From Brokenness to Compassion: Gina Economopoulos on Grief, Faith, and Finding Purpose

🗓️ Episode Summary:
In this deeply moving episode of Walk With Me, host Stephanie Bloom speaks with Gina Economopoulos—author, end-of-life doula, and former Catholic nun—about how life's deepest wounds can cultivate our greatest compassion. Gina shares her journey through chronic illness, profound grief, religious trauma, addiction, and recovery, and how these trials ultimately equipped her to serve others at the threshold of death.

Her story, told with unflinching honesty and fierce grace, invites listeners to reflect on how pain doesn't disqualify us—it prepares us to walk with others through theirs.

📚 Gina is the author of Shake the Dust Off Your Feet and Walk, a memoir of loss, love, and liberation.

💡 Key Topics Covered:

• Growing up with illness and internalizing unworthiness
• Seeking belonging through people-pleasing and performance
• Joining—and being expelled from—a religious order after 12 years of service
• Losing her fiancé to alcoholism a month before their wedding
• Discovering her own alcoholism and beginning the healing journey at 49
• Becoming an end-of-life doula and rediscovering purpose through presence
• What it means to help others die with dignity
• How trauma, grief, and spiritual surrender shaped her story of transformation

📌 Notable Quotes:

“I got so used to bad things happening that it became normal. But healing meant choosing not to expect pain as my identity.”

“I don't fear death. I see Jesus in those I sit beside in their final hours.”

“If nobody told you they love you today—I do.”

📖 Resources & Links:

• 📕 Shake the Dust Off Your Feet and Walk – Available on Amazon
• 🌐 Visit Gina’s website: www.ginaecon.com
• Learn more about end-of-life doula work: INELDA.org

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🔗 Share this episode with someone who is grieving, healing, or searching for meaning. You never know whose life it might change.

🎙️ Episode Title: Between Beauty and Pain: Navigating Love, Loss, and the Aftermath of Suicide
🎧 Guest: Paula DiMarco
🎤 Host: Stephanie Bloom
Podcast: Walk With Me

Episode Summary:
In this powerful and emotionally charged episode, visual artist and writer Paula DiMarco opens up about surviving childhood dysfunction, loving someone with PTSD, and ultimately processing the tragic suicide of her partner, Alex. From her upbringing in Argentina to her creative healing journey in Canada, Paula shares the raw reality of trauma, the double-edged sword of hyper-adaptability, and how writing and art helped her make sense of the unimaginable. Together with host Stephanie Bloom, they discuss the rarely acknowledged trauma experienced by those who are left behind when someone threatens or dies by suicide.

Key Themes:

• The unseen trauma of suicide threats
• Loving someone with PTSD and depression
• Grieving someone whose truth you never fully knew
• Emotional abuse vs. mental illness—holding both truths
• The role of art and writing in healing and identity reclamation
• What the system gets wrong about crisis support
• Setting boundaries when your survival is on the line

Quotable Moments:
🖤 “Hyper-adaptability helped me survive, but it also made me tolerant of environments I should have never stayed in.”
🖋️ “Writing became my lifeline—the only place where I could unpack everything without censoring or sugarcoating.”
💬 “Being the one someone threatens suicide to is a trauma all its own.”
🌊 “Art was how I stayed connected to myself while everything around me was falling apart.”

Resources & Mentions:

• Paula’s blog and forthcoming book on surviving suicide loss
• Suicide Prevention Resources (e.g., Talk Suicide Canada, 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline)

🎙️ Walk With Me Podcast
Episode Title: Healing the Root: Tammy Cox on Breaking Cycles, Reclaiming Self, and Transforming Love
Host: Stephanie Bloom
Guest: Tammy Cox – Relationship Coach, Host of Behind the Veil Podcast

Episode Summary:
In this raw and illuminating conversation, Tammy Cox shares her journey from a traumatic childhood marked by abuse and religious control to becoming a transformational relationship coach. Tammy walks us through how she unraveled her own inherited wounds, recognized destructive patterns, and rebuilt her life through deep emotional work and spiritual clarity. Now, she helps other women uncover the subconscious beliefs keeping them stuck—especially in love—and walks with them toward genuine healing.

Tammy’s story is not just one of personal evolution; it’s a blueprint for stopping generational trauma and choosing emotional freedom over inherited pain. This episode explores the connection between inner healing and outer relationships, the limitations of talk therapy, the power of somatic release, and why motherhood became her wake-up call to finally heal.

What We Talk About:

• The trauma of being raised in a controlling and abusive environment
• Losing her father to AIDS at 11 and the psychological aftermath
• The internal conflict of grieving someone who hurt you
• How unresolved trauma shows up in motherhood and relationships
• Why traditional therapy didn’t go deep enough
• The belief that ruled her life: “I am unlovable”
• What actually works to heal core wounds
• The importance of finding the root pattern and subconscious belief
• Releasing fear-based religion and embracing spirituality
• Creating a new legacy for her children by modeling emotional freedom
• The power of being fully present, even during conflict
• How she works with clients to guide them through deep transformation
• Why healing isn’t quick—but it is possible

Quotable Insights:

“If I don’t heal me, she is going to become me.”
“Talk therapy was just a band-aid. I needed to go deeper—into the body, into the belief.”
“You can’t pass on what you haven’t practiced. That includes peace.”
“Every traumatic event comes with a belief. And that belief is creating your entire life experience.”
“You’re not just healing for yourself. You’re healing for your lineage.”

Connect with Tammy Cox:

• Website & Coaching: Tammy's Linktree
• Podcast: Behind the Veil: Anonymous Transformations

Trending Topics Covered:
mentalhealth • healingjourney • traumahealing • emotionalintelligence • selflove • innerchildhealing • somatichealing • mindfulness • resilience • relationshiprepair

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