Month: May 2021

The M word

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Words and image by me (Fiona)

Imagine, if you will, doing your job, doing your extra curricular activities, living your life.

Planning next month, next quarter, next year.

Then all of a sudden you feel awful. Tired, teary, unable to make decisions.

You stand in the kitchen at lunchtime in tears because you can’t choose what to eat.

And you just know that your life is good! You have a great job, friends, family, a puppy, travel plans. A home and a car. Even a bike and a home gym.

But you are sad, anxious and overwhelmed.

Your ADHD gets worse, you feel all over the place.

You are not coping with your fabulous life.

You don’t like who you are.

Then you feel ok again. For a day, or even 3. Maybe you imagined it?

No, it’s back.

You have to go off camera for a meeting as you are crying for no reason.

So you see your Doctor. Who is fabulous.

She asks some questions.

Do you feel like insects are crawling on your skin when nothing is there? Why yes – I pulled over yesterday as I was so sure an ant or spider was crawling around my ankle only to find nothing there.

Other than the hot flushes (which is the main symptom people talk about!) I have most of the symptoms of menopause.

But it doesn’t end there. I am given choices for management of the symptoms. HRT or antidepressents. I choose HRT.

I start on patches. They help, a little. But not enough. So I start on higher dose patches. Then patches become hard to get in Australia due to shortages. I am putting on 2 patches, each the size of match boxes, and I can feel them constantly.

And it is still not enough.

I drop many of my outside of work projects.

I drop some of my work extras.

And it is still not enough.

If I talk to people about it they sometimes get embarrassed. Like it is something I should be ashamed of. Others are supportive. They may have been there. They may see it on their horizon. But I get nervous about sharing. What if I make others uncomfortable? Something extra to feel anxious about. If I say nothing but I am acting different will people not wonder why? But if I tell them they may not want to know.

And it is still not enough.

So I start on antidepressants. I take a week off work because I am told I will feel worse before I get better. I am aware still that my life and my doctor are amazing. I just don’t feel it.

The antidepressants make me so sick I spend the week on the couch. I persist for 2 weeks.

I can’t keep going. I feel too sick, most of the time.

My doctor is not sure why I reacted that way. She calls the pharmacist and they agree on the next antidepressant for me to try. The patches are back in stock so I only have one matchbox stuck to me at a time. I miss the thumbnail sized ones, but I take what they have.

I dread starting the new antidepressants. What if I get sick again?

I don’t.

I feel immediately better. I don’t feel sick, I don’t feel tired.

These ones take longer to start working. And I have a bad cold. I am a terrible patient. I complain. I whine. I share my suffering. But that is me, not menopause.

So I wait. In weeks to come I hope to feel more like me again. The me it took me a long time to learn to love. If not, I will keep trying.

And I have been warned, adjustments will be needed along this path. As my hormone levels keep changing.

I am sorry if this post makes you uncomfortable. But I can almost guarantee menopause is making me, and most women who go through it, even less comfortable.

No Regrets!

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Story by me (Fiona) based on an interview with Karen
Image by me

Karen was not sure how she was going to support her family through the pandemic “I found myself in an area where I was not sure about what my income was going to be like, or really how my family was going to be able to be supported moving forward.”

It came to Karen through a meditation that she needed to tell her daughter’s story.

“So, what happened was that when my oldest daughter was 11, I found out that she was autistic. And not just shy, as the doctors had been telling me since she was born. Through testing we found out that she was autistic.

“And being a single parent, raising three young kids, and owning my own business I was really overwhelmed and didn’t know how to deal with that. Which is very normal for a lot of parents who have children who are diagnosed with a special need later on in their life.

“At age 11 it was, it was late for her to have this diagnosis, but not uncommon. I really didn’t know how to handle it, I didn’t know how to manage.”

Karen got lots of advice and found herself going into ‘mama bear’ mode. Trying to gain some control. Trying to do everything she could to make sure her daughter was going to be ok.

“And it came to a point where she just exploded at me and was like, ‘Well, why can’t I? What’s wrong with me? Why can’t you just love me for who I am?’

“And in our relationship, and in my parenting relationship with her, that was a huge defining moment. I woke up and I heard her and that changed how I parented her. I really taught her how to advocate for herself, and really taught her how to think about what her needs were.”

Jordan, Karen’s daughter, is about to graduate from college. The same daughter that Karen was told “was not going to have friends, not be able to get a job, not graduate high school, not go on to post-secondary, not be able to live on her own.

“And she has done all these things. And she’s done all these things, with honours, and with flying colours and just a breath of fresh air. And she’s just a beautiful joy to be around. She has her struggles, but her whole theory, her whole motto in life is I don’t want to have regrets.”

With Jordan as her example Karen started saying yes to every opportunity to speak about her amazing daughter “yes to anybody who wanted to talk to me, any platform where I could start telling my story because there is somebody who needs to hear it.”

Karen has done podcasts and Facebook lives with audiences all around the world. She won a prestigious speaking prize at John Maxwell where she was learning to perfect her craft.

When Karen wonders if maybe she is doing this for herself, not for others with special needs children, she gets a message from someone who has heard her story and was impacted by it. That keeps her going.

Karen’s advice for anyone considering stepping out of their comfort zone? “So to step outside of your comfort zone is terrifying. And it is hard

“And of course, within our comfort zone, there’s also that terror barrier  – that really big thick elastic band that you’ve got to really push against in order to break through.

“So my advice is for you to create some type of vision board of what you want your life to look like outside of that comfort zone. So really commit to that: write it down if you like to journal, create a vision board, make a video blog. Before you actually begin, visualize and know what that end looks like. So that when you start to feel that resistance, when your limiting beliefs start to kick in, you go back to that, and you say ‘yes, this is why I’m doing it. This is where I need to be.’

“Because you don’t need to know the path but you need to know where to go, the path will be revealed one step at a time.”

And Karen has told me a book is somewhere in her future!

Thank you for sharing Karen.

About Karen:

Karen Anne Fasulo found out when her daughter was 11, that she was Autistic and not just shy. Karen learned very quickly that she also required a lot of support.  However, everyone she spoke to didn’t understand HER, The mom.  9 years later and lots of learning, Karen Anne Fasulo, is a Certified Coach, Trainer, and Speaker as well as a Certified D.I.S.C. Behaviour Analysis Trainer, and uses her training, but also her personal experience to help parents just like YOU navigate through the steps to happier, healthier family life. Karen’s motto is in order to have a great relationship with your children, you first must have a great relationship with yourself.

Living outside your comfort zone

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Miranda lived her life outside her comfort zone, but nothing could prepare her for the year when everything changed.

“Suddenly her own private world collapsed when (within a few short months) her beautiful mother passed away suddenly and unexpectedly due to suicide (much like Robin Williams) and on the very same day Miranda adopted her baby sister who was then 11, then her grandmother died due to aggressive cancer, her brother in law passed due to brain tumours, she was fired from her job (that she took on to grieve her mum) and she discovered “Mr Forever Fiancé” was cheating on her this entire time.

She found herself planning funerals, (and later a tinder profile) as a single mum when she was meant to be planning a wedding, family and her “perfect life”.”

Rolling out of my comfort zone

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On Sunday I did something that many people do every day, but for me it was a long way out of my comfort zone.

I wore rollerblades!

About 20 years ago I decided to buy rollerblades in the post-Christmas sales. I was going to get fit, and be one of those people who rollerbladed along St Kilda beach.

Well, my dream was ended rather abruptly when about 6 steps in to my new activity when I broke my back.

I have made a full recovery, physically.

But for several years I could not even watch others rollerblade.

And for longer I got nervous on any slippery surface.

In the back of my mind was the fact that the rollerblades won.

I had this idea about just wearing some rollerblades once more and just standing in them. Maybe for a minute. To even the scales a bit. But I let fear stop me.

Then last year my sister-in-law invited me to go roller-skating with her, my brother and their young kids.

I decided it was my chance!

And then we went into lockdown.

Fast forward to this year and the invitation was reissued – mother’s day at the skating rink!

My expectations were low, and my trepidation high. I had a goal to stand in the rollerblades, but was fully prepared to not even mange that.

My brother suggested roller skates instead, but it had to be the blades.

The rental counter handed over my size 7s and I went back to our table.

Step 1 – putting them on- went ok.

Standing up… I was not sure it was going to happen! But after quite a bit of self-talk I stood. And then let go of the table. For a minute!

Then I sat back down.

Part 3 was going from the table to the seat beside the rink – holding my brothers hand. I managed to shuffle across. I watched people of all ages skate and shuffle about the rink. And started moving around a bit myself, on the carpet.

After a while I realised that my rollerblade confidence was at it’s limit, so I switched them out for rollerskates – with the wheels tightened.

And I am proud to say that after quite a few trips along one edge of the rink holding the rail, I did a full lap of the rink without holding onto anything or anyone!

It was slow. It was wobbly in places. It was more shuffle than skate.

But I feel I have conquered my fear of being on skates, and am going to go again!

There is no why

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Story by me based on an interview with Richard
Image by me

Interviewing Richard was an experience out of my comfort zone! He definitely challenged my thinking.

“Since about 2012, I’ve put myself into a whole bunch of adventures, and they vary dramatically from something more recent, which was I lived on the streets in India pulling a two-seater hand-pulled rickshaw. It’s a two-seater wooden cart that generally a very old wiry man pulls on, and they often do that barefoot, and they are in extreme poverty. They live on the streets, eat from the streets, sleep with the rats. So basically, what I did as a bit of a social experiment was live with work with those guys for a whole week, just mirroring that their life completely in every aspect.

“Then if you go right back to the start, I’ve done things like ran around the base of an exploding volcano in Sumatra while being rained on by rock and ash. I’ve been in a war zone in the middle of Israel with missiles flying overhead. I have pushed myself doing a hike to such an extent that I put myself in hospital and nearly came close to amputation, and that’s just a few of the things.”

When I asked Richard why, he shared Mount Hiei’s marathon monks’ story – who challenge themselves to circle the mountain every day for 1000 days. And if they miss a day, they take their own lives, regardless of the reason.

Richard thinks “it’s more to do with a feeling or an emotion. I’m not a big believer in a purpose or a mission statement, or a goal, per se. And the reason for that is that goal, I guess, are only guidance; they don’t drive us. So you’ve always got to look for what the driver is. And I think that has to be emotionally driven internally; it’s unique to every single person. When you have that feeling, I believe you are on the right path. I think intuitively, people probably know what direction they are supposed to go in. “But I think that the strange thing about intuition is that it tells you what you need to hear, not what you want to hear. So you’re looking down a path that can be very scary and a bit daunting. And that doesn’t seem right. But, generally is the right way. 

“I think whatever that feeling is, you know you’ve got the why when you have a love-hate relationship with it, because I love what I do, but equally I hate what I do. I think the why has to be something that is almost not controllable. I don’t think you can have it as a mission statement, or this is why I do what I do.”

Richard spoke to me that being uncomfortable can be dark and miserable and should not focus on the positives. “It sounds counterintuitive to focus on the negatives, but you have to because that’s the only stuff that’s going to stop you from moving forward and pursuing whatever it is you want to follow, not the positive stuff.

“The positive stuff takes care of itself. It’s the stuff that gets rid of the positive stuff that you need to focus on. The anxious feeling, the overwhelm, there’s a whole array of stuff that comes along the path to any goal, and you need to focus on that stuff. If you feel that you’re willing to take that stuff on, then that’s okay, but if you’re not, don’t do it. But don’t fool yourself and go, ‘well I’m going to give this a crack; it’s going to be amazing, and then at the first hurdle you go ‘it’s all too hard, or it’s too scary, or it’s too whatever.”

The last part of Richards advice I am going to share is about fear “the exciting thing about fear is that if I am in the middle of a war zone, for example, or I’m about to stand in front of a camera for 2000 people the feelings the same. It’s kind of cool if you can work out how to step into fear. You’ve conquered most things in life because every situation feels the same! “Also, remember that fear and excitement feel the same. You could almost think yourself well, let me flip my thinking to excitement, and I’m feeling no fear at all.”

Thank you, Richard, for your unique thoughts on stepping out of your comfort zone!

Richard Bowles is the founder of Adventure Alchemy and a five-time world record-breaking Australian adventurer. He’s also a multi-disciplined educator, executive advisor, and top 20 rated APAC speaker. His risky adventure experiences and unique research have enabled him to accelerate his clients’ performance and organizational progress. His work features in international media including CNN, Sky News, and The Today Show.