At Peace & Content Janelle Poskocil

Hello everybody, welcome to another episode of the Thriving Adoptees Podcast. Today I'm delighted to be joined by Janelle, Janelle Poskusil. I got it right 2 times in a row, did I?

Yeah, very good.

Yeah, wow, looking forward to our conversation. Uh, listeners, we've been talking for half an hour already before we get around to doing the podcast, right? Um, so, uh, Janelle is an adoptive mum and adoption professional. Um, so what does thriving mean to you, Janelle?

Thriving to me means that your life feels good to you. That you are happy. And I don't love the word happy. Content, proud, fulfilled by, by the life you're, you're living, and that your life is impacting others in a positive way.

So there's quite a lot that ties in with your professional stuff there, isn't there?

Yes, yes. But I think making a living that ties in with the core of who I am and what I believe is important personally. Yeah, yeah.

What, what I call making a living by making a difference.

Yes, yes, absolutely.

And the meaning, the meaning and the fulfillment and the contentment.

Yes. I feel like that's always been important to me. I always wanted to do something as a career that was a career and not just a job, something that I felt like originally that was teaching for me. It wasn't until later in life recently that I've, I've Morphed into the adoption world professionally. That wasn't where I started, and so yeah, I feel like that that that need to know that what I was doing was impactful and meaningful. I think that, and that doesn't just come from your job, right? I think it's lovely when it does come from what you do for a living. But it but you know for years I wasn't I wasn't working. I was a stay-at-home mom for a portion of time. And, and that can be very— that can— you can be thriving in that. You can really feel like this is life-giving and what I'm doing is extremely important and all of those things.

Yeah. What about the per— the, the personal stuff? If we, if we, uh, go, go through the layers, you know, uh, Janelle as a professional adoption professional, Janelle as a teacher, Janelle as a, um, very proud mum of 4, right?

Mm-hmm.

Uh, what if we go like the Janelle Janelle stuff underneath that? What does What does that— what does thriving in that way look like to you?

For me, I think it's, um, it's being at peace. I need to be at peace with who I am as a person and what I'm allowing into my life, what I'm— who I am and who is impacting me. I think having peace at that, in that, is really critical for me. Because I feel like the years where I felt like I was coming undone and I was not thriving, that's what had been robbed from me, was I felt like there was no— I would say that all the time. There's just no peace in this. Like, I just— I feel like I'm constantly fighting a battle. And everything is hard. And I'm not happy with who I am. I'm not happy. I feel trapped in my own life. Yeah. Those were years I did not feel like I was thriving. And we all have seasons of that, I think, to different degrees. But yeah, yeah, for me, it's that. It's having peace and contentment with where I am and who I am as a person. And for me, my faith is really important to me. That is really an important piece of who I am. For me, it's probably the most important because I feel like there's a greater purpose. I know there's a greater purpose in my life. I have a— I believe that my choices and who I am as a person matter, and that this isn't just all haphazard. And so that really has a lot to do with me thriving. It's also a source of strength for me. Um, when things get hard.

Yeah. Are any particular moments stand out for you in terms of when you, uh, when you saw the constant battle? Um, or, or, or the other way around, right? Where, where the, where the moments of peace became clear to you, where the, where the, where the peace became clear, the, the peace became palpable, right? Like, like you could, you could feel it. Uh, and I'm, I'm just getting— I'm, I'm using that stuff because I'm guessing that you're quite a feeling type person.

Yes, very much so. But it also I'm a pretty logical person too. So I'm very cognizant of trying that we can't make decisions just based on our feelings, right? That gets dangerous, that we can get in a lot of trouble if we're constantly trying to just meet an emotional need all the time. But you're asking if there was a time where—

I can give you an example if, if that—

Yes, that would be really helpful.

So, uh, it was— this was 25 years ago. Um, I'd been working pretty hard. Uh, we got to— we were going on holiday And I always used to be crazy for getting stuff sorted before I went on holiday. So there's this big rush up to go away for 2 weeks, and it was like a midday flight to somewhere in Greece. And so we basically got to the flat and just dumped, pretty much just dumped the bags and went off to have some dinner. And I— we sat down at this little taverna, this table in this taverna, and I, I literally, I, I felt the weight lift off my shoulders. I, I, I felt, I felt the battle end and then, and, and the peace. Yeah, I was relieved of, of the of, of the emotion, of, of the hectic, of the, of the noise, of the busyness. And, and it— I, I literally just, I felt it. I felt the peace, which I would now say is the, the truth of who we are.

Right.

You know, when you talked about the faith, your faith, I thought of— I was thinking, when I was thinking about faith and peace, You, you went down a meaning route and a greater purpose. I, I, I was actually thinking about the peace that seems to happen when you go into a, into a church.

Yes, yes.

There's a, there's a peace. It's a, it's a—

That's right.

Unless it's one of those loud churches that we sort of— that we see, we see on television. Um, you know, the, the sort of places that you, you'll see on a film about Whitney Houston where it, it's, it's Baptist or it's loud, I don't know, whatever, but it's a loud church. I'm, I'm talking about a, a quiet church, a place of reflection.

Reverent.

Yes. Yeah. So I was just, I was asking you about your moments when you became aware of the battle or you became aware of the piece, the significant kind of moments in—

Yes.

Where stuff changed for you?

What first comes to mind for me is when my children years ago, when they were school-aged, things were— we were really struggling on a lot of fronts. I was feeling super overwhelmed and, and getting to the place of hopeless, which is really shocking for me as a person because I've always been much more of an optimist. And I very— the cup was very empty. I was very empty. And I was invited by another adoptive mom to go to a breakfast that was for other adopted moms. And it was faith-based, she told me. I was like, okay, I'll go. And so I went. And I mean, again, I was not in a good place, just barely keeping it together. And I walk into this room and there's probably a dozen other women in there, all adoptive moms, most of whom were a little bit older than me, a little bit ahead of the game. Their kids were a little bit older than mine. And I walk into this space and they, they're sharing their lives and what's going on with their children. And I— it was, it was just a game changer for me. It was that piece that you were talking about where their situations were no better than mine. Some were even worse. But what I found was that what was killing me was the isolation and feeling like I was the only one who was suffering this way. My friends and my family weren't. Their families didn't look like mine. And I just felt like I was alone. And to walk into a space and recognize, Oh my gosh! Well, you look kind of normal. You don't look crazy. You don't sound like a horrible mother. I mean, really, I was mind blown. Like this hasn't killed you? Like I mean, really, because I thought there were days where I thought this is going to kill me, and recognizing there were other people living a similar experience, and they were hanging in. And some of them were thriving, and it blew me away. And they didn't fix any of my problems, but I walked out of that— I'll never forget it. Thank God my friend drove. And on the drive, I could not stop crying. I cried and cried. It was the most healing thing for me. And, and it was like an hour drive for me, and I continued to go for years. Ended up getting my children involved in that agency's Therapeutic program, it they it was a game changer because what I started realizing was I could not only could I survive this, but that some good might come from it, and that that was absolutely game changing for me. And then I began to learn some tools through that that agency's um. support programming for parents that, that made me look at parenting a different way, that taught me how to parent my children differently and not in a lot of traditional ways. And again, it was a game changer. It gave me hope. It brought peace into our home. It didn't mean that everything was perfect or got better quickly, but I wasn't hopeless anymore.

Yeah. Were you, were you quite, uh, were you crying with relief?

Yes, yes, absolutely, absolutely. Yeah, it was just sheer— it was that feeling of like I was hanging on by a thread and all of a sudden I just felt like I felt seen. And I think— and I see this all the time with the parents I work with— I felt validated that I wasn't crazy, that I wasn't a horrible mother, and that I could still love my kids well. And those things infused so much healing in me. Like I just, I was yes, I was crying out of relief, hope. Yeah, I just felt so seen, and I hadn't in a very long time. And I see that with a lot of our adoptive parents. They're very isolated. Oftentimes, if they're dealing with a lot of tough things with their children. They, they, there's a lot of shame. They don't know how to help their children, so they feel hopeless. All of those things.

I'm going to a bit, we're talking about blokes, men going to rationale, you know, as a big the rational side, as a big massive gender stereotype. I'm going there now, right? Um, so what was there also a, a realization that you— that, that the voice in your head that was telling you that you were a, um, SH1T mother was a liar? Was there, was there anything around that? Was there anything?

Absolutely.

Imposter syndrome? Do people call it imposter syndrome? That sort of stuff? Yes.

Yes, absolutely. I was killing myself trying to keep up the facade that everything was okay. I think that is one of the most unhealthy, mentally, emotionally damaging things we can do is not be honest about the reality of where we are, our situation, how we're feeling. And I I so didn't want to fail at this that I was just putting all my energy in the wrong places. I cared way too much what other people thought. Um, yeah, all of those things. Yeah.

And you, you know that adoptees have exactly the same kind of reaction at this normalization thing. You've seen that?

Absolutely. Oh, absolutely, absolutely.

Uh, so the line that's often used is, uh, all right, yeah, I, I was having— I've been having, uh, and I've had a normal response to, uh, an abnormal event, I think. Is that one of the— that's one of the lines that, uh, and I, I, and the, the, the relief that we're not going crazy.

Yes.

Absolutely.

That will, and it all stems, I believe, from this— well, maybe not all. So much of this stems from the messaging around adoption that we sell people and the way we romanticize adoption. And it's so— anytime we do that with anything, It's, it's so damaging to the real people who are, are there, who are that. And so it's, it's so damaging to anyone— adoptee, adoptive parent, birth parent— that romanticizing around adoption is just the pressure that puts on all of us to, to— we buy it. I, I totally bought into the all we need is love. Oh yeah, absolutely. I'm gonna love these babies and give them everything they need, and they're gonna be great. I'm enough. I'm enough, me and my love, you know? I mean, it's just garbage. I mean, we do need love. It's critical. Absolutely. Is it all we need? No, right? So—

I have a favorite line around this. Okay, so I'm sorry, listeners, if you've heard me say this recently, but I don't think I have. So Hopefully. But, you know, like, it's a really good place to start. It's the foundation for everything, right? I love that. You know, you can't just like— it's the foundation. It's the foundation. Without that, you're snookered. I was going to use a rude word there, but you were snookered, right? When you said enough, I was actually thinking about Janelle, and I was imagining that you have been told that sometimes you're too much. You'd be told that.

Yes, yes, I have a big personality.

Yes, you have a big personality. Um, I, I, I, I've spent a lot of time over the last 18 years in lots of different spaces with lots of different people. I've only spent time with a lot of people in the adoption space only in the last 4 years, and what I've realized is that every single person on the planet has got a voice in their head that's saying that they're not good enough, right?

Oh, absolutely.

Insecurity comes in a million flavors like ice cream.

That's right.

You know, and it just like adoption clearly is not a regular thing. So it's more like it's not vanilla. It's not the vanilla of insecurity because it's just a minority. So maybe it's, I don't know, what's your favorite ice cream? Like slightly off-the-wall ice cream flavor.

I don't know. My favorite?

Yeah.

A nice toffee chip. We have a place here called Graeter's.

Right. So toffee chip, it's a niche choice, right? So it, it's, it's an, it's a niche choice. And, and that, and I think that what that means is that, uh, it's a, it's a minority, uh, it's a choice for the minority, and it's the minority of people who are, you know, adoptive parents or adoptees. So, um, uh, so, you know, you can look at insecurities, uh, like a gender insecurity thing. would be more like, you know, men would be about their, you know, career, career, or their, their ability at sports, or their car.

Yes.

Right. And, um, whereas women's vanilla insecurity would be other things that I'm not going to talk about because I'm not a woman. But do you know what I mean? Like, it's— but we've all got this voice.

Those are good boundaries.

Sorry, they're great boundaries. I sometimes— we were talking about honesty earlier on, I think. And yeah, sometimes I get into trouble for being too honest. So there, yes. So there was something that, uh, kept me back then from doing some gender stereotyping. So, um, yeah, this, this voice in our head. And that, that's the one, that voice It sounds like us, but it ain't us. We're the one. We're what? We're the ones that are hearing it, aren't we? And and that isn't isn't that the one that's well, I'm talking for myself here, right? Um, that's the thing between me and my peace. Uh, so, yes, yes, the, the, the moments, uh, why haven't I had more podcast downloads, right? Why doesn't everybody that I asked to come on the podcast say yes to come on the podcast? You know, those sorts of overthinking.

Doubting. Yeah, doubting. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it'll eat away at us. It's brave to push through those things and to move forward in spite of our doubts, right? I think it shifts the narrative of I I thought a good mother looked like this. I thought if I raised my child well, they would look like this. And, and recognizing we need to throw that all out the window because that's just a load of goods that society has sold us.

Yeah.

And recognizing we have the power and authority to define that for ourselves. We don't need to allow someone else to define that.

Yeah.

And that what I look at now and am incredibly proud of for my children and for myself is very different than what I would've defined success as. 25 years ago. And I'm, I'm thankful for that. I'm glad that that has happened because it's allowed me to support, love, serve other people better because I no longer think quite so highly of myself. I'm not quite as proud as I used to be and recognizing how nuanced all this is.

And so you've got good at, you've got good at modesty.

I don't know that I've ever, I don't know that we ever arrive, but I'll tell you.

I came up with that. I came up with, um, this idea of being good at modesty a couple of weeks ago. I tried it out.

And how's it going?

It is not going well. It's not going well. People look at me like I'm nuts.

Yeah.

People look at me like I'm nuts.

You know that, but that to be truly modest, to be truly humbled, you have to have been knocked off your block a few times, right? Like you have to have been knocked down a few notches. Um, otherwise, you know, when you're young, you're so proud and sure of yourself and you have all the answers and, and I, you know, Parenting did that for me.

Yeah.

And and I'm thankful for that. I it's it's good.

So the other thing that you got well no first first one a question that came into my head a couple of weeks ago, which kind of fits with the the the tears of relief, right? Talked about autism. Well, I. I asked it and you agreed, so I don't know whether that means you said it or not, but—

Yeah, I do, I do.

What, what is it about tears that you can— that we can have good tears and bad tears? That's not what most people— there's a contradiction there somehow that I've never really explored, and, and you've kind of given me an entrée into it, so I've You know, what's that about?

Don't you think it's just an over— it's an overwhelming emotional response? Like, I feel it good and bad. Like, I'm overwhelmed emotionally in the moment. That's where the tears come from. And sometimes that's out of deep sorrow, and sometimes it's out of deep joy, and sometimes it's out of overwhelming pride. Like, I think we cry Positively and negatively. I don't even know if I like the way that sounds, but like, we're just overwhelmed emotionally. And I think, I think that's good. I think what's not good is the imbalance of it. Those who never cry, or, you know, it's— or those who are— or if you're constantly crying. I had a period in my life, I swear, I'd walk through the whole day and I would just cry. On and off all day long. I just doing the dishes, weeping.

Yeah.

Taking the dog for a walk, weeping. I mean, it was just, it was constant. And that, that's not healthy, right? And neither is the suppression of all that, right? It's, it's the, it's like everything else. It's gotta have some balance. But yeah, I think it's good.

It's good. So go, I'm going back to this, this breakfast with the fellow parents, you know, that you'd driven to that was so impactful for you and you kept going. You got some hope there that there were people that were— I think what you said was there were people that were having a tough time like I was having, and there were some other mums that were a little bit further on the journey. I think that's kind of what you said. Is that about right? That right?

Yes. And even those— some of those who were further along in the journey, they were still going through tough things. The difference was I saw that it— they weren't in a place that I was in that was all-consuming and hopeless. Like, I could see that they still had hope, or they, they were just in an overall healthier place. Not everyone, But most of them, you could tell what they were doing collectively was helping them live life. And that's where I found in my own professional work, that's why peer support can be so impactful and so beneficial because there is nothing— I feel like it is one of the most Beautiful things to sit in a space with other people, in a vulnerable space where you are sharing sensitive, hard things, and other people in the room have the head nod. They see you, they get it, they're nodding their heads because, yes, I know that, or yes, I've lived that, or yes, I feel that way too. That is— and it doesn't— it's amazing because it doesn't fix anything. It doesn't fix whatever is broken, but maybe it does in an emotional way because it just— that peer support of, I'm in a space with people who understand, man, it will keep you going the next mile. It just will. I see it all the time. And that's what that did for me.

So as you were sharing that, I, I, something popped into my head about kind of like a, a 2 tracks, 2 tracks to life, right? Um, so, so one, one of the tracks is, is the external stuff, what we're going through. And then you've got another track which is the internal stuff.

Yes, yes.

So what I kind of— what I heard, or what I jaloosed— I don't use that word very often, jaloosed. Anyway, what I get—

I've never even heard that word.

Yeah, um, how can I explain it? What, what I surmised— yeah, that's a bit of a formal word as well, a bit Maybe a little bit.

It's all right. I don't like it.

Right.

Okay.

I don't normally speak like that. So what I guessed at, what, what I guessed from you were talking about was the fact that they were more resilient in themselves about the SH1T that they were going through.

Maybe not in themselves, in community. It enabled them to personally, in themselves, be more resilient. But that it's that idea of we're linking arms, that I'm not doing this life alone. Like I, in all the support. I facilitate support groups. I do mentoring, lots of things like that. And that is the common healing thread I see over and over and over. Yes, I can give you advice. Yes, I can give you resources. I can give you knowledge. And that's all valuable. But what I really see sustain people is that I'm linking arms with other people And, and I'm not doing this alone, that I'm in community with people who understand me and, and don't want to— because we talked earlier before we started the podcast about how sometimes you can be in spaces where it keeps people stuck, because if everybody's negative, if everybody's hopeless, that's not helpful. And I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about Spaces where I affirm what's happening for you, and yet I want to help carry you, lift you up, encourage you. I'm not, I'm not validating it and saying, yeah, let's just roll around in the mud together forever, right? Like that's not helpful. But I just have found that that is the thing that. that just carries people through the hard things. It's just so, so valuable, so deep.

Did they— I've got this, I've got this big belief that, that resilience is seen recognized, uncovered, discovered, realized, all those things, right? It's not— it's not strengthened. It, it, it's strengthened by seeing it.

Okay.

Yeah, you see what I mean? It, it's, it, it's, it's strengthened by seeing it.

It's not We're more resilient than we believe we are. Is that what you're saying?

Correct. Exactly.

Yeah. Yes.

That's what I mean.

Yeah. So I agree.

And, and so we don't see our resilience until we see it. And, and I—

yeah, I agree.

What, what I'm— what I'm— the theory that I'm putting out there is, is that, uh, that the community is one of the— the community Is one of the things that helps us see our resilience.

Absolutely. Yes, I would agree with that 100%.

So we're, we're drawing, we're drawing on, on the group for the support. I, I, and I'm with you all the way on, on this as the, the support mechanism to, to, to, to carry it through. to carry us, to carry us forward. And I think it's also something to do with insight.

So— Sure, sure.

I, I don't think—

because if it doesn't, we become— then we can become codependent on people, and we have an unhealthy dependence on others to carry us through. I think what you're saying, there's a lot of validity in that. Like, I want somebody to help encourage and lift me up so I can stand on my own two feet. I don't want you to continue to carry me forever, right? Like we're we're we're building each other up and encouraging and supporting and equipping each other to the point where I can stand on my own. I mean, it's very much like raising children, right? The goal of one of the greatest goals of raising children is that they be. independent, healthy adults. And so all the things we're doing, we don't want to continue to have to feed a child a bottle at 10 years old, right? Or, or hold their hand when they cross the street at 20 years old, right? Like, that's not appropriate. So yeah, we are building up what's already in ourselves.

Yeah. And generally we're modeling it as well.

Yes, yes, that's a lot of what I see. I— yeah, I love that modeling. I feel like that is a huge part of my job. I feel like it's what honestly makes me good at my job, is because you can't model something you haven't lived and experienced and are— you can't model those things. And so That's what allows me to work with families as I do, is because I am one. I am a parent. I am an adoptive parent. I, I do— I have lived these things, and so I can model the things that I've learned for those who are behind me in this journey. Yeah, yeah, it's great.

So you talked about, uh, your kids' relationships with trauma before we hit those themes. And I'm, I'm not going to ask you about that because I don't think it's— it, it— I don't think it— it doesn't feel right to me.

That's okay.

There, there is, there is something there that, um, that, that, that, that I can make about, uh, about me in a bigger picture rather than your kids.

Sure.

it's for them to say their stuff. Um, when, when I was thinking about relationships with— relationship with trauma, um, I was doing a, a, a training last week and I, I, I floated an idea of our own trauma. This was a, this was a training for adoption professionals, social work. Uh, I, I, I floated the idea at this Towards the start of the session of trauma being a gift, our own trauma being a gift, right? And then I left it at that for some reason. That that's what my gut told me to do in the in the moment. But then I came back to it at the end, and there's somewhere somewhere along the way this idea popped into my head that you know. our own trauma is the secret source, the special gift that allows us to empathize with others. And that seemed to be similar to the sorts of things that you were just saying just then. So it's—

Yeah, I think it's hard to hear and hard to say trauma is a gift because we all know trauma is hard and it's awful. And no one, like I said earlier, no one No one would choose that, right? Like, oh, I'm gonna pick the box with the trauma. Yeah, give me some of that, right? Like, nobody's voluntarily picking that. But do I think that it can be useful and helpful and, and good can come of it? Yeah, I do. I, I've, I've lived it. I've seen that happen. Yeah, yeah. Because you, you, you don't want to hear from anyone who hasn't walked in your shoes when you're going through something hard. I can't talk to the breast cancer survivor About that, that trauma. I, I haven't been there. What would I? What would I can empathize? I can, or I should say sympathize. I can, I can be kind. It can be supportive, but I, I can't speak to that trauma because I haven't lived that, and they don't want to hear from me. Who wants? Who would they want to hear from me? Right? But I can tell an adoptive parent in the middle of their really, really hard. I can say things that are hard for them to hear, and they'll listen to me simply because they know I get it. Like, I— it opens a door and gives me the the opportunity to speak into situations that other people couldn't, and to listen and really again validate that because I've lived it and done it. Um, and that's true of all these things. And so, in that way, trauma can be a gift. It's— it's the— I don't know that the— well, like, I don't know. I don't know. I'm wrestling with this, Simon.

Yeah.

'Cause I don't know that I love thinking that trauma is a gift. I think the— the gifts that come out of the trauma, the— The skills we build, the knowledge we gain, the maturity that all of these things that grow in us from it. I think those are the gifts that we can then give to somebody else. For instance, resiliency. You know, we were talking about like that my resiliency grew out of that. And so that is a gift. Right? The wisdom you gain from those things are just— and like you said, that the realization that we are more resilient than the things that we think will undo us. And when they— we walk through them and they don't, when the fire doesn't consume you, you realize, oh, okay, I can do hard things. And it not kill me. I'm stronger than I think.

There's a Winnie the Pooh thing around that.

Is it? I love Winnie the Pooh, so maybe that's—

stole that from Tigger. You know, you're, you're braver than— you're braver than you think, you're stronger than you think, or something like that. It's Winnie. It's great. Um, what, what I was thinking about, as you said, talking about being, you know, overweight, Did you use the word overwhelmed, overcome, something like that?

Yeah, overwhelmed.

Yeah, overwhelmed. I was thinking about— over the last year or so, I've written a couple of poems and I've done some of them freehand, you know, just me. And then I've had— I've used ChatGPT to help me with stuff. And I came up with this idea of drowning in our tears.

Mhm.

For the line of the, the poem. And isn't that our— is, is that, is that why I— you know, you talked about tears being— we, we talk about happy tears, tears of, tears of relief, uh, tears of sorrow, tears of grief, um, happy tears. You talked about tears of— you had another cause of tears. But, you know, I'm, I'm back to that kind of like, we, we push— we— the trauma is the gift. If, if trauma is a gift, right? And it, it is a very counter— it's a very countercultural kind of idea, right?

Mm-hmm.

And that's, that's why I'm bringing it up, right? Because If we don't accept the gift, right, we're trying to suppress it. So why do we suppress it? Don't we— we suppress it. Why, why have I suppressed it? Who's the I, right? Who's the separate self? I is not— because I'm feeling I'm gonna— I felt like I'm gonna drown in my tears.

Yes, yes.

And I'm gonna die. And like, that's what drowning in the tears is Is about them. That's why I have repressed it at some point. You know, I was thinking about a therapist I saw about ten years, ten years ago. Sorry for. I know. Excuse me. Sort of every week or so for like six, eight weeks, something maybe every couple of weeks. I don't know. Anyway, she. I, I had this massive meltdown, a real breakdown to breakthrough moment with her, uh, which put, put me back on the, uh, the, the search and reunion path, right? I, I paused my search and reunion. Uh, I, I put— I'm sorry, I paused my search.

Yeah.

To be— I paused my search. I had this massive breakdown moment, uh, with her in the, in the room. I restarted my search, and that laid me, you know, led me to this, a, a, a finding that my birth mother had died. But yeah, finding out, getting the letter from her, finding the letter in my file where I realized that the teddy bear was from her was not a consolation prize, as I'd thought for a couple of seconds, right? It was a symbol of her love. And huge healing. off the back of this.

Yes.

And then another massive moment, another breakdown to break— breakdown to breakthrough moment, reading the letter. Um, and, you know, the, the breakdown in the, uh, the breakdown in the therapist's office had been about hot and cold and freezing in terror and then red-hot in rage. No tears. But, but 6 months later, a year later, whatever, when I got the, the file, then the tears really, really came. And I, I felt her pain. I, I was at—

Yes.

I felt her pain. I felt her powerlessness. I felt her hopelessness. I felt her agony. And I felt her love for me, and I actually felt that I and her— me and her were one, right? So it was a merging of, of two people.

That's so lovely. Yeah, what a gift.

Exactly. So maybe that's why I came up with the idea of trauma being a gift. But, you know, like, if You think of a gift, you know, when I did this on this slide deck, it— I got an image of a gift with a bow on it, right? Trauma, trauma is a gift. Like, we kind of like, we accept the gift. We've only got—

What?

We get a gift from somebody, we've got, um, 2 options. We can accept it.

Yeah.

Or we can say no thank you, right?

Yeah, yeah, that's right.

You're, you're wearing a, a striped shirt today. And how many years ago? 40 years ago, my dad was 40. Yeah, around that time, right? I bought him a stripy shirt. and a pair of stripy boxer shorts, right? He took the short, he said, boxer shorts, not for me, Simon. You know, you'll wear them, I won't, right? So we've got 2 options when somebody tries to give us a gift, right? We can accept it or we can not accept it, right?

Right.

And then we've got another choice if we accept it, we can then regift it, can't we, if we're going to be nice to somebody. Right. We don't want, we don't want them to be upset that we haven't accepted, you know, we, we don't want them to find out that they've— we didn't want them.

We didn't really want it. Yes.

We can regift it. But if we've only got those 2 choices, right, with a gift, literally, is that what we have with, with, with, with trauma? Does the metaphor, does the metaphor carry? We either reject it. Or we accept it. That's it. Is there another option? Suppress it? Well, that's rejecting it.

Right, right. Well, and we have to remember that trauma is our emotional response to an event. It's not actually the event. That's why two people can experience the same thing, and one person can be deeply traumatized by it, and another person is not. The same event happened, right? But not they did not one they didn't both experience trauma, and so I don't know how that. Plays into all that.

Um, there's a meaning. There's a meaning. Yeah. So I'll, I'll, I'll go with something. I'll go with something on the gift, uh, gift, gift idea thing, because we're— it's a, it's a rich vein here, it seems to me anyway. Um, my, my wife's— yeah. My father-in-law's second wife, my father-in-law's second wife was had been through a lot. Let's just put it that way. And my and my wife had known her. My wife had known her for a long time.

Oh, okay.

My wife knew her for a long time, and my wife gave her a. Some, some jewelry. And nothing was, nothing was said. But about 6 months later, we happened to be round at their house for, for Sunday lunch. And on the way out, my, um, this, this lady, my, my— I mean, she wasn't a stepmother, right? Because it was beyond that. But my, my My father-in-law's second wife gave a letter to my wife saying, returning the jewelry and saying, this, you obviously don't know me. You don't know me. You don't like me. Otherwise, why would you have given me this jewelry? Yeah, your head's going, right? Yeah. So it, it's the meaning. Now, there was— it was like, it, it was like my, my wife had given her a piece of poo in a box, right?

She was offended. Not only did she not like it or want it, she was like offended by it.

She was offended, but it wasn't a piece of poo. it was, uh, perfectly acceptable from a man's point of view, and obviously my wife's point of view because she bought the gift. She didn't, she didn't buy, she didn't buy the woman, uh, a piece of poo and, and, and give it to her. She didn't buy her like, um, a size 10 dress knowing that she was size 20. You know, there was—

Right.

But, but this, but this woman, somehow, because of the, because of her trauma, to some extent, she got this. She, um, she associated a meaning that was totally off the scale with this.

So interesting.

So it's the meaning. It's sad, yeah. But the central—

She wasn't able to receive not just the gift, but the heart behind the gift, right? The intent behind the gift.

Indeed.

It was completely lost by her.

Yeah.

But, but that, that is what— I think that's interesting. It is what trauma does to us. It can, it can skew our perceptions of things.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So at 40, having gone through 40 years of my life never thinking about my birth mum, something happened— the teddy bear thing, found out about the teddy bear— and the, the, the meaning I associated with it in that moment was he didn't love me enough to keep me.

Yeah.

Right? And the lady that I was— the, like, counselor lady, coach lady that I was talking to at the time said, um, I don't think you're quite right there, Simon. And so she invalidated me, and she was right to do so. Right? And, and I saw, I saw the truth in her words.

Yeah.

At one level. And then another 10 years later, I saw the same truth at a far more profound level. So it's the same kind of learnings. So it's about the meanings and what What you know, it's it's about the meanings and it's about the beliefs and it's about yeah, it's about feelings that come beliefs become beliefs.

Yeah, absolutely.

I was ranting a little bit for there.

No, it's good. It's thoughtful. There's it's. I always say, we know trauma is complex. Adoption is complex. It's just all— life is complex, right? I mean, it just is. It just is. There's always so many layers to unpack. We never get to the end of it, right? You know, using your gift analogy, we don't— it doesn't— it's not something we finish unwrapping. It just keeps— we keep getting closer to the core, but, you know, it's— we're never really there.

Um, it's the gift that keeps giving.

There you go. There you go. Yeah, yeah, it is. It is. And I do— although I am cringing when people say, oh, adoption is such a gift. They love to say that along with all you need is love. It's such a gift.

Um, have you seen those, um, seen those books on Amazon? Adoptee, like, it's like a, uh, a coloring book, like, you know, like there's a thing, isn't it?

Yes.

Coloring books for adults has become a mindful activity, right? Um, yeah, so there's all these books, um, all these kind of things. That, uh, and, and they've got these fantastic— it's all black and white design, right? Because it's for coloring in. But, you know, it's got other things that— and it says, thank— thanks for the trauma.

Right? Oh my gosh. Oh yeah.

I don't think they're coming at it quite the same way.

No, I don't think so either. I think that there's— that's a little, uh, Sarcastic. Yeah.

Yeah.

And it feels that way, I think, for a lot of— for all of us who are touched by adoption. It feels like— I think when you were talking about getting to that place of peace and/or thriving, I think when we can come full circle with it and accept it fully for the mess that it is, the messiness that it is, and the complexity that it is, and yet realize it is part of who we are, right? It's a huge part of who we are, and, and it's a huge— it shaped us all in its own way, and yet you're thankful Getting to a place that I wouldn't, I wouldn't do it differently, right? I don't. I'm at peace with the journey that I've been on, and and I'm thankful for it. And I'm yeah, that's a lovely place to come to, right? And it's not all settled. I say that when there are still lots of hard things going. Going on, but I'm in a place where I can better, better respond to those hard things. Right? The scales aren't tipped so much anymore to feel like the hard is always overwhelming what's good and what what feels like love. You know. So I'm thankful for that, you know.

Yeah, cool. Thanks, Janelle.

Thank you. Thanks for having me.

Thanks, listeners. We'll speak to you again very soon.

Take care.

Bye-bye.