Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Welcome back to another episode of the Silence Voices of mst. Rachelle here ready to share the second part of Lakedra's story. She's going through quite a bit and she's going to go through more, but she will find her way out.
[00:00:13] Speaker B: It's something that you don't want to miss.
[00:00:14] Speaker A: Also, stick around to the end. You might get a good laugh out of it.
[00:00:17] Speaker B: Here's Lakedra.
The next segment contains triggers. Here's your warning.
[00:00:26] Speaker A: Timestamp is from a minute 5 to about 14 minutes 10 seconds.
[00:00:30] Speaker B: For a full list of trigger warnings.
[00:00:32] Speaker A: And an episode summary, please visit our blog.
[00:00:40] Speaker B: So you've already had culture shock just from your first airplane ride.
[00:00:44] Speaker C: Correct.
[00:00:45] Speaker B: And then going to basic Arizona now Korea after a deployment. My goodness.
[00:00:54] Speaker C: Back to back to back. I didn't, I don't even think I was at my base after I came back from a deployment for another year. I was gone. Within six months, I was out. I was happy, though.
[00:01:05] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:01:06] Speaker C: Just to leave and start over.
[00:01:08] Speaker B: Yeah. How was that transition?
[00:01:11] Speaker C: Arizona's so hot. Oh my gosh, it's hot. And then to switch over to Korea and I think I went in November. It was freezing, snow everywhere. I was like, I can't do this. I want to go back home. It was a huge shock. I don't think I was ready for it mentally. I wasn't ready. It was so fast paced. It was so much alcohol. It was so much drinking. It's like, oh, you're, you're new here. Let's go take you out on the town. And you go out on the town and they're giving you these soju drinks.
Yeah. Oh, I will never have that again. They give you these soju drinks and everybody's drinking and they're getting you drunk. And then guess what? Back in the same situation I left from, so I was like, okay, here we go again.
[00:01:54] Speaker B: I can't remember what soju's made of, but, like, that stuff will tear you up.
[00:01:59] Speaker C: Yeah. And you can't, like, you can't taste it.
And it has different alcohol levels. You may have one that's 80%. You may have one that's 7%. You never know.
[00:02:10] Speaker B: Yeah, I think it's, it's more regulated now. But some of the stories I've heard from the people that served as I was like, and they're like, ye, sometimes it's homemade too. So they don't even know, like, and.
[00:02:23] Speaker C: They give you this thing called green slime and it's like a bowl of like all these different soju. But it tastes like a fruity drink. So you're like, okay, well, I can drink this whole thing halfway through, you're like, okay, what's my name?
[00:02:36] Speaker B: Right, Right. You just, like, reset the whole hard drive.
[00:02:40] Speaker C: Yeah. Yes.
[00:02:42] Speaker B: Oof. Man.
That is a big part of military culture is just alcohol itself.
But if you look at all the MST statistics, alcohol is involved in a fair few.
Like, that's the majority of them. And it does not seem like, even still to this day, that they're willing to kind of call that part of the. The culture. Like, okay, maybe we should actually do something about this.
[00:03:11] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:03:11] Speaker B: That doesn't make sense.
[00:03:13] Speaker C: Yeah. Because even going over there, just barely turning 21 or whatever, even the girls who are younger than me, we would go to Kuchak, a part of their command, they had this area. They go and party. So we would go to all the guys who work on airplanes. We go there, and then we'll go to the logistics people and just. Just hop around to everybody's, like, little area. And not knowing, like, everybody's drinking from your commander all the way down to your youngest person, they're just feeding you alcohol. It was just how it was over there. That was a sad part to see that.
[00:03:45] Speaker B: But yeah. Yeah.
[00:03:47] Speaker C: Cool.
[00:03:49] Speaker B: Yes. It's very much that. The people that actually abstain from drinking, for whatever reason, they are outcasts.
[00:03:59] Speaker C: Yeah.
It was like you were teased. It felt like, yes. Because in the moment, like, when I initially got there, I was like, I'm not going to drink. Then it was like, oh, you're weak. You're this. And you're like, no, I'm not. Then you have to. That pride comes in. You want to prove a point. Yeah.
[00:04:13] Speaker B: And then this is another thing where women feel the need to prove themselves, because men are like, oh, you can't hang. So to be like one of the boys, you got to go shot for shot. Whenever people would, like, chug beers, you had to be done first. Like, it's just. All of it's toxic.
[00:04:31] Speaker C: Yeah. Very toxic culture.
[00:04:34] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:04:34] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. After doing that or being there for a little bit, I was able to go to school. That kind of helped some. But I had another that happened while I was there. The girl who was supposed to protect me. Because we told each other, Right. That when we go out, we're going to be each other's wingman. We're going to have each other's back. I basically get left with a group of men that I think she was friends with. I don't know the Situation. But I remember waking up that morning and seeing the guy that I really don't remember him, but I know we work in the same area. Seeing him next to me, I was like, oh, my God, what happened? I remember going to the doctor. What happened? Oh, nothing happened, but I just want to make sure I don't have anything. I was doing that, but I never reported. Right, right. I went back and told her about it. I said, hey, this happened with your friend. Where were you at? She was like, well, you were hanging all on him, kissing on him. You wanted it. I was like, are you freaking kidding me? I seriously wanted it. And I said, well, if I was drinking or if I was feeling that way, I said, I don't remember. I was blacked out. I don't even know how I was able to move around. There were other people there that were. Well, he held you up.
Well, if somebody holds me up, why aren't you protecting me? Obviously that tells you I'm not in good space.
That really ruined our friendship. She started calling me slut around the dorms.
So I had a reputation off of one. Off the. The first that happened in Korea. Another one happened that everybody found out about. He was going around talking about me, like, oh, yeah, I got her. Blah, blah, blah. And so two in Korea.
[00:06:09] Speaker B: And the attaboys that they get after doing something like that rather than actually getting prosecuted.
[00:06:18] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:06:18] Speaker B: Jesus.
[00:06:22] Speaker C: I went on to say, too. I remember because there was another time I remember in the guy's bedroom and not remember anything. Who protects us? Who. Who do I have?
Of course, the drinking increases in Korea again. That's all you have. We're back on that trail again.
[00:06:39] Speaker B: Right, Right.
[00:06:41] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:06:41] Speaker B: So I'm just going to infer that your mental state at this point, like, you've gone from numb to just like, dead, basically. Like walking dead. Like, you're alive, but it's like just the lights are on, basically.
[00:06:57] Speaker C: Yeah, it was. I didn't talk to my family much. They knew something happened over there. My grandma was like, hey, I heard that things happen overseas. You okay? I was like, no, you know, it's okay. It's nothing big. I just didn't want to tell anybody. I was embarrassed because when it happens to you over and over, certainly as a kid, and then now you. It's going as adult. What do I do here?
This is my. Probably the third or fourth time that I use the word actual. Because I never said that. I was like, oh, it's a. Not trying to trigger anybody. I only said that word a Handful of times because I still can't process. That's what happened still.
Yeah, yeah, it was. It's a lot. So I was just there. I wasn't even. Yeah, yeah, wasn't even.
[00:07:44] Speaker B: Not only is it. Why. Why is this happening? It's. Who's gonna believe me?
Yeah.
[00:07:50] Speaker C: Yeah. Korea was interesting. I work town patrol, and that's where you're basically a cop, and you go around the city to make sure the city stays protected.
Fighting my own demons and then going out there trying to help out in the city was hard. Certainly when we saw trafficking was big in Korea, it was like helping them get to safe houses, things like that. And then getting a phone call saying, the boss who's over the town patrol is the one that's trafficking them. My boss. So I was like, what is going on here? You're the one who's supposed to protect us. You're the one doing this. Was like, back at Arizona again. I'm like, what is going on here? The world was, like, crappy to me. I just didn't. I didn't care. Yeah. Over it.
[00:08:34] Speaker B: We were in that. That loop. Yeah.
[00:08:36] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:08:37] Speaker B: That's.
Seems inescapable. While you're in it. It was actually the very first episode of this podcast. Julie, she mentioned the juicy girls. Yeah, those are the young women that are trafficked pretty much from all over Southeast Asia.
They're paid to basically. Well, not even paid, but they're just there to encourage young men to buy drinks and more. But it's horrific.
[00:09:09] Speaker C: Yeah, it was sad. You've seen a few who were devastated, and the other juicy girls would surround her or one of the other ladies and like, it's okay, it's okay. But she was like, you know the gis, because that's what they call them over there, military members. The GI promised me that I would be a singer. He would promise me money so I could take care of my family. You saw a lot of them that were really struggling, and being a cop that was walking around checking on them, they would sometimes just run in your arms, and you're like, I don't know what to do. It was very, very sad. But that's when I initially knew what trafficking was.
[00:09:43] Speaker B: Right. And that's been a huge part of military culture that people don't know about.
[00:09:51] Speaker C: They shut down a lot of the bases after that.
[00:09:54] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:09:54] Speaker C: But it was one of those things I would never want to see again.
[00:09:57] Speaker B: Yeah. How was it feeling? If I can't protect myself, how am I going to protect these. These trafficked young women like that must have been a hell of a thing to wrestle with when you're already mostly shut down.
[00:10:14] Speaker C: Even helping them and also responding to in the military. It was just hard. I felt like I couldn't be emotional. I had to act like I didn't go through anything. Empathy was not there at that moment. I just didn't know what to do. I knew I was hurting, but I couldn't be a voice for them later. Thinking about it, it's like, emotional because you're like, I wish if I would have stepped in, some of them would have got the help they needed, but I just. I couldn't. I was frozen.
[00:10:42] Speaker B: So it's an ugly place to be. You just don't feel alive at all.
[00:10:48] Speaker C: Yeah. And then you don't want to. You don't want to recognize that you're going through stuff either. I was like, I'm going through too much. I don't want to talk about it. Like, that makes me feel weak. I was like, I'm weak for going through this or how I'm handling the situation.
[00:11:00] Speaker B: What helped you get out of this loop? You've been stuck in this for a couple decades now.
[00:11:06] Speaker C: What happened was I left there. I went to another. I had two more duty stations. I went to Ramstein Drive, Germany, had a great tour. Nothing bad happened. But when I went to Tinker, Oklahoma, I kind of woke up.
I had just arrived there after leaving Germany. This was like February 2009. I get a phone call saying, hey, something's going on with your sister, and she's been found dead. And it was on Facebook. I was like, what? My mom calls me and she's screaming, and I'm like, what is going on? Talk to me. She said, kedra, your sister's dad. I was like, oh, my God. As I'm trying to figure out myself and just get in this duty station, I get this phone call. I took emergency leave and I went to my family and talked to them about what happened, got the details, and found out she was and murdered. We have some insight that she could have been trafficked. We don't know the full details, but what they're saying that happened. This is my sister who was deaf. She's going to school to learn how to be a math teacher. And that's something that people used to tell her. You're not going to be able to do it because you have a disability. She was going against the grain. What we told her not to do, she was going to do it. She wanted to find a way and just ran into the wrong person. When we found that out, we went down to where she was found. It was so much, so much corruption with that now on top of my stuff, I have to deal with her death and people who are involved in it who were part of the police. My family's getting death threats. If we keep on investigating, they were going to come after us. So I was dealing with all that. And after the funeral, I came back home to Oklahoma and that was my first attempt.
And.
[00:12:55] Speaker B: Take your time, it's all right.
[00:13:01] Speaker C: It sucked because it reminded me of the people I didn't protect in the past. Right. And then to find out you don't know how to protect your own flesh and blood, it weighed a lot on me. In a way, it gave me the strength to fight. So that's why I'm advocating now.
But this attempt, my ex husband grabbed the gun for me. I got married again. I got divorced and I got married again. We were about to get married, we were dating. And he grabbed the gun away from me. Was so crazy. He was like, I have to my head. I was barely pressing on the trigger. I don't know how he found me, but he ran around the corner and he found me. I was inside the house and I was in a corner that was kind of ducked off and he found me and he was like, keeji, you can't do this. I screamed like, oh my God. I lost my best friend. I lost my person I could just be there for. And it did something to me. Maybe I do have purpose. Maybe there's something behind all the trauma that I've been through. I have a little bit of hope, but in the back of my head, I knew after the attempts I have to do it a different way so he won't find me. I was coming up with a plan to do it differently and somewhere differently, whether get a whole bunch of pills or whatever I could do.
But before I did it, I came across this master sergeant who was kind of like a first sergeant.
Really didn't talk to me that much. But he pulled me aside, he said, come in my office. I was like, oh my. I'm not going in here. Back of my head. Because I'm like, if I go in here, this is what's going to happen. I'm going to get.
He said, no, I need you to sit across from me. I'm going to stand behind my desk and I need you to tell me what's going on.
I said, I don't know if I'm ready To express it. And it just all came out. He said, you were heard, you were seen. He talked to me. He gave me so much hope. He was like, you're a light. I need you to go get help. There's something in you. I don't know you, but I see you walking around. There's something in you have to get help. And that's my journey of trying to find mental health resources.
He referred me to military One source because he didn't want me to end up getting kicked out. I found a way to go to a military one source and get the help I needed. And, you know, I was able. I was telling anybody, you know, when you go through therapy, like, you have to continue going through it. Like, don't stop at a bad therapist. You have to find somebody. I mean, even being told that, hey, are you now I gotta go home, I gotta cook dinner, I gotta go on a vacation from a therapist, it was hard. I went and sought help after he talked to me, and that was probably the best thing I could have done.
[00:15:37] Speaker B: He saved your life.
[00:15:38] Speaker C: Yeah. Yeah. Still talk to him every now and then. I'll check on him. Yeah.
[00:15:43] Speaker B: I'm sure he is beyond happy to see what you've done and what you've become. And we'll get to that in a minute. But therapy is difficult. I know people understand it kind of. That is difficult, but they don't understand. What would you want to share with somebody? Thinking about it, they're like, okay, maybe I need help. Maybe I can muscle through. What would you advise them?
[00:16:06] Speaker C: When it comes to therapy, you have to remember your why. I always say, remember, why are you doing it? And just because one therapist doesn't work for you, don't quit, don't stop. You're going to find somebody. I mean, it took me five, six, seven tries to find somebody. But you will find somebody who fits you, who wants to hear you, who gives you good advice, gives you good instruction. Don't stop seeking that help. That's what I did. I continued seeking help and making sure I had someone who really was there for me.
Don't stop seeking therapy. Find somebody who works for you.
[00:16:38] Speaker B: We should probably share what military OneSource is. It is an amazing resource and it's kind of like a workaround.
[00:16:46] Speaker C: Yeah. Military One source is basically a. It's a website, and they have just basically all these resources that you can go to therapy. You don't have to report to the military about what happened. The only thing they report is if you're homicidal Suicidal, those things they have to report. You just go there and just get help. As far as like mental health, homeless, homelessness, things like that, you can go to them. Great resource and they were able to, you know, talk to me and help me see things outside of the military and then deal with the young trauma. Everything I dealt with. So a great, great resource. If anybody you know, doesn't want to go the way of going to the military chaplain or whatever the case may be, definitely look into military one source.
[00:17:28] Speaker B: I will put that website down in the show notes.
[00:17:31] Speaker A: Here's another trigger warning. It's going to go from about 1734 to 26 minutes 43 seconds. And remember, you can always send the keydra a message with Salute to survivors on our website.
[00:17:45] Speaker B: You've had this incredible journey and it's led you to, to having this huge impact in service members lives. Do you want to share what that's like?
[00:17:57] Speaker C: What made me get to finally sharing with other service members was after all this happened, I became a recruiter. Not a line recruiter, recruiter. I was a good recruiter. It was around 2017 that actually publicly came out. That was when a recruit that I put into the military was on a deployment. She called me when she got on to Kansas to get help. She's like, nobody's here. First sergeant's not here. Screaming, crying, yelling. I said I gotta do something. I spoke up against her command. I just had to. I couldn't see another person die. I could not see MST continuing in our service. I spoke up, did a lot of things on social media. I felt like I had the strength to tell my own personal story because it, it was. Well, why are you advocating for this person? You don't know what it feels like. Oh no, I do. Just because I don't share my story does not mean I don't know what it feels like.
[00:18:45] Speaker B: The audacity of somebody to say something like that.
[00:18:49] Speaker C: Yes.
So it was heartbreaking for people. When you speak up, oh whatever, you don't know what you're talking about. Sharing my story was where others can see, like, wow, you've been through this. But it was also a backfire. Like, well why did you report it? Does it mean it's true? Because you didn't report it. I'm like, that does not mean it's not true. I wasn't ready. Now I'm ready to say what happened. That's another thing I want people to understand. When you're ready, you're ready. Don't rush it. When it's your time. It's your time. I started voicing my opinion was a recruiter the time that Vanessa Gann that happened. We were out there searching for her body, looking for her. That led me into fighting for the Vanessa Guillen act and being featured on Dateline NBC. I was like, I'm not going to stop. I can't shut up. I got to keep on going. Advocacy has been a very challenging ride. It's like crabbing a bucket sometime. It's my story is better than yours or your story is better than mine. It shouldn't be like that. I've learned to shut out the noise and fight regardless of what anybody says. I'm going to fight. That's what I've been doing fighting ever.
[00:19:53] Speaker B: Since what that master sergeant saw. Yes, it's right on display right now. I, I do want to touch on the victim blaming there of the well, why didn't you report it?
If you are a survivor listening to this and you haven't shared your story yet or even reported what happened to you, that's something you're going to encounter, unfortunately. But you have the two of us here that believe you. We believe don't let people like that stop you. Whenever you're ready, you come forward. But there's always these naysayers out there. They're trying to protect their military or protect, I don't know, maybe themselves and their own little like weak psyche. But don't let that detract you because everybody has experienced pain in some way shape or another. But I guess some people don't believe that other people's pain is the same or other people can't experience pain the way they can. It would take you all day to unravel that one. But don't let people like that make you even second guess what you've been through because it will happen and kind of something you have to prepare for emotionally and mentally. So let's talk about some of the organizations now that you are a part of. Whether that comes to saving lives or helping people get to resources.
You're a busy lady.
[00:21:21] Speaker C: Yeah, it's a lot. I started working with the Pink Berets as national outreach, just connecting with other resources a few years ago. What we do is we help women who have struggled with MST find resources. It's more holistic because the VA wants to give you pills all the time. We're doing a more holistic approach to find deep down like what's going on. Whether it's equine therapy, fishing, glamping, cooking, boxing It's a way for us to come together and just unite and take a second from the world and strengthen yourself. I love that with them. Then also I got certified as a Texas office Attorney General victim services advocate. I'm able to help not just military, but the civilian side sector of it. Now I work with this organization called the Turning Point. And I basically get calls. I'm on call if victims of sexual assault is at the. If they're at the hospital, I have to go there, meet them, get resources, help them find shelter, you know, depending on the situation. Then I helped co author a book called Wounds of Wisdom. And it's just basically talking about my story and actually writing on paper what happens, details. As a child to currently what I went through. And I've been all over the place and I'm not ashamed. I was shameful for so long. I didn't want to really fully. I'll talk about it here and there, but I didn't accept what happened to me. But now I accept it and understand it's not my fault. I think when I recognized it wasn't my fault, more opportunities happened to help other people. Now I can help others without the mask on.
[00:22:51] Speaker B: Right.
The amount of love that it takes, the amount of strength that it takes to be with someone in their pain when it's fresh like that. Thank you for all that you're doing for active duty veterans and civilians. You've been instrumental in people's lives. How does that feel?
[00:23:15] Speaker C: It feels good. It feels good because you're healing yourself. I know that I'm in a healed space because if I wasn't healed, I couldn't help others. I won't say I'm fully healed, but I'm healing. I'm becoming better now. I can show up for others as well as myself. But one thing I have to always realize is that self care is very important. Take a step back. There's. Sometimes I can't be there for people. Sometimes I can't take calls. Sometimes I just want to sit in my house and just like, okay, you just sit here and don't do nothing. Understanding my worth. Like, girl, it happened to you. But what are you going to do? We're going to turn it around. Don't give them power. That's what I did. I turned all that pain into power. I've been pushing ever since.
[00:23:55] Speaker B: For somebody that is struggling right now, where they feel like no one's going to believe them or they're caught in a trauma loop, what message would you have for them?
[00:24:06] Speaker C: The first thing I would tell anybody is to give yourself grace. Understand that again, it's not your fault and you have a support system. Whether you contact me or whoever, you know, you have a support system. Give your sec. Give yourself some grace and seek help. That's the biggest thing. To seek help. You have to realize it's not your fault. It is not your fault. You just got some bad people out there.
Yeah, there's a lot of bad people out there and sometimes we run into them, sometimes somebody we love, sometimes somebody that we don't know. However, it is not your fault. Give yourself grace and take your time to heal and understand what healing for you means. Because it. Healing for me may be different for you. Understand what your healing journey means and take advantage of healing.
[00:24:52] Speaker B: And you have an organization that you started. It's called Key fit. Did you want to share about that one?
[00:24:58] Speaker C: Yeah. So it was a whim.
It was something I thought about and it's something I'm starting to get back into. But it's knowledge, empowerment, unity. But with unity, it's Y o u n I t y. The fit is focused on wellness, being whole, mentally, physically, spiritually. Whichever way you find wholeness in yourself, that's healing, knowledge. We need education when it comes to, you know, these things. Empowerment. We need to empower each other. And unity starts with you. That's how I feel. Yeah, I love what I do. I've helped youth. We're working on an at risk program right now to help girls who've been trafficked in the jail system. We're helping them out. I would like to start a nonprofit to help those young women who are trafficked to find emergency housing because there's no emergency housing for them. I want to find emergency housing, housing, resources. That's what it's about, helping the community.
[00:25:49] Speaker B: I'm going to harp on it, but to have gone through so much and then not only have the willpower to turn it around, but also see these other needs out there that need to be met. This is a beautiful person inside and out. It takes love, lots of love. They say that because when you go through extreme traumas like that, that's something that is just removed completely from your life is love, love, hope and trust. They're just, poof.
Um, in your journey, was there like a moment where you were like, okay, I got this. Those things have reappeared in my life. The, the love and. And trust and hope.
[00:26:35] Speaker C: I got that back in January 2023. I went through a whole thing. Even after I transitioned out the military that's another story, right?
And then being reconnected with my son after all those many years. He's alive now, but he had a fentanyl overdose. Right. I had to deal with that. And I blame myself and my traumas for that. That hope came after that when I went to a place called Boulder Crest. And it's a place under organization called Combined Arms. They basically are a kind of like a military one source. They have a whole bunch of resources. I know they're in the state of Texas, but they're venturing out all over. I went through them and talked to them about getting help. I was like, I can't die by. I got to figure this out. I've been doing so good helping others like, I can't. I went to this place called Post Traumatic Growth. I was able to sit there and be taken care of for six days. I didn't have to cook. I didn't have to clean. They did everything for me. Everything just came out of me. Everything I went through, I said, this is it. This is my life. The light bulb came on and I was like, I have to continue asking for help in talking to the right organizations. I knew I got it. I knew there was a light in me. Even with the women who didn't even know me, they're like, there's something in you. And actually believing that, just hearing it, you're just being nice, but actually accepting it. Accepting and trusting women or people again, that helped me. It opened my eyes to life still happens to us.
[00:27:59] Speaker B: It does.
[00:28:00] Speaker C: But you just learn how to navigate and watch who you let in your circle. Now. Now I'm more of aware it was a life.
[00:28:08] Speaker B: That's another part of healing is I think some folks expect like, oh, I'm healed. Nothing bad is ever going to happen again.
Oh, it'll happen. But you'll. You'll be more prepared. You'll have more tools.
[00:28:24] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:28:25] Speaker B: Yeah, I wish it worked like that, boy.
[00:28:28] Speaker C: Yeah, I wish. And even now you have those flashbacks. I still have them every now and then. And I have to learn how to navigate. What can I do when this happens? How do I feel? I'm learning myself. And that's the biggest thing. Learn what triggers you. Learn what you can do to offset those triggers. Like, you have to really, truly learn yourself in this healing journey. Then stay away from those things that can trigger you.
[00:28:51] Speaker B: If there's one or two major lessons that you've. You've taken from this that you've used to navigate life since you had that light bulb moment, Would you care to share them with the audience?
[00:29:05] Speaker C: The first thing, I always say this like you deserve to be here. I always feel like that you deserve to be here. The second thing is don't let anybody dim your light. Those two things I think about every day. I deserve to be here. Don't let anyone dim my lights. That's what I've learned. And, you know, find your own affirmations or things that make you feel good. But everybody who hears this, they deserve to be here. We all have a light in us that we just need to get the dust off and go and figure it out. You don't have to figure it out alone. You have tribes here that will help. We got your back. You're not going to struggle alone. Just remember that you deserve to be here.
[00:29:44] Speaker B: We did mention a few throughout the episode, but any other organizations or people that you'd like to give a shout out for being there to assist through your journey?
[00:29:55] Speaker C: Definitely the pink berets. Oh, my gosh. If it wasn't for them, I would be like all over the place. They keep me sane, man. It is so many. One in six. They help men. I love their organization.
Was it veterans rescue in America? They help with sexual assault survivors. It is so many out there. But yeah, I have a list of them. If anyone needs anything, definitely contact me. There's a lot out there but connect with them.
[00:30:22] Speaker B: Let's share the name of your book again so that folks can go pick it up and, you know, get some more of this. This light. Get some of that shine on them.
[00:30:32] Speaker C: To wisdom. I co author it with a lot of different soldiers, FBI agents, like everybody from different walks of life that talk about resiliency, how they overcame and then what they're going to do now. It's a beautiful book. We got Canada, we got international bestseller at one point. It was amazing. If you want to get the book, it's on Amazon. Sarah is her name but it's wounds to wisdom and you'll see us all co authoring on the back. Definitely grab it.
[00:31:00] Speaker B: Yeah, I'll put it in the show notes. And congratulations on that international bestseller. Holy crap.
[00:31:05] Speaker C: Yeah. Like, I can't believe this.
[00:31:07] Speaker B: Yeah, that's no easy feat. Lakehidra, thank you so much for taking the time to speak with us and share all of this wisdom that you've gained. Thank you so much for sharing the pain and the struggle, but also that it is possible to overcome and get out of that trauma loop.
[00:31:25] Speaker C: Yeah, it definitely is. Thank you for having me. Keep on doing your work. For you to have a platform where you went through your own things and you're helping others continue letting the light shine.
[00:31:37] Speaker B: Don't quit.
[00:31:38] Speaker C: Don't quit.
[00:31:40] Speaker A: Wasn't that an incredible story? To put herself out there continuously and keep fighting for people who have been through what she's been through, she's doing even more outreach. She's just a beautiful person inside and out. If you want to leave her a message, there is the Salute to Support Buyers option on the website and the top toolbar. She would be glad her voice reached you. As for another way to support the podcast, we do have a Freedom Fade shirt that is available for sale now. If you are a patriot like I am, you are not here for the fascism that's trying to creep its way.
[00:32:16] Speaker B: Into our country and our daily lives.
[00:32:19] Speaker A: The proceeds from the shirt are going straight to podcast expenses so that we can continue to give you a great, high quality show. You might have noticed camera setup's a little different. Things are a bit more clear. So if Lakeitra's story had an impact on you, please help us amplify her voice by leaving a review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. A big part of getting survivors heard is visibility. In the next episode, we will be sharing how to solve the problem of MSD with our guest, Jeff Derry. We'll see you next time.
[00:32:51] Speaker C: Take care.
