Alex Brandt
Alex rebuilt from thirty years of addiction and parental betrayal by studying her parents' war trauma and learning to reparent herself.
Hear this story
Alex Brandt arrived in Australia as a child of war refugees who carried unresolved trauma from the Second World War. Enrolled at age seven without English, without the right uniform, without any social experience, she stood out immediately. At her first school, she was abused by a janitor. When she told her parents, they argued, kept her there for three more months, then told her never to speak of it again. After that, her parents decided she was the problem making their life harder, a position they held throughout her childhood, especially once her mother had a new baby. With no school structure and no explanation, Alex began wandering the streets. By high school, she had met two sisters who introduced her to a narcotic drug. The relief was immediate and complete. Every problem disappeared, and she felt emotionally pain-free for the first time. She did not know she was carrying that much pain until the substance removed it.
What followed was thirty years of addiction. Alex dropped out of university psychology, moved to a hippie farm on the edge of Wagga, then drifted into the streets of Sydney and King's Cross. She married four times; three of those partners died from addiction while she was still using. She watched friends overdose, normalised dysfunction, and fell beneath society's norms. The breaking point came when she was arrested in Melbourne for a crime she did not commit, pregnant, handcuffed to a chair. She refused to sign a false confession and suffered a miscarriage in the police cell. In that moment of complete desperation and physical pain, every part of her knew with absolute certainty that she was done.
Alex rebuilt herself through university, studying forensic medicine, mental health social work, languages, and the psychology of war trauma. Understanding what her parents had survived gave her deep compassion for them and, eventually, for herself. She learned to let go of the survival skills that kept her alive and to reparent herself, bringing her authentic self out of the shadows. Today she works as a counselor and writer, grandmother to five grandchildren, and travels internationally giving talks on transformation. She refuses shame about the cracks.
⚠️ Content advisory: this episode discusses addiction & recovery, which some listeners may find distressing.
If you need support, you're not alone. Help is available: • SMART Recovery Australia (addiction): smartrecoveryaustralia.com.au • ReachOut: au.reachout.com
“It's one thing being abused, but how it's received, it's a whole different story, because that's a trauma in itself.”
“Every part of me knew that is as far as I go. And with that experience, some people might call it a rock bottom. Some people have described things like this as a moment of clarity.”
“Everything in my life, every problem disappeared completely. I felt emotionally relieved and I felt as if it was like magic. I had no pain.”
The hero, today
How abuse is received and responded to matters as much as the abuse itself; being told to keep silent about trauma created a trauma all its own for Alex. When parents carry unresolved trauma from war and displacement, they may not have the capacity to support a child through their own crisis, no matter how much they love them. The relief a substance provides can feel so complete that it masks the pain you did not know you were carrying until the substance removes it. Rock bottom, or what Alex calls the gift of desperation, is a moment when every part of you knows with absolute certainty that you cannot continue; it is not something you have to imagine or decide, you simply know. Rebuilding yourself means learning to let go of the survival skills that kept you alive and instead finding your authentic self, the person you should have been underneath all the armor.
Yes. Alex Brandt is a real person who shared their own story in their own words. Kintsugi Heroes is a not-for-profit that shares first-person stories of overcoming adversity, told with the person's consent.
Kintsugi Heroes, a registered Australian not-for-profit. Every story is shared with the hero's own consent and reviewed under Kintsugi Heroes' trauma-informed content standard before it goes public.
How abuse is received and responded to matters as much as the abuse itself; being told to keep silent about trauma created a trauma all its own for Alex.
When parents carry unresolved trauma from war and displacement, they may not have the capacity to support a child through their own crisis, no matter how much they love them.
The relief a substance provides can feel so complete that it masks the pain you did not know you were carrying until the substance removes it.
Rock bottom, or what Alex calls the gift of desperation, is a moment when every part of you knows with absolute certainty that you cannot continue; it is not something you have to imagine or decide, you simply know.
Host · 00:00
Kintsugi Heroes acknowledges funding and was made possible with support from the Community Broadcasting Foundation. Find out more at cbf.org.au. Welcome back to Kintsugi Heroes, helping people tell the stories they need to share so you can find the stories that you need to hear. This week, Simone Allen is joined by Alex Brandt, a woman of remarkable strength and resilience. Alex's life has been a turbulent journey marked by early childhood trauma, substance abuse, and numerous personal losses. Despite these hardships, she emerged as a beacon of hope and transformation. Alex's story is one of self-reconstruction. She left behind a life marred by addiction and embraced education, and now she travels the world sharing her insights on survival and transformation. Enjoy this one with Alex Brandt. Good morning.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 01:02
Hello, Alex Brand. I am just so excited to talk to you today. And I know deeply that you're one of the most resilient women that I've ever met. And your story, my goodness, it's gut-wrenching. And it's your early childhood is really quite Quite a story. And I know that our listeners of Kintsugi Heroes will really love to hear what you have to say, Alex, and more importantly, sort of lessons to share for others. I'm really looking forward to sharing your story with our listeners and applying the philosophy of Kintsugi to other people's lives, learning how to accept your past, overcome doubt and shame, and learn to heal and find new happiness and joy. Joy. So, um, Alex, welcome on board. Uh, please share us a little bit about your story and, and tell us a little bit firstly about, about your upbringing.
Host · 02:06
Thank you, Simone. I'm so grateful to be here. I first want to say thank you to you. Thank you to Kinsuki. I'm just really grateful because it helps me to also reflect and see a bit where the journey is, how it started, and how it all unfolded. So look, my, uh, my parents came here from Europe after the Second World War. So my father was actually born in, uh, Odessa, which is the Ukraine, and my mom, she grew up in the Baltic provinces in Europe. And it just so happened they both ended up in Germany after the Second World War, and they were both displaced refugees. And it turned out they came here to Australia, and I was born here. So I'm born in the 1960s, and what happened was that my parents were traumatized from their past, and, and they were carrying an awful lot of unresolved baggage. But to put the, to put my story in context, and it's, it's, it's, it's easy for me to talk about it now because I've got the, the benefit of hindsight, of course. But they, um, my parents were very were very shut down, as I said, and they just weren't able to understand the culture and what was happening here. They also didn't speak English. English is not my first language, so I didn't speak English till I was about 9 or 10 years old. Wow. But told me, yeah, they just enrolled me in school when I was 7 and 11.
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This conversation includes parents carrying war, starting school without language, abuse at school and the silence after, labeled the problem in the family, wandering the streets during school gap and first drug use in high school.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 03:42
So it was a hard start just from I can't imagine that at 10, not, you know, really still learning English. Uh, so what— tell me, um, a little bit about that schooling time.
Host · 03:53
The schooling time for me was, was a very overwhelming place. Um, I— for first of all, I didn't have the right uniform because my mom didn't understand the whole concept of, you know, everyone having to wear the same uniform, so I stood out from day one. Plus I didn't speak English, plus, um, I was never in a social setting before, so it was very difficult for me. Even my lunch, I remember, was very different to everyone else's, so everything about it was uncomfortable for me. But the worst thing that happened at that school, there was a pedophile that worked as a janitor, and he is the reason, I guess, for the beginning of my intense trauma. Because after the abuse, I told my parents. I came home, I told my parents, and a big argument broke out between them, and they just kept on arguing. Um, and I was asked to go back to that school for 3 months. Before they took me out.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 05:06
Wow.
Host · 05:08
I've turned 8 now and I'm completely shut down and I'm at that school and they take me to a doctor and the doctor, in a sense, he, um, sides with my parents, advised not to speak of this ever again and that the child, my— I'm 8 now, would forget about it. Finally, they do take me out. They do take me out. So I'm, I did 3 months there, but the damage was profound.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 05:38
Oh, profound. I, I can't imagine if they told you not to say anything.
Host · 05:42
You're already being told to keep a very, very desperately sick secret, desperately unwell, desperately shut down, confused. And now I have no structure because there's no school for me. And there's no explanation. And I think, Simone, the way abuse— I, I suppose, um, it's one thing being abused, but how it's received, it's a whole different story, because that's a trauma in itself.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 06:11
It, it's, um, quite scary to think about it, Alex. And, and we know in Australia sexual abuse is, is, uh, very high. Uh, I think it's something like 1 in 5, uh, women Um, have experienced sexual violence since the age of 15, and I imagine, uh, the impact that that had on you, on your future relationships, um, on your sense of identity, and would have been, uh, yeah, and the fact that, that for 3 months nothing was done too, which is a long time, you would have, uh, felt like you weren't heard, uh, you know, a really, really tough time. And you had, uh, did you have any siblings?
Host · 06:56
So I had siblings. So I have a brother that was 2 years older than me and he was performing very well. And so I was, I was compared to him. And when I was 8, so roughly when they took me out, my mother had my, had my sister. So she's 7 and 11 months old, younger than I am. So she's busy with the new baby and I become almost the problem in the family. And my parents made a decision and basically both of them were in agreement with the decision that I'm the problem and that I'm making their life even harder. And that is really how the scene gets set and that's how it plays out right throughout the entire rest of the time that they basically, they took that position and that's how it stayed.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 07:50
So Alex, they would've labeled you the black sheep. You would've felt like that. Uh, they would've felt desperately, um, I suppose ashamed of what had happened to you, but they were walking in with carried shame from their own past. Uh, and they wouldn't have known how to support you in the way that you needed the, the love and support. And with your mum having a little baby, uh, that's another whole time for her and a challenge. So, uh, it would've been a really isolating time. So what did you do? Did you go to, you know, so you, you, you're at this new school, what did you do?
Host · 08:29
Enrolled in a new school and I'm basically, it's basically over half year, you know, so So I'm, um, 8 and a half now. So I had a big gap, and based in that time where I had a gap, I just started wandering around the street during the day, and I met other children that were also displaced or wandering, or somehow, somehow they weren't at school either. So that is what started my basic journey where I'm feel that I'm not anymore part of the family. I'm drifting now. And now when I've come back to school, I'm also having to learn English. I'm having to go back into a school environment. Well, that's very triggering for me, and I'm not able to settle. I'm not able to learn. I'm not able to get on with the children at school. So there was a whole different story that developed from there, and I only go to primary school up to Year 4. So I, I'm put back— I'm put into Year 1, 2, and 3, which I don't complete, but they just keep putting me up. But then, then in Year 4, I'm taken out, and then I don't be— and I don't appear back on any school roll or any school register till high school. So, so I am 12 or 13 when I start high school. By then, of course, I'm speaking English, but I've had basically no learning. I can't read, I can't write, and I'm labeled a child that is, um, a slow learner. I, I'm labeled as a difficult, perhaps someone that can't learn. Remember the headmaster having— mistress, sorry, talks with my mum and saying, look, Alexandra might be better off not attending school at all and just working in a factory, which that's all she may be capable of. But one thing after another, I do stay at high school. In my later year of high school, there's a teacher that befriends me, again a male teacher, who starts driving me home and starts befriending me and talking to me about his marital problems and By then, I, I have accepted my role as someone, as, as, as a person that's different, a young teen who doesn't belong. I also told my mother about this, and then she, I remember clearly just saying to me, look, you are the problem and all these things are happening to you because it is your fault. Wow. I am not believing her totally, but at that time it sort of really comes home to me that I'm different from the family. Wrong with me, how it went. Yep.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 11:25
So talk to me about, you know, that's an interesting that the teacher, um, confided in his marital problems. So you would've been like considered this old head on young shoulders, but deep down you were screaming inside as just a little child, not really knowing what on earth you were doing. But obviously people sought, sought you as a, someone that they thought they could identify with and trust. So, so talk to me about, so you left, uh, finished school, you did, you did still do the HSC despite people saying all of that. And, and what was next?
Host · 12:01
I did the HSC. I mean, my, the time I got into high school and the children, the young, the young teens that I was also mixing with, there were two sisters and they were using a narcotic drug. And this was my introduction into it because they introduced me to this substance and I used it. Everything in my life, every problem disappeared completely. I felt emotionally relieved and I felt as if it was like magic. I had no pain. And it's funny when I look back on that because I didn't actually feel that I was in pain. But I only noticed that when I started using a substance that I was emotionally pain-free. And with the help of that, I did complete that school. I did, I did speak to my parents in a respectful tone. I was able to live at home, but it was because I was, I had a substance now that was helping me even though I did not do very well in my HSC. However, I was so determined to keep going, I actually enrolled myself in a TAFE course of equivalent to the HSC at Ultimo TAFE. And it was, it was, I had completely different experience there. There were adults that were doing that course. The teachers were completely different. And I actually, in that whole year, I caught up basically my entire 6 years of high school. I got a scholarship to either go to New South Wales Uni or Riverina College of Riverina for a teacher scholarship. And I chosen Riverina because it was my way of getting out to Riverina. When I get to Riverina College, I see that I'm actually eligible to do other courses and other subjects. And for whatever reason, I think it's because I needed to work out what was wrong I felt with me, I chose psychology. So I'm enrolled in this psychology course and, um, I am using a narcotic. And so I'm, I attend very, very briefly. I start the course and I realize this is way over my head. I'm not gonna be able to do it. And so I leave college and I move out. To a place called Riversdale. It's on the edge of Wagga. It's a, um, it's a hippie farm basically with other lost souls. Some are using, some are not. Some are just there because they like the lifestyle. But I gravitate to the narcotic users and we start basically living a lifestyle completely outside of society. Now I've let the Studies go, my family is completely estranged from me and I'm in an, in a, in a world of using now. And that's basically what happens to me. It just keeps on going. This is where my life is headed now.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 15:09
The elixir of, um, the amphetamines or the, the, the, the drugs starts to take over. Uh, comfortably numbs you. And you just keep going down that track. So you drop out of college.
Host · 15:24
And about this life now where I feel I am somehow connected to these people, we have a common goal. They seem to also be broken. They have their own stories, which I'm strongly identifying with, and almost it's calming for me and soothing for me to make those identifications and those connections, and we have our own solution. We have our own secret. We have our own, we have our own medication. And so somehow it start, it, it, in a weird way, it made sense for a short time.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 15:57
Yeah. The spiral begins.
Host · 15:59
That's correct. That's right. That's how it started.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 16:03
Yeah. Alex, so, so you join this sort of hippie community, uh, you're, you're now kind of just living a life of, um, kind of starting in the drug world, obviously that probably leads to more. Tell us a bit about what happens.
Host · 16:17
So in the beginning it seems quite innocent and it also seems quite freeing, and it seems to me that we are not part of society and people are getting along and, uh, wearing sort of very nice hippie clothes even. And there's music and there's, there's, there is a sense of community. However, The next thing that happens is the drug actually takes over and I'm actually seeing my peers, my friends, my young friends overdosing and dying. And that for me was an enormous shock, an enormous reality shock. And for a, for a very short time, it did startle me and pull me up. But the fact is that the, the promise of relief is so great. And I'm, I am now seeking relief from the trauma of what's happening to me in the drug world.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 17:10
Mm-hmm.
Host · 17:11
But the story continues. I end up in Sydney, but now this is not a hippie farm with, um, nice music. This is now the drug world of Sydney, the streets, the crime, the older addicts, the, the experienced, um, drug dealers. And I'm, on the streets of King's Cross, and I'm just swamped. I have nowhere to go except to basically somehow work it out. I knew I had to somehow work this out. I have no idea how, but I know that I'm also not in the right place now. I have fallen beneath, I guess, society's norms to a huge degree, and I'm falling levels in myself. So what didn't seem right the day before all of a sudden seems the norm and I'm doing this now.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 18:02
Yeah. So normalizing dysfunctional behavior and you are acting out of your integrity because it just becomes this cycle, I suppose. And, and like you say, one day you're, you're at one level and then next minute something else. Are you able to talk through, um, how did you survive as far as um, companionship, friendships? What, what, how did you— you didn't have your family, so, so what happened there?
Host · 18:30
So usually, um, that sort of, that sort of, um, using also requires teamwork, and it requires, in a sense, teamwork where you team up with a specific person. And on those levels, um, the people that that I was seeing, that I was teaming up with, were, um, were men who were incredibly street smart but also had had a criminal past, a criminal history. And we become connected. And in a sense, that's very treacherous in itself because that involves a lot of violence at times, domestic violence. There's an enormous amount of pressure continually to keep producing, um, ways of earning money to buy the substance because the, by now the substance has taken over. It's taken priority and everything that in this group we were doing, we were just, we were just, I suppose, focused on the substance, but also knowing that we are all going to our death now. So it's very obvious that People around us are overdosing and dying, and people around us are not actually coming out of this alive. And it's a, it's, it's just such a fast-moving slippery slope, and the addiction is now jumping all over you. That's how it feels. And I actually ended up being married 4 times, um, but in the drug world 3 times, and all those partners died.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 20:08
Wow. So all of them died.
Host · 20:12
All of them died while I was still in the group of using. So when one, one partner died, I basically ended up creating a new relationship with someone else. But the lifestyle is so hard and so harsh that, um, yeah, so, so, so they die. They just die from that.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 20:33
That's, that is just shocking. And I, I can't imagine that feeling of abandonment., again that you would be going through. And I imagine they weren't pretty in terms of the way they passed as well.
Host · 20:47
Not pretty. A desperate, you know, horrendous death. And, and then it just brings, brought it home to even for me, like this is where I'm headed. This is what's happening for me. And it was just in a way like everyone's waiting in God's waiting room, you know, but at the same time. There is no way of coming back from that.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 21:10
Yeah. So what, tell us, tell me, uh, a, a bit about what was the crunch for you to say, all right, I, I can't live like this. You, you mentioned a little bit earlier that you had a knowing that you weren't, you, that there was a way that you should step out, but you, you had this inner knowing, but you, you knew every day your, your level of, uh, of integrity was they compromised with what you had to do to survive, to get drugs. How on earth did you step out to be where you are now, Alex? Because it, it's, uh, I cannot imagine that. And are you able to share just briefly how they, how they passed and, and how you ended up sitting there or deciding, I'm not gonna live like this anymore?
Host · 21:57
Well, I guess what happened for me, and it, and it does happen to some Some— I have met some people that this also does happen for. It's a— it's where, you know, you fall way beneath your own level of, um, coping. So what happened for me is I was arrested, and this is with my last husband. I mean, he ended up suiciding after this, but we are— we're arrested, and we happened to be in Melbourne at the time for a crime that we did not commit. And when, um, we ended up in the police station, the, the confession was already in front of me, and I— all I had to do was sign it, but I refused to sign it. I didn't sign it. The interview went terribly wrong, and I am pregnant as well, and I'm handcuffed to the back of the chair so I cannot move. And they, they, they they turned on me, the, um, the actual detectives. Um, now that wasn't unusual back then either, because I mean, we are seen as garbage people. We are here to clean up messes. And I mean, that's not an unusual thing that happens on the street. The unusual thing was that they, they just persisted with, um, with a ferocity, I guess. And I, I mean, the, the tragedy for me was that I had a miscarriage. I mean, I was so shocked that this could even be happening, and they could see what was happening for me, and they untied me and they just threw me into a cell. When I put myself back in that place of the emotional pain, the powerlessness, the physical pain, the desperation with that, some people might call it a rock bottom. Some people have described things like this as a moment of clarity. Even with that comes a knowing that that is done. I am over this. I am done. And I think I described it like my toenails knew it, my hair knew it, every part of me knew that is as far as I go. And with that experience, toenails knew it.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 24:13
I love what you just said there. Uh, it's I have to say that, what do they call it? The gift of desperation.
Host · 24:20
Gift of desperation. And with it comes an, a, a different type of strength, a different type of clarity, and an absolute knowing that that's over now. I have seen the darkest moment, the most desperate time that I need, needed to see or experience. And I don't mean that I needed it, but it was almost like the darkness just fell away now.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 24:45
Wow.
Host · 24:46
That's what happened.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 24:48
Uh, it's interesting how you say that you had to sort of see the darkness because, um, I, I really like the quote, like one of my favorite philosophers, Carl Jung, who says, one, that one does not become enlightened by imagining figures of light, but by making the darkness conscious.
Host · 25:06
Beautiful. Making the darkness conscious that all I felt, I sensed, I saw, I knew where I was. And the horror of my own story and the horror of my position in the scheme of life. And, um, with that came an incredible also, uh, wisdom and knowing. And it happens, happened fairly quickly, but I knew to the bottom of my being that that was it for me. And I wasn't gonna destroy my life. I wasn't gonna destroy another human's life. I'm gonna make it count. And I am now done with all of this. And that's how it happened.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 25:48
So how did you, what did you do? Now I know you're a, uh, an incredible counselor and so, and you've got an incredible background to support others. How did you get to where you are? You obviously then went back to, to getting more study done. Tell, tell, tell us how you, you, what you did.
Host · 26:05
Well, eventually, yes. And one of the platforms that I have used is education. I went back through school, went through university. I mean, I did, uh, forensic medicine at university. I did a, um, degree called accredited mental health social work. And then I also did maybe 15 years of language studies where I went back to actually culture and looking at language studies. I've done quite a lot of years of studying war. The trauma of war and what does— which— what does what war do to people's self, like their psychology, their psychological, um, impact. What's the psychological impact on a person that's gone through the Second World War or Vietnam or Korea? Every war has its own psychological stamp of trauma, and I went back through that Also, I was interested to look at what had happened to my parents. I felt very close to their roots and I wanted to retrace that, retrace my family lineage. And a big part of that, you know, Simone, from, for this type of, um, I guess reconstruction transformation, I've needed to find, um, a deep level of forgiveness. And gratitude and knowledge is power. I think so. Knowledge has been something I've used in my process of reconstructing self. Yeah.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 27:45
I love what you've just said, like the curiosity to understand your parents, what it, what war had done to them, studying languages, uh, appreciating that that where they came from, their past, they were broken. Um, and, and finding that compassion for them allows you to no doubt find compassion for yourself and what you, the decisions you made through the, through the fact that you were deeply abandoned. And, um, I, I think that, that it's extraordinary what you did. Like, to, you think about that and, and the compassion that you must now that you have for how you were raised because of your parents' own trauma.
Host · 28:31
Correct. Yes. Yes.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 28:33
Really powerful. And so you, you've got numerous tertiary qualifications.
Host · 28:41
Yes.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 28:42
Um, you do now so much good work for others, including, including what you've just been doing for, for me, for this podcast.
Host · 28:50
Thank you.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 28:52
Yeah. To talk a bit about what you currently do now, and it must be that experience of going through all those marriages, coming so close to death, seeing, experiencing the early childhood trauma, deep traumas that you went through, uh, must be an incredible asset now. Uh, it sounds ridiculous, but out of pain come, often comes our purpose, doesn't it? And, uh, I like to look at nature and think, well, look at all the things in nature that, that become more beautiful through, through grit and through tough things like diamonds and pearls and opals and the lily out of the mud. And you truly are an absolute lily today to hear, to see you in action and the things that you do. Share a little bit about what you do today.
Host · 29:41
Oh, look, I'm so passionate about not hiding the flaws. I'm so passionate about seeing the cracks. I'm so passionate about showing who we are as not just as, say for instance, not just as a woman, but I think as a man as well. Like who a, a, a soul that's been completely and totally broken and then can rebuild and reconstruct itself in a new way and then look back, you know, it's sort of like a butterfly has emerged from a caterpillar and And, uh, someone said to me once, a butterfly never looks back in shame on the chrysalis that it popped out of. And I just love that.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 30:25
Oh, it is such a good, good saying. A butterfly never looks back on itself as a caterpillar in shame. No, that's, it's shame and guilt are just two shocking, um, emotions that, um, really lock people, imprison people in their own their own capability and their own, um, complete, um, opportunity, doesn't— don't they? I, I would imagine you're a grandmother, right?
Host · 30:53
I've got two beautiful daughters. They've had between them, they have, they have five children. So I'm a grandmother. I've written a book now. I have opened my private practice and I'm— I do a lot of traveling. I have been involved in giving talks, traveling. I've been to Russia several times. I've been to the Ukraine before the war, of course, and saw where my father grew up. I'm, I'm traveling to Cyprus in a month where I'll be involved in some talks and some meetings about people who are also seeking transformation, who have also been to the depths of their own, um, rock bottoms.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 31:38
That's amazing. I also think what you learned along the way with connecting people— I know you're a great connector, and that's probably what you had to do in the drug world, is you'd be sent out probably with your, one of your husbands, to go and solve, go and connect in some way to lead to the next hit or the next deal. So I imagine, and I know too, Um, that so often a, a child that has to be, that is so deeply abandoned is very good at, uh, got a radar for sensing people very quickly.
Host · 32:10
Absolutely. And you know, all those are transferable skills, really are. So we can use them to survive. So you can be a great survivor, but on the other hand, we need to actually use them in a very different way. And one thing that was really difficult for me was the person that survived the trauma. The person that survived my own personal war, I guess, had to then let go and let the real person emerge. And it's very difficult to let that go because that was the person I depended on. That was the person I— that, that life made me. And she had to basically let go of some of those beliefs and some of those survival skills and then transform that and become who I was, should have been, could have been, and really my authentic self underneath all that.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 33:04
Alex, I, it, this is probably one final question because what you've just said there about, uh, you had to find the little child again and, and not hold, you know, not like the butterfly, don't look back on things in shame or guilt.
Host · 33:22
Um, yep.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 33:22
So what's some tech what's some suggestions for the listeners on that? What, what, what do you think's important as a way of, for you, what have you used to find the, that beautiful inner child that is there and is creative and is giving and generous and kind? What, what did you do?
Host · 33:45
I got in touch with the authentic self. Who am I really? And the authentic self seemed to be the child. And so that was an enlightened moment for me when I realized, well, that is actually who I am. And then it was, um, a, a different methods of reparenting myself in a way, and bringing her out of the shadows and not abandoning her and being there for her, and then following all that up, and then It's a kind of an internal love story, if you like, of accept.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 34:22
Yeah. Well, I often say that you can't love others unless you first have love for yourself. Really important to find that inner child and no doubt mentors and, uh, uh, therapy and, um, education as you've spoken about, all of those things have given you steps to esteem and to really embrace that beautiful person that you are. Uh, look, Alex, I wanna thank you so much for joining Consigui Heroes today. It's been an absolute delight to talk to you and your story of resilience, uh, and recovery after such a, a tough upbringing and the proactive steps that you did to do that are just inspirational. So I wanna thank you so much.
Host · 35:07
My pleasure. Great honor to speak to you today. Thank you for having me.
Alex Brandt (Guest) · 35:13
Thank you, Alex Brandt.
Host · 35:19
Thank you for listening to this episode of Kintsugi Heroes. Thank you to Colin Lilly for permission to use Broken as our theme music for this series. If you enjoyed this conversation, share the podcast with a friend and let us know by leaving a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. If you'd like to support Kintsugi Heroes and the stories we share, head to kintsugiheroes.com.au and follow the instructions to make a tax-deductible donation. Thank you for listening, and we'll see you next time.
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