Soul SiStories
Soul SiStories was born out of a mutual desire to bring forward hope and healing through sharing our lived experiences. Hope is embracing life despite adversity. Hope is our reason.
Soul SiStories
Hope Through The WTF Moments
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When life throws the kind of curveballs that make you say “are you kidding me,” where does hope live? We open up as sisters about the losses that reshaped us—death, divorce, and the everyday mess that never takes a day off—and how we learned to hold grief and gratitude in the same hand. This is a raw, practical conversation about staying present when love is gone, routers won’t connect, and snow stacks up on the windshield.
We trace the small, stubborn actions that become lifelines: assembling a crib while heartbroken, hanging insulation with an aching hand, building a wobbly workbench that still works. Those tiny wins aren’t cosmetic; they create dignity and momentum. We talk about acceptance without surrender, how “magical thinking” gives way to sober truth, and why doing the next right thing is a powerful form of self-respect. Along the way, we share how community keeps us upright—an online grief group that still meets weekly, friends who show up, and a creative practice that invites others to speak their stories aloud.
There’s also the mystery we can’t ignore: the ongoing relationship with those we’ve lost. We’ve seen how love continues in unexpected ways—dreams, timing, the ripple effects on friends’ weddings, tattoos, and new children. That continuity doesn’t cancel the pain; it sits beside it. We name both. If you’re navigating loss, burnout, or a season of relentless “WTF,” you’ll find real talk, gentle humor, and tools you can use today. Press play for a grounded take on resilience, grief literacy, and everyday courage, and then share your own “hope through” moment with us.
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Welcome to Soul Sisters.
SPEAKER_00Well, we just had a fun conversation with ourselves. So uh Donna and Diana got together just to kind of chat a little bit today. And we want to share kind of our hope through the WTFs of life with y'all.
SPEAKER_01Hey, hey, hey, welcome to Solstice Trees, everyone. Here with my sister Diana. This is Donna. And you know, we're we're having some days. We're having some stuff, some challenges. Or like, what's what's the hope right now? And it's like, uh, we decided it's hope through WTF. So this. Let's get let's get into it. Yes.
SPEAKER_00And we're doing something a little bit different this time, right? Instead of, you know, having a guest on the show that we get to interview. I think coming into this new year, it's uh gonna be some time for us to just chat together about kind of life, about what's happening, about hope. And and like you said, that WTF, because I think every day we both kind of wake up and have that thought, WTF. And uh and certainly other people I know are feeling that also.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and people like like you, you and I were like, let's face it, we are resilient as heck. We are we keep going, and I don't know what that thing is in us, but we do. I don't know if it's nature or I mean it's a lot that we've built up some stuff, some calluses over time and some practices. We do some things, um, varied things, but I mean, you know, it can be very hard for people to hear, oh, hope through, have hope, just have hope. And and we're never just saying that, right? It's not just as simple as the Pollyanna, no, everything's okay. It's like right now, in both of our lives, there are a lot of WTF challenges where we want to stop and go, are you effing kidding me? Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00You know, and it's I'm like thinking this whole thing about like, well, when did we develop that? Where did we learn to keep going? And I'm going back to high school. If remember when we graduated, you had to think of your senior quote that was in the yearbook. And I remember mine was something like, you know, here's a test to tell whether your mission on earth is finished. If you're alive, it isn't. And I think that that is very much still my motto. Like, I'm here for a reason. There's something I'm supposed to be doing, and and this belief that I kind of chose this existence. So I I don't have a choice. Like you just have to deal. I mean, that is the choice, right? I do I don't have a choice, and you just have to deal with it and you have to keep going.
SPEAKER_01And but but in that you don't have to, you know what I mean?
SPEAKER_00Like the you have the drive to yes, I have the drive. And and I don't believe that any of us were put here just to suffer. I I don't believe that the universe is cruel and had that intention for any of us. So if there's the craziness happening, the give me a break moments, it it's just, I mean, it's a challenge to get through because there is something bigger and better and and there's a I mean, there's a purpose for it, I guess.
Resilience, Purpose, And Keeping On
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so I think that's the thing, right? As we go through the various challenges that are here, we see again and again the rainbows, the the stuff that comes after and through the storm and only because of it. You know, I was talking with uh an old friend of ours yesterday, ended up we were gonna meet for like an hour for coffee, five hours later.
SPEAKER_00Yes.
SPEAKER_01Well, I mean, amazing and amazing to have some days off and sometimes and dig in for those five hours. Um, but we were talking about, and now my thought just totally rolled out of my head. What were we talking about?
SPEAKER_00That is our life. Um that that staying the course and continuing to kind of move forward despite the the challenges.
Grief’s Depth And Ongoing Connection
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and who knows what it was that I was gonna say. Hey, producer. Maybe we maybe we got this big gap of yeah, WTF. I have no idea. I have no idea what the answer is there. But I think there's this um, I know I feel the compulsion to keep putting one foot in front of the other. Um, but it's but I'm not denying the truth of what's going on. There are some super real hardcore challenges in my life right now. Like, and if I tell other people about, they're like, oh my god, oh my god, what like whoo, that's a lot. And yeah, it is. Um, but I think I've I don't know, I've weathered so much. And I see, I guess that's where we started talking, that there's always that path. Oh, here we go, here's the gold, here's the pot of gold. That so I was talking about when Kenny died, when you know his son died six years ago, six and a half years ago. And I mean, it can't get more WTF than that, right? There are can there's a connection I have with him now. There's a relationship I have with him now. He is living his best life now, and I know there are a whole bunch of people who won't understand what that is. I just tell you that it's true. Yeah, he is so good and so happy, not angel wings and I'm hello. He is living his free and full and total life. I would not have this connection and this profound and beautiful experience if not for the fact that my son died. It still and always sucks that my son died. It does, it will throughout the totality of this life. That is a truth, and also I am profoundly and beautifully and joyfully connected with him still. Yeah, and it's not like, oh, okay, you know, yay for this win. Oh, I win. It's not that, but it is God, there's some tremendous beauty to be found here.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And I don't know how to say that other than that. Like that is a truth. Yeah.
Beauty Alongside Everyday Chaos
SPEAKER_00Yeah. You know, there's days that I think I would give up everything I know now to go back to how things were, you know, six years ago, six and a half years ago, you know, our our journey, you know, we've lost a lot. And, you know, 2019 started with the loss of, you know, our stepfather, and a few months later, your son, my nephew, my godson, you know, and six or seven months after that, my guy. And um, you know, that that's huge, that's huge loss that we lived through at the same time as the world was going through 2020 with COVID and all of that. And there was a lot of despair. And we could have we could have wallowed, and we I'll I'll speak for myself. I did have my wallowing. I mean, there was like if I wanted to scream, I screamed. If I needed to just sit and cry, and even today, I will let myself scream and cry and holler and do whatever I need to do, and then kind of, you know, like David would always say, you know, here's a straw, suck it up. Okay, well, it's time to put on my big girl panties and get on with life because I'm I'm still here. I mean, I still have my children, I still have, even with all this craziness, I mean, there's still just a beautiful world. I'm sitting here in my little retreat looking out at just white fallen snow that's just absolutely gorgeous, and the trees are covered, and I've got my little Christmas wreath out my window, and it's peaceful and beautiful. And that exists at the same time as the WTF, at the same time as the grief, the sorrow, the anger, the bitterness, all of those things.
SPEAKER_01And the reality, the everyday things too. You driving down the road and it's icy and snowy. I can't even see, and how am I gonna get home? And the windshield wiper breaks, and then you can't get to the store, or mom needs what something, or kids need something, like all of those things. It's not just, oh, you have this grief and that's your one thing. Right. Right. The car still breaks down, the computer right now won't make the connection it needs to make. I couldn't get my new routers on last night to make this recording, and now I gotta pay the freaking company a couple hundred bucks to come out here because their equipment doesn't work.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. So it's everything. And and you know, I I guess that just reminds me of, you know, when people always say, you know, you don't you don't know what's going on in somebody else's life. You know, you get mad at the person in front of you driving too slowly because they're messing up your day, but you don't know what they're dealing with. And and I remember after losing Kenny and David, I remember thinking that a lot when I would be out and I'd somebody would upset me for some reason, and I'd have to stop and just say, God, you have no clue what's going on with them. Like, what if they just left the hospital from visiting a loved one? What if they just lost a baby? What if they, you know, what if they just want to be able to do that?
SPEAKER_01They're their child, their teenager is in dire straits and they can't do anything about it. There's so many things going on in people's worlds.
Screaming, Doing, And Small Wins
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And and you know, I think we we both offer people a lot of grace and and we don't always give ourselves that same grace, you know. And so I I so it's been a work in progress for me to, you know, the other day when I was trying to hold it all together, after I found a mouse in the basement, it was dead. Thank God it was dead. Um, and I was trying to re-put up um the insulation in the basement, you know, where I used to have a partner who did all of those kind of things for me, right? So I'm trying to figure those things out and hold things in place and use the staple gun with my arthritic hand that doesn't work so well. And and, you know, just knowing I well, I can hire somebody to do it, right? But that's ridiculous because this is something that should be easy. And then finally just going, just scream. You're in the basement. I mean, who cares if everybody hears you upstairs? I mean, I don't even know where the kids were at that point, and so I did. I mean, I just screamed loud and didn't say WTF. I used other words. I yelled at David, and then I laughed hysterically because I pictured him just watching me going, like, girls, suck it up. Just do it. And then I did, and I stepped back and I looked at it and I went, okay, my insulation is up. I've got this beautiful pink ribbon holding my insulation up, and it looks fine.
Building Cribs, Benches, And Confidence
SPEAKER_01And you did it, and that's the like, okay, even you stayed the course, you found and you did it, yeah, which is a lot of pride in that. And like what so that reminds me so years ago, man, sis. There have been there's been a lot of crap in this life. So years ago, right after literally right after Kenny was born, as you well know, my first husband decided adios. I love you, but I love her too. And I'm supposed to be with her. Yes, yeah, great story there, Paul. But keep telling it to yourself, keep telling yourself that story. So I remember I moved in with you and mom. I moved back home. I could like I had this baby, I had this new baby. What was I gonna do? Moved in with you guys, and then mom was moving, you guys were moving. And so had my baby had the stuff setting up in this room, and you guys dropped me at the new house where I had my little Kenny, and I had his crib, and you were going to get more stuff, and I had to get his crib set up. He needed a nap, there was nowhere else to put him, and I couldn't make this GD thing, I could not make it. I could, and I was, and I sat there and I cried, and I've got this baby, and I have no husband, and I'm still postpartum. And I'm like, it was it was a whole lot, a lot of but by God, I made that crib. Oh I did it, I did it myself. Yeah, nobody else, I didn't know how to do crap like that. I figured it out, I put my baby down for a nap. He took a nap, and I still feel that pride that I felt in that moment, you know, and I could I could have just fallen apart. I could I could you know just lie here on the floor, kid. But I was gonna build that crib, yeah. And it even and even when you decide to do the things, they still don't always work out. Oh so it's not like that, Wolf. You just stay with it, it'll work out, yeah. But something will like Ted Lasso. There's a line in Ted Lasso where he talks about it's all gonna work out. It may not work out the way that you hope it will or you think it will, but it will work out in the way that it's like supposed to work out, yeah. And just that acceptance is huge. Yeah, but the crib worked out, and I feel freaking proud, proud of you for that insulation.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah. That's funny. I I mean, I of course Ted Lasso is everything. And if you haven't watched Ted Lasso, you gotta go watch that now. But um, you know, even last summer when I decided, okay, I'm gonna make my workbench because you know what? David would have made anything, you know. You know, I would sit around and go, oh, wouldn't that be nice if we had this on the wall, or wouldn't a table like this be nice? And he just ran into the garage and whipped something up real quick. And and so, you know, I did a little bit of planning and I'm it wasn't perfect, but I have a workable workbench in the garage that I'm pretty proud of myself. And it's not, I mean, it's a custom workbench, right? It's and it's not what he would make, it's not what I would have if I hired somebody to do it, but I'm like, okay, I'm I'm pretty handy. I can get through these things on my own. Driving home in the snow the other night without a windshield wiper, I figured out how to get home in one piece, luckily.
SPEAKER_01Amazingly. You know, I'm I'm always and have always been impressed by you. And let me just say that out loud for posterity. I am impressed by your tenacity and your can-do spirit and your figure it out. And you and David definitely had that in common. You were a shared, like, well, here's a thing, let's figure out how to do it. And that you do it still, and you do it and you keep he's close with you, but you're doing it, you're finding a way. I'm I'm just I'm so impressed by you and proud of you. And thanks. Like, wow, that's that's really something. You were always the ones who like, well, I'd like to ice skate, I'll take a class, I'd like to sign, I'll take a class. Yeah, I'd like like you just do. You don't just think you don't think it you enact it.
Taking Action And Creating Community
SPEAKER_00Yeah. I was talking with a friend last night who um, you know, just doing, right? I lost Kenny, lost David, and COVID shut down everything. And I kept thinking, like, okay, when the world opens up, I'm gonna start this grief group, right? It'll just be something in my neighborhood. It'll be like, you know, on my front porch, we'll get together and sip iced tea and and chat about, you know, loss and grief and anything else. And a few weeks later, when the world was still not opening up, I just started an online group. And a handful of us still have met weekly since 2020. And last night was our meeting, and one of my friends said that very thing. She's like, you know, just laughing. She says, I just love that you that you just took ice skating. And it was like, yeah, as an adult, I wanted you. The difference between David and I were if we said we want to ice skate, he would put on a pair of ice skates and he'd go. I was, let me look for what kind of ice skate I'm supposed to wear. Let me go take that lesson so I can see where your feet go. And and then I'll go and I'll do it.
SPEAKER_01But you are ever the academic, the researcher. Yes, yeah, yeah. Yeah. I am, see, I'm not like David where I'm just gonna do it, nor am I the academic, though I was always known for being studious. I'm the well, I'm gonna try and somehow I'm gonna channel the information and I'm too lazy to read all the stuff about what it is I'm supposed to do. But maybe I'll ask somebody who knows and that'll do. So I'm somewhere.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And boy, we do have such a group, uh such a network, right? Of people we could reach out to. I I mean, there's so many days though that I want to pick up the phone and call David or Kenny to ask them. I mean, Kenny was my math guy. Kenny was like, I mean, I could remember helping Blake and even junior high and like struggling with, oh, what is the equation for this? Like, let me call Kenny. He'll tell me how to work it through, right? And and there's still times where I have that kind of, okay, let's let's call somebody for help. But but we can. And and we do. And you know, I I I I guess I don't even know what I was saying with that, but like uh the fact that you do the things, I mean, like even, hey, no clue on how to do this podcast, but this sounds kind of fun to get together and chat. And even if you say, yeah. And if people listen, great. And if they don't, okay, we still get to meet people and we still get to talk. And that's really cool. And then for you to reach out to, you know, producer Kirk and say, Hey, can you give us some tips? Can you tell us what equipment to buy? And yeah, then he said, Well, I'll just come aboard with you. And I know. Thank you, Kirk. Yeah. And you know, that if you build it, they will come. And it's it's very true. It's yeah, yeah.
Acceptance, Magical Thinking, And Meaning
SPEAKER_01It's really true, sis. And the thing, uh you know, in 12-step recovery, they say don't leave, you know, five minutes before your miracle or whatever it is. And it like it's always coming, the payoff is always coming. Yeah, the satisfaction is always coming, and there is satisfaction also, there can be in the struggle. Like that struggle of that crib, that may seem small, but man, like I said, I feel it to this day, and I feel great pride in my persistence. And I did this for my kid, and I kept showing up. Yeah, that's a big deal. And and like even speaking of that time, I remember, man, I was in deep grief then. That was profound grief. That was a death for me. And it's not the same at all. I mean, it was massive, but then you know, once Kenny died, I'm like, oh my god, all the rest was child or that. Um, but through all that, like I remember consciously thinking, okay, somehow, somehow, I have to be present right now. I have to be present for my child because I don't want years to go by and I have no memory of what the beginning of his life was. Yeah I I need to somehow stay present.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And so I fought through the depression and the pain. I mean, I felt it, you know, you're front row seat for it. Yeah, you know, but of course, that's also where Kenny bonded with David and you profoundly and mom, but you got you guys became nanny dah. David was da, and as everybody should know, da is a word for dad and places in the world. And and David was that profound connection for him.
SPEAKER_00And had you not had that loss, and I mean, and and I mean my loss was not the same as yours, but I certainly remember that because your husband was my brother, you know. I mean, I absolutely adored him and I loved him. He did us all dirty. Yeah, he did us all, yes. He did us all dirty. And also what a gift his I'm trying to not use the words I want to use. Um what a gift his b behavior was in that he I mean he gifted David and I with Kenny's presence. I mean, uh we fought over who got off work earliest to pick Kenny up from daycare. We took days off so that we could spend it with Kenny. I mean, from the time he was, you know, just a couple months old. And um I mean, what a blessing that was.
Support Networks And Future Stories
SPEAKER_01We can be real and say, I mean, I can say David was the number one man in Kenny's life for his life. And as others, and he had a a new dad who came into his life, who's very important relationship, and I'm not diminishing that or negating that, but there was something very profound about that connection from the very beginning that Kenny made with you too. And so, even that, sure, you're his aunt and godmother, but you're more than that. He belongs to you, yeah, too. He does, and I can, and I can, I'm his mom, but I know like I'm not his only mom.
SPEAKER_00Right, right. And I know this is a conversation for another day that we will have, but you know, in my life, you know, David had been in my life since I was a kid, you know. We were we were friends, but we weren't partners. And um Kenny came into our lives, right? And David came into you know, at the same time, David came in vacation just within, I mean, David and I started Kenny was born six months later, yeah, and then Kenny died, and David followed him six months later.
SPEAKER_01Yep, you know, and so And isn't there some crazy beauty in that as perverse as that feels like saying?
SPEAKER_00But there is yeah, and and my anger and my hurt that David isn't on this earth for me and his kids, there is so much beauty in knowing that they're together, and that I mean, their connection, I mean, it was always there, it was there from day one. And I imagine it was there before that day that we knew they were connected, right?
SPEAKER_01Yeah. And just for the record to say, there was no part of David that wanted to leave his children, he loves his children. His heart literally broke when when Kenny died. His heart broke, yeah. There was no coming back from that. So that's just real.
Closing Reflections And Listener Invite
SPEAKER_00That's real, yeah, yeah. And so then that's it, right? That's that all these WTF moments. Yeah, and then like, but there's this beauty in it, and um, you know, I guess I I mm, it's it's all of it. And you know, you were talking about like me taking lessons and you figuring things out and us just doing some of the things. I mean, what's the worst thing that's gonna happen? Yeah. I mean, if if we try something. I mean, if I, you know, I'm looking at this snow going, you know, it'd be fun to go snowshoeing. Maybe I'd hate it, but you know, I we did it once in Tahoe, right? So, hey, let's just do it. What's the worst that's gonna happen? I mean, unless I, you know, took myself off. Yeah, yeah, bears, right? That sort of thing. But it's like, yeah, okay, well, then what? You know, I I don't know.
SPEAKER_01It's but look even right where you are, and you mentioned a little bit looking at your gorgeous window, but sis, you did that. You dared to see a new reality for you and your kids, and moved across the freaking country, yeah, all that that entailed, yeah, and found this home in this gorgeous paradise that also is muddy and challenging. It's not just a paradise. No, it's not, it's not, um, but wow, yeah, well, wow, and a lot of people in the country, yeah, they're like snow, big deal. I don't know, us Southern California girls.
SPEAKER_00Oh it's huge. Yeah, I'm sorry, like waking up to you know, eight or ten inches of snow yesterday was like, oh, this is like real snow. I mean, this is our let's go to mammoth or Tahoe for the winter, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Right, yeah, and you like that feeling and sense the whole Gilmore girls thing, like that world, you found it for yourself and you made it happen. Yeah, gosh darn, that is amazing. And that's that's what happens with the WTF. WTF, I'm gonna go dare to dream something new. Because that it's kind of like you know, someone very close in my life right now, as you well know, is is meaning his full life challenge for coming in at the end of the story. Yeah, and you know, we've had a lot of conversations about you. This is not the life you want, but this is the life you have you have. So what are you gonna do with it? Like you gotta accept this the the this is it, and the big part of the grief, right? Like with with Kenny, it was like just that disbelief. It can't be true, it can't be true. He's gonna walk through the door and somehow gonna this is you know, or then the other crazy hopes, like there's gonna be a kid who shuts up at my door who's that this child that he had in life that never knew, like, you know, just all the fantasies. Uh Joan calls it the year of magical thinking. Yes, relate to that. Yes. Um, but hoping that that was all that was the reality, and it isn't getting into the acceptance finally. This this is he's not here.
SPEAKER_00That physical being will never be here. Yeah, and and it has opened you up to some amazing experiences. I mean, yeah, one, one, your connection to him and your connection to you know, just kind of everything that is, right? But also the stories that have come through from his friends, from you know, people who have included him in their weddings and the tattoos they've gotten and the birth of their children, and you know, the job.
SPEAKER_01He comes to them in their dreams and they give me a call because told them to.
SPEAKER_00Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah. So, you know, I I I mean, there's this beauty that on the one hand I go, like, yeah, well, who cares? I don't need this beauty. Give me back the life I had, right? Yeah, yeah. But then like this beauty that we get to experience that we wouldn't have experienced otherwise. And and all, you know, my women's group that I've had for five years, and you know, shout out to Catherine, who I've met with weekly, with the exception of, you know, once or twice, you know, um that we've been together through all of this. And it yeah, I wouldn't have had been able to make that connection. I wouldn't I wouldn't have had a desire to make that connection, right?
SPEAKER_01So Catherine's got to be one of our next we keep saying it, but also she's got a story.
SPEAKER_00She's got a story.
SPEAKER_01Here's the little teaser everyone want to come back and listen to Catherine and her story and what she does. She blows me away. Talk about hope through. Well, sis, the WTFs, yeah, they're always gonna be there, right? Always. And um onward. Onward we go. Yeah. Hope through. Yeah. Hey everybody, that's it for that's it for today. We'd love to hear your hope throughs if you want to share with us. And um, you know, the WTFs, you've got this too. You've got it. Sending you all lots of love. Thanks for joining us today on Soul Sistories. And thanks for sharing stories with us. We'd love to hear your stories as well, and keep the conversation going, absolutely keeping the hope going. So we're really hopeful that you'll connect with our guests as well who have great stories to share. Go ahead and follow them in various social media platforms or live venues, wherever it is that they're performing and uh sharing what they do.
SPEAKER_00We would love to have you follow us on all of our social media platforms, subscribe and rate, as that will help us get our message of hope out to others.
SPEAKER_01Thanks for listening to Soul Sisters.
