Thee Real Joy Podcast

Welcome back to another episode
of Thee Real Joy podcast.

Today I have here with me Brittany.

Hi, guys. Brittany.

I met Brittany through Jamie's
little client, Nyla

So we call her Nyla’s mom,
but she has a name.

Her name is Brittany.

So real quick,
before we start our episode today,

we're going to do a journal prompt
out of our new journal.

So we're just going to jump right into it.

What are three things
I wish my younger self knew?

I'll let you go first because I might
I think I might stole some of your.

Okay, but I'll let you go first. Yes.

The, Three things I thought I'd say that,

I wish my younger self knew. Yes.

For a fact, for one,
is how dope I really am.

Yeah.

I spent a lot of time,
trying to, like, rearrange myself

for other people to like me

and, like, trying to do things other
kind of way until I learned my own path

and realized that my path is the path
that they need to be in. Yes.

So that's one I really like that. Like
I should have learned.

Yeah, like early on.
But now I know it's always good.

I know.

Another thing I wish I knew

is that, the people around
you are not always to hurt you.

Like, you know how you
have, like, older adults,

and they're trying to tell you
something, and you like,

She's getting on my nerves.

Or is he doing too much? Sometimes.

Listen, sometimes you just gotta listen.

And I've. Been here before that.

Crazy. Like.

Yeah, I learned that the crazy way.

And that my mom is always right.

Always.

I hope that she don’t see this part,
they’re always ways.

Like we were saying, they know
that little friend that they like.

That girl's not your friend.

Like my mother is always right.
That's like.

That's like key. That's key.

It’s top

And it's like even being a mom
now is like, it makes you look back

to, like, moments of silliness.

Like, your mom wants the best for you.

Your mom is the person
that want you to succeed.

Like, you know what I mean? Like,
why not listen to her?

Why you gotta fight me?
I'm trying to tell you something.

Good for you. No, seriously.

So I defintly understand that.
Yes, I agree,

and I want to, like, piggyback
off of the first one you said. But

kind of like, for

me, I kind of feel that
because it's like you don't.

It's not that you don't fit in.

It's like you weren't meant to fit
in, you know what I mean?

And, like, I look back in, like, rooms
I never had to force my way in.

It's almost like
I just knew, like, let me go over here.

Like I'm not meant.

Yeah, I'm not meant to be over here.

And I think it came across as like,
oh, she's arrogant,

or she thinks she's too good at what
it's like.

Like you said, I just knew I was different
early on, and I'm starting to see it

with my daughter, too.

Like, so I'll come home from school
and like, she'll say certain things.

I'm like,
they're not like, oh, it's like it's okay.

Like, yeah.

They just not like is.

Don’t even worry about it.
Exactly

I think it's all going to make sense
when you get older.

Do not be sad about that. Yeah.

So definitely that
I think what I would tell

my younger self is like every fall back

or every L really is a lesson
like, it's not the end of the world.

Like, I feel like sometimes we spend
too much energy being low or being down

when like, you could just see the lesson
and go like, yeah, just move on.

We spent so much energy in it.

So it's like I was telling myself that.

And then the third one,

Boys\Men

is not the world like it's
more to life than boys and men.

Like I was on my 20 year old self that
like when I look at my roster for my 20s.

These boys could never.

You can never, I said,
I sat next to you like you could know.

And I used to cry over y'all.

I used to like.

Like I used to like,
try to get you to see my value.

That's crazy. Yeah. That's crazy.

So I would definitely.

That should have been my number one.

Like, yeah, these boys is nothing.

No. You got to look back.

The same ones you're crying over.

You're going to end up laughing. Yeah.

So that's why I tell the girls
and like because I work at a high school.

So I tell them all
the time, like, boys are going to be here,

like you're going to go
on, you want to live your life,

you're going to do
whatever you want to do.

They're going to be right
there. You're going to be right here.

Probably in the same spot
that you leave them.

In. Like it crazy.

You got both can go and do your lives
and just meet back like my boyfriend now

was my friend in fifth grade and I never,
ever, ever seen him like that.

Oh, that’s so cute!!!

But he wasn't my shorty.

He wasn't. No, no he wasn't.
That was just my boy.

And we went and did our live.

I went and did my life like.

And I even moved to South Carolina
for school.

Came back and look who my boyfriend
is all these years later.

Oh, that's so cute.

I'm gonna have you back.

when I talk about love and relationship.

Oh, yeah,
maybe you could give me a word or two.

But. All right, so today

our topic is more so to
do with, like, self-care

how to learn how to take care of ourselves
before our body.

Makes us, makes us. Yes.

So I'm not going to tell you a story
because I definitely

want to reveal your story as we go on.

So what was life
like before your health scare?

We'll call it a health scare for now.

Life was free.

Like I didn't have, like,
a care in the world besides my daughter.

Like, yeah, I just felt like
I was just running on everything.

Making ends meat, just doing whatever you needed to do

Whatever I wanted to do

I was doing, I was working overnight.

I had a first shift job.

I was being a mom during the day.

I was tutoring during the evening,
and I was eating steak and cheeses.

Drinking Red Bull

Making like nachos at home.

And I had just what I was eating.

Well, that was that was
what I was surviving off of.

Yeah.

Like my daughter was little
like she was to the point where, like,

I didn't have to cook a whole meal
because it was just me and her

She'd be happy with hot dogs
and mac and cheese.

You know, maybe. Had me to have her like.

And I just was going like.

And every day it's felt like

if I wasn't tired or if I took
like a quick little 30 minute nap,

I would get like I was straight
because I didn't feel like.

Yeah, you had trained yourself.

Just I just.

Trained myself to go
and I just knew I needed money.

All I cared about was getting money. Like.

And so me and my daughter
could be comfortable.

Me and my daughter could stay there
and I could keep on driving my car.

Think I didn't care about nothing else.

And even when I wasn't working overnight
and working the first shift

and doing everything,

I was going on my friends on the weekends,
yeah, well, on Fridays I would go by.

I was getting off at, 2:00 in the
afternoon after working overnight,

got off at seven.

I got off at seven.

I had to be to my next job by eight.

My daughter had to be to,
her daycare at 730.

So I would go home, take a quick shower,
literally go get her, like, the same thing

and just go, go home, take a quick nap
for probably, like two hours.

Three hours.

Go get drunk, my friends,
and be outside. Yeah.

And then do it all over. Yeah.

Like, yeah. So I was like, really?

All you were balancing was like work
being a mom and fun, like.

That's that's literally that's literally
all I was.

And I whole time I was in school,
but I was doing so bad

in school
at that point in time, like it was.

That wasn't my priority.

Yeah. Like it wasn't my priority.

Like now at like at the age

I am now and like the place I am now,
I had to retake all of those classes.

Yeah.

Because I just was there to say
I was there.

Yeah.

And I'm. Not really in the mindspace
to be there space.

To be there at all, which.

I feel like you were kind of like
survival mode.

It sounds like, definitely like
I just need to make ends meat.

I need to be a good mom,

keep my daughter alive, keep a roof
over her head, keep us in the car.

Yeah, that's about it.

And I feel like when you're in that mode,
it's hard to think of anything outside.

That's why it's called survival mode.

Yeah, because. But I didn't know
I was in survival mode

You never do

I never I didn't know like
I didn't, you know.

You just get.

So it's like, a hamster in the wheel.

For a fact. For a fact.
Just going around and around.

So did you have, like, any thinking back

right before the health scare happen,
did you have any moments you're like,

maybe that could have been a or like,
oh my gosh, like, did I feel something?

And I just ignored it, or did
they really just hit you when it happened?

It just hit me like it just hit me in.

I was in
I was in nursing school, like, so

like when it hit me, I knew. Exactly what.

It would hit me.

But I didn't feel it before then. Like,
I didn't feel it before that day.

Before that moment
when it was actually happening.

That's when I felt it.

Like after I knew because I was drinking
Red Bulls after Red Bull

after Red Bulls.
I wanted the green one.

I wanted the yellow one.

In the moment where that's
happened, you're probably like this.

Of course this is happening.

This is like for a fact. Like that.

Yeah. Okay.

So I know I heard your story and you told
I was like, getting goosebumps,

but try to, like, put them in
the car with you on that day.

Like, what were you doing?

Where were you going
and what was your mindset?

on that kind of got you through it

So let's start to... I was home.

I was home that day.

It was a Saturday and I was home that day.

And my daughter, she was about 2 or 3,
and she was away with my mother

and she, my mother had called to say
that she was bring her home.

And I said, okay, but I was going to
get up and make her some food.

But my mother ended up
bringing her McDonald's

so I didn't have to get up,
but I was just so tired.

But I just as much as I like
I said I was going and going and going was

I just really felt like I needed
to go to sleep and I just was tired.

So my mother brought my daughter
in and everything, and I got up

and I was in the refrigerator
and I'm dressed for Yale

I was doing environmental services
at the time, cleaning the rooms overnight,

and I was dressed for Yale, and,
I was in the frigerator, and I just felt

myself, like, feel dizzy for a second,
and I stop, and I'm just like.

So I just sit here, and I went
and I sat on my couch or whatever.

So my daughter, like she little,
so she jump in on me

and I'm just like, give mommy
a second. I'm like, go get mommy a water.

Like, could you go get mommy water?

The frigerator was still open
because when I felt like

I immediately needed to sit down,
so I never closed refrigerator.

So she went
and got me a water or whatever,

and I sat there or whatever,
and I still felt like a little tired,

but I'm just like,
all right, Brittany, you going?

Gonna be late for work.
So you got to get up.

So I got up. Whatever.

I got my shoes and everything,

and I had to get my my
my daughter was with my mother,

so her car seat was in my living room,
and I had to bring it to my car.

So I went to go pick up the car seat.

So, as y'all know,
like a car seat is not nothing,

but it's felt like the heaviest thing,
picking it up.

Like I tried to pick it up
and it just felt so heavy.

So I picked it up and I managed
to get it to my car or whatever.

So my daughter with me,
whatever mind is poor or raining outside,

she's with me or whatever.

And I put the car seat in there
and I struggle getting her in the car.

So I strapped them both in and whatever,
and she goes back there,

she goes to sleep, and I,

sit down in my seat in my driver's seat.

And mind you, I live in exit eight,
like up on Quinnipiac at the time.

And where I was going,
where my daughter was going,

was to my house in the hill
next to Roberto Clemente. So,

at that point, my body felt weird, like.

And I knew that my body felt weird.

I knew something was happening to me,

but I didn't know
exactly what was happening to me.

I just knew it was something.

So I started to drive whatever.

I lived on the hill or whatever.

So I'm driving down the hill,
everything, and I get on the highway

and like once I'm driving on a highway,
I feel this whole side of me

get numb and like, mind you, I'm
driving on a high when I'm just like, and.

It's raining.

It's raining
and I can't see it to begin with.

So I go, I already need glasses,
right? So.

So like I'm driving
and I feel everything get numb.

So I like switch so I can drive like that.

So my brothers used to laugh at me
and say that I

when I was learning to drive,
I drove with both feet

So I knew how to drive
with this foot already.

So I was prepared for this moment.

So I switched whatever, and I, I made it
all the way to the hill and everything.

And I got to my aunt's street.

So, say, like, where your arm
is it's my aunt's house.

I stopped like, over here to my house.

And her cousin, her son came downstairs.

She, like, he's like, Bree,
why are you way up here?

And I'm just like, let me rewind.

When I was getting
when I got in front of her house to stop,

I tried to stop and I couldn't stop
because, like,

I couldn't press down on my foot
and I couldn't.

I feel like I was,
like, pressing down so hard and I.

And it wasn't doing anything like.

So when I was able to stop in front of her
house, that's why I was up there

and he came down there like,
why are you park way down here?

And I'm just like, go get your mom,
go get your mom or whatever.

So I'm just like, like, get Nyla, like,
get my daughter off the back.

So she sleep,
he bring her upstairs or whatever.

And I'm walking to, their porch
to sit down so he, like, you could walk.

So I come, like,
I feel like I'm walking regular,

but I know I'm, like,
dragging myself like.

and he like you okay??

You okay? And I just start throwing up.

That's what I had to buy.
I owe him a pair of sneakers.

I messed up his

sneakers because I just started throwing
up, and I couldn't stop throwing up.

And I didn't know why
I was throwing up or whatever.

So his mother, like, she come downstairs.

Brittany, What's wrong with you?
I'm just like.

Like I can't breathe like nothing.
Like what's wrong?

So I'm talking to her
and I'm talking to her regular.

But she's looking at me like this.
Brittany, what's wrong with you?

And I'm just looking at her
like I'm talking to you.

Like I'm telling you what's wrong with me.

Like. And she, like,
put her ear, like, right here to my mouth.

And I realized she couldn't hear nothing
that was coming out of my mouth.

Because even though
I felt like I was talking,

I wasn't saying anything or whatever.

So then I start throwing up again.
She's like, I'm calling you mother.

I'm calling your mother.
So she called my mother.

My mother live around the corner.

So my mother come around the corner
and, her or her sister, like, lift me up.

Like they was like, come on, Britney,
you got to go to the hospital.

So I stood up, and then I fell back down
because I was so weak.

There was like, she can't stand up.

So they picked me up
and put me in the car.

And when I got to the hospital,
my mother had to pick me up

and put me in a, wheelchair
because I couldn't walk.

And at that point I couldn't feel
absolutely anything like the last time

I felt like when I felt
something again is

when the lady, like,
was messing with my fingers,

like telling me to do certain things
or whatever like that.

But I was still so out of it,
so out of it.

And I didn't really come to a conclusion
of what happened to me

and everything like that
until I was in the room

and I was in a room with two other ladies,
one that had a stroke three years ago

and one that has been there
for like nine months.

And I was in that room in

that's what happened.

I had a stroke.

And then when it came down to it,
I ended up having a hole in my heart.

So I had to be out of work
for like ten months.

And then when I finally went back to work,
I had to be out of work again,

because at that point,
I had to have my heart surgery

and I had to walk around
with like a heart monitor

because they had to monitor my thing.

That's why I always wear my Apple Watch,
because it's it monitors it.

And if it's like if my pulse is going
too fast or too slow or something,

or if I need to sit down
and tell my watch,

tell me it's time to sit down like it's
or your blood pressure was too high.

Like it literally tells me because, like,
my doctor actually helped me program

everything that it should be.

And so when it's, like, too much
or too low, I can instantly tell that.

That's good for people to know, too,

and that that is a good feature
that they can use on their watch.

But y’all so Brittany is at the studio
telling us this, so let's go back to Nyla.

So we're all sitting there so serious.

We looking at Brittany.

Here we go Nyla mommy

why Auntie call your mother.

Why didn't nobody call 911??

And we're all like good point right.

And I think that that just go back to Nyla
real quick reminding me of that.

But she never heard the story.
She never. Heard it.

So she's always a story
and she's just like but mommy...

We're like, what ‘s this little girl gonna say.
Why would you not call

And then she's like, ask
and where was I at?

And we're just like, oh my gosh.

But yes. All right.

So wow.

So looking back, all them
Red Bulls you were drinking,

I'm sure it was not good for your heart.

I won't touch a Red bull.

No. Come on, touch a Red bull.

No energy drink, no type, nothing like.

And my friends,
I tell you like I'm Brittany.

Give me a Red bull. I'm not getting,
you know, Red bull.

Like I'll get you a lemonade
I'll get you something else.

I'm not buying nobody no Red Bull.

Just because I know the
I know that I over.

I overdid it with the Red Bulls.

But I also know that how not good
they are for you. Yeah.

So that is definitely like any type
of energy doing any type of anything.

I don't want no part.

So you said when you got to the hospital,
they had you in a room with somebody

that was there for three years
from something you just experienced,

and then someone who's.

There for nine. Months, for nine months.

Was older.

Ladies like, this was me.

Well, this was like three years ago.

So I was like 29, 30.

These old ladies.

And it's just like,
you're so young to be here.

What are you doing?

Oh, my doctors

keep telling me I'm young, I'm young,
and I'm just looking at them like.

But I'm here.

Yeah, like so how.

Are you going to assist me? Because.

So what was your mindset like?

Like because I know me.

Like if I'm walking into a situation.

Okay, I just have this.
You've been here for this long. You.

I don't have all this time.

I can't be here for nine months.

I can't be here for years.

Like, how did that did it?

Like,

were you, like, defeated in that moment?

Did you feel like, okay,
I got to fight for this?

Like, how do you remember?

Like I was scared.

Yeah, I was scared.

Every day was going by
how much more attention I got to say.

What am I going to do?

How do I get out of here today?

Do I get out of here tomorrow?

Like, I was so pressed to get out and I
ended up having to stay there for a week,

and it felt like
the longest week of my life.

Especially when you're used to

the lifestyle
you're living for, not sitting down.

I'm not sitting.
I don't exactly, not even.

Now that I have to sit down.

I'm not a sit down person. Like, yeah,
I feel like I'm sitting down.

I feel like it's
something that you should be doing.

Like it?

I'm not asking to be.
Doing something right now.

Even if I'm on my phone,
just rearranging my notes

to say something like,
something's got to give.

I got to be doing something.

So in the second part,

we're going to learn
how Brittany had to make herself sit down,

what life looked like for her after that,
what self-care routines

did you come up with
and what does your life look like today?

Okay, so we'll be back.