Mental Health Matters - IN Sickness and in Health

So it's Hola, my friends and DJ. Um, I was texting DJ as that was playing, but he is here, so now I can talk to him directly. So DJ, I just want to start the show by saying sorry, I just sent you the link like 30 seconds ago. So, but on the plus side, we have a new fun thing on StreamYard where the intro thing, we can just set it up to play when we play. So isn't that fun and exciting?

I love it when technology makes a jump for the better. That's, that's good to hear.

Yeah, well, I was like, I, because I was stressing because normally you push all the buttons for these things, and I'm like, oh look, they've got a thing. So StreamYard is trying to make themselves better after they tried to rip us all off and pay lots of stupid money for things that we didn't think we wanted to pay more money for. So yay for StreamYard getting their act together. So anywho, Thank you for popping on last minute, and I apologize for, um, that whole last minute thing, but here we are. So let's just get into welcoming everybody. I see you've already been out there in the chat chatting people up, so more than a little bit.

I tried to welcome everybody in as they were dropping in, and I see that a few other new people have dropped into the chat. But so far out there, guess who was first? The big hand waving, it's the Krabby Turtle holding down the East Coast. We got Mike White, 2A Advocacy, also in the room. Gun Websites joins us, as does The 2 Live Moo. G23, you can have the West Coast and represent it well. Coming in, let's see, ZariaFan93 was the next person in the room. You were in the room, as a matter of fact. Mark Thomas followed a great start shooting school, and that brings you current. That is our roll call for right now.

Awesome. Well, let me thank everybody for not tar and feathering me for missing last week. I do want to start out with an apology for that. In that I was in so much pain I even forgot that it was Saturday. Uh, from time to time I, I suffer from migraines, and last Saturday I was towards the end of one of my pistol permit classes and a, a migraine hit me harder than I've ever been hit before. And so it's one of those things where I just literally got knocked out, basically was on the couch from as soon as I finished my pistol permit class until the next morning when I finally decided I'd go to the ER because it still wasn't stopping. And then I finished teaching on Sunday because, you know, a little trip to the ER, it's fine. It's not that big a deal. However, since G Webs is here, I must ask G Webs directly. I'm like, every Saturday since 2018 except for last weekend. I hope that you don't think I'm too much of a slacker and that you won't leave me just because I did miss one Saturday since 2018. And I didn't do a makeup on Sunday because I was still pretty beat up. So anywho, welcome everybody. Thank you for popping in. I am hoping that there are some folks over on the Facebook side because I've sort of kind of maybe fixed a little bit of it because I gave a couple of you invites and some of you responded to invites. So I'm hoping the Facebook side actually works a little bit. Um, still working on getting it to actually be public, so we don't know. So like we started off, technology can make stuff way cooler and better. However, sometimes we don't really know what is what. And somewhere here is, uh, G Webs asked, um, if there was a better version of StreamYard that doesn't cost as much. There it is. Thank you. Sorry, I didn't touch it. Yes, thank you. And G Webs, if anything, I would have asked you that question because I would expect you would know more than I would. So when they went to raise their prices, I did not look around. I did see some posts that you did and posts that Hillbilly did on what the features were and what the cost was going to be. Um, but I'm just going to say I am too pressed for time and I'm just still at the lowest version so I can stream to a couple places, and I haven't looked into that. So there's my answer. But like I said, I had to get to Gwebs first because I know he doesn't like slackers like me who take a whole weekend off because, well, because like legit I couldn't move off of the darn couch last Saturday. So thank you all for coming back this Saturday. So if y'all read, uh, the— what is the title of this? In Sickness and in Health. Hmm, why do you think I chose that for this weekend? Oh, because the sickness was pretty, uh, pretty miserable. Um, so I will have to check out the Streamlabs and see if I can get that to work. 'cause like I said, definitely having issues for real. So, in sickness and health. Most of us, if we're married or we've ever been to a wedding, which I'm hoping, I'm guessing is most of the audience here, we've heard that phrase, right? In sickness and in health. Oh, for the love of peanut butter jelly, 5 minutes in and I am just still not on track. Hi everyone, welcome to Mount to Health Matters. Why are we here? Because 2 out of every 3 gun deaths we hear about are suicides. And if we want to save lives, not just those who die by gun, we need to talk about mental health. Ta-da! There's the intro that I should have given you like 10 minutes ago, well, 5 minutes ago and 45 seconds ago. So in sickness and health, if we've been to a wedding, we have heard that phrase. When we commit to someone, when we marry someone, one of the things we talk about is in sickness and in health, because this is super important. Now, most of us hear it in a church. Most of us hear it at a wedding, but here's the reality. You and I need to have that in sickness and health, in our brains, in our bodies, because we need to take care of us. And last weekend was definitely a combination of trying to get over bronchitis because it's still not quite gone yet on top of the migraine, which just, just, just knocked me right the heck out. And it's what made me think of the insickness and health. So one of my favorite things to do when I'm not feeling good is listening to music that does make me feel good. So tonight's episode, I'm going to be throwing a couple of quotes from some of my favorite songs that help bring me up when I am not physically feeling well. So Stress. Everybody has it, right? We are— I don't even want to say it, but 7, 8, 9, 9 days away from the U.S. presidential election. Now, there are other people on the ticket besides the presidents, and I know most of the people on my ticket here in Connecticut, whether they're state senators or federal or all of that fun stuff. And so I actually physically know the people I'm voting for. So most of us already know who we're voting for, and we're going to be super happy if the people we want to win win, and we're going to be super stressed if the people who don't— who we don't like win. Now, I'm not telling you who to vote for, but the reality is that emotion is probably true for pretty much every one of us. Now, what is different is the level of stress that one thing is going to cause versus the other. So when we're talking about sickness and health, we need to talk about taking care of ourselves. When we're getting married and committing to another soul on this earth for as long as we shall both shall live, I think it helps remind us that we are supposed to commit to ourselves, right? So whether you're married or not, this conversation is still for you, because unless we are taking care of ourselves We cannot take care of anyone else. And I have notes, why I keep looking down. Hold please. I also have tea. And if it gets real bad, I got the inhaler, but I should be okay. So in sickness and health, till death do us part. Guess who the one person is that we're in it till death do us part, whether we're married or not, right? Y'all know the answer. Yes. Yeah, it is you. Like, I am here until I die, whether my husband predeceases me or not, or whether I predecease— all of that stuff. I have to take care of me until death do us part. So drink water, number one, simplest thing. Number two, sleep. Most of us— DJ, hahaha— Sorry, I have to make fun of DJ because like DJ just doesn't sleep often, or he does sleep often for a period of time and then doesn't sleep for a long period of time, as far as I understand. And those of you who know him know that this is true. I am not letting any secrets out. But sleep is one of the best things we can do for our health according to all of the health coaches out there. However, it's probably one of the things that we will ignore the most. In that, oh, I'm going to get one more thing done. I'm going to get one more thing done. Like tonight at the top of this hour, right? Go and play with Hillbilly and the crew that is going over there for their Halloween celebration weekend. So sorry, my brain went dumb again. So Mr. DJ, do we have any comments that I need to respond to while my poor little brain regroup here?

Absolutely. Check this out, bring them to you on the screen right now. Mark Thomas comments that 30 years for he and his wife on Tuesday. 30 years.

Loving it.

There are a couple others out there in the crowd too that I know had long marriages, and it's always good to see that sort of thing. And guess what? There's another one right here in the chat a couple of comments later. It's G23 on your screen saying, been with my wife since '01. Don't make me do math, but I'm pretty sure that matches the 23 following his G. I don't know if there's a super special version of that this year or not.

Actually, it's gonna— because we're in '24, so it's been 23. Yeah, there you go. See, you made me do math and now I do know, so you're correct.

How did I know math and someone else didn't? I give it up to anybody else when it comes to numbers. But check this out, 2 Live Move letting us know that he celebrated 32 years in April this year. So we got some long-term— oh, check this out, Fiona's popping it in here saying Hubs and I have been married for 22 years. I'm glad there's such good examples out there, at least in the text chat, right? Because on the panel, we're a 50/50 split. You've been married for a while, and mine was about 2 years long. So I guess that might say something about how easy it is for people to get along with me. I don't know.

No, no, no, no, no, no, no. That is not how that works. It's like, there are people that are meant to be together, and there are people that are meant to learn from each other of what not to to do. That's what I'm gonna go with. It's not that you're good or bad, it's that that wasn't the one for you.

So, well, check this out. Sorry if they had 93 on your screen saying not married yet to my girl, but if my dad was still here, his parents would be married for 41 years.

There you go.

Oh, follow-up: my grandparents have been married close to 70 years. 70 There's not even a card for that. Hallmark doesn't even do a card for that. I mean, come on, that's, that's amazing.

I will tell you for sure, like, for our 25th wedding anniversary, we got a lot of the exact same cards because— and one of my uncles is like, I looked and I couldn't even find a 25-year anniversary card because it's rarer than it once was. And to be fair, we did get married later in life, so our anniversaries will be shorter and, and less of them. So there is that. But so yeah, um, all right, so my brain, by the way, really and truly is taxed because I'm thinking and I have to pay attention to my breathing all of the time, and also the way that I talk. Now, if you look at earlier videos of me, I usually actually talk even faster than this, and I don't take as long pauses, but now I have to focus on my breathing so I don't cough all through this. So anyhow, um, how and why do we— see, I wrote notes so that I could keep on track. How and why do we, uh, deal with our unknowns? So what is anxiety? Do you all know? Do you remember? Have I said this before and just you forgotten? I know, but anxiety is worrying about what is to come. So when I said I don't even want to count how many days until the election, it's because I do have trepidations over what's going to happen after the election. Regardless of which presidential candidate wins, because that's just how I feel about it. So anxiety is worrying about what's coming, right? So it's thinking about what could happen. Now back to my— I told you I'm going to drop down lyrics and whatnot. One of the songs I listen to says, just because it's raining doesn't mean the sun won't shine. And this is one of those things. If you're on the Facebook side, or if you go to my Facebook side, which I know DJ doesn't go, but I do have a Bruce Lee quote that basically says, when things are good, enjoy them. When things are bad, know that this too shall pass. So anxiety is a waste of our emotion and our time. However, we still have thoughts, right? It's like, tomorrow morning, can I get up and feed myself? Can I feed my children? Do I have a roof over my head? All of these things create anxiety. So one of the things to do is focus on when stuff isn't the way that you want it to be. Be in that moment, experience that thing that's happening right this moment, and know that it's going to pass. And either enjoy it or bear through it and deal with it. Like last weekend, like I said, I'm sitting on the couch and my head's killing me and I didn't even know it was Saturday. But the idea is this too shall pass. And how do we deal with our unknowns? We pay attention to what we're paying attention to. Because if all I do is look at my calendar and do the countdown to the election in 10 days, 9 days, 7, 8, 9, 9 days, um, I could get myself all worked up. But instead, I want to prepare And how do we prepare? Well, we want to prepare mentally. We want to be aware of what we're focusing on. We want to minimize our anxiety. And then the other part of this is after the fact, minimize depression. And the reason I say that is because depression is what did happen. So if on election day what we want to happen doesn't occur, then we could set into depression because then we'll be all sad that we didn't do enough to move the things we wanted. So mental— pay attention to what you're paying attention to. Be present in this moment. 2, spiritual. I don't know if Jamie is out there, um, but I thought of Jamie as I wrote this part down. So are you right with God? Have you been saved by Christ? What is your spiritual journey? Are you ready to go to heaven and meet your maker? Are you not? D23, and actually, and I actually talked a lot about this, I think during, but definitely a ton before and after his actual interview, about how God saved his life. He attempted suicide multiple times, and then he, he turned his life towards God, and that's where he found his wife of the past 24 years, is in the church. And Being spiritually aware of what your path is and having faith there is such an amazing mental booster for pretty much all of us. Because it's nice— like, I worry about my friends who are atheists a little bit because I'm like, you're kind of a pessimist, aren't you? Because if you can't believe in something bigger and greater than you, then all the weight of the world is on your shoulders to save it. I love having belief in God and being able to be like, okay, when things really suck, like losing my sister, suicidal thoughts, depression, all of those things, it's like, what's the lesson? What's the lesson? What's the lesson? Why am I here going through whatever this thing is, and how do I become better on the other side of it? So our spiritual journey, we got to pay attention to that. You know, uh, I love it when I'm in the right mindset, and every morning I get up and pray, and every night before bed I pray. And I haven't done that for a while. I've been out of sorts. So check in with your God and figure out what it is you need to be doing to strengthen that, because the stronger our faith is, the happier we are. It's been shown time and time and time again, and it does not matter what your faith is. I'm not here telling you you have to be a Christian and pray to my God. You can be Jewish, you can be Muslim, all of those things. It's like whatever it is, but find your faith. And then what's our third pillar? There's always three pillars if you've ever noticed when we look at things that are making us better, is our physical, right? One of the things over the last couple weeks, copious amounts of tea, because garbage in equals garbage out. If I'm living on Twinkies and Coke and Frosted Flakes, I'm gonna stay sick that much longer. If I am doing my herbal teas and drinking water and putting good proteins in my body, I'm going to be stronger. The better we feel physically the happier we're going to be mentally. So we want to fortify all of these things going into what may be challenging times. So, Mr. DJ, is, is Jamie out there now? I want to know that I mentioned him and now I'm curious.

Well, I put that up on the screen and you were busy speaking, so there it is. He came in just before you started. There you go.

Just before I started talking about him, or just Just ask.

Yep.

All right, let me— Jamie, just so you know, I wasn't saying anything bad, but when I was talking about being right with God, I definitely thought of you. And for those who don't know, Jamie's a pastor, which is why I was thinking of him. All right, so more stuff I've got down here for you guys is fortify yourself in these three areas, right? Mental, spiritual, and physical. Know your strengths. What are you good at? And excel in those and offer those up to your friends and family who need them. Know your weaknesses. Understand that whatever you suck at, it's okay. You don't have to get better at that because chances are you've got someone who can help you out. So for example, I got DJ. DJ helps me stay on track. DJ gives me a break when I need it. DJ pushes the buttons when I can't, especially if I'm on the road and doing this on a phone, because goodness knows I'm no good at that. But knowing your weaknesses, understanding who you have around you— take an inventory of your friends. Who can help you with X, Y, or Z, right? So I don't know if Barbecue's out there being obnoxious or not, but Barbecue helped me a lot. I always talk about GWebs to my husband about— I would not be here on YouTube the way that I am without those guys picking me up, pushing me along, and showing me things I didn't know. Unfortunately, I think a lot of us believe that somehow we're supposed to take care of it all, and somehow we don't need anybody else because we're being a burden to somebody if we need to ask somebody else for help. Like Hillbilly, uh, last week, week before, he just reached out checking on me. I was actually really pretty rough, but it was really great to hear from him. And it's like little things like that. It's like when we're down is usually when we aren't reaching out to others. And when we're talking about suicide prevention, when I go to funerals where people have committed suicide, one of the biggest things is, well, why didn't they check? Why didn't they check in with me? Or why didn't they reach out? It's like, well, because when we're feeling low, that is not the time we reach out to our friends. However, I strongly suggest that you do what I try to do, but I'm not good at it always, is do a physical inventory of your friends. It's like, all right, what can Hillbilly help me with? Well, he's really much better at editing than I am. What can DJ help me with? Well, he just knows everybody everywhere. Um, so resources, same with Gwebs. And, um, and then so understanding who can help you and just being able to reach out I was listening to another song, and I'm paraphrasing this because it's not exactly the, the line in the song, but it's like, open the door to let people in who want to help you. And I know, like, DJ and I were talking about this earlier this week, is like, there are people out there that are more than happy to help me. They would have hopped on my stream if I had the wherewithal to ask somebody to go jump on my stream and and step in for me like you guys all do. I know Gizzard Gary does overtakes, and the Mouse, and, um, and even Jamie from time to time, or Viejo. So I know you're all out there, and if I had the brain power that day, I would have had someone come on. Or even DJ. Yes, he could do this all by himself, right, DJ?

Oh, I couldn't do it without you. Come on, you are the beginning of You are the beginning and you are the end. And I only get— I only get to like step in and say something at the end. But no, it's all you, girl. I'm just here in that support role that I do enjoy.

I'm willing to bet though, if, if I had enough brain power last Saturday, if I said, hey DJ, here's a link, here's how you log in, you would have found a way to put some folks up here. So you're right.

And I probably would have tagged Barbecue as the first one because comic relief is always a good thing. And that he is not out there today, at least he's not in the text chat right now.. And yeah, I spent some time, you know, next to that guy in the broadcast booth, so to speak. And, you know, he can bring a smile and a chuckle. And I'm glad that he and other people I see out there in the chat are the kind of people that will check in on their friends just at interval or when you're thinking about them. The best time to do it is when you think about it. Are you really that busy? You know, one of the things, one of the things that I've tried— well, you are incredibly busy in the way you keep Schedule is just complete. It would be complete chaos to me. But you thread your way through that every day regardless of illness kind of thing. And what I've taken to doing is if I think of somebody, but I, I should give them a call, but I'm busy enough where I'm gonna— I need to, you know, continue with what I'm doing, I put a reminder in my phone to do it later. And I make the day that it ends, I just stretch it out for months. So I get a daily reminder of who it is that I did not call yesterday or the day before. And there are also some people out there in the chat that I have not called in some time. And so I guess I'll be looking to do that. You know, our busy lives sometimes make us believe, um, before we sit and think about it for a minute, that we don't have the time for any of that. And we certainly do. We have time to do this show. We have time to listen to other shows and participate in them. Grab a greeting card, you know, let it go. I'm sorry, what you say?

No, no, no. I was just going to say it's like, right, you've been, you've gotten a random call. Barbecue gets random calls. G-Webs hasn't got a random call in a while, but like, I will call, but it's just like, I love the fact that I have friends that I cannot talk to for 10 or 15 years and call up And I get the, what can I do for you? Because we're not into the chit-chat stuff, but we're there for each other. And I realize, I'm like, to some people that probably might seem rude. But I forgot, I got to get this note in here though, because I almost forgot. Because TJ, I think you'll appreciate this. When you pay attention to your friends, they will pick you up and take care of you and help you out. You also need to make sure that you have your friends. They will call you out on your BS. Because we do not all need a bunch of yes-men around us saying that, yes, everything you're doing is wonderful. Sometimes we need our feet held to the fire and be like, yeah, knock that off, because we are, we are human and we have definite challenges from time to time. And, you know, if we're down in a slump, it's nice to have someone say, knock it off, get over it. In the appropriate way and manner, because sometimes that's not as simple as that. But oh, oh wait, see, I just happened to, um, pop on and look what Mark Thomas said about you, DJ.

Yes ma'am, and thank you very much, Mark.

Yes, well, DJ is always nice to, uh, tell us all how wonderful we are, but he loves being told how great he is. Right, you said you want to come in for tonight. Um, all right, well, Jamie, here's the deal. I know you may not be in a— wait, so wait, now I'm confused. But anyway, here's the deal. The way I read the Bible is if we talk about the Bible, we're, we're, we're pastors in that God said spread the word. And the Word is God and all of that fun stuff. For those of you who know the Bible, good job. And for those of us who just struggle through it, I apologize for butchering it. But, um, Jamie, you have such an amazingly happy, wonderful love of God in your heart. Um, to me, you're a pastor because his love shines through you. And so that is where I'm gonna keep calling you a pastor even if you're only ordained, because I don't even know what it means to be ordained. So there is that. Oh yeah, sort of like what Mike Thomas said, we don't care about titles, we feel the highest level bring us closer to God. Voilà, such is that. Okay, did I get through all of my things? Um, yeah, I have two quotes left. One of them is Pick Me Up from That Rock Bottom. And that particular song is talking about finding Christ and being saved and washed in holy water. And, uh, that was one of the things I was listening to. And then there is Mercy New Each Morning. I don't know about you guys, but it seems to me every time I watch a horror movie, whether regardless of what kind of horror movie is, because I don't watch that many because they freak me out and then I have nightmares, but Most horror movies end somehow that we're waiting for the sun to rise. And so that's why the mercy knew each morning came to mind, because no matter how hard life is, no matter what challenges we're going through, we are always stronger on the other side. Sometimes we are broken, and sometimes it takes a long time to heal from that thing that we're broken but we are always stronger on the other end. And when we're watching horror movies, it seems as though they're almost always waiting for the sun to rise because that sun peeking over the eastern side of whatever continent you're in gives you the idea that there's a new day. And with that hope of that new day, you have another day to survive, you have another day to thrive, you have another day to be a blessing to someone, you have another day where someone gets to be a blessing to you. And I have friends who say, oh, I'm so old. I'm like, think about the alternative, you could be dead. So this is where I want to leave you guys, not dead, but, um, we want to be aware of today. We want to get through the stuff we've got done today. We want to make ourselves as healthy as we can so we can love and serve those around us. We want to be humble enough to accept the service of others who wish to help us. We need to remember to reach out to people when we can, like DJ just said. We need to also remember to let people know sometimes we do need people to reach out to us. So, um, oh wait, so D23 is helping me out here. Uh, wait, what? That I— this one, sorry. Where ye gather together and praise thy name, I will be. So there we go. And it's Moo. All right. Anywho, Mr. DJ, how is that for you? You got a couple moments to say hello, goodbye, because that's a whole 30 minutes. Glad— way too much time to prepare for this week. So that's what happens when I skip.

I do. I've enjoyed the episode. Enjoy. I've enjoyed the episode. You enjoy your tea. And with mercy new each morning, Something popped into my head. Tomorrow is promised to no one. And so, if you're honest with yourself, you know, moving into that next day, it's not just that you need to realize that you're given that mercy each day, it's to make that day count. So, you know, people say that in different ways. Make today count. Go out and have a good one. You know, it's usually an encouraging kind of atmosphere or suggestion that people have about future. You could be optimistic about something that could be rather than the thing you might be stuck in right now. And the steadfast love of the Lord never ceases. His mercies never come to an end. They are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness. Right on. Thanks, Jamie. And so what I'm going to do is hit the roll call on our way out the door. Thank you for joining us this evening. The Crabby Turtle, Mike White 2A, was out there. So was Gun Websites 2 Live, G23, sorry, Bam 93, Mark Thomas. Thanks again for those kind words. Fiona, rock it, Billy Up. Hey man, Mike and Aubrey Bellinger out there. JH586, thank you for being in the chat tonight, Jamie, and thank you for being quick on those quotes. Appreciate that. Viejo, thanks for coming in late. It's great. Oh, check it out, Garage Guy 879. On the edge of the end of the program, man. Thanks for, uh, thanks for joining us. And check out the replay, recommend the show to other people. And remember, if you're in crisis or you know someone who is, dial 988 or 1-800-273-TALK. If you don't want to talk, then you can text the word TALK to 741741 and get assistance there. Local help is all available. Always available. In the UK, you can dial 0800-689-5652. I'll take a second to say I've added that to part of my rotation. You all are probably familiar with that paragraph that I read and composed that's out there in the text chat early in some places, and in others I thought to include places other than here. I know that we have global, uh, the global listening capability and there's no reason not to make sure that their needs are met as well. So what I'm going to do is I'm also going to leave you with Australia's. So that's 13, 11, and 14. Thanks for getting together, everybody. Have a good one, or take care, and rock! We're out.