Speak Honest Podcast: Real Talk on Relationships, Attachment Styles & the Work of Healing Childhood Trauma

83. Stop Shoulding Your Grief | My Conversation with Teri Kingston

• Jennifer Noble, ACC | Certified Relationship, Dating, NLP, & IAT Coach • Episode 83

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Have you ever felt like grief should have an expiration date?
In this heartfelt conversation with grief educator and TEDx coach Teri Kingston, we explore the messy, tender, and very human journey of loss. From anticipatory grief to sudden loss, Teri opens up about her own story and shares practical insights on how to support yourself and others without falling into the trap of “shoulding.” Together, we talk about what to say (and not say), why workplaces need grief literacy, and how to find purpose in the middle of pain.

You might want to listen if:

  • You have ever wondered why you still miss someone years later and feel like you “should” be over it
  • You are supporting a loved one who is grieving and do not know what to say
  • You have experienced anticipatory grief while watching someone you love decline
  • You have felt invisible or unsupported in the workplace while grieving
  • You want to know when your story is ready to be shared and when it still needs a softer container

About Our Guest:

Teri Kingston works with business owners, executives and leaders who want to magnetize their message so they can maximize their impact each time they speak.

In her role as a caregiver advocate and widow, Teri shares stories of courage and compassion to help caregivers understand their role and cope, especially when the end of their caregiver journey is in sight. She is a sought after TEDx coach, speaker and author.

When she isn't coaching speakers or delivering talks of her own, she eats too much dark chocolate as she sits and soaks in the sea air of Saint Andrews, NB.

Stay in Touch with Teri:

FIND OUT MORE!


DISCLAIMER: Speak Honest podcast content is informational, not professional or medical advice. Jenn is an ICF relationship coach, not a licensed therapist. Consult health ...

Speaker 1:

Hello and welcome to Speak Honest. I am your host and certified relationship coach, jennifer Noble. It has been my passion for over a decade to help women like you heal what's been holding you back from having the relationships you deserve. Are you struggling with a relationship where you can't seem to voice your emotions, needs and boundaries without having it blow up in your face? Then you have found the right podcast, my friend. Get ready for practical tips, empowering truths and honest conversations. Now let's dive in.

Speaker 1:

Hello everyone and welcome back to another episode of Speak Honest. I am Jen Noble, your go-to relationship coach, and on today's podcast I'm so excited to have a guest on with us. I have my good friend, terry Kingston, on to talk about all the different types of things. So Terry is actually a caregiver, advocate and widow. She shares stories of courage and compassion to help caregivers understand their role and cope, especially when the end of their caregiver journey is in sight. So she is a grief educator and it's so powerful to have her on the show. But in addition to a grief educator, she's also a sought-after TEDx coach. It's actually how I know her. She is an award-winning speaker, a best-selling author, and she is just a fantastic human all around. She has a fantastic TEDx talk if you want to go check it out about grief and about her husband, and it is so powerful. I highly recommend it. But that is actually how I got to know Terry. She came into one of my Toastmasters meetings a couple years ago to talk about TED and what we can do to get ready for it, and I started getting to know her a little bit more. And then I was following her on LinkedIn, which I highly recommend. Go and follow Terry Kingston on LinkedIn. It's where she gives all of her great tips. And the next thing I know I'm looking up her book. She has a book called Get Ready for Ted when Ted is Ready for you, and I noticed the publisher and so I reach out to the publisher and they like what I do. And next thing you know, I'm signed up with the publisher and so I get to write a book.

Speaker 1:

As a lot of you know, I am currently writing Dance of Attachment and I am working with Lucky Book Publishing. Shout out to Sammy and Samar, hello, and all my beautiful community over there. I love you guys so much. My Monday mornings are so much better now because I get to spend it with all of you, but that is beside the point. So I'm writing Dance of Attachment, as a lot of you know. If you want to join the dance circle, if you want to be a part of the early release of the book, then just scroll on down to the show notes and I'll add a link down there. You can be a part of the dance circle, join us over there. You get maybe an early copy of the book. You get to be a part of the launch. You get to maybe read a little bit before it gets out there. If you want to be a part of that, let me know.

Speaker 1:

And this book I'm overwhelmed with emotion thinking about it. Never thought I would ever write a book. Yet here we are and I'm actually currently struggling with a lot of writer's block. I'm actually working with a coach right now, a somatic coach to kind of work through that. What's going on with my body? How come every time I sit down, my whole body wants to shut down or I want to fall asleep? And this is what this work is all about. It's about getting curious, not judging, not shaming, not telling myself oh, why don't you just do it? You're such a waste of space all this stuff. It's just about being able to work through it, and in my conversation with Terry, you're going to hear what we talk about a lot on. There is not shooting ourselves, and I was thinking about that a lot when I am struggling to write my book right now, and I shouldn't shoot on myself. I should be writing. I should have it done by now. I should have had it finished. I told my publisher I'd have it finished by June. It's not. I should be speaking on more stages to promote it and I'm just so tired I can't. All of that really resonated with me and with where I'm going in my life right now.

Speaker 1:

So, as you're listening to this conversation with Terry, I just want you to think about where in your life are you grieving? This doesn't necessarily have to be about death, although we do mainly talk about the passing of her husband. At the same time, this could be about divorce, this could be about moving away, this could be about changing careers, just going and transitioning to a different part of life. It doesn't matter. Grief is heavy and grief is everywhere. So, even if you've never lost anyone, if you have not had to deal with the death of a loved one, I want you to listen in on this conversation with Terry and figure out where can you share your story, where can you find your purpose, where can you utilize this grief, this pain, this feeling in your life and use it for your best self, use it for your good. Be able to figure out a way of saying, okay, I'm going to channel this into this area here. So I hope you enjoy my conversation with Terri. Hello everyone and welcome back.

Speaker 1:

I'm so excited to get to talk with Terri Kingston today. Terri Kingston is someone that I consider a friend, a colleague, someone that I've kind of traveled along this journey with and she's kind of been on my side there. She is a TEDx speaker, an award-winning speaker, a TEDx coach, but more importantly to me right now, because what I want to talk about, is she is a grief educator and this is such an honor to get to have her on the podcast today to be able to talk about that. But I actually met Terry when I was giving my own TEDx talk about attachment styles and she came into my Toastmasters meeting, got to know us, helped us so much. We actually. I have her book here. That is one of the very first books I read on really how to give a TEDx talk, which is Get Ready for TED when TED is ready for you. It's so nice to have you on the show, terry. Go ahead and say hi, introduce yourself. Anything else, you on the show, terry Go ahead and say hi, introduce yourself, anything else.

Speaker 2:

Thank you, jen. Yeah, it's wonderful to be here. I remember dropping in on that Toastmaster meeting and getting to meet all of you that were preparing for your TEDx talk. But anytime you drop into a club like that, there's always one or two people that stand out with their readiness or their eagerness or just their connection with their own content, and that's what you did for me, and I watched your talk later and I thought, yeah, she nailed that. She nailed that. She nailed that. And I was just so excited for you that you got the opportunity and you did it so well, so congratulations.

Speaker 1:

Thank you so much, terry, and it was such a divine thing to get to have you be a part of that community and to get to know you, because I, when I read your book, I started kind of getting interested of, like, this is such a well written book I mean, look, it's not that big, it was such an easy read. It helped me so much. And I looked and there was this little tiny thing that said lucky book publishing and I was like that's interesting. I'm going to reach out to Terry and find out a little bit more about this. And that is how I ended up signing up with Lucky Book Publishing myself and, as my listeners know, I will be finishing up my book soon, hopefully with a launch this fall, some sort of event happening in LA with some of our other authors.

Speaker 1:

And it has been an amazing community to be a part of do you just want to talk a little bit about Lucky Book Publishing real quick, terry Well as one of the co-founders said yesterday, I'm one of the original old girls. You are, you're an OG, like you really are, and I really am an OG.

Speaker 2:

I do remember getting a cheeky little note from Samantha not long after I started and she mentioned something like you're really good for your age and I kind of laughed at her and I said you may want to check your ageism bias there. You know, but I have never felt anywhere near the age I am and usually I haven't looked at either.

Speaker 1:

No, not at all, but.

Speaker 2:

I do have to tell you that, and we will get into this a little bit as the talk goes on today Grief ages you beyond what you can even imagine and there's just so many components to the anticipatory grief journey when I was a caregiver for my now late husband when he was very ill. When you know what's coming and you don't want to face it, that's a huge part. So anticipatory grief is a big part of what I'll be talking about more in the future. But dealing with losing your second chance, your golden years, gentlemen, and all of that possible future of what I thought I'd be living at this senior age of mine, that's just simply not there anymore. So a huge part of the grieving process is coming to terms with the future I have, and the present that I have is nothing like I imagined it to be when we first married.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, Thank you for sharing that, terry. Can we back up a little bit and can you tell my listeners a little bit of your story, how long you were married when your husband passed? All of that to kind of set the groundwork. And then I would love to touch more on this anticipatory grief and what grieving has been like for you afterwards.

Speaker 2:

Absolutely so. Funnily enough, because we mentioned Toastmasters already, I met Harry in my first year of Toastmasters and I think his 32nd or something or 39th he'd been in it forever in a contest at the district level.

Speaker 1:

I didn't know this. That's adorable.

Speaker 2:

I had won at club area division and I was at district. I hadn't even been a Toastmaster for a year and I'm on the district stage for the International Speech Contest, which is our highest level of speaking, and the Evaluation Contest the next day. So I met Harry in the briefing for the Evaluation Contest. He'd heard me speak the day before and he came up to me and this man was tall, handsome, very charismatic, very gentle and had a tendency to see potential in someone and believe in you more than you believed in yourself at the time and then help you rise to the level of his beliefs in you. And so he came up to me at the briefing and he said you did really well yesterday. You're obviously new at this. You have a lot of raw natural talent, but you really need some coaching. Can I coach you?

Speaker 1:

He did yeah, oh and wait. When was this? Like what year, Like how many years ago?

Speaker 2:

That was 2003,. In the spring of 2003, at the conference in Pointe Claire, Montreal.

Speaker 1:

Well, he just came right out and did that. I love that so much. He did.

Speaker 2:

Now, mind you, we were friends for a couple of years and I joined an advanced club he'd started, he mentored and coached me for two or three years before he took me out for dinner one day and he said this is what I see happening next. What do you think? And it was basically an engagement proposal and by then I'd really gotten to like and admire and really learned from how he coached other people. He mentored so many police officers in the Ottawa Police Force, helped them with promotions.

Speaker 2:

He just was a huge part of the community and watching him, his heart for community service, his heart for Toastmasters was huge and yeah, and so that's how we met and Toastmasters was kind of our thing, which is a good thing, because he went on to be part of the district executive, which was extremely busy, and at his side I must have visited over two, three hundred clubs in you know, five or six years. I tell people he exposed me to more Toastmaster speaking than I would have ever had the opportunity had I just been myself bobbing along the Toastmaster, current and so many, many clubs, many different styles of speakers, evaluated by everybody, but mostly by him in the car on the way home after a meeting. Honestly, that's where real love comes in, because you have to listen and you have to say yes, dear, but you also have to take it on board, because he always knew what he was talking about.

Speaker 1:

That just sounds be able to take that kind of feedback, that kind of, you know, constructive criticism, or the evaluation as we would say in Toastmasters. I find I see you talking about it and this beautiful, secure relationship that you have with him. To be able to actually hear that for someone means you trust them, you feel safe with them, you love them, and that part is so incredibly important. So tell me a little bit more now. When did you find out that he only had so much longer?

Speaker 2:

Well, there were different things that were happening. He wasn't all that healthy when we met, but neither of us knew it. There were different incidences he started having high blood pressure and nosebleeds, and then he had kidney stones. And then there was something else and something else. But we were taking Thanksgiving dinner to my father, I think a year or two after my mom had died and Harry had been. He loved to cook, so he'd been in the kitchen all day cooking the turkey, standing on his feet, and when he went to carry the turkey out to the car, he just he looked at me and he said I just don't feel right, Like I don't feel well at all.

Speaker 2:

We got to my dad's house, we walked in, I put the turkey in the kitchen and my dad came out and he said there's something wrong with Harry, he doesn't look right. And so, fortunately, he allowed me to make an appointment to see a family doctor the next day. This is very rare. This family doctor understood his symptoms, knew what was potentially happening and got us an appointment at the Ottawa Heart Institute within a few days. This is one of the best heart clinics in all of Canada, but they also have a special branch called the Pulmonary Arterial Hypertension Clinic. That's what it turned out he had.

Speaker 2:

Most people go undiagnosed for years because doctors think it's asthma or bronchitis or different heart things. They don't understand that there are specific symptoms that show up when the pulmonary arteries which are the arteries in the right side of the heart, not the left, which is usually where people have heart issues but they're clogged and they can't get enough oxygen into people's bodies clogged and they can't get enough oxygen into people's bodies. And so he would fall asleep anytime. He sat down because he was constantly exhausted, he couldn't catch his breath. We would go for walks across to the river in front of where we lived and he would have to sit down and he just would say, oh, I just want to watch the ducks, and he would not let me know.

Speaker 1:

Oh yeah, finding like kind of excuses to make you feel comfortable and safe throughout this. So after he was diagnosed, about how much longer did you have to be able to be with him? Did you do it? You mentioned anticipatory grief. I'm assuming hearing that word. It kind of means you know somebody is nearing the end of their life. This could be the case for maybe people as well who have loved ones with cancer. Something like this Is that right, absolutely.

Speaker 2:

And when we got the diagnosis the doctors were really clear. They said we don't go on Google, don't look up the symptoms. You'll read all sorts of stuff that just aren't true. But it's a very aggressive, incurable disease that he had, and so it was rare, aggressive and incurable those were the words that kind of stuck in my head. Three to five years was the average prognosis. They put them on very strong drug therapy, which is almost like continuous chemotherapy. It's actually really horrible and some patients do well for way, way, way longer. But he had some other issues that were already showing up and so for him this was kind of the winding down. He was a hunter, a fisher, he loved being outdoors, he was strong, he was vibrant, and then this disease got hold of him. We did well for the first three years. We continued. He was district officer during those years.

Speaker 1:

Oh, so he's still working or doing his thing, and all of that stuff is still going.

Speaker 2:

Okay, oh yeah, and then eventually the drug therapies they start stacking them up and then eventually the disease just keeps overcoming the therapies.

Speaker 1:

Can I ask you, terry, because my heart kind of started like feeling something right now as I was talking and I'm just thinking can you talk about what it must have felt like in those three years to see the love of your life going about, doing his life like normal, doing all these things? But you know this is not going to last. Like you said, you're not getting your golden years with this man, this love of your life. How does that change you? What did you do differently? Gained 50 pounds.

Speaker 2:

Go on. That's a huge part of it. Well, the first couple of years we both just you know, we're both speakers. So he became a member of the board for the Pulmonary Hypertension Association of Canada. I became an advocate so we threw ourselves into making sure parliament, making sure medical systems, knew what we needed to get drugs approved. We were very active.

Speaker 2:

I helped start a support group for the Ottawa community, which is still one of the strongest and biggest in the country of patients because the patients were always well taken care of and caregivers, because I felt the caregivers had an unheard voice that needed to be supported and loved and carried through so we could carry what can't be carried. And so I've spoken at their conferences. I actually helped them develop a tool to help caregivers, you know map their wellness throughout different stages of this anticipatory grief journey and just general awareness. We have a great support group on Facebook that I'm still part of, even though it tears my heart out sometimes to see other people that I've come to know and love going down that slope where the symptoms are getting worse and the drugs are no longer coping. So one of my ways of coping you can't see my bookshelf, but I have a bookshelf that's about 12 books long of anticipatory grief.

Speaker 2:

How do you deal with death when you know it's coming? How do you face what can't be faced? I read a lot. I'm not a support group person other than the one I helped start, but I read a lot. I took a lot of webinars about understanding end of life and I wrote a TEDx talk. That's where that talk came from was me trying to cope with it?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, it sounds like you really kind of put your energy into doing stuff, which I think is just so beautiful, like you fought for legislation. You kept working. You didn't kind of just stop. You guys didn't just stop your lives. You didn't just grieve the entire time. There was grief that was happening whilst kind of making something out of this. And you're right, your TEDx talk is one of the most powerful TEDx talks I've watched in a long time, like it was just incredibly special.

Speaker 1:

So I a bit of my personal story. I lost my dad back in 2014 with a heart attack, what they call the widow baker. So it was. It's the opposite of anticipatory grief. It was getting the phone call and not completely just being like you're making a joke, right, like I don't even. I didn't even get to say goodbye.

Speaker 1:

So my mother she was what? 60 at the time and my dad had just turned 64. And so she did the same thing. She is starting that second stage of her life, not expecting this without the love of her life, you know, going through all of this and she's just lost, just completely lost. And I actually sent her your TEDx talk and I remember it made her cry a lot, because having someone there to kind of understand this process. It's you just when you're in it, and would you agree with this one? And maybe again, anticipatory grief is different than sudden grief, but sometimes you just feel alone. What would you say to those women out there Maybe someone's listening right now. They've lost their loved one, they've lost the love of their life and she just feels so alone. What would you say to that?

Speaker 2:

There's almost no words that can help anybody make it feel better, because no words can. When I moved here this past summer, I went through or three summers ago, when I left Ottawa, I went through a stack of sympathy cards from Harry's funeral and I was rereading them all. I didn't bring them with me, I let them all go, but I was rereading them all and realizing that, no matter what people said at the time or how much they meant, none of it mattered. It's really strange, because a sudden death is really difficult. Knowing someone's going to die is really difficult.

Speaker 2:

I talk about it like it's like you're standing on train tracks and you can see the light of the train coming towards you, barreling towards you. You know it's coming. You're not even sure you can step out the way and have the time. You don't know if you want to, and that's a reality as well. It's probably one of the toughest things I've ever gone through and I'm still. You're never not out of not missing that person. I don't think you're in the same stages of grief as when it immediately happens. But, as someone said the other day, grief is universal, but everybody's experience with it is individual and unique.

Speaker 1:

It is. I love that. I want to repeat that Grief is universal right. Of course we've all been through grief. We all will go through grief at some point in time probably, but each person's experience is unique.

Speaker 2:

Unique. That's why I love to do what I'm doing now, which is kind of a grief advocacy, grief literacy education, in that we really need to understand that people need to grieve the way they need to grieve. And there's some wonderful active grief experts out there. I'm on all their groups, I think, and on linkedin and whatnot, but one of them has a book called it's okay not to be okay on LinkedIn and whatnot, but one of them has a book called it's Okay Not to Be Okay. And there's another one called Refuge in Grief and most of the work that these women are doing.

Speaker 2:

And there's one gentleman I've just started following who lost his wife a year or two ago. He's very articulate and very clear on Facebook and it's we're alone. We'll never have that person back in our life because they are gone. The future we thought we would have, the trips Harry and I had planned, the houses we might have lived in or what we would do, just having someone to have coffee at the kitchen table. With the way I started my TEDx talk, you know I miss those wise conversations with somebody caring and warm and understanding on a daily basis.

Speaker 1:

This touches on something that I heard my mom talk about, which she said something in one of her grief-stricken moments of just being like people don't understand that you're grieving more than the loss of your husband.

Speaker 1:

Yes, yeah, you're grieving exactly that. I think it was when you said, like having coffee. Now my mom and dad, they are smokers, so they have this like little special space outside in the back of their little house that they would go and have their morning smoke at. But that was that it's like not having someone to speak to in the morning anymore, not having that person to grab you the milk from the fridge while you're busy cooking something you know like for so long. She would turn to like say something, because he's always right there and then he's not anymore. And it's like those are the griefs, like there's grief after grief after grief after grief after grief, and I think honoring that heaviness is so important to all of us. Not thinking I should be over this by now. Can you speak a little bit on that concept? How long has it been since Harry's passed it?

Speaker 2:

was eight years on June 27th of this year, so it's been a while.

Speaker 1:

Eight years, and that feeling, that concept where just recently something happened and I started crying because I missed my dad for some reason or whatnot.

Speaker 1:

And I had that immediate reaction, that like old school feeling of like it's been like 11 years, jen, what is? You know what I mean? Like why are you not over this yet? And I stopped that immediately. The work that I do now, the self-compassion, all of that stuff. I immediately was like you're allowed to feel and grieve however long you need to, but can you touch on that feeling where people say I should be over this by now, I should have moved on, I should go get married? Any of that stuff?

Speaker 2:

I tell them to stop shitting on me.

Speaker 1:

Stop shitting, yes.

Speaker 2:

We love to shit on people. You should do this, you should do that, you should do this. It has no place in grief language at all whatsoever. It's none of their business how long I take Now. If I'm in deep grief, that's debilitating. After eight years I need help. You know there is kind of chronic grief or complicated grief or long-term grief, and that is when you need to be with a licensed practitioner psychotherapist, psychologist, whatever that specializes in helping people. I will never say move on, because you don't, but you move forward.

Speaker 2:

And I have seen a beautiful illustration where there's a bookshelf and so if you look at the first month of when Harry died, there might've been one book on the bookshelf the book of Harry, the book of my life with Harry and then it might've stayed empty for a year or two years. But eventually there are other books that come in. I'm now a grandmother, so you might see the birth of my first grandchild. My son got married six months after Harry died, so I became a mother-in-law. There'd be other books that would be now part of that, but the Book of Harry remains in that one space in the bookshelf. It doesn't move, it doesn't shift. You just keep adding more life experiences, more books, more holidays with the children, more Toastmaster things, more goals for myself that I just keep. I guess I'm extremely, from what people have told me, intrinsically motivated to just still keep finding purpose, finding purpose.

Speaker 1:

I've heard that before, like in terms of what are the things that can really make your life satisfied, fulfilling? There's kind of four key things, you know. Usually it's whole foods, healthy foods, movement, and one of them is a sense of purpose.

Speaker 2:

Yes.

Speaker 1:

And that sense of purpose. I heard that even when you were talking about the time before. You know, in those three years you and Harry had a sense of purpose together. You found that purpose and sometimes it takes needing to go with a coach or a therapist or a psychologist to get them to help you find that purpose. But if you're feeling purposeless right now, you're kind of mindlessly all over the place. That's okay, right as well. For a little time. Like you said, a year, two years. Take your time with it and then, if you're starting to feel stuck, if you're starting to feel like maybe I could be doing something a little bit more but I don't know how that's when you go and you get help. You find grief educators. You find them online, on Facebook and LinkedIn, on Instagram, and these are the places where don't be afraid to ask for help, right, is that right, terry?

Speaker 2:

It's huge and for someone who's as self-sufficient as I am and apparently I've got strong Liverpool bloodlines and pull yourself up by your bootstraps and to be an entrepreneur, as you yourself know, you need an extraordinary amount of resilience and just an ability to learn new things and adapt and build. The world of coaching that I'm in now is very different to what I started in 2011 when I was still married and I certified within you know a Toastmaster certified speaking coaching. It's very different, but I've had to learn to adapt and learn to adapt, and some stuff I'm better at than others, and when I can't do some of the tech stuff, I ask for help. But it's true, being resilient, being self-aware enough to know or to have family around you that says, you know, mom, you've been really low for the past couple of months. What can we do? Who can we help you connect with? Or do you just want a little mini holiday?

Speaker 1:

You know, oh, I love that. So I love that so much in terms of, let's say, you have someone else who is struggling. So I can imagine I have some listeners now and they have parents, or maybe I'm thinking of someone whose sister recently lost her husband. That's such a good point that you can help them in ways where you're kind of asking them what they need, not necessarily going over and kind of projecting and putting all of your stuff. You need to be doing this, you need to be getting out, because if you ask someone, hey, do you want? You need to be going on vacation, or you should be right, that's what you said Don't shoot on yourself, don't shoot on other people either. And so if you're saying, like you got to get out of the house, you need to go get some sunlight, can you talk us through a little bit what would be the nice, balanced way of helping someone?

Speaker 2:

It's really tough because, again, it depends on different people. Some people are more easy to approach when they're hurt and in pain than others and others. You have to be able to read the signals behind what they may be shutting you out because they need to protect. I can honestly say in the weeks even though I knew Harry was going to die in the weeks after he died, I felt like I was walking around inside out, like someone had turned all my nerve endings to the outside of my body. I felt raw, I felt like I was vibrating, but I also felt invisible, because no one else knows that you've just come back from a funeral or no one else knows, unless you're close work colleagues. But I had finished work by the time he died. I was working for myself, but my family and people that were close to me a drink or let's go take a walk together those are the things that are really helpful. It's the people that come in with prescriptive do's and don'ts that just don't understand, and usually they haven't lost someone. Please don't do this.

Speaker 2:

The one-upmanship of grief and loss oh, I know exactly how you feel because my uncle died years ago and so by the time Harry died, my mom had died in 2010. That was hard. I was still working. I had a wonderful manager who supported me beautifully through that whole process and then, about seven years later, my father died. But he had watched me help Harry through the whole illness and he was my go-to, sometimes when I just needed to say, hey, harry's going back in for another nasty test, you know, and he'd check in with me. So he died and eight months later Harry died, and so that was like yeah.

Speaker 2:

But when people come up and they say, oh, we're so sorry for your loss. You know, when mom died, we're sorry for your loss, we're sorry for your loss. Okay, I understand, we don't know what to say when people have died, and so that becomes the go-to. But then when dad died and Harry died and I'm talking to people, I say, well, I lost my mom, I lost my dad, I lost my husband, I lost my husband. I joked about it once in a Toastmasters speech. I said that just makes me sound careless.

Speaker 1:

Stop losing people all the time. Stop losing people.

Speaker 2:

And I actually said in that talk they're not house keys or an umbrella. You know I haven't lost, you know I haven't misplaced them.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, it's not a loss. Oh, what would you say instead, Terri? I would love to explore this.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and so Megan Devine is one of the people I do follow. She's the one with the Refuge in Grief. She has a whole series of graphics that are really important to share that say don't say this, but try this instead, and some of them is you know, this must be really hard, just right up front. This must be really hard. This must be really hard.

Speaker 1:

That really sucks that's kind of my go-to. That's actually really good to hear because I just get really honest and I'm just kind of like dude. That really sucks, oh my god it does.

Speaker 2:

And so many people don't say that they want to gloss over it because they want to make you feel better, which it's not their job to do. And the other thing is I had a friend. She's a lovely British lady. She always wanted to cheer me on. She always wanted to say, well, at least you can. If you find yourself saying well, at least, yes, well, at least, oh, no, stop it. Yeah, at least you've got your children's visit to look forward to coming up, surely that makes you feel better.

Speaker 2:

And I'm saying, surely it doesn't bring him back from the dead. Like I can be really brutal with people that are starting to be too chirpy and just come on, buck up and get over it, you know. And so, yeah, it's like learning the language to cope with grief. That's what grief literacy is all about. And this is what I'm starting to ask more and more workplaces when they're starting to look at their policies and procedures or how they're supporting their employees that are coming back to work, like when mom died and I went back to work with three to five days because that's all you get. My manager then was just so supportive and so loving and I had the flexibility I need. There's huge documentation of how poorly we function when we're still in that grief state. We think we're doing okay but productivity at work falls back. We could be a safety issue with some jobs at work and the stats that I came across when I was researching that Disrupt HR talk about bringing grief to work.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, such a great talk. By the way, it even opened up my mind a lot in terms of thinking like, oh my gosh, you're right, we don't take any time, this is wild.

Speaker 2:

Are we supporting employees? Enough was one point in that. Do the managers understand how to lead through loss? Lead through loss Through loss, not around it or ignoring it or bypassing it? Can managers? Are we training them enough so they can lead an employee through a deep, significant loss of a spouse, a daughter, even extremely important pets, all of that sort of thing, but the bottom line. I was shocked when I read that in the US alone, it's like $1.8 billion a year are lost to companies in their finances and their bottom line, to productivity, due to grief more money.

Speaker 1:

But actually, if you gave them more time off or you listen to them or you were able to actually, like you know, have them come into HR, talk about how, how heavy of a loss was this? Was this somebody in your life every day, like you said, were you drinking coffee with them? There could be different. Even losing my dad, it wasn't as the same as like for my brother, because my brother so much closer to him and they were together and he could come over to his house and help things out, but I'm on the other side of the country, so my brother's loss was different than mine. He needed more time than I did.

Speaker 1:

That doesn't make anyone, you know, more greater loving all that stuff. But talk to HR, do that, and then actually the company themselves will lose less money. Or, you know, I guess, make more money or stay equal, whatever it is, by allowing that person that time to grieve, versus forcing them back before they're ready. Then, like you said, you don't have productivity, you start making tons of mistakes, you don't actually just have someone else in their place doing the job as it should be done. All of this stuff I just thought was so clever, such a great point.

Speaker 2:

And the other point that I made there was there's not just the dollar cost, but good employees will leave if they're not supported, which is what I did under my second director, who did not understand how sick Harry was and was really not supportive of what I was going through. As I'm doing multiple doctor's visits, my son was having braid surgery at the same time and there was just a whole lot going on, and meanwhile she would say, well, you're not really doing the job we're paying you for. And in the end I had to say you know what, you're right. And she was absolutely right and I had no strength left in me to advocate for myself.

Speaker 2:

There are things I should have done, but I just couldn't even think about it and so I just said okay, so what I'll do is I'll quit, but you can't quit the federal government in Canada. I resigned and then I got a small pension not as much as I would have had if I'd stayed and not as much support as I would have had if I'd stayed. But at that point I was a very valuable employee before Harry got sick and in the end I had to make a choice because I was gaining weight, getting sick. I had chronic lung infections. I had numerous things going on and I finally said I have one job right now and that is to go home and take care of him until he's gone. And that's what I did, yeah.

Speaker 1:

Terry, I just want to say thank you so so much for just being so vulnerable and sharing so much of the story. I know one of the things that you said was take this situation you're in, take this grief that you have and find a purpose for it, find a way to kind of still work through it. Like you said, work through these feelings, this grief. Don't shit on yourself, don't think that you need to be doing one thing or another. But let's say there's someone out there. Something I was thinking about is my big thing. My platform is getting women to use their voice again, getting them to find that voice, and I was thinking, as you're talking, I'm like what better way to find your voice than to talk about it? So there is a woman out there and she wants to tell her story. If there's a woman out there, you know you and I both know this now there are stages everywhere. Even this podcast is a stage. There are webinars, there are podcasts, there are people online. They want to hear from women, they want to hear their grief stories. It's so powerful, it's so important.

Speaker 1:

If they want some help with writing that speech, they can reach out to you right, absolutely, that's what you do. I mean you guys. This is Terry's thing. I know she's talking about grief. She's a beautiful grief educator but also amazing speaker, speaking coach. I can't even say the word speaking, see. That's why I need so much help, terry. But I was thinking what a beautiful way for them to find purpose. Maybe they just say it once or twice somewhere, but they get it out. So how can they reach out to you? Tell us a little bit more. They can get your book or anything like that. I want them to know you more.

Speaker 2:

Thank you. Well, my book is on Amazon in the US, in Canada and the UK. Wherever you can buy books on Amazon and as long as you spell Terry as a four letter word T-E-R-I, you'll find me. I am on LinkedIn. I tend to post a fair bit on LinkedIn, mostly TED tips, but I also on Fridays, I'm trying to touch more on the grief aspect of the work I'm doing now because I'm a coach and I'm a speaker. I love coaching people where they are, and so that means I don't have a cookie cutter program that I put all my speakers through. People come to me, talk to me. Sometimes they want to know what their TED idea is. I do have a chance. If you go to my website, you'll see there's a chance to book a discovery call. Do you know what their TED idea is? I do have a chance. If you go to my website, you'll see there's a chance to book a discovery call. Do you know what your website URL is?

Speaker 1:

It's Real Impact Speaking. Real Impact Speaking.

Speaker 2:

Okay, perfect, spelled exactly what it looks like On LinkedIn. I'm under Terry Kingston, but I love to have those half-hour chats with people to see if they have an idea we're spreading, which is so important to Ted, but also more and more now to help women, as you said exactly, find the story that needs the voice that other women need to hear.

Speaker 1:

Find the story that needs the voice that other women need to hear. Whoa, that's stunning, I got to put that somewhere. That's like, yeah, that's, I think, where you and I intersect. Terry is exactly that place, right, we just really want to be able to lift up voices, be able to help people find their power, find their confidence, because that's the thing is there's so many people.

Speaker 1:

I never would have thought that I was going to be a speaker before I got this opportunity with Ted. That's because I talk so much. And then, like someone was like, hey, you know you could actually put these words into like actual boxes and make sense. And I was like what? And the next thing, you know it is it's giving me a sense of purpose, it's helping me heal, it's helping me just be able to find a place for myself within this world. You know as wacky and wild as it is right now, and so that's what I encourage.

Speaker 1:

If you're out there listening and you've been through any type of grief it could be your loved one passing away, it could be a divorce, it could be moving away, it could be anything that grief means to you Find some purpose through that, find a way, maybe, to share your story. You can even come into. I have a Facebook group Speak Honest. You can come in and just share your story there. There's so many women in there that just want to lift each other up. You come in and you say this is my husband, this is what we went through, this is how much I love. Come and tell all your stories about it. We want to hear all of that. But, terry, thank you so much for being on the podcast today and I hope you have a beautiful week.

Speaker 2:

Thank you, I appreciate being your guest.

Speaker 1:

Is there anything else that you would like to say as we wrap up today?

Speaker 2:

One final thought you cannot take a story to the stage that you haven't fully dealt with yourself, and so when we talk about grief, it is very vulnerable and you need to be ready.

Speaker 2:

So it's to have healed enough within yourself that you could stand in your own pain. It still comes in waves, but share the story from a place of strength and, with that wound covered, rather than the raw vulnerability we feel, go to the support groups when you're still processing the grief. When you're ready, then that's when the stage and the audience will be ready for you, and so that's really, really important. We're not up there to have the audiences, our therapists. We really need to be speaking from a place of of strength and what we've learned. Right, and that's really, really important. But do reach out to Jen or myself or Jen's Facebook group sounds wonderful Explore what grief feels like for you and then, when you're ready to maybe do a TEDx talk or put in an application for some of these other great stages, reach out, find me on LinkedIn or find me on my website and we can start a journey.

Speaker 1:

Beautiful. Thank you so much, terri, you are most welcome.

Speaker 2:

You take care, you too.

Speaker 1:

All right, everyone, I hope you enjoyed this conversation with Terry as much as I did. I could just sit and chat with Terry all the time. I wanted to go and get like a cup of tea with her at the end of the session and I was like I just want to go be near her. She just has this energy about her. That is stunning. It makes you feel safe, it makes you feel calm, it makes you just feel just so taken care of. When you're with her, her voice is so soothing and I think that's just one of her strong suits, which is amazing. I hope you got so much out of this conversation. Like I said in the intro, even if you haven't lost a loved one, this conversation is still so important. The topics that we touched on like not shitting on yourself huge, just so huge in that, and there were so many other amazing tidbits. I want you to let me know which area of the conversation spoke most to you. You can jump into the facebook group, speak honest, secure communication for women. Go find us over there and just keep the conversation going.

Speaker 1:

And remember, if you wanted to get in on the ground floor of my new book, dance of attachment, which is with the publishing company that I'm, you know, working with Terry, then you can join us. I'm going to drop a link in the show notes, or you can just go to danceofattachmentcom, so danceofattachmentcom will get you the information you need to sign up for early release. We can win free books. You can help me out with reading pre-copies, maybe helping me to check and make sure I'm writing everything correctly. If you want to read a chapter too, I have the first four chapters written. So, hey, maybe you want to read the chapter on disorganized attachment. If you do, let me know when you sign up to be a part of the dance circle.

Speaker 1:

We want to create a community here at Speak Honest and really, really see that healing is a co-collaborative space. All right, this is why we need community. In fact, in order to earn a secure attachment, you have to be able to do it in relationship, and what better way to do it than with a bunch of other like-minded you know, wackadoodle women that are all trying to do their best as well. So come into the Speak Honest community over at Facebook and join us there. All right, everyone, I hope you have a beautiful week.

Speaker 1:

I will speak with you all next week. Take care, as we wrap up today's conversation, always remember that healing is a journey, not a destination, and it is an honor to be a part of your healing journey. If you want to dig deeper into the topics we covered today, be sure to head over to our show notes, where you can find all of the valuable information mentioned in today's episode right there, and please remember to rate, review and subscribe if you enjoyed today's podcast. Your feedback means the world to us and helps others discover our podcast. Until next time, remember to speak up and speak honest.

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