‘I started this personal journey of what I now call “coming home to me.”’

Point Lookout

“My life of loss began the day our young mom left due to childhood wounds of her own, and though her choice deeply impacted us, I have come to understand how losing her own mom at a young age traumatized her. When I was 23, I became a young widow and a single mom resulting from a tragic accident. Later in life, I remarried and gave birth to my third child. Unfortunately, we ended up in divorce, leaving me a single mom of three children. Fast-forward to around my early 40s, and I met somebody new. After five years, we were engaged. It was everything I could have ever wanted at that point in my life: to have family unity in the home and in love. The wedding didn’t come to pass. It threw me into a tailspin, becoming the catalyst in saying, ‘Enough is enough’ and wanting to understand how this loss, along with all other past losses, impacted me.

“I started this personal journey of what I now call ‘coming home to me.’ I went to therapy and also started doing my own research. After watching a video on childhood trauma, everything began to click. Since my 30s, I’ve always written. I don’t have a journalism degree, but I am published, and it’s a part of my journey that I cannot explain. As I started to write about what I was learning, people would reach out to me for information on mental health. Next thing I know, I found myself unemployed. I had nothing to lose.

“There were so many people looking for resources, so I spent the next couple of months working on all the details for our first mental health community resource event at a local library. I did everything for it: I coordinated it, I contacted people, I made the flyer. We had 32 agencies show up. It was more than I even planned. I didn’t have any experience with this. Once I saw how well it worked out, I started coming up with other topics and did 10 presentations over the years. Originally, when I introduced the topic of trauma, the library was hesitant because trauma is not an easy topic to discuss, but I knew it was something I wanted to talk about. It was the most well-attended event. There were no open chairs left. You could hear a pin drop. The speaker had their full attention.”

Because of the wounds we carry, we sometimes hurt people and we don’t mean to do it.

“What I’ve learned, unfortunately, in my life, is that when we have trauma that’s not addressed or healed, we walk around with it. Because of the wounds we carry, we sometimes hurt people and we don’t mean to do it. It’s not an intentional thing. We don’t realize. That’s why childhood trauma, or generational trauma, is prevalent throughout the world. I come from a family of generational wounding, and we were all too young when these traumas happened, and we had no support. Generational trauma can take generations to heal. I want to see families be connected, not detached from each other. We’re getting smarter and starting to understand how the brain works, especially in a child’s developing brain. We need to heal ourselves and our community members. Nobody should have to wait until their 60s to get their act together and understand who they are.

“The last column I wrote was really about how meditation helped me to connect with my inner self, the disconnected part of myself. I did guided meditation, and each time, I became very emotional. That’s when I realized I was connecting to my feelings. I’m coming home to knowing myself again – like really, truly knowing who I am. I’m feeling a love for myself that I haven’t felt most of my life. There’s always been something missing, and that thing I was missing was me. It brings tears to my eyes. Now, I could feel and love myself. I take each day as it comes. I think the beauty of having a voice is to use it to help people. I have nothing to gain by helping other people, except knowing that maybe somebody will be spared some of the pain that I’ve had to live through. It’s a very strange feeling to not know who you are.

“You can go through life not being connected to yourself and feel fine, or believe that you feel fine, but it takes time to reconnect with yourself. Everybody’s journey is unique. I’ve seen peoples’ resilience and other people’s journeys. I know for myself that I took too many hits and too many losses, so I wanted to really understand all of this because I didn’t want to hurt people. Life has taught me the hard way, but this is my journey.”

Instead of faulting each other for the traumas we carry, we should have compassion for the ones we carry, and do whatever we can to help each other. We always have to have hope.

“For those of us who have lost ourselves in childhood, it wasn’t through anything we did. It’s a survival mechanism that takes place. We disassociate and disconnect from ourselves because we were just in survival mode. As a child, we needed healing resources, and that’s what trauma-informed care is about. That’s what I want to focus on going forward. That’s what this journey has been about – learning about traumas and how the brain works and how healing works. It’s a very complex thing. It’s about realizing the power of these unhealed wounds and how they impact our lives. Everybody deserves to be happy, to have self-confidence and high self-esteem and to believe they are worthy of love. People have every right to feel it and to learn how to do that for themselves. People who have childhood trauma and wounds grew up believing that they’re unlovable, and then we make choices based on that without even realizing it’s all subconscious. It’s an issue of trust. We have to learn to trust ourselves first before we can trust any other human being.

“When you’re not available to yourself, you can hurt people. That survival feeling of having to self-protect is always there. I have to try to find ways to bypass that feeling, and I have to take care of myself. That’s why awareness is key and to understand the choices you’re making and why you’re making them. The wall is always there. That doesn’t go away, but now, I don’t want to stay behind that wall. I’m going to try to climb over it to get to the other side because I know there’s something better there. It’s not easy to let that go. It’s been an armor all your life, but it’s not the kind of armor that helps you grow. Some people are suffering so much that they can’t find it, but I just want to see people have happiness. Instead of faulting each other for the traumas we carry, we should have compassion for the ones we carry and do whatever we can to help each other. We always have to have hope.”

Interviewed by Melanie Gulbas

‘I always try to better myself and push myself to do what I love and not let anything get in the way of that, but first I had to learn how.’

Point Lookout

“I originally lived in Merrick, but when my parents got divorced, my mom and I moved to Las Vegas after junior high. I got in with the wrong crowd, dropped out of school in ninth grade and got hooked on methamphetamine. I was addicted for two years, but one day I woke up and was like, ‘What the hell am I doing?’ I wanted to go to rehab, so my mom sent me back to live with my dad in Point Lookout. I always try to better myself and push myself to do what I love and not let anything get in the way of that, but first I had to learn how.

“After coming home, I was a 17-year-old freshman at Long Beach High School, but graduated in two years. I went to day and night school; they let me go to summer school. I went to a class early in the morning and did four years of high school in two years.

“I met my ex-husband in high school. We tried everything in the world to save our marriage, and it was just something that wasn’t doable. Although my ex and I chose to separate for some time, we quickly found out that it would be best to move back in with each other, co-parent and raise our kids together. We became friends and focused on what we created together, realizing our children meant more to us than anything else in the world. We both came from broken homes and did not want the same for them.

“My mother was a single mom, working three jobs and struggling while doing everything in her power to give us the best life. I always know there’s someone there to back me up, so I don’t think I deserve the title of single mother.

“I became a firefighter at 18. I was the only girl at the Point Lookout-Lido Fire Department. My father, grandfather, cousins, uncles and my ex are all firefighters. I joined because my dad had no boys, so I had to keep the family tradition alive, and mother always taught me, ‘Anything boys can do, girls can do better.’ I was up for the challenge. I even ran for fire commissioner at age 21.

“I was also employed as an EMT on an ambulance but have served as a volunteer firefighter since 1999. I once ended up fighting a fire while pregnant with my first son! Some people at the scene were screaming ‘No, you’re pregnant,’ and I was like, ‘But this house is on fire!’

That was the only time I thought I might not make it, like this disease was going to take my whole family away.

“While I was pregnant with my first son, I was feeling like something was wrong, and when I finally found a doctor who would take a chance and give a pregnant woman an MRI, a huge tumor was found right on top of my carotid artery in my head. Surgery while pregnant is risky, so they waited until my son was born. It was a very calcified tumor, so when they broke into it, I bled out and flatlined on the operating table. I ended up needing transfusions during the surgery. In the end, they left the tumor there. It’s benign, so I live with it, but there’s always a chance I could go blind because it’s sitting right behind my optic nerve.”

“When I tried to go back to the fire department, at first I was denied because of the tumor, so I got a lawyer. I fought from June through November of 2004 to get back, and once the lawyer was able to get a neurologist to clear me, I returned to the department, only to soon find I was pregnant with my twins, so I had to leave again.

“Years later, when my oldest was 15 and my twins were 12, I would be diagnosed with Stage 3 rectal cancer at the age of 38. I was having problems with my head tumor, which was making my eyeball protrude from my face for no apparent reason, and an MRI found new tumors around my maxillary sinus. The doctors didn’t want to touch those after what happened during my previous surgery, and I naturally started stressing out. I developed stomach issues and started bleeding, so I thought I might have a stress ulcer, but after a colonoscopy, they found the rectal cancer.

“On top of that, my father and aunt were also suffering from cancer at the same time. I was diagnosed on April 8 of 2019. My father passed on July 1 that year, and then my aunt died Aug. 30. Between treatments, I was flying down to see them, doing my best to take care of them. I was literally laying on top of my dad as he took his last breath. That was the only time I thought I might not make it, like this disease was going to take my whole family away.

“Can you imagine how hard that was? Fighting for my own life while watching them lose theirs?

Not many people can say they love what they do, but this lady here has been given a third chance at life, and I wouldn’t change a second of it.

“Luckily, my doctors were positive about the whole thing, saying that I was going to beat this, and my ex-husband, my family, my friends and the whole Point Lookout community supported me. I was rarely not smiling through the whole process. In the end, it gave me hope and made me realize what life was all about. I just got my second scan in October, and it was clear. I am now two years in remission.

“Due to complications from the brain tumor, I was having double vision and couldn’t drive. At that point, we decided I should be a stay-at-home mom. I was grateful, but quickly realized it was the toughest job ever. I had worked as a firefighter and on an ambulance as an EMT, but nothing was harder mentally than being in charge of a household. I was raising three beautiful children, cooking, cleaning and doing laundry for seven years, but when a restaurant opened only three blocks away from my house I thought it was a perfect opportunity to get a mommy’s-night-out kind of job for a couple of nights a week. I started as a server, but over time I realized I had more to offer. I started working more, and it became a job I loved, where I can walk through the doors and all my problems would go away. Fast-forward nine years to 2021, and the owners of the restaurant trusted me and made me the general manager in September, perfectly timed with my onset of midlife crisis.”

“At the same time, while I never lost my certifications to work in the fire department, I decided in November to go back to school and take the training again. I’m actually going with my firstborn, who is also joining the department. Despite being sick, I always kept up my certifications to be a Class A firefighter, but I don’t feel comfortable running into a burning building right now as things have changed over the past 15 years, so I’m taking the class so I can feel confident walking back into those firehouse doors again.

“Not many people can say they love what they do, but this lady here has been given a third chance at life, and I wouldn’t change a second of it. Everything happens for a reason. I’m one of the lucky ones to find my purpose.”

‘The moment I began dance classes I said, ‘This is what my body is supposed to do.’ Dance fit my body.’

Point Lookout

“I am a performer extraordinaire with 35 years in show business. It started when I was 5 and I became a competitive swimmer. I swam in three junior Olympics.’ My focus switched to gymnastics at the age of 7 when I discovered that I could throw my body through the air! I taught myself how to flip on my front lawn from a book about gymnastics.

“At 15, I happened to be at my little sister’s dance recital. They did ‘Thriller.’ I said, ‘I can do that!’ I made my mother sign me up for dance, and the moment I began I said, ‘This is what my body is supposed to do.’ Dance fit my body. I split my days with classes at Long Island High School for the Performing Arts. They allowed me to be me and to express myself through movement. I realized that was where I belonged. I also entered the talent show at my high school and competed against an unknown singer named Debbie Gibson.

“During her song the mic wasn’t working. She put it down, stepped to the front of the stage, and belted the song. My dance partner and I immediately thought we had lost, but we beat her in the talent show! She said to me, ‘I’ll never forget you.’ When she got her record contract six months later, she hired me as a backup dancer. Before I was 21, I went on three world tours with her, and it changed the trajectory of my life.

In the beginning I was performing to feed my ego. Then it changed. People would say things like: ‘As a gay kid in Minnesota, I hadn’t seen anyone that was like me, and then you showed up on TV.’

“I did shows on Broadway and in Vegas. At 37, I wasn’t sure where I fit with performing; I was going to retire. All of a sudden, Deborah called me again and asked me to do a show. I realized I can still do it.

“I have now been with her for the past 25 years. I’m choreographing her new show in Vegas, and I’ll be dancing in it as well. In the beginning I was performing to feed my ego. Then it changed. People would say things like: ‘As a gay kid in Minnesota, I hadn’t seen anyone that was like me, and then you showed up on TV.’ Watching me be comfortable in my own skin meant a lot to them. This keeps me humble.

“I still tour the world and teach all over the country, but my home is Long Island. I’m thankful my parents let me do my thing. I had that fire in me. I’ve learned that you’re going to fail a million times, but if you keep getting back up, one of those tries is going to work.”