9. My Heart...

In 2015 I was admitted to the hospital with congestive heart failure.  I was 32 years old.  Because of these medical issues, I had to walk away from my career at the time, sell my house and move back to my hometown, and reevaluate my entire life.  

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Transcript

Hi, I'm Leah. Before we get started, I have a thing. It's like a whole thing you guys. It's like basically one of the most fun announcements that I've ever had the pleasure of announcing. So pay attention. I have been selected to be an inspirational speaker at the She is Me 2022 conference taking place this October. The She is Me conference is a virtual event of women empowerment. This year, there will be over 40 speakers, me included. Entertainment, round tables and other amazing events. And right now there is an early bird special being offered. You can purchase your single ticket for admission to the 2022 She is Me conference at 50% off right now through August the 15th, 2022. After August 15th, you can still purchase your ticket, but you will be paying full price. 

The goal of the She Is Me movement is simple. It's about freedom. Freedom from self-loathing, freedom from the rules and false beliefs that are thrust upon us from birth. It's freedom to show up and be who we really are. And it's freedom to be who you are in your truth and shine as brightly as you can. The theme of this year's conference is you are not alone and I could not be more honored to be part of such an important and meaningful event. Go to www.SheIsMeConference.com to purchase your ticket at 50% off now through August 15th. And just for fun, if you do sign up, be sure to send me a screenshot of your confirmation email. You can email it to me at Leah, @theLeahIdeologyPodcast.com or send it to me via DM on Facebook or Instagram. And I'll be sure to say hello to you during my speech at the conference. Go to www.SheIsMeConference.com to get your ticket for the 2022 She Is Me annual conference. I cannot wait to see you there.

Welcome back you guys. Welcome back. Welcome here. Welcome to the podcast. I love that we keep bumping into each other here. It's so exciting. It's so fun. I'm glad that you found your way here this week. I never ever, ever take your time for granted. And I'm grateful that we get to share this time together. I love showing up for you and I love that you are showing up here for me. It's just super exciting every week to get to do this with you. So thanks for being here. We are going to jump right into the episode this week because I have a lot to talk about. I've been asked to talk about this several times, both in public spaces and in private conversations. And I just felt like maybe the right thing to do is to just lay it all out there on the podcast. And then I can refer people back to this specific episode if they want all the details. 

This episode is about the health issues I faced in 2015, specifically around the health of my heart. How these issues changed literally everything about my life at that time and how we still need to adjust to living with my heart condition. I kind of want to just set the scene for you here. Like what was going on in my life in 2015, where I was living, what I was doing, just kind of a glimpse into what life looked like for me. I was living in the south Hills of Pittsburgh. I had a growing career in the corporate relocation industry and I loved it. It was a very high pressure job. I excelled at it. I really enjoyed the work that I did. I had a two year old son that I was having a really difficult time connecting with at the time.

And I was in a marriage that was crumbling. So I spent a lot of my time at work. Work at that point, work at that time, it made sense to me. Yes, there was a lot of problem solving and high paced energy involved, but it was different, I guess, from the problem solving and the high paced energy that came from being a wife and mom that I wasn't clicking with, that I wasn't getting the hang of. I dreaded being at home. I felt disconnected and out of control when I was at home, I felt very chaotic and also very lonely at the same time when I was at home and when I was at work, I felt like I was in control. Those were problems that I could take care of. People came to me to help solve their problems, which fed my ego that I needed a little bit, because I was failing so much on my home front.

So without knowing I was doing it, I hid at work as much as I could. Isaac has been a daycare child since he was six weeks old. We loved our daycare. And at that time I was completely convinced that spending as much time at the daycare was what was best for Isaac because those women knew what they were doing. Those women knew how to care for children. I did not. I truly, truly in the depths of my soul really honestly thought that Isaac being at daycare was a healthier and happier and all around better environment for him than being home with me. And you know how daycares can be like with pickups, they give you like the latest possible time. You can pick up your kid each day before you start accruing extra charges. 

So for our daycare, the latest possible pickup was 6:00 PM. And I knew down to the minute what time I needed to leave my office, which was 5:41 PM to get to the daycare right at 6:00 PM. Isaac and I then had a 45 minute to an hour drive home depending on the traffic. And we get to spend a little bit of time together before bedtime. But if I'm being honest, I was probably on my phone with work or working on my laptop, taking care of my caseload. At that time, having a career and being good at my career was extremely important to me. I would go to sleep each night, wake up around 6:00 AM, drive the 45 minutes to take Isaac to daycare. Then drive the 20 minutes to my office. Work for 9 to 10 hours, leave work at 5:41 to pick up Isaac from day care right at 6:00 PM. Drive the 45 minutes to an hour home and the cycle started all over again. That was our every day. That's what we were doing day in and day out. 

Joe was working an insane amount of hours at his job. I think at one point he actually worked like 75 to 80 hours in one week. It was crazy. We were constantly on the move. Like our life was insane. We were just two boats that sailed by each other in the middle of a dark stormy night or whatever that phrase is. That's what we were. We were just constantly, constantly moving. On the weekends, Joe would always be working and I would drive to Leganare to take Isaac to see my parents because I didn't want to be home by myself with a kid who I didn't know how to talk to or entertain or relate with or connect to. And if again I'm being honest, my work laptop was never far out of my reach. This is who we were. This was what our life looked like walking into December, 2015.

On Sunday, December the 20th, I felt like I was coming down with a cold, like I was kind of feeling achy and really blah, like maybe at the worst I had caught the flu or something. And Joe had suggested that I go to the doctors so that I could hopefully get some medicine and be feeling better by Christmas. I of course dismissed that suggestion because, well, I knew better and I was going to be fine. I was going to tough my way through it and I didn't have time to go to the doctors. So I was sure that whatever it was was going to pass no big deal. There was no need to go to the doctor. 

I went to work on Monday and around lunchtime. My friend Jocelyn stopped by my desk for a chat. And I told her that I wasn't feeling quite right. It felt like my heart was racing, but I had been sitting at my desk all morning. It felt like I couldn't quite catch my breath, but I wasn't exerting any energy. Jocelyn, who is truly one of the kindest souls that I've ever met. Just wait Jocelyn and her husband pop up again later in the story. So stay tuned. Jocelyn's sweetly encouraged me, like only Jocelyn could do, to go to the doctor. And I listened to her, just not right away. Remember I knew better than everybody. Also you guys, I had work to do, I had things I had to get done. So I went to the doctor when it was convenient for me, after work. After I got home, after I was able to get a few more emails sent out, after I got Isaac taken care of, and I passed him over to Joe who by the way, came home early from work so that I could go to the doctor. 

He walked in the door and I tossed Isaac over to him. Like I think Isaac may have had actual hang time in the air. I told Joe, I was sure I wouldn't be long. I was just going to get some antibiotics I thought, and I will be right back home, no big deal. I jumped in my car. I backed out of the driveway and I didn't see them for the next four days. We were living in the south Hills of Pittsburgh. And the main hospital in that area has their own version of a MedExpress. So I decided to go there. There was a bit of a wait, which I didn't really mind. It gave me some time to send out some emails and do whatever other corporate task I felt was important to do at the time. I was called back, they ran some tests and it was determined that I needed to go to the emergency room to be further examined. 

They said that they could tell that something was wrong, but they only had so much testing capability at that office. And that going over to the ER was what they suggested. And here's a good indicator of where my mindset was in 2015. Instead of being concerned or worried, I was instantly annoyed. Instantly. I just needed someone to prescribe me some medicine and then I would be good to go because obviously as a corporate relocation specialist, that made me way more qualified than an actual medical professional. Cool, cool, cool, cool. I begrudgingly went to the ER and the waiting room was packed you guys, it was packed. That pretty much settled that for me. I'm not going to stick around for this. I mean, I couldn't even tell if there was a seat for me to sit in, like no one was wearing masks. 

I mean, granted, this took place in 2015 and the global pandemic hadn't even happened yet, but oh my God, isn't that so weird? It's so weird to think like that we live in a time that we can refer to life before the global pandemic and after the global pandemic. Isn't that weird? So anyway, no one was wearing masks. We were buck wild back then you guys. But the point is I didn't want to wait around in the ER, waiting in a jam packed room of people. And so I turned around and I walked back to my car. I would love to tell you that it was some sort of divine intervention that took over and turned me around and walked me back to the entrance of the ER or I had some image up here in my head of my sweet child that gave me the strength to turn around and do it in his honor. 

But no, I got back to my car. I saw my reflection in the window. I told myself to stop being such an asshole and go to the emergency room. I turned myself around. I walked back to the ER, I checked in and I was immediately taken back, no waiting at all. None. Looking back on it, it's obvious. I mean, the first place I went to was associated with the hospital. And it seems as though that first place knew that there was something more wrong than they maybe had indicated to me. And they probably just got on the phone and told the hospital that I was on my way over. But at the time I thought that God himself had parted my red sea and allowed me to walk freely towards the land where medicine will be distributed and I will be cured and I can then go home. 

I was given more tests, nothing that hurt. And then I waited and I waited and I waited. It could have been two minutes. It could have been four hours. There wasn't great cell phone reception where I was sitting and I couldn't get any work done. I couldn't scroll through Facebook. I just had to sit there alone with my own thoughts. So I have no idea how much time had passed. I know I text Joe and I told him that I had no idea what the hold up was but as soon as someone comes in, I should be able to come home. And I sat there and I sat there, until this cute little doctor boy came in to talk to me and I say, cute, not like, oh damn hey doctor, boy. Like, he was like super hot. I mean, cute. Like I wanted to pinch his cheeks and tossel his hair and play a game of catch with him. 

He looked like he was 10 years old playing dress up as a doctor. It was adorable. So in my mind, I named him Buckaroo like, Hey, there Buckaroo like that kind of a thing. Anyway, Dr. Buckaroo came over to me and stood in front of me and said, Leah, you will need to be admitted. Your heart is very weak right now. You are in congestive heart failure. We are getting a room ready for you. And we will get you settled in there as soon as we can. I stared at him. I blinked exactly twice. And then I laughed, oh my God. Oh, Buckaroo. This is so embarrassing. And no worries I make mistakes like this all the time. We're all human, #AmIright? But it sounds like you're looking for an 87 year old man who from the sounds of it has some serious heart issues, poor thing.  But my name is Leah Wagner. I'm just here for some penicillin, easy peasy. If you could just check the charts, but I'm sure you're not looking at the right one. Okay. Thanks. He stared back at me. He did not blink. And he said, Mrs. Wagner, you are in stage four heart failure. You are very sick right now. If you didn't come in tonight, I'm fairly sure you would not have lived through the week. You are in heart failure. We are getting a room ready for you. And we'll get you situated as soon as we can. He gave me a sympathetic look as his words sunk into my brain. And he walked out. I sat there still in disbelief. I called Joe and told him what Dr. Buckaroo said, but I was sure that there was a mix up or something. I wasn't going to cause a fuss. I told him not to worry, but I was just going to play along wink, wink, and I'll be sure to get this straightened out first thing in the morning. 

Sometime after midnight, I got wheeled into my room. I got hooked up to a bunch of different machines and the nurse came in and introduced herself and she seemed very kind. I asked her if I should be concerned, like for real, for real, like just between us girls, you and me, should I be worried about this? And she looked at me and she said, you're in good hands here. And your heart is being monitored at the front desk up there. So we'll see immediately, if you need anything. Try to get some sleep, honey. And suddenly I was very, very, very angry/emotional/scared to fall asleep. In my mind, this had gone on long enough and I was going to get this all straightened out first thing in the morning, like first thing. I didn't want to risk going to sleep and oversleeping and not getting this worked out. So I did not sleep. I stayed awake. I watched TV. I scrolled on my phone. I had to pee every 0.7 seconds because they gave me a diuretic to help drain the fluid in my lungs. But I did not sleep. Also if I'm awake, I know I'm not dead. Awake, meant alive. So I was staying awake.

The next morning more tests were done. I talked to my parents. We made arrangements for Isaac to go to their house until I was able to come home, which I thought was kind of dramatic because I was sure I was going to be released any minute, but Joe needed to go to work. It was the end of the year. And he was out of vacation days and we couldn't go a whole day without pay. So Isaac headed to my parents, Joe headed to work. And I waited for this huge miscommunication/mishaps/mis-whatever this is to get straightened out. The next person to walk into my room was a little man dressed in a white doctor's coat. He was little, like his frame was small. He was short. He was just little. He was just a little guy. And his face was very kind and his salt and pepper hair and mustache and the wrinkles and veins in his hands and the reading glasses he wore on the very tip of his nose reminded me of a combination of my dad and his brother, my uncle. 

So he felt safe. And I named him Buddy. Dr. Buddy sat on the side of my bed. He put his hand on mine and my heart sank. His hand on mine told me that there was no mistake. There was no miscommunication, no mishap, no mis-whatever my heart was failing. And Dr. Buddy was here to confirm it. Hi Leah. I'm Dr. Buddy. I'm one of the cardiologists on call at this hospital. I've reviewed your tests and I'd like to go over the results with you, is there anyone else you'd like to have here in the room with us? No. I replied. Whatever Dr. Buddy was going to tell me. I wanted to hear alone, by myself. I wanted a chance to process my thoughts and emotions first before everyone that I know and love will affect my thoughts and emotions with their thoughts and emotions. I wanted Dr. Buddy to tell me what he had to say. I was finally in the right head space to hear it.

Your heart is very weak Leah, the numbers are not good. One of the numbers we are looking at is your ejection fraction percentage. Your ejection fraction measures the amount of blood, the left ventricle of the heart pumps out to your body with each heartbeat. This percentage should fall between 50 and 70%. A heart in crisis is anything below 35%. Your ejection fraction is 12%. This is a situation that I would consider critical. I don't have any answers as to why this happened. All I know right now is that your heart is in an extremely weakened state. And we are going to try to stop it from getting any weaker. Are you following me so far? I nodded. He continued. I'd like to do a heart cath tomorrow to make sure that we aren't dealing with any blockages or anything, just to confirm that the heart itself is a weak muscle and not being affected by anything, we would be able to detect through a heart cath. 

I nodded and we sat there for a moment in silence, looking at each other. I remember thinking, gosh, what kind of job is this for Buddy? Like to deliver this kind of news to someone? Wow. I don't think I could do it. I think I would be too emotionally involved, I think. And I wouldn't want to. What an awful, awful thing to have to do. And there are people who have to do it like Buddy. And so I took a moment to feel for him in the position that he was in. His eyes looked sad. He was still looking at me with a sympathetic smile, but he was also kind of bracing himself a little bit for how I would potentially react. I finally said, so this is serious. Like, this is a serious medical issue that I am experiencing right now. And without losing eye contact with me, he responded, yes.

I heard him and I continued and it's not going to get any better. We are going to try. He replied, I heard him and I continued. When can I go back to work? He squeezed my hand and said, Leah, you are not going back to work. You aren't leaving the hospital for now. Your heart is too weak. We need to be grateful that you are alive right now. Do you understand? And for whatever reason my comedic response was, but it's Christmas. I can't die the week of Christmas. He squeezed my hand again and said, I'm going to give you the best care I can. He then sat with me for a bit longer. He eventually stood up, told me he'd see me the next day for the heart cath and walked out of my room.

The next few days are a bit of a blur in my memory. I did the heart cath. It didn't show anything abnormal, which confirmed that the issue was that my heart as a muscle is weak all on its own. I took meds. I did everything that the nurses told me to do. I followed all the rules and before I knew it, it was December 23rd. And it seemed like a very real thing that I wasn't going to be home for Christmas with my kid. When I asked the nurses if this was going to be the case, like if that was like a, for real, for real possibility, they said that the doctor was getting me set up with a life vest. And if the life vest people can get there on time, it's possible I could be discharged in time for Christmas. The name of the company who made the LifeVest is Zoll.

And according to the Zoll website, a life vest is a wearable cardioverter defibrillator. It's worn by patients at risk of sudden cardiac death. The life vest is designed to detect certain life-threatening rapid heart rhythms, and then automatically deliver a treatment shock to restore the heart to its normal rhythm. In a typical situation the entire event from detecting a life threatening rapid heartbeat to automatically delivering that shock occurs in about one minute. The life vest people did make it to see me in the hospital. I was fitted for my life vest. They were able to get me all set up and I was able to be discharged on December 24th. My dad picked me up. We stopped by my house to pick up some clothes to wear. We drove the hour and a half to their house where Isaac was waiting with my mom and we made it to church on time for Christmas Eve.

Immediately after the holiday, like December 28th, the battery of doctor's appointments started to try to figure out why a relatively healthy 32 year old woman would have such a weak heart. And what, if anything, could be done about it? Dr. Buddy, my cardiologist from the hospital, let me know that he felt most comfortable referring me to a larger hospital in Pittsburgh that has an area that specializes in advanced heart failure. So they became my heart failure team. Immediately. They immediately told me that because I'm wearing the life vest, I was not permitted to drive due to the liability of having the vest on. I am not permitted to be alone with my kid or to hold my kid because obviously if the life vest were to go off, it could hurt or even kill Isaac. So we didn't want him anywhere near me. And I'm not permitted to return to work for the foreseeable future and that I needed to be on light bedrest at home.

So walk through this with me. I must be at home and I can't have Isaac with me. So he still needs to go to daycare. Our daycare is 45 minutes away from our house without traffic. I'm also not allowed to drive. So how is Isaac going to get to and from daycare. I can't work so my income is affected and the bills keep on coming. They don't stop. And actually we have more bills now because of all the doctors and hospital visits. How are we supposed to handle that? Not to mention it was likely that I wouldn't live through the year. What do I need to do to prepare for that? Here's how we handled it.

Here's what our 2016 looked like. Joe took on another job in addition to the full time one that he had. He drove Isaac to daycare every day at 6:00 AM and then went to work for the day where he went directly from job number one to job number two. He got permission from job number two, to leave work each night and come home so he could give Isaac a bath and put him to bed. He'd get home after midnight and wake up the next day and do it all over again. Remember Jocelyn from earlier, my friend who visited me at my desk and sweetly encouraged me to go to the doctor? She and her husband lived in the south Hills, kind of near us, probably like 20 or 30 minutes away from us. And they volunteered to pick Isaac up every day after work and drive him home to me. Every day after work, they drove to our daycare, signed Isaac out, got him in his car seat, which I mentioned, because as you may or may not know, getting a kid into a car seat is a special kind of hell. And they brought him home to me. They did it every day. 

2016 was rough. You guys, it was rough. I honestly don't remember a lot of it. I was depressed and in shock for most of it, I think. Traumatized maybe. Everything in my life changed drastically and dramatically. And I had no idea how to process any of it. So I put myself in autopilot. I just took my meds. I went to my appointments and I tried to show as much gratitude as I could to everyone around me whose lives had also been uprooted and had to change because I'm now sick with a bad heart. And I sat at home. I sat at home and I waited to see what would happen next. That's literally all I was allowed to do.

It was determined that I have a very rare congenital cardiomyopathy, left ventricular non-compaction cardiomyopathy to be exact. According to the Medline Plus website left ventricular non-compaction Cardiomyopathy is a heart muscle disorder that occurs when the lower left chamber of the heart, the left ventricle, which helps the heart pump the blood through the body doesn't develop correctly. Left ventricular non-compaction is estimated to effect, get this, oh my gosh, listen to this. It is estimated to affect 8 to 12 per 1 million individuals, 8 to 12 people per 1 million per year. And two thirds of the individuals with left ventricular non-compaction will develop heart failure. There is no cure for it, but there are a bunch of meds and they do their job. I take them every day and they keep doing what they're supposed to do. Basically what I'm saying is I win my own kind of lotteries, am I right?

We ultimately decided to sell our home in Pittsburgh and buy a home in my hometown and move closer to my family. That way they could be there to help raise Isaac after. Joe and I wrote our wills and for all intense and purposes, I got my affairs in order. In August, 2016, I went to Pittsburgh for an appointment with my heart failure team. I was due for some more tests so we could see the new reading of what my ejection fraction was. They told me before my appointment that they were not expecting to see any change in my ejection fraction. It was 12% before they are expecting it to be 12% again. If there was any change at all, maybe we could hope for like a 15%, but they were not hopeful for that. And I said that I understood. I went in for my echocardiogram and my cardiac MRI and ended the day in my doctor's office.

He was going to discuss the results with me before I went home that day. We were in his office for quite some time before he eventually called down to the MRI echocardiogram guys, to see if he could get like a verbal confirmation of what was going on or what the ejection fraction was. I watched him make the call. I heard him ask about my results and he then turned his back and talked into the phone in like a muffled manner that I couldn't decipher. The only thing I heard him say was, I'd like to take a look at them myself, please. Thanks. And he hung up, turned around and said he wanted to look at the tests before he discussed them with me. And he excused himself. And about 10 or 15 minutes later, he returned. And he had this excitement in his eyes. 

Leah, I looked over your results. Oh my God, dude just get to it. That's what was going through my head. Like just tell me what's going on. Did the numbers go up? Where are we? 15%. 18%. I mean, screw it. Let's dare a dream, 20%, dude. Just spit it out. Just tell me what's going on. Oh my God. Oh my God. Just tell me. I didn't want to believe it when they told me on the phone. So I wanted to confirm by looking at the tests myself, but I agree with their assessment of your results, which shows that your ejection fraction is 50. I'm sorry, what, 15? Like 1 5, like 14, 15, 16, like 15 the age at which a boy named Jared broke my heart by calling me and saying, Hey, welcome to Dumpsville, population, you. 

Sorry, 15 is a rough year for teenage girls. No, I said 50, like five, zer0, like 49, 50, 51, like 50, the age that you could possibly live to with these kinds of numbers. How did this happen? I asked in complete shock. Leah. I honestly have no idea. I've never seen it happen. It's just one of those things, I guess. Yeah, just one of those things, I guess. 

Since then, I still have regular appointments with my heart failure team in Pittsburgh. I have to take multiple medications each day, but my numbers stayed up near 50 for a few years. Over the past couple of years, my ejection fraction has started to decrease. I'm probably dangling right around the 40% mark right now. If I fall below 35, I'll likely have a defibrillator put in, but I will cross that bridge if the day comes that I even encounter that bridge. These days, I feel okay. I feel okay. Physically I get very tired, very easily. Both out of breath, kind of tired and also like exhausted kind of tired. I get really overheated really, really quickly, like really quickly. One of the meds I take makes me sensitive to heat. And in addition to being naturally sensitive to heat, like I swear to God.

Okay, anything above 43 degrees Fahrenheit makes me throw myself on the floor. Like even in public, on the pavement, I don't care. And I will have a full on temper tantrum, like a toddler. I hate hot weather. And I think it's mostly because I sweat so freaking much. And I'm not like one of those girls that's like, oh my God, I'm sweating so much. And then you look over at her and she's like, glistening, like somehow she's prettier because she's sweating. I'm not that girl. I am not that girl. I pour sweat. It looked like someone just like dumped a bucket of water over me. It's not a good look. So then I had a medicine that makes me even warmer. So being hot is not my jam. If you ever come over and visit my house, I would snowsuit up if I were you, we keep it nice and cool all year long.

Every once in a while, my doctors will adjust my meds when I'm feeling worse than normal. And so far, I've been able to hold steady around a 40% ejection fraction with med adjustments only. So I lean on my village. I lean on my people and I try not to take on more than I can handle. And one day at a time we see how it goes. How am I doing with everything mentally and emotionally? I don't know, really. I have a lot of feelings about it and a lot of things to unpack regarding all of it, which I can do and explore in another episode. I think the hardest part for me, the place where I struggle the most inside, like my own mind is that I'm raising this nine year old kid. I'm raising this nine year old active dude.

And I am trying to do my best to keep up with him, but I feel exhausted all the time. And when you're exhausted, you are low on patients and you are low on energy and you're low on everything. It's easy to feel like I fail him every time I have to miss something because I have a doctor's appointment or if I have to hesitate to have friends over to our house to play, because that is so exhausting for me, which I feel like a little bit it's embarrassing to say that it's embarrassing. It's easy for me to get really down on myself. And I feel like I'm failing him or denying him memories, that I'll be known as the shitty mom and that Isaac will ultimately get so embarrassed of me that he and I will like barely have a relationship with each other. 

So you see how, like I spiral, I downward spiral pretty quickly there. Like I said, I can do a whole other episode on that, on how it affected me parenthood wise. And I do want to do an episode on how this whole experience affected how I parent, like the way I parent and the way that I view raising Isaac, because that definitely changed since having all of this heart stuff happened to us back in 2015 and 16. So stay tuned for that down the road.

Life is crazy, right? And I guess that's really what I want to explore in this podcast. How absolutely silly it is to try to plan out your life. I mean, you can't do it. I tried, you can't do it. You can hope and dream and wish and plan all you want, but everything can change in an instant. In an instant, you will be forced to change directions. You'll be forced to pivot and it will be uncomfortable and it will be weird and it will be emotional and maybe even painful, but it will happen. Like no one is exempt from it. We all have to figure out how to adjust our sails and change directions. And we have to figure it out on life's terms. Not ours. We can't plan it all out. Life is a very real player in the game. Sometimes we have to deal with stuff when life says it's time to deal with it.

And we all go about it in different ways, right? So my solution to this is to acknowledge that I never know who is going through what and who is dealing with what and who is thinking about what? So I choose to simply root for you along your way. That's what this space is for. That's what I'm passionate about creating, a space where we share our stories and talk about the paths we're on and how we got here and how we plan to move forward. Because let's be honest. Sometimes the moving forward part, that's the really, really hard part. So let's talk about it. Let's share the stories and share the feelings and share the things that we've lived through. Let's talk about it. Let's share it. Let's get it out there. That's the only way that others are going to know that they are being rooted for, and that they also don't walk alone.

Don't forget to head over to www.SheIsMe Conference.com to sign up for the 2022 She is Me conference taking place this upcoming October. Yours truly is one of over 40 speakers who will be talking, presenting, storytelling all related to women empowerment. You can get your ticket to the conference at 50% off through August 15th, 2022. Be sure to send me a screenshot of your confirmation email after you buy your ticket. And I'll be sure to give you a shout out during the conference. Visit their website to learn more and buy your ticket. Www.SheIsMeConference.com. 

Outro: Thank you so much for joining me for this week's episode. Next week is episode number 10. That's insane. That's so cool. Feel free to follow me on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and Pinterest at Leah Ideology. Or you can visit me at my website at www.theleahideologypodcast.com. Also, please be sure you are subscribing rating and reviewing this podcast wherever you are listening to your podcasts. New episodes are released every Wednesday. So until we get to hang out next, thank you for being here. And I hope that you know that until we get to meet again, that I am rooting for you.