Teri Benson: Finding Joy in my Life's Second Chance
Teri Benson died for 26 minutes during the surgery for her aortic dissection. Listen as she shares the secrets to finding joy in life.
In Teri’s podcast we discuss:
How to deal with hard times
Why it is important to have a purpose to pull you forward
The reality of angels—both the heavenly kind and the earthly kind
What heaven is like
How God and prayer can help us
You can choose to find joy in life’s little victories
Sometimes you have to allow others to serve you—and that is okay
Gratitude equals positivity and joy
You can find Teri on Facebook or on Instagram @TeriBenson48.
Here is the transcript of Teri’s podcast:
Teri 0:04
Like the whole dying thing is just a progression and it's hard to lose a loved one for sure. But I know they're in a great place. It just wasn't my time to go. When it is, that's great. A lot of people are afraid of death. There's no reason to be afraid.
Tamara Anderson 0:33
Welcome to Stories of Hope in Hard Times, the show that explores how people endure and even thrive in difficult times, all with God's help. I'm your host Tamara K. Anderson. Join me on a journey to find inspiring stories of hope and wisdom learned in life's hardest moments.
My guest today was born and raised in Logan, Utah. As the middle child between two brothers, she grew up spending as much time as possible outdoors, water skiing, swimming, riding motorcycles, and snow skiing. She is known as a survivor. I say that because she has survived cancer, a heart attack, a divorce and an aortic dissection, which we'll have to have her tell us about. She has three amazing children, a daughter in law, and now a grandbaby who are the center of her life. I am pleased to present Teri Benson. Teri, are you ready to share your story of hope?
Teri 1:39
Yes, I am. Thanks having me today.
Tamara Anderson 1:43
This is fun. So one little known fact about Teri is that she is an adrenaline junkie. Just to give you an example of that, I was scrolling through her social media feed, and it shows she went and hiked Angel's Landing not long ago. For any of you who have not hiked Angel’s Landing in Zion National Park, it is one of the hardest hikes and the trail gets really narrow. You have to hold on to this chain. So Teri, tell me why the adrenaline junkie in you desires these crazy things? They're fun, right?
Teri 2:23
Yeah, absolutely. All of it’s fun. I would I think I was just born with it. My two brothers are exactly the same. Just ride your mountain bike as fast as you can, or just ski like, 55 miles an hour, whatever.
I've always been that way. It was suppressed for a long time. When I was married, it was a bad marriage. Everything kind of went by the wayside. I was just surviving every single day, and not really having any joy. I just kind of put that on the back burner for a while.
Tamara Anderson 3:14
So it's part of your true self. It's one of those things that brings you joy. Being outside, pushing yourself to the limit, exploring and doing new things that you haven't done before that
Teri 3:27
If there's a skateboard sitting there, I've got to get on it. I've got to just try it. Why not?
Tamara Anderson 3:40
Why don't you tell me a little bit about that living in survival mode, before you got your divorce? What was that? What did that look like? What things did you learn because of it?
Teri 3:56
I didn't really know that I was living in survival mode until after I got divorced, I was still just hanging on by my fingertips. Just there was no joy in my life. It was just like, Okay, I've got to get up. I’ve got to go to work a job that I hate, but I'm grateful for it because I needed the health insurance.
I did die for 26 minutes during the first open heart surgery. I thought October 23, 2012 would have been my last day. I wasn't supposed to survive.
I look back now and I think, “How sad is that?” I hadn’t been living. I need to just be grateful for every day, serving people and sharing my story and helping them. I don't want to look back on my life and think, gosh, your life kind of sucked, because it did for a long time. I realized I didn't want that kind of life anymore.
If you're going to be happy, you have to make that choice. I could sit around and feel sorry for myself because I had a heart attack, I got divorced, all this stuff. I don't want to be that example for my kid, either.
You can have all the support, I had an army of support, but ultimately, it's you that has to make the choice. I had to make that choice over, and over, and over again, so many times in that first year of recovery. On a daily basis, almost. Sometimes you wake up and you're like, “Ah, it wasn't a bad dream. It was real.”
I just feel like you have to live life on purpose. You have to have something to live for, something to look forward to and find a purpose.
Had this never happened to me, I would have never known that I could write. I hadn’t written anything since I was in college back in 1980. People said, “You've got to write a book, you've got to write a book.” I'm like, “How do you write a book?” You put it out there, and I had people literally come into my life to make it happen.
Tamara Anderson 6:54
It's interesting when something's supposed to happen. I think I read a quote once about the universe conspiring to make things happen. When it's supposed to happen, and you decide that you want to, miracles happen.
Teri 7:07
Yes. I truly believe in miracles. I had to still write it. But there were people that helped to put it all together and make it happen. I would have never figured out so late in life that I love to write.
Tamara Anderson 7:32
You had to be slowed down just a little bit.
Teri 7:38
You have to really hit the bottom. It's a blessing. That stuff happens to people every day, every single day. I think what shows your true character is how you decide to deal with it.
During my recovery, I just thought I don't want my kids to feel like you can't find the joy. I could have been miserable and grumpy all the time, but I didn't want my kids to see that as an example of when bad stuff happens to you, you don't just give up. You kind of have to figure it out and make some changes.
Tamara Anderson 8:30
So why don't we go back? First of all, what is an aortic dissection? I don't think I really understood what it was until I read your book. After I read that I was like, “Oh, my gosh, it's a miracle she's still alive.” It's not one of those things like a heart attack. You know what, you had one of those too, by the way, holy cow. Why don't you tell us what the difference is between a heart attack and an aortic dissection?
Teri 9:06
I had my heart attack in 2009. I had just had a normal day, and I came home and it was almost like a light switch went off. I just had this horrible front jaw pain. It was like someone was twisting the inside of my neck and I was like, “It's happening.” It started to go down into my left arm, just excruciating pain. I go over to the laptop in the family room and Google these symptoms, which are symptoms of a heart attack. I'm 48 years old. I don't get a heart attack.
I work out. I take pretty good care of myself. We ended up going to the ER and it was a heart attack, but they couldn't actually figure out why I had it because there were no blockages.
My cardiologist came in a couple of days later and said, “We've done all the testing we can do, and there's really no reason why you should have had a heart attack except for stress.”
Stress can kill. He said, “You need to figure out what's causing you so much stress, and you need to make some changes.” I’m like, “Yeah, I probably need to get divorced”. So I ended up doing that about nine months later. I actually filed for divorce and bankruptcy the week before Christmas.
Tamara Anderson 11:02
Was that a good step to take? I know it was hard, but talk me through what you were thinking, as you were doing that.
Teri 11:11
I just knew that I needed to get out of my marriage. He was an alcoholic. My kids were old enough to know what was going on. There was stuff that I never thought I would have to do, ending my marriage and being on my own. The house went into foreclosure. I had to move into a rental. It just was a spiral. I was just living each day going through the motions.
When I was 50, I had the aortic dissection. There's distinct factors when you have a heart attack. You know something's wrong.
It's painful with an aortic dissection. I've read other people's stories and talked to other survivors. Some of them have pain, some of them don't, some of them have a weird stabbing in the back of their chest, or their in their back. I just had a little stinging pain under my sternum. So I knew it wasn't a heart attack.
I had gotten up that day, went to work, went to the gym, ran like five miles of sprints on the treadmill and I was getting ready for bed that night. I just felt like a tearing and burning. That's the thing with an aortic dissection, you don't know you're dying. Most people don't make it to the ER. There's a lot that they don't diagnose in the ER, because it's hard to diagnose. They just get sent home, and then they die. That was it. I didn't have any other symptoms.
So you have your heart, and your aorta comes up, and there are two big arteries. The arteries go to your brain, then come down and goes to all the main organs. So the aorta is pumping. That's what's keeping you alive. My aorta dissected, which is a tear. It tore down into the root of my bowels. It tore up around and then all the way down into my abdomen. When I think about it, I don't even know how I survived. They went in and my doctor worked miracle after miracle. So I do have a new aortic valve, they replaced it, and then rebuilt my whole aorta. Maybe I'm a little bionic. I don't have any superpowers.
Tamara Anderson 13:52
Yeah, that's pretty funny. Now, what's interesting about you going to the hospital to begin with, because you said it was just kind of like a little heartburn or something. You had an interesting experience that kind of pushed you to go, why don't you tell me about that?
Teri 14:06
Yes. I kept thinking, “I'll be fine. I'll be fine.” I was laying in bed. It was probably 12 or one o'clock, and I googled stinging pain and chest. Of course, everything that came up was, “Go to your cardiologist” or “Go to the ER” and I'm like, “I'm not doing that.”
So I just laid down to go back to sleep. I don't know if I fell asleep, but I was laying there and I distinctly heard my dad say, “Get up and go put your sweats on and have McCall take you to the ER now.” It wasn't his kind voice. It was his you're in trouble voice. My dad had died 10 years before that. I don't know if I dreamed that or if I heard it, but it scared me to death.
I sat up and I thought, “Okay, I need to do that.” McCall was home from college for a couple of days. I peek in and it's like 1:30 in the morning, and she's watching Netflix. So she was awake. So I said, “Take me to the ER.” So first of all, I never would have gone to the ER had I not heard my dad's voice and felt scared about it.
Second, if I had gone to sleep, I definitely would have been dead within three or four hours. I would have just internally bled. It's the craziest thing. It's hard to diagnose. So they took my blood, and everything came back with no markers for a heart attack, no enzymes, blood pressure's fine, heart rate’s fine. I had no fever. That's why it's hard. The only way you can detect it is if you do a CT scan. As an afterthought, the doctor was like, “Let's just do a quick CT scan.” Of course, I'm just like, “Is that necessary?” That's when they saw it. Literally two minutes later, I was in an ambulance being rushed to St. Mark's hospital for open heart surgery.
Tamara Anderson 16:31
My goodness. So the surgery in and of itself was crazy. You don't remember hardly anything? Well, you were out. You also died. So you were dead for 26 minutes. And you went to a beautiful place? Why don't you tell me about that place?
Teri 16:56
It's the most meaningful thing that's ever happened to me. It was really hard when I wrote my book, initially to talk about it, because there were no words to explain it. First, it was just so close to me. I didn't talk about it for a long time because for a very long time, I wished I had died. Because it was the most amazing feeling I've ever felt.
I didn't see my dad, but there were a lot of colors and a lot of, I want to say, beings. I couldn't make out their faces, but they all were familiar. I didn't recognize anybody, but everyone was familiar. So I'm sure it's just generations and generations and generations of people that I'm from.
I remember the smell and just the beauty. I was suspended. I wasn't walking. I was kind of floating. It's weird. But I remember thinking, “Oh my gosh, this is home, this is where I want to be.” I definitely felt like I was in the presence of something very, very powerful, and so much glory. I think I said in my book that it was just like a warm blanket that someone had wrapped around me. I felt like I was home.
Then, all of the sudden, I was actually starting to get pulled away. I felt that, and everything got further and further away. Apparently that's when I came back. But it's a place we all want to be and this is just a blip of what's to come, life here on earth. Because there is a whole eternity out there. It's where we all want to be and we're going to be with our families. I did want to stay.
Tamara Anderson 19:27
I bet. So describe the feelings. I know you say it's hard to describe. It felt like home, so comfortable.
Teri 19:36
Yeah, and it was just familiar. Very familiar. I want to say it was just the surrounding love and the surrounding beauty. There's no words to explain what I saw, like colors I had never seen before. Everything was calm, everything was beautiful.
For the longest time I thought, “Was that heaven?” I believe it was. The whole dying thing is just a progression. And it's hard to lose a loved one for sure. But I know that they're in a great place. They're not thinking, “Oh, I wish I hadn't died.” No. It's just part of the progression. It just wasn't my time to go. But when it is, that's great. A lot of people are afraid of death. And there's no reason to be afraid. No, it's going home. It’s very calming for me to know that. Because you always kind of fear of death.
Tamara Anderson 21:05
Because it is the unknown, but since you've been here, even for a little blip. Is that what you're saying?
Unknown Speaker 21:14
Yes. It's where we want to be. I look forward to the day that happens. It could be two weeks, it could be 20 years. Who knows? Your life changes forever. It’s just an ordinary day. It wasn't a party, like a going away party. I didn't call everybody I knew that day, telling them goodbye.
Tamara Anderson 21:48
No, no, no, there's no way you could have known.
Teri 21:51
No. It's that phone call that changes your life. It's a car accident that changes your life. Things just happen in an instant. You don't get that time back. It takes a lot more energy to be grumpy and feel sorry for yourself than it does to be happy. Have your life and make it better.
Tamara Anderson 22:18
So let me ask you this, because you went from this beautiful place, to being pulled back into your body, to recovering, where you were in extreme an extreme amount of pain. Why don't you take me to there? Because I can imagine that switch from peace to extreme pain was probably not only mentally challenging, physically challenging, but you know, emotionally challenging as well. So tell us how you were able to do that and what it looked like.
Teri 22:52
The first time I remember waking up, my family was all there in the ICU. My little brother and his family had come from California. I was laying there. I had like 19 IVs. I was on a ventilator, they had just taken it out. Like I had tubes everywhere. I didn't know what had happened to me.
I was like, “Why am I here?” My family was all just like shocked and horrified and happy that I was awake. It had been like five days. I was coherent during that five days, but I don't remember any of it. It was just kind of a blessing. I don't think it was pretty, according to what my kids went through just waiting.
My whole family was there and I thought they were trying to kill me because I wanted some water. I asked them, “Why are you all here? I need water” My throat was like sand. I couldn't have any because I had gone into kidney failure, colon failure and liver failure. They had to go back and recreate those arteries because they had not come back.
They actually kind of freeze your body. They don't freeze it but they bring it down to I think 56 degrees during the surgery to just preserve your brain and your organs and stuff. So I had no idea what they were doing and they wouldn't give me water so in my freakishly, over-sedated mind, I was thinking they were doing tests on me and trying to kill me. It took a while for me to kind of understand what had happened.
It was months before I ever really delved into like googling it and watching a procedure. This was in 2012. I asked my cardiothoracic surgeon, how many dissections they had done that year, and he said, “You were number four.” So they don't get to do it very often. They never really get the chance to do it. But he said, “Yeah, and yours was by far the worst case. And you were the only one that survived.” So then I’m kind of like, “What am I supposed to do?”
Tamara Anderson 25:34
Yeah. You know, obviously, I'm back for a reason, even though I'd rather be in the other place.
Teri 25:40
They just didn't want me up there.
Tamara Anderson 25:45
I don't think that's it. Not at all. Not at all. You had to teach us a few things from your story, I think, first.
So talk me through this recovery. Because I mean, things like climbing the stairs, or even walking to the bathroom, things that you used to do without even thinking about them all of the sudden became the hardest thing in the whole wide world. Tell me what that looked like.
Teri 26:14
Well, when I was there, I would get up and walk with my physical therapist around the nurse's station, The steps when I was in the hospital, it was a killer. It was all I could do to literally walk around this little circle. I had been crazy before this.
This happened in October. My 50th birthday was September 1. So the summer before this, I'm thinking, “Okay, I'm going to be 50. I'm divorced.” Two things you never think are going to happen to you. Like, I'm never going to be 50. So I ran and I bike hundreds of miles on my bike a week, I would go to the gym all the time. I was getting in really good shape. I've always taken really good care of myself, but I literally just got in the best shape I had been in for years.
My doctor told me, he said, “Had you not been in such good shape, there's no way you would have survived.” Just like, every day after work, I would just go run or hike or bike or go to the gym. I think also I was running from, my life. That's the only way I could get away from my life. Then it was kind of turned upside down at the time. It was the only way I could kind of stay sane. I had no idea that I was you know, preparing for to fight for my life.
Tamara Anderson 27:57
So you are probably using exercise not only as, I'm trying to get myself in shape, but also as a coping strategy. Like, yes, the distraction.
Teri 28:08
Almost, yeah. I didn't want to think about my life, because it was kind of in ruins at the time.
Tamara Anderson 28:22
So tell me how the strategies of exercising and stuff like that played into your recovery, just that mentality of pushing and trying to do more than you could the day before?
Teri 28:34
Yes, I was sidelined for quite a while. The only thing I looked forward to the whole time I was in the hospital was just getting home to my own bed. Everything would be fine when I got home and I would be just fine. Because the last time I was in my house, I was perfectly fine.
So my physical therapist on the last day said, “Hey, do stairs in your house.” I'm like yeah, my bedroom’s on the second level. He said, “Maybe we should try some stairs.” I'm like, “I’m good. I got it. I mean stairs, how hard can they be?”
I remember getting in the car to come home and just the vibration of the car was causing so much pain in my chest. My whole body was just racked by the time we got home. I have two steps to get into my kitchen from the garage. I barely made it up both. I kept thinking, “I've got to go upstairs. I just want to get to my bed. I just want to get to my bed.”
I did those first eight stairs and then the second eight stairs and I nearly collapsed. My daughter was so scared. She was like, “Mom, call the neighbors.” So I call someone to help. I'm like, “No, I can do this.” It took a lot to get up the stairs. I thought, “Wow. I ran upstairs a million times, and I've never thought twice about it.”
That became one of my enemies, that staircase, for a really long time, that we finally we conquered it at some point. I think about that every day. As I run up those stairs, I think, “There was a time when you couldn't do it without just unbearable pain.”
So then I got up to my room, and my bed was high, and I couldn't get on my bed. I have a little loveseat, so I just went and sat on my loveseat. I slept on that loveseat for probably two or three months or so cuz I couldn't lay down. The pressure was just too much. My doctor kept saying, “Just keep trying, it'll happen. It'll happen.”
Tamara Anderson 31:16
It's probably easier for her to say that than it is for you to do it when you're like, I just really just want to lay down in my bed. But I can't.
Tamara Anderson 31:26
How do you fight that mental battle? You wrote in your book about just the battle of sleeping, and not being able to sleep because you were so uncomfortable. Here's a great quote from your book: “You can't conquer this kind of problem with a single battle. I had many more battles ahead of me, but at least I'd won this one.” So you made it through one night, which was a battle, right?
Teri 31:56
Yes, every day it became like that, like I just had to just battle it that day. The sleeping part was definitely an issue for a long time. My doctor did mention one thing to me, he said, “When you have a really bad trauma, could have been a car accident or anything like that, when you've had that kind of trauma, you don't really feel it. But your subconscious also is afraid that if you go to sleep, you'll never wake up.” So it’s kind of a mental game with that whole thing. So it was hard. I mean, I'm still a terrible sleeper. But, you know, I'm in my bed.
Tamara Anderson 32:49
Yeah, and you can lay down flat now.
Teri 32:50
It's so great.
Tamara Anderson 32:55
We're gonna take a quick break. But when we get back we will have Teri tell us a little bit about her purpose for living, and how God helped her throughout her strenuous recovery.
Tamara Anderson 33:09
How many of you out there feel like your life is chaotic, crazy, and completely awful compared to the norm? What if I were to tell you that you are normal for you? I am so excited to announce that my book, “Normal for Me,” by Tamara K. Anderson is now available for purchase on Amazon. This book took me 10 years to write. I share 20 years worth of lessons learned in my life detours, including being in a car accident and having two of my children diagnosed on the autism spectrum. In this book, I share the secrets of how I made it from despair, to peace, with God's help. I also include a bonus Diagnosis Survival Guide at the very end of “Normal for Me.” The Diagnosis Survival Guide includes 12 tips to survive and thrive in tough times. Wouldn't you like to know what those are? So what are you waiting for? Grab your copy of “Normal for Me” today on Amazon.
Tamara Anderson 34:17
And we’re back. I've been talking to Teri Benson about her recovery from an aortic dissection and how crazy that was. I'm going to read this quote from your book, because I think it tells a lot of how you made it through those long, long nights and those difficult challenges. You say, “Heavenly Father heard me. I pleaded for the strength to get through this and not let myself get discouraged. ‘I need to get better,’ I prayed. I need to get strong again. I have so much I want to do. I'm so grateful to have this second chance at life and I want to live it, really live. I prayed about my love and gratitude for my three kids, who had been by my side for a week. I thank Heavenly Father for the support of my family and friends and continue to beg for courage to persevere. As I prayed, I felt a sense of renewed strength. As hard as it was, this was possible.”
Teri 35:18
Well, you can't do it alone. No, absolutely not. No. We're kind of not in charge. So at the end of the day, you can make all the plans you want, but it's not up to us. I've always known there was a plan. But now I know there's really a plan. Like I said, doesn't matter what you plan, or what you think you should be doing. Someone else has a better idea of what you should be doing.
Tamara Anderson 35:59
So part of your strength to get through those daily battles came from God, part of it came from friends and family who came and helped. We'll call them angels here on Earth, people that came to your aid, and helped you through it. But you also had to have that inner will to work and to live. A lot of that, I noticed throughout your book, was your kids. That was why you worked so hard. You wanted to, not only get better so you could be a good mom, but you wanted to show them that, to be an example that I can conquer my demons. So tell me what these next few months look like for you as you push forward every day, Teri, because I know it wasn't easy.
Teri 36:59
No, just washing yourself or washing your hair, or getting dressed. My cute daughter has done and seen things that no daughter should ever have. Oh my gosh, she was just an angel. I couldn't lift my arms for like four months. I couldn't drive. I couldn't do anything. Basically, I could eat and I could go to the bathroom by myself. I couldn't use my arms for any kind of support.
Then physical therapy. I remember it was my first day at the cardiac rehab center. I think it had been about six or seven weeks because he didn't want me doing physical therapy right away. I had a homecare guy come in, but I didn't do a lot of physical therapy.
So I went to my first one. They put the electrodes on you and you have a little monitor and they watch what you're doing. They took me over to the treadmill. There was a guy that looked like he was well into his 80s. He's got an oxygen tank. My physical therapist set my treadmill to 1.1 miles an hour.
I look over at the 80 year old guy next to me, and he's going 2 miles an hour. And I'm like, that dude's going faster than me. That is not funny. That's not acceptable. How can he? He's got oxygen, you know?
I was kind of a rebel. When they would walk away, I would turn up the treadmill or whatever it was. I was like, “No, I can do more than that.” When I really knew and accepted my new life, I was going to be relentless in my recovery. There were so many setbacks, so many tears, so much disappointment. But I kept thinking, “I've just got to do it.” That's kind of my stubborn side.
Tamara Anderson 39:24
But you did it. You did it. Resilience.
Teri 39:29
I didn't complain to my family at all. I couldn't do that to them. So the only person I would complain to is my cardiothoracic surgeon. One day I asked him, “If I'm never going to run again, or work again, or do all the things that I love, like how am I ever going to be happy?”
And he scooted his little chair over, grabbed my hands and he said, “You know what? You are going to find things that you would have never known that bring you happiness. That's what you'll take from this, you will find other things.”
And I was like, “Okay, I don't understand. And I certainly don't believe that's true, what am I going to do?” At my eight-year checkup, I was like, “So do you think I could go skiing?” It was winter. He's like, “No, I'm not going to let you. I've never had a patient survive this. So you're kind of like my little pet project.”
He wrote about me in the World Medical Journal, I’m subject a or whatever. He told me that when he saw the CT scan images come through, he didn't even think that I would make it there alive in the ambulance. He didn't even plan on doing the surgery. So weird.
And then I came in. And the other crazy thing is that my brother had gotten there and he gave me a blessing. If you don't know, it's kind of like praying for someone but they actually direct it at you. They lay their hands on your head. So the doctor left the room, and my brother gave me a blessing.
My doctor said, “I was in the hallway and something told me that I just needed to try. I just needed to try and save her.” So all the planets had to line up just right for me to survive that night, and they did. They did, that's the craziest thing.
Tamara Anderson 42:03
Oh, such a miracle. So looking back at lessons learned. We've already talked about a couple of them. First of all, God is in charge. He's got a plan. Your plan probably isn't always going to turn out. So it's okay. Turn it over to God.
Talk to me about choosing joy, because we've mentioned this briefly about choosing happiness. Why is this such a critical battle? Because a lot of those things are a battle inside your brain. So talk to me about what that looked like for you. What did you do to choose joy on a daily basis?
Teri 42:50
Honestly, I think just praying every day, for the strength and for the strength to be happy, to have a good attitude. I literally prayed my guts out every day that I would be able to do this and that I would recover. But in my mind, I was thinking, “No way. No way this is ever gonna happen. I'm never gonna be normal again.”
Then I just had such a support and army of people, friends, neighbors, family. I'll tell you one thing. When I was in the hospital, they had just moved me to a regular room. I had been out of critical care. All my three kids were there. My oldest son Dallin, he’s the one that's married and has the baby, he was so cute. He just said, “Mom, you know what, God knew that we needed angels. And you know what, they're everywhere. And they are taking care of us.”
My kids actually know now how to react when someone else goes through a crisis or something like that. Just be supportive and loving, and how much that means. Because he was like, we had no idea how many people love us. We had no idea, the amount of love and support that. My kids just felt so blessed. People that are so unexpected that would just drop in or drop by or bring food.
Tamara Anderson 44:42
You mentioned your daughter's birthday and how people bailed you out for that too.
Teri 44:47
I'm thinking, “Okay, I can't leave the house. I can't drive. What are we going to do for her birthday?” I had friends that made it happen and that was a special birthday for her. She was like, “I could have lost my mom. I mean, I could be celebrating without you.”
Tamara Anderson 45:10
So let me ask you this because often allowing people to come in and serve you is a, it's a battle in and of itself. We have that sense of, “I need to be self-sufficient. I need to take care of myself. I need to take care of my family.” But obviously, you were in a situation where you couldn't do that. What did you do to be able to allow yourself to be served? Was it a mental shift? What did that look like?
Teri 45:41
I am that person that’s like, “No, I'm good. I'm good.” So I would feel guilty. My friend would come and clean. It just made me so uncomfortable to be served. I finally realized there's a time and a season. When something happens to someone, it gives a reason for someone to be able to serve. They get those blessings from serving you. I just had to kind of change my mindset and think, “Okay, this is just a season. I've served others, when they were having whatever it was.” But I think it was good for my kids to see that too. Because then they know how to reciprocate that in the future. We know how important it is, just a phone call or a text sometimes would make me feel so much better and brighten my day.
Tamara Anderson 46:50
It can be little things.
Teri 46:53
Yes. But I really had to just change my mindset, because I am not one that likes to be served. I have a hard time accepting help. I didn't really have any choice. Every day when I open my eyes, I am still so grateful, every morning, to be here. We have good days and bad days and I'm still grateful for those. I look back and I think, “I would have missed out on so many things had I not survived.”
Tamara Anderson 47:34
So obviously, people know that physically you're doing amazing right now, compared to probably most people who’ve had an aortic dissection.
Teri 47:44
Yes.
Tamara Anderson 47:45
What tips would you give to someone who is just really, really struggling right now. Maybe they're facing a Christmas like you did that first year where you feel like life is just coming apart at the seams? What advice would you give to someone who's facing a really hard time?
Teri 48:07
Well, I think, first of all, you have to find a reason. Whatever that reason is, you have to have something that keeps you going. My reason was my kids. I just knew that I needed to be here and I needed to be better for them. It's not easy. There were days that I wouldn't even get out of bed. It was a lot of mental depression. I was so physically fragile, and just frail. But I feel like if you wake up every day, and you think, “Okay, I have a purpose.” No matter what it is, you have to find a purpose. You have to find something that you have to live for. Honestly, it's hard. It's hard to choose joy sometimes. But you have got to figure out what it is that you are living for.
Just be accepting of your life. No matter how upset I get or how sad I get about my condition, it's not going to change it. I really had to work on that because I thought my life was over. Then I started walking. Any little thing, just walking down the block made me so happy. I feel like if you can find small victories every day, like when I walked up the stairs my first time by myself. I mean how ridiculous is that? But that made me so happy. You have to find some kind of joy. Whatever it is you're doing. But it's a choice. I think if you have someone or something like I had my kids, you have to have a reason. And you have to find that reason.
Tamara Anderson 50:12
Then set those little goals, if they may seem super ridiculous to anybody else, but maybe they are so meaningful to you like climbing those stairs, because it was such an impossibility almost that first time you did it. So climbing the stairs by yourself was huge. Also don't compare yourself now to maybe who you were before, you probably almost have to say, “I’m different. And it's okay.”
Teri 50:41
Yes. When I would go run or bike or whatever I was doing, I always had to do it a little bit faster than I done the previous time, or I had to go a little bit further. There just wasn't a lot of joy in it. Not so much joy in the journey.
Now it's like I want to go out and just ride my bike for fun. I don't have to go faster or further than I did the day before. That part I do like about myself is that I can just find joy just walking my dog. I don't have to be running a marathon or proving something for anybody but me.
It took me the whole two and a half years to figure that out. I still do get kind of bummed when there's stuff I can't do. There's days I don't feel 100%. The medications I take make me very lethargic and tired. So I fight fatigue all the time. So I'm going to do it regardless of if I'm tired or not.
Tamara Anderson 51:51
I love that you haven't let this challenge slow you down. Here you are, eight years later, you're setting goals like, hiking Angel's landing. You're like, “I'm going to do it.” You mentioned to me before that you went paragliding and I'm like, “Oh my gosh!” So you're setting these goals, you're living your life.
Teri 52:19
I just missed out on a lot of joy and happiness for years and years and years when I was in a bad marriage, and it takes work every single day. But honestly, I think if you just find something to be grateful for every day. I got to brush my teeth. I did that by myself. Just those little things. I couldn't get myself dressed for a month. So I had a lot of little victories, but you have to take it one day at a time.
Just honestly, that's the key for me is that I wake up every morning and I'm so grateful. COVID has just changed everybody's life. But what are we going to do about it? We're gonna do what we have to do. We're gonna wear a mask, even though we hate them. We're gonna socially distance even though we hate doing that. If you complain about it or you're mad about it, it doesn't change it. You were still going to do it. So I choose joy, instead of being unhappy over what you can be unhappy about. Because in these days, there's a lot to be unhappy about.
Tamara Anderson 53:51
It really is a choice. I think part of it boils down to also, picking what you fill your life with. If all you fill your life with is negative, negative, negative, I think you're gonna have an easier time being negative all the time. Instead, you might need to make a conscious choice and say, “I'm going to fill my life with positives. Today, I'm going to turn off media for a day and just find a positive podcast to listen to, or I'm going to read a good book or listen to a good book.” Just fill your life with positivity so that making the choice to be positive and joyful, is easier.
Teri 54:37
Right. I don't know if I willed my life to like recover after two and a half years or what. But I never gave up hope that I would ski and bike and do all this stuff. In the back of my mind. I just kept thinking, “There's no way you can't do this.” So it took two and a half years. I'd had a scan and my doctor was like, “I can't believe I'm gonna say this, but if you want to go skiing, go ahead. But be mindful, because we do not know what sort of trauma you can withstand. Just remember, it's not worth your life.” I was always just like, “Oh, I've got to go faster, stronger.” Now I'm like, “No, I'm just gonna go and enjoy it.”
I hike, and I love to just stop and look at the beauty. Sometimes you just get that tunnel vision, and you kind of forget to just stop and look around and just be grateful. We live in the most beautiful place. For a long time, I didn't even notice. You're too busy being stressed out, being unhappy, and not caring. So yes, having a dissection was definitely the best thing that ever happened to me. It changed my life. Incredibly, it put life into perspective for me. Life can be very short. Some things will just change your life forever. It's not always a bad thing.
Tamara Anderson 56:26
It may feel like a bad thing at the moment. Because admittedly, that first year, it probably felt like the worst thing ever.
Teri 56:33
Yeah.
Tamara Anderson 56:36
But hindsight is always 20/20. So looking back, you'll see the blessings and the miracles. So let me ask you this, Teri, what resources would you recommend to people who are struggling? Obviously, your book, it's called “How my Ordinary Became Extraordinary.” That's basically the first year of your recovery. Tell us about this new book that's coming out in the spring.
Teri 57:07
Yes. When I wrote my book, I wrote it from the day the dissection happened to exactly one year later. So at that point, I didn't know if I was ever gonna get on my bike, or do anything. I've had a lot of lessons, a lot of lessons have been learned in the past eight years. I just kept getting stronger. There's just a lot that happened after that. My new book is called “Beautifully Broken.” I'm getting close to having it finished. My goal is to have it fully written by the end of December. It's basically my story again, but now I tell it better. I add more things. I did die for 26 minutes. I talk about that a lot more in the next book. When you have a near death experience I feel like people want to hear about it. I think it gives them hope. People are very curious about death, and they're very scared about death. There's nothing to be afraid of.
Tamara Anderson 58:25
That's so good to hear.
Teri 58:27
No one, probably, that reads my book is going to have an aortic dissection. But people have struggles every day. Sometimes you just need to read someone's story or hear someone's story to kind of go “Okay, well, they did this. So maybe if I work on this, I'll progress.”
Tamara Anderson 58:50
That's one of the reasons I do this podcast. It's so awesome to hear other stories of people who've been through hard things. Often, we do learn the same lessons. But sometimes the way someone tells their story may impact you in a different way.
I love one of the final quotes in your book. It says, “I will remember the victories I've already obtained and pray for the strength to rise up and fight the next battle. I will feel my heartbeat as I fall asleep and prepare for the next day. I will keep going. I'm not at the beautiful place. But I know it's waiting for me. Until then I will strive to make this life the best it can be. I'll get there eventually. Tomorrow is just the next step.”
Teri 59:36
It's true. There's always tomorrow. I just I feel like if you fill your life with those gratitudes, those kind of thoughts, your life is just instantly happier.
Tamara Anderson 59:49
Where can we find you online?
Teri 59:51
My Facebook is just Teri Benson. My Instagram is Teri Benson 48. You can find me there. I will definitely announce my release of my new book on there.
Tamara Anderson 1:00:10
I'm excited for that. Can't wait to read version two. Version one is so beautiful. You just feel like you want to cheer for Teri. Your books available on Amazon. Perfect, perfect. So go check out her book, “How my Ordinary Became Extraordinary,” available today. You can also get her new book as it comes out in the spring, “Beautifully Broken.”
Teri 1:00:38
Thank you for letting me share my story. Because if it just helps or touches one life, that makes all the difference in the world. And just make each day extraordinary. That's kind of my mantra for every day.
Tamara Anderson 1:00:58
Hey, thanks so much for listening to today's show. I know that there are many of you out there that are going through a hard time and I hope you found things that have been useful today. As you listen to the podcast, if you would like to access the show notes from today's podcast, visit my website. That is storiesofhopepodcast.com. That is where you'll find favorite quotes from today's episode and shareable memes. Those are fun because you can share them with your friends on social media. You will also find the links mentioned throughout today's episode, so you don't have to remember what those were. You’ll also all the tips that were shared. Sometimes tips are shared so much throughout an episode you forget and wonder, “What were those great things?” So go to the show notes, storiesofhopepodcast.com to look up these fantastic resources. You know, if someone kept coming to mind during today's episode, perhaps that means that you should share this with them. Maybe there was a story shared or a tip that they really, really need to hear. So go ahead and share this episode with them. May God bless you, especially if you're struggling, with hope to carry on and with the strength to keep going when things get tough. Remember to walk with Christ and He will help bear that burden. And above all else, remember God loves you.