Christie Deiter 00:00:00  And everything drastically changed in what my trajectory of my life looked like on January 31st, 2023. What I ended up seeing when I look back in retrospect of like, what gave you the courage, Christie, to not go home that day? It’s because of what I did and the habits that I built and the confidence that I built in myself of what I was able to do and how I changed my body, and how I felt in the confidence that grew through the work I did in my health and wellness, is what gave me the strength to not go home, and what’s continued to give me to the strength to fight this fight.

Katy Ripp 00:00:34  Hey there fellow rebels, welcome to #ActuallyICan, the podcast where we say a hearty hell yes to designing life on our own terms. I’m Katy Ripp, a lifestyle coach, business mentor, and serial entrepreneur here to guide you through the wild ride, defying what society expects of us and embracing our authenticity. On this show, we dive deep into taboo topics like death, money, spirituality, Entrepreneurship, unapologetic self-care, and personal development, all while swearing and laughing along the way.

Katy Ripp 00:01:06  Expect down and dirty conversations, plenty of humor, and a whole lot of exploration, leaving you feeling empowered to be your truest self. Whether you’re craving a good laugh, seeking unconventional self-care tips, or simply looking for some camaraderie, you’ve come to the right place. We only get this one short life, so buckle up and let’s design yours on our own terms. Ready to dive in? Let’s go. Let’s introduce you. Yes. And I’m gonna let you do that. But we sort of met via Instagram. Instagram. But you also went to high school with my husband, right? I did yeah. Yeah. So that’s amazing. Yeah. So tell me a little bit about yourself.

Christie Deiter 00:01:49  So my name is Christie Dieter. I have been in the health and fitness mentorship platform for three, almost four years now. And it’s been something that’s evolved my entire story in my position in what that has looked like drastically changed on January 31st of 2023, which is the big reason why I’m here today, to talk about that taboo subject of financial abuse.

Katy Ripp 00:02:16  So I had not really I had actually never heard the term financial abuse. So I’m super interested in hearing about that. I think most people know I like to talk about taboo subjects. I think that most of the things that we don’t talk about end up under the bed, and then we get cloaked in shame and guilt and all the things, all the lovely things that usually come from the Catholic religion, but in general, in general, just come in midlife kind of rear their ugly head. So tell me a little bit about what financial abuse is before we get into your story.

Christie Deiter 00:02:51  Financial abuse typically, like if we think of financial abuse in a general term, or kind of where people are starting to understand it, is that you’re withheld from finances, you don’t have access to bank accounts. Maybe you’re given a allotment that you’re able to spend. That’s kind of the most typical is that you’re just isolated from funds. It’s some atypical things that happen were more. Where I fall is that I did have access to all of the accounts.

Christie Deiter 00:03:21  I did all of the bill pay. The reason was because then that would fall and manipulation of if anything went wrong, the accounts weren’t high enough, whatever. If there was a bill to pay, I got in trouble. Yeah, it all fell on me. If I did all the finances, he could do nothing wrong.

Katy Ripp 00:03:41  So interesting. And just hearing that also, it makes you sort of think like without the actual abuse piece, how many women are not actually paying attention to their own finances also. Right. which I suppose could be a form of abuse or a manipulation at least, like it is some kind of control over you, right?

Christie Deiter 00:04:03  Absolutely. Control? Yeah. Power and.

Katy Ripp 00:04:05  Control. I think it’s just one of those things like if we can pull it out and talk about it. Well, there’s lots of layers here. So tell me about your story.

Christie Deiter 00:04:13  So my story, like I said, everything kind of drastically changed in what my trajectory of my life looked like on January 31st, 2023.

Christie Deiter 00:04:21  That afternoon, my ex-husband had essentially what I would equate to like a nervous breakdown. And we were in a Sam’s Club parking lot. We had two separate vehicles because the plan had been he was going to get some work done on his truck. I had the minivan with all the girls. I have three children, five and under now, and he lost it emotionally. Totally lost it on a car dealership because they were going to charge him for some work on his truck that he thought was under warranty. And it wasn’t. it had gone. I wasn’t at the dealership, but it had gotten so elevated that they told him he needed to leave or they were going to call the police. So then we were talking on the phone and got to Sam’s Club, and I could tell he was agitated. He was angry. He wasn’t talking to me. So there started to be the spiral of just how we were communicating. So we got the two. My two oldest were three and two at the time.

Christie Deiter 00:05:20  My little one was seven weeks. He loaded the kids up in the cart. I had the baby in the carrier and it was like kind of drizzly. And we lived in Middlesboro at the time in Kentucky, we were in Lexington, which is about an hour away, and I started to go towards the store, and I was frustrated because I knew he was mad. And I’m like, you’re ruining our day off. I understand this is lousy, but, you know, let’s just pull it together and get through our day. And I started to walk ahead and he said, put the baby in the cart. And I said, well, we have to get another cart. Let’s just get in the store. And he pushed the toddlers into the open parking lot and said, well, then you don’t fucking need me, and walked away and I had to run to go and collect the children in the cart, who were gripping it with like, this look of fear on their face. I can’t get out of my head and run to get between him and the truck, to try to stop him, because he just started to pace and was threatening he was going to kill himself.

Christie Deiter 00:06:24  He was going to go kill the people at the car dealership for talking to him that way, and he carried handguns. So he had two in the truck at the time. So it wasn’t this totally outlandish possibility. The thing I remember about that day the most was that he was totally vacant, that he was whatever space in place he had gone to mentally, there was no connection. And so we kind of waffled back and forth. Got him to calm down. We went in to go have pizza, but then he left again. Then he called me from the parking lot. He came in, but he was still mad. So was this weird back and forth. And then I had gone out to the car to nurse the baby. He still had the toddlers. And then I started to panic because I’m like, he’s not okay right now. And I just left him with the kids. So then he eventually did come out maybe ten minutes later or something like that, and he started loading up the children in the car seats in the minivan and said, well, you’re never going to see dad again.

Christie Deiter 00:07:28  This is the last time you’re going to see dad. Dad’s crazy. So my three year old starts to cry. My two year old’s crying, and I’m saying, what are you doing? Why are you saying this? You know, kind of having that. And he put everything in the car. I was sitting in the passenger seat because I was nursing and I couldn’t get up, slammed the door, got in his truck and like it was the peel out, you know, like the tire burning and all of that. And I sat there and I watched and I was like, if he goes, right, he’s going to the dealership and I have to call 911. If he goes left, he’s going home. And he went left. And then my whole body just sank and I started to sob as I was nursing my seven week old. And I called a friend of mine and I was like, I don’t know what to do. And she said, what do you want to do? And I said, I want to go home.

Christie Deiter 00:08:17  I don’t know what I’m going to walk into. If I go, I want to go home to Wisconsin, okay. I was like, if I go to our house, I don’t know what I’m going to see. I want to call my dad and I want to go home, she said. Then that’s what you need to do. So I called my dad and it’s a phone call that he still talks about and hears up because he’s like, you never expect your daughter to call you on a Tuesday afternoon at 11 and say, dad, I need help. And so he and my mom, in a couple hours got their stuff together and drove down to Kentucky to meet me and the girls because we didn’t have anything. I didn’t have a diaper bag. I had the random, you know, lucky that you keep your cars a mess with like, diapers and white clothes because we sought shelter at an old neighbor’s house because we used to live in Lexington, okay? And I went there for a couple hours to let the girls run around.

Christie Deiter 00:09:08  And she had just had a baby like two weeks after I did. So she’s got like a five week old. I had the seven week old. And so we’re like, letting the kids run around. And her husband was there and they, you know, embrace me to just kind of get grouped. And then we went to a hotel that night. I couldn’t get Ahold of my ex-husband. I had no idea where he was. I had no idea if he was okay. I was talking to different police departments to try to get a well check, you know, just whatever. I talked to the Lexington Police Department, Richmond Police Department. I was calling the State Patrol, and we did get to a hotel that evening. I checked in by at that point. He then had gotten home and realized that I wasn’t there, and then it got worse. And then we have a new layer of financial abuse because he turned off my credit cards. He turned off my phone, and then I got berated because I was luckily at a hotel.

Christie Deiter 00:10:04  At that time, I had Wi-Fi so I could still use my phone via Facebook Messenger. You know we hate social media, right? Everybody always says.

Katy Ripp 00:10:12  That until it saves your life, until it.

Christie Deiter 00:10:13  Saves your life. Yeah. And so he was sending me a lot of, you know, verbally abusive messages of, you know, you bitch, if you come home, I’m going to call the cops. All the things that are ugly and you don’t want to read. But I never went home again. Oh, my God.

Katy Ripp 00:10:31  I want to sit with this part of this just for a minute. One. How long were you married? Five years. Were there signs?

Christie Deiter 00:10:38  There were. If we go back to, you could go all the way back. These are things that I know now because of what I know about domestic abuse. What I’ve learned about emotional and financial abuse. I was never hit. You know, physical abuse was not a part of it for me personally. However, emotional abuse is a part of all abuse sexual, financial, physical, emotional or kind of your four big ones.

Christie Deiter 00:11:05  All anybody knows about is physical abuse. Right. So when you talk about other layers nobody knows. They don’t know what it is. So when I look back now that I’ve learned after my mountain of therapy that I’ve gone through, good for you. I can identify where these problems were. 2022 was a rough year. We had two little kids. I got pregnant with our third. He was losing jobs. Money was going out faster than it was coming in, so there were a lot of stressors that were going on. But I was always just, this is normal. It’s normal to have this unrest when you got littles. Everybody struggles in these times. You know what I didn’t know was that a lot of the stuff that was going on in the way things were being handled fell in that category of emotional abuse, because I didn’t know what it was.

Katy Ripp 00:11:51  Yeah.

Christie Deiter 00:11:52  So I’m thinking what we’re doing is normal when it isn’t. Yeah.

Katy Ripp 00:11:56  And like you say, some of the intense part of having littles, right.

Katy Ripp 00:12:02  That 320, my kids were three years apart. But that’s such an intense time. And so you think that it’s normal, right? Like I have not been in this situation, but everybody kind of tells you like, oh, it’s such an intense time. It’s okay. Right. Like this is going to pass. You’re going to get out of this. And so it’s hard to not have that insight during it. Right. Always hindsight’s 2020 kind of thing. Tell me about that phone call and how hard or easy or like your perspective on the phone call to your dad.

Christie Deiter 00:12:37  Now God was on my shoulder. And I’m not a religious person. I didn’t grow up with religion. I’ve always been spiritual. I’ve learned more about God and angels, and I’ve, like, introduced myself to that layer more because I’ve had a lot of divine things that have happened and that moment. I mean, I can transport myself back to sitting in my car in that drizzly, cold January day in Lexington, Kentucky, and I knew I couldn’t go home.

Christie Deiter 00:13:09  There was that gut feeling, that gut intuition, you know, and we all know, like, you need to listen to your gut and do what your gut tells you. And we tend to do the opposite. But there was so much pull about, you cannot go home. You have to call you. And I have a very close relationship with my parents, especially my dad. Well, both of them, yeah, but I’m a bit of a daddy’s girl. Yeah. That’s just. Yeah, I think my mom would say it, too. I wasn’t scared to call my dad, but it was even interesting. In that moment, I knew I wanted to talk to my dad and I was scared to tell my mom, but it was even like I didn’t want my mom to know because I was afraid of being judged or something, and she wouldn’t. But in my head in that moment was like, I knew she was at my great aunt’s house, so I knew she wasn’t going to be home.

Christie Deiter 00:13:54  And I would get my dad and it would be isolated. And my dad has an ability to stay incredibly calm and clear where my mom gets more emotional. So then it gets a lot of other things going on. But it was what needed to be done and it just.

Katy Ripp 00:14:11  Worked out right. Yeah, I think we get into situations like that where there is no other choice. No, I mean, what choice did you have except to call your parents?

Christie Deiter 00:14:22  And that was my safety. We knew no one. We’d only lived in Kentucky for a couple of years. We had just sold our house. I had only been in our house in Middlesboro for four weeks. I knew nobody there.

Katy Ripp 00:14:32  Oh my goodness.

Christie Deiter 00:14:33  So I had my old neighbor in Richmond. That which is where I went to. But we had nobody, you know, all of my supporters here in Wisconsin because we just hadn’t been in Kentucky that long. Plus we moved during the pandemic. I had little kids. So you live in isolation even without a pandemic, but then you put that on top of it.

Christie Deiter 00:14:50  Yeah, there was no other option. And I didn’t know, you know, at the time I knew we were having issues. But I’m also put it in perspective of how this was such a blindsided thing. January 25th was our wedding anniversary and we spent a lovely evening. My ex-husband’s a chef. He cooked this beautiful dinner. We snuggled on the couch holding the new baby because that’s what you do when you have little new babies and, you know, have this really nice anniversary where we were talking about how he was having a hard time with this transition and the things that he wanted to do and how we were going to pull out of it, and making plans to have a Super Bowl party for his staff at the university. And like all of these things. So to go from like, okay, I know we’re in a rough spot, we said some not good things to each other, but we’re going to get through it. and then January 31st was like, you are not going home. Yeah.

Katy Ripp 00:15:43  Wow. Let’s talk about the kids. Yeah. Your kids were little. So little. Well, there’s still so little. Every time I see pictures, I’m like, Holy shit, those kids are little.

Christie Deiter 00:15:53  I hope I got one year old, almost four. She’ll be four next month. And my other one just turned five, weeks ago.

Katy Ripp 00:15:58  Are they in school yet?

Christie Deiter 00:16:00  Yeah. Came for three K.

Katy Ripp 00:16:02  Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Tell me about what transpired like right after that. As far as the kids go.

Christie Deiter 00:16:10  You pretty much just go into the mama bear mode of you’re safe. I mean, I remember getting to my friend’s house where it was like it gave me a moment to kind of breathe because they could kind of step in to help with the girls, get them distracted. I could just kind of collect myself for a minute, even at the hotel, of trying to explain things in a way like Dad is having a hard time. We’re just going to give dad some space.

Christie Deiter 00:16:38  And I mean, and that’s what I truly believed was like, we’re going to go to Wisconsin, get some space, take some time, get a breather, you know, and then we’ll regroup back together, you know? And I did have a police officer come to the hotel room to talk, because we were talking about filing an emergency protection order, which I did do the next day, which if is a restraining order. Yeah, but even trying to explain that, you know, my obviously the seven week old is immune. Yeah. My two year old at the time didn’t really say much. My three year old at the time is very emotionally aware. She knows everything. So even though she’s five now I had to have honest conversations with her and not in a way. I always looked at this and I always said and I even told my ex-husband this, I will always lead with love. I will never have never slandered him against the children. I have never said anything. Off colour.

Christie Deiter 00:17:37  I have also never lied to them. And I have celebrated with them when they got to see them. Like you’re going to go see dad. It’s going to be so much fun, you know? And because I don’t know any other way to do that. Yeah. And to keep it in perspective of what my oldest understands, the first time she had a visit with him in May. So we fled January 31st. He didn’t see them again until May. She said to him, dad, why do you hate the world and why did you leave your family? Oh no. What you think they don’t know? They know, they know. And even at that young age, she was four at the time. I said, you know. And he right away he said to me, well, what did you tell her? Why would she say that to me? And I said, well, you were angry. So instead of her believing that you were angry at her because you weren’t, or even that you were angry with me, you were mad at the world.

Christie Deiter 00:18:26  And in that moment, on that day, you were mad at the world. You were mad at the dealership. You were mad at our situation. You were mad at your boss. You were mad at all these things. That’s what happened.

Katy Ripp 00:18:37  Mental health issues for him.

Christie Deiter 00:18:40  I believe a lot of untreated.

Katy Ripp 00:18:42  Things. Yeah.

Christie Deiter 00:18:43  You know he had said to me at different times throughout our relationship like I should really go to therapy, I should probably go to therapy and talk about this stuff. But yeah.

Katy Ripp 00:18:51  You don’t. Yeah that’s hard. Yeah. I mean it’s hard for you, but also, you know, from an outsider looking in when you’re telling the story, you can sort of hear this sounds like untreated mental illness. And I’m not a doctor. Right. Like and I’m not here to judge anybody’s mental illness except that like over the years, you can sort of pick out little things, right? Not when you’re in it, but from an outsider looking in, it sometimes feels like, you know, I see that now and you never really know what goes on behind closed doors with people, right? Like it’s a battle you just don’t know anything about.

Christie Deiter 00:19:27  And I’m such an advocate for therapy. I always have been. I’ve seen different therapists over the years, and now I go to therapy pretty much twice a week. I’ve done it basically since I got up here in February. I started at group therapy. If you’re local in the Madison area, there’s a center called Days Domestic Abuse Intervention Services. They host group therapy sessions once a week. It was the scariest thing ever to walk into that room the first time, but I’m so grateful I did. And then I also see a therapist once a week on my own.

Katy Ripp 00:19:57  Did you say you went to days right away in February? Tell me about when you said to yourself, I am being abused enough for you to call a domestic abuse place and go.

Christie Deiter 00:20:11  I had to be told.

Katy Ripp 00:20:13  Okay. By whom?

Christie Deiter 00:20:14  My sister and my parents.

Katy Ripp 00:20:17  Okay.

Christie Deiter 00:20:18  Mostly my sister because she was on it immediately. So when shit was hitting the fan on January 31st and we were and you know, and I started to use language like I fled.

Christie Deiter 00:20:31  I fled to Wisconsin. I fled to a hotel and I was like, I feel like a woman on the run. I was like, I literally was. Yeah. I was scared for him to know where I was. I was scared to use a credit card because then it tracks it on where it’s being utilized. And it wasn’t so much that I had proof that he would do anything to hurt me. I had the opposite, but I didn’t know. Yeah, and somebody who is showing signs of being mentally unstable, threatening, suicide, threatening to shoot car dealership staff, you know, these are things that were happening. He was drunk from the night before. So you combine alcohol in on that and he has handguns. These are just facts of things that were like, this isn’t okay, because I don’t know what he’s going to do. Yeah. Felt unhinged, you know.

Katy Ripp 00:21:20  Well and then not knowing I mean anything. Right. Like the not knowing is the fear. That’s where the fear comes from.

Katy Ripp 00:21:27  Okay. Tell me about the financial piece after you left. You know months after, you know this has been now almost a year and a half.

Christie Deiter 00:21:37  You’re in it. Yeah I filed for divorce April of last year.

Katy Ripp 00:21:41  Okay.

Christie Deiter 00:21:41  So we’ve still been in the process of trying to get divorced. The financial piece is not good when it comes to again, like, as I mentioned in the beginning of like, the obvious ways that we talk about financial abuse is that you’re isolated from funds. I was isolated for my funds, I still have. He drained bank accounts. He closed bank accounts. So I was a stay at home mom. You know, the little bit I was starting to grow an online fitness business that wasn’t like this was going to pay for bills at the point that I was. Yeah.

Katy Ripp 00:22:09  everybody’s got to start somewhere.

Christie Deiter 00:22:10  You start? Yeah. Started zero. Yeah. So he took all the money, essentially. And then he opened a new bank account, I’m assuming, because I don’t know where it is to this day.

Christie Deiter 00:22:22  I don’t know where it is. He has paid zero in child support. He’s currently under a court order to pay, but he quit his job.

Katy Ripp 00:22:32  Okay, I was going to ask if he was working.

Christie Deiter 00:22:34  As of I found out he’s no longer employed. When the company that I thought he was employed by. When the order came through, that he was to start paying this. And this just happened last month.

Katy Ripp 00:22:45  Well this is across state lines.

Christie Deiter 00:22:47  So everything funnels through Kentucky. Oh God. So the order came in at the end of March. I found out that he quit his job on March 17th. So when he knew the order was coming and this is me totally making assumptions. I have no idea why he would have quit his job, but he ironically put it right when the order came through. So he has still paid zero in child support. The one time I asked him for money because we had, as a couple, had made an agreement for him to have a visit with the girls for a week in June, and I told him, you have to pay travel expenses.

Christie Deiter 00:23:20  I don’t have access to our bank accounts. I don’t know where the money is. Literally, you need to pay for gas and you need to pay for a hotel for me to get to Indianapolis. I was still nursing my youngest, so she wasn’t going to go because that wasn’t an option. And I said, I can’t do Indianapolis. And back in one day, with however old she was. This was in June. Yeah, six months old. So we went. Of course, it was a fight to get anything because he didn’t want to give me. He said 400. I said, it’s going to be 800. We have met in the middle. At 650. He gave me a check. It was.

Katy Ripp 00:23:56  Bad.

Christie Deiter 00:23:58  So if you want to look at like well you’re at zero because you provided no child support, but now you’re actually technically -650 because I cashed the check, I used it, I was all excited because I went to the bank, I opened a checking account and a savings account with it so I could start to put money somewhere.

Christie Deiter 00:24:15  And then I got the letter that it was insufficient, that my checking account was negative, because then of course, they wanted to take the full 650, but I had money in the savings account. So I called the bank. I’m like, why did you take the money back? And they’re like, it was a bad check. Who did you get it from? It’s like my ex-husband and I have told him because he said, well, you know, you say that you’re abused. Did I abuse you? And I said, financially, yes. And you’re doing it right now.

Katy Ripp 00:24:42  Yeah.

Christie Deiter 00:24:42  And I told him because I had to be told this is abuse.

Katy Ripp 00:24:46  Yeah. Tell me about what the next few months looked like after that. Did you take the girls. Did you take them to.

Christie Deiter 00:24:54  Yeah, I told him so. And that’s where, you know, you kind of live and learn things where now it’s like, well, now you have to wire money before. Yeah, well.

Katy Ripp 00:25:02  Fool me once.

Christie Deiter 00:25:03  And so I had cashed the check right before I was headed back down to go pick him up. And so at that point, nothing, you know, it takes days before that stuff clears and all that, you know? So I was very angry and it just was like, we’re just in this, that there’s no money coming for me. I am extremely blessed, and I have affluent parents who have the financial means to support me and my three daughters. And that is a gift that is not lost on me because it has given me space to heal. It has given me space to just be the mom and do everything I can for my kids, like I always have. And I don’t have to worry about money. Yeah, I also know that I’m incurring debt upon tens of thousands with my parents, and we’ll figure that out later, but I don’t have to worry about it.

Katy Ripp 00:25:51  Yeah, and while that is a gift, you also, by telling your story, are sharing inspiration for other people.

Katy Ripp 00:25:58  I always think, you know, it’s a good problem to have to have parents that will help you, right? But a problem still needs a solution. And by you sharing this story and talking about financial abuse is eventually going to help someone. And you wouldn’t be able to do that if you wouldn’t have the space to heal, right, there’s absolutely no way you could do this with three little girls and heal and also pursue a career in health and well-being and move forward in what is this abuse look like for other people? So tell me a little bit about that.

Christie Deiter 00:26:35  So it’s been an evolution. So I’ll kind of back up a little bit. When I started the health and wellness business I was happily married. I was a stay at home mom who in a little bit about my back story, I haven’t worked for a company or somebody else since 2013. I have been in an entrepreneurial role and a mom for what is it, 11 years now? Yeah. So I owned a salon. Here was my first industry.

Christie Deiter 00:27:01  And so I did an independent salon for 5 or 6 years. I was independent contractor for two different product brands. So I used to travel around the Midwest and teach salons on cutting techniques and product knowledge and things like that. So that was my world when I met my ex-husband, and then he owned when I met him, he owned a corporate catering company. Oh. So when we decided to come together and we got pregnant and got married, I transitioned out of the hair world and full time into the corporate catering company.

Katy Ripp 00:27:34  Oh, okay.

Christie Deiter 00:27:34  So then I was running all of the back office with that and raising the baby. So it was again, like, I just haven’t worked for somebody. And then when we moved to Kentucky, then we didn’t have the catering account. We closed the catering company because of the pandemic. Oh, sure. It was a young company. No one’s doing buffet lunches. Right.

Katy Ripp 00:27:53  So even anymore?

Christie Deiter 00:27:54  Hardly. It barely. Yeah. So there wasn’t it just wasn’t something that we felt we could sustain.

Christie Deiter 00:27:59  So when we got to Kentucky, being somebody who has owned businesses whose I like to have things to do, I need something for myself. As wonderful as being a stay at home mom is, I needed that piece for myself, and I started walking with the stroller. I would walk every day, and then I would do like a walk around and I was like, but I still I was carrying extra weight. I didn’t feel good in my skin, I was bored, I felt flatlined like these, you know, I felt stuck. And so then I started getting curious about what home fitness looked like. And then I started talking like, you can make this a business and I can help other moms because I can’t go to a gym. And I was watching the pressures that he was feeling as being the primary financial support for a family is a lot, you know, take out any financial abuse, just any single spouse that provides all the money that feeds and clothes and shelters and family is a lot of pressure.

Christie Deiter 00:28:58  And I thought, well, even if I’m able to just provide for our bottom line, if it’s paying for the fun things or whatever, you know, anytime you’re adding more money.

Katy Ripp 00:29:10  Yeah.

Christie Deiter 00:29:10  It’s making life easier. Yep. So that was what started it for me, okay, of where I wanted to be. And I was like, I started to watch my body change. I felt better in my skin. I had more energy, like I was killing it. As a stay at home mom who was starting to run a business like I gotta, I started getting up at 4:00. I get my workout done. My kids were sleeping from 7 to 7, so good.

Katy Ripp 00:29:34  I had sleepers. Like, I love it whenever I hear people with like, good sleepers, I’m like, yeah, I love that it.

Christie Deiter 00:29:40  Well, and it was a year because they’re not such great.

Katy Ripp 00:29:43  Yeah. Yeah. Right. Well yeah, it’s short lived. But even that we can celebrate, right.

Christie Deiter 00:29:48  It was great because I, you know, I did everything for myself in the morning. I had three hours, I got laundry, I had cleaned, I did all those things. And I could just be a mom mode. And then I unwind in the evening with my husband. We’d watch a show, you know it. Things were good, you know. Now it has.

Katy Ripp 00:30:09  Evolved.

Christie Deiter 00:30:10  Because what I ended up seeing when I look back in retrospect of like, what gave you the courage, Christie, to not go home that day?

Katy Ripp 00:30:18  Well, I have the goosebumps because.

Christie Deiter 00:30:20  I wait.

Katy Ripp 00:30:21  Trained.

Christie Deiter 00:30:23  It’s because of what I did and the habits that I built in my fitness regimen and the confidence that I built in myself of what I was able to do and how I changed my body and how I felt in the confidence that grew through the work I did in my health and wellness is what gave me the strength to not go home. And what’s continued to give me to the strength to fight this fight?

Katy Ripp 00:30:46  Oh my God, I like I’m gonna cry.

Katy Ripp 00:30:50  That’s so amazing for me, what I hear. And maybe it’s because I love it so much. But for what I hear, like in that story, is self-care complete, like 100%? You put yourself first before you took care of your kids, before you took care of anything else. It’s the first thing you did every single day. It still is. Tell me, how important was that piece?

Christie Deiter 00:31:15  It saved my life. You look at a health journey, and everyone focuses on like I lost £50. I, you know, reduced my cholesterol.

Katy Ripp 00:31:24  Like, these are.

Christie Deiter 00:31:25  All important things. I’m not saying they’re not. It’s the stuff. It’s the feelings. It’s the confidence. It’s the inner growth that you get from exercise. It’s the endorphins. It’s the confidence. It’s the.

Katy Ripp 00:31:39  Self-worth.

Christie Deiter 00:31:39  You’re worthy of feeling good in your skin. So then when you have these exterior challenges that start to pressure you, you start to say, well, that doesn’t feel good, that doesn’t feel good.

Christie Deiter 00:31:51  And then you have the confidence to make the choice of walking away. And the thing I hear of when I sit in group therapy the most from women, they have completely lost themselves. And it’s not a judgment. It’s not a fault, it’s just what has happened. You shrink yourself down so small to accommodate the abuser, to follow the rules that they have set to not be noticed because you can’t get yelled at. And I never lost that. Like I still like you said, I always put myself first. That was always the number one priority. And it was those habits that have carried me through all of this where it was like, I can’t function in the day without exercising first, like it has to happen.

Katy Ripp 00:32:39  Was it ever a chore for you? Not really. Yeah.

Christie Deiter 00:32:42  You know, in the beginning, when you’re starting it, it’s always hard to start. But I just kind of operate like I have decided this is what I’m going to do.

Katy Ripp 00:32:51  One decision, not do it.

Christie Deiter 00:32:53  And I approached it as I am a healthy and fit mom. That was my goal. I want to be a healthy and fit mom. And so like, well, in order to be a healthy and fit mom, you have to work out, you know? And so then I was like, well.

Katy Ripp 00:33:07  I saw a reel or something the other day. Who knows where it comes from anymore, right? Meme real? Whatever. Yeah, I saw something the other day and it was like a male’s version, a story of his weight loss journey. But the audio in the background was, you say you’ll die for your kids, but will you live for them? Yes. And I just like that hit me so hard in a way that I don’t think self-care is selfish. It’s like the least selfish thing there is. Because if you cannot take care of yourself, you cannot take care of anyone else. One of the other things you said earlier was, you know, a lot of people in your group therapy, they’ve lost themselves.

Katy Ripp 00:33:47  How many have even found themselves?

Christie Deiter 00:33:50  They’re not there yet.

Katy Ripp 00:33:51  Right? I just feel like it took me a really long time, a really long time of really hard decisions, some really uncomfortable conversations with myself, with the people around me to even know who I am at my core, much less who I am in the world. And to get to this point for you, right? To, like, survive this and then get here, what would you say to somebody that’s in your situation? Because I’ll tell you what, whether they’re listening or not, there’s thousands of people in your situation, especially with the financial piece. Oh gosh.

Christie Deiter 00:34:30  Yes. It’s astounding and scary. And the amount of women that don’t know, they don’t even know you have to sit in your own shit. Yeah. I mean, to be crap. Yeah, but you have to do the shadow work. Yeah, you have to do the shadow work, and you have to feel all of the awful, wretched emotions. You have to.

Christie Deiter 00:34:50  I mean, I can’t tell you how many times I found myself crying and screaming on the floor, literally, because the weight of all of it gets to be too much. But if I hadn’t done that, and the thing that I learned through this, and I still have moments of total breakdown. I know when I’m in it that I’m going to come out later. Like every time I get pulled down into the shadows of, like, the discomfort and the wretchedness of understanding abuse. The interesting part because for me it was the twofold. It was the emotional abuse and the financial abuse, the emotional abuse I learned how to deal with quicker. When we got into the financial abuse part, I had a lot of PTSD responses to it. If I would sit down to try to talk about money with my dad, to understand the scope of how long the financial abuse was going on. I mean, that’s like a whole part two. We could. Yeah, because it’s big. Yeah. My body would literally I would start to sweat, my anxiety would go up, I would get agitated where I couldn’t.

Christie Deiter 00:35:53  I was mad at my dad. And I mean, he’s totally neutral, but I couldn’t have the conversation. And he would even comment, like you would completely break down, like you’d be fine when we’d start. And then you’re like, I’m moving and I’m shaking and I like my hands would literally start to shake. Like you could see my fingers. And I talked to my therapist about it, and she’s like, your body is associating. Like, your brain doesn’t understand that when you’re talking about money, that you’re in a safe environment, that you’re with your dad, so you’re safe, so your body and your brain are transporting back to where it was unsafe to talk about money. So your brain is trying to protect you. It’s saying you got to run. You have to flee because this is not a safe space. Yeah. And so I had to physically start to train my body in my brain to understand it’s okay. So there’s physical tactics, but I mean, but that’s what I’m saying.

Christie Deiter 00:36:44  People don’t want to do that work. They just don’t. Yeah. And you have to.

Katy Ripp 00:36:49  How did you not go outside yourself to cope? And what I mean by that is drinking, watching Netflix, eating Doritos, you know, all of the, you know, Shopping, spending money, all of the things that we do to cope with those unknown feelings because a lot of people don’t know what that feels like. Many of us have no idea what the feelings are, that we just know it’s not great. And so we’re going to go outside and find something that feels better.

Christie Deiter 00:37:18  Personal development.

Katy Ripp 00:37:20  Yeah.

Christie Deiter 00:37:21  I have read mountains of books I have for 20 years, so it was kind of like it was this build up of all of this reading I’ve done. So that’s I’m unique in that way because I’ve already done so much work. So it was easier for me to step into making healthier choices that served me versus not the alcohol piece. I stopped drinking five years ago when I got pregnant. Never, just never picked it up again.

Christie Deiter 00:37:44  I was also married to an alcoholic that I didn’t understand, so alcohol for me also had worked its way out of my life because I was watching what alcohol was doing to my ex-husband. He didn’t drink for two years when our daughter was our first daughter was born, and then when the pandemic hit, it started to find its way back into his life, and we would talk about it minimally that he needed to stop. Yeah. You know, but he had never said to me that he was an alcoholic. I don’t think he’d still probably admit it to this day. Yeah, but. So I watched what alcohol did to him, to our marriage, that it’s very easy for me to walk away from that part of it. Ice cream is my addiction.

Katy Ripp 00:38:22  I like that.

Christie Deiter 00:38:25  I was always like, I can lose weight and build a body, and I’ll still eat ice cream every night, which I did. Yeah, but July of last summer, I just made the decision that the bloat was too much.

Christie Deiter 00:38:35  I didn’t feel good. And so ice cream has found its way out. Yeah, for the most part, I admit that will still be something I lean back on that I will scarf a bowl of ice cream.

Katy Ripp 00:38:46  Well, we’re not monsters.

Christie Deiter 00:38:47  We’re not. We’re not in the. You know, the key to that is you just don’t buy it. Yeah, if I don’t buy it, it’s not in the house. I can’t do that. So I started to limit my exposure to things instead of watching TV. At the end of the day, I pick up a book. Yeah, you know, and it’s the easiest and the hardest thing to do. It is the easiest thing to just say, I’m not going to do that. And it’s hard to follow through on it. And for sure you have to do it with grace. It’s not going to be perfect. There are nights where I watch Schitt’s Creek because I just want to not think about things.

Katy Ripp 00:39:19  Yeah, I think the beauty in finding the part that you are using it to cope versus I’m doing this for enjoyment, or I’m doing this for a reason, or being aware that you’re doing it for a certain thing and still doing it and being okay with it, like I do need to check out right now.

Katy Ripp 00:39:39  And Netflix is going to do it for me right now, which is, in the big scheme of things, a fairly safe way to do it. Right. Like of all the things that we need to cope with. I recently what was happening to me is I have kindergarten naptime in the afternoon. Every day I like go home and nap. I just it’s who I am. I have to do it. I get up super early too, and so. And now I’m getting old. I need a nap in the afternoon. But also, I was getting to a point where I was going home from work and I was turning on Netflix and I was watching for three hours, and then I would go pick up the kids. But what I recognized and part of it was because I had surgery and like that was the easiest thing to do. But what I recognized is it had become such a habit. But I was like, I couldn’t even remember what I was watching anymore, right? Like I would just turn something on and then stare at it.

Katy Ripp 00:40:26  And I was like, this is not right. Like I am checking out, I am numbing, which is how I used to drink, right? Like I self-medicate. And what was happening was I was self-medicating with Netflix. I mean, Netflix gets a bad rap, right? It’s kind of like Band-Aid or Kleenex, right? Like, I mean, I was watching Amazon Prime.

Christie Deiter 00:40:44  Yeah.

Katy Ripp 00:40:44  And Hulu and I don’t limit.

Christie Deiter 00:40:46  Oh.

Katy Ripp 00:40:48  God, I guess I’m not a monster. I watch all of them. But I gave it up for April and I was like, I just, I can’t do it. If I’m going to go home and nap, that’s fine, right? Like I’m not taking my nap time away because no, right. I’m not taking my nap time away. But I made a list of the things that I could do instead of watch TV. And so I started reading. I started like actually napping right when I would actually nap rather than just lay in bed and watch TV.

Katy Ripp 00:41:16  I got a ton of shit done. You know, I do the dishes. I would, you know, go outside and sit with the alpacas or whatever. But recognizing that ice cream might have been your coping mechanism, right? Like, it’s not that ice cream is bad. It’s not that Netflix is bad. It’s not that a glass of wine is bad. It’s what you’re using it for. Correct.

Christie Deiter 00:41:35  But that’s the work that’s required. You have to be aware. And that’s what I watch. Other women. You don’t want to sit in your shit like you just don’t.

Katy Ripp 00:41:45  Yeah.

Christie Deiter 00:41:45  And you don’t want to try to understand that. Like it feels bad in this ice cream is going to make me feel better. But then as soon as the bowl is empty, I’m going to feel guilty and beat myself up because I broke a promise.

Katy Ripp 00:41:56  It’s a it’s a very vicious cycle. It’s.

Christie Deiter 00:41:59  It is. Yeah. And what I’ve done when I decide popcorns my other voice that what I’m going to have a popcorn an ice cream night then I can’t sit on my phone.

Christie Deiter 00:42:09  Yeah. Then I have to be insanely present with the popcorn and the ice cream and the episode that I’m watching.

Katy Ripp 00:42:15  I mean, they do deserve the attention. They do.

Christie Deiter 00:42:19  I love it like it brings me joy. But then feel the joy. Yeah. Don’t shovel in the popcorn bowl. You’re mindlessly watching reels and have the TV on like nobody’s winning in that situation.

Katy Ripp 00:42:30  Yeah, except Instagram and Netflix, correct?

Christie Deiter 00:42:33  I mean, and the pop in the popcorn.

Katy Ripp 00:42:35  Right. And Orville Redenbacher. Yes.

Christie Deiter 00:42:38  Yeah. And I feel that’s the part for any well, for women who are struggling, if you are aware that you’re in an abusive relationship or you’re starting to sense it, like you have to sit with those emotions and it’s awful. There’s no easy way through it. The only way is through. Yeah, and it does get better. It does get easier. It gets easier to recognize. And, you know, I read a lot of different things to where people talk, but, you know, like the pursuit of happiness and the pursuit of joy is not to be elevated all the time.

Christie Deiter 00:43:09  You cannot be up here all the fucking time. No, you have to come down. Yeah. And the key is so that your peaks and valleys aren’t so extreme. Yes. And that is the work I still do is to get it balanced. Yeah. Because I can feel like when I’m on a high, it’s awesome. But it’s also exhausting because then it’s like, I’m amazing, I’m going to do this and this and this and this, and then I sing all over the place, and then the next week I can have a low point. And then it’s these devastating valleys that are paralyzing, and I’m exhausted and I’m angry and my patience is shot and it’s like, I gotta get to the middle. Yeah. So the goal, I think, is that you become so aware of your emotions that it’s like, I’m having a shit day. Yeah, so I’m going to sit with it. Yep. For a day, not a month.

Katy Ripp 00:43:56  Right. You also have to take the diaper off.

Katy Ripp 00:43:58  You do. We are capable, resourceful women. We also have to take the diaper off when it’s appropriate to take it off. Correct. We also need to do something about it. There are plenty of times that I sat in a dirty diaper for years. Yeah, years. And then I was like, I think I’m going to take this fucker off. Yeah, I think I’m no longer going to sit in this.

Christie Deiter 00:44:23  Well, and typically women who are in abusive marriages, you’re talking 20, 30, 50 years. I got lucky it was only five for me. And sometimes I felt like I didn’t have space in the room because I wasn’t in it long enough. Like, well, was I supposed to give it a chance? You know, and, like, that’s a whole other again. And that’s another layer of it. Yeah. And that’s where I’m going to circle back to the health and fitness part. Because when you weight train specifically weight train, the goal of growing your muscle mass is that you weaken that muscle to the point of breakdown, right? That’s how we build new muscle.

Christie Deiter 00:45:02  So when you look at that as the metaphor of life, you have to be willing to go into the full breakdown of the shadow work to build back the muscle stronger. So the lessons that you learn by committing to your health and fitness, specifically when you translate that into how you approach your daily life, is the exact same for sure.

Katy Ripp 00:45:22  Absolutely. It made me want to ask on a daily basis, what are the things that you do over and over and over again that you’ve seen results from? Yeah.

Christie Deiter 00:45:34  Number one, I get up when I wake up.

Katy Ripp 00:45:36  Oh, I love that. Get up when you wake up. Do you set an alarm? Nope. Okay.

Christie Deiter 00:45:41  And I pretty much it’s a guaranteed it’s a 4 a.m. that I naturally wake up. And that happened with training my body. You know, it did start with setting an alarm, and it started at 430 and it’s gone up to four. I do get up as early as 330. The reason why is because we sleep in 90 minute cycles.

Christie Deiter 00:45:59  And this was something I learned from Mel Robbins, who is a wonderful resource.

Katy Ripp 00:46:02  I love her. She’s my favorite.

Christie Deiter 00:46:04  If I go back to sleep at 330 and I want to get up at four, I’m going to be more tired. It doesn’t work, so I will get up as early as 330. If I wake up at three, I do allow myself to go back to bed because three’s getting a little insane and I’m going to be too tired by the afternoon. Yeah, so I know the importance of sleep, but that’s number one. I get up when I wake up because that’s when my body is and has a natural cadence to say, this is when you get up. If I go back to sleep, I’m going to be more tired.

Katy Ripp 00:46:30  Yeah. Let me ask you, have you always been a morning person?

Christie Deiter 00:46:34  Essentially, yeah.

Katy Ripp 00:46:35  Because we’re going to have some night owls here that are like, what the fuck?

Christie Deiter 00:46:38  Oh I know, and everyone’s going to fight me. I know fights me on 4 a.m. I know like, you know, there’s a 5 a.m. club and I’m like, I’m sorry, but four is more magic.

Katy Ripp 00:46:46  Well, and it just works for you. It does, right? Like it does not mean that that is the rule. No, right. Like you’re not better than anybody else because you get up at four instead of five. No, it just works for you. Like that’s for me. I rise and set with the sun. Like that is how my body works. So in June I get up at 430. In December I like to get up at eight. Yeah, right. I mean, generally I will go to bed when the sun sets like that’s. So in January it’s 430. Yeah. I mean that’s what I want to get my PJs on. But I’ve also just accepted that that’s how my body works. And it’s okay. I just it doesn’t make me any better or worse than anybody. It just makes me who I am. And I’ve just accepted it. It’s fine.

Christie Deiter 00:47:35  Like, it all circles back to the awareness. So I know I’m at my best in the morning.

Christie Deiter 00:47:39  Yeah, somebody else might be at their best at night for sure. Honor it. Yeah, honor it because we don’t. That’s the other part. People don’t do that. Like then you try to do what somebody else says and make what do they say? The square peg fit the round hole and it’s not going to work. So there again, you have to sit in your own shit to figure it out, right.

Katy Ripp 00:47:58  And know who you are and know that it might change, right? You’ve got littles right now. It probably is super easy for you to get up at 4:00 and get it done, because you can get out the door and be fine with it, right when your kids are going to go to school and you have to get everybody on the bus at 650 around here, right? Like you, 4:00 might not work, 730 might work. Right. Like those things, you have to be a little bit adaptable to.

Christie Deiter 00:48:23  What you do. And it does fluctuate. I mean, everything evolves.

Christie Deiter 00:48:27  Yeah, right. So get up. When I wake up, I exercise first. I know that. And there’s always the theories of like, well, you you exercise on an empty stomach. I don’t like exercising with food in my stomach because I can feel it. Yeah. So I drink my pre-workout. It’s a green tea. Energize. That just helps. Like give that little boost it rather than coffee because, like, coffee’s soothing and kind of makes you jittery. Yeah. This is what I always say. It’s like my clean energy and I. And put some hydrate in it because it gives you that boost of hydration from sleeping when we’re dehydrated to get started and then of course, water. So I kind of do that. I center for a minute. It’s usually like a half an hour that takes, and then I do my workout. And then the other thing that I do every day is I get dressed every day. Oh, makeup, hair, clothes and the clothes have been a bit of an evolution because, you know, we’ve got our mom uniforms.

Christie Deiter 00:49:19  Yeah, especially when you got little kids like leggings with pockets on the thighs are my go to because I can put a key and I can put a phone in. Yeah. And I can be hands free. Yeah. So that has started to change in my desire to get out of the leggings all the time, because it doesn’t feel like the next evolution of me. But I get dressed every day because if I stay in pajamas, which is like, it’s a pet peeve of mine, so I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be judgmental.

Katy Ripp 00:49:45  No sorries necessary.

Christie Deiter 00:49:47  When I listened to moms talk about being tired all day, and then I find out they don’t even brush their hair and they’re in your pajamas. Pajamas are to wear, to bed, to sleep, not to go throughout the day. So of course you’re tired.

Katy Ripp 00:50:01  Yeah, you have to get.

Christie Deiter 00:50:03  Yourself prepared for the day. And so sometimes that fluctuates. You know, like if a kid gets up at 5:00, I’m not someone who can work out with my kids.

Christie Deiter 00:50:12  It just doesn’t work. So if they get up like this morning, I was 15 minutes in and my one year old got up. I got 15 minutes of the workout and that’s fine. Yeah, that’s just what happened. Yeah, but those are my non-negotiables that happen every day. And I read ten pages of nonfiction.

Katy Ripp 00:50:28  I love it, I’m a reader, too. And one of the things you said before was like that personal development. Since I was 20, I feel like I’ve been struggling most of my life with some sort of like wanting to be better, wanting to be a better version of myself, wanting to improve, wanting to be something different. And so I’ve always read, and I only pretty much read self-help books. I’ve read almost every single one on the shelf, and if not, I’ve listened to them multiple times. I have many, many, many problems is a favorite. Jensen is a favorite, and after reading them for 25 years, almost 26 years, it does get to a point where it’s the same message over and over.

Katy Ripp 00:51:12  It’s just a different vehicle. But I kind of love it because I always take something out of it. But it’s all of those years of little things over and over and over that get you to hear. So one of the things that I’m hopeful that this podcast does is give people the inspiration to just like, do one thing, like try one thing, right? Like, even if you’re sitting in the shit right now, like, just do one thing. What would that one thing be for you? Exercise. What kind of exercise? Because that’s the first thing that people ask, right? Like, should I be lifting weights? Should I be walking? Should I be running? Should I be doing yoga? Should I be hiking? Right. Like there’s so much fucking information out there. And one of the things that my sister and I joke about is if information was all we needed, we’d all be rich and thin.

Christie Deiter 00:52:01  Oh my God. Right.

Katy Ripp 00:52:02  There’s so much fucking information, but it’s like, you know, you said before, should I work out on an empty stomach or should you not? How about you just fucking work out, right? Like, no, no, no, we’re not going to like we’re not going to worry about what’s in our stomach at the time.

Katy Ripp 00:52:19  We’re just going to do it well.

Christie Deiter 00:52:21  And we overcomplicate everything. And it has to be this perfect time and perfect setting. And and for me, you know, what exercise is it? It’s weight training. Yeah. Like and that’s my opinion. Yeah. Hands down is weight training. Because the fatigue that you feel, the pain that you feel. Like I said before, it translates to how you approach your life and your willingness to do the hard things because of what weight training does for you. And let’s be honest, if you’re a woman and you’re picking up a £30 dumbbell, you feel like a fucking badass for sure.

Katy Ripp 00:52:55  Yeah, yeah, and that’s a great point. If somebody has never lifted a weight before.

Christie Deiter 00:53:00  Start with £2 because that’s hard to £2.

Katy Ripp 00:53:03  Of what? Like where do I get it? Where do I go? What do I do right?

Christie Deiter 00:53:08  £2 dumbbells you can buy at target. You can order it on Amazon. You know you start there. I mean, even when I started so my ex-husband had like the bench and he was real into weight training at one time.

Christie Deiter 00:53:22  So like we had the dumbbells that you could switch the plates to. Oh shit. But it started at four and I was like, that’s too heavy.

Katy Ripp 00:53:29  Yeah.

Christie Deiter 00:53:29  You know, I was doing a bar thing like a bar class and it was 1 to £2 weights and I didn’t have it. So I use soup cans.

Katy Ripp 00:53:36  Oh.

Christie Deiter 00:53:37  So my whole journey started in my living room with soup cans. And now I have a room that’s dedicated to my gym, and I’ve got my array of dumbbells, and I have to get heavier ones because I don’t have the old collection I used to have. But you, even if you don’t have weights, if you just try to hold your arm up and fight gravity, there is so much you can do to feel that pain and that burn without even holding.

Katy Ripp 00:54:03  Yeah, I love it and the confidence it gives you. Like the weight training. Confidence is something you can’t get from a run. No, it’s just different. It’s just different.

Christie Deiter 00:54:13  And that’s where, you know, it does become a personal thing that you have to decide.

Christie Deiter 00:54:17  For me, I used to be a runner, ran the half marathon. I did the thing, you know, and walking and running weren’t cutting it. It wasn’t challenging me anymore. And so even if you think you know what it is, because currently I’m dancing and I it is weird and I’m not a dancer, but I love it. Weight training also wasn’t working for me anymore. Yeah, and my therapist identified it and she was like, you’re carrying so much external weight of the process and the emotions that you’re going through. She’s like to pick up a weight. You’re just adding to all of the emotional weight you already have. And I’ve been plateaued for a while. And there’s studies behind dance that when you’re depressed, when you are carried a lot, dance opens up your body adjusting in different ways. And I was advised by a friend, she’s like, you need to try dance.

Katy Ripp 00:55:12  Do you know what crossed my mind today? I saw a reel and I was like, I think I might want to start line dancing.

Katy Ripp 00:55:17  I am not a dancer as well, but I was like, I mean, I, you know, from the 90s, we certainly had the dancing at the Dry Bean. Right. But I’m kind of into it. So I think I might look at a tutorial today. So you might have just inspired me to try line and try it. It’s, you.

Christie Deiter 00:55:33  Know, in like when you when I think about the abuse world, so much of when you become abused, you shrink down and you’re afraid to take up space. Dance requires you to take up space. You have to be big and you have to move your body. And it’s still uncomfortable for me, like I even and I know these things and I have to coach myself through it of like, take up the space, push the wall, you know, all of these things. And so I’m doing the hard thing, but I’m doing a dance program and I love it.

Katy Ripp 00:56:03  Oh my God, I love that so much. Good for you.

Katy Ripp 00:56:06  Tell me now I’m going to let you just, like, give me all your small business, health, fitness. What do you got going on right now?

Christie Deiter 00:56:14  So I’m still in the place of building. Yeah. And I’m also at the point of, like, I have to stop making excuses. You know, we talk about parents and my love, my parents and the ability that they the opportunity they’ve offered me to have this time to heal. However, it also holds me back because I don’t have to worry about money. But eventually I would like to be out from under their umbrella.

Katy Ripp 00:56:39  Sure, right.

Christie Deiter 00:56:39  So I’m at a point right now I’ve really wanting to push and to grow, and a lot of that is a two fold part, because I believe so much in the health and fitness world and what home fitness can do for you when you are at home with children, when you can’t get to the gym, when you need that solution that’s going to get your results when you commit to the program.

Christie Deiter 00:56:59  Home fitness can do so much for you. The financial piece of it because of what I’ve gone through from financial abuse. And I know there are so many women who don’t have the support that I do to pay for the attorney fees, to pay for the housing and everything else. Yeah. This home fitness is also a way to build a business, to mentor other women, to pay for your own gear, like the things that you need to do, the home fitness, but then to also help elevate and lift women into that financial independence piece. And I look at that. You know, if you’re specifically looking at the single mother. You know, she’s carrying a full time job. She wants to be present with her kids. I’ve never had to work with my children, so I don’t know what that looks like. The only way I know that I can stay present is by building a business from home. That’s just what works for me. And that’s what I want to teach other women to do.

Christie Deiter 00:57:54  But it’s also I look at financial independence and even when you’re married and you can be in the healthiest loving relationship. But what happens if your spouse dies in a car accident. And you don’t have that income coming in anymore. Like yes, there’s life insurance and yes there’s other things. But there is never anything bad about building financial independence. And that is what I think is a stay at home mom. As a single mom, when you’re able to bubble that and grow that more, it gives more opportunity and it allows you to be with your family more.

Katy Ripp 00:58:32  Yeah.

Christie Deiter 00:58:33  So that’s really what my goal is, is to one. Let’s start by building the confidence in the health and the fitness world. And then when you’re starting to feel good about that, let’s start making it a business. Yeah. Because everybody needs health and fitness. This is an avenue. This is a tool that works when you work it. Because we all know like a hammer is not going to do anything if you don’t pick up the hammer.

Christie Deiter 00:58:54  Yeah. So yeah, you know that is my main goal. Like that’s the immediate my big dreams. Yeah. Because I’ve got those two.

Katy Ripp 00:59:01  Yeah. Give me all of them.

Christie Deiter 00:59:02  So in 22 I wrote a book.

Katy Ripp 00:59:05  Oh I didn’t know the hat.

Christie Deiter 00:59:07  I said it’s all about motherhood and finding your identity and motherhood. It is all written, but it is trapped in editing nothingness because there’s no money right now to pay for it, to get it edited and to get it to its next step. So it kind of sits there, and it also emotionally sits a little awkward for me because I wrote it. Married? Sure. In a totally different mind frame than I’m at now. Yeah, so it’s there. But I do want to still publish that book. I’m also currently writing another book because why not?

Katy Ripp 00:59:38  I love this.

Christie Deiter 00:59:39  And I’ve always said that my goal, like one of my big dreams, is to sit on Good Morning America and be interviewed by Michael Strahan about my New York Times best selling.

Katy Ripp 00:59:47  Book. Oh my God, that’s probably not very far off. And now it’s so. And now it’s out in the world.

Christie Deiter 00:59:53  It’s out in the world. I’ve said this for two years that that’s been a goal. And I had a friend who said to me, he’s like, well, Strahan’s not going to be there forever, so get your shit together.

Katy Ripp 01:00:02  Well, here’s the other thing is, like, if there’s a copywriter out there, that or an editor that’s interested in helping Christie edit her book, yes. For free, that would be amazing.

Christie Deiter 01:00:13  Yes. If you know anybody. Yeah, that, you know, that’s where it starts. Yeah. And I the other part, you know, is doing things like this.

Katy Ripp 01:00:21  Yeah.

Christie Deiter 01:00:21  Sharing my story because to be a one on one coach has never really been my goal to be that in contact with what people are going through. I don’t think that’s where my strength lies. Public speaking is something I love. That’s always been something I’ve wanted to get back to.

Christie Deiter 01:00:39  So podcasts kind of fall in that. Actually being a spokesperson in this avenue, because I’ve looked at it as like, I want the woman at table nine to hear my story and start asking.

Katy Ripp 01:00:49  Questions, I love that.

Christie Deiter 01:00:51  And so that’s, you know, it all funnels back to the health and fitness business because that’s the direct contact, the direct way I can start to impact. But now it’s blown up into this other piece of like, let’s identify what these problems are, and then we can get into more of what the solutions can look like.

Katy Ripp 01:01:08  Well, one of the books that I love is The Obstacle Is the Way. Have you know that one? So I will definitely put it out there for you. But and I hear a lot of that in your story, you were presented with this obstacle and it will end up being your way.

Christie Deiter 01:01:26  Absolutely.

Katy Ripp 01:01:27  It will end up being the path. Even though it was super shitty, even though it was scary and filled with anxiety and fear and the unknown, that obstacle is going to end up being your way into the world.

Katy Ripp 01:01:43  And I firmly believe that when you can look at obstacles like this as opportunities, which is basically what you’re doing, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t need the attention it deserves in therapy, in talking to other women, in all of those things, but it will end up being your way and will lead you to like it will just keep offering you the next best thing, right? Like that’s just what we’re trying to do anyway, right? Like let’s just like try to find the next best thing.

Christie Deiter 01:02:15  And my goal in all the things that I’ve done, even when I was a hairdresser, it’s always been, how can I serve people. It’s just my platform has changed. Instead of empowering women by their hairstyle and the confidence that’s dished out when you sit with your stylist, and we all know what that feels like. Yeah, you know, it’s become the health and fitness component. And now it’s shedding light on these financial abuse specifically. Yeah. Because that is such a topic. Nobody knows about it and it needs to be talked about.

Katy Ripp 01:02:47  I would love to have a part two, because I think that we could really dig into that money piece where not only in abusive relationships, but in the best of relationships, money is ignored. Like a lot of us, women stick our head in the sand, we don’t know what’s going on. And then heaven forbid something happens, or even if something doesn’t happen, it needs to be talked about. And you need to know. You need to know where you’re at. And a lot of the things about where we’re at is not as scary as you think it is, right? Like when you start pulling out the numbers, right? Like sitting with your dad, I’m guessing. And I’ve recently opened up my eyes a little bit and started digging into where are we really? Right. Like, because we can look at the surface level, but when you start looking, I was always so terrified to look because I thought that it was going to be horrible or somehow it was going to be my fault, that we were in a situation that either we couldn’t get out of or was less than favorable, it was somehow going to be my fault.

Katy Ripp 01:03:49  And when I started looking, I was like, fuck, we’re all right, right? Like, this isn’t as bad as I thought it was again, like, let’s just take the monster out from underneath the bed, because once they’re out, they’re out. But we have to be willing to look.

Christie Deiter 01:04:04  The reward is in the work. You avoid.

Katy Ripp 01:04:06  100%, I love that.

Christie Deiter 01:04:09  Yeah. And that was a piece I learned through therapy that my therapist like you avoid. And then because you avoid, you get anxiety, you create a false story instead of just doing it. So that has been one of the areas I’ve grown. The biggest is like I start by doing the thing I don’t want to. Yeah, first, because then it’s done.

Katy Ripp 01:04:28  Because that’s where the magic is, right? Yeah. How can people find you if they want to work with you?

Christie Deiter 01:04:34  Instagram is really the best place. It’s kind of where everything starts and ends with me. So it’s just at Christie Dieter, my name on there you will find me usually talking about working out and but mostly in that how it makes you feel because quite honestly, I don’t care how much weight you lose, I don’t care what the pounds are.

Christie Deiter 01:04:52  I force women to look at the scale because we have to desensitize the scale because yeah, that holds way too much power for yes, the only way you do it is by not avoiding it. Yeah, I like that. Well, that scale out, you got it off number.

Katy Ripp 01:05:05  Well and numbers don’t lie. That’s the other thing is like numbers just don’t lie. They’re not positive or negative. They just don’t lie. They’re not mocking you. They’re not doing anything except telling you where you’re at.

Christie Deiter 01:05:18  We put the emotion on the for sure. Yeah. And I have just learned, you know, the number is there. And if I get on it and I don’t like it, well, then it tells me what I have to say, right?

Katy Ripp 01:05:31  Not just like fucking with you. It’s in there for a reason. Yeah.

Christie Deiter 01:05:35  So I try to bring into that space and look, just a lot of the shifting your mindset. I will sit there and I will show you that I do show up at 4:00 every day.

Christie Deiter 01:05:45  And again, it’s not about the time. It’s the consistency that I’m doing that every day. That’s what it’s about.

Katy Ripp 01:05:51  Well, and knowing that that’s the best thing for you, just period. It is the best thing for you. If that means that you wake up at 9:30 a.m. and you do the same things, cool. I say that all the time. I go to bed at 8:00 almost every night. Like when I had to tuck my kids in, I would tuck them in and I would go straight into my bed. That’s just what I did. I could care less what happens after 8:00 pm. I like I don’t have any interest in being out after nine anymore, even on a Saturday. You know, it’s.

Christie Deiter 01:06:20  Like when you’re 21 and it’s like nothing good happens after midnight. Now in your 40s, it’s like nothing good happens after eight.

Katy Ripp 01:06:25  I mean, really, it doesn’t.

Christie Deiter 01:06:27  That’s when I mean ice cream and popcorn.

Katy Ripp 01:06:29  It’s right. Right. Like it’s better just to sleep through it.

Christie Deiter 01:06:32  Yeah. Yeah.

Katy Ripp 01:06:34  Well, thank you so much for being here today. And we will definitely have a part two, because I would love to dig into that money thing and maybe get some, like real concrete advice for people either in that situation or just like what is happening with money.

Christie Deiter 01:06:48  One thing that I will add to this, because I know we talked and talked about this in the prep work as far as resources. Oh, if you’re in Wisconsin, if you’re in Madison, number one days, Domestic Abuse Intervention Services has a 24 hour hotline. They’re amazing. If you have any inkling that something is not right, give them a call. They will help you identify what the problems are so that you can start to make that process. They do group therapies on Thursday night from 630 to 8 every week. Call to reserve your spot because it is limited to ten. As much as you’d love to bring everybody in.

Katy Ripp 01:07:22  Yeah, right now, of course.

Christie Deiter 01:07:24  It takes a lot to share and get those things, so definitely utilize that as a resource.

Christie Deiter 01:07:29  Everyone is welcome. It is the best thing that I ever did for myself in this abuse journey. Yeah. The other thing if you’re facing financial challenges, there are state programs to help you with that, especially if you’re a woman with children. There’s Wick women, infant and child that will help with food. I am not embarrassed to say I fully a part of all of the programs. I have a wick card so I get my groceries paid for. I utilize Badger Care and Medicaid for the health insurance, which I don’t know what the amount of emergency room visits we had this year. My daughter had her tonsils out. Like, this is how I care for my children. There is nothing to be embarrassed about it. That’s where we’re at right now and we are so blessed to have these resources.

Katy Ripp 01:08:15  Yeah, it’s what we pay taxes for. And you pay taxes.

Christie Deiter 01:08:17  So yes. And the other resource that I didn’t even know about this year, but there’s also a program called Young Star that helps pay for childcare.

Christie Deiter 01:08:25  Oh, so you know, the component that’s always hard. Like you work to basically pay for childcare, right? Yeah. Depending on where you’re at financially and what you’re looking for, there are programs that are going to fund your childcare so that you can go to work to actually start to build yourself out of the wick and out of the Medicaid.

Katy Ripp 01:08:42  Oh, interesting. I didn’t know that. We’ll make sure to put all of those resources will get together. And you can send those to me and we’ll put them in our show notes for sure.

Christie Deiter 01:08:50  And I will say the Dane County Consortium’s office. Those people are amazing. They have always been so nice and so helpful. So don’t you know, is survivor of abuse? The number one emotion that you feel is embarrassment. You feel embarrassed that you got yourself in this situation is the terms that we always use. And you didn’t. You know, it’s nothing to be embarrassed about and utilizing and leaning on these resources. It’s not forever. Yeah, it’s to help you through this time.

Christie Deiter 01:09:16  And I don’t know what I would do without those things, so don’t be embarrassed about it again. Like, don’t be embarrassed to use the wick card at the grocery store. Like it? It does not define who you are. Use the support that is there. Yeah.

Katy Ripp 01:09:30  And any judgment that’s passed on people like that comes from them, not you. Right. Like that has nothing to do with you.

Christie Deiter 01:09:38  No, no. Yeah.

Katy Ripp 01:09:40  Can people reach out to you if they have questions about any of this? Absolutely. Okay. Yeah. Awesome. Instagram DM and.

Christie Deiter 01:09:47  Instagram’s the like I said this is the best place to find me. I’m just on there the most regular. Yeah.

Katy Ripp 01:09:53  So yeah. Awesome. Well we’ll have you back for part two.

Christie Deiter 01:09:56  I love it.

Katy Ripp 01:09:57  All right. Thanks, Christy. Thank you. And that’s a wrap on today’s episode. I hope you enjoyed diving deep into the world of living authentically with me. Before you go, don’t forget to connect with me on Instagram.

Katy Ripp 01:10:09  Shoot me a message @KatyRipp. I’d love to hear your thoughts on today’s episode and connect with you further. And remember, if you want more details on today’s episode, or just want to explore more about designing your life unapologetically, head on over to my website at katyripp.com. There you’ll find all the juicy details and resources you need to keep the inspiration flowing. Lastly, if you’d like to join me on the show, whether it’s to tell about your experience of designing your own life, to share your expertise, or if you’d like to participate in lifestyle coaching live on air, don’t hesitate to reach out. Your story could inspire countless others on their own path to living authentically. Thanks for tuning in. Until next time, keep living boldly designing your life. And remember #ActuallyICan.