Hello all, welcome to WFHR's Rapids Report, probably brought to you by Crockett Sceptic for
this June 19th, 2025.
Have your host James J. Malev here, welcoming in our great friends from UW Extension.
We have among outreach specialists with us, and Ka, I want you to say your name.
So the audience hears it properly before I muck it up all over.
It's Kazooa.
Kazooa.
I'm so sorry.
I will let you know there is a listener that we have calling in, and another guest that
we have, and their name is Greg.
And for some reason I have trouble with the name Greg too.
So I just, I'm just bad with names, but, Kazooa, I really do appreciate you being here,
and appreciate the subject matter that we're going to get into today.
Yes.
Kind of a continuation of our last conversation by the way now.
Yes.
So our last conversation is all about the intergenerational trauma within the munch community, and just
because of the Vietnam War and the secret war in Laos, how this trauma has been passed
down to the newer generations.
And so I know that last time we ran out of time.
We could have sat there all day and talked, but, you know, it's that continuation of,
you know, what can we do from this point on to bring awareness to just not even just
a munch community, but the general community, because there's meant to health everywhere.
I think a good point is in the purpose of that and how much we believe in that mean that
is that we are continuing this conversation.
You're right.
We could have wrapped it up right there, or we could have talked for days, but we wrap
up there.
You know, there's plenty of things that I know you guys at Extension want to talk about,
want to highlight the fact that we're going to continue to talk about this, not only speaks
to the importance of it, but I think the relatability of it too.
After our last interview, I, you know, we talked during the interview, and I talked with
my mom about it.
And there was such relatability from other creeds, other cultures about this.
What I was really impressed with was members of our community reaching out and talking about
that and how they felt it was relatable in people from walks of life that I wouldn't
have guessed and I wouldn't have expected.
I appreciate that not only from our listeners out there in the feedback, but just in this
subject in general that, and I think with that is a big part of why, not only why we're
talking about it, but the mental health part of this, the healing that can happen from
this, that for some, that didn't even realize they needed healing.
You know, that's, I know that we're getting better about mental health and I know we're
talking about it better, but there's so many layers to it.
And there are so many people out there for every person that is identifying trauma and
able to approach it and work on it and everything.
There's so many out there that don't even realize they're dealing with trauma or that they
have PTSD from this particular subject or something along those lines.
And when they're triggered, they don't even know that they're being triggered.
So hopefully that's another part of this conversation that people that may be struggling
out there are also being tuned into that.
Oh, yeah.
And you brought up a really good point, James, just because like in our conversations,
we have, we talked about the trauma with war, right?
But it doesn't have to be something huge like war that brings trauma to you or any kind
of lived experiences I think of anything as big as a car accident or a house fire, right?
But it could be as small as just a really bad experience at school or at the grocery
line or just with somebody in general in the community.
That's trauma too that you really don't think about, but the next time you experience something
similar or you see something similar, just that it's that flight or freeze, right?
And most people really freeze because they're going through that same, that same, the same
emotions and the same trauma again.
And so I think one of the biggest things that we, that we don't talk about is that when
that happens, we really unintentionally pass it down like I had said earlier to our kids.
And because we had such a bad experience, we're going to make sure that our kids are sheltered.
And so the kids don't have the same experiences, but yet at the same time the world does change,
times change.
And so when we shelter our kids, then they never experience the real world or what, or
it's a culture shock once they go into the real world, right?
Because they don't know what real reality is.
And so I always say we unintentionally pass it on to our kids.
And so that's why we have this generational trauma.
But we are afraid of, we instill in our kids unintentionally and it just continues unless
we recognize it and try to break that trauma.
We, I have my father's eyes, my mother's hair, and you know, anybody out there listening
can say something similar to that of having, you know, inheriting something from a parent
or something.
This stuff isn't any different.
The trauma, some of that stuff gets just inherited just as well as these other things do.
And while it's not maybe a scientific DNA kind of thing, it is something that if you
as a parent are going through something more times, not your kid ends up dealing with that
and feeling some of that too.
And that's not, that's something to identify, not to feel guilty for.
We don't need parents to have more things to feel guilty about.
We already do that enough as parents, but this is something to address, not to feel bad
about or anything because it's, again, we're so much of this and this topic I think needs
to be brought up more often.
When we're talking about mental health, there's no judgment here.
At least I can speak for me and I feel pretty confident that Kazooa feels a very similar
to this, that we want just people to be aware of this stuff and to catch up on these things
because as a society, we're catching up.
We're trying to fix the hole in the boat on the water, you know, we're trying to do this
in real time.
So we all need to give each other some grace and maybe just as importantly or maybe the
most important part of this, give yourself some grace on this subject matter.
That's how we heal.
That's how we get better as a society and hopefully some of these things, our kids inherit
are just our funny noses or something like that and not so much, you know, some of these
other things.
But I feel like for most people when I'm trying to explain this to them about generational
trauma or how that could be passed on, the hair or the things that we inherit from
our parents using, that as an example is a great way of doing that or seems to make
that connection for people.
You brought up another great point of this too, though, of the idea that actions or certain
events sometimes can do that.
You don't necessarily know when something is going to be triggered or when something is
going to trigger you with a topic.
Oh, yeah.
Definitely.
Like I said earlier, you could just be, you could be doing your own little thing, taking
the walk and just the slightest noise or the slightest movement of something could
really trigger all of that, you know.
And so just, I always encourage others to begin having that conversation with their parents
or their grandparents or just with their family members, anybody, just because if we keep
it silent, we're never going to truly understand the trauma that they went through.
For example, my personal parents, we have never had that conversation of their journey
from Laos to Thailand to America just because I know it was very traumatic for my parents.
And so I know that they, we know little bits and pieces, we know some of the things that
happened to my older sisters, but other than that, we really don't know what that journey
was like besides knowing that it was traumatic.
And so as kids growing up, we never wanted to have my parents go through that traumatic
experience again, right, just because it was so hard on them.
However, now that we're all getting older and my parents are starting to understand mental
wellness, my mom is starting to open up and kind of talk about life back then, which is
really good for her just because you can see the good times shining through.
She talks about her parents and her sisters and her brothers and so it's something that
we never really heard or like we never really heard these stories growing up, but now that
mental health is out there and it's becoming more, I want to say, normalized, right, she's
becoming, she's, I think she's starting to heal, which is great to see because you know,
she's going through these experiences, but she's finding the good parts of it.
And then she's on the other hand, she's like I said, she's healing and so she's,
she's able to be more present with her kids and her grandkids and I think that's something
that we all really truly love and enjoy just seeing that happier side of my mom and not saying
that she was never happy, but now you can just see like all this weight lifted off her shoulder.
Right. You know, you see, you can tell the difference when you see it, you know,
that got me. My mom and I are going through a similar thing. I should say my mother is going
through a similar thing right now too. And I'm so, on a personal level, really happy for her,
for your mom and for you guys as a family on a lot of levels. That's really encouraging to
hear in it. It also reminds me and speaks to something and I am every day trying to be a better
parent and trying to be a better person and all those things. So I'm not saying any of this from
on top of a mountain or anything like that. I got to learn and I got to take my own medicine
as much as anybody. But the job of a parent, what's our, what's our, you know, protecting our kids,
keeping our kids safe. Job number one, certainly taking care of them and all, but also preparing them
for the next stage for them to be able to fly out of the nest. And we do them no service if we're
not preparing them for life. It's the job. We, I, you know, most of us don't want our kids to
leave the nest and everything or hang on to them to be youth young as long as possible. But
that's not how time works. And that's, this is, this is the, the gift that we're given as parents
of getting to see our kids take flight. And one of the, one of the ways of doing that is giving
them some world perspective, some ideas of, you know, you may see me now, but this isn't where I
started. It took all of this for me to get to this point. When I hear about what my mom and dad
went through just to go on a first date, let alone to have me. It gave me perspective when I had
kids and, and some of that and to share with them, along with all the other life examples they
shared, when your mom shared that with you, I can only imagine the amount of not only empathy,
but perspective and different, you know, appreciation that came to you, along with just the
wonderfulness of knowing our own personal history. Every single person has an amazing story. And
if you think your story is amazing, well, imagine your grandparent or your grandparents grandparents
how their story was. And I admit that this is a little bit part of my culture. It's a very
important part of Jewish culture to pass down history for thousands of years and continuing.
My people have been just scorched, just done. And there was no internet to keep our track of our
history. So it was important to our people to pass it on down. I used to think this was a very
Jewish thing. This is a cultural thing. It's like almost every culture has that. And so what we're
doing when we're sharing these personal stories, we're just continuing our legacies. We're continuing
the important, one of the important parts of all of our cultures to share these stories. And
along with that, giving some perspective, helping our kids be better adults, I think, in the long
run, and where this goes, along with all the healing that can be done. And you don't need a,
you know, nowadays it feels like you turn, there's a supplement or a pill for everything,
and it has like 30,000 side effects. This is not that. This is something that you can just do on
your own through healing through time. I wouldn't encourage necessarily just jumping right into this.
You as a person have to think about this first, I think. But it's doable. And you don't need a,
you know, the worry about a bunch of side effects or anything. Oh yeah, it is very doable. And just
being like you said, just it takes healing, it takes time, but just being supported by the right
people too. So rounding yourself with people who will support you throughout this journey is super
important. Whether it's just somebody listening, right? It doesn't, they don't really have to give
you feedback or anything of that sort. Just being that listener and just listening to you,
I think is super important. Just making sure that you have that support network around you.
And I'm glad you mentioned the kids because I think of my own personal kids when my mom started
talking about these things. I think it changed my kids' perspectives on how their grandparents
are too. Just because, you know, they were born and raised in America. They're very Americanized.
I can tell you that. And it's a completely different mindset from our elders because they have gone
through so much. And so the expectations of our elders for like my parents expectations of me,
it's like anybody's right? They wanted me to become a doctor or a lawyer. So, you know, go get my
PhD and all of that. And so it wasn't anything on their end. You know, it's not their fault or
anything, but it's what they wanted us to do better, right? They came to America. They wanted us
to be successful. And so, you know, I think that was something different. I always say, no, I will
support my kids no matter what. But whenever we have that conversation of, oh, Grandpa wanted us
to do this, I think my kids weren't always 100% sure why. But now that they are starting to hear
Grandma and Grandpa's stories, they're changing their mindset and they're becoming more understanding.
And like he said, more empathetic about the journey and everything that's happened.
So much of this is like trying to, especially for the children of the kids and we're all children
of immigrants. We all are in this country. So it's not just that, but certainly the newer or whatever
however you want to say it. When it comes to that, that gift, that gift of that perspective,
what that can give is so unique to each individual family and each individual story is so important
and unique. And I think not only does it give that, but give some pride, give some strength to
a kid, confidence to a child, which is another part of what we're trying to do here and as adults
in building up the younger generations and everything along with that, that I keep coming back
to that perspective that is so hard to eat. I don't know that you can necessarily teach perspective.
I don't think you can really, you know, hey, read this book and it's going to give you that.
It's life and it in the more personal it gets, the more we are likely, more likely to have that
perspective. So when it is on that personal basis, like your grandparents or something, good on
them for sharing and to everybody out there that is being that kind of brave. And I don't use that
word lightly, but brave in sharing those things. Another thing that can be really helpful with this
is some of the resources that you guys have available over at UW. And it really appreciate that
you being able to highlight some of these, anybody out there listening, especially to,
one other part of this, I know that I am focusing a lot on the parent and child dynamic.
There are individuals out there that are probably struggling or dealing with things and maybe
your kids are older or out of the house or maybe you don't have kids if you're alone or something.
These resources can be just as available to you as anybody else and and encourage you to reach out
and share your stories just as much. Your stories are just as important as any others too.
What are some of the resources available? I always say I am the bilingual community health worker.
I work predominantly with the Monk community, but if you need somebody to listen to you or just
to find resource for you, you can definitely reach out to me. I will never turn anyone away.
I'm here to support everybody in the community. You can reach me at 715-421-8502. That's my direct
line at extension. Otherwise, I always say it's super important to know 988. That is the
suicide increases lifeline. You can call or you can text that number. If you're unsure of calling,
just text it. Somebody will respond and there's always somebody there. Some of the other resources,
some are more county, some state, some federal, but Wood County Health Human Services. They
offer mental health outpatient services and therapy for all ages, right? The children, the elders,
the the adulthood, right? Anybody. And so we have two locations. One's in Wisconsin, rapids and
ones in Marshfield. If you feel like you need might need help with mental health problems,
you can call the outpatient clinic receptionist. The Wisconsin Rapids number is 715-421-8840.
And in Marshfield, it's 715-387-4529. And I can definitely send these numbers to James too,
so that he can put it on the website. And so it's more people are aware. But
or like if you're going through anything, most workplaces have the employee assistant program.
So the EAP talk to your HR. Talk to your supervisor, your manager. They always have the connection.
They know most places have free sessions. And so it's really important to know what resources
are out there. Some other ones that I'm going to shout out to is NAMI. It's the National Alliance
of Mental Illness. They're amazing. Even if you don't have their direct, if you don't call,
they have so many different resources. Their website is www.NAMI.org. So it's www.NAMI.org.
And the other one is Samsa. So it's a substance abuse and mental health services administration.
They are amazing as well. I love all their content. Let's just say they added any kind of webinars
or trainings you can get through them. It's amazing. It's S-A-M-H-S-A.gov. And so any resources
related to mental health or substance use, you can definitely go there. They're really there
to support everybody. Always good talking with you. I really do appreciate the time. I'm looking
forward to the next conversation already. Thank you again for everything, Kosoah. Appreciate you.
Thank you for having me today, James. Say hi to the UW Extension staff over there for us. And
we'll talk to you guys again real soon. Appreciate you. And appreciate all of you out there joining
us for another edition of WFHR's Rapids Report, probably brought to you by Crocodceptic.
