Beyond the Edge: A Path to Healing from Suicidal Ideation

Are you ready to go beyond the edge of despair and step into the light? Join us as we sit down with author Gina Cavalier, who opens up about her intimate struggle with suicidal ideation and her journey toward healing. Show Notes | Transcript "We could be dealing with 90% of the population that have suicidal thoughts once in a while. So, yeah, normalizing it in a kind way, with some levity and understanding, that we're just all unique, our story's unique." - Gina Cavalier Gina Cavalier confronts the often-taboo subject of suicidal ideation in this candid and uplifting discussion. Gina is the co-author of the book, "Surviving Suicidal Ideation: From Therapy, Spirituality, and the Lived Experience" which promises to be a groundbreaking work on this topic. We delve into the raw realities of mental health, the importance of creating a safe space for these conversations, and the life-saving work she intends to offer through her planned nonprofit, Suicidal Ideation Anonymous. In this episode, you will learn: Gina's personal struggle with suicidal ideation, and her journey towards healing The transformative power of connecting with one's spiritual core and embracing authenticity The role of setting boundaries and fostering self-love How to transform your life by understanding personal energy, grounding, releasing negativity, and connecting with nature's energy The power of volunteering and the healing process of writing with spiritual guidance Resources: If you or someone you know is in crisis, please call 988 in the United States, or visit the Suicide Crisis Lifeline: 988lifeline.org Help is available 24/7. Join the Soulful Women's Network Connect with Gina Cavalier: Website: theliberatedhealer.com Get Gina's book: theliberatedhealer.com/books Connect with Live Love Engage: Send Gloria Grace a message ☕ Support the podcast ❤ Love this episode? Leave us a review and rating LinkedIn: Gloria Grace Rand Facebook: Gloria Grace Rand YouTube: Gloria Grace Rand TRANSCRIPT Gloria "Grace" Rand (Host) Namaste. Did you know that nearly 50,000 people in the United States and more than 800,000 worldwide died by suicide each year, and in the US, it's the second leading cause of death among 10 to 14-year-old kids and young adults between the ages of 25 and 34. Young adults between the ages of 25 and 34. So it's not exactly a fun subject, not one that we typically talk about on the podcast, but it is an important one and I think, yeah, it needs to be talked about, and I've got a great guest who I'm going to be bringing out in just a moment. She has co-authored a book that is coming out soon called Surviving Suicidal Ideation from Therapy, Spirituality and the Lived Experience. But before I bring the wonderful Gina Cavalier on, I would like to welcome you to the podcast, especially if this is your first time. I am Gloria Grace and I help female entrepreneurs shed self-doubt, negative thought patterns so you can grow a business that aligns with your soul's purpose. So I think part of that is really being, you know, being able to, yeah, get rid of some of these negative thought patterns that are can be very destructive sometimes. So we're going to bring on a wonderful woman right now sometimes. So we're going to bring on a wonderful woman right now, Without further ado. Her name is Gina Cavalier and, yes, she's also host of the Liberated Healer podcast. So a fellow podcaster, and I'm glad to have you on the show today. Gina Cavalier (Guest) Thank you for the opportunity. And, yes, it is a serious topic but we don't call it a dark topic and we are putting an effort together to bring levity towards it and to kind of take away some of the stigmatism so we can help our fellow humans. And so, yeah, we kind of raise the frequency, we try to keep it in the space where it's not so taboo and not so scary and so we can actually make headway. Gloria "Grace" Rand (Host) Yeah, absolutely. I like that. That's a good way to frame it. So I always love to start the interviews, you know, with our guests, kind of having them share with us a little bit about their journey, and so you know what got you here today, where you are someone who is talking about healing and talking about, you know, helping folks who may be having some trouble managing their lives. Let's put it that way. Gina Cavalier (Guest) Yeah, well, you know, we're just so individual, our story is always different, but there's a lot of things that are very similar. And you know, I just I had a suicidal ideation. On and off I wasn't even really a depressed person, I just didn't feel like I fit in anywhere. You know, I had abusive childhood and that kind of beat, some unworthiness into me and self-pity and doubt and just fears. And I knew I was a good person at heart. So I didn't understand. I felt there was a disconnect between what my soul was and how I was feeling inside and how the world around me felt. Also, I was very empathetic and very sensitive to energy, and so my nature was to go in and help people, heal people. And so I came in, just started helping everyone as much as I could, to the point where I got chronic fatigue syndrome. I was just overweight, I was exhausted and I was sad and I didn't understand this process. I just kind of, when life events would come in like a divorce or a job change or anything that felt really overwhelming, I just would kind of go there just saying, yeah, I don't belong here. I just don't feel like I belong here, I'm outside the circle, always, just always on the edge of feeling like I belong. And then I just really got tired of that record playing in my head and I said I'm going to really try to figure this out and I put the healing in my own hands um, knowing that I'm the only one with me 24, seven and I continued through a path to heal that and it was. It took me a while, but now I feel like I can reduce that um length of time for people explaining what my process was, some of the things that helped me creating these books, these workbooks that people can do on their home so they're not alone, I mean, so they don't have to tell anybody if they don't feel comfortable to do that yet, but they can still get some one-on-one advice and safety plans with some therapeutic context. And I'm building a nonprofit Suicidal Ideation Anonymous, which I'm trying to get grants for right now, and it's going to act much like AA and I thought, well, anything that needs to be anonymous probably is suicidal ideation, and that's just where we're going now. And so I'm building a whole 360, you know I'm building an app building this whole world around helping mental health and, you know, normalizing these conversations so we don't have to hear as many of these stories. It's correct, we do lose one person every 11 minutes in the United States alone, so it is actually a worldwide epidemic, pandemic, whatever you want to call it. It's 911. We also have to have programs in place where people are so scared and overwhelmed by what might happen. Is it going to damage their future prospects of working? Is it going to? Because a lot of people have these emotions and they come over you and then they go away. For a lot of the people that have, on and off, suicidal ideation, it's not something that's every day, so they don't want to damage their future by just communicating. Yeah, I have some dark thoughts once in a while, and the thing is we don't know the statistics on how many people have suicidal ideation. We only know people who've actually either had an attempt that was documented or, you know, actually followed through with it, and those numbers alone are staggering. So we could be dealing with 90% of the population that have suicidal thoughts once in a while. So, yeah, normalizing it in a kind way, with some levity and understanding, that we're just all unique, our story's unique. What are you going to put in your toolbox for you, whether it's exercising, meditating, maybe even church or whatever it is to you, but you have to create your own playbook, in a way. Gloria "Grace" Rand (Host) Yeah, I love that and so many things are going through my mind as you're talking about it and I'm going to start. I'm going to start with one thing is that I also believe that you know, because you went through this, it's why you are here now to be able to do this. You know it's clearly, this is your, you know reason for being here, and I love that. I love the idea also about suicidal ideation on out of us. I think that is very good. It makes so much sense and I do think it may be 90%. I mean, I remember when I was a teenager and I briefly thought about it because I was growing up in a household that wasn't a lot of fun, and then you mix in just becoming a teenager and all the crap that goes with that sometimes, yeah, and, and I think the main thing that prevented me, or one of the things, was that my mom I had seen my mom when I was a little girl. She lost her best friend to suicide and I saw how devastated she was. I mean, just even I was probably five years old or something, and so I think that was always in the back of my head, that, nah, I can't really do that to my mom, so I didn't go through with it. But, yeah, so there's so much to it, and I love that you mentioned a few things and that we all have our own journey to go through. What do you think actually helped you maybe the most, or have? Yeah, let me just start with air first. Okay, end up doing compound questions too often, so let's go there. What do you think helped you the most in being able to you know, finally, you know, flip that switch and be able to say, okay, I don't have to be in that place anymore. Gina Cavalier (Guest) We've kind of forgotten about spirituality. Spirituality comes last a lot of times when we're in our development. So it's physical and education and all these different things....