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Handle with Care: Empathy at Work


Sep 3, 2019

Jasmin is no stranger to loss: her mother died of ovarian cancer while Jasmin was in high school. A few years later, Jasmin’s brother, Rory, took his life. She shares deep wisdom from her journey towards healing for those that have been affected by suicide and loss and speaks on the invitations of grief. Jasmin is the founder of Fall Up, a community driven platform that brings people together to navigate the spectrum of grief.

 

You know, grief is about love and it's, it's such a taboo and when we can remember that when we hold grief, we, and we honor it with the reverence in the space that it deserves, we have more joy in life, not less,

 

INTRO

 

When I was in high school, the father of one of my friends shot and killed himself.  I remember the strangeness of the funeral.  My friend was crying, standing by the side of the casket in a suit that was too big on his small frame.  I wondered, how had they made his dad look so good in the casket after a gunshot wound to the chest?  I recall our collective discomfort.  We were a bunch of fifteen-year-olds, totally out of our depth.  What should I say?  What should I do?

 

 Age hasn’t necessarily made that much of a difference.  It can be difficult to know how to support friends and coworkers after a suicide. 

 

My guest today is Jasmin Jenkins.  Jasmin shares about losing loved ones to both cancer and suicide.  We talk about meaningful gestures, careless phrases, and what it looks like to journey towards healing.    

 

Jasmin and I attended college together and I have loved seeing her life journey extend beyond those formative years.  She lives in sunny Los Angeles with her dog, Birdie. 

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

I love, having grown up in the Midwest where it's gray for probably it feels like seven months a year, I love the consistent sunshine and the proximity to the mountains and the beach. Nature is super important to me.

 

- Liesel Mertes

Do you have to be particularly careful with the sunshine as you are a lovely redhead? Is there an element of danger that you feel?

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

Yes, I wear, I wear lots of sunblock and have my fair share of hats to choose from on any given day.

 

In LA, Jasmin walks alongside men and women in their grief journey.  Jasmin partners with a women’s focused app called Quilt and she is building out her vision for empowering people through the spectrum of grief with a community project called Fall Up.

 

It is no coincidence that Jasmin’s work centers around grief.  Loss was a part of her story from an early age.  Jasmin’s mother went through her first bout with cancer when Jasmin was very young. 

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

 I think that it it just made I didn't feel anxious as a child, but I think I was I was just more attuned to, to, the temporary-ness of all of this from an early age.

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

My mom had had a a bilateral mastectomy so she, I saw the scars on her body, and I knew that, you know, she that there was a gravity to her story. And as a child, I would go in and, you know, I would sneak into the bedroom and make sure that she was still breathing at night. So, I really, I don't think that I was particularly anxious, but I was definitely aware of the fact that she wasn't going to be with me forever. You know from it and I knew that from an early age.

 

Jasmin had always sensed a fragility around her mother, this sense that she would not be there forever. Then, when Jasmin was just 13, there was the hard, hard news:  her mother had advanced, stage 3C ovarian cancer.  

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

It was just, it was so, I felt I was so powerless. And I think when you're a child and you see your parents suffering and they're clearly in such good seeing my mom in such excruciating pain, was it really, it was painful. But I, I, I just kind of shut down emotionally because there was unfortunately nothing that I could directly do to alleviate her suffering. So, it was, it was a very difficult time and she was in and out of remission for a bit. So, you have, as anyone who's dealt with cancer knows, you have those pockets of remission and you feel like you can take an exhale for the first time and and then unfortunately, my mom circumstance, it ended up that that cancer had metastasized to her lungs, which is, you know, that's a very serious diagnosis and there really wasn't much that we could do once it had reached her lungs.

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

 So yeah, it was just, it was a very painful time and as a teenager, you're already going through so much from an emotional standpoint. And then, you have your your parent’s mortality kind of facing you every day. It's was definitely challenging, and I wish that I'd been able to show up with more heart and love, but I did it in the time what I had the capacity to do.

 

Jasmin attended high school at Wheaton Academy, in a suburb to the west of Chicago.  She remembers a supportive community of friends, parents, and coaches that came alongside her in ways that were immensely meaningful. 

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

Cards. People wrote me so many cards and I'm a, I, anyone who knows me knows that I am a card writer. And they just, I saved all, I have all those cards in my storage unit. They're just, reading those cards and knowing that somebody's either a friend or a friend's family member sat down or they picked out a card and they sat down and they wrote from their heart to me. And sometimes, it was a card that was also to my dad and to my brother. But yeah, the cards meant a lot.

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

 And then just those moments with the teacher, either before or after class, just that presented like, how are you doing? You know, knowing that there is a weightiness that I was carrying that some of my peers, many of my peers, weren't carrying at the time. So yeah, just those moments of pause that communicated that there was a compassion for what I was going through was incredibly meaningful.

 

MUSICAL TRANSITION

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

And in terms of, I don't feel like I missed anything directly, but I know that it would have been, had like an adult female figure stepped in at the time and said, look, like, either I've been through this or I see you in this and I want to mentor you and just show up through you or for you rather through this consistently. I think that would have been really helpful. I don't look back and feel like, Oh I missed; I wish that X would have happened, but I think if there had been either a teacher, a specific teacher that would have said, like your mine for the next three years, I think that could have been really helpful. If schools had some sort of a structure like that in place for students whose parents were either terminally ill or had died, I think, you know, because a lot happens in the time after death of a parent.

 

 

- Liesel Mertes

And what. What would you speak? I want to ask you more a little bit later on about some of the ways in which you, your, the work of this season of life has been shaped by the four imitations of grief. What so.

 

- Liesel Mertes

As someone who is living in the years beyond without your mother, do you find like is she, how is she present or how are you aware of her absence?

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

I think it's it's really been about honoring that person's absence because the absence never goes away. And I think it's being friendly with that absence and I remember a teacher/professor from Wheaton College; we'd connected over loss. He actually married his wife at the time knowing that she was going to die from cancer, and we connected over my mom having died from cancer as well. And he saw me in that and he's like, you know Jasmin, the thing that I want to remind you of is that your mom is in your DNA. And even though you don't see her, she's with you all the time. And. It was it's obviously like, you know. Our biological parents are part of our DNA, but it just struck me with such profundity and yeah

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

I can't, I can't physically see my mom, but I do see and I connect with my mom and I feel the certain, there's certain things that I'm attuned to whether it's aesthetics or music and I I definitely feel her presence and have a friendliness with her. Like sometimes I'll get dressed and I'm like, Oh hello Mother. I think that's totally something that she would have worn you know and just, my mom was always so colorful and fun and vibrant and sometimes over that can you not wear that interview like you know what. When you're an adult you can decide how you want to dress. But I was so shy that I, as a child, that it was hard for me to understand why she would sometimes like wanted something she wanted to is just being true to herself that she dressed bright with color and texture. And so, I think it's yeah, it's just that friendliness and knowing that. I am my own mother. My mother mothered me with such love. I had an amazing mom and I'm so incredibly blessed to be able to say that because I know that there are plenty of women for whom that's not true.

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

 But in terms of my life I here in L.A, I have a couple of very dear friends and we try to meet once a month for dinner and we've all lost our moms through various circumstances and we're all about the same age and have creative professions and callings and so, it's sometimes, our dinner conversation isn't even specifically about our moms but it's more what we would share with them were they here. So, we call ourselves Mother More and you know it's about finding them more in in the less you know the we're not. There's a book called Motherless Daughters and you know, we talked about that and we we really wanted to name ourselves and call ourselves something that is a tuning us to the expansion that comes when we create intentional space for for conversation that uplifts the soul yeah

 

- Liesel Mertes

There's something I have appreciated from a distance here purposefulness and holding memory and holding space at night. I think there are things that you do each year, whether that is around her birthday or Mother's Day. Can you speak a little bit to those things that have been particularly helpful that you've just built into the rhythms of each year?

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

Sure. So, I always, my mom's birthday is February 22nd and there's always a bittersweet-ness to, to that day. And with my long term ex-boyfriend, we would, he would usually buy me a cake and we would have some sort of a, you know, we would eat the cake and I would reflect on a memory of my mom and it just bringing a that celebration even though my mom isn't physically present. Getting a cake and bringing some lightness and levity to the moment and connecting with people that loved her and that she loved is definitely part of.

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

My ritual around her birthday and then with the anniversary of her death, which is on July 16th. There isn't really something that I do consistently around that it's more than just holding space for it. And if I'm with my dad, being intentional about conversation or connection. And.

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

Writing letters, I think is also a great way to just, you know, I do believe that my mom can, I believe that there is a connection that transcends the physical. Absolutely. But there's something also very important for healing about writing to our loved ones. So, I think that's an important. There's an invitation with our writing to connect and to support ourselves.

 

- Liesel Mertes

We've talked some about your mother. There was also another loss within your young life. Please tell us about your brother, Rory. Some of some of your favorite aspects of your brother? A little bit about who he was?

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

Sure. Rory, I mean, I can't say his name without smiling because he just he lit everyone up that he met, and he really brought so much joy into the lives of the people that he was connected to. So, Rory and I were just a year apart. I'm April 1st he was April 30th and we really grew up on each other's heels and it wasn't until mid-teenage years that we really, I mean, of course you have a bond of growing up as children together. But we really came to this place of like, Oh yeah, I'm so grateful for you. And I love you. You know, mid, mid teenage years and we just had so much fun together. He made me laugh so much; he was a wild and beautiful and dynamic soul and I I wish that he was still here. But unfortunately, he's not physically present on this earth any longer either.

 

- Liesel Mertes

I, I imagine that for both of you that time, do you as you think about becoming closer in your teenage years, did that dovetail with, you know, well Mom, Mom is gone and we are like choosing each other differently or do you feel like that was more coincidental with its time horizon?

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

I think it was more of a subtle kind of, OK let's get over our teenage angst and you know, my brother had a drum set in his room and he would play it super loudly just to annoy me my room. And you know, that kind of stuff like, let's get over whatever the metaphorical genocide is and just, yes, mom is no longer with us. Let's love each other as though she was still present. And yeah, I think her passing definitely united us and my, my brother had such an open and sensitive heart and he really, where I wasn't able to show up for my mom when she, I just with a heart and an open heart, he was really able to show up with her and he really, after she died, I think he really carried that openness and sensitivity with him and and really brought that out in me. So yeah, it was, I think definitely her death and then my brother when he enlisted in the army. I don't remember exactly how many years after her death, but that, having him in a war zone just brought us, so they brought us really close. And I think, you know, I would always await his phone calls and look forward to talking to him and hearing about how everything was going where he was, and he returned home from a war zone.

 

- Liesel Mertes

Would you tell us a little bit about what led up to the your awareness of his death at what point in your life did that occur?

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

Sure. So just to provide a little bit of context for, my brother had had mental health struggles for a lot of his life and he also struggled with addiction. And he I bet he'd always had this calling to, to serve and it from in the army I should say. He always felt this, patriotic, he had this really specific desire to be in a war zone and I think I think that he probably felt like being in an environment like that was more like home than being in the suburbs of Chicago because of how his mind felt.

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

You know when you, so Rory, yeah. He he went to Iraq, was deployed and I know that he saw a lot there. And he you know he was, he was happiest as a soldier. And that was absolutely the intersection point of his passion and purpose. And I find great joy in knowing that he he really did what he wanted to do. From, yet from a purely purpose standpoint. But unfortunately, when in many circumstances, when you mix prolonged mental illness with addiction with PTSD, it's a, it's a very toxic combination. And you know, my brother did return from Iraq and, and things really felt very positive.

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

But unfortunately, you know he just, from a purely factual and not emotional standpoint, he did end up taking his own life and it's, you know, there are people in my family that really believe that it was an accident and perhaps it was it seemed like everything was going really great for him. But at the end of the day it's, you know my brother ended his own life.

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

And you know, it's, it's a thing that we grapple with and I think there's one of the teachers that I follow is named Tara Brock and she has a beautiful book about radical acceptance and the radical-ness of accepting what's completely unbearable and the things that we can't understand and the stories that we'll like, I'll never fully know what happened that night. But you know, the stages of grief:  denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance is the last one and, you know, I would give anything to have my brother here but that's not within my my power to make true.

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

 But I can hopefully inspire others who are going through, you know navigating suicide and in their family systems to explore the freedom that comes from acceptance because there's often so much guilt that comes when, when a situation like this occurs and it's nothing that I did or that somebody else did or didn't do. It's really unfortunately completely out of our control.

 

- Liesel Mertes

You, you talk about the stages of processing grief. Do you remember what, what was it like for you to initially receive that news?

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

Very. It was completely devastating. You know, having had, as I said my brother had mental health struggles from an early age and, and very profound rejection struggles. So, there is a part of me that I was, you know, fight or flight for quite a while wondering like, am I going to get a phone call? And I certainly had scary phone calls with my brother in the E.R. et cetera. But this particular night, my long term ex-boyfriend and I were returning home from a Paul McCartney concert and my phone had died at the concert and I plugged my phone in the car and I had a couple of missed calls from a number that I didn't recognize and then I heard a voicemail that was from my brother's former fiancé, her sister called me: this is an emergency. So, I, of course, called her back and the first question that I asked, because she said that it was about Rory, and the first question I asked was:  is he alive? And just tell me that he's alive. You know, like tell me, I don't care if he's, you know, like just tell me that he's alive and when she said No, I just, I've never, it was this scream that I don't know. Maybe mom's let out when they're lifting up a car to save their child. It was, you know, fortunately Dave was driving and was able to, you know, deal with the fact that I was completely overtaken by emotion, but it was, it, I've never had anything like that come through me and then knowing that. I would then need it. Dave drove me to the hotel where my dad was staying. We were in New York at the time and I had to go and tell my dad that his son had died. So it was, there was a level of anguish that, I I can't articulate there are words for that anguish.

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

And you know, to this day, that is the worst moment of my life is having to knock on my dad's hotel door and tell him. So it was truly, you know, one of those moments and I know that we're not alone in those moments but we feel so alone in those moments and I'm so grateful for for the people who showed up for me and who were there with me that night, because cancer is is a different sort of demon. You know, for, for those of us, even with the later onset cancer, like you know, you do have a little bit of time, you have some time to do at least mentally wrap your head around the fact that, OK we're walking, we are actually walking this person home. But with my brother, it was like completely, in complete shock as a suicide is.

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

So yeah, it was completely, completely devastating. And I I don't think you ever get over those moments, but I do think that when we can bring a grace to the conversation and return to those stories, we can return to a piece of ourselves through remembering. As painful as sometimes that not remembering can be.

 

- Liesel Mertes

What words would you give to someone who's coming alongside someone who has had someone they care about that has taken their own life?

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

Show up and know that presence is so much more important than actual words. It's the, the, I don't remember what people said. I mean, you remember the stupid things of course that people said, which seemed to inevitably be plentiful in times of distress and anguish. But it's showing up with consistency, with presence and not knowing that there, there's nothing that you can say to alleviate the pain but the the physical presence of being in a holding space for grief communicates, it uplifts the soul in a way that you, over time, with that consistency of presence, you feel.

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

 And so, you know, there's, there's so much shame in our culture around suicide and you know there's a shame that I think family members carry. There's a, there's a lot of shame. So it's just, you know, I think knowing that if you're endeavoring to support somebody who's navigating that, that there might not be an organic opportunity to speak into that but in time, through just showing up your, you might create that opening for the healing conversation that can really lead to deeper places of peace for those who are struggling to make sense of suicide.

 

- Liesel Mertes

You referenced the plentiful dumb things that people can take away from is blunt saying and or dumb. What were some of the things that you think just don't ever see this term somebody?

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

I know where to start? Yeah, I think, you know, there were a couple of people who said, well you know, it was his time and you know, when you lose your brother and he's 24, it's not his time. I'm sorry. Like, it's just, I think, you know, there's that ego like desire to provide solace with words but really stepping back into the humility of the soul and just going into physical presence. So yeah, it was his time or he's in a better place or you know, just these clichés that it's almost a reaction because there's no, you're, you're out of control in this situation and suicide and death brings up, you know, oh my gosh, the fact that we're all mortal being so it's like these, I think intentions to put a salve on the wound but really, it's like, no you just put like sandpaper in my wound and I'm gonna forgive you for that but please maybe learn to not say things like that you know. Right. Just. It was it wasn't his time.

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

I mean maybe that's a reflection of my not fully accepting it, but I think that there are things that you can say like, you know, I'm here for you and I'm going to keep showing up for you. Can I bring you a meal? Or giving gifts that like planting a tree. Buying a star; you can buy a star. You know they're really thoughtful things that you can do for people who've lost a loved one or a loved one specifically to suicide that can bring those, those little windows of light into the soul of those who are suffering and can meet that impulse that people are displaying even when they say you know ill-intentioned things like that when I'm single. There are better ways. Yeah.

 

- Liesel Mertes

One thing that I have loved in speaking about how to help is you have in your own reflection and now in your work really taking some of the things that have been important in your story and are giving it to other people. Tell us a little bit about the four invitations of grief and the work that you're doing with follow up.

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

Thank you. Yeah. So. I in January I wrote an article for a publication that's based in California called The Fullest. And their mission is to bridge wellness and culture. And I had kind of received these insights around grief is such that we know, for those of us who are either, you know experienced a lot of grief or you're actively grieving, like it's such a taboo it's still a taboo word in our culture. And so, I really kind of, in knowing that, stepped back from that and said, well what's a way to kind of soften that word and create an entry point for those who are in that place and feeling like they're in the desert with their arms up? What do I do with this experience? How do I make meaning out of it? And so, I really believe that everyone's grief is as unique as a fingerprint. And so, they’re going, you know, going to need to create a journey for healing that is uniquely theirs. But the invitations are really about finding the layers for beauty and freedom.

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

 And it's very simple. You know the invitation to find your sacred pause. So, when we have an unexpected death where we have a death, it's just, you know, there's so much that's happening that we have to attend to. But really returning to ourselves and sitting with ourselves and embracing the pause that arrives with death is, I think, the first, it's the first layer invitation that I've identified. And then the second invitation is about, you know, really feeling into your breath as your anchor in these tumultuous times of grief. We know that, you know, our emotions can be, they are like waves, you know, one day you're, you feel completely overwhelmed by sadness and then maybe it's anxiety or fear around when's the next phone call going to come or whatever. But really, you know, putting your hands on your heart and knowing that your breath you're always breathing but it's bringing that layer of awareness to your support with your breath.

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

And then the third and fourth invitations that I have identified or are, the third is to feel so it's, so the mind often protects the heart more going through intense journeys of grief and our heart shuts down because we feel like, oh my gosh, you can't really feel through this but it's just taking like one pocket of feeling at a time and kind of, it's like a pocket in your pants, like, you know, putting your hand in there and seeing what's there and, and knowing that the feelings are, are just information, it's not something that's going to envelop you, it's information about the state of your heart and it's information about, OK if there's sadness here, is there something that I need to say, is there, how can I take care of myself in this sadness? Or third, you know, it's just, it's like creating, a bringing of friendliness to the information and knowing that every, no feeling is temporary. Every feeling comes with a purpose of bringing us into our heart and in turn, bringing us more into our lives. So, feeling. And then the last invitation, it is healing. And I put that as is the last one the invitation to heal.

 

Because, as I said before, every journey with grief is so different. So, I've taken a very, you know, my mom died 20 years ago. My brother died ten years ago, and I've committed to a lot of, I've done a lot of therapy, more traditional therapy and in some intensive therapy and then I've also explored very non-traditional and alternative methods of therapy that have served me incredibly well. So, it's, it's about really knowing that healing is. And I wrote this in the article, healing as a verb. You don't just say I want to heal from this and then you've, your healed. It's, it's bringing those rituals and, and frameworks into your everyday so that your soul can remain buoyant in those times of greater emotional tumult.

 

- Liesel Mertes

Thank you for sharing that. I know that has been impactful both in your writings and also with some of the clients that you are beginning to share. So, I'm excited as that continues to grow for you.

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

Thank you. Yeah. That's really the blueprint. Just as I'm working and guiding individuals, I, I take them through that container of the four invitations and then how are these, how can these invitations become uniquely yours? So, walking them through the pause, the breath, the feeling and the healing and, you know, really sending them on their way. Like, I do those sacred containers ideally give them some sort of, they do give them a an ability to navigate their, their situation in a way that they were not able to before we started co creating and healing together.

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

And then in terms of, just from a very practical standpoint, and I've said this before and I think just, I would be remiss to not say, you know, grief is about love and it's, it's such a taboo and when we can remember that when we hold grief we, and we honor it with the reverence in the space that it deserves, we have more joy in life, not less, because we're attuned to the fact that this, it's such a gift to be here, to open our eyes, to be in our bodies. And the gift of grief is really a deeper capacity to love when we can feel through the layers that are true for our grief stories and a reminder of how deeply we have loved.

 

- Liesel Mertes

You don't grieve unless you have loved deeply

 

- Jasmin Jenkins

Yes.

 

Is that is the price you pay. No but yes, it is absolutely the reminder of that. And that's that's the beauty that is the beauty for sure.

 

MUSICAL TRANSITION

 

Here are three reflections from my conversation with Jasmin

  • Presence is so important. As Jasmin said, in the aftermath of suicide, there is no way to take away the pain.  But showing up, being willing to hold space and be with someone that is grieving, that speaks volumes. 
  • Avoid phrases like, “It was his time” or “He is in a better place”. This flattens the experience of a grieving person, reducing it to an easy cliché. Instead of trite phrases, consider some of the meaningful gestures that Jasmin mentioned:  send a card, plant a tree, visit the grave of the deceased. These are gestures that don’t cost much in time or money, but they convey intention and meaningful care.  Perhaps you know someone who is no longer in the acute stages of grief; these gestures still matter.  As a friend or coworker, you can show support by remembering birthdays of those that died or significant anniversaries with gestures like a cake or a kind word. 
  • If you are in the midst of grief, consider the four invitations that Jasmin described: the invitation to find your sacred pause, to feel your breath, to feel your emotions, and, finally, to heal.  You can find more information on Jasmin, her work, and her writings in the show notes.

 

OUTRO

 

Here are some links to resources that Jasmin mentioned:

 

Fall up website
The Four Invitations Article
Instagram
 
Jasmin is the Founder of Fall Up, a community driven platform that brings people together to navigate the spectrum of grief. She believes that your grief is as unique as your fingerprint and that through exploring the invitations within your grief, there is greater presence and joy to be found in this one, precious life -- for all.