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[INTRO] Can you heal from abuse? What do I do after leaving my narcissist? What does a healthy relationship look like? These concerns cross the minds of over 20 people every minute, over 28,800 people every day. And the sad fact is, we still don't talk about it enough. Healing from emotional abuse isn't a band-aid situation, but it doesn't have to take years either. The lives of millions of other survivors around the world have been impacted by their narcissist, yours doesn't have to. To show you how to live a free, confident and peaceful life, your host and founder of the Healing from Emotional Abuse Philosophy, Marissa F Cohen.   MARISSA: Overcoming narcissism and healing from emotional abuse are so important to your mental health and to living a life filled with freedom, confidence and peace. Today, we're going to be talking to Patrick Monet, who is a Trauma Informed Therapist, EMDR Therapist, and he's just hilarious. But before we start, I want to brainstorm ways that I can help ease your healing journey. Imagine you're standing on a cliff and on the other side of a deep, deep canyon is a life that you dream of. A partner who connects with you, supports you and empowers you, someone who makes you smile and laugh a life filled with freedom, confidence and peace. I have been where you are now, standing on the edge, dreaming of that life. And I've built the bridge between where you are now and that dream that seems so far away. Let me walk you across the bridge and literally hand you the life of your dreams. It's possible! I've walked this path with 1000s of survivors before who were in your place who now live a free, confident and peaceful life. Let's walk this path together. Don't waste any more time feeling lonely, worthless or exhausted. It's not worth it and you deserve to live a happy life. Schedule a call with me today at scheduleacallwithmarissa.com.   Welcome back to healing from emotional abuse. Today we have an awesome guest and we've been vibing for the past 10 minutes just chatting about Jewish guilt and Catholic guilt and being silly. So today we have Patrick Monette. He's a licensed mental health, addiction and certified trauma counselor, located in northern New York. He's also a certified EMDR Therapist and EMDRIA Approved Consultant and trained couples counselor. He's got a great resume. His work focuses on helping people learn healthy coping skills and resourcing as part of their trauma treatment. He has taught at local universities and maintains a private practice focusing on couples work and trauma informed treatment, as well as gender issues, anger management and co-occurring disorders. He's actively engaged in a local community drug court system as a mental health consultant and educator. Patrick is fluent in English and Spanish and offers treatment in both languages. Welcome on Patrick. Jeez your work is great.   PATRICK: Thanks Marissa, I sound so fancy. So it's so nice, thank you. I'm so honored to be on your show and to connect with you. And I can't think of a better way to end a crazy week and then hanging out together. So I'm super excited to be here.   MARISSA: Thank you, I feel the exact same way. So would you mind outside of your intro just like telling us a little bit about yourself, what you do, what you enjoy...   PATRICK: So you know, as I was saying, it's like I'm pretty low key. So I'm in private practice. I'm a mental health counselor. And I love working with a variety of people. In my private practice, especially with COVID my practice is completely online. So I've been able to modify all that where I do individual therapy, group therapy. And I also started offering online couple retreats, which has been really powerful, which I really love. So EMDR is a trauma informed treatment, so I also work with that. I assistant in trainings and I also do a lot of consultation for people who are learning EMDR, which I just love as well. So it's a really nice blend of different professional experiences.   MARISSA: That's awesome. So I have heard so many positive things about EMDR therapy, and how it's helped sexual assault and domestic violence survivors. Would you mind just giving us like the very basic about what EMDR is?   PATRICK: Sure. So EMDR stands for Eye Movement De-sensitization and Reprocessing Therapy, which is a mouthful. It was created in the 80s by Dr. Francine Shapiro. And the basic version that I can say is that it helps to identify targets or issues that you've been struggling with whether it's specific trauma or disturbing events or upsetting events, that gets stuck in certain parts of your brain. And with EMDR interventions, we're able to help the brain communicate more efficiently to be able to take those disturbing events and make them more adaptive, so they're not causing you so much pain and harm. So you can be, I don't want to say move on, but so they're not harming you and as painful as they once were.   MARISSA: Wow, that's really awesome. I'm still not entirely understanding of like the intricacies of that.   PATRICK: So basically what happens is, for example, when you go about your regular day, and then you go home, and you rest, and you go into your REM sleep, your deep sleep, your brain is able to process everything that's happened during that day. So when you get up in the next day, you're like, okay, I had breakfast, we did this, we chatted, and then there isn't any distress really. When something traumatic happens, the brain cannot process it, it's almost like too big. If you think of it like a conveyor belt, that memory, that event is too big to go down into the other parts. So it gets lodged. And then it gets stuck on that part of the brain, which then leads into a whole bunch of other issues of, you know, when we're talking about PTSD, flashbacks, nightmares, other anxiety, depression. That's why a lot of people when they can't, quote-unquote, move past a trauma, they either develop anxiety, depression, I see a lot of people who develop addiction related issues, because they're trying to eradicate the pain.   MARISSA: That makes a lot more sense. Honestly, thinking about it as like a survivor, I feel like the most common immediate response is if I just stopped thinking about it, it'll go away. I want this to go away...   PATRICK: If I wash it away.    MARISSA: Time will make it go away, because that's not true. And so EMDR therapy breaks that down, and like allows your brain to process it. That is super cool.   PATRICK: So if you think of it, the trauma is like a giant iceberg in your brain, and then by doing what we call bilateral stimulation, which is a really natural intervention, it melts down that iceberg, and then it can go into the channel into your brain, where it doesn't make the event get erased, but you can move on with your life without being harpooned back to that pain anytime you might be potentially triggered or reminded of that event.   MARISSA: How long does it take generally, for somebody who has experienced severe domestic violence or sexual assault, to really be able to move forward using EMDR?   PATRICK: That's a great question. And it's really case by case because it depends on the severity of the attack, of the abuse, of the violence. Every person that I work with, when we say we're trauma informed care, that is, for me, it means we're taking this slow. Not because I want you to be in pain longer, but because safety has been bastardized in your life. We want to look at security, we want to do the safe and sound in the way of let's figure out what you are able to address, and what you actually need to work on. Because everyone needs different things. Sometimes it's guilt, anger, shame, it might be different aspects of their lives that are affected by the trauma. I just take my time to really see, build that strong therapeutic relationship with clients to see what is it that you actually want to work on? And let me see what I can do to support you on that. Now, when you get into the EMDR therapy itself, it's really a case by case scenario of everyone's individual brain processing. Of how how much EMDR they might need, how much time they need to process it. In addition to what I see is, are they still in the relationship? Are they still in a situation? Which is very different compared to if they're out, that freedom, it's all of those, if their basic needs are being met. So I kind of look at all these different components when I'm meeting with someone.   MARISSA: That makes a lot of sense. So in my mind, I saw it as a resource for after people leave, but people who are still in abusive relationships, they come and work with you too?    PATRICK: Yes, yes.    MARISSA: Do you know like, how it affects them? Or if doing EMDR has encouraged people to leave faster? Have you gotten that kind of response?    PATRICK: See, I think a lot of times, and I'm sure you've seen this with your own experiences and other people is there's that expectation sometimes that people when they're in those situations of just leave, turn it off. If it was that easy, it would be. But there's that deep emotional and psychological component going on when you're in those abusive and destructive situations. A lot of times what I've noticed with my people is when we're doing EMDR it's kind of like they're going through a snowstorm and we're giving them some additional support to get clarity. So when you're doing some other trauma informed care treatments, you have to talk about the trauma and you desensitize, you decrease the trauma. But with EMDR, you don't actually have to talk about it as much. You identify what the target is, what the problem is, and it's more about this beautiful journey of what do you believe about yourself? So, for example, when someone stays in that relationship, I'd say, so when you think of this abusive relationship, what is the negative belief that you're telling yourself? And being able to look at the negative beliefs, and help the clients just sort of build a little bit more resilience and clarity into what's going on. Because when you're in those situations, there's usually such a high level of psychological damage going on, that you don't even know who you are sometimes.   MARISSA: That is so true. And that's something that I also identify in my coaching is that you lose yourself in abuse, because they program you to feel differently than you might actually feel and take away the aspects of your life and of your identity, that might be very personal to you. Wow, that's really, really cool. I'm so happy that that exists, and that that's getting more clout, and more attention now.    So let's get off the EMDR topic, although I could talk about this with you all day, because I think it's awesome. We were having a separate conversation before we started about guilt, and how guilt in different religions plays a role in just how people interact. But specifically what I want to talk about, because you come from a Catholic upbringing, is how Christianity and how Catholicism view abuse, and the guilt of staying in an abusive situation.   PATRICK: It's so hard because most of us grew up to believe, you know, if we grew up in a belief system, that that's supposed to be our protection. That that's where we're supposed to be safe. But the more [audio break 12:02] there is, and a lot of these situations, and how that division of power is used. We're in a religious system.   MARISSA: That makes sense. And I can speak from Judaism. I'm not Hasidic or religious really, but in very Hasidic communities, which Catholicism in my opinion is like a more religious aspect of Christianity, and I could be very incorrect, so please correct me if I'm wrong. But in Hasidic communities, they don't go outside of their community at all. Everybody takes their questions and their problems to the Rabbi, to the head Rabbi, he's the person in charge. So in domestic violence in Hasidic communities, the Rabbi is the one who gets to say, well, what are you doing to anger your husband? Or what are you doing wrong? You, the wife, generally, are the peacemaker in the household and so you need to be the one fixing the problem.   PATRICK: I don't want to generalize, I can only speak to my experience in certain things. I grew up where about sinning and when you make that vow in the Catholic Church, it's forever and all these different things. But I've also seen where there's that abusive thing of, you're going to disappoint God by ending this marriage or by leaving it, or look at the damage, it's a lot of victim blaming.    MARISSA: That's a good way to put it.    PATRICK: And that shame, I mean, not even talking about guilt, let's latch on to that shame of you're letting God down. You put that on top of someone who's being abused in every aspect of abuse that there is, and it's such a deadly cocktail. I've also seen people, amazing advocates in the Catholic Church. It's hard because during the last few years if we're going to keep it real, the coming to light about all the abuse in the Catholic Church towards children. So it's really like a mushroom of different issues right?   MARISSA: Yeah. I mean, I definitely see your point. I mean, it's a person by person conversation. So there are some rabbis who'd be like, get out. And there are some rabbits would be like, no, you stay, this is your problem. And I'm sure it's the same thing with priests and pastors and everybody, it's a very person by person basis.   PATRICK: What I have seen in some experiences with clients is sometimes they get into those situations where they are blamed. You're not praying hard enough, you're not doing this. And I'm a person of faith, I love God. It's a huge part of my -- I don't identify as Catholic. I'm more spiritual, but there is a place for prayer and there's a place for action and therapy.    MARISSA: Yes.   PATRICK: And I think they can dance really well, too. I mean, in my life they have, but in other people, it's hard because there's such abuse in the spiritual world and or in the religious world. I always go to is like, if this doesn't feel right, it's probably not right for me.   MARISSA: That's a good way to look at it. And I think that a lot of religion is kind of just how you consume it and how you process it. Because there's different sects of every religion that read the same texts, but just observe differently. And so when it comes to trauma, and it comes to domestic violence, because it's a private issue, people don't really know how to handle it. So a lot of people turn to religion. I guess my biggest concern with that is because the text is susceptible to being --  like you can read it and understand it a different way.   PATRICK: The interpretation, and it's usually not in favor of women or anyone that's not  a like white male. In my experiences, I could be wrong of the view, but it's...   MARISSA: I tend to agree with that.   PATRICK: It's like come on, we got to keep it real. Things have to evolve. And one of the things is, whether it's religion or not, is that shame and the secrecy that is so damaging to people who are experiencing violence and abuse.   MARISSA: And then if you if you interpret the text in a way that in order for you to leave, your partner needs to have cheated on you or asked for a divorce. That's so limiting, because in my opinion, and I could be wrong, but I don't think God or Jesus or Allah, like anyone, I don't think that being wants you to be unhappy or in a dangerous position. And so by looking at the text and saying point blank, no, you can't leave until that person asks to leave or until that person leaves, that's so dangerous.   PATRICK: Right. And it also takes away freewill choice, which that's part of the human experience.   MARISSA: Right. But I think that the religion, like when people interpret it that way, it consumes their whole life and they're not able to act on freewill...   PATRICK: Agreed, that they're supposed to sacrifice for the greater good in a way. Even though that version of the greater good may not be accurate or really true or loving.   MARISSA: Right, absolutely. So let's go back to your professional experience, you don't just do EMDR, you also do Addiction Therapy and Trauma Informed Therapies and stuff like that. So how often do you see like an overlap in other areas that probably stemmed from abuse or sexual assault, especially with addiction?   PATRICK: I would say, if I even like made it a little bit broader, if we just put in terms of trauma in general, I would say, probably like 98% of people that come in my door have some aspect of trauma.   MARISSA: Wow!   PATRICK: I think when we classify trauma it used to be 9-11, it used to be Vets. It used to be very specific populations. But the word trauma actually means a wound. So if you changed trauma for wound, how many people do we know that are wounded?    MARISSA: Everybody. Everybody has experiences that shaped them.   PATRICK: From COVID, to sexual assaults, a physical assault, to addiction to a million different things, to losing a job, to losing a child, to losing a relationship. And I think when you're doing trauma informed care, you have that broad view of this person has strength, they have resilience, because they've survived but there's some injuries, there's some wounds there, and maybe I can help them find ways to mend it and to move forward in a healthier way.   MARISSA: If there was one thing like one routine change, or one small activity that people could add to their daily routines that might alleviate some of that, do you have any like recommendations? Or do you have like any ideas of maybe something that you've done with other people?   PATRICK: This is going to sound funny, but I have clients ask them what they're feeling. Because how many of us are disconnected from our emotions? And if I don't have a relationship with my emotions, I'm probably not going to get very far.    MARISSA: That's very fair.    PATRICK: So it's just a check in throughout the day of how am I feeling right now? How am I feeling? And not having to necessarily do anything, but to develop our awareness. Because when we don't deal with our emotions, when we don't have a healthy relationship with them, it's sort of like building a house on top of swamp land, it's probably not going to go very well.   MARISSA: That makes so much sense. Just like becoming more self aware allows us to recognize and work through something that we need to process in that moment.   PATRICK: Right. And it sounds simple, like oh, that's not really profound. But if we put it through the lens of someone who's gone through something traumatic, a lot of times people, all of their energy is to avoid all the emotions. Because it's not safe. It's painful. It's scary. Like you said, you just want to forget it. So you want me to talk about my feelings, that could be opening up a barrel of monkeys, that's really dangerous.   MARISSA: I think that that's something that's a really important thing to do is be able to check in. But what do you recommend starting doing that while in a therapy session, or with somebody who's licensed who might be able to help somebody through it? Because I know that right after my abuse, if I was trying to do a check-in, I probably would have like, launched myself off a bridge and I'm not saying that to be funny. Like I would have tried to attempt suicide.   PATRICK: Definitely! And when I'm working with someone, especially with EMDR there are very specific techniques that I teach clients, almost every client, of how to help improve their emotional regulations that -- going back to the brain function, that helped them sort of develop ways to ride those waves of emotion instead of being drowned by them. So definitely reaching out for help, someone that can be there for you that's objective that can give you specific skills to improve your emotional functioning.   [OUTRO] If you enjoyed this podcast, you have to check out www.marisafayecohen.com/private-coaching. That's www.marissafayecohen.com/private-coaching. Marissa would love to develop a made for you healing plan to heal from emotional abuse. She does all the work and you just show up. Stop feeling stuck, alone and hurt and live a free, confident and peaceful life. Don't forget to subscribe to the Healing from Emotional Abuse Podcast and follow us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/marissafcohen and Instagram at Marissa.Faye.Cohen. We'd love to see you there.

[INTRO] Can you heal from abuse? What do I do after leaving my narcissist? What does a healthy relationship look like? These concerns cross the minds of over 20 people every minute, over 28,800 people every day. And the sad fact is, we still don't talk about it enough. Healing from emotional abuse isn't a band aid situation, but it doesn't have to take years either. The lives of millions of other survivors around the world have been impacted by their narcissist. Yours doesn't have to. To show you how to live a free, confident and peaceful life, your host and founder of the healing from emotional abuse philosophy, Marissa F Cohen.   MARISSA: Overcoming narcissism and healing from emotional abuse are so important to your mental health and to living a life of freedom, confidence and peace. Today, we're talking to our special guest Lorraine Patterson about self love and healing after abuse. But before we start, I want to brainstorm ways that I can help ease your healing. Imagine you're standing on a cliff. And on the other side of a deep, deep canyon is the life that you dream of. A partner who connects with you, supports you and empowers you, a partner that makes you laugh and smile, a life filled with freedom and confidence and peace. I've been where you are now, standing on the edge, dreaming of that life. And I've built the bridge between where you are now and that dream that seems so far away. Let me walk you across that bridge and literally hand you the life of your dreams. It's possible! I've walked this path with thousands of survivors who live a free, confident and peaceful life. Let's walk this path together. Don't waste any more time feeling lonely, worthless or exhausted. Schedule a call with me today at scheduleacallwithmarissa.com.    Okay, welcome back to Healing from Emotional Abuse. My name is Marissa F. Cohen and I am joined today with Lorraine Patterson. Lorraine is an incredible survivor who's here today to share her story with us about surviving, her book - Freeing your Heart for Love, and a little bit of insight about how she healed and overcame her abuse. So Lorraine, welcome! Today I'm so happy to have you here. Thank you.   LORRAINE: Yes, thank you Marissa for having me and allowing me to share my story.   MARISSA: Of course. So introduce yourself, tell us a little bit about yourself.   LORRAINE: Yes, so my name is Lorraine, and I am a mother of four boys. Three bonus children and three grandkids, so I'm a grandma. I have a very blessed life. I am married to the love of my life, but it hasn't always been a blessed life. As Marissa explained in my bio, I was at a really young age, I don't remember a lot because I went through a lot of abuse as a child. And so both my parents were both physically and mentally abusive. And so I grew up in that environment of not learning how to love or not even really knowing what love is. And so at the age of 16, I had my first suicidal thoughts. And I didn't know where all of that was coming from. I just knew that I was really sad and that I didn't want to be alive anymore. So I didn't know what to do with those feelings. But what I ended up doing was running away.    So I ran away with a boyfriend of mine who ended up being my husband, he was my first husband. And I married him at the age of 17. My mom's husband at the time convinced him to marry me when I came back home. And so I ended up marrying him and leaving that chaotic household, thinking that I was going to go into my happily ever after. But what I ended up doing was just going into nine more years of mental and physical abuse. So I married him at the age of 17. I was with him for nine years. And he was, let's say mentally abusive, meaning he would always put me down. We had two beautiful boys. But he was cheating on me all the time. He was an alcoholic. He was arrested for dealing drugs, so he went to prison for three years. So I was left to take care of two small children on my own while running a family business. So that was really hard. I was so young, I was still trying to figure out my life. I was in my 20s, so I was trying to figure out my career. I somehow managed all of that while he was in prison. But it also gave me the strength to finally leave him. So when he went to prison, I felt like I was released from prison because I could never leave him. He had this control over me. And because I married him at such a young age I didn't really have the strength to speak up for anything in that marriage at all.    And so I finally got away, we divorced but then I still was attracting controlling men. Controlling, unavailable men. I was putting myself in situations that were unloving and disrespectful to myself, my body, my soul, because I didn't know what love was. I was seeking for love outside of myself. And so I was most looking for it in men. So my whole story that I write about in my book is just about going through all of these bad relationships because I met and married a second guy, which wasn't a bad guy.    But because I was so broken inside, I didn't realize how to be in that relationship. And he also still had that control over me, because my dad was a controlling man. And I didn't realize that until later on that I was attracting how I felt inside, I was attracting those people in my life. And so I married him for about six years, we had two boys. And so I did have two beautiful boys out of that marriage. But that marriage didn't last. And when I divorced him is when I was in my 30s. And that's when I almost took my life. So that suicidal depression never went away from the age of 16, to my 30s. And so I almost took my life, but then I stopped myself, I heard something that night, and I write about it in my book about the experience, because when you're in that dark place of you don't want to be here anymore you just feel different things, you hear different things. And I heard something that night, and I ended up not taking my life and the next day, I got therapy.   And the therapist told me if you take your life, you will break your children. And I didn't want to repeat that cycle of having broken children because I was a broken child. So I just kind of started working towards removing that feeling of being so depressed that my life wasn't worthy enough. And I discovered spirituality, I started practicing positive affirmations. And I started working on myself, but I still wasn't there with the love part. So it still took me probably another gosh, until I turned 42 is when I really woke up.    And that was in my third marriage, which is what I call my rock bottom relationship. Because that marriage actually broke me, that broke my soul. He had this illicit fantasy where he wanted me to make love in front of him with other men. And I didn't know he had this fantasy until after we married. And so I thought this was going to be a one time thing. But he wanted it all the time, it became this regular thing. And I felt like I needed to stay and do this for him. Because if I didn't do this for him, he would leave me and I would have three failed marriages. So essentially that thought in my head essentially broke me and after six months of being married to him, I couldn't do it anymore. And I woke up one day, well it was the last time we had this encounter. And I just remember looking at myself in the mirror, and it was just a hollow person. I was seeing myself going back to that depressive state that I was in that I said I was never going to go back to. And I started slipping back to that dark place. So finally I just woke up and said, I don't want to do this anymore. I don't want this for my life. I deserve a man who loves and respects me. And I just divorced him and I started working on myself. And it still took me a couple more years to learn that lesson that I needed to learn in life, to love myself and discover self love.    And so that's when I transformed my life, was at the age of 45. And I met my husband who I'm married to now very happily married since 2019. But I couldn't have gotten to where I'm at today if I didn't discover that self love for myself. My heart basically had to break wide open to allow the love that I deserved in. And so I realized that, but it took me 29 years to get to that point in my life.   MARISSA: Thank you for sharing your story. And you brought up so many fascinating points. I just want to talk about all of them. So first and foremost, I don't think people realize, unless you experience it how much your childhood and the relationships that you grow up around, influence and impact the way that you perceive love. So, like you had said, you grew up feeling like emotional and mental abuse were normal. And so that shaped a lot of your relationships. Can you expand on that just a little?   LORRAINE: Yeah. So my parents, I don't remember them hugging me. I don't remember sitting on their lap, when kids are playing I don't remember going to the park. I don't remember a lot of the loving things that my parents used to do with me as a child. And that's all I knew. I thought chaotic life and abuse was normal, because that's what I grew up in. So when I was getting involved with these unavailable men, I kept telling myself, well, this is my life. This is who I am. And that was like my thoughts all the time. So each and every time I would meet somebody it would basically just be for sex. I ended up being just somebody that was like a sexual object. And until I realized my self worth and my value, I didn't get out of that cycle. It was one after the other, after the other, after the other. And every guy, I would just cry because I'm like, why is this happening to me, but it was what I was attracting because of how I felt about myself. I hated myself, I hated my body. I said negative things to myself all the time; that I was a horrible mother, I'm a loser, I'm an idiot. All of those thoughts were in my head. Now I don't say those at all. It's always I am loved, I am enough, I am worthy. And it's all these I can do it. It's more positive statements, instead of those negative statements that we tend to put in our head that really, really messes you up. I mean, it doesn't do you any good for your life at all?   MARISSA: Absolutely, I find that we tend to, just as survivors, we tend to mirror and repeat the negative things that people say to us. And then we do the most damage. Other people can say horrible things to us, and we can kind of let it bounce off. We can build that resilience, but when we're the ones saying it to ourselves, we're really deeply hurting ourselves. I mean, even down to our biology, we're really messing up our brains. So would you mind and I don't know if you're comfortable with this, would you mind sharing some positive affirmations that you use to help build yourself up? Was there anything specific?   LORRAINE: Yeah, so I follow Hay House. Louise Hay, that was the first person that I found with positive affirmations. And she's with Hay House, she discovered Hay House, she passed away. But I still get her calendar, which is sitting on my counter every day, it's just a calendar you can tear off. So a lot of her stuff is self love affirmations. And so I started practicing self love affirmations where I put it in my bathroom mirror so that when I go brush my teeth, I'm reading it every single day or I get like deck of cards through Gabby Bernstein who I adore. And I love Hay House. I say that Hay House saved my life, because discovering Hay House turned my life around for the good. And so you know, there's different things I read. I read unconditional love for myself type affirmations, the universe, I trust in the universe and the process. And so a lot of my affirmations are, the universe has my back, I trust the universe, I trust the process. And it's just a lot of  adding I am in front of statements for me. And I look it up on Pinterest. Pinterest is a huge resource that I love looking at positive affirmations and it's all over my house. Live, love, laugh is something that I repeat constantly. I even have it tattooed on my arm.   MARISSA: Oh I love that.   LORRAINE: I grew up in an abusive home. And so I am the kind of person that needs to remind myself, even today, I'm going to be 49 this year, 16 years old is when I was depressed. But even today, I still have to remind myself that I am worthy. And it's just something that I think is never going to go away. It's just something that I have to work on every single day of my life. Because I can be that person that goes back to that sad place, I just choose not to.    MARISSA: Good. And I'm glad that you keep making that choice but like you said, it's work every single day. And I also have experienced abuse. And I am also constantly reminding myself. Something that I tell people all the time is to make a list of three things that you love about yourself. Even if you can't think of anything, ask somebody that you respect and love, three things about you that they love, put it on your mirror and repeat them to yourself three times a day every day. And I still do that, I've been doing that I don't even know, probably for 11 years, and it has never let me down. But what it does do is it allows me to catch my negative thoughts and say, nope, that's wrong. I'm not going to say that again. It makes you more self aware I think.   LORRAINE: Yeah, my first husband, he did a lot of damage to me. And he used to tell me that my nose was big. So for the longest time, I hated looking at myself in the mirror because I'm like, God is my nose big? I would say that to myself. And now I'm just like, I'm beautiful with my big nose, or without a big nose. I don't care.   MARISSA: Absolutely. And it's not funny, but it's funny that you say that, because I'm of Jewish heritage and we have that stereotype of having really big noses. And so growing up I also had a really big nose and that was like a bullying point for people. So I had this very similar issue. And what I did was I went in knowing that my nose was a part of my heritage and it was part of my family. And so now I can look at myself in the mirror and love myself in photos. And I'm glad that you also found a way to be able to love yourself and not that you don't deserve it. But sometimes words really stick.   LORRAINE: Oh yeah, it stuck with me for a really long time. I mean, all the way through. That was in my 20s when I was with him, but all the way through the 30s. But now I'm totally confident and comfortable in my own skin.   MARISSA: Good because you're beautiful. So tell us about your book Freeing your Heart for Love.   LORRAINE: Yes, my book. So I had talked about writing this book for over a decade with my friends. My friends would always share my story, like what I just shared a part of it with you, and they would always tell me, oh my gosh, you should write a book about your life. Consistently! Or like people would live through my life, because somehow it was so exciting. But they didn't know how sad I was. So I talked about it, I joked about it. And then in April of last year, I joined a virtual writing workshop with this healthcare company that I was working for. And it was just for fun, literally, like just to do writing prompts. But when I started doing the writing prompts, I started crying, because I was writing a lot about my past. And I don't know where this emotion was coming from. And something just told me, I think it's time to write your book. I just started typing in April of last year. And then I just dove into learning how to write a book. So I knew that I wanted to write a book, I knew my passion for writing, it was to inspire others and to help other people who are going through similar struggles. I wanted to share my experiences that way in a book. That's all I knew. And so I dove into like a 7-day writing challenge, I dove into a writer's community, I joined a book program, I got a book coach. And I just started investing my life into this book. And so I finished the manuscript in December of last year, I'm now done with everything completely, and I'm ready to print and I'm releasing in April of this year.   MARISSA: Congratulations! That's an amazing story and an amazing journey.   LORRAINE: Thank you and this is a huge accomplishment for me, because I never read books. I'm not a book reader. So to write a book was like, Oh my God, I wrote a book! I even cried tears of joy, because I can't believe I wrote a book. But it's already reaching so many people. I've been on a lot of podcasts, people are reaching out to me on Instagram that don't know me from all over the world - Iceland, New York, everywhere, London, and they're telling me how much I'm inspiring them. So I know that this book is going to take off because I was ashamed. I was like, I don't know if I want to put this out, this is like my most vulnerable experiences, especially about my third marriage. Nobody knew about this fetish that my husband had, I wasn't going to share it with anyone. But I feel like if there's a woman out there, or even a man, I think it happens to men, that if you don't want this for your life, you don't have to stay. There's a man out there or a woman that loves you unconditionally. You don't need to do this to your body to be loved.   MARISSA: That's an amazing revelation. And I think that it really impacts way more people than we know of, because like you, they're embarrassed to talk about it or felt uncomfortable talking about it. But this kind of thing, and these fetishes, and these preferences that people have that are closeted, can make you feel really bad about yourself, or make you feel uncomfortable or uneasy, and then you're trapped. So I'm really glad that you were able to open up about it and maybe not feel comfortable with it having happened, but feel comfortable sharing that part of your story and your life. And I think that's what makes you so relatable, and so easy to talk to, because you're just so open and confident and willing to share. So thank you so much.   LORRAINE: Just to add on to that is that if people are in that type of relationship, and they're okay with it, then that's okay. But I feel like I wasn't okay with it but I stayed because I was so scared that this guy was going to leave me. And I thought he was the end all, this was it. I wasn't going to have anybody else. I had four kids, I'd been through two marriages, nobody's going to want me. But I got all that out of my head. And I said, you know what, I deserve to be loved completely and respected and valued, because he didn't value me. He didn't respect our marriage. And that's not okay, if that's not what you want for your life.   MARISSA: Absolutely. I was not trying to kink shame. But there's definitely a societal standard, that you get married and that's it. Even now, it's still oh, you got divorced, ooh. But getting divorced twice, there's such a stigma with that. There's nothing wrong with that. We are human and we grow and we change, and so getting divorced and remarried and dating around like, none of that is a problem. We just need to change the way that we perceive it and we need to change the way that society responds to it.   LORRAINE: Yeah, because I mean, I was ashamed to tell people I was married three times. It's like, whoa!. Now you're married four times. I'm like, but I don't care because my husband truly is the man that I'm supposed to be with. I truly truly know that now.   MARISSA: You mind if I ask how you know that? Like what is it about your relationship that makes you know that he's right?   LORRAINE: There's so much so. So a psychic told me I was going to meet him, it's all in my book. She told me, I was going to meet them by the end of 2017, or the beginning of 2018, or I was never going to meet him. And I didn't know how I was going to meet him. But I met him in October of 2017. And he is exactly the person that she said he was going to be. She said, he was going to love you unconditionally. He's going to love your kids like they're his own. I've been with many guys, even past marriages that I was in and nobody loved my kids as much as he does. And so that I knew was the number one reason because the reason why a lot of these relationships didn't work in the past is because they didn't love my children. And if you don't love my children, then you don't love me. My children come with me. I'm not going to give up my kids. And there were thoughts in the back of my head sometimes, which is crazy to even think that that I'm going to choose a guy over my kids, that's not going to work. So that was the number one reason. Number two is that he just takes care of me. I had a surgery that happened before we got married and he stayed by my side the whole time, there hasn't been any man in my life that has supported me that much, or cared for me that much. As well as my book. There's things in my book that he didn't know. And so I had to be open and honest with him and tell him, listen, there's things in my book, I need your support before I start writing this book, otherwise, the book is not going to come out. And he said, no, I support you 100%. And he didn't judge me with these past experiences. And he accepts me for who I am. And so that's how I truly know that he is the man that I'm supposed to be with. Because there hasn't been any other man in my life that has treated me the way he treats me.   MARISSA: That's incredible. Take notes guys.    LORRAINE: True love does exist. I keep saying that.    MARISSA: It does. It really does. And don't lower your standards, right? Aim for exactly what you want, because anything less isn't worth it.   LORRAINE: Yeah. And it doesn't matter how old you are. I met him at 45. And there's a lot of women out there, you hear it, you see it on the internet, even on TV. Oh, my clock's ticking. I'm 30, am I going to be single for the rest of my life? Those are all the wrong thoughts. And that's the thoughts I had, until I said at the age of 45. I'm like, you know what, if I don't meet anybody, I'm perfectly fine with that. And that's when my husband came into my life. But it's like, you can't force the outcome. You can dream about your dream man but the universe will bring you what you manifest. You can't force it, like say, Oh, I want that guy. And that guy is going to come to me. It's just doesn't work that way.    MARISSA: No, I agree. I love that. Thank you. So where can we pre-order your book? Because it comes out in just a month. That's so exciting.   LORRAINE: Yeah, I know.    MARISSA: You're to be over the moon.    LORRAINE: I'm so like crying tears of joy. Because it's like, I saw the book cover, the back of it, I just finished the back of it and I'm like, Oh my God, I'm an author. But yeah, it's on pre-order now at freeingyourheartforlove.com, there are bonuses if you preorder it. Entered to win a Kindle, my author Q&A and my first chapter for free, and then the book comes out end of April. So yeah, you can go to my website, freeingyourheartforlove.com, and all my social media handles are on there too.   MARISSA: Awesome. Thank you so much. If you could give survivors one piece of advice, what would it be?   LORRAINE: You know, I would say forgiveness. I didn't realize how much I didn't forgive myself for things that I've done in the past until I wrote this book last year. So I would say forgive yourself, and forgive those that have hurt you in the past. Because it really is freeing to have that feeling of not holding on to that hurt anymore. So that would be the one thing that I learned about myself at the age of 49. I keep saying my age because it's crazy to think how long it took me. And that was the reason why I wrote this book, it's because I want somebody who's younger to not have to wait until their 40s to figure it out. Like you can read my experiences and know that you don't have to go through that.   MARISSA: That's a beautiful message. Thank you so much for all the work you're doing for survivors of abuse and assault and thank you so much for sharing your story with us and with the world. I think that you're going to make a huge impact. So thank you very, very much.    LORRAINE: Thank you so much.   [OUTRO] If you enjoyed this podcast you have to check out www.marissafayecohen.com/private-coaching. That's www.marissafayecohen.com/private-coaching. Marissa would love to develop a made for you healing plant to heal from emotional abuse. She does all the work and you just show up. Stop feeling stuck, alone and hurt and live a free, confident and peaceful life. Don't forget to subscribe to the Healing from Emotional Abuse Podcast and follow us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/marissafcohen and Instagram at Marissa.Faye.Cohen. We'd love to see you there.

We discuss if the Lakers can contend for a championship after the AD trade and who won this trade, New Orleans or L.A.? Also, we debate who the Pelicans should draft with the #1 & #4 pick and if Lebron James is the G.O.A.T or even if he is still the best player in the league anymore. JOIN THE CONVO. (00:01-24:00) INTRO Can the Lakers contend?/Who won the trade? (24:07) 1st Call in Marcus (35:00) Pelicans draft strategy (47:25) 2nd Call in Brandon (56:42) 3rd Call in Tyler (59:26) Is LBJ the G.O.A.T? Or Best in the League? (01:24:40) TOP 5 Draft Prospects (01:35.36) FINAL THOUGHTS --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/mandown/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/mandown/support

Mark Nagata talks about his passion for art and classic Japanese character toys. Mark discusses the process of bringing an original Kaiju creation to life, the tension between being both a toymaker and an artist, and his 2019 exhibition at the Japanese American National Museum. (Intro: Can’t Stop Smiling)

Intro • Can't wait to see Stephen King's IT • The Death of Georgie • You'll die if you try!!! • I Know you want to see IT don't you? • Don't you Want IT?!? • It Theme (From "Stephen King's It") • E... --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/graywolf/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/graywolf/support

The Show Notes Condolences to the Novellas The cost of video and photos Intro Can you jinx a thing? Interesting Fauna      - Zuul crurivastator Seven Stupid Tools in Your Toolbox Ranked By How Stupid They Are Baby Driver (and expectations) Ask George      - Charlie Watts? from Bill B. in Rockford Religious Moron of the Week      - Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints from Bill Dowling Geo at GeologicRecords is no more… Check out this week’s Cognitive Dissonance PFA at Rivals on Friday Musikfest next week! Show close ................................... Mentioned in the Show Zuul crurivastator Charlie Watts / Jim Keltner Project Cognitive Dissonance ................................... Geologic Podcast Patronage Subscribe and information on subscription levels. ................................... Sign up for the mailing list: Write to Geo! A reminder that the portal to the Geologic Universe is at GeorgeHrab.com. Thanks to Joseph at Pixel + Spoke. Score more data from the Geologic Universe! Get George's Non-Coloring Book at Lulu, both as and E-BOOK and PRINT editions. Check out Geo's wiki page thanks to Tim Farley. Have a comment on the show, a Religious Moron tip, or a question for Ask George? Drop George a line and write to Geo's Mom, too!

Visit Hideous Energy at the following places:Twitter - Facebook - hideousenergy@gmail.com - Fan Off.comFollow Austin on Twitter @austinRwilson; @HideousEnergy David @dc_hopkins and Super Cute artist Brent Hibbard @BrentHibbardEp. #241 - Steal This Episode• Intro - Can't steal something that's free, right? Or, what about downloading it through channels that aren't approved by the creators? Yeah, it's all a giant complex mess. Make sure you swing by Eerie, Intl. over on FanOff, a brand new horror themed podcast hosted by David, Andi, and Dave! Go to DCBS where comics are between 20% and 40% off. You will be happy I promise.• Topic Thunder - A movie came out with four superheroes in it, and oooooh boy did the world have a pretty unanimous reaction. And what about piracy and Digital Rights Management? Hey, wanna' rob some people? Find a Merry Maids car.

Intro: Can't Stop Won't Stop - Scrape the Sky// Selling ancient wall comics, the messed up personal lives of the X-Men, London Comicon is mostly depressing but is rescued by family costume teams, hellish ball jointed dolls from Japan, TMNT is back and it's freaky as ever, America never got Sharky and George, Top Tier Hipster Tshirts, Antman is to dark for Adam and Joe, Superman is totally played out, staying cautious about Gatsby, Simon enters a Mcdonalds toilet and is reborn as poop Keyser Söze and we celebrate the defeat of racism with tea, biscuits and 5-a-side// Outro: King Crimson - One More Red Nightmare