Trigger warning. The following podcast contains explicit language and discussions of sensitive topics that some listeners may find distressing, including miscarriage, child abuse, mental health issues and birth trauma.
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Listen to discretion is advised. If you feel triggered or overwhelmed at any point, we encourage you to pause the episode and take care of yourself.
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Hello and welcome to another.
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Episode of the Touched Out podcast.
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In this episode, I speak to Mark, which is a fake name.
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Who wished to?
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Remain anonymous. Mark is an indigenous Australian as well as a dedicated father in corrections.
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Officer Mark shares his unique approach of mentally switching off from his job by putting on and taking off his uniform at work, ensuring that his family only sees him as a loving father and partner.
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Throughout the episode, we delve into various topics, including the profound impact of choices and consequences. As Mark reflects on how many of his friends ended up in prison or dead due to poor decisions.
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We also discussed.
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The power of.
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Empathy and how experiencing hardships early in life can foster a deep understanding about the struggles mark opens up about his father's life as a naval officer.
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The subsequent diagnosis of PTSD and the emotional toll that took on him when he had to revive his father after an overdose. We discussed the tragic death of Mark's father by suicide and its lasting impact on him.
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And his family. I'm really grateful for Mark's bravery and vulnerability in sharing his personal journey, as I acknowledge that Ma wasn't used to talking about his feelings, especially on.
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Open forum.
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I hope you enjoyed today's episode, and if you did, please consider subscribing and leaving a rating as well as following us on socials at Touched Out Podcast for sneak peeks at upcoming episodes and more thanks all.
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No lifespans are, so take up from everything.
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Alright, today we.
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Have Mark, how are you?
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Mark. Yeah, good mate. Cool.
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Yeah. Well, thank you. Thank you for being with us today.
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So we'll start off with you telling us a little bit.
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About yourself and a.
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Little bit about your family.
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Larry, I live on the South Coast. I'd see children. Partner. Yeah. I'm currently going through divorce at the moment with my ex wife.
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Yeah, pretty messy as they get. So yeah. Just trying to, yeah. Just don't laugh and you.
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Know they're the best.
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That I can.
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Be, you know, work my job and.
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Just try and make him late, man.
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I'm sorry about the the divorce, mate. It must be a hard.
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Time for you. Yeah. No anybody, man.
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Look, you know, these things happen, mate.
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Yeah, yeah, they certainly do, unfortunately. So you said you've got three kids, correct?
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Yeah, yeah, I got.
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Three beautiful kids.
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Yeah, and they're.
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Your biological children. Are they with your ex?
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Wife or your OK?
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Say my three children are with my my ex partner. They're my biological 3 and my car partner we had.
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Two as well, yeah, so.
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OK.
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On kids all up.
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Yeah, awesome. And how old are they?
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So our eldest.
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810863 and two.
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Tell us a little bit about your history, mate. So you're an indigenous gentleman, is that correct?
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Yeah, yeah. Here from the UN nation.
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Your nation. That's your mum.
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Yeah, that's your mum. Yeah. Yeah.
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Awesome. And tell us a little bit about life as an.
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Indigenous boy growing up so.
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Well, obviously here in our community on the South Coast, one of our mobile, obviously quite close. You know, everyone knows everyone and obviously a lot of stuff happened around town, but that's good or bad.
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Everyone knows you people, so I got up. I was quite good, like, believe. Quite a lot of work to be going pretty far. Played 24 metal Storm and Kennedy Bulldog. Yes, I played a lot of.
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Me and you know, obviously.
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Help stamp my.
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Name in the community role with, you know have.
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You know you should be put your mouth.
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Washed up now.
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Yeah, it's like everyone's quite close down here and everyone, everyone, like I said, yeah, it's it's it's a good little, quite little community.
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And you currently work as a corrections officer is.
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That correct?
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Yeah, that's correct. Yeah. Yeah. So this should.
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And how long have you?
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Been doing that.
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Be my 7th.
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Year in the job, yeah.
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And do you wanna tell us a little bit about that a little bit about your?
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Experience as as correction officer.
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Yeah. So data correction Officer, obviously it's true.
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Like any like different man, like somebody. The good, somebody, the bad, somebody pretty strong, maybe like different.
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Actually, it's quite stressful at times. We do a lot of confronting situations, you know, start the salts or self harm or, you know, assault on each other.
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What email from each other? Like stabbing the assault? Yeah, just it's full on man. Yeah, but everyone. Yeah. Everyone pretty good luck where we work and everyone gets along and when.
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When it gets hard and tough, everyone puts them together and stuff. But yeah, it is. It is quite stressful.
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Like you know, sometimes something might happen at work. It's quite confronting and you'll go home and.
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You know, you just gotta sort of.
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Switch off soon.
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As you come to the door and.
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Just. Yeah, just try and you know your role changes from the correction officer to a father or a partner and yeah, it's just a constant juggle.
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Man often jump on. There's a lot of head miles that you do at night before bed or, you know, yeah, it's it's it's a hard job, man.
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But you know couldn't for long. But Sunday is a good to, you know, yeah.
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Something's gotta do it, huh? Definitely.
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Actually, yeah. So I also work in.
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Corrections, so I I definitely empathise with the the hardships of the job and the, you know, all of the traumas that you have to kind of go through in a professional, in your professional life and then having to kind.
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Of flip the.
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And then head home and be a dad and be a partner and everything. So it's definitely a a hard juggle.
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So what is it that you do to ensure your own mental health stays as good as it can be to show up for your family? And what are your self care go TOS?
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Probably took me about maybe two or three years to finally find my groove. My work for my life took me.
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Probably, yeah, it took me a long time, man, but now the the few little things I like to.
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Do before I come home so.
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I'll go to work in my cities into my uniform at work, and then when I finish my shift I'll get changed at work back into my civies the moment I put my work, my civilian shirt on, I'm no longer a correctional officer.
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You know what I mean? I'm not connected to the job. At least the normal everyday citizen in that society.
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But I find that helps a lot like that mindset that I have when I take that shirt off and and.
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Put on a a normal T shirt and walk out of work. It definitely does help, like when I come home, I just enjoy the time I have with my party.
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And huge. And when I'm not working, I like to keep myself busy, sounds 2.3 local. I like to detail cars, rush cars and just getting in my family like we do.
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I'm very family orientated. Say. Yeah, I just like to just keep myself busy, man. And just not not think about work when I'm not there and just enjoying the time where I have away from the place.
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Yeah, definitely the.
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The fact that you put your uniform on.
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When you're at.
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Work and take it off is just before you leave.
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Is is a great tool. Actually, I'd never thought about doing that. I get ready at home and kids see me in my uniform all the time.
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So they obviously always ask what I do for work and you know, they say you go and look after the bad men tonight I work night shift so.
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OK.
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I always explain to them it's not as easy as just bad men. Good men. You know, everyone's in there for different reasons in different circumstances.
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And yeah, it's just lump them all into one box of good or bad. You know, there's unfortunately toddlers don't really understand nuance and things like that.
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So what led you to getting into corrections?
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Was there a?
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A lead up to it. Is it something you've?
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Always been interested in.
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You know.
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Did you I myself personally, I got into it because I wanted to give back to the community and I.
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Wanted to help.
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People that you know perhaps didn't really have anyone on their teams to advocate for them in in their times of need.
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And that's, you know, led them to making some silly decisions that have led them to being in that position. So I wanted to kind of try to be their work.
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Yeah, it's good to.
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Instead of.
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Hear man, you know what? There's sort of, there's a lot of a lot of reasons why.
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Doing the job.
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I sort of.
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I never like to be a correctional officer or, you know, wanted to wake up every morning and put on a uniform that wasn't really excited for me.
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I think when my ex wife and I were pregnant with my with our first child, we sort of had a conversation.
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We realised that, you know, we had to earn some more money and she was obviously gonna be at home with the baby.
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So and at that time it was a big recruitment Dr and one of the boys actually grew up with since we're little boys. So they said, oh, you know, and apply.
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Should be what my say.
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Yeah. See my head maybe.
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Ask physical or the interview the sock process. You know, it's like me and like all the the recruitment application.
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Ohh it's a it's a long process, isn't it?
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It's about 3:00 and.
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1/2 four months of interviews and.
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Yes, like examinations and drug tests. And did you have to do like the scenarios where they haven't paid actors and things like that?
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OK, from the training course, but in my interview we did go over a couple of scenarios just terribly and you know obviously that assessed on your, on your response to those scenarios. So yeah, yeah, you truly your process, but obviously yeah, it's pretty. It's truly rewarding too.
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Certainly is. Yeah, everything at the end of the day, everything's pretty worth it and it's the type of job where you you only get out of it. What you.
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Put into it.
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Yeah, for.
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A patient. It's about all your receipt. Yeah. So, I mean, it's a an absolutely selfless job and it's an absolutely thankless job. So something that you definitely wouldn't hear anywhere near offer.
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Thank you for your service. It's truly appreciated by a lot of people that just don't get a chance to say thank you, mate. So for everyone that doesn't say thanks. Thank you.
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No, I'll say that to you, Bubba. Thank you.
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You're more than welcome, mate.
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So just going over a little bit of of what?
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You had written.
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Through to me previously. So you grew up indigenous on the South Coast. You did state you.
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Been through and seen many things in your young life and you'd like to share your experiences, guidance and advice to youth and other people in your community and the rest of my listeners.
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So do you want to go over that? What?
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Are the what are?
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The things that you've been through, what are?
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Your experiences.
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And any advice you would like to give?
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They yeah, that's a that's a. That's a long one man growing up, there's a lot of drugs and a lot of parties, a lot of drinking, a lot of domestic violence, a lot of a lot of good.
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It's such a low socioeconomic area, man, there's a lot of crime down here and obviously, you know, Grant going up around boys who didn't come from, you know, such strong home.
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And they didn't have the right mindset in mine or mind frame. And to make those right decisions, a lot of boys that I grew up with, you know, obviously in gaol now, I was just lucky that my mum and dad were strong people.
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And you know, they gave me the right way to make the right decision. Yeah, I just see laughing about choices, man.
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Like the right choice is is is the.
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Truth that you make is the path that.
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You take, you know what I mean.
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Regardless of whether you come from, you know, a broken broken home, or you come from a rich upper class to him, everyone everyone makes their own choice and walks down their own path.
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So I just see. Yeah, it's hard, man. Like you just need to think about what you're gonna do and just make the right.
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It's always a hard one that fork in the road because you know, regardless of.
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Of you know your two choices.
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You're right or you're wrong.
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Choose the wrong path. You've got another fork down that path, mate leads you to different circumstances or choices. That could be the right ones for you.
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So it's it's, it's not always so black and white to just make a yes or no choice or a right or wrong choice.
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It's always just leading you to different outcomes and different choices that ultimately put you on the path that you're supposed to be on, you know, so I I mean, I grew up with a fairly decent family.
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I was. I'm a child of divorce and all that. I grew up middle to lower class in a country town.
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But I definitely fell in with the wrong crowd. I definitely made a lot of wrong choices looking back, those choices made me who I am today.
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They made me the empathetic person I am today. They made me want to help people that grew up like me or worse off than me.
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So, you know, at the end of the day, those choices were.
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Wrong at the time, but.
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They led me living where I'm supposed.
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Yeah, I'm blunt.
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To be now. So I hope that I hope that you.
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I haven't been there like this. The the experience that I learned growing up has made me who I am today, man.
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Feel same way.
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And you sort of gives you a better perspective and you know what's around you and this situation that you find yourselves in and just learn from the experience you've had before and make better choices every time. So that. Yeah.
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Correct. Not only that but, but you can also. You also possess the ability to put yourself in other people's.
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Use and and possess that empathy because you know you're not only.
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Seeing their experiences through like media and news and things like that, you've their lived experiences that that resonate with you personally.
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So I think as far as you know, like attending the school of Hard Knocks goes it's it's it's incredibly important for you to be able to develop that that kind of empathy and resilience and things like that to better deal with.
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Anything that life throws at you once you're an adult, think those bad choices are absolutely.
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Necessary. But it's a spectrum, you know, like one bad choice may lead you to, you know, getting detention or getting out of school or whatever.
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And another bad choice may lead you.
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To unfortunately castrated.
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Or worse off. So it's always kind of this balancing act and it's unfortunately not so black and white and there's no.
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One clear.
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Direct, instant ugly. Always have for something.
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So you Speaking of your younger life and your experiences.
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You did say that your father has passed away. Truly sorry to hear about that. Are you OK with him discussing that and how that affected you and everyone around you and how you kind of moved on from that or not moved on, but how you cope with that on a day?
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Yeah, man.
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To day basis as an adult.
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Yeah. So my father passed away. I think. I think it's six years this year, pretty were quite recent. Yeah, obviously from my understanding, I think 2022 years in the Navy, then overseas tours, when you come back, obviously come back with PTSD. He was struggling for a long time. And like, sometimes I remember coming out.
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And you'd you'd try and overdose. Like, when I come home from school and I'd have to involve him, you know, coming home from come back from school.
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But and and I have to try and help him out when he's on the floor in the house. And yeah, he was bad for a long time.
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And we, yeah, obviously we.
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Tried to help him out as much as we could in the family. Yeah, obviously.
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In life, but I remember, like yesterday, man. Like it's something I never forget. So yeah, after that passed away, it sent like a a big ripple of sex to our family, you know, like a lot of people were blaming each other. And, you know, people. Yeah. It's just it's your fault. It's your fault.
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It's a big ripple effects to the.
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Family name I.
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Fell out with my family for maybe five years. Like I stopped talking to my family for about 5 years.
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Because of everything that.
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Happened and it's pretty messy man.
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Like, really big, like people are fighting over this like my father has stayed and like money. Money makes people do terrible things.
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They they they should get that to get that feeling about and yeah, it was just it was a.
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Long road, man.
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Like I said, since I've left my ex wife, I've reconnected my family again and you know, now we're closer than ever.
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I just try and remember all the good time to have my father, you know, he he was lucky enough to meet my.
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The child. And yeah, just the little things that we used to do together, you know, go for coffee on the street or down the beach in the family and just know that he'd be keep you looking down on us happy.
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And you know every.
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Now and then.
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With a couple of songs for me that show my dad still around.
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Like, there's like a white a white butterfly that flies around when he's around. You know what I mean?
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And me and my family, we we believe that dad. Just stay with us. He's.
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Yeah, man. So it's just, yeah, like you don't ever get over it, bro. You just, you know, cherish every close, enjoy every second.
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Every moment you can with him, because you can walk out the door and you know, touch wood, that someone passes away in a car accident or you know something, you know, devastating happens and you never see them again. So you need to, I think everyone just.
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And I decided to little bit and stop getting so caught up in the world. And you know, they laugh and just take take the moment to, you know, just enjoy each other something and just tell each other how much you mean to them and how much you love them.
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Yeah, certainly. I always, before I was a father, I had this very, very.
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Internalised battle with myself and I was worried about bringing kids into this world with just it's just.
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Yeah, it's not a very nice world for the most part. You know, if you kind of go by news reports and and the the happenings around you years of COVID we had the, I mean obviously we had the strictest and longest lockdowns in the world and it was absolute torture.
00:16:21
Yeah, I mean.
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And I was, you know, really worried about bringing out our kids into the world that just as seemingly so full of hate.
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But when I had my first, I realised that just because this world is full of.
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Doesn't mean their world has to be and and I ensure that their world, which is, you know, their direct surroundings, this House is just absolutely full of love.
00:16:46
What we say I love you is any chance we get kiss each other goodbye. We kiss each other. Hello.
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We hug each other.
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Constantly our kids never see me and.
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My wife argue.
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They only know us as just absolutely loving each other. You know, we've maintained even if there was just something to.
00:17:04
Happen both of us are on the same page as far as the kids go, and it's not our lives anymore.
00:17:10
Percent we are. We are here for.
00:17:12
Our kids, you know.
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My my wife and I, we have a life outside of our kids, but to them like they they are our number one priority.
00:17:20
And all those will be our marriage, even it it's it's an equal first to our kids. So if our marriage were to break down, we would remain best of friends.
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And we would maintain parenting together and I think that's it doesn't always work like that for some people. I'm just very, very lucky to have, you know, not only my wife, but my best.
00:17:36
Yeah, yeah.
00:17:39
So yeah, that's that's as far as, you know, hugging everyone and cherishing every moment. Yeah, 100%, mate.
00:17:45
Same time.
00:17:45
You don't know when it'll all end, so I mean, obviously I'm. I'm incredibly sorry to hear of your father's passing.
00:17:51
My mother passed away too six years ago this year. She had a it it is what it is, isn't it? You know, it's it's it's a. It's a hard thing to swallow.
00:17:55
100%.
00:18:00
No matter how much you wish it not true, it is so. It's just a.
00:18:04
Matter of putting on that smile everyday mate and just finding comfort in the small things that as you said you know, you know when they're around and and you know having that belief that their memory will live on through you know your stories and your family stories and finding comfort in those things. You know my daughter now is 4.
00:18:21
So yeah, she asks a lot of questions about man. Why? Why Nana doesn't come to visit her on her day and things like that.
00:18:24
One yeah.
00:18:27
So you know I've, I've, I'm honest with my.
00:18:29
Kids. And we've talked about death.
00:18:31
And everything like that. Unfortunately, my kids.
00:18:33
Have seen a little bit more than what I would have preferred, probably about four or five months ago, we were driving home from getting shopping.
00:18:43
One of the towns close by and I had to stop on the side of the road because there was a treatment for and crossed the road and the car was under it.
00:18:49
No, no.
00:18:51
So so I jumped out and.
00:18:54
There was no one helping. There's a couple of people standing around and I was like, what's going on? And they're like, oh, there's a car under the tree.
00:18:59
I was like, is there anyone in it like we don't know, we haven't looked so, you know, being the corrections officer with the first aid training I am, I pulled the car over and I said to my kids, you know, just stay here. I'll be.
00:19:11
And yeah, I just kind of ran into it. So the driver side of the car, the door was pretty jam shut.
00:19:18
But there was movement, so I ran around and I had to, like, flip the door open. The whole car was crushed, basically ripped the door open.
00:19:24
And I've managed to pull the driver out and he was OK and I said, you know, is there anyone with you? And he said, yeah, he's.
00:19:31
I'm OK, but I'm pretty sure my wife and then I and then I looked down through the driver side door and where his wife was was just just the tree trunk thing, so it was a pretty, pretty gnarly thing to to witness and my kids.
00:19:48
We're all very much in tears of not being able to understand or cope with, you know, kind of what's happened.
00:19:54
They saw that I was pretty frantic and yeah, calling ambulances and whatnot, you know, in the end, I had the ambulance was like 10 minutes away.
00:20:00
There was nothing more I could do. Yeah. So I was like, I have to get my out of here, you know, they're my priority now. So unfortunately, yeah, the.
00:20:08
The blokes wife did pass away and they do quite often talk about that.
00:20:12
But you know, we try to be an open book, and if they bring it up, that's obviously them trying to make more sense of of the things that they saw. So I'm more than happy to.
00:20:20
Talk about it with them.
00:20:22
Yeah, where? Where massive advocates for like therapy and things like that in this House, I I attend therapy through my work. I'm sure you probably get therapist provided to yourself.
00:20:32
Judy, your job is that.
00:20:34
Yeah. Yeah, we do have a like a support network. Yeah. So you can talk to you, you know, so our colleagues and stuff about, you know, anything you want, relationships, family, friends and you work and you have to understand, I I personally have never tried it personally.
00:20:53
Yeah, but for me, to my my partner and my family and that that's good enough for me. But today understanding and you know, especially being to my father, we're all all like you said, mate, we're all pretty open books, right?
00:21:05
Yeah, so that helped me, but I do know obviously I know a lot of people really see stuff all the time to, you know, keep them on the ground and, you know, just keep them functioning the best they can.
00:21:14
You know what you and I see every day inside the.
00:21:17
Walls. So it's a different world inside, inside.
00:21:19
Those gates, isn't it, mate?
00:21:21
You know you you walk in and the the air, the air just gets thick and you can just just feel the tension and it's just an.
00:21:28
It's it's it, it it really is just an entirely new world in and of itself.
00:21:30
Yeah, it's very like you said, it's very.
00:21:34
Teams like some.
00:21:34
Days it's it's more tempting. Others like you can walk through the yard and you, you know that something's gonna.
00:21:39
Happen to you because you can.
00:21:40
Just feel the tension.
00:21:41
You can just cut it with a knife and you know. Yeah. When I first started, I couldn't really feel the tension in the place. I just thought, you know, I'm just coming to work and going home. But.
00:21:50
As you spend more time inside and you know, experience more things and deal with and make more and stuff you you sort of you you start to understand the place.
00:21:57
A lot more, and it's definitely a learned sense being able to feel that tension and know that some.
00:22:04
It's off and a big part of our training was really just trusting your gut. If if you think if you feel or think something's gonna happen, it's probably gonna happen and you need to get on to Intel and, you know, let let some people know and see.
00:22:18
See if you need to kind of lock down or cancel movements or things like that.
00:22:20
I'm decent.
00:22:23
So I mean.
00:22:24
All the.
00:22:24
To itself, utilising your senses, being emotionally intelligent, having good communication skills within your team or whoever's on the floor asking for support are all incredibly, incredibly important pillars to have not.
00:22:40
For your job, but in your personal life as well. So do you. After seven years of being a correctional officer, do you find that you have taken those practises and those things that you've learned in your job?
00:22:51
Do you feel like you've been able to become a stronger person in your community, in your family and you know, be able to face life challenges?
00:23:00
Head on with a little bit more expertise and.
00:23:03
A little bit more.
00:23:04
Being able to be calm and.
00:23:05
Centred instead of kind of.
00:23:07
Yeah, 100%. Yeah, I.
00:23:09
Think she's the way they're growing up? I've already had a, you know, quite a lot of.
00:23:13
Level of common sense about me.
00:23:14
But coming to the job, you know, my communication skills have gone like above and beyond, like just the way I can talk to her. You know, inmates and other stuff and just the way you do situations. And you know what?
00:23:26
Your perspective on TV roll.
00:23:29
I can see what's going to be the outcome further than the chapter where we are at that point in time.
00:23:32
You know what I mean and and how to go about things I'm definitely, 100% are.
00:23:37
Much more confident person than than.
00:23:38
What I ever have been?
00:23:39
And I got back myself from any situation now and keep that off to a lot of people that I'm a confident person as well too. So now that helps out everyone else around me and definitely helps out my children.
00:23:49
And my and my partner, you know, they can always lean on me for support and you know, lean on me for guidance and, you know to always get us out of trouble within whatever the.
00:23:57
Situation. So yeah, 100% man like the job is you know, the skills that you're learning, the job you can transfer to your, to your life outside to.
00:24:05
It's definitely helped me infinitely with anything that parenting especially has thrown.
00:24:11
At me, you know?
00:24:12
If my kids are kind of brawling over a toy, I mean, I don't put them in in our pre-approved techniques or anything like that.
00:24:21
I don't have to go hands on or.
00:24:22
Call a code or.
00:24:23
Anything like that? But I I definitely know.
00:24:25
Conflict resolution and and stuff like that, which I can I'm able to apply sometimes pretty well with the kids. And yeah, as far as confidence goes and your ability to talk and communicate, I think it's it.
00:24:36
It's taught absolutely invaluable skills.
00:24:38
Yeah, I think like you said me, like I I wouldn't say people who aren't like obviously in our.
00:24:44
Job like corrections police.
00:24:46
Police, paramedics, all those emergency services like who exposed to, you know, high conflict situations every day or high pressure situation every day, I.
00:24:54
Think you can tell the people who?
00:24:57
Can't expose so much in their life very much because you know, like you said, they panic under pressure or they get rattled or like they gotta be, they just, they just lose their they can't think properly.
00:25:06
You know what I mean?
00:25:07
And 100% like like.
00:25:08
I said, man, you can just.
00:25:09
If anything happens in your life.
00:25:11
Like outside the job, people get pretty slanted about like you can you just fill yourself, remain calm like you just know that everything is gonna be OK and you can work it out. But yeah, I think, yeah, a lot of things that that help.
00:25:22
You out on the job, man.
00:25:24
So you did mention that you haven't utilised any psychology services or any therapy or anything like that growing up in the community?
00:25:31
Did you have any formal diagnosis of anxiety, depression or ADHD? Or any any sort of thing like that or?
00:25:38
You've just you've never thought objective.
00:25:39
So probably.
00:25:40
For this side of your brain.
00:25:43
And already partly because of that. Lock him up and man, it was pretty flown by over there. A lot of lot of situation I found myself in and you know a lot of things I had to deal with a lot of things. I had a lot of friends who committed suicide or you know.
00:25:56
Passed away some car accidents and.
00:25:58
You know, but not only people on on are new personally, but people who are new of in the community as well, you know, and being in being in the small community, anything that sort of happens, it's pretty drastic how their ripple effects to our community.
00:26:09
Man like, it's pretty. It's pretty crazy, man. But when my father passed away. Probably. Maybe. Yeah. Three years after that all.
00:26:16
For me to.
00:26:18
I'm I'm I'm a very proud man.
00:26:20
Like I think.
00:26:21
But I don't need anything to make myself feel better or I believe everything is self regulated to make yourself feel better or you know, stuff like that man like I'm being.
00:26:29
I'll guess you could say old school guy or or dad's dad's dad didn't catch up to me straight away. It probably took maybe 12-2 years to finally, you know, realise what had happened and you know.
00:26:41
Sometimes I wake up in the morning.
00:26:43
You're just a few flat man lock or just you. I don't wanna go to work or I don't wanna play the kids, so I just didn't wanna.
00:26:50
I didn't have any motivation to do anything I didn't want to try and didn't wanna do anything and I sort of.
00:26:56
I was starting to get like, you know, obviously starting to get upset and just hit the drop of the hat like was very, very rude to me, but I think.
00:27:03
You feeling well? You see, my doctor spoke to him like, you know they do. Me and like they put you through those questionnaires. And if you at least get self harm.
00:27:11
Whatever. Yeah. And it came back that I just had anxiety. So now I take, like, not too much. But I take a little bit of medication in the morning before, like, after I wake up and I'm good to go, man.
00:27:21
Like I'm I'm I'm slowly finding myself back to where I was, especially like the divorce, some stuff happening as well with my ex partner like I quite miss.
00:27:29
You at the moment.
00:27:31
Just get tired sometimes. Slow, but you just need to push. You know what I mean? The world is gonna keep spinning with or without you. So you need to. You need to keep down.
00:27:39
Yeah, certainly. So as as someone who hasn't implemented therapy.
00:27:43
Things like that were you were you thankful to have that resource available to you through your doctor? You know, do you feel like the medication helps you function on?
00:27:51
That day to day life. And do you think overall it has been a?
00:27:56
Yeah, I feel, yeah, I feel secure. Sorry that he said that to to help you get through the days and and a lot of a lot of officers I know like a lot of officers know on medication though like 1 to have, you know, done a lot of time and or seeing them done to him. You know it does affect.
00:27:56
More positive outcome.
00:28:14
Yeah. Yeah, it is. It is good to have problems. It helps me. What about what about yourself?
00:28:19
That's good. So I growing up, I've been in therapy pretty much my whole life. My parents divorced when I was young.
00:28:26
It was very messy. There was a pretty horrible custody battle. We were all caught in the middle of it.
00:28:31
And now, as much as I love my parents, think they let their own needs and wants and egos get in the way.
00:28:39
The bigger picture, which was us as kids, you know, me and my my siblings. So a lot of it, even though it wasn't anything to do with us, we got dragged through it a little bit.
00:28:49
So I withdrew quite severely as a kid, so I ended up with, you know, having therapy and stuff like that. And I've kind of just been on and off.
00:28:57
My whole life and my mum was diagnosed.
00:28:59
With breast cancer, when I was 12.
00:29:01
Just moved. Yeah. Newtown, where I knew absolutely nobody. And then all of a sudden, you know, there's this risk of my mum passing away. So I, you know.
00:29:10
Yet again I withdrew and I started having problems at school and all of.
00:29:14
These issues so.
00:29:15
Yet again, therapy ended up getting diagnosed with depression and anxiety. At 14, I believe.
00:29:22
Hosts of different medications that never quite worked for me, but therapy has always been a constant in one way or another in my life, and it hasn't been until I started job in corrections where I actually found the right therapist.
00:29:34
So it's not a matter of I've talked about this in every podcast I've done so far, and I'll continue in every podcast and.
00:29:40
After not every therapist is going to be the right one, you need to work at it and you need to find the right one that deals with you.
00:29:46
I'm lucky enough to have found the one that has got shared experiences and can actually empathise, because she has lived in circumstances that I.
00:29:55
Have dealt with.
00:29:56
So not only is it great to talk it out with someone that's impartial.
00:30:00
And doesn't have any kind of skin in the game, but it's also invaluable to me for her to be able to teach me tools and tactics for me to be able to make sense of my emotions and my feelings.
00:30:10
I was diagnosed myself with ADHD and autism last year after my 2 year old son was diagnosed with autism.
00:30:15
Yes, a major, major part of why I started this podcast. You know, it's it's as much about you guys, you know, sharing your experiences.
00:30:23
It's as much about that as it is about me learning about everyone's experiences and creating this, you know, kind of global bigger picture.
00:30:31
Of people's mental health, especially, you know, parents and and how everyone copes on day-to-day life. It's about me adding to my personal toolbox to be able to implement anything and everything to be a be a better.
00:30:42
Person and be a better parent.
00:30:44
So I mean, as as someone that you yourself said, you're pretty old school and you don't generally open up or talk to anyone.
00:30:50
You haven't implemented therapy. I'd definitely appreciate you being willing to come on here and and talk so frankly and talk so honestly about your experiences.
00:30:58
It's it's great to see, especially with such an under representation.
00:31:01
Of men in in the.
00:31:02
Community as far as like mental health goes and.
00:31:04
Yeah, we're still very, very.
00:31:06
Much a part of that old school work, you know, like just just man up.
00:31:09
And we don't talk about it. You know, if you talk about it, you're a girl. And and those, those sorts of things that aren't necessarily a healthy way of.
00:31:17
Hoping so. Yeah. Yet again, thank you so much for for being willing to come and talk about it. So when you talk about community, are you talking about community as a whole or are you talking about your community as as in like your indigenous family?
00:31:31
Or your mob.
00:31:32
Yeah, I can. I see, like, can you that I'll. Yeah, to to beat it to like I said man, everyone knows everyone here and generally the there's a lot of good people here and everyone went there everyone out and yeah, I don't see I don't see.
00:31:34
So ho.
00:31:45
One community down here.
00:31:47
It's certainly a great thing to to not separate, you know, mob community. I think we all need to kind of try to live alongside each other, regardless of of the past, which you know, it's it's unfortunate the way indigenous communities have been treated in the past. And it is definitely.
00:32:08
Important to not forget about our shared history, but it's also equally important to be able to look at the future and and reconcile and move on and.
00:32:18
Just one entity of community. One thing I do want to discuss within mob is is the roles in which everyone plays, especially when it comes to the the views of family.
00:32:29
You know, from my understanding, the role of a mother is played by not only biological mum, but like armies and things like that as well. Yeah. Are you happy to discuss?
00:32:39
That a little bit.
00:32:39
Like I said, like roll down here. We'll all be one big family man. You know, I'm me and my family are welcome with a lot of houses like community, like a meal. That's sort of the same whether it's.
00:32:50
Money from Google, like housing, relation, actually, and we all we all pull together like if I need need to drop my kids off somewhere like one of the ones that's that's fine and vice versa. Like there's no, there's no problem. Like everyone just pulled together and really just look after each other.
00:33:07
I I love, I love that aspect of indigenous culture, especially when it comes to families. You know, everyone says it takes a it takes.
00:33:15
A village to raise.
00:33:16
Kid. But you know westernised culture. It's a saying that we hear, but it's not a saying that's often implemented.
00:33:24
So you know, to hear that it's actually implemented in other cultures is is really great. I love the fact that, you know, people do take on board, it takes a village and you know, in a pinch, you're able to drop your kids off with Auntie, uncle or or what have you. And the fact that.
00:33:37
You know, you see your cousins.
00:33:39
That's your brothers or sisters, and everyone's literally just fools and respect, fear, elders and things like that plays a a really, really, really big role in in being raised, yeah, growing up.
00:33:50
Within more, you know you wanted to come on here to raise awareness around suicide and and the mental health aspects of of the the way in which you've grown up.
00:33:51
I've sent.
00:34:01
So what message would you like to share with our listeners, particularly those who may be going through similar experiences or facing similar challenges in?
00:34:08
Our own lives.
00:34:08
Yeah, I understand. Yeah.
00:34:10
I think like I said, that no matter who you are, male, female, boy, girl, whoever you are, you're you're going to.
00:34:17
100% you're gonna go through hardships in your life, right? No matter what the hardship is, it might be small to me, but it might be massive for you, you know, I mean that no one can.
00:34:26
No one can tell you your perspective and your feelings and how hard that hard you will ease or will be the biggest thing for me is I just think you just gotta, you know, it's hard as it may be to open up.
00:34:38
Talk about your feelings and, you know, seek to help you need. And you know you're not a weak person for speaking up like you. You just just you just calling out for help. You know what I mean? You just.
00:34:47
Help they all it takes you to someone to grab your hair and pull you out of the whole union.
00:34:51
You, you know. Yeah, it could open up a new world for you. So just still don't ever be afraid to speak up, man.
00:34:56
And like I said, just enjoy your family and enjoy.
00:34:59
Your time with him.
00:35:00
Tell him you love him and.
00:35:01
Just get through everyday.
00:35:02
Just take one day at.
00:35:03
A time and just push through. They're always like I've got my own battles and stuff at the moment.
00:35:07
Don't mind things going on, but I know no matter what happens.
00:35:10
It will all come to an end and they light at the end of the tunnel.
00:35:13
Exactly right. And you never know what? What, just just opening up or asking for help. May may bring you, you know, the fact that you've been willing to come on here, discuss your thoughts and your feelings and your experiences with me.
00:35:26
That's opened up, you know, a new, a new connection for both of us. And, you know, as as two people that are.
00:35:32
In the type of work that we do, you know, you now know that you'll always have someone that you can kind of open up to and and talk about. I'm always here for you, mate.
00:35:41
Me too, but I appreciate.
00:35:42
It you're more than.
00:35:43
Welcome, mate. So you know that's that's that's 100%.
00:35:46
The message that I'm trying to get out there, you know, just just ask for help. Doesn't matter who doesn't matter. When doesn't matter how. Just ask for help if you are in a hole and.
00:35:55
Need a chop out? Just just say so. Is there anything else that you would like to personally discuss or?
00:36:00
Anything like that?
00:36:01
I'm pretty good, man. Like like I said and I spoke to my upbringing and my father in the job and.
00:36:06
I'm a community.
00:36:07
Yeah. I just wanted to, you know, thank you so much for having me and taking the time to have, you know, have a chat to me.
00:36:12
And the yarn? Yeah, my my story. Appreciate it, man.
00:36:14
You're more than welcome mate. Alright. Well, we will end it here, mate. Thank you so much yet again for coming on.
00:36:21
I truly appreciate your time. Keep up the great work that you're doing, the thankless work that you're doing, the best of luck with the.
00:36:28
For your personal life that's going on. I hope whatever outcome happens. You're able to reconcile those things within yourself and you know, move on to live a happy and healthy life.
00:36:40
Yeah. Thanks, man. I appreciate it.
00:36:41
No worries mate. You have a great day.
00:36:42
All right, you.
00:36:42
Too then bye.
00:36:44
Wake up. It's another day. Try and find a way to make it so my life. Some better place.
00:36:55
If there's one thing I see.
00:36:58
Then the only thing it's me.
00:37:01
Knowing that.
00:37:17
If there's something I know, it's just knowing that I'm trying to make a change.