like the only place where I could be me and find the most me. So I've been back since 1994. I've been back and I left in 1986.
Speaker 1Wow. So where'd you go to school around here?
Speaker 2So I grew up in Willard Elementary. I went also to McGuffey, turner East and Harding when it was the Harding with the Panthers, okay, when the Panthers and the Raiders actually played on Saturday and you know the big rival and you went to McDonald's after the game. I grew up in that era here in Warren when everybody was my sister and brother's keeper, like literally you couldn't do anything on your street without somebody knowing, like when the Harpers, the Hines, the Franklins, it was like one big family. So I grew up doing a really, I'd say, a really good time that if we went back to some of those principles, I think that our communities would be stronger.
Speaker 2We didn't have a lot financially. I didn't even know I was poor until I left and went overseas because everyone I grew up with lived in poverty, so it was just our normal and so. But it was a good time. So we didn't have a lot of things, but we had a lot of love. We had a lot of community. We made games. We just explored the neighborhood. We would do like snow igloos on days off from Milton Street to the Trumbull Homes. We would play in the big field football. We had the basketball courts. The Delaney Center was open. So we did a lot of community. It was part of our life, we didn't know any different.
Speaker 1I agree I started smiling because we haven't got a lot of snow over the last few years, like even you guys started smiling because we haven't got a lot of snow over the last few years and, um, one of the things was just missing being able to with the kids and probably now with grand, with my grandkids. If it does snow, hopefully we'll get a lot to the igloos. You know, I'm making trenches and yes putting little flags in there and snowball fights.
Speaker 1Oh yeah, I miss it I'm, you know, the neighborhood, exploring, climbing trees. You know what I mean playing rough and tumble because I grew up on Elm Court but my grandmother stayed in the Fairview Gardens, so I'm an east side guy, so we would go over there and play rough and tumble, hide and seek, freeze tag, super friends, you name it. Whatever was in our head, that's what we did, you know, and or you know, roam on the railroad tracks and make slingshots, and so I agree. And then when you look at community, it was like you know you wouldn't get in the way with too much.
Speaker 2No.
Speaker 1Yes, sir, no, sir, yes, ma'am, no, ma'am, you know what I mean. So so that was that was. That was a good time. So in Harding did you take any special? You know, was any special classes like?
Speaker 2Yeah, I actually end up in being in. Now I won't even remember the name of it because you asked me, but it was like a business education prep track and so actually it was stenography, that's what it. Yeah, and we did stenography and so I learned how to do shorthand type filing and it actually was the best thing that happened to me, because I ended up never having a minimum wage job, even for, like the summer jobs. Instead of cleaning a building, I was at the courthouse working with attorneys and I had side jobs on Saturdays transcribing for them, so it was a really good program for me.
Speaker 1Wait, they had a stenography class. They don't have that now.
Growing Up in Warren and Educational Journey
Speaker 2No, and I still do shorthand sometimes if I'm sitting, you know I still remember parts of it. So that was a really good um program that they had it started in 11th grade.
Speaker 1I think it was our 11th and 12th grade year oh, I was gonna ask, well, one of the questions like what kind of jobs did you have? But you, you ain't.
Speaker 2You was with the professionals yeah, and then my um job, because they also placed you somewhere. So my job I went out and found my job because the courthouse only allowed me during summertime. So it was like the summer program, you know, for the underserved population, where they allowed you to work. So they made an exception they allowed me to work during the summertime. So when that ended, then I went to Joyce's House of Style.
Speaker 2I don't know if you remember Joyce Butler, so her shop was on North Park. It's still there now. Someone else has it. But I went to her and I was like Miss Joyce, I want to work as your receptionist here. And she's like a receptionist. Well, you know, we answer the phones ourselves. I was like, no, I need to be placed somewhere, I want to answer the phones. And so it ended up she let me work there as the receptionist. Then I would do shampooing sometimes. And what I really appreciated about her is that we didn't have a lot of money to get my hair done. But since I worked there, she always allowed the people to do my hair. So Bobby Bodie Smith would do my hair like every couple weeks. I'd have all these fresh hairstyles and cuts and color, and so I know that miss joyce was doing that because she knew that we couldn't afford it.
Speaker 2you know but, she never made me feel like that. I didn't realize that until I was older. Like she would always say, hey, we got this new product in, let you know, let bobby try it on you, or oh wow, well, that goes back to that community. Community.
Speaker 1Yeah, did you have a dream career? I feel like you're going to say this, but I'm not going to bring it up. But did you have a dream career when you?
Speaker 2were. I did, I did. Actually, my dream was to be a teacher and I used to make my siblings sit and I would write and have them write down their assignments. I'd make them play. But I actually ended up being a social worker, because that's what I saw the most. My mom was a social worker at Children's Services before she took ill and wasn't able to work. Maxine Franklin, another community person who just sort of adopted me into not just her, the work, but her personal family, was a social worker.
Speaker 2And so when it came time to choose a career, I started off in business management and hotel hospitality actually, and then I transitioned into social work, and then social work led me into being a professor. So I knew that I wanted to be a teacher, but I didn't know how to merge the two and social work felt like it was like a call to me that I had to answer. I was a non-traditional student. I said when I came back to Warren I had already studied business but then decided this isn't really working for me.
Speaker 2I worked in catering sales and I had a problem selling the same dinner for 10 and 27. Like I knew you could go down to 10. And so when people who could afford it at 27,. I'd be like you want that you don't have to stick with what the menu says. With that price we can work with you. And my food and beverage director was like Sherry, you can't be like giving away stuff Like we can do it for 10 because of the 27. So it just didn't feel ethical to me to be able to do that in the wedding planning and people who would be willing to spend like $80 a person, and I knew it could go down to like 12. And so I'd have these people paying $12 with this elegant wedding. It wasn't working for me.
Speaker 1It felt like it was a battle with conscience. It was.
Speaker 2It was. And then I felt like, just because you didn't have the money didn't mean you shouldn't have the quality of my service and a wedding that really did what you needed to, or a catering function. So there was this little battle. So I came back, ended up with Beverly Jean Pollard at UMADOV and worked for her as a prevention coordinator and she was like why aren't you in school?
Speaker 1That sounds like her.
Speaker 2I don't know. She's like you need to enroll in school. I said how would I do that? I had my daughter. My husband at the time had been in a car accident and was in Colorado. He was immobile and unable to move excuse me, which is part of why I came back to Warren to get help with my daughter. And so I was like how do I do this? And she was like we'll figure it out. Like what hours are your school? And you work here during the off time. So she helped me get back into school and you work here during the off time. So she helped me get back into school.
Speaker 2And Dr Mosca Joe Mosca is his name. At the time he was a social work instructor and his teaching was so extraordinary and I was like he taught back then and it wasn't popular with movies and he used demonstrations and we actually talked to each other in dyads and not just him talking. And so I was really intrigued and I said I like your teaching. I wonder if I would be able to be a social work teacher. And he said why not Go back and get your master's and I'll hire you part time? So I did, and I came back and he did Because by that time he was the I think he was the chair of social work.
Speaker 2So he hired me as a part-time faculty. Then I was like I want to be a professor. He said, go back and get your doctorate and I'll write your letter of reference. Because by that time he was a dean. And he did. And it wasn't an easy route getting there. Like there was some really challenging things about YSU, like literally some institutional racism and struggles that I went to to get the job. But when I finally did, it wasn't because he didn't support me, he was very supportive. President Trestle at the time was very supportive and so I was able to start and that's where the two merged. It was like, wow, I could be a teacher and do social work and so hence, social work professor.
Speaker 1I don't know if it's over here smiling, you could probably tell. The sun shines on you, though, but I got to smile because I do believe that, like these, you know how there's certain careers where this is. You have to be this right, you can't be anything else.
Speaker 2You can't blend nothing.
Speaker 1You are this and you know, when I look back for me, like I chose social science for my bachelor's degree because, number one, I didn't want to do anything related to math. Number one, I looked at that thing up in higher I was like no, but the other thing was that I could blend, because there were, there were certain things Communication, I'm big on that. Business management, I'm big on that. Entrepreneurship, I'm big on that you know. Theater and the arts, you know. And because a lot of that plays a role to even how I manage the companies, you know Oklahoma Glass Menagerie, just little elements of theater that tie into business, believe it or not. But so I sit back and I tell my kids is, I'm very happy on the path that I took.
Speaker 1In my head I still kind of have that mindset of, you know, running nonprofit, even though I'm for profit because I like to help people, I like to give them information or or access to things that you know. Oh, by the way, you know this, this workshop is going on and is free because I know, you know, because my client has, you know, might be a budget thing for them. So I'm still helping people even though I'm over here in this space, I'm still giving back. I'm still helping people. Even though I'm over here in this space, I'm still giving back, I'm still helping people. I'm, you know, linking up with people who do amazing things. So I really like that. So you're the social work and teaching and combining that. It's almost like the wonder twins.
Speaker 2Yeah, that's funny. You should say that you know, you just you boom.
Speaker 1You know what I'm saying, so that's a good thing. What was the hardest? So you transition, like I know as you speak it it sounds like you just boom, boom, boom, boom. But as you and I both know, like taking those elevations in education, there's, you know, you juggling, you know you have a child. You're doing all this. What was some of the things that maybe like some of the challenges going through all that? Because you got your doctorate Like you just boom, boom, you just went straight through.
Speaker 2I did and part of the blessing was the curse was the going straight through. So I started my children when little my daughter was in kindergarten. Yeah, when I started my son he was a newborn. When I got my bachelor's and in fact I was on bed rest and wasn't even able to go to graduation and so part of that was like I didn't get to walk. Maybe I should go to my, get my master's so I could walk, like just weird thinking, but that it was really challenging because of the time that I gave up with them and I didn't realize it then.
Speaker 2But there were some consequences to that in their life and me being present. I remember my son. He was really good at basketball and he made like the shot of the game and my head was down looking at a book. And when I looked up and he looked at me and he could see that my head was down and he was like, mom, you didn't see me. I was like, yes, I did. He said, no, your head was down, I saw you, and so things like that.
Speaker 2I will say this I was present, but I was absent. So I was physically present, but it was always oh, this paper is due or I need to turn in the first three chapters of my dissertation proposal, or, okay, we can do this, but only until this time because I have this. And so what was the blessing for me was my husband was really so. He was a dad, mom. He already has that in him. So for him to do like PTO and show up for everything for the children was natural. So he easily, you know, filled in that way. But there were things that I missed because I was too busy pursuing my education and so my children missed out.
Speaker 1And you said you were a non-traditional student too. Yeah, I understand.
Speaker 2I worked full time, even through my dissertation, and I did my doctorate in three years. I completed the coursework and the dissertation in three years. That's not. It's not healthy, it's not normal.
Speaker 1I was going to say what's the norm?
Speaker 2Five, five to seven. I would tell anyone, don't do it. We had a cohort and we were really like we started from the beginning like we're done with these classes, one year we're done. And it was the norm at Ashland, where One year we're done, and it was the norm at Ashland where I attended like that high achievement level and I just really fought hard with my own demons of, like people pleasing perfectionism, performance, right. I call it the P trifecta and it beat me down. Education is not a good place for someone who already has a performance disorder, right. And so being in school challenged me like always working to get that A+, not just the A, you know, do the extra and that requires a lot of time.
Speaker 2I took away from my children. That was a challenge. And then, even with the going into education, so here it is. And then, even with the going into education, so here it is. I fight and beat those demons through school, I make it through, I become the 1% of African-American females holding their doctorate or whatever it is, and get into the sister doctorate club, as they call it. And then I go to an institution and become a faculty member where you perform you people please right, getting tenure is about. Will they approve what you've done? And as an African-American.
Speaker 2So our requirements were like, let's say, two journal articles, two presentations, so much service. So that was the minimum. And someone told me from the beginning which they were right we have to have more. So if their requirement is two, you need six. I had eight and they still didn't want to give me 10.
Speaker 2Like there was still when I went up early for tenure, because going early means that you've met the requirements and you really believe that you've done it to the rate of excellence that you shouldn't have to wait for that time. And so when I went there like no, you know, you didn't make it, I'm like I'm over what I have. So it really sent me into this depression, because it's about performing, people, pleasing, you know, showing up in perfectionism, and so I hit these demons again. So another challenge and it wasn't until after I got tenured that I was able to rest into who I was and to recognize the spiral that I had gotten back on in this performance. And all this time we're still doing our nonprofit stuff. And all this time we're still doing our nonprofit stuff, I'm still, you know, taking care of my mom, my children, you know, being a wife, all of these things at once. So I would say that those were the challenges, that really it came with the cost a really high cost Going back that I wouldn't pay again.
Speaker 2I wouldn't pay it that way.
Speaker 1Going back, that I wouldn't pay again. I wouldn't pay it that way. Being a nontraditional student just does that make you. Do you think there's there's some benefit to that now, despite you know the things you you just mentioned. But just being a nontraditional student like I didn't go back, I didn't get my GED until I was 26. I didn't enroll in college until I was close to 27, right around in there, and I used to always think somehow. So I'm sitting in these college classrooms and there's these younger ones, you know they ain't showing up or it's summer. Like I went all through summer. I was like no breaks for me. You know, I'm just running through, but then I would be sitting next to the young, you know, like they just coming in, they ain't taking it serious or anything like that. And I was kind of glad because I don't think the younger me would have took it as serious. Do you think there's just something about being a nontraditional student Like you're ready for that? You know, maybe battle tested.
Speaker 2So that question is heavy weighted right. I would say that there are benefits to being nontraditional, because you are about the grind, you know the cost of it, you're going for a goal, you're willing to do what it takes to make it happen, and so you have more dedication. Like I noticed my students who are non-traditional going into the graduate program that they're just focused, they want to learn, they don't complain I don't do undergrad. Like when I started I was like I don't like them, they don't like me.
Blending Social Work and Teaching
Speaker 2Yeah, don't add any more of them to my course load. We're not working together. They're like, oh, dr Woods expects too much, she doesn't understand, we don't know this. I'm like you would know it. If you pay attention in class, you know you're on your phone. So I think non-traditional people they show, they pay the money, they know that there's a cost, they do that, but at the same time I think that it pulls on the demand. So a lot of my non-traditional students don't go through the process. They start and they don't finish. Because life happens right and you're so busy trying to balance your children and things that occur in your life that you can't commit that time and because you are one that is trying to achieve at a certain level, you find challenges in how do I balance all of this and so sometimes they topple out.
Speaker 2So one of the things that I'm really excited about in my classes is that I add in a self-care component. So every class I teach substance use and recovery, a trauma recovery course. That are my specialties spirituality and social work. Each one of them has a self-care component where we do, like one of them, I use business skills class, I use breath rumbles and we do breathing practice, but we rumble with. Who are we? Who are we in business? Who are we showing up as ourselves? How does the authentic person of the therapist show up in the space of the therapist? And so in the trauma class, we use actually the episodes of the Maid. Have you seen that on? It's on Netflix and it's about a maid and her dilemmas and traumas through interpartnership violence.
Speaker 2And so, as a part of the course, though, I have them rumble with their own trauma, like how does this? Where have you seen inter-partnership violence? It has substance use disorder as part of her life there. It has social systems, social service systems and institutional racism demonstrated. So then I ask them, like what's this like for you? You know, take a breath in, sit in that space. What are you feeling in your body? What's uncomfortable for you in watching this? Why?
Speaker 2I asked about their substance use history and their family, and how does that interrupt with how they might show up as a therapist? So, in that they're caring for themselves, they're doing either usually it's breath practices restorative stretch. I use meditations and mindfulness as part of the self-care, but as those exercises, you're rumbling with who you are so that you can begin to understand yourself, balance that life, like in business skills. We talk about home life balance, and so I believe that it's I don't know what the question was again how we got here but that self-care for the person as a non-traditional student can help them then to make it through the pathway. Without that, they crumble.
Speaker 1I believe that, like I'm listening to you describe this class and I'm like that would be good for like a business workshop, because you know we do in our realms of work. You know we, you know some of us, even with myself, we may be going through you know grief, we have the pressures of, you know economy, especially if you're a minority business, because that's there's some similars.
Speaker 1but then you know, as you know it's a whole nother space and you know some of us have younger children, so it's just you know. And then we just have some some trauma and conflict, inner conflict. Like you don't teach that, like you don't just have that as a workshop, yeah, actually I do.
Speaker 2So part of the work that I'm doing is to teach healthcare professionals about what does it look like for vicarious trauma, secondary trauma, compassion, fatigue, burnout. How does the person in self show up as the healthcare worker? What are strategies to help build your own resilience for trauma growth as you're exposed to people with trauma and working through? So one of the specialties or expertise that I have is building that community resilience within a person so that they can take that into their community as well. On next Monday I have some work I'm doing with Palestine, around the train wreck, with the community and then members and also the practitioners on how to build resilience within yourself utilizing mindfulness, meditation, movement, so that you can show up being your most resilient self. For instance, on a scale I'll ask you on a scale of one to five today, how resilient do you feel? With five being, I'm okay and ready to face any adverse, any adversity that may occur, and zero being, I'm bottomed out. Where are you today?
Speaker 1I would say four.
Speaker 2Okay, so explain to me, what does four feel like?
Speaker 1Four to me feels like just especially with what I told you about. Now, like you know me, I'm doing it all today. I'm the producer and the cameraman. You know what I mean Like waking up and doing that. But I would say four, that's like high resilience, right? Yes, just so. I would choose four because I don't think there's much more that would put a damper on me. Like I woke up on a mission and I'm expecting you know, I'm not expecting something to go wrong, but having to deal with today and make sure this was a nice, comfortable and everything good for you and make sure the equipment work and checking emails and all that. Like I'm, like I'm good. When I woke up I was just on a mission, so I felt like a four, you know. But there's always that little bit of room that might be a little something, might be something coming out of nowhere. So I would say a four.
Speaker 2So what would you say? Is your normal?
Speaker 1Three, three or four right around in there, especially because, remember, I've had to build up to this.
Speaker 2Right.
Speaker 1You know, after being off for so long and just trying to do stuff, and now just really like I'm just focused, you know I got to get this stuff done, I got to do this and I can't go backwards like I was talking to you before and I can't stand still because that's even going backwards. You know, in my definition of it so usually it's like a three or four- so four is a high resilient number.
Speaker 2So do you mind if I engage in a little?
Speaker 1Break me down, Listen OK.
Speaker 2So yeah, this is a bonus feature on your podcast, so I just invite you Take a deep breath, just settle into your seat, whatever that looks like for you. Maybe you would choose to take a breath in through your nose and send it out through your mouth with a sigh, or in through your nose, out through your nose, just whatever feels comfortable, no judgment, just being comfortable in your breath. And I invite you just to allow your imagination to be sanctified, just sacred. A space where you can create, think, move, be. When you feel like you found that space in place, that sacredness within your mind, just let me know, put your hand up. So, from that sacred space, I want you to ask yourself what do you need to know in this moment? What does your mind? A picture of someone or someone speaking to you in your sacred imagination? But right in this moment, to validate and affirm that you are resilient, what do you need to know?
Speaker 1There's a quote, the Banner La Mancha. I never had the courage not to believe that is always with me in some way.
Speaker 2So I'm going to invite you to think of that mantra. I've never had the courage not to believe. Write it in your mind. See yourself writing it, maybe you write it in script.
Speaker 1maybe you write it in print?
Speaker 2Yeah, I got a giant magic marker. I'm writing it on the wall. Okay, so write it on your wall in your giant magic marker. What color is it?
Speaker 1Red.
Speaker 2How big are your letters?
Speaker 1Like maybe two feet.
Speaker 2Two feet.
Speaker 1Just really big.
Speaker 2Is it all script? Is it small letters? All caps, all caps. What's the end? What's the punctuation at the end of the quote?
Speaker 1A period.
Speaker 2A period. Why a period?
Speaker 1Because that's you know, I'm not trying to shout it out, or it's just that is it. I never had the courage not to believe, Just a period.
Speaker 2Drop the mic, Done Period. So allow yourself to just be embodied in that, seeing that I never had the courage not to believe period In the red and the big letters. And as you take a breath in and out, just scan your body and notice like what feels pleasurable. Where do you feel like good in your body as a result of embodying that?
Speaker 1My shoulders.
Speaker 2Your shoulders. What might that be telling you? Why your shoulders? How's that significant to resilience?
Speaker 1They carry a lot of weight significant to resilience.
Speaker 2They carry a lot of weight. So I invite you that if there's any weight that you're carrying that doesn't belong to you, to just put it on that board with your imagination, with that marker saying right at the end of that period, let those burdens, the things that you're carrying, just be put on that board, taken off of you. Breathe in and out. What are you noticing?
Speaker 1A little bit of lightness. A little bit of lightness.
Speaker 2Where's your resilience skill at this moment?
Speaker 1It can only go up. You know, it can only go up, wow.
Speaker 2So that's resourcing. That's called resourcing. It's when we tap into something that is already a resource to us internally that we don't realize and we sit in it. Resource to us internally that we don't realize and we sit in it and we allow it then to give us that space and sacredness within our mind, within our body and our soul so we can show up resilient. So if there happens to be a day where you are scaling yourself and you're like I only feel like a one or two go back to that and see where you end up.
Speaker 1Look at this bonus extra content. You were the host, I was the guest.
Speaker 2Oh yeah, I'm sorry, no, no, we switched roles.
Speaker 1That reminds me I was interviewing Matthew Longmire and he asked me a question about AI and I was like, matthew, you're the guest, I'm the host. But I answered it. It was great, that's incredible. And like that's incredible, like our guests who listen could take that and make their own thing about that. But yeah, my shoulders it just that's incredible. You talked about because you're a professor, right, mom, wife, all that and you have a nonprofit.
Speaker 1I do Now, the one you just spoke about earlier. This is the one I want to introduce. It's mind, body and soul, but the way it's written out, I didn't want to mess it up, so I'm going to let you say it, but it's Mind, body and Soul. That's the one you're referring to as being the nonprofit. Yes, yes.
Speaker 2So within our nonprofit, then we have different initiatives and we're almost in the process, mr Marketer, of rebranding. So we started off Mind and so as a development center doing work with under-resourced children in specifically metropolitan housing. So my husband did most of the programming and what it was. We worked within Warren City Schools, which you know, and we found out that working with students in under-resourced neighborhoods that they didn't have the exposure as other students, so at summertime they didn't have quality summer programming, they weren't exposed to museums and like the bird zoo and science center and going to historically black colleges. They didn't have these sort of experiences but that when they did, it changed their mind of how they thought about themselves pursuing education and so we began to develop the programming and doing that and so our focus at that time was really on direct service and about I forget what year it was, but there was the accident that happened with the eight children and six of them died on Buckeye Curve.
Speaker 1Oh yeah, yeah, I remember that.
Speaker 2Yeah. So that year, my husband most of those children were part of our families that were involved in Mind, body and Soul and he began to suffer from vicarious trauma and compassion fatigue and it led to burnout, where he was experiencing depression and wasn't sure why, but he was walking with his families and so their trauma, at the end of the day, I say it was residue. He couldn't wash it off. So he decided it was about 2013 14, when we decided to shift. Like this isn't a good fit for him. He was burnt out so that he could get the mental health support that he needed to make it through that, recognizing that as he walked through those families, every time he was reliving what happened and he had his own connection to these children, but he couldn't grieve his because he was too busy grieving theirs. So he decided to do the co-pay, as I called it, and we began to switch more to doing professional development and continuing education for the community, educating them on aspects of how to work with youth who reside in poverty, how to build parent engagement, and we worked in that. Around that time, inspiring Minds was really like blowing up and doing really great programming and it was like, ok, we don't need to be doing the same thing. They do it well. They have a lot of funding. So we took sort of the backstage of working with on the training end. So we did a lot of that.
Speaker 2I did professional developments with churches around building programming in poverty, understanding what poverty is and the different levels of poverty, how that impacts learning. Troy did trainings with clergy around how to understand what happens when poverty shows up in the church. How do you build programming Like how could you use Sunday school lessons to actually help children increase their education awareness, like Noah's Ark is a math lesson. So we did some training around that. I was doing that for a while, as well as some private counseling and spiritual formation.
Speaker 2At the same time Troy was back at the seminary pursuing his master's and so he did some of that work. And then we were kind of like where do we go from here? Like we felt like we need to do another level of something, but wasn't quite sure At that same time as when I started going to Rwanda, and so it's like a seed being planted around this trauma and doing the trauma work, and so now it's rebranded to we actually still do the professional developments. In fact I'll be rolling out a series here in September of free continuing ed. Most of and it's probably the nonprofit mentality to a fault, because we give away a whole lot.
Speaker 1I understand, but it comes back, definitely understand that.
Self-Care for Non-Traditional Students
Speaker 2But the workshops from the grants will be sponsored, so this time we're able to do it with some payment. So we'll be offering some continuing education workshops around somatic psychotherapy, which is understanding how trauma stays in the body and how would you move that out, including mindfulness, meditation and movement as part of the treatment process, community resilience workshops, as well as perfectly hidden depression. People with perfectionism, like myself, end up in depression and it's hidden. You don't know, but when you set your goal so high and you don't reach it, it causes depression. So you sit in that and you fumble. So teaching people about perfectionism and a few other workshops. So we're rebranding, doing the workshop. Troy is busy doing the administrative part, also working on, like he wrote, the grants that we received, getting the funding, and we feel really called to begin to share.
Speaker 2I went from one place to another, but I'll go back to say during the time when we were deciding what's next and I began to travel to Rwanda and do some professional development there because they're recovering from the genocide. It's only 30 years, so anyone who is over 30 was a survivor or victim of the genocide and those under that age are children of those. So it's still real fresh. They're still recovering from trauma recovery. They don't have access to professionals. A whole field was wiped out and so they had to wait for people to even get old enough to begin to be trained in social work, psychology, psychotherapy. So they don't have like, for instance, their program is like three years and it's expedited, it's really fast, but they don't have a lot of continuation and ongoing training in the up-to-date methods. So part of the charge when you leave the seminary. So I received my doctorate in Formational Counseling from Ashland Theological Seminary and, one of the biggest things, when you leave and when I was defending my dissertation, they asked you what are you going to do with the information you receive? It's your responsibility to give it back to the community. How will you do this? So one of the things that I said is that I would offer continuing education to under-resourced populations. So it started here, doing it here within the states. But when I went to Rwanda I was like no, this is where it's needed. So we began to develop sort of a continuing education institute and so I take students over, we do training there, but I also did some online ones and some on demand just to continue. When I go there, I work directly with the practitioners. So fast forward.
Speaker 2This summer, troy and I spent the summer in Rwanda because prior to that he was the sender right, some people go, some people send. So his role was making sure that I had funding, that I had resources to be able to go to Rwanda and do the work that I did, but he had not gone. So this summer he was able to go and see what was going on there, the trainings, the need. We have partnerships with King Faisal Hospital, which is like Cleveland Clinic. There's mHub, which is a mental health agency that services people with genocide, but the practitioners are survivors of genocide, so every time that they're counseling they're reliving this. But they didn't know what vicarious trauma was, or secondary trauma, or compassion fatigue. So I began to teach them about that and work with them on some resilience skills so that they can get past that. And so Troy was able to witness that this summer, meet with some people, and we came back with a joint goal. Now he sees his part in it. He was doing it from afar, but to be immersed in the culture and see and understand.
Speaker 2And so our new initiative still to continue doing the continued education, but with the global perspective is to allow the people who live in the villages, who are survivors of genocide, who are still living in poverty but doing co-ops, like women co-ops, the inter-partnership violence agency that we work with, where there the goal is not to leave, but I teach the women how to stay because it's in their culture. They won't leave, they're not leaving those relationships. So how do they learn how to stay in those relationships? How do the relationships become healthy? So this summer, troy and I did some partner and couples work and he worked with the men around how to work with their aggression, how to understand their anger. A lot of them were perpetrators of the genocide and so they were used to that fight and they have that anger and sometimes they end up fighting with their wives. So we did some healthy work around how to do family meetings, how do you deescalate conflict and understanding.
Speaker 2And so our goal is to come back and to build this wellness center in Rwanda where Americans can go and have this cultural emergent experience and offer their expertise. For instance, you might come and work with the villagers and the businesses on how to market better, market their product, how to get their sound out, their voice, how they might. The therapist might podcast about some of the strategies that they're learning, or a social worker might come and teach them how to do group work, which we take students over. But the center will be where this teaching will happen as well, as the villagers who never got out of the village can come for self-care and wellness. They'll come there. We'll treat them like queens for the weekend. They'll get to have pedicures, they'll get to learn about how to care for themselves and their worth and journal and walk the grounds and sit under a garden tree and just journal and relax like they haven't had that opportunity.
Speaker 2The students from King Faisal that we teach will be able to come there and do self-care, because they're like residents who have lived through the genocide, who are now treating people of the genocide, so that vicarious trauma is constant and self-care is such an important aspect. So we're hoping that this center will be a global center where Americans can come and learn and be immersed in a culture. But that funding that they pay to stay at our center will allow us then to host the villagers at no cost to them. And that's just a little bit of it.
Speaker 1But that's where we are now. Is that the? So that's the Asset Development Center.
Speaker 2That's the yep. Okay, and the funny part? Well, I don't know if it's funny, but we always thought it would be here and it started off in the Trumbull Homes. When we started, we had actually three sites. We had a location in the Ferry Gardens and two in Trumbull Homes.
Speaker 1I remember those.
Speaker 2Trumbull Metropolitan, with Don Emerson helping to sponsor that, and we looked into building a separate center and it never happened here, and it's like now we're like, oh, that's why it wasn't even meant for this space, like it was meant to be global, and so that's what we're working towards.
Speaker 1It is funny you should say that, but we'll talk off mic about the expectations. You know, you think it's here, but it's over there. You know this maybe was the proving ground it was, and then you move. So yeah, we definitely. I think I feel like you're going to be more episodes when you come back, because there's just a lot of topics. I want to ask this because outside of licensed individuals doctors or what have you that the definition is just a little bit everywhere or what have you that the definition is just a little bit everywhere, and I've my experience, you know, I've I've heard it used, but I don't really agree with what their definition is. Anyway, what is, what is the definition? I mean, can you define trauma? That's the first part.
Speaker 2And the second part is what do you think people most misunderstand about it Interesting? So for, for the definition of trauma, I'm going to go to Jamie Marge, who is an EMDR specialist and expert in our area, and she says, quite simply, trauma is a wound. And I just take that definition a little further. I say it's an emotional, spiritual, financial, you know, cognitive wound that disrupts you in your mind, body and soul, just disrupts the flow of who you are, your being, and it just that's almost that definition alone, because I'm visual.
Speaker 1I mean, you know, I look at that wound and then I look at something emotional and yeah, yeah, there's no long paragraphs that's needed, or boom right there, and then, on top of what you added, just totally makes sense. What do you think people misunderstand about it, though?
Speaker 2I think they most misunderstand, that they think that it's something you can talk away. It's something you can talk away, right, and that they try to categorize it as something that is like cognitive. They forget to include. No, it's a spiritual disruption and this doesn't mean religion. When I say spiritual, I mean just your innermost being and what you believe to be true to who you are and the essence of you.
Speaker 2Mine happens to be Christian. My essence is God, but it doesn't mean, because you're non-Christian, that I can't treat you as a therapist or that you don't have wounds that my gifts are called to answer, that your psyche is asking questions that I have the ability to help you find the answer to. So I think that it's important to understand that wounds come in the mind, body and soul and you have to treat all three parts. Therapy alone won't do it. You have to tap into how is this affecting my essence, my being, my spirituality, who I am, my relationship with God, who I claim to be as a person? Where is it showing up? In my body, for instance, it's somatic. So whenever you feel anxious. Well, I'm going to ask you when you feel anxious, how do you know that in your body?
Speaker 1When I feel anxious I start to kind of fidget. I might even go into like a panic mode maybe.
Speaker 2What do the insides of your body feel like? Where does anxiety show up in your body?
Speaker 1I'd say up here, like in the mind, in the mind, yeah.
Speaker 2So that could result in headaches. It can result in what I call fog brain, where you just can't stay focused or think.
Speaker 1That is a thing because I was reading something. Because when E-pass I was reading walking I remember we had had conference I'm reading walking, I'm journaling, all this other stuff, and it was a section about grief-bearing and I was like well, I'm not going because my memory I mean my memory is really good. You know, people I'll be bringing up stuff and be like you remember that, like yeah, but I think it was maybe last year like stuff, just yeah, you couldn't find it, it was just floating out there.
Speaker 1Yeah, and it put me in a state of shock because that's not me, you know like I my memory is good, I can tell you what the price was for something that heals. You know what I mean, but it's just, it was just wild and that was because then that led to you know, like am I getting like some memory, you know medical issue going on here, Like what's going on, and so, yeah, that is an absolute effect of trauma.
Speaker 2It's a natural occurrence, right. But if people don't understand that, then they don't know how to address that, and so the biggest misunderstood thing for me about trauma is the fact to think that you don't experience it yourself. It affects your mind, it affects your body and your soul, and so you have to do interventions and treatment for each one of those, and so if it's stuck in your body, you have to move it out. So for me, I get a real nauseous stomach, right. I might have to use the bathroom a lot. My stomach feels like knots on the inside. I need to do something to move that out right. I need to move.
Speaker 2There are movements, there are stretches that help you to just lay in rest. That removes that. For instance, I might just put my legs up the wall, okay, and it changes the blood flow and it releases my stomach from that tension. Right, I might lay in fetal position and that might give me a feeling of comfort. So there are things that you have to do to move it out. You have to address each one, and I think with trauma and I especially have found in certain circles that when you talk about doing the stretches or that there's this omen out there like, oh you, you're doing yoga and you know it's letting demonic paths in and that can't be Christ-like and that's so untrue, like when you see people doing stretches for the Olympics right, they're doing these stretches. They're not yoga, they're stretches. They don't belong to yoga and the philosophy.
Speaker 2And I'm a Christian, I believe in God, so everything that I do reflects who he is in me. It's in him. I live, I move and I have my being. Those stretches are in him, they're moving and I have my being. I'm not inviting in demonic things. I'm moving the somatic symptoms which are real, the physical right Psychosomatic symptoms, out of my body so that my body can find rest and healing. So that's the biggest thing. It's like I almost get like angry sitting here because people who are not aware and misinformation cause people to still live in hurt.
Speaker 1You know it's crazy, you said when your mind runs, like your stomach and stuff, and I just I sat here and I thought about Erica and my wife, cause that was one of the things like, uh, because he would you know if something went wrong. It was like you know a little nervous as to where, versus me it was like it'll work itself out, right, but it would with her would be this, and so we'll bother her stomach and you know all the other stuff. And I remember she went to the doctor and said got ibs, something like that, and and because her mind would run, though I literally went because I was like I'm no doctor or anything like that and I didn't want her having to take medicine all the time. Okay, you have this, take this medicine, because I'm I'm totally on the other side of that. So I bought her to slow her mind down. I bought her these coloring books.
Speaker 1Um, real fine, uh, emig, that you I'm not the medallia or whatever it is like these real intricate coloring books, because she did like the color and I remember I would work late, come home at two o'clock in the morning or something like that, and I hear some music playing a little bit. I'm like why is she up? She got to go to work at like eight o'clock. You know she land on the bed coloring because that was her way of kind of calming down a little bit. In fact, in my office I got the last one she covered as a picture, that she colored as a picture in there. But I just when I just kind of like huh, I had an aha moment, like OK, because when that would happen it would straight to her stomach going to the bathroom. Often like that, and you know, knowing her history I mean we're together 28 years of things that she had went through like that makes a whole lot of sense now, you know.
Speaker 2So and I think that's the biggest misunderstanding is that because people have misinformation and almost their own religious ideologies, it keeps them other from the relationship with healing.
Speaker 1Yeah Right, wow, that's eye-opening. So you get something to think about. And I have family. When you were talking about the perfection how you live up to and you can't reach, and then it just I have a family member that that I mean you saying that just kind of opened my eyes Like wow, because they are a type A and they're tremendous goal setters and happy as can be when them goals are getting knocked down. And if one it could be one, you could have knocked down 10. There was 11 of them. You knocked down 10. Now number 11, you couldn't reach and it just puts them in a state of Puts you over.
Speaker 1They're just in the bed, don't want to be bothered because of that. So that's very interesting. I'm learning a lot today. I got a question for you too. So reading the Bible as we do, and stuff like that and you mentioned it earlier formational counseling and like the traditional approaches. So what's the difference between formational counseling and the traditional?
Speaker 2So formational counseling includes mental health counseling, pastoral counseling, spiritual direction, spiritual formation, journey coaching, as I call it, different than life coaching. Okay, life coaching proposes that you're the expert and you're giving this person direction in life, journey coaching means I join you. You're the expert of your own journey. I'm just walking alongside you.
Speaker 1I like that one.
Understanding Trauma and Its Effects
Speaker 2So it includes those practices and strategies in one. So when you're in counseling, you're recognizing that God is the healer, jesus is the wonderful counselor, the Holy Spirit is the guide and you invite them into the process. So if I'm working with you on trauma and a memory, instead of you sitting there feeling alone first, I'm establishing that, not just how we do in EMDR, which is a form of trauma therapy, that we're not just establishing a safe place, but you're in that safe place with someone who makes you feel safe. So perhaps if you're a Christian, it's Jesus, or maybe it would be a memory of you cuddling with your wife on a day where you just felt like the day was the worst and you came home and you laid your head on her lap and you could feel the blanket and that moment felt safe. You're encountering, then, this memory that you want to work on from that safe place and feeling of what really made you feel safe and integrating Christ into the process. So formational counseling is a Christian, christ-centered method.
Speaker 1Okay, I'm going to switch gears a little bit and ask you this, and I'm interested to hear your answer. It's going through experience, like many of us have to hear your answer. It's going through experience, like many of us have, probably some of our listeners what are the most important aspects of supporting someone through a loss?
Speaker 2Wow, that's so relevant right now, right. So when we talked two years ago I was telling you how I was just getting on the other side of the grief from my sister, christine, who had passed, and you were really fresh in your grief experience and since then I've lost my sister just in May to cancer. So it's like the second journey, walking with the sibling, being, like, I felt, left as the excuse me, the sister left behind, right, so I say that to say it's relational, because I was looking for support, like where are you Like, right? So people would call or ask questions and I needed support in a way of I've lost two people who were like my cheerleaders, my encouragers, my cuddle buddies. I needed a sister to show up and say let's walk, you know, or let's just sit on the couch and can I just wrap my blanket around you and we eat cheesecake until your stomach hurts.
Speaker 2Yes, yes or can we just sit in total silence and say nothing and listen to the rhythm of the song, just work on our heart, right? But I didn't get that. I didn't get that support and I realized that what is crucial in support is recognizing what that person needs in that moment and being open and enough to do it in their way and not just ask the question like what can I do for you? Because I was telling people like I don't have the words to tell you what I need, but you've been walking with me on this friendship journey for 20-something years. Think of something that you know before made me smile and just come make me smile because I don't even have the words to tell you that I need that now. So I think support looks like you knowing the person enough to know how to support them so you can ask, but they may not be verbal.
Speaker 2So going to that place, within your relationship with them, of knowing how do I show up, how do I show up for Deshaun, what would be good for him right now Because he's speechless, right, but what's something that I've done before, like maybe it's somebody bringing you a chocolate bar. It's like simple things. I don't think that there's like this magic solution, but that support is relational, so it's in the relationship, and finding what in our relationship has shown me to be supportive to this person. What did it look like before and what does it look like now? And even recognizing it may change Now, when my sister, my first sister, christine, passed away, what I needed was totally different than what I needed this time. Yeah Right. And so recognizing that and being willing, as a support person, to offer something, even if it may be rejected, but just being creative, yeah, that was my.
Speaker 1You know, when we lost Erica, I think the initial for me was, you know, people said what do you need? Like I was like I don't know what I need. You know, like, how am I supposed to know what I need? The person you know, my other half, my one, is gone, so I'm still. You know, you're dealing with that and you know some people kind of you know, I don't know if they took offense to it there were some people, a lot of it.
Speaker 1I just didn't want to be bothered because I'm one of the people I like to work alone and with this grief and trying to figure out. You know you sneezing in the house and there's that person always either cracking a joke or saying bless you. You don't hear nothing but the cat walking with the bell. You know just little things like that. And so for me I just kind of it was important for me and I think I've always been that way, even when I was little I just kind of bring everything in and just try to figure it out and really don't want disruptions.
Speaker 1But opening up the probably the best visit I had and I say this all the time was my nephew. At the time he was 11. He was like oh Sean, can I come over? Now? In my head I'm like you know, it's maintenance, right, I'm going to have to entertain this dude, or something like that. I laid on the couch. He sat there, we played video games for a minute. I didn't want to talk or anything, I just laid there. He was playing on his thing. We walked to the garden. He wasn't asking me. The best visit.
Speaker 1I think you know, when I look back on that, that was the best visit that I ever had, and it was by an 11 year old. He just wanted to be around his uncle and that's it. You know what I mean. And I didn't have to talk, or you know he wasn't asking me. You know how I felt, because sometimes you don't want to talk about how you. To me that sometimes makes it worse. You know, trying to tell people how you feel. And probably the second visits was when I decided I was like I'm throwing me a party and I would. Just I would put up every. You know we throw house parties me and he I'd go and get some, cause I'm from the club days.
Speaker 2Right.
Speaker 1So, you know, go to choice. In that the dance club they had lights. That was part of the movement. So I bought some strobe lights many years ago and all that. And so I said, you know, I want to play my music loud and I want to have lights up and I just want to have a good time and I would just do it. And I told my friends like, yeah, I'm gonna just do it by myself, like I can entertain myself. You know what I mean, and nobody wants to see me dancing. So it was good, the cat was my audience. But so I invited a couple of friends over, just, you know, because they were going through some things too, and I said, you know what we just and it was some of the best times I mean my mind. I saw a mind that came on, it hit me with E, but I was in a safe space with my friends, so when I was breakdancing I might stop and I would just stand there, you know. Oh, and I had a smoke machine too.
Speaker 2Oh no, the doing it up.
Speaker 1Yeah, my neighbors were like well say, something come out of your window and the smoke alarms going off. Well, I said I forgot about the smoke machine and the smoke alarms, but those visits, those things really, really helped me, if only for that moment. You know, just just really took things away. But then on the other end of it there was, like you said, people that you would think would be there, would you know just just from DNA and bloodline would be there were. You know just just from DNA and bloodline would be there, were you know not. So it was very interesting to go through that. But what strategies would you give individuals to manage their grief and promote healing? So you know, just with them, so there's nothing coming from the outside. But but how would people be able to handle that like for themselves, do you think?
Speaker 2So I think the first thing about a strategy is information right, Because you hear all these myths around grief. People tell you, oh, it'll get better in time. It doesn't.
Speaker 1Yep, say that again.
Speaker 2It doesn't. You learn how to integrate it into your life over time, but it doesn't get better, right, it's a loss, yeah, okay. So the information of understanding that some people may look like they're living better, but on the inside they're still broken and leaving space for that, that it's a part of you that has left, or it's something that because grief isn't always about loss of a person, but it's a loss of expectation too. So it's an expectation that you had that you'll never receive, that's gone. So, understanding what is grief, what is loss, understanding that there's a process and a timeline that is yours alone. It's all individual, right?
Speaker 2So when I talked to you, I felt like I was really recovering from my sister. I was telling you I'm finally in a good place where I could even say her name without going to tears. And now you know, two years later, my other sister passed away fast forward, 2024, and I went back to day one. Like I felt now? I felt both, like the heaviness of both losses at the same time. So there's no formula, no magic thing. So the biggest thing is information, right, understanding what does it mean? Before any strategy will work, you have to know what it is that you're trying to strategize against, so helping them with the information. The other is simple things like journaling or writing. So when Christine first died, I used to write her a letter every day, right, because we talked, so I missed that talking, so I would just write. Hey, I know you're laughing at what happened today and I don't appreciate it.
Speaker 1And so I would write.
Speaker 2And then there would be some days like because, for me, grief was my constant companion and I'll use the analogy of teaching, since I'm an educator. But some days it was the student who sat in the front of the classroom demanding that I paid attention, like, hey, teacher, I'm here, I'm grief. Hey, hey, are you listening? Some days it sat in the back of the classroom mean mugging me, never said a word, but I knew it was there and it demanded that it had command of my day.
Speaker 2And then some days it was like the attentive student just taking notes on how I was going on with life without my sister or how life was interrupting Right, but it was always present. So I had to just understand hey, it's here. How do I integrate in my life? So if I woke up and I was extremely depressed which I was, I went through many of those days. I gave depression 15 minutes to just be there, however it needed to, whether I needed to cry, curse someone out, lament it, whatever I needed to do in that moment. It's like you have 15 minutes to dominate this day and after that I need to go forward.
Speaker 2So that understanding of integration and giving grief time in your day is a strategy the journaling, the mindfulness and I know that there's, like again, controversy around what does that word mean? But it means present awareness.
Speaker 1There's controversy around that word.
Speaker 2Oh, don't get me started, that's another episode, another episode.
Speaker 1Okay, I'm going to keep you on track.
Speaker 2Right. But there is that when people hear mindfulness, they automatically think this is Buddhism or something Right. And so then there's that, oh, you're going down dark channels. Mindfulness is being present in the moment, being aware, right, of what is happening. So how it helps me is that being aware that grief is present, right? I feel sad today. I feel overwhelmingly sad, but I still have to teach. So how can I put this in a container until I can go back and visit it, so I can be present in this moment and not miss out on the joy? There were things happening Like my niece had a baby and so I was in sorrow that my sister couldn't be there to see her grandchild, but I was so excited that I got the privilege to be here. Like, two things can be true being aware of the joy in this moment and letting that be bigger than the grief.
Speaker 2So mindful awareness is a good practice. The journaling, the restorative stretch. Your body keeps the score, so it holds all of that grief and trauma. And just laying in a restful place, right, rest is a revolution, right? Someone said like it's radical we're so busy going that we don't realize that rest helps us heal. So being able to sit in stillness and silence, you know, under your blanket or whatever it is that gives you comfort, on a pillow, on one of those plushy mats, something, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2Or you can just Right.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Supporting Through Loss and Managing Grief
Speaker 2Breathing is a strategy. It's not something I made up, it's neuroscience Right. So our breath can send us different places. It's why, when they said your blood pressure's up, take a slow breath, breathe in, let it out and your blood pressure will go down right. The breath is something that's always with us. So learning about our breath, learning how to take breaths that help like in through your nose, long exhales through your mouth, automatically three times over, like 10 to 20 seconds reset your nervous system. It takes you to what they call to the vagal nerve. It's not the fight, flight or flight thing where your body feels like it needs to do something, but that resilient top of the ladder place like hey, hey, I can conquer something here. So, using your breath, um, journaling, meditation, movements, rest, talking, right yeah but not always to a person right?
Speaker 1sometimes I just I'm walking and I turn on my um voice memo and I'm just like going in on somebody that I needed to say something too I just did that, um, because you know, you know, I told this to my kids Like I feel like, with this relocation of the offices, that it has nothing to do with the business and there's something else and I don't know what. It is right, it's the thing that we relocated and it's great and all that, but I feel like this move was more than just the business. Um, but I was sipping on some bourbon good bourbon looking out the window and, uh, I just had this. So, taking that, I was looking and the, I was looking at the traffic lights. It's about 11 o'clock and the traffic lights were going, you know, like red, you know yellow, green, in that order or whatever it is, and there were no cars, it was just empty.
Speaker 1And I'm sitting out this window looking, and I just felt this feeling. So I grabbed my phone and I wanted to because I didn't want to forget it. This thought, so I hit record and I started saying I think I'm starting to understand why this where I'm at right now has nothing to do with the business, and it was related to remember you were talking about the global. And then you know something, you know this transformation, that it's something global, and I felt that way. I didn't not global per se, but just this is just the proving ground where you've already proved as much as you needed to. There's something else, and by you know, just sitting there and looking at them traffic lights and empty, just quiet Stillness.
Speaker 2Yeah, I was like silence speaks.
Speaker 1So when you said that record, that was the first time I did that because normally I journal like I still write Erica love letters, but I journal a lot still but that was the first time I did the thing because I just didn't want to forget and I wanted to also hear how I felt when I said it and so that. So when you said that, and then you know, going back to this, to the grief thing, I remember reading this seven Because me and God had some interesting. Well, I was doing more of a talking because I would go out to the garden and I've never been more mad at God until.
Speaker 2Erica passed.
Speaker 1I was in the garden. If somebody from far away, I'm sure my neighbors see me, but I'm sitting there holding a bourbon. It could have been raining. I'm yelling at God about everything because the garden was her safe space.
Speaker 1So I was like I'm coming to the garden and I'm going to let you know what's going on you know I remember reading this thing and I don't believe it because when I read it I was just like that doesn't make any sense, but it was the steps you go through. You know like, this is what you're going to go through first. This is what you're going to go through second. That stuff is not because some of that I've never done yeah.
Speaker 1And some of what I've done. A lot, yeah, and you know so. I was like I remember some time like you're going to go through these stages and I forgot the lady's name who made it up. But, my friends, that you're going to go through these stages, and I printed this out for you just so you know what's going on, and I remember one day God bless him that good friend. But I was like I ain't, I ain't went through that. It's been a year. I've done a lot of that, you know so. And then there was some reading I did to confirm like it's, it's separate, none of that, there's no stage. It's all different for everybody, you know so that information right.
Speaker 2Proper information. That's important of a strategy to just know this is what they say. This does not mean that it's you and it could be in any stage. It could be only one, it can be all. It could come back 10 years later stage. It can be only one, it can be all. It can come back 10 years later. Yes, so there's no yeah, there's no formula.
Speaker 1That's the biggest thing, that, and how powerful the brain is and the whole whole thing of grief, and you know the crying and you know why can't I stop crying, but but, and actually in some ways that is, that is healing in a sense.
Speaker 1You know the tears because I was like man, I mean honestly I can't. I can't remember when I stopped, but I cried every day for at least a year and a half, every day, you know, usually in the mornings, because that was my my weakest hour was in the morning, in the morning time, but I remember that. And then I read this book called the Grieving Brain and I was like, oh, how powerful our body's designed to deal with some of this stuff in its own way, to where, as, yeah, he's crying, he's hurt and all this, but in some ways it's like it's a healing thing, it's releasing, yeah, and so that book and just the journaling, to your point, and the walking in the park I think people see me walking so much in that park, you know I was like 30 degrees, I got my headphones on going in the thing you know.
Speaker 1So I think those things you talked about really are truly, you know, individualistic, but truly helpful and that helped me. I don't think, immersing myself in work I've had friends who had lost it. You got to stay busy, so you don't think, and me, I'm like, well, if I do that, then I'm not, I'm just suppressing it and then I'm not going to be able to sleep. I slept very good, you know, and I still do. You know cause you read about insomnia and things like that. But I was just one of them people. That's why I took that time off, because I said I couldn't imagine going back in three days, five days. I'm going to take as long as I want and how I need to do this, you. But that helped me a lot by just taking that time off and just figuring this out and writing and stuff. So, yes, yes, I agree, all of that you know, and it's individualistic, but I think the writing and that memoing yeah, the memo I was going to say with that that I think it was.
Speaker 2I don't know if it's Israel New Breeder, it's some old gospel artist. But there was a lyric in his song that says say what you heard so you can see what you said. Let that sink in.
Speaker 2Say what you heard so you can see what you said. And, being a visionary, that was really powerful for me, so I learned to put things on voice memo, right. So this center that we see happening in Rwanda, troy and I, when he was able to be in the land and just fell in love with it and got the heart, passion, like this is our work, this is our life work, the rest of our life work. And so I said what do you see Like? What do you really hear God saying about what we're supposed to do? Right? So we recorded it, left it alone.
Speaker 2So we get back here to this state. So I was like I want you to hear what you said. And so now that's turned into vision, mission, purpose around the center. When you say it and you hear it, then you can see what you said, and then it becomes a reality, so that the verbal, the speaking into existence, it has power right In the beginning. It was spoken, so there's a power in what we speak. So when we say it, then it becomes visual.
Speaker 2You can see it and then you can make it happen. So the memo is connected to that. And then you were talking about being angry with God. That's another tool. It's called a lament right, lament, lament.
Speaker 2And so you just really write. I'm angry as heck. Some people swear I did. I said words that you know it's like they weren't speaking life, right, but that's how I felt Like and I've heard people say that you swear when you don't have a vocabulary, and that was true.
Speaker 2There was not a word that could describe how despicable this grief felt within me, except for despicable words, Right, and so I said it, I wrote them down, I told God every single thing I had to say. Sometimes I voice recorded it to him because why? He's big enough to hold that. He's not offended by my thoughts or what I'm experiencing. He wants to come in and heal me, but he can't heal me if I don't invite him into that space. That needs healing and he is not concerned. David read through. Like David was like I hate these ninjas, you know. Oh, save me, I love you, God, in the same breath, so he's not offended.
Speaker 2There's a whole book in the Bible called Lamentations. So say it uncensored, unfiltered. If it comes out in words that need to be bleeped out, that's okay. He knows that too. But fully expressing how you feel to him. And I think that that is so healing, because for me, I was taught about religion in the beginning, not about relationship, right, and so I knew God as God, the big person in the sky that I couldn't be honest with because I would be condemned to hell if I really told him some of the horrible things that I thought and even did. Right, that is so not true. He's gracious. That's why he sent Jesus. Grace is to me the reality of living in your own mess with someone who can clean your mess.
Speaker 1Okay, right, yeah.
Speaker 2So I was like, hey, here it is, this is what it is. And that lament and being true really cleansed me of recognizing, like moving from the place of God being father to him, really being like my Abba, like this is my dude, we're cool. We're like hanging out in spaces. He's like Sherry, you don't need to be here. I'm like, dude, we're cool. We're like hanging out in spaces. He's like Sherry, you don't need to be here. I'm like, yeah, but we'll talk about it in a minute, because you already knew I was going to be here, like not prostituting the grace, but really being like this is who I am and you knew it already, so authentically, this is what led me here and let's dig in that so I can get past this place. But having that conversation and relationship and so I think, lament is the beginning of that process of honesty and transparency and authenticity with God that allows you then to move into the grace of healing who he is. It's like being a father. So you're not going to just tell your children you do this and I'm done with you. Right, you may not like what they did. You're going to correct them and chastise them and try to help them be better, but you don't stop loving them because of that.
Speaker 2I think a myth in our own minds sometimes is that if we really say what we feel, that people say, well, you believe that and you're like you just have to have faith that you'll get better. No, no, faith has nothing to do with this journey, trauma walk. If that was it, it would have been over yesterday. Right, it's the reality of what happens in the journey that I have to take to get to my healing, and it may take me longer. And guess what, as soon as I think that I've reached it, something else will happen and push me back and we'll start all over again, right, but the honesty of that and so lamenting is a really good process at any time, about loss, about what you're going through to express that.
Speaker 1Learn a lot here. I want to switch to something. You an expert on all these questions.
Speaker 2No, not expert. I'm living life trying to figure out the experiences. With a little bit of education, you get credentials to be answering these questions.
Speaker 1I want to talk about community and spend a second on this. How do mental health self up with a mom who struggled with mental illness?
Speaker 2from the time I was young, right in a place where you weren't allowed to be mentally ill. You couldn't say that you know your emotions had overtaken you or that you felt depression or you had postpartum, because you had two children within 13 months of each other in diapers. You couldn't talk about the realness of that and so, as a result of that, she wasn't able to do the things that she needed to do to care for herself and spiritually, people would tell her your faith isn't strong enough, right, you aren't praying enough or you really aren't trusting God. In a situation she's like, no, I'm trusting God, but I'm depressed. To get out of bed, like postpartum is real, right. It's a mental health issue, as well as the old issues that she had already from her childhood trauma, the adverse childhood experiences that she had had that weren't processed and she hadn't recovered from, and when she had children at childbirth. At this time it just came to the surface and she didn't know what to do with it and, because of the community and that myth and misnomer and stigma, it didn't allow her to care for herself or to be spiritually directed toward a path that was healing right.
Speaker 2So when we look at it, I think it's really important, first, that we start with talking about mental illness, telling people the difference between feeling sad and living in sadness, right, the difference between chronic depression and situational depression. It would make sense that you would be depressed from the loss of your life. You lost your one, right? That makes sense. It doesn't mean that you'll be depressed always. It's situational and it doesn't mean that there's something that's going to cure it. It may come back, but you understand what it is and learn how to deal with it. Right, and in that you find the way that you care for yourself. Your walk to the garden, you're listening and throwing your own private dance or parties. Whatever it is, it's going to help you to care for yourself. You're intentionally setting time aside to rest and to care for your mind, body and soul daily.
Speaker 2Not something when you crashed and you're going to do, but what is it that I do every day to make sure that I get back to my most resilient zone? That I'm checking between zero and five and you know you're at one. You need to do something to get to five. Maybe that is a piece of cheesecake, maybe it's a wok, maybe it's a Pepsi. You know, sometimes that's my drug of choice and I've been off the Pepsi wagon, I will say, for about four months.
Speaker 2And then I'm moving my mom for today and so I got some things from her facility and there were these mini Pepsis, right, and so I brought them home and Troy's like oh no. I was like I know they were talking to me. I said, but I'm not going to drink them. He's like yes, you are, just prepare for it. That's self-care, like finding what. How do you care for yourself? What are you going to put in place daily to help you get back to your resilience? Doing that reflection like I wasn't where I wanted to be today and that's okay. But what do I need to do? So you said you were at four. You might ask yourself, what do I need to get to five? But you're not always going to be at five. So I think four is just absolutely great.
Speaker 2But I'm just using that as an example to show that as a two, so doing that, integrating it into their all part of your life. So it's understanding. What does mental health look like for me? Right, because for me it's going to look different than what it is for you. This is an individual journey. How do I care for myself? And then what direction am I seeking spiritually? Towards hope, health and healing. And it looks different.
Speaker 2It doesn't always mean showing up at Sunday service, because Sunday isn't always going to carry me Monday through Saturday, isn't always going to carry me Monday through Saturday. So what's the relationship about with me and God to develop me into the best person, so that on those days when the pastor isn't preaching, how am I preaching and encouraging myself? What direction do I need? How am I pondering questions with God about why does grief have to happen like this? Again? You know, when my sister died, I asked him like, really, like, that was my question, like nothing else, just really. And that word was so much Like, really.
Mental Health in the Community
Speaker 2I had to walk with her from November to May, knowing that her path was that one. I really, really believed because I prayed that he was going to heal her. I was like, certainly he wouldn't take. Take my sister too, right? So really, like really she died on her birthday, which is hilarious now, but it's like she wanted. I was like she always wanted to set a record. She was a track star, basketball star at Harding. She's got some records up. I was like you always want to be someone. That's a wrecker, you know. And so when she was passing though, in the end because she was so miserable, she was fighting us, and so someone's like, oh well, she's just probably it was like the family joke and I won't say who said it, but like she's waiting for her birthday, you know. So we're just praying that she makes it to the birthday. I said you can pray that she makes it to their birthday, but pray, she stopped fighting me along the path because you over there and she kicking my butt over here.
Speaker 2You know she kicking my butt making these last days hard for me, so that really you know asking those questions. And so it's a matter of just understanding that pathway, of how it's all working together and if each person does that work right and they do their co-pay. And it doesn't always mean that you go and see a therapist, because I'm not one to say everyone needs one. I'm a therapist with a therapist and her name is Sarah and, like she's been the best thing that happened in my life. She helped journey with me from the death of Christine all the way through Tanya. I had an appointment tomorrow that I had to cancel, or I'm sorry today because of moving my mom, but finding what is it?
Speaker 2And if each individual does the work of finding their path towards hope, healing and health and healing from any adverse childhood experiences or trauma that they have not processed, then the community gets stronger. Right, because individuals make the community. And if the community becomes focused on how do we build resilience within people like these workshops that I'm going to do, that help teach methods that you can use yourself and teach others as practitioners or using your daily life, our community gets stronger. Podcasts talks like this that talk about the realness of mental health, take away that stigma and say, hey, I know I look like I got it all together, but I'm really like this therapist in therapy who daily is like, what's your mental sharing?
Speaker 2Taping it all together a little bit some days Taking those pieces, putting it together, accepting the beauty out of the ashes of life and trying to do something with it. Like those things, then build a community. I think it's about us having a conversation, especially in the brown community, because we don't talk about mental health and in the brown Christian community we don't talk about mental health. Sometimes we talk about prayer and faith more and we forget they can coexist. And Lewis Macklin made this Facebook post that just I was like. You are on it, brother. He said that deliverance deals with the demons, therapy deals with the damage.
Speaker 1Wow.
Speaker 2Right, so you go to this church service, somebody casts out all these things in you. Okay, and I'm not knocking the process of that right, because it works and that's some people's path. Okay, so you get the deliverance, but then what happens with it? It's like, even after open heart surgery, you have to hold this bear, you have to go through cardiac rehab, you have to begin to walk. They don't just cut you up, put you back together and don't do something afterwards.
Speaker 2So therapy is like the rehabilitation of that experience, and so it's a matter of us, within spiritual direction and the community, recognizing the role of healing agents. And I'm not saying it's always a therapist. I do a lot of work with lay people, people like you, who people talk to. Right, you have this gift to pull stuff out of people, to talk, to inquire, to have their story told, to learn of their narratives. That's counseling, it's talking, it's a conversation. So I just give you some skills that help you to know so that you can help them realize how to get to that place, that direction. Right, it's not always about I've got the title, it's about I've got the gift. How do I use it to help people get towards hope, health and healing, so that?
Speaker 1was a long explanation. No, no, no. This is. This is great. How do you, how do you balance it all, your personal life and, and you know your profession and and like, how do you? How does sherry dr woods balance this stuff for you?
Speaker 2I'm gonna be so transparent with you. It is a struggle, right, one that I I fight against every day, right? I told you about the perfectionism people pleasing perfectionist. They, they, I'm in recovery, but they pop. They pop up and when it pops up I have to do certain things to to balance right and to say this isn't good for me. So I'll give you an example and just tell my business, because that's how I find healing right. Don't hide the story because it helps somebody else.
Finding Balance in Professional Life
Speaker 2So I'm the director of our Master of Social Work program at Youngstown State. It was one of those titles, or just one of those roles, that helped me to be able to get tenure, because it set me apart from something else. So tenure's over, I have tenure. Next step is full professor, and some changes have happened at the university where they are adding more responsibilities and changing things because we're short on staff, short on money. You have to do that Administratively.
Speaker 2I totally understand it. I told you started out in business. I get the administrative part of it. I'm not mad at you, but the balance for me was I had to look at it and say do I need this and why, and how is it serving me? Right. So I looked at it like okay, in the beginning I needed to have something extra, to sort of set me apart, to do some things that were considered extraordinary within a program that, at the time, was being ordinary. I did that. Okay, I needed to find my place within a faculty that was already established, where everyone had their roles, and make my own path. That helped me do that.
Speaker 2Right now, what do I need it for? And so, knowing personally how perfectionism, people pleasing and performance struggle in my life, continuing to do more with less time will take me away from my life purpose. It'll take me away from building a center in Rwanda, from this global thing that has gotten so much bigger than me. Ysu Warren right that this life work that God has given for me and Troy to do to leave a legacy for our family, and not a legacy as in a place, but a legacy of purpose and service coming to a sense. If I'm knocking myself out doing the MSW director program, which I will, even though you're decreasing the hours, I don't know how to tell a student I can't get to you right now. I already used up all my hours.
Speaker 2And so I'm going to be doing all of this extra and what I need to do as purpose is going to go to the wayside. Well, I'm finally and like I said, this hasn't been always, but finally at a point where I can look at that and say that doesn't serve me, it doesn't balance my life, it makes my life more unbalanced. I've done too much on the copay to get well and know who I am and be authentic and not need to prove anything to anyone to go back into that place, and so I stepped down. So I said, when I return from my sabbatical, I won't be returning as the director of social work, and I did it so fast that it surprised me. So I talked to my best counseling guy, my husband.
Speaker 2Right, I'm like, babe, this is what's going on and this is what they're saying. And he asked a question, like he always does Well, what do you feel is best for you? Right, and I'm like I. What do you feel is best for you? Right, and I'm like I don't think that's best for me. And he says why. And I gave him my reason. What would it serve you to do that? What would you be gaining? You know how would that help you stay healthy? And he went through all these questions and we got to the end. It was like I'm telling her now I'm these questions. And we got to the end. It was like I'm telling her, no, I'm telling her, I'm stepping down. He was like I'm glad for you.
Speaker 2A year ago, dashawn, I would have been like I can do it all, because I felt like I needed to be at all, because cultural taxation tells you that you have to do it all.
Speaker 2You have to be bigger, better, browner, brighter. Yeah, right, you have to balance all of these things at the same time and smile while you're doing it and stare in the face of racism and when they say I'm not with her, and when they're really saying I'm not with you and take it on right and I looked at not my supervisor, who's the most supportive person that has been in my life since I entered the YSU faculty role, but at the university as a whole, understanding, okay, you have your needs as administrators to balance the books and make things work, and I totally get that. It doesn't work for me, so I'm not doing it and so this is probably my best place of balance that I've ever been in my life. But it came from all the grit of the grief. Right, I'm finally living in the beauty of the ashes. So when Christine died, it taught me to count the days. Life is short. Count the days you may not have tomorrow.
Speaker 1Yep.
Speaker 2When Tanya died, it taught me to make the days count. Live well. Don't just live up in those days and don't just count them. Live well. Make sure every day you're living in your purpose, every day you're doing something to advance who you believe you are as a person, working towards your purpose of the kingdom, serving somebody else, doing something to make the world better, and that's just it. That's where I've come to and I'm really excited for myself. When my son was young and he I've come to, and I'm really excited for myself. When my son was young and he I'm going to put him out here, but he was being potty trained he would go to the bathroom and he would say I'm so proud of myself. Aren't you proud of me? Like?
Speaker 2he would not wait for you to say I'm proud of you, right? Because he was proud of himself the same young man that said don't hate me and call me egotistical because I'm confident and you're not Right. So he taught me some things in life. So right now I'm like, I'm with him, Like I'm proud of myself. I don't care if you are or not, but I'm so proud of myself and don't get mad at me and call me egotistical because you're not confident.
Speaker 1I am pretty certain I have. I know I got a picture of Troy. I think we went to the Cleveland, we went somewhere, and that's when I was starting with my camera back in the day and I got a picture of all of them, all the kids on this bus. I'm going to have to find them, I'm going to text it to you. And Troy is sitting here, but it's all the kids that got. I got a picture of the young man too. I'm going to look and see. And that's back in the film days. I think I was learning at Hiram as an independent study. I needed one credit to graduate, so my instructor said well, I'll teach you photography. I was like okay, so I was learning.
Speaker 2How cool is that.
Speaker 1And I would take my camera with me all the time. So it's on film I'm going to hunt for those pictures.
Speaker 2Oh, how cool is that.
Speaker 1I'm going to hunt for that and send you, take a screenshot. Let me ask, before I go into this next question what's your zodiac?
Speaker 2Gemini, don't make me go there.
Speaker 1Okay, no, I wanted to make sure, because the way you was talking I was like a Capricorn, Because I'm not fighting it.
Speaker 2I get along great with Gemini's. I'll tell you the joke. So my sister used to say when we were younger, that watch which Sherry that you get. So there are two Sherry's, there's Sherry and Carrie. I'm just going to tell you Sherry and Carrie.
Speaker 1I'm just going to tell you Okay.
Speaker 2So Sherry is the nice professional that you know, tries to do everything right, and I'm so offended that you said that right, carrie's the one like ninja, really, we went there Like Carrie's the ghetto one. So she used to say there's two, two of me Like, hence the Gemini, it's all good.
Speaker 1What wisdom.
Speaker 2what nugget of wisdom would you give the 18-year-old Dr Woods Sharon?
Speaker 1What wisdom would I give to the 18-year-old? What nugget of wisdom would you give the 18-year-old.
Speaker 2You, wow, I would tell her don't run, because I told you I left home at 18 running away and I ran into something awful. I ran into actually a domestic interpartnership violence. Situation was in another country, couldn't get back Because pride wouldn't let me come back, because people told me don't leave. I was leaving for the wrong reason. Because people told me don't leave, I was leaving for the wrong reason and because I was so proudful and not allowed to fail. Right, as an African-American female, raised by a strong African-American female, you don't fail. You make things work. So my pride wouldn't allow me to come back home and so I would say to the 18-year-old you can always go home, don't run from trauma.
Speaker 2Run to safety.
Speaker 1Yeah, I dig that One word. So I do this every interview. I ask everybody about their one word because I believe there's. It can change Mine from last year might be different but the one word that you would use to not maybe completely define you, but what's your one word that kind of defines you, exudes who you are, that just encapsulates you.
Speaker 2So it's interesting. So about maybe seven years ago I think yeah, it was about 70 years ago I started doing the one word challenge. Have you heard of the one word challenge? So it takes you through these exercises and you choose one specific word that's going to guide you throughout the year as you make decisions to pursue your goals. So everything comes back to this one word, and so my word for this year was expectancy, and so I take the word and then I give it my own definition. So my definition for expectancy is a restful anticipation of hope, something unexpectedly, beyond what I can ask or think will happen. It hopes in promises fulfilled, and it's what I see manifested into what is done. And so my word is expectancy, and manifested is really important in that definition, because last year my word was manifest.
Speaker 1Okay.
The Rwanda Wellness Center Vision
Speaker 2So I would say my one word now is expectancy, and I've seen that happen this year. I received a sabbatical for this year from YSU. Being an African-American female in a predominantly peach, male-dominated place, it was really like a gift. And yet, when I found out that I received the sabbatical, I also found out that my sister was diagnosed with cancer, and so I was like I'm not doing this because I need to be focused on helping her. Because, again, I was taught to be the caregiver and you care for other people before you care for yourself. That was before I knew what self-care was. So I was like I really can't do this. But that part was fighting. But the wall part of me was like self-care, this is what you're supposed to do. So I went to my sister and I'm like hey, you just got diagnosed like this and I'm going to walk with you through your journey. What's going to be best? She's like you're going to take the sabbatical. I meant like what's the question? Like you're going to take it and you're going to expect that as a result of that, great things are going to happen. So she's not here to see that now, but she gave me that wisdom and I took it, and I've been expecting and seeing so much like even the fact that this sounds really weird, but the gift that she died before I left for my sabbatical. So the way it was intended is that I was going to do June and July because, instead of spending a lot of months, because that was all, I was willing to give up being away from her, and so I didn't know that she was going to pass. But I said I'm only doing these two months and then I'll write about what I did and then I'll go back in May with students, so I'll break it up rather than being in extended time. So I was expecting, though, something, but I didn't know what. Right, I'm waiting for these promises, unfulfilled, to manifest themselves into what really becomes an action. So she died in May, so one I was able to leave without worrying about coming back or being away while she might pass or something. So that was her gift. That she gave me on her birthday was kind of like I'm okay, you go, do you? And she would say like you got to go, be great. I'm like okay. And so her nickname for me was Dee Dee Bum, right, so she's like Dr Dee Dee Bum, you got to go be great.
Speaker 2So I expected when I went to Rwanda that those two months were going to be good. It was a wonderful thing. This was the first time my husband was able to come with me and see it. I expected that we would be envisioning and he'd be able to bring back administratively in his mind all the pieces merging. I expect that right. But while I was there then I received the invitation to even come back again. So I'm leaving next week to go back. King Faisal, which is a teaching hospital, sponsored me to come back and to launch their midwifery students about vicarious trauma, secondary trauma, trauma-informed care, community resilience, self-care all of these things that will help them be more resilient on their walk as practitioners. I was expecting something. I didn't expect that.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Speaker 2Right. So here it is. I go back, vulnerable, broken, like this is May 14th. We left June 11th, right A month. Like grief just dripping all over me.
Speaker 2I said it was like a fabric, you know just all Yep, ijekente cloth is what they call. Like the different designs, like this that I love. I was like it was wrapping me like Ijek off right. So I go expecting something, but not like this, like wow, it really be able to do my sabbatical during the, the academic school year in a way that would be so much bigger, right. So one word expectancy. I expected it. It's showing and it doesn't. Expectancy doesn't necessarily mean that you do something to like name. I'm not saying name it and claim it, but it's like the mind frame that I believe that God is going to do exceedingly, abundantly, above what I can ask or think. So I'm going to start asking and thinking those things that are exceedingly and above Right, and so I was like I want to come back and I want to do some work that I feel like is really meaningful, and then this opportunity is here, and so my word for this year and that was a really long story is expectancy.
Speaker 1Well, congratulations on that.
Speaker 2Thank you.
Speaker 1Yeah, so we have a round. It's called the random question round.
Speaker 2You see me reach for this paper. Yeah, I'm ready. I listen to some of your other podcasts. I'm ready, though.
Speaker 1But they're cool, lighthearted. You know it's nothing. So are you ready?
Speaker 2I'm ready.
Speaker 1If your life was turned into a movie, what genre would it be and who would play you?
Speaker 2So Mary J Blige has to play me, because that's, that's my husband's fake boo, right?
Speaker 1So you got to get approval, so it has to be Mary J. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2You know, so she has to play me. The genre would be suspense, right. I would want to be like this person who like stole very valuable paintings and you know I'm this therapist by day and like this, this.
Speaker 1And nobody knows. No, they wouldn't even think about it.
Speaker 2Not even think about it. Thief by night Right.
Speaker 1If emotions could be bottled up and sold as perfumes, what would your signature scent be called and what emotion would it capture?
Speaker 2Sacred scents is what it would be called. The fragrance would be lavender and it would capture the emotion of chaos and peace, because both can be true, they can coexist. Okay, you can be feeling chaos in certain things in your life, but peace in the chaos, knowing that you're going to make it through. So, sacred sense lavender, chaos and peace.
Speaker 1Chaos and peace. If you could close your eyes and, upon opening, be anywhere you wanted to be anywhere, what would that place be?
Speaker 2On the heels of Rhonda in our wellness center, the MyBulso Wellness Center, sitting up on a heel with glass windows and when you look out you see the healing heels of Rhonda, and I'd actually be doing this podcast with you globally. You'd be over there helping the women figure out how to market and get to their next level.
Speaker 1You know what I like about when you give an answer. Your eyes was closed and your hand was moving. You had everything you was visualizing. It was there. What is your go to karaoke song?
Speaker 2what is your go-to karaoke song and how confident are you in your singing? Oh, my goodness, so pre-covid, you couldn't tell me that I couldn't sing now. Now I listen to her so like who is that? Um, but my go-to song is strength, courage and wisdom by india irie. It's just like I remember, like it's inside of me, all all alone, and I have to go back and remind myself. When I have those moments of fear and they come a lot that's another one of the things that I fight is just fear of what, if what, will happen. You know, when you experience a lot of loss, that's a common emotion that would try to paralyze you. So when I have those moments, I speak back to myself and I sing that song Full Blast. It's like when it's playing and my husband's like, oh, she having a moment.
Speaker 2Let me let her be. You know, my children will walk in a room and my daughter's favorite expression is you're doing too much, you're doing a lot. They don't criticize me in that moment, even though I'm doing a lot and dancing around with my fake mic, with my toothbrush.
Speaker 1you know that's her song and you know, I think India Arie is very she's wonderful. I don't think she gets enough. I remember when she first came out, I mean it was a few songs that got the airplay, but she didn't get enough airplay. You know what I mean. I think she's very underrated. A phenomenal singer.
Speaker 2Yes, what's one book or movie that you could watch or read over and over again without getting tired of it? It's funny you should ask this. My family watches the same movies. I'm like how many times are we going to watch this? How many times are we going to watch this? But I would so if they heard this they're going to. When they hear this, they're going to say I'm a hypocrite, because I'm like I don't want to watch something else, I want to watch something new.
Speaker 1But my favorite movie is Love and Basketball.
Speaker 2OK, I like the, the truth and the transparency of the wrongness of finding health in a relationship, like it really reminds me. So I've been married 32 years to my husband and like to see us. You might think, oh, 32 years, but we always talk about you don't know the grit to the glory, yes, right, like you don't know how we got here, and that movie just reminds me of that fight to get to where you know you belong and the hardships that come with it. Haven't been any way near perfect in my walk of this wife thing, but really grateful for the grace and the forgiveness and the path that I've been able to walk with my husband to help us find this place of just sacred marriage I guess I would call it.
Speaker 1And you know it's transparency here, because at some point I don't know when it came along and I understand why people ask it. So, the subject of dating like hey, you think about dating, yet you know, like I get asked that from family to friends and always say, you know, you know, I either joke and say, yeah, I'm dating like seven times a week, her name's D5. It's my company, that's, you know, happily I'm happily dating. But on the other end of it it's it's like people just don't understand. Like when you cultivate, when you, you know you from high school.
Speaker 1So we were like he was in high school, I was out, but you, you building that, you know what I mean. Like you're cultivating and building this love. You know everything that comes along with it, the foundation, oh, by the way. And then there's kids and you just managing it because you know you didn't have the blueprint to be parents and you didn't have. On both of our sides there was no blueprint on what love is or how to do relationship. So you're building this, but you're seeing the fruits of it and you know, and then it's just growing.
Speaker 1So for me, to your point, like that, for me, even if I went into that realm and that's why I don't want to like. I'm very content to me. When you build those relationships or building love like that, that takes time and all this other stuff and me I got more time behind me than in front of me. As far as you know, numbers go, so it's just. I see you, you know you kind of lit up when you were just talking about the forgiveness, like everything that encapsulate building this relationship. Right, like the great relationships that I see. They've been through some stuff. They've had celebrations, they you know me and E. I remember us being on food stamps. I remember me getting mad like we getting off of food stamps because y'all get a quarter raise, they taking two hundred dollars away you know I mean I don't want them.
Speaker 1And how are we gonna survive? We'll eat spaghetti and whatever hot dogs and ramen noodles.
Speaker 1You know my raise is my raise, you know, and so you know going through that and building and building, and then you know the profession and her profession. So it's it's one of those things that I really, really appreciate to hear other people say, like you, just you build it from the ground up versus now, and no knock to it. But from the ground up versus now and no knock to it. But technology wise, you know you can meet somebody on an app and you know, and you can start from there. But that that raw back in the day type love that you built best ever, the best ever. So I got, I had one more, but I'm gonna switch it up because I'm interested to see what you would use. You are a superhero, you are a superhero. Well, you are a superhero. I'm just saying, okay, but if you had one superpower, what would it be and how would you use it?
Words of Wisdom and Expectancy
Speaker 2So that is so funny that you would even ask the superhero question. So, first off, so my husband. They gave him a Rwandan name, right, and it's Nuali, and that means superhero, but this isn't a name that they give to a lot of people, and after they got to know him at different places with our partners. The name, though, means, in its most true essence, one who struggles for the sake of others. So anybody that knows my husband knows this is true, so they named him Nawali, so him being a superhero, and so we are like wonder twins. We say so. When you said that, I was like that's funny.
Speaker 1Earlier when I mentioned that earlier. Yeah, that's why I was laughing.
Speaker 2We're like wonder twin power, you know, activate. So my name is Keza right, and so my Rwanda name, and it means beautiful from the inside out. And that's so significant because if you knew me growing up, like I had no humps or bumps in any of the right places, like you know, my my hair was like always kinky, that type four curl that wasn't cool to be natural kind of thing. And so finally, over these last, I would say, seven years, growing into the inner beauty, really working like what's my character, like I don't even care what my outside looks like, and embracing my awkwardness, like I have on my, you know, katenche cloth with Nike slides, like you know, and Jean Legans, like this is just so authentically who I am now right, so embracing that.
Speaker 2So my name being superhero would be Keza, the beautiful one from the inside out, and my superpower would be my words that I would be able to, when I speak, speak, healing on people, that the words that I had would just take them to a place of hope, healing and health.
Speaker 1Okay, I like that, I like that. With Nawali my husband With the Wonder Twins power activating. What are your future goals for your organization Now? So it's mind, body and and soul. But I've seen my do you? Did you shorten it? Go my, my boso, my boso, because I like that, like yeah it's so, it's the, it's the mi from mine, the b from body it does we have those?
Speaker 2yeah, so that, um, we're working on getting like the brand too. So the my boso. Um, the goals are to continue to offer the continuing education and professional development that helps people grow in their understanding of how to address trauma in non-traditional ways, so that people are able to find the paths to healing that work for them.
Speaker 1Sure.
Speaker 2Right, joining them on their journey, not becoming the experts, but saying, hey, can I walk alongside and, like a tour guide, just sort of pointing out did you see that flower? What does that mean to you? So working that avenue of it, receiving funding so that we can offer them at no cost to people. A lot of times a barrier to growth and good professional development and continuing education is financial. So working to get funding to do that.
Speaker 2But, ultimately, it's this mind, body, soul wellness center in Rwanda, sitting on the hills looking out onto the healing hills of Rwanda. They call it the land of a thousand hills and everywhere you go you see hills. And the reason it's healing for me is to understand that people who came from genocide, the massacres of death and rape and all of the horrible things that have happened, that are in recovery, building this land of reconciliation and forgiveness and hope and healing, that every time I go there I come back healed and stronger and more purpose driven and more purpose-driven. And so this center to be a place where we can take other people from the US there so that they can find their purpose and begin to offer and serve those who are in the midst of recovery, themselves sacrificing as they serve others. So the center is our main focus and these professional development workshops, both domestic and global, to help people grow. So that I can live out that charge that I pledged to when I accepted my doctorate to serve and grow others with the knowledge that I have.
Speaker 1That's powerful. Do you have a Facebook page? Anything that people can get up to date?
Speaker 2So here's the thing. So I have I think my Facebook is Sherry Harper Woods that usually, like I'm going to Rwanda again, I blog my experiences.
Speaker 1Okay.
Speaker 2So I have the past, I had the summer there, but I need to do more right. So I need to talk to somebody about how to really market, get it out there.
Speaker 1The D5 group is a phenomenon.
Speaker 2Yeah, I heard about that, you know. Yeah, I heard about that, you know. So, yeah, I need to do something because I feel like this global place that we're being called to won't allow as much as I want to do little. It won't allow us, Like it's time to switch our perspective, even to be intentional about how we promote everything. So I want to be more intentional about that. So I wanted off camera, actually today I was telling Troy, yeah, I want to talk to him to say, like, how do we begin to say what we heard so we can see what we said and allow it to come to be?
Speaker 1Yeah, but two things before we wrap up. So I was thinking about this and laugh and actually went and looked for it and I found it and I used it a lot when I was teaching at YouthBuild and a lot of leaderships and self-esteem classes. But you were teaching a workshop. We were in the basement part of ACOP.
Speaker 2Okay.
Speaker 1And you were teaching this workshop and I want to say I can't remember what it was. I think it was like teamwork and things like that Around that under that umbrella, like teamwork, and it was a phenomenal exercise because you pass it out and you put us in groups and it was about being an astronaut stuck on the planet and you have all these supplies.
Speaker 2Okay.
Speaker 1So we, we did the exercise and I'm still, you know, I'm in youth build, yeah, youth build. And I think I was going on to Rebecca Williams, but I was at youth build and I remember walking up to you and I was like Miss Woods, I said can I have this? Because it was like a blank one. And I was like can I have this? I want to use it to teach stuff. And you just gave me this look. He was like you know, like why are you asking me?
Speaker 2Yes, that kind of thing, looking at you like, oh, this is about to go all bad. So I'm glad I said yes, because I told you I've done the copay to get well. I wasn't always well and so I was wondering, like, was that a time when I was in one of my? Give me $90 for this worksheet? You know, like not good places, like no, I've worked too hard to get this.
Speaker 1I'm glad that was the encounter and I can look back on certain exercises and then, flying high, I would do it. It's like one of the first things because for me, I would use it because to get a real understanding of who my groups were. You know, after the first week or so you can see the ones that were very talkative, the ones that were shy, the ones who were leaders, the ones that probably, and others, just to put them and see who really would develop out of being the leader, because a lot of times the person who's doing the most talking and ain't really the leader is that quiet one over there who can bring everybody together and figure out what we need to get off this planet. You know that type of thing, so that. And then, as you were sitting here talking, I remember one of my favorite quotes is to learn so that you can teach, and teach so that you can learn, and that's good.
Speaker 1Coming on the backside of this in this podcast it is, you know, learned it so I can interview and interview so that I can learn. And so I want to thank you for being on here because there's a lot Thank you. We've got a lot of information that I hope our audience takes with them and can use, and I did, especially even here behind the mic. You know what I mean. I'm taking my notes in my head because KG gives you can hear a pencil, right, so she'd be trying to edit that out. But I learned so much and it really from you, from switching roles to you being the host and me being the interviewer, that helps so much and I'm going to take that with me but I'm glad that this will be out there in the universe for people to hear. So you define the people that we want to interview and have on this show. I mean, you are a true definition of that of South United Presents and I want to thank you for being on here.
Speaker 2Thank you. Thank you for this time. I feel like I've been in therapy. Thank you, thank you for this time.
Speaker 1I feel like I've been in therapy.
Speaker 2I really appreciate your ability to ask questions to help you to ponder, and knowing your story is part of trauma recovery and so just the privilege of telling it each time you tell that it builds up your resilience of who you are. So that's why I say I've been in therapy. So I walk away from here today feeling five on my resilience scale. And I needed that for the things that I need to conquer today, and so I thank you.
Speaker 1Thank you, and this is your first podcast too.
Speaker 2I know Like I conquered it Finally.
Speaker 1And it don't even seem like it, because you're a good host.
Speaker 2You have a natural gift to lead people into conversation.
Speaker 1Thank you.
Speaker 2You're a counselor. Thank you, all're a counselor.
Random Questions and Final Thoughts
Speaker 1Thank you. All right, ladies and gentlemen, I hope you get a lot from this. I truly and truly do. And once again, we got to thank Dr Sherry Harper-Woods for being on here. She's a Gemini. Shout out to all my Geminis out there. Thank you for hitting the play button. Take care. This episode was produced by the Sound United Podcast Studio, led by Kimberly Gonzalez. Photography and video content produced by the D5 Group, and be sure to visit our website, soundunitedpresentscom, where you can catch up on all the episodes and get some behind the scenes content. I'm Deshaun Scott. Thank you for listening. Ready to launch a podcast or create standout audio content. Sound United Podcast Studio has everything you need Studio rental, consulting, content development, marketing support, and we even offer remote editing services. And we can help you, whether you're local or nationwide. So book your discovery. Call at wwwthesounducom. That is wwwthesounducom. That is wwwthesounducom. Or do it the old fashioned way and call 330-238-7157. That is 330-238-7157. It's time for you to empower with sound.
