Kisha and Frances

Coach K. Woods is back with another episode of Empowering Real Talk. She introduces her guest, Fran, who is an author and entrepreneur. Fran talks about her background growing up in California with a stepdad who had addiction issues. She discusses the influence of her upbringing on her career choices and relationships. Coach K. Woods shares her own experience of childhood trauma and the impact it had on her relationship with her mom. They discuss the importance of having open and honest conversations to heal and move forward. They also touch on the challenges of parenting and breaking the cycle of trauma. What up, y'all? Welcome back to Empowering Real Talk. It is your girl, Coach K. Woods. And yes, I am back with another dope session. If you have not, make sure you have subscribed to the YouTube channel. If you see my beautiful face, but if you are listening on any of the podcast streaming platforms, then make sure you favorite your girl over there and keep on coming with that feedback because it is definitely appreciated. And I definitely am listening to your feedback. So, you know, future episodes will be aligned with that. So thank you guys so much for your support. Let's go ahead and get this party started. If you are watching here on YouTube, then you see that I'm not here by myself. I'm going to allow my guest a chance to introduce herself. Hello, hello, hello everyone. So my name is Fran. You want me to go into the whole thing? Absolutely. Tell them who you are, baby. Tell them who you are. All right. I am an author of a book called Can You Hear Me? I'm also an entrepreneur. I do freight brokering, also previously dispatching for logistics, trucking specifically for full truckload containers. And I'm also working on releasing a natural deodorant. Okay. Yeah. Come on in. I love it. Hey, y'all heard what she said? Entrepreneur. So y'all already know I love it. Anytime I can bring other women on here to tell you about their story and to also give that insight and that value and resource. Y'all know what it's about for me. Get that. So I'm super excited to get into some conversation with her today. So let's tap into that. So Fran, tell us a little bit about your backstory. Tell us a little bit about, you know, kind of some of the things that, you know, got you kind of where you are today. All right. So I could dig into my childhood if you like. That's kind of where you are. Hey, fine, real talk, baby. Whatever you feel comfortable with. All right. So I grew up and my background is I'm Samoan. I'm a Pacific Islander. So my parents, we grew up mostly with other people and mostly in the projects in California. So Southern California and Northern California. Okay. So my stepdad, he was a crackhead. Yeah. And so a lot of the influence of why I wanted to do what I do came from not being able to have things around and in the house. We rarely never had any food around. Only time we had food was that first and 15th of the month. And that went super quick. Yeah. For those of you that don't aren't familiar with those numbers, that's if you're on government assistance. And it's the 15th, baby. Yeah. And back in the days, it used to be called food stamps. So yeah. Now they don't call it what is it, EBT now? So yeah. I remember them days so, so, so clear. Oh, yeah. Yeah. It was like we were always with somebody, always having to be pushed out of the place that I had become comfortable in staying. And because we were too much for that family, we would end up just having to go find another place to stay. Or maybe my stepdad did some stuff or had stolen some stuff. And I didn't know about it because I was a kid. Yeah. Yeah. So and then also to growing up in the house, I always watched my mom and dad. It's the first time I'm really calling him dad. Right. Have like physical fight. Yeah. So like communication in our household wasn't done with verbal language. It was really through fighting and strength. And so watching that, that really made me hardened something inside of me. Like I will never let a man touch me like that. I will never let somebody like overrule me like that, which hence rolls into the reasons why I made the decisions that I did in my relationships. So, yeah. Yeah. And I get it. I don't think people understand the severity of how like childhood trauma affects us. Right. You know, I being born, you know, me and my mom, you know, we're super close now. And I love that we were able to finally get to that stage in our relationship. But, you know, I was born in a federal penitentiary and like my mom was in and out of jail the first 13 years of my life. So, you know, my grandmother raised me and I resented the hell out of my mom for that. And because of that, you know, I can relate to you having that sense of hearty because it's like, hey, I feel like none of this ever happened to me. I'm going to let you see that I'm sad, upset, mad, any of that, you know, and my grandmother that she could. I did my grandma like shit. Like, I definitely don't. You know, she's no longer with us. She's been gone since I was 21. But looking back, you know, it's like I know she forgave me because, again, I was going through my own trauma. So I don't think people realize the severity of our individual traumas and how they can have that effect. But I love that you, you know, had it in your mind. You're like, hey, I'm not going to let this happen to me. You know, I'm going to do what I have to do to, you know, make sure that happens. So get into a little bit more because I know you are a mom, you know, and I know that me and you talked about that a little bit. So kind of tell the audience a little bit more about, you know, you becoming a mommy and how that works. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I do want to talk about that, but I do want to dig into that resentment. Oh, yeah. Go ahead. Yeah. So you had mentioned that you had did your grandmother wrong. And I think mentioning that is helpful because of the experience of that childhood trauma, it causes us not to really identify and know what the difference is between real love and it ain't shit love. Period. Right. Yeah. Yeah. And we don't know how to nurture that. We don't know how to receive that because it wasn't given to us. Yeah. So because we can't identify those characteristics and those traits, we tend to treat something that is a blessing for us like, like it's nothing. Yeah. And then we go looking for those things in other people and other relationships when that's that whole separation anxiety, you know, with our parents and things like that. And with my mom, too, I resented the hell out of her. Come on. Yeah. And so I think it's important to talk about that because if we don't really say, hey, why, why did you do the things that you did? Yeah. We sometimes we can't get clarity to move forward. We cannot. And we need that. People can say all day long, you know, do I agree with everything that needs closure? I don't. Right. But when it comes to that, going back to like the childhood and the deep rootedness that comes behind that. Absolutely. Because me and my mom did have those conversations. We had a bunch of those conversations and she in the beginning was not accepting to that. But eventually she became accepting because I had to kind of change the approach. I went to her aggressively before, you know, I want answers. Tell me what's going on. But I ended up turning that because again, I was on my own journey. So I ended up shifting that saying, OK, I can't come aggressive if I'm trying to get answers. And it actually works, you know, and it actually the death of my sister brought us closer together, too, because I became a mother of three overnight with the death of my sister. She had two boys and I only have one. So, you know, but like, you know, we started to amend our relationship then because back then I was like, whatever, you know, my mom will come into town and I drop my son off and I'm gone for three days. If I've seen her, I've seen her, you know, but I'm just glad that we are in a better space. But, man, it took a lot. It took a lot. And it's still times where we have those conversations, but I love that we're in a space to where we can have those conversations. Yeah, I'm really glad that you brought that up because I'm still working through it with my mother because like I really had to sit my mom down one day because I get phone calls, hey, can I have some money? And that's really only the time that I get a phone call. Right. I just got so pissed off and I was like, do you not realize that all you do is you call me is when you need something? You don't call me to check up on me. You don't call me to ask how I'm doing, how I'm feeling. But yet when my brothers call you and they have issues, you stay on the phone with them. Where, how does that dynamic work? And then once again, going back into our childhood trauma, she's not really knowing and seeing the difference. So I blew up on my mom and I said, and I was actually cussing. I said, yeah, I was like, I'm sick and tired of this shit. I want you to sit and listen to what I have to say. I don't want any feedback from you. I don't even want to hear anything that you have to say. All I need for you to do is I just need you to sit there and listen to what is in my heart. And I swear I went on for a whole hour. You made a best list. Yeah. And after that hour, my mom was crying and she was like, wow, I didn't even realize that I was doing that. And so sometimes we just really have to bring people to a space of being present as you so right. You are absolutely right about that. And it's not you trying to be disrespectful. It's not you trying to be mean. You had to tell her, listen, I'm not trying to be disrespectful to you, but I need to get this out for me and for you because you are going to continue to do it if if you don't understand what you're doing, how you're doing it and how it's affecting us, you know, because not only with you, you know, but with your kids and, you know, with your brother, if they have kids, you know, it's going to be a continuing cycle unless we sit down and say, hey, it stops right here. I am super proud of you for taking that initiative, but I'm also proud of your mom for actually being receptive and listening. You know what I'm saying? And I'm definitely, you know, wishing the best for you guys as you continue on making those amends because it's not an overnight process, you know, definitely not. Even even there was something that happened recently because she's raising one of my stepdad's kids and this is her second marriage. And I heard her in the background yelling at yelling at her. And I think she's about maybe 10 or 12. And I said, Mom, how old are you? My mom's like 60 something. And she goes, I'm 60 something. I forgot. My mom was born in 57. And then she goes, Yeah, that's how old I am. I said, Mom, how many years out of that time span have you yelling at kids worked? And she goes, it hasn't. I said, Don't you think that it's time to make some different kind of choices, different communication? Because it hasn't worked, Mom. Yeah. And she goes, yeah. And then she goes, Oh, you're right. Okay, I'm gonna work on that. And like, that just touched my heart. Yeah. Being with us. I said, Yeah, she she is a very, very slow journey. Yeah. I take those small victories all day. And I don't think people understand how important those small ones are as much as the big ones. I am proud of anybody that actually will sit down and reflect and say, you know what, you're right. You know, let me they're actually taking the emotion out of it and applying the logic, you know, and that's a lot of times we don't do that. And especially us as mothers, you know, we are I love how you pointed that out to her. Like, I love how you were like, Hey, listen to me real quick. You know, I'm just coming to you. I'm not trying to do anything. But what I'm telling you is, you notice how these things have not, you know, worked before. And she puts the logic there for a second. She inserted that logic instead of the emotion and like, you know what, you're absolutely right. I love that. Like, those are the type of breakthroughs that I'd be talking about. That's not small to me. To me, I feel as big personally, because it's never too late for us to break those cycles. Sometimes people feel like once we get a certain age, that's just how we are. I hate those words. I cannot stand when somebody say that, you know how I am? You know how I get? No, I don't. I don't know. I don't know. I cannot stand it, you know, and because I used to do it. And to me, it's a lazy way of saying, you know what, this is how I'm gonna be if I'm being negative and toxic. That's just how I am. Okay, so now I don't got to deal with you. Because you don't want to make no changes. So all right. The choices, right? Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah, and people are giving away their power when they do say those kind of things. That's just how I am. Really? Yeah. Is that? Yeah. It's funny that when they say that it's just how I am. It's like, come on now. Nature itself even tells us that change is consistent. So come on. That applies to us. It applies every day. I know I make sure it applies for me. You know, and like I said, the thing about it is one thing I have definitely learned is if nobody is on a similar journey with me, I don't need to associate. I don't need to deal with. I don't need to collaborate, do business with none of that. I am so strict when it comes to my energy. I don't care who you is. I have, you know, told family, hey, I got to fall back, you know, because I'm not accepting and dealing that with anybody because I have been walking this journey strongly for the past three years. Not everybody know where I stand. So, you know, it's easier for me to enforce it now because everybody already know. Oh, no, you can't go to Keisha with that. You know, you can't go with that. Yeah. But it took three years to get to that point. And I'm happy with that, you know. But it also has made things healthier with other people for me, too. Those that are still in my life, those new people that have come in my life because I have definitely lost some people, you know, taking a stand on my own journey, you know, and self-prioritizing me. I have lost people behind that. And it's OK. You know, I lost no love, but I have gained such a sense of peace for myself. And I'm so unapologetic about that. You hear me? That is so important that creating those boundaries and protecting your peace and protecting your energy. Like you said, I had to cut off family to my own son. I had to cut him off. We were at my birthday party and something happened to where my son got offended because I was having a conversation with my daughter, his sister. And I had just gotten set up because he has this narcissistic behavior in which I probably, if I'm not mistaken, that's probably a behavior that I had created in him. And that's another thing that is good to talk about, absolutely, is taking responsibility for the shit that we had a hand in, right? And so when I had finally felt like because when I would be around my son, I would always feel like I had to walk on eggshells. I couldn't say certain things. And that is how I used to be. So on my birthday at a restaurant, at a Mexican restaurant, I just finally said, you know what? Thank you so much for the dinner. I can actually pay for it. I'm not going to deal with this behavior anymore. Y'all go ahead and enjoy my birthday. I'm going to go home and enjoy my birthday. And that was it. I hadn't talked to him after two years after that. And I think sometimes because as mothers, we automatically feel like that we're just supposed to accept and deal with bullshit. When I walk that unapologetic journey, I walk it across the board. And I know as mothers, we are in protective mode. But like you said, you knew that you were coddling, in a sense, and pacifying, walking on the eggshells and stuff like that, because you didn't want to hurt his feelings or trigger him or whatever else. But we don't have that control. You know what I'm saying? We don't have that control on how they react. We can only continue to give what we give. But how you react to that is not on me. And I'm not going to sit up here and damn myself, because I might trigger you. Get some help. And I didn't know that at the time. I didn't really know that. I didn't know how to. So like you said, this is a journey. And I'm trying to figure out how to respond to this. And I just really had to figure out how to utilize the art of not giving a fuck. Hey, come on. I love it. You definitely got to utilize it. And it's going to come with some pain. And I think people feel like when we talk about this, that we aren't associating the fact that we are going to go through some hell of pain, some hell of tears, some hell of emotions behind it. And I damn sure have had my share of cries when it comes to wanting these things. Yeah, because it's like this relationship that you nurtured from childhood, this little baby. And then all of a sudden, you have to separate that, not just with your own kids, but just with those around you that you forged those strong relationships with. It could have been fucking trauma-bonded. That part. It's a lot of trauma-bonded around here, like for real, for real. Talking to people, just being a coach or whatever else, it's a lot of trauma-bonded relationships around here, whether it is through kids, whether it's through friends, it's a lot of them. And that's not talked about enough. It's not talked about enough, the fact that it's a lot of trauma-bonded people walking around here acting like that they have best friend relationships, they have happy marriages, they're in this, and they're not. It's trauma-bonded. I looked at a lot of things in back on friendships and stuff like that, and it was a lot of things that were trauma-bonded. I had to look and say, damn, we only was cool because of this, or we only was hanging out because of this. That's self-possession. That's crazy. Oh, for sure. My daughter, the other day, I came in and I had emotions dumped on her. And she goes, hey, mom, when you come sometimes and you pour that stuff out, I need some space. I'm not ready for that sometimes. And I was like, can't be. I know I didn't. I'm at work. I'm at work and I'm still dumping stuff. And she's only 20. Oh, my God, I swear my youngest is my teacher. But she's like, yeah, mom, I need that. And so she knows how to create boundaries with me as well when she feels, or whomever it is. And I'm really glad that she's able to articulate that to people that she's felt that have crossed their boundaries with her. Regardless of whether it's her mom or whomever it is. So that right there for me is a little light telling me that I'm on the right path. You definitely are. Just having this conversation today, I can definitely sense that. And we're going to have our bumps. We're going to have our obstacles. We're going to have our reroutes and stuff like that. I feel like that we have to realize that just because we're on this path, that doesn't mean that it's not going to reroute. It doesn't mean that we might not hit a setback. But the thing is, and this is what I teach my clients, we prepare ourselves for the setback. We prepare ourselves for the wall that might try to come into place. Well, it's not such a hard blow when it does happen. Because we are going to have those. Life is going to life. We can't control that. So just being able to soften that blow so we can maybe go around it. Instead of it being a brick wall like behind me, it could be a sponge wall. So you're still going to hit it, but you'll be able to bounce back quicker because you're prepared for that. And that's really what I teach. Just prepare yourself for the obstacles because we're going to have it because we can't control everything. Yeah, I don't think we talk about that enough, preparing ourselves for the obstacles, because I have a martial arts class and she was teaching me how to fall. My professor, she's African American. And she was like, Fran, you got to fall. I'm like, Professor, I don't like falling. Okay, Fran, you have to allow your hand to take the brunt of the break. She's like, we're going to fall regardless. It's really how you take that energy and transpose it in the fall. And I was like, you talking to me about just your life because all this is a flip of the switch. What you say like, wait a minute now, where are you going with this? I know. I know, totally. We do need to be prepared for those falls and for those breaks. And I think growing up in the household, kind of like how I grew up, it was like, if you were to do something bad or something wrong, it was looked at like making a mistake or failure was looked at something that was an actual failure versus an actual lesson. Yes. Come on, Francie. Used as a pillow. So I want you to talk more about that because I really think that we need to get into that conversation. Yeah, I agree. It is. And when I say that we are like breaking our cycles and we're breaking those curses and the things that we feel like because our moms and our grandmas did things this way that that's how we're supposed to do it. And it's on every level, right? From religion to spirituality to family, like every level. We are not our parents. We are not our grandparents. We are us. And we have to find our values. If our values say that we still want to holler fuss and cuss, then yay, we're going to holler fuss and cuss. If our values say that I want to look at it in a more gentler standpoint and have a conversation, but it really determines on how you are. You've got to figure out who you are instead of just being a follower and feeling like that this is where you're supposed to be because this is what was embedded in you. No, you have to determine who you are as an individual. And I feel like it's super important for us to embrace that on a daily. Understanding that you're not going to please everybody with that, you're not going to appeal to everybody with that, but it's you as an individual. I talk about me being unapologetic and people feel like when I say that, that I'm saying that I don't care about nobody else. No. Why I say I'm unapologetic is because I care about me first. My priorities matter first. Then I'm able to pour into others better because my priorities matter first. I'm not pouring into empty cups. You know what I'm saying? So it's like being that person who wants to teach people more about embracing themselves as an individual instead of feeling like that they have to still go to church every Sunday because that's how they were raised or because that they have to still thank their kids because that's how they were raised. No, you are an individual. If you're struggling with that, you owe yourself the right to really self-reflect and figure out who you are as an individual. That's pretty much what I talk about it often. In my book, From Havoc to Healing, is my 30-day journal just really talking about the transformations that I wanted to make at that time. I walked that journey wholeheartedly. That's the goal for everybody. I was just about to ask you about that. For those that are trying to figure out what that looks like for them, how can they actually find a way to forge their own voice? It really is going to take a lot of deep-rooted reflection. It's going to take some trauma responses that you might not want to deal with, that you might want to keep suppressing. But in order for you to truly be able to walk that journey of a positive, more fulfilling life, you've got to be ready to expose everything about yourself, the good, the bad, and the ugly. The ugly side of things, in 2020, I actually wrote my book. My book was a journal first. It was my 30-day journal that I recorded in April of 2020. It's just all kind of deep reflections that I was going through at the time. But what I did, as I was putting in the things that I started doing, I really started exploring meditation around that time. That's in the book. Those were just some of the things, some of the tidbits that were in there. But baby, when I tell you, I had to go through the good, the bad, and the ugly. When I tell you, I had two or three days of nonstop ugly crying because I just felt like I wasn't in the right space at the moment. But once I got through crying, I felt so much clearer because I was accountable. I was accountable for the things that I might not have done right. I was accountable for the things that I accepted, I allowed. Once I became accountable for that, then nobody could hold anything against me because I'm owning everything. I'm owning all the fuck ups. I'm owning everything. That's really important. I talk about it every day. We've got to own everything. The fact that I might have stayed in a relationship longer than I should have, I'm owning that. The fact that I sat up here and said, hey, I'm not doing this anymore, but I did it six more times, I'm owning that. Because in order for me to break free from it, I got to own it. That goes for everything that we go through in our life. The things that we feel like we fucked up on, we got to own it. Once we start owning it, then hey, it's up from there. Not to say it ain't going to be a little jiggle along the way, but it's up from there because nobody can hold anything against you. Nobody can say, oh, guess what? I know you did this. Oh, grandma already talked about that. You must have read my book yet. It ain't nothing you can say about me. You know what I'm saying? I'm good, sis. I'm good. That part, that part. I feel like that in order for us to really begin to walk that path, we got to be prepared for that. We got to get ourselves equipped to say, hey, it's not saying that you're not going to have them emotions. You're not going to be crying. You're not going to be snotting and doing everything else. It's not an overnight fix. We spend so much time wanting to fix things in one walk. That's why we fall short. We want an overnight success story and that's just not the case. Just understanding that your journey is your journey. It's not going to be the same as everybody else. I don't care if you've experienced the same thing as somebody else. It's not going to be the same as everybody else. So once we come to that and really embrace our individuality, hey, it's up from there. Totally. There's this one saying by Ayala Van Zandt. It was in her book called When I Cry. This is for those that are not, they're not, they're on that journey of trying to figure out how to get past like that stuck part where they feel like, oh man, I don't know how to take ownership of it. Well, if you were in a relationship at the time or whatever the situation was and you don't know how to get over it, she said to put the blame onto ignorance because when you have something to blame it on, you can now put that down and move forward. Absolutely. I love that analogy and she's right. That's what we have to have and especially as women, we definitely feel like we have to have it and place it somewhere. It's got to be placed in a category and I know my overthinking brain definitely feels that way. But it's like, you know, I'm just self-accountable for so much but also it doesn't have to be a person and I love that you pointed that out. It doesn't have to be a person where you're going that into. It can be a characteristic. It can be something that you're no longer wanting to embrace. Leave it over there. Close that folder. I love that. Yeah, I do love that. Yeah, absolutely. So tell us what you've got going on. What's going on with you moving forward? So with me moving forward, I am working on the prologue to the book that I already wrote which is Can You Hear Me? The new book is going to talk about how I got to where Can You Hear Me? which is called Victim and Violator. So like you said earlier, there's a saying by Bozoma St. John and she actually has a new book out called The Urgent Life but she talks about people always want to be in your victory but they never want to take responsibility of the hurt that they created in their life. Oh, come on. Come on. I'm excited. Yeah, I don't know if you remember who she is. She's a Ghanaian from she used to be for Netflix and Uber. Okay, okay, okay. Okay, okay. Yeah, consensus out of this world. When you hear her speak, she speaks with such a conviction. I love that. When you hear somebody speaking with purpose and passion, you know that's a go. Absolutely, absolutely. Well, yes, she does have her book. So we will make sure that the book link is actually in the podcast details. Listen, when it comes to like growth, you are definitely walking that journey. I love, thank you so much for being so transparent today. These are the conversations that are necessary. You know, I know that somebody is going to definitely look into to hear this and they're going to be like, oh my God, is they talking about my life? They talking about me? They talking about me? You know, but these are the conversations that we got to have in order for us to move forward individually and as a whole. So I'm so grateful for you to be here. You know, you're welcome back anytime when that next book come out, make sure you come back so you can tell us about it. I'm super grateful. I'm just honored to have you here in this space and let them know where they can find you at on social media and everything. I lost her real quick, but I will definitely make sure that the details will be as far as where you can find her at on social media. It's Fran Fomey. So you can definitely find her on social media. I will definitely make sure that the details will be as far as where you can find her at on social media. It's Fran Fomey. So you can definitely find her on social media. I will definitely make sure that the details will be as far as where you can find her at on social media. I will definitely make sure that the details will be as far as where you can find her at on social media. I will definitely make sure that the details will be as far as where you can find her at on social media. I will definitely make sure that the details will be as far as where you can find her at on social media. I will definitely make sure that the details will be as far as where you can find her at on social media. I will definitely make sure that the details will be as far as where you can find her at on social media. I will definitely make sure that the details will be as far as where you can find her at on social media. I will definitely make sure that the details will be as far as where you can find her at on social media. I will definitely make sure that the details will be as far as where you can find her at on social media. I will definitely make sure that the details will be as far as where you can find her at on social media. I will definitely make sure that the details will be as far as where you can find