The Dennison Download

From Surviving to Thriving with Deanna McKellip

Kara and Jack Dennison Season 1 Episode 10

Have you ever heard the phrase, you can’t change anyone but yourself?

Different upbringings and life experiences give us each our own identity, but they also highlight the fact that we each learn different skills based on how our parents raised us. This can include survival skills. 

Deanna shares how the transformation of asking “why is this happening for me” instead of asking “why is this happening to me” became a life changing shift in radical self-responsibility, allowing her to feel empowered to seek the lesson instead of stuck in victim mentality mode.

Trigger Warning: We discuss Eating Disorders, cPTSD, and Suicidal Ideation in this episode

In this episode, you can expect Kara, Jack, and Deanna to talk about:

  • What transformation means to Deanna and how she overcame cPTSD and an eating disorder to thrive in her business and life
  • How your upbringing can influence your life, and how not everyone may grow up with the same tools for basic self-care. How to learn these lessons later in life.
  • Why it’s important to listen to your body and be more intuitive, not only when it comes to eating but also living intentionally 
  • The importance behind therapy in growth and how radical self-responsibility plays into it 

Want to watch it instead? Click here: https://youtu.be/SG6ypbBCnI8

About Deanna: Deanna is a woman in tech, and an entrepreneur of two successful businesses. She’s also the host of the popular podcast, Fragmenters. Fragmenters is a podcast that focuses on building up women in male dominated fields. Check her out on Instagram at @fragmenters and on Facebook at facebook.com/Fragmenters1

Sponsor: Optimized Career Solutions at www.optimizedcareersolutions.com  If you're ready for a transformation in your career, but not sure how to take that next step, we want you to learn the strategies and gain the support every high achiever needs to feel empowered in their career. Be confident in your job search and schedule your free consultation with Kara and Jack at https://getstarted.optimizedcareersolutions.com

About Kara: Kara is the CEO of Optimized Career Solutions, an Executive Career and Leadership Coach and a Forbes Contributor. She is a Senior Professional in Human Resources (SPHR) who has spent her career as a Corporate Recruiting Leader, working closely with decision-makers. Throughout her career, Kara has personally reviewed over 300,000 resumes. Through her executive coaching programs, she has helped thousands of professionals land their dream jobs and has been responsible for negotiating over $10 million in salary increases over the last few years.

About Jack: Jack is the COO of Optimized Career Solutions, an Executive Career Coach, and comes from a life coaching, personal training, and philosophy background. As the Accountability and Mindset Coach in their coaching program, Jack is passionate about helping high achievers and leaders live impactful lives by shifting mindsets, gaining personal accountability, and achieving personal and professional wins that lead to major life transformations. As a high ticket sales closer, Jack has sold over $1M in high ticket sales in under 3 years.


Email – thedennisondownload@gmail.com

Website – https://optimizedcareersolutions.com/

Kara LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/karadennisonsphr/

Jack LinkedIn -https://www.linkedin.com/in/jackrdennison/ 

Instagram - @thedennisondownload

Tiktok - @karadennisonsphr

we love to talk about transformation I know we talked a little bit about transformation on your podcast and


you've had an incredible life of just changing and rising from the ashes like


Phoenix and I'd love to hear what does transformation mean to you in your life


oof um well I'll be honest transformation is why I'm still here if I did not make


that transformation on a personal level I would not be here as of it's 2023 so


three years ago I had my exit plans


welcome back to the Denison download and the first episode of 2023 we hope you


all survive the holidays and welcome to the new year we are so excited to


introduce you to our first guest of the New Year Dina hi what's up hi hi


welcome we are so excited to have you here Dina Dina macalp is I probably said that


wrong please correct me if I did mckellip mckellip okay uh is amazing


Dina is not only a woman in Tech which is badass in and of itself but she is


also a podcast hope host she hosts the fragmentors podcast which is incredible


highlighting other women in male-dominated fields which is just oh chef's kiss amazing and she and her


husband are also entrepreneurs and amazingly they started their first


business and has since opened other businesses in the last couple of years so a lot of incredible transformations


in your life Dina I can't wait to dive in that's amazing thank you so much for being here thank you I know if anybody


wants to hear Cara over on fragmenters she shared her wisdom there too so just


saying absolutely so definitely go check out my uh episode at launch I think in October of last year right yes awesome


so we had a really really great uh conversation there so Dina


we love to talk about transformation I know we talked a little bit about transformation on your podcast and


you've had an incredible life of just changing and rising from the ashes like


Phoenix and I'd love to hear what does transformation mean to you in your life


um well I'll be honest transformation is why I'm still here if I did not make


that transformation on a personal level I would not be here as of it's 2023 so


three years ago I had my exit plan so okay it is life and death to me


that is obviously the far end of the spectrum transformation to me is


fun and exciting and I okay I'll start from the beginning


because when people hear that they're like oh what a sappy blah blah blah but it was fun and exciting though right


after so it's got to be wild go for it yes so at one point my


I'll explain how much I've transformed my husband wanted to throw me a surprise


party not with people but just do something as a surprise take me


somewhere experience new things which I absolutely love traveling and doing new things but I was having panic attacks


because I didn't know where we were going or what we were doing sure surprise and change was terrifying and


now it's fun and exciting so that's why for me it's such a huge pivotal thing


yeah and in order to get there obviously I had to go through a lot of different


things first and foremost 100 if you are struggling especially this time of year I get sad


the seasonal depression not just sad so especially this time of year after the


holidays you no longer have things looking forward to or if the holidays are rough it could see if you even


grayer colder and Bleaker so 100 therapy yeah it


even if you don't think you need it like you're like I don't know what I'm gonna talk about or I had a good childhood or


there's really nothing going on I'm just sad and it's ridiculous just go the


worst that's going to happen is you're gonna spend a few dollars on yourself talk to someone and decide it's not for you the best


that can happen is it can literally change your life for the better so that's number one and that is what


saved me I am now with my third therapist we are working on an eating disorder I realized I had that I didn't


know I could have because I was fat I'll be honest I did not know I could have it


and it might be my night night night thank you whatever that is


or just my lack of Education in it but I was talking on fragmenters to a health


and nutrition coach coach and afterwards we were talking about it I hired her worked with her I knew all the things


but I couldn't do it um really that's an eating disorder if you know what to do and you cannot for


the life of you follow it because you have some mine I have a trigger Warning


by the way a binge and restrictive cycle so I would restrict myself to the point


of starvation having like two to seven hundred calories a day until I couldn't


handle it anymore and then I do like three to five thousand in a couple days and just keep going back and forth


so that is an eating disorder and that is why I'm heavy I've come to find out


even though I knew what to do I exercise I do all the things that's it so this is


my latest adventure for transformation wow tell me a little bit


um well one how long have you been doing this the binging and the Restriction


thing and how did you and your therapist kind of work through that and just or how are you rather working through that


and describing it so it all starts back when I was in diapers


and I know it really does though I grew up in a


pretty tumultuous childhood situation there was drugs there was alcohol I


think the first time I got drunk was with my parents and I was eight years old so it was not your average Lifestyle


and with that came a lot of traumas and when you have people surrounded with


addiction you have issues I had food insecurities hygiene insecurities a lot


of other stuff but I didn't eat a lot and I couldn't and we couldn't well it wasn't afforded to us


so it started when I was young okay and then when I got a little older I'm curvy


when I was at my my lowest weight it was after I had my daughter I was 17 years


old I could only well I couldn't afford food so where I worked I got one free


side when I worked so I'd have a side of fries a day and that was it and I was in housekeeping so I worked my ass off


literally yeah so I was like so skinny you could see bones and I was a size 10.


so that's that's what I mean by curve yeah I'm just bigger but


that wasn't the thing in the 90s in the 90s what was the thing was you know


super skinny and so that's when the true


anorexia started and then I got to the point where I wasn't eating so much that


like my teeth were having issues and I was having skin issues so then it transformed to bulimia after I had my


daughter got into better working finished high school did all that I was able to eat more but I had never learned


a proper way of eating so I gotta say it it was forever wow


that's fast it's almost sorry to um


to keep going on to this but it's almost like you were never taught about it and so now is it almost a relearning


process 100 so what I did and you you brought up


something that I really I feel like I'm pretty good at explaining because


a lot of people think they know that not everyone has the same upbringing and that common sense you know but there is


a shared common sense and I can tell you there's not because like you said I didn't learn how to eat properly I mean


there were times I went to my grandmother's house or friends houses and I did experience you know like fresh


vegetables fresh fruits I didn't have that at home so I had experience with it but


know how to do it and everyone's like well of course you know how to eat but really you don't


um I didn't learn how to clean until I was 30 years old like when my boyfriend


when we first started getting serious and he came over and I was gonna clean I


pulled out a mop a sponge a gallon of bleach and Lysol wipes


and we're gonna clean the whole house and he was like where's your bucket where is your toilet cleaner I'm like I


don't I don't need any of that you put water in the sink and you put the mop in and he's like no you don't so like


literally to the bear what you think is bare minimum to yourself is not it really


and when I finally figured that out it really helps me in situations


personally it helps me with my kids especially because sometimes you're like


[ __ ] I told you 700 times but they have so many things you're learning


it helps put into perspective that it's not actually easily easy and it's


definitely helped me in my career moving up to I'm now in leadership so in


my career working with my peers especially since I kind of for a while had a chip on my shoulder because my


first experience in it was in a gold mine and that was just really frustrating to work with men so then I


had this chip on my shoulder and then I was just mean to men because of it but when I finally figured out that portion


that it's not just me that everyone else just because it's really common sense for me how to you know script HTML and


work with DNS and all of that stuff it has to be learned for someone else


yeah yeah and you had asked me something else and I just went on that tangent so what


was your original question I love it what I am really Gathering from this is that you know


it's eye-opening for me too because I think we all kind of walk around this


the world right with this assumed knowledge that everyone has this base


level knowledge right we all know how to walk talk eat right or Faith properties


whatever and it's really eye-opening to know and to to hear it and I appreciate


you sharing thank you that not every one of us has the same upbringing or has learned the


basics to the same level or to a different level or whatever as each


other and what's fascinating is I look at you Dina and I'm like wow I'm badass like holy crap like HTML scripting woman


in leadership entrepreneur like holy moly and to hear you say I didn't even really learn how to to clean properly or


the basic rules of of feeding right until I was older and


it's true when I think about my life too there are some of those basic things that I didn't learn that I was older but


I could I can rattle off all this other stuff and I make this joke all the time to Jack and to other people where I'm


like man I feel so smart and some stuff and so dumb and the other things right


but it really just truly is a a good reminder to us that


every person that we meet knows something we don't know but every person that we meet might not


know what we know too so it just goes back to being kind and and to remembering like you said when you're


teaching people are a leader you don't know what they don't know so sometimes that assumed knowledge might not be


there as well either yeah it definitely helps like I said helps at home with the


kids helps in my relationship with communication because we had two different upbringings for sure helps it work because there are


times I walk into a room and there's people who have 20 more years experience


than I do it's more rare now I'm now at 17 years so I'm getting up there but they have so


much more experience and I'll be talking to them about something and they're not getting it and I


am human and I just want to go oh my God are you kidding me you don't understand this but they're 30 some odd years of


experience is not anything like what I've experienced so it helps me calm


down and be like [ __ ] you couldn't even brush your teeth right you can be patient explaining this new process


so I want to ask this question when it comes to kind of transformation and and


things one of the things that I've been spending last year 2022 learning or


relearning is how to take care of myself because I like that self-care thing I feel like I


spent a lot of my life living in that survival mode right in that constant state of fight or flight or you know


there's other ones now like bonding whatever but I just tend to find that I'm now


re-learning how to calm my nervous system down and actually live in a


healthy life and a fulfilled life instead of that constant survival mode I


want to start switching my life into thriving instead of surviving and it almost seems like you're kind of transforming into that oh hey I don't


need to survive I I I've got it like I I can take care of myself this is great I'm not in that moment of


holy [ __ ] I don't know where my food's gonna come from I don't know if this is a place where I'm safe anymore I know


I'm safe now I can actually switch into thriving is that is that kind of where you've been a hundred percent so I told


you I had my strategy and plan figured out for 2020. well in 2019 I was in such


a bad place that I didn't think I'd make it to that cut off date so that's why I


entered therapy and um when I finally told my therapist hey


just so you know we just passed this date and that's why I went to you she was like what the she was just like


flabbergasted but that again that really shows you just


how much you could not know someone because my therapist knew all the things and had no clue where I was so another


Reach Out get therapy ask for help but when I went to her


first session she was like holy [ __ ] UFC PTSD and I


was like I can't have PTSD I never went to war you know I never did any of that so


cptsd is complex post-traumatic stress disorder and if you haven't heard


anything about it essentially it happens to people in my


in my life it's childhood trauma-induced but it can happen to


um like rape survivors domestic violence survivors kidnap survivors it's


something that it's traumas that are lived over and over for a certain amount


of time that actually rewires your brain yeah and so when I found this out first of


all I bald because I'd never had a reason I just was told I


was Germanic I was told that I was too much you know I I didn't know why so when I finally


saw it I was like oh my God there is help there's something for me I just


cried and it was really eye-opening but what we did was EMDR


because I was I'm PTSD I don't I don't remember the


numbers specifically but let's say it's out of a hundred you have


your triggers your I was like I'd had night terrors I'd wake up screaming you know all of the


different things that happen out of like a hundred I was in the 80s I was like


way up there had almost every symptom I was stressed the [ __ ] out


so we started EMDR which is I don't know the acronym I try to remember that one


just escapes me every time it's like I wrap it yeah it's like eye movement


rapid desensitive decent that word yeah


we get it yeah well yeah and essentially it's a way to work in a safe place with


your therapist to retrain those neural Pathways so that


you're not always expecting the worst like if I got in a slight argument with


my partner my nervous system felt like I was being punched in the face like there was no in


between I was either everything's fine and hunky-dory or I was being stabbed


yeah there was no a little tiny disagreement would send me spiraling


into deep depression so being able to work through that and first of all


knowing that it it wasn't my fault that I wasn't just


a dramatic [ __ ] like I'd always heard was so good getting on Prozac the right


dosage key um and then working through the EMDR I


think after a year and a half was when we did my final test and I'm in


remission okay so it never goes away those were super grooved in there they


can come back if I don't continuously take care of myself but it took about a year and a half of the MDR to get


through that then pandemic happened everybody's losing it


um trying to keep my head together trying to keep kids in school doing all the things that everyone had to do


um after that started feeling somewhat normal that's when I started my podcast and had that conversation with Kirsten


and was like oh there's there's a lot there's some more trauma there that I didn't even register and now I'm working


with I'm pretty woo I'm I'm just saying so talk therapy is


good and I do a little bit of it but like EMDR worked really well and now I'm doing ifs which is integrated family


systems and essentially it's it's a meditation based that's how I


would say that's not how they explain it but in my experience it's more of a meditation close your eyes get in the


zone go inside and then you interact with all the different parts of


you and your parts are your little toddler self that was hungry


or you know the fat kid in school that was made fun of and just try to make


yourself an integrated family yeah and it has


been that's how I've been working on my eating disorder yeah on the therapy and Wu side on the actual side on the not


actual but on the lived experience side initially I forced myself to have three


meals a day it was a must and let me tell you I


cried sometimes when I was eating because I did not want to I


tried to Purge and made myself stop so it was


that that's how heavily ingrained this was and I didn't even know it existed so


that was my initial after six months of eating three meals a day minimum you


know I could have snacks I could whatever um I gained a [ __ ] ton of weight obviously because I'd never done it


before but I got to where I didn't have the


Cravings to hurt myself anymore especially working with a therapist hurt myself as in restrict or eat to the


point where I'm miserable you know those were those were how I caused myself pain so working with the therapist doing the


regular eating now we're we're I'm learning how to listen to my body


like I've never had that hunger and I've never had that full I just when I had


food I ate it and when I didn't have food that was just


the way it was so now I'm finally learning to oh no I'm bored that's not hunger you


know why am I discom feeling discomfort oh that's hunger so I'm again something


that most people understand I'm relearning how to listen to what my body


is saying whether I'm hungry or not and working on the intuitive eating so that's that's where I'm at so far I love


that you know that brings me a lot the intuitive eating and listening to your


body it reminds me a lot of what Jack and I talk about which is kind of living intentionally


um when we were in South Florida and severely burnt out and stressed out it


was almost like um we were kind of at the whim of whatever


desire came along or whatever was there you know Starbucks or you know fast food


whatever and we gained a lot of weight mainly because we couldn't discern


between boredom or stress or we just ate and it was more a convenience thing and


more of a we weren't intentionally listening into what we needed or taking


care of ourselves because we were so just burn and taken you know all that


other stuff and so what I really loved about what you were saying is


one it's it sucks feeling so


um so burnt out and so stressed and having


the PTSD and the eating the disorder or the cpsdn eating disorder on top of that is tough and


you can feel a lot of different ways about yourself right and what I loved about your story is that you made a


decision one of you had made one decision and then you made another decision which was to get help and to


tell um your therapist and the overarching theme that I'm getting


from your story is that it's never too bad there's always ways


to get help right from therapy to edmr to IFS I've done NLP right to tapping to


we actually just recorded an episode about using your tools right and there's so many tools to help even if it's just


a minuscule amount those Middle School amounts day by day add up and they can do massive amounts


of things like reprogramming right really detrimental programming that you


have gained throughout your year you can act or your years right you can actually be reprogrammed to have a healthier


better more fulfilling life and to get you out of that survival mode and it's There's Hope out there so anyone who's


listening uh to do the story and you're feeling that way or you've had any of those experiences or something similar


don't do it alone I can't help get therapy get someone who can


um who can listen and to work with you through this for sure right and you are worth someone's time


yeah that was one thing I told myself all the time but you are worth the time


it doesn't just that's it you're worth it it


whatever you are telling yourself or it's not you it's it's that part of you


that says it but whatever it's saying it's a [ __ ] liar and you are worth it


and it doesn't matter who you reach out to you will be


you you can get better yeah I love that let's take a quick break I want to read


our little ad and then I want to come back and I want to hear you go through a couple of years of some


tough work and I want to kind of hear the other side of it and how we're using some of our transformation and all the


stuff that you're doing so let's take a quick break and uh we'll be right back


if you're ready for a transformation and you're not sure where to start Jack and I we always suggest so take a look at


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all right we are with Dina overall badass she is a woman in Tech a leader


woman in Tech she's also an entrepreneur she's the host of the fragmenters podcast and she shared at the top of


this episode her transformation overcoming cptsd and an eating disorder


Dina I want to hear how have you used and you did share a


little bit um at the beginning how you use some of your transformations to help in your job but I want to hear a little bit more


about some of the other I'm not going to say passion projects because these are Big projects your your


business and your your podcast how have you used your transformations to help


transform some of the other lives that you've you've touched you've been around so


that your employees I'd love to kind of hear a little bit about what you're


doing and where you're going well it always starts at home


so at home I am a much better mother than I was to my


kids because confrontation was so awful for me that included with my kids


so I had a couple spoiled little turds [Music]


I'll admit it it was I was always


and then when I was single there was only a good cop so it it got kind of


rough and what I've learned is that I was not teaching them the life lessons they need to be adults if you have a kid


and you just give them give and give and give and you see them fall and you go and catch


them and you make sure they never fall or you pick them up and then you carry


them around for the next two years I'm talking metaphorically my 14 year old is


five inches taller than me so I'm not physically carrying him but you get what I'm saying yeah um


they will not be able to cope with their life because they've not learned at the


ages that they're supposed to how to deal with conflict and how to


fight urges and all of that stuff so I've been able to before they were in


adulthood and I [ __ ] them too royally seriously it's everyone 's worth


nightmare but I've been able to adjust that and help them more into being


better people for themselves and everyone around them so that's first and foremost


um my husband tells me all the time he's a better man because he's with me and I


feel the same for him we have strengthened our bond and our


communication so much I I'm telling you even if you just go to therapy and you're like I don't need this but I need


to learn how to communicate just interacting with them and knowing how to


ask questions better helps your relationships it just does it


I learned how to make everything me


so instead of saying you're being a dick saying when you said this I felt like


you were being a dick it's totally different the way it


impacts even though you say the same thing I get it I get it yeah


so it's definitely helped in that regard he actually is now in therapy because he


was always like I don't I didn't have a bad childhood I didn't I don't know what to talk about now and after seeing me go


from wanting to do the deed to now this you


know super confident I mean not perfect obviously but I'm


super confident in myself I take care of myself every day in some regard journaling working out you can see I get


my nails done that's one of the things that I do just for me I dress better I


do makeup when I want to not because I feel like I have to or I don't you know


he's seen all this he's like I think I'll give it a shot and he's already


feeling different because of going so that's interesting


yeah that actually happened for Jack too do you want to share yeah that was uh exactly what happened I kind of watched


you going through therapy when we got together it was never something I ever felt I needed we had similar


conversations about childhood and kind of talked about how I felt my childhood was good and I never looked back on


anything negatively but what I really realized that once I kind of got over


myself and just tried it was that I I didn't have a lot of the tools like


you said Dina that you're trying to teach your kids so that they can be well good well-rounded adults and I didn't


know how to process the emotions that I was feeling I would just kind of compartmentalize and push them down and


move on yep and I got really good at it I think a lot of


men are good at compartmentalizing too oh yeah I think we're we're probably some of the best at it and so


um just because we're not necessarily told that we're allowed to process emotions or given ways to do it healthily so


typically what you see men doing processing emotions that goes to anger it goes to rage it goes to these bursts


these outbursts because they they hold it into the point where they can't anymore and then unfortunately that's


what happens and that for me I noticed was coming out in


probably more passive aggressive ways I was probably a little bit more passive aggressive in the sense that I was feeling something didn't know how to


process how I was feeling and so instead of saying what I was feeling I would just


be crappy to the people around me you've been in that for over a year now and it's been wildly helpful how about


for for your man so he's only been for a couple months but already there's a transformation


he's still in the beginning stages so it's still


really rough for him but I know where he's at thankfully I've lived it so I'm


a little bit more patient not as patient as I should be I still I'll try the I


know you're hurting right now and blah blah and then after the second or third I'm like no you can't talk to me like this I know


you're hurting but no so I'm not perfect but it's it's already helping and


we communicated really well before but now like I said you start learning the


instead of use you have eyes and it's helping even more and his major issue is


the same Jack and I think it is fed into our boys and men way too much that you


should not show your more emotions you don't want to be a [ __ ] you don't wanna you know you know want to throw like a


girl you don't want to cry like a girl you don't want to be like a girl it's just you're surrounded by it so I'm so


glad you were able to get into it and feel better too yeah it's it's been


awesome it's been very helpful and I tell all my friends anybody who's dealing with something hey maybe this is


something you want to try I I don't uh necessarily think it's for everybody um because I've done it in the past and


it didn't work for me then but also you have to be in the right place you have to be willing to work on yourself you


have to be willing to think past that thought of no everything's fine I'm good


right that surface level mindset that we're all taught to to kind of put out there uh kind of when we go to high


school right well you mentioned Dina is that you know your husband's in that that


tough spot right like therapy is not going to be oh great I had a I had a session and look I'm Healed everything's


great I feel amazing it's the tough work it's the hey are you willing to scratch


the surface and go underneath and see maybe what is going on why you're


reacting sometimes like that to sometimes benign things that maybe other


people don't react that way why why are you reacting that way right and it does it gets tougher sometimes before it gets


better and to Jack's point you have to be willing and ready to do that work or Jack to your other point is maybe that


first therapist wasn't for you sometimes you have to feel comfortable in that container and if you're not try another


therapist you don't have to go with the first one it's like dating you know yeah for sure and you will not hurt their


feelings I've talked to I'm on my third third yeah so three therapists you know and it you're not breaking up with them


they're not gonna be I mean you are important but they're not going to be devastated and heartbroken if you say


hey I'm not really getting anything anymore I'm gonna go to someone else it's it's kind of like it's kind of like


rehab yeah you know they want you to leave and never see you again not


because they don't like you but because then you've healed and you've succeeded or you're on to the next step yeah so


definitely be willing to break up with your therapist but another thing that I had to do was


and I think it's part of what Jack was saying is radical self-responsibility


I growing up the way I did was a victim and I was a victim things that I


experienced no one should have to experience but when you're a victim for so long you


get a victim mentality and that means it's always someone else's fault and I


lived my life like that for a long time everything happened to me everything was


against me you know even good things something bad was gonna happen afterwards because I was always going to


be a victim because I always was and when I was able to have radical


self-responsibility and I don't mean to say if you were raped


it was your fault that is not self-responsibility what it is is acknowledging this horrible terrible


thing happened to me and I am responsible to get past it


that's what it is and when I was able to process that


and realize that once you hit a certain age your childhood your parents aren't to blame


anymore because you have the responsibility to learn what you weren't


taught when you were younger so once I was able to do that that's when you can


scratch through the surface and that's when you can say yes this was horrible awful but


I'll use work again work is way easier to talk about than like some of the other stuff so


I was having an issue with a co-worker he was misogynist is probably still he


retired so I'm not sure but it was really hard to work with him he would


not listen to me he would talk down to me and he was he was a really nice guy he was


just fed this his entire life and that's how he was so I got to the point where I didn't


work with him unless I absolutely had to and when I went in I had a fortress


around me not even barriers I came in already on the offense offense and


defense came in with a biting tongue and


once I started therapy and healing and it went from


getting myself you know bathing and living again and I started seeing around


I walked into that and heard my tone and was like oh [ __ ] I


am part of the problem like this isn't him this


that may have been how it started but after two years of working with him


I have ached the song like I see how I responded like this and he became more


and I became more and we just can't work together and I had to humble myself


forgive myself for sure because that that's where I get stuck a lot but


forgive myself for doing it and saying okay that was me it doesn't have to be me and the next interaction I had he was


a total dick and I was nice as can be and I was like it's because you were a [ __ ] before you gotta get past it the


second time same reaction the third time we worked pretty well together so he had


to realize that it was happening so even if someone is a huge jerk to you


some of it could be you and you have to to look at yourself


and be like how am I hurting this situation sometimes they're just an [ __ ] you


know sometimes you're doing absolutely nothing wrong but 99 of the time I found


a way that I could change and at least no for myself that I've done everything


to make this situation easy I love that I I think that's such a perfect place to wrap up self or radical


self-responsibility is such a huge thing for Jack and I I think


um that victim mentality was something that was brought up to me in therapy as well


um and it's really easy to fall into that victim mentality right because [ __ ]


happens like let's be real I mean especially over the last couple of years with the pandemic and all this other


stuff it's very easy to fall into the why me why me right and


I've seen people live that way I also live that way for a very long time and like my dad dying or I was also date


raped and things like that too and what Dina is saying is those things


are going to happen right life is going to happen and that doesn't mean that you're not a victim of things happening


to you what she's saying is it is then your responsibility to determine what are you going to do after that right


because we've all heard the saying you can't change anyone else but yourself right


you know and that for instance my date rape right I could and I did spend a


couple of years being afraid of men not dating um holding myself up in my apartment uh


not going out with friends really not liking myself right and that was a choice that I did but I lost years off


of my life off of my social life off of my self-confidence and it wasn't until I


flipped it around and became radically self-responsible for my actions to not


let that control who I was moving forward my confidence Etc and I decided


to work through that with therapy Etc and all that other stuff I decided to become responsible for how I was going


to move forward from that and heal from that so what Dina is really saying is when things happen to you you get a


choice you get to either let that thing Define you or you get to become empowered and move


from that learn from it heal from it Etc absolutely I I like to I'm just gonna


get in here for one more second yeah how I reframed it is nothing


ever happens to me anymore it happens for me so if something's bad is


happening yeah if something bad is happening to me I have to sit back and be like what is


the lesson I'm supposed to learn yeah what is it's happening for me to learn


something to better myself now what is it when you're in the throes of it when you have someone dying


it's really hard to do and sometimes you just have to come back to it when you're at a better place but when I start


getting that victim mentality why is this happening to me why does this always happen to me blah blah blah life


is horrible I know something's happening for me to really dig down and figure out how to


change and transform I guess I love that I can grow from it yeah we


just did an episode a couple weeks ago about the win or learn mentality it's it's hey if you're feeling why is this


happening to me if you can't get to the why is this happening for me yet the


question in between was what can I learn from this right and I really like that a


lot um because everything's a lesson that I think really is so Dina thank you so


much for coming on oh my gosh and for telling your story I can I can already tell that this is going to help a lot of


people and um I hope so it was eye-opening for me for sure is there any final parting words that you would like


to share with our listeners um I really think that was I can't pick


myself for a listen but it's happening for you not to you so I don't think so


but if you like hearing ladies and male dominated Fields you can always listen


to fragmenters absolutely so where can you find Dina online she is the host the


amazing host of the fragmenters podcast um she is on every podcasting uh place


that you can basically find the fragmenters podcast right oh yeah um she's also on Instagram on Facebook


so check out the fragmenters podcast on those as well if you are in Idaho where


can you find her yep I'm in Idaho Falls I mean


technically a suburb but whatever it's Idaho Falls so we're in East Idaho we


sell wine barrels with mcilman's just saying they're used wine barrels or you can get dry cleaning done at Teton


cleaners amazing amazing she is about us thank you so much for coming on uh for


our listeners we are on Instagram at the Denison download on Facebook that doesn't download podcast uh check us out


on all major podcast streaming sites and from our family to yours have a great rest of your week