The One Who Went From Golden Child To Scapegoat

Sam: 00:00:06

I would like to begin by acknowledging the traditional custodians of the land on which I live and work, the Gundagara land and people. I pay my respects to their elders, past, present and emerging, and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.

I also want to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the lands on which you, our listeners, are joining us from today.

I recognize the deep connection that first nations people have to this land, their enduring culture, and their commitment to the preservation and care for their country. This land was never ceded, and it always was and always will be Aboriginal land.

Hey there, and welcome to beyond the Surface, the podcast where we explore the stories of people who have survived religious trauma, left high control occult communities, and are deconstructing their faith.

Foreign I'm your host, Sam, and each week I'll talk with individuals who have taken the brave step to start shifting their beliefs that might have once controlled and defined their lives. Join us as we dig into their experiences, the challenges they've faced and the insights they've gained.

Whether you're on a similar journey or you're just curious about these powerful stories, you're in the right place. This is beyond the surface. Welcome, Lauren. Thanks for joining me.

Lauren: 00:01:30

Ah, thanks for having me, Sam. I'm super excited to chat with you.

Sam: 00:01:33

I am as well. I'm really. I. We've chatted about this on. Off the recording a little bit, but it's always nice.

And I'm doing spoilers here, but it's always nice chatting to someone in the southern hemisphere and yet your accent will not suggest. So where in the world are are you at the moment?

Lauren: 00:01:52

Yes. My husband and I are expats in Thailand.

Some even, sometimes we even think to say that we are immigrants in Thailand, which really wigs people out because they're like, well, what do you mean white people can be immigrants? What?

But really, it is actually more accurate because we came here eight years ago doing missions work, and my husband's a therapist and I was doing member care at that time. I was a nutritional therapist, but we were helping support basically overseas workers, missionaries in Thailand.

And when we left the church and left missions, we were like, do we move back to America? And as many are aware, America is a hot freaking mess.

And we have had so much trauma happen surrounding the mess that it is and the relationships we've lost that we were like, why would we ever choose to go back there? This is a home that is safe and secure and there's not school shootings here for our children.

And there's not just all these variables of the tension, the political tension and animosity. It's not here for us. Obviously, there's a different story if you're Thai and you're a national.

But for the expats that live here, the immigrants that live here, it's a really welcoming, comfortable place. And we just decided we'd stay at least until our kids graduate high school and give them the stability of Thailand. So we're still here.

And we were really just continually thankful for the hospitality that Thai people offer, the kindness, the generosity, the. We speak Thai and they're like, oh, you're so wonderful. Even though we sound like a, you know, kindergartener, it's. It's an amazing.

We've learned so much about the world through our time here.

Sam: 00:03:47

Oh, beautiful. And we've had a few little spoilers in there. So I love that missions work left the church spoilers. But let's go back. Where does your story start?

Lauren: 00:04:00

Yeah, I love that question of yours. I think that my story starts in a little town called Elmira, New York, where I was born into a family. And my role was the golden child.

And no one ever, you know, stitched that onto my little clothes at the time. But I knew my role from very, very early on. I would say, like toddler.

And that began kind of my shaping of my sense of self, my nervous system, my how I engaged with the world and with relationships from that point on.

Sam: 00:04:45

Yeah, how did you know that? What was it about the way that life was that early on?

Lauren: 00:04:51

Right. I know I've done, I'm, I'm, I've published a book called Golden Child.

So I've done a lot of work to figure this out, like, how the hell did this happen?

And I think that was the best gift to me in the three year writing process was like really getting down through layer after layer after layer and looking at it like on a microscopic level of what is this? How did this develop?

And the best I can make sense of it in those early, early years was I had an older brother, four years older, older sister, three years older. And then I was born. And the older brother was pretty easygoing and just kind of did his own thing in the background.

But the older sister was very quickly seen as the naughty one, who then later became more clearly the scapegoat. But when I was born, she was a, you know, toddler, preschooler, I guess, preschooler.

And she was already quite difficult, as far as I can understand from the stories. And I, you know, in the way that kids perceive things. I saw that and I knew that. And I was very naturally empathetic.

See, it's so hard to know, like, what's nature and nurture? I don't know.

But I, I think at least, at the very least, there was a baseline of empathetic nature in me and attuning and being aware and mindful, which of course we know trauma can also cause that. But I think that was also there to begin with, that's my guess. And so I just would notice how she was causing problems in the family system.

And I told myself very, very early on, which this is a common theme, like, I'm not going to do that to my parents. I'm not going to hurt them like she's hurting them. And it just shaped my decisions from a very early place.

And an interesting dynamic was I actually became the attuner to her, to my sister. So I was physically very well taken care of, but emotionally those needs weren't super met. And so I was the one.

I kind of got this message early on from my parents. I don't remember a time where it wasn't the message. Message was like, make your sister happy. That's your job. Make your sister happy.

And so I was always trying to stay out of her way, or when we did play, which was a lot, do exactly what she said and fall in line perfectly. Because if she got pissed off, then she would get angry and throw a fit and then my parents would know and then they'd be pissed off.

So it was like my compliance was birthed very, very early. Yeah, unquestioning loyal compliance. That kind of became my anthem all along.

Sam: 00:07:55

And so, I mean, usually we talk about compliance, particularly on this podcast, in terms of, you know, compliance in faith based, high control, faith based systems. And so did you grow up with a particular flavor of religion?

Lauren: 00:08:10

I did, actually. And my story is interesting there because we, my mom is 100 Italian and we grew up in the Catholic chur.

And so we, long story short, literally a whole book. My parents, my dad struggled with alcohol consumption and my mom separated when they were in the Catholic church from my dad.

Even though she came from alcoholic family, she started to really feel like it was wrong and that what she was passing on to her kids was wrong.

And so they separated and they actually, on the day of their divorce, they got back together and they called it this big miracle and like God saved them. And then they started feeling really. Because in.

Okay, so in aa, my mom met a woman who was a, quote, born again Christian and born again Catholic, actually. So that's super interesting. That's rare, kind of. I know, right?

She stirred up a lot in my mom of like, desire for something more that she wasn't finding in the Catholic church. So a few years later they got back together. We started going to an Christian missionary alliance. So pretty mainstream evangelical church.

And I was in. I was in like 6, 4. Why can't I remember what grade I was in? Late, late elementary school when we started going there.

And it was not charismatic, very compliance based, but also had a lot of the love elements. So not so cold that you didn't feel the love and the acceptance and the purpose and the belonging, all those things that intoxicate us.

It had all that. But very much conservative in all the ways and follow the rules and you get to be one of the good ones here. And guess who signed up for that?

I was like, I'm here, I'm gonna do it. I already know how to follow all the rules. I'm gonna be your little golden child spokesperson. And I was. That was what I did. Yeah.

Sam: 00:10:20

Well, I mean, I feel like you've just answered my question, which was how did that church space just exacerbate and intensify that level of compliance and obedience that was already drilled into you a thousand years. Yeah. Now you've just got a religious, you know, faith based identity layer on top of it to really like hammer that.

Lauren: 00:10:38

Into you, cement that in. Yes. Thank you for just affirming that it was like regular on steroids. Yeah, yeah. There was no other way. I was absolutely wholeheartedly in.

In all the ways. And I was not going to be questioning that. There was no questioning of that. Those models. Yeah.

Sam: 00:11:04

Okay. I'm going to ask a side question because like, I can't ever keep up with what ages with like us schooling systems. It is.

So how old were you during elementary?

Lauren: 00:11:15

I'm sure. So what's it. What's. What's elementary in Australia, I think it's. Is that not the word?

Sam: 00:11:22

I'm assuming, like, well, how.

Lauren: 00:11:24

Yeah, so I was, I was like 12. Oh, 10. Golly. I must be having some brain fog or something. I don't know what. I know that I got quote, saved.

Sam: 00:11:40

Okay.

Lauren: 00:11:41

At 12.

Sam: 00:11:42

Oh, sames.

Lauren: 00:11:45

Yeah. We're saved buddies.

Sam: 00:11:48

So. Okay, so I was, I was in year seven, which is like. Year seven is like the first year of high school for.

Lauren: 00:11:55

Okay. Yeah.

Sam: 00:11:56

Well, if you wait on the younger side, it's. It would have been 12, 13 if you weren't. So it sounds around, like for Australian listeners around year six, year seven, age was that.

Lauren: 00:12:05

Yeah. Time, right? Yeah.

Sam: 00:12:07

Okay.

Lauren: 00:12:07

Yeah.

Sam: 00:12:09

Okay. So love, I love meeting other people who like got saved at the well brain developed age of 12 years old. So what was that like for you?

Lauren: 00:12:22

Oh my gosh.

I mean, I, I did this little, like had this little social justice warrior in me from day one because I remember thinking like, the Catholic Church has lied to us. And I remember saying this to people like, it's fair we didn't know. Like we. Oh. And I think back to those versions of me. Lord have mercy.

I was self righteously judgmental against the Catholic Church, not telling us the steps to salvation.

So I was like overjoyed and felt like I had hit the lottery because finally I'm in this church that's like, told me the way because it's kind of was more vague in the Catholic Church and maybe more workspaced, I guess. But it's just became such a quote, good news that I found out and I was just gonna go all in.

So I started telling my little friends about hell and showing them Bible verses and saying that they were going to hell and writing my family member letters and my parents like, let me and helped me do that, which I have a lot of feelings about now. My grandma and grandpa and my aunt and uncle and just telling them, oh, but it's really good. Like you're go to hell.

But it's really, really good news is there's a way you cannot go. And I can tell you the way. Yeah, so I told them.

Sam: 00:13:46

Yeah, I mean, moral superiority in an adult is one thing. Moral superiority in a teenager is a whole other world. Like it is.

I mean, and I, I look back and I would have described myself as that very black and white obnoxious Christian who just was not fun at parties. But yes, you know, when you think that you have the truth, that moral superiority just ramps up with like teenage. I know everything.

Anyway, the two of those things combined is just like, I mean, bad.

Lauren: 00:14:18

A match made in hell.

Sam: 00:14:20

Pun intended, but okay. So like if compliance and obedience was your jam at that moment, that was the way for you to keep safe and, and good and to be the good girl.

Lauren: 00:14:34

That's right.

Sam: 00:14:35

Was the structure and the rules that Christianity provided you. Was that. Did that feel good for you?

Lauren: 00:14:45

Yes, it did, Sam.

Sam: 00:14:47

Yeah.

Lauren: 00:14:48

Yes.

It felt really good to have clarity and certainty because I saw at this point my sister's, you know, a bit of an older teen and she's doing all kinds of crazy stuff and she's getting in so much trouble. And I'm. You know, that's terrifying as a younger sibling to see, because it's like, well, what am I supposed to do?

How do I know what to do to not do that? I need to not do that. And I found so much assurance in the rules. Like, everything in evangelicalism had an answer and a rule and a way forward.

And if I didn't know it on a certain issue, I would read about it. I would try to understand, well, what about this issue? What about this issue would find the answer?

And thankfully, they had all the answers, so I found all of them.

Sam: 00:15:40

And if they don't, they'll tell you that they do anyway.

Lauren: 00:15:43

Sure.

Sam: 00:15:44

So, okay. I love asking this question because usually it shifts because I don't usually have still conservative people on the podcast.

So usually there is a shift that happens. So during your high school years, those years where you were that very youthful, you know, fervent Christian girl who was God to you?

Lauren: 00:16:10

Yeah, yeah, God was. God was close to me. I felt like I was able to experience some security and attachment with God that at the time, I believed I had with my parents.

But in hindsight, I think there was some emotional intimacy missing. So, like, they were there for me. They supported me, they loved me. They doted on me as the golden child. I was their prized possession.

But there was, like, a depth to the emotional connection that was missing. And I found that with. With God.

And I found that through journaling and talking to God and praying to God and finding verses that God would, you know, show me. Just me. God would, like, give me these verses. I felt. So it became really personal to me, and it became really precious and meaningful.

And it's like, if God loves me this much, how could I not be completely, utterly committed to serving him and loyal to everything that he asks? Like, how could I not do that? Yeah. Yeah.

Sam: 00:17:26

Okay. I wanted. I was going to ask this question earlier on, but I've held off because I wanted to ask those questions.

Lauren: 00:17:32

Just this one. Okay.

Sam: 00:17:34

Usually when we use terms like golden child and scapegoat and things like that, we are usually referring to families where one or both parents might display some narcissistic traits or there is some narcissism in the family somewhere that would require us to develop these roles to keep ourselves safe and secure and stable in that space. And so what was your relationship like with your parents while you were in this period of time?

Lauren: 00:18:06

Yeah, yeah, that's exactly what I found as well. Trying to think about how to communicate I'm a super direct communicator.

Sam: 00:18:19

Yeah.

Lauren: 00:18:19

So I've had to learn, as I'm talking about this story publicly, I've had to learn how to just be mindful about what I'm saying. You know, it's not easy for the direct ones in us. The family system was very much. It was rigid and it was closed.

And my dad was definitely the head, so he held the power in the family system. And my mom was more of the. The enabler, which you'll often see in those family systems of the one who is.

Has the more of the narcissistic tendencies and then the who enables them, which was also the dynamic that was happening when he was abusing alcohol is that she was the enabler. So unfortunately, they got back together miraculously. But there wasn't an ounce of inner work, healing that was done. Nothing was done.

He didn't even go to Al Anon meetings to recover to try and figure out, you know, why he became alcoholic in the first place, because that wasn't the model that he was even thinking of. It's just like, oh, well, I'm not drinking. I'm not doing the bad thing and not I'm better.

But unfortunately, all of those dynamics that led to alcoholism and then the enabling were still very much intact in our family system, even though there was not a drop of booze in the house. Yeah. And because of that, my. There.

There's this common dynamic in significantly dysfunctional family systems, slash narcissistic family systems, where there's idealization and deval situation and they often bounce. The. The people in charge of the system often bounce people back and forth from those roles, but they also often have.

That's where the roles come from. Like, so I was the golden child. I was the idealized child, and everything I did was good.

And there was no bad motive in me, and there was no bad anything in me. I was only good. I was only pure. And then the devaluation is the, the scapegoat role, which was my sister, it was the same thing, but opposite.

There was nothing good in her. Every motive she had was bad. Every difference.

And way outside the box that she thought in the artistic artistry that she kind of lived her life with, that was all, you know, on the outside that wasn't part of the in circle.

So the scapegoating and the, the golden child and the scapegoat roles kind of give the framework to keep the system intact and like you said, to protect yourself for.

For the people in charge of the system to protect themselves and to have that projection of good and then that scapegoating of the bad really helps them deal with their very poor sense of self. And they have to, you know, project that out onto their children.

And unfortunately, neither one of those roles gets to be themselves, to be their authenticity individuated self from the. From very early on.

Sam: 00:21:31

Yeah.

I'm wondering whether, like, you are comfy sharing a little bit about what that was like for you, because I'm sure there are people listening who were not the golden child in their family and they were perhaps played other roles going, well, surely it's great to be the golden. Like you're the favorite, you know, the quote unquote favorite in the system. Right. So.

But whilst it's, you know, lovely language, like golden and favorite and all of that sort of thing, the reality of living as that child is a really different experience. What was that like for you?

Lauren: 00:22:10

Yeah. And to be completely honest, in the middle of it, without the knowledge that that's what's happening and that there are repercussions for that.

It was wonderful. Yeah.

Like, that's what's very unique about my story and why I wrote this book is because there is this subset of people who didn't experience the harsh traumas, betrayals and abandonment by their parents until they stepped out of their role. Whereas a lot of people experience that their whole life. You know, it's from the beginning that they're being so hurt by their parents.

There is this group of people, and it's not that small, who really do follow the rules in their faith system and in their family system.

And they get these gorgeous benefits of this, this decent pseudo attachment, pseudo secure attachment where you're getting delight, you're getting the benefit of the doubt, you're getting mutual love and respect and reciprocation. You're getting to be chosen, to be seen, to be valued, to be given, you know, for your voice to even matter to the degree that it can. If you're.

If your voice is. Is being used within the system, then it, then it matters. Okay, you want to be a vegetarian in fourth grade? Go ahead, honey, we've got your back.

Okay, you want to be the Pink Power Ranger because you love little girls that are strong and feisty, but also feminine. Okay, go ahead. Like, if it, if it fit within the parameters, then I did have a voice and I did have a say. And so I actually developed this pretty.

It's so weird to say, but also, I think makes sense, this pretty robust sense of self. Which is what the scapegoat and other roles are not really able to develop.

And so I hold this kind of dichotomy within me of I absolutely owe so much to the fact that I got to be the golden child. Like it helped me actually eventually leave the system.

It gave me the strength to do the hardest thing, which was to find my actual self to go on in the search for my authentic self. And a lot of, you know, my siblings didn't, didn't gain that.

And they have challenges in adulthood that I don't have because I had developed a strong sense of self even though it was a bit unrealistic. Like I wasn't golden. I was just me. I was just me. And, and that was great. We were all golden, right?

Like everyone had their own unique thing to bring to the table.

But the downside to being the golden child is you are set up actually from the beginning, which one of my writing coaches helped me, helped point this out, that from the very beginning, when you're made a golden child, you are also made a scapegoat in the future because there's no one or very few people, I should say, that can uphold those standards of perfection and of merging with your parents views across the board at all times. At some point in your life, you're going to have to start questioning and step out of that role.

And as soon as you do, you will be clobbered and you will be scapegoated. And that is the trauma for the golden child is they don't know until they know.

And then their whole world is turned freaking upside down, the rug pulled out from under them. Everything's 180 and they're disillusioned as, because oh my God, what just happened? My life was great. I had the love and support of my parents.

I had the love and support of my church. Everything was great.

And then I just started, you know, this one area I started exploring or questioning or pushing back against or changing in and I lost everything. Like a Jenga tower. Just. Yeah.

Sam: 00:26:17

Did the facts in the family system both crumble at the same time?

Lauren: 00:26:22

Yeah, pretty much. Okay, go hard or go home.

Sam: 00:26:28

Okay.

Lauren: 00:26:28

That's right. That's right.

Sam: 00:26:30

So I guess before asking the moment when that happened, were there small moments like I'm thinking, you know, you're also still human.

Like yes, you are the golden child, but you're also a teenager and a young adult and just like a normal ass human that has like thoughts at 11 o' clock at night when you're alone in Your bedroom. Right.

So, like, was there a part of you that was still asking questions that you wouldn't dare voice because you knew that you were either not allowed or not able or it, you weren't really sure about it. But was that process before the dismantling was that slow or did it happen in an instant?

Lauren: 00:27:17

I think it was both of those somehow, which those seem like opposites.

Sam: 00:27:20

But let me explain.

Lauren: 00:27:24

As a teen. No, there genuinely was not. I'm just like, was I alive in there? Like, what kind of robot doesn't there, There wasn't.

Like, when I would have questions or doubts about faith, I would just go to my parents and they would like, give me the assurance I needed. So I guess there was little glimmery things here and there, but not much, and I just followed it.

So I had such a dogmatism and a rigidity about what I did. Like I didn't kiss my, kiss my partner, Luke, until we got married. We didn't have sex obviously, until we got married. If we didn't kiss, yay.

And I got married at freaking 19 years old. I mean, how very good.

Sam: 00:28:04

Literally the bell of you.

Lauren: 00:28:07

It's so terrible. We tell our kids like never ever. No, no, this is not a good idea. But the chapter in my book about that is literally called Golden Child Bride. Yeah.

Wow. Yeah. Well, I mean, not wrong, exactly. I, I, it was, it was that.

So all of that up until then was just completely lined up, followed and not questioned once I started having my own kids and then adopting. So we adopted two. We have two biological kids. We adopted two kids.

And that's when things started to like, basically the world started getting bigger and I didn't have all the answers I needed in my little prepackaged care package of Christianity box I got. And so parenting started shifting things actually, because we started to do more trauma informed parenting and less authoritarian parenting.

And they were very uncomfortable with that. So we would have to be really careful and tiptoe around that.

But there was some rumbling underneath before the volcanic eruption and it was things like medication and, you know, meds for the kids and parenting and diagnosis like adhd, things like that, that they, that they didn't see as valid and just different parenting decisions. We were making our schooling decisions like they wanted us to.

Hilariously, my mom didn't homeschool, but they wanted us to homeschool and they wanted us to do all these, I know, it's kind of funny, all these very right wing conservative things. And we were kind of evolving in a more Bigger, eclectic way, especially as we were adding adoption into the mix and then biracial children.

And it was like the. The room we were in was not big enough to contain all the complexity that we now were swimming in. And so we had to find bigger spaces.

And that's what happened in: 2015

Sam: 00:30:26

And I imagine, like, you know, I think you guys are in America at this point, right? So, like, you can't escape the political landscape and the impact that that would have been having on parenting and.

And also on the flavor of religion that you're in, like, the flavor of evangelical Christianity and. And all of that sort of thing, but which I'm sure we will talk about, because there's the whole Christian nationalism aspect.

But I want to ask how it impacted you going into your relationship with Luke and getting married to Luke being the golden child going in to that. Were you the golden bride.

Lauren: 00:31:10

Of.

Sam: 00:31:10

What would say about that?

Lauren: 00:31:15

Well, it's actually really sad because thank God we were best friends. I mean, that was the only thing that saved us, because who gets married that young with all of that freaking fundamentalist ideals? It was.

It was just not. Not. It was not going to be likely that we succeeded. However, we were best friends, and that was real.

And what we developed, we kind of saw something in each other that our family systems didn't have, which is the magic of chemistry. Right. And how we go for people that we need. Not always, but you know what I mean? So he.

It's sad because I went in very much feeling golden and feeling right about everything, because that's what I was told my whole life. And he went in feeling he wasn't a scapegoat, per se, but he. He definitely had CPTSD and lots of shame and didn't feel good.

That was one of his, like, core woundings, is like, I'm not good, which also came from Christianity. So we came into this dynamic of, like, I'm really good because I'm golden and you're not good.

And then this continued for years of like, well, I'm clearly right about this, and you clearly need to change. And not to say that there wasn't things that did need to change. He had a lot of trauma, and he brought that into the relationship.

But that dynamic was so unfair and it was so painful, and, like, you know, there's still remnants of it, even today, 20 years later, that we, like, oh, that just came up again. You just. You just set the. The stage of that argument. Like, you were, like, all Knowing and all right again. And I'm like, oh, my God, I did. I still.

I did it again. So those foundational ways of being in the world and relating, they don't just go away after they're shaped into us, like, built into us.

Trying to remember your original question was, I like, the golden bride. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I was, girl, I did it. I did all the things, and I did them all right.

Sam: 00:33:20

And even if I didn't, I did.

Lauren: 00:33:23

That's right.

Sam: 00:33:26

I mean, it's like a double whammy of, like, I use the term mental gymnastics when talking about, like, the things that we try to make sense, particularly in, like, high control face systems. But you're doing that in a family sense as well.

Like, you're making shit make sense that doesn't make sense because it's the only way to survive that system.

Lauren: 00:33:46

That's right.

Sam: 00:33:47

so, okay, so what happened in: 2015

Lauren: 00:33:54

Words.

Sam: 00:33:54

That's a very Australian saying, isn't it? I just realized the fan.

Lauren: 00:33:58

Yeah, no, we. We totally say that. That's a shared saying. Yeah, the two words. Okay, I might need to bleep them out. Donald Trump.

Sam: 00:34:15

I feel like even here in Australia, we have, like, a visceral reaction, right? Yeah.

Lauren: 00:34:21

Yeah, he came on the scene in: 2015

So he was like the one all the Republicans picked to. To. To run. And when that happened, we were. Just went into a tailspin. My husband and I, of like, wait, what? This is. This is who we.

Wait, because it's very much like group think and like, collective like, this is who we are. This is what we do. So you're going along with that.

You're going along with that, and all of a sudden, Donald Trump comes on stage and it's like, this is who we are. This is what we do. And you're like, what the fuck? This is who we are. This is what we do and stand for. And we were just very, very confused.

Like, talk about mental gymnastics. Needed to justify a person and a life such as that as your new savior. So we just started questioning. It was the first time. And honestly, we.

So Black Lives Matter was really going strong at that time because, unfortunately, because of the tragedies that were happening. But that's when I started seeing articles about white privilege and white supremacy and honest to God, I swear, I never heard these words before.

That's how blind you are when you're blind. Like I.

Sam: 00:35:53

Something like that penetrate the bubble when that's what the bubble is built on. Right, that.

Lauren: 00:35:58

Exactly. How could you. Yeah, it's like a. It's like a missile defense system. It's.

It's around you and it is needed to build the missiles inside or something like really wonky like that. Like you have to have it to have the toxic bad stuff inside, which is the white supremacy. So I just remember thinking, what are these words?

Why have I never heard this before? And I was reading it and it made perfect sense. So I was like, well, of course there's supremacy. There's white supremacy. Like, look at the.

Look at all of history. Like, it started to click in and make sense, even though I didn't have the foundation for it.

Just because, you know, these writers and these podcasters and these activists are so brilliant at educating and explaining to people. And so I started talking about these things, which was very much not what the golden child does. Yeah.

Sam: 00:37:00

Yeah.

Lauren: 00:37:00

I started posting about them.

And what happened was my dad and mom came over one night, two nights actually, and after the kids were in bed and like, sat us down and tried to tell us, like, this is not what we believe. You can't believe again, that. Yep. Yeah. So. Well, why can't we. Why can't I, like, still be a Republican? This is what I said.

And like, still have this one area of racial justice. Like, be important to me and let that matter. And like my dad, you know, I can't explain it all to you, but you. You just can't.

And in one sense, that's infuriating, but in another sense, he was a hundred percent right. You can't. Those systems all build upon each other. So he knew he was right.

Like, if I wanted to stay a conservative Republican, then I needed to walk away from these little rumblings and just not worry about it anymore. Like, don't look over here. The dead bodies on the side of the road.

Just pretend like they're not there if you want to stay in the car of conservative Republican. Yeah. And I couldn't unsee what I was beginning to see, and my heart was breaking.

And the thing that is such about this whole thing is the very nature that they shaped me to be.

The empathetic one, the caring one, the fixer, the problem solver, the troubleshooter, the one who saw the brokenness and responded was then the thing that they began to decide spies in me when it was for people that they did not validate as worthy of that care. It was like, no, this is not where your golden light gets to be shown. But guess what? Too late. Joke's on you. You made me this way. I can't not see it.

I can't not care. My heart can't unbreak. And so it was like, once that spun into motion to where I started to wake up to these realities, I was.

The trajectory completely changed.

Sam: 00:39:09

Yeah.

And I think that that's something that so many people in different situations will be able to relate to, because the very values that led me into Christianity were the very values that led me out of it also.

Lauren: 00:39:22

Girl. Girl, say this. I totally say that. Yes. Yeah.

Sam: 00:39:27

Like, my beliefs changed, but my values are the same. They're just in a different setting and in a different circumstance sense.

But I am curious, when all of this is like, the foundation is cracking underneath you. How is your faith through it throughout this? Because it's hard.

Lauren: 00:39:48

Yeah. Yeah. You know? Yeah, it's. It was like a lifeline in some ways in the beginning.

Sam: 00:39:57

Yeah.

Lauren: 00:39:58

Because it was just like, oh, well, these people don't see the true gospel. It was like I. I reframed it in a way that helped me sense of. And I think there's still truth to that. Like, that's not Jesus.

Like, Donald Trump is not like Jesus. That's. No.

Sam: 00:40:13

I often will say, like, I don't have a problem with Jesus. I reckon he seems like a pretty cool guy. We'd probably be friends, like, in this day and age.

Lauren: 00:40:21

Right.

Sam: 00:40:21

I'm pretty sure we have the same values, but.

Lauren: 00:40:24

Right. Yes.

Sam: 00:40:25

The whole.

Lauren: 00:40:28

No, it's not. That's exactly it. That's not what we're talking about. But I was.

I was at that time trying to make it still work and really, like, kind of making my faith my own at that time of, like, what. What even, you know, is faith and what do I believe? And. But it was still. It was still, like. It was like, progressive Christianity.

That's what it was becoming, which was a huge jump and a really important bridge for where I'm at now, which is probably where I'll be for a long time. But who knows? I'm open to shifting. People shift all the time. Yeah. And the story is all about shifting. But I. Yes, God was.

I was confused by God, but I also knew, like, something that Luke and I talk about a lot is we really believed. We took seriously what we were taught, and we really believed, like, that God loved all people and that the world was, like, such a meaningful.

That there was sacredness in humanity. And that God was good and that we are to treat people like, better than we treat ourselves.

We took that stuff to heart and metabolized it so deeply so that then when that wasn't happening, it was like, well, you're kidding, right? We know what you taught us. You're not following what you taught us.

And so we just said, well, we're going to follow that like what we know to be true about loving people. And you know, where that takes us, will take us. It will take us.

But I don't think we knew at that time it would take us to, to deconstructing and deconverting. I don't think we, we could have seen that.

And I'm glad that we didn't because that would have been terrifying at that time because we were already losing everything else. Like, you lose your position in the church often long before you lose your, your faith and.

Sam: 00:42:18

Absolutely. How did your family dynamics shift over this period of time? Because I imagine they shifted quite dramatically.

Lauren: 00:42:27

It did, yeah. It was completely dramatic. It went from me being beloved, warmth, camaraderie, connection. Let's see you every day. Let's text every day. Let's.

To cold enemy territory. You are danger, almost your stranger. You're not like one of us anymore. I was quickly. When you have such a. A strong, rigid system. Not strong rigid.

That allows in and out like the other. As soon as someone is othered, they're out. And there's no gray land like you're either in or you're completely out.

The problem for that is what happens to these people when it has to be their child that they're sending out.

Like, these people have these systems that they bow to and it works when it's like the weird neighbor who's got blue hair or, you know, it's fine when it's a stranger or someone you're not close to and don't have all this history and care for. But then when it's your child who's now the more leftist or the commie or liberal or the feminazi. These are the words my dad would use.

What do you do then? Yeah, how do you reconcile when it's your, your precious, like, flesh and blood and they just had no other way but to just distance me.

And so we stayed in contact, but it was very. We ended up doing mediation the next year when we were in Thailand. So this is what sucks.

Trump was elected in November: 2016

With four little kids. And we were so vulnerable and so just fragile. Like, just so fragile. And my parents kind of pulled away and stopped talking when I really needed them.

I really needed their help and support in this huge life thing we were doing. But it was too late. I had already rung the siren. I was already the. The scapegoat. I really had started being scapegoated at that point.

Right away, yeah. So I was refusing in my golden child ways of, no, we've got to do it right. We've got to make it work. I refuse to accept that distance.

And I initiated mediation and I chose our pastor, who was their age and who was also conservative, to give them, you know, someone that would feel comfortable to them and know that he's not just going to be for us. And mediation was incredibly painful. And I told them, like my three biggest fears was that I would.

Ultimately it came down to the last one, was that I would lose them forever. And they were pretty cold in the mediation and they just couldn't understand the pain that I was in. They couldn't attune to it.

They just saw that I was different from them. And judging them, they felt like I was judging them for their views and there was very little warmth.

So we just decided at the end of the mediation, we won't talk about race and we won't talk about politics, and we'll try to salvage the relationship that we have, and we just won't. Won't talk about those things. So that's what we did for the next couple years. And we tried to.

We lived in Thailand, but we visited once and we tried to do that, but it never felt the same.

I felt like I was tiptoeing completely around everything, trying to, like, garner their love again, trying to be seen in a good light again, but not lose myself, you know, vacillating between. But my heart and my voice matter to me, but so do my parents in this relationship with them. So I was just going back and forth between both ends.

And then: 2020

iously Covid was happening in: 2020

And we ended up going back up to New York. They live in Tennessee down south.

And we ended up going back up to New York where We were from, and staying with Luke's family and seeing all our church and family up there, but we ended up staying. And the distance of us staying up there and not talking for months, they kind of just got icy cold.

When we started talking again on social media about these deaths and about racial inequality and things of that nature, I wasn't even talking about Trump at this point. I didn't even talk about him. I tried to keep it just about race, but that was, that was more than they could handle.

And so that year, everything just kind of lost its. There was nothing left to fight for.

And I sent them a letter because this is a long story, that's why I wrote a book, because it's so hard to explain. How estrangements happen is really, it's really complicated and nuanced.

So essentially they intervened and didn't, didn't let us go see my brother, who we were planning on taking a trip to go see my brother and his new baby. And my brother basically got on a call with me and said, mom's not happy, she's crying on the phone to me, you need to fix it.

And I'm trying to explain to him, listen. And using, not using psychology words because I knew he wouldn't care about that.

But I'm like, mom and dad are really mistreating me at this point point, and it's not working. Like, we want to be in relationship with them, but they're really, really mistreating us.

And he starts swearing at me about how I've been spoiled my whole life. There's the golden child theme and how, how can I even say that they're doing that to me?

So there was no place in his imagination for that to shift and for them to actually not be treating me that way anymore.

And so once I saw that they were like, like basically just telling people we won't let them see our kids, that was the narrative that they were telling people with nothing else connected to it is obviously much more than that.

I decided to write them a letter and I wrote them a four page letter explaining to them my heart for them, how I wanted them, what I needed from them, relationally, what has hurt me, and how I will always be willing to try and reconcile a relationship because it means so much to me. Yeah. Two weeks later, I got back the most brutal but important gift that I've ever gotten because they wrote me.

And finally, for the first time, they were honest about how they saw me. They didn't hold back at all. And I knew it was More recently, how they saw me, because before I was scapegoated, they didn't see me in a bad light.

They saw me in a great light. But they kind of painted it as, oh, you've always been disrespectful, and you've always not been thankful for the ways we've helped you.

these last four years, since: 2015

Is how they saw me in that way and how basically just everything was my fault and I ruined the relationship and ruined our family by talking about these issues and how I wouldn't see the harm, the damage that I did. And then at the end, of course. But in Jesus, all things are possible. And we, too, would love to reconcile with you one day. Oh, good Lord. Yeah. Yeah.

So that was brutal. That was just beyond. That was like the nail in the coffin, that letter. Yeah.

Sam: 00:50:29

I feel like I have so many questions.

Lauren: 00:50:32

I know.

Sam: 00:50:32

I'm just gonna, like. I mean, I think, firstly, there's so much change happening in general. Like, even just, like, the.

The deconstruction aspect, the, like, the move to literally the other side of the world are big enough things at it as it is.

But what I actually want to ask is, what was it like for you personally, to realize that the love from your parents was entirely conditional on your conformity to who they wanted you to be? Like, that's heartbreaking.

Lauren: 00:51:14

Yeah. That sentence is exactly it. Entirely conditional.

Sam: 00:51:19

Yeah.

Lauren: 00:51:19

Based on conformity. Yeah. To who they wanted. To Their vision of me as a human. I kept saying. At one point, I kept saying, but I thought they knew me.

I thought they knew me.

I was, like, so disillusioned, like, trying to figure out why they saw me saying these things about race and trying to understand why they saw it in such a negative light. Like, I knew they didn't understand it, but I thought, well, they love me and they know my heart. Why don't they, like, want to hear. Hear me out?

Sam: 00:51:53

Yeah.

Lauren: 00:51:53

So it was very, very confusing how it was. Like, as soon as I shifted, I was no longer seen by them in that light. And. Yeah, I mean, devastating.

Like, I don't know if there's a word to explain how painful it was to know that all along it was. It was kind of a theater. It was kind of a show. It wasn't. It wasn't authentic for me.

And even right now, as I'm saying that, I'm, like, gaslighting myself. Like, well, yeah, it was. It's complicated, right. Because of course there's love. But if you can't make space for someone's personal evolution and.

And individuation. Yeah. Like, you don't love them. Yeah, you. You don't. And. And it's what I was actually told. Love was my whole life, which was like an action.

Love is an action word. You. You care about someone and you do things on behalf of their good. So it's like, if they can't extend that to me, then is it really love?

And I think that's something estranged children really struggle with. Like. Like what to do with that piece about their parents. Love. But I do feel sure that it was very conditional. Like, that feels clear to me.

And in some senses, it, like, really pisses me off. Like, I was your little jumping monkey for years, doing all the things you wanted me to. Yeah. And then you liked me. And now I have, like, a few areas.

I mean, they don't even know how different I am now. They would certainly not accept this version. But in the beginning, it was like it was nothing.

I mean, I know it was everything, but it also was nothing. Like, just let your child use the critical thinking that ironically, my dad taught me to have. Yeah. He taught me to think critically.

And then I started doing it. And. Yeah, it's a big sorrow. It's a really big place of pain. Yeah.

Sam: 00:54:08

And I'm curious what it was like for you, because there is this really harmful narrative that plays out that. Where there is estrangement between a parent and a child, that, of course the children did something to piss off the parents. Right.

Like, there is this harmful narrative that, like, well, a parent loves their children, so, like, obviously the child did something to. For that to happen. And I mean, I'm yet. I'm yet to find that usually. Right. So, like, what was that like for you?

And, like, was that narrative external? But, like, you. You just use the term then in terms of, like, you're almost gaslighting yourself.

Was that narrative also a little bit internal as well? For a while.

Lauren: 00:55:01

It was definitely external. And I wasn't surprised that they blamed me. 100. It was like, of course they are. They have no ability to be reflective. Yeah.

And consider why it is their daughter is so terrified to speak to them. Yeah. Why. Why would your daughter, who adored you her whole damn life, you were like God to her. Why all of a sudden is she shaking when you text her?

Yeah. No imagination, no curiosity about that. And that's really, really sad.

With estranged adult children and their parents is just this defensive protection that the parents often have to not truly consider the agony that their child is in because this relationship is so incredibly built into our DNA to maintain at all costs. And that's what we do as children. We maintain it at all costs until that's who I wrote my book for.

People have had to genuinely consider, is it more painful to have a relationship with my parents or without them? Which one can I live with? Which one can I choose? And it's a nearly impossible decision because they're both incredibly painful. Yeah. Yeah.

I don't know if the narrative went inside. I mean, it's. I think it did a little bit. Just feeling their shame from across the ocean, like, just feeling it, like, bore into me.

They're just staying. It's really hard to be the object of someone's disdain, but I just feel such certainty about what happened.

And thankfully, I've had a really good partner who's helped me. The first couple years, I would just be gaslit all the time. So, yeah, I guess it was more of a thing.

And I would be so confused, and I would be like, did I miss something? Like, did I not say it right? And I would just spiral, and I would have to sit down with him and be like, okay, can you walk me through this again?

A week later? Okay, I. I'm. I'm really confused again. Can you walk me through this again, please help me see what I need to see.

And he would just show me, like, a little, you know, camera, like, putting a lens on. Okay. And then this happened. And then, remember this one? This happened. And then there's this one here. And now. What do you think? After seeing all that?

And I had to, like, reorient and recalibrate my internal monologue about this all the time. And so, yeah, I guess now I have the advantage of really feeling very confident. But early on, I've been estranged for five years.

Those first couple years, I wanted so badly, and I think this is what happens with children, is we want so badly to think it's something else. Like, no way could it be what I'm seeing. Yeah. There's no possible way they could really choose a life without. Without me and be okay with that. Yeah.

And so we look for any other possible explanation, and usually that's at our own expense.

Well, I didn't say it good enough or I was disrespectful, or I wasn't thankful enough when they helped lend me their car, or I didn't do this or I didn't do that. So it's like, we look for any example possible that could explain why they've turned cold and why they're gone. Why the still face?

You know that experiment where the parent, the baby's crying out for the parent and the parent no longer responds. I would have that dream. Oh my God.

So many times my dreams have been so much nightmares about screaming out to my parents, begging, pleading, crying for them to see me. And it was like there was just glass between us. They wouldn't. They just stared at me and no, no impact, no response.

And that's what children need to know, is that I impact you. You see me, you feel pain when you see my pain. That's the nature of the beautiful dance of. Of attunement and co regulation.

That's the magic of relationships. And once that's gone, to try to like reconcile how that is possible.

Especially like you said, with all the narratives we've heard our whole lives about. Well, parents always love their children. They love them more than anyone in the world. Yeah, it's.

Sometimes we do go to ourselves and I see that a lot in clients and in other folks, that it's just, it's got to be me.

Because to accept that it's not me and that they really have chosen to stop loving me well or to never love me well, have loved me well is so painful. And so that brings me to like a lot of the acceptance and grief work I've done. I've done so much work around acceptance and grief.

I feel like they go really well together. And that's how I've been able to live in the story. Knowing the truth, not having to live in denial. Really, really.

Living in the true, truest version of this story is through accepting reality and living in reality and then grieving that over and over and over again.

Sam: 01:00:29

Yeah, I think acceptance is one of the most beautiful things when we are living in the painful cycle and circular thinking of trying to make sense of something that doesn't and should never make sense. And acceptance is the only way.

Lauren: 01:00:45

I think that the only way.

Sam: 01:00:47

It's the only way we can do that. That what has healing looks like or recovery looked like or.

And not all and finding more of your authentic sense of self that's yours, not anybody else's.

Lauren: 01:01:04

That's right. Yeah. It's such a privilege to get to do that. And that's why I will always say it's worth it.

Even though the losses have been and continue to be and will forever mark the. My life massive. The. The gains and the freedom and the lightness and the exploration of me, it's just been such a cool process.

And like, I love the version of me I'm getting to know and I love that I don't have to be the golden child anymore. Like I get to be Lauren and I get to show up and embody myself in its imperfectness. And that's just such a joy.

And the ways that I've done that, that's been what my healings looked a lot like is just leaning into like, what does it feel like to be alive and to feel good in this body? A lot of us when we're in roles, we're very disembodied and we don't, you know, we don't know what it is to be fully human.

It sounds weird, but we're. Yeah, we're not, we're not all there.

Sam: 01:02:09

I mean also another shout out to purity culture. That helps.

Lauren: 01:02:13

Yeah.

Sam: 01:02:13

In terms of that disembodiment. Yeah, that's right.

Lauren: 01:02:16

Yep. So.

So like stepping into my more fully free self without the restraints of the religious system or the, the golden child role in the family system has just been really cool and, and some of the main ways that I feel like have led to more healing and more integration of like my true, true self would be body related things. So like yoga, actually the gym. Super surprising. I had chronic illness. That's a huge part of my story. I didn't even share.

I developed chronic illness, I believe from being the golden child. Chronic fatigue syndrome and chronic pain and chronic gastrointestinal issues, headaches, all kinds of things developed actually started quite early.

My first one was 5 years old that I developed autoimmune disease and then just continued on for years.

So stepping out of the that I'm broken, I'm sick, roll into like I'm healing and I'm going to find the most abundant life within my, you know, whatever my system allows me to have. That's what I'm going to find.

So like I, I did some rock climbing and I did some Zumba which was really fun and also went against purity culture because I was like shaking my hips like crazy.

Sam: 01:03:25

Also Zumba just requires so much like physical coordination. It's not funny.

Lauren: 01:03:31

It does like a random little side note, it's hard and coordination is not my thing. So that was a very stretching season. But like lifting weights and feeling strong.

Like I always had to be mentally strong for other people but now like, oh, I can be physically strong. For me, this is only for me. That's been really cool.

And then just being in Nature, like, lots of nature seeking, nature walks, nature hikes, finding beauty. Relationships can feel really scary. But nature is a way to feel comforted and loved. And, you know, it's different. It's not people, but it's.

It's a way to feel access to safety that doesn't involve relationships, which is really good for trauma survivors because relationships are really hard. And then writing.

Writing my book was a huge, huge, huge way to really get the story out and find out what is the story, because there's lots of different versions. But what's the truest story that I can find in the story that has been huge and such an honor for me to be able to do?

And then my friends, my close, like, inner circle, they have been like, life and light and all good things. My partner, he has. This sounds ridiculous and maybe sappy, and maybe people are like, well, you don't need to be saved, but guess what? Up.

aved Lauren. But I was so. In: 2020

I was down to, like, only tolerating 10 foods. And I was just really, really, really, like, couldn't get out of bed because of the paralyzation of what happened between my parents and I.

And there wasn't, like, an ending yet. So I was just waiting in this frozen state of agony. And he, like, helped life me. And I needed.

At that point, I needed a person or, like, I maybe would have had to go to, like, an institution because I couldn't do for myself at that point what I needed, what I needed.

And so he think so thankful he was able to help me remember who I was and to kind of put a mirror to myself and show me me and the true me and the goodness that I held. And I came back to life. So I'm really thankful for that. And my pets, my puppies, I love poodles.

And they just sit with me and they help me write my story, and they help me process my grief, and I cry on their fluffy fur, and I feel so loved. And nothing like, they don't see me as broken or shameful like my family does. They just see me as, well, they see me as God. Right? That's what.

Sam: 01:06:16

Dr. There is nothing like. I mean, we have a cavoodle, and everybody who follows me knows how much I love Naya. She's like my heart and soul.

Lauren: 01:06:25

Yes.

Sam: 01:06:25

But, like, there is nothing like a dog to remind You. That love can be unconditional when you have experienced conditional love. So they're so beautiful.

Lauren: 01:06:39

Exactly.

Sam: 01:06:41

Before I ask the last couple of questions that I usually finish these episodes with, I want to talk about the book for a minute, because you. At the beginning, I was going to ask.

Lauren: 01:06:50

Ask this.

Sam: 01:06:50

And I'm so glad I remembered. I don't usually remember things when I think, oh, I should ask that at the beginning of the episode.

And then the whole conversation passes and I completely forget, usually. But I remembered you referred to it as, like, you went through it, like, microscopically, essentially. But you are not.

Like, this is not like, research, like, where we think, like a microscope lens in. In something else. Like, this is your own story and your own pain and your own journey. And so what was it like for you to put all of that in writing.

Lauren: 01:07:29

Again? There's another dichotomy because it, like, almost killed me.

Sam: 01:07:34

Yeah.

Lauren: 01:07:35

It was so hard. And also, it was like the path to. For me to healing. So I don't know how it can be both, but it was. It just was like.

Sam: 01:07:50

Your truth.

Lauren: 01:07:52

Yeah, the. Just the two things we constantly hold that are seemingly mutually exclusive, but they're not. They're not. We don't have to split, Esther. Paralysis.

Don't split the ambivalence. Like, both feelings about something can be equally true. Yeah. And so I had a lot of symptoms come back up.

A lot of chronic illness symptoms as I was writing. A lot of brain fog, a lot of exhaustion, fatigue. So that's why it took me three years. It. It really was writing every single weekend for hours.

Saturday and Sunday for three years. And it was just such a slow, slow process because of what I was dealing with.

And it's not like someone just gives you the story and then you write it. You have to find the story. What scenes, what parts. Yeah. What commentary do I even attach to this? What do.

It was probably one of the hardest things I've ever done. Like, it was so freaking hard. And I had co. I had coaches who helped me. And then they'd be like, I'd get a ton done. Like, 30, 000 words done.

They'd be like, okay, let's rewrite all that. Just constant, constant disappointment. Yeah.

Sam: 01:09:07

Oh, my goodness.

Lauren: 01:09:08

Yeah. It was so hard, and it was so stretching, and it was so good, and I'm so glad it's over. Oh, yeah.

Sam: 01:09:21

I mean. And, like, how does it feel that, like, you know, I saw. Like, I.

We're recording this, and I think it will be out by the time people are listening to this episode. But, like, I just saw your reel on Instagram where you got, like, the. Like, you got the copy and you held it in your hands.

Like, what was that moment like for you?

Lauren: 01:09:43

Yeah, that was just this week. That was just a couple days ago. It felt amazing.

It's like all of this work that's kind of spread out on Word documents and in your head, and it's all this abstract thing for a while. For three years, I should say. And then you, like, get this. This bound book, and it's like, oh, my God, my story's a book. Like, how did I do this?

I followed all these specifications and word counts and sizes and this and that and chapter sizes and. And I got it into a book. It just felt. It felt incredible. It felt so. So cozy and delicious, and I was so thankful. Yeah.

Sam: 01:10:20

And as a quick side note before I get to these last final questions, it's so freaking pretty.

Lauren: 01:10:25

Like, so pretty.

Sam: 01:10:28

Like, I love aesthetics.

Like I said to you before we started, like, I love your background for people who do, like, watch the reel and things like that, but, you know, it's so pretty. It's just. Yeah. Beautiful.

Lauren: 01:10:41

Shout out to the book designers on Instagram. They did an incredible job painting my vision and just making it so much more beautiful than I even could have pictured. I love. Yeah.

I'm trying to figure out what tattoo to get. I was. I promised myself once the book was out. Ow. I was gonna get a tattoo, like, to commemorate it. So I'm still on. I'm still not quite sure.

I might do, like, a little cage, because the whole idea is, like, I was in a golden cage, and I got out a little tiny, like, bird cage with an open door and nothing in it. I don't know. I don't want to do a bird necessarily. I feel like it's a bit cliche, but maybe we'll see.

Sam: 01:11:15

It'll come too. I love.

Lauren: 01:11:18

Yeah, I love that. Yeah.

Sam: 01:11:22

Okay. So I love to do full circle questions to mirror back one of the ones that I've already asked where, like, what is spirituality like for you now?

Lauren: 01:11:33

Yeah. So I got rid of the certainty, and I think that characterizes my spirituality the most is, like, I refuse to get.

Get stuck back into those binaries or those rigid places of certainty, because, honestly, that's what got us into this mess in the first place, is the rigidity. So my spirituality is spacious and is. And is open and is curious and is, like, full of wonder and is also not on a time crunch.

Like, I get to figure out where I'm at with that and my own time.

And that was something that was really important at first because I was so ready to, like, repackage it all and get it all figured out in, like, a new version. And I. And I just sense such a. Such a permission to just not do that. Like, wide open spaces. I get to go as I go and see where I land.

And for now, it's like, I believe. I hope. I think maybe that there is the divine somewhere with us. I hope so. I feel like for a lot of us, it's hard to imagine there not being anything.

And I'm also open that that may be true and that this may all just be biology that is happening in all of these interactions. As I'm looking at you and feeling, like, love towards you, it's like, oh, that's just my neurotransmitters.

Sam: 01:13:01

It's just science.

Lauren: 01:13:03

Yeah. Like, there's nothing more. But I tend to think that there's more.

I just see such a sacredness in humans and such, like, deeper meaning and purpose that it's hard to believe that it's truly just biology. But I don't know. Beyond that, I don't know. And so that's where I swim. There's a. There's a quote by Suleika Jawad, who wrote between two.

Between Two Worlds. I believe she had cancer, and she. I think she has cancer again. She's a young person, or she actually partners with John Batiste, who's.

Who is a musician, and he just had a NETFLIX special. Anyways, she wrote this beautiful, beautiful book, and one of the quotes in it that I put in my book is my greatest work.

I'm saying it not verbatim, but my greatest work is to learn to live, to swim in the ocean of not knowing. Like, this is where we swim. This is our space. And to learn to do that, when you can really do that, it's so incredibly freeing.

And life can be so full and feel so good when you don't have to know.

Sam: 01:14:17

Yeah, absolutely. I. I talk about it a lot. That.

The freedom that comes when you can say, particularly when it comes to, like, big existential questions, like around faith and religion and the universe and all of that. The freedom to be able to say, I don't know when. For that, to not instill automatic anxiety, essential terror. Yeah, it's really nice.

And to one day be able to think and believe and perceive one thing, and then for tomorrow to. For it to be something different and for that to be okay. It's a really beautiful place to land.

So I like to end these episodes with some encouragement for people. I have a range of listeners from, you know, people who are fresh in this space to people who have been doing it for a number of years.

But I particularly want to speak to those who have family estrangement with their parents. In particular, what would you say to someone who is navigating that personally?

Lauren: 01:15:22

Oh, I'm just so incredibly sorry. Yeah. Like, this was never, ever, ever in any world or dimension or galaxy the way it was supposed to be. And the losses connected to it.

Really, only people who have lost their parents can know because it's so layered and so, like, you can have one memory just crash you for a whole day because your entire world is made up of the framework of them being in it. So every holiday, every birthday, every song, every smell, every food, every event has connection points to your parents.

And when they're no longer in your life, but they're not dead, you live with this very complex grief. And it's a cruel grief, I like to say, because they have the power to stop it from happening.

They have the power to stop your heart from breaking, and they don't. Yeah. So in that, I just. I just want to affirm to your listeners, like, this pain is so significant. If you are struggling pain immensely.

A, with a decision, do I go lower? No contact. And B, with. Once you've already made it, just struggling with the fallout from it, the.

The losses that are piled up all around you, the immense loneliness and, like, the shearing pain, you are so incredibly normal. It's that big. It feels that big because it is, honest to God, that big.

And just because it hurts doesn't mean you've done something wrong and doesn't mean that it wasn't the right decision. Like my teenage son said to me a couple months ago, like, I was telling him how happy I am in my life, and he was like, really?

It's like, you're happy though. You've, like, lost everything.

And I'm like, I know, but I. I hold that grief in one hand and I hold this beautiful, joyous existence that I get to have in the other. And I walk with both. They're both real and they're both mine. And the grief does not need to cancel out. It can at times.

Like, if you're in a season where you don't have the joy and abundance, hello, completely normal.

Like, my grief seasons were years where I had a very hard time feeling good feelings, too, but that they're both available to you and intending to your grief is how you can access and unlock and open the door to a real, meaningful, joyful life as well. So I just want to affirm the hell out of whoever's listening who's trying it. It is one of the hardest things you'll ever do.

And you're not alone in that. There's a huge, huge body of people, collective of people that know this pain really, really well and that, yeah, you're not alone.

And you're super freaking brave to choose yourself and to choose the possibility of a life that's not so full of trauma and, and mistreatment and dysfunctional relationships so that you can have a good, a good go at the rest of the life you have. It's super, super brave and I just applaud you and give you a big, big hug.

Sam: 01:19:11

Beautiful. Thank you so much. That was beautiful. And I'm not saying anything after that, but except for back at you in terms of the bravery.

And also, thank you so much for joining me today. It has been an absolute delight.

I'm so sorry that you're sitting here telling me this story and I'm so thankful for you sitting here telling the story as well. So it's been an absolute joy to.

Lauren: 01:19:42

Talk to you too, Sam. Such a gift.

Sam: 01:19:49

Thanks for tuning in to this episode of beyond the Surface. I hope you found today's conversation as insightful and inspiring as I did.

If you enjoyed the episode, be sure to subscribe, leave a review and share it with others who might benefit from these stories. Stay connected with us on social media for updates and more content. I love connecting with all of you.

Remember, no matter where you are in your journey, you're not alone. Until next time, keep exploring, keep questioning, and keep moving forward. Take care.