Wendy: Hi Welcome to Wendy Says Things. Today on the show I have my friend, Maren, dialing in via zoom from Delaware. We’re talking about dreams and the stories we tell ourselves today, and I’m going to put a little disclaimer in here, because I did get a couple of things wrong, but I’m not taking them out – one has to do with a study recently that Yale did about autism about distress. I thought it was pain because I did not verify my source before I referenced it. I’m leaving the clip in, however, because I think there’s a really important point to be made here about ethics and board reviews, especially in regards to people who have a diagnosis of having autism, which has a communication complication by the definition of the diagnosis.
Wendy: The second reason I’m leaving it in is, of course, to show that it is important to verify your resources, even if you don’t think you’re going to use it. The reason I hadn’t followed through with that study was because I didn’t want to be distressed. The person who posted about the study had been very distressed, so I was like, I don’t want to look at that right now, but then I remembered it later, and I didn’t…I hadn’t bookmarked the origination for it when I should have, but went ahead and referenced it later. And I did get some things wrong. So, I could not verify the quote that I mention in the podcast, where a researcher had allegedly said that they don’t even feel pain. They’re not even human, they don’t feel pain at this point. That may have happened, I could not verify it. So i left in my references to it, and am putting this up front here as a disclaimer even though I have also added the disclaimers into the show notes.
Wendy: Those are things that I had gotten incorrect. So, it shows how right information can get spread easily through social media channels, but wrong information also can as well, because we’re moving quickly, we’re sifting through a large amount of data. So, it is, of course, important to verify sources, or to bookmark anything you might think is interesting, even if you don’t have the wherewithal to look at it right then. So, without further ado, I’m going to flip over here to the podcast where Maren and I are…you know, we had a little moments of reminiscing leading up to it, and I may do some short outtakes of those in addition to the main podcast, but the main podcast ended up being about Dreams and the Stories we tell Ourselves, our personal narratives, and about memory, I hope you’ll enjoy it. Thank you for tuning in. Welcome to Wendy Says Things. I’m always say things, sometimes I will say incorrect things, hopefully not that often. I will usually track down the correct information where possible.
Wendy: Some of the studies that Maren references, I may not have been able to find the exact study she was referring to, but I did get as close as I could, and those are all in the show notes, and transcription, links to which you will find on my website wendyakheiry.com. So, again thank you for joining into Wendy Says Things, and here we go:
Wendy: Yeah, yeah, yeah. No regrets. I mean, it’s kind of how you figure stuff out. Like this comes back to like, you know, you try things to see what works, but the biggest mistake is when something kind of is not working out, and then you keep trying to make that work. You know, instead of being like OK that’s…instead of just assessing: OK, hey this is not working, so let’s go a different way.
Maren: So, you are one of the very few people that I have ever known who got the chance to live on a Caribbean island.
Wendy: Yes.
Maren: And that was also maybe an example of something worth…not working out where you had to reassess at a certain point.
Wendy: I took the kids back there this past summer.
Maren: And for your listeners: Where is that? Because it’s an island I had never heard of before you moved there.
Wendy: So, yeah, so we lived in the islands of Saint Kitts and Nevis. We lived on Nevis, which is a smaller secondary island. And it’s really not a single country. It’s the Federation of Saint Kitts and Nevis, and so they share some governmental things. Both are affiliated with Great Britain. So, one of the interesting things there, at that time, there were a couple of times where I’ve had dreams of places before I’ve gone there. And so, one of the places was actually…do you remember Ali? she was Alex’s babysitter. Allie…
Maren: Yes
Wendy: OK, so Allie babysat Alex after I had a problem with his original sitter. And that was a daycare place and the daycare place…
So, I’m jumping way back, before I get to Nevis because that place…
So, the daycare place that was watching Alex[WK1] …
I went to pick him up a couple of days and he was crying when I picked him up. And I’m like this isn’t good. It’s not like he saw me and started crying. Like he was crying from the back when they brought him out and so I…over[WK2] that weekend I got new daycare. And I hired Allie to do it, who agreed to wake up at like an ungodly hour because I was working at the coffee shop. I was opening the coffee shop, and she lived like 30 minutes out of town. So, I opened…the coffee shop had to be opened like at 6:30. I had to drive way out of town and back in to get to the coffee shop. And I was really nervous over this weekend, like I knew her but I didn’t know her really well, and so I was nervous, of course, about leaving my child with someone that I knew but didn’t know super well. And I had a dream that night of this house, about going down this road with this hill and this little Red House on the right. And when I drove him there for the first time to, like meet her that’s the house like I drove down this little road and there is this Red House on the side and I’m like that is really bizarre to have a dream of a place I’ve never been.
Wendy: So, I was nervous of course about leaving the country to go live in…on these little islands. And…I was not world traveled at the time. The trip there to Nevis was nerve wracking. We stopped for a couple of days in Puerto Rico. And, ended up getting there, but in the lead up to our time in Nevis I kept having these dreams about housing. And it was odd because sometimes I would dream this one house that was like gray and like kind of looking down from a hill, like I’m up on the hill looking down at this house and out beyond the house I can see on the ocean. And sometimes dreams I would have would be in the other house, but it would only be from the inside. There would be this tile, this nice wall, and this little chair and I knew they weren’t the same place. So, sometimes in my dreams I’d be living in the one place, and sometimes in my dream I’d be living in the other place. So, when we finally get there, we arrived at late at night so I didn’t see the house coming up…oh, we did go down the hill to get to the house, but I couldn’t see it because it was dark, you know, and we just flat gone through this horrible flight and lengthy period at the airport.
Wendy: And so, when I first did see the house from that vantage point, it was exactly how it was in my dream. So, the second house I didn’t find anything about for about six months. I met one of Jamal’s coworkers, Mary, and we would go out, but we would meet out, or she would come pick me up and we go out to eat, or whatever. And one time we had to run back by her…her place and we went in there, and I was like, “Oh my gosh I’ve dreamt this house!” And she’s like, “Yeah,” she said, “the boss of the newspaper had had both of these houses in mind, and he wasn’t sure if you were going to live in the one or the other.” So, it was like as he couldn’t make up his mind like I would one…one night dream I was living in the one house, and another night I would dream that I was living in…in the house I ended up living in.
Maren: So, which house would have been the better fit?
Wendy: Um, so, the reason he ultimately decided to give us the house where we ended up was because it came on an acre of land, and he knew I wanted to garden. I was like, I don’t really care too much about like what the house is, as long as it has enough room for us, and I can garden. I couldn’t garden the whole land, because there was so much, and we didn’t have any tools, and didn’t have very much money to, like, to get industrial…so, a lot of it went uncultivated, but I did have a good garden. And I had these big boulders that I used as backdrops for these rock gardens, and whatnot. Yeah, it was a good place to live. So yeah, I lived in Nevis for a year that was 1999 because Y2K was the big thing that winter. And I remember watching the ball drop, and wondering if all the computers were going to crash the next day, and the banks because…you remember the whole Y2K thing?
Maren: Oh yeah. Oh yeah.
Wendy: Where they realized like, “Oh shoot. We only put the back end of the numbers in the computer systems, and we need all four, instead of just the two, to tell what year it is.”
Maren: I was just thinking that the run up to 2000 was when I was getting sober, and then moving out to Oregon. And I hadn’t put it together that that’s when you were down on Nevis. Like, it seems like this was earlier than that because I was…I was in Oregon for the 2000 switch, and then moved to Bloomington in like March of 2000.
Wendy: Huh. Because I thought I was still on Kyle David Way when you were out in Oregon[WK3] .
Maren: I thought so too.
Wendy: Hmm.
Maren: And that’s when you’ve got a podcast with two 50-year-old women.
Wendy: So, this is the point where we are in our life where go, “Well, who knows?”
Maren: Who knows? There’s some truth in there somewhere. It did switch from 1999 to 2000. We were somewhere geospatially on the earth during this period.
Maren: And the rest is a mystery.
Wendy: I think it lends a great deal of humility to how I go through the world now. It’s the kind of thing you have to piece together from whatever clues that you can do. You can find that…like that movie Memento.
Maren: Oh my god, yeah.
Wendy: Yeah, you’re chasing the clues down to try to figure out what did happen in my life. What goes on here? And I think that for everyone if you are really living in the moment, you really have this, kind of, ever present now that takes precedence. And what went on before is like “Eh.” You know, those are minor. But I did read…did you read that article that was saying that like premenopausal[WK4] and menopausal women that the hormonal shutdown process does actually erode memory to a degree?
Maren: No, I hadn’t realized what was operating in it. I’ve just definitely noticed I…my memory is not what it was anymore. I’ve reached a level of acceptance with that. And I think on top of that like there must be a coping thing that goes along where it’s the memory, and then it’s the story I tell myself about the memory.
Wendy: About the memory, mmhmm.
Maren: So, the story or the myth becomes the thing that I hold onto. Like I…I know that in…I had an idea in my head of…then I told this story a lot as I became sober because it was the story of my sobriety. This happened, and this many days went by, and then I went to this meeting, and this and that. When I went back and looked at a calendar, it was impossible that the story was actually that. Because what I had told over the course of one week had actually occurred over the course of a month.
Wendy: Oh, right, right. So, it condensed.
Maren: It condensed in the myth of it. And that’s just the way it was. So, days were going by but in my head, like when I when I retold that story, like a year or two out, it all became…it all happened within a week.
Wendy: So, this study that I’ve seen on the study memory [WK5] say that you only remember it once. And that every point that you think about an event after that first time, after that first memory of it, is the story that you tell about it. And so, the further out you get from the actual incident it’s like playing telephone with yourself. That game telephone where you whisper the secret, and it goes around the circle only you’re every person in the circle. (Laughter) You’re every person in the circle and you’re telling it to yourself and it changes a little bit overtime through each telling.
Maren: Well, and I think as humans we create a theme. This the theme of this story. This is what I’m trying to get across and then you…you might not even create things, but you focus on that aspect of it when we’re telling the story. The purpose of me saying this story is to explain to somebody X. I was just reading about how stories become more mythic and heroic over time[WK6] , like in the standard of a classical hero. And the person was talking specifically about like George Washington as the mythic founder of our country, and that when you…like there is a story of him and he is not actually connected to many of the stories we tell about him, but he has become this thing. And they…they were saying it’s going to be very interesting to watch how the other mythical stories of our country change overtime, so that we won’t even be talking about the nuances of this period or that period. It will just be this over arcing theme that isn’t connected to reality anymore. And that it’s just a human thing that we do that. And so, then I…you know, the humility for me is to look back at my life and say, “What’s story, and what’s real?” and all of that. You know what, where is it really real? And is it even important? I mean, perhaps, and in the final telling, it’s story that’s important.
Wendy: So, in a way our storytelling reinforces perhaps our…our best ideal of ourselves and how we fulfill that. And so, someone comes up to us, for me it is…a lot of times it’s my kids…and says, “Well, Mom, actually…” It’ll be…and I feel so defensive about it because my story that I told myself about how things were has just been completely destroyed. Which means my idea of myself living up to my best ideas and values has just gotten shattered. And so, now I have to, and I struggle with, trying to find that place where I can let go of my story, and listen to their story. Their story about how things were. Their story about what my role was, and how it played out for them. And, you know, some of it is just, you know…I come from[WK7] …I want…I didn’t want them to have experiences that were negative like mine – and as one of the examples that one of my daughters gave me recently, she’s like: “I was so mad at you for so long because you wouldn’t let me purchase the clothes item that I wanted. You said that it would have seams that would be scratchy or tags that would be bad, or they were made out of materials…” And she goes: “And my skin was just not that sensitive.” (Laughter) You know what’s true for me is that my skin is really sensitive, and the smallest things will cause me problems with it.
Maren: I’ve heard that from other friends of mine who are parents this idea that my kid is not going to have to go through the things that I went through and…and I just always thought well of course not. They’re going through the things that they have to go through.
Wendy: Right.
Maren: It’s interesting like you say like I had to let go of my story because I had to listen to their story and the truth is it’s like…that it’s like your story together.
Wendy: Right, well you know…
Maren: Our story.
Wendy: And so a lot of conversation about the past becomes, like, can we find a place where our stories agree? And if not, can we understand that both stories have a really strong elements of truth to them without invalidating the other person’s story? And I don’t have to argue, and I shouldn’t argue I believe, that my kids’ impression of their experience is wrong.
Maren: Mmm.
Wendy: Their impression of their experience. Their experience, and the way that they experience it, the way that they remember it, the way they process it belongs to them. They can own that, and I can listen to that. And I can honor that. I can reevaluate my own story in light of their impression, and their experience[WK8] . I can apologize when necessary. Sometimes I can add further information like, “Oh, I see how you would have felt that way. Here’s where I was coming from. Here’s what I meant with that. Here’s actually, maybe, some information you didn’t have about that situation[WK9] .
Wendy: So, yeah…yeah…so, I mean holding and honoring, kind of another person’s story, when it’s your kids and they’re…and it holds an element of criticism or, like you know, you wronged me. You know, there there’s a real opportunity to heal things. And I think, for me, one of the things I feel strongly about is that if I’ve made it safe enough for my kids to bring these things to me I’ve done a good job.
Maren: Yes. Yup, that is true.
Maren: I think…I mean the younger I was the more I was caught up in like…like factual events like: “Well, this person did this, and this person did this, and this person did this.” and I was, maybe, not even able to see how my emotions were influencing how I viewed those events. It just felt like facts, like hard truths. And the older I get the more I think, like, human interaction is almost all emotion and feeling. And those are the things that are motivating so many of our choices. And unless you have some level of insight into each person’s emotional motivations, you’re really not going to get to the truth. And the hard facts get created out of those. So, I don’t know, life has become way more fluid and less stable the older I get.
Wendy: At least one of my classes at IU, I want to say that it was that Death and Dying class that I took and failed. I failed. That I failed. Let’s be completely honestly here, I took a class on death and dying, and I failed it.
Maren: You’re still alive?
Wendy: I’ve been failing that class my whole life. (Laughter)
Wendy: I’m just not good at it. What I do remember him saying in one of the lectures was…he illustrated the filter, the filter that’s out in front of us as we interact with the world. And that filter has been instilled in us and installed in us through our experiences, through our parents. So, if you think about this, I thought about this a lot when my kids were little, and…you know, how some cats or animals will look like they are looking at something you can’t perceive. Right?
Maren: True. Yup.
Wendy: So, take that thought, that someone or something or some animal is looking at something that you can’t perceive. Understand that about language…studies about language show that babies make [WK13] every sound in[WK14] every language[WK15] no matter where they’re from when they start gabbling.
Maren: Right.
Wendy: But they only keep the sounds and are only able to continue making the sounds of the ones that are reinforced[WK16] .
Maren: Right.
Wendy: Children, maybe, see things we don’t perceive. They begin to filter out things that we don’t reinforce[WK17] .
Maren: Oh, that’s an interesting thought.
Wendy: Yeah, and that would blow my mind. So, when my kids were little, and they’d be like looking at things I’d be kind of like, “What do you see?” You know what I mean? Like, “What are you talking to?” You know, and…and I kind of wondered…I’m like, what if we have this capability to perceive so much more, but our cultural reinforcement continues to drop the perception of it. They’ve done these other studies too that show, like, if you put animals in a room that has a specific kind of wonky-off line-age along the side of it, their perception of it when they’re put in a straight…in a room where all the lines are straight, they can’t navigate it.
Maren: Interesting.
Wendy: And so…so my point is, that it’s possible that humans…what the human brain can do and what the human brain does culturally, overtime, and down through the generations is…is it…maybe we’re in a skewed room. Our room is skewed. And when we try to see it, if we get put into a situation that doesn’t fit that skew, we are off balance. And we want to run back to the room. We want to run back to the room that’s skewed because we’re comfortable there. And this is where a lot of this talk, I think, comes from, you know, “Try to get yourself out of your comfort zone.” “Get out of your comfort zone because that’s where the magic happens.” Get out of the comfort zone because you’re finally, when you’re out of your zone, out of the skewed room, and may be able to perceive things that you otherwise wouldn’t. Your mind is open. You’re out of your comfort zone. You’re allowing yourself to feel and experience the world in a way that is new and unique and, perhaps, that’s where the greatest truths come.
Maren: That is an interesting thought.
Wendy: You know, I wanted to be medical researcher, once upon a time. And that was back when I was doing premed at IU. And…but, I’m really grateful that I didn’t end up pursuing that because what I know of my ethical structure at the time, there, is that I probably would have been one of those mad scientists. (Laughter) Like, I don’t think I had the empathy. I think if I would have gone on that…stayed on that path, from standpoint of where I was then, that I would have had less empathy. And I think, from a moral and ethical standpoint, that without empathy going into research science and medical research is really dangerous.
And, in fact, I…I saw an article that reinforced this because…I was…it was, I think it was on Twitter someone was posting about how a recent study came out about pain studies that they did on autism…on kids with autism, babies with autism. Pain. And the researchers said they’re not even humans at this point, and they don’t feel pain[WK18] [WK19] .
Maren: Wow.
Wendy: And the person who posted it, who I think has autism, was like, I’ve been crying for hours over this. And it’s unconscionable. How did that ever, ever pass a review board? An ethics board? You can’t do pain studies on infants, on babies. Because you label them autism? You don’t…how can you even confirm autism at a preverbal stage[WK20] ? I think they were like 18 months and some kids don’t talk until they’re two or three.
Maren: Yeah, that doesn’t make sense.
Wendy: So, it’s…it’s unconscionable. And so, I think that ethics and empathy have to be taught together. And if you don’t have the empathy, if you don’t have a compassion…a compassionate way of approaching science and people, you shouldn’t be doing this research on people. You know there should be…you know, the review boards – before you do a study you’re supposed to, I believe that the process is, that you have to submit the idea for your study someplace to be peer reviewed.
Maren: Yeah.
Wendy: …or ethics. And how did that ever pass an ethics review board [WK21] is beyond me. Beyond me. It’s ridiculous the harm that has been done. Like what? Because they can’t communicate? Because autism is…by definition has a communication difficulty issue[WK22] . They can’t come back and sue you later because they can’t communicate how bad it was? So yeah…so, there’s that. I think that the events that did end up coming through my life have made me a much more compassionate person than I otherwise would have been, so I’m really grateful for that.
Maren: I’m grateful for that too.
Wendy: Because…one of the biggest struggles for me, since I got divorced, has been to commit to any dreams. To commit to it. Because I didn’t want dreams. Because I don’t want dreams. I don’t want dreams of the future. I don’t want any bigger thing to have to do. I don’t want…I didn’t want these things, because, if you’ll recall, I also have had dreams of places that I’ve never been yet. When I was living in Saudi Arabia, I was having dreams of the Green Mountains and I would wake up “Oh my gosh, I got to get to the Green Mountains!” And so, I would look for property. You know, we looked in Missouri. We looked in Vermont, and I thought Vermont was too expensive. So, we looked in New Hampshire, which is a little less expensive. I didn’t know at the time, of course, that Vermont was called the Green Mountains. So, we were actually looking at properties in New Hampshire, when we found the property in Vermont. And so, we ended up living in Vermont for 5 year. I had this dream of having the horses, and doing all of that work, and I committed to it. And I think I’ve really had to come to terms with the idea that when the universe gives me a big dream, you know…I dreamt about Jamal before I met him, you know, and being married…
M: I didn’t know that.
W: Yeah, yeah. So, I would have these dreams when I was a kid[WK28] , and I would be like, you know, I don’t know who I’m supposed to be with, I have crush on this one guy. I would get this kind of like blank space for the face, but I would get this window…this window over kitchen sink with a tree right out of it. And our house on East Taylor Street, the first house that we bought together, had that window with the tree in it. So, it’s like one of those I’m chilling out doing the dishes one day and I look up and I’m like, “Holy shit. That’s the tree from the dream that I had my whole childhood.” So, I want…I want them to be permanent. So, it feels like this big betrayal of the universe, you know, that my marriage to Jamal, which I know was supposed to happen, ended. That the dream that I worked so hard to fulfill in Vermont, that I felt called to this dream, like, I wanted that to be it. Like my dream, on top of the dream[WK29], is that that would be my retirement, that I would be doing…I would still be doing the horses and the farming in Vermont when my kids graduated high school.
Maren: Mmhmm.
Wendy: And there’s this betrayal. The ultimate rug out from under the feet by the universe. You know, if the universe comes to me with more dreams, I’m like, “I don’t think so.” Like, I don’t want to do that. But I still ended up getting a guitar and trying to learn to play music and getting a piano and getting back into that. And then coming here and all these doors opening up for this, and at the same time I’m like “I’m not doing anything.” It’s like the time…there was a time that I copied a book by hand word for word for study later. And Jamal was going by and was like, “Are you copying that book word for word?” And I’m like, “No, I’m just taking notes, man.” (Laughter) And at the end of it I had…I had written the whole book by hand because I couldn’t leave any of the words out. I actually don’t still have a copy of that. I don’t know what happened to it. But it was just a very short…it was a very short book about some kind of meditation study. And I kind of feel like that’s how this dream has been. This dream has been like the universe is going by, “Yeah, you’re still working on that music/creativity dream.” And I’m like, “Nah, man I’m just taking notes.” (Laughter) I’m like doing the process. I’m in the process. I’m putting the steps down for the dream, but I’m kind of, like, in complete denial that that’s what I’m doing at the same time, you know? I don’t want to own up to it. I don’t want to verbalize it because to verbalize it means is this another thing I’m going to commit, to put myself whole heartedly into, and, maybe have some success with. Because you know, I had success with my marriage. I had success with my horse business. The dreams that I put my shoulder to have come to fruition. Just, I didn’t want them, then, to end. I didn’t want there to be a change, and to be another shift in gears. And so, I don’t…want to put my shoulder to the wheel real hard. I kind of want to kind of do it. Because I don’t want to have a kind of outcome, and like have put all of that hard work into it. And it’s the opposite, because what I believe is that life is like a [Sand] Mandala and…I don’t know if your…you know what that is…
Maren: Yeah.
Wendy: Yeah, the very intricate sand drawing the monks do. They put all of this time and effort into the sand drawings, and then sometimes they wash them off into a river, or…anyway, they’re destroyed right after.
Maren: Right.
Wendy: And the whole idea of non-attachment is to be able to do this, and I believe this. I wrote about this when I was doing the farming. This was some of my…I had a whole post on my blog[WK30] , then, called Life is a Mandala. But I don’t want to live like that.
Maren: Right.
Wendy: I think that this is a challenge for all who…all humans
Maren: Oh yeah.
Wendy: Okay, no one wants to put the effort into something that is short lived, but the way to live the most fully in the here and now…in this…fully into the present moment is to absolutely do that, is to commit to that moment, to put the shoulder in, even if your success only last for a minute.
Maren: Right. I mean impermanence, that’s the whole human experience.
Wendy: It is the whole human experience, but it’s quite difficult to continue re-committing, especially when looking back. So, here we go back to the stories. When we look back at our story, we tell ourselves the story…I wrote about this. I wrote a 40 page paper on my…in my 7th St apt about if, we could only change our perception of the past could…how much could we heal? So, if we look back on our story and I say the universe hates me because look it took away my marriage. It took away my horses. It took away my farm. It took away the good that I was going to be doing, and that I had planned. So, you know, basically, “Up yours, Universe.” That’s one story I can tell myself about what happened, but I can also look back at that story, and I can look at the successes, look at the successful marriage that I had: these beautiful kids with this person who helped me raise them, and who foot the bill for a lot of the recovery and healing [WK31] that happened in my life, and I can be extremely grateful for that. And that I was allowed this opportunity to work with horses that were amazing, like Buddy, and Canon and have that be a part of my life, and share that with people who learned, and grew, and benefited from those experiences. Isn’t that fantastic? And then when I needed to heal[WK32] , I got to a place in Ohio, which I didn’t want to be there in this place, but I found everything that I needed for my healing right then to be able to launch me and move me into this new phase. How exciting is that to be able to open up and to write daily, and to make music, and to meet musicians, and to have these wonderful experiences? If I tell my story as a success story, can it launch me a little bit better into the future as opposed to telling myself the story…the failure story. And both stories are true.
M: Right.
W: This is the paradox that we live in, impermanence and paradox, is that both stories are true, but if I focus and I orient myself to the success story, even if I’m also setting myself up for potential failure. Because that’s…life is these risks. You don’t get the success unless you risk the failure.
M: I was just reading…I was just reading this week, I’ll have to find it and send it to you, an article, I think it was about a study about re-framing, just like you’re…you’re talking about like what is going to be the central theme of the story that you’re going to tell yourself about your past.
Wendy: Right.
Maren: And…and how much power we have in that part of the process.
Wendy: Right
Maren: Like, you know the…the results that’s out of my control, but how I operate in the present and what I tell myself about the past, I do have some…some input on that and it can make all the difference, I think, in what future results will be.
Wendy: Right. So yeah, I think that’s a good way to sum this up.
Maren: I hope that your podcast is a…is an amazing future result that has, well not permanence, some staying power, perhaps.
Wendy: So, one of the things that I really like the idea of…I like talking with someone. I feel like I do better when I have someone else, kind of, in the room.
Maren: Sure.
Wendy: So, I’m thinking of inviting other people to come on to my podcast.
Maren: I think that’s a great idea because I…I think that that is probably the most standard podcast model that I’ve seen different like conversations. Some are more of a standard interview type of situation but often it’s just people talking like, and the magic that occurs because of that.
Wendy: Yeah, our conversations are always…I always really feel like we’ve accomplished something.
Maren: Yeah. (Laughter) You’re also the only person I can get on the phone with and then look down and realize we’ve been on the phone for two hours, chatting about something.
Wendy: Right? So definitely, we go some cool places and I really appreciate your sitting and taking the time to talk to me, and to consent to being recorded.
Maren: Well, I hope to be your first repeat guest.
Wendy: Yeah, that was my lead-up. I wanted to have you on the show again, because I think that, you know, coffee with Maren and Wendy podcast segments would be…
Maren: Where Wendy Says Things…
Wendy: I’m always going to say things. (Laughter) I think the thing that I said this time that should really go on a T-shirt, accompanying merchandise I can draw is “Up yours, Universe.” (Laughter)
Maren: I’ll buy that.
Wendy: Right? (More laughter) I’ll draw that out later. Alright, have a great day. I’m going to stop the recording real quick.
Maren: Alright.
Wendy: Congratulations, you’ve made it to the end of the first episode of Wendy Says Things. This is an exciting time to be alive. You can find me on Facebook at Wendy Kheiry Arts. You can find me on Twitter at Dandeliontwine. You can find me on Instagram, just under my regular name. Please feel free to check out my website [you are here], which includes poetry and music. I’m also on SoundCloud. Thank you very much for tuning in. I hope you-all have a wonderful day, and see you next time. Bye.
[WK1]To trail off rather than to criticize…how many tries before I could say that they did something wrong?
[WK2]Two weeks paid notice to stop day care, plus paying for the new babysitter for the same two weeks
[WK3]We moved back from Nevis when it was still winter, because Judy picked us up from the airport with winter coats from the thrift store. So both things may have been true.
[WK4]Find study on menopause and memory recall reduction
[WK5]Find study on memory and the memory of having the memory
[WK6]Find study about how stories about oneself become more historic over time
[WK7]Mentally editing what I am willing to share about my upbringing
[WK8]Their impression is what and how they think about their experience (which is their experience).
[WK9]Do my kids feel that this approach minimizes or otherwise fails to honor their experience?
[WK13]Perceive Perceptual narrowing, or perceptual reorganization
[WK14]Found a reference to babies making all of the sounds
[WK15]Abstract with a lot more information
[WK16]Not reinforcement like a la Skinner, but reinforced by hearing and tracking the sounds in the environment
[WK17]Again, by not reacting to, naming, interacting with rather than Skinner behavioral reinforcement
[WK18]I could not find this reference again. I did find a study at Yale about autism and distress where they issued a statement. https://medicine.yale.edu/news-article/29344/
[WK19]This quote could not be verified
[WK20]Mean age for diagnosis in US is 3 years. Being verbal is not needed for meeting Autistic Diagnostic Criteria
[WK21]Because they are mirroring one another from the same skewed room, and not taking into account the view the room in which person with Autism is standing.
[WK22]“Children with ASD are often self-absorbed and seem to exist in a private world in which they have limited ability to successfully communicate and interact with others. Children with ASD may have difficulty developing language skills and understanding what others say to them. They also often have difficulty communicating nonverbally, such as through hand gestures, eye contact, and facial expressions.”
[WK23]I like this example of us checking in with each other, so we can consider the different factors.
[WK24]I like this part because it’s clear that I have no idea how to podcast
[WK25]Dear listener, this could be your fate. I will send you down a hole.
[WK26]I’m not even offended, I know me.
[WK27]Alright – a lot…and something about writing the words one million times
[WK28]Also as a kid dreamt of the horses, and of retreat like place, farms etc. Being a private eye.
[WK29]The Purity of Heart is to Will One Thing Soren Kierkegaard
[WK30]Wendy’s Horse Adventures
[WK31]Complex trauma survivor
[WK32]From (a) horseback riding accident(s)
