Ronni Tichenor: 5 Things You Need To Heal After a Dramatic Loss Or Life Change

An Interview With Heidi Sander

Pay attention to whatever you have to be grateful for or happy about. At the end of the day when my children were little, I used to say, “OK, let’s think of three things that we’re happy about, that we’re really glad that happened today, or that we’re grateful for.” We did that every night, so that we were focusing on the things that went well in our life that day, on the things that we appreciated. That’s so important. It’s easy to focus on the negative or hurtful things and ignore what made us happy or feel good.

The world seems to be reeling from one crisis to another. We’ve experienced a global pandemic, economic uncertainty, political and social turmoil. Then there are personal traumas that people are dealing with, such as the loss of a loved one, health issues, unemployment, divorce or the loss of a job.

Coping with change can be traumatic as it often affects every part of our lives.

How do you deal with loss or change in your life? What coping strategies can you use? Do you ignore them and just push through, or do you use specific techniques?

In this series called “5 Things You Need To Heal After a Dramatic Loss Or Life Change” we are interviewing successful people who were able to heal after a difficult life change such as the loss of a loved one, loss of a job, or other personal hardships. We are also talking to Wellness experts, Therapists, and Mental Health Professionals who can share lessons from their experience and research.

As a part of this interview series, I had the pleasure of interviewing Ronni Tichenor and Jennie Weaver.

Ronni Tichenor has a PhD in sociology, specializing in family studies, from the University of Michigan. Jennie Weaver received her master’s degree from the Vanderbilt School of Nursing and is a board-certified family nurse practitioner with over 25 years of experience in family practice and mental health. Their new book, Healing Begins with Us: Breaking the Cycle of Trauma and Abuse and Rebuilding the Sibling Bond (HeartWisdom LLC, April 5, 2022), shares their inspiring and hopeful story of healing from their painful upbringing. Subscribe to their podcast: Ronni and Jennie: Breaking the Cycles of Trauma and Abuse, Silence and Shame. Find links on ronniandjennie.com.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we start, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your childhood backstory?

We grew up in a home with addiction, abuse, and mental illness — multiple adverse childhood experiences — and lived in denial about it through our late 20s. It wasn’t until we were married and starting to parent our own children that we began to look back at our childhood and recognize how abusive and traumatic it was.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

Ronni: One of my favorite quotes is from Mark Twain: “I’m an old man, and I have seen many troubles, but most of them never happened.” Growing up the way we did generates a lot of anxiety, worrying that bad things are going to happen in the future, and most of the time they don’t. So, whenever I feel myself winding up with anxious thoughts, I think of Mark Twain.

Jennie: One of my favorite life quotes is from Maya Angelou: “Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.” The reason I like that quote so much is that I regret some of the choices that I had made when I was in the grips of denial and our family’s dysfunction. That quote spoke to me as I became more self-aware and started making healthier choices — without the shame and guilt of the past.

You have been blessed with much success. In your opinion, what are the top three qualities that you possess that have helped you accomplish so much? If you can, please share a story or example for each.

Ronni: I think one of my qualities is the capacity to work hard no matter the circumstances. There have been times, especially when our parents were particularly harsh with us, I would just plow through. I would keep going. I think we both did that. We survived through hard work and perseverance whether it was emotional or physical labor. I remember one time, as teenagers, we had to load a whole trailer with 75-pound bales of hay. We worked so hard that we injured ourselves. I ripped significant muscles in my neck and shoulder and couldn’t turn my head for a week. That’s not necessarily a good thing, to push yourself to the point of pain or injury. But sometimes, the ability to keep going forward, even if things are really hard, is an important skill to have.

Compassion for other people is another important quality. We’re both in professions where we have to help meet the needs of other people. Our ability to reach out and connect with others in a way that is compassionate is a quality that has helped us. I get students that come into my office, not just to talk to me about the work in my class, for example, but to tell me what’s happening in their lives and why they’re struggling in my class. Or, when I teach my class on power and violence in the family, they come and tell me about their own trauma. So, our ability to connect with people, in a way that is compassionate, has helped us — not just in our chosen professions, but also in trying to get our message out.

Jennie: I also believe that being an empath and an intuitive is, in a way, a superpower because people are able to feel that compassion in our presence. There’s a level of openness and trust that can occur very quickly. I believe that has been a gift in a lot of ways. I used it as a child to survive, and I’ve used it as an adult to help others to feel safe, supported, protected, and to seek healing. Relatedly, learning to trust our intuition as we move through our recovery process, has been so important. That has allowed us to heal more fully. Because, when you’re in a traumatic situation as a child, especially in your own home, you have people telling you all the time that the things you’re seeing, feeling, and experiencing aren’t really happening. That’s denial. Everybody lives in denial. So, one of the reasons that we’ve been able to attain such a level of healing and understanding is that we realized we’d developed a distrust in our own instincts. We worked to reconnect with our inner guidance, and trusted it to move us through our recovery process. We would have an inner sense of knowing that we should attend a particular workshop, or read a certain book. And following that inner guidance has accelerated our recovery process.

Let’s now shift to the main part of our discussion about ‘Healing after Loss.’ Do you feel comfortable sharing with our readers about your dramatic loss or life change?

After exhausting all avenues for healing our family, and realizing that reconciliation was impossible, we came to the decision to cut contact with our parents and our brother. That was the most painful decision of our lives. We knew that it was necessary. To be truly loving to ourselves, and to our parents, we had to step out of the cycle of abuse and trauma. We had to remove ourselves because our parents would not stop hurting us. We needed to leave in order to become the fullest version of ourselves, and to heal. And, as part of their revenge for taking that step to break contact, our parents systematically went about cutting us off from all our family members, by telling them how terrible and horrible we were. So, in stepping away from our parents and our brother, we lost our entire family. But we have each other. We created the loving family that we always wanted and needed in each other, our children, and our spouses.

What was the scariest part of that event? What did you think was the worst thing that could happen to you?

Jennie: The scariest part was finally cutting contact as our parents spiraled out of control. They became angrier and more volatile. And there were times that I was afraid of physical retaliation in some way. At times, they were making veiled threats. They often tried to corner me at my local church and other public places, so they were still coming at me even though I told them that I wanted no contact with them. It was frightening and, at times, I felt overwhelmed.

How did you react in the short term?

Jennie: In the short term, I sought spiritual counseling from my pastor. I shared what was happening with just a few close friends, people that I sang with in the choir, to try to make sure that my children were protected. So, I had to open up and share the bare minimum of information about our family with others — that we grew up with addiction and physical abuse and molesting issues. And that we needed to cut contact for our own safety and the safety of the children. These people were very understanding and supportive. I was still, in some ways, trying to protect the privacy of my parents. I didn’t even like admitting that our family had these issues. But I had to say something to help others understand how serious my situation was. Those people ran interference for me as much as they could. If they saw our parents heading in my direction, or approaching the children, they would take the children with them, or step between me and our parents.

Ronni: There was also a lot of shame. We were ashamed about what happened to us, ashamed about what our parents did to us as children. There was also the shame of “what kind of terrible, horrible human being permanently cuts their parents out of their lives?” People judged us for that, for having to make that painful decision. Many people did say hurtful things in an effort to shame us, including our relatives. But we had to stand strong and say, “I know what I’m doing is in the best interest of my children and myself.” We did what we had to do to break the cycle in our own families.

After the dust settled, what coping mechanisms did you use?

Jennie: I sought every coping mechanism I could find. I sought spiritual counseling. I sought mental health counseling. I attended Adult Children of Alcoholics meetings, Al-Anon meetings. I sought healing services, spiritual retreats. And when those brought me as far as I could go, I started seeking more spiritual healing, energy healing, Reiki healing. I came back to yoga and meditation. I found that I needed much more time alone than I ever realized, and I needed time outside. I needed time in nature. I needed to be alone in nature. So, I started taking more long walks outside among the trees as much as I possibly could. All of that together is what helped me find balance, healing, and peace in my daily life.

Ronni: One of the things that’s important for us to communicate is that, when you’re in a family with the kind of trauma that we’ve had, including the dynamics associated with it — fear, denial, isolation, shame — the children are often pitted against each other. So, people grow up hating their siblings without even knowing why, and often end up isolated from them. When our daughters were first born, we were trying to figure out how to be good parents. We started talking about what happened to us as children. And fortunately, our relationship was good enough that we could do that. Our relationship had its problems, but we actively worked to repair it. That was crucial because all along the way we’ve had each other to validate our memories. To say, “Yes, that really did happen. Yes, it really was that bad. Yes, I remember that, too.”

That’s one of the things that we think is very important for survivors of childhood trauma — to recognize that your sibling, who you may have seen as an enemy, can actually be your greatest ally in figuring out what happened to you and helping you move down the healing path even faster than you’d be able to do on your own. The key is that we talked to each other. We took the risk to communicate openly and honestly, as much as we could, given our level of denial at that time. We’d been cast in roles as children. I was the hero, the oldest. Jennie was the youngest, the scapegoat. And while every child in a family like ours is harmed and damaged, the scapegoat gets the worst of it. It’s highly unusual for the hero and the scapegoat to become friends. Normally they hate each other for life. But we managed to heal our relationship because we both wanted that, and we both tried. We had our ups and downs, especially in our 20s. But by the time we were in our 30s, we’d pulled ourselves out of denial and we’ve been each other’s healing partners ever since.

Jennie: It was crucial that you were open to believing me, to see the dynamics for what they were, instead of accepting the family myth that everything was my fault because I’m the scapegoat. I’d been participating in counseling on and off through my 20s and early 30s. I began talking to you, sharing some of the things that I’d addressed in counseling. You validated me. That’s what helped me to be vulnerable and open up to you even more, and we began to rebuild our relationship. So, my role of bearing the family pain as the scapegoat became the catalyst.

Ronni: Yes. Once I recognized the level of pain that you were in, even though our parents were not as awful to me as they were to you, I could no longer sit there and watch it happen and do nothing about it. We tried to get them to pursue family counseling. We tried to get them to admit that there were problems in the family, but they just saw you as the problem.

Can you share with us how you were eventually able to heal and “let go” of the negative aspects of that event?

Ronni: That has been a long road. It’s been a daily process of choosing to forgive our parents, even though reconciliation won’t be possible. Both parties have to want to work on the problems, and our parents were never willing to accept any responsibility, or even or even admit to the real problems. We also had to learn to love and forgive ourselves, because there’s a lot of self-blaming that goes along with what we experienced: “Why did I take it for so long? Why did I keep going back for more?” We had to remind ourselves: “I was the child; I was the innocent.” And, of course, we realized that our parents were innocents as well, at some point. Something happened to them, which obviously affected them, too, and contributed to their becoming abusers. Having that understanding, that compassion for them, helped in our healing process.

And we continue to seek healing. We call it healing, but really, it’s evolving. Our identities, as souls, were hijacked because of the trauma. We’ve tried to focus on reclaiming all of who we are — loving every part of us, even the experiences that we didn’t choose.

Jennie: I deserve to be accepted for who I am. When I think of my children, if any horrible things have happened to them, it’s not their fault. They deserve to be loved and accepted for all of who they are. Raising my children and wanting to love and embrace all of who they are has helped me to realize that I deserve to be embraced and loved fully for who I am. Loving my children has helped me to love myself more.

Ronni: The other important part of letting go is just living my life. My advice to others is to develop your own joyful, beautiful life. Do what nurtures you. Listen to your inner voice. What is it that I need to do? Do I need to change jobs? Do I need to move to a new place? Do I need to pick up a new hobby? Do I need more time alone? Just check in and take care of yourself. If I’m taking care of myself, and I’m living a peaceful, joyful life, I don’t have room for bitterness or regrets. Living well really is the best revenge. Not that we seek any revenge against our parents, but just living my life and being happy, that’s how I let go. There’s no room for the anger or sorrow at that point.

In my own grief journey, I found writing to be cathartic. Did you engage in any writing during that time, such as journaling, poetry, or writing letters? If yes, we’d love to hear about any stories or examples.

Ronni: I started keeping a journal a few months after we broke contact with our parents. It was a helpful way to vent — especially in those early years. I eventually stopped because it started to feel like a chore. I thought, “I’m not going to document anymore, I’m just going to live my life.” But what’s been most significant for me is the writing of our book. We revisited our history and things came together in some new ways as we were trying to tell the story of what happened to us.

Jennie: I did some journaling early on. I also wrote letters to our parents and our brother. I found that to be very cathartic. I wrote down everything I wanted to say, everything I was feeling, and then I would burn them. It did help me to release some of that energy, that buried anger. But I would agree that writing our book together has brought an incredible depth of spiritual healing that I didn’t fully anticipate, and I’m grateful that we walked through this together. I’m so proud of what we’ve written together.

Ronni: The book brought us out of hiding. We live in a culture that allows parents to do these things to their children, and yet forbids us to speak about it. The children live in shame.

Jennie: If you try to talk about it, people will put a hand in your face, like a big stop sign: “I don’t want to hear it.” So, there’s a tremendous amount of shame and judgment. And part of writing our book together is about releasing that shame and that judgment, because it was never ours to carry.

Aside from letting go, what did you do to create an internal, emotional shift to feel better?

Ronni: For me it’s yoga and meditation. I begin every day with my practice. I find quiet time during the day to just breathe. I spend time outside, in nature. The answer is particular to each person. What makes you feel happy and peaceful? Those are the two guides to shifting your emotional tenor in the moment, and everybody has to figure out what that is for themselves.

Jennie: It’s similar for me. I’m not always as regular in my meditation and my yoga, but those are huge parts of my healing, as is walking outside daily. Unless it’s thunder storming, I’m outside walking with my dogs. Animals are so important to me. I’ve always been drawn to them. Part of that is the empath and the intuitive in me, so I’ll always be surrounded with animals. I’ve had goats, horses, cows, chickens, dogs, and cats, and I’ll continue to have some menagerie of animals because I need that. Music is another wonderful release for me — singing in my choir with people that I’ve known for 30 years now is healing.

Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to cope and heal? Can you share a story about that?

Jennie’s first counselor, MC.

Jennie: She hasn’t been my counselor for quite a long time, but we’re still friends. And she’s a ray of light and love in this world. Her insight and her understanding as a counselor were such gifts. She helped us plan our last attempt to bring healing to our family — the intervention with our father that failed. She met with both of us and with our children over those first couple of years after we broke contact with our parents. She supported us all through that whole process. I thank God, Source, The Universe for putting her in my path. She’s a soul sister to me, and I love her! If it weren’t for my beautiful sister and her, I don’t know what I would have done. They both saved me when I was drowning.

Were you able to eventually reframe the consequences and turn it into a positive situation? Can you explain how you did that?

Jennie: I knew enough about what had happened to me that I wanted to help others. I wanted to take my wounds and use them to help others to heal. That’s what drove me into medicine and the helping profession that I chose. And I know that I’ve helped people. That helps me to make sense of why this happened to me.

Ronni: At the time that we broke with our parents, I was finishing a PhD in sociology and family studies was my main area of focus. As I moved through my career, I started looking more at families with abusive dynamics. I teach a course called “Power and Violence in the Family,” and I always tell my students that it’s my favorite course to teach because invariably the students say: “It’s the best course I ever took. It’s the most important course I ever took. Everybody should take this course.” I love teaching it because my students encounter ideas that we don’t usually talk about, and it blows their minds. I’ve had many people take the course and discover, over the time that they’re in it, that they themselves have trauma in their background. Maybe in their family of origin. Maybe a dating relationship they were once in. Maybe one they’re in now. Or they recognize that a friend is in trouble in a relationship.

As a society, we’re not taught about these dynamics or how to recognize them. I always tell my students that the most important thing I want them to take away from this class, if they remember nothing else, is that they’re now able to recognize somebody who has been traumatized because they behave in the very predictable ways that we’ve talked about. And my students can be the one light in their lives, the person who can provide crucial support when they need it. That may make all the difference.

What did you learn about yourself from this very difficult experience? Can you please explain with a story or example?

Ronni: Growing up the way I did, as the hero in the family, I had to sort of harden myself, and I developed a capacity to power through anything so that I could achieve. I had to be able to do great things no matter what. That made me close off my heart. As I got older, our mother started referring to me as the “rotten kid” because I never gave her emotional cards on Mother’s Day or her birthday, saying “You are the most wonderful mother in the world.” I would always give her Lucy cards from the Peanuts Collection, which are kind of snotty, bratty, or sarcastic, so she would call me the “rotten kid.” As I moved through my recovery process, I realized that I’m actually a very loving, kind, and generous person. I just was protecting myself all those years by not being as open, kind, and loving as I was feeling on the inside. I didn’t express my true self. I think many survivors close themselves off in that way to protect themselves and don’t even realize that they’re doing it.

Jennie: Surviving these adverse childhood experiences is just a small part of the recovery and healing process. I learned how to drive myself when needed, but at quite a cost. I powered through my graduate studies on little sleep because I felt driven to make a difference in this world by assisting others. I felt powerless to help my own family members heal, but knowing that I may be able to impact the lives of others in a positive way motivated me. Unfortunately, that meant that I was living for others and was very externally focused. I’ve learned that my needs matter and, at times, must come first. After nearly three decades of recovery, I realized that the most important healing process is my own.

Fantastic. Here is the main question of our interview. Based on your experiences and knowledge, what advice would you give others to help them get through a difficult life challenge? What are your “5 Things You Need To Heal After a Dramatic Loss Or Life Change? Please share a story or example for each.

1. Trust yourself. Learn to follow your inner guidance. One of the things that helped accelerate our healing in recent years was moving into energy work, like Reiki. This helped us heal emotionally, physically, and spiritually.

Ronni: As an academic, I struggled with this initially. It felt sort of “out there.” Even though there’s research that demonstrates that Reiki can be very helpful, it was hard for me to let go of my rational mind and try something new. But something inside told me to try it and I listened to that. It sent me in a different direction that dramatically accelerated my healing. If I hadn’t trusted that inner guidance, I would have missed those healing opportunities.

2. The next step is to be vulnerable and open with those that you can trust.

Jennie: Seek support from your spouse, friend, sister, brother. It’s important to open up and to talk about what happened to you. You don’t have to tell everybody. Counseling may feel like the safest place to begin. I had a lot of explaining to do with my husband to help him understand what was going on inside my head and heart. Open yourself up and trust those closest to you by sharing as much as you can. Certainly, retelling your story can be re-traumatizing, so I’d be cautious. But by sharing, you give others a window into your experience, and a crucial opportunity to support you.

3. Nurture yourself.

Ronni: Many of us put ourselves on the back burner. Women are particularly prone to doing this. Nurturing yourself could mean doing something simple. Perhaps you just want to sit in peace and have a cup of coffee in the morning for 10 minutes without anybody interrupting you. Or you may want to walk outside every day, or practice yoga, or enjoy five minutes of stillness and meditation — or 30 minutes of stillness and meditation. You might want to take dance lessons. Every day, try to find at least a few little things, including new things, that can bring something enjoyable into your life. Anything that will bring you some happiness, excitement, or simply more peace is worth pursuing.

4. Focus on the things in your life that are going well.

Jennie: Pay attention to whatever you have to be grateful for or happy about. At the end of the day when my children were little, I used to say, “OK, let’s think of three things that we’re happy about, that we’re really glad that happened today, or that we’re grateful for.” We did that every night, so that we were focusing on the things that went well in our life that day, on the things that we appreciated. That’s so important. It’s easy to focus on the negative or hurtful things and ignore what made us happy or feel good.

5. Embrace change.

There will be tremendous change as you let go of old patterns, and that can feel frightening. Even though those patterns are hurtful or painful, they might be comfortable and we may be reluctant, on some level, to give them up. Know that by making those changes, by letting go of the things that were hurting you, you’re opening yourself to wonderful possibilities. Change is inevitable, so we recommend embracing it with an attitude of adventure.

You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be?

We want to inspire people to break out of their denial about what happened to them. And if they had a traumatic childhood, to come out of hiding, let go of the shame, and embrace all of who they are. The shame was never yours to carry. You are a beautiful and whole human being, and you have so much to offer this world. The world needs your light. Be all of who you are. Love all of who you are.

We are very blessed that some very prominent names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US with whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them. :-)

Hands down, it’s Oprah Winfrey. We’d like to thank Oprah for her years of work in helping to bring these issues to light. We read her book (with Dr. Bruce Perry) What Happened to You? as we were finishing our manuscript. She’s done so much to shine a light on childhood trauma and the fact that we’ve been asking the wrong question in trying to assist people. We, as a culture, ask: “What’s wrong with you?” as opposed to “What happened to you?”

We’d like to speak with her because we want to add our voice to her conversation. In all the great work that’s being done on childhood trauma, and there’s a lot of it, we don’t see anybody talking about the damage done to sibling relationships, how to heal that damage, or how important that is to help accelerate the healing process for each individual. That can’t be overstated. Neither one of us would be where we are now without the other. We can’t emphasize that enough.

Jennie: Every time we talk about it, I cry. The gratitude I feel is profound. My husband is wonderful and has been a loving and supportive partner in this life. But nobody could help me heal like my sister.

Ronni: I agree.

How can our readers further follow your work online?

We post everything we do on our website, www.ronniandjennie.com. You can join our email list there to receive regular updates.

You can also follow us on Instagram: @ronni_and_jennie

Thank you so much for sharing these important insights. We wish you continued success and good health!