Real Talk with Tina and Ann
Tina and Ann met as journalists covering a capital murder trial, 15 years ago. Tina has been a tv and radio personality and has three children. Ann has a master's in counseling and has worked in the jail system, was a director of a battered woman's shelter/rape crisis center, worked as an assistant director at a school for children with autism, worked with abused kids and is currently raising her three children who have autism. She also is autistic and was told would not graduate high school, but as you can see, she has accomplished so much more. The duo share their stories of overcoming and interview people who are making it, despite what has happened. This is more than just two moms sharing their lives. This is two women who have overcome some of life's hardest obstacles. Join us every Wednesday as we go through life's journey together. There is purpose in the pain and hope in the journey.
Real Talk with Tina and Ann
Who YOU are in your Fear is NOT who you REALLY are
When you live in fear people do not get to see who you really are. A beautiful, daring, caring, loving, dream-seeker person is hidden behind that mask. let's talk about the courage of breaking from that mask.
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Welcome to Real Talk with Tina and Anne. I am Anne and today we have Denise, and she hasn't been out on for a while, so I'm really excited to have her back on. Happened since the last time you and I have been on together and we actually got to meet in person. Our families got to actually hang out a little bit together and you got to meet my kids and I got to meet one of yours.
Speaker 2:It was a fun day. It was. It was really fun, so exciting to be able to see you in person. Versus the computer, yeah, yeah, it really does make a difference to computer.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, it really does make a difference to actually see each other in person. Tina will be back and we will have our regular episodes soon. I love who I am today. I love how I feel, I love how the journey behind me has shown how strong I am, but also how much who I was was hidden behind fear for years and years. So we wear masks, many kinds of masks, but who we really are is living behind that mask, and I would say that one of my biggest reasons and most people's reasons for wearing masks is fear, wouldn't you say, denise?
Speaker 2:I would absolutely say fear, yeah, you, just. You can hide behind anything if you put a different persona in front of you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't think that anybody really knew me until maybe the last 10 years of my life. I've really changed.
Speaker 2:I agree, for me too. I don't think. I think we spend so much time behind it. We're so used to it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, that's a really good point. I don't even think that sometimes we we went so long with the mask on that we didn't even realize that that wasn't who we were. I think that we even thought that that's who we were.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know, when you come from a background of trauma, it's, it's beaten to you I guess from the day one you were born into this story that they told, story that they told and even though you've changed your story, you're still so used to kind of protecting yourself from, from the outside, I guess. And you just not. You're just, you know you're living inside two lives. I always say it's two lives. I live the outside life, which everybody typically sees, but there's an inside life that's like authentic, and it's scary to come out because it makes you vulnerable or at least that's how we feel is maybe vulnerable by letting ourselves be who we truly are.
Speaker 1:And I didn't want to let people in because I was afraid. Voiceless was one of the things that came to my mind when I was thinking about. When I lived behind a mask, you know, I was completely unable to say the things that I wanted to and I could literally hear in my head the most amazing things that I wanted to say to people. I mean I would like have this great answer, response to what they were saying, and then I would just look at them and say, okay, I mean, it was crazy that that was going on in my head was actually coming out of my mouth.
Speaker 2:I think it's funny because I've done that and I still do that. Sometimes it's almost like, like I don't want to say something and come off. I don't know saying the wrong things. You know what I mean, because I want to say them too. It's like oh, is that the right word? Does that word mean what I want it to mean? Because it sounds great to me. I make up my own language, I don't know. But yeah, I get scared of saying the wrong thing, Like how are they going to perceive it? So I just keep it shut, you know. But, like you, it's like these incredible things that I think are inside and I want to say them.
Speaker 1:Well, partly, you know, because I really am autistic, and so part of it is that, and I've really had to learn along the years how to be able to actually say the things I mean. Oh yeah. Because I used to always be told well, that's not what you said, yeah, yeah, but so I mean there is some of that going on, but it really is kind of using the tools that you have and learning, and over the years I've learned how to actually say the things that I mean to say the things that.
Speaker 1:I'm thinking you know, and it's taken me many years to be able to get that, get to that, and I really do think that a lot of that was the trauma response, because when people are yelling at you and people are doing and saying all kinds of crazy things are going on in the room, your brain shuts down.
Speaker 2:Absolutely.
Speaker 1:So you become like to the point where you only have a few words maybe that you could say you know, I mean it's like trauma brain. You know it's taken me a while to be able to get to the point where I can actually say the things, but now I do. I mean, now, you know, I'm a lot better at it. And the other thing was connection. You know that's one of the biggest things too, that I think that when we're living behind a mask, you know you're not able to connect, you're keeping everybody at a distance, and I think everyone thought that I was either aloof or rude or I really didn't care about them.
Speaker 1:And you know that was further from the truth. I was just afraid. You know, I simply did not let people in to my world. And I think it was not intentional either, because it wasn't like, oh, I'm going to consciously keep these people out. You know, sometimes that's there, but it was just something kicked in and it took over me and I wasn't able to reverse it. I wasn't able to let people in. So there was something definitely within myself that was keeping people out and I didn't have control over it. And Tina and I have talked about irrational fears before on the podcast.
Speaker 2:Yeah, definitely the same. It's I always call it like a wall. I've always had where for some people, they've gotten into this one circle, right, but then there's this center core that even they can't get in, because you're just, yeah, you're, you're kind of built into silence. You know what I mean? Yeah, and I will say this.
Speaker 2:So, um, something that I had used to do and and I only talk about this cause it's, you know, you were talking about this, this inside voice, or this inside, when there was trauma going on, things were happening to me.
Speaker 2:I had learned to shut myself off even from the chaos, into silence, like into that silent world that nobody can hear me, nobody can see me, as these traumas are going, you know, going on. So you're, you know, trapped in silence, and so it was a protection, though, you know, I thought in my little world, and I learned to do that, like you start to that, and now that was when I was younger, but as I grew, it just kind of grew with me. You know, you still had those things that you were so used to. It was kind of routine to you that you didn't even recognize that it was happening. I don't know about you, but you didn't recognize it until, truly, you started to come out of it. I didn't realize how much, until I was like, oh my God. Like you know, I was really silenced more than I thought. And you lose that part of your authentic self and I love the word authentic because we're trapped behind this, we can't truly be ourselves because we're trapped behind that fear.
Speaker 1:Yes, I think that the fear lived right here.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:No, and I honestly think, I really do believe that the majority of my childhood, young adulthood, into my adulthood, well, into my adulthood, that people did not know the real Ann. I mean, they just didn't, and I think I even believe that that's who I was. Yeah, that quiet person, that disconnected person. You know, when you're really afraid of people, you're just going to keep everybody out and that's just the way it is. You know, the example that I jotted down was the movie Jaws, and I don't know if you've ever seen that.
Speaker 2:Yes, I did Makes me. That's my irrational fear of the ocean.
Speaker 1:Yes, that, yes, I did makes me. That's my irrational fear of the ocean. Yes, but I I've always been really afraid of sharks because of that movie.
Speaker 1:Yes, yeah, I saw it young yeah, well, me too, yeah, and and uh, you know, sharks hurt people, they kill people, and so then you're afraid of them and then you never go in the ocean again, and that can be somewhat of a rational fear, you know, and it can turn into an irrational fear if you don't even want to put your toe in the water, I guess. Yeah, you know you do that with humans, and that's what I've done. I've done it with humans because they were the ones that were hurting me, and so then I've kept them out of my life. A lot of people, a lot of people that probably I could have had great relationships with, but for some reason, just something triggered me and I just said, okay, I'm not having a relationship with you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I feel the same way too. And the sharks thing yeah, I realized you're just so used to being behind that, that mask, and I agree, you miss out on some friendships too because you're just so afraid of I think I call it messing up. Do you know what I mean? You have this, this fear of of, um, not being accepted. So for me, it was easier for me to hide in my little you know shell than it was for me to to come out and be me because of that fear of judgment. You know what will people say, what will you know of who they were. And it took, you know I'm still kind of coming out to be honest with you it took, you know.
Speaker 2:I'm still kind of coming out to be honest with you, Like I found. I found that I started to take off the mask once I had courage to speak up about the things that had happened to me. It's what I do now. You know, I speak to schools and whatnot. I wrote the book and once I started doing that I, it was a whole new thing for me. I was less afraid. So now I'm not I. I should take this back.
Speaker 2:I think I will always live with some kind of fear, some kind of mask because, I don't want to allow myself to have people still come in Maybe I'll let them into a certain point that I never take that fully off, I think for some people, for some people I do, but I think it's just that fear and, and you know, as I've been able to have, um, the ability to use my voice, that that has shown me, even me, a different part of myself that I, I didn't, I'm sure was always in there, but I've never recognized it on the outside.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, it's funny because when I was younger and I've talked about this before, but you know I well I failed speech because I would do everything but speech. Yeah, did all the tests, all the quizzes and I did really well in all that stuff, but every single time it came to the actual speech in class in college or in high school, I wouldn't do it. So I would miss that part. So I ended up getting I think it was actually like a D minus because I did do the other work. But I mean it's really funny because that's what I do now.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I speak and I want to speak and I want to have a voice.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I you know what. I was so quiet. I was always in trouble at school for talking, but outside of that I was very shy. I think. For me, school was a safe place for me, especially when I was in elementary school. My God, I would get in trouble all the time. I mean, if you sat next to me, you were getting in trouble. I don't care what, what was going on, I'm going to talk to you and somehow you're going to be pulled into being in trouble. I mean, that's just how I was.
Speaker 1:That was not me. I was the opposite. I was the opposite. If you were sitting next to me in class, you wouldn't have gotten a word out of me.
Speaker 2:Oh, no, I was. I was very talkative, but outside of school, outside of my little small group of of good friends, I and this is elementary school outside of my little small group of good friends and this is elementary school.
Speaker 2:Probably I got a little bit voiced, I don't know. I got myself in a lot more trouble as I got older, but outside, like in my family, I was very quiet. I was in my extended family. I was so quiet. But you learn to do that when you have to hide everything, it's easier to stay silent than it is to say something.
Speaker 1:Isn't it funny how we can be completely different people in different situations.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, oh yeah.
Speaker 1:And yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:I always said that this is so funny because you know we're talking about hiding behind the mask and things like that. And here I am. I'm doing the opposite now as myself you know, I'm speaking in front of educators and teachers I've written a book like if you can't put yourself all the way out there. I've gone from this to this, but again there's still like a you know, there's still part of you that is afraid to let it all out. You know, but yeah, I used to. I used to definitely get in trouble.
Speaker 1:I was you know you touched on a little bit on some of the things that happen when we are afraid, and one of the it's being made to feel as if you know people are judging us and if you know even perfectionism can set in because you just feel like you have to be perfect. Yeah, so you'll procrastinate because you don't want to. You know you're afraid that you're going to be wrong or whatever you're doing it's just not perfect and so it creates all these other kind of side things that can happen because you know you just you want to be and make everybody happy and not make people upset.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that that's trained in that. So you know, when you're just, when you're taught it from a younger age, it just becomes so normal that that's, that's life for you. You don't know life any other way. And, and as you said in the beginning, you know there's um, there, we're hidden inside. We kind of have this person that we know we are.
Speaker 2:It's just it's. You know, when you're like I said, when you're made to believe all the outside stuff, you just learn how to keep them inside hidden. It's two lives. I always talk about this. I always say there was two lives. I lived the life at home and I lived the life at school. They were my two lives and I never intertwined them at all. You had your we'll call it a lack of better mask at home and your mask at school, or your mask at home and your mask in public. And I think you know I think there's still part of us that does that. I think all of us maybe have that too.
Speaker 1:Sure, to a certain degree, but for different reasons.
Speaker 2:Yes, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, now, one of the things that you did was you were an angry kid and you get into a lot of fights in my middle school years um, yeah, it was the only outlet I had, or at least I felt I had, and so I would just, yeah, I would take everything that's trapped inside, and the only way that I knew how to get it out was fighting it's that fight or flight, yeah, or either running away from oh, I've done that too Fighting or responding.
Speaker 1:I mean, I think that it's either or.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, I mean it's funny because a lot of people now when I tell them you know the trouble I was in, like I'm a different person now because obviously I'm an adult and as I've grown older and faced a lot of the silence, and now that I'm talking, if I say to a friend that knows me now, you know, oh my God, in middle school. Like I tell people now and I'm like, oh my gosh, yeah, in middle school. I mean this is embarrassing. But I'll say this my yearbook and I just found one I don't have a lot of stuff from when I was growing up, but I found the yearbook and in the back everybody's writing, hey, would you go beat this girl up for me, would you go beat this person up for me? And like I, literally then it was my outlet. So I was like, sure, I'll do it, sure I'll do it.
Speaker 2:No one now who knows me now can believe that that was me. Then we just, we, we just change. And you know, we, we, we, we, you know, come out of that fear. I mean we, I don't know, I don't know for you or not, but you mature with it. So it changes and more in different ways. So you're hot, at least for me. At least for me, I've hidden them and I don't fight anymore. I like to tell my daughter if anybody comes after you, you don't, you worry, I'll swing hands, but you know.
Speaker 1:It went into needing to numb for me and drinking all the time I mean day and night. It got to the point where I was waking up drinking and going to bed drinking and I started when I was 11 and I stopped about when I was 30. But I think that that really was what helped me be able to be more of me. In a weird way and I'm not telling people to drink because it was the it was a different version of me that I thought was me. It was still wasn't me, but I thought, you know, because I could be more fun, I was able to open up a little bit more, but all it did was kind of let my defenses come down a little bit more, but I still wasn't who I should have been.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think I. I was probably similar where. Um, I drank too in middle school. Um, I don't know that it opened me up. I went for the numbing portion.
Speaker 2:And that was yeah and I, yeah, it was a couple of years that I did that and then I didn't for like drink for like two years and then I was 21 and I drank again and, um, but yeah, I, I would see. I can see that, if you're a quiet person, like you were, in order to come out of your shell, sometimes they say you know, if you drink a lot, you'll, you'll say the things that have been trapped inside of you that you don't want to say. A lot of people will say things that they've always thought but they never said anything, because now they're, you know free to say it.
Speaker 2:Um, I never had that, though Mine was. Mine was definitely the numbing.
Speaker 1:Oh, me too. It really I think that that's where it stemmed from, yeah, but then I kind of eventually liked who I became, and it was I became the quietest one in the room to the person who was one of the most fun. So yeah, but I'm not proud of that, because now I mean I don't drink and I am having an amazing time and I am, and I am me now you know, I'm finally me, and if I was drinking I wouldn't be me. I wouldn't be the me I want to be.
Speaker 2:So if that makes any sense, it does, so do you feel like you're, you're the you, both at home and outside.
Speaker 1:You're like 100%, authentically you now am where I like who I am and I have a story to tell and I want to help other people and I think that my mission behind who I am really changes what I share and why I share it. You know people sometimes when I've shared some things, they've been like oh, I'm so sorry and I'm like no, that's not the purpose behind this Sharing this because I want to help other people and I know that if there's a little nugget of information or wisdom or something that I've taken along with me from the pain that I've had in my past that I want to be able to, I want to be able to help.
Speaker 2:So able to. I want to be able to help. So, yeah, I think, well, it's, I'm, I think I'm coming out of everything. I still, I still think I have ways to go.
Speaker 2:But I definitely feel, um, in similar with with what you just said about you know, if it's going to help someone, um, I took a big chance and I, you know, let a lot of that stuff out there, Like it, almost like it spewed all of a sudden. But you know what motivates me for that? And maybe that is kind of putting down the mask. What motivates me is I see the 14 year old me in someone else that's sitting in a classroom that is shut off, that doesn't have the voice, that is hiding behind all that fear and not being able to take the breath, to be them, and they shelter themselves and they shelter all that. And so I think for me, I really did have that, um, where that's helped me, I'm like, no, I'm going to, I'm going to use the voice. You know, I'm going to be that voice.
Speaker 2:And as I've used my voice I have, like you said, I really am happy with where I'm at and with who I am, and I'm still getting used to it. I'm not going to lie. Yes, I talk. Yes, I wrote the book, Definitely helping me, but I know that I have a far. I have a lot more to go. I don't think I'm 100% there, but I am definitely making progress.
Speaker 1:And honestly, I think until we take our last breath that we're always growing. I mean, there's room for improvement, no matter who we are. So many people I've have been going through my head while you're sharing, and one person was one of the people that helped getting me got. They helped get me out of the worst situation in my life and that's not an exaggeration. And the reason why she helped me was because she was a counselor. She was in the helping profession and she got up at a church and she started sharing her story and she started sharing something that helped bring my mask down a little bit for me to be able to let her in, and then it started a relationship with her. But that's what the proof is is when you start sharing your story, what it can do on the other side for somebody else that's listening.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, I've, I've had that too. I've listened to a couple of people and I'm like, okay, but I still, yeah, for me, I saw them but I and I wanted to be that, but I wasn't there yet, but it was something that helped me to strive, to be that, you know, to have that courage. I had somebody say this was on one of the social medias. After, like, I posted something, something of well, I'm not even sure what it was, but it was on one of my social medias and I got a. This is perfect for this. I got a message, a private message, from someone and said thank you for saying the things that all of us want to say, but we're too afraid to say them.
Speaker 2:And so, yeah, and that's that's. I think that's the same way it's like, you know. You hope, then, that your voice helps them to maybe use their voice and, you know, equate the mask. You know, as we're using our voice, that mask doesn't have to be there so much, you know. You just start to open that up, take it down, even if it's for a minute, to take a breath. I think for me, when I was growing up, I had all these teachers and that's who helped me take my breath. You know, they take it down for a second, long enough for you to just breathe in once, and then you could put it back up. But it was all these people that just slowly, slowly, you know, pushed away. But again, you know, I'm 49 and I, I know that there's still part of me that that is up there, especially around certain situations or certain settings, cause there's, you know, we feel that fear in those settings. So if you feel that fear, automatically the guard goes right up and you lose the mature person that you've already been, you know.
Speaker 1:Or or you also, that mature person realizes, hey, this person for me is not safe, and you recognize the triggers and then you say, okay, I need to reel it in. Nope, you're not the one I'm going to let in. And it's not wrong to do that. It's actually really healthy to do that, because sometimes the person across from you really does need to be kept at a distance.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's your boundaries.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and there's nothing wrong with that. Not everybody needs to be your best friend. Not everybody needs to hear your story unless they're in the audience and you're up there talking about it. Yeah, you know. But yeah, I mean, there are healthy boundaries and we need those.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think a lot of times too, is when you find your small circle of people. That's when you're most comfortable and that's where you learn how to be you, because you know those small people, the small circle, like I call them, a smirkle small circle I call my circle of friends.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And I definitely feel the most comfortable with them. I definitely feel less that I could just be myself. You know what I mean. So everybody else, but yeah, the speaking. I mean you got to let yourself out there. I mean I've got to let everything out there.
Speaker 1:That's what we've been called to do and so and I and I really do believe that. You know, it's really funny because back in the you know I was it was one of my first really big jobs in the field because I got a counseling. You know, I have these degrees and so I wanted to go into the helping profession and I ended up being a director of a battered woman's shelter and it was one of my most, every single job I've ever had. I really feel the mission and the purpose behind it. So I did all the things. I did all the things. I was great.
Speaker 1:You know, I really loved going to the hospital and helping the women there and transition them into the shelter and help them in their life and help get them jobs and and help the staff be who they needed to be and all the things. Um, but then the director there was I was the director of the shelter, but there were many facets to this organization and the head of the whole entire thing says to me you're going to speak in front of the board and I just went, no, and she said, yes, you are, and I rose and I called in sick that day.
Speaker 2:Oh no.
Speaker 1:And I did not do it. And I'll tell you what it wasn't like, and this is years ago. Would I do it now? Yes, but under I would go in, and this is the autism in me. I would have to sit in a certain place. I couldn't have people close to me, I would have to hold on to something. I would have to have all my senses taken care of in order to do it. But I would do it. But back then all I did was see the intimacy behind what she was asking me to do, because they just wanted to hear about me. They just wanted me to come in and share and meet me. And I panicked. I just panicked that wall. See, I was one way with the women in the shelter, because that was my mission to fall down with them. It was a different thing when there were people that were of power for me to sit across from them. My mission wasn't there anymore. It just changed. It scared me and I again became voiceless. I couldn't even show up.
Speaker 2:That's really interesting.
Speaker 1:So this is the end of part one. Tune in next week for part two.
