Michelle speaks with unvarnished honesty about her experience of growing up with an abusive father, within a context of chronic stress and fear. And about how that experience played out throughout her family, what that looks like today, and what she's learned from it. 

The most important thing, Michelle says, is to find your voice and to move past the past. 

This is part one of Michelle's episode. The second half will be out at the end of the week, and I feel like if you give Michelle five minutes of your time today, there's no way you're not going to come back on Friday to hear the rest. She's an excellent storyteller, with incredible insight, and a resilience that looks and seems nearly bulletproof to me. 

Michelle is an excellent example of how controlling the narrative of your life, and how it's used, and for what purpose, can be what sets you in motion toward moving past it. And, while she and I had very different experiences of childhood, we both know what it is to have grieved a man with whom we've had to develop visitation arrangements for our children. A man we loved, deeply, and lost, in the end, but one we grieve a little bit each time we see them, and we see them often. 

We both also know how awkward it can be to speak openly about the biggest challenges in our lives while also staying within - if we must - or, better yet, restructuring our environments to reflect social expectations that we endorse. 

Part one is about finding your voice, what Michelle calls "risin' up." 

Part two will be Michelle explaining what "sailin' on" means to her. 

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