Two Merry Widows and a Thrice Divorcee

How we live with anxiety after the loss of our loved ones

• Laura Mazelis, Brig Miles, Judy Beck • Episode 2

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On this episode we will discuss how we are coping with anxiety after a loss, or not coping, whichever the case may be.

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Laura Mazelis:

Welcome back to the two merry widows and a thrace divorcee. We are here today with me, laura Bridge and Judy best buds. Okay, we, I think our subject today will be something along the lines of how we live with anxiety after the loss of our loved ones. I think the person that should go first is Judy. What do you think?

Brig Miles:

Oh, anxiety. Well, how did I deal with my anxiety? I joined a kickboxing club. Yeah, a gym, A kickboxing gym, that's a very healthy way of dealing with anxiety. Well, it took me it only took me a month to make the decision to do it. But I was really struggling to cope with the loss because it was very unexpected. And so I went and joined a kickboxing club, a gym, and I took my anxiety, my aggression, my anger, all my emotions out on the bag and I went 17 days straight and then I got hooked.

Judy Beck:

I was going to say you went for longer than 17 days.

Brig Miles:

No, that was the first like the first month, the first time, the very first session I did. I lasted 45 minutes and I honestly thought I was going to die. I was like in the locker room thinking they're going to have to call 911 and they're going to have to take me out of here on a stretcher and I'm going to be so embarrassed because I'm so out of shape and I'm so unhealthy. And then I went 17,. I made a commitment and I went 17 days straight. I was hooked. And then I was going all the time. I was doing two days I was going at least five days a week.

Laura Mazelis:

Are you keeping it?

Brig Miles:

keeping it up now. No, I injured my shoulder and my anything. I had to do any stroke I had to do with my right side. I couldn't do it anymore. I couldn't do my, I couldn't do push-ups, I couldn't do anything. So I stopped going. But I did it for almost two years. For two years I did it.

Judy Beck:

Wow, I thought it was a fair amount of time that you were going.

Brig Miles:

Yeah, and it was probably one of the healthiest it was. I couldn't get into therapy. I called several places and nobody was calling me back. I'm like I had that problem and unless I I mean unless you're going to say you're suicidal what do you do? You know, and I didn't think I was, I knew I wasn't suicidal, but I was very heavily depressed. So I went to my primary doctor and he put me on anxiety medication and he told me to keep up going to the gym because whatever I was doing was working, especially because I had some other health issues going on and I was starting to see positive results towards those other health issues. And man, I'm telling you it was. It was better than therapy.

Judy Beck:

Cathartic, it was very cathartic, very cathartic.

Brig Miles:

Punching that back yes, it was, and we now have a we call it the I love kickboxing ladies and we will get together once, usually once every couple months, and we'll have a wine on Wednesday. I love it, or something like that. We'll go meet it, we'll go meet at the happy hour and have dinner or go have dinner with each other, and it's really nice, that's really awesome, you know. So we, that was like my family, because I was my home away from home, I mean I was going. Oh, I mean any opportunity I got, I went and it really really helped. And then the I'm not going to lie the antidepressants help too.

Judy Beck:

That's a very healthy, productive way, though, to deal with anxiety going to the gym.

Brig Miles:

I was always afraid of going on antidepressants because you know there's always a stigma with it, especially back in the day. You know your own pros, accurate, crazy type thing. And then you know there's always the side effect of weight gain and all the other negative effects of it. But I have had none of the negative effects of it and I even asked my doctor if I could stay on it a little bit longer and he's like oh, you can stay on this stuff for as long as you want. There's really the side effects are very, very the long-term side effects aren't there. There's nothing that's bad, that could. At least that's what he told me. We'll see.

Judy Beck:

How do you deal with your anxiety, laura Well?

Laura Mazelis:

in the beginning just do everything until it was done. But I think what I did because I also have my son Max to think about was I turned Al's man cave, literally ripped out everything. Sofa's 80s stereo equipment, pulled it all out. I even called 1-800 God Junk, can I say that on here?

Judy Beck:

Or you know. Oh, this is not an advertisement.

Laura Mazelis:

But they were a fabulous, because there's no way I could have hauled that all of that.

Judy Beck:

So what'd you do with all this stereo equipment? You just let them take it.

Laura Mazelis:

No, I actually took that to the dump myself because it was. You know, nowadays with Bluetooth and you know the advanced, forget it.

Judy Beck:

It just made so much more sense there are some junkies out there, I think, who like that kind of stuff. I don't Fine, I get that and you know if you've got to get rid of it, if you have to get rid of it, you've got to get rid of it.

Laura Mazelis:

And when I got rid of it I felt like yeah. So we gutted out the basement and I turned it into a gym for Max so that he could have a place. If he couldn't get to the gym because I couldn't drive him at the time, he had at least a bag to beat on.

Brig Miles:

Right.

Laura Mazelis:

So we did that for anxiety. I finally it took me a while to find a therapist that I liked. I had to poor fella. He sound like he was very young and I wanted to talk about adult relationships. I'm like I can't do this with you, sir. And he completely understood, because they, you know, they understand that the relationship needs to be there in order for you know full, you know, recovery Right. So I finally found somebody that I chimed with and Online.

Judy Beck:

Or this was in person.

Laura Mazelis:

Actually, I was able to take my first you know session with her in person, and then we realized that you know hey we could do this online.

Laura Mazelis:

It's no big deal and a piece of cake really. So those are some of the things that I did. I did get into. It took me a while, though. I was in a funk for maybe about six months, like a real funk. I couldn't do anything. I drank, I ate everything, you know, because food was my little warm blanket, my security blanket, and it just spiraled out of control and I was like I need some focus. And so I joined a program and it did help me lose the weight. I started in August. By January I was to the weight that I wanted to be and I've pretty much maintained it since then.

Laura Mazelis:

But I realized what health, what a huge factor it is to get me feeling better, not only physically but mentally, and having a reason and how to follow a diet and how to, you know, do things right. And then, when I was working out, I felt better and it's like I really wanted to hate it. You know I wanted to hate working out and be like, ah, it's not for me. But now I had to be real with myself. I feel pretty good right now, you know it's a love hate relationship.

Brig Miles:

You can, you'd love to hate it, you hate to love it, but once you get into it, it's pretty amazing.

Laura Mazelis:

See, I love walking. I love walking and biking. I can't run, I don't have the knees for it or the breath.

Brig Miles:

Yeah, I've decided my running days are way, way past. You did used to run, yeah, when I, when I left husband number two, running was my therapy and painting and art and create crafting was my Therapy. When I left my second husband and I did, I had a little run group. I had a group of girls that I would meet at 530 in the morning and go running and yeah. But I just can't do that anymore. My legs, my knees can't, can't handle it, my feet can't. My feet couldn't handle it. I had to have that surgery because I ruptured my plantar effect, my plantar plate on my, the tendon on my foot and and then the tendon in my ankle from, you know, rolling my ankle from wearing my platform sexy hot shoes.

Brig Miles:

Cobblestone streets of Annapolis.

Judy Beck:

Stones of Annapolis not not a match. Sexy shoes and cobblestones not a good match.

Brig Miles:

Yes, that sideline me for a while too, and I just Takes a while to get back into the groove of exercising. So that's why going back for me was important. But it did take me, to take me a while to get in there. But once I, once I committed, I was full on but and I loved it. But then the gym's not the same. They had a lot of turnover and it just wasn't didn't have the same meaning anymore. So I Do have another members gym membership. I just haven't really gotten it back into it yet.

Laura Mazelis:

It took me a while to understand that I was not a gym membership type of person. I have one, just in case. Max was like, hey, let's go together, be like, okay, no problem, but it's, it's such a low fee that it's I'm willing to be, I'm happy to help at a local gym because the fee is so Like whoa, like, I kid you not. Anyway, he loves it, right, he drives there all the time by him, you know, by himself, or with his friends, and so it's like a second hangout. So I'm really glad that. Oh yeah, but let's just talk about and of course I want to take this to you, bridge the anxiety question, but also the idea of just finding the flow. Again, your flow has been so messed up that just finding your day-to-day is a whole new adventure. But anyway, bridge, what do you think? How do you Overcome your anxiety?

Judy Beck:

Well, I think I'm being very quiet because I don't. I'm not at that point at all. I don't think Judy knows. I mean, I have Anxieties, ever, everything, I worry about everything, I ruminate on everything and and Generally I don't have a solution for them. Sometimes Judy comes over and solves it for me, like when things are falling apart in my house and I really need help. I have social anxiety. I just don't want to go anywhere. I just feel like I Don't know. I just feel like the awkward girl in the room or something, which is not a phobia that I used to have. So I just I have. I guess I'm not really dealing with it very well.

Judy Beck:

I like to stay home, you're it, but you are therapy, I am in therapy. Um, I Did find a therapist online we meet over zoom and I think I was really fortunate because she was the first person that I matched up with on this online therapy and we just clicked and I really love her and I've probably been doing the online therapy with her for it's been over a year now it's probably closer to a year and a half, yeah, and? And well, I have had others, not with this particular online site and not for this particular issue. I was dealing.

Judy Beck:

I don't know why I was I'm, I don't know why I was in therapy this time, the previous time, and it was in person and we just didn't click at all, so I just stopped and then, you know, months and months or years my timelines all forgotten, I don't remember I Hooked up with this person online one of these online Therapy sites, over zoom, and we just clicked, so it, that's been good, that's actually really been good, and I look forward to to our therapy sessions, because I just opened up my laptop and then we talk, and so it's that's pretty cool, pretty cool, and she's helped me with a you know some major things that I needed to Overcome that I just couldn't do on my own, and other than that, I just struggle. I'm still struggling with the with anxiety.

Brig Miles:

I Don't think anxiety ever goes away. I think it's how you, how you manage, manage it and cope with it, and what Mechanisms you have in place to deal with it. Like us, maybe you hitting your bicycle, or you taking a walk, you Scheduling an emergency meeting with your therapist, or you'd sending me a meme that says thank God, thank you for the free therapy sessions.

Judy Beck:

That is true. Yeah, I do unload on my bestie all the time, but, um, but those are all coping mechanisms.

Brig Miles:

Mechanisms, you know, because I don't think, because there's always going to be stressors and there's always going to be anxiety, and For you guys it could be a simple moment of coming across a photo of something.

Judy Beck:

Anxiety about for a long time After, right after my husband passed was going to the grocery store. I Could not go to the grocery store if I went. There was one particular time I abandoned my cart and left because I was having such an anxiety attack. I couldn't breathe, I was sweating, I had to. I leaned over my cart to hold me up and I was just, you know, taking these really short breaths and I was like I think I'm having a panic attack here in the middle of the damn giant. How long ago was that?

Brig Miles:

It's probably been a year, because I think you called me, then I think you called me when you got in your car, or you called me after and I just was.

Judy Beck:

I and I don't know why, but I had a very hard time for a very long while because I would go through the grocery store and I would put my hands on things, or I would look at things that were on sale and try to Then think about buying them and putting them in my cart. Stuff that only my husband would eat, like canned chili I'm not eating that, I'm not eating that, but he would. He liked it. So I would buy, buy that for him, and if I saw it on sale I'd be like, oh, let me get some of that. Wait, I Don't need to buy that. What am I? You know, I'm not gonna buy that anymore. There's no one at home to eat it.

Judy Beck:

So the grocery store was hard for me and I was very Regimented in my grocery schedule. I went every Sunday morning, figured out for the most part, figured out what up, what we were gonna eat For the week, what I was gonna cook, and I would go every Sunday morning and go to the grocery store. And after he passed it took a very long. I mean it's been two and a half to two, almost two and a half years, a little over two years now. I I don't feel those anxieties when I'm in the store. I still think about them sometimes when the damn canned chilies on sale, but I don't have the anxiety of, oh my god, I'm about to pick that up. No, wait, don't pick that up.

Laura Mazelis:

I have a similar story. Shortly after he passed, I kicked you out. Within a week. I had to go grocery shopping, whether I liked it or not, and I went to a supermarket and I saw the very thing that was his favorite. It was a crab pretzel and I just stood there and my face swelled up, my eyes started to water and I'm like I am standing in the middle of a grocery store having a moment and I'm alone.

Judy Beck:

A meltdown over a pretzel Like crab pretzel.

Laura Mazelis:

They were delicious. But yeah, I remember that and every single time I go there they always have those damn pretzels out. I mean, I'm now not swelling up and having a moment, but still you're just like. That was his favorite.

Judy Beck:

Right, it still comes to mind Same thing. Like I can walk by the can chili now and whatever else. I mean he ate a lot of things that I wouldn't eat and I can walk by them and just be like, oh, that was MK's favorite and continue my shopping, whereas two years ago I would have meltdowns, complete meltdowns in the store, to the point where I have left the store before Abandoned my cart. Gotta go, gotta get out of here.

Laura Mazelis:

I get it, I totally get it.

Judy Beck:

I was gonna say so. I don't know if that's dealing with anxiety or handling anxiety, or, but those are some of the anxious moments that I've had.

Laura Mazelis:

But in that you have grown since then. Listen to yourself. You just said that you had a hard time in the beginning, and now you're able to walk a path.

Judy Beck:

Right.

Laura Mazelis:

That's a step.

Judy Beck:

It's one of those things where you know it really is just time and people hate to hear that and it's not time. You know time heals all wounds. I don't believe that, but I think time helps you learn to just deal with the wound. You, you're able. It gets softened a little. It's not, you know, it's not as hard inside where you're just like I can't function. You just, it's still there. You think about it, but you just continue to live your life. Time will help you continue on, because you have to continue on. You have to. I eventually had to go to this grocery store. I was eating junk food all the time.

Brig Miles:

There's only so much Uber can deliver.

Judy Beck:

There's only so much delivery. Exactly, exactly.

Brig Miles:

That's why I don't go to the grocery store. I let the grocery store shop for me and I just go pick my groceries up.

Laura Mazelis:

Yeah, I'm. I think I'm going to start doing that because I don't know about you, but my sister just told me this week, laura, you have some lofty goals, lofty lofty lofty.

Judy Beck:

I think we've told you that before too.

Laura Mazelis:

Yeah, and again it comes back to me doing too much where I'm trying to skirt the issues. And this week my therapist actually said something to me where it kind of stopped me in my tracks, just like are you mad at me, are you upset? I'm like no, I just don't know how to respond.

Judy Beck:

Your therapist asked you if you were mad at your therapist.

Laura Mazelis:

It was. It was more like does that upset you? Yeah, that kind of thing. I was like no, I just don't know how to respond. And you know it's it's it's their job to smack you in the face every once in a while, yeah, it is.

Brig Miles:

It should be a therapist. It is Hmm, hey man. My mom always said I was in the wrong profession. Oh to tell. She always told me I had a very um an insight, that I could really read people well and I had a good instincts when it came to people.

Judy Beck:

She wanted you to be a fortune teller.

Brig Miles:

No, she just thought. She just thought. She just thought I understood people and she's like you. Should have been a therapist, although I certainly am not a matchmaker.

Laura Mazelis:

Well, you are a bartender, correct.

Brig Miles:

I do bartend with one of the catering companies that.

Laura Mazelis:

I work for. Yes, okay, well, that was a, a superpower of Al's, my husband. He really could read a room. He could always, uh, man, it was just sick, it was just off the charts.

Laura Mazelis:

Weird how I swear he must have been psychic on some level because he could just I don't know what work a room.

Laura Mazelis:

He could get them all fired up, he would flare his bottles and then, you know, he would just take care of business and he would just know who to talk to, who not to talk to, and, um, he could always seem to understand people on their own level. Um, like, for instance, I know this sounds silly, but he was so eclectic when he loved his music, his music so eclectic, every, every song you knew the worst to. And he would talk to anybody at the bar and just like, wrap it out or just sing along, and you know, he just wow, it was, it was amazing to see, wow, see that. But bartenders have an amazing ability, if they're good, um, to handle their shift, handle it well and to make sure that, uh, the bar is never out of control, because you know there's some people out there who like to cause a ruckus. But he would handle business and, uh, do it well and people enjoyed him very much and I miss that. I really do.

Brig Miles:

Second husband was a bartender part-time.

Laura Mazelis:

Okay.

Brig Miles:

That was kind of how we met, but I don't know that he was very he wasn't like like I was younger, did you?

Judy Beck:

I did for several years and I was a good bartender and they would come back to see me Because you know of my linguistic skill. Oh, wow, yeah. You know, I mean, I just I was good at talking to people. Yeah, yeah, I really was.

Brig Miles:

And that's why we got to socialize you more. I know I've I and I feel like I could tell you have anxiety and I and like I don't like really big crowds anymore. I hate crowds. I'm just like. I'm just like, I'm just like Post COVID.

Laura Mazelis:

Yes, correct Post COVID yeah.

Brig Miles:

Mine has nothing to do with COVID, mine is just people.

Judy Beck:

It's a social anxiety. I don't want to be anywhere where I feel too crowded.

Brig Miles:

Well, I think my crowdedness started before COVID, but then after COVID it was from being so isolated for so long I'm like I really don't know if I like people.

Judy Beck:

Oh, I know, I don't.

Brig Miles:

And then I'm like but I miss people and then I have my peeps that I do hang out with. But yeah, don't. But I know when you're, when I'm out with you, you tend to get a little antsy sometimes when you're in a crowd. Yeah, I do If you're in a crowd. I can tell you start to get uncomfortable, I do. And I can tell when you're ready to go, I do. That's a gift.

Judy Beck:

Knowing when we're ready. That I'm knowing when I'm ready, it's true, but and I didn't used to be like that- Well, is it because?

Laura Mazelis:

do you think it's? I mean, yes, because of circumstances, but do you think now, at our age, that we're just tired of the bull?

Judy Beck:

Well, it could be that too, because I don't necessarily know. So for me, the hanging out and hanging out where there's crowds and you know, you sent me that poster about someone was having a Halloween party on Saturday and I was immediately like I am not interested. Oh, yeah. I knew there was going to be a crowd, and it was.

Brig Miles:

Whereas, yeah, I want to go with you last night.

Judy Beck:

Going to get you know rowdy and I'm like I just can't do it, but I don't necessarily think that that happened because of Mike's death. I think that was just me getting older. And one of the things with that is I like the fact that I was now married and settled down because I really didn't have to go out to the crowded places. I mean, I still I don't have to if I don't want to but it's different when you're married.

Judy Beck:

Yeah, just like. Well, I can sit in the. Even if you go to a crowded place with your husband, I can sit in this corner with my husband, or my husband can go run off and I can sit in the corner, right, and you know, just watch, and that's fine. But it's different when you're single. I feel like I don't know, it's a different vibe.

Brig Miles:

Well, one of the things that my second husband and I did do is we went out and we partied a lot. We went out drinking and hanging out at bars and he loved to karaoke, I love to listen to him sing so we did a lot of that kind of social interaction. And then when we moved out and we bought our own house and we didn't have that extra cash flow to be able to do that, because now we had, now we had to be growing up, so we had to pay, pay our bills. I think there came a resentment in that from on his side, because I was no longer fun, because I kind of happened with the third husband too.

Judy Beck:

That's what I'm saying.

Brig Miles:

My third husband. Oh, you said second. Did I say second? I meant my third. Ok, sorry about that. Sorry about that. This was the third husband, not the second I've had, so many, I can't keep track.

Brig Miles:

Blooper, no, yeah, my third husband, yes, no more second husband and I know, third husband, and I think that that was what caused the that he drifted apart. We drifted apart because he never wanted to give up that lifestyle and he wasn't he's not capable of giving up that, while he wasn't, when he was with me, capable of giving up that lifestyle, nor did he want to give up that lifestyle, and he made that abundantly clear through his actions that he was not going to give up that lifestyle and started going back to places that we used to go together without me. And you know it was hurtful and you know, and he was, you know, sneaking the alcohol in the house and hiding it from me and spending more time like he had a camper, the. The idea of the camper was so he could travel.

Brig Miles:

Well, he sat out in the camper every night and drank and smoked and he'd come in at three, four o'clock in the morning. I'm like, don't come in the house and wake me up, because you're, because you come in the house, and then he turns around and gets up at five, thirty in the morning to go to work. I'm like, you know, that would upset me too. You're going to stay. If you're going to stay, if you want to stay out in the camper and drink to you, you pass out and do that. But don't wake up and then come in the room and then be angry because I'm asleep with the dogs in the bed or something stupid, you know.

Judy Beck:

Right, you guys, really, you guys really had a lifestyle shift. Yes, where you shifted right for reasons.

Brig Miles:

I shifted for reasons and he didn't want to.

Brig Miles:

Right. And he, he felt that just because I had to shift, for for reasons that it shouldn't affect his lifestyle and what he failed to realize that it was our lifestyle. It was. It was now, where's the team? Where's the team in it? You know where's where's? And sickness and in health, you know richer or poorer, where were those vows? You know that we were going to, that we were going to. You know, be each other's ride or die, you know. Well, you, you know the ride got hard, you got off.

Laura Mazelis:

Right Is really what happened.

Brig Miles:

Right, which is fine. I mean I look back now and I'm better off.

Judy Beck:

But you know, and now I have that, and he made it seemed like you were doing something wrong, right, when you were not doing anything wrong, right. I mean, there were valid reasons why your life and lifestyle changed and none of them are, or anything that that that's that out of the ordinary for a lot of couples, right? But he was just like I don't care, right, I'm going to still drink and smoke, with or without you, and then I'm going to.

Brig Miles:

I'm going to hang out, I'm going to hang out with my single friends. Yeah, you know, go out. Go out in the middle of the night on their boat and very unsupportive.

Judy Beck:

He was very unsupportive of you.

Brig Miles:

I mean he would literally drop me off at my doctor's appointments if I had to go in and then go, and then I'll call me when you're ready to be picked up, type thing, right I?

Judy Beck:

mean instead of going with you.

Brig Miles:

Right, instead of going with me. Or I mean, there was a couple of times where I had to drive myself to the emergency room and he was like, let me know if they admit you, type thing, and that was not fun.

Laura Mazelis:

No, not at all that is not fun.

Brig Miles:

And you know, and yeah, and then then comes along. You know that that brought on. So I probably had more anxiety during my marriage or towards the end of my marriage and when he first left, then I do now, Like now I feel like I don't have. I have the probably the normal amount of anxiety, Right?

Judy Beck:

I don't really feel like you suffer from a real anxiety issue.

Brig Miles:

Everyone has the nervousness and the stressors and stuff like that and I think stuff. But yeah, actual anxiety walked out on me and I really have to thank him for that, because he made a decision that I couldn't make yeah, especially after being twice divorced, not about to do it again but he did it for me and that's fine.

Judy Beck:

But so your, your, your anxiety actually was better my anxiety after he left. Yeah after the loss after the your husband after the recovery of the loss.

Brig Miles:

Recovered. That is true, because I did. It did take me a good six months to recover from that loss, yeah, but I think we're. I think we're all healing and getting better and that's why we're all together. That's what brought us all together. It's so exciting.

Laura Mazelis:

Learning how to deal with anxiety. It's an everyday occurrence. It's not like just on the weekends, no, it's every single day. I have to be cognizant of my mood and how to be the better person because, honestly, down on my deep dark crevices, I really want to be the better person and I really want to move forward in Just better. I just want to move forward better. And how do I do that? And Anxiety just seems to take that chunk. Does that even make sense?

Judy Beck:

yes, it does make sense because it will take over your mind and your thought processes. And you're just, I Find I get stuck, you guys.

Brig Miles:

I think you guys, you get stuck like that hamster. On that I do.

Judy Beck:

I mean I think you guys like Doing the DIY projects and stuff. I'm so jealous. But I can do stuff like that when I feel better. When I don't feel good, I Don't want to do anything, I get stuck, I sit, I watch TV right and people Don't understand that most people, not my good friends that that's coming from a place of Anxiety and overwhelming. This is that a word, because when I have, when I feel good, when I wake up and I have a good day, I get a lot accomplished. But when I'm having those overwhelming feelings of a sadness, anxiety, depression I get, I can't do anything and I don't know.

Brig Miles:

That's why I say come on, bridge, just go and Sunday and go for a ride.

Judy Beck:

Yeah, and I have some condenses the Jeep, y'all they try to. They try to pull me out of it, which is a good thing, but I and I get stuck in my own mind, ruminating anxious, and then I get stuck physically ruminating anxious.

Laura Mazelis:

Have you thought of? I don't know? Just writing a list, I know this on a done list but the list of this is what I'm do. I'm gonna do when I get out of my funk. Yeah, you know lots of lists.

Judy Beck:

Yeah, some with things checked off and some without, like sending that text message.

Brig Miles:

Oh yeah, are we ready to do that? I think so.

Laura Mazelis:

I think so. Is there inside joke here?

Judy Beck:

Well, it's not really a joke I have. I have a text message that I need to send to my husband's Brothers and for some reason I'm paralyzed. It's not?

Brig Miles:

even that big of a deal.

Judy Beck:

But I'm paralyzed and I've been ruminating on it Literally since June that I need to let them know that they need yes come get this dad, okay, so literally it's been since June. We're almost in November. I just can't bring my fingers to do it. So that's why Judy offered hers. So Judy's gonna send it for me, she's gonna take my phone, she's gonna type my words and we're gonna send it. Because I I'm stuck and that happens to me With a lot of things I just get paralyzed and I don't know is that anxiety?

Brig Miles:

It's gotta be, because I know we hit when you. You had the like, I had no anxiety over getting.

Judy Beck:

One of my lists.

Laura Mazelis:

What to get rid of your anxiety.

Judy Beck:

To send, to send that text. Oh yes, and I've checked off all these other things around it, but I just can't do that.

Laura Mazelis:

So not what I was meaning, though. I like the things that you love, make a list and then, when you're ready to get to them that you won't forget because I have done that, I'll be like okay, I think I'm in the right mood, what do I want to do? So? No, I just want you to feel better. Bridge.

Judy Beck:

Yeah, I'm trying, I'm trying.

Brig Miles:

Am I getting there? You are, you have made, you have made a huge strides, because the first, the first year, was really difficult. I know because I was there for a lot of it and Cleaning out his Storage, his storage bin, was a huge, huge step for you and and you did, you even did a little yard sale thing with some of the stuff. Then that was a huge, very small amount but yes, I did, but I but I was there weak we cleaned out his locker.

Judy Beck:

But I wouldn't have been able to do it on my own, but I guess that's irrelevant. I mean the fact that it got done with the help of my well and and regardless of that, regardless of how or who helped you, it got done.

Brig Miles:

And and if it takes if it takes a village, yeah, it does it, and everything you do, it takes a village. You, sometimes, you, you can't. There's some things that you probably need to do On your own, but then there's things that you just can't do on your own. You need, you need, the motivation of others, like you know, you need, you need the support of others.

Brig Miles:

You know, getting rid of Al stuff. You you called and got stuff out. I, I guarantee you, my son, you got rid of all this stuff. I had this stuff pulled out of the shed and in the driveway and she did well. I didn't care if it got rained or it was rain or shine.

Laura Mazelis:

I'm gonna end this podcast on a very positive yes, and I know that we're dating these episodes. Probably we shouldn't put anyway. Halloween is Tuesday. Okay, I am celebrating my one year of my last surgery of having breast cancer On Halloween. It was on Halloween.

Judy Beck:

I'm not sure I remember that Wow.

Laura Mazelis:

Well, apparently the first surgery a week prior, they did not clear margins. Okay, if you understand what that means Means, the cancer didn't clear those.

Judy Beck:

I didn't take enough tissue right, make sure it wasn't infecting any other tissue, right?

Laura Mazelis:

I do recall that a week later they said we have one opening and it's on Halloween. It's like I don't care, let's just do this. And the only thing I wanted, so bad, was to hand out a piece of candy to one of the kids and, thank God. At like 8 30 pm, one last knocker came. I'm walking up there with a handful of candy and all the tubes are hanging from my ribs.

Judy Beck:

They thought you were the scariest.

Laura Mazelis:

I didn't care very own Frankenstein. I got to hand out that piece of candy. I was gonna end this day on a positive note and I did so.

Judy Beck:

Yes, Yay me. And here we are, a year later, we're getting ready to have like a good Halloween night. We have plans, we've got Jello shots in the works, we've. You know, I mean it's gonna be a good night, it's gonna be a good night. Does anyone have a fire pit that they can carry Portable? You know, I mean it's got to be wish me you know what you could?

Brig Miles:

I have to look because they they have some. They're like single-use ones.

Judy Beck:

Well. So, anyway, you know, in contrast from last year, where Laura was having a surgery, this year we're having a party Not very small.

Laura Mazelis:

I'm looking forward to it. Small but mighty, small but mighty.

Brig Miles:

Thank you for coming, yeah it's gonna be forward to it.

Laura Mazelis:

All right. Well, that concludes our episode. Two of two merry widows in a thrace divorcee. Thank you for joining us and we will see you next time you.