Ep.26-Unresolved Trauma: Learning to Speak Up and Start Living!

In this episode, I am joined by Kevin Tuttle, and we have a beautifully vulnerable and honest conversation about the impact of unresolved trauma. Kevin shares his story of childhood trauma and finally faces the biggest challenge of addressing himself to begin his healing. Unresolved trauma can have massive effects on all aspects of your life. We develop unhelpful patterns of coping that are actually leading to our own self-destruction. Listen in, as Kevin shares with us, in deep honesty, how he stopped keeping secrets, told his story, and began to see healing on the other side. There is healing for you and you are not in this alone!

 

About our guest:

Kevin is a husband to an amazing wife and father of two incredible children. He’s the public relations director for Our Amazing Grace’s Light Shines On, Inc., as well as associate producer for The Robert Scott Bell Show. Kevin believes in freedom and in YHWH, the Creator of everything. To hear, “Well done, my good and faithful servant,” when he’s face-to-face with God is what drives him to be a better person each day. Kevin is a veteran of the U.S. Air Force, and enjoys road biking, making people laugh, and spending time with his family. Facing his trauma has released him of the bondage that tore at his life and his soul, and encourages everyone to do the same. 

 

 Resources:

“Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents” by Lindsay C. Gibson

“The Body Keeps the Score” by Bessel Van Der Kolk, M.D. 

 

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Transcript
Anna Ditchburn:

I know you, you are afraid to speak up, you are scared of what other people think of you. And you blame yourself for what happened to you. I know how it feels. Because I’ve been there. If you found me, I’m so grateful you’re here. This podcast will give you hope. And now I’m your host, Anna Ditchburn. I’m going to hold your hand and provide the guidance that I needed the most. It’s time for you to find your why. And turn your experience into your superpower. So lock your door, put your headphones in, and enjoy. Kevin Tuttle Welcome to the world’s best Trauma Recovery podcast.

Kevin Tuttle:

Thank you so much. And it’s an honor to be here.

Anna Ditchburn:

Thank you so much for coming. And your story is just incredible. And I’m looking forward to dive in. But before we do this, Kevin, what is the definition of trauma means to you,

Kevin Tuttle:

our trauma is the the pain endured, usually as a child, but can be later in life. Just any unresolved pain that you haven’t worked through emotionally especially. And that trauma can just affects your life and every single facet until it’s addressed.

Anna Ditchburn:

Why do you think it’s so important to speak up and heal?

Kevin Tuttle:

Well, man, where do you start, I don’t feel that you can truly live and be who you’re supposed to be, unless you’ve addressed that trauma in your life, burying it, pretending it didn’t exist, pretending it didn’t affect your life that just eats you up. And you have to you have to face yourself, you know, I spent many years running from who I was due to the trauma I had as a child, and it never did any good for me. And it wasn’t until I addressed those those fears, you know, addressed myself about starting about two years ago that I finally was able to start living and to be who I’m supposed to be.

Anna Ditchburn:

This is so spot on. Start leaving, because so many people don’t realize that it’s holding us back.

Kevin Tuttle:

Yes, yes. You can’t. You can’t function in life. I mean, the patterns that you that you’ve created through your trauma, those negatively affect your lives. You know, I’ve not heard of anybody who had these patterns that that did amazing things for them later in life, you know, it doesn’t work that way. So it’s definitely something that you have to face head on and, and realize that it’s okay, that you don’t have it all figured out. You know, their life is a is a journey. And even the bad stuff can eventually become something that we can view as something beautiful. Because it made us who we are.

Anna Ditchburn:

I love it. Kevin, what is your trauma is coming from.

Kevin Tuttle:

So when I was a about five years old, we had just moved to Alaska. My dad was in the Air Force, and he got stationed in Fairbanks, Alaska, or in North Pole technically. And shortly after that he separated from the Air Force, and we moved out to the bush of Alaska. So we live near 60 miles north of Fairbanks. And we lived in a small log cabin, no running water, no electricity. There was a little community out there, you know, I went to a little public school that had about 20 Kids K through 12. But shortly before we moved out to the bush, in the community that’s in North Pole. And in our neighborhood, there was a fort that the neighborhood kids had built out in the woods. And it was this fort that, you know, at five years old, I wasn’t allowed to go there. Because it’s for the bigger kids. You know, it’s for the 12 and 13 and 14 year olds and I didn’t know what was going on back there. But I heard all sorts of great things about this for you know, is this mysterious fort. And it turned out that my my sister took me to this fort. One day when she knew no other kids were there. How old was she? She’s seven years older than me. And she said, Do you want to see what’s in the fort? I’m like, Yes. Finally the fort, the mystical fort. So she took me out there. And you know, there were cigarette butts and beer cans and that sort of thing. And this crummy little, you know, just had like plywood walls. There was nothing, you know, as far as as far as the majesty of this board, but uh, so it had just garbage and stuff in there and then it had a stack of mag busines, and she asked me if I wanted to see what was in the magazines. And they were pornography. And I had no idea what I was looking at. But she wanted to show them to me. And it just made me feel awful. You know, I didn’t, I didn’t understand. So fast forward then to moving out to the bush. It’s then that my sister began molesting me was when we moved out there. And that continued for about two years. So I was about six to seven, almost eight years old before it stopped. But yeah, it was, it was that, you know, the sexual molestation by my sister.

Anna Ditchburn:

Kevin, did you tell anyone about what was happening?

Kevin Tuttle:

No. Not at all. I, I had parents who were very loving to me, you know, I, but for some reason, I was so fearful of telling, I wasn’t even threatened. Other than my sister saying, Don’t tell this won’t be good. You know. So I felt like I was I needed to be loyal to her and not get her in trouble. Because that’s, that was kind of what she said, you know, this will get me in trouble. So don’t say anything. And she was the one that I played with all the time, you know, she would play outside with me. And I had an older brother who’s two years older than the my sister, and he didn’t know anything he didn’t know, nobody knew. I didn’t tell anybody. In fact, I didn’t tell my parents for 30 years. And the secrets, you know, everything. It just builds in your body. It was awful. But no, I didn’t tell anybody. You know,

Anna Ditchburn:

it’s, it’s very common, when even without any threat, kids are so afraid to speak up, Kevin, how this unresolved trauma impacted your personal life impacted your relationship with your wife and your kids

Kevin Tuttle:

in every way possible. It impacted. So, you know, I told my wife before we got married, she was the only one I told I felt like she needed to know this. And, you know, she was horrified, of course, shocked? And then it’s like, Well, you told me, okay, great. So, you know, we can move forward now. And there was never any talk of, you know, should you get counseling for that? Should you, you know, it was more like, Okay, we know now, and, you know, and that was just our immaturity at the time, too. But the biggest place where it impacted me was the repeated patterns of destruction in my life. Because I would sabotage anything good. I would start to sabotage, if it’s a friendship, if it’s a job, whatever it was, you know, my brain was was rewired through that trauma. And it made me think, and do things that irrational person wouldn’t do. I wouldn’t, today, I wouldn’t, I wouldn’t try to find somebody to try to take my pain away. And that’s, that’s one thing that I constantly tried to do, you know, there was a lot of infidelity in my life, because I felt, you know, my wife is not taking this pain away, she’s not healing me. And so somebody, this relationship can’t be right, it has to be, it’s her fault. So there has to be somebody else out there who can take it away from me, and then I would move on to the next person and the next person. And I was very, very good at keeping these secrets, because that’s something that I learned at that, through that trauma is the secrets. So my wife never knew. And, you know, ultimately, it just, it was just a destructive pattern over and over and over again, and the amount of sorrow I have for my actions, and the amount of guilt and, and all of that, you know, it’s been so great to finally address myself and to stop running because that’s, that’s what I felt I was doing. And I’m 45 years old. And it wasn’t until two years ago that I addressed any of this. And that’s a long time to run. It’s a long time. So it as far as how it affected my kids. I’ve always been proud of how of the good father that I am. I’ve protected my kids, from the moment they were born. I’ve tried to you know, not just medically, but in any facet. Emotionally, always. The one thing I’m most proud of actually in my life is that I didn’t pass down what was done to me to my kids, because that’s a typical pattern of somebody who’s been abused as a child, that you end up abusing your own children. And that’s the number one thing I’m so grateful to God for for giving me that much grace, that this was never even a thought in my life to To put that evil onto my kids, I knew it would die with me. And, but it affected my kids overall, you know, in that I was still running from myself. I scheduled a lot of work conferences away from home, I got into cycling, you know, really into cycling where I go and do 120 130 miles. And you know, that takes eight, nine hours a day sometimes, or a weekend long bicycle trips, or whatever it was that, that I could just be away from the family because when I wasn’t there, then there was no guilt. Right, then I felt like it also the exercise took over where it felt like this therapy that I needed to punish myself, and, and just sweat all day and be miserable sometimes. But whatever it was, it felt therapeutic in a sense. And then I felt like I could see my family again. So it’s been a very twisted relationship sometimes. So

Anna Ditchburn:

thank you so much for sharing, Kevin. I wonder, what was your aha moment? When you stop and thought, now this is the time to heal? And what do you do first?

Kevin Tuttle:

Well, you know, I’d like to take all the credit for it. Like I looked at myself and said, You know, it’s time. But that’s not how it happened. I was having an affair. And I got tired of this woman. And I started talking to somebody else on social media. And those two ladies found out about each other. And they both contacted me and said, We know what you’re doing. And they said, We’re going to contact your wife, if you don’t tell her in the next hour. And I was actually out on a walk when I got that call. And there’s traffic going by. And the first thought I had was, is this? Are these cars going fast enough to actually kill me? Or am I just going to get injured when I walk in front of one because that’s what I wanted to do. And you know, it’s a residential neighborhood. So they were only going 25. And I’m not that good at math. And I couldn’t figure it out in my head would kill me or not. So I was like, You know what, I love my my family and my kids too much. Anyway, this is it wasn’t a serious, suicidal thought. But I said, Okay, this is it’s time. So I went back home, and I talked to my wife and told her what, what I was doing. And yeah, that was that was the aha moment. But it wasn’t just about the, the earthly moment of that, you know, the, my physical moment, it was more spiritual based. You know, I grew up, as you know, in a Christian household. I was I had a relationship with God, from the time I was 10 years old. until probably my college years, early college years is when I started moving away from God. And it felt like it was that moment that God, like, grabbed me by the collar and gave me a good slap and said, Kevin, it’s time now come back. Because I feel like I have a lot to offer. I feel like you have always been a good person outside of this realm, right? I’ve always helped people I’ve generously given of myself and financially and all those things, you know, I never want to see harm come to people. Yet. My own destruction was something that I was always okay with. Because I always felt like I wanted to die. Like inside, I was like, I want to die. And I was in the Air Force. And I volunteered to go to Afghanistan. Because I thought, Look, if I can go there, and I can get into a battle and I can die there, then I will die as you know, an American hero or whatever. Whatever you however, we want to look at that. Right? It was just so sad. My life was sad without God in it. And, you know, it was that point when, when God grabbed me and said, It’s time now that that I really felt it is time and I really repented. I repented to God. I repented to my wife, and I actually had to repent to myself, and that, believe it or not, that was probably harder than repenting to my wife. Because accepting yourself after everything you know, that you’ve done, and all the trauma you’ve been through to say that you can love yourself. That’s been the hardest thing,

Anna Ditchburn:

Kevin, I really appreciate you being so vulnerable and so open and so honest, because not many realize that all those destructive behavior is coming from our childhood. It’s not because we are bad people. It’s just we didn’t I have the strength and discouraged to address those traumas and to see how trauma is causing all these challenges and negative things in our in our life. Yeah, you

Kevin Tuttle:

know, there’s no classes you go through in elementary or high school that say, Here’s how to deal with trauma, it’s, you know, that’s a, like a forbidden topic, like, you know, it’s always, especially as a male, and at least that’s how I feel like, we’re supposed to be the ones that that can kind of handle everything, right, doesn’t matter how much it hurts, or, you know, just buckle up, you know, get over it. And so that those are the attitudes that, that are very difficult to overcome. That, you know, I can’t just buckle up, I feel dead inside. And I told that so many times, I even told it to my wife, you know, in a joking manner, well, you know, that’s not going to matter, because I’m dead inside anyway, you know, that, that type of delivery, where there’s so much truth to it every time I would say it, and then in those dark moments by myself, that’s, that’s when I, I especially felt alone, and, and lonely. You know, no matter who was in my life, I always felt lonely. You know, the children that I love more than anything, they couldn’t make me feel they couldn’t take that pain away from me either. You know, so it’s addressing yourself, that’s the biggest challenge, I think,

Anna Ditchburn:

how did your relationship with your wife improve? After you? What are your thoughts here?

Kevin Tuttle:

Well, right now, it’s night and day, even to what it was before I told her everything, we are closer now than we’ve ever been. And I’m very, very fortunate to have a wife who, who loves me that much that she would stick with me after all of this. But she understood both from a spiritual point of view, as well as the emotional trauma point of view, that the things I did weren’t me, that’s not who I was deep inside that, that there is a good person, there’s a somebody who has, you know, many gifts, and abilities, and who will nurture and care for his family and be a spiritual man that he’s always supportive always was meant to be. So she saw that, but it was a long process. I mean, we’re still going through, you know, it doesn’t heal overnight, we’re still in counseling together. But our relationship is better than it’s ever been. Because those secrets are gone. All the secrets are gone. And I can’t explain to you, you know, there’s any man out there listening, who thinks that you’re texting somebody, and your wife’s not going to find out or your Facebook messaging somebody or whatever, these these little things, you know, are these little adrenaline rush things that you get by by communicating with people outside of your wife. It’s all worthless. It’s all don’t do it, you know, just stop what you’re doing and, and realize that, you know, this, it doesn’t fix anything. You know, going on to another person doesn’t fix your pain that you’re dealing with right now. So there’s something that happened in your life that you’re even at that point where you’re doing these things, so you need to go back and address what it is within you. That’s making you do these things. And once you do that, things, it felt like 1000 pounds just fell off. You know that this? You just feel light. You just feel joy. You feel hope? You feel love, you know, and you don’t feel lonely anymore. It’s It’s amazing.

Anna Ditchburn:

Wow, Kevin, I’m very happy for you. And your story resonates with me. When I told my mom what was happening to me here reaction was so amazing. I got my mom back. She became a mama bear. Even though she was the hardest person for me to tell. And you’re saying there is no more secret. And I felt like in our relationship with your and that was always close to here. In our relationship with your there was always an elephant in the room. And it just it can’t bring you closer. It we couldn’t connect. And when I told her, I felt exactly the same. It’s like the weight of the world came off my shoulders, the light and it really made us closer together. I’ve never had such an amazing relationship with my mom. And I am so grateful she understood me. I love that she didn’t turn her back.

Kevin Tuttle:

What you said there was you couldn’t connect. That’s exactly true. And it’s wasn’t just with your mother, you couldn’t connect with anybody, I’m sure because that’s that’s how I felt like I can’t fully connect with anyone. That’s why you feel alone. And yeah, right after this happened, actually, after the confession and everything, it was springtime. And I went out we have a bunch of these ferns in the backyard and I went out because they’re they take over these ferns, you know, you can plant one and pretty soon your whole yard is taken over by these things. Because the roots go underground and connect with one another, then you have a noose, a new firm spring up. And it’s this tangled web of ferns. So I went out to remove a couple of these ferns think I didn’t know that this is how they were connected, right? I thought each fern is its own route, but they’re all connected to when I started pulling one up, then this long route would go to the other one. And now it pulled that one up. And they’re not easy to get up. You know, they’re they’re underground are a good ways. And I was out there for weeks doing this. And I’m on my hands and knees and pulling these things out. And there was something within me that said you have to keep going. And because there was some sort of connection to the way these tangled ferns were there, their roots. And I, I likened it to the lies that I was living in my life like one Fern represented one lie. And I would go out and pull up the other lie. And I just needed to pull them all out and get rid of them all. And I was physically doing what I was emotionally doing inside as well. And then I could connect

Anna Ditchburn:

Kevin, just listening to your story contesto. You know, in my previous relationship, I was constantly the one who would leave the relationship or cheat on my boyfriends. And it’s really it wasn’t because I’m an dishonest person or bad person, I think I was so afraid to get closer, or to let them come closer to me. And as soon as I would feel they tried to get into my soul, I would back up straight away, I will just find other person, just you know, like you to get my pain away. I didn’t want to bring anyone closer. The reason I’m telling you this, thank you for opening up. I feel like I’m not alone. Thank you.

Kevin Tuttle:

You’re welcome. You’re not alone. We are not alone. There’s when you look at the stats, I think the stats say something like one in five people have been sexually abused in one fashion or another. So imagine that imagine when you go to church, and you sit around and there’s 100 people in that room? Imagine what how many people there have been, have been affected by trauma, or you go to a concert where there’s 3000 people and we’re not alone. We’re not alone at all. It’s just we’re the ones who are are moving past that stage of this is what happened to me and I have to live with it eternally. No, you don’t, you can get rid of this, you know, the trauma can be overcome. And then you can become somebody new, somebody better, and somebody who’s living freely. You know, I’m a huge part of the reason I wanted to join the Air Force in the first place was because I believe in freedom so much yet, I’m living this life that is keeping me in chains, both spiritually and physically. And I kept repeating these these growth patterns that weren’t free at all. So now you know, I’m I continue to fight for freedom all the time, if it’s medical freedom, or you know, freedom from tyranny, but also freedom from trauma. And it’s, it’s amazing to be free is the greatest dance, why? In the Bible even says it? You’re supposed to be free. So it’s a beautiful thing.

Anna Ditchburn:

I mean, brother. Given you’ve mentioned that you haven’t told your parents, what was happening to you for 30 years. What was their reaction? And how did it feel?

Kevin Tuttle:

So I was actually on the phone with my parents. They live in Israel. And I was living in Florida at the time. And I had not seen my sister in I don’t know, a few years at that point. And you know, this conversation I’m having with my parents, they’re telling me all about her and her name is Nicole. So they’re telling me all about Nicole, what she’s doing with her kid is doing stuff I said, Mom, I don’t care. Just I don’t care about Nicole just stop talking to me about her. And because I was every time I even heard the name Nicole, like this knot in my stomach would would appear right? And I get really agitated and triggered. And so my mom was like, What is your problem? What do you have against her? Like all the time every time I start talking about her you get mad like what is the issue? And I bet Have you just snapped? And like, do you really want to know? Are you ready? Do you really want to hear and I told them, I said, remember those times on the Elliot highway in north of Fairbanks, Alaska in the bush, when you guys were searching for God, you didn’t know what was happening to me upstairs in that cabin, you didn’t realize that Nicole was molesting me, you didn’t know that every time you went into town, to go grocery shopping, that she molested me, you didn’t know any of these things, because I kept them secret. And the reason I didn’t tell for so long was because I knew that if I told that it would ruin the relationship that my parents and my brother had with my sister. And you know, I believe that that eventually actually came to pass, they don’t have much of a relationship. But you know what, that’s it’s just the truth. The truth is the only thing that you should tell. And, you know, the reaction that my parents had to me was one of complete love, you know, they, my mom broke down crying my dad, it’s, it’s hard to, you know, I didn’t want them to feel those things. I didn’t want them to feel the responsibility, because I don’t ultimately believe it was their fault. You know, this, but they did not cut me out. They did not accuse me of being a liar. They embraced me and said that they’re so sorry,

Anna Ditchburn:

what an amazing, amazing response. And you know, Kevin, very often and I, I felt exactly the same. We are trying to protect our parents, I was one of the reasons I couldn’t tell my mom, because I thought she’s not going to handle it. Yeah, she’s not going to handle it. But opening up to here, I’ve realized it helped your to get on your healing journey. It’s like Pandora’s box was open for sure. And all these signs of me, you know, begging here here for not leaving me with him, or why I was so angry at him. And just everything made sense, for sure. And it helped her to open up to me what she was going through as a child.

Kevin Tuttle:

Very true, very true, you know, as twisted as it sounds, you’re giving that person an opportunity to love you. And it’s hard. You know, none of this is easy. Facing yourself and the trauma and it’s all very, very hard. It’s physically draining, it’s emotionally draining. Like after, after therapy, sometimes my wife is just like, how did it go? And I can’t even answer I just want to go lay down because I’m spent, you know, but it’s, I don’t know, I feel like it’s it’s one of those bike workouts where I’m going for 120 miles, and afterwards you’re exhausted on the I feel like that after an hour just talking about stuff that happened to me. You know, so the, the amount of work on your body is similar, you know, in a weird way. Exactly. But you know, one of the things that that you mentioned with not telling your mom I’m reading or I’ve read this book, The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel Vander Kolk Vander Kolk, fantastic book for anybody out there, who is just starting to face your trauma, get this book, I guarantee it’s going to help you. And one of the things he talks about in it is loyalty. You know, we have, we have this innate sense of loyalty to those who are, are near to us, and we want to protect them. And he says in it, the price of this loyalty is unbearable feelings of loneliness, despair, and the inevitable rage of helplessness rage that has nowhere to go is redirected against the self in the form of depression, self hatred, and self destructive actions. That couldn’t nail me any more than it did I mean that the self destructiveness, the self hatred, all of that has gone away by by facing myself and getting help for for this trauma. So amazing book again, please, please go get that

Anna Ditchburn:

I would also highly recommend that it explains so many things. Just Knowledge is power. Honestly, when I started to tap into my, my trauma, I realized that I did so many things without even knowing where is it coming from? And you know, you know, even talking about parents now, when I when I speak freely with my mom, our parents, biologically designed to kill for their kids to kill to destroy, and by keeping a secret, we just we do a dishonor for them, because they really, as you mentioned, don’t have an opportunity to protect us. But I understand not many parents have this feeling for their kids. And so, I still think if you don’t have this relationship with your parents, this is for my listeners, look for someone who went through a similar situation. Look for someone who who knows how It feels and who is already there on another side of the tunnel? Because asking for help is what helped me.

Kevin Tuttle:

Yeah, you have to you have to find what it is that is causing the destruction. You know, and that comes through the, through the therapy. Recently in our, in our bathroom, we had a little bit of mold. And turned out that that little bit of mold was not a little bit it, we had to tear apart the entire bathroom to get rid of this mold. And I thought, This is what occurs to you with secrets. Secrets are mold. They they fester, they, they germinate, because you know one secret on top of another and now you’re growing that the mold that is so toxic, and destructive and deadly. It just starts spreading. And then pretty soon in order to get rid of it, you got to tear it all down. You got to remove everything. And it’s a pain. It hurts. It’s it’s burdensome. But then after everything gets put back together, it’s perfect. It’s operating as it should. It’s clean. It’s holy, it’s pure. And yeah, it’s so worth it. You can’t live with the mold. It’s just going to kill you.

Anna Ditchburn:

I bloody love this analogy. Honestly, it’s literally explained the trauma. I love it. Kevin,

Kevin Tuttle:

thank you, I’ll send you a bill. Use it.

Anna Ditchburn:

copyrights. Kevin, what would you say, if you will have an opportunity to your five years old self now? Knowing what you know now?

Kevin Tuttle:

Wow. That’s a Yeah, you know, I mentioned the fort earlier. And this is something that my therapist and I have have covered. The fort is where everything started. For me. It’s the first time I saw pornography. And he took me back to that fort. And he said, you know, tell me about the day, I had to tell him about the weather, everything that I could remember, and it was a great spring day it was it was chilly out. It was mid morning, you know, giving them every detail I possibly could. So okay, tell me what you see on the fort. And I told them about the cigarette butts and the beer cans. And he said, What else is there? And I said, well, the magazines are there. And then he had Nikolas show me the magazine. And he said, Now What? What do you want to do? Because as that five year old, I wanted to run, but I didn’t. And he says you can change it. What do you want to do? I said, I want to run? Okay, run. So I did. And he said Where are you running to? So I thought about that. And like I’m running home home is where I felt safe. But he said, Well, who’s going to be home? And neither of my parents were home. So nobody would be there when I showed up? Right? So I’m aware I’m running home, but to what? And he said, What about you, Kevin? And I didn’t understand what do you mean? You said, How about Kevin today is waiting for five year old Kevin. And he said, I said I would love that I would love to run to myself because I know who I am. And how I would comfort that kid. He says okay, then run to yourself. And then he asked me what I would do. And I said, I would get on my knees and embrace the five year old who’s who’s scared to death, who’s running for his life, I would embrace him and, and tell him, it is not his fault. Because that’s the biggest thing that I’ve carried with my life is that all of this was my fault. At six years old, it was my fault that I didn’t stop it at seven years old. It was my fault that I didn’t stop it. But I was a child. And you know, I take my mentality as an adult thinking, Okay, I could have stopped it. But I was a little kid. And it wasn’t my fault. And that’s what I would tell myself that what that proves what your sister showed you was not your fault. You are not in trouble, you are safe. And we can we can move on from this, you know, so that that was the most memorable session that I’ve had with him to be able to kind of change that memory, where it not only changed my outlook of things, but it got to the point where recently I was having a conversation with somebody and they mentioned the name Nicole that had nothing to do with my sister, just somebody else with the name Nicole. And it didn’t trigger me. And when I got in the car, and I was driving home after that meeting, I reflected on that. My that name didn’t trigger me. And then I thought I’m there. I said I forgive her. I actually forgive her. I don’t want anything to do with her. Don’t get me wrong. I don’t want to relationship with her. You know, she’s just whatever happens to her happens to her but I she doesn’t own me anymore. by forgiving her. I’ve put all the guilt on her shoulders. Everything’s with her, it wasn’t my fault. And that again is so liberating.

Anna Ditchburn:

Wow, Kevin, I was getting so emotional. While he was telling this story. Thank you. You’re welcome, Kevin, what would be your best advice for other men who is going through a similar situation?

Kevin Tuttle:

First of all, you have to turn your life over to God. Without God, there’s no foundation. All right, you can think that the world is just appeared here. But without God, without a creator, there’s no foundation for anything. And so you need to get your faith, right. And then you just need to address yourself, you know, find a therapist who deals with trauma, there’s a lot of good ones out there. And they can do these types of tactics to take you back to change some memories to to work through everything that’s hurting you. It’s, again, that mold is just going to spread and you know what you’re doing in your personal life. If it’s, if you’re watching pornography, you got to stop. If you’re watching, you know, anything that you’re you’re seeing that isn’t righteous, and that isn’t right, you got to knock it off. And, and it’s not just men, this is women too, right? I mean, we all we’re all humans, we all do things we shouldn’t be doing. But the trauma, the growth of of the mold inside of you, only the cleansing bleach of Jesus, and, and spirituality can actually remove this from your life.

Anna Ditchburn:

Thank you, Kevin, thank you so much. Thank you, Kevin. Before we go, do you have any concluding thoughts?

Kevin Tuttle:

Yeah, so you know, I mentioned cycling earlier, there’s a bicycle ride that takes place every year across the state of Iowa. It’s called rag Bri. And I did that ride numerous times. But the first time I did it, my daughter was about a year and a half old, and I had never left her before. And this way, the right is a week long across the state. So I was gone for eight days. And when I came back, Ellie saw me from across the yard. And she came running to me. And you know, I pick her up and I give her a big hug. And she gives me a big hug. And then she pushes her her body away from from my body. And we’re face to face, and she grabbed my face. And she just started bawling, just weeping. And then she put her her head on my shoulders, that feeling of of joy. And, and missing somebody. And all of that can be can be felt by you, just by addressing your trauma, you can eventually look at yourself in the mirror and grab your face out of love and, and then just know that it’s over your back your whole you can you can feel complete. And I just encourage everybody out there to address this, please. And you’re going to be a better person for it. You’re going to be able to live your life as was intended to whatever your mission is, is here on life. We all have different missions, whatever that is, you’ll be able to do it. But until you address that trauma, it’s not going to happen.

Anna Ditchburn:

Kevin, thank you so much for sharing your story. And again for being so vulnerable. And I’m sure it helped me, and it will help millions who hear this story. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Kevin Tuttle:

It was an honor. Thank you so much, Anna,

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