%20(1080%20x%201080%20px).png)
The Mostly Mental Mom
Real talk on the rollercoaster of mental health—it's affect on every part of your life, survival hacks, and a little bit of funny banter to remind you that showing up for yourself is the most important thing you can do in the mental health game!
The Mostly Mental Mom
EP.6: Real Talk | Journey to Genuine Living While Facing Bipolar
What happens when your mental health challenges become the lens through which you view your entire existence? Join me, Lauren, as I share my deeply personal journey through the hurdles and unexpected turns of living with bipolar disorder. From striving to meet societal and familial expectations during my college years at Louisiana Tech to grappling with the tension between external pressures and my authentic self, this episode exposes the complex interplay between mental health and identity. Through my stories and reflections, I aim to reveal how mental health can often feel like it controls the narrative of our lives, leaving us passengers in our own stories.
My journey has been marked by a search for self amidst shifting career paths and personal relationships. The struggle between following a path dictated by others and discovering my true desires has been a recurring theme in my life, from my time as a mechanical engineering student to my ventures into the field of dermatology. Along the way, significant life changes, like moving across states, have both hindered and propelled my growth. These experiences highlight the challenges of achieving stability and fulfillment when mental health conditions influence every decision and relationship. Yet, through these trials, I have learned the crucial lesson of prioritizing authenticity over meeting traditional expectations.
In exploring the power of authenticity, I recount moments of personal triumph and realization. A poignant video brought me to tears of pride, reaffirming my commitment to mental health advocacy and the importance of embracing who I truly am. My hope is to inspire others to pursue their genuine selves, even in the face of mental health obstacles. With gratitude for the unwavering support from my listeners, I invite you to join me in continuing this journey toward personal growth and authenticity, as we navigate the complexities of mental health together.
TMMM --
Lauren
www.themostlymentalmom.com
References in the Podcast:
My Interview with Michael VanZetta | PiZette Media: Content with a Cause
Buzzsprout | Referral Link
Show up friends!
Lauren | The Mostly Mental Mom
Welcome.
Speaker 1:Welcome to the Mostly Mental Mom podcast. I'm Lauren, your podcast host and your resident Mostly Mental Mom. I'm here to bring you all things mental health from mainly my perspective and my bipolar disorders perspective, but hopefully it just sheds light on the topic, encourages people to tell stories about what is going on in their lives and to just be authentic and vulnerable. I am honored and privileged that you are here and listening and tuning into today's episode, which is episode six of the Mostly Mental Mom podcast. With that said, let's dive in. Today I'm going back to about me. There's a lot of history we got to build up for it to make some sense or to even dive into other topics. I guess Better and more qualified. I guess Air quotes for those not watching, I'm doing a YouTube video this time. So I'm going to try that. Try to get that going again. Um, so trying it again.
Speaker 1:But um, for me, at this point in my journey with bipolar disorder, it has reached so much havoc that I feel like it's taken away from the fact that I've I've had success, I've done good things. I like it's taken away a lot of the positives of who I am in general, like personality, positives, skill sets, um, abilities, because it's just like the bipolar cloud covers everything, and so it's just kind of it seems it feels like it neg of comes and goes for me on how that, how I internalize, or how that affects me, and it's kind of, when it sporadically comes up in conversation, uh, like someone needs, someone needs something done creatively, and I'll just grab my iPad or computer or whatever and I'll whip out something on Canva or Photoshop, whatever it might be, and they're kind of like you can do that and I'm humbled by their uh, awe, I guess. But at the same time I'm like, yeah, I've been doing it for years. I'm actually a very creative person. I have done this in jobs. I have done this for my own businesses and for other people's businesses and there's so much you don't know because just, you see me as this failed individual who is trying to pull stuff together on a podcast to create something for her family, to create supplemental income and all that, and who's on TikTok trying to promote and all of that's, all is seen.
Speaker 1:It's, um, my true backstory is not reflected. I don't even know how you go into that really, but it just kind of hit me because I almost feel inferior at this point in life. It's why doing this podcast or being a TikTok shop affiliate and creating content on there, being a TikTok shop affiliate and creating content on there that is easy, because the only pieces that I still feel like I have of myself I can show on these platforms, and there are people that appreciate them. Hear people listen to a podcast and that is an appreciation From my perspective. On TikTok yeah, it's stupid, but the likes that's an appreciation of my ability to make a content interesting enough for someone to engage with it, and it's not a needing approval, it's I could care less.
Speaker 1:People in general think of me. It is about something I know I'm good at and I've lost along the way how to do it. Or I'm unable to find jobs that support people like me, people that are unpredictable and can't always do the 9 to 5. But that's not accepted. And so when you struggle and I feel like this also might apply to chronic illnesses, other chronic illnesses when you start to not be defined by your illness, but it makes choices for you right, like if you have Crohn's disease and you're hospitalized because you had a flare-up, it made a choice for you that you could not then be at home with your family until you were out and clear you couldn't be at your job. It made these choices that naturally affect these other events in your life and you're lucky if you have people and you have jobs that allow to work that together. Most don't. It's gotten worse and worse and worse of how much of a hold my bipolar has, how it's holding the deck of cards. You know, and I know that there's work on my end, but whenever it starts to strip you of things you are capable of and possibly great at in love I'm trying to figure out how to word this I feel like that's when you kind of start to lose yourself, pieces at least, because we are meant to find fulfillment in all areas of life, not just being a mom or a husband or a wife or whatever. So much of life should bring us joy, but for so many it doesn't, and that's a wider topic and I'm not diving deeper into that.
Speaker 1:But, um, my point being is that for me, as these kind of standard human adult freedoms, of standard human adult freedoms the ability to go to a job, the ability to interact with people on a consistent frame or order, the ability to even be like the parent you want to be or the spouse you want to be. When those things start to become very hard because of your mental health, you're losing those pieces of who you are. That's how I feel about it. I feel like I've become detached, like I'm a spectator to my world. Apathy is a real thing. It's not always a negative. It's not a purposeful emotion, it's not I'm choosing to be apathetic, it is quite literally. There are days I feel numb and I'm staring at the world in front of me, not understanding why and so, and so I wanted to talk about that part of mental health today. And well, I guess that was the intro. I'll tell you a little bit more about Well, I guess that was the intro Tell you a little bit more about my background in life and how we are.
Speaker 1:Also, none of us are protected from anything any of this happening to anyone, not necessarily mental health, but just hard back things. So this part might be a tiny bit boring, because you know who wants to hear the story of Lauren Morris, but we're gonna go do it anyways, because I need it in here, just for reference, so that some more of this makes sense. So trust me on this part. Um, so I mentioned this maybe in episode four, I can't recall now, but about how, like knowing me, if you've seen me grow up, you would never expect this, this level of how much my bipolar disorder affects my day-to-day Um, and you wouldn't expect how much havoc it has wreaked on my life, because I didn't have childhood trauma. I didn't have any negative, awful experience happen to me From birth to early 20s it was.
Speaker 1:I had a wonderful life. I had wonderful parents. I was an only child and I loved it. Frankly, thank you. Any judgment on the only children Not everybody's meant to have siblings Okay. I liked being independent. I liked my. It wasn't, I was not. Not everybody's meant to have siblings okay, I liked being independent. I liked my. It wasn't, I was not. I really was not a. It was not a spoiled situation. Yes, I got more than others did, but not it didn't affect who I was, I just simply liked being alone. I liked that. I got my parents and then I just got to play independently and I had a wonderful life, always had good friends and great friends in high school.
Speaker 1:Then I went, so I'm in Texas, um, and if you know anything about Texas, you know A&M and UT are uh, rivals, to say the least. And my mom went to A&M and my dad went to UT. So growing up they were constantly trying to get me to do a gig'em or a hook'em horns. It was like which one are you going to do? From an infant, like a little bitty, you know, and I always sided with my mom and did a gig'em. And so when it came to going to college, everyone's like are you going to go to one of those? And everyone's like are you going to go to one of those? Well, at that point I was dumb and in high school and more infatuated with the boys in my life than I was. The heritage of my parents went to two of the greatest schools in Texas and maybe I should follow in their steps. So I did not. Now I joke and I just say I didn't want to pick between the two. But you know, let's be real, it's not why I didn't go there. Uh, so I actually went.
Speaker 1:After high school I went to Louisiana Tech in Ruston, louisiana, the Bulldogs Um, home of Terry Bradshaw, carl Malone, the Duck Dynasty dude Can't remember his first name. Great school, I loved it. It was wonderful. It was small enough, still D1s. We still played all the big teams but we were crappy, so no one bought tickets and students got in free to every sporting event. That was the time of my life. It was so much fun. I'd been free to every sporting event. It was, that was the time of my life, it was so much fun. But this time of my life also was kind of the I don't really know if it was, it was not, I was not aware Um, cause I had been the only thing from my child, like teenage, to on.
Speaker 1:Is people pleasing was my profession? Um, I, and it wasn't to make them happy, that wasn't it, it was a. I wanted them to see value in me. So I think there's a difference. Like there's, there's people pleasing to like just gain more of a short term. I don't know if I'm making sense, but for me it was. I needed to prove that I was enough to whoever I was, smart enough, pretty enough, talented enough, whatever it might be.
Speaker 1:To the person I would laser in, and this was usually in my relationships. It was very rarely a friendship that I would do this with, but I would laser in on like what they saw as like amazing in a girl and like in their relationship and I would not only take note. I would become that, and it seemed innocent at first and it started with graduating from high school and going to college. That's when it really really hit me. I didn't like school. As far as schoolwork goes, I am very smart, but I'm not book smart and the traditional structure of how to learn and take tests is not my cup of tea. In hindsight I swear I was bipolar then and I didn't realize it. It was mild, because there's a lot about how I handled life that makes sense to me that I'd have been bipolar then too, anywho.
Speaker 1:But when it came to going off to college and deciding what to major in, I had no opinion of my own. I just knew I hated history and English with a passion. I was just like how far away can I get from those two subjects? Who's got opinions? My dad had an idea and then my boyfriend at the time just so happened to be majoring in it at yep, you guessed it Louisiana Tech. He was two years ahead of me. Engineering was what was advised and they're like you can do that. And I was like, okay, in my head I'm like game set, match. It's time to be this person At whatever cost, and I did. I freaking graduated with a bachelor's degree in biomedical engineering and I did well, it wasn't that hard. That sounds conceited, but I'm just noting that I'm a smart individual to correlate along with the fact that, yeah, I have debilitating bipolar disorder and now I don't know how to use that part of me anymore. That's why we're going back down memory lane.
Speaker 1:But the first relationship didn't work out. That got me to Louisiana Tech and I spent my college years studying and working on school work and morphing myself to be whatever my current boyfriend like, whatever they want, like their image and their likes. I switched gears. I had a hunter and a fisherman and I had waiters and tried to get into deer hunting. I've never done that in my life. I mean, I grew up around it but I didn't do it. But I was going to be the role that this person wanted me to be and I'm referencing this because I think that this is a part of why my bipolar kind of went completely unhinged on me, because I ignored who I authentically was for a long time to then, once the bipolar went nuts, like there was nothing for my person to grasp onto as real. It didn't know. I'm still not sure. So it was in crisis, there was nowhere to be grounded. And in college I this is where I'm kind of trying to like I don't, I don't want to, I'm trying to share my story but at the same time like anonymity that's a hard word to say. I don't even know if I said that right, just that I just felt like Nemo, fine, nemo, anonymity. Okay, sorry, but I did the same thing for the last relationship of college.
Speaker 1:I originally started out as a mechanical engineer. That was my discipline of engineering that I had chosen. But a new boy came across my sophomore year of college and, oddly enough, we had gone to school together in high school but it didn't Our school. We graduated with close to 300. Decent, it's enough where you don't know everybody or you're not friends with everybody, right? Well, I was. I didn't ever cross paths with him in high school. He was way cooler than I, was Good football player, good looking, all the things. And all of a sudden, once we got in college, he liked me and yeah, you guessed it. That started Lauren 3.0. That switched into gears to match this person's ideal mate, and he was in biomedical engineering. So I switched major or switched disciplines to biomedical and we did our senior year project together, like all the things and you you start to lose yourself.
Speaker 1:Then, when you do that to the degree that I've done it, I've never I don't know if I've experienced what real me is enough to share it with anyone and the level that I changed who I was to be somebody for somebody else really did a number on me, because someone with a degree in biomedical engineering, you can't fake that. I had to do the work, I did it and I earned that degree, but I had warped who I was so much that that's honestly, whenever my brain started to just unravel, there was, there was no stability, and the only stability I had, where it had, was in these relationships that I was like that was it, that was it, and it wasn't real because I wasn't being my real self. I was just making sure I was being what they wanted me to be, but it was the only thing I could hold on to at the moment. It was my only anchor, healthy or not. And becoming someone for someone else leaves you with no self-esteem, the inability to speak up for yourself, the inability to voice your opinion, because you've only taught this person that you are here to appease them In anything and it's. I don't think that starts in any kind of negative way or like anticipating negative actions, but that's just what you're, that's what you're showing. It's just like you know, when you're trying to model behavior for your children, you're maybe not always actively aware of what you're doing, but they're picking up on this general theme, and my general theme was a pushover can be taken advantage of, can be talked down to. All that that's just a snowball and and it makes it hard to know who you are, to even know what steps to take next. So fast forward a tiny bit.
Speaker 1:Um, I married the last one from college and we moved for him to go to graduate school and I didn't know what I was going to do. Fun fact for biomedical engineering, you usually need a master's or a PhD to do much else with it, and I was At that point. I knew I was like I don't even really want this degree. I don't really know why I got it, but here I am, so definitely not going to grad school for it. So we moved from our home our family being in Texas to Indiana and had no one there there and trying to figure out how I could help support our family with this new college degree. But that's it. It's not going to do me anything at this point, really.
Speaker 1:And I actually ended up working in dermatology and I'm sharing this because, again, I'm a talented individual that is smart and has done some amazing shit, but that's been lost or just like redacted, I guess. So I worked for a dermatologist in this in the city I'm kind of trying to leave out you know some things Um, and I had no experience. They just were willing to train me on the job and I worked for them for five years and did everything from insurance and taking patients into surgery with the doctor. They literally taught me everything and it was awesome. I loved it. But as much as I loved it, my mental health was starting to decline and my home life was starting to decline. But I had such an impact from that dermatology clinic that I had enrolled in nursing school. I was like I would love to do this, but let me just let me get my RN. You can get an accelerated program if you already have a bachelor's so I can make more right. A medical assistant wasn't, as you know, helpful to support our family, and so I did.
Speaker 1:I enrolled into an accelerated RN program while my husband was still working on his PhD and excelled Shocker, you guys. I excelled at a lot of things. But who would know, right, because then we just beat ourselves up and it's all done and over. But so I finished my first semester in nursing school and I loved it. It was great. I was excited to be doing something that I thought this might actually be a Lauren choice.
Speaker 1:Only to just have that change, I finished up that first semester in December and we had to move to North Carolina in January or the following summer. Actually, we got notified in January and I couldn't transfer my credits with ease anyway and so I didn't do it. Um, lauren now would have fought tooth and nail to not give that up. Um, lauren then just bent over and took it. So, uh, we moved to North Carolina and I went and did what I knew dermatology and again loved it, succeeded at it. The doctors preferred me in surgery. Um, we did.
Speaker 1:You know, I got to learn a lot of things with them. It was a great. I was good at it. I had a great mentor, one of the PAs. She was such a good friend and encourager and taught me things that then I was like, okay, maybe I could, I could go, I could be a PA Like. I have these skill sets, I have the brain and the capacity to do so.
Speaker 1:But guess what? Home life got worse and depression started to really take hold. This was in 2011. And anxiety started to rear its head when I it wasn't allowed to do so. I was working, um, and that started the I'll be right back and I went in the bathroom and breathed heavily over the sink while I had a small panic attack in the middle of work day and tried my best to pull it together to the first time. I quit a job because of my mental health, and now I know it's okay. The world doesn't make it feel okay, but I know it's okay.
Speaker 1:But at that time it was devastating because I was a smart and talented person and I couldn't function normally. Other things in my home life got worse and other things in my home life got worse. Life was not perfect anymore. It was not like it was at home in Texas. I was not treated the best just to be kind of, keep it close right here for now. But I was also a thousand miles away from my family and I had no way to support myself and this is where these relationships they're your only anchor, sadly, because what else are Um? So, from 2011 to 2014, I stayed at home.
Speaker 1:Um, I didn't. I had one other endeavor I tried. Um was cosmetology school in the middle of there in Chapel Hill, and my anxiety was so high. Again, I couldn't. I couldn't keep up, but I was good at what I was doing. It wasn't about a skill set, it was just about my health. I couldn't keep up with the expectation, I guess. So it was another failed venture for Lauren on the. You know wherever we're placing all these, I can't think of the word. Wherever we're placing all these, I can't think of the word Um. But while it's home, I was a gracious host to our friends. Um, our house was always the cutest and the most welcoming and I tried.
Speaker 1:That was the early blog days of that's where influencers started and me and my best friend there actually started an Etsy shop. I can hand, letter and do calligraphy and we made signs and would ship them. You had to ship them. It wasn't digital forms at the time and I did blog. I did blogging of lifestyle and home and DIY and built a coffee table out of a palette you know like, and I did good, but I would have a good week and then I'd have a week where I couldn't get dressed hardly so it just all just I don't know what unleashed it fully, but something did, because it just kept going downhill from there.
Speaker 1:Side note, I grew up in church Denomination doesn't matter to me so I'm not going to explain that part but me and my husband in North Carolina were going to church at the time. We had a great, great, great group of friends. I don't that is not something I follow right now, but at the time the community the church brought to us was very, seemed very, real and helpful, seemed very real and helpful until I didn't match what the church teaches you, and mental health was not on that list. So when I started to get worse, I was blown off, and whenever I would try to seek help, I was given a scripture and I'm sorry, friends, but scriptures are, if you believe, I understand their value.
Speaker 1:However, in crisis and in the real moment, that does not help, and eventually home life got to a point where I was severely depressed, so much so I would find myself just curled up in the bathtub, unable to move. One time it happened right before we were supposed to go to a concert with friends. I was showering, you know, trying to get ready, and as I was trying to get out, I just sunk back down. I just sunk back down, I just cried and it just got worse and worse and I had my first inpatient stay in August of 2013. And, from every vantage point, nothing was wrong with my life. Only I saw the real whole life part, because that was covered up really well, and then when I was around people, I made sure to look the part and act the part. So I had my first inpatient stay and those are terrifying. For the record, I'm grateful they're there.
Speaker 1:But if I could add a bucket list item things I hope to accomplish by being a mental health advocate and starting this platform and hopefully, hopefully, raising funds to do more therapy centers that are somewhere in the middle that can meet people in a different place than full-on hospitalization would definitely be on the list. So, anywho, but I'm grateful for that hospitalization. Because I'm grateful for that hospitalization because the thing about those days to me is you're given a week, however long, you stay away from the world, away from whatever might be triggering you and you're being prompted with questions and group therapy, things to think about, just time to reflect on you, and that opened up enough of a window into my soul and into my mind and heart that I was worth more than I was receiving and that I had to stand up for myself and I had to do what was best for me. Now, if you're familiar withorce, okay, there you go in turmoil. Because I did believe, I believed that Christ loved me, I believed a lot about Christianity and so for being growing, for growing up in that and then to be facing what I believe to be best but it goes against everything I've been taught was very confusing, but ultimately my mom summed it up the best because she was in Texas, I was in North Carolina and we talked on the phone every day. She's still a firm believer and I do very much respect her faith, whether I'm not on the same path as her now, but I respect her faith greatly. But she told me then on the phone. She said, lauren, to me, I believe that God loves you and cares about you as a human and as his daughter more than an institution. And that's all she said and that was all it took Um. I'm going to keep referencing it as home life because I'm not ready to say some of the things on here for other people's sake but when I did disclose to our friends our church friends and all of that and said I was leaving, I was going back home to Texas because of XYZ, I was the one cast out and the victim was cast out, and I saw that world in a whole new light. We're not going to go into that right now because that's a whole other tangent.
Speaker 1:But so in 2014, in January, I moved back to Texas, I loaded up my car the best I could and I drove home with my cat 16 hours and I was done. That was it. We did all the stuff via email from a legal front and in 2015, I was officially divorced. Since we were in North Carolina, you had to be separated for a year before you could file, but that's neither here nor there. Started that from 2008 really, or 2004, to going to college, to 2014, to leaving North Carolina and leaving my first marriage. That 10 year chunk was the.
Speaker 1:It was like it was, I guess, like the um, like fault lines, you know, like many shifts, many earthquakes happening to where, in 2014, it just collapsed. That's what I feel like, what happened in my head and my brain, because once I moved back here, my mental health was raging all the time. Granted, I wasn't medicated for a year and I went on my most manic route ever from 2014 to 2015 and uh, probably definitely trauma. Bonded with my husband now and met him in 2014. Probably wasn't a great great time to do that, um, but all that to say, I got back here and I started the on and off switch again Like I could function. For a while. I could succeed. Um, I was a store manager at a local store here and was great and loved by the staff and the the boss and could do the job Like I was gifted. I I'm a good worker and I'm smart and I'm a problem solver. And then, just bam, I'll start to have flares of my mental health pop up and I had my second inpatient stay in 2019, in 2019. And they were much more understanding, so I stayed with them, actually Through 2018 to 2020. But I left after I had another impatience day in 2020.
Speaker 1:How do you keep up with what is expected? How do you hold the jobs? How do I become success in everyone else's eyes again, success in everyone else's eyes again, when history has just shown that my brain for some reason just has to turn off at a point. But I but I kept. I keep trying. I've kept trying to meet the standard, to meet the social expectations and the expectations from family and friends and social media and whoever's watching or whatever I've made up in my mind. I've been trying to keep up. I had another great job from 2021 to 2023.
Speaker 1:Succeeded in it Very much, so I can. I mean, I've taught myself web design and graphic design. I've done that literally for companies and I've been paid to do it. I taught myself photography and I had a photography business and shot weddings. But every time I am knocked down on my ass by my mental health and left going. I can't do it. I can't, I don't know how to do this and it's just making me look dumber and dumber. And then I start to believe it. I start to believe that I don't have skills and I'm not capable and I'm not this talented person when that's a lie I am and then I thought, okay, work from home, let's go like super simple. Well, that was just like a month ago, less than, yeah, a month ago, and you see how that turned out For me.
Speaker 1:Part of it is on other people's time and expectations and schedule, and if I can control my schedule then I can be productive within the time frames that I know I can be productive in, and for me, if I'm kind of a little bit more manic or I'm in a just more hyper state, like I'm awake I can work for 12 hours from home on stuff, but then I may sleep and not get anything done the next day and I wish that the world would help people find ways to be successful in the midst of their struggles. But since that is not an option right now and I have grown a lot in my ability to accept who I am, see my gifts, and while it may seem like the dumbest thing for me to be putting stock in a podcast and then creating content on social media, well frankly, I don't give a fuck what you think. The other alternative for me right now at this point is if is to feel bad because you think I'm doing something that's is to feel bad because you think I'm doing something that's never going to be fruitful or stupid or insert whatever there. But but the reality is is that this is giving me fulfillment and giving is breathing life back into me. Fulfillment and giving is breathing life back into me and that's the only way I know right now to grow all the areas of my life. If all of this gets taken away, then I lose all sense of self. And so, yeah, I'm gonna keep creating content and I'm gonna create, making podcasts and updating my website, which I think looks fucking amazing. I designed that people. I'm gonna keep making music because I can, because I can play the guitar, the electric, and I can put it all in recording and produce it. That sounds really, really, uh douchey, but I have not owned up to my own abilities for so long that I'm done. Frankly, I am humble, but there's balance in being humbled but also knowing your abilities and your gifts and what you've been given.
Speaker 1:And to anyone still listening, because this episode is longer, the only way we can somewhat not internalize shame and guilt is to literally just say screw it, I'm doing this for me. And guess what? Sometimes that sucks because sometimes the people in your home, the people in your life, they don't support it or they think you're crazy or they're not interested, they're not going to cheer you on. All those things which can be discouraging, but do it anyway. It's for you, and when you're fighting the fucking demon, we're fighting our heads. You need something that's going to bring you back to reality and give you something to battle with. So do the thing that you love and that you're good at, and don't apologize for it. Those that believe in you and people that support you will come around, and it'll all be for a purpose greater than us. So, okay, I don't really know if I made any sense there, but considering this is going to be an hour long podcast, I'm going to go ahead and wrap it up. So thank you for listening today.
Speaker 1:Um, it just seemed important to kind of line out my history a little bit, um, to line out where I kind of saw some of the things that help, at least for me. There has to be a bigger why, and that helps me know there's no like I don't know. I'm on to something, I guess. Um, and I just I don't know. I just believe that there is value in being authentic and vulnerable and I firmly believe that authenticity and vulnerability will win at the end of the day. It may not come easy, but that is where I feel like that's just where the community lies, that's where, that's where we learn to understand each other like. That's just. That's just where we need to shoot for. That's the goal authenticity and vulnerability. With that said, go ahead and wrap up some notes for the podcast today.
Speaker 1:Speaking of authentic invulnerability, the podcast episode with Michael Vanzetta on Paisetta Media Content with a Cause is live on YouTube.
Speaker 1:I will link it in the podcast, in this podcast below, for you guys to go watch. Please go take a peek. It's only 25 minutes, but I was so proud of myself when I watched it that I cried yeah, sure did, but it is, but it is. It was fun, I was honored, it was a privilege and I know I'm doing the work I'm supposed to be doing right now and I want to help you get to where you want to be by encouraging you to be your authentic self, whatever that looks like. As usual, thank you, buzzsprout for being the best podcast platform and thank you PreSonos for being the best recording equipment. I'll link them in here as well, and I have not linked them in the other episodes, yeesh, okay, but I appreciate you guys so much for tuning in and listening to me ramble. But this is episode six of the Mostly Mental Mom podcast. And this is Lauren, and I'm going to go ahead and sign off for today.
