Splintered Grace πŸ’ 

An Elephant and a Mouse 🐘🐁

August 19, 2021 Bonnie Violet & Tina Frank Season 3 Episode 2
Splintered Grace πŸ’ 
An Elephant and a Mouse 🐘🐁
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Show Notes Transcript

In this episode Bonnie Violet has a confession. ... Bonnie and Tina talk about overcoming offense by taking responsibility for their own emotions.  They find that the emotions that carried their offense is a cycle and needed to be broken.

This season we push the depths of our relationship even further. Tackling the difficult conversations that we fear may separate us.

Tina, a conservative Christian woman and Bonnie Violet, a trans gender queer drag queen have an anti-cancel culture conversation. While many family members are choosing to no longer speak, we have chosen to sit at the table and engage in difficult conversation to find peace and restoration.

#christianpodcast #transpodcast #lgbtq #trans #genderqueer #thankgodimqueer #splinteredgrace #heaven #family #conservativechristian #drag #spiritualawakening #queerspirituality

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[Music]
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[Music]
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will be [Music]
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hi everyone welcome to splintered grace my name is bonnie violet and i'm a transgender queer spiritual drag artist
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and digital chaplain and this is my co-host hey everybody this is tina frank
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i'm logging in from arizona and i'm a con mature conservative christian woman
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thanks for joining us tonight i'm so excited that you're all here yes i'm so glad that you're here this is
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episode two of season three um and for folks
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for folks who've never been here before we love to hear from you so feel free um and for folks you might be listening to
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us so you might not be able to engage in the same way um if you're listening to us on a podcast but we do record this live
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um every thursday at 5 30 p.m pacific standard time and it can be watched on facebook youtube
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um or twitch um so the great thing about watching us live is that you can
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participate so you can ask us questions you can tell us we're pretty you can tell us there's something weird
1:38
going on behind us like whatever um if there's bad sound like please tell us
1:44
those sorts of things did you did you forget instagram
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um well instagram is a place they can watch it afterwards for sure okay all right so i'm still learning all this all
1:57
this technical stuff i know so hey where are you coming live from us at bonnie
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i am in baltimore um which you know it feels like it's so late which it is it's
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like 8 30 here um and uh yeah so i'm in baltimore i'm here
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um for a couple of days and then i'm going out to deep creek um to a lake house i'm here with
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my sister's family my um chosen sister chosen family sister marcus
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um we've been friends for like 20 plus years you know marcus yep i do but marcus and i have been sisters for a
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long time and so i'm here hanging out with his um brother and his brother's husband and
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their family and it's just been like super super great that's awesome how is the weather there
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i'm all about the weather so i didn't make it outdoors today but when
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i came in last night it was uh very different than san francisco i had
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left san francisco in like pants and a sweater and i was like girl you are like not
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dressed well because like i was it's just humid um and fairly hot
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so um but it's still great to be in in the heat for sure
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um hi elizabeth how's it going hey there how's baltimore i'm watching you on my
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big tv tonight uh-oh oh wow yeah i hope we're looking good on i know
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i hope we're looking good on the big screen i know i'm gonna how about you let's get away from my camera no
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right how what's going on with you tina uh you know i'm just having a
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a wonderful week i've been able to keep busy connect with friends enjoy being in my space we had rain here which
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for the last few years has been non-existent so we've gone on a couple weeks now of rain i've just so enjoyed
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that so i've been spending some extra time in my garden and i've found that if i sit in my house when it's raining
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outside i can decide whatever temperature it is outside because i can make it feel like fall or feel like winter
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so i've been doing some pretending this last week and the rain and heat to me is so much fun i i loved i know they don't quite
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have months using monsoon seasons like they used to but i loved monsoon season when i lived in arizona yeah yeah and
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you know i'm kind of grateful for those big storms that we have with the dirt flying i don't miss that but yeah we the
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monsoon season has certainly changed over the years so we're grateful for the rain a little bit of flooding going on
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in places but everything's good and hi cheryl um
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uh i can't wait to meet you as well this weekend cheryl is marcus's sister and
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we're all meeting up kind of a little family reunion so it's going to be super cute um you guys are going to have so much fun
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it's going to be a lot of fun there's a boat and water skis too so oh yay
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i hope you brought your bathing suit i i did i'm gonna yes i'm i'm gonna
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um so uh i wanted to start off this i guess this week um you know this week our
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topic is the elephant that is spelt wrong did you see that typo
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anyway oh wait no it's spelled right my eyes were just crossed i think the p is is making it look wrong it looks like an
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h huh anywho sorry uh but the elephant in the mouse um was just scheduled as our episode two
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um and we can take that a number of ways um but the idea of a mouse and an elephant kind of being in
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in close companionship um is uh i guess something that's not thought to happen elephants are often
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scared of mice um allegedly and mice could probably be harmed by an
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elephant pretty easily and even unintentionally so we're not calling either of us an
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elephant or a mouse thanks for clarifying that because people are stereotyping right now
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i know when we brought it up you're like as long as i'm not the elephant yeah i was like well i think we i think we
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all get to be an elephant and a mouse at some point right i think you're right i think you're
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right yeah and so for folks who maybe didn't see last week's episode you might have noticed and maybe it wasn't noticeable
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to everyone else but to me i was really um challenged um and
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what there was some stuff going on with me that i i don't think i was fully aware of um and it kind of like after the episode
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i was kind of able to i don't know just think about like hey what's going on because i felt like a
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lot of resistance on my side or some sort of like defense almost was kind of coming up for
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me and i was trying not to um respond as if that was what was going on
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but i had like this stuff going in uh going on for me and um
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confession is i think i um i came to realize that um
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gosh it's a number of things one um i how do i want to say this i um
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just take your time and just what you want i know there's no wrong way to say what
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you want to say so yes so what we talk about we always talk about how we're not trying to change one another and um we
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hope that we're changed by being in relationship with each other but we're not necessarily trying to change each
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other's ideas or perspectives or beliefs um but i think i was i think there was a
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part of me that there was one part of you and i don't even know that it was necessarily you i think it might have
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been like what you represent but i think it did i think it was personal just because it's you
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um as well in that sense because i know you love me and i know you care about me and you like
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see me and hold me and um are in relationship with me in a way
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that um i would love all my family to be in relationship with me you know
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and so um i was under the i got hung up on the idea of whether or not you thought being trans was a sin
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and um and it really doesn't matter but it did to me um and i hadn't
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realized that i kind of had i know we talked about kind of being afraid of that
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moment that something would happen or something would be brought up and yeah one or the other would kind of like break this up
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and i think for me that had become the thing it was like if she thinks being trans is
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a sin then i'm done i'm out and i was like girl that's not that's not fair and
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that's not even what you're trying to do like as i was thinking okay next episode i'm going to just say it it's trans
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being said and then i'm like but if she says yes she says no what does it like
8:53
what does it matter if she says yes do i say bye see you you didn't love me the right way or you
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know whatever you know that sort of thing or or because you did say that it's not
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then for some reason i can feel affirmed and whatever either way it was me
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putting um a condition um
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on our relationship with one another um and i don't think it was unreasonable
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for me to have you know that sort of response and to kind of be struggling with this and this is partly why
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we wanted to bring it up because i did talk with you earlier today kind of about what was going on and confessed to
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you um i was definitely a little bit more snottier and tearier um
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but um it was it was a difficult thing for me to talk with you about because i didn't want to hurt your feelings and and i knew that it was kind of my own
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[Music] my own thing and you know like i'm good with god i know that this deeper
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relationship i have with god and the more i seek god the more trans i identify as being and the more that
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i'm expressing myself in a way in which i kind of fall in that column at least in my understanding of this part of my
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life and so so i don't need anyone um to
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affirm or confirm or validate if you will my experience with god and i know that and
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plenty of other people can tell me that being trans is a sin or you know
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all those sorts of things and and it would just kind of roll off it's gotten to where it just rolls off of me
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but i realized that you were different for me in that way and that really wasn't fair um for me to
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put you um like in that place of power or i don't
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know how to how to say it um but um i'm happy to
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to be able to like be on the other side of that like you like i don't have to know those things
10:57
in order to um you know to continue on with this relationship in the way
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and the way that it has and and in some ways i feel like i'm all the better i'm just all the better for it and
11:08
having the opportunity to kind of really like um
11:13
dig deep yeah i i think relationships that challenge one another
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um to be better and to seek um our our purpose i think those
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relationships are ship little relationships are healthy but it can be hard it can be hard and
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it's really hard not to uh try to change the people around us and to just love them where they're at
11:38
it's hard for it's hard for everyone so i commend you for
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being willing first of all to have the conversation because this isn't an easy conversation
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i appreciate you being brave enough to talk to me even though if i could have went totally
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ballistic and said blah blah and you're willing to take that risk because that to me
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lets me know that our relationship is important to you and i'm grateful because it's very
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important to me as well and i would have been very very very
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upset yeah you just called me and said nope sorry yeah and i would have been really
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disappointed in myself and that was a thing that that for me like i knew better like i knew better
12:25
you call me regular you talk to me you pray for me we talk about things that really matter like
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all the kinds of things to show action and love and for whatever
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reason like there was this one thing that i was hung up on and and again i don't necessarily need any of that from
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you for love but it's cute you know like it's nice
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um but um brandon says thank you for your honesty and sharing
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uh and i think and you know and and i i um
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i didn't i didn't bring it to you for a couple of months you know like the the i had this we had a conversation about
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um trans kids having access to hormones and one thing led to another and
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uh something was said and then i was like oh wait maybe she doesn't think how i thought
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she thought and i hadn't really thought that way and i felt like i had totally kind of like
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just let go and then all of a sudden it was just like an old an old thought an old situation just
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like clicked in and it and it kind of took over for a minute and um i also felt like it was my it was like my
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it was my stuff that i didn't want to put on to you and that's something that i often do in relationships that's not
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helpful that i'm coming to get like my even if it's my like it's and it's impacting our
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relationship like i need to talk with you about it um
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in order to move on because in otherwise we're like having two different relationships or two different experiences with the same
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relationship right and that you know what you're saying is so key as we
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continue relationship and not just the two of us but any of us in a relationship it's going to require
14:16
um a change not necessarily a change in you know our identity or appearance or
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whatever but changing how we look at things changing how we purview things changing how we interact with one
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another and maybe hopefully if we're learning from one another which is our goal helping us to change some of the
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interactions of the other people around us and so it's hard so what you just described to me just listening was that
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you got caught in an old habit or an old way of thinking that you saw it right away
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and you too you decided i'm going to change this you're renewing your mind you're renewing it to say you know what
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i'm not going to do that i know this isn't true i know this is old thinking and i'm not going to engage in it and i'm so
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grateful that you reached out to me i will say over the last few months i'm like this our conversations have been
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different yeah and i was sharing with my husband that
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i think i must have offended bonnie um she hasn't said so um she still responds to my text
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messages but it's different so now now i now i can understand
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yeah there was just some distance there and at the time i was just so hard-pressed of trying to get you to
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understand and it was like it it doesn't matter and you know what i
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mean and so what if we don't understand um each other's perspective and
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um i was at that moment i was just so caught up in wanting to change
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how i perceived you saw things and um and i just knew it wasn't i knew
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i wasn't like behaving i knew that i wouldn't have
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been in conversation in a way that i felt would feel good for me and also be
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useful um and so i think it just took me a little
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bit of time time to to process it you know and
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um thankfully you know and i mean i just think those are the things that are going to happen sometimes
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um and i know i'm just all the better i'm all the better for it because i there i
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was kind of putting you on that pedestal again like i did when i was a child don't do that don't do that it's not no
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and that's what i said it's not fair to you and it's not even like it's not even helpful you know and i
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think there was just one part of me that i just i hadn't really thought or
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i don't know you know like i kept saying too like as long as you see me the way that
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you know i don't know there was just like this there was a condition um and i'd been saying it very out loud the
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whole time but i didn't even realize that that that was there um so i i appreciate that we've been able
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to kind of like continue so that um yeah selfishly i can come to
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that kind of understanding and awareness as well um it's just gonna
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you know help me actually live into um what i believe god wants all of us to be
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able to live into you know the the goal for us i think for all of us is to
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fulfill the purpose that we were created for and the only way to do that is to allow
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ourselves the opportunity to continue to change and move because
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as much as i may not need to change on the outside or there's always something to change on the inside
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you know i want to build my character every single day i want to understand other people's perspective and grow my
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own perspective every single day i want to gain wisdom on how to navigate the the things around me and
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the new relationships i i pray that i get new encounters with people every single day
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and if i'm not willing to change and adapt so that i can have conversations or at least be open
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you know i don't want to be that grumpy lady at the supermarket that nobody wants to say hello to i want to be that
18:16
lady that's smiling that's almost a tiny bit annoying to people because the smile is so big on my face
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and they're like oh if i say hello to that lady she's not going to stop talking to me here comes her here she comes again yeah i want to yeah exactly
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i want to have an infectious a positive infectious um
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i don't know interaction with people i don't know if that's right word but yeah so
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but it requires me to change because i don't always feel that way so anyway i appreciate you saying that
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and i'm sure we'll have other things i'm sure i'll have my share of things also um because as much as we we are
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different um we our relationship that we choose those differences will run into one another a
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little bit yeah yes it felt it was i'm just glad that we
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were able to talk about it this i felt like you know we just talked about it this evening so earlier so it's like
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yeah we're cute we're good yeah we're good okay but um but we felt like it was good
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um and can you talk a little bit or do you mind sharing a little bit how that was for you to hear that um hear me
19:28
earlier and kind of hold that space for me well it was it was an easy one i felt
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really bad that i had offended you or had hurt you in some way because that is not the desire of my heart
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and my mind was racing on how do i fix this how do i fix this how do i fix this and i decided i don't
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yeah i just i just let you say what you need to say i respond the best way that
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i know how with honesty and and love and a desire to continue to
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um do life together and i had to be willing to want to allow
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you to get all that out because if i try to interrupt you and it's not gonna it's not gonna end well i feel like i felt
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like it it never has in my past anyway let people finish what they're saying and then
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come in as calm uh as positive loving way as possible and i felt like as much
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as my heart was breaking that you were gonna say okay i've decided that we're not doing this anymore
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i had to allow that to be okay
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and in the moment and not respond quickly i know that there's a couple moments there that i was like had to
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catch myself because i was like wait i'm like oh stop stop we're not doing that
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and so it was it was it was scary i don't know how else to say it it was scary like oh my gosh is this thing that
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that is this relationship that i've missed for all that time that i've just gotten back is it about ready to just
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slide away so i'm glad we were able to talk through it
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and i was just as afraid of that too i i felt um i felt like you you allowed
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the space for that to happen and i tried to over and over say like no like you didn't hurt me and this isn't
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anything that you really did it's it's like me you know like i'm the one who
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um i guess was you know what i mean like i was causing that pain um
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it wasn't anything that you were doing do you know what i mean yeah and uh yeah so i think that was something that i had
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to i mean i you know you know that right but sometimes when you get in those spaces it's just like yeah yeah yeah
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and i felt bad about the whole conversation that we had however many months ago i'm like oh why did i even bring that up
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well we believe in an important conversation well you know but i think it was really good because those that was one of the
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things that like and you you think very differently on that than
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i do or at least you did in that moment and i felt like we both were having a really um
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like it was definitely like a very much kind of like a knee-jerk kind of like yes conversation right fight or fright
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kind of fight or flight kind of like conversation it was definitely really a different
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um different type of conversation than we're used to having so we're trying to
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be convincing and neither one of us needs to be convincing yeah yeah yeah it was it was yeah and i
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hadn't had that experience with you and i was like and i i guess you know and that's not how i want to be in
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relationship with you it's okay that that happened and that might happen at some point in time
22:44
but it was definitely like i do not want to continue at this level
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you know in our relationship like it's not going to work and so i really had to kind of evaluate like why does it matter
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like why why is it that important and i think for me i just felt like
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yeah and i and i just want to share this just in case there are other folks that are also having a challenge in
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their own relationships you know i did feel like if you didn't like it was just
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now i forgot what i was gonna say but um
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i don't remember what i was going to say but i definitely felt like i almost i almost you know i questioned
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whether i was betraying myself like am i betraying myself by not um
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demanding that you see and see things a certain way and and
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really it was you see me a certain way and that's not something you know what i
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mean like that's god god is the only one who can really see me for who i am if i continue
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to expect people in my life even the people that are the closest to me to see me and know me in the way that
24:00
god does i'm gonna constantly be let down and that's that's no um
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like that's no um shade on anyone else like that's just how we are humans and i think that's
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what for me a little bit of what the um utilization of god like what god's for
24:18
in some ways he created you so he he knows all your ins and outs
24:26
all the all the potential he put in you all the potential he wants to draw out of you when he wants to draw it out of
24:32
you and i remember um there's the passage ephesians 3 20. this
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is my paraphrase so if you go readers it's not going to say exactly this i'm not paraphrasing this one of the few scriptures that i've got to memory
24:43
is that you know god wants to do far more than i can think or imagine in me
24:49
and through me and so i just try to tell myself every single day that i want to have a vivid
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imagination and a large imagination of what my life should look like of the desires that i
25:02
have of the potential that i have within myself now i can only do that for me i can't do that for bonnie i can't do that
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for my children or my husband i can only do that for me but when i sit down and i think about
25:13
all those things and i realized oh my gosh god wants to do more than that
25:18
it really is as a space that helps me to land and to ground myself and to find a
25:23
place of of joy and um opportunity to move forward
25:30
so so when i yeah anyway so that's what i see when i see you i see
25:35
an unlimited opportunity that god has put in you that i'm just very excited
25:41
to be a part of to be able to see as god molds it and shapes it
25:47
for the purpose that he created you for yeah yeah and i definitely and like continues to create me you know it's not
25:53
about just being like god loves me anyway or god understands why i'm a mess up
26:00
it's like uh no uh we're like in this together and we're doing this you know like it's not right
26:07
um and so it's like and and like you said it's like i know that ever since i started seeking
26:13
a relationship with god a spiritual way of living again um i have lived beyond
26:21
um anything i could have ever thought of for myself you know i had limited myself
26:26
in so so many ways um we've talked about this in previous uh seasons kind of that poverty thinking
26:34
that really wasn't about like money or anything like that it was just this idea of scarcity or
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i don't know what it was but um i've definitely been able to since i've
26:45
again actively saw a spiritual way of life i've continued to
26:50
um i mean who knows like who knows what's next i mean even like two months
26:56
ago i wouldn't have told you i'd be like moving out of my house and deciding to like
27:01
just show up across country all over and like do what i
27:06
think is gonna happen you know like i i didn't come up with that on my own wow
27:11
that's pretty it's been interesting for me watching you get ready for this transition you know
27:18
calling you and you've got all your stuff out and you're you're giving it to people and people are coming by to i
27:23
mean it's like oh my gosh part of me was like no this really isn't happening and then here you are i saw your tech
27:30
your facebook and your stuff yesterday okay i'm on the plane i'm like oh my gosh this is really happening
27:37
for you know i'm thinking oh it's the 14th 18th the 17th whatever day it was it says it's coming it's not but it's
27:42
like oh my gosh that's today so yeah yeah it's crazy it is it's awesome it was a little surreal for
27:49
a while but it's definitely real yeah now you are in baltimore
27:56
wow angel angel is saying hi happy thursday happy thursday and he's his topless
28:04
photo thanks angel [Laughter] no shade
28:12
yes so um now what i mean like now i feel like we can just like go on and
28:18
talk about dance in the dance in the grass wave our arms
28:26
how about folks that are listening to us do you have any questions about um kind of what this process was for us or um what was going
28:34
on or if you could identify with with anything but i just yeah i mean i just went back to that old way of
28:40
thinking and seeing things and it's easy to do i feel like sometimes when we get backed in a corner
28:46
or things happen that we're like not expecting uh we go back to what's what's natural
28:52
what was natural because and so that's i feel like that's exactly what you did what had you always done in that situation
28:58
yeah i mean it was definitely like a trauma response it was like you know it's like because when i
29:04
yeah it was like it was like that time when i lost church after my hiv diagnosis and my sexual orientation it
29:11
was like that same old feeling again where again i gave power where i shouldn't give
29:17
power and it hurt me and um and that's just
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you know and so it was just a reminder of like oh there's just a little bit of that still in there and who knows maybe
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maybe i'll find more of that some other time too but this particular thing i think is was
29:34
really kind of the the i don't know the thing for me um christine says
29:41
the kind of bold courageous love that you ladies exhibit as you hold space for each other
29:47
is total hashtag life goals hashtag just saying
29:52
three hearts thanks christina thanks christine a regular uh listener of ours yes
30:00
so happy to see you um journey over to over to another season with us
30:07
so christine does this time frame work better for you than the morning time
30:12
i know she um was working sometimes on the when we were together during the day so
30:18
so that's something else you can let us know you know if we if there's a that this time slot's
30:23
better if you like the daytime better we're going to continue with this through this season but as we're
30:29
building and and as we continue to learn how to do life together
30:35
we want to make sure that we can share as much of ourselves with you guys as we can yeah and you know i think maybe we are
30:42
and again as always we love to hear what you all would like to hear from us whether tonight or in future
30:48
conversations but i think i think for me i'm probably a lot more
30:53
better prepared and ready you know to be able to talk about some of the nitty-gritty stuff in a way in
31:00
which maybe we each can share our perspectives um
31:05
without um and just doing that you know like just sharing our perspectives
31:11
um and uh yeah we'll see how that goes huh
31:18
i mean i feel from my perspective yeah i mean i feel really um light and ready and so light that my shirt won't
31:24
stay on but
31:30
you know when when you have a breakthrough like that i feel that that there is a
31:35
a lifting like a lifting of a burden that that comes off you know that's kind of a spiritual thing but you can
31:41
physically feel it and i think that's what you're describing you know i can feel when after we had our conversation
31:46
today i was like oh it it's i felt like whatever was in between us keeping us from that that
31:52
deeper conversation because remember we used to have some pretty deep conversations yeah and they kind of just
31:58
just have kind of there we've had conversations because we're both committed to walking and being in relationship
32:05
together and although over the last couple of months those uh relationships were a little bit shallower
32:11
um we because we still had them and so i'm so looking forward to
32:16
um that being lifted so that we can move forward and continue to
32:22
um share with one another at a deeper level right and i had thought you know and uh
32:28
i thought yeah i don't know just like because because we did kind of i don't remember what i was gonna say
32:33
with that but christine says that um she has a more open schedule now
32:40
oh that's awesome i think this time works fine for her
32:50
so how's the time shift how are you handling that bonnie you've got a three-hour difference right
32:57
uh yeah yeah and it's i mean it was wild because and it's i think partially like
33:03
i don't know because like i when i left you know i i got maybe like two hours of sleep i got up at 3 33 in
33:10
the morning because you know i'm that girl and you know was the airport by 4 30 then on a plane and then last night i
33:17
fell asleep like i think 8 30 here at night which is like
33:22
5 30 you know and then i slept through until like seven six o'clock this morning this time
33:30
so it was like i was tired so yeah i think that helped reset me to where now i'm like okay i'm
33:36
on the regular schedule you know like it feels like 8 30. that's cool
33:42
so you don't have too much jet lag or anything today i slept it all away
33:50
yes yes yes um cool cool so next so yeah i'm like i really feel
33:57
like it's just like i think i'm still kind of shifting in my mind like um
34:02
there's just been such a shift um and you know like i never i find it
34:07
really hard to like ugly cry and like really like get that way but i was able to get that
34:14
away with you earlier and it was just like it just so i don't know
34:20
just sometimes it doesn't happen you know yeah it's it's cleansing i think
34:25
it's very cleansing ugly ugly cry once well crying is crying was something
34:31
that's been really difficult for me because i had a problem with crying as a kid and i would always
34:37
start crying when i was a kid and like everyone like i couldn't control it and then it would just
34:44
it'd be really uncomfortable because people would get upset and mad and then it would make me even more uncomfortable
34:49
and it was like really wild and i think over time i just learned not to cry you know i learned
34:55
no i learned to avoid things that made me cry [Laughter]
35:00
it's not funny i don't know about you but when i make a choice to not do something or to do something or whatever
35:06
and i'm not telling anybody all the stuff that's going on in my head you have that like that voice constantly
35:13
going i'm not doing that nope you're not i'm not doing that nope that's gonna and it's amazing to me even as as
35:19
a mature christian woman how much that still happens you know i'm like okay
35:26
i'm not doing that no i'm not gonna do that i'm not going to say that i'm not going to stare i'm going to be happy i'm
35:31
not going to be that grumpy it's in my head all the time right and it's it's amazing to me how
35:38
that that self-talk is still and it's not all the the good self-talk that you're supposed to have i still struggle
35:44
with that that being consciously um aware of what i'm thinking before i say
35:50
it and it's not easy sometimes but i was hoping that as i got more mature
35:56
i would kind of not have to do that or grow out of that a little bit because sometimes i feel like who is that voice in my head i don't don't want to hear it
36:03
anymore i've definitely it's been nice to be in a place in which i know it's a lot less
36:09
and i often can identify when it's happening and can sometimes either rephrase what i
36:15
just said or you know oftentimes it's the thinking in my head um
36:21
that i have to like alter or stop or whatever because i
36:26
was noticing with my depression um i was really struggling with depression and i feel like part of that
36:32
was is that my thinking like i would feel a way that i didn't think i should should feel
36:38
which was sad or mad or whatever because i was actually like dealing with some of my childhood drama
36:45
and then um and then i would get mad at myself saying oh you shouldn't or you should be older you're too old to for
36:51
this you're too like that and um and then it would just be the cycle you know the thoughts would make me feel
36:58
shitty then i'd feel shitty and then the thoughts would just get worse and then i was just noticing that
37:03
either the thoughts would start that and then the emotions would follow or the emotions would follow and then you know
37:08
and i was just noticing how how connected they were and if i could just stop
37:14
the um the thoughts um i think that's something i've been really trying because i think in the
37:19
past i was subconsciously just stopping the emotion yeah yeah and i think i need more experience
37:26
and feeling the emotions than i do letting thoughts
37:32
run their course yeah that's that's interesting yeah yeah i was doing some um just kind of a side
37:38
note here um so i'd like to do word studies sometimes and and visual
37:44
study of different things and i when understanding that certain visual things help me respond differently
37:50
to different things like when i see a coffee cup i automatically want a cup of coffee it doesn't matter if there's
37:56
coffee in that cup or not if someone's holding it i want a cup of coffee and then what i do when i drink coffee is i usually read
38:02
so then i'm like oh i just want to sit and read and drink my coffee and it's such a no matter what i'm doing in the
38:07
middle of the day but that's that's not the only thing i realize i have preconceived emotions or responses
38:13
emotional responses to different things different scenarios different scents
38:18
and um it's amazing and i think what you're talking about there you're intentional
38:24
about okay if i can manage the thought portion some of the rest of this stuff will will follow so i think that's key
38:31
and it goes beyond sometimes those things that will trigger aren't always just an emotion it's well
38:37
uh something that triggers an emotion that gets those thoughts going yeah
38:43
elizabeth says all feelings are valid they are all drag is too just saying
38:50
[Laughter] yeah all feelings are valid you just have to manage them right
38:56
well and i think that their information i think they are things that can help us it's just like what information are we
39:01
gonna take from it and what what does it mean i know for me i i had to gain a literacy
39:08
of what i was feeling and what was it about um and and and sometimes try not
39:14
to change it sometimes i needed to soothe it or attend to it but i didn't necessarily need to change it or run
39:20
from it or numb myself from it like i would do in the past
39:26
um vexed confidant says a lot of times our patterns with
39:31
um anxiety and how we taught ourselves to survive aren't as good for us as we
39:37
thought they'd be a lot of trans folks notice that when they start hrt
39:42
they are able to feel their emotions more as well as feel grounded in their bodies
39:49
i love that and i would have to say that i have not had
39:57
much of a relationship with my body i have not been in my body much until i started
40:03
embracing the fact that i was trans and started actually being in my body and taking care of my
40:09
body and having a relationship with my body in a way that i'd never had before and then through that yeah
40:16
you know our body holds it holds things it holds our story
40:23
and as we i think be with our body those things come out especially
40:29
for for someone who hasn't who isn't aware of her body and you know what i mean like i just haven't
40:36
ever i very rarely fully like in my body
40:41
spirit you know all that sort of stuff so but doing yeah i was like trying to just think about
40:47
emotions in some ways i just feel so much better
40:53
with all of it i was super moody and emotional before before i started hormones so in some
41:00
ways i feel more like tempered or grounded or balanced
41:07
um whether that has to do with the hormones or just where i'm at right now i don't know but
41:14
huh interesting so it's it's so interesting how um
41:19
how hormones do impact things like i was really surprised at um
41:26
yeah i was surprised that my um my uh that hormones would impact my
41:32
sexuality um and it has kind of it has kind of impacted my sexual
41:39
sexuality in some ways um i feel like in some ways it's allowed me to be a little bit more expressive
41:46
and also like it's just different um
41:51
uh especially like when it like probably more than what we need to talk about but like just as far as like libido and how
41:58
much sex i think about or what kind of sex or what sort of relationships that sort of stuff it's
42:04
it's all very different again i i do think that hormones do have a little bit to do with that
42:10
but i do also think by the time i decided to take hormones
42:17
i just making that decision i think is huge and it puts your mind
42:24
it puts everything in a in a different space and so i think it's i don't know that it's just one thing i
42:30
think it's kind of a combination of all those things um that have you know
42:36
kind of allow me to be where i'm at right now well i'm i'm excited to see
42:43
what the next season this season actually because you just started a new season of your life looks like and how all
42:50
those previous seasons are going to come into play as they have positioned you for what happens next
42:57
yeah well and did we start our we started the podcast when i because i left my job about a year ago now where
43:03
did we start the podcast after or while i was still at my old job i think you were still working not very long after
43:10
okay so we've been doing this maybe not maybe you had just left your job
43:15
okay yeah so wild how time is time has flown but
43:20
and again it's like those are some of those trajectories like i always i said i was going to do a queer chaplain and i
43:26
wanted a queer chaplain to be national and you know and like that's happening
43:32
and i saw that coming years ago but i didn't realize it was happening as
43:39
it was happening do you know what i mean like it just it's just kind of unfolding in a way
43:44
again that i would not have ever um
43:50
created on my own yeah yeah yeah oh boy i think we're awesome
43:56
we're at our 45 minutes so okay do you want to um say some like
44:01
summarize some things or say something before we go before i do all the say something profound i don't know if i
44:08
have anything profoundly so i just wanted to say we appreciate you guys taking time with us to just i don't know hang out a
44:14
little bit um hear a little bit about our story we hope it's uplifting for you guys and and we just encourage you you
44:20
know we want to be part of the conversation if there's some questions you have for us if there's some specific things you want
44:26
to know about who we are how we think about things uh life we're we're willing to have
44:31
those conversations so um you honor us by being here with us you honor us by listening to the podcast
44:37
after the facts so thank you for that and i look forward to being back with you guys next week thanks bonnie
44:44
yes thank you thank you so so much and if you're coming across this for the first time wherever you're listening to
44:49
us or watching us take a moment and follow or subscribe or
44:54
join or whatever those things are that you're doing on the platform that you're on and if you heard something that um
45:02
i don't know that spoke to we'd love to hear it um and um if you know someone who might do well
45:07
to listen to this podcast um please feel free to share it i know sometimes we have these intimate conversations and it
45:14
feels like that's something that's just for us but we trust that you would pass it off
45:20
to someone else who could benefit or hopefully gain something from it in the same way that that you have and we have
45:27
so we will see you next week if you do join us live on thursday
45:33
uh september or 2nd i think is it september 2nd
45:38
why did i even go there i don't know i know next thursday i'm sorry like it's the
45:44
thursday after the 19th of august which is today um we'll see you then at 5 30 p.m
45:52
pacific standard time uh thanks so much uh cheryl for the thank
45:57
you and um is that it
46:03
yeah all right bye-bye splintered grace podcast
46:09
is brought to you by a queer chaplain follow us on all of our social medias
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46:22
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