Hello there,

I felt pretty happy to have Robin on a call for this interview today.

Being adopted is a very individual/subjective experience.

Sometimes reconnection happens like in Robin's case.

In other situations you never reconnect with your biological family..

either way..

how can you find peace?

how can you be at peace with your past ?

how do you find out who you are ?

This is the intro episode around this sensitive topic

Know that you matter

Know that you have a precious place here on planet earth and we need you to shine your light

you are loved ..

enjoy this very touching episode

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A.

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Unknown: 00:00:06

Hello, hello, and welcome to the Borealis

Unknown: 00:00:09

experience. I'm your host Aurora, and I'm very happy and

Unknown: 00:00:13

excited to have Robin Ryan Walker with me today, we will be

Unknown: 00:00:19

talking about a very sensitive topic, a topic of adoption and

Unknown: 00:00:27

how being adopted is. Yeah, very, very tough for some people

Unknown: 00:00:34

easier for others. But the search for identity is what

Unknown: 00:00:44

unites pretty much every person on this planet who has been

Unknown: 00:00:50

adopted. And yeah, I'm very happy that Robin is here with

Unknown: 00:00:55

me. He will be walking in the coolies in Lethbridge, and I

Unknown: 00:00:59

have a beautiful view of Mother Nature. They're awesome. And

Unknown: 00:01:06

yeah, he will be talking about his experiences and what he has

Unknown: 00:01:11

to share with us about this beautiful topic. Thank you so

Unknown: 00:01:17

much for making the time and for taking us on a walk with you

Unknown: 00:01:21

today, Robin.

Unknown: 00:01:23

Absolutely. And thank you for inviting me here. I'm happy to

Unknown: 00:01:27

be here. And as I mentioned earlier, this would be my first

Unknown: 00:01:30

podcast that I do speaking on. So maybe not as polished as I

Unknown: 00:01:36

could be.

Unknown: 00:01:39

Yeah, we're not going for polished here. We're going for

Unknown: 00:01:42

raw and honest. So I'm very happy that you're here and I

Unknown: 00:01:47

know you will be shining brightly. I would love to share

Unknown: 00:01:53

with with our listeners hear a little bit about your

Unknown: 00:01:55

background. And as you might know, can imagine, the more you

Unknown: 00:02:01

go into detail, the better it is for people to being able to

Unknown: 00:02:06

relate to you and feel less lonely with their experience.

Unknown: 00:02:14

Absolutely. Okay, well, I'm, I go by Robin. I was I was born

Unknown: 00:02:24

and named Robin in my birth actually. You know, I didn't

Unknown: 00:02:31

really find anything out about that part of my story in detail

Unknown: 00:02:38

until just a couple years ago. Most of my life, you know, I

Unknown: 00:02:44

knew I was born in foothills Hospital in Calgary. 1979. I

Unknown: 00:02:50

knew that I was adopted, I knew that. My parents were still

Unknown: 00:02:57

children, really, they were 15 and 16 when I was born. So they

Unknown: 00:03:03

both were 15 when I was conceived. And, you know, the

Unknown: 00:03:09

world was different than my mom didn't have a lot of support.

Unknown: 00:03:14

And back then, having children that young and out of wedlock,

Unknown: 00:03:19

you know, was frowned upon. So the decision to put me up for

Unknown: 00:03:24

adoption, like made a lot of sense. You know, my adoptive

Unknown: 00:03:28

parents told me when I was young that I was adopted and what they

Unknown: 00:03:32

knew of the circumstances around that. And it all made sense to

Unknown: 00:03:36

me and I didn't consciously feel slighted or unwanted or

Unknown: 00:03:42

anything, you know, I had a pretty normal upbringing for the

Unknown: 00:03:45

time. I've lived in Lethbridge since kindergarten age. Maybe

Unknown: 00:03:52

the year before that. See, you know, my experience that way was

Unknown: 00:03:57

was pretty normal. And it never even really occurred to me, like

Unknown: 00:04:05

to look for my birth parents. Until I found out I was going to

Unknown: 00:04:11

be a father. You know, and that didn't happen until I was 30. So

Unknown: 00:04:17

at that point, I applied You know, one of the provincial

Unknown: 00:04:23

buildings here in the city, photos and paperwork and you

Unknown: 00:04:28

know, while later I got a, an envelope in the mail with some

Unknown: 00:04:33

mostly redacted documents, that didn't really tell me much more

Unknown: 00:04:36

than I already knew at that time. And sometime after that, I

Unknown: 00:04:43

think it was maybe a few years after that, the laws in Alberta

Unknown: 00:04:48

changed to the to for adopted for a season. And parents have

Unknown: 00:04:55

adopted children, where they could apply for information and

Unknown: 00:04:59

there would be more available to them without the consent of the

Unknown: 00:05:03

other party. So at that time, you know, I reapplied and, and

Unknown: 00:05:12

I, I got some more documents, less redaction, so I can't

Unknown: 00:05:19

remember exactly, but I think I found out my mom's name at that

Unknown: 00:05:23

point. And actually I did. And you know, this was around 20.

Unknown: 00:05:31

Around 2012, I think 13. And so I looked in the Calgary

Unknown: 00:05:39

phonebook. So I found that my last name, or her last name is

Unknown: 00:05:43

pronto. And although I didn't know how to pronounce it at that

Unknown: 00:05:47

time, because I just read it. And I looked in the Calgary

Unknown: 00:05:50

phonebook and there was like, three pages worth of Toronto's.

Unknown: 00:05:53

So I wasn't about to start calling them, you know, it just

Unknown: 00:05:56

seemed like No, I mean, for what, what possibly could have

Unknown: 00:06:00

been nothing. And I believe I looked on Facebook, and I didn't

Unknown: 00:06:04

find anything, and you know, maybe just did a Google search

Unknown: 00:06:07

or whatever. And, and that was that and kind of left it alone.

Unknown: 00:06:13

Shortly around that time, I had my second child, and then a year

Unknown: 00:06:17

and a half after that, my, my third and last child. And again,

Unknown: 00:06:23

it was, you know, it was nice to know the information I had, and

Unknown: 00:06:25

I didn't really think too much of it. And then early 2019, I

Unknown: 00:06:32

was recently separated, and I got laid off and, and I decided

Unknown: 00:06:36

to take the month of February off. And I considered you know

Unknown: 00:06:40

what something I put off for a while and so, so one of the

Unknown: 00:06:42

things associated with my birth, I guess is that I was my mother

Unknown: 00:06:50

is matey. And when I was younger, I had matey status, and

Unknown: 00:06:54

I, I use that to gain some to access some funding for college.

Unknown: 00:07:02

And back in about 2004 2005. And then sometime after that, I'm

Unknown: 00:07:06

not sure if it was the provincial government or if it

Unknown: 00:07:08

was the matey nation, or who but they

Unknown: 00:07:14

updated the requirements to obtain matey status in Alberta.

Unknown: 00:07:17

And part of the requirements now included genome genealogical

Unknown: 00:07:25

information, which again in my situation I didn't have. And so

Unknown: 00:07:29

for a while there, I lost that status. And so, in February, I

Unknown: 00:07:33

decided, well, that's maybe something I'll look into, like

Unknown: 00:07:36

see if I can find things out there. So I went down to the

Unknown: 00:07:39

local matey office in Lethbridge, you know, told the

Unknown: 00:07:45

lady my situation and she instructed me to come back the

Unknown: 00:07:48

next day that there'd be a woman there that we could go through

Unknown: 00:07:51

some genealogical records and see what we could find. And so

Unknown: 00:07:55

the next morning, I was as I was sitting, having breakfast, and I

Unknown: 00:07:58

had my snack, or my two folders anyway, and I was leafing

Unknown: 00:08:02

through my documents. And you came across the document with my

Unknown: 00:08:07

mother's name on it, and had my phone there. So I opened up

Unknown: 00:08:10

Facebook, you don't type your name in, and this time she was

Unknown: 00:08:13

there. And I clicked her profile a little bit just to confirm

Unknown: 00:08:18

before I reached out to her and then as I was looking at her

Unknown: 00:08:22

profile, I saw there was a woman listed as one of her sisters.

Unknown: 00:08:25

And so I decided to reach out to her instead. And I can't

Unknown: 00:08:30

remember exactly what I told her I still have the message on my

Unknown: 00:08:32

phone though if I want it to go back to it. And her initial

Unknown: 00:08:35

response to me it wasn't like a you know, what are you talking

Unknown: 00:08:38

about or whatever so I knew that I was on the right track there.

Unknown: 00:08:42

And so she got in touch with my mom who was at work and then she

Unknown: 00:08:47

got back to me and and you know, my mom and I started texting

Unknown: 00:08:51

through Facebook messenger from there. And later on that week,

Unknown: 00:08:55

we talked on the phone and then made arrangements to meet in

Unknown: 00:08:59

person so I I found out that she was living in wood Duke and I

Unknown: 00:09:04

had two younger sisters. And one of them two nephews, and a whole

Unknown: 00:09:11

bunch of cousins. You know, five aunts two uncles, one who passed

Unknown: 00:09:17

a couple years prior. And yeah, so in mid February, I took my

Unknown: 00:09:25

oldest son up to Edmonton to West them into mall and we did

Unknown: 00:09:29

the waterpark and a little bit of shopping and then then we

Unknown: 00:09:35

went and met my mom and one of my sisters and my nephews for

Unknown: 00:09:39

dinner that night. My youngest sister was living in Red Deer at

Unknown: 00:09:42

the time and she couldn't make it up but we were able to

Unknown: 00:09:44

connect with her on our way back to Lethbridge at the end of the

Unknown: 00:09:47

weekend, so yeah, I guess you know, meeting her meeting my

Unknown: 00:09:54

sisters. It was just It just felt really normal like it felt

Unknown: 00:10:03

like home right like I just I connected with them pretty

Unknown: 00:10:06

easily we we you know had things in common perspectives you know

Unknown: 00:10:14

my one sister talking about like raising children and we had a

Unknown: 00:10:18

lot of same ideas and and I brought up a bunch of childhood

Unknown: 00:10:24

photos and stuff with me so we were all going through pictures

Unknown: 00:10:26

and my mom and you know pulled out a bunch of pictures so you

Unknown: 00:10:29

know a lot of the genetic resemblance was apparent right

Unknown: 00:10:32

between like my children or me when I was young and and my

Unknown: 00:10:37

sister's and nephews and aunts and uncles and all that so that

Unknown: 00:10:40

was it was really positive experience for me and and then

Unknown: 00:10:46

it opened up a lot for me that I've been carrying all that time

Unknown: 00:10:51

that I didn't realize consciously right because

Unknown: 00:10:53

there's a lot of stuff that gets in there unconsciously

Unknown: 00:10:55

especially like I was adopted right from birth. So you know, I

Unknown: 00:11:01

found out a lot of these a lot of these details obviously after

Unknown: 00:11:04

meeting my mom, and so she she was living in BC when I was

Unknown: 00:11:09

conceived and when she found out she was pregnant, she moved to

Unknown: 00:11:12

Calgary and she was attended a school for unwed mothers which

Unknown: 00:11:18

you know, again speaks to the time that we were in back then.

Unknown: 00:11:22

And you know, she was in the hospital for some time after I

Unknown: 00:11:27

was born because she was so young and she wasn't permitted

Unknown: 00:11:33

to pull me or anything right like she she'd come she'd come

Unknown: 00:11:38

to the nursery and look at me but other than she told me there

Unknown: 00:11:43

was one time that nurses couldn't get me to stop crying

Unknown: 00:11:46

and she was there and and they let her hold me for a little

Unknown: 00:11:49

while and I stopped crying right of course but you know for for

Unknown: 00:11:56

an infant you know to consider nine months and mom's belly you

Unknown: 00:12:02

know I can hear her heart I can hear her voice I can hear the

Unknown: 00:12:05

people that she's with

Unknown: 00:12:09

and then you know the first day come out into this world and all

Unknown: 00:12:12

that like she's just gone right like I there's no I mean again I

Unknown: 00:12:17

don't know all the specifics but for me to think of my own

Unknown: 00:12:21

children and and what I know from from raising them and and

Unknown: 00:12:29

you are so so far successfully I think and you know I can't

Unknown: 00:12:34

imagine what it must have been like for infant me to just she's

Unknown: 00:12:38

not there right and sure you know my my basic needs were

Unknown: 00:12:41

attended to buy nurses but it's it's not the same at all right

Unknown: 00:12:49

so there was definitely stuff that I was carrying in my body

Unknown: 00:12:52

you know trauma from that experience that I wasn't aware

Unknown: 00:12:55

of. And even now I'm still processing

Unknown: 00:13:03

Wow, thank you so much for for sharing this with us and

Unknown: 00:13:09

especially the last part of what you said that so like I can

Unknown: 00:13:14

imagine when you hear that story and I would say like physical

Unknown: 00:13:18

touch is basic need that that you haven't received this in the

Unknown: 00:13:25

first couple of weeks after you were born made you feel very

Unknown: 00:13:31

like vulnerable but at the same time also maybe helped you to

Unknown: 00:13:35

make sense of of how you feel and perceive life. I don't know

Unknown: 00:13:41

now after you realized Okay, you were deprived of physical touch

Unknown: 00:13:48

and closeness with your mom can you like see what it did you

Unknown: 00:13:55

like when it comes to physical touch? Are you extremely needy

Unknown: 00:14:00

now? Or? Or is physical touch something that is very difficult

Unknown: 00:14:04

for you to receive? Like on that level of connecting with people

Unknown: 00:14:10

do you notice that it did some damage to you?

Unknown: 00:14:19

I mean now I'm in I'm in a pretty good space, you know,

Unknown: 00:14:22

I've done I've done a lot of work, you know, as we call it,

Unknown: 00:14:26

and I wouldn't say it's impacting me much in the

Unknown: 00:14:31

present. But if I look at my younger years, especially like

Unknown: 00:14:35

my young adult years, I you know, I was I related very

Unknown: 00:14:40

superficially to people to women in particular. And I wouldn't I

Unknown: 00:14:46

wouldn't say physical touch was like difficult or a problem or I

Unknown: 00:14:50

don't know that I was necessarily needed, but

Unknown: 00:14:53

definitely like a lot of very short superficial, primarily

Unknown: 00:14:59

sexual relationships. As a young adult,

Unknown: 00:15:04

yeah. And it can be connected to that. It doesn't have to be, but

Unknown: 00:15:08

it certainly can. And how was it for you during your teenage

Unknown: 00:15:13

years? And you you're your 20s? Did you have a longing, like a

Unknown: 00:15:21

search for identity more than others? Because I know that a

Unknown: 00:15:26

lot of people who are born in a family with their dad and their

Unknown: 00:15:30

mom, they go through the same thing. They don't know who they

Unknown: 00:15:34

are, they feel like they're very different to their siblings and

Unknown: 00:15:37

parents, and they have to find themselves. Was it, like, more

Unknown: 00:15:41

intense for you than for others knowing that you were adopted?

Unknown: 00:15:47

Or was it not really a thing? conscious?

Unknown: 00:15:56

Yeah, well, I mean, obviously, I can only speak to my experience,

Unknown: 00:15:59

which makes it somewhat difficult to compare and

Unknown: 00:16:04

contrast with what others experiences might have been.

Unknown: 00:16:08

From what I can imagine, I don't for me, like I remember one time

Unknown: 00:16:15

meeting, one of my dads I can't recall was a friend or an

Unknown: 00:16:18

acquaintance or a business associate or what, but, you

Unknown: 00:16:22

know, my adopted dad, and he said something like, you know, I

Unknown: 00:16:25

mentioned that I was a son, and he's like, Oh, yeah, I can see

Unknown: 00:16:28

the resemblance. And you know, and in my mind, I'm like, what,

Unknown: 00:16:31

I don't know what you're seeing, but it's not fucking there, man.

Unknown: 00:16:34

Yeah, there's no resemblance. There's nothing right. And

Unknown: 00:16:37

that's just it. Right? So it's all my family, like there was.

Unknown: 00:16:41

We didn't have a lot in common, right. Our interests are like,

Unknown: 00:16:45

the things I was curious about. They didn't have those same,

Unknown: 00:16:50

like my two older sisters that were both also adopted. And I

Unknown: 00:16:57

knew that, you know, it was easy to understand that, yeah, we

Unknown: 00:17:02

don't have these things in common because we aren't related

Unknown: 00:17:05

in that way. Right now. It doesn't mean like, you know,

Unknown: 00:17:09

it's not like we never did things together. We did you

Unknown: 00:17:11

know, we play board games and, you know, have movie night and

Unknown: 00:17:14

whatever, just like anybody else. But when it came to the

Unknown: 00:17:17

things that I was really curious about, and I really liked

Unknown: 00:17:19

spending my time with, like, I was inside of my family, I was

Unknown: 00:17:23

mostly alone in that, and I was okay with it, too. Like, I I

Unknown: 00:17:28

kept my own counsel, I, I was pretty okay with, like, a being

Unknown: 00:17:35

by myself. Now. That's not to say that I spent all my time by

Unknown: 00:17:38

myself, like I had friends growing up. And I, I certainly

Unknown: 00:17:42

spent a lot of time you know, at the park and over a friend's

Unknown: 00:17:44

places and all that sort of stuff. But again, a lot of those

Unknown: 00:17:47

relationships were were fairly superficial, right? I never

Unknown: 00:17:50

really got into the stuff that really mattered to me with

Unknown: 00:17:53

anybody. You know, I never really like express things that

Unknown: 00:17:57

upset me, or, you know, if I got bullied at school, I didn't

Unknown: 00:18:01

bring that home. And maybe that's why, you know, maybe it's

Unknown: 00:18:07

I just didn't want to bother my parents with it. Maybe it's, you

Unknown: 00:18:10

know, who knows? For sure. But I can imagine that that had an

Unknown: 00:18:16

impact instead of all of that, right, like just being left

Unknown: 00:18:19

alone. So early. It just kind of carried through. And it was just

Unknown: 00:18:24

normal for me to just think it out by myself, right?

Unknown: 00:18:27

Yeah. Yeah. And to feel like yeah, you have to struggle

Unknown: 00:18:34

through life when it gets difficult by yourself and you

Unknown: 00:18:38

can't rely on other people or maybe other people are not

Unknown: 00:18:42

really trustworthy. Yeah, it's, it's when I read your post, like

Unknown: 00:18:49

a couple months ago, I felt so attached because yeah, you just

Unknown: 00:18:55

picture that little baby that's crying for intimacy and for

Unknown: 00:18:59

physical touch, or for whatever the mom could provide. And it is

Unknown: 00:19:04

cut off of that source of love and holy shit like it's, it

Unknown: 00:19:10

really gave me goosebumps, and I felt Yeah, it was so powerful of

Unknown: 00:19:18

you to share this with the world with the Facebook world and, and

Unknown: 00:19:23

that you made yourself so vulnerable. So I have so much

Unknown: 00:19:27

respect for you. And I feel that it can help a lot of people out

Unknown: 00:19:33

there to, to know that when you realize something like that when

Unknown: 00:19:39

you hear news like this, and you share this with the world then

Unknown: 00:19:43

people can connect with you on a deeper level. They can

Unknown: 00:19:47

understand you and be closer to you. After you posted this post

Unknown: 00:19:55

Did you have like lots of feedback from people

Unknown: 00:20:02

Yeah, I mean, there was, there was public feedback on the post

Unknown: 00:20:05

and, and some people did reach out to me and, and some, like,

Unknown: 00:20:10

you know, after the fact just in conversation would mention what

Unknown: 00:20:16

they got out of it or, you know, I'm discovering more and more

Unknown: 00:20:19

people that I know that were adopted that I didn't know,

Unknown: 00:20:22

right. And it's not necessarily something you go around asking

Unknown: 00:20:24

people particularly as adults, right? Yeah.

Unknown: 00:20:27

Yeah. If you were to speak to someone who still hasn't found

Unknown: 00:20:33

their parents, and they feel that longing for yet to know who

Unknown: 00:20:40

they are that search for identity, did you come up with

Unknown: 00:20:45

tools over the years, like before you met your, your

Unknown: 00:20:49

family, your biological family that helped you out that made

Unknown: 00:20:54

you feel safe and understood? I know last time we talked and

Unknown: 00:20:59

walked around, we talked about astrology. Is there is there

Unknown: 00:21:06

other sources that you like, Did you go to counseling or any,

Unknown: 00:21:12

like anything, you can think of books or whatever you could

Unknown: 00:21:16

recommend to somebody who is still feeling like something is

Unknown: 00:21:21

missing in their life, because they're not connected to their

Unknown: 00:21:24

biological family?

Unknown: 00:21:32

If I look back on my life, you know, I kind of fumbled through

Unknown: 00:21:35

it all really. And I see the first, like, major work that

Unknown: 00:21:44

well, I guess, one turning point for me would have been right

Unknown: 00:21:49

around young adulthood, right, somewhere like 1718. You know,

Unknown: 00:21:54

as a teenager, I lead I read a lot of fantasy I read some like

Unknown: 00:21:57

David eddings, Robert Jordan, Terry was, you know, like,

Unknown: 00:22:04

dragons and sorcery and, and, you know, fantasy type novels

Unknown: 00:22:09

and a bit of sci fi as well. And, and then when I was around

Unknown: 00:22:12

1718, I can't remember the exact circumstances around it. But I

Unknown: 00:22:16

came across this book, I think it might have been one chapters

Unknown: 00:22:20

open the left bridge, I'm not sure. Anyways, it was called

Unknown: 00:22:23

seven life lessons of chaos. And I think, around the same time, I

Unknown: 00:22:28

kind of come across chaos theory and like the idea of fractals

Unknown: 00:22:32

and the Mandelbrot set, and I was fascinated by it. And so I

Unknown: 00:22:35

read the book, I didn't memorize the seven life lessons, so I can

Unknown: 00:22:40

wrap them off. One of them was about like butterfly power. And

Unknown: 00:22:45

you know, the idea that if a butterfly flaps its wings on one

Unknown: 00:22:48

side of the world does it cause a tornado on the other side of

Unknown: 00:22:50

the world, and so just the idea of like, all these independent,

Unknown: 00:22:53

you know, kind of feedback loops that can build into something

Unknown: 00:22:56

greater, even though they're not specifically organized to do

Unknown: 00:23:00

that. And also the different ways that we kind of reinforce

Unknown: 00:23:03

like, the status quo, through all of our little, you know,

Unknown: 00:23:07

individual, and yet collective actions of, you know, putting

Unknown: 00:23:14

the open sign in the window, and, and, you know, wanting to

Unknown: 00:23:17

work and all that. So, so that was interesting. And from that

Unknown: 00:23:20

book forward, I, like kind of stopped with fiction, I found

Unknown: 00:23:25

reading about the real world to be far more interesting, because

Unknown: 00:23:27

it was, it mattered. It seemed like to me, whereas stories were

Unknown: 00:23:31

fun, but I had a good one, while I didn't even really watch much

Unknown: 00:23:38

TV. Other than, like, documentaries and stuff, so I

Unknown: 00:23:42

did a lot of just like, learning about the world, worrying about

Unknown: 00:23:45

how my mind works, learning about how my body works,

Unknown: 00:23:48

learning about how society works, and psychology and

Unknown: 00:23:52

different cultures. And, you know, I was raised Roman

Unknown: 00:23:56

Catholic. So, you know, religion was something that I was curious

Unknown: 00:24:01

about, and, you know, so being raised Roman Catholic, I was

Unknown: 00:24:04

presented with that. And then in the making sense of it, you

Unknown: 00:24:08

know, I wanted to look at Well, what do other people believe,

Unknown: 00:24:12

right? What do other religions teach and, and then looking at,

Unknown: 00:24:14

like the commonalities To me, that's where we could find

Unknown: 00:24:17

truth, right? Like if there's, if all of these different

Unknown: 00:24:19

religions that, that were developed in all these different

Unknown: 00:24:22

areas of the world, all speak about certain things in common,

Unknown: 00:24:26

like, that's what matters all the rest of it's just, you know,

Unknown: 00:24:29

bullshit that this or that leader put in there to control

Unknown: 00:24:32

or whatever it might be. And I've since come to apply that

Unknown: 00:24:36

same sort of idea to the kind of other things I've been studying.

Unknown: 00:24:39

But so I guess, you know, just kind of went off on a tangent as

Unknown: 00:24:46

far as your question goes, but I think for any individual and

Unknown: 00:24:49

their search for you know who they are, I guess, you know,

Unknown: 00:24:55

part of that might involve and external, like, find out what

Unknown: 00:24:58

you're interested in right? Find what you're passionate about

Unknown: 00:25:01

find out what really kind of pulls you forward. And then from

Unknown: 00:25:08

there, maybe you can reflect and take it in, right and look

Unknown: 00:25:13

inside. So, so that would have been the first thing that kind

Unknown: 00:25:16

of got me going. But really through my 20s, I was a heavy

Unknown: 00:25:20

drinker and, you know, partied a lot and didn't really do much

Unknown: 00:25:27

for my future during that time other than to experience things.

Unknown: 00:25:31

And my my oldest son, Steven, so his mom, my relationship with

Unknown: 00:25:39

her was really quick all around. I was 28, when we met, I didn't

Unknown: 00:25:48

know she was 18. I thought she was like, early 20s, she didn't

Unknown: 00:25:52

realize I was so old either. So it wasn't until after we like

Unknown: 00:25:54

started dating that we both found out we were 10 years

Unknown: 00:25:57

apart. And you know, it wasn't long after that, that Steven was

Unknown: 00:26:02

conceived and, and then he was born, and then we got married.

Unknown: 00:26:08

And we made it just over a year. And then we separated and

Unknown: 00:26:11

divorced. And, and that was not a great experience. But through

Unknown: 00:26:18

it, I definitely like for me, it was like, Okay, well. Why did

Unknown: 00:26:24

this happen? Right? What did I do wrong? What Why did I behave

Unknown: 00:26:28

the way I did you know, if that's not wasn't my intention,

Unknown: 00:26:32

or what I was committed to. And

Unknown: 00:26:35

I had the luck or, you know, if you want to call it that of

Unknown: 00:26:39

meeting, a gentleman that introduced me to, ultimately the

Unknown: 00:26:44

work of Werner erhard landmark worldwide. And so, over the

Unknown: 00:26:48

course of that, the following year, I did a bunch of personal

Unknown: 00:26:52

development programs offered through landmark and developed a

Unknown: 00:26:59

greater I don't wanna say understanding, but that's all

Unknown: 00:27:03

it's coming to me this time, but, you know, understanding of

Unknown: 00:27:05

kind of how we perceive and see and interact with the world,

Unknown: 00:27:09

through like, filters that have been put in place over time,

Unknown: 00:27:14

based on stories that we tell ourselves, because of the

Unknown: 00:27:17

experiences we've had, you know, so for, like, one story that I

Unknown: 00:27:21

might have had, since infancy would have been something like

Unknown: 00:27:24

that I don't matter or that I'm alone, or, you know, something

Unknown: 00:27:29

of the abandonment sort of flavor. One, so, yeah, so doing

Unknown: 00:27:37

that work, you know, enable me to, to be able to examine my,

Unknown: 00:27:41

well, first of all, to be aware of my filters, and then to be

Unknown: 00:27:44

able to examine them and eliminate them really, right.

Unknown: 00:27:48

Because once once you're aware, it's easier for stuff like that

Unknown: 00:27:53

to be disappeared. Whereas a lot of people aren't aware that

Unknown: 00:27:58

they're operating with these filters in place. And so

Unknown: 00:28:00

therefore, they, they think and act like they're perceiving

Unknown: 00:28:05

reality directly, and that they're dealing with reality as

Unknown: 00:28:07

it is objectively, when really, it's, you know, highly

Unknown: 00:28:10

subjective and, and that's why of course, they can't understand

Unknown: 00:28:13

why that person thinks this and this person thinks that and so

Unknown: 00:28:16

on and so forth. Whereas when you can see your filters and are

Unknown: 00:28:19

able to dismantle them, then you can also see, you know, be aware

Unknown: 00:28:22

of the filters that other people are operating with, and not that

Unknown: 00:28:25

it's my place to do anything about those, but just to be

Unknown: 00:28:27

aware that they're there and that, you know, I can maybe be

Unknown: 00:28:30

patient and, and compassionate understanding with these people

Unknown: 00:28:33

and, and in my dealings with them. And so yeah, so that, you

Unknown: 00:28:41

know, highly recommend landmarks work, it's great, it's not a

Unknown: 00:28:43

call. That's all I'm gonna say about it. But there's definitely

Unknown: 00:28:48

other all sorts of other work out there. I did do some I think

Unknown: 00:28:54

it's a lot like EMDR therapy at one point. I'm not really sure

Unknown: 00:28:58

how effective that was because I I got booked in for it before I

Unknown: 00:29:01

did the landmark programs, but I actually did it after so I feel

Unknown: 00:29:06

like the program is moved a lot of stuff in the in the in

Unknown: 00:29:10

between time that when I was doing a therapy, the therapist

Unknown: 00:29:13

even noted like, you know, you don't really seem to need this.

Unknown: 00:29:17

So that was kind of interesting to me. And then after that, more

Unknown: 00:29:22

recently, so when I separated my littles Mom, I would have been

Unknown: 00:29:27

early 2019 late that year. You know, the works definitely not

Unknown: 00:29:46

logical, like smaller stuff that I've read and understood

Unknown: 00:30:00

So, Robin one second. Connection is not on the mic is not really

Unknown: 00:30:09

good anymore.

Unknown: 00:30:11

Okay, I think the winds picking up here. Yeah, now it's okay.

Unknown: 00:30:16

Yeah, there's, there's like a breeze pick it up. So maybe

Unknown: 00:30:19

I'll, I'll stick around here.

Unknown: 00:30:21

Yeah, this is perfect. Thank you.

Unknown: 00:30:23

Okay, sorry, sorry. Yeah, no, no, no, that's, that's all

Unknown: 00:30:27

right, the better better than me to go on at length and, and all

Unknown: 00:30:32

you hear is the wind so but yeah, the work we did, like I

Unknown: 00:30:36

said it's just, I don't want to get into trying to explain it

Unknown: 00:30:40

too much because even now I don't really understand but I

Unknown: 00:30:44

but I do understand enough to know that like, there's a lot

Unknown: 00:30:47

going on in our bodies that, you know, Western science still

Unknown: 00:30:52

can't explain. And we know this. And you know, we hold just like

Unknown: 00:30:59

emotion and things that we haven't processed somewhere

Unknown: 00:31:04

somehow, you know, in our bodies and different organs. And it's,

Unknown: 00:31:07

it's not all mental stuff, like, a lot of people think, and, and

Unknown: 00:31:13

sometimes even just like, kind of playing out a scene. And like

Unknown: 00:31:18

witnessing and seeing and hearing things can shift a lot

Unknown: 00:31:22

of stuff, even though it's not actually like real, right? Like,

Unknown: 00:31:26

I don't have to necessarily sit down and have this heart to

Unknown: 00:31:29

heart with my birth mom or dad or whoever. But you can almost

Unknown: 00:31:34

fake it. So that the body is like, then able to release

Unknown: 00:31:38

whatever it's been holding on to.

Unknown: 00:31:40

Yes, yes. Ah, this is such a precious work. Also, when you

Unknown: 00:31:45

think about breakups and finding closure. A lot of people feel

Unknown: 00:31:51

like they can't find closure if they don't talk to the person

Unknown: 00:31:54

anymore, or finding closure with somebody who passed or something

Unknown: 00:31:59

like that. So it's very precious work. Wow. And how's it called

Unknown: 00:32:04

again?

Unknown: 00:32:04

Absolutely. I'm not really sure. I think I think it's worth

Unknown: 00:32:11

doing.

Unknown: 00:32:14

Yeah, it wasn't really, my introduction to it. Everything

Unknown: 00:32:17

wasn't really that formal. I just saw she was posting some

Unknown: 00:32:19

interesting stuff on Facebook and, and started hanging out.

Unknown: 00:32:23

Yeah. Very, very cool. Thank you so much for sharing. Man, we're

Unknown: 00:32:29

coming to an end here already. We have a couple minutes left, I

Unknown: 00:32:35

would like to ask you one last question. What was the the first

Unknown: 00:32:43

like question that you had for your mom that really helped you

Unknown: 00:32:48

to connect with her? When you met when you reconnected with

Unknown: 00:32:53

her? Do you remember?

Unknown: 00:33:02

I don't know if there was like a specific, you know, q&a, it was

Unknown: 00:33:05

just kind of a we met for dinner and had a conversation and, and

Unknown: 00:33:10

inside of that, all of that. I guess just to add, it's like he

Unknown: 00:33:21

just thinking about, like, how it was for her. And like, being

Unknown: 00:33:30

that baby and being born and stuff, like it's still triggers

Unknown: 00:33:33

emotion for me. Which tells me I'm still processing right and,

Unknown: 00:33:37

and so sometimes they'll sit in a little bit and then you know,

Unknown: 00:33:40

it can be uncomfortable. And I'll leave it alone for a while.

Unknown: 00:33:43

But it's there. And anyway, so. So yeah, like really hearing

Unknown: 00:33:48

like her story of, of all of that, right? Like how it was for

Unknown: 00:33:51

her when she was pregnant. And just to just to think about

Unknown: 00:33:58

like, the decisions the choices she was faced with. And how

Unknown: 00:34:02

difficult that must have been. Yeah, and like, you know, what

Unknown: 00:34:06

she wanted for, for me and and for herself. And and she

Unknown: 00:34:12

couldn't see like that she could do it. And so she did what she

Unknown: 00:34:17

felt was best for me and and it was, yeah, and it was best for

Unknown: 00:34:21

her and you know, my sisters and everything. But because of the

Unknown: 00:34:24

way like our system deals with these things, that's really

Unknown: 00:34:28

where the trauma came in. Like I think that we could do adoption

Unknown: 00:34:31

in a way where you know, these babies aren't left with this

Unknown: 00:34:35

traumatic experience, but i don't know i mean that it takes

Unknown: 00:34:39

a lot more compassion than what the system offers today.

Unknown: 00:34:42

Oh my god. Yes, yes. This is like so touching. I wish I could

Unknown: 00:34:48

give you a hug right now and say nothing but we're just meeting

Unknown: 00:34:53

over zoom. So I hope you can feel a virtual hug and and I

Unknown: 00:34:58

appreciate your soul. Deeply your story is heard and you

Unknown: 00:35:02

matter. So much like your story and to share this the way you

Unknown: 00:35:08

did is so precious. And to see and feel how much compassion you

Unknown: 00:35:15

have for your mother really shows that you are living from

Unknown: 00:35:20

the heart, you know, you don't live and walk around like a

Unknown: 00:35:23

victim and make excuses. You face reality. And you face the

Unknown: 00:35:29

situation with grace. And you have so much compassion for her

Unknown: 00:35:33

situation for for another human being out there. And yeah, I

Unknown: 00:35:39

have so much respect for you. And thank you so much for making

Unknown: 00:35:43

the time and walking with us in the coolies. I deeply like

Unknown: 00:35:52

appreciate all of this. Thank you so much.

Unknown: 00:35:57

You're welcome, Aurora. And thanks again for having me. It

Unknown: 00:36:00

was my pleasure.

Unknown: 00:36:03

Thank you so much for listening to the conversation I had with

Unknown: 00:36:08

Robin. And yeah, if you have any questions and want to reach out

Unknown: 00:36:12

to him, I have his link to his Facebook Messenger here in the

Unknown: 00:36:16

show notes. I hope we brought a lot of value into your life. And

Unknown: 00:36:22

yeah, if you haven't subscribed to this podcast yet, please

Unknown: 00:36:26

subscribe. And if you want to leave us a review, share your

Unknown: 00:36:30

thoughts with us. Thank you so much and I will be out there

Unknown: 00:36:35

very soon again. Bye bye.