Interview with Diane Byron
In this episode, we will uncover 3 keys:
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The Importance of Building a Support Network
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Embracing Vulnerability and Asking for Help
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Celebrating Small Wins and Personal Growth
A Podcast Transcription
Radical Self-Prioritization to Follow Your Bliss ~ Diane Byron
Intro
Odiva Vasell: (00:32)
Welcome, welcome, my fabulous Fempreneurs! I’m excited for you today because we have a special guest here who’s going to teach us about finding joy in our lives and the step-by-step process that it takes to put yourself first so that you can be better for everyone else and take care of whoever you need to in your life, but mainly knowing that you first of all matter. Welcome, welcome, Diane!
Diane Byron: (01:14)
Thank you so much. This is such a pleasure to have this conversation with you today.
Odiva Vasell: (01:19)
And this is a much-needed conversation. We find ourselves as entrepreneurs, or just as women in life, with our emphasis on being the best we can be for our work, for our business, for our family, for everything, and then losing ourselves. We kind of get on an autopilot system, so to speak.
Diane Byron: (01:51)
A 100%.
Odiva Vasell: (01:52)
Tell me a little bit about this autopilot system. How does this happen to us?
The Importance of Building a Support Network
Diane Byron: (01:57)
I think it happens because we, most women, and I would say, you know, I’m 56 years old and I was raised by Depression-era parents, so I grew up in a different environment where my mom put everybody else first and she was last in line. So, that’s what I learned. We learn how we grow up, and there was validation in taking care of other people. When I graduated from high school, I didn’t know what to do as a profession, so I became a nurse because my sister was a nurse and my mom was a nurse, so that must be the thing I’m supposed to do—be in public service. In fact, almost my entire family is in public service, either law enforcement or nursing, and part of that is give, give, give. What happens is you become so focused on the doing and the giving that you don’t even realize life is passing you by because you’re getting validation from what you’re doing for other people, but you never, or very not very often, sit down and think about what do I want?
Odiva Vasell: (03:12)
What do I want?
Diane Byron: (03:15)
What do I want?
Odiva Vasell: (03:16)
Wow.
Diane Byron: (03:17)
Right. And when you give yourself permission—I work with a lot of midlife women, women in their 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s, and because now I’m 55, 60 is now midlife. 70 might be midlife soon, but you said, if you could do anything in the world, what would you do? And the answer is the same answer I gave almost 10 years ago when I had my first coach and I said, I don’t know. I don’t know who I am anymore. I’m Meg’s mom, I was Kay’s daughter, I was Keith’s wife, I was my siblings’ sister, I was the nurse, but I lost who Diane was. And I think that happens to a lot of women; our identities are wrapped up in the roles we take.
Odiva Vasell: (04:10)
Yes. And I like what you said about there being validation for that, validation for giving of yourself, for being the mother, the caretaker, the wife, the nurturer, and not having the balance or the awareness even to know that there could be other options. There’s another part of you that needs to be tapped into. So, with that, tell us your story. How did you first come upon this awareness?
Diane Byron: (04:48)
Well, I tell you, it was… I lost my mom in 2010 and she had… I lost my dad in 1992. My mom blossomed after my dad died. She was happy when he was alive, of course, but she all of a sudden had all this time because she spent her time taking care of him and the house and everything else. So, she and I really created a great friendship. I got married, and then in 2010, when I lost her, it took me about a year, and I was down visiting my oldest brother and his wife. My husband was home working, and I looked at my sister-in-law and I said, I need to get a divorce. And she said, why? And she said, honey, I’ve been married to your brother for almost 40 years; marriages go up and down and all of that. And I go, I don’t know where he was during Mom’s funeral. And she said, what do you mean, where he was? He was right next to you. I’m like, I have zero memory of him being present for me. I went up to the casket. My youngest brother, even though I’m the youngest, but the youngest of my brothers came up behind me and tapped his hand on my shoulder and said, it’s time, and took me up to the casket with his four kids and his wife. To this day, 13 years later, I still have no idea where my husband was, and it took a year for me to realize, whoa, how much automatic pilot have I been in that I didn’t even realize he wasn’t there?
Odiva Vasell: (06:31)
Wow.
Diane Byron: (06:32)
And I came home, and I filed for divorce, and we got—you know, I used to say it’s the fastest divorce in history. I filed in August, we went to court in October, and it was final in February. And there was no fight. He didn’t fight, and he left the house the night I told him. And as time went on, I started to realize, like, whoa, what have I been doing with my time and my life? And there came a time, about 10 years ago, when I was like, something needs to change. I got into a deep depression. I had been mourning. I had lost my last aunt, who was my mother’s best friend, and it was the year after the Marathon bombing in Boston, where I had been living. I just was like, I need support. So, I ended up getting therapy and doing all that kind of work, and I met a coach for the very first time. I didn’t even know what a coach was. And she said, Diane, what do you want? And I was like, I have no idea. I have no idea. And so that started me on the path of… I’m now 47, I don’t know what to do with the rest of my life. I knew I didn’t want to be a nurse anymore. Okay, well, it’s all I’ve done for 25 years, now what? And so, I started looking and rediscovering things I like to do and things I wanted to be. And one day in February of 2015, my daughter and I were shoveling out from one of the heaviest snows we’ve ever had. That winter, 2014-2015, we had 7 and a half feet of snow at our house over the course of the winter. And she said, can we move to California? And I said, yes. And the next day, I said, what did I just say? And by August of that year, our house was on the market. We were vacationing in San Diego because we were moving to San Diego but had never been there. So, I thought maybe we should go visit. And my house sold while we were on vacation in San Diego. We came back, and the journey started to get me to California, to get us to California. And I remembered, suddenly, in that course of preparing, that when I was in the Navy in 1990, I put in for San Diego, Naval Hospital in San Diego, and I was sent to Virginia. It took me 25 years to get to San Diego, but I rediscovered that dream and I started following the steps.
Odiva Vasell: (09:12)
Wow. The steps.
Diane Byron: (09:14)
And here we are eight years later.
Odiva Vasell: (09:16)
Yeah, and now you’re bringing that to other women. And I like the way that you kind of simplify things by explaining your story because I can imagine thousands of women can relate to your story. Not the exact same situation, but as you said, being that caregiver and that person who gets validated by putting yourself or pouring yourself almost into the life of another person. That person doesn’t have any responsibility to pour back into you, and then one day you wake up in the time that you are in deepest need and realize you’re alone. Wow.
Diane Byron: (10:09)
Yeah, and the real wake-up call came during that time of transition where I had sold my house. I moved into a one-bedroom apartment with my daughter who was 13-ish at the time because she was in seventh grade, and I wasn’t going to move her in the middle of the year. I didn’t expect my house to sell that quickly. I expected, you know, the next summer. No, no, it sold immediately. And on her birthday, I went to the doctor, a new doctor, and she felt my neck and she felt there was something wrong. She didn’t know what it was. It took about four months, or two months, and I was diagnosed with thyroid cancer. And immediately, people were like, well, you’re not going to move now, are you? And I was like, oh no, I’m still going. This is in the way, but so let’s cut the cancer out and leave that in Boston and do all the things. And I had such a vision of coming to California that when the doctor told me, and I had other people—I had a good friend with me when I was at the doctor’s because I always recommend, just full-time nurse here, whenever you go to the doctor and it’s a big thing, have someone go with you. My sister and one of my good friends were with me, and the doctor said our first available surgery date is in May. And my friend said, oh, but she’s leaving for San Diego in June, so that’s not going to work because she needs treatment too. So, what can you do? And the doctor went out and came back in and had opened a surgery date just for me in March.
Odiva Vasell: (11:43)
Oh, wow.
Diane Byron: (11:44)
And I had my surgery in March, my treatment in May, and we were on the road in June. The thing I learned, looking back, was I made it okay for everybody else that I had cancer. I called up my siblings, I called up the friends in the group, in the coaching group I was in, and I said, “I just want to tell you I have thyroid cancer, but it’s okay. I’m gonna be okay. It’s not the kind of cancer that kills you. It’s totally fine. We’re just going to do the surgery, then I’m going to have radioactive iodine. I’m going to be fine.” I had someone watch my daughter for the three days I was in the hospital and someone watched her when I had the three days I had the radioactive iodine. The rest of the time I did it on my own. And do you want to know what happened in 2017 here in San Diego? It was back, and it was back with a vengeance. Oh, I walked into my doctor’s office, who I had never met before, a surgeon out here, and before he even said hello, he said, “The cancer is back and there’s a lot of it.” And I said, “I’m sorry, what?” But I expected a small lymph node, and he showed me an MRI that showed this whole area was involved. I just looked at him like he lost his mind, and I had my sister on speaker phone and my best friend out here. Again, I wasn’t alone, and I just looked at him like, I don’t have time for this. I’m sure the women listening can hear this: you get a bump in the road, you get past it because you muscle past it.
Odiva Vasell: (13:24)
Oh, yes.
Embracing Vulnerability and Asking for Help
Diane Byron: (13:26)
And then, but now it’s here. Oh, and that was what the doctor said. So I remember, I got downstairs to my best friend, and I’m standing there talking to her, and she said, “This is happening for a reason. There’s a lesson here for you.” I did not. I said some choice words because I wasn’t happy. But what ended up happening was I didn’t make it okay for anybody except my daughter about the cancer. I wanted her to be clear I was still going to be here. It wasn’t going to be the end. I was going to have to have surgery, things were going to change for a little bit, but I was okay. And if anyone offered something to me: white light healing, prayer, reiki, distance reiki, touching hands healing, anything, I was like, I’m in, I’m in, I’m in, I’m in. And when I had the surgery in August of 2017, there was a complication and I was put on bed rest. Nothing to eat or drink for seven days. I was in the hospital for nine days. My daughter started high school from my best friend’s house. And that’s when I learned the really important message that this cancer journey brought me on: surrender, and asking for help and receiving help is actually a strength.
Odiva Vasell: (15:10)
Oh, powerful. Very powerful.
Diane Byron: (15:14)
My oldest brother, whose wife I had had the conversation about divorce with, said, “I’m going to fly out when you get discharged from the hospital,” because my sister had to go home. We didn’t expect me to be in the hospital for nine days; she had a life. And I said, “No, okay.” I almost said no. And he, during the time he was out, took my daughter to the glider port here in San Diego, took pictures. He loves to take pictures. But they got to see the guys on the gliders, and my daughter got to have a relationship with her uncle and her aunt that she wouldn’t have had if I had said no. She built a relationship with my best friend she wouldn’t have had if I said, “No, no, no, I’ll figure it out.” But I let people support me, and it was in those moments that I realized that’s what my mission is: for people to recognize, especially women, that asking for and receiving help is actually the best way to come through life. And when you take care of yourself first, everything else is so much better, so much easier. The people in your life are happier because they really don’t want you to be miserable, but you don’t even see how they look at you because your head is down doing the thing.
Odiva Vasell: (16:41)
Yes, okay, I can totally understand. We’re so caught up in whatever challenges are thrown at us, and we feel stronger. I’ve even said this: “Oh, I’m getting stronger because of the challenge that is coming at me.” And now, one of the key steps to taking care of yourself is not even taking care of yourself. It’s surrendering.
Diane Byron: (17:11)
Yes.
Odiva Vasell: (17:12)
And the three things you said about that: you said asking for help, receiving help. There was one more. I may have missed it, but it was…
Diane Byron: (17:28)
But that’s the most important, being able to ask for and receive support. And it’s really accepting what is. I couldn’t get out of that bed. I went from someone in April who had walked 52 miles down the coast of San Diego in two days with an organization that I work with to being someone who needed support to get out of bed because I spent seven days on bed rest. It was shocking. When I came home, I live on the second floor. My brother dropped me off and I walked to my stairs, and I looked at the 20 stairs and I went, I don’t know how I’m going to get up the stairs. You know how I got up the stairs? One step at a time. One step at a time. And that’s perhaps the biggest lesson is all of these changes didn’t happen like that. It happened in the tiny moments, in the tiny steps. You know that moment when my brother said, “I’m coming to see you,” and I started to say no, and I said yes instead? That changed everything.
Odiva Vasell: (19:01)
And when you said being able to receive that help, I mean, it sounds so logical. It sounds like, yeah, of course, this is what you do. What is blocking many of us?
Diane Byron: (19:16)
It’s, again, the validation that we get from helping other people and the habits and the patterns that we’ve developed. And you know, it can be an adrenaline rush, whatever you want to call it. You get the good feeling when you help somebody, so you want to keep fueling yourself with those good feelings, and you do it by helping other people. And asking for help, but actually receiving it and allowing it in. You can create a story that it’s a weakness. I need help. I need someone to XYZ. And the reality is you don’t need help; you need support. Support is we’re arm in arm together, we’re locking arms and doing it together. It’s just like when I went, perfect example, when I went shopping for the first time after my surgery here in California. I needed a shopping cart. I didn’t need a shopping cart because I was shopping for so many things. I needed a shopping cart to lean on for support. I was like, I’m not sure I’m going to make it through the grocery store, right? So it’s really about recognizing that what’s stopping us from receiving is this story we’ve created, the story that we grew up with. You know, I grew up in the ’70s where you know, you gotta, what is it, put the bacon in the frying pan and fry it up, or bring home the bacon and fry it up in a pan. It’s, you know, that’s how the modern American woman was, do it all herself. We don’t have to. It’s exhausting to try to do it all yourself, and you miss out on so much of life.
Odiva Vasell: (21:09)
Awareness is key, and what you’re bringing to our awareness is one of the first steps is having that support. Maybe people come to you and say, “What can I do to help?” And maybe they will give you some practical assistance, or maybe they can’t give you practical assistance. It’s not ABC, do this, do this, do this, because you know, sometimes I know I struggle with people. They have their own lives, their own problems, they’re quite busy, so I don’t really want to ask anybody for ABC. But a key step is having support while I do ABC. If it needs to be done by me, at least the support network is there, arm in arm. I like that analogy, arm in arm with you, and that’s so key now because it doesn’t have to be someone that’s right next door. It doesn’t have to be your neighbor. It can be someone online that you reach out to. And tell me, how did you, I mean, you talked about the example with your brother coming in and helping with your daughter, and that was beautiful. How did you continue to expand your support network?
Diane Byron: (22:44)
Part of it was the coaching group that I was in, and they, you know, the women were here, my best friend was living here. But it was also, you know, another friend was like, “Hey, I know you’re not going to be up to much. I’ve got some coloring books and colored pencils. Can I bring them to you?” Yes. You start saying yes. You know, I think Shonda Rhimes wrote the book of Yes or The Year of Yes, and it’s really about saying yes to things that may not even make sense, but it’s like, okay, yes. I might not end up using them, but they’re there for me. It’s also recognizing the letting go of control. This is another part of the surrender. Part of the reason we resist other people helping us or supporting us is because we think there’s only one way to do the thing we want help with. Like, have you ever had someone load the dishwasher for you, and then you go back in and you reload it, or you change it, or you adjust it because my way is the best way, right? You get to learn that even if it’s not done exactly right, the dishes still get clean. My daughter went to high school for the very first day at the biggest high school I have ever seen in my life, 2400 students. I went to a high school of 800, from my best friend’s house. Did she have the exact experience I thought she would have as a freshman when we went to the orientation two weeks before? No. I don’t know. Did I expect that the first time she had a speaking role in a play, I wouldn’t be there? But I needed treatment then, so I couldn’t be there. So someone video recorded it on their phone and sent it to me, and I went the week later. Thank God they had two different things, and I got to be okay with it not being exactly as I pictured it, right? And it’s really allowing yourself to say it might not have been the way I wanted, the way I thought it would happen, but it still happened.
Odiva Vasell: (25:21)
Oh, wow. That’s beautiful. Yes, and I can imagine not just us as women at this age, but I can imagine our mothers and grandmothers setting an example of, this is how it has to be done and this is the only way. And we get criticized if we don’t follow, you know, if we ask for help, if we even ask for a service like someone to come and clean the house, that’s like a huge shame.
Diane Byron: (26:02)
Yeah, many clean the house before they get there.
Odiva Vasell: (26:06)
Yes.
Diane Byron: (26:07)
Right, so it’s really the idea of allowing yourself to receive. People think about it that it’s about money, or it’s about a thing, or it’s about help that’s tangible, but sometimes allowing yourself to receive is quite simply somebody saying, “Do you want to go sit in the sun? Do you want to take a walk? Do you want to do X, Y, and Z?” A coach that I had once, and now I do this for my clients as well, put me on a receiving stretch, which was 72 hours. It could be two now, with when now that COVID is there and we’re not in person as much, it might be a two-week-long stretch of saying yes to anytime anyone offers to support you, while aligned with your values, of course. So if you are in a grocery store, for example, and you have one bag of groceries and the bagger says, “Can I carry it to your car?” You’re darn capable of carrying it to your car, but you get to say yes. If someone says, “Can I get the mail for you? Can I get the door for you? Can I do the…” Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. And it breaks the pattern of seeing receiving help as weakness. It’s one of my favorite stretches because it allows people to see that other people do actually want to help them and support them. And when we say no to someone offering us support, we’re actually saying no to a gift. So imagine if you are the one offering support, and that friend, that person, that child, that teacher, whatever, says, “No thank you, I’ve got it.” How do you feel? And that’s what we’re doing to people without even realizing it because we’ve got it together.
Odiva Vasell: (28:29)
So, whereas you speak, I’m envisioning a community of people, and the community of women especially, who are there to just support each other. And, again, it does not have to be someone that lives in the same city as you or has things in common with you at all. Just having that ear of support or that knowledge of small steps, this is one of the small steps and one of the greatest steps to self-care.
Celebrating Small Wins and Personal Growth
Diane Byron: (29:12)
A 100%. And the beauty is we now have Zoom, we have FaceTime, we have every platform known to man, really, and it just takes a moment. Before we got on this call, I had a catch-up call with someone who lives in San Francisco. I haven’t seen her in person in five years, but we picked up like it was yesterday because we both made that effort. And it was, hey, let’s, and she supported me and I supported her, just little bits and pieces. It’s allowing yourself to use that technology because we all have technology, and it’s very easy to be locked on our phones and miss the person in front of us. I’m not talking about that. I’m talking about the intentional use of the technology to support. It’s allowing yourself to be in an online prayer circle or a support circle or just a general, hey, let’s just all get together. And one of my friends did this, and I thought it was so brilliant. She had a Bagalicious party for her friends where everybody got to brag on themselves because women are good at that in general. And it made us all uncomfortable, and we all stretched, and we had this Bagalicious party that was hugely supportive to everybody in the room because we got to celebrate. Because that’s the other really important part: celebrating the achievements, the goals—that’s one thing—but also who we’re being when we’re doing the thing that gets us to the goal. If, for example, me growing up, we had a lot of fights in my family. We were very loud, very rambunctious, lots of anger. It’s just how we were raised. I’m like, we’re Irish; we do everything big: laughter, anger, everything. But if I can actually have a challenging encounter with someone who I’m needing to either ask to correct something or, you know, those confrontations that we may have sometimes, if I can get through that and be like, wow, I handled myself really well, I want to call someone and celebrate. And that’s getting support, too. Celebrating with someone is giving them support, and it’s the reminder we need to celebrate not just what we do but who we be when we do it.
Odiva Vasell: (31:56)
Beautiful, and I would add to that, calling someone and saying, okay, I think I believe I made a mistake. I did this the wrong way, but I’m okay now. Realize that’s okay. I’m not going to beat myself up for it. Yes, that could be a step that we can do.
Diane Byron: (32:18)
Absolutely, absolutely. You know, I tell people there’s a lot of ways. I’m writing a book called “Unstoppable Heart.” My coaching company is called Unstoppable Heart Coaching, and it all stems from having heart defects as a child and being raised to be unstoppable because, quite frankly, I didn’t know until I was in nursing school how sick I had been. I came home and asked my mom, “Did you know I could have died?” And she was like, “Yes.” And I learned to be unstoppable, and people think being unstoppable means you just go, go, go, go, go. But that’s not what being unstoppable is. Being unstoppable is putting yourself first. I call it radical self-prioritization, and it’s not just about the self-care that you and I were talking about, like drinking water or things like that. It’s also being willing to be wrong, like you were saying, like, I messed up. It’s also being willing to let go of what doesn’t work for you, whether it’s a relationship, whether it is a pattern, whether it’s a food. I am lactose intolerant, so I get to let go of foods that don’t work for me.
Odiva Vasell: (33:32)
A person?
Diane Byron: (33:33)
Right, a person, a habit, a job. And when you see that self-care is all about how do I take care of me such that when I’m out in the world, I make the world a better place, or I allow other people to shine. Because you shining your light doesn’t stop me from shining mine. And when we do it together, it’s so magical. But you got to have the awareness that you get to receive because you matter. You get to ask for help, you get to have the support you need and provide support. It’s a two-way street, just like giving and money; it’s an exchange of energy. Same thing. It’s powerful.
Odiva Vasell: (34:43)
I’m just soaking it all in. I’m soaking it in, what you’re saying—these nuggets upon nuggets of wisdom. And just really taking home the awareness that it starts with small steps: allowing yourself to be vulnerable, allowing yourself to accept, receive, ask for help, building that support community continually. Because some people might say, oh well, I do have this group that I go to once a week, but that group might look at one aspect of your life. And as complicated as each individual is, there may be various aspects that you need to grow in, and you need support for that growth.
Diane Byron: (35:43)
Right, and it’s recognizing that it’s okay to have multiple different groups of friends, whether they all get along together or not. Whatever which way it looks, you can have multiple coaches. It’s just like, you know, I’m a nurse. I’m very well-versed in Western medicine, but I also believe in holistic parts of medicine. When I was told I had cancer the second time, I did it differently. I took on, yes, I’m going to have surgery, yes, I’m going to have the radiation treatment. I’m also going to have, you know, white light healing. I’m going to have people put their hands on me to heal. I’m going to have people pray for me. I’m going to have reiki. I’m going to do all the different things. And here’s the beautiful thing that I didn’t tell you: when I had the surgery, the doctor, when the biopsies came back, only one out of 18 lymph nodes had cancer. That is not what that picture looked like in June. And that was before I had the radiation. That was all the other end of it. But I needed to have the surgery because I needed that last one out, and I needed to clean up that space. And it’s the marrying of different people, different experiences, different ways to be supported. I was supported in every which way but loose. I had someone I’d met on an interview like this, on a summit that I did in 2016, send me an entire box of goodies to support me on my journey: a water bottle, a set of headphones for the hospital, “You Are a Badass” by Jen Sincero, that button. All these different things. We met once, and now we’re good friends. And she went on a cancer journey after I did, so I supported her. So it’s really about the exchange and trusting that we’re exactly where we’re meant to be.
Odiva Vasell: (37:55)
Trusting, big word. Surrender, huge word. Accepting and knowing you matter. And I want to thank you for coming today and talking about this and, as I always say, for sharing with our listeners this wisdom. But I’m going to change it today. I’m going to thank you for sharing with me this wisdom, this knowledge. You’ve inspired me to keep pushing forward in my vision of a community of international women entrepreneurs who support each other in getting their voices heard.
Diane Byron: (38:48)
Yes, yes.
Odiva Vasell: (38:52)
Other things that they can support each other in doing. It’s beautiful.
Diane Byron: (38:57)
Elevate each other’s voices. It so matters. You know, there’s no coincidence that I had thyroid surgery, which is the throat chakra, and that I had buried my voice for 47 years. And I haven’t shut up since, is what I tell people.
Odiva Vasell: (39:19)
Thank you. Thank you, Diane.
Diane Byron: (39:21)
Thank you for having me. This has been wonderful.
[Music]
Conclusion
In conclusion, it’s important to build a strong support system, be open to asking for help when needed, and celebrate every bit of progress. Connecting with others and accepting support can lighten our load and strengthen our bonds. Each step we take toward self-care and personal growth is a reason to celebrate, guiding us toward a more fulfilling and supported life journey.