S02 E01 - Shelane's Run - On Perinatal Suicide, Grief, and Finding Meaning After a Loss
Faces of Postpartum—The Podcast is a show about the postpartum period and its unique variations, hosted by Ariane Audet.
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S02E01
Shelane’s Run — On Perinatal Suicide, Grief & Finding Meaning After a Loss
Joanne and Sarah lost their beloved daughter and sister, Shelane, in 2015. After suffering the miscarriage of her fourth child, Shelane’s died by suicide. To honor her memory and her life, her family founded Shelane’s Run an event dedicated to spreading awareness of postpartum depression disorders and helping families find the support they need.
They partnered with Postpartum Support Virginia to encourage postpartum people to reach out and ask for help.
In this episode, Ariane and Mara Watts, therapist and outreach director for Postpartum Support Virginia, sat down with both Shelane’s mother and sister. Together they talked about Shelane’s bright life and how it abruptly came to an end. They discuss grief as a family, surviving the unimaginable, and finding meaning.
Full Transcript
Ariane: Welcome. Welcome my lovies, to faces of postpartum, the podcast season two. I'm Ariane Audet, writer, photographer advocate, and founder of the project. In this podcast, I feature postpartum stories from parents, informal discussions with friends about parenthood and interviews with passionate providers and experts.
Everything here is honest, raw and heartfelt. So stick around one more time for someone unfiltered talks about the postpartum period. It's always an honor to have you here.
Joanne: My name is Joanne Bryant. And I'm Shelane's mom. And she was my firstborn. I have three children. Shelane was the oldest, and then I have a son who's two years younger. And then I have a younger daughter who's two years younger than Shawn. And they are just hearing, which is me,
Sarah: Sarah, Sarah.
Ariane: Yes.
Joanne: And. Shelane was born in 1979. She was 35 at the time of her passing.
So when I was having my children, I didn't even know the term postpartum depression. I had never heard anyone mention it. I do remember after having my second Shawn, that anxiousness, that I was feeling the feeling of being overwhelmed at times. Not knowing, you know, how do I handle two at a time when they're just two years apart?
And now looking back on that, I realized that I most likely did experience postpartum depression or anxiousness. Cause I, I do remember being overwhelmed at times, but again, I didn't know what I was going through at the time. So I wish there had been more information out there for me to read about when I was younger.
And if I had just been better prepared, you know, if, if more people had written about it or talked about it, I don't think I would have been so hit blindsided about everything I would have thought anyway, that I would have passed that information onto my own children. You know, just be aware these things can happen.
It's, it's a feeling that a lot of people experience, but I didn't know what I didn't know, basically.
Ariane: And so your children grew and you have grandchildren?
Joanne: I do. I do. So the kids grew up in a military family. So we traveled around a lot when they were little. Shelane was born in Fort Campbell, Kentucky where my husband was stationed right there in Kentucky, on the border of Kentucky and Tennessee.
And we lived there just for a few years and then we continued to move on. My second and third, Shawn and Sarah were actually born in Hawaii. We were there for about five years. And so they, they grew up in a very diverse, multicultural, you know, atmosphere. They were very well-rounded in my opinion, just able to meet people and garnered a lot of worldwide kind of experience, you know?
Yeah. But Shelane, we settled in Virginia. At the time she actually got into high school when she first started high school. So all three of them got to go to the same high school all four years, which is our goal. And Shelane was very outgoing in high school. She had a lot of close friends that she, even after she was married and had children, they did a lot of traveling together.
There was a group of about six or seven girls that always traveled. And after she got married she actually became a police officer just before getting married. And she was a detective at the time of her passing.
Sarah: This is a fun, fun story about how Shelane met her husband actually about six, you know, saved up my money. So I said, I want to buy my own car, have my own independence bought this little bright blue Neon Dodge Neon. Yes. And one or two months later I crashed it. And the police officer on site was Brian.
He was in his uniform, looking handsome, came up and wrote me a ticket for, I forget failure to be attentive of something of the sort. And of course, I called my sister to come to pick me up because it's, my car had been totaled and had to be towed.
And she came from like a workout, of course, was all annoyed that she had to stop her workout to come to save her sister and pick me up.
So she was kind of sweaty in her t-shirt and shorts and saw Brian and then like her whole demeanor and her stature kind of changed. And it was, she became flirtatious with this police officer. They started talking. I could tell I was, you know, I had, I was crying. I had mascara running down my face, all upset and they're over there enjoying themselves, having a conversation.
And by the end of before the police officer left, he said, "You know what? I, I think I made a mistake on that ticket. I'm just going to rip it up. Don't worry about it." And I don't know if we're allowed to share this, but there goes my ticket. And they kept in contact ever since then. So.
Joanne: They were both seeing someone else at the time, but soon after that they ended up doing a ride along. Shelane was the one that asked for the ride along. Yeah.
Sarah: Shelane was interested in criminal justice. Yeah. She was interested in criminal justice. And when it came time for her to, you know, one of the, one of the options that she had was do a ride along with a police officer, kind of get to know what their days are like. So she remembered his name. And I think I called the police station or something like that and arranged a ride along with Brian.
Ariane: Ride along, it has that name. That's amazing. This is just perfect.
Sarah: So now the rest is history. Yeah.
Joanne: This was 2006, I believe. Yeah. And soon after that their oldest Nadia was born. And less than two years later Sophia was born and less than two years later, Olivia came along. Yeah.
Ariane: And how was she after each pregnancy?
Joanne: You know, I honestly don't remember seeing any signs of postpartum for her other three. Did you?
Sarah: Shelane was a person who was always put together. She made sure everybody was, you know, have their clothing was clean and pressed and their outfits matched and lunch boxes were packed. That was her type-A personality.
And I think that in retrospect it could have been more type-A after she had each child But it was only after you know, she had her three and one of the things that she always, she wanted was, you know, nice round four children.
Joanne: So she wanted to try for that boy. Of course.
Sarah: No, of course, Brian wanted to try for that, that boy as well, but they were, they were happy, but she just really wanted four. After she got pregnant, she was elated.
Announced that she was pregnant on Mother's day. I think it was that year or Memorial day. And then she went in for her 12-week checkup and unfortunately the doctor couldn't find a heartbeat.
It was the next day, she went in for a DNC. And the week, the week after that, she was what you'd call as a kind of like, we felt it was normal. She was upset. She was depressed. She lost her baby. Yeah. And I think it was the second week where it started to feel like her depression was getting worse.
But at the time we weren't thinking of it like that. At the time we just thought she was just really sad because she had lost the baby and she really wanted to go and try again. She also had a lot of stress at work. Which I think weighed on her. And she had already taken the, I think that she took that time off to be with the kids those two weeks.
The day before she took her life, she had a conversation with my mom. She was in and out of this state of you know, feeling like somebody was after her and her family. And then the next second she was talking about what, what she was planning on doing, I think summer vacation and making plans for the family.
The evening that evening, actually I spent with her at a pool with all the, her three and my two, my two kids. And she had this glassed overlook on her eyes and I just, I couldn't... I knew something was wrong. I just didn't know what it was. And then she, she also talked about, she just needed to sleep. She was sleep-deprived and she could not sleep. She felt like she was not sleeping at night. She told me one thing that really sticks with me to this day, she said, "I feel like a failure." And at first, I was shocked because I hadn't, I had never heard my sister say she felt like a failure. She was probably the most, the strongest person other than my own mother that I know. And she was that person where, if anyone said anything negative about her, she made sure to show you she was not that person. And she was quite the opposite. So this really had my brain kind of spending, like what, what could be possibly happening.
Ariane: It was out of character?
Sarah: It was definitely out of character. And then we talked about the next day we were going to do, we had a girl scout activity with our kids. I said I'll see you I'll see you tomorrow. Oh. You know, for the girl scout event.
Joanne: It was that morning that she called me. I had actually just left a few days beforehand to go to Tennessee and to take care of my mother after my father passed away and my older sister and I were taking turns, going back and forth.
So I remember specifically the night before I left over to her house and just giving her an extra hug and telling her, you know, everything will be okay. And when I get back, we'll do some things together. But the morning of her passing, she called me in Tennessee.
And you know, it wasn't uncommon for her to call me. We talked almost every day on the phone if we weren't in town. And she kind of caught me by surprise cause she was saying. "Mom. I just, I have this very odd feeling in my stomach." She said, "I, I can't, I can't place exactly what it is, but I feel like something's going to happen." She said, "I, I don't know if something, if it's Brian or the children, but I feel very awkward that something's going to happen."
I just kept reassuring her that everything was fine, that Brian was good at work, you know? And the children were well taken care of. I was going to be over there on a daily basis helping when, when I got back. And Sarah was, was there. And I said, "Can you tell me why you think, you know, something's going to happen? Why do you feel this way?"
She said, "I don't know, mom, I just have this gut feeling." Immediately after that, she'd start talking about what we were going to do next week and next month and our beach trip coming up. So it wasn't enough of a red flag to me to like call 911. I mean, if I thought anything was really wrong, I would've, I would've called Sarah of course, or, you know, my husband or a neighbor, Brian, you know, her husband. But again, she kind of waffled in and out.
So I didn't I wasn't really that worried.
Ariane: We can take a pause. We can take a break whenever you want. Okay.
Sarah: Well, so I recall it was that Friday, two weeks from the day that she had the DNC on that Friday, I was working at a school close by and on my way home, I, I would drive by. Drive by essentially the house on my way home. And I just passed the entrance to her, her neighborhood. And I got a call from my dad saying, have you, have you talked to Shelane?
And I said, "Last night I was with her." He goes, "Did she seem off? And I said, "Yeah, but I, it didn't seem enough to raise a whole lot of red flags." I anyways, so he said, "Why don't you drive by there and check?" And unfortunately, when I was pulling up, there was several police officers in front of the house already.
So I knew something was, was certainly wrong. I didn't know what had happened, but I was trying to get by the police officers to get to the house.
And then wouldn't let me past. I said, "Let me just, let me just talk to her."
Just, you know, maybe I can talk to her. I thought maybe she was upset and the police were called because maybe, you know, she had said something that, that alerted the police. And he said, I can't let you in. So, and I, of course, I think he said you don't want to see her like that.
And then I realized something more serious had happened.
Ariane: Who called the cops?
Sarah: A neighborhood had called the police.
Ariane: When you said, she said, "I feel something's going to happen." There's something that drained out of my body and I just went somewhere else. Because this is very, very, very familiar. What this makes you believe is that your sister and your brother and other people around you are not going to care like the disease is so deep inside of. You really, truly don't think that it's going to affect people on the contrary. You feel like other people will be better off you. And so to me, it's relevant to hear you because you are that sister who would have missed me and you are in the sister who is missing her.
And so if for you going to her house is, is a way to express that. We can go there if it's not, it's not, you know, you obviously care a lot about your sister and you obviously care a lot about your daughter. I'm not after the gore details, I'm not TMZ, you know? It's also something that is familiar, unfortunately, hearing the story. So
Sarah: Yeah, I don't want to talk about the girls because I don't want them meaning her, her daughters, her daughters. I don't want them like, everything that we've done past, this has been in a positive light and I don't want them to have any triggering trauma, if they were to come and hear. And hear about, and then have them picture what they witnessed.
Ariane: Okay. I'm really sorry. What do you need right now?
Joanne: Maybe we can just move on to. Yeah.
Ariane: So let me ask you a question. You say, where do you go from there?
Joanne: You try to piece things together. And then we felt like we needed a reason...
Ariane: Basically the question is how do you grieve? How do you start the grieving process when something like that happens? Eventually leading to the run that you put together as a mom. Where do you start?
Joanne: Well, we knew after her passing, after we sort of pieced together what had happened, you know, we kept asking each other what happened? How could we not have seen these signs? What could we have done differently? You know? And there was a lot of blaming, you know, we blamed ourselves, we blamed others. We, we blame the doctors.
The people that should have known, you know, to at least explain to her, these are the feelings you may have in the near future. Here's what you can do to get through it. It's all temporary. If you feel like you're losing control, here's some people to talk to. Here's some possible medication you can take, you know, you don't have to do it full time.
But there are people and resources to help you get through the next few weeks or months or however long it takes.
Ariane: Because it's temporary.
Joanne: It's temporary. Well, now we know that. She didn't know that. She didn't, she was so type-A that she internalized a lot of things. And if she had just said something, I'm having these feelings, or if someone had known enough to talk to her and ask her these questions. Stay with her.
That was the one thing I kept thinking about. If someone had just stayed with her, you know, why was she alone? Someone should have just been. You know, being her buddy, you know, just hanging out with her. But you know, after the weeks went by and we just felt so helpless, we decided we just couldn't just let things fall by the wayside.
There were other, if, if it happened to her, it could help happen to anyone. And so we wanted to find a way to make a difference. I guess that the worst feeling is we didn't want her to die in vain.
We wanted her, her, her life to be meaningful. We wanted her to be able to help others get through it and be her voice. I think the worst thing is: she's gone, but now what? You know, if there's other women out there suffering, we didn't want them to fall through the cracks.
Sarah: So we did a lot of research and we started, you know, probably the biggest, the main place you go to is Google.
You start looking up all these things that you saw that were seemed off, but we couldn't put the puzzle pieces together. And we learned that she was suffering from not only postpartum depression, but postpartum depression with psychosis, which are these interjecting thoughts either of self-harm or doing something to others.
And I, I honestly believe that she might've felt like she was saving her family or saving somebody else by taking her own life.
(PAUSE)
Joanne: So Nadia is 13. She's about to turn 14 in November. Sophia is 11 and Olivia is today. Is her, her birthday, her ninth, birthday.
Ariane: Happy birthday. This is a nice, yeah, this is a nice gift. Do they live here or they live...
Joanne: They were living right down the street. On the same street. We do see them. It's not as often as we would like, but we do get together for special occasions and holidays and we just got together the other day for my birthday. We called this morning, we have a tradition where we always sing happy birthday to birthday family member.
First thing in the morning, we bring them a muffin, candle and sing happy birthday as a family. So this morning we were on the phone with them as they were singing to Olivia.
Ariane: This super sweet.
If you don't mind going back to what we just talked about. One of my questions that I had before coming in was I know there's a lot of guilt often associated with suicide: "I should have known, I should have known."
And what I'm hearing is, "I didn't know. And how could I have known?" And it was somewhat unexpected of me to, to, I, I didn't, I didn't think this would be a thing. And I can see now how painful it is.
And to go back a little bit to what we were saying, what, what should we know now, based on your experience, based on the advocacy work you're doing, what are the things that you know now, that you might have wished to have known before.
Joanne: Well, for me, I think just knowing that these things can happen to a woman who's not only just had a baby, but also possibly had a miscarriage. You're always worried about the baby. Everyone's always worried about that baby! But how often do we hear about the mom? You know, have, have you checked on her today? How is she feeling? Just just having a conversation with a mom on a regular basis, checking in with her.
And then if she's not feeling well, seek help, you know reach out to the experts. They know the questions to ask. They, they know what type of help she might need. But everybody's very quick to check on that child and they forget about the mom and the fact that even a loss pregnancy can bring on these terrible thoughts.
I don't, I don't think many people think about that. Just checking on the mom more.
Sarah: Yeah, I'd say baby and mom are equally important. No, none neither. You know, more than the other. So. I think the main thing is educating, not only the spouse, but the family members to really look for signs, things that don't sound right coming from that person.
Ariane: Speaking of, you know, finding meetings and postpartum plan.
Joanne: Well, one thing I've learned from all this is that there is such a thing called a postpartum plan. And the more you plan early on the better, the whole experience will be just having people lined up to not only bring you food, you know, and, and maybe help with, with the baby, but just having a whole network of friends that are there when you need to reach out to them at all hours of the night. Knowing how important sleep is to that mom. Having various family members and neighbors and friends that can come in and just kind of take over for you. So you can just get that sleep that you need extended sleep, not, I'm not talking about, you know, a nap I'm talking about extended sleep through the night.
I can't stress enough, just planning ahead for, for what's to happen, even if you're a new mom.
Sarah: I realize that's probably easier said than done. Sometimes. I know there are some people, we are, we are a family that is grateful to have very close-knit family that are willing to help and come over.
And fortunately, there are families that don't have those. So there's great resources like postpartum support Virginia and postpartum support international. There's a ton of support groups across the nation that you can reach out to and they have sometimes have funds and extra, extra grants to help support those families that don't have the close network that that we might be able to provide.
Ariane: Which from what I understand is also what Shelane's Run is about. Just to provide fund to grant access.
Sarah: So after Shelane passed it was one of those things where we didn't want her to pass, you know, in vain, we wanted to make it an educational piece to other families.
So we took three things that Shelane loved the most, which was running because if you're, if you were driving down the road, most likely you were watching her run on the side of the road, or either all by herself or with a jogger stroller in hand.
Also the other thing she loved was her family. An in-person event is very family-oriented. We have, we had lots of activities free for the families to come out and do.
Then the third thing was her community. She loved being a police officer and she loved serving her community. You know, and, and to use her words, I liked getting the bad guys off the street.
So we took those three things and we decided we were going to with the help of actually her friends on the police force helped us launch Shelane's run. And the money from Shelane's fund goes to provide grants to families that might need either just, it could be as simple as a ride to their doctor's appointment. It could help them get therapy, it could help them with their doulas. There's a plethora of things that, you know, anything that you can think of, that you, if you, if you call and say, I need help financial help, they will provide a fund from Shelane's run to help that family or that mom get the resources that they need.
Ariane: Through postpartum support, Virginia, correct?
Sarah: Through postpartum support, Virginia.
Ariane: They cannot call you on your cell phone. Exactly.
Sarah: Exactly. The event provides additional funds, but postpartum support, Virginia, are those who they want to call.
Ariane: And when did that start?
Sarah: We started planning in 2015, but our first official event started launched in 2016.
And we decided to do it in October, which was because of her birthday, birthdays at the end of October.
Ariane: So it all moved very quickly.
Joanne: Very quickly. Our first run kicked off and it just sort of grew and grew. We, for the families, had a rock wall and face painting and the police came out and forced and the fire trucks came out.
It was just wonderful. We had a DJ to provide the music. The girl Scouts came out. Yeah, so it, again, it just sort of grew from that. And we started in 2016 unfortunately with the pandemic we've had to curtail and the last year, and this year is virtual. But what's come out of that is amazing too, because now we're able to.
Promote it across the country. And last year we were just overwhelmed with the support we had over 300 runners from over 25 different states, Japan, Canada. People out there sending in their pictures of themselves, walking, running, riding bikes, you know, with their t-shirts on, it's just very heartwarming now to know that what started out as a very small family-oriented idea has grown and.
I think the nicest thing is walking into a local store around here and wearing our t-shirts and having a cashier or just a patron walk up to us and say, "oh my gosh, I'm so glad that you're advertising and you're promoting postpartum depression because I'm actually a victim of it. Or my mother had it or my sister had it and no one ever talked about it, you know, but now you're getting the word out." And they were very thankful, grateful for what we were doing.
Ariane: So you're giving meaning to her life and also meaning to your life at the same time.
Joanne: Yeah.
Ariane: Has it helped?
Joanne: It has helped. Well, we can see the results from the moms, you know, that come back and tell us how much help that they've received from postpartum support, Virginia. But it's also been very therapeutic, I think, for the family as well.
Sarah: Yeah. So I, I'm not going to lie, planning is very stressful and sometimes overwhelming, but you know.
Ariane: Are you type a too.
Sarah: A little bit? So there's not as much as my sister, but I'm a little type a yes.
Ariane: So there's joy in the misery in it.
Sarah: A little bit. Yes. But at the end of the day, when it's all said and done, and then you hear, you know, not only to see everybody having a good time and coming up to us and feeling comfortable talking about it and saying that they've never felt comfortable before it is rewarding as well as them going to PSVA and saying, I never knew about you guys. This is great. And then I'm, I'm sure PSPA has gotten a lot more calls and contacts, you know, asking for, from families asking for help. So I think it's therapeutic for, for us and the kids and as well as the community, the families that are struggling silently.
Ariane: So the kids are participating.
Sarah: Yes, they have, for sure. They, they really enjoyed being a part of it. And when we did it in person, the first couple of years, they really enjoyed it and then got into it.
Ariane: How old are your kids?
Sarah: My kids are now 13 and a half and 10 and yeah, so 13 and 10.
Ariane: So they were around when, when, when that happened. And when you started to, how do you grieve as a family? Your wife looks at you like, huh?
Sarah: We lean on each other and we lean on each other. Yeah. I'm, I'm probably, I'm the worst. Probably keeping my emotional, my emotion that you know, inside. I try to be the strong person, unfortunately, but that's just how I've learned to cope and for it, get it. I have my wife who is very, very supportive. That is helpful. Yes. That's you she's here. Whether it be, you know, waking up crying in the middle of the night and she's rubbing my back.
Joanne: So, Shawn Sarah's brother older brother is out in California and unfortunately not close enough. But, but he calls a lot and we do talk by phone and, you know, he really wants to be a big part of Shelane's run. So he's always here when we actually have the run and he, he sort of our runner actually, you could say. He does whatever we need help with. We're trying to get him back home. No pressure, no pressure. But yeah, he loves being a part of Shelane's run.
Sarah: It makes it a plan to, to get a flight home during the event or around this time, or even around my mom's birthday, just to kind of spend time with family because family is important to us.
Yeah.
Ariane: And of course we want moms to live, you know you said something about naming it. And last week there was an article that was published and it was, I was interviewed for it about suicide and it was the first time that really, my name was associated with that.
And it was it. And it's always been that, but to see it like, so it was black on white and people are very uncomfortable with that. And to name it, like to, to do events and name their reality and want to prevent it and be clear that it's treatable. It's, it's huge. So I kind of, I have no question. I'm just commending you for, for doing this because it's, you know, it's beyond some vague not that there's anything wrong with that, but you know, it, you were shattered by, by someone who committed suicide and it's, and now you're, you're fighting to put the word out there and to make sure that people hear.
And that's pretty, that's a big deal.
Joanne: I feel like I have to share something with you.
Ariane: Please.
Joanne: So the term commit suicide. It's fine. But not many people realize the difference and that when you experienced that, if, if that. Terms suicide has affected her family. It's a term that we, we refer to died by suicide.
Died by suicide. So not committing.
Joanne: Right. Because the term of commit just makes you feel like.
Sarah: Like she knew what she was doing and in this case, we feel like she was, she was not in the right mindset to know what she was doing. I understand. So we would prefer the term died by suicide, versus side suicide.
Not to take away from anybody else who has family members who have committed suicide.
Ariane: It's part of your healing process. I imagine naming things to reframe things is very important. So I understand.
Sarah: I think, I think it's one of those things that have to do with just, you know, an educational piece it's, it sounds very minute and it, at the end of the day, it's, it's the same, the result is the same.
However, I guess how we perceive it is a little bit different because. Again, like I said, like the mindset that she was in, we don't believe it was, it was her herself making that decision. It was the disease.
Ariane: Disease. Yes. And the words matter. So thank you for letting me know.
Can I ask you one last question? What is something that people did that helped you. What is something, support that you've received as a bereaved family? What are the things that helped you in the process from the community and around?
Joanne: I think just, just reaching out to us they didn't necessarily have to talk about the particulars.
But did you want
Ariane: to talk about it?
Joanne: No, not really. Not until I got to the part where I wanted to help others. But I think just reassuring us that they're there. If we wanted any help or if we wanted their involvement or just letting us know that they care, you know, that she meant so much to them. I get a lot of calls from her previous coworkers in the police force. And it's, it's just very heartwarming to hear them talk about Shelane and their experiences with her working with her and how much she meant to them and, and others.
I love hearing hearings. Little things that she did on the force.
Sarah: Stories are great. Those are really helpful. Yeah, we, we love hearing stories about how she's, you know, tackling, you know, two grown men.
Ariane: Do you have one?
Joanne: I'm trying to think of. Well, I remember one time when she was, she would sometimes on Sunday we would always have Sunday dinner together and she would tell us about what her week was like.
And I remember one in particular, where she said she was called out these two guys, were in their car, racing down the road and she was the first one. On-location and it was icy. The road was icy and she was sliding around on the street with her police car and drifting.
Ariane: Like race cars kind of stuff.
Joanne: Yeah. Anyway, she said, I remember just kind of sliding into the curb and jumping out of the car. And just about that time, the two of them had hurdle the fence. And she said, oh, what the heck?
Sarah: So she hurdled
Joanne: that fence, that fence, she managed to get both of those guys down on the ground and had called in.
Sarah: Yeah. She had somehow gotten both of them. And then the guy who was her back or something like that arrived and was like, do you need help? And she was like, no, I did it. Yeah. Really there's some there's, there was some funny stories if I had, I wish I would've wrote some down, but there was one time where she went out and, and, you know, got called out for somebody.
I think the person might have had some mental issues, but she had to go out there and, and, you know, talk to this guy. And I guess the guy, unfortunately got a little aggressive with her and they ended up in this like altercation where they were rolling around on the gravel and she had to like, Hmm, you know, what's the word, not handcuffed, but secure and secure the guy.
And she said she got up, she said she got up and her hair was all in a mess. Like her bun was all messed up because she, you know, it was all, you know, pristinely pulled back or this nice, beautiful bun. And she got up and she said it was all wrecked. And she was like, I haven't even had my coffee yet.
Joanne: I do remember her also mentioning she was always multitasking. And so it happened to be just a couple of days before her daughter's birthday. And she was trying to figure out how she was going to do her work, and how she was going to get these balloons blown up for the party. So she decided she would blow them up and put them in the trunk of her cruiser.
So that she could get them to wherever they needed to get to by the end of the day after. So anyway, she got them all blown up. She got them into the trunk. And she got called out and she said, all she could think of was having to open up that trunk and having all those balloons come out of the truck while she was on duty.
Ariane: And also fly away after all this work, all that work.
Joanne: Exactly. Yeah. Hm. Her friends and coworkers, I'm sure it could tell you some amazing.
Ariane: I always end my interviews asking why you agreed to talk to me. So why did you agree to talk to me today?
Joanne: Well, I think most of all is just. Reading and listening to some of your podcasts and envisioning the moms that would be listening to those podcasts and hoping that in some way, our conversation could strike a chord with another mom who was suffering in silence. And perhaps after listening, they would be more willing to reach out.
And get the help that they need. And also knowing that nowadays talking to others there's, there's so many ways that you can get help nowadays. So I think it was just a, more of a matter of knowing how, how far-reaching your podcast and your art reach and just praying that in some way or fashion, you know, you who you could very well be saving a life.
Ariane: You. What I see too also is a family who loves each other so much. And this is, this is a pretty powerful message to hear when you feel like no one cares.
People care, your family care.
Sarah: We thank you, for reaching out to us. Thank you for, for this, wanting to share this. Yeah. We really appreciate that.
Joanne: And for Mara bringing us together.
Sarah: Yes.
Ariane: Well, Mara is bringing everybody together. She, she shakes her head, but she's, she's amazing. Thank you so much for today.
Sarah: Thank you.
Joanne: Thank you.
Ariane: Thank you so much for listening to faces of postpartum the podcast. If you'd like to show, be sure to subscribe and rate it on Apple podcast or anywhere you listen to us. If you have any show ideas, comments, and inquiries, you can reach us at podcast at facesofpostpartum.com. We also have an Instagram @facesofpostpartum, and we always love to hear from you.
See you soon.