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Health & Fitness Redefined
Health and Fitness Redefined with Anthony Amen. Take a dive into the health world as we learn how to overcome adversity, depict fact vs fiction and see health & fitness in a whole new light.Fitness Is Medicine
Health & Fitness Redefined
Transforming Suffering into Purpose
How does one rise from the depths of trauma, addiction, and chronic illness to find hope and resilience? Join us as we host Marcy, a remarkable survivor who recounts her extraordinary journey through life's most daunting trials. From enduring multiple surgeries for a cleft lip and palate to battling poverty and addiction, Marcy’s story is a testament to the power of determination and love. She shares the pivotal moment that led her to sobriety for the sake of her daughter and celebrates an inspiring 21 years of being clean. Marcy’s narrative provides invaluable insights into the ongoing struggle with unresolved trauma and the critical importance of the healing process.
Our episode also shines a light on the transformative power of turning personal suffering into a meaningful mission. Through compelling stories of overcoming childhood challenges, mental breakdowns, and career shifts, we explore how adversity molds resilience and empathy. One particular account details a parent's journey to change their overbearing parenting style after confronting their own past traumas, leading to a profound shift in their relationship with their daughter, Brianna. These narratives emphasize the cyclical nature of healing and growth, and the critical role of unconditional support in fostering resilience and confidence in our children. Tune in as we explore these powerful stories of transformation and the lessons they impart.
https://courses.marcylanglois.com/1-on-1-vip-mentorship
Hello and welcome to Health of the Nutrition Fund. I'm your host, Anthony Amin, and we are finally back to some panel episodes with some amazing guests and I hope you enjoyed the last three. That was all me. Hearing me banter and rant about travel tips, about WTF is a macro. And then the last one about my favorite drink always and it's not water, that's right coffee. So if you haven't had a chance to already go back and listen to those three solo episodes, I know you guys love them. I constantly get asked to do them, so it's going to be a pleasure to three of them in a row. But now we're going back to guests, so without further ado, let's welcome to the show, Marcy Marcy it's a pleasure to have you today.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much, Anthony. I really appreciate the opportunity.
Speaker 1:You're my first guest back for the last month, so congratulations, yay.
Speaker 2:Yay, I am super pumped.
Speaker 1:I just got to say one thing you have to fight against coffee, which was last week's episode, and I know that coffee is awesome, so good luck. No teasing.
Speaker 2:All right, all right.
Speaker 1:No pressure, no pressure, but without further ado. Why don't you tell everyone a little bit about yourself and why you came on today's show?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and why you came on to the show. Yeah. So I am a trauma survivor, recovering addict, alcoholic, chronic illness warrior. I've been fighting the fight for all of my life and, you know, gathered tools, tips, tricks and whatnot to learn a more fulfilling way of living. I consequentially healed my body from doing so and just want to, you know, be the light on somebody else's path. Really, that's why I'm here today.
Speaker 1:I gotcha and you mentioned trauma survivor. Tell us a little bit about that and what you went through and how you overcame.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so there's a lot of things that I could tell you. My story is pretty in depth. It started from the day that I was born. I was born with a cleft lip and palate, which required about 23 surgical procedures spanning from three months old until I was 18 years old, including having my jaws broke twice. So it was a long haul just in the medical realm. And in addition to that, everything that came along with that was a lot of illness, doctor's appointments, speech therapy, teasing, bullying.
Speaker 2:My parents really didn't have anything. We grew up in a state of poverty. Have anything? We grew up in a state of poverty. So things were always tenuous in my house and in my life. And those were my really young years.
Speaker 2:And then, as I went through high school, I gravitated to sports and taking care of my body. I was into cycling and loved all that kind of stuff Competitive, really Anything competitive. I was all in and thought I had turned the page or it was looking like I was about to turn the page and head off to college. And as I was accepted into college and rounding out my senior year in high school, I got into a devastating car accident on my way to my afterschool job and three people lost their lives that day, yeah, yeah. And you know, 30 years later, it doesn't sting. It stings a lot less, but it's still a tender spot in my heart when I talk about it. They were not my passengers, they were the passengers in the other vehicle. Me and the other driver are the only people that walked away from the car accident, and so from that moment forward, I had a lot of unresolved trauma from my childhood, and I had started dabbling with drugs and alcohol at a young age, and then, after the car accident, it really escalated. I took on the story that I had killed three people. That's what I told myself every single day, and I didn't believe that I deserved the air that I was breathing and I wanted to die every day of my life, and I just never had the guts to take my own life, because I would always see my mom's face pop in my mind, and she was my biggest advocate, from the day I was born, really almost up until today. She's so supportive of my life and my journey, and so I never did that route.
Speaker 2:But that's how I felt and that's how I operated, and so the only thing that I could find to really ease that pain was drugs and alcohol, or so I thought. Right, I thought it was easing the pain and it really wasn't doing anything. It was making my life a lot worse. And eventually, 10 years after the accident, when I was 27 years old, I had a daughter at the time and I realized that I was doing to my daughter what my father had done to me. He was an active alcoholic when I was growing up and put me through a tremendous amount of turmoil, and it just became crystal clear to me that I was doing the exact same thing to her.
Speaker 2:And I made a decision and 10 days later I went to my first 12-step meeting, and that was 21 years ago and I've never drank or taken a drug since that day, 21 years ago. And I've never drank or taken a drug since that day. And so that was the beginning, right, I thought that I had arrived. I thought, you know, if I just quit drinking, then all of my life is going to get so much better. And in a lot of ways it did right, like the trivial things, the day-to-day stuff, like how am I going to pay my rent this month? Am I going to show up to pick my daughter up at school on time, like those kinds of things. Right, I started lining up because I was sober and I was able to make sober choices. But lo and behold, what we don't feel doesn't heal, and all of that stuff from my younger life was there waiting for me when I got sober.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:It kind of just comes knocking. It's ferocious, really. That's how it showed up. For me. It showed up in, like you know, anywhere from 12 to 15 panic attacks a day, Insomnia, like maybe I could sleep a couple of hours a night if I was lucky. I had like about 70% of my body was covered by psoriasis. I was having heart palpitations, chronic sinusitis, you name it. I was experiencing it literally in every area of my body and, truthfully, I had no idea what it was. I had no idea until I went to a naturopathic doctor and she was like it's this, it's this, it's all this stuff, Marcy, that you haven't dealt with. And I'm like but I got sober and she's like that's fantastic, but your body is screaming at you and telling you that there's this unresolved stuff that's held in your system.
Speaker 1:Yeah, people don't. We've talked about this a lot. I mean, I don't want to say people don't realize, because if you listen to the show you definitely have by now but how mental state and mental health directly impacts physical and it's pretty crazy to see, even at a cellular level, like we talked about, the vibrations of your cells, but, like things like that, people don't realize how much of a struggle it actually is. Or even the motivation, let's say, to go motivation to go to the gym, or the motivation to go eat healthy. You're like why? And you're like well, I'm not drinking but I'm grabbing an Oreo snack thinking that it's okay but you're just doing yourself more disservice from that.
Speaker 2:Exactly, yeah, exactly, and that's how it works, right? All spectrums and walks of life is that when people cannot face their past, they need relief from that. It's so painful to be in our own skin, in our own body, to acknowledge our own experiences, to say, you know, my father really wasn't that great of a person or whatever is true for you, right? But just to acknowledge these things or this really awful experience happened and no one even cared that this happened to me, whatever those things are. But when my clients start to name this stuff, it's like, oh, my God, no wonder. You know, I eat six bags of chips every night and I don't work out and I don't take care of myself and my health is failing and all of these things, right. It's like, yeah, because you're evacuating your body, because it's too painful to reside in there, and that's what I did. You know, that's exactly what I was doing.
Speaker 1:How did you get through it?
Speaker 2:Well, I didn't initially right. I, as I said, I thought that I had had climbed the mountain when I got sober and stopped drinking. When I had a week of sobriety, I thought I should give a TED Talk. I couldn't stop drinking for the life of me, and so I thought I had nailed it at a week sober and that everything in my life was going to fall into line. But when my body started failing me, I was like oh my like, this is, this is not good. You know what is the problem. But still, I refused to connect it all. So the doctor sent me to therapy. I started doing therapy. So I you know collectively I've been in therapy for 20-ish years and did all the things that I thought I was supposed to do. But what I failed to see was what actually took place is kind of what you just mentioned a second ago is like I'm not drinking but I'm eating Oreos.
Speaker 2:Well, I didn't do it with food. I mean, to some extent I did. I ate ice cream every day when I first got sober. But what I did was I switched it for working and I was in a sales profession in the mortgage banking industry, and man, sales for somebody who has low self-esteem is a place to be if you can excel, right, and I just had my. You know, really, I just put a brick on the gas and I was just on it and I would work from the moment I got up until the moment I went to bed. And I did this seven days a week and I thought there was nothing wrong, right, and I had no idea that I was just being an addict with work and that I was being even though I was going to therapy and all the things.
Speaker 2:I was still shoving stuff down. I still wasn't, I was intellectualizing, I wasn't necessarily feeling, and as I went through this process, what ended up happening three years ago is when the brick came off the gas and my body said no more, I literally went into my entire body, shut down, my nervous system completely failed. It messed up my immune system. I had mast cell activation syndrome going on and histamine intolerance, which are life-threatening conditions. It's what puts you in an anaphylaxis. So you know it's very serious.
Speaker 2:And uh, I was supposed to take the day off from work because, uh, I was having tremors so bad I couldn't tell if my desk was moving, if my computer was moving or I was moving and uh. So I was like I literally cannot do this a minute longer. I had been doing it for months and not listening to my body and I called my manager and I said look, I got to get out of here. I was supposed to be gone for the day and I became bedridden for the next 40 days and almost died and that's when I got it. That was when I got. It is when I was laying in bed, dying and nothing, no amount of money I had made, no amount of awards that I had gotten, nothing that I had accomplished mattered in those moments. Nor could they save me right, nor could they change the circumstances that I was now faced with, and that was like a two by four right over the head.
Speaker 1:I just want to clarify for those watching video. I am laughing and smiling because I went through the same exact thing and I'm just. When you mentioned getting into sales. After going back, I was like, oh, there, we go, there, I am. Else, after going back, I was like, oh, there, we go, there, I am. I'm just reliving my life. As you're talking, it's like, oh yeah, oh, I did that. Oh, I did that, I get it, you too, huh.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, oh my God, I went right into gym sales and won a bunch of awards there you go Right, and that just keeps feeding it Right. Yeah, it took until I had a total mental breakdown when I was 25 years old, Like what am I doing with my life? This is not the direction. And then that's how the gym started, whatever. But like it's funny Cause I was there.
Speaker 2:You got it.
Speaker 1:you hear me yeah, I just start from the beginning. But first of all, glad you're finally moving on from it, which is awesome to hear the. But go back where we think and it's just a side effect of being a kid, right, because I was in the same boat but we think that a physical attribute that we have is life-ending or life-altering and we think that it's the end of the world because I have this one thing I mean, you had yours, mine was called Big Head, that was that's what I was known as. But, like you, just get that trauma built up from kids and they're cruel. I don't want to argue and say it's worse now, but because it's online and it's way harder, I just missed that cutoff. But, like this horrible thing you have to go through and I want to say this the right way is a blessing, and I only say that because you went through a hardship right and that taught you how to be tolerant to things in your life and you learn a lot better when you're a kid than when you're an adult. So you had kids picking on you. It was very emotional, it was a hard thing to get through, but then when you got over it and then the next chapter right.
Speaker 1:So if you want to go back into the drinking and you said you went to the Tulsa program and then stopped and went back I would bet a million dollars. The reason you were able to do that is because you figured out your trauma as a childhood. And when you figured out, hey, I'm resilient, I went through X so I can go through Y, that puts your life forward. And that was the same situation with me, youngest kid, same exact situation. Literally. Everything you said was literally my life. And then bump forward mine wasn't alcohol, mine was neck injury and then written off that way, right, and then it's. My thought process was okay, I went through X so I can can get through y and that's added so many layers.
Speaker 1:And so the next thing and these always kind of come that way but then people like you and I are able to now come out, talk about these things and help other people, while those that never went through these situations can never have it right. If I just if I could decide to become a therapist, I decided to help people. It's a lot harder to relate because I never experienced the exact like things you were talking about, but you're able to, and you're able to relate, that you're able to understand people better and you're able to now do be better in your life because you have a life devoted for others, as as do I and as do hundreds of other people that are around that have had on their show. It's like that's, that's what made you better, because you got to experience is not or poor me.
Speaker 1:I went through it, you had the privilege of going through it, and that sounds odd to people, but that's what I've realized in my life. It was a privilege for me to go through all that because it got me to where I am today and, like I told you pre-show, I wouldn't have changed any of it for the world. Does that make sense?
Speaker 2:150%. I have deep and profound gratitude for every moment of my life, every single moment of my life, including the car accident. You know people think that's really strange, but I agree with you wholeheartedly. That has been my lived experience also. And there's also this like helping other people with my story right, with your story right.
Speaker 2:Why did you do the show? You're doing the show because of what you've experienced, right? How many millions of people have listened to you and transformed their own life because of what you've been able to provide, your insight and your experience and your wisdom? You've gained from that right, like that's the thing for me today, that's what lights me up is that I have transformed my pain into meaning and you know, or transformed my pain and suffering into meaning and purpose, and that is so powerful and that's what makes it all worthwhile. And then to be able to use it for my own self, right, like you said, I've been through X and now I can go through Y, you know, but my daughter ended up getting in an accident as she, just a few years ago actually and she ran over somebody with a jet ski and they almost lost their life. They were on life support for 13 days and who would have ever thought, right, who would have ever thought that my experience from the car accident would show up to be helpful for my own daughter? Right, like I could have never made that up in a million years or imagine that that could have happened. Right, but when I flew into Phoenix and we landed at the airport, she said, oh my God, you're the only person that can understand what I'm experiencing in this moment. Right, and and that was when I got it so profoundly that every moment up until that moment in time was absolutely 100 percent worth it, and I do it all, again, to ease my daughter's suffering.
Speaker 1:I love this because I'm going to make that a topic point right now, because I'm always pregnant, but we don't have our kid yet, but we're working on it. Yeah, I want to relate that back to kids, right? I want to relate that back to parenting as a whole and I want to hear your explanation of this. This is just a working theory I'm working on right now, but I'm one of four kids, right? So I look at my parents and they always, from the moment we were born, one of the best of us, and they were great, absolutely great parents and they constantly gave, gave, gave, gave, gave. So we never had to.
Speaker 1:We never had to struggle, right, as, growing up, as kids, I had personal struggles outside of my home life and that was everything I've talked about.
Speaker 1:My siblings didn't really. They had some, but nothing like I was experiencing it. And then, if we fast forward 30 years and I kind of get an understanding of where they're at mentally and I can see how, as far as like gratitude in general, like I'm super freaking happy I married the woman of my dreams, like I, I love her wholeheartedly. She's gonna listen later and yell at me, but, um, I really do so, like getting to experience that and getting to be with her, knowing that we're having a kid, and just knowing I get to teach my kid lessons and help them, I feel like, because my siblings didn't go through the same exact thing. They lost out on that. So, as I guess, my question is as a parent, what do you do with your kid? Are you blinding her from the hardships, or do you feel it's better, because you went through these kind of things, to let her go through them in the fall, because you know if she falls she's going to be able to get back up and be better than everybody else?
Speaker 2:That's such a great, great question. So she, she is 31 years old today and she is my wife's biological daughter and I've raised her since she was eight years old. And just to be clear on the timeline, and so she, before my trauma was healed, before I was really working in therapy and really moving forward, no, I didn't let her just go in the world and trust that she would fail and be fine. I tried to protect her from everything and I did that by being like an authoritative parents, like like your, your curfews, you know eight o'clock in your in the ninth grade, you know like I was just unreasonable and over the top and trying to control her, to prevent her. Really I was terrified. She was going to die. That's truthfully what was plaguing me. And so I didn't go about it right, and I was parenting in a lot of ways that I had been parented because I didn't know any better and I didn't know that the way I was parented had caused my trauma. Right, Like there was a lot of dots I had not connected at that time.
Speaker 2:But I went to when she was 16 years old, I went to the Meadows, which is a leading trauma facility in the country. I had to do work around my car accident, because when she because she started riding with friends and I lost my mind literally, and so I went to the meadows to really focus on the car accident, and lo and behold, you can't just focus on one thing, you have to look at your entire life. And so while I was there, I looked at my entire life, your entire life. And so while I was there, I looked at my entire life. And when I came home, we had a family meeting and I sat her down and I said, look, I'm so wrong, I'm so wrong and the way that I have raised you is so wrong.
Speaker 2:And here's all the reasons why I did that, and none of that forgives why I did it right. I just want you to have some understanding that I wasn't trying to just be this controlling, you know, wicked, whatever. I was doing it out of my own deficits and my own pain. And since that time, since that it was literally like a pivotal moment, right, Like I think I have it written in one of my journals the day we had this conversation and since that moment, I've done everything completely different, right, and it is a lot more like I trust that you have to have, whatever life experience it is, that you have to have to be able to be the person that you're intended to be in this lifetime right, and that when you struggle, that is going to give you grit, for when you know the shit hits the fan right Like, and you have to have that grit or otherwise life is so much more difficult without it. So that's a long answer, but that's really what happened for me.
Speaker 1:I have two. I have a statement and a question. First statement I love you said the word grit. Just go listen to that episode. It's grit teachable because you literally just nailed it on the head. The second the real question was how did she take the conversations and what have you seen in her life that's changed or been different, right? Do you see a difference in both styles?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that her name is Brianna and probably one of the most accepting, loving, tolerant people that I've ever met in my entire life, and I can say that pretty objectively because she's not my biological child, right, I have nothing to gain by saying that. That's just her demeanor and who she is. And so when we had this conversation, she said, yeah, like you're right, you, you know you were a jerk, or that's how I perceived it, or, you know, I thought you were just being a controlling bitch right Like okay, that's fair and she's like.
Speaker 2:But I really appreciate this and I really appreciate the conversation and I'm really sorry this is what she said to me I'm really sorry that you were in so much pain that you felt like you had to act that way with me, like she got it, she got it, and so how has it changed her? I think my whole deal is that I just support Brianna, regardless if I agree with her decisions or I don't, that's irrelevant. Her path is her path. It's not mine, and my job is just to love her, to show up and love her and tell her oh, honey, that didn't work out for you.
Speaker 2:Okay, so next time, what do you think you're going to do differently? Right, that's it. It's not about oh, I told you so, or you should have, or you could. Right, like, that's not helpful and that doesn't give anyone any confidence. Right, giving confidence, I think, comes from like I'm going to love you no matter what you do and I'm going to be here no matter what happens, and then we're going to figure out whatever we need to figure out from there. Right, I'm not going to do it for you, but I'm going to be here to listen and I'm going to help give reasonable advice or feedback, or maybe just nothing, right, but that's what I feel like I've really offered her when I made that shift is she's just so confident, she does what she wants when she wants to do it, and she makes no excuses for it. She literally is just her. It's amazing.
Speaker 1:I love that it kind of cause you got the opportunity to go through both sides of it, have an understanding of it during it and then get to see the actual product of it right, and I'm just kind of sitting here guessing what the next 30 years are going to be like. Who knows.
Speaker 1:Yeah yeah, just hope for it and hope that myself, as a parent, is different than my parents for a reason. Let's say it was wrong. I just think different is better, that's all. Exactly Like you said, I think they have to fall and learn to pick themselves up, because that's overall going to build that grit and they have to have the confidence of knowing that, even if they look like complete idiots, you're there for them 150% Always.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I, I love that. I think it's a good way to place in the show. That's amazing. But anyway, marcy. So the last two questions I'm asking I ask everybody. First one is if you were to summarize this episode in one or two sentences, what would be your take on message?
Speaker 2:Oh, that's a big question. You just lay it on me like that, that's it All right, let's see. If I had to summarize it, I think the summary of today's show would be that, regardless of whatever it is that you experience, that there is absolutely an opportunity in it, even if you can't see it in that moment. There is an absolute opportunity on the other side, if you can just make it and hang on till you get to the other side.
Speaker 1:I love that. And the second question this is an easy one how can people find you, get ahold of you and learn more?
Speaker 2:TikTok, facebook, youtube Feels like I'm missing one Instagram, and then I believe you'll have show notes with a link. And right now for your show, because people are all about redefining health right and looking at their mental well-being and all of the great stuff that you talk about, we've decided to discount our coaching programs by 20% so people your listeners can reach out to me and they can have a free consultation with me and they can find my information in the show notes to do that.
Speaker 1:I love it. Marcy, thank you so much for coming on. Thank you, guys, for listening to this week's episode of Health and Fitness Redefined. Don't forget, hit that subscribe button, button share with the fend. It's the only way this show will grow. And don't forget, guys, fitness is medicine. Until next time, thank you, outro Music.
