Hello and welcome to the Get to Life podcast where we have conversations about organ tissue and ideonation. I'm Lori Steele. I'm Joey Houdreaux. I'm Sally Gentry.
And we are so grateful to you for being part of our life-saving team and we appreciate you listening to the Gifted Life. We try to bring these great interviews on here so that we can all learn more today. Listen to this. As part of his healing journey, donor dad has been to book.
It's a pretty powerful book and you can feel that emotion. Not that it joins us today. And we're going to talk about what is personality? Personality.
Yeah, there you go. We're going to talk Lori. You have to talk a lot with me, right? All right, that and more coming up on the Gifted Life guys.
Our goal is to get you sharing these conversations so that we can all have these healthy conversations about organ tissue and ideonation. That's why we try to make it as easy as possible to find us. Yes, find us, read us, subscribe. You can find us easily now on Apple Podcast, Google Play or any of your favorite podcast apps.
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It's that easy. I love it, guys. You can be a part of this life-saving team. We want you on our team.
So join us today. Lots to get to as you heard. Let's do it. Here on the Gifted Life, we are so pleased that donor dad Eric Gregory has joined us.
And as I'm prepping for this interview, I learned how closely Ty he is to a lot of the Lopa family, which is pretty neat. Laurie, I was fortunate enough to be able to read Eric's book All My Tomorrow's. One of our colleagues who Eric knows well, Libby Harrison, works across the hall from you. And she approached me one day and she said, Joey, you have got to read this book.
He knows, of course, I've been in donation for 16 years and I love reading stories about donation. It was by far the best donation story or book that I had read for a number of reasons. One, he did such a great job with capturing the emotion and bringing you in and you can visualize everything as it was happening and bringing everyone else's stories around and how they worked together for this one huge story. And second, how detailed and accurate it was about the process.
And many times I became emotional because it brings me back of course, working so closely with families and I can picture something probably back to some of the times that was intimately involved. So a great story and really happy to have you on Eric. Great review, Eric. Let's add that to the book.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Oh gosh. And then we learned that Sally has ties here too that takes us kind of to the beginning. Yeah. It was my honor to I think get the first recipient letter that we were able to forward to you and your family and then it kind of went from there.
And I think you got to meet all the recipients at this point. We had nine for us. Right. And those lives were saved because of your son, 19 year old Chris Gregory was a freshman at Loyola in New Orleans, Louisiana.
He said he wanted to be an organ donor. And so it really starts with this amazing young hero, your son, right? I like to say he was very popular, very friendly guy father. He was at home hospice for my wife, Grace, to get a call from Chris.
Oh, yeah. I like to call you. You're kind of a guy who was very, very, very, very. And then a week later is when it was.
You're here, you know, you fly down from Baltimore and you're expecting to see some kind of minor issue that's going to be fixed and he's going to be sitting up talking, you know, and walking out in a couple of days in your pose with, you know, organ donation. I can't even imagine. And fortunately, you know, in your case, you know, in through that fog, you had had that conversation with Chris. So it was something that was much more clear to you.
So that was at least the one, I guess, a small take back that you didn't have to struggle with the decision there. No, Eric, when you started to write this book, how was it? Was it helpful for you during your grief to help alleviate some of the pain that you were going through or were you finding joy in writing the book to be able to share all this about your son? What?
Oh my. But I can tell you, as I met Nick, he'll just like to start planning his funeral. Oh my gosh. Yeah, he got one call and he got pretty much going to take himself off the list when she got out to the curb, the doctors running outside told her to come back and she thought she left her person in the doctor's office.
Oh my. You know, they were all coming together. So, you know, if I can tell Chris's story, transplant, some of donation. That's right.
And that means. And Eric, what a great story and the way you laid it out. It was, it was incredible. And you mentioned the miracle of donation and it brings me back to the book when you say that the miracles that took place.
It's so funny. We talk about it and people talk. It's almost like miracle is almost an overused perms sometimes. And when you read the book, you realize the miracles that take place, you know, and he mentioned or he being second up on the list and then having to get turned back because, you know, of course, we always have to have a backup in play.
And of course, he decides, you know, he decides that pretty much he's going to take himself off the list. What that did was allowed a dry run and created an efficiency like he wasn't very close to his transplant center in Florida or he and they were because they had gone through the motions before and had everything set up, he was able to then efficiently arrive on time and that was the only way he would have gotten been able to have that second chance. Wow. Yeah.
He's always been talking about the storytelling behind this book, which sounds incredible. So it's called All My Tomorrow. So Eric, where do we find it? I highly encourage everyone who's listening to buy the book and read it.
I can say I love to read on the plane. If it's not our own local work, oftentimes I like to read books, especially about donation. And this was one that I mentioned that the power and the passion and the emotion, you know, when the plane landed and I was almost finished reading it, I was almost completely in tears and I was by myself, of course. And it's just one of those books that you forget where you are, you know, and you get wrapped up in the emotion.
It was a fantastic book. Eric, I just want you to know how much that we appreciate hearing from you. And we thank you, Chris, to begin with so much and you and your family for thinking of others and willing to share his story that others might find some inspiration or something to help them get through this difficult time also. So thank you for that.
And Eric, I know you're not done yet because Chris isn't done touching hearts across the country, across the world, because you heard Joey's review of the book. We've been hearing that from folks outside the nation world too. So beyond the book, we heard hints of maybe a movie. There it is.
Yeah. They liked it. And standing is that it is casting presently in the end of this month. We were impressed with is that.
Yeah, we're going to have to be back on the gift of life and tell us about that. I'm sure you're going to visit the set at the beginning of the interview. You said Chris was a popular guy. He is like everybody.
He's touching. It's just incredible. Chris Gregory, a hero. Eric, we appreciate your sharing your story.
We appreciate you writing that book and just putting donation on another level. We thank you. What is personality? That's what we're talking about during today's mental health minute.
So who do we ask? That's a great question. Oh, we have the of course the personality guru. Okay.
I like it, Sally. Our very own Sally Gentry. Well, I appreciate that. Thank you.
What a personality you are. She wasn't looking at me. She wasn't looking at me. Okay.
All right. So a lot of times you'll hear people say, well, they have a great personality. Well, what does that truly mean? Well, actually we're made up of thoughts, feelings, behaviors.
And those are all three separate entities that make up our personality. By the time you're three to four years of age, 90% of your personality has been formed and established. Now, it can change. That's right.
A little bit. It's a little toddler. I was going to think. I was thinking it.
But your parents do mold and model different behaviors for you. And so it can be positive or negative reinforcement, which we would hope it's more toward the positive than the negative. While there are many theories of personality, most psychologists have kind of given up on explaining all this information because people, you know, you can only hear so much about, well, okay, so what is my personality about? So we talk about people who have the trait of openness.
It refers really to experiences in life, not necessarily you're just an open person, but you are open to various experiences, literature, music, things like that. An imagination. Like Laurie. Is anybody where I'm raising three and a four-year-old at home?
Well, yeah, we do think about that, but we're not saying anything right now. I'm listening and I'm learning. Okay. And we also look at people who are conscientious.
Usually these folks are organized. They have a sense of duty. They're dependable, disciplined. They're achievement-focused.
And usually they say that people who are the conscientious, it's the best predictor of personal and professional success. So they're saying to think about. We give examples of people that are popping into our heads. We're just going to keep that.
We have some people. I'm writing it down. Okay. Now, sometimes this trait is referred to as searchancy.
And you might say, no, what does searchancy mean? Tell me more well. It's people who have high levels of positive affect. Oh.
You know, Laurie, this might be you. Sociable, fun-loving. Oh, that's Joey over there. Oh, you got one, Joe.
Oh, talkative. How's it going? She pointed to me, guys. Okay.
You all know introverts. They're just almost the opposite. Even though introverts are not necessarily shy, they're just not into people that much. Okay.
So you're looking my way. I'm an extrovert. I consider myself an extrovert. And I'm very shy.
Well, I'm not saying. Uh, not really, but just personality. That's not going to work. Okay.
And another trait is agreeableness. And this really talks about the person's warmth and just how they're kind towards others. As you know, we all like to work with agreeable people. Sometimes we're not always agreeable.
And people go, but most of the time, people who are agreeable are much easier to get along with needless to say because otherwise you have people who are very suspicious, they're old or hostile, this sort of thing. You didn't mention that we were. No taking note. And the last trait is neuroticism.
You know, people who are neurotic, they worry a lot. They dwell on things that they really cannot have any control over, but they dwell on it. And also people who are neurotic for, you know, any of you that I'm sure you don't indulge in these kind of behaviors, but alcohol, drugs, tobacco, those sort of things are, you know, nice if you're, yeah, that's just things that people use to try to ease their nerves. And I want you all to know too, I'm not making any judgment calls on any of this.
So please don't take me wrong. We're just holding around. It's going to be right. We're just having fun.
So just to sum all this up, Raymond Cottal is a theorist from back in the 50s and he states that personality is that which permits a prediction of what a person will do in a given situation. So when you look around at your friends or your relatives and you go, I think I know where this person's coming from. They will kind of fall into one of these five personalities, right? So there you go.
I saw people in my head and you were like, I need you one. And then I'm like, am I in this one or is my toe dipping in that one? I'm not sure. Anyway, something to think about, something to talk about.
That was fun. All right. Thanks for the info, Sal. All right, more to come here on the gifted life.
In every episode of the gifted life, we honor a hero. Yes, in today's episode, that hero is Chris Gregory. And we'll hear about Chris from his dad, Eric. And now we pause to say thank you to Chris for the gift of life.
Here on the gifted life, we're always asking you to please share your stories, be part of the team, help us make life happen. And guess what? Oh, we got this wonderful phone call. You all want to listen to this one.
This is fantastic. Why did you do these guys? But you listen, here's on. Here we go.
Hi, Jennifer. And I wanted to let you know how much I appreciate your podcast. I found out about non-directed living kidney donors through another podcast I was me too. And then I went out in search of more information about living donors and found your podcast.
And I want to say it's really helped me with my decision to hear the stories of other people who have been living donors and how their recovery and their lifestyle has pretty much returned to normal. So that really helped me with my decision. I'm actually scheduled on May 2nd here in California at UCLA to donate my kidney. And it will be headed out towards your area to Florida.
For somebody, I haven't received any more information about the recipient yet, but I'm really looking forward to it. I'm really excited to be able to help somebody out. And I want to thank you for your podcast. So after listening to this, our producer has made contact with Jennifer to wish her well.
And that our team is planning on connecting it for another episode to find out how everything went. Well, you just have to. You have to follow her. Yeah, absolutely.
But that was the main reason we started the podcast was to get people talking, get people sharing to inspire, go out and do something that you don't normally do to help us make life happen. She literally went out the door and did that. She did. Oh my gosh.
So she was saying surgery was in May and said we try to keep up with folks and of course share that with you because we want to spur those healthy conversations. I'm so happy that that happened. And just think people helping one another in a way that hasn't been that long ago that no one would really, well, most people would not even thought about doing something to help a stranger like that. How cool.
Making life happen, making the world a better place. Maybe you have something you want to share with us info at lope.org. We also have the hotline, which is what Jennifer is. Yes.
All right, everybody. Listen, write this down and please give us a call. Five, zero, four, six, four, eight, three, four, seven, seven. And that'll do it for episode 84 of the gifted life.
Yes, what an episode. Eric Gregory showing the passion. Of course, it came through in the interview itself, but especially sharing the book and sharing Chris with us. And I'm looking forward and I think probably y'all are too to sing the movie.
Can't wait. So hearing about the book, right? Can you imagine the movie? So that is coming up.
Something will keep you up to date on. And look, that's what he did for his Healing Journey wrote a book. It's turned into a movie. So what are you doing out there?
We would like to know. So be a part of our team. Help us make life happen. One person can make a difference.
We are proving that here on the gifted life. And we want you to go out and do something that you don't normally do to help us make life happen because you can do it. Thanks guys. We'll talk to you next time.
This is a production of the Louisiana Organ Procurement Agency, or LOPA, and Gifted Life, hosted by Lori Steele, Joey Buudrow, and Sally Gentry. Our producers are Kirsten Heinz and Shalom Caraway. We are recorded, engineered, and mixed in our Metery, Louisiana studio by Troy Perez.