Episode 30 from The Grit Theory.

Today we sat down with the indomitable Pete and Shara Heiniger who founded the non profit called Stages. In addition to the nonprofit, they also started a podcast by the same name with the goal to change the stigma and story of the cancer journey. They work to accomplish this goal by focusing on honesty, candor, and hope through building resiliency.

Highlights include:
-Stage 4 Cancer.
-The importance of listening when going through hell.
-The elephant in the room.
-Your family is on the journey whether they like it or not.
-The medicine of normalcy.
-The power of routines.
To learn more about the Heinigers and their work, check them out at:
http://www.stages.community

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Also, check out Be Relentless: If the obstacle is the way, then we must be waymakers HERE.

Do you want to learn more? Check out:

The Book: Be Relentless: If the obstacle is the way, then we must be WayMakers.

The Podcast: “Be Relentless Podcast”

The Fuel: Sisu Stamina, Performance Evolved

Linktree: Here.

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Episode Transcript

00;00;03;11 – 00;00;09;02

Jon

Hello, everyone. Welcome to the grid theory, where we believe in facing difficulty head on.

00;00;09;15 – 00;00;19;17

Aaron

These are stories of inspiration. We applaud grit, tenacity, resilience, the struggle in the pursuit of better, more intentional lives.

00;00;24;00 – 00;00;46;16

Aaron

We’re here with two wonderful guests today. Pete and Cheryl. Heininger. We’re going to have a we’re going have a discussion about, boy, lots of things, but it’s going to be centered on sort of your cancer journey, your podcast, that how you support people as far as support the people who support the people, even going through cancer. We’re going to get into that in just a minute.

00;00;46;28 – 00;00;48;14

Aaron

But thank you so much for being here, guys.

00;00;49;03 – 00;00;58;07

Pete

Yeah, our pleasure. We’re we’re just I think it’s been it’s been a long journey, but I’m glad to share it, so I’m excited.

00;00;58;15 – 00;01;00;21

Aaron

Excellent. Glad you’re here and share it.

00;01;00;26 – 00;01;01;15

Jon

The wife.

00;01;02;08 – 00;01;02;24

Aaron

Of Pete.

00;01;03;02 – 00;01;03;15

Jon

Yes.

00;01;03;20 – 00;01;12;16

Aaron

We’re here to have you fact check him. Really? So chime in as needed. He gets a little too out there, inflates the story too much.

00;01;12;16 – 00;01;13;29

Jon

That’s okay. Yeah.

00;01;14;00 – 00;01;15;06

Aaron

So, how’s John doing today?

00;01;15;06 – 00;01;16;28

Pete

Doing well? Yeah.

00;01;17;18 – 00;01;18;16

Jon

Continuing the journey.

00;01;18;23 – 00;01;25;08

Aaron

Yeah. Excellent. I can always tell your mood by how well your beard has been trimmed. And so, like, life is good.

00;01;25;24 – 00;01;28;07

Jon

Yeah, life is good.

00;01;29;01 – 00;01;44;25

Aaron

Okay, well, let’s jump right into it right away. I want to just kind of find out what your what you’ve been working on. Cause you use sounds like you’re. Your journey has been through cancer. You share that it was a 20, even 22nd round of chemotherapy.

00;01;44;26 – 00;01;48;11

Pete

Yeah, This Wednesday will be round 22. Yeah. Wow.

00;01;48;13 – 00;02;01;05

Aaron

Okay, so you had some thoughts to share, how to endure and be gritty and and get through tough stuff, I’m sure. Okay. Tell us a little bit about your podcast and why how that came to be.

00;02;01;11 – 00;02;26;25

Pete

Okay. Yeah, we when we started facing cancer a lot of times what happens with a lot of us is that we can lose our employment. I mean, either because we’re we’re just struggling physically and can’t do it anymore or, you know, work seems to make that decision for us. And that’s kind of where we landed. And so I think out of that we thought, okay, what is it that I need to focus on and what can I do?

00;02;26;25 – 00;03;01;10

Pete

And I think going through cancer for me was something that I realized is there’s so many firsts that people are prepared for. And so we really kind of launched a nonprofit called Stages that is, you know, there’s going to have a podcast by the same name stages just to come alongside, I think, cancer fighters and also their the spouses, but also just anybody that’s friends with them, I think trying to help people understand like how you can you come alongside somebody and really walk them through the journey.

00;03;01;24 – 00;03;21;12

Pete

But I think, you know, we were faced with so many firsts in that first, you know, six, six months of you get in a stage for colorectal, you hear those words and you just you you don’t listen to another thing that the doctor says. You’re just like, what do we do with stage four? I know it’s like probably worse than stage one through three, but I mean, what does that mean?

00;03;21;12 – 00;03;33;10

Pete

You know? And I think you then you start to go through. How long do you have? And you have to come to grips with your mortality. But there’s so many little things, you know, what is chemo, what is it? You know, infusion, what is that like? You know, and tell me.

00;03;33;10 – 00;03;45;24

Aaron

But tell me about that. Because these journeys are thrust on us. Because I’m sure you didn’t walk in with any preparation thinking, well, this is going to be a huge change in my life completely.

00;03;45;25 – 00;04;07;26

Pete

Yeah, I think the very first time we sat down to go over everything, it was they used the word palliative. And of course, with me in my past, when I hear somebody say palliative care, I think hospice, this is the end. So the very first thing you hit with is, is this word that you’re associating with. Oh, like, this is like, I don’t have very long.

00;04;07;29 – 00;04;26;12

Pete

Mm hmm. And I think then they explain, Well, no, like, I mean, but the average, you know, length of time could be four years or something like that. So you go into that and then you’re told, like every other week you’re going to do chemotherapy, and then you kind of have this idea, I guess you’re going to put chemicals in my bloodstream and it’s going to be brutal or something like that.

00;04;26;22 – 00;04;46;06

Pete

But it’s even gets down to the place where you’re, you know, what’s what’s the hospital like? I mean, what are you going to what are you gonna walk into? So everyone has this idea that you’re going to be in this room by yourself and know you’re on a floor next to 40, you know, 45 other people. There’s no oftentimes there’s no barrier between you and the next person.

00;04;46;06 – 00;05;09;07

Pete

And they’re in the chair, basically 6 to 8 feet, you know, from you. And there’s just a whole row of of everyone going through cancer. They’re all different ages. Some are older than you, some are younger than you. You kind of get the first taste of, okay, cancer hits a lot of different people. And and and then you get this pump that’s attached to you after 5 hours of sitting there and having all this other stuff.

00;05;09;07 – 00;05;31;06

Pete

But when your bloodstream now you have to take it home and then wear it for 48 hours and have to go back in and have it removed on Friday. So my and I go in Wednesday and then I have it removed right. So it kind of completely changes your life. And to the chemo weeks, you could be in the hospital in visits and working, I mean like six, seven appointments that week.

00;05;31;11 – 00;05;52;10

Pete

And so you just kind of in and out, in and out, in and out. So it does, you know, kind of thrust itself right into your routine, right? So it just breaks everything. And then it’s so challenging in the front end because you don’t listen. You know, you like to think that you listen, but you don’t. And so, like, for me, I have numbness in my hands.

00;05;52;18 – 00;06;07;00

Pete

That’s probably permanent damage in my feet. I can’t feel my feet. And that, you know, is called peripheral neuropathy, but it’s due to a side effect from a drug. But as they’re flying through those drugs, they’re like, oh, be sure to tell somebody when you have no license.

00;06;08;06 – 00;06;09;26

Shara

No girls, girls, girl.

00;06;10;11 – 00;06;10;27

Jon

You know, but.

00;06;10;29 – 00;06;11;22

Shara

You don’t listen to know.

00;06;12;03 – 00;06;27;20

Pete

And because it would go away, like the numbness would come on. But then I’d have my off week and I’d then I’d feel again. So I thought, oh I’m just going to power through it. You know, my big thing was, you know, I’m just going to be I’m going to go longer, more and more rounds, you know, extend this out.

00;06;27;20 – 00;06;44;28

Pete

I’m just going to fight through because I’m younger and I’m healthy and I can I can do this. But what I found out was that somewhere in the pamphlet that they gave you a folder of like a bunch of information, they’re telling you this could actually be permanent damage. And so you there’s all these first that you kind of go through that you don’t know.

00;06;44;28 – 00;07;07;00

Pete

So then when you finally bring it up, all of a sudden the the feeling doesn’t come back. You’re like, oh, I just created permanent nerve damage, you know, and two different things that I should have listened better. So I think part of stages is trying to walk people through just that, that aspect of it. Like, hey, there’s some things that you should probably you’re not going to pay attention to, but you should.

00;07;07;00 – 00;07;09;13

Pete

Right. Right. And you’re walking people.

00;07;09;13 – 00;07;20;02

Aaron

I mean, you’re already you’re very distracted with like the severity of the situation. You’re going, you know, who’s who’s reading every single word. You’re just like, okay, how do I get to the end of this thing now?

00;07;20;04 – 00;07;20;14

Pete

Yeah.

00;07;20;19 – 00;07;32;12

Aaron

And then and you’re sitting and you’re sitting copilot. I mean, what’s that like? Because, I mean, you can’t go do the chemo for him. What is how does it feel being in that circumstance? What how did you go through that journey?

00;07;32;19 – 00;07;51;07

Shara

It changed everything about I literally have things about my life before hearing those words and things, you know, that will ever never be the same sleep. The things I think about, you know, very much every aspect of my life has changed from that.

00;07;51;21 – 00;08;07;19

Aaron

We’ve talked about it in the past that like when we go through difficulty, that how dare us to think that we’re doing it alone. You know, the ones that love us are right there and they don’t have a choice like you’re shackled to this thing, You know, he’s going the water. So are you, you know. Yes. And and it’s it’s just as difficult.

00;08;07;19 – 00;08;24;17

Aaron

And I think it’s worth noting because those people who are walking through these journeys, whatever they are, cancer is a big one for a lot of people. It could be job loss which expounds things or are going through grief of any kind, the ones that all of us are right there with us trying to deal with it.

00;08;25;05 – 00;08;53;11

Shara

I did write a blog about the elephant in the room that very often times you you can act like it doesn’t exist, but it is very much there. And one of the visuals I use is our our number two daughter was pretty newborn and number one daughter was sitting beside her. And then she stood up and very slowly just sat on her sister because she was like infringing on her life, you know.

00;08;53;11 – 00;09;19;09

Shara

So and then I have that imagery with the elephant in the room, and for me, it comes at night. We’ll talk about heavy stuff. He’ll go to sleep and then the like, the elephant, you know, just comes and sits on my chest and and, you know. Yeah. So right then you have a decision, you know, is this what gets to take over my life or do I have a choice?

00;09;19;09 – 00;09;31;14

Shara

And, you know, I’m going to choose to fight this elephant. So I imagine myself as a little kid kicking it off and pushing it off and yelling and telling it who’s boss and it’s not the elephant.

00;09;31;18 – 00;09;55;04

Aaron

So we just had a podcast about this recently regarding grief, and we talked about, you know, loss of family dog, everyone’s lost a family pet that stinks on some level. It has those same exact stinging, maybe not as lasting effect when it’s that human being that we’ve loved for many, many years, but it’s still the same kind of feelings.

00;09;55;04 – 00;10;09;28

Aaron

And one of the things that we’re talking about is, is how how we do face it, because it’s like you’re saying you made a choice to go towards it. And what do you say to those who are who are very tempted to be like, I just don’t want to deal with this. I don’t want to look at this.

00;10;09;28 – 00;10;17;15

Aaron

I don’t want to talk about it. I don’t want to let anybody else know about it. This is my fight and I’m just going to get through it. What do you say to that mentality?

00;10;17;22 – 00;10;37;06

Pete

I think the first thing that I say is I felt the same way in many ways that I’d rather internalize and not make it everybody else’s thing. And I think there is a line. There’s always a balance. I think when you’re going through things, you you don’t want to bring your family and your friends and make it all about like now.

00;10;37;10 – 00;10;58;06

Pete

Now you’re part of this too, right? But there’s also a part of it where you need those friends and family. So you have to keep a balance because you you can let cancer in this case take over everything. And so then your conversation is that everyone and that’s not how you want your friendships or your relationship. You know, with me and Sarah, we can’t make it all about that.

00;10;58;06 – 00;11;18;03

Pete

So I think I think what we had to do is learn a good communication strategy. But I think when you try to think you can take it all on, my answer to that would be I’m I’m a pretty big fighter. And I learned I can’t take it all. Like when you’re sitting there in chemo and you feel nauseous and it’s been 72 hours.

00;11;18;03 – 00;11;48;12

Pete

It’s been, you know, and it’s just been straight. And then you’re thinking about like, okay, is this worse than just just, you know, let it take its course and everything. And so you have to fight those internal battles about, you know, is this worth it? Should I go through it and and or should I just, you know, like, let’s just go in the hospice and let’s just call it, you know, And I think those things battle you and there’s no way that you can overcome that by yourself.

00;11;48;12 – 00;12;04;19

Pete

You’re going to have to develop deep friendships with people who are going to be stubborn with you, who are going to, you know, draw it out of you. And, you know, I think over time, then you start to get a resiliency. I think there is a part where you need a fight, you need grit, you need to approach it that way.

00;12;05;01 – 00;12;27;05

Pete

But you have to realize that it’s a team effort. Like there is going to be people and I need a team because I can’t just bring everything to her. One of the first things you have to worry about is communication with your spouse. I mean, she’s working full time, right? And I’m sitting there working on the nonprofit, but she’s working full time, 8 hours a day for a software company.

00;12;27;05 – 00;12;44;20

Pete

And so when she gets out of a heavy day, it’s been busy like the last thing, you know, like, how are you up? And then I’m like, you know, dump like, well, you know, today I felt, you know, so you have to have a balance and try to not draw her in. So there’s things that you’re are really heavy and that you’re fighting through.

00;12;44;20 – 00;13;05;18

Pete

And sometimes it’s depression, sometimes it’s, it’s just that the you’re scared of what’s going to happen. I think it’s good to have people you know, I have some good friends in my life who I can sit down and they’re like, You can tell me anything, you can say anything. And that helps me buffer what I say to her.

00;13;05;18 – 00;13;23;29

Pete

Like, I know keep her in the dark, but there are some times where she’s like, How? And I’m like, I’m good, you know? And and we kind of have a tone that we have between us of communication, which is means let’s not talk about that right now. I’m okay, but let’s, you know, let’s just not go there because, you know, it’s not the time or the place.

00;13;23;29 – 00;13;31;03

Pete

We’ve got to set up a a balance. And I don’t feel like this is a good time to to tell you where where I am mentally because it’s just deep.

00;13;31;11 – 00;13;49;17

Aaron

Yeah. We’ve and John, I know you exercise this, too. Like sometimes we have these unrefined thoughts that like, I got to I got to go beat this out of me a little bit with a friend or whether it’s a physical thing or whatever. I just need to I’m not quite ready to speak it out, but I will, I will.

00;13;49;17 – 00;14;03;12

Aaron

I’m committed to doing it. But I, but I got to first figure it out. Yeah. It’s time to start saying these things in a john. Sometimes I’ve come in, you’re like, Yeah, I had a rough day. I’ve done a few things to kind of be ready, but I needed to have the conversation.

00;14;03;20 – 00;14;28;27

Jon

Timing’s important, right? Yeah. A good thing can be a terrible thing if you don’t have some foresight into what it’s about. And earlier, a few minutes ago, we were talking about everything that happens good, bad or indifferent. Every stimulus requires a response, you know, And I think that’s a lot of what we’re talking about here. So it’s like cancer stimulus response, long and complicated.

00;14;28;27 – 00;14;45;10

Jon

But one of the things is we’re we’ve been talking like he referenced, one of my dogs was hit by a car. My wife shaved her dog mine two on Monday night. And then he came home, me barrier. But we had to choose. Right. Where are we going to play the blame game? We’re going to be angry with each other.

00;14;45;10 – 00;14;50;11

Jon

We’re going to be angry with ourselves. We’re going to choose to have that, you know, lightning bolt moment.

00;14;50;29 – 00;14;51;05

Pete

Could.

00;14;51;19 – 00;15;13;25

Jon

Be something we deliberately have bring us together. We chose that and then we work through the ramifications. Now, what’s interesting is for young children that you saw when they came in your car and they were all asleep. Well, I didn’t go wake them up to tell them, you know, I let them sleep. We fed them breakfast. And then once they were fortified, we had the conversation right.

00;15;13;26 – 00;15;35;06

Jon

And then began walking to the process so that this was a small example of how timing with this is important. And then the other thing that just jumped into my mind from what you’re talking about, like sometimes it’s not for my bride and I to walk through. It’s for me to battle or me and a friend, right? It’s like when you’re walking through a significant challenge, The goal plan appears to often be outward focused.

00;15;35;12 – 00;16;01;24

Jon

Right? All right. I’m one piece of the resource load in this network, and how can I contribute in that so that it doesn’t become all consuming, You know, less tragic, but similar is parenting, right? Yes. A lot of marriages struggle because raising children becomes the only thing in the conversation. And that lack of balance, even with a good thing, is just as damaging as something where cancer can be all consuming.

00;16;02;03 – 00;16;15;09

Jon

Right. You know, it’s that’s a pretty wide spectrum. But I love the emphasis that you guys are bringing in of like and really what I heard of how you lost so many friends and you lost work and all these things from from before we jumped on the mixes you have when you.

00;16;15;27 – 00;16;16;07

Pete

Go.

00;16;16;07 – 00;16;33;10

Jon

Through these things, It’s going to it’s going to bring up other people’s demons. It’s going to bring up their discomforts, their own mortality. Right. And if you don’t have the courage to look at it, you may run away or have other issues. But knowing that I’m just one peg in, this is a big part of it.

00;16;34;08 – 00;17;00;23

Pete

Yeah, I think that’s so true. I mean, like for one, I think we have five daughters and they’re older, but at the time because of COVID, we had one girl that came home from college and was student teaching here. And so she is staying with us. She’s back home. And then we had two at home already. And so, you know, you have a you’re experiencing the journey, but there are that with you, whether they like it or not.

00;17;00;23 – 00;17;18;26

Pete

Right. Like I can’t when they were there when I went through my first round and I mean, I can’t I can’t go through eight and a half hours of throwing up and not have them know they’re in the same house. Right. And it’s just brutal. So, I mean, when you’re when you’re going through those things, they’re kind of living it with you.

00;17;18;26 – 00;17;42;07

Pete

Right. And then I think we had to say, okay, how do we create some space in there where that’s not so heavy? And I think it was good. She took a job in Chicago to teach. And and then our our next girl, who is 18 said, I’m going to wait to go into school and maybe I won’t go to school, but I’m going to go with her and kind of help her adjust to Chicago.

00;17;42;07 – 00;18;00;15

Pete

And so they moved in together. But I think that gave him some good space. I think there and I think the other side of it is you do have to kind of see their friends that showed up immediately and said, we’re here. And like so we have a couple in our lives that meets with us every, you know, Sunday night.

00;18;00;15 – 00;18;21;17

Pete

We just go hang out. There’s no agenda. There’s no like, you know, we have to share or talk about cancer or anything. Most of the time we don’t. But it’s just that they their presence became more pronounced in that space. And I think that was so important to us. And then we had friends that we thought would be like that who just completely, like you said, you know, we know they love us.

00;18;21;18 – 00;18;42;29

Pete

It’s not like, oh, well, now they have they’re fighting cancer, so we just don’t love them anymore. I know that’s not the case. I think it is that kind of unspoken thing. I think what the two things that I learned going through cancer, the the to me, the having worked with people and try to counsel people through cancer and be there for people before that.

00;18;42;29 – 00;19;07;25

Pete

Now, I experienced as a cancer fighter, one of the things I learned was just sometimes we we’ve given ourselves such a small toolbox to help people, you know, like everybody kind of does the whole online Facebook, you know, you know, hey, I’m praying for you. I hope you you know, I’m pray for complete healing or I’m going to you know, and you get that, you know, and I have tons of friends from high school all the way through on Facebook.

00;19;07;25 – 00;19;29;22

Pete

And we started with a group called Pete’s Posse. A friend of ours started. And so then but now we have like 900 people in there. And so there’s 900 people that are that are making comments. But a lot of times it’s that and then they don’t know what to say. So once you kind of as a friend have gone to a your your friend going through cancer and you just say, hey, I’m praying for you.

00;19;29;22 – 00;19;49;16

Pete

Well, that sounds great. The first two or three times. Then there’s nothing else in the toolbox, Right? I think one of the biggest things I learned is that for 90% of us, we’re not going to get that magical, you know, thing where, hey, there’s no evidence of disease. You went through chemo for six rounds and it’s all gone, you know, and some people get that.

00;19;49;16 – 00;20;11;27

Pete

But there’s a lot of us, I think that basically are in the long haul. It’s going to be a long journey. And so I think people become intimidated by, well, then what do I say? What do I do? Like, this isn’t going away. I keep saying I’m praying for them. And I just would say like, hey, encourage somebody to have your prayer.

00;20;11;27 – 00;20;32;02

Pete

Your your focus should be, can I help them? Have hope, no matter what the circumstances of that week is or that day? I think that’s the biggest thing that you could do for somebody as a in what way could I contribute to them having hope in the midst of circumstances? Sure. You know, say a prayer for healing, do do something like that.

00;20;32;02 – 00;20;52;15

Pete

But I think on the other side of that is this idea of just like I need hope to make it through this tough spot. Right. And what could you do to contribute that? So we spent a lot of time writing blogs and focusing on friends who just did these little things, you know, for us and kind of showing people exactly what you could do.

00;20;52;15 – 00;21;12;12

Pete

I mean, it’s just it’s amazing. You know, I had a buddy who used to go on a fishing trip in Minnesota all the time, and he just called his buddies from high school and said, hey, can I bring a friend? And they’re like, Sure. So then he just he said, Hey, on your off week, we’re going to go up to Minnesota and spend three days in fishing opener and go up there.

00;21;12;12 – 00;21;15;29

Pete

I got to get away from cancer and everything.

00;21;15;29 – 00;21;16;11

Jon

And they.

00;21;16;11 – 00;21;18;16

Aaron

Just planned it for you. Yeah, we’re going fishing.

00;21;18;22 – 00;21;19;26

Jon

Yeah. Okay. Yeah.

00;21;19;27 – 00;21;21;13

Aaron

Because you’re not planning anything for yourself.

00;21;21;27 – 00;21;22;13

Jon

And you’re not.

00;21;22;13 – 00;21;25;16

Aaron

In that state of mind. Yeah. Yeah, We got you. Yeah. Yeah.

00;21;25;21 – 00;21;40;15

Pete

And it was such a blessing just to get away from. Yeah, I think just, you know, I think getting away from everything, talking about it, I didn’t. I don’t think I talked about cancer at all. It wasn’t like I was like, Hey, I don’t know if you guys know, you know, it was like, it’s like we were just talking fishing.

00;21;40;15 – 00;21;57;05

Pete

We went back. We’re all from Minnesota, so we had a lot to talk about there. But I think it just that’s an easy thing that someone said. I’m just going to add one little thing to my summer. Yeah. And it changed my life, right? I mean, it really, really did some amazing things for me. So I think that was cool.

00;21;57;05 – 00;22;00;13

Aaron

What a subtle thing for a friend to do. And it meant the world.

00;22;00;16 – 00;22;00;24

Pete

Oh, yeah.

00;22;01;05 – 00;22;21;25

Jon

I think it’s the medicine of normalcy, right? And I think that one of the things I’m hearing is you’re giving permission to people to just interact with you normally, right? That that’s part of the walking through the journey because yeah, I think there’s this feeling of need to address the problem that scares people away once they run out of the okay, I’m praying for you.

00;22;21;25 – 00;22;25;17

Jon

All right? Theorizing and prayer are great, but actions better.

00;22;25;17 – 00;22;27;15

Jon

Come on. Yeah. Show up, please.

00;22;28;20 – 00;22;40;03

Jon

You know, it’s like when the dog died and I knew I had to dig a gigantic hole, right? Because she was a large dog. It was very helpful that he did. He didn’t just send his thoughts, but.

00;22;40;03 – 00;22;41;12

Jon

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

00;22;41;12 – 00;22;43;22

Shara

My thoughts and prayers are with you. Yeah. Yeah.

00;22;43;22 – 00;22;58;28

Jon

Came and picked up a shovel and dug with me. Right. So it’s like that. That was a great thing. And. And there has to be, I think I think there’s a combination because you don’t want to just pretend and ignore the elephant in the room. Right? Right. So it’s a willingness to say like, Hey, I see that elephant, I know it’s there.

00;22;58;28 – 00;23;16;22

Jon

I’m ready to address that often. If you guys need to or want to. But since we’re on the same page, let’s lovelife together, right? And let’s try to just have enriching experiences and walk through this and then we can kind of learn when we need to bear each other up and when we just want to enjoy a good steak and beef or whatever these are.

00;23;17;04 – 00;23;36;14

Shara

These are two things that I do. Are I give myself license to deal with it for a little bit of time, Like I’ll go running in, like the neighbors will be like, Oh my goodness, what’s going on? Because there will be, you know, angry, running, indoor screaming that is that goes on.

00;23;37;18 – 00;23;40;10

Jon

Right? Yes. So and then.

00;23;41;28 – 00;23;48;08

Shara

And then also being pickier with the friends that I do trust and let in.

00;23;48;08 – 00;23;48;29

Jon

That’s critical.

00;23;49;11 – 00;23;49;19

Jon

Yeah.

00;23;49;26 – 00;23;50;17

Jon

You have to have a.

00;23;50;27 – 00;23;51;06

Pete

A.

00;23;51;20 – 00;23;53;28

Jon

Very carefully filtered inner circle.

00;23;54;06 – 00;23;54;18

Shara

Yes.

00;23;54;19 – 00;24;22;14

Aaron

Yes. That’s I think something that’s something that becomes apparent when you go through more and more difficult things. I think people who haven’t had to pick their friends probably haven’t really faced big battles because you can always sort of get soothsayers around you for things that if you want to keep things that are. But if you’re trying to strive to overcome something that either happened to you or you’re trying to challenge yourself, you’re going to need new friends.

00;24;22;25 – 00;24;25;05

Aaron

I mean, somebody somebody is not going to make the cut.

00;24;26;19 – 00;24;28;13

Jon

Unless they join the journey.

00;24;28;13 – 00;24;44;07

Shara

Right? If they become someone who fills your bucket, it’s reciprocal. It doesn’t need to be you know, I don’t need to be the only one who’s taking care of that person. And that person doesn’t need to be the only one. You know, It needs to go both ways.

00;24;44;17 – 00;24;57;14

Jon

Well, it’s kind of like if you’re on a train or a bus, right? Some people are going to get on, some are going to get off, some are going to say, hey, let’s just keep going this direction together. But is that mutual? Two way street and yeah.

00;24;58;04 – 00;25;13;14

Aaron

What are so you mentioned the fishing trip. I’m kind of curious because with your podcast, even with stages, what are some of the things that people can say around somebody who’s going through a big, difficult, hairy, awful time in their life?

00;25;13;27 – 00;25;36;13

Pete

But I think, you know, I think moving past a lot of I think we do a really good job initially when we when we embrace somebody that’s going through something, we show up like, hey, can I bring some meals over? Can we do that? I think once you get kind of past that first two, three or four weeks, I think one of the biggest things is just, hey, can we can we grab some grab some time together?

00;25;36;13 – 00;25;51;16

Pete

And I think think back to when you what was life like before you found this out? I mean, did you hang out, talk football? Did you did you did you go out? I mean, what did you do? And then can we just do more of that? Because usually normal. Yeah.

00;25;51;16 – 00;25;52;12

Aaron

What should be normal.

00;25;52;14 – 00;25;54;01

Jon

In that is normalcy. Yeah.

00;25;54;04 – 00;25;56;09

Jon

I’m plugging it. It is so.

00;25;57;02 – 00;26;19;20

Pete

Important because I mean, you had people who I would sit there and they’re just five weeks ago we were sitting there having a laughing conversation about whatever, you know, and just just goofing off and not struggling. We’re just like, Oh, crap, we’ve just been here for two, you know, 2 hours. And then all of a sudden you get this diagnosis and you sit down with them and they’re just like, So, I mean, how are you?

00;26;19;22 – 00;26;21;25

Pete

You know, how are you feeling? And then supposed to.

00;26;21;25 – 00;26;22;09

Aaron

Be somber.

00;26;22;09 – 00;26;43;23

Pete

Now. Yeah. You know, and you’re just like, yeah, you’re like, and that’s not you know, I don’t think that’s the kind of thing that anybody needs. I think you what what I’m looking for is, you know, like, if I’m really going through something, the understanding that you’re willing to hear me out, right, like that, I need to just unload.

00;26;43;23 – 00;27;07;16

Pete

But that that’s not going to be every week or every day. But on the other side, I want normalcy. I want something that that feels like it did before because it helps kind of relieve my mind of of this big. I’m sitting at the the bottom of a huge mountain that I have to climb. And it looks like it’s the, you know, the kind of the false peak you get so far up the mountain.

00;27;07;16 – 00;27;31;28

Pete

Now you’re, you know, okay, we’re 22 rounds of chemo in and then you’re like, but it could be, you know, end up being 44, you know, you know, we could relive this entire year again. And that’s a reality. So that how do I get encouragement and encouragement? For me, it’s just like normalcy. It’s just like hanging out and doing stuff with my buddies that that I used to do right.

00;27;31;28 – 00;27;54;25

Pete

And not having to change the conversation or change our the way that we work, you know? And then I think people come out of the woodwork. Who are those those individuals that you can trust where you just say, Hey, I just need to go out because I’m scared to death. Like I am just absolutely scared to death this week or I’m just kind of losing it.

00;27;55;07 – 00;28;19;16

Pete

I’m kind of getting depressed. I don’t I’m getting frustrated and, you know, and somebody who’s going to step in and go, All right, let’s talk about that. Right. And I think the other thing was just I had a buddy who just learned that one of the things the doctor said was like, hey, if you can, you know, continue to do your going to the gym and staying in shape and doing that stuff, that will really help you in this in this journey.

00;28;19;28 – 00;28;36;26

Pete

So he just stepped up and said, I go to the gym with you every morning and I won’t let you out of it. Like, I’ll just I’m going to show up at your house, pick you up, drive you there, and then take you back to your house. So like every morning, his big diesel dodge listening to, you know, at five.

00;28;36;26 – 00;28;41;16

Jon

In the morning waking the neighbor. Yeah. Yeah. I think that’s great. That’s. That’s He’s driving.

00;28;41;17 – 00;29;01;12

Pete

Yeah yeah exactly yeah yeah. So that’s been so I think that’s been huge for me just because then you get that time with each other, but you’re also know that you’re putting in some physical effort that has massive payoff. I think one of the biggest things I face is people have chemotherapy. They’re like, Oh, you’re going to lose your hair.

00;29;01;12 – 00;29;08;14

Pete

And then I have this big, huge beard and they’re like, You’re going to lose the beard. And I’m like, Blasphemy. Yeah.

00;29;08;14 – 00;29;09;00

Jon

And it never.

00;29;09;00 – 00;29;09;28

Shara

Concerned about the.

00;29;09;28 – 00;29;11;20

Jon

Beard. I was thinking in the that.

00;29;12;03 – 00;29;12;28

Aaron

That was 11.

00;29;13;01 – 00;29;13;21

Jon

Yeah. Yeah.

00;29;14;02 – 00;29;16;23

Aaron

So for me to see know that the beard might go.

00;29;17;02 – 00;29;18;13

Jon

Yeah it’s, it’s not good.

00;29;18;24 – 00;29;39;29

Pete

Yeah. And I think everybody so what ends up happening is you put a game face on, you try not to draw people into what you’re going through and then you don’t look like you’re sick. So then people make all these assumptions like, Hey, you know, we’re going to go, Hey, let’s go hiking or Let’s go. And you’re just kind of like, I’m I’m like, barely holding on here.

00;29;39;29 – 00;29;55;18

Pete

Like, I have a smile on my face. Like, a lot of times I feel that when I’m around a group of people where I’m just planting a smile on my face, I’m trying to get through it like, you know, I’m glad we’re here. And so I’m enduring it. But I’m also going through a lot that I’m not communicating and telling you.

00;29;55;19 – 00;30;16;23

Pete

And I think that’s been one of the things that’s so hard is asking me, you know, you have to keep people asking, just like today, it didn’t work like today. I don’t have it in me to do that. But that doesn’t mean the next time. Yes, it’s going to be a no. It’s just this just not today. And so I think you have to kind of encourage people.

00;30;16;23 – 00;30;33;14

Pete

Otherwise, friends will just be like, oh, don’t ask him to do that because he he can’t do that anymore. Like, he’s suffering here. Like, no, it’s just like today. Like, it’s just because that’s the thing with this is it comes at you in waves. You just can’t predict from one day to the next how you’re going to feel.

00;30;33;14 – 00;30;47;25

Pete

I wake up and go work out and I feel like I can conquer the earth and all of a sudden 1 p.m. hits and I’m like, I’m feeling groggy. I’ve got brain fog, you know, It’s just this is one of those things and some other day I could feel perfectly fine. So, yeah.

00;30;48;00 – 00;31;05;17

Jon

It’s, it’s interesting because I think what we’re talking about even goes beyond normalcy. It you have to give permission to people to say, hey, you don’t have to walk through this with me. Right. Because like family, you’re in the journey whether I want you to or not, whether you want to or not. We’re stuck. So let’s figure this out right.

00;31;05;17 – 00;31;25;13

Jon

But friends, they’re not that way. And it’s better just to say, Hey, let’s accept this up front, that if you don’t want to walk through what is actually needed here, let’s not do the fly by touches, Right? Because that is a lot of what you’re talking about. What I’m hearing, it’s from from those who only see you enough that the only thing they can think to do is ask, are you okay?

00;31;25;13 – 00;31;58;04

Jon

Instead of doing the things right, I had a buddy who started going through some some personal relational, big issues, right. And it ripped his world in half. And I was like, all right, well, guys were jumping in and I want to do that for everyone I know. But I made the choice that, hey, we’ll do this journey. And then every single day, kind of like your friend with the truck on, they’re shown up right now, metaphorically, mentally, we reach out and have conversations because we’re not geographically located in the same spot, but every day we have touch points.

00;31;58;04 – 00;32;11;02

Jon

Every day we have conversation about life, right? And it takes the investment of that frequency to be able to know when to say, okay, the elephant screaming, let’s address it versus. All right. We’re just trying to get to Georgetown.

00;32;11;04 – 00;32;11;26

Jon

Yeah, yeah.

00;32;11;26 – 00;32;37;07

Pete

Yeah, exactly. Well, and I think it empowers you. I think what people don’t realize is, you know, when you do that for somebody, when you when you actually take those steps, what that means for me is that it encourages me to power through what I’m going through. But on the other side, like through stages, you know, I had a friend of mine who he he worked for me.

00;32;37;07 – 00;32;55;12

Pete

He’s a young kid. He’s now he was a manager, Dutch Rose, and he was going through and all of a sudden he’s diagnosed with cancer. He’s 21. He dated one of my daughters. And so I’ve known him for a for a while. I have, you know, a good relationship with him. And his parents are off, you know, in North Carolina.

00;32;55;23 – 00;33;16;25

Pete

So he’s going through here in Colorado and he’s going through this massive thing. And then pretty soon it’s spread to your lungs and you have two tumors in your brain. So he’s texting me constantly. What’s chemo like? What is this going to be like? How do you, you know, asking me all these deep questions like how do you just keep going on when it just stinks and it stinks every day?

00;33;17;09 – 00;33;38;19

Pete

How do you just keep moving forward, right? And being able so people are encouraging me and giving me strength and encouragement, help me be able to step in for him and really kind of, you know, reach in and say, hey, let’s set up let’s set up a routine. Let’s just let’s talk about what you need. Let’s get some people put in your life.

00;33;38;19 – 00;33;58;06

Pete

You know, I could sit there and encourage his boss to touch base with him more because they had a strong relationship. I could encourage him, hey, bring somebody to infusion with you because they’ll let somebody come in. Even during COVID, they still let you have a guest. So don’t go it alone. Like be there, you know, and have somebody that drives you.

00;33;58;09 – 00;34;13;13

Aaron

Well, that’s the evolution of pain that we we don’t realize is that it starts with our own journey. Yeah. And then it and then as you face it, I mean, that’s the key. You have to face it. You can’t, like, close your eyes to it because you’ll be unqualified for that person who says they’re going through because what can you say to them.

00;34;13;18 – 00;34;13;24

Pete

Yeah.

00;34;14;09 – 00;34;21;12

Aaron

It’s like, oh, what you do is you ignore it. Like that’s not going to help them. Right? So what do you say? Like he’s texting you? I’m curious.

00;34;21;27 – 00;34;44;27

Pete

Well, I think yeah, in the one where he asked me the really hard one, which is like every day this is just pack a lunch and do it again. I just went through it yesterday and now I’m going to go through it again. What do you do? And I said, Well, if you want what I do, I said, I have a place in Mount Hermon where I bring a camp chair or a hammock and I just I, you know, I’ll have sir bring me out there.

00;34;45;05 – 00;35;03;07

Pete

I’ll be alone and I just yell. I just like because it’s a place where it’s isolated, there’s no trails, there’s nobody nobody can hear me. If they can hear me, it’s like an echo, you know. They’re not going to like, know where it’s coming from. But I just have those arguments, you know, with myself, with God or, you know, whatever.

00;35;03;07 – 00;35;21;16

Pete

I just scream out at this circumstance because I just need to get that pressure off of me. And then I you know, I encourage him. Then you got to find some people that are going to walk in that you can do that in person. I’m not going to scream and yell, but you can grab coffee and just be honest with like this, this things.

00;35;21;16 – 00;35;49;10

Pete

And then the people who are going to stop by your house because you’re just you can’t even get out, you know, And so they’re going to stop in and check in on you. And I think be there for you. But I think those are big steps in that right that right direction. And the other thing that happened was I had a mentor the the really good excuse me, I had a mentor that really invested in me for years.

00;35;49;10 – 00;36;09;05

Pete

I mean, I had met him in 1991 and he was a professor of mine. And then we ended up working together for a company. And he was this this guy who I had learned so much from. And so all of a sudden, you know, was it three or four weeks ago we had we had a I get a text from him and he goes, I have pancreatic cancer.

00;36;09;15 – 00;36;31;11

Pete

I was just diagnosed. And so it’s like, and I can’t eat. Foods are going through that. They’re going to have to do the surgery. So I haven’t eaten in the last 30 days. And so she knows his wife, so she’s able to be able to talk with her and stuff like that. And I think that’s one of the biggest things that I learned is that our journeys are so different.

00;36;31;21 – 00;36;57;04

Pete

The caregiver faces so many different things than than than what I face. And so I have to always kind of that’s why I love stages. And what we’re doing is, because I want her to give a voice to what it’s like because it’s it’s not a picnic to sit there and have to watch a loved one go through something, but also just the fears that she has, fears that I don’t have.

00;36;57;04 – 00;37;17;19

Pete

I’m worried about what’s next, what happens when I die through things like she’s thinking, what’s next? What happens when he dies? But it’s a completely different thing. We still have five daughters and I you know, and I might be doing this journey by myself. And so what does that look like and how do we do that? And the job I have right now, is that going to really pay the bills?

00;37;17;19 – 00;37;21;11

Pete

And so there’s so many more things that kind of sit with you. Right.

00;37;21;22 – 00;37;47;11

Shara

And a couple things that we do well. One thing that we avoid and one thing that I do, one thing I avoid is the platitudes we were given, you know, the patting you on the back, sort of That’s how it feels. Obviously, that’s not the that’s not the energy that they have when they say those things. But those platitudes don’t help in the moment.

00;37;47;21 – 00;38;06;07

Shara

Like right now we can we could tell people in the in their journey, your pain has a purpose because see how many people we can help because of our pain. But when we’re when someone else is right in the middle of the thick of that, that is not what to say. You know, like we said earlier, the timing is everything.

00;38;06;23 – 00;38;25;08

Shara

You know, when something comes up where they’re like, I was able to help this person because I had that happen, you know, then that might be a conversation to have. But when they’re right in the middle of a diagnosis or something else hard in their life, you know, I don’t you know, when when I was in those moments, I didn’t want to hear my pain as purpose.

00;38;26;02 – 00;38;29;14

Jon

Or you were born for such a time as. Yeah, yeah. Okay.

00;38;29;14 – 00;38;31;13

Shara

I’m breathing. I’m. I have a cold.

00;38;31;26 – 00;38;32;09

Jon

I think it’s.

00;38;32;19 – 00;38;51;19

Aaron

I know. I think it’s funny how people all of a sudden seem to think they need to be counselors. And and I have, I have a good circle of friends. I didn’t. Not all of them are counselors. They have different roles in life. Right. But also they feel like they have to be. It’s like, okay, I still get this, but I’m going to try anyway and it’s really not helpful.

00;38;51;19 – 00;38;52;29

Aaron

And maybe you needed a press pass.

00;38;52;29 – 00;39;11;09

Jon

And here’s the other thing, too. It’s like just trying to slap a solution makes you feel better, not the person, right? It’s like, Oh, I’m scratching the itch now. False stop. And the other piece to it is I wish I knew who was the origin of it, but they said when someone’s walking through a tough time, don’t bring your summer to their winter right now.

00;39;11;13 – 00;39;13;16

Shara

It is not about you at that moment, correct?

00;39;13;16 – 00;39;29;20

Jon

Right. And they don’t want your summer. You don’t want to hear the cheery platitude of like pain has a purpose. And here’s the idea. Like when the bad thing strike, you may know on some level that it’s possible to create a purpose from the pain, but bad things happen all the time for no reason, right? There is not a bigger why, right?

00;39;29;26 – 00;39;49;03

Jon

The purpose if there will ever be one, because it’s not guaranteed, comes from going through the journey and choosing to create something based on the response. And so so it’s it’s very backwards to try and put a chicken back in the egg. And that’s what we do there when we try to say, Hey, your pain will have a purpose.

00;39;49;18 – 00;39;59;03

Jon

That’s actually not true. It may only it will only be true depending on what value is created from the journey. And that takes time.

00;39;59;07 – 00;40;03;26

Shara

And like you said, where each person decides they’re going to correct with that stimulus.

00;40;04;16 – 00;40;23;20

Jon

Because we don’t talk about it. But a lot of people who go through tragedy, there’s no purpose. There’s no purpose that gets created because they die. They choose not to fight. They give up right where they choose just to become miserable wretches of themselves and not strive for anything of value anymore and just become a shadow. So it’s like it’s a choice.

00;40;23;27 – 00;40;26;10

Jon

Every aspect of life is a choice.

00;40;26;10 – 00;40;26;24

Pete

Yes.

00;40;26;24 – 00;40;28;26

Jon

And you guys are representing a strong choice. Sorry.

00;40;30;07 – 00;40;53;26

Shara

I’m sorry. And the other thing that I do is is allowed that person who’s come to me just to be feel safe and like they don’t have to like, sugarcoat how they’re feeling. To me, you know, I’ve had people say I’m sorry. I’m just, you know, downloading all this on you and just like dropping it all off on you.

00;40;53;26 – 00;41;19;05

Shara

And I’m like, well, I’m I’ve been there one nothing you’re saying I haven’t for first of all, experience, but to I’m a safe place where you may not have people like this where you can just be here’s all of it. And I you know, I can I can take it. You know what I mean? When I ask people how they’re doing in what they’re struggles are, I actually want to know and I’m a safe place for that.

00;41;19;12 – 00;41;23;25

Jon

Do you give permission, like quite literally just in conversation, like, hey, please keep sharing with me?

00;41;23;25 – 00;41;30;04

Shara

Yes. Yeah. And I say any time at all, you know, you need to call me in the middle of the night. Well.

00;41;30;25 – 00;41;50;00

Jon

Here’s a question, right? Because I’m very sensitive to this. I am much more comfortable giving than receiving. So if I start to receive a lot and there’s no ability for me to give, I will avoid the relationships where I can’t give back. It may if it’s because I’m in a position I can’t get back, so be it. That’s life and it sucks and I’ll get through it.

00;41;50;08 – 00;42;09;23

Jon

But if I’m in a position where I should be able to give back, I’m not being afforded the opportunity because of whatever dynamic has stepped in. That becomes really suffocating for me. And that’s what I’m hearing. And what you’re saying is like, If I can’t hear your problems and walk through your life still with you, that kind of normal give and take, then I start to really not enjoy it.

00;42;10;01 – 00;42;26;29

Shara

Right? And I wrote a blog about this because I had people who wouldn’t talk to me about their lives because they’re like, Well, my husband doesn’t have cancer. I’m like, But you’re like in the thick of your battle. And I want to know because I’m, you know, I’m asking I had to sort of like pry it out of them.

00;42;26;29 – 00;42;33;15

Shara

And I’m like, This is how I was before cancer. Yeah, you know what I mean? So this is still how I’m going to be as well.

00;42;33;18 – 00;42;43;11

Jon

In different battles. Same war, right? We’re on the same war fighting different battles. So it doesn’t matter the specifics. It matters that we can all support each other in the struggle. Yeah, Yeah.

00;42;43;22 – 00;42;44;21

Shara

Exactly, exactly.

00;42;45;11 – 00;42;58;09

Aaron

Yeah. We had a conversation early on in our podcast with Deb and she AbiNader the debonair. We called her and she similar journey. The cancer is different iteration, but she talked about.

00;42;58;09 – 00;42;58;24

Pete

How.

00;43;00;15 – 00;43;19;24

Aaron

The struggle with people even coming to her is because she was the embodiment of death. That’s her words, not mine. Yeah, she’s that people people saw her as sort of like you’re walking death and I’m not comfortable being around you because it deals with their own insecurities or fears and that kind of thing. Is that some of maybe what you’ve had to deal with, with friends.

00;43;19;24 – 00;43;30;06

Jon

Or in real quick to one of the differences, because you highlighted the struggle of looking healthy. Well, through hell she did. DOT Yeah, she she was the gone hair gone, everything looks.

00;43;30;06 – 00;43;34;11

Aaron

But once the information gets out there and people know that Yeah. What are they doing with it.

00;43;34;11 – 00;43;40;00

Pete

Well and I think that’s what you kind of learn I think on the pizza policy group, you know.

00;43;40;00 – 00;43;42;15

Jon

I love that, by the way. I think that’s awesome.

00;43;42;21 – 00;43;59;11

Pete

It was really cool. I think if you want to do something for a friend creating a group where because I have people that I went to high school and college with from all over the place that support me. But I think that’s what you kind of learn because in there I made a promise to them early on. I’m not just going to say cheery, cheery things here.

00;43;59;11 – 00;44;24;26

Pete

I’m going to be honest with you. So there’s a times where I posted a video or an update and I kind of get choked up in the midst of it because it’s it’s been a week or a day. And and I try not to make every post that way, but I think that’s where you start to get an idea of the people who can who can kind of deal with that and encourage you and then some of the people who just kind of fall off.

00;44;24;26 – 00;44;47;14

Pete

Right. I think you can see that even in the group that there’s just it’s really hard to get people to feel strong and wanting to encourage you when they have to kind of face again their own mortality while at you realizing, oh, my goodness, he’s going through this. And I don’t know how I would go through it. Right.

00;44;47;14 – 00;45;10;06

Pete

And I don’t even want to think about that. I don’t even and sometimes I think we don’t always know everybody’s journey either. They could have lost a loved one or a parent or something to cancer that you’re unaware of. And so this just reminds them and it pulls all of that in. I know I had a good friend who kind of fell off, whose dad had died a year before my diagnosis.

00;45;10;06 – 00;45;35;09

Pete

And so and they were so tight, you know, they were really, really close. And so I think to a certain degree, I can I can at least understand that that talking to me and listening to me and watching that can kind of pull all of those Yeah. Sore spots up. And and he hasn’t had much time to heal and mourn that loss and so I can completely understand it and get it to so right.

00;45;36;04 – 00;46;01;18

Aaron

It is important that eventually we do get to the point where I wouldn’t say I comforted by the wrong word, but strong enough to face it again. That’s part of the journey. It’s like if it’s not today, it’s going to happen eventually. I mean, death and loss is part of life. It’s more it’s more frequent as you get older, but it’s something if we train ourselves when we go through it, we’ll be ready at least a little bit more.

00;46;01;18 – 00;46;02;15

Jon

So yes.

00;46;02;20 – 00;46;03;13

Aaron

It comes around, right?

00;46;03;13 – 00;46;38;28

Pete

Yeah. Yeah. And and I think sometimes we just have to be so mindful and careful with what we what we say. We had close friends who had a son, a young boy who was suffering with cancer. And as I kind of unpacked, you know, as he’s walking this journey with me, his name is Billy, Billy and I go back and forth and I just asked him, I said, when, you know, the second year, when everybody is walking in and saying, hey, praying, praying for your son, praying, you know, praying for healing, you know, doing that, I said, what is that do to you?

00;46;38;28 – 00;46;58;13

Pete

And he goes, Well, it just taught me that there is one, obviously one entity in the entire Earth who could deal with this. And he wasn’t. And so it made me angry at him. And so it which is the exact opposite, I’m sure, of what his his friends in his community wanted him to think. But it was what the emphasis was.

00;46;58;13 – 00;47;18;02

Pete

Well, the only thing we can we have in our toolbox is to pray for this healing. So it’s not coming in. And now it’s him. It’s his son. So like, he’s even more emotional. Sure. And and hates. He’d rather it’d be him going through that than a son. So that’s that really opened my eyes to, I think, because I could feel to a certain degree.

00;47;18;15 – 00;47;34;13

Pete

But then I he was admitting to me that as he started seeing things on Facebook and comments that people were making, he was reliving those moments as people said the same comments to me as they were saying. They said to him and he would like to ask why I’m so mad, you know, And I was like, it’s okay.

00;47;34;14 – 00;47;52;22

Pete

You know, it’s like because you and I get it right. Like, we can walk through this and we can discuss this and maybe there will be some healing for you in this because we now both can go through it a second time and kind of process it. And you have somebody that understands it and can process it with you, which you didn’t have before.

00;47;52;29 – 00;48;02;01

Aaron

Rather than combating the anger. It’s almost like I am so a, I can’t even think straight. And I’m I don’t understand why this happened. And you’re just like.

00;48;02;01 – 00;48;03;20

Pete

Yeah, yeah, I know.

00;48;03;23 – 00;48;04;28

Aaron

Yeah, I hear you, man.

00;48;05;05 – 00;48;05;14

Pete

Yeah.

00;48;05;14 – 00;48;10;27

Aaron

I mean, you’re not like, pushing back. Like, it’s okay. You’ll be fine. You should get back to happy, like. Well, that.

00;48;11;06 – 00;48;12;02

Jon

Yeah. This is.

00;48;12;02 – 00;48;12;11

Aaron

Real.

00;48;12;16 – 00;48;36;10

Pete

Yeah. I mean, whether you’re a person of faith or not, I think whoever you shout out to in the middle of the day or night, I think there’s this idea of What do you want? You know, for me? And I think you get to that point, you know, when you are on any journey, whether it’s, you know, a work journey, something that you have to dig in and be gritty about.

00;48;36;10 – 00;49;03;03

Pete

And and I think in the midst of those that that tough battle, you you’re really kind of faced with this this this challenge the like there’s got to be something that is wrong with me or there’s something that why is this continuing to happen. I know like one one time I have I’m in infusion, I’m going in. I’m supposed to get the pump off.

00;49;03;03 – 00;49;21;26

Pete

This must be a good day. No more chemicals are going through my body and now I can recover for a week. And they’re like, Oh, you have an irregularity in your heartbeat, so we’re going to have to kick you over to emergency. So I have to call her at work and go, Hey, I’m gonna need you to get a ride over here, because you’re going to have to drive me home because they’re definitely not going to let me drive.

00;49;22;12 – 00;49;33;11

Pete

And so we go through all 6 hours of sitting in there watching everything. So it’s like middle of the night. We walk out in our cars, battery is dead and we can’t even get in it.

00;49;33;11 – 00;49;36;29

Jon

Really. We’re just who do we know? Who do we.

00;49;36;29 – 00;49;44;29

Pete

Know that we can wake up and be this fairly close to the hospital, you know? And you’re just like, but that’s when you kind of get in that moment of.

00;49;45;27 – 00;49;48;13

Jon

Come, what do you want? Yeah, want. What is it that you’re.

00;49;48;13 – 00;50;07;09

Pete

Trying to get from me? Because I just tell me what I need to, like, do and I’ll do it so that we can check that off the list. And I don’t have to keep do it, you know? But, you know, that’s not how it works. But I mean, it really does get to those points where you’re just like, what’s next when you’re just waiting for the next boot to drop?

00;50;07;09 – 00;50;08;27

Pete

Right? And I think that’s hard.

00;50;09;14 – 00;50;30;18

Jon

Which makes it even harder, is that we look for patterns, right? I think we look for patterns. It’s like, okay, Dawn’s coming, but that’s not always the case with circumstances like Don may not be coming for some reason, the analogy that jumped to my head is I don’t get angry at fire for burning, right? If I see a flame burning something, even if it’s something precious to me, I don’t get angry at the fire.

00;50;31;05 – 00;50;47;23

Jon

You know, I understand that doing what it does and that’s kind of life. It’s like, you know what is required of me? Everything. Until I die, everything is required of me. If I want to live here and turn something. So no matter how bad it is, life is kind of like this fire that will burn everything it can.

00;50;48;04 – 00;51;14;19

Jon

And there’s no reprieve in sight until it comes. And it’s not because any choice has been made. It’s just because the same roll of the dice circumstantially is now back in your favor or back to your reprieve where it was just torturing you and I don’t know, for myself, working through some of the things that I’ve done, I found more relief in that, knowing that it’s not some dictated thing, but it’s just like, okay, there’s no guarantee that I just stepped on this.

00;51;14;19 – 00;51;41;20

Jon

That really sucked. The last four days have really sucked. Maybe, yeah, tomorrow will be better. Like knowing that that’s not guaranteed tomorrow could be worse than today. Let’s. Let’s do whatever can or hit it broken or hide or whatever may be needed in whatever state of despair there might be has been a relief to me because it’s almost like I’m choosing the opposite creates a greater letdown if the reprieve doesn’t come.

00;51;41;24 – 00;51;42;03

Pete

Right.

00;51;42;10 – 00;51;45;22

Jon

Opposed to just All right, time to just get through the storm, right?

00;51;46;00 – 00;51;46;21

Pete

Yep. Yeah.

00;51;47;00 – 00;52;09;27

Shara

Yep. And then sometimes, you know, we’ve talked about friends have fallen off and, you know, given us the platitudes, but our journey is sort of just extending them, you know, sort of seeing where they are in their life and sort of just extending them grace that, you know, it’s fine that they’re they’re not in that spot where they can do that taking care of us.

00;52;10;07 – 00;52;12;20

Shara

But also they’re trying their best.

00;52;13;29 – 00;52;37;25

Pete

And there’s a side of it, though, that I want to be honest with the listeners. I was mad like I got pissed. I was really pissed when I saw the people that I invested in that I mentor, that I that I, you know, took interest in them and help them and poured life into them for sometimes for a matter of years.

00;52;38;05 – 00;52;56;15

Pete

And then it’s all of a sudden this happens and I didn’t even expect them to come along on the journey with cancer. That was not an expectation I had for anybody. It was kind of like if you if you want to, that would be awesome. Yeah, but there was no like, Hey, I’m just going to draw any. If you’re a friend of mine, I’m going to draw you into this big cancer thing.

00;52;56;27 – 00;53;10;29

Pete

It was just, I want the same with you that I had before. I mean, why did it need to change? What? What about my diagnosis? Change? And so when it did change it, I’m to be honest with you, as much as I wanted to give them grace, I think that came later.

00;53;11;11 – 00;53;14;08

Jon

I was I was like, so bad.

00;53;14;08 – 00;53;30;12

Pete

And there’s some times where even right now I’m struggling with a few people. Like, do I just communicate to them like, Hey, let’s grab coffee? And they’re like, Hey, why’d you fall off the face? You know? Or is that too in their in their face? So I haven’t I haven’t I don’t even have an answer for that. Like, I.

00;53;31;14 – 00;53;51;07

Jon

I love that so much because there’s such an important distinction. It’s kind of third rot we didn’t talk about earlier. So, yes, tragedy strikes. You can jump on and fight with me. That would be awesome, right? Like you said, like, thank you. I will take it. But also that’s not an expectation. So why can’t things just continue as normal?

00;53;51;13 – 00;53;59;16

Jon

It’s like panic and flee or jump into the fight or like the binary code everyone sees. It’s like either have to jump in or I’m going like, out. And you’re like, No, no, no.

00;53;59;16 – 00;53;59;23

Jon

Like.

00;54;00;11 – 00;54;16;06

Jon

Can we just stay the course as it was? And I’m of the mind. My bent would be absolutely to sit down back Why we fallen off the face of the earth. Is it because you don’t know what to do? Because I can help you with that. But I just miss my friend. I don’t need anything extra. And maybe it’s like you’re not already.

00;54;16;06 – 00;54;21;23

Jon

You’re already not talking to him. So if anything insults them or offends them, well, you’re not in a worse spot, right?

00;54;21;28 – 00;54;22;12

Pete

Exactly.

00;54;22;12 – 00;54;40;20

Jon

But you may get your friend back to who’s just, you know, like you said, didn’t know how to handle, did the best they could. Think that they’re helping. Maybe even, maybe not. And that can just be revealed. I just think that there’s there’s no shadow I’ve put light over, but I’ve not regretted putting it over. Even if it’s ugly, it hurts.

00;54;41;02 – 00;55;01;13

Jon

I’d rather know and see it because it’s the ambiguous and unknown that really terrify me and keep me up at night. Yeah, but once I face them and put them in the light, it’s even if it’s able to eat me, it’s not as bad as my imagination made it. And you know what, earlier we were talking about potency is lost over repetition.

00;55;02;01 – 00;55;11;07

Jon

And I think that even ties into relationships of like I will assume the worst of someone I love if I haven’t had the conversation to figure out what’s actually going on.

00;55;11;16 – 00;55;12;09

Jon

Yes. Yeah.

00;55;12;12 – 00;55;12;24

Pete

Oh, yeah.

00;55;13;01 – 00;55;23;23

Jon

But then it’s like the more of this conversation that happened, the less of it of a monumental task they appear right. And that’s that potency piece.

00;55;24;12 – 00;55;37;20

Aaron

We build it up bigger than it really is. And I think, you know, with the like you’re saying like, I just need you to be normal around me, you know? And I think I have to be a master counselor in order to engage. So I’m just not going to engage it.

00;55;37;20 – 00;55;38;17

Jon

All right, Exactly.

00;55;38;17 – 00;55;47;14

Aaron

It’s like not like that’s not what you were before, nor if you were. Is that necessarily what I need right now? Like just to hold a pull next to me?

00;55;47;14 – 00;55;48;05

Jon

Do Well.

00;55;48;16 – 00;56;05;14

Jon

It’s it’s like a reeducation thing, right? Yeah, It’s educating the people. Walk through it and the people who are going through it. Right. So like, whether it’s the friend or the actual the person with the problem, it’s they both need educated. Like you said, hey, you’re not going to listen to these things upfront, but listen to them because you may cause yourself permanent nerve damage.

00;56;05;14 – 00;56;19;28

Jon

Like what to pay attention to. It’s different like that. And that’s why I understand Stages to be. It’s a it’s a total education program for both those who are going through conflict and both those who are around it to have a healthier response. That’s actually beneficial.

00;56;20;08 – 00;56;21;02

Shara

Yes, exactly.

00;56;21;02 – 00;56;30;05

Jon

What’s fine is you can send this episode to the friends you want, have coffee with. Yeah. And say, Hey, like I want to have coffee with you. Listen to this. So you’re a little bit worried because I’m bringing this to the Congress.

00;56;30;05 – 00;56;31;03

Jon

Yeah, exactly.

00;56;31;25 – 00;56;32;21

Shara

Here’s the baggage.

00;56;33;03 – 00;56;34;01

Jon

Yeah, Yeah.

00;56;34;01 – 00;56;37;07

Jon

Here’s my question. This will prepare. You. Think. Think about it. Be ready.

00;56;37;14 – 00;56;37;21

Jon

Yeah.

00;56;38;13 – 00;56;40;24

Jon

I’ll put you in the corner booth so you can’t get out of the conversation.

00;56;40;26 – 00;56;41;27

Jon

Then we’ll go on with our lives.

00;56;43;09 – 00;57;05;04

Aaron

I see this. And. And that is not just cancer, but people who’ve gone through divorce or some other kind of loss. It’s amazing. And people just check out, you know, it’s like assuming that that person, like they don’t have enough to give to them. And it’s like, to John’s point, it’s like everyone just needs a friend no matter what you’re going like, just be a friend, right?

00;57;05;06 – 00;57;35;29

Aaron

Don’t feel weird about it. Like be the person you always have been, you know, use tact. You know, I tell John, I said my my go to and I have to resist it. Whenever there’s something something off is I want to be humorous, which is my superpower at the correct time. Maybe not right after the news. You know, only friends have fun with this, but but trying but being yourself because you’re sensing that you say platitudes like you’re being fake with me right now.

00;57;36;02 – 00;57;41;21

Aaron

Like I don’t need fake, right? I actually need real authentic right now so I can walk through this correctly.

00;57;41;24 – 00;58;02;07

Pete

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I and I think too, when you have whole, you know, you can distance yourself and have those healthy moments. I think you also to grips with as is the fact of like maybe just in general, whether you have cancer or not, how often do you actually just tell somebody how much you value their friendship?

00;58;02;07 – 00;58;22;04

Pete

Mm hmm. Right. Because that’s really what you’re trying to say to them, right? Is that when you fell off, it destroyed me, Which means I really valued what we had. But maybe when my healthy moments, when I think about this part of that is because I never really said that. I just assumed because we were getting together and having a great time, that it was just assumed like that.

00;58;22;12 – 00;58;36;16

Pete

You knew that this was but maybe it it wasn’t. Maybe you don’t know how much you mean, because I think we all kind of discount how much we mean to other people sometimes, like, Oh, it’s not that he probably has tons of friends, you know, or.

00;58;37;02 – 00;58;39;02

Jon

Or whatnot is each passing year.

00;58;39;03 – 00;58;53;09

Pete

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. And look at all these people. And so, you know, he doesn’t, he doesn’t need us. And I think that’s that’s something that, that for me I had to come to grips with. It was like, well I mean how often did you actually tell them how much he did value what you had with them?

00;58;53;18 – 00;59;16;23

Jon

And do they even know you’re hurting from the loss? Right. What I love about what you’re talking about is you’re doing that mirror gazing, right? You’re looking in yourself. The introspective journey which is typically painful because you can’t blame things when you’re like, I’m what can I own in this? That’s even more aggravating because you’re acting, you know, like if what if you talk to every person you feel this loss with and most of them think they’ve been doing what you want, right?

00;59;17;04 – 00;59;24;01

Jon

So it’s been on use this whole time, right? It’s also on them because they could ask. But that’s that’s less helpful with the mindset of I’m going to own it. Right right.

00;59;24;02 – 00;59;24;19

Pete

Exactly.

00;59;24;19 – 00;59;36;26

Jon

So it’s like, well, if I own and I ask and I find out that my friend’s been here the whole time mourning, also not knowing what to do, and they thought they were helping me. It’s like, well, we just resolved that. Let’s let’s jump back in right now. Oh.

00;59;37;08 – 00;59;39;12

Aaron

You’re doing I see.

00;59;39;23 – 00;59;40;12

Pete

In you.

00;59;40;23 – 01;00;04;24

Aaron

That you’ve only gotten stronger through this journey. You have gotten stronger through this. And I say that here’s the evidence of it, because it is a monumental task to be able to face the fact that I have cancer and say those words. I have cancer and I’m fighting cancer. Right. But now you’re going several levels higher and you’re going, hey, I wonder how I should talk to my friends through this that are seeing that I have cancer.

01;00;05;00 – 01;00;24;25

Aaron

It’s the opposite of victim mindset. Like you could say they should. I’m the one dealing with this, but because you’ve been lifting this heavy weight in many ways, you’re almost stronger than the people around you in this particular area. It’s like this is what happens when you do this in a healthy way. You start even getting more. It’s like, okay, I’m lifting that weight.

01;00;24;25 – 01;00;36;23

Aaron

I’m like, not not that it’s easy, but then I can also look to other things. I’m like, I wonder if I could really challenge my relationships right now. I wonder if I could challenge this. And it’s a perpetual thing because this is similar. Similar muscles. Yeah, Yeah.

01;00;37;01 – 01;00;46;02

Jon

Real quick, I think what you’re hitting on, the strength that’s visible is it’s the trained response versus the natural response. Yeah, right. You guys are conditioned for chaos.

01;00;46;05 – 01;00;47;03

Aaron

You are, you are.

01;00;47;19 – 01;01;04;19

Jon

So we’re the strength that you’ve built, right? Because the natural responses you’ve talked to are fair, but with the conditioned responses over time, now you have a strength that’s giving you the ability to sit here and think, Maybe I need to sit down with these guys and see where they’re at right now. That’s evolved.

01;01;04;27 – 01;01;30;23

Shara

Yeah, I remember too early on in our marriage and ministry, our working, we had a guy who had he had a little he was a big guy like Pete, and he had a lot of little kids always running around in, jumped on his lap and he’d kiss him on the cheek and then they’d run off. And one time this guy and he hugged goodbye.

01;01;30;23 – 01;01;41;15

Shara

And the guy just like, just out of response, you know, because of doing that so often with these kids, the guy kissed him on the cheek and he was like, Oh, my goodness.

01;01;41;26 – 01;01;43;13

Jon

What? What’s happened? Like, he.

01;01;43;14 – 01;01;52;29

Shara

Was like, Oh, that was so awkward. But that is something, you know, that I do see him do a lot. Now. That’s fun to watch just how I’m one of those.

01;01;53;09 – 01;01;54;20

Jon

I guess all.

01;01;54;27 – 01;02;09;06

Shara

In like walk across the parking lot and give a big, big, big hug and say, you know, And then when when you leave people, you always say, I love you, you know, two guys, which is one of those things that that growth.

01;02;09;23 – 01;02;09;29

Jon

Yeah.

01;02;10;10 – 01;02;28;20

Jon

What you have I love what you said about they don’t they don’t take for granted peace. Right. It is fun because we’ve had a number of conversations this the last seven days that have had some themes. Right. And I was talking with a buddy. He hasn’t seen his family for a while this but he hasn’t seen his family for a while.

01;02;28;20 – 01;02;51;26

Jon

And they’re having this reunion around a happy event and stuff. And there’s been some strife because it’s a stressful, happy event. And he he’s been reflecting on what the heck’s going on. And he realized that when you take for granted expectations in a relationship like, oh, because we’re family will always be here. So because we’re brothers, we’ll always have a relationship that is actually not true, right?

01;02;51;29 – 01;03;11;06

Jon

And he’s like the realization the fruit of it was, I need to be more intentional. I need to invest more energy and show more respect. And I need to pursue the unity I want in the family as if it could be lost in an instant because it can be very true. And that’s kind of what I, I just see the direct correlation to what you’re saying here.

01;03;11;06 – 01;03;33;02

Jon

It’s like, do they actually know family friend or whoever the value that they hold in my life? It’s good because it’s it’s up to me to speak them. Right. I had a I even have a coworker who got emotional because he failed to express that to his father and his father passed and it’s like, got to express it.

01;03;33;06 – 01;03;33;15

Jon

Yeah.

01;03;33;26 – 01;03;59;19

Pete

Exactly. Yeah. And, and you just never know how the perspective of that of that person and how they’re translating the things you guys are going through, life in general, different things that happened between you and your families and just their life, you know, separate from yours, because they’re processing it through a lens that you don’t possess, you know?

01;03;59;19 – 01;04;18;27

Pete

And I think I learned that the most through my brother Paul. He moved to Germany when I was in high, when I was in junior high. And so he’s lived there ever since. Right. And so he’s he’s now lived in Germany longer than he ever lived in the United States. Right. He has a broken English when I talk to him and.

01;04;19;00 – 01;04;19;09

Shara

Was like.

01;04;19;16 – 01;04;42;22

Pete

Yes, a traitor. Yeah, exactly. A German. But I’m just like, he he sounds like he can’t speak English. And so I give him a lot of grief. But I think in that relationship, because you only touch points ever so often, I forget what lens he looks at relationship through. Like for me, that’s my big brother. I have all these fond memories of when I was a kid and looking up and he was the strong guy.

01;04;42;22 – 01;04;59;12

Pete

He was 14 years older than I am, so I got to see him kind of at his peak in high school and all this stuff and then go into the army and do all these things. And so when I watch that, I have this image of him, but I never said those things to him. I never were like, you know, like, you’re my hero, you know, or anything like that.

01;04;59;27 – 01;05;25;27

Pete

Well, he just sees these other touch points. And so I think he he’s discounts how much he means to me. Right. And I think, again, it’s because of the lens I, I don’t have to be present with my brother to have this hero image of him just record up in my mind. Right. But for him, he I was just this little five year old punk, you know, like that.

01;05;26;12 – 01;05;47;15

Pete

The you know, he didn’t get to experience the rest of those years with me because he was in Germany. And so we and we weren’t tight and there wasn’t email back then. So it wasn’t like we we kept in touch or zoom call each other or something like that. So I think the that taught me an important thing with him because I think there’s been times where he just goes, I know we haven’t always gotten along.

01;05;47;15 – 01;06;04;22

Pete

And I was like, What is he talking about? Like, I’ve always gotten along with him. And then I was realizing that, you know, there have been a few times through the years where we’ve disagreed on something, right? But that through his lens, we’ve never always gotten along. And I’m like, those are just two five minute conversations like me.

01;06;05;08 – 01;06;21;24

Pete

And I think those are the things that we don’t realize is that, you know, not only are we living different worlds and different journeys, even though we’re friends, but they’re seeing things through a completely different lens. So I could look at the same experience that they’re going through and just kind of like, you know, like that’s not a big deal.

01;06;21;24 – 01;06;31;17

Pete

And to them it was like a huge a huge deal or something that you said was a big deal to them, either in a good way or a bad way. Yeah. And you just didn’t take it that way.

01;06;31;17 – 01;06;32;06

Aaron

Yeah, that’s.

01;06;32;06 – 01;06;33;21

Pete

Good. Yeah.

01;06;34;00 – 01;06;51;12

Jon

I want to bounce an idea and it’s a poor, poorly formed one, so I’m sorry if it doesn’t come out well, but I want a litmus test if you guys don’t mind. So I’ve been walking through chaotic event after chaotic event and tragedy with one of my friends for a couple of years now. It’s just been rough, you know?

01;06;51;16 – 01;07;13;19

Jon

Yeah, trust me, the cycle is just not letting up. It’s like this. Kitano announced this and. And he’s a warrior, so it’s not like he’s bringing this on to himself through an action or anything. It’s just. It sucks. And there’s been times where I also just battling alongside him, right? I’m not in the circumstances. I’m just continuously going through it to the best of my ability with him.

01;07;13;29 – 01;07;43;17

Jon

Get fatigued and I’ve what I’m realizing I’ve not done well it’s all true to try and go and recharge and then come back right in. Right. So there’s not an absence, but I’m trying to handle my fatigue without him knowing, right? Yes, because it’s fatigue from his problems that I’m trying to help with. And what I’ve realized with what we’re talking about is, man, I think it’d be so much beneficial instead of the moments where I get frustrated with him just being like, dude, like I’m just fatigued fighting the fight with you right now and I’m ticked off about these things.

01;07;43;28 – 01;08;03;24

Jon

Yeah, I’m not ticked off at you, but like, I’m also infuriated by this. You know, I’m hitting a fatigue point, fighting alongside you. So I just want to be clear. Yeah, I’m ticked. I’m pissed, but it’s not at you. It’s at these freaking situations that we can’t get a hold of. Is in. The thought is, I feel like that’d be more beneficial for him because that’s why he’s mad.

01;08;04;00 – 01;08;07;05

Jon

He’s mad because he’s fatigued also. And he thinks this is B.S., right?

01;08;07;11 – 01;08;08;03

Aaron

Yeah, sure.

01;08;08;13 – 01;08;09;21

Jon

Is that good?

01;08;09;21 – 01;08;35;13

Shara

Yes, I think there’s very there’s a level of health in that that not many people do. You know, like we just for one of our podcasts, we were talking about how I see something and he hears it differently than what I mean. And it was along that line my doing self-care, taking care of myself, just having a moment like away from the situation.

01;08;35;29 – 01;08;45;06

Shara

And he he interpreted that as mine, not wanting to be in the fight with him. And I’m like, Yeah, I just need a break.

01;08;45;19 – 01;08;45;28

Jon

Right?

01;08;46;04 – 01;08;50;05

Shara

Can I just go paint with the friend? And we not talk about cancer today?

01;08;50;09 – 01;08;50;19

Jon

You know.

01;08;50;26 – 01;08;53;14

Aaron

Even even nurses have to hit the pillow every now and then. Yeah.

01;08;53;16 – 01;08;53;26

Jon

All right.

01;08;54;10 – 01;08;55;26

Aaron

Or hey, be careful with that. Yeah.

01;08;55;28 – 01;08;57;19

Jon

Can I go to the mountain with you and scream with you?

01;08;57;28 – 01;09;00;05

Jon

Because I need to scream too. Yeah. Yes.

01;09;00;09 – 01;09;05;04

Jon

So I have some cleanup to do, but I’m glad to have the visibility right. I’m really grateful.

01;09;05;16 – 01;09;19;26

Pete

And I think he’s right. I think to answer your question, I think honesty and having that is actually because it helps us. I mean, because it shows that you’re in the fight. Like if you weren’t fatigued, I mean, how invested are you?

01;09;19;28 – 01;09;20;15

Aaron

And like.

01;09;21;09 – 01;09;42;15

Pete

If there’s been this cycle and you’re just like, oh, come on, we just power through it. Let’s just and you didn’t really ever get into that emotionally. If I did with it, then, then how much is there? And it also gives like it would give me strength to know like, yeah, this is crap, this is difficult. This is even fatiguing my friend.

01;09;42;15 – 01;10;03;27

Pete

And I think that helps me do a few things. It helps me balance again, like the importance of balance of saying like, Hey, I know like I had a friend that signed up to say like, Hey, you can talk to me about anything anytime, anywhere. But that also means like I have to also be trusted with the idea of like, Yeah, but there’s still the right times to do that.

01;10;03;27 – 01;10;26;03

Pete

And there’s a pace to do that in which I can, I can actually be a friend to them in the midst of them being a friend to me. Like I don’t have to have that conversation today with that person. And yeah, and that’s why I think trying to get more I try to get people to get more people into the fight.

01;10;26;03 – 01;10;27;16

Jon

Spread out, spread it out some.

01;10;27;20 – 01;10;28;02

Jon

So you.

01;10;28;02 – 01;10;29;18

Pete

Can like text tag tag.

01;10;29;18 – 01;10;30;23

Jon

Team you.

01;10;30;23 – 01;10;47;11

Pete

Know or you know it’s just like you know because some someday some is going to have it another day another Yeah is going to have the energy and it’s just like, you know, maybe I’m, you know, having that conversation. I’m feeling fatigued. I was wondering if we pull a few more people into these deeper discussions.

01;10;47;11 – 01;10;47;24

Jon

Yeah.

01;10;47;25 – 01;10;51;24

Pete

And things like that. There’s going to it’ll be better for all of us.

01;10;52;09 – 01;11;21;14

Shara

Well, there’s two good aspects to that relationship where, like I would say, I needed. I’m just going to have an art night with a friend. He in the past would just say, Oh, okay, bye. And then just stew and think about how I don’t want to be in the fight with him. And then because of this happening, he’s he’s communicated more and said, okay, so this is how I feel right now.

01;11;21;28 – 01;11;51;10

Shara

You saying that could be totally not an issue, not with all this baggage, but at the same time, that’s how I’m taking it. Well, so then, you know, you would communicate so. So you don’t want to be hang out with me tonight. And I’m like, I just need a break, you know? And then it wasn’t it was this big old issue that because we dealt with it, it wasn’t as big of an issue.

01;11;51;10 – 01;12;13;19

Shara

And then, you know, the honesty and just communicating. And sometimes he said, this is how I feel when I’m like, Well, that’s not what I meant. I’m like, And then you were like, Well, that’s how I took it, right? So we can’t discount how I took it. Yeah, because that’s not what you meant either, you know? So it’s all, all talking communication and being honest.

01;12;14;10 – 01;12;14;18

Jon

Yeah.

01;12;14;18 – 01;12;44;11

Pete

And I think too, sometimes there’s got to be that healthy conversation because we when like, it wasn’t so much that I thought, Oh, she doesn’t want to be with me. It was, Oh, my issues, this cancer is too much for her. She needs an escape. So you kind of carry, you know, like, oh, and so you have to fight because you want to like, oh, well, I’ll just, I’ll internalize also.

01;12;44;21 – 01;13;01;22

Pete

So I think when we talked it out, it was good. No, I’m in the fight. I’m there, I’m here. I’m just exhausted. Right. And I think that’s the difference. I’m still in it with you, but we’ve got to pull more people into this. Like, I need you to lean on some friends. I need you to to do that.

01;13;01;22 – 01;13;30;15

Pete

Why don’t you actually go out and hang out with someone tonight, too? You don’t have to sit by yourself, you know, and stuff like that. And so I think that’s that’s been really helpful. I think there are moments for that kind of I don’t know, I don’t want to say brutal honesty, but just real honesty. And like, she’s pushing back me and going, hey, well, I mean, it’s your choice tonight to be by yourself because you could actually call a bunch of buddies and go do something to.

01;13;30;15 – 01;13;44;12

Pete

Right and use that an escape yourself. But we probably both are exhausted. Why don’t we both get a breather? Yeah, I think that’s that’s that’s the reality. But if we never had that conversation, I just kind of internalize it.

01;13;44;12 – 01;14;01;08

Jon

And what I love about is both are true, right? Your perception is as true is it’s not what you wanted it to be perceived. I Just need a break. I’m not going anywhere. I just need to break in. You’re like, I’m alone now, right? This emotional response, like she she’s being abandoned. She doesn’t want to be a part of anymore.

01;14;01;08 – 01;14;18;10

Jon

It’s like it’s fair to feel that way, but it’s also not true. Right. And it’s fair for that not to be what you want the perception to be. And you just need a break. Both are true, right? And it’s kind of working, too. Well, the emotions still mixing this up, but both are true. And we can take that in trust because of our relational capital.

01;14;18;19 – 01;14;45;28

Jon

Now. Okay, that’s not your intent. You just need a recharge. I’m going to accept that and allow my emotions to run their course and not let them take, you know, push me in despair. Right. And it’s interesting because, yeah, this ties into some things that I’ll even talk with, like with Lindsay about, right. Because I’m noticing in our conversation some, oh my gosh, there’s this perception of what I’m saying where it’s like, I’m just need recharge because I’m fatigued here.

01;14;46;10 – 01;15;04;01

Jon

And I can tell that right now in the conversation, Oh, this is being perceived as I want out and want to be part of this anymore, be part of this journey, you know, these specific things anymore. It’s like, Oh, that’s not true. So like, I’m just loving the conversation because it’s like, know, me being frustrated with having urges to be more specific instead of ambiguous.

01;15;04;01 – 01;15;14;18

Jon

Me being frustrated by having four young kids doesn’t mean that I’m going to get in the truck and drive away, not come back. Right. Right. Yeah. I just need recharge for a little bit. It’s just literally I just need recharge for now.

01;15;14;19 – 01;15;14;25

Jon

Yeah.

01;15;15;10 – 01;15;16;12

Jon

It’s not. You’re going.

01;15;16;12 – 01;15;16;17

Pete

To.

01;15;17;09 – 01;15;18;07

Jon

Not have me come home.

01;15;18;15 – 01;15;19;28

Jon

You know.

01;15;19;28 – 01;15;38;10

Jon

And having and just seeing that right now I’m like, oh my goodness. No wonder there’s like this thought here, especially from back when I was in the military that I just up and disappear. That’s the fear of just like now I’m just fatigued and there’s I don’t know. The reason I guess I’m beating on is because I think that there’s a big deal there that I just benefited from.

01;15;38;10 – 01;15;46;17

Jon

And I’m assuming others can benefit from facing too of like, yeah, remember that what is perceived may not be anything in the realm of what you could imagine.

01;15;46;26 – 01;15;47;13

Jon

You know.

01;15;48;13 – 01;16;01;19

Aaron

Which is I love how your investigative tool is that that’s really key. It’s like, where are we at? I mean, this is not on like when you say your friends need to to know what to say, when to say it. I mean, a of that just comes around questions like, are you having a good day, a bad day, bad day.

01;16;01;20 – 01;16;18;15

Aaron

All right. Hey, do you want to go fishing? You know, I guess that or. Yeah. Good day. You know, tell me about how you. You know what made it a good day? Did something cool happen today? Like celebrate something that happened? Like having that that timbre and and a lot of what we’re talking about here, too, is true of marriage.

01;16;18;15 – 01;16;31;27

Aaron

When you guys conversation, let’s just add this gigantic weight to the conversation. There’s a lot of that where we just have to be like, no one person should is built to be your savior, you know?

01;16;32;14 – 01;16;57;25

Shara

So and there have been conversations that he’s had with me, and I’ve said, you know, I’ve done all that I could. But at the same time I said, I’ve said you need to talk to that guy, you know, and sort of use the the support system. We have to be of more benefit for him because that guy’s gone through more of what he has than I have, you know what I mean?

01;16;57;25 – 01;17;13;12

Pete

So it’s not as you can ask on behalf of that person. You know, I think I’ve pulled I’ve talked to some of her friends who said she’s a week and the words, even if if they were the right words coming for me are what matter.

01;17;13;25 – 01;17;16;10

Shara

And I’ve texted friends and been like, pleased.

01;17;16;16 – 01;17;20;14

Jon

You just texted right now. I love it because it’s not just.

01;17;20;14 – 01;17;22;11

Jon

Timing, it’s delivery. Right.

01;17;22;24 – 01;17;23;11

Jon

And like.

01;17;24;20 – 01;17;26;16

Jon

I can give you something.

01;17;26;16 – 01;17;26;25

Jon

I can.

01;17;26;25 – 01;17;30;20

Jon

Tell it to you, right? I can touch your shoulder, but you need it from Tasha, right?

01;17;30;20 – 01;17;31;13

Jon

Right, right. Yeah.

01;17;31;13 – 01;17;34;00

Jon

Or in my case, it’s not the right delivery.

01;17;34;11 – 01;17;43;17

Shara

And we have we have adults in each of our teenager girls lives that we’re like, could you girls say the same thing to them that their parents are saying? Oh.

01;17;43;28 – 01;17;44;14

Jon

Yeah, I’ll.

01;17;44;14 – 01;17;53;29

Jon

I’ll try to comfort one of my kids and I’ll walk up to and Zenobia and you go down. She’s like, What did you try? This is like, it’s not that. It’s not what I’m doing. It’s that I’m not you.

01;17;54;03 – 01;17;56;04

Jon

Yeah, Yeah, right. Yeah, It’s.

01;17;56;04 – 01;17;59;19

Jon

That I’m not you. They need you that that’s a good additional point.

01;17;59;19 – 01;18;17;12

Pete

And the other thing I think too, is just like we talked about working out and I think one of the aspects of working out, you know, is when you’re in the gym or you’re running or anything like that, you get those moments where you’re going to be like, I’m going to do I’m going to try to push for five extra reps, I’m going to go to failure, I’m going to, you know, I’m going to go and dig in.

01;18;17;12 – 01;18;40;26

Pete

And I think that’s part of the relationship thing, too, is trying to encourage each other like, hey, I know we’ve been having kind of a revisit to some dark moments or to some thoughts, but can we push through? And it’s like try to build that space a little bit more so that like maybe I can hold my tongue for two more days can you know, You know what I mean?

01;18;40;26 – 01;18;59;25

Pete

Like, do we have to discuss this thing or can we just push through it and talk and keep positive? And I think that’s been a big thing between us is just like being able to say like, Hey, I’m just going to grit it out and, you know, and then usually what I find is I grit it out and I only needed to do it for another day.

01;18;59;25 – 01;19;18;29

Pete

And then I kind of get a release, a release from it. So it didn’t have to be a two hour long dark session of it was just like, if I could just power through that moment, that evening, tomorrow and some circumstances that happened kind of erased it and eroded it. And it’s not as a heavy.

01;19;18;29 – 01;19;27;13

Aaron

It’s important to communicate that, too, because if you’re using the gym analogy and you don’t tell your spotter, you’re going to do another five. And he kind of quits on you in the last five. It’s going to be problems.

01;19;27;15 – 01;19;28;12

Jon

Know you’re going to get.

01;19;28;12 – 01;19;35;22

Aaron

Hurt. But if you’re just saying, hey, look, this is it has a beginning and end is a timeline, but I do need to push a little further here. Back to that.

01;19;36;01 – 01;19;56;16

Jon

As we keep talking for you. Just want to make a little bit closer. Yeah. You importance. You don’t have to lean forward to make you comfortable, but it is interesting too, because going back so I’m kind of like seeing nuggets out of. That’s right So we have the one of, okay, I’m not going to lose it. So you have who’s delivering it matters, right?

01;19;56;17 – 01;19;57;10

Jon

Timing it came.

01;19;57;10 – 01;19;59;19

Jon

Back who thank you So.

01;19;59;20 – 01;20;24;00

Jon

You have timing right is super critical for dealing with this stuff You have whose the delivery is super critical. And then the third one is kind of like the self assessment of not it kind of into timing, but is is it necessary? Right. Which is what I just heard you say is like because it’s so easy when the pain flares up to want to rehash it for release.

01;20;24;14 – 01;20;44;05

Jon

But really, it’s just putting vinegar on the wound, right? When in reality it’s just like, let’s just get through it. And if it’s still here, like you said tomorrow, then I’ll address it. But otherwise, maybe it’s just an emotion that needs to pass, like a real tongue in cheek, super small example would be when you wake up at four in the morning and you want to go back to sleep.

01;20;44;05 – 01;20;50;25

Jon

But if you get up at four or five, the emotions passed, right? That’s a micro example. But what do you think? It’s.

01;20;50;25 – 01;21;27;09

Pete

Well, I think it’s exactly I mean, I think you all of those all of those things have to be brought in, but especially as you as you start to work, work through it. I think the important thing through all of this is in endurance. Can I get can I get some more ideas? I mean, like when we’re trying to help somebody a buddy through something, my ultimate goal is like, can I help, you know, push through so that not only is this this problem, we can put it, but I remember is the next one comes, you know, because when you’re talking about periods of chaos and things are just cycle cycling that can last for

01;21;27;09 – 01;21;48;04

Pete

a long time, how do we pull endurance through it? So I can I can I can I be there to kind of push you through and and and help you? So I think, you know, that comes through all of those things. I think it’s like making sure the person, the right person delivering the message, making sure it’s the right timing, you know, making sure the message is actually right.

01;21;48;04 – 01;22;04;08

Pete

Right. You know, that you’re checking yourself there. But I think then, you know, moving into what do we need to do it right now? Do we need to do it at all to? We need to like, you know, I know it feels good because sometimes we you know, we enjoy wallowing in something together.

01;22;04;15 – 01;22;04;24

Jon

Yeah.

01;22;04;24 – 01;22;05;12

Jon

Yeah.

01;22;05;12 – 01;22;26;27

Pete

You know, like, you just. Yeah, you know, and you go and sometimes that can feel good. But I think most of us have kind of at the end of that conversation, don’t feel that that anything is changed too much, you know? Yeah, it might have been great to feel like you redirected all this energy and emotion toward someone else or to another circumstance or a group of people.

01;22;26;27 – 01;22;45;11

Pete

At the end of the day, tomorrow is going to be the same problem. And you didn’t actually add any benefit to it, right? To do it forward. Yeah. So if you can at the end of the day, if the bare minimum that you could do is just say I went one more day without having a you know, for lack of a better term a bitch session, you know, with someone.

01;22;45;11 – 01;23;05;18

Pete

I think I think that’s that’s really, you know, actually a big deal. I think it was maybe then it’s a, you know, two days and maybe it’s a week or maybe it’s you know I don’t know if I need to wallow in anything mean. Like maybe I can develop a resiliency where I’m not stuffing it. I’m honest with.

01;23;05;18 – 01;23;09;15

Pete

But it’s just not bother me as much because I you know, I’m taking it in stride.

01;23;09;23 – 01;23;27;07

Jon

What do you think about this? Because we’re talking about some, like, doctorate level art stuff here, you know, art versus science. This isn’t a science because, like, on the one hand, you have to share. On the other hand, now I’m sucking it up to not share to build resilience. Right? And if you look at this in a binary black and white code, you’re going to miss everything.

01;23;27;07 – 01;23;45;17

Jon

So what we’re talking about here is the art of going through hard things. And it’s funny, we’ve been talking about stewarding pain, right? There’s a lot of resources out there for marriage and and money and building your career and stuff, but there’s not a lot on stewarding pain to a more positive outcome, right? And that’s what we think.

01;23;45;17 – 01;23;50;09

Jon

The theory in part is these conversations. I think this is a confirmation of that, right?

01;23;50;12 – 01;24;10;23

Aaron

Oh, yeah. It’s I mean in certain pain is as long if not longer than many of those other areas of focus and finance sometimes can be set on autopilot. Pain sometimes is like in your face, you get a second. Yeah, it’s a lot bigger thing. And that’s what we’re talking the stewardship. You have to know how to deal with that.

01;24;11;08 – 01;24;14;19

Aaron

That’s that’s very much what you’re dealing with. It’s, it’s a weight like anything else.

01;24;14;27 – 01;24;32;22

Jon

The question I had as you’re as you go through now, you’re in the cycle of like okay because it seems like a journey. So the journey now is can I build the resilience to go another day without the bitch session? Can I go another day without this venting of this visceral problem just for the release of it? Right.

01;24;33;10 – 01;24;59;12

Jon

So, so I think there is an evolution here. There’s a progression, right where it’s like now you’re coming back to have these conversations with friends or, you know, it’s really great to have this resource, but do I really want to use that resource right now and share this emotion right now, or can I go the day? So I think now what’s being questioned is and as this becomes more part of my existence, am I going to allow pain to be my identity right?

01;24;59;17 – 01;25;08;03

Jon

Am I going to allow cancer to become my identity? They’re going like this thing because you have been very strident. Both of you have been very straightforward about cancer is not going to be all our life’s about.

01;25;08;04 – 01;25;09;00

Jon

Right, right, right.

01;25;09;21 – 01;25;25;21

Jon

So it’s kind of like with the resilience, can I wait another day and have a normal conversation and not allow the pain and frustration here to dictate my identity with my friend. Right. Is kind of what I’m hearing. You know, it’s kind of an interesting thought. What do you think?

01;25;25;21 – 01;25;58;05

Pete

I like it because I think our big our big thing has always been, like you said, not to make cancer. The big thing hope is the big thing for us. Like how do I pull hope into any moment, any circumstance, regardless of whether it’s good or bad? And I think that’s exactly what you’re you’re talking about, because there is so much more hope in developing a resiliency that like, you know, because I think some of us who are in the midst of pain are just like, if I could go five days, if I could go three days, if I could go an hour.

01;25;58;05 – 01;26;19;13

Pete

I mean, it all depends on where you are in that journey. But if I could just go where I just powered through and I could just change my mindset and know I had people along the journey with me that are helping me do that. So I’m staying focused. I think that’s such a big light at the end of the tunnel because you’re like, okay, I can turn.

01;26;19;13 – 01;26;44;13

Pete

It’s just like working out, right? Yeah, I can turn those five extra reps and the ten extra pounds and I can, you know, and I can start moving and developing and getting stronger. And it’s the same thing. It’s like I can turn that, that two days of not having to wallow in, in the three days and I can turn into four days and if I can start seeing brightness in my life there where I can control that and I’m really taking control of that inner thought process.

01;26;44;29 – 01;27;07;02

Pete

And the beauty of it is I have all these friends, you know, I have close ones who are helping me stay focused on that. And that’s what we’ve been trying to do, is try to get everybody to remain focused on, you know, hope, you know, like with stages, our blog posts on our podcast basically are telling the victory stories of people who stepped in our lives and done good things for us.

01;27;07;17 – 01;27;23;17

Pete

And the reason why is because we could have focused in on the people who fell away or but they probably just need to read a blog post or or hear a podcast about the little thing that somebody did like. Well, I could have showed up and worked out with them every day, you know, or like, Wow, you know, I was thinking about that.

01;27;23;17 – 01;27;46;18

Pete

Anyway. So I think focusing on the hope and and the life giving things is, is so much better because those are the things that empower us to go a little bit longer, a little bit farther. And then think of the impact to me like that. You know, I know it sounds cliche, but the ripple effect is now I you know, I can and share can help someone else.

01;27;46;18 – 01;28;05;15

Pete

You know, I talked about my mentor. Well, because she’s talking to his wife and I have known him for so long. You know, his wife is like he’s he’s really grumpy. Like he’s he’s doing all this. And I’m just laughing because I remember all that a lot. The times we’ve worked together. And I’m like, Oh, I know, I know.

01;28;05;15 – 01;28;05;26

Pete

That’s right.

01;28;06;17 – 01;28;06;23

Jon

You know.

01;28;06;24 – 01;28;24;28

Pete

So. So then I’m like, All right, I’ll text him in a couple of days and, you know, so that there’s no like, Oh, Sherrod is happy to talk to Gina. And then all of a sudden I got a text from me. But so, but for me, it it’s like I need to be there for him and like because I was I was the grumpy guy, right?

01;28;24;28 – 01;28;40;29

Pete

I was the guy. He was like, don’t you understand? Like, I’m just going through a terrible time, you know, like, you know, and you just kind of don’t want to be around anybody but you do, you know? And so I think I totally get where he’s at. But at the same time, he’s going to hear that better from for me.

01;28;40;29 – 01;28;53;09

Pete

Mm hmm. Like, you know, because I can text him and go, Yeah, I mean, that’s just part of it. I mean, you’re in your first year in your first round of chemo. I mean, like, that’s that’s the deal. I mean, like this, you know, I understand like that’s going to be the deal for the next couple of rounds.

01;28;53;22 – 01;29;02;17

Pete

So but it’s going to get better. But, you know, like, just like this is what you have to get through. So just and he can hear that better for me. Have you heard that from his wife? He were like.

01;29;03;09 – 01;29;04;07

Jon

You’re you know, I do this.

01;29;04;07 – 01;29;06;10

Pete

You know, you don’t know. You’ve never been through that.

01;29;06;10 – 01;29;09;01

Aaron

You’re talking about growing hope like it’s a muscle.

01;29;09;24 – 01;29;10;29

Jon

Yes.

01;29;10;29 – 01;29;30;08

Aaron

Because you’re saying, hey, you can like this guy is he’s coming in, say the gym for the first time is like, why ever be able to lift this bar? Even? Yeah, it’s like it’s I know it’s hard at first. Just do it. I’m here with you. I’m going to help you actually on the spot a little bit because you’re really not saying the right things to you right to yourself right now to even get through this.

01;29;30;16 – 01;29;50;17

Aaron

But I’m borrow my words, borrow my hope, borrow my strength a little bit, and then eventually I’m going to start letting go a little bit. I’m here with you, but you’re going to see that you’re going to get stronger, stronger, and then take some time eventually. But you’re going to eventually find out. You can go weeks and really deal with this healthy, hopefully, but you can have a bad day and then you come back and you go a little.

01;29;50;17 – 01;29;54;24

Aaron

But it’s growing hope because the what’s the opposite? It’s growing despair.

01;29;55;01 – 01;29;55;09

Pete

Yeah.

01;29;55;17 – 01;29;56;17

Aaron

What is that showing up?

01;29;57;01 – 01;30;13;10

Jon

There’s two there’s two tines there. One what I like about what he just said with the example with your friend is when you remove the special from struggle. Right. Because it gives you even said. I’m going through a hard time saying life is hard times and then you die.

01;30;14;04 – 01;30;17;08

Jon

You’re not unique. Yeah, let’s not that’s not good for.

01;30;17;08 – 01;30;19;08

Shara

Children would tell you I told them.

01;30;19;24 – 01;30;22;01

Jon

But that’s not fair.

01;30;22;01 – 01;30;26;08

Shara

Well, life’s not fair. And then you die like, Wow, that was a lot, Mom.

01;30;26;20 – 01;30;28;16

Jon

Yeah, but it’s true, and it’s.

01;30;28;16 – 01;30;48;02

Jon

You do with that, right? Because that’s. That’s the whole thing we’re talking about. What choice are you going to make with the fact that life’s unfair and that there’s no guarantee that it’s not going to get worse Every step of the way until you die? Right. That that’s the question here. It’s like, well, I’m not going to make it special and I don’t want to feel like I’m in a special circumstance because it’s not fair.

01;30;48;02 – 01;30;54;06

Jon

But I need someone maybe to remind me that it’s not special. It’s like, No, man, life just sucks. Oh, thank goodness I’m not unique.

01;30;54;19 – 01;30;56;13

Jon

But you just get through it, you know?

01;30;56;27 – 01;31;19;01

Jon

And the the linguistics, I’d say the spirit or the central feeling of what you guys talk about with hope versus despair is what I’ve really been honing in. And also, Erin and really been honing in on with unity versus divisiveness. Right. Like hope unifies, right? Having hope, building resilience has brought your guys marriage stronger. It’s bringing these relationships stronger together.

01;31;19;01 – 01;31;19;20

Aaron

It’s policy.

01;31;19;21 – 01;31;21;14

Jon

It was being a hope. I hope.

01;31;21;24 – 01;31;39;23

Jon

So. Hope unifies. It’s not divisive. Yeah, right. It’s not tearing you guys apart. If all you focused on was that you need a break and she’s banning you. And that’s what the focus became in that, you know, all these second and third order effects and you despair. Now you’re being separated also, you’re isolating, and now you’re really going to get yourself in trouble, right?

01;31;39;25 – 01;32;05;13

Jon

Because it’s the adverse and and it’s interesting because like you said, if you focus on building resilience, there’s hope in that. If you focus on what we have unity in, there’s hope in that, there’s strength in that. And it’s a lot more powerful than focusing on the maybe more sexy or loud things that we’re not in agreement on, but it can destroy things but aren’t necessary.

01;32;05;16 – 01;32;11;10

Aaron

So Sessions like you say, Oh, this feels good and blah, blah, blah, blah, it’s like you got to get up and do something.

01;32;11;18 – 01;32;13;03

Jon

Yes, exactly.

01;32;13;09 – 01;32;18;26

Jon

There’s just a union there, right? Yeah. Pursue unity, pursue hope and pursue strength, you know? Yeah.

01;32;18;26 – 01;32;39;02

Aaron

What an incredible story that you guys are walking out. This isn’t like a happy ending. We’re not going to wrap this all up. And then this is what happened. And Now you guys can all rest that the ideas are just fine. And the last chapter is, I think you’re very much in this right now and you’re still smiling, you’re still laughing, You’re thinking that’s that to me is an incredible thing.

01;32;39;20 – 01;33;09;02

Pete

It is. And it’s a credible thing from I think, where we started. I think because you in those opening moments of any journey or chaotic experience, it comes in your life. You when you have to accept that reality you like okay like I don’t know how this is, how long it’s going to last, but it you end up with that darkness, you know, that kind of just clouds over and this is going to be something that’s kind of cloudy for the foreseeable future.

01;33;09;02 – 01;33;39;22

Pete

So to feel like you’ve worked through that and get to another side and feel like not only do I have a brighter outlook and I have hope, but now I’m also able to give it to so many more people and unable to. And it’s not platitudes. It’s like I can tell you, you know, from experience. And I think even though my journey is going to be different, even my cancer journey is different than somebody else’s cancer journey, and we all kind of respond to chemo and everything a little bit differently.

01;33;40;13 – 01;34;07;06

Pete

It’s something that you can, you know, you kind of have that mark. I mean, like you served in the military, there’s just something that you understand about the military that I don’t write because and, you know, and I think it’s the same thing. You’ve walked through some level of cancer. You do that if you’ve walked through some trauma, you’ve walked through those things or grief, you’re now more apt to be able to help somebody through that.

01;34;07;06 – 01;34;27;06

Pete

And I think if that can be your focus, like don’t just do it for yourself. Like, you know, Yeah, like you need to care for yourself and do great self-care. But at the same time, like if you can give yourself a purpose of if I get through this, then I can, I can unlock keys for somebody else that’s on the same thing.

01;34;27;14 – 01;34;45;04

Pete

Then how much more purposeful that, you know, is my life. Right? And I think all of a sudden, you can give yourself joy and peace in the midst of, you know, like you said, our journey is still going. But I get joy and peace from helping someone else, even though I’m I still got more of my journey to continue.

01;34;45;15 – 01;34;46;24

Pete

And so that’s like a big deal.