She Lost Her Mom at 12—Now She’s Saving Lives with Her Story | Stories With Traction Podcast

SHOW NOTES:

In this powerful episode, Matt Zaun sits down with Kristen Harootunian, mental health advocate and speaker, to explore her journey from addiction and childhood trauma to long-term recovery and national advocacy work.

Kristen shares how losing her mother to suicide at age 12 led to years of substance abuse, and how her path to recovery began at just 17. Now, more than a decade sober, she’s committed to helping others find healing through storytelling, vulnerability, and mental health education.

In addition, they talk about:

✅ Kristen’s advice for parents of struggling teens and why secrecy can be harmful
✅ How she helps normalize the idea that healing is nonlinear, lifelong, and filled with nuance
✅ The “post-speaking high” many speakers experience, and how she manages it with intentional habits

…and much more.

BIOS

Kristen Harootunian is a speaker for Minding Your Mind, a national organization dedicated to reducing the stigma around mental health. After beginning her recovery journey at 17, she now shares her story at over 150 events annually, ranging from high schools and colleges to corporate teams and correctional facilities. Kristen is passionate about redefining what recovery looks like and building cultures of empathy, understanding, and support.

Matt Zaun is an award-winning speaker and strategic storytelling expert who helps business leaders inspire action and drive results. With a track record of catalyzing growth across 300+ organizations, Matt shows clients how to leverage story to transform sales, marketing, and company culture.

 

*Below is an AI-generated transcript, which may contain errors

 

Matt Zaun 

I've been anticipating this episode for quite some time. I was listening to another podcast a couple months ago, the TLC Connections podcast.

Highly recommend it for anyone listening. I will actually include a link in the show notes. Highly recommend checking out that podcast, but I was listening to the podcast and there was an incredibly powerful story that just really connected with me.

And I had to have that guest on. And I'm excited because our guest today is Kristen Heratunian. Kristen began her recovery journey at just 17 years old, has since become a nationally recognized speaker and advocate for addiction recovery and mental health awareness.

Her powerful story underscores the transformative impact of seeking help, showing that recovery is not a path we won't walk alone, but a collective journey of connection, support, and shared resilience.

Welcome to the show, Kristen. Thank you so much.

 

Kristen H

I'm really grateful to be able to be on.

 

Matt Zaun 

Yeah, thank you so much. I really appreciate your time. And I mean this sincerely, I was listening to that podcast episode and hearing the story that you were sharing.

I was getting so emotional based on all the different elements and the struggle and the pain that you've experienced.

And what really struck me is there's a lot of individuals that I work with that will tell me, hey, my daughter's struggling, my son's struggling.

So I felt like it was incredibly relatable. And I really want you to unpack it with us today. Before we jump into your story, I do want to learn a little bit more about what you do, the organization, Minding Your Mind, what you stand for, the mission, different goals that you have.

So can we start there?

 

Kristen H

Yeah, sure thing. So I've worked with Minding Your Mind for about probably like eight years now, which like, I mean, I look pretty young, right?

So I started working. I've there when I was like 18 years old. And I have been a full-time speaker with them for probably about four of those years.

Our mission statement is basically like, all we want to do is reduce the stigma associated around mental health. Um, my story specifically surrounds trauma, recovery from substance use disorder, um, and like what that looks like in a very practical way.

Um, but like if a lot of people ask me like, you know, what do you do for a living?

And, you know, it's always funny cause I never know how to say it. And I basically say, remember in high school when you would have a guest speaker come in third period, like that's who I am.

Like I go into schools and I go into organizations, community centers, businesses, kids as young as third grade, all the way up to, you know, full grown adults.

And, and really what I do is I share my story.

 

Matt Zaun 

That's incredible. Share with us a couple of those experiences just so people can, you can kind of paint a picture.

Is this primarily keynote, classroom style? Any different locations that you've spoken in that you remember for sure?

 

Kristen H

Yeah. So, I mean, typically, I mean, I love a keynote. I mean, how could you not love a keynote?

Like if anybody here has experience with public speaking, it's quite the whirlwind because like when you get up on that stage, it's like you have 800, 900 people looking at you and 90% of them have no idea what you're going to say.

And I specifically love a keynote because it's such like a grander impact, but I also have a special place in my heart for classrooms.

Like a lot of the time I'll go into a school and they'll say, hey, I want you to do one through five periods and just do them back to back to back to back to back and happy to do it.

more intimate setting, but typically it's keynote. I'll also do panel discussions. You know, there's a really cool partner. that we have with Minding Your Mind called Strike Out the Stigma with the Philadelphia Phillies.

So once a month during their season, we'll have like one of our speakers go in with other presenters and we talk about how important it is to take care of our mental health.

So that's a really cool thing that I've done a few times.

 

Matt Zaun 

That's incredible. Have you ever gotten surprised by someone approaching you after a session, keynote, and thinking to yourself like I would never imagine that person struggling?

 

Kristen H

Yes. that continue to surprise you? Oh my gosh. Every time, every like every time, you know, before I present, I always try to, you know, I mean, I've been doing it for a couple of handful of years, but I still get nervous.

It's really nerve wracking to speak and to be vulnerable in front of large groups of people that you don't know.

And every time I speak, I always will quiet myself and say, please help me help one person, even if that person is me.

And it always surprises me when I get done presenting and I'm putting my bag away and getting ready to go, like there will be a line of like 15 to 20 kids that want to come up to me and want to share their story with me and how similar it was.

And there is one very specific instance that I'm remembering that happened probably at the tail end of this school year.

And, you know, when I go into schools, like I'm typically talking to kids, right? And very rarely does a teacher or somebody, an administrator come in and there was a teacher that came up to me immediately, tears in her eyes.

And she looked at me and like grabbed my shoulders and just said to me, you told my story. I lost my mom by suicide X amount of years ago as well.

And you inspired me like I'm going to call my therapist right now and get back into therapy. And like that.

That right there is, like, I have goosebumps just saying that out loud because that's the reason why I do what I do for, like, a woman like that.

 

Matt Zaun 

Wow, that's so powerful. I really appreciate you sharing that. You know, it's amazing to me different people that you would never think are battling this and dealing with this.

I remember, in particular, I was speaking, there's probably three years now, I was speaking at a yacht club in California.

Okay, so imagine this. I'm in this yacht club, California. There are these massive, massive windows around this room. Like, whole room is basically glass where you can see all the different yachts and stunningly beautiful scenery.

And the gentleman who was the main host of this event who brought me in, incredibly successful person. I mean, wildly successful, someone that most people would put on a pedestal.

Most people would say, hey, I want to be like this person. And during the break, I remember walking to the bathroom and...

Just looking at him, were walking together, and I said, so how are you doing? And not like a normal, like, hey, what's up, or how are you doing?

But like, how are you doing? Like, legit, I wanted to hear from him. And he looked at me and said, I'm doing terrible.

And I was kind of taken back, and I was like, terrible? I mean, you're in a position most people would kill for.

 

Kristen H

Right. He said, I'm doing terrible.

 

Matt Zaun 

He said, I'm really concerned that my son's going to commit suicide. He said, my son's been battling some really, really horrific mental health stuff.

And he's like, it's all I can think about. And it just really, it created this pause in me and a moment that I stepped back, and I was like, you know what?

It doesn't matter who the person is, how much money they have, what kind of home they live in. Like, they could be battling this, or one of their family members could be battling this.

So I really appreciate what you do. I appreciate you, you bringing light to a subject that I just feel like, for however long as a society, we've tried to silence.

We tried to belittle people that have mental health or whatever the case may be. I really appreciate you bringing light to it for sure.

I do want to backtrack. want to talk more about your story, your upbringing. I like to ask people about their teen years.

I think teen years are just an indicator of transitioning into college and life and everything else. So if I were to ask 15-year-old Kristen what she wanted to do, be, aspire to, what would the response have been?

 

Kristen H

Oh, 15. I would say my teen years were not my most glorious years. 15 years old, where was I?

I was probably leaving my second psychiatric hospital, my first drug and alcohol rehab. I was starting to fail a lot of my classes and...

I didn't think that I was going to make it past 18. Now, if we're talking about 12-year-old Kristen, which is a much different story, 12-year-old Kristen probably would have said that she's going to be a writer, and she's going to write many books, and she's going to try to positively impact the world in some way, shape, or form via communication.

I loved reading books when I was a kid. I would always, when my parents would fight, especially around like 8, 9, 10, 11, I would walk up our very long driveway, because I grew up in Glen Mills, Pennsylvania, and I would walk up our very long driveway, sit under the tree, and I would read.

And I would read anything, anything that I could get my hands on, like typically fantasy. But I just, that was like my first way of escaping my reality.

And, you know, typically we wouldn't look at the 12-year-old girl. I her reading is an addiction. You know what I mean?

But it was, it was mainly a coping mechanism for me to not live in my own existence. So yeah, that's probably where I wanted to be.

I could see myself doing something like that. So you said escaping your own reality, what was happening around you that you needed to escape from?

Oh, man. I mean, my mom was an alcoholic. She also struggled with anorexia. So my mom presented very sick.

But she acted like to the public that she had it all together and was very healthy. My mom was a stay at home mom.

So she was home all the time. My dad worked for a company that he was extremely invested in and would travel all over the country for, you know, weeks at a time.

So my dad was always coming home with some sort of knickknack or some sort of gifts. Like this is from China.

This is from Sweden. This, you know, wherever he was, like he would just This is from Tokyo. it was like, oh, wow, okay.

But, you know, like my earliest memories, it was me and my brothers trying to protect each other from whatever the day was going to look like.

I mean, a lot of people ask me, like, did others know about what was going on? Because, like, my mom was either really happy or she was yelling or she was crying or she was sleeping.

Like, my mom was extremely unpredictable. So I thought to myself, I would always go to friends' houses and be like, they have a different life than I do.

They're presenting as if, like, they're all put together. So I need to present that I'm all put together, which is why I love that story that you shared about that man sharing with you.

Like, no, I'm actually terrible. Because it's like, if we could do that more often, maybe we could, like, be more honest.

 

Matt Zaun

That's incredible to me. So you're at home with brothers, you're talking about protection. Do you feel, did you almost take on a mother role of yourself with your brothers?

 

Kristen H

What were the ages of your brothers compared to you? Do you older, younger? Yeah, so I'm the youngest. My brothers are two years apart.

So Connor is two years older than me and Corbin is four years older than me. I would say, I mean, at this point in my life, like, we didn't have cell phones.

We had like, you know, flip phones, but we didn't have like the iPhone, right? So like my brother was the one, my oldest brother, Corbin was the one that had the cell phone.

He played mother, I would say. And then Connor and I would try our very best to play and be like kids and try to like be in the unknown for as long as we could.

But by the end of it, like, right, I say the end of it as in like, I'm talking like 11, 12 years old.

At that point in my life, like, my brothers and I were just trying to stop my mom from And like,

Like, that's all it was. Like, we would, like, look for her alcohol, take it, dump it, we would get in a big fight, and then I would go to school the next day and pretend that nothing happened.

So I lived, like, these two completely different lives.

 

Matt Zaun 

And how did that go dumping the alcohol? Was there, was there, I'm sure that that created a shouting match?

 

Kristen H

Oh my gosh, of course. Like, you know, we weren't allowed to have, you know, because we had phones on the receiver then.

So, like, my mom would take all the phones from the receivers and, like, hide them because she knew that if we found the alcohol that we would call my dad and she would get in trouble, right?

So, like, should we have had that responsibility as children? Absolutely not. Was my dad as aware as he is now?

No, of course not. Like, there are a lot of things that we wish that we could have done differently.

But I know that I had an unhealthy sense of responsibility for taking care of something that was much, much larger than me.

At 11 years old. You're supposed to be like learning about yourself and figuring out like, what do I want to be when I grow up?

But I was thinking about, is my mom going to be dead or alive when I get home?

 

Matt Zaun 

So tell us just the element of insecurity and what that would do. Because you had mentioned you didn't know if your mom was going to be screaming, if she was going to be happy.

What did that do to you, especially in those early, incredibly important years? You know, you're mentioning 11 and 12, and we were talking about 15.

mean, those years are so important for the development of any kind of mental health whatsoever. So explain to us just the sheer insecurity and what that might even be doing to you today.

 

Kristen H

So I mean, I can tell you that I find that today, I am not nearly as insecure as I used to be.

I attribute that to public speaking, because that is one of the scariest things you can do. And I do it on the regular.

I mean, I do 150 presentations in a year. So it's a lot of presentations. And, you know, I've been through the gamut and I haven't had kids, you know, do terrible things very rarely, right?

Like 2% of the time. But I feel like if I can get through that, I can get through anything.

But backtracking as like a child, I mean, I learned the gift of empathy because I had to empathize in order to survive my reality.

I mean, because the reality is like this is wrong, right? Like this isn't okay. So I had to learn how she moved.

I had to learn how she acted. And like, you know, I don't want to demonize my mother. She was an incredible person.

And like people are very multifaceted. But she was also very sick. So, you know, like really the insecurity bloomed into, as I've mentioned before, like wearing those masks, like I couldn't be myself.

And who myself was, was like a scared, angry, confused girl. That needed help. I didn't want to project that or present that to other kids in school or teachers in school.

So I became a completely different person. Like I always joke, like I will, I was a chameleon. I would be whoever you wanted me to be.

And if you liked that, then I would just be that person around you 24 seven. So it was, it initially felt really good.

But when I left that interaction or left that play date, I was, I was still left with me. Does that make sense?

Oh, absolutely.

 

Matt Zaun 

Are you familiar with the Enneagram by chance?

 

Kristen H

No. Ring a bell?

 

Matt Zaun 

I'll highly recommend it. It is, it, it's like a personality assessment on steroids. It's really the only way I could describe it.

It's incredible. Anyway, when you mentioned chameleon, part of my personality is that as well. So there's different numbers, the Enneagram and each number, it really shows you kind of a person in their fullest health.

And then there's someone where they're not healthy, right? So the chameleon. And I call it like vanilla ice cream, right?

Like vanilla ice cream goes with peach cobbler. It goes with chocolate drizzle, right? So it's almost like you can become a different person and kind of play the actor in different settings.

Where in the business world, that works incredibly well because people are, you know, stressed beyond belief. So if you're stressed, you can kind of play the persona of everything's great, right?

Which can take a toll on you, you know, later on. It just, it got me thinking regarding, you know, you mentioned the chameleon piece.

I do want to mention the empathy piece. I really appreciate you bringing that up on the pain leading to more empathy.

You know, it's interesting. One of the most empathetic human beings I've ever met in my entire life was my grandmother.

And what was amazing to me is she could connect with everyone. Didn't matter if the person was a janitor or a CEO of a massive organization.

She could connect and relate to everyone. And I remember asking her once on how she was able to do that because she didn't have much formal training.

She didn't, I mean, I don't even know if she. She What level of school she reached. But she had mentioned the Great Depression had such an impact on her where her family greatly suffered financially.

And then she learned an element of the human condition where everyone goes through trial. Everyone goes through some type of just something they're working with, some type of baggage.

So she really saw a person as a human, not a title, which really it created this dynamic of her ability to just have incredible conversations with everyone.

I thought that was really interesting for sure. So I really appreciate you mentioning the empathy piece. I want to jump a little bit.

So you mentioned, you know, 12 years old, you're fascinated with writing. You have a knack for reading. Take us through the next few years.

So you mentioned escaping your reality through books. Were there any other escapes that started to happen outside of books as you got older?

 

Kristen H

Yeah, I mean, 11 to 12 where It was a monumental time in my life. My mom, she went in and out of treatment.

She went to jail. She went through a whole lot with her addiction. She got sober for a little while.

I don't know if anybody here is familiar with like 2020, but ABC's 2020, like we did like an actual episode and they like followed us around for a year to like try to get her We're better, you know, but like we did everything that we possibly could to try to like make it so that she would find recovery.

And she didn't. On December 6th of 2009, that was when my mom attempted and completed suicide. And it was huge.

It was a shock to all of us. You know, education back then was a lot different than how suicide prevention and education is now.

It's part of the reason why I'm so passionate about what I do. Because, you know, like, I look back at that time in my life, like there were so many warning signs, like there were so many things that we could have picked up on that we just weren't educated on.

So, you know, fast forward, after that happens, like cats out of the bag, everybody knew. I mean, we even tried to say like, she died in her sleep, right?

But like, it's just, we were so afraid of people judging us or looking at us like we were differently, like that we were different.

And people in my school knew, people in our community knew. And I, as much as I do stand in the spotlight, I do not like being in the spotlight.

It's a very strange dynamic, right? Like, I want help, but I don't want help. I want to be seen, but I don't want to be seen.

Like, it's like, there's a risk in getting vulnerable, because you don't know if somebody's going to accept you or not.

So it's like, at that point, people were reaching out to me, but I wasn't sure if I had wanted it, had wanted the help.

So I kind of put my head down and was like, I don't know if I want to do this.

Like my dad threw us in family counseling. He became a stay-at-home dad from being like this executive to a stay-at-home dad and, you know, learning how to make dinners.

And still to this day, like I'm seeing my dad after this. And like to this day, my dad, when we were kids, he would perfect, it would be like the lemon chicken, you know?

And he like would like totally, it's so good. But he would try his best to play the role that we always needed, which was a nurturer.

 

Matt Zaun 

Wow.

 

Kristen H

Was it perfect? No. But, you know, around that time, my brothers and I stopped doing as well in school.

I started self-harming. My brothers kind of like partied a little bit, but nothing crazy. And life continued to move on for other people, but I still felt.

Like, I was frozen.

 

Matt Zaun

Wow. Sorry to hear about your mother. That's incredible. So, so she dies by suicide, 2009. What, what, how old are you at this time?

 

Kristen H

I just turned 12. I was about to turn 12.

 

Matt Zaun 

Oh, so part of your escape with reading was...

 

Kristen H

yeah.

 

Matt Zaun 

Okay, that, okay. All right, that makes, that makes more sense. So as you got older, based on, you know, you had mentioned trauma and substance use.

When did that start with you? What, what age was that?

 

Kristen H

Thirteen.

 

Matt Zaun 

Thirteen?

 

Kristen H

Okay, take us through, what, what, what did that look like?

 

Matt Zaun 

And you had mentioned self-harm, so kind of paint the picture for us.

 

Kristen H

Yeah, I mean, the road was really quick, right? Like, I mean, I, today, like, going into support groups and 12-step meetings, like, I see people that are like, oh, I used for 25 years.

Like, that's, it's not my story, right? Like, I burned out so... So quick, like the first time that I'd ever used a substance, I was around 13.

I was with a very good friend of mine. And we like smoked a little bit of weed, you know, in the woods.

And I remember thinking to myself, like, this is it. Like, I want to feel this way forever. Like, I love this.

I mean, and I don't say that to like glamorize it. Like I say that because like that feeling was all I wanted to do was make the noise in my head, go away.

Like I felt a lot of responsibility for the death of my mom, even though I bared no responsibility. I felt like I didn't fit in with other kids.

You know, I, I self harmed because it was a, it was a way in which I could ask for help without having to verbalize it like, but like through the ages of like 13 to really 16, 17 years old, like I, my whole mission was to burn down my life.

Because I felt like I deserved it. Which is like wild, right? Because like I look at that time and I'm like, oh my gosh, like all she needed was a hug, a candy bar, and a therapist.

You know, like that's all she needed was like to just like be loved and be supported. And like, but every time somebody tried to put a therapist in front of me, every time somebody tried to like put me in psych, every time I was put into rehab, I always wanted to like hit the hand that fed me because I was afraid.

I didn't know any better. You know, I didn't know that recovery in any way, shape or form, whether it's recovery from depression, recovery from losing a spouse, recovery from, you know, I moved from point A to point B, and like I don't fit in where I thought I was going to fit in, like with identity, like, I didn't think that recovery could feel this good.

So, I mean, I'm jumping around a lot, but. Ultimately, my dad and my brothers did to me in trying to help me the way that I tried to help my mom.

And I didn't want it until the very last second before I could pull the parachute.

 

Matt Zaun 

Would you say this was like self-sabotage from 13 to 17, almost as if you're trying to punish yourself, that you were experiencing so much shame regarding your mother's death that you wanted to cause some type of destruction regarding success?

I ask that because you were raised in a very high-achieving home. You mentioned your father. I mean, parents have tremendous influence on us in multiple ways.

So you're being raised in an environment. You mentioned your father, executive, a go-getter, even when he became a stay-at-home dad.

He's trying to cook and he's trying to figure things out. So you were definitely raised in an environment where you had that modeled for you.

And I noticed there are a lot of people that when they're doing... Or something good is happening. They feel that they need to have some type of self-sabotage to not actually reach the extent of the success to punish themselves.

Do you feel that at all during this time?

 

Kristen H

Yeah, I mean, it was like a sick sense of control, you know? It was like self-sabotage with a little bit of control in the mix.

Like, I knew that I was doing all of these things. I felt like I was simultaneously a victim and responsible.

So it's like, I felt like I was a victim because of my childhood and what had happened. But I also felt like, okay, well, I'm going to choose to get high every day.

I'm going to choose to drink every day. I'm going to choose to, like, surround myself with these people that I know aren't good for me.

Because it was like, I felt like the world had taken so much from me and had done so much to me that I was like, all right, let me double down.

Like, and of course, like addiction runs in my family. So I find, you know, I always. Joke around that my moderation button is broken.

Anything that feels good, I want to do to access. However, as a 17-year-old girl with a 1.5 GPA who couldn't play lacrosse anymore because her GPA was so low, I was facing, am I going to make it past 18?

If I am, what am I going to do? Because I can't live my life. Doing this anymore. And seeing that my father was so high achieving, him and I are extremely close.

And he could tell you he did everything that he possibly could to try and save me. And I thank God for that.

Because if my dad gave up on me, I don't know what I would have done.

 

Matt Zaun 

I don't think I would be here right now. Wow. Take us through a little bit of the recovery journey.

Ernie, you mentioned that it started at 17. So we have first usage at 13, all the different years of addiction and all that went with that.

What was... Actually, do this for us. Explain to us the difference between recovery and sobriety. I want people to recognize that and then kind of jump more into the recovery piece.

 

Kristen H

I love that. I mean, I feel like I've gone through period... So I've been in recovery for 10 years, right?

I got clean when I was 17. I'm 27. It's miraculous. I still can't believe that I'm in recovery. But there are differences.

mean, through these 10 years, I wouldn't say it was straight recovery. I mean, there were like a year or two or three in there where I wasn't quote unquote putting in the work.

Like what that means for me is like recovery looks different for each and every person and sobriety and abstinence looks different for each and every person.

But for me, I know that I am in recovery when I am going to therapy on a semi-consistent basis, right?

I'm being honest with that therapist. I am, you know, my method of recovery is 12-step meetings. It's not for everybody, right?

But it's for me. So I know for me, like if I'm going to like two to three 12-step meetings a week, I feel good about that.

And then also for me is the behaviors, right? Um, sure, I could be abstinent from drugs and alcohol. But if I'm, you know, playing video games for eight hours a day, and it's making my life unmanageable, then I might be slipping in one area of my life.

Um, if I'm, you know, swiping the credit card left and right, and then find myself in debt, like that's not a good place to be in.

So I look at all of the areas. Yeah, really appreciate you bringing that down for us.

 

Matt Zaun 

I heard a gentleman say once, and I'm paraphrasing, I'm sure I'm going to butcher it, but essentially, it doesn't matter how far down the road you are in recovery, you're only a couple feet away from the ditch.

And it really got me thinking that even if someone has really, really gone deep in their recovery journey, something can still happen, and they can get right back into the old habits.

My uncle shared a story with me once, just horrifying to think about this. He had a friend who was an alcoholic for quite some time.

He ended up being sober for 20 years, 20 years, and then gave the toast at his daughter's wedding with champagne, and he went right back to his old habits.

 

Kristen H

Oh, my God.

 

Matt Zaun 

So that story horrified me from the sense that you could spend a great deal of time. Time being sober.

And maybe I don't know how much he worked on himself from a recovery perspective. But that's kind of horrifying to me that that could still happen.

Does that, does that give you anxiety? Or does that give you pause where it's easy to go back to old habits, regardless of how much work's being done?

 

Kristen H

It's so easy. Like, I mean, just because I don't think about having a drink doesn't mean I don't think about other things.

Right. So like, you know, for instance, like I got engaged in April. Right. So like, I'm really excited about it.

We're like planning a wedding. And like, my fiance is awesome. Like, I love him so much. And he's like a huge supporter in everything that I do.

And, you know, for this wedding process, like, I'm like, Oh, I want to look good. I want to feel good.

Right. Right. So like, let's, and I typically go to the gym, like a handful of days a week. Right.

Always have. It's another part, another pillar of like my positive coping skill list. And But something inside of me took it too far to where I was like, I'm going to be on like a 1300 calorie, you know, only a day and go to the gym five days a week and drink like three gallons of water.

Like I took it so far. And like, it's funny because like, Matt, like by the end of the month, like Tim looked at me and he was like, are you okay?

Like, are you, are you good? Like, you're kind of, kind of irritable. And I was irritable because I was starving.

Like, you can't spend two hours at the gym and then only eat 1300 calories. Like, it's just not sustainable.

And like, I was like, yeah, I'm fine. And I like, ended up calling somebody in my support group. I think I actually talked to my therapist about it.

And I was like, so this is what I'm doing. And she was like, yeah, I don't know about that.

And I was like, yeah, I don't either. So, you know, scaled it back into a nice gray area, but I know that I'm slipping.

Not necessarily towards a relapse, but I know that I'm slipping backwards when I start to live in the black and white.

That is a very dangerous place for me, where if I start saying, well, everybody thinks this way, or everybody doesn't like me, or everybody's talking about me, like they're not.

Nobody, I promise, nobody's talking about you.

 

Matt Zaun 

So talk to us about that black and white area, because I feel there's so many high achievers that are all or nothing at all.

And we live in a society that rewards type A, hardcore, intensive, choleric type personalities. So someone that is go, go, go, and to the extreme.

mean, pick a celebrity that our society values, and there's some element of absolute extremism with that person. Any athlete, any massive business person.

I mean, there's an element of gut-wrenching, incredible amounts of extremism. What would you say to that person? I mean, maybe they're accomplishing tons of goals, but what questions would you ask regarding their mental health and their well-being?

 

Kristen H

Well, I mean, like I even think of my dad, right? Like when I was a kid, even as like a teenager, would walk downstairs to get some water and he would be on his computer at three in the morning, like writing emails, you know?

And I would look at him and I'd be like, what are you doing? Like you're not, you're not the CEO.

Like what are you doing? And even if you were like, get sleep, like you need to go to bed.

And like, he would be like, I just need to finish this email. And it would be like completely dark, only the computer illuminating his face.

And he would do that all the time. And I look at that and like, my dad would always say to me, like, he got addicted to the attaboys.

You're doing the most, like that type, like, like, like that behavior was, uh, it was celebrated. So like, you're doing the most, and you know, you're probably going to be up for promotion, and you're going to get a really good raise, and you're the best employee that we have.

And, and he got addicted to that, because he wasn't getting that anywhere else in his life. Right? So like, they're, they're right there as a gap.

Um, now, what I would say to somebody at that point is, you know, even for me, um, living in the gray is extremely difficult, and having boundaries in our life, in my life is extremely difficult.

Um, I don't pick up the phone every time. I don't. Um, I will say no to presentations, even if they are enticing.

Uh, because I know that I'm speaking eight times that week, and I don't have it in me to like, fly to Erie, Pennsylvania.

You know what I mean? Like, I just don't have it in me to do that for one presentation. Um, and it's like, I, I have like, little boundaries for myself on this is what, what's acceptable, and this is what isn't.

And if I start crossing these boundaries. I'm flirting with extremism, which will burn me out, and I will be resentful and want to quit my job.

 

Matt Zaun 

I appreciate you mentioning that. I want to talk about the addicted to the praise. You had mentioned your father, you know, this addiction to praise.

And we all have an element of that. I mean, you mentioned that. I know for myself, this was a big deal.

And then I do have a question for you personally regarding recovery, is that for me, speaking is incredible. It's a natural high.

I love it. It's absolutely, absolutely incredible. I never, ever, ever want to be a celebrity. I don't want to be famous.

I think that that brings up a whole slew of negative, negative things in one's life. But, you know, when you're, when you're speaking, it's almost like you are a mini celebrity, right?

Like you're on, you're on a stage and people, you'd mentioned a line of people coming to talk to you.

That, that really was challenging for me personally, because I felt like I needed to chase the dopamine after the talk was over.

So... So... I go out. I give this awesome talk. There's a room of people. And after the talk, just like yourself, there's a line.

People are talking to you. You have this incredible amount of praise being put on you. And for me personally, I really struggled with that because I'm like, this feels so good.

Like you had mentioned your first encounter with marijuana, right? Like just so good. Like, I don't want this to stop.

And one of the things I would do, I would drink alcohol soon after a talk because I'm like, I got to chase this dopamine.

Like I got to feel like I don't want this to end. This is incredible. So for someone like yourself, you know, you're, you're a decade into your recovery.

Is that a challenge for you when you get on stage and, and, and people are just, just, just lavishing you with praise and, and then you're trying to figure out like how you deal with that dopamine spike.

And if so, what, what do you do to, to, to combat that?

 

Kristen H

I mean, it is. Semi-recently, I spoke at a women's prison. I was very scared, not of the women, but of the prison, because I'd never been in a prison before, didn't know what to expect.

It was my first time doing that. And they told me, typically my presentation is about 45 minutes to an hour.

They said to me, you have 15 minutes. And I was like, great, love it. And that is not including the intro.

All that stuff takes time. And if you're like, oh gosh, I only have basically 12 minutes now. Let's see if I can fit my entire story and life lessons that I have in these 12 minutes.

And I was like, filled with adrenaline. Was like, all right, let's do it. I don't know if these women are going to relate to me.

I don't even know if they're going to like me. Like, I have a completely different story than they do.

Like, I mean, here we are living in black and white, me and them. Right. And I shared my story in the 12 minutes that I had.

Every inmate gets up, standing ovation. It was beautiful. They were all very grateful that I spoke to them. And, and I had a woman come up to me who is serving, I believe she was serving two life sentences.

And she shared with me that I gave her hope that her daughter will speak to her again. And I was like, well, how old's your daughter?

She was like, wait, she's, she's about 12. I was like, how long have you been in here? She was like, well, 12 years now.

So like she went into prison when her daughter was an infant. She told me the story that she was defending herself through domestic abuse and ended up killing her ex-spouse.

And I share that because like this woman who could have been, who was completely different than I was. Right.

Completely different stories. Like we hugged. don't know if we could hug, but we hugged. And I was like, thank you for sharing that with me.

Like she's doing her own counseling in the prison system. And I could not tell you how euphoric that felt.

Other than the fact that I knew that I had to do something. Like I had to do something with that energy.

So I went to the gym. I went to the gym. I got all that stuff out of my system.

And let me tell you, Matt, every time I present, I always think I'm going to be tired. I'm not.

I'm like all jazzed up. And I always have a gym bag in my car for that specific reason. When I'm done presenting, I go to the gym.

I eat something. And it's like sort of a bridge between me being on that stage and me being at home on my couch.

Like I need to have something to help taper the way that I feel so I don't crash.

 

Matt Zaun

Yeah, that's incredible. I really appreciate you mentioned that. And it's amazing. I can relate to that for sure. Because for me, I needed an idea.

So for me, was I unwind with alcohol. And then it became, no, I'm a healthy person. And I don't do this anymore.

So just like you, gym was it for me. And I started exercising three times a week. And I mean, there's hotels everywhere that have gyms.

So if I'm speaking at a hotel, and it's in a conference, and I can go right to the gym, I can lift a little bit, I can run a little bit.

So that became, I like that you mentioned that bridge, that became a bridge for me. I want to speak to, there's someone listening to this right now, where they have it all together on the outside, right?

They, they have achieved pretty much everything that they...

 

Kristen H

Go on.

 

Matt Zaun 

So I want to talk to you about, there's... Someone listening right now that they have done it all, they've seen it all, they have the t-shirt to prove it, right?

They may have created a wildly successful company. They may be an author. On the outside, they are incredibly successful, but they're really struggling with their daughter or son due to what you're saying, substance abuse, whether it's marijuana, alcoholism.

What would be a starting point for them that they should turn to, whether it's hope, whether it's a resource that you wish that you had back at 13?

What would be a recommendation that you would have for that person?

 

Kristen H

I mean, the recommendation that I would have would be like, don't keep it in the house. Don't keep it private.

Don't keep it secret. Because like the more people that... I mean, I'm not saying like shout it from the rooftops, right?

But like, if we can at least have one expert in our corner that is able to like help us navigate these situations, or like, let's say, at least for my dad, like my dad had parents that had been that were going through that situation.

He had a therapist that had been through that situation. My therapist would talk to him about what was going on.

So like, it helped him feel like less in the dark. But like, listen, like for any type of parent that's struggling with their kid using substances, or their kid struggling with mental health, like, I mean, my dad was so scared to put me in the hospital.

My dad was so scared to put me in rehab, like he thought it was going to tarnish me, he thought it was going to like, like, that something would fundamentally change.

But like, I needed inpatient care. Like, that is exactly what I needed. And the first time, I relapsed immediately.

The second time. He put me in long term treatment. I was in treatment for six months. And like, let me tell you, like, if I could do it time and time again, knowing that it would lead me to the life that I have today, like, I would have done it.

But like, I also have found to my dad probably could have been more supportive to me if he was filling his own bucket, so to speak.

Like when we see our kids struggling, we want to fix it and we want to make it better. And, you know, a lot of the time, like I just needed my dad.

I to hear me. I needed him to not fix it. I needed him to just be there and like be in my pain and say, Chris, like, that sucks.

And I'm sorry that you're going through that. Because my dad always wanted to make it better. Like, that's a dad's job, right?

It was the therapists that were really going to like help me do the work. But when my dad started to listen more than like talk at me, we started to build a much stronger bond and stronger relationship.

 

Matt Zaun 

know. you. you. great. you. Wow. Yeah. That is incredible advice. There's a tremendous amount of wisdom with that. Thank you so much for sharing.

And thank you for this conversation today. I really appreciate your vulnerability. I appreciate what you do more than you ever know.

I think that what you do is absolutely incredible. There's a lot of takeaways for me regarding this conversation, but there's three in particular that I'm going to remember after this podcast episode.

The first being, you mentioned empathy through pain. I think that's really important for people to recognize is that regardless of what we go through, we could see it as an opportunity to not only grow stronger, but to be able to connect with people.

You know, there's so many people talking about how AI is going to change culture and all these different things.

But one thing that AI cannot do is connect on a human element through that empathy. So even someone going through a really tough circumstance, use it as an opportunity to recognize this is a way for me to connect with someone even stronger.

That's the first point. The second point, I really appreciate you mentioning. That you have been in recovery for a decade and you're still going to meetings and you're still reaching out for counseling and you're still doing what you need to do.

I think that's really important because sometimes when we start to feel that we have it together, we let that go.

And you proved today that you shouldn't do that, right? And you're living proof of that. So I really appreciate that.

And then the third and final piece is I really appreciate you spelling out for us the dopamine bridge. You talking about that speaker high and instead of reaching for alcohol or instead of reaching for another substance, you go to the gym.

I think that's so important because it's incredibly relatable to everyone. It doesn't matter if they're 13 years old or if they're 65 and running a massive organization.

There's so many people that will reach for alcohol or reach for marijuana or reach for whatever. So I think it's really important for us to hear about that bridge that you had mentioned.

So Kristen, thanks so much. If anyone wants to get more information on what you do, they want to reach out to you for speaking.

 

Kristen H

Thank you so much, Matt.

 

Matt Zaun 

That was awesome.