This week's episode is a reminder to look past the 'attention-seeking' behavior and look at it as connection seeking. This episode is for anyone who has had someone change the trajectory of their life with a simple act of kindness or if you have done this for someone else.
Join us (Ann and guest host Denise Bard) as we embrace the fact that our past gives us the wisdom we need to equip us to shine in the future. Denise Bard and her new book 30-second Moments and the Women Who Raised Me.
Colorado radio station is coming soon. We are very thankful and blessed for our continual growth. Thank you to all of our listeners and now watchers. and a future Colorado station.
We are very thankful and blessed for our continual growth. Thank you to all of our listeners and now watchers.
This week's episode is a reminder to look past the 'attention-seeking' behavior and look at it as connection seeking. This episode is for anyone who has had someone change the trajectory of their life with a simple act of kindness or if you have done this for someone else.
Join us (Ann and guest host Denise Bard) as we embrace the fact that our past gives us the wisdom we need to equip us to shine in the future. Denise Bard and her new book 30-second Moments and the Women Who Raised Me.
Colorado radio station is coming soon. We are very thankful and blessed for our continual growth. Thank you to all of our listeners and now watchers. and a future Colorado station.
We are very thankful and blessed for our continual growth. Thank you to all of our listeners and now watchers.
Welcome to Real Talk with Tina and Anne. I am Anne and today we have Denise Bard back with us and I'm so excited. She has written a book and you know it originated on our podcast and we were talking and when we were talking we started really getting into the depths of her story and it kind of sparked this want to finish a book that she had already kind of promised herself. So I'm really excited to have her here today, for her to talk more about her book 30 Second Moments and the Women who Raised Me. Denise, what in the world? I mean, I am so excited that you and in a very short time, by the way that you got this done.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, that's what you said. It's been in there. It's something that I talk about in keynote speeches. I was just able to really elaborate on things, and these were things that I was able to talk about, because it's all personal and so it's my journey through my story and the women who really did these things, and for me, like being able to write the book was being able to say, hey, you know, thank you for what you did and you don't know, but this is what was happening and this is how you helped me, type thing. So it kind of came easy to be able to say it.
Speaker 1:
You know for our listeners and maybe for some people, that they really don't know your story. Let's go back and start there. Let's talk a little bit more about where and why and how this all came to fruition.
Speaker 2:
Right. So my story, in a nutshell, is that I'm a product of two drug addicted teens. My mother was 16 when she had me and I grew up on my maternal side. I don't use the word raised because, again, my book tells the story of how I really was raised. But I faced a lot of forms of abuse and so many forms, beginning with being part of, I guess, maybe a payment for her drug addiction. I was put into situations that no child, no adult, should ever be put into. My mother was addicted to cocaine and so that addiction led her into using me, I guess, as a form of payment or, you know, a bargaining chip, and I grew up, you know, in my youngest, youngest years, having to deal with that.
Speaker 2:
I spent time in kinship care, which is, for those who don't know, is family foster care, where the family court gives custody or temporary custody to a family member. Then I would was reunited again with my mother when I was 12. And while she wasn't on drugs, some of this, still the abuse continued, a lot of the verbal, a lot of the psychological, the hitting, things like that. So you know, I would face these traumas at home every single day and at about 14, I, you know, decided I didn't want to do it anymore and I did try to commit suicide but I stopped, which obviously that's the best thing. And so, long story, I went into a shelter for runaway, abuse and homeless youth, which I announced it on the board for, and my life kind of completely changed then because I went from being something which was that something bargaining chip, something taking your rage out of, and something that caused all these things to go wrong, including the things that happened to me. I lived with my childhood and life like that, and then when I went into Anchor House, things changed. So I finally went from being just something to becoming someone.
Speaker 2:
You know, I learned a lot. I got that freedom. It was the first time I felt safe and the first time, you know, I felt like somebody looked at me as being human and not some bargaining chip. So there I learned to shift my focus. I became very close with my caseworker there and learned to shift my focus from, obviously, I was facing all these abuses and continued as I went back to my mother, but she said one thing which was there are so many people around you who care about you, and so I was on tunnel vision, which it was okay that I was on tunnel vision, you know, seeing these abuses and just focusing on that that I never really did notice all these people which were my teachers.
Speaker 2:
So they saw me and saw that there was something inside of me that I didn't see in myself and I always say they believed in me until I believed in myself. So they were the things that got me through every single day and a lot of things that these teachers did they had no idea Because, again, like the, my book title is 30 second moments is those small little moments in time. They said something to me that hit me in a way that nothing else has ever hit me. It was like deep down inside and it was just such a simple thing that they said that they had no idea made the greatest impact on me and those little moments would get me through every single day and fast forward.
Speaker 2:
You know, I'm a mom, I'm a wife, and those moments I continued to have, even in my childhood or, you know, growing up when I became a mom, those feelings and those lessons that I learned from each of those teachers who, again, had no idea what they were doing. I was able to apply that to being a mom, and so I'm navigating a world that I never thought was even possible, and it was all because of these women. So they gave me, you know, they really raised me, they taught me the things that I should be, have learned, have felt, have gone through at home, but I didn't, you know what's really beautiful about your story is that you grabbed on to these little nuggets.
Speaker 1:
You know that they provided you and these 30 second time moments of you know very brief periods of time that changed your entire insides and how you felt about yourself, which motivated you to where you are today, and I find it really interesting that you because not everybody can do that every there are some, some people and I did this for many, many years where I was so hardened that I really wouldn't let anything in or anybody in, and I was skeptical of everybody that kind of even acted nice to me because of the crazy making that I went through. You know, some of the people that were supposed to be taking care of me were the ones that were hurting me, and so when somebody showed that kind of care for me, I instantly the walls went up, and so I find it really interesting that you were able, that young, to hold on to those really special times.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, it's kind of crazy. I always say, you know, one of the things I did was when I wrote this book. I showed who these people were because I wanted to make sure people understood these are real people, these are real situations, these are, you know, everything is authentically real in here. And yeah, I, you know. Again, I want to go back to my, my case manager at the shelter. You know, had she not taught me to go and look around, I never would have been able to see those moments or to find those things that were happening to me.
Speaker 2:
And it's kind of crazy because the one and I explained this in the book I was about 16, you know, all these things happened again and I was back in, feeling defeated and I made my plans to you know again, take my own life and my coach.
Speaker 2:
At the time I went to my last class like I've all practiced and gosh, if you I mean you're looking at me on the screen, but I'm four like 11, maybe five foot, so I'm not a basketball player but I played for her and she came up to me that day and just threw me into this headlock saying she was taking me under her wings, and it was like all of a sudden, everything went quiet, but I can hear my case manager saying you know, there are people who care about you, and so it kind of again click that in where, yes, I'm doing the right thing.
Speaker 2:
I got to keep remembering and reminding myself that these people are there, you know, and, and I just needed to to to really latch on to that. And I don't know what you know really made me. But I also realized too and this is another thing that these moments of opportunity come to us every single day. Every day there's a moment for us to grab on to something. If we just kind of shift our focus to, you know, take everything in, and one of those things is going to resonate with you deep inside.
Speaker 1:
Well, one of the things that you also do is speak and you go around and you have talked to educators about how they can make a difference in just 30 seconds.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, you know, one of the reasons why I did the book and I think about this every day is that there is a kid out there who is you know.
Speaker 2:
I'll say there's a 14 year old kid sitting in a classroom right now who is dealing with trauma that no one knows about, and they're trapped inside with these secrets and the one thing that keeps them going every day is that they get up and show up to a class because that teacher or educator in anywhere of the school makes them feel like they are seen, makes them feel like they are worthy, just helps them to feel again like they are human. And so my goal is to absolutely inspire and encourage, let a teacher know how valuable that they are in this world, especially to kids who are facing trauma. So I wrote the book to say this 14 year old, I see you, I see you and I'm going to fight for you because I want you to have the same experience I have by having these educators just notice you and just in a little bit of a way, and especially educators with teacher turnover right now. It's ridiculous.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, yeah, and you know, we don't want to lose these teachers because someone is counting on them every day, outside of the subject. Do you know what I mean? Right, they are changing lives and you know. I hope that someday someone like me will come along and tell them. You know what I want you to know, the impact you made in my life and that's, you know, one of the goals I want to do.
Speaker 1:
You know everybody. You've got 30 kids in a class. Yeah, they all look the same to you. Maybe you know you've got all these things. You have to get all these academics in play and really that's the most important thing is the grade and teaching to the test and all these other things that that educators talk about, but it's also having that radar in your classroom, in your classroom, being able to pick up on that one child or two or however many. I mean the way our world is today. There is so much that goes on with a child before they even get to school. You know, even to expect kids nowadays to go home and do homework and do all of these things that with all these things that are going on in the world, when they get home we don't know what they're going through by the time they get home.
Speaker 2:
Right.
Speaker 1:
And you're a really prime example of how some teachers just picked up on that radar that something was going on with you and how important that is for teachers to try to check in with their kids to see how they are.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, and it doesn't have to be a lot. And that's one of the things I like to stress anytime I talk about this thing is it doesn't have to be a lot. The most poignant thing is in those small moments. I mean, my book is not very long and I worried about that and then I thought to myself well, you know what, this is the point, you know, you don't have to do something so big. I mean my third grade teacher I talk about this in the book, how, you know, it was Mother's Day and she would like everybody to draw a picture of what they love to do most with their moms. And I sat there and I didn't know what to draw. But she walked around the classroom and she, you know, looked at everyone's pictures, asked them questions, and then she got to me and I'm like, oh no, you know, and I had this figure in a car, because that's you know where I really didn't feel.
Speaker 2:
You know that things were going to happen. And she didn't say anything to me, she just looked at me and smiled and that little smile changed my entire day. I mean, that's it, just a small smile, and I can go on, like you know, the teacher saying this is my Denise. She didn't mean anything. You know we do things like that. Oh, this is my kid, or. You know, we say little things that don't mean much to us, we're just kind of saying something, but it's impacting that kid. Who they say. You know, people will hear what they need to hear in that moment. So as you say something as small, as innocent, as you know, you just go through your daily day and say something. That kid needed to hear that because it made them feel in a way that they have never felt before. Whether or not you realize it, these moments are happening daily.
Speaker 1:
And lots of times it's a kid in the classroom that has the behaviors you know. I mean I was acting out, oh yeah, and or I was the quiet one in the room. I mean I was actually both at different times in my life. When I was younger, I was that quiet one in the room and I wanted to disappear, and please don't call on me, and you know. But I also had some acting out behaviors and as I got older, towards high school, I did a lot of things that were, you know, it looked like I was probably attention seeking.
Speaker 1:
But you know, I just saw a quote recently. You know something. It went something along the lines of if try to change the wording from attention seeking to love seeking or something like that, where connection seeking I think that that's what it said Try to change the wording from attention seeking to connection seeking. And that really opened my eyes because it's, you know, I've known lots of people in my life that have had a lot of behaviors, including myself, and that's what I was doing. I was just trying to find connection. I was trying to find somebody that could connect with me in a positive way, where there wasn't negative abuse of behaviors or agendas or anything else. It was just a connection that would be pure, without all that other stuff in it.
Speaker 2:
Oh, yeah, and I did the same thing. I think I was in kimchi care with my grandmother through elementary school and you know, I faced different challenges with her. She was a very manipulative woman. There was no sexual abuse, so I didn't have to think about that. So it was the other things, you know, the manipulation, just those horrible things. They can be just as damaging. But in elementary school I was a good kid, you know, I had great memories.
Speaker 2:
But when I moved back in or I moved in, yeah, I guess again, because I had lived with her younger than elementary school when I moved in with my mom, all of a sudden, you know, all this rage came out. Or I found these women. Okay, I did find these women who I gravitated to. I call it like you know. They checked off my mom box because I wanted a mom so bad. I mean going from when I was four and so when I got to middle school, I was feeling so much pressure that I noticed, when I, you know, mouthed off or anything, I was noticed. Do you know what I mean? And so I had one of two things that were going to happen they were either going to abandon me, like a lot of people did or they were going to stick with me, and so I did that.
Speaker 2:
I got in trouble. I used to fight, you know, fist fight. I used to get in trouble at school. I got detention purposely, so I didn't go home. So it was these. Yeah, I agree, it was these times where you know we, you're not right, you're not attention seeking, you are seeking just somebody to notice you and you hate to do it in a negative way. But sometimes you're overlooked when you're that quiet one, or you know, and I had been that, you know, a couple times. But it was like I got the attention from the people I wanted to like a middle school. I would get in so much trouble and they would send me down to the guidance office and that's the woman who I cannot find. So of course I went. I'm like, oh, what can I push it to where I won't get too in trouble? But I'm going to be able to go down and talk to her and see her. You know. And so that you're right, it's not a tension seeking, it's, you know that, just connection. I just wanted somebody to connect with me.
Speaker 1:
I have some, you know, key people that I can look back on and I can say that they really made a difference in my life. I also have some key people in my life that I can say they weren't for me, you know, and some people just show up and it's their job and they look the other way. Maybe they don't want to know more, because if they know more then they have to get involved more and they don't want to. So it really is, you know, and I think that, and for me, because of God in my life, I really feel like he links us up with the key people that he believes is going to help us get to where we need to be and it, you know, I didn't always latch on to those people and there were people that I think genuinely cared about me, but I did some things to hurt them first and then I walked away Because it was just easier for me to do that, and that's what I knew. And I was also a self-sabotager, you know I did a lot of that. So I really but, with that said, I still got to where I am today. You know, I just took a lot of bumps and curves and wines and did all this stuff to get where I am and I consider myself very successful, even though I had a pretty rough beginning and the same as you.
Speaker 1:
And you're raising a family. I'm raising a family. I don't know about you, but I think some of those teachers back then would have looked at me and said you know, she can't even take care of herself, so how could she ever take care of a family? And I think I've done absolutely amazing and they said I wouldn't graduate high school and I got a master's degree. And look at you and me We've written books and we have a platform and I think that that's amazing.
Speaker 1:
We've also been tried to be silenced many times in our lives. Where we were and I know, especially when we were kids, we were told you know this is happening to you, but you can't tell yeah, so it's really I'm very grateful and look at you writing that book, being able to get that story out there. Yeah, and you can tell people that they can make a difference. And if there's kids out there that are also going through what you went through or what I went through, that look, look for that person. Yeah, you know if you are getting some sense of something inside of you is telling you to trust somebody and you're going through something. It could be this tug of trying to get you to connect with somebody to help you out of your situation.
Speaker 2:
You know, I do wonder and often think, you know, if they saw me again, what would they think? Because in my mind back then, you know, my mother convinced me that everything was normal. The things that had happened to me growing up, you know, were normal. And so you'd saying anything's going to make you look horrible and you're going to be in trouble and or you'll be taken away and given to people who will hurt you. Sure, and that's the constant. So you believed that. You believed that maybe these people thought of you that way and like I think about that, I'm like you know, what did they think about me? And you know, when I was going through these, you know those interpretations and in getting in trouble and things like that, I'm not that person. I really wasn't that person.
Speaker 2:
Then I just needed somebody and so, yeah, I became successful. I have, you know, I have. We've broken the cycles, we have started new, and I was thinking about that today. I'm like you know, like I genuinely broke a cycle like my. I'm not in contact with my family. I have, like one cousin, a couple of cousins, but I'm not involved, and I began this new family tree, I began this new family. That's great.
Speaker 1:
Other things I love that.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, and you want those teachers like I want them to see me and like feel proud or, you know, be proud of me. I have one of my teachers in there she's kind of reason why I also wrote the book Miss Sedia, who always makes sure she says to me I'm so proud of you. Almost every time I talk to her she always says I'm so proud of you, and so that does something to you because it makes that she saw me, she continues to see me. You know she saw, she didn't know what was going on, but she saw where I was and maybe going through difficulty, and then sees me now and she knows my story, you know now, and she sees the success and I think you know, in writing the book again, it was so many different things and, yes, being on the real talk with Tina and Anne was the push that I needed to be able to say, oh my gosh, I need to share this.
Speaker 2:
This is so important. You know whether people can get it from you know the podcast, radio anything, or they can get it from a book, if I can. You know, reach people. I just want that teacher to know that there's that student, because I know if I didn't have these people, I wouldn't be where I am. And so again, writing the book and these people being in there, I want them to see I'm not a mess, because in my mind yes that's so important.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, yes, and I find like I'm sure you agree, or we've talked about this before, you know, you think you know, if you see them, they're going to think, wow, like you know, did she mess up or did she whatever? And you want to say, no, I didn't and I am successful and I look at the way I turned out. You want them to see you as you and not the environment that you were living through. That you know. I want them to be like, oh my gosh, this you've done really well. You know what I mean. Yeah, that's what you want. You want them to see and you want them to know that they were part of this.
Speaker 2:
Sure, they were the ones that were. Had they not been in my life? Had those small little moments? Had my connection with them be any different? And again, they didn't know most well, I guess a couple of them had no idea, but yet that connection between us was something that I needed and, like you said, I feel like people were putting my life at the times that they needed to be put in my life for me to know the different things and the stepping stones that you know. But, yeah, you want them to look at you and say oh my gosh, like you.
Speaker 1:
look at you, you know, while you've done, you know my kindergarten teacher is the one that I always and I as a journalist I had the I was very grateful to be able to have the chance to call out my favorite teacher and, you know, write a whole Article about her, so it was really cool and so she saw it and we had been kind of connected at different times in my life, but she was the one who said that there's something different about Anne, there's just something not right. She was the one that caught my disabilities. She was the one who knew that something was going on Trauma-wise, because she said that that I was the most cautious person that she had ever met in her entire years of being a kindergarten teacher and she had been doing it a long time. So she did this thing with me where you know, they had to give your address and phone number and all that stuff, and it was in kindergarten, it was a practice kind of thing and I would not give her any information about me and I was super quiet with her and she just knew in her heart that something wasn't right and she went with it. And she also went to my parents and said, look, she and and they hadn't caught yet that, I didn't know how to my eyes were not converging as one, they were.
Speaker 1:
I was seeing two of everything. My parents didn't know that. She caught that. She caught that when I would draw diamonds there were ears on them and that meant something, and that I wasn't really able to Do my letters and I was way behind everybody and it did get to the point where I wasn't able to Routine and comprehend my what I would read, and so that's when more neurologists and things came into play. But she was the first one who caught all of that. And when I got my master's degree she came to my master's degree party. So I she was one of the first people that I invited. So she always was kind of one of my biggest cheerleaders and it started with just her paying attention.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, I have my case manager issues my counselor to from anchor house Since I was 14 well, denise, I just want to really acknowledge the fact that you were able to Hold on to those 30 second moments and get you where you are and get you to the point where you actually wrote this book 30 second moments and the women who raised me, and I just Encourage everybody to go out and get it. Amazoncom, there's the Kindle and you can get the hard copy of it. So you know, I mean for her to just say you know what I'm gonna do this. I'm gonna get this story out there and let people know and hopefully, because why we do this, why I do this Podcast and why you wrote that book, was because we want to help other people.
Speaker 1:
We want to help, maybe, people that might come into contact with somebody who needs help, or we can maybe help somebody that is out there and they don't. We don't want them to feel alone. We want them to know that there are other people out there that have gone through what they've gone through and that they can make it, and to hold on, like you said at one point that you were going to take your life. You didn't, fortunately, but if you ever get to that point, anybody that's listening all you have to do is dial 988 and there's just somebody on the other side of that phone and do anything that you can to take one more breath, because you definitely will be missed and you don't know what is ahead.
Speaker 1:
As we know, because at one time life was really horrible and it appeared as if it was always going to be, but we did find the light at the end of the tunnel and we did end up getting to the point where we are today, where we're making a difference in other people's lives. So, denise, I want to thank you so much For coming on real talk with Tina and, and again, I just want to thank our listeners for being a part of this podcast and Always supporting us. It really means so much and we're always blessed. So thank you so much again from real talk with Tina and Anne, and we'll see you next time.